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only be visited on a warm, sunny day when the bees are too busy collecting pollen to pay you much attention. Like us, they get grouchy when it rains.
- Open the hive only when necessary - visiting too regularly can cause them to think something is wrong.
Here's me feeding the bees a few days after the installation - note that there is a frame feeder inside the hive which I am filling up with sugar syrup.Now the waiting begins. Because the nectar flow has not yet begun in earnest, it's necessary to feed the bees sugar syrup to keep their energy up as they build comb and establish the hive - feeding takes place every spring and fall, and you simply keep feeders topped up until they stop eating. And once feeding is over, you settle back to a less intensive regime of checking - ensuring that the queen is laying and that there is a good pattern of comb-building in the hive. Eventually, you will need to add extra hive bodies, and possibly even a honey super (though that may not happen in your first year).
There is, of course, much more to successful beekeeping than outlined in this short post - so please read up on all you can. But I hope the above account allays some fears from those thinking beekeeping is too complicated, or too dangerous, for them to have a go. We need all the bees we can get - and that means we need beekeepers.
For more resources, check out Honeybee Farms' step-by-step instructions on installing a package of bees, or you can check out the video below from NeBees. And of course, if there are any other beekeepers reading this - amateur or professional - please share your experiences in the comments below!
More on Bees and Colony Collapse Disorder
Blogger Writes about Colony Collapse Disorder in his Own Back Yard
Saving the Bees
Photo Essay: Bees and Bee Keepers in CrisisPeople weren't "dying in the streets" for lack of insurance before there was Obamacare, and they won't be after it's repealed, Sen. Rand Paul said Wednesday, agreeing with President-elect Donald Trump's comments concerning Obamacare.
"We had an imperfect system that needed to be improved on, but we had a system even before Obamacare where 85-90 percent of people were covered," the Kentucky Republican told Fox News "Fox & Friends" program, while explaining he wants to expand on that.
"I would think that the goal should be, as President-elect Trump said that everybody should be insured," said Paul. "That is the goal. I want everybody to be insured; the most people to be insured at the least amount of cost."
Obamacare, however, added mandates while deterring young, healthy people from buying insurance, said Paul, but he wants to do the opposite in order to lower costs and invite people to buy insurance.
"Basically, what Obamacare did was expand Medicaid," said Paul. "It also said, 'hey, guys, it will be for free. All of the states you can put all of the poor people on the rolls, but it won't cost you anything because the federal government is going to pay for it.'"
The federal government, though, has a $20 trillion debt, which means the nation's economy needs to be built up strong enough so there is only a small number of uninsured people, said Paul.
"If you have to provide to people with Medicaid, let's be honest about the accounting," the senator continued. "If states want to have more expansive Medicaid, they should probably raise taxes on their citizens to pay for it."
Paul said he plan would include ending insurance mandates and allowing people to buy their choice of insurance, which would drive down costs.
He also calls for allowing people to save money through health savings accounts, and to allow tax credits or deductions to encourage using them.
Also, Paul said individuals should be able to join together in groups to use their leverage to reduce costs, while getting insurance that won't be dropped.
"I've got my work ahead of me," said Paul. "I already have the ear of the president. Now what we have to do is get the ear of the leadership and the Senate and the House. I'm working on that, so I've got a lot of work between now and the next couple weeks. "Salvaging the Deficient for the War Effort
BY HAMILTON GREGORY
One morning in the summer of 1967, I sat with more than a hundred men in a room at the Armed Forces Induction Center in Nashville. It was the height of the Vietnam War, and I had volunteered for service in the U.S. Army.
A sergeant walked into the room and announced that all of us soon would travel to Fort Benning to begin our Army training. Then he asked, “Is anyone here a college graduate?”
I raised my hand. He motioned me to follow him. He took me down a hallway and introduced me to a young man sitting on a bench. (To protect his privacy, I have changed his name to Johnny Gupton.) The sergeant told me that Gupton also was being assigned to Fort Benning.
“I want you to take charge of Gupton,” he said. “Go with him every step of the way.” He explained that the young man could neither read nor write and would need help filling out paperwork. Then he added, “Make sure he doesn’t get lost. He’s one of McNamara’s Morons.”
I had never heard the term, and I was surprised that the sergeant would openly insult Gupton. In a few weeks I would learn that “McNamara’s Morons” was a term that many officers and sergeants used to refer to low-IQ men who were taken into the military under a program devised by Secretary of Defense Robert McNamara.
The sergeant left us for a while. When he returned, he gave me a sealed envelope that contained my personnel records and Gupton’s. I was instructed to give the package to the sergeants when I arrived at Fort Benning.
As we traveled by bus and by plane, I tried to make small talk with Gupton, but he didn’t say much. I asked him what state he was from, but he didn’t know. I later found out that he was from the Appalachian Mountains in eastern Tennessee. He was very thinunhealthily thin.
I was surprised that he knew nothing about the situation he was in. He didn’t understand what Basic Training was all about, and he didn’t know that America was at war. I tried to explain what was happening, but at the end, he remained in a fog.
In Basic Training, he was helpless. Another trainee and I had to make his bunk for him because he couldn’t do it to Army specifications. I tied his boots for him every morning until another trainee had the patience and time to teach him how. He didn’t know his left from his right, so he had trouble with basic commands like “left face” and “right face” and he had trouble with marching. When the sergeants screamed at him, he became terrified and confused. On the rifle range, he was erratic and dangerousthe sergeants feared he would accidentally shoot himself or someone else. Finally, he was put on permanent KP.
Gupton was not the only low-IQ man I observed at Fort Benning. After being hospitalized for heat exhaustion, I spent time in the Special Training Company, which was made up of trainees who had failed Basic Training because of injuries or inability to pass the physical or rifle tests. I got to know dozens of men who tried to pass the Physical Combat Proficiency Test but failed miserably, partly because of physical weakness but mainly because of mental limitations.
Part of the test was throwing five non-explosive practice grenades. You had to throw each grenade ninety feet onto a huge canvas target that lay flat on the ground. It resembled a giant dart board, with a bull’s eye and concentric circles. The scoring was similar to that of a dart board, toothe closer you came to the bull’s eye, the more points you got. In order to simulate combat conditions, you were required to stay on one knee while throwing.
Most of the Special Training men could not even reach the target, much less hit the bull’s eye. Because of the heaviness of the grenade, they needed to throw it in a high arc, like a centerfielder throwing a baseball to home plate, but most of the men failed to grasp the concept. They would try to throw the grenade in a straight line like a pitcher throwing a ball to the catcher, and the grenade would plop down far short of the target. Despite all the sergeants’ explanations and demonstrations, they could not understand the concept of a high arc.
SECOND-CLASS FELLOWS
I wondered why in the world such men were taken into the military. Later, I researched it. In 1966 the U.S. war in Vietnam was heating up rapidly; McNamara and President Lyndon Johnson faced a problem. The armed forces needed more and more troops for the war effort, but there was a shortage of men considered fair game for the military draft.
There were plenty of men of draft age in America, but most were unavailable. Many were attending college and using student deferments. Others had found safe havens in the National Guard and Reserves, which by and large were not sent to Vietnam. Still others were disqualified because they scored poorly on the military’s mental and physical entrance tests.
How could McNamara and Johnson round up enough men to send to war? They realized that they would anger the vote-powerful middle class if they drafted college boys or if they sent National Guardsmen and Reservists to Vietnam. So they decided to induct the low-scoring men, whom Johnson referred to (in a secret White House tape) as “second-class fellows.” On October 1, 1966, McNamara launched his program, which he called Project 100,000 because he wanted to induct that many low-aptitude men each year.
Imagine the situation. One day a man is unqualified for military duty, but the next daylo and beholdhe is deemed qualified. By the end of the war, McNamara’s program had taken 354,000 such men into the armed forces71 percent in the Army, 10 percent in the Marine Corps, 10 percent in the Navy, and 9 percent in the Air Force. Among the troops, these men were often known as “McNamara’s Morons” or “the Moron Corps” or “McNamara’s Boys.”
What happened to these men? Many of them should have been discharged and sent home. In fact, some company commanders tried to have incompetent men discharged. But they usually failed because the Army and the Marine Corps were facing serious manpower shortages in Vietnam in 1966-71 and were reluctant to discharge anyone. Most of the war’s 58,220 dead and 321,704 wounded occurred during those years, leaving many units short-handed. In addition, hundreds of thousands of men were going AWOL. In 1970 alone, wrote Marine Col. Robert D. Heinl, Jr., “the Army had 65,643 deserters, or roughly the equivalent of four infantry divisions.”
Reacting to pressure from their superiors, some training officers and NCOs finagled to graduate men who were clearly unsuited for combat. For example, in my Basic Training company, low-scoring menincluding Johnny Gupton, the man I accompanied to Fort Benningscored high on the physical, mental, and rifle tests because young-looking sergeants shaved their heads (to look like trainees), swapped shirts (with nametags on the front), and took the tests for them. In their records, these men were superb athletes and experts with the M-14 rifle, and they were sent down the path to Vietnam.
Cheating also took place at recruiting stations and induction centers. Recruiters and examiners fudged testing and screening so that the Army and the Marine Corps could induct men blatantly unfit for military dutymen who in normal times would be turned away because of mental limitations, psychiatric disorders, criminal records, and physical defects.
Some people wonder: What was McNamara thinking? Why was he so cruel? Part of the answer lies in the fact that McNamara loved technology. Like many Americans in the 1960s, he was dazzled by the exciting new world of computers
and high technology. He thought he could win the war in Vietnam by using advanced technology and computer analyses.
When he launched Project 100,000, McNamara puffed up his program with rhetoric, claiming that he would “salvage” and “rehabilitate” the men and raise their level of intelligence. Although the men may have failed in school, they would succeed now because the military was “the world’s greatest educator of skilled manpower,” and it possessed an impressive array of multimedia teaching equipment.
He believed that he could raise the intelligence of low-ability men through the use of videotapes. “A low-aptitude student,” McNamara said, “can use videotapes as an aid to his formal instruction and end by becoming as proficient as a high-aptitude student.”
This idea was ridiculed by many educators and psychologists. Yes, of course, video can be a useful aid in helping students learn, but it cannot magically raise a person’s IQ by twenty points. Deborah Shapley, a biographer who wrote a book about McNamara, said that, in regard to Project 100,000, he was “a naïve believer in technological miracles.”
Were his videotapes capable of producing miracles? We’ll never know, because very few men in Project 100,000 actually received video instruction and remedial training. There was no time, and adequate funds were not provided. A bloody war was raging, and training centers were under great pressure to get troops to Vietnam as quickly as possible.
DEATH ON THE BATTLEFIELD
Military leadersfrom William Westmoreland to lieutenants and sergeants at the platoon levelviewed McNamara’s program as a disaster. The Project 100,000 men had difficulty absorbing the necessary training because they were slow learners. Many were incompetent in combat, and they endangered their comrades as well as themselves.
Most of the 354,000 men in Project 100,000 went to Vietnam, and about half of those in Vietnam were assigned to combat units. Their death toll was appalling. A total of 5,478 of these men died while in the service, most of them in combat. Their fatality rate was three times that of other GIs. We don’t know exactly how many were wounded, but it is estimated at around 20,000. Some of the wounded were permanently disabled, including an estimated 500 amputees.
Some officers and sergeants protected low-IQ men by keeping them out of combat and giving them relatively safe jobs away from danger. Johnny Gupton, my low-IQ platoon mate, was sent to Vietnam, and he survived because he was protected by a sergeant who gave him non-dangerous jobs. The sergeant was sympathetic because he had grown up with a sister whom he called “mentally handicapped.”
Who were the men who died in Vietnam? Here is one story. Barry Romo and his nephew Robert ended up in the war zone at the same time. “I loved Robert like a brother,” Barry Romo said. “We grew up together. He was only one month younger.”
Barry served in Vietnam as an infantry platoon leader in 1967-68. He saw a lot of combat and received a Bronze Star for his courage on the battlefield. During his tour, he learned that his nephew had been drafted and was being trained at Fort Lewis to be an infantryman.
Barry was alarmed because Robert was “very slow” and had failed the Army’s mental test. But then Project 100,000 lowered standards and made him subject to the draft. A host of peoplerelatives, comrades at Fort Lewis, sergeants, officerswrote to the commanding general at Fort Lewis, asking that Robert Romo not be sent into combat because, as one relative put it, “he would die.” But the general turned down the requests.
Once in Vietnam, Robert was sent to an infantry unit near the border of North Vietnam, one of the most dangerous combat areas. During a patrol, he was shot in the neck while trying to help a wounded friend. He did not die instantly. Heavy gunfire kept a medic from reaching him. “He drowned in his own blood,” Barry said.
At the request of the family, Barry was given permission to leave Vietnam and accompany the body home to Rialto, California. The aluminum coffin was sealed and draped with a flag, and the family was not allowed to view the remains. (It was Army policy to discourage or forbid viewing when a body was badly mutilated.)
Looking back, Barry said that his nephew “really didn’t have much luck. While others were getting deferments, he was drafted. While congressmen’s sons were getting exemptions for braces on their teeth, Robert was drafted as part of Project 100,000.”
In a speech delivered forty-two years later, Barry Romo said that the family never recovered from losing Robert. “His death almost destroyed us with anger and sorrow.”
A BRIGHTER FUTURE DENIED
Nonetheless, some Project 100,000 men were successful in the military. They may have scored poorly on the Armed Forces Qualification Test, but they had “street smarts” and sound native intelligence, and they adapted well to training and the rigors of duty, even winning awards and promotions.
For most Project 100,000 men, however, the program was a debacle, according to Lawrence M. Baskir and William A. Strauss, senior officials on President Ford’s Clemency Board. “It was a failure for the recruits themselves,” they wrote. “They never got the training that military service seemed to promise. They were the last to be promoted and the first to be sent to Vietnam. They saw more than their share of combat and got more than their share of bad discharges. Many ended up with greater difficulties in civilian society than when they started. For them, it was an ironic and tragic conclusion to a program that promised special treatment and a brighter future, and denied both.”
McNamara had predicted that after they returned to civilian life, Project 100,000 men would have an earning capacity “two to three times what it would have been if there had been no such program.” After the war, however, a follow-up study showed that in the 1986-87 labor market they were “either no better off or actually worse off” than non-veterans of similar aptitude. So much for McNamara’s rosy prediction.
Joe Galloway, a war correspondent who was awarded a Bronze Star with Valor for carrying wounded men to safety at the Battle of the Ia Drang Valley, wrote a column in 2009 shortly after the death of McNamara entitled “100,000 Reasons to Shed No Tears for McNamara.” Project 100,000 men, Galloway said, “were, to put it bluntly, mentally deficient. Illiterate. Mostly blacks and redneck whites, hailing from the mean big city ghettos and the remote Appalachian valleys. By drafting them, the Pentagon would not have to draft an equal number of middle-class and elite college boys whose mothers could and would raise hell with their representatives in Washington.
“The young men of Project 100,000 couldn’t read. They had to be taught to tie their boots. They often failed [in Basic Training], and were recycled over and over until they finally reached some low standard and were declared trained and ready. They could not be taught any more demanding job than trigger-pulling, [so most of them] went straight into combat where the learning curve is steep and deadly.
“The cold, hard statistics say that these almost helpless young men died in action in the jungles at a rate three times higher than the average draftee. The Good Book says we must forgive those who trespass against usbut what about those who trespass against the most helpless among us; those willing to conscript the mentally handicapped, the most innocent, and turn them into cannon fodder?”On the most recent edition of “The Steve Austin Show-Unleashed!”, host Steve Austin conducted a Q&A and below are some highlights. You can listen to the entire episode at this link.
On Whether or Not It’s a Good Idea to Give Talent a 4 Week Layoff Off the Road:
Well, I’m not going to sit here and be an advocate for mandatory 4 week break period, but I think it would be a pretty good idea to give the guys and gals a little bit of a break to step in there and take a load off of them to allow them to chill for a bit. Whether it’s to give them 4 weeks solid, or 2 weeks here and 2 weeks there; you know, the business of pro wrestling, or sports entertainment–whatever you want to call it, it’s a grind, and those men and women are working their a**es off, and sometimes when I look back on the way I was running–pretty damn fast. If I had a little stop down there, would have been pretty cool, but you never are going to get one of the boys or girls to say, hey man, go see the old man [Vince McMahon], I’m burned out. Vince McMahon is a workaholic, he sleeps 4 hours a night. The last thing that you want to tell the old man is that you are burned out–you need a break. Triple H was a road warrior too. I know he’s taken on more of a role there. Working with talent, and the Head of Talent, so, Triple H was a road warrior. He wasn’t a drinker, he was in the gym, he studied the business, so he’s not a burned out guy either, and that guy had a high work ethic before he got into the business. He started sitting side by side with Vince, so he’s a lifer in the business, and a high work ethic guy, so when you say burned out, I know he’s just going to look at you with that look like you’re just not cut out for this. That is a great idea; the company would have to implement that because you’re not going to get too many people to say that. Now, there is always that arbitrary knucklehead who will say that, but usually when they do, that is when their push comes to an abrupt stop.
On Whether Earl Hebner Should Be in the WWE Hall of Fame:
Earl Hebner should definitely be in the WWE Hall of Fame. I think, Tommy Young [NWA Referee] should be in the WWE Hall of Fame. Those two guys definitely stand out for me. Earl Hebner was one of my favorite referees that I worked with. When I was drinking those beers; because Earl was a big drinker, and I tossed him those beers, he was like a kid in the candy store; we just crashed those beers together, and he would tell me with that Virginia accent, “Austin, you motherf***r!” We were all just having a good time, and he definitely should be in the Hall of Fame. There should definitely be some referees in the Hall of Fame. They have that Celebrity Wing Hall of Fame, let me tell you, we should have some of those referees in there as well. People don’t know, but some of those referees were over, and they added so much importance to the match, so I’m definitely down for that.
On Why He Won’t Come Back for One More Match:What an election. And out come the bad moves.
Sure, every party makes mistakes during an election: openly false comments are made and disproved just as quickly. Third parties put out advertisements with patently wrong accusations. Words are twisted in debates. Most of these are genuine mistakes, repeated by eager candidates who talk too quickly, or folks knowingly taking information out of context in hopes that the opponent trips and falls explaining it. Heck, it is so common that political ads are generally exempt from libel and slander laws because (as John Adams once told the Czar personally) the courts would be overrun with charges.
But there is an evil malevolence being directed against Republican candidates which the Czar has not seen in recent years: specific acts of fraud and voter deception by increasingly desperate Democratic candidates. Some examples:
Senator Harry Reid (D-NV) inserted the unrelated and fulsomely unpopular DREAM Act into the Defense Authorization Bill as a way to woo Hispanic voters in hopes that they will provide the edge he needs over competitor Sharron Angle. Not only did this bad move cause both parties to vote against the bill, it denied pay raises to military personnel as well as ending needed discussion on the legitimacy of Clintons Dont Ask, Dont Tell policy.
Rep. Debbie Halvorson (D-IL) buses in fake protestors with false signage in an attempt to discredit her opponent, Adam Kinzinger.
Rep. John Adler (D-NJ) was exposed as bankrolling a fake Tea Party candidate, Peter DeStefano, in order to divide conservative votes away from Republican candidate Jon Runyan. Adler denied this, but aides confirmed his plan to steal an election.
Rep. Alan Grayson (D-FL) edited a video of his opponent, Dan Webster, to make Mr. Webster advocate strict religious fundamentalism up to an including violence against women. Grayson accused Webster of being a Taliban Dan while showing the video in an advertisement. However, honest people on both sides of the election came forward with the original video that showed a very different presentation. Grayson has since dropped in the polls, and many local voters attribute this to the counterfeit ad.
A Democratic plant posed as an openly racist spokesperson for Rand Paul (R-KY), even giving a media interview before he was exposed as a fake. This is not the only targeted hoax of which Mr. Paul has been accused.
In Michigan, a group calling itself the Tea Party attempted to register itself with the states Secretary of States Office. The party lists former labor leader Mark Steffek as the party president. However, not a single Michigan-area Tea Party organization can identify any of the almost-60,000 signatures as legitimate, and say that none of them are involved with this.
Rep. Bryan Lentz (D-PA) openly assisted self-proclaimed Tea Party candidate Jim Schneller obtain enough votes to appear as an independent running against GOP candidate Patrick Meehan, solely for the purpose of taking votes from Meehan. Evidently, Mr. Lentz does not deny any of this. No, this is not illegal…but the intent here is obvious: intentionally planning to pervert the election from legitimate campaigning efforts by two candidates.
There is actually good news in all of this. If one or two candidates tried this, it might have worked. However, the copycat campaigning style of the Democrats has revealed to millions of Americans the pointless objective of these techniques, and that makes America even smarter for 2012and if these are failing, the next batch of candidates will be less likely to try.
Thank goodness for the Internet. Really: it has been the worst thing for liberals.a little knowledge can go a long way
a lot of professionals are crackpots
a man can't know what it is to be a mother
a name means a lot just by itself
a positive attitude means all the difference in the world
a relaxed man is not necessarily a better man
a sense of timing is the mark of genius
a sincere effort is all you can ask
a single event can have infinitely many interpretations
a solid home base builds a sense of self
a strong sense of duty imprisons you
absolute submission can be a form of freedom
abstraction is a type of decadence
abuse of power comes as no surprise
action causes more trouble than thought
alienation produces eccentrics or revolutionaries
all things are delicately interconnected
ambition is just as dangerous as complacency
ambivalence can ruin your life
an elite is inevitable
anger or hate can be a useful motivating force
animalism is perfectly healthy
any surplus is immoral
anything is a legitimate area of investigation
artificial desires are despoiling the earth
at times inactivity is preferable to mindless functioning
at times your unconsciousness is truer than your conscious mind
automation is deadly
awful punishment awaits really bad people
bad intentions can yield good results
being alone with yourself is increasingly unpopular
being happy is more important than anything else
being judgmental is a sign of life
being sure of yourself means you're a fool
believing in rebirth is the same as admitting defeat
boredom makes you do crazy things
calm is more conductive to creativity than is anxiety
categorizing fear is calming
change is valuable when the oppressed become tyrants
chasing the new is dangerous to society
children are the most cruel of all
children are the hope of the future
class action is a nice idea with no substance
class structure is as artificial as plastic
confusing yourself is a way to stay honest
crime against property is relatively unimportant
decadence can be an end in itself
decency is a relative thing
dependence can be a meal ticket
description is more important than metaphor
deviants are sacrificed to increase group solidarity
disgust is the appropriate response to most situations
disorganization is a kind of anesthesia
don't place to much trust in experts
drama often obscures the real issues
dreaming while awake is a frightening contradiction
dying and coming back gives you considerable perspective
dying should be as easy as falling off a log
eating too much is criminal
elaboration is a form of pollution
emotional responses ar as valuable as intellectual responses
enjoy yourself because you can't change anything anyway
ensure that your life stays in flux
even your family can betray you
every achievement requires a sacrifice
everyone's work is equally important
everything that's interesting is new
exceptional people deserve special concessions
expiring for love is beautiful but stupid
expressing anger is necessary
extreme behavior has its basis in pathological psychology
extreme self-consciousness leads to perversion
faithfulness is a social not a biological law
fake or real indifference is a powerful personal weapon
fathers often use too much force
fear is the greatest incapacitator
freedom is a luxury not a necessity
giving free rein to your emotions is an honest way to live
go all out in romance and let the chips fall where they may
going with the flow is soothing but risky
good deeds eventually are rewarded
government is a burden on the people
grass roots agitation is the only hope
guilt and self-laceration are indulgences
habitual contempt doesn't reflect a finer sensibility
hiding your emotions is despicable
holding back protects your vital energies
humanism is obsolete
humor is a release
ideals are replaced by conventional goals at a certain age
if you aren't political your personal life should be exemplary
if you can't leave your mark give up
if you have many desires your life will be interesting
if you live simply there is nothing to worry about
ignoring enemies is the best way to fight
illness is a state of mind
imposing order is man's vocation for chaos is hell
in some instances it's better to die than to continue
inheritance must be abolished
it can be helpful to keep going no matter what
it is heroic to try to stop time
it is man's fate to outsmart himself
it is a gift to the world not to have babies
it's better to be a good person than a famous person
it's better to be lonely than to be with inferior people
it's better to be naive than jaded
it's better to study the living fact than to analyze history
it's crucial to have an active fantasy life
it's good to give extra money to charity
it's important to stay clean on all levels
it's just an accident that your parents are your parents
it's not good to hold too many absolutes
it's not good to operate on credit
it's vital to live in harmony with nature
just believing something can make it happen
keep something in reserve for emergencies
killing is unavoidable but nothing to be proud of
knowing yourself lets you understand others
knowledge should be advanced at all costs
labor is a life-destroying activity
lack of charisma can be fatal
leisure time is a gigantic smoke screen
listen when your body talks
looking back is the first sign of aging and decay
loving animals is a substitute activity
low expectations are good protection
manual labor can be refreshing and wholesome
men are not monogamous by nature
moderation kills the spirit
money creates taste
monomania is a prerequisite of success
morals are for little people
most people are not fit to rule themselves
mostly you should mind your own business
mothers shouldn't make too many sacrifices
much was decided before you were born
murder has its sexual side
myth can make reality more intelligible
noise can be hostile
nothing upsets the balance of good and evil
occasionally principles are more valuable than people
offer very little information about yourself
often you should act like you are sexless
old friends are better left in the past
opacity is an irresistible challenge
pain can be a very positive thing
people are boring unless they are extremists
people are nuts if they think they are important
people are responsible for what they do unless they are insane
people who don't work with their hands are parasites
people who go crazy are too sensitive
people won't behave if they have nothing to lose
physical culture is second best
planning for the future is escapism
playing it safe can cause a lot of damage in the long run
politics is used for personal gain
potential counts for nothing until it's realized
private property created crime
pursuing pleasure for the sake of pleasure will ruin you
push yourself to the limit as often as possible
raise boys and girls the same way
random mating is good for debunking sex myths
rechanneling destructive impulses is a sign of maturity
recluses always get weak
redistributing wealth is imperative
relativity is no boon to mankind
religion causes as many problems as it solves
remember you always have freedom of choice
repetition is the best way to learn
resolutions serve to ease our conscience
revolution begins with changes in the individual
romantic love was invented to manipulate women
routine is a link with the past
routine small excesses are worse than then the occasional debauch
sacrificing yourself for a bad cause is not a moral act
salvation can't be bought and sold
self-awareness can be crippling
self-contempt can do more harm than good
selfishness is the most basic motivation
selflessness is the highest achievement
separatism is the way to a new beginning
sex differences are here to stay
sin is a means of social control
slipping into madness is good for the sake of comparison
sloppy thinking gets worse over time
solitude is enriching
sometimes science advances faster than it should
sometimes things seem to happen of their own accord
spending too much time on self-improvement is antisocial
starvation is nature's way
stasis is a dream state
sterilization is a weapon of the rulers
strong emotional attachment stems from basic insecurity
stupid people shouldn't breed
survival of the fittest applies to men and animals
symbols are more meaningful than things themselves
taking a strong stand publicizes the opposite position
talking is used to hide one's inability to act
teasing people sexually can have ugly consequences
technology will make or break us
the cruelest disappointment is when you let yourself down
the desire to reproduce is a death wish
the family is living on borrowed time
the idea of revolution is an adolescent fantasy
the idea of transcendence is used to obscure oppression
the idiosyncratic has lost its authority
the most profound things are inexpressible
the mundane is to be cherished
the new is nothing but a restatement of the old
the only way to be pure is to stay by yourself
the sum of your actions determines what you are
the unattainable is invariable attractive
the world operates according to discoverable laws
there are too few immutable truths today
there's nothing except what you sense
there's nothing redeeming in toil
thinking too much can only cause problems
threatening someone sexually is a horrible act
timidity is laughable
to disagree presupposes moral integrity
to volunteer is reactionary
torture is barbaric
trading a life for a life is fair enough
true freedom is frightful
unique things must be the most valuable
unquestioning love demonstrates largesse of spirit
using force to stop force is absurd
violence is permissible even desirable occasionally
war is a purification rite
we must make sacrifices to maintain our quality of life
when something terrible happens people wake up
wishing things away is not effective
with perseverance you can discover any truth
words tend to be inadequate
worrying can help you prepare
you are a victim of the rules you live by
you are guileless in your dreams
you are responsible for constituting the meaning of things
you are the past present and future
you can live on through your descendants
you can't expect people to be something they're not
you can't fool others if you're fooling yourself
you don't know what's what until you support yourself
you have to hurt others to be extraordinary
you must be intimate with a token few
you must disagree with authority figures
you must have one grand passion
you must know where you stop and the world begins
you can understand someone of your sex only
you owe the world not the other way around
you should study as much as possible
your actions ae pointless if no one notices
your oldest fears are the worst onesSo it finally happened. The official PostgreSQL master source tree is now managed in git, instead of cvs. This means, amongst other things, that the worlds most advanced open source database now has a version control system with.. eh. atomic commits!
Like the first run, this one had some issues with it, but it was smaller and resolved in time not to have to roll back. This time, it turned out that the cvs version that ships in Debian GNU/Linux comes with patches that change the default date format to the ISO standard. But since one of our main requirements on the conversion was to be able to faithfully represent the old versions of the code, this broke every single file - since we used CVS keyword expansion in the old tree. Once we found this, it was a simple case of adding the DateFormat=old parameter to the CVS config file and re-run the whole conversion - which took several hours.
A lot of work went into making the repository conversion correct. Some of this was due to issues in the toolchain used - many thanks to Michael Haggerty and Max Bowsher for getting those fixed and explaining some of the behaviors of the |
To examine the expression of the transgenes and how they affect the expression of related endogenous genes, we performed semi-quantitative RT–PCR on the endosperm of the developing seeds of a PER line (PER-Z#3). All the transgenes were expressed at high levels, similar to or somewhat lower than that of the highly expressed reference gene OsActin1 ( Figure 5 ). In the PER line, the expression of 13 endogenous genes related to anthocyanin biosynthesis, which were silent or expressed at low levels in the endosperm of ZH11, was activated or upregulated ( Figure 5 ). These genes include upstream phenylalanine pathway genes and structural, decorating, and transporter genes of the anthocyanin biosynthesis pathway. We also found that the endogenous WD40 gene OsWD40 was upregulated in the PER line, probably by the MBW complex. However, the endogenous MYB gene OsC1 was not activated in the PER line.
We measured the total antioxidant activity of four PER lines and ZH11 using the Trolox equivalent antioxidant capacity (TEAC) assay. As expected, the antioxidant activities of unpolished and polished grain samples of the PER lines were much higher than those of ZH11 ( Figure 4 F).
To examine the anthocyanin composition in the PER lines, we performed high-performance liquid chromatography (HPLC) and identified two kinds of anthocyanins, cyanidin 3-O-glucoside (C3G) and its derivative, peonidin 3-O-glucoside (P3G), in the endosperm of the PER lines. These anthocyanins are also found in the pericarp of the black-grained rice variety BGR1 ( Figure 4 D). Quantitative analysis showed that the PER lines had a much higher proportion of P3G compared with that in BGR1, and the total anthocyanin content in one line (PER-Z#3) reached ∼1 mg/g of dried grain ( Figure 4 E and Supplemental Figure 13 ). We detected no anthocyanin in the unpolished grains of the non-transformed parental varieties, nor in the polished grains of BGR1 ( Figure 4 D). In addition, we detected low levels of some flavonoids and proanthocyanidins in the endosperm of the PER lines but not in ZH11 ( Supplemental Figure 14 ).
(F) TEAC analysis of the unpolished and polished rice grains of the PER lines and ZH11, showing different levels of antioxidant activity. **p < 0.01 and ***p < 0.001, significances between the PER and ZH11 line, respectively (n = 3), with Student's t-test.
(E) Quantitative analysis (n = 3) of the C3G and P3G contents in grains of the PER lines and the control materials. gdw, grams of dry weight; nd, not detectable.
Unpolished and polished grains from the black-grained rice (BGR1), ZH11, and the “Purple Endosperm Rice” (PER) or “Zijingmi” (ZJM) lines (T) of transgenic ZH11. In PER-Z#2 with lighter purple-colored grains, three transgenes (SsCHS, SsCHI, and SsF3′H) were absent ( Supplemental Figures 9 and 10 ).
We used Agrobacterium-mediated transformation to introduce pYLTAC380MF-10G into the japonica rice variety ZH11 and the indica variety HG1. We obtained 15 and 13 transgenic (T) plants, respectively, and found that 11 and 9 of the ZH11- and HG1-transgenic plants, respectively, produced purple seed grains ( Figure 4 A–4C and Supplemental Figure 8 ). We named these lines “Purple Endosperm Rice” (PER) (also called “Zijingmi” in Chinese).We used PCR to verify the presence of the transgenes in the transgenic plants (T, T, and T), and the results indicated stable inheritance of the integrated transgenes in the PER lines ( Supplemental Figures 9 and 10 ). The grains of three transgenic lines (PER-Z#1, PER-Z#2, and PER-H#11) were a much lighter purple than those of the other PER lines, and PCR showed that these lines lacked three of the structural genes, SsCHS, SsCHI, and SsF3′H ( Figure 4 A; Supplemental Figures 9 and 10 ). This suggests that these transgenic structural genes enhanced anthocyanin biosynthesis, even though the introduced regulatory genes activated the corresponding endogenous genes OsCHS, OsCHI, and OsF3′H (see below). PCR analysis also showed that the selectable marker/Cre gene cassette was excised as expected, producing homozygous marker-free PER lines in the Tgeneration ( Supplemental Figure 11 ). Most of the growth characteristics of the PER lines, such as plant height, tiller number, and seed-setting rate, were similar to those of the parental varieties; however, the grain weight of the lines was reduced by about 25% compared with ZH11 ( Supplemental Figure 12 ).
(B) Not I-restriction analysis of the acceptor constructs from different rounds of gene assembly with increasing numbers of target genes (1G to 10G). Arrows indicate the newly added gene(s) in each gene assembly cycle. For structural stability testing of pYLTAC380MF-10G in the A. tumefaciens strain EHA105, the plasmid was introduced into EHA105, isolated from colonies, transferred back into E. coli, and isolated for restriction analysis.
We cloned the eight anthocyanin pathway genes into six intermediate donor vectors with the ESPs, giving four vectors that each contained one target gene and two that carried two target genes. Each of the genes was controlled by a distinct endosperm-specific promoter ( Supplemental Figure 7 ). After six rounds of target-gene assembly and the final integration of the selectable marker/marker-excision cassette, the multi-transgene stacking construct carrying all the target genes, pYLTAC380MF-10G (with a T-DNA of ca. 31 kb), was completed ( Figure 3 A). Restriction analysis with NotI verified the vector structure and further confirmed its structural stability in E. coli and A. tumefaciens ( Figure 3 B).
Therefore, we explored a new strategy involving transformation with two regulatory genes and a complete set of the six structural genes of the anthocyanin pathway, all controlled by endosperm-specific promoters. We selected maize ZmLc (Leaf color) and ZmPl (Purple leaf), which encode the bHLH-type and MYB-type transcription factors, respectively, to activate the anthocyanin biosynthesis genes; ZmPl is a homolog of ZmC1 but has stronger activity (). Based on the high sequence conservation of the anthocyanin pathway genes in plants, we used PCR to isolate cDNAs for the six structural genes for anthocyanin biosynthesis from Coleus (Solenostemon scutellarioides, known for its colorful foliage), including SsCHS (encoding chalcone synthase), SsCHI (encoding chalcone isomerase), SsF3H (encoding flavanone 3-hydroxylase), SsF3′H (encoding flavonoid 3′-hydroxylase), SsDFR (encoding dihydroflavonol 4-reductase), and SsANS (encoding anthocyanidin synthase) ( Supplemental Table 1 ). For the promoters that drive the expression of these genes, we PCR-amplified eight endosperm-specific promoters (ESPs) from rice (), and cloned them into pYL322d1 and pYL322d2 to generate a suite of 16 intermediate donor vectors ( Supplemental Figure 6 ), which can be used to engineer various metabolic pathways in the endosperm of cereal crops. We used these structural genes and two regulatory genes, under the control of the ESPs, to engineer the anthocyanin pathway in the rice endosperm.
To determine why many rice varieties do not produce anthocyanins and why previous attempts to bioengineer anthocyanin production in the rice endosperm did not work (), we first analyzed sequences of the anthocyanin pathway genes in different rice varieties. The sequence analysis showed that OsB1 and OsB2 and the structural gene OsDFR (encoding dihydroflavonol-4-reductase) are defective in rice varieties that do not produce anthocyanins, including the japonica variety Zhonghua 11 (ZH11) and the indica variety Huaguang 1 (HG1), which we used for transformation in this study ( Supplemental Figure 4 ). Furthermore, analysis of public transcriptome data showed that the regulatory gene OsC1 and most of the genes encoding proteins of the anthocyanin pathway are silent or expressed at low levels in the rice endosperm ( Supplemental Figure 5 ). Our RT–PCR analysis in ZH11 (see below) was consistent with the transcriptome data for these genes. These findings suggest that transformation with only regulatory genes or structural genes would not be effective for engineering anthocyanin production in the rice endosperm.
(B) When all target genes are assembled, the selectable marker/marker-excision cassette is recombined into the acceptor vector by Gateway BP reaction to generate the final binary construct. In transgenic plants, Cre expression driven by Pv4 (or another suitable promoter) mediates loxP recombination to excise the cassette.
Multiple assembly cycles for multi-gene stacking. One or more target genes (A–F) are cloned into the donor vectors ( Supplemental Figures 6 and 7 ). For Round I of gene assembly, the acceptor vector and pYL322d1-A (with gene A) are co-transferred into an E. coli strain (NS3529) expressing Cre. The in vivo reversible recombination (i) between the wild-type loxP sites produces an intermediate recombinant plasmid, then an irreversible recombination (ii) between the compatible mutant loxP sites loxP1L (1L) and loxP1R (1R) excises the donor vector backbone (containing two I-SceI sites, a loxP site, and the bacterial selection marker gene), generating the target plasmid Acceptor-A. The irreversible recombination generates an inactive recombinant site 1LR (and 2LR in the even-numbered assembly cycles). After the gene assembly, a digestion with homing endonuclease I-SceI (with PI-SceI for even-numbered cycles) is performed to remove the original acceptor, donor, and intermediate plasmid (which contain one or two of the homing endonuclease sites), recovering the uncut target plasmid that lacks the corresponding homing endonuclease site. For Round II gene assembly, Acceptor-A and pYL322d2-C/B (with genes B and C in this example) are co-transferred into NS3529. The recombination events produce the recombination plasmid Acceptor-C/B/A. A third (and other odd-numbered, with pYL322d1-based vectors) and fourth (and other even-numbered, with pYL322d2-based vectors) round of gene assembly can be conducted to stack additional genes like Round I and Round II, respectively.
To use the TGSII system, we individually cloned the target genes into the pYL322d1- and pYL322d2-based donor vectors (each capable of holding one, two, or more target genes) by various cloning methods, including Gibson cloning and Ω-PCR cloning (). The two groups of donor vectors carrying the target gene(s) are used in rotation for recombination with the original and target-gene-carrying acceptor vectors, in an E. coli strain (NS3529) expressing Cre () ( Figure 2 A). In each gene assembly cycle, the donor vector backbone in the intermediate recombinant plasmid is automatically removed by irreversible recombination between the paired compatible mutant loxP sites (loxP1L/loxP1R for odd-numbered rounds or loxP2L/loxP2R for even-numbered rounds). After each round of recombination, the unrecombined plasmids and intermediate recombinant plasmid are removed by digestion with I-SceI (odd-numbered rounds) or PI-SceI (even-numbered rounds), recovering the uncut target recombinant construct that lacks the corresponding homing endonuclease site. With this iterative Cre/loxP recombination strategy and the large cloning capacity of TAC, many target genes can be assembled into the acceptor vector, independent of the limitation imposed by the number of available “cloning sites” in the vectors. Finally, the marker/marker-excision cassette is introduced into the target-gene-carrying binary vector by Gateway reaction ( Figure 2 B). In transgenic plants with the stacked transgenes, the marker gene/Cre sequence is excised from the T-DNA insertion by loxP recombination in certain tissue(s) where Cre is expressed from a tissue-specific or inducible promoter; in this study we used the pollen-specific promoter Pv4 from the rice gene OsVillin 4 ( Figure 2 B).
The TAC-based acceptor vector, pYLTAC380GW, uses the P1 plasmid replicon and the pVS1 replicon for replication of large plasmids in Escherichia coli and Agrobacterium tumefaciens, respectively. This vector contains three key components within the transfer DNA (T-DNA) region for multi-gene assembly: a wild-type loxP, a recognition site for the homing endonuclease I-SceI, and a mutant loxP1R. The target-gene donor vectors, pYL322d1 and pYL322d2, carry a wild-type loxP, two mutant loxP sites, and homing endonuclease sites; these sites are located in different arrangements in the two donor vectors ( Figure 1 B). Each of the marker-free donor vectors has a cassette containing a plant-selectable marker (HPT, NPTII, or Bar) and Cre driven by a pollen-specific promoter (Pv4) isolated in this study, and flanked by two wild-type loxP sites and two sites (attB1, attB2) for Gateway recombination ( Figure 1 C). We also developed two sets of binary acceptor vectors for different applications based on the TAC backbone and the pCAMBIA backbone. These vectors also could be adapted for use in non-plant systems by modifying suitable acceptor vectors with the key components loxP/I-SceI/loxP1R ( Supplemental Figure 3 A–3C).
Compared with our previous transgene-stacking vector system (), the major improvement we incorporated in this new TGSII system is the ability to automatically remove the donor vector backbone from the intermediate recombinant plasmid without separate restriction and ligation steps. Cre catalyzes reversible recombination between wild-type loxP sites and can also catalyze recombination between mutant loxP sites with a few nucleotide variations (). To enable Cre to automatically remove the donor vector backbone in the TGSII system, we designed and synthesized two pairs of mutant loxP sites, loxP1L/loxP1R and loxP2L/loxP2R, which can mediate irreversible recombination ( Supplemental Figure 2 ), and used them in the TGSII vectors. The two mutant loxP sites of each set contain variant nucleotides in the left arm or right arm and the spacer region; they can be recognized by Cre to undergo an irreversible recombination, because Cre cannot recognize the resulting recombinant sites loxP1LR or loxP2LR, which contain variant nucleotides in the both arms ( Supplemental Figure 2 ). Recombination does not occur between the sites of the different mutant sets (nor between a mutant site and a wild-type loxP site), because they have different, incompatible spacer sequences; identical spacer sequences are required for pairing and exchange of the strands.
(C) Structural features of the donor vectors for insertion and excision of selectable markers. The plant selectable marker gene/marker-excision cassette between two loxP sites includes a marker gene (HPT, NPTII, or Bar, for pYLMF-H, pYLMF-N, or pYLMF-B) and the Cre gene (with an intron from the catalase gene) driven by a pollen-specific promoter (Pv4); these components are located between the Gateway attB1/attB2 sites. Pv4 from Villin4 (Os04g0604000) is expressed specifically in pollen. This cassette can be recombined into the pYLTAC380GW-based constructs by Gateway BP reaction to form a structure that is competent for in planta excision to produce marker-free plants.
(B) Structural features of the basic target-gene donor vectors. The wild-type and mutant loxP sites, the homing endonuclease sites, and MCSs are located in different arrangements (MCSs are in different orientations) in the donor vectors. The replicon is from pBR322, and Cm r and Amp r denote the chloramphenicol- and ampicillin-resistance genes, respectively. LacZ is used to indicate blue bacterial colonies of the recombinant plasmid with unremoved donor vector backbone.
(A) Structural features and the key sequence of the basic acceptor vector. The vector backbone contains a bacterial kanamycin-resistance gene (Kan r ), a P1 plasmid replicon for replication in E. coli, a P1 lytic replicon for increasing the plasmid copy number induced by IPTG, and a pVS1 replicon for replication in A. tumefaciens. The loxP and loxP1R sites are located in the T-DNA region (from right border [RB] to left border [LB]) for recombination with a target-gene donor plasmid and deletion of the donor backbone sequence. PI-PspI, I-SceI, and I-Ppo are homing endonuclease sites. A Gateway recipient region containing the SacB gene (which causes lethality in E. coli in the presence of sucrose) flanked by the attP1 and attP2 sites for recombining the excisable marker cassette into the vector after assembling all target genes.
The basic TGSII system consists of a binary acceptor vector, two target-gene donor vectors, and an optionally used donor vector with an antibiotic selectable marker and a marker excision (marker-free) cassette ( Figure 1 A–1C). The donor vectors containing target genes are used in alternation for Cre/loxP-mediated recombination with the acceptor vector; the Cre recombinase then removes the donor vector backbone in the intermediate recombinant plasmid via an irreversible recombination between paired compatible mutant loxP sites. In a final step, the chosen selectable marker cassette is incorporated by Gateway recombination reaction; this cassette also contains Cre under the control of a tissue-specific promoter, allowing the markers to be removed by recombination in planta, thus resulting in plants that contain a marker-free transgenic insertion of a stack of target genes.
Discussion
Naqvi et al., 2010 Naqvi S.
Farré G.
Sanahuja G.
Capell T.
Zhu C.
Christou P. When more is better: multigene engineering in plants. Butelli et al., 2008 Butelli E.
Titta L.
Giorgio M.
Mock H.P.
Matros A.
Peterek S.
Schijlen E.G.
Hall R.D.
Bovy A.G.
Luo J.
et al. Enrichment of tomato fruit with health-promoting anthocyanins by expression of select transcription factors. Shin et al., 2006 Shin Y.M.
Park H.J.
Yim S.D.
Baek N.I.
Lee C.H.
An G.
Woo Y.M. Transgenic rice lines expressing maize C1 and R-S regulatory genes produce various flavonoids in the endosperm. Ogo et al., 2013 Ogo Y.
Ozawa K.
Ishimaru T.
Murayama T.
Takaiwa F. Transgenic rice seed synthesizing diverse flavonoids at high levels: a new platform for flavonoid production with associated health benefits. Genetic engineering of complex metabolic pathways requires: (1) an understanding of the underlying gene networks and the regulatory relationship of the gene expression in these networks; (2) identification of the set of target genes that are required to establish the complete pathway in the target tissues of the organisms; and (3) an effective vector system and transformation method, particularly if a relatively large number of transgenes must be introduced. In the past decades, many studies on genetic engineering of metabolic pathways and multi-gene traits have been reported, but most of these studies involved transformation with relatively few genes, mostly up to three or four (). For example, the anthocyanin-enriched “Purple Tomato” was engineered using two regulatory genes, Ros1 (encoding an MYB protein) and Del (encoding a bHLH protein), which could activate the necessary endogenous genes (present in functional but silent forms) of the anthocyanin and flavonoid pathways in tomato. The resulting “Purple Tomato” plants produced high levels (0.23–2.83 mg/g fresh weight) of complex anthocyanin and flavonoid products in the fruit (). However, previous studies by transformation of rice with regulatory genes or structural genes failed to produce anthocyanins in the endosperm (). Therefore, engineering complex metabolic pathways in many plants remains a challenge because of our limited understanding of the gene networks and the mechanisms that regulate the expression of many metabolic pathways in certain plants, as well as the technical difficulty in linking and transferring multiple target genes.
Figure 6 Engineering of the Anthocyanin Biosynthesis Pathway in the Rice Endosperm. Show full caption The genetically engineered anthocyanin biosynthesis pathway involves the metabolic enzymes expressed from the transgenes (red), the rebuilt MBW transcription factor complex, and some functional endogenous genes (blue) activated (or enhanced) by the MBW complex. The pathway synthesizes cyanidin as the major anthocyanidin, which is further decorated by one and two steps to produce the anthocyanin products C3G and P3G, respectively. The minor proanthocyanidin branch is not shown. In this study, we successfully genetically engineered the complex anthocyanin biosynthesis pathway in the rice endosperm using the TGSII system. This success could be attributed to several factors in our design ( Figure 6 ). First, we examined the genes for anthocyanin biosynthesis (whether they were functional or non-functional) and their expression (expressed or silent) in the endosperm of white-grained rice varieties. We found that OsB1, OsB2, and OsDFR are defective, and that OsC1 and most of the related genes are silent or expressed at low levels in the endosperm. Based on this analysis, we selected the appropriate target genes for genetic transformation to reconstitute anthocyanin biosynthesis in the rice endosperm. Second, we used both the transgenic and endogenous regulatory genes where possible. For example, the transgenic ZmLc and ZmPl and the endogenous OsWD40 rebuilt the MBW complex, which enhanced or activated the expression of some other endogenous genes for gene regulation (e.g., OsWD40) and for biosynthesis, decoration, and transport of the anthocyanin products. In fact, the two lines (Z#8 and H#9) that lacked only ZmLc produced white grains ( Supplemental Figure 9 ), confirming the requirement of ZmLc for this engineered anthocyanin biosynthesis. Third, we used homologous structural genes to complement the anthocyanin pathway. Because the necessary endogenous structural gene OsDFR is defective in the parental varieties, and two other genes, OsF3H and OsANS, are not expressed in the endosperm of the wild-type and PER plants, we transferred the corresponding homologous genes from Coleus (SsF3H, SsDFR, and SsANS), which enabled the completion of anthocyanin biosynthesis. Consistent with this notion, a line (H#12) that lacked SsDFR did not produce purple seeds ( Supplemental Figure 9 ). Fourth, we supplemented endogenous genes with transgenes. For example, although three endogenous genes (OsCHS, OsCHI, and OsF3′H) were activated by the rebuilt MBW complex, the absence of the corresponding transgenes in the lines (Z#1, Z#2, and H#11; Supplemental Figures 9 and 10 ) resulted in lower anthocyanin contents and lower antioxidant activity ( Figure 4 A and 4E; Supplemental Figure 13 ). Therefore, introduction of the two necessary regulatory genes together with the complete set of structural genes successfully produced and enhanced anthocyanin biosynthesis in the rice endosperm.
6 ) and expressed the expected anthocyanin products ( Our results showed that although several transgenic plants lacked one to three gene fragments, which probably were lost during T-DNA biogenesis in A. tumefaciens and/or T-DNA infection/integration in callus cells, most of the transgenic plants contained the complete set of transgenes, and these transgenes were stably inherited in the progenies (we observed inheritance at least to T) and expressed the expected anthocyanin products ( Supplemental Figures 8–10 ). Compared with the complex anthocyanin and flavonoid products in the “Purple Tomato,” our PER lines produced only two anthocyanins (P3G and C3G) in relatively high amounts (up to ca. 1 mg/g dry weight), and low amounts of some flavonoids and proanthocyanidins. This new biofortified germplasm may provide a source of health-promoting food, improving the hydrophilic antioxidant levels in human diets.Former president George W. Bush has offered his endorsement of Mitt Romney.
From within an elevator.
As the doors were closing.
Reports Matt Negrin of ABC News:
“I’m for Mitt Romney,” Bush told ABC News this morning as the doors of an elevator closed on him, after he gave a speech on human rights a block from his old home — the White House.
Bush’s endorsement isn’t a surprise, given that Romney is virtually the Republican Party’s nominee. But the 43rd president has been absent from the 2012 campaign and hasn’t made any public comments showing his support for Romney.
Other members of the Bush family have endorsed Romney in more orthodox ways.
Jeb Bush, the popular former Florida governor, formally announced his endorsement of Romney in mid-March.
And the Bush brothers’ father, former president George H.W. Bush, threw his support behind Romney in a late March news conference in Houston along with his wife, Barbara Bush, and Romney.
At that event, a reporter asked Romney, “Governor, have you met with George W. Bush while you have been here, and have you sought his endorsement?”
Romney responded: “You know, I haven’t met with President George W. Bush,” he said. “We speak from time to time.”
The Obama campaign responded to the endorsement Tuesday by comparing Romney’s views on tax cuts and Wall Street regulation to Bush administration policies.
“President Bush has endorsed Governor Romney, and Governor Romney has endorsed a return to Bush-era economic policies: massive tax cuts for the wealthiest and no accountability for Wall Street, which led to huge deficits and tepid growth,” campaign spokesman Ben LaBolt said in a statement. “Now Romney wants to double down on those same, failed policies – expanding upon the Bush tax cuts for millionaires and billionaires at a cost of $5 trillion, and, once again, allowing Wall Street to write its own rules.”On its Online Security Blog, Google has announced that the company will be increasing its bounties for serious code execution bugs found in production versions of Google products to $20,000 (about £12,400). It will also be paying $10,000 for less severe vulnerabilities like SQL injection flaws as well as $3,133.37 for other vulnerabilities such as cross-site scripting exploits.
The blog post says that the programme has been a great success so far, with over 780 vulnerability reports being received from around 200 individuals. In the first year of the programme's existence, Google has paid out around $460,000 in total. Bounties are only paid to individuals if the vulnerabilities have been disclosed in a responsible manner, allowing Google to fix them before hackers can build proof-of-concept attack code.
At the same time, Google has decided to decrease rewards for flaws found in products that have been acquired by the company but have not yet been integrated into the main Google product line. The company says that it will decide what vulnerabilities qualify as high risk issues and will be paying bounties based on that assessment.
Google is also running a separate bounty programme that pays out rewards for security problems found in its Chrome browser. Bounties for that programme range from $500 to $3,133.37 for a single vulnerability.
See also:
Google expands its security rewards programmes, a report from The H.
(fab)What happens in the past stays in the past. That is exactly what our Bollywood actress Sunny Leone believes in.
Ask her if she is trying to change the perception that people have towards her and she says, “I don’t think that it’s a perception thing, I just don’t want to go nude in movies, and it’s not something that I am interested in doing. It’s something that’s a part of my past, I accept it and don’t regret it, but it’s not something that I want to go back. It’s like going backwards and I am here in Bollywood to make mainstream movies & this is what I wanted to do. KUCH KUCH LOCHA HAI is about to release and I am so happy and proud of that, why would I want to go backwards. I am here to make a new life & beginning for myself.”
Also Read - Ram Kapoor: Sunny Leone is the hottest chick in Bollywood right now
When asked her if she will sign any nudity clause for films, she said, “No, I will not accept any nudity clause. I have come here to do something different in my life. I have gone down that road as everybody knows. This is a step forward for me and I don’t plan to go backwards.”
Also starring Ram Kapoor, Evelyn Sharma, Navdeep Chhabra & others, KUCH KUCH LOCHA HAI is directed by Devang Dholakia.Produced by K.K Agarwal, the film is set to release on 8th May, 2015.Former Shakopee Schools Superintendent Rod Thompson racked up more than $30,000 in personal expenses on his district credit card, using public funds to splurge on sports memorabilia, first-class airfare, concert tickets and an Xbox game system, according to charges filed Tuesday in Scott County District Court.
Over a six-year period, the embattled schools chief used an assortment of schemes to make hundreds of personal purchases on the district’s dime, said Scott County Attorney Ron Hocevar.
Thompson, 52, turned himself in to authorities Tuesday afternoon and is being held at the Scott County jail ahead of Wednesday’s arraignment hearing. He faces 20 felony charges, including six counts of theft by swindle, 13 counts of embezzlement of public funds and one count of possession of stolen property, plus one misdemeanor count of receiving stolen property.
Unsanctioned purchases included a $23 Vikings flag, a $476 flat-screen TV, $220 cowboy boots, a $46 garden hose and miscellaneous jewelry, according to the criminal complaint.
Thompson ignited the ire of parents and community members in March, shortly after he notified staff of a $4.5 million budget shortfall, which he blamed on “human error.” The announcement prompted a Shakopee Valley News inquiry into the district’s finances, school board members’ travel and credit card use. News coverage and community outrage led to his June resignation — about a month after police launched a criminal probe. His separation agreement granted him a $50,000 payout from the district.
“At the end of the day we’re all losers. But the only satisfaction is that he’ll have to pay for what he did,” said Carrie Ferris, an active member of FACT: Friends & Concerned Taxpayers of Shakopee, an offshoot of the “Concerned Citizens of Shakopee” Facebook group, which clamored for a formal investigation.
“He will hopefully be a deterrent for those who think they can get away with this garbage,” said Ferris, calling the charges long overdue.
Shakopee Police Chief Jeff Tate said his investigators found $73,642 in what he called fraudulent charges and unjustified reimbursements by Thompson since 2012 — as far back as the Minnesota statute of limitations allows for charging such crimes.
“Anybody with any integrity is going to be disgusted with this,” Tate said. “How can a public official think he wasn’t going to get caught?”
Records show that Thompson’s spending was not limited to material items.
An adoption benefit in Thompson’s 2014 contract with the school district offered more than $30,000 in reimbursements toward the cost of adopting his second child. The “family-friendly” addendum was meant to thank him for his service and help retain him as an employee. He would ultimately use it as a cash advance, submitting copies of checks that he claimed were from his personal checking account to the Adoption Network Law Center, according to the charges. But none of the checks submitted to the adoption agency was ever cashed, authorities said.
During a six-month period in 2014, the district “paid Thompson back” $35,400 for bogus adoption expenses. In 2015, Thompson asked board members to approve his travel to Washington, D.C., and New Orleans for the Urban Superintendents Academy. He claimed a grant would cover the costs, but that didn’t happen, police said.
The district picked up nearly $13,500 for 10 of Thompson’s trips over two years.
On Tuesday, the Shakopee School District released a statement saying the allegations “are not only disturbing, but, if true, clearly reflect inappropriate conduct.”
District administrators said they have revamped school policies to create a system of “checks and balances” to ensure that misspending doesn’t happen again. The Citizens’ Financial Advisory Committee was recently established to oversee the district’s finances and revised credit card manual.
School Board Chairman Scott Swanson referred all questions to the district.
Shakopee watchdog groups like FACT, which argue that the school board was complicit in Thompson’s actions, say they will continue pushing for board members to step down. A June petition calling for a vote of no confidence in the government body condemned members for failing to recognize Thompson’s misconduct.
“They have a lot of explaining to do to this community,” Ferris said.
Since 2012, Thompson has reimbursed the district at least $3,450 — including more than $2,100 in personal Amazon purchases and hundreds in travel and food charges, according to school financial records.
He has declined to discuss the allegations.
The FBI has an open investigation into Thompson’s alleged crimes.
At the time of his hiring, board members praised Thompson’s charismatic personality and dedication to diversifying the district. He would ultimately be chosen out of a field of 42 candidates. In his job application, Thompson touted his 23 years of educational experience and “proven record of success.”
In his cover letter to the district, Thompson wrote, “My experience with optimizing human and fiscal resources and having to ‘do more with less’ gives me perspective that is invaluable to the Shakopee team.”OAKLAND (KCBS) — Winter rains, heavier than what we’ve been used to, have pushed a lot of debris and trash down the Bay Area’s streams, and that means there’s more to clean up this coming Earth Day.
The city of Oakland is putting the call out for more volunteers to show up on Saturday to help with the cleanup.
Plastic, Styrofoam, and rainbow sheen dot East Creek Slough next to the Oakland Coliseum, which is one of the spots where the cleanup effort will be focused.
“There’s trash, but there’s also leaves, and branches, and trees come down, and that impacts our creeks as well,” Jennifer Stern, an Environmental Services Analyst with Oakland.
Workers in Oakland recently pulled a mattress, a car bumper, and other trash out of one of the city’s creeks.
“We really need volunteers to come out this Earth Day,” Stern said.EUGENE — Former Grant High School standout Mike Moser will visit the Oregon campus on Friday as he looks to transfer from UNLV, according to reports.
Moser is also reportedly considering Washington and Gonzaga. The 6-foot-8 forward earned honorable mention All-America honors at UNLV in 2012.
CBSsports.com has reported that Moser is scheduled to graduate from UNLV this summer, which means he would be eligible to play his senior year at another Division I school next season.
Moser was "leaning toward" a transfer to Washington, CBSsports.com reported earlier this month. Oregon has since "closed the gap" with Moser.
Moser played his freshman season at UCLA before transferring to UNLV.
Moser averaged 14.0 points and 10.5 rebounds as a sophomore with Runnin' Rebels, after which he considered entering the NBA Draft. He return to Las Vegas for his junior season but missed seven games with an injured hip. He averaged 7.1 points and 6.1 rebounds for UNLV this past season.
-- Adam JudeMore Cognitive Bias in MTG Finance
by SaffronOlive // Dec 02, 2014 Tweet
finance theory
A week ago I wrote about some common cognitive biases that can impact our financial decision. Based on the comments, Cognitive Bias in MTG Finance: Save Yourself From Your Mind may be the most popular article I've written, so here we are again. I'm not going to bother going over the introduction to cognitive biases again, please check out last week's article. Instead, we are going to jump right in and start talking about some more biases.
Choice-Supportive Bias
The choice-supportive |
which had prompted the Indian Council for Child Welfare (ICCW) to seek reinvestigation into the matter.
The council, which had taken cognisance of an HT report, had also asked the Jaipur district collector to file a report in this regard.
ICCW president Geeta Siddhartha had earlier told HT that Malaika was given the “benefit of doubt” pending re-investigation but added that action would be taken after getting the fresh report.
However, no one from the ICCW was available for comments on Wednesday.
Police sources said the fresh probe report is likely to be handed over to the ICCW “very soon”.
In a report submitted to a local court in Jaipur in December last year, the police had said that the incident “did not occur” and the case as “false”.
The police relied on CCTV footage from a computer shop located near the spot where the alleged incident took place on February 15, 2013.
“The CCTV images showed a biker approaching her and she had some altercation with him. There was no SUV and no kidnapping bid took place,” said a police officer on condition of anonymity.
The police report, a copy of which is with HT, had named nine independent witnesses who denied the occurrence of the incident.
Statements of the girl’s father Mukesh Tak and mother Nidhi were also mentioned in the report.
First Published: Dec 03, 2014 20:44 ISTDigi-Fu's Abernathy Farm blueprint - Restoring the Commonwealth Optional if you want to have the cat and its happiness bonus
Digi-Fu's Covenant blueprint - Restoring the Commonwealth Optional if you want to have the cat and its happiness bonus
Digi-Fu's Graygarden blueprint - Restoring the Commonwealth Optional if you want to have the cat and its happiness bonus
Digi-Fu's Nuka-World Red Rocket blueprint - Restoring the Commonwealth Optional if you want to have the cat and its happiness bonus
Digi-Fu's Oberland Station blueprint - Restoring the Commonwealth Optional if you want to have the cat and its happiness bonus
Digi-Fu's Outpost Zimonja blueprint - Restoring the Commonwealth Optional if you want to have the cat and its happiness bonus
Digi-Fu's Red Rocket Truck Stop blueprint - Restoring the Commonwealth Optional if you want to have the cat and its happiness bonus
Digi-Fu's Starlight Drive-In blueprint - Restoring the Commonwealth Optional if you want to have the cat and its happiness bonus
Digi-Fu's Sunshine Tidings Co-op blueprint - Restoring the Commonwealth Optional if you want to have the cat and its happiness bonus
Digi-Fu's Taffington Boathouse blueprint - Restoring the Commonwealth Optional if you want to have the cat and its happiness bonusFirst off, while it's not as crazy-slim as the first Z, the Moto Z Force comes awfully close. That's pretty damned impressive when you consider all the extra physical layers that form Motorola's ShatterShield display technology. It's also so light it's barely there — I've been carrying it in my jacket pocket all day and I've already forgotten where it was three or four times. It'll look awfully familiar if you've spent any time with the Moto Z2 Play as well, but you probably could've guessed that based on their names.
Motorola deserves credit for piecing together such a sleek little device — with 7000-series aluminum, no less — but I still long for full-on water resistance. The Z2 Force is treated with a nano-coating to keep things from getting fouled up in a light rain, but really — who among us hasn't gotten our phones right to the edge of "dangerously wet"?
I haven't loaded up our usual slew of benchmark tests and games, but the Z2 Force felt incredibly snappy as I zipped through running apps and long web pages. The Snapdragon 835 strikes again, and Motorola's still-restrained take on Android certainly helps. (It doesn't hurt the Motorola launcher looks and feels a lot like Google's own Pixel Launcher.) Then again, I really never worried about pure speed.
No, the real concern here is still battery life: the Z2 Force has one of the smallest batteries of any device running a Snapdragon 835. This doubly hurts when you consider that earlier Z models — including the first Z Play and the original Z Force — had tremendous longevity. I get wanting to balance style and performance in a flagship phone, but last year's Force felt like a no-compromise machine — this one doesn't, at least at first. Here's hoping for a pleasant surprise when it comes to our full battery test.
The only truly new addition to the Moto Z formula is the dual camera, and it's doing well so far. It's a dreary day here, so colors across the city feel more muted than usual, and the Z2 Force has been doing a fine job accurately rendering these scenes. It has a little trouble locking down the correct exposure sometimes, though — we'll have to see how it handles brighter conditions. On the flip side, today has been pretty good for using just the monochrome sensor, and a lot of the quick test shots I've snapped are loaded with noir-y drama. Here's one of our videographer Brian pausing mid-sandwich.
And now, some miscellaneous observations:
I'm almost completely over it at this point, but the Z2 Force doesn't have a headphone jack.
Speaking of things the Z2 Force doesn't come with, there's no StyleShell in the box — the other Z phones usually had a woodgrain one. It's not a huge loss, but it does mean you're stuck with the camera hump rubbing up against flat surfaces.
The pill-shaped home button/fingerprint sensor combo is inset into the glass a bit, and the edge that encircles it is a little sharper than it probably should be.
This T-Mobile model comes with five carrier-loaded apps, and people who hate bloat can disable all but one.
Of the 64GB of storage the phone ships with, close to 20GB are taken up by Android and pre-loaded apps.
I'm still not in love with the compromise Motorola made with the battery, but a marketing exec offered a little insight into how the decision was made. Apparently, Motorola asked people in focus groups to divvy up stacks of poker chips to figure out how highly they valued certain features. In other words, we have our fellow consumers to thank for the (arguably misguided) balance of battery life and thickness on display here.
All told, I get the impression that this is the flagship phone Motorola wanted to make all along. No wonder, then, that the Z2 Force feels so much like the two flagships made immediately before it. None of the changes here feel particularly groundbreaking, but stay tuned for our full review to see if the Z2 Force forces me to rethink that notion.Dutch soldiers are being forced to yell 'bang bang' during training because the country's army is suffering from an ammunition shortage.
Frustrated soldiers are making the noises after being told they would no longer be able to use live ammunition in training - because too many bullets have been used on missions abroad.
It has led to a drop in morale, the military union VNM has claimed.
Play fighting: Soldiers in Holland have to yell 'bang bang' during training because of a shortage of bullets
President Jean Debie told De Standaard: 'Even if you have no bullets, you have to train with your weapon. That means you have to call out bang-bang-bang.
'That is of course disastrous for the morale of the military.'
Debie went on to argue training with fake bullets was not as effective as using the real thing.
A confidential email, leaked to RTL Nieuws has revealed the extent of the shortage, with even competitive shooting teams being told to stop training.
'I cannot make it better, but there's really no ammunition,' the email concludes.
Problem: The government says problem has been caused by 'high consumption' and 'long delivery times'
The Dutch defence ministry has acknowledged the problem, saying it was caused by 'high consumption' and 'long delivery times'.
But said it is not adversely affecting its soldiers.
'They can practice as much as necessary,' a spokesman told NOS, a Dutch broadcasting company.CINCINNATI -- Bengals defensive tackle Devon Still responded Wednesday to allegations he hasn't paid child support in months, calling them untrue and saying he will continue to let the court system deal with the matter.
"My daughter's battle with cancer has been inspirational to many all over the world," Still said in a statement released by the team. "When she gets older, I want her to be able to look back and read about her positive impact on the world, not about the private issues her parents were going through. I am not going to retaliate against the mother of my daughter, and the untruthful reports in the New York Daily News article, by criticizing her character. I am going to continue to allow the court system to handle this matter, as it has been doing these past couple of months."
Still has been in the international limelight at times during the past three months because of his daughter, Leah's, widely publicized fight with Stage 4 pediatric cancer.
The mother of Leah Still told the New York Daily News of father, Devon: "I don't consider him a deadbeat dad. I know he loves and cares for his daughter and he is there for her. I just need him to help me financially." Courtesty of Devon Still
Yet in a letter recently sent by attorney Gloria Allred to the NFL, as reported by the Daily News, Channing Smythe, Still's ex-girlfriend and the mother of Leah, alleges he has refused to pay child support for four months, driving her to the brink of homelessness.
"I don't consider him a deadbeat dad," Smythe told the Daily News on Wednesday. "I know he loves and cares for his daughter and he is there for her. I just need him to help me financially."
The letter asks the league to investigate whether Still has violated its personal conduct policy for allegedly failing to make payments to Smythe, who lives in Delaware with Leah.
Bengals coach Marvin Lewis said Wednesday afternoon the team remains "very confident" in Still in the wake of the allegations.
"We're not privy to all the facts of it," Lewis said at the start of his weekly news conference, "but Devon is very confident that he's taking care of business the right way and eventually, at some point, if there's things that need to be done through the legality through the courts, that all would come out that way.
"We're going to continue to support him. We're very confident in the things he's done."
Lewis said he met with Still on Wednesday morning.
"Devon has grown up so much through this unfortunate illness that his daughter's dealing with," the coach said. "It's really grown him as a man and as a person. I told him that just today how he's handled everything. I'm so impressed.
"He's really a beacon for a lot of people. He will be for a lot of young guys as they face different trials and tribulations as an NFL player. There are the outside pressures that no one understands that guys go through. There's the pressure of playing, the pressure of performing. All those things that occur, and this one is really outside of football."
Still was seen writing the statement in the Bengals' locker room Wednesday morning. He sought counsel on it from veteran teammates.
The Daily News reported that, in a declaration that accompanied Allred's letter to the NFL, Smythe said she was unable to work because her daughter's treatment and care required full-time attention. Had it not been for a friend of Smythe's mother, she contends, she and Leah would be homeless. She also claimed she accepted food stamps from July through October to feed herself and her daughter.
Still recently became engaged to another woman, who lives with him in Cincinnati.
The combination of Still's injuries in the preseason and his mind being preoccupied on Leah's medical battle forced the Bengals initially to cut him Aug. 31, to get down to their 53-man active roster. A day later, he was re-signed and added to the practice squad so he could pay for Leah's medical expenses with the NFL's health insurance. A week later, he was promoted off the practice squad to the active roster.
Still, a former Bengals second-round pick who is slated to make $570,000 this season, has played in nine games and has 18 tackles.
An avid poster on social media, Still has regularly shared photos via Instagram showing himself and his daughter during his weekly visits to see her. He was there when Leah had her cancerous tumor removed in September, and was even there Monday and Tuesday when she began undergoing stem-cell treatments.
To help raise awareness about the illness, the Bengals raised nearly $1.3 million earlier this year as part of a donation tied to sales of Still's No. 75 jersey.More than 8000 motorists were breath tested by police who shut down key intersections into Hamilton city in a targeted operation at the weekend.
About 25 staff were involved in 'Operation Stocktake' which set-up checkpoints breathtesting motorists on Friday and Saturday night.
As a result, 3775 compulsory breath tests were conducted on Friday night and 5015 on Saturday.
District road policing manager, Inspector Freda Grace, said police ran the operation after a successful pilot last year.
"Instead of relying on a couple of booze buses at fixed points we identified key intersections that would mean if you came into town between 10pm and 4am you would have to go through us.
"Unfortunately it showed a lot of drivers are continuing to drive after they had been drinking."
A total of 123 people failed breath screening tests on Friday and another 196 failed on Saturday.
Grace said of those 319 drivers, 41 now faced excess breath alcohol enforcement action.
"In addition to those drivers, another two were suspended from driving on Friday and seven on Saturday.
"Six cars were impounded during the operation while eight people were arrested and 108 infringement notices were issued over the two nights for a variety of offences."
"In addition to the Road Policing related matters we had some really good feedback from our section staff walking the beat in the CBD on what are usually our two busiest nights.
"There were very few alcohol related incidents outside the bars, alcohol related infringements in town were virtually non-existent and overall arrest numbers were right down."Protesters rallying against a controversial new McDonald's restaurant on Melbourne's eastern fringe have failed to deter a flood of customers from queueing along the Burwood Highway as it opened for the first time on Monday.
About 80 protesters lined both sides of the highway outside the restaurant at Tecoma, at the foot of the Dandenongs. Its opening followed a heated battle over whether the fast food giant should be allowed to open in the Yarra Ranges town.
As the protesters waved banners and chanted “No maccas, no Tecoma” and “We don't want your French fries”, police and security guards managed the flow of customers entering the store shortly as it opened about 11am.
Licensee James Currie said he was excited to give 100 new employees the same opportunity he was afforded when he started working for McDonald's 39 years ago.Fan art of Lin-Manuel Miranda and Patrick Rothfuss.
When Lin-Manuel Miranda first reached out to fantasy scribe Patrick Rothfuss to tell him he liked his work, the author had never heard of the composer. (“My friends were like, ‘Holy shit, holy shit, holy shit!’” Rothfuss told me in a recent interview. “But I live in the opposite of New York. I live in small-town Wisconsin.”) These days, on stages at Comic Cons, Rothfuss likes to describe Miranda as “my new best friend.” The two are working together to adapt his beloved fantasy trilogy, The Kingkiller Chronicles, into a series of movies, and their affection for one another is well-documented. When Rothfuss announced the news on Twitter last year, he confessed that he didn’t quite know how to tell the world: “I might be too excited to play this elegant, Lin. I’m too much of a geek for you.”
I have no idea to do this.
How on earth do I just *mention* I'm working with @Lin_Manuel on adapting Kingkiller?https://t.co/7TPJGvoMkb — Pat Rothfuss (@PatrickRothfuss) November 29, 2016
In addition to the movies, Miranda is also executive-producing a Showtime series based on The Kingkiller Chronicles that will tell an origin story of sorts, set in the generation before the first book. Kvothe, the roguish magician at the center of series, is a renowned musician, from a family of traveling troupers. Miranda will write the music for both the show and the films, which are already being hailed as the next Game of Thrones. Recently, I caught up with Miranda to discuss his collaboration with Rothfuss, the fantasy author’s “intoxicating” presence, and why the project both terrifies and thrills him.
How would you describe Pat?
I would describe him as a for-real bard. That’s for all you Dungeons and Dragons fans out there. He’s just a dyed-in-the-wool storyteller. You feel that in his books, you feel that in his joy of telling stories. The structure of [the first book in the series] The Name of the Wind is almost like this Russian nesting doll — within the story, within the story, here’s another character telling another story. He loves telling stories. That’s true both in person when you hang out with him and it’s also true in his writing. And that’s intoxicating.
Related Stories Patrick Rothfuss Is About to Be Fantasy’s Next Superstar
It’s interesting you mention the structure, because he told me about how he has problems with structure and plot. What do you make of that?
I don’t know. I think fans of good writing just like The Name of the Wind. I had not read a lot of fantasy books at that point, but I read the first sentence and I just, I was very drawn in. I very rarely reread books, but I reread those books several times just to luxuriate in reading them and spending time in that world and with those characters.
What’s it like collaborating with him?
It’s a lot of fun. We were mutual fans; he came to see Hamilton and we struck up a friendship. And he texted me to pick my brain because he was understandably very skittish about the rights to his books. He said, “I want to tell you who I’m talking to and what’s going on,” and I acted as his shrink for a 40-minute conversation. I was like, “Well, listen, I have exactly a fraction more experience in Hollywood than you do, which is really not very much at all, but I do know what it’s like to sign over rights and not know what’s going on and I would hate for that to happen, so keep me in the loop. Because I could just wear a hat as the chairman of the Don’t Fuck It Up Committee.” Because I’m a fan of those books, and I want to see an adaptation that has the same love and care as his books do. So that’s sort of how I fell in the snowball as it rolled down the hill.
We’re working with Lionsgate, and we’ve had a wonderful experience with them so far. Everyone’s really responsive to making sure he feels like we’re going in the right direction. And I look to him for that. That’s really my only job. At some point, I’ll hopefully get to write the music for the thing, which is exciting for me. And when it was announced it was sort of like, no pressure! But these are described as the greatest songs ever written, and every reader has imagined their version of Kvothe playing the lute until his fingers break all the strings. Or when he’s playing so beautifully at the Eolian that everyone in the room is weeping. It’s a daunting task to actually put notes to that, but one of the things that drew me to those books is how beautifully Pat writes about music and the way it speaks to us and the way it feeds us in the absence of actual nourishment. That was what grabbed me most powerfully about his stories, and so I’m terrified to help make that happen — but that’s what you’re supposed to run towards. Run towards the things that terrify you. So I’m excited to try to make that music a reality whenever these things make their way to a screen, big or small.
Music is so fundamental to the plot of the books. One of the most important things that happens in in the story — the murder of Kvothe’s parents – happens as a result of a song.
Yeah, our kid is a theater kid! [Kvothe grew up] among traveling troupers. I obviously related to that. Kvothe’s parents are killed because they tell the wrong story. And even throughout the two books we’ve been lucky enough to read, we don’t know if this thing is a tragedy or triumphant. We don’t know how the story is going to end, and that’s also the part of this that’s so exciting. It could really go either way. We could be reading the fantasy equivalent of King Lear, or we could be reading some triumphant story, and we don’t know. We’re two books into the three books set, and we still have no idea.
Is there something nerve-racking about beginning work on this epic adaptation without an ending? [Editor’s note: The third book in the series has yet to be released.]
Yeah! [Laughs.] It’s all nerve-racking. I mean, I don’t understand people who try to write the same thing over and over again. That doesn’t interest me. It’s ironic for me to say, given that I performed the same words every night for a year, but there’s something about writing — you want to go in new directions, you want to go places you haven’t been before. So it’s exciting to jump in, letting Pat lead the way, not knowing if we’re going to come out on the other side all right.
Do you know how it ends?
Hell no! Pat guards this secret. I’ve talked to Pat for hours about these books and the stories in them, and I don’t know how it’s going to end. He’s very good at talking about it in a way that leaves it open.
I know you’ve said “The Story of Tonight” from Hamilton was partly influenced by a passage in The Name of the Wind, but are there other ways you’ve drawn inspiration from the books?
I’m glad you noticed that passage. That’s exactly what I was chasing. The melody I used for “The Story of Tonight” is a melody I wrote when I was 16, 17 years old. I wanted it — even if it was just for me — to feel like youthful idealism. And that was a melody I wrote for a group of friends that used to sing together – it was a doo-wop group – and I’d write songs for us to sing. So I stole that melody from myself, who was way more idealistic than the present-day me, because I wanted it to have that feel. The other thing I think fans of Hamilton and Pat’s book see in common is that Kvothe is brilliant, but he also fucks up a lot. We’re not deifying either of these guys. Pat shows us all of Kvothe’s faults. He accomplishes great things and he also messes up great things, and it comes from the same place. He shares that with my version of Hamilton, who believes he can write his way out of anything, and he really can’t. It’s this sort of brilliance and impatience with this bedrock of insecurity underneath that Hamilton and Kvothe both share.
How about Moana? Pat told me the story of going to the screening with you.
Oh yeah – spoilers for Moana, by the way. When Moana goes towards Te Fiti and she says, “I know your name!” – in Pat’s books, when you know the true name of a thing, you have mastery over it. So there is that little bit of Pat Rothfuss’s Name of the Wind in one line of Moana, in the confrontation of Moana and this enormous nature spirit. Because the second she connects these dots she goes — “I know who you are,” and in knowing who she is, she’s able to actually connect with the nature spirit and save the world.
Have you started playing around with the music for any of the songs yet?
Last weekend, just fucking around, I did write some music for the Lady Lackless tune, the one that young Kvothe gets caught singing. But I really just wrote the song because I was rereading the book, a melody came to mind, and I recorded a dirty little voice memo and sent it to Pat. That may not be what we use at all, but I wanted to write something super singsongy and it just popped into my head. It’s really singsongy, something that will get stuck in your head easily. Because that’s also a power as described in Pat’s book — he writes “Jackass Jackass” and no one can stop singing it. Pat was delighted by the little sketch I made, but who knows if it will make the final version. That was one I did just messing around on a Sunday afternoon.
Some people are saying the movies and show are going to be the next Game of Thrones, but really the books are so different. I’m wondering, when you think about these adaptations, if there’s anything in movies or TV that you would draw inspiration from?
I’ll tell you what it does share with Game of Thrones. It shares an excellence in the caliber of writing and in the source material. One, George R.R. Martin’s books are so incredibly written that you are able to keep up with legions of characters. And two, that writing is so good that people who wouldn’t ordinarily be drawn to the fantasy genre are just drawn in because they’re compelled by the story. I think that’s true of both Game of Thrones and Name of the Wind. A lot of my friends who like Name of the Wind, that’s not like the 50th book they’ve read in the fantasy genre. It’s like a gateway drug to the fantasy genre. So I think they share that. But of course, they couldn’t be more different. Game of Thrones follows many characters over many years. Whereas Name of the Wind is Kvothe, and it’s the stories inside the stories of this guy, and then the satellite of stories around that, but he’s the central character. So structurally, they’re very different. But they’re stories so well-told that you don’t have to have read your Tolkien or Robert Jordan, you don’t have to be into the genre to enjoy them. You can just enjoy them on their own terms, as a great story in a great world.
When we spoke, Pat talked about the pressure of fame, and the total shift from where he was before the books came out to becoming famous. Obviously that’s going to become a lot more intense when these movies and TV shows come out. I’m curious if you’ve spoken about that all?
A little bit. It’s interesting because I wrote Hamilton, and then it was done. There’s no Hamilton Part 2, no third book to see how Hamilton turns out. So he’s got a very different and very particular-to-writers fame that he gets from his readers.
I remember when George R.R. Martin came to see Hamilton and — I take pictures with the fancy folks who come to the show — I tweeted the picture of him. And the vitriol he got! “Oh my god, finish the books, what are you doing seeing the play.” It was truly vicious. More vicious than for politicians who come to see the show were the George Martin “finish the book” wolverines. And Pat has his version of that. He’s pretty good at tuning that out and staying focused on what he’s doing. But that’s a thing I’ve never had to deal with.
Everything is a distraction from the work. The thing I always say, and I’ve said this to Pat, and I say it to myself, is, when you’re lucky enough to have success with a thing you’ve made, your road forward is this balance of the things inside you that you’ve always wanted to make, that are still there — they didn’t go away because your book sold well or your play did well, you still have those stories that you’ve been thinking about, and honoring those and getting them out of your system and into the world — and then the opportunities that come up. The opportunities you’d kick yourself if you didn’t say yes to. Pat and I and everyone who’s had a little success is balancing those two things all the time.
I think Pat’s found ways to do a lot of good with his Worldbuilders initiative, and he’s been able to leverage his success and his fame to do a lot of good for a lot of people, which is fantastic. And he does stuff for fun — he tells stories at Comic Con and he plays with Paul and Storm and fantasy-genre freestyles onstage, and then there is the thing inside him, which is the rest of the story, which he continues to find time to devote to and finish. And you’ve got no shortage of people heckling him to finish. He’s going through his version of his balance, I’ve got my version of that balance. That’s the new challenge, once you have a bit of success at a thing. It’s continuing to do what you’ve always done, but also be real about the world in which you find yourself in and the opportunities that surround you.
This interview has been edited and condensed.Cheikhmous Ali pushes a box of ballpoint pens across the table towards his friend and countryman Ahmad. The stout Syrian laughs aloud as he tucks one of the pens into his shirt pocket. "You think it'll work?" asks Ahmad.
Ali nods. "And how," he says. The archeologist is proud of his plan: he has inserted mini digital cameras into the pens. "The quality isn't great, but it serves our purposes," he says.
It's a hot summer's day and the two men are sitting on the terrace of a restaurant on the first floor of a department store in Gaziantep, in southern Turkey. Below them is an electrical goods retailer and a busy four-lane street. The Syrian civil war is raging some 60 kilometers away.
In a few days' time, Ahmad, armed with a pen set worthy of James Bond, will set off to Idlib in the northwest of the country. "A normal camera would be too risky," explains Ali. He recently bought the gadget in a store in Strasbourg, France, his adopted home.
These days, filming and taking photographs arouses immediate suspicion in Syria, not only among the soldiers in the pro-government Syrian army but also among the rebels.
Ahmad is on a potentially deadly mission -- he risks being kidnapped on suspicion of spying, tortured and possibly even executed. Even so, he is determined to document for Ali what is currently happening in Syria's venerable mosques and crusader castles, as well as its museums filled with historical treasures dating back to the Byzantine and Roman empires. He also intends to film the smuggling underway in the war-torn nation.
World Heritage in Danger
But 35-year-old Ali is no Indiana Jones. He relies on people like Ahmad for his information and needs their help if he wants to begin devising rescue plans for imperiled ancient sites, mosques and museums and to compile an archive that will one day, once the conflict is over, make restoration work easier.
When the war broke out, he founded an organization called the Association for the Protection of Syrian Archaeology (APSA). These days, it employs around 24 journalists, like Ahmad, and researchers. Some of them still live in Syria, some in France, and others shuttle back and forth between Syria and Turkey. Gaziantep is where they meet and coordinate.
Every historical site pulverized by a bomb, every mosaic shattered, chips away at Syria's history and identity. "We won't be able to withstand this as well," says Ali, who left Syria in 2003 to write a PhD thesis on architectural depictions in lapidary art in the ancient Near East at the Université de Strasbourg.
He hasn't dared return home since 2011, when protests against President Bashar al-Assad first erupted.
The Syrian civil war has already claimed more than 160,000 lives. Cities such as Homs and Aleppo have been reduced to apocalyptic landscapes. While nearly 3 million people wait for a better life in Lebanese, Turkish and Jordanian refugee camps, the towns and villages they come from are going to ruin. It's a loss not only for the Syrian people but also for archeologists and historians all over the world.
The region is often described as the cradle of civilization. In Tell Brak and Uruk in northern Mesopotamia, archeologists found the remains of one of civilization's oldest settlements, some of which date back to 8,000 BC.
For now it is unclear what sort of condition Syria's various archeological treasures are in. All of the country's six UNESCO world heritage sites -- such as the 12th century Crac des Chevaliers, the site of Palmyra and the ancient city of Aleppo -- are now included on the list of endangered world heritage.
Lost Sites
On the day of his meeting with Ahmad, Cheikhmous Ali winds his way through the bazaar in Gaziantep, a rucksack slung over his shoulder like a school kid. Copper pans are piled up in front of the stores; men's voices mingle with children's babble and the clattering of blacksmith's hammers on metal.
"This pales in comparison to Aleppo," says Ali. "The bazaar there was hundreds of years older, more beautiful and also more significant." Today, all that is left of the historic souk is a pile of rubble.
The market stores, along with their ornate wooden doors, went up in flames in 2012 during fighting between the Syrian army and rebels. The destruction reached as far as the covered market's stone roof. Aleppo is still on the frontline of fighting.
"My son will never have the chance to see Syria the way I saw it," says Ali. He and his French wife had a baby a few months ago.
Ali grew up in a small town in Syria some 40 kilometers (25 miles) from the border to Turkey. Two years ago, he drove as close to it as he could get. "I could even see the lights of my town from the border," he recalls. "I wept." Even so, he chose not to go back. "It's too dangerous," he says.
Dozens of excavation sites have been abandoned and left exposed to the ravages of the sun in the northern Levant. Including Tell Brak. 40 meters (130 feet) high and one kilometer long, this ancient settlement mound is not far from the village where Ali grew up. Dating back 6,000 years, Tell Brak was one of the world's first cities.
"I grew up with so much unique history on my doorstep," remarks Ali. "I was never going to be anything other than an archeologist."
Artifacts for Arms
A team of British archeologists were working in Tell Brak until the outbreak of the civil war, but according to the Syrian authorities, the camp was looted long ago, along with the tools and ceramics that were being kept there. The experts -- who were dusting off ancient artifacts and restoring them with paintbrushes -- have been replaced by voracious armed bandits.
The remains of this ancient site were first discovered by the British archaeologist Max Mallowan. He was in charge of the initial excavations that began in 1937, aided and abetted by his wife, the mystery writer Agatha Christie, who would help clean up the finds and then photograph them. The couple was responsible for discovering the famous "eye idol" figurines in the foundations of a temple, believed to be over 5,000 years old.
For years, these sculptures -- with their funny little bell-shaped bodies and cylindrical necks topped with two perforated circles -- were among the highlights of the National Museum in Aleppo. These days, no one knows for sure how many of them are still there. The International Council of Museums (ICOM) has officially added them to its Emergency Red List of Syrian cultural objects that are in danger of being damaged, looted and illicitly trafficked, along with reliefs from Palmyra, a bronze lamp from the Damascus region and gold jewelry from Aleppo.
Museum experts hope that the Red List will help police in Turkey, Jordan and Lebanon identify looted art which smugglers are seeking to carry over the borders.
Many of the objects being flogged by refugees and black marketeers end up in the hands of traders in Gaziantep Urfa and Mardin, who in turn sell them on to Europe and the US.
"The smugglers' motivations vary," Ali points out. Some of them are forced into it by desperation because smuggling is the only way they can afford to eat. Others are driven by greed. Often, the proceeds -- and some of these antiques are worth hundreds of thousands of euros -- are immediately used to acquire weapons and munitions. The looting, dealing and smuggling of antiquities from Syria helps the ISIS jihadists keep their coffers topped up.
Whenever Turkish police succeed in seizing smuggled cultural heritage, it generally ends up in secure storage. Turkey is cooperating closely with the Syrian opposition, Assad's enemies, and only plans to return the antiquities to Syria once the civil war is over.
Archeology Gets Political
The exiled oppositionist interim government has set up headquarters in a whitewashed house in Gaziantep. Ali is a regular visitor to the second floor, where he meets with the culture minister to discuss, for example, the authenticity of smuggled goods.
Earlier this year, the Turkish government confiscated yet another hoard of Syrian antiquities. A smuggler had attempted to transport over 300 ancient objects across the border near Mardin. The seized artifacts are now being kept in storage in a museum in the Turkish city, much to the outrage of the Assad regime, which is demanding their return.
In Syria these days, archeology and politics are inextricably linked.
Countries such as Lebanon go along with the demands of the pro-Assad camp. Last summer, the Lebanese Directorate General of Antiquities (DGA) handed over 18 mosaics uncovered during a routine border control to the Syrian authorities. Guards had stopped and searched a tourist bus at customs and found the more or less well-preserved works of art, one of which depicted scenes from Homer's Odyssey. According to experts, they most probably came from northern Syria.
The Lebanese daily newspaper al-Akhbar reported that the smugglers were professionals who had hidden the mosaics in the |
Bush, a sure sign of concern that he could beat her in 2016. “He’s got his own party to run in, and I will be very impressed if he makes it through that primary system,” Paul Begala, a longtime adviser to Clinton and her husband, said after Bush announced this week that he is “actively exploring” a presidential run. Make no mistake. Clinton’s team and other Democrats already are trying to figure out how to take on Bush, and there’s no early consensus. They could portray him as a shadow of his brother, President George W. Bush, as a moderate who can’t make it through his own party’s primary, or as a candidate who is too conservative to win a general election. A Bush-centric e-mail that EMILY’s List sent to its donors on Wednesday took the latter approach. “Jeb Bush made it official. He’s exploring a run for president,” reads the graphic embedded in the fundraising pitch from the group that supports women candidates who back abortion rights. “As governor, he called himself the ‘most pro-life governor in modern times.’...Imagine what he’d do as president.” A button at the bottom of the e-mail says “Help us get ready to hold Jeb Bush accountable. Donate.” Stephanie Schriock, the president of EMILY’s list, is often mentioned as a possible campaign manager for the former First Lady. Jess McIntosh, a spokeswoman for the group, sought to portray Bush as too conservative for the American electorate. ‘Their Side’ “Jeb Bush is going to spend a long time reminding everyone how conservative he is on these issues,” she said. “Voters are going to see that he’s not on their side.” Yet at the same time, the Democratic super-PAC American Bridge released a Web video replete with clips of Republican commentators and news reporters saying Bush will struggle to win over conservatives. The group counts high-profile Clinton donors among its benefactors. Jaime Harrison, the chairman of the South Carolina Democratic Party, said that if Bush runs and wins the Republican nomination, he’ll struggle to galvanize the conservative base because he’s endorsed the Common Core education standards reviled by many in the Republican Party and speaks warmly of undocumented immigrants. Harrison said that while it’s important to appeal to independent voters, a modern presidential campaign has to energize its party’s grassroots to win. Clinton spokesman Nick Merrill declined to comment on Bush, following her team’s protocol when it comes to discussing potential 2016 rivals. ‘Too Conservative’ Candidates are always trying to define their rivals for the voting public, and Democrats often pick the tag “too conservative” for Republicans. President Barack Obama’s aides believed they had a choice in running against Mitt Romney in 2012, between calling him a flip-flopper or a far-right conservative. It was former President Bill Clinton who said the flip-flop tag wouldn’t stick. Romney’s the other Republican, besides George W. Bush, to whom Democrats would like to compare Jeb Bush. Democrats were able to use Romney’s wealth, and the ways in which he attained it, to argue that he was out of touch with the needs of most voters. And the one anti-Bush theme that is a common refrain among Clinton-aligned groups and longtime advisers is that his business ventures will hurt him. He started two private equity funds this year, including one, BH Global Aviation, that’s incorporated in the U.K. and Wales, allowing foreign investors to avoid taxation in the U.S. ‘Benedict Arnolds’ “He would be the first president who organized overseas tax havens for billionaire Benedict Arnolds,” Begala said. Bush will give up his role as a senior adviser at Barclays Plc (BARC), according to a person familiar with the matter who asked not to be identified because they were not authorized to speak publicly. Whatever approach Democrats choose, it’s clear they’re wary of Bush. One veteran Clinton adviser said that he is probably the strongest Republican nominee, citing his moderate positions on education and immigration that don’t sit well with conservatives but hit home with independent voters. The adviser, who spoke on the condition of anonymity, said Bush would benefit in a general election if he can survive the primary without pandering to the Republican base on those issues -- both because his positions appeal outside the Republican Party and because it would show him to be a candidate of conviction. Bush Fatigue? “As I look at the Republican side, he’s an adult in the room that commands respect and the kind of conservative that Wall Street and other Republican establishment types can get behind,” said Democratic strategist Rodell Mollineau. “The one downside is his last name’s Bush and there’s still fatigue in this country.” Like Mollineau, Begala acknowledged Bush could be a strong candidate, if he makes it to a general election. “Since he’s likely to run as a Republican, I think it’s more of a question for potential Republican candidates than potential Democratic candidates,” he said. “The guy is formidable. He’s impressive.” If some Democrats try to sound more blase, it’s rooted in other reasons. Clinton’s political allies don’t want to feed the Bush-Clinton throwback hype that has tantalized cable-news producers. The battle of the dynasties talk isn’t helpful to her if she ends up winning the Democratic nomination and facing someone not named Bush. And there’s no reason to elevate a potential heavyweight. ‘Act of Love’ Part of the challenge for Democrats is that Jeb Bush himself has staked out varying positions on issues, such as illegal immigration. In April, he described families that decided to come to the U.S. as breaking the law. “But it’s not a felony,” he said. “It’s an act of love.” By last month, he moved closer to his fellow Republican hopefuls when he criticized President Barack Obama for using executive powers to protect as many as 5 million undocumented immigrants from being deported. And on Wednesday, he described Obama’s decision to begin normalizing relations with Cuba after a five-decade embargo a “foreign policy misstep.” His recent moves toward a run, including a forthcoming e-book on his years as governor and yesterday’s Facebook announcement about his decision-making process, have been greeted warmly by veteran Republican Party political operatives and coolly by a younger generation that identifies more closely with the Tea Party. Paul, Cruz Kentucky Senator Rand Paul and Texas Senator Ted Cruz are leaders among the latter set and could be part of a large field of Republican candidates vying for conservative votes. For the first time in decades, there could be multiple candidates fighting for the middle-of-the-road mantle in the Republican primary, including Governor Chris Christie of New Jersey. Mike Duncan, a former chairman of the Republican National Committee, said the expansion of the Republican field is a sign of strength. “Historically, we have not had as level a playing field with as many entrants in a long time,” Duncan said. “This is relatively new territory for us.” Duncan pegged 1964 as the last time the Republican Party offered such a strong set of contenders across the ideological spectrum. That year, the party nominated Barry Goldwater, who won the support of a young Hillary Rodham Clinton but lost the election to President Lyndon Johnson. His opponents included New York governor and future vice president Nelson Rockefeller, Governor James Rhodes of Ohio, UN Ambassador Henry Cabot Lodge Jr., and former Governor Harold Stassen of Minnesota. *The Hill blog: Ballot Box: “Clinton spokesman: '16 campaign would be 'different' than '08” <http://thehill.com/blogs/ballot-box/227575-clinton-spokesman-16-campaign-would-be-different-than-08>* By Peter Sullivan December 18, 2014, 2:08 p.m. EST A Hillary Clinton spokesman says that if the former secretary of State launches a presidential bid, her campaign will be different than it was in 2008, when many criticized the way it was run. “If she runs, it will be different,” Clinton spokesman Nick Merrill told The New York Times. Clinton's 2008 campaign, which saw Barack Obama come from behind to beat her in a drawn out primary battle, was filled with staffing problems. Clinton fired her campaign manager, Patti Solis Doyle, and chief strategist Mark Penn was widely blamed for the campaign's failed course. The Times reports that Clinton is seeking out a wider range of opinions as she attends parties and events this year. The talk about a new campaign strategy comes as the The Washington Post reported earlier this month that Clinton is involved in talks about how to handle the transition from the campaign-in-waiting and whether to set up an exploratory committee before announcing. That report suggested the formal announcement would come in the spring. At events this year, Clinton has been speaking out on women's rights issues such as paid leave and equal pay, and repeatedly mentioning being a new grandmother. Still, there are doubts about whether Clinton is plotting the right course this time around. "What happened in 2008 was that Hillary’s candidacy got out in front of any rationale for it, and the danger is that that’s happening again," David Axelrod, the former Obama adviser who helped defeat Clinton in 2008, said earlier this week on MSNBC's "Morning Joe." Clinton now has a range of former Obama staffers on her side. Obama's 2012 campaign manager Jim Messina is co-chairman of the pro-Clinton super-PAC Priorities USA Action, and top Obama campaign aides Jeremy Bird and Mitch Stewart have joined the group Ready for Hillary. *Wall Street Journal: “Amid Warren’s Rise, a Democratic Split Becomes Apparent” <http://www.wsj.com/articles/amid-warrens-rise-a-democratic-split-becomes-apparent-1418936408>* By Peter Nicholas December 18, 2014, 4:00 p.m. EST [Subtitle:] Liberals Embrace Senator’s Populist Themes, While Moderates Prefer a Message With Broader Appeal Democrats looking for a way forward after their election losses this year have wound up in a debate over how best to frame the party’s economic message, with the most liberal members rallying behind Sen. Elizabeth Warren (D., Mass.) and her calls for a focus on income inequality. Ms. Warren had gained new prominence on the national stage—and drawn increasing calls for her to run for the White House—with her attempt last week to scuttle a compromise budget bill because of concessions to Wall Street, as well as her opposition to President Barack Obama ’s choice for a top Treasury post due to his Wall Street ties. Those moves have reinforced Ms. Warren’s long-standing message that Democrats should fight to reduce corporate influence and the share of wealth controlled by the nation’s richest households. Other Democrats say Ms. Warren’s message will lead only to more electoral defeats, as many voters will reject the focus on income inequality and instead want policies aimed at broad economic growth. While all Democrats say they want to foster a growing economy, the two wings of the party are at odds over which points should be most central to their message. “In a world where there are more self-described conservatives than there are self-described liberals, is having a campaign that only tries to win by appealing to your base the right strategy?’’ asked Jack Markell, the Democratic governor of Delaware. “I would argue it’s not.” Mr. Markell, who hasn’t yet endorsed a candidate for the 2016 election, said the next Democratic nominee has to reach independents and “some Republicans, as well. In my mind, an agenda around [economic] growth is the most likely message to do that.” At the same time, Ms. Warren’s populist message has made her a focal point of a vocal wing within the party. The liberal advocacy group MoveOn.org hosted an event in Iowa on Wednesday night aimed at showcasing support for Ms. Warren in the state that holds the nation’s first presidential contest. MoveOn also plans to spend $1 million on its “Draft Warren” effort and is hiring staff in Iowa, New Hampshire and possibly other states that hold early primaries. So far, Ms. Warren has said only that she is backing former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton, telling National Public Radio earlier this week, “I am not running for president.” Yet in sticking to the present tense, as NPR’s Steve Inskeep pointed out, she suggested she hasn’t entirely ruled it out. One question hanging over the party is what economic policy Mrs. Clinton would propose should she run for president, and whether she would cast herself in Mrs. Warren’s populist mode or adopt a more centrist, business-friendly stance. Much of Mrs. Clinton’s career suggests she would take the latter course. For years, the liberal and moderate strands of the party largely minimized differences and kept a united front amid Republican resistance to President Barack Obama’s agenda. But the uneasy alliance has become strained after the midterm elections, in which the party suffered deep losses. A sign of the split is stepped-up calls for Ms. Warren to jump in the presidential race. Some 300 lower-level former Obama campaign aides are lining up behind the Massachusetts senator, signing a recent letter describing her as someone who would “take on the Wall Street banks and special interests” and tackle “rising inequality,” which they called the “challenge of our times.” A liberal advocacy group called Democracy for America is putting $250,000 into the effort to draft Ms. Warren. Yet the group’s founder, former Vermont Gov. Howard Dean, has endorsed Mrs. Clinton. Ms. Warren gained fresh attention in recent weeks. She played a leading role in opposing Mr. Obama’s choice for a top Treasury post, Antonio Weiss, due to his Wall Street ties, and also mounted an unsuccessful campaign in the Senate to scuttle a provision in a $1.1 trillion spending bill that will loosen parts of the Dodd-Frank financial regulation law. In her attempt to do away with the provision, she employed the sort of language that leaves liberals enthralled and centrists unnerved. Taking aim at Citigroup Inc., a recipient of taxpayer-financed bailout money during the financial crisis, Ms. Warren said in a speech on the Senate floor: “Washington already works really well for the billionaires and the big corporations and the lawyers and the lobbyists.…What about the families who are living paycheck to paycheck and saw their tax dollars go to bail out Citi just six years ago?” *Bloomberg: “Is the Draft Warren Campaign a Piece of Progressive Performance Art?” <http://www.bloomberg.com/politics/features/2014-12-18/is-the-draft-warren-campaign-a-piece-of-progressive-performance-art>* By David Weigel December 18, 2014, 4:05 p.m. EST [Subtitle:] The grassroots may not want to draft her, and she may not want to be drafted—but other than that, what a splendid movement. DES MOINES, Iowa—The two women stood under a Kinko’s worth of merchandise promoting Massachusetts Senator Elizabeth Warren, and they compared their ardors. “I listened to her and I thought, ‘She’s my hero,’” said Lorna Hall, 51. “Oh my gosh.” “I saw her speak for Bruce Braley,” said O’Leary, 53, referring to the Democrats’ amazing self-destructing 2014 candidate for U.S. Senate. “I said to myself, ‘She should run for president.’ And then I turned around, and there was this girl with a sign, saying ‘Draft Warren.’” It was Wednesday evening in Des Moines, and Hall and O’Leary had beaten the rush to find prime standing room at the Run Warren Run kickoff at Java Joe’s, a café that typically hosts NBC News and MSNBC during campaign seasons. The “girl” who had informed O’Leary of the draft campaign was there, too–Erica Sagrans, an Obama campaign veteran who had founded Ready for Warren. Sagrans’s group was technically independent of the Wednesday meeting, organized by MoveOn.org, but she was co-sponsoring it. MoveOn was collecting its own signatures from possible volunteers; she was doing the same, snapping photos with the people wearing plastic hats branded with a Warren campaign logo, some of the “hundreds” left over from her group’s buzzy summer launch. This party was even buzzier, with reporters from the New York Times and the Wall Street Journal braving a Des Moines December to meet a hundred or so Democratic activists. Copies of the full-page ad that MoveOn put in the Des Moines Register were splayed across tables. A posterboard quickly filled up with reasons why people backed Warren. I don’t want corporations buying our politicians. * She has common sense!* * Hillary doesn’t represent me!* * I’m sick of the male oligarchy.* Warren’s adherents were so busy talking that they hardly touched the free cookies and coffee near the entrance of the room. O’Leary had caucused for Barack Obama six years earlier; Hall had caucused for a pre-scandal, pre-trial John Edwards. Neither really resented or opposed Hillary Cinton. “I happen to agree with her politics,” said O’Leary. “I just think we need fresh blood. We don’t need another Clinton. We don’t need another Bush.” The progressive organizers, who had flown in from New York and Chicago, were beaming at what they’d created. “Draft Warren,” in all its forms, is not a campaign with a candidate so much as an exercise in culture-jamming. It’s something for progressives to do. O’Leary, for example, said she was “done with politics” until being enticed to spend an evening with fellow Warrenophiles. Shortly after 5:30, they all heard the MoveOn campaign’s national field organizer Victoria Kaplan tell them how to summon Warren into the race. “Iowans have the ability to introduce, to the rest of the country, candidates who inspire us to be more active citizens, to fight for ourselves, and to fight for the middle class,” she said. “I invite all of you to take out your phones, to tweet, to take photos, with the hashtag RunWarrenRun. That’s #RunWarrenRun.” Tweets sent, mission accomplished–whatever the mission might be. Des Moines’s Polk County had offered fertile soil for Barack Obama’s 2008 campaign against Hillary Clinton. Obama won 39 percent of the vote from the sort of voters who crowded Java Joe’s, 12 points ahead of Clinton, who came in third in the county (and in the state overall). When Kaplan asked what the Warren campaign achieved, one voice cried out “to do it again,” and no one mistook what that meant. But Java Joe’s had seen bigger crowds. Ready for Hillary, the facsimile campaign created by supporters of the heavy favorite to “freeze” the field, had held bigger events in Iowa. Vermont Senator Bernie Sanders, who had just buzzed through Iowa, drew more than twice as many people to a lecture in Ames as showed up to the Draft Warren party. True, had Warren herself parachuted in, she could packed every café and bar on Fourth Street. She was not parachuting in. “I don’t understand this alleged Draft Warren movement,” said Brad Anderson, the Democrats’ narrowly unsuccessful candidate for Iowa secretary of state. In 2004 he’d organized for John Edwards; in 2012 he was President Obama’s state director. “I view this 'Draft Warren' movement as something that is much more D.C. and media driven than Iowa grassroots driven,” said Anderson. “Most people are enthusiastic about the options that we have–and she’s not running! If you look at Hillary’s messaging, and her positions on issues, they really aren’t different from Elizabeth Warren’s.” The “options” consist of Clinton, Sanders, Maryland Governor Martin O’Malley, and former Virginia Senator Jim Webb. (Few Iowans expect Vice President Joe Biden to run if Clinton does.) Democrats here expect some kind of contested caucus. Few see the makings of a dogfight like 2004 or 2008. Clinton, whose third-place finish in Iowa led to Obama’s eventual nomination, leads the field handily in most polls. The difficulty of breaking that was brought out when Pam Jochum, the president of the Iowa state senate–still Democratic, after 2014–gave a speech to the crowd. It was the only address from any elected official, and it fell wide of a Warren endorsement. “I have no doubt in my mind that someone like Elizabeth Warren is a woman who is articulate, she is brilliant, and she is courageous,” Jochum said. “And this is a moment in history when we need elected officials who have courage. This is our chance to show America what it's like to have a marketplace of ideas, to have Elizabeth Warren or anyone else who might jump into this race articulate a vision for America.” When Jochum left the stage, reporters followed to ask why she’d quasi-stumped for Warren. Did she think Warren was more in touch with Democrats than Hillary Clinton? “I don’t know if I’m in a position to say whether that’s true or false right now,” she said. “Whoever comes out of that primary season ends up being a much stronger general election candidate.” It fell short of her 2007 Obama endorsement, when she compared the future president to Robert F. Kennedy. This was because it wasn’t an endorsement. Back in the café, activists watched a short promotional video–ending with Warren giving a longish, Sopranos-finale kind of pause to a 2016 question–and watched as the screen was replaced by MoveOn activists and locals. They told their personal stories as MoveOn’s executive director, Ilya Sheyman, roamed the stage. Only when he opened the even to questions was there a scintilla of static. “I’m asking this because we need to get this stuff done early on,” said Craig Maltby, a 55-year old communications adviser, standing near the exit. “I hear Senator Warren has a very significant net worth. Can you tell us how that net worth was created? And do we know that she has not taken PAC money from Wall Street firms?” Sheyman took a second to gather his thoughts, which formed into the standard Warren pitch. “So, Senator Warren, as folks know, never intended to run for public office, right?” he said. “Before serving in the Senate, she was a lecturer at Harvard. She’d been a lawyer, previously.” When he finished with the Warren biography, he reassured Maltby that “her wealth is a matter of public information. Everyone in the Senate reports that.” Arms folded, Maltby sounded unimpressed. “That’s a good non-answer,” he grumbled. “Do we have any information about her PAC contributors?” “Yeah, it’s all online,” said Sheyman. “Happy to talk it through with you. But in terms of who she’s fighting for…” “That all goes up six months down the road if we find out that Goldman Sachs was contributing to her political fortunes,” snarked Maltby. “Do your own research!” snapped a woman on the other side of the coffee carafe. “The campaign should know,” said Maltby. “It should be an easy question to answer.” “Go to the website,” said an older man closer to Maltby. As Sheyman kept talking–“Elizabeth Warren won a race against Scott Brown, a Wall Street favorite”–Maltby ducked out. He informed me that he was most excited about Jim Webb’s campaign, and that Obama’s own support from Goldman Sachs did not hurt his 2008 campaign because he didn’t make the campaign about purity. Yet nobody else left early. For them, Warren could remain an ideal, unsullied by caucus campaign attacks or smears or questions. The people who stuck around were divided into four groups, for brainstorming sessions facilitated by MoveOn organizers or Sagrans. At a “visibility” breakout, the largely middle-aged activists started by thinking up letters to editors. A younger activist, joining the circle late, said that the best visibilities she’d seen were the “die-ins” that shamed police departments after the killing of Ferguson, Missouri teenager Michael Brown. No one knew where to take that. The winning idea, after a hurried discussion, was announced back on the main stage: Warren-drafters were encouraged to wear red, white, and blue colors to New Year's and Christmas parties, and start conversations about their would-be, mortal savior. “I saw the postcards being passed around your group,” said Kaplan, pointing to MoveOn-provided cards that left room for the name and address of potential Warren fans. “Maybe, bring a few of those to your New Year's party.” The work was going to continue long past New Year's, anyway. MoveOn would hold another launch event in New Hampshire. The people inspired at Java Joe’s would have house parties, if they could. This would not end just because Warren claimed (and claimed, and claimed) not to be running. “As long as there is enough time for her to get in the race and win–and she is uniquely positioned to do that later than other folks, by having a message, by having an infrastructure that raised $42 million in Massachusetts–as long as we think there’s ample time for her to build a winning campaign, we think there’s time to keep making the case to her,” said Sheyman. “Can it go through summer? Absolutely. Can it go later? Potentially. There’s plenty of time.” *MSNBC: “Keith Ellison: ‘I would love to see Elizabeth Warren’ run” <http://www.msnbc.com/msnbc/keith-ellison-i-would-love-see-elizabeth-warren-run>* By Alex Seitz-Wald December 18, 2014, 10:22 p.m. EST Democratic Rep. Keith Ellison, the chairman of the Congressional Progressive Caucus, said Thursday night that he hopes Sen. Elizabeth Warren runs for president in 2016. “I would love to see Elizabeth Warren in this race. I think it would be fantastic. I think that it would help the quality of the debate and she may win,” he said on a conference call with members of Democracy for America (DFA), a progressive group that is trying to draft Warren. “But even if she doesn’t, I think she’ll make Hillary Clinton a better candidate.” That’s the closest any major elected official has come to endorsing the Massachusetts Democrat, who has said repeatedly that she is not going to run for president. Ellison added that he feared Clinton, the presumed frontrunner for the nominee, “could just walk into the general [election] without having committed to some important real, real economic populism.” “So, I’m supportive of what [DFA] is doing, I’m supportive of what MoveOn is doing, and I think Elizabeth Warren is one of the great, bright lights of our time,” he added. MoveOn.org and DFA, which grew out of Howard Dean’s 2004 presidential campaign, officially kicked off their campaign to draft Warren Wednesday in Iowa, and have together committed $1.25 million to the effort. Earlier in the call, Ellison offered warning to moderate Democrats. “We also want to let our weak-kneed Democratic friends know that we’re watching, and if they’re standing with the corporatocracy and the big banks, we’ll find some other people who will stand with the people,” he said. In an interview a few months ago with the liberal AmericaBlog, Ellison called for pushing Democratic presidential candidates through activism. ” We will get the candidate we’re looking if we are in the streets and set forth an agenda they then need to adopt,” he said. “When politicians feel the heat, they tend to see the light.” Ellison endorsed Barack Obama in the 2008 Democratic presidential primary. DFA is now run by Dean’s brother Jim, and even though they’re supporting Warren, Howard Dean is backing Clinton. ”That’s just fine, not withstanding the enormous number of phone calls I’ve been getting from fam therapists offering their help,” Jim Dean said on the call. *National Journal: “Carly Fiorina Hiring for Presidential Campaign” <http://www.nationaljournal.com/politics/carly-fiorina-hiring-for-presidential-campaign-20141218>* By Tim Alberta December 18, 2014 [Subtitle:] Despite her improving political skills, the California businesswoman would be an underdog in a likely all-male GOP field. Carly Fiorina is laying the groundwork for what one ally says is an "imminent" presidential campaign—one that could launch as early as next month. The former Hewlett-Packard CEO, who raised her political profile with a failed run against Sen. Barbara Boxer of California in 2010, has frequently been mentioned as a long-shot contender to seek the Republican presidential nomination. The speculation is driven by equal parts novelty and activity: Fiorina, who paid several high-profile visits to early-nominating states in 2014, acknowledged that she would likely be the only woman in the GOP field. "Look, I think it would be great if we had female candidates—or candidate," Fiorina told National Journal earlier this year. Fiorina is now poised to become that candidate. According to three sources with direct knowledge of the situation, she has authorized members of her inner circle to seek out and interview candidates for two key positions on her presidential campaign: political director and communications director. Notably, the sources said, her associates are aiming to fill both positions with women. The search, sources say, is being spearheaded by Amy Noone Frederick, a Republican consultant who sits with Fiorina on the American Conservative Union Foundation's board of directors. One Republican operative was recently approached about a position with the Unlocking Potential Project, Fiorina's super PAC. The operative, who asked not to be named, said that in the course of the interview one of Fiorina's allies began gauging interest in a separate position "for a certain presidential candidate who is gearing up for a run." It's unclear if any hires have been made, and emails to officials with Fiorina's PAC were not returned. Still, people familiar with Fiorina's camp say the organizational outreach proves that she's serious about getting a campaign off the ground—and quickly. Former Florida Gov. Jeb Bush is already effectively in the race and consuming other contenders' oxygen. If Fiorina wants to jump in and make a media splash, she probably can't afford to wait much longer. "It appears that they want to move fast, which is smart," said Jason Cabel Roe, a Republican consultant in California. "Carly getting in as the 10th candidate is not nearly as interesting as Carly getting in as the first or second candidate." Meanwhile, as she seeks to make significant personnel moves, Fiorina has also maneuvered to promote herself in front of influential conservative audiences in the early part of next year—a key set of auditions that could very well coincide with the launch of a campaign. Fiorina, who chairs the ACU Foundation board, is said to have already secured a prime speaking slot at the ACU's 2015 Conservative Political Action Conference. That event will be held in the D.C. suburbs on the last weekend of February. But the bigger prize is one weekend earlier. Fiorina, sources say, has accepted a coveted invitation to deliver the keynote address to the Council for National Policy—home to many of the conservative movement's biggest donors—at its private gathering in southern California. "February's going to be a big month for her, with two signature events where she's going to have a big role," said one prominent conservative activist leader, who spoke on condition of anonymity because of his involvement with both the ACU and CNP. "One speech in front of movement leadership, then one speech in front of grassroots activists—those are going to be big moments for her." If her message stays consistent with appearances of late, Fiorina will hope to appeal to these audiences as a political outsider. But she is hardly without political connections. While serving as an adviser to Sen. John McCain's 2008 presidential campaign, Fiorina was named chairwoman of a Republican National Committee fundraising initiative. She parlayed that role into a speaking slot at that year's GOP convention, and had even generated some buzz as a dark-horse vice-presidential pick. Though she could not overcome California's liberal electorate in her 2010 Senate race, Fiorina showed significant improvement on the stump over the life of the campaign. Her 10-point loss did not tarnish her stature as a rising star among Republican women; in fact, her opportunities and exposure have steadily increased. She served as a vice chair of the National Republican Senatorial Committee in 2012. Her successful takeover of the ACU Foundation board last year was the clearest indication yet of her political chops—and ambition. That said, if and when Fiorina pulls the trigger on a presidential run, she will enter the contest a decided underdog. She enjoys little national name recognition, lacks a top-notch political team, and has never won a major race for public office. Not only did she lose by double digits in 2010, she left the campaign with a significant amount of debt, some of which remains unretired more than four years later. (This fact is not lost on Republicans who have examined her viability as a sleeper candidate.) But none of that may matter. Several people familiar with Fiorina's operation suspect that her ultimate goal is not winning the nomination, but rather breaking through what is expected to be an all-male Republican field and positioning herself for the second spot on the GOP ticket. "I don't think Carly's running for president. I think Carly's running for vice president," said Roe, the California Republican. "If Hillary Clinton's the nominee, Republicans need a woman front and center—probably on the ticket. And Carly knows that." *Calendar:* *Sec. Clinton's upcoming appearances as reported online. Not an official schedule.* · January 21 – Saskatchewan, Canada: Sec. Clinton keynotes the Canadian Imperial Bank of Commerce’s “Global Perspectives” series (MarketWired <http://www.marketwired.com/press-release/former-us-secretary-state-hillary-rodham-clinton-deliver-keynote-address-saskatoon-1972651.htm> ) · January 21 – Winnipeg, Canada: Sec. Clinton keynotes the Global Perspectives series (Winnipeg Free Press <http://www.winnipegfreepress.com/local/Clinton-coming-to-Winnipeg--284282491.html> ) · February 24 – Santa Clara, CA: Sec. Clinton to Keynote Address at Inaugural Watermark Conference for Women (PR Newswire <http://www.prnewswire.com/news-releases/hillary-rodham-clinton-to-deliver-keynote-address-at-inaugural-watermark-conference-for-women-283200361.html> ) · March 19 – Atlantic City, NJ: Sec. Clinton keynotes American Camp Association conference (PR Newswire <http://www.sys-con.com/node/3254649>)This year’s edition of NIPS was a big success. As you probably already know we had the surprise visit of Mark Zuckerberg (see here for the reason behind this visit). More interestingly (or perhaps less interestingly depending on who you are) here are some of the papers that I liked the most.
Optimization
– Non-strongly-convex smooth stochastic approximation with convergence rate by Francis Bach and Eric Moulines. With noisy gradients (see this post) it is known that the best rate of convergence to minimize an -strongly convex function is of order while for convex functions it is of order. Unfortunately in Machine Learning applications the strong convexity parameter is often a regularization parameter that can be as small as, in which case the standard analysis using strong convexity do not yield any acceleration. In this paper Bach and Moulines show that in the case of the square loss (whose strong convexity parameter depends on the smallest non-zero eigenvalue of the covariance matrix of the covariates) one can obtain a rate of order (i.e. with no dependency on the smallest eigenvalue ). The proposed algorithm is simply Stochastic Gradient Descent with a constant step-size (and averaging for the output). A more intricate algorithm is also proposed for the logistic loss.
– On Decomposing the Proximal Map by Yaoliang Yu. Algorithms such as ISTA and FISTA (see this post) require to compute the proximal operator
Recall that this proximal operator arises naturally for the minimization of a function of the form, i.e. when one wants to minimize some function while enforcing some of the ‘properties’ of in the solution. For instance with one would like to output a sparse solution. Thus it is very natural to try to understand the relation between and. This paper consider various properties under which one has.
– Accelerating Stochastic Gradient Descent using Predictive Variance Reduction by Rie Johnson and Tong Zhang. This paper gives a beautiful new algorithm achieving the same performances as SDCA and SAG (see this post). The algorithm/analysis are much more intuitive than the one of SDCA and SAG. I will make a more detailed post on this paper later next year.
– Accelerated Mini-Batch Stochastic Dual Coordinate Ascent by Shai Shalev-Shwartz and Tong Zhang. Both SDCA and SAG have a linear dependency on the condition number. For the deterministic case Nesterov’s accelerated gradient descent attains a linear dependency on. This paper partially bridges the gap between these results and present an accelerated version of SDCA using mini batches.
– Mixed Optimization for Smooth Functions by Mehrdad Mahdavi, Lijun Zhang and Rong Jin. This paper considers a new setting which seems quite natural: what if on top of noisy first order oracle one can also access a regular first order oracle? Mehrdad will do a guest post on this problem soon, but the short answer is that with only a logarithmic number of calls to the regular oracle one can attain a rate of order for smooth optimization (while with only the noisy oracle the rate is ).
– Estimation, Optimization, and Parallelism when Data is Sparse by John Duchi, Mike Jordan and Brendan McMahan. For this paper too I am hoping to have a guest post (by John Duchi this time) that would explain the new algorithm and its properties. The idea is roughly to do a gradient descent where the step-size adapts to the sparsity of the observed gradient, allowing for much faster rates in certain situations.
Bandits
– Online Learning in Episodic Markovian Decision Processes by Relative Entropy Policy Search by Alexander Zimin and Gergely Neu. This paper shows that one can solve episodic loop-free MDPs by simply using a combinatorial semi-bandit strategy (see this paper by Audibert, myself and Lugosi where we solved the semi-bandit problem). I believe that this paper initiate a research direction that will be very fruitful in the future. Namely reducing (or rather reformulating) a complicated sequential decision making problem as a linear bandit (or semi-bandit). A similar approach is very popular in optimization where everyone knows that one should try very hard to formulate the problem of interest as a convex program. On the other hand such an approach in online learning/sequential decision making has not been recognized yet. I believe that at the moment the most promising direction is to try to formulate the problem as a linear bandit as it is both an extremely general problem but also one for which we have seemingly canonical algorithms. A related paper is Online Learning in Markov Decision Processes with Adversarially Ch |
only just returned from missing more than two months with a torn meniscus, and because he hasn't been a part of the national team setup since that forgettable day in Honduras.What Chandler's recent injury layoff makes it easy to forget is that he was in outstanding form before the injury. He was playing extremely well for Nuremberg and looked like a very viable candidate to return to the U.S. setup and challenge for the wide-open right back position. Unfortunately for him, the injury hit, and he once again fell off most observers' radar.Klinsmann wasn't one of those observers, and when he took to Twitter on Saturday to point out that Chandler's return to action for Nuremberg was "Good news" it was clear the U.S. coach still sees Chandler as an option.And why shouldn't he? When healthy and on form, Chandler is the most well-rounded right back option in the pool. While Geoff Cameron has really solidified his game as the starting right back at Stoke City, he doesn't offer Chandler's attacking threat. And other than Cameron, none of the other right back options can really match up to Chandler, who it is easy to forget was impressive for the U.S. at right back and left back in the early months of Klinsmann's tenure as U.S. coach.There is some belief that Chandler's absence from the national team setup for more than a year somehow makes him a less viable option for the World Cup. That isn't reality. What will ultimately matter is if Chandler can stay healthy, regain match fitness and sharpness in the final weeks of the Bundesliga season, and then impress Klinsmann enough during the pre-World Cup training camp to give him a World Cup roster spot ahead of other fullback options such as Michael Parkhurst and Brad Evans. If he can regain the form he showed earlier in the Bundesliga season, he can win that competition.Ream and Chandler stand very good chances of being invited to that all-important camp, and given how wide-open the competition is all across the U.S. defense for roster places, and even starting roles, it's unreasonable to think that they can't make it to the World Cup because of their absences.Klinsmann will select the 23-man squad that gives the U.S. the best chance to win, and after years away from the national team, having done well to regroup on the club level, both Chandler and Ream should have chances to make their cases for not only being back in the national team fold, but also on that plane to Brazil.A former Utah lawmaker under consideration for a position as a state judge has apologized for his past support of anti-LGBT bills.
Rep. Kraig Powell (above) told the Utah Senate Judicial Confirmation Committee on Monday that he is not anti-gay and was in fact trying to help in the aftermath of court rulings on same-sex marriage.
According toFox13, earlier this year Powell ran a pair of bills dealing with same-sex couples following the SCOTUS ruling on marriage equality. While a bill which aimed to make Utah marriage law gender neutral received praise, another was less well received because it suggested giving heterosexual couples preference over same-sex couples in adoptions. Neither bill passed the legislature.
In 2014, Powell filed a bill in the Utah legislature which suggested rewriting the law to refer to same-sex marriages as “pairages.”
Of his track record, Powell said:
“I do understand the concerns expressed by the LGBTQ community over this issue and I’m truly sorry for the offense I caused. I’m sorry that some of my statements about that provision were the source of such pain. I regret having made those statements.”
Although Senator Jim Dabakis (right), the only openly gay lawmaker in the state, praised Powell for trying to make marriage law gender neutral he said the adoption bill “would have done great damage to LGBT couples.”
Chase Thomas of Alliance for a Better Utah said:
“Although we appreciate the apology Rep. Powell expressed during his hearing today, we are still concerned about the implications of his confirmation as a judge. Rep. Powell may have backtracked on his stated desire to explicitly discriminate against LGBT parents who were trying to adopt, but his legislation as actually proposed still allowed for judges to act upon implicit biases they may hold toward LGBT persons.”
However, Heber City councilwoman Kelleen Potter offered support for Powell “open minded and willing to listen to all sides of an argument.”
Initially opposing Powell’s nomination, Troy Williams, the executive director of the LGBT rights group Equality Utah, eventually said he recognized “the evolution and the journey that Rep. Powell has been on. I sincerely believe you,” he said, “and I accept your apology.
Dabakis joined in backing Powell and the committee confirmed him unanimously.
Watch Powell explaining last February why he wanted to implement preferential treatment for opposite sex couples in adoption of children from foster care.
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Put it in the comments or goto our contact page!This article is about medieval fortifications. For other uses, see Castle (disambiguation)
Fortified residential structure of medieval Europe
A castle (from Latin: castellum) is a type of fortified structure built during the Middle Ages by predominantly the nobility or royalty and by military orders. Scholars debate the scope of the word castle, but usually consider it to be the private fortified residence of a lord or noble. This is distinct from a palace, which is not fortified; from a fortress, which was not always a residence for royalty or nobility; and from a fortified settlement, which was a public defence – though there are many similarities among these types of construction. Usage of the term has varied over time and has been applied to structures as diverse as hill forts and country houses. Over the approximately 900 years that castles were built, they took on a great many forms with many different features, although some, such as curtain walls and arrowslits, were commonplace.
European-style castles originated in the 9th and 10th centuries, after the fall of the Carolingian Empire resulted in its territory being divided among individual lords and princes. These nobles built castles to control the area immediately surrounding them and the castles were both offensive and defensive structures; they provided a base from which raids could be launched as well as offered protection from enemies. Although their military origins are often emphasised in castle studies, the structures also served as centres of administration and symbols of power. Urban castles were used to control the local populace and important travel routes, and rural castles were often situated near features that were integral to life in the community, such as mills, fertile land, or a water source.
Many castles were originally built from earth and timber, but had their defences replaced later by stone. Early castles often exploited natural defences, lacking features such as towers and arrowslits and relying on a central keep. In the late 12th and early 13th centuries, a scientific approach to castle defence emerged. This led to the proliferation of towers, with an emphasis on flanking fire. Many new castles were polygonal or relied on concentric defence – several stages of defence within each other that could all function at the same time to maximise the castle's firepower. These changes in defence have been attributed to a mixture of castle technology from the Crusades, such as concentric fortification, and inspiration from earlier defences, such as Roman forts. Not all the elements of castle architecture were military in nature, so that devices such as moats evolved from their original purpose of defence into symbols of power. Some grand castles had long winding approaches intended to impress and dominate their landscape.
Although gunpowder was introduced to Europe in the 14th century, it did not significantly affect castle building until the 15th century, when artillery became powerful enough to break through stone walls. While castles continued to be built well into the 16th century, new techniques to deal with improved cannon fire made them uncomfortable and undesirable places to live. As a result, true castles went into decline and were replaced by artillery forts with no role in civil administration, and country houses that were indefensible. From the 18th century onwards, there was a renewed interest in castles with the construction of mock castles, part of a romantic revival of Gothic architecture, but they had no military purpose.
Definition [ edit ]
Etymology [ edit ]
The Norman "White Tower", the keep of the Tower of London, exemplifies all uses of a castle including city defence, a residence, and a place of refuge in times of crisis.
The word castle is derived from the Latin word castellum, which is a diminutive of the word castrum, meaning "fortified place". The Old English castel, Old French castel or chastel, French château, Spanish castillo, Italian castello, and a number of words in other languages also derive from castellum.[1] The word castle was introduced into English shortly before the Norman Conquest to denote this type of building, which was then new to England.[2]
Defining characteristics [ edit ]
In its simplest terms, the definition of a castle accepted amongst academics is "a private fortified residence".[3] This contrasts with earlier fortifications, such as Anglo-Saxon burhs and walled cities such as Constantinople and Antioch in the Middle East; castles were not communal defences but were built and owned by the local feudal lords, either for themselves or for their monarch.[4] Feudalism was the link between a lord and his vassal where, in return for military service and the expectation of loyalty, the lord would grant the vassal land.[5] In the late 20th century, there was a trend to refine the definition of a castle by including the criterion of feudal ownership, thus tying castles to the medieval period; however, this does not necessarily reflect the terminology used in the medieval period. During the First Crusade (1096–1099), the Frankish armies encountered walled settlements and forts that they indiscriminately referred to as castles, but which would not be considered as such under the modern definition.[3]
Castles served a range of purposes, the most important of which were military, administrative, and domestic. As well as defensive structures, castles were also offensive tools which could be used as a base of operations in enemy territory. Castles were established by Norman invaders of England for both defensive purposes and to pacify the country's inhabitants.[6] As William the Conqueror advanced through England, he fortified key positions to secure the land he had taken. Between 1066 and 1087, he established 36 castles such as Warwick Castle, which he used to guard against rebellion in the English Midlands.[7][8]
Towards the end of the Middle Ages, castles tended to lose their military significance due to the advent of powerful cannons and permanent artillery fortifications;[9] as a result, castles became more important as residences and statements of power.[10] A castle could act as a stronghold and prison but was also a place where a knight or lord could entertain his peers.[11] Over time the aesthetics of the design became more important, as the castle's appearance and size began to reflect the prestige and power of its occupant. Comfortable homes were often fashioned within their fortified walls. Although castles still provided protection from low levels of violence in later periods, eventually they were succeeded by country houses as high status residences.[12]
Terminology [ edit ]
Castle is sometimes used as a catch-all term for all kinds of fortifications and, as a result, has been misapplied in the technical sense. An example of this is Maiden Castle which, despite the name, is an Iron Age hill fort which had a very different origin and purpose.[13]
Although "castle" has not become a generic term for a manor house (like château in French and Schloss in German), many manor houses contain "castle" in their name while having few if any of the architectural characteristics, usually as their owners liked to maintain a link to the past and felt the term "castle" was a masculine expression of their power.[14] In scholarship the castle, as defined above, is generally accepted as a coherent concept, originating in Europe and later spreading to parts of the Middle East, where they were introduced by European Crusaders. This coherent group shared a common origin, dealt with a particular mode of warfare, and exchanged influences.[15]
In different areas of the world, analogous structures shared features of fortification and other defining characteristics associated with the concept of a castle, though they originated in different periods and circumstances and experienced differing evolutions and influences. For example, shiro in Japan, described as castles by historian Stephen Turnbull, underwent "a completely different developmental history, were built in a completely different way and were designed to withstand attacks of a completely different nature".[16] While European castles built from the late 12th and early 13th century onwards were generally stone, shiro were predominantly timber buildings into the 16th century.[17]
By the 16th century, when Japanese and European cultures met, fortification in Europe had moved beyond castles and relied on innovations such as the Italian trace italienne and star forts.[16] Forts in India present a similar case; when they were encountered by the British in the 17th century, castles in Europe had generally fallen out of use militarily. Like shiro, the Indian forts, durga or durg in Sanskrit, shared features with castles in Europe such as acting as a domicile for a lord as well as being fortifications. They too developed differently from the structures known as castles that had their origins in Europe.[18]
Common features [ edit ]
Motte [ edit ]
The wooden palisades surmounting mottes were often later replaced with stone, as in this example at Château de Gisors in France.
A motte was an earthen mound with a flat top. It was often artificial, although sometimes it incorporated a pre-existing feature of the landscape. The excavation of earth to make the mound left a ditch around the motte, called a moat (which could be either wet or dry). "Motte" and "moat" derive from the same Old French word, indicating that the features were originally associated and depended on each other for their construction. Although the motte is commonly associated with the bailey to form a motte-and-bailey castle, this was not always the case and there are instances where a motte existed on its own.[19]
"Motte" refers to the mound alone, but it was often surmounted by a fortified structure, such as a keep, and the flat top would be surrounded by a palisade.[19] It was common for the motte to be reached over a flying bridge (a bridge over the ditch from the counterscarp of the ditch to the edge of the top of the mound), as shown in the Bayeux Tapestry's depiction of Château de Dinan.[20] Sometimes a motte covered an older castle or hall, whose rooms became underground storage areas and prisons beneath a new keep.[21]
Bailey and enceinte [ edit ]
A bailey, also called a ward, was a fortified enclosure. It was a common feature of castles, and most had at least one. The keep on top of the motte was the domicile of the lord in charge of the castle and a bastion of last defence, while the bailey was the home of the rest of the lord's household and gave them protection. The barracks for the garrison, stables, workshops, and storage facilities were often found in the bailey. Water was supplied by a well or cistern. Over time the focus of high status accommodation shifted from the keep to the bailey; this resulted in the creation of another bailey that separated the high status buildings – such as the lord's chambers and the chapel – from the everyday structures such as the workshops and barracks.[22]
From the late 12th century there was a trend for knights to move out of the small houses they had previously occupied within the bailey to live in fortified houses in the countryside.[23] Although often associated with the motte-and-bailey type of castle, baileys could also be found as independent defensive structures. These simple fortifications were called ringworks.[24] The enceinte was the castle's main defensive enclosure, and the terms "bailey" and "enceinte" are linked. A castle could have several baileys but only one enceinte. Castles with no keep, which relied on their outer defences for protection, are sometimes called enceinte castles;[25] these were the earliest form of castles, before the keep was introduced in the 10th century.[26]
Keep [ edit ]
The 14th-century keep of Château de Vincennes near Paris towers above the castle's curtain wall. The wall exhibits features common to castle architecture: a gatehouse, corner towers, and machicolations.
A keep was a great tower and usually the most strongly defended point of a castle before the introduction of concentric defence. "Keep" was not a term used in the medieval period – the term was applied from the 16th century onwards – instead "donjon" was used to refer to great towers,[27] or turris in Latin. In motte-and-bailey castles, the keep was on top of the motte.[19] "Dungeon" is a corrupted form of "donjon" and means a dark, unwelcoming prison.[28] Although often the strongest part of a castle and a last place of refuge if the outer defences fell, the keep was not left empty in case of attack but was used as a residence by the lord who owned the castle, or his guests or representatives.[29]
At first this was usual only in England, when after the Norman Conquest of 1066 the "conquerors lived for a long time in a constant state of alert";[30] elsewhere the lord's wife presided over a separate residence (domus, aula or mansio in Latin) close to the keep, and the donjon was a barracks and headquarters. Gradually, the two functions merged into the same building, and the highest residential storeys had large windows; as a result for many structures, it is difficult to find an appropriate term.[31] The massive internal spaces seen in many surviving donjons can be misleading; they would have been divided into several rooms by light partitions, as in a modern office building. Even in some large castles the great hall was separated only by a partition from the lord's "chamber", his bedroom and to some extent his office.[32]
Curtain wall [ edit ]
Curtain walls were defensive walls enclosing a bailey. They had to be high enough to make scaling the walls with ladders difficult and thick enough to withstand bombardment from siege engines which, from the 15th century onwards, included gunpowder artillery. A typical wall could be 3 m (10 ft) thick and 12 m (39 ft) tall, although sizes varied greatly between castles. To protect them from undermining, curtain walls were sometimes given a stone skirt around their bases. Walkways along the tops of the curtain walls allowed defenders to rain missiles on enemies below, and battlements gave them further protection. Curtain walls were studded with towers to allow enfilading fire along the wall.[33] Arrowslits in the walls did not become common in Europe until the 13th century, for fear that they might compromise the wall's strength.[34]
Gatehouse [ edit ]
A 13th-century gatehouse in the château de Châteaubriant, France. It connects the upper ward to the lower one.
The entrance was often the weakest part in a circuit of defences. To overcome this, the gatehouse was developed, allowing those inside the castle to control the flow of traffic. In earth and timber castles, the gateway was usually the first feature to be rebuilt in stone. The front of the gateway was a blind spot and to overcome this, projecting towers were added on each side of the gate in a style similar to that developed by the Romans.[35] The gatehouse contained a series of defences to make a direct assault more difficult than battering down a simple gate. Typically, there were one or more portcullises – a wooden grille reinforced with metal to block a passage – and arrowslits to allow defenders to harry the enemy. The passage through the gatehouse was lengthened to increase the amount of time an assailant had to spend under fire in a confined space and unable to retaliate.[36]
It is a popular myth that so-called murder holes – openings in the ceiling of the gateway passage – were used to pour boiling oil or molten lead on attackers; the price of oil and lead and the distance of the gatehouse from fires meant that this was impractical.[37] This method was, however, a common practice in the MENA region and the Mediterranean castles and fortifications where such resources were abundant.[38][39] They were most likely used to drop objects on attackers, or to allow water to be poured on fires to extinguish them.[37] Provision was made in the upper storey of the gatehouse for accommodation so the gate was never left undefended, although this arrangement later evolved to become more comfortable at the expense of defence.[40]
During the 13th and 14th centuries the barbican was developed.[41] This consisted of a rampart, ditch, and possibly a tower, in front of the gatehouse[42] which could be used to further protect the entrance. The purpose of a barbican was not just to provide another line of defence but also to dictate the only approach to the gate.[43]
Moat [ edit ]
Sample of a dry moat by Slovenska Bistrica castle in Slovenia.
A moat was a defensive ditch with steep sides, and could be either dry or filled with water. Its purpose was twofold; to stop devices such as siege towers from reaching the curtain wall and to prevent the walls from being undermined. Water moats were found in low-lying areas and were usually crossed by a drawbridge, although these were often replaced by stone bridges. Fortified islands could be added to the moat, adding another layer of defence. Water defences, such as moats or natural lakes, had the benefit of dictating the enemy's approach to the castle.[44] The site of the 13th-century Caerphilly Castle in Wales covers over 30 acres (12 ha) and the water defences, created by flooding the valley to the south of the castle, are some of the largest in Western Europe.[45]
Other features [ edit ]
Battlements were most often found surmounting curtain walls and the tops of gatehouses, and comprised several elements: crenellations, hoardings, machicolations, and loopholes. Crenellation is the collective name for alternating crenels and merlons: gaps and solid blocks on top of a wall. Hoardings were wooden constructs that projected beyond the wall, allowing defenders to shoot at, or drop objects on, attackers at the base of the wall without having to lean perilously over the crenellations, thereby exposing themselves to retaliatory fire. Machicolations were stone projections on top of a wall with openings that allowed objects to be dropped on an enemy at the base of the wall in a similar fashion to hoardings.[46]
Arrowslits, also commonly called loopholes, were narrow vertical openings in defensive walls which allowed arrows or crossbow bolts to be fired on attackers. The narrow slits were intended to protect the defender by providing a very small target, but the size of the opening could also impede the defender if it was too small. A smaller horizontal opening could be added to give an archer a better view for aiming.[47] Sometimes a sally port was included; this could allow the garrison to leave the castle and engage besieging forces.[48] It was usual for the latrines to empty down the external walls of a castle and into the surrounding ditch.[49]
History [ edit ]
Antecedents [ edit ]
Historian Charles Coulson states that the accumulation of wealth and resources, such as food, led to the need for defensive structures. The earliest fortifications originated in the Fertile Crescent, the Indus Valley, Egypt, and China where settlements were protected by large walls. Northern Europe was slower than the East to develop defensive structures and it was not until the Bronze Age that hill forts were developed, which then proliferated across Europe in the Iron Age. These structures differed from their eastern counterparts in that they used earthworks rather than stone as a building material.[51] Many earthworks survive today, along with evidence of palisades to accompany the ditches. In Europe, oppida emerged in the 2nd century BC; these were densely inhabited fortified settlements, such as the oppidum of Manching, and developed from hill forts.[52] The Romans encountered fortified settlements such as hill forts and oppida when expanding their territory into northern Europe.[52] Although primitive, they were often effective, and were only overcome by the extensive use of siege engines and other siege warfare techniques, such as at the Battle of Alesia. The Romans' own fortifications (castra) varied from simple temporary earthworks thrown up by armies on the move, to elaborate permanent stone constructions, notably the milecastles of Hadrian's Wall. Roman forts were generally rectangular with rounded corners – a "playing-card shape".[53]
In the medieval period, castles were influenced by earlier forms of elite architecture, contributing to regional variations. Importantly, while castles had military aspects, they contained a recognisable household structure within their walls, reflecting the multi-functional use of these buildings.[54]
Origins (9th and 10th centuries) [ edit ]
The subject of the emergence of castles in Europe is a complex matter which has led to considerable debate. Discussions have typically attributed the rise of the castle to a reaction to attacks by Magyars, Muslims, and Vikings and a need for private defence.[55] The breakdown of the Carolingian Empire led to the privatisation of government, and local lords assumed responsibility for the economy and justice.[56] However, while castles proliferated in the 9th and 10th centuries the link between periods of insecurity and building fortifications is not always straightforward. Some high concentrations of castles occur in secure places, while some border regions had relatively few castles.[57]
It is likely that the castle evolved from the practice of fortifying a lordly home. The greatest threat to a lord's home or hall was fire as it was usually a wooden structure. To protect against this, and keep other threats at bay, there were several courses of action available: create encircling earthworks to keep an enemy at a distance; build the hall in stone; or raise it up on an artificial mound, known as a motte, to present an obstacle to attackers.[58] While the concept of ditches, ramparts, and stone walls as defensive measures is ancient, raising a motte is a medieval innovation.[59]
A bank and ditch enclosure was a simple form of defence, and when found without an associated motte is called a ringwork; when the site was in use for a prolonged period, it was sometimes replaced by a more complex structure or enhanced by the addition of a stone curtain wall.[60] Building the hall in stone did not necessarily make it immune to fire as it still had windows and a wooden door. This led to the elevation of windows to the first floor – to make it harder to throw objects in – and to change the entrance from ground floor to first floor. These features are seen in many surviving castle keeps, which were the more sophisticated version of halls.[61] Castles were not just defensive sites but also enhanced a lord's control over his lands. They allowed the garrison to control the surrounding area,[62] and formed a centre of administration, providing the lord with a place to hold court.[63]
The Bayeux Tapestry contains one of the earliest representations of a castle. It depicts attackers of Château de Dinan in France using fire, one of the threats to wooden castles.
Building a castle sometimes required the permission of the king or other high authority. In 864 the King of West Francia, Charles the Bald, prohibited the construction of castella without his permission and ordered them all to be destroyed. This is perhaps the earliest reference to castles, though military historian R. Allen Brown points out that the word castella may have applied to any fortification at the time.[64]
In some countries the monarch had little control over lords, or required the construction of new castles to aid in securing the land so was unconcerned about granting permission – as was the case in England in the aftermath of the Norman Conquest and the Holy Land during the Crusades. Switzerland is an extreme case of there being no state control over who built castles, and as a result there were 4,000 in the country.[65] There are very few castles dated with certainty from the mid-9th century. Converted into a donjon around 950, Château de Doué-la-Fontaine in France is the oldest standing castle in Europe.[66]
11th century [ edit ]
From 1000 onwards, references to castles in texts such as charters increased greatly. Historians have interpreted this as evidence of a sudden increase in the number of castles in Europe around this time; this has been supported by archaeological investigation which has dated the construction of castle sites through the examination of ceramics.[67] The increase in Italy began in the 950s, with numbers of castles increasing by a factor of three to five every 50 years, whereas in other parts of Europe such as France and Spain the growth was slower. In 950 Provence was home to 12 castles, by 1000 this figure had risen to 30, and by 1030 it was over 100.[68] Although the increase was slower in Spain, the 1020s saw a particular growth in the number of castles in the region, particularly in contested border areas between Christian and Muslim.[69]
Despite the common period in which castles rose to prominence in Europe, their form and design varied from region to region. In the early 11th century, the motte and keep – an artificial mound surmounted by a palisade and tower – was the most common form of castle in Europe, everywhere except Scandinavia.[68] While Britain, France, and Italy shared a tradition of timber construction that was continued in castle architecture, Spain more commonly used stone or mud-brick as the main building material.[70]
The Muslim invasion of the Iberian Peninsula in the 8th century introduced a style of building developed in North Africa reliant on tapial, pebbles in cement, where timber was in short supply.[71] Although stone construction would later become common elsewhere, from the 11th century onwards it was the primary building material for Christian castles in Spain,[72] while at the same time timber was still the dominant building material in north-west Europe.[69]
[73] Built in 1138, Castle Rising in England is an example of an elaborate donjon.
Historians have interpreted the widespread presence of castles across Europe in the 11th and 12th centuries as evidence that warfare was common, and usually between local lords.[74] Castles were introduced into England shortly before the Norman Conquest in 1066.[75] Before the 12th century castles were as uncommon in Denmark as they had been in England before the Norman Conquest. The introduction of castles to Denmark was a reaction to attacks from Wendish pirates, and they were usually intended as coastal defences.[65] The motte and bailey remained the dominant form of castle in England, Wales, and Ireland well into the 12th century.[76] At the same time, castle architecture in mainland Europe became more sophisticated.[77]
The donjon[78] was at the centre of this change in castle architecture in the 12th century. Central towers proliferated, and typically had a square plan, with walls 3 to 4 m (9.8 to 13.1 ft) thick. Their decoration emulated Romanesque architecture, and sometimes incorporated double windows similar to those found in church bell towers. Donjons, which were the residence of the lord of the castle, evolved to become more spacious. The design emphasis of donjons changed to reflect a shift from functional to decorative requirements, imposing a symbol of lordly power upon the landscape. This sometimes led to compromising defence for the sake of display.[77]
Innovation and scientific design (12th century) [ edit ]
Until the 12th century, stone-built and earth and timber castles were contemporary,[79] but by the late 12th century the number of castles being built went into decline. This has been partly attributed to the higher cost of stone-built fortifications, and the obsolescence of timber and earthwork sites, which meant it was preferable to build in more durable stone.[80] Although superseded by their stone successors, timber and earthwork castles were by no means useless.[81] This is evidenced by the continual maintenance of timber castles over long periods, sometimes several centuries; Owain Glyndŵr's 11th-century timber castle at Sycharth was still in use by the start of the 15th century, its structure having been maintained for four centuries.[82][83]
At the same time there was a change in castle architecture. Until the late 12th century castles generally had few towers; a gateway with few defensive features such as arrowslits or a portcullis; a great keep or donjon, usually square and without arrowslits; and the shape would have been dictated by the lay of the land (the result was often irregular or curvilinear structures). The design of castles was not uniform, but these were features that could be found in a typical castle in the mid-12th century.[84] By the end of the 12th century or the early 13th century, a newly constructed castle could be expected to be polygonal in shape, with towers at the corners to provide enfilading fire for the walls. The towers would have protruded from the walls and featured arrowslits on each level to allow archers to target anyone nearing or at the curtain wall.[85]
These later castles did not always have a keep, but this may have been because the more complex design of the castle as a whole drove up costs and the keep was sacrificed to save money. The larger towers provided space for habitation to make up for the loss of the donjon. Where keeps did exist, they were no longer square but polygonal or cylindrical. Gateways were more strongly defended, with the entrance to the castle usually between two half-round towers which were connected by a passage above the gateway – although there was great variety in the styles of gateway and entrances – and one or more portcullis.[85]
A peculiar feature of Muslim castles in the Iberian Peninsula was the use of detached towers, called Albarrana towers, around the perimeter as can be seen at the Alcazaba of Badajoz. Probably developed in the 12th century, the towers provided flanking fire. They were connected to the castle by removable wooden bridges, so if the towers were captured the rest of the castle was not accessible.[86]
[87] The gatehouse to the inner ward of Beeston Castle, England, was built in the 1220s and has an entrance between two D-shaped towers.
When seeking to explain this change in the complexity and style of castles, antiquarians found their answer in the Crusades. It seemed that the Crusaders had learned much about fortification from their conflicts with the Saracens and exposure to Byzantine architecture. There were legends such as that of Lalys – an architect from Palestine who reputedly went to Wales after the Crusades and greatly enhanced the castles in the south of the country – and it was assumed that great architects such as James of Saint George originated in the East. In the mid-20th century this view was cast into doubt. Legends were discredited, and in the case of James of Saint George it was proven that he came from Saint-Georges-d'Espéranche, in France. If the innovations in fortification had derived from the East, it would have been expected for their influence to be seen from 1100 onwards, immediately after the Christians were victorious in the First Crusade (1096–1099), rather than nearly 100 years later.[88] Remains of Roman structures in Western Europe were still standing in many places, some of which had flanking round-towers and entrances between two flanking towers.
The castle builders of Western Europe were aware of and influenced by Roman design; late Roman coastal forts on the English "Saxon Shore" were reused and in Spain the wall around the city of Ávila imitated Roman architecture when it was built in 1091.[88] Historian Smail in Crusading warfare argued that the case for the influence of Eastern fortification on the West has been overstated, and that Crusaders of the 12th century in fact learned very little about scientific design from Byzantine and Saracen defences.[89] A well-sited castle that made use of natural defences and had strong ditches and walls had no need for a scientific design. An example of this approach is Kerak. Although there were no scientific elements to its design, it was almost impregnable, and in 1187 Saladin chose to lay siege to the castle and starve out its garrison rather than risk an assault.[89]
After the First Crusade, Crusaders who did not return to their homes in Europe helped found the Crusader states of the Principality of Antioch, the County of Edessa, the Kingdom of Jerusalem, and the County of Tripoli. The castles they founded to secure their acquisitions were designed mostly by Syrian master-masons. Their design was very similar to that of a Roman fort or Byzantine tetrapyrgia which were square in plan and had square towers at each corner that did not project much beyond the curtain wall. The keep of these Crusader castles would have had a square plan and generally be undecorated.[90]
While castles were used to hold a site and control movement of armies |
ensual violence, and that we, as a community, will stand by uncritically – or worse, cry out in support – as victims of violence are once again silenced. I don’t wish to be complicit in someone’s misappropriation of BDSM terminology and codes as a shield for rape and assault. So when this defence comes up, my immediate reaction is to listen very carefully, read everything I can find on a given instance, and hold back on my knee-jerk inclination to side with the “persecuted pervert.” Persecuted perverts do exist, absolutely. But we don’t know, until we hear the full story, whether that’s what’s really going on – or if we’re being thrown under the bus by someone who’s no friend to sadomasochism.
In this case, Ghomeshi made a pre-emptive strike, setting the terms of the debate: don’t demonize me for being kinky, even if you don’t like my proclivities. But so far, this doesn’t seem to be a scandal about kink at all. From Ciccone to the anonymous accusers, the women who are (or seem to be) complaining about him aren’t complaining about his kinks or calling him out for being a disgusting pervert. They’re complaining about far more mundane and familiar things: the ex-co-worker is noting unwanted ass-groping in the workplace. Ciccone mentions creepy non-consensual touching at a concert date that wasn’t supposed to even be a date, followed by stalker-y behaviour. And the anonymous women who wanted to get involved with him at first aren’t complaining about how gross his supposed perversions are. They’re making allegations of regular old non-consensual violence. And part of the reason they are saying they won’t come forward in person is because they’re afraid their pre-date conversations about kink will be used as evidence that they consented to what he did. In other words, these women may have said “sure, some kink sounds like fun” and are concerned that their own stated interest will be held up as evidence of consent to violence. If I am reading this right, these women were either themselves interested in kink to some extent, or at least weren’t put off by Ghomeshi’s interest, since they each still went on a date with him. This is a very different story than “Ew gross he wanted to use handcuffs what a total sicko!”
Ghomeshi’s timing is everything: he’s of course very media-savvy, because he is media. So he’s well aware that if he creates a lens through which people should perceive things, that colours the conversation in his favour from go. (The “high-stakes” PR firm may be helping here, too.) As well, he has a massive platform and a large existing fan base who of course don’t want to hear that their darling might have done something wrong. All the odds are in his favour thus far.
Ghomeshi says he’s into a “mild version of Fifty Shades of Grey.” The anonymous accusers say he hit them with a closed fist and an open hand, beat them about the face and head, and choked them to the point of almost passing out, among other things. I’m gonna break out my Pervert Glasses to read what’s being said here about kink.
Face-punching and choking to the point of unconsciousness are absolutely some people’s kinks. But even among seasoned BDSM players, these acts are widely understood to be things you must do only with the most carefully negotiated consent, with a goodly amount of education and practice, and with the knowledge that they are highly risky. Beginner BDSM this is not. As a BDSM educator, I have been teaching how to do safe body punching for over a decade, and I don’t go near the face except symbolically (fake or very light impact for psychological effect). It’s just too easy to do major damage. I’m sure someone out there could teach you how to do it safely, but it won’t be me. As for choking, it’s a topic of massive debate among pervs, with some veteran kinksters even insisting that there is simply no safe way to do it and therefore shouldn’t be done at all. I’m not saying everyone agrees on the absolute-no approach. But I am saying that Ghomeshi’s argument that what he does is a “mild version of Fifty Shades of Grey” does not match up with his apparent practice of engaging in very high-risk activities with women he’s just beginning to date. If what they’re saying is true, that discrepancy alone is enough to make me highly suspicious of his “I’m a poor innocent kinkster” argument. A mild version of Fifty Shades would be some dirty talk (probably with poor grammar) and necktie bondage.
Another element of Ghomeshi’s pre-emptive strike that doesn’t add up is the reason he says he’s being fired. It doesn’t make sense that the CBC would fire Ghomeshi for being kinky. Remember the openly bisexual Sook-Yin Lee, who masturbated and had non-simulated sex on camera in the 2006 film Shortbus? She’s been working with the CBC for well over a decade, and while they initially considered letting her go when the controversial film was making headlines, support for her was so strong that they kept her on. Fast-forward eight years: the CBC knows that their audiences support even the very public sexual explorations of CBC stars. The CBC is of course also aware of Canada’s relatively permissive climate when it comes to sexual freedom. So why would the CBC not only fire the immensely popular Jian Ghomeshi for his supposedly mildly kinky “private sex life,” but to go so far as to bar him access to the building after doing so – and all of this already knowing he would sue? The CBC is not exactly in good shape right now. They don’t need another money drain and they certainly have no reason to do anything that would turn public opinion against them, while the Harper government quietly undermines their very existence.
Ghomeshi could be totally innocent. Four women could be making shit up, anonymously, because… well, I don’t know, but that itself might be an interesting question. For fun? What exactly would the motivation be for this supposed smear campaign, that four women would take part in it despite having evidence that when a previous woman made much milder accusations that don’t even explicitly name Ghomeshi, she was completely trashed on the Internet? Hmmm. This, too, doesn’t add up. Only the most hell-bent revenge-thirsty ex would take this on, knowing the likely consequences. Four women? Really?
Like I said… Ghomeshi could be totally innocent. I’m sure his many fans would like him to be. For now, I’m going to keep reading, with my critical thinking turned up high. I suggest we all do the same.BEIJING (Reuters) - IBM Corp will share technology with Chinese firms and will actively help build China’s industry, CEO Virginia Rometty said in Beijing as she set out a strategy for one of the foreign firms hardest hit by China’s shifting technology policies.
A worker is pictured behind a logo at the IBM stand on the CeBIT computer fair in Hanover February 26, 2011. REUTERS/Tobias Schwarz
IBM must help China build its IT industry rather than viewing the country solely as a sales destination or manufacturing base, Rometty said at the China Development Forum, an annual Chinese government-sponsored conference bringing together business executives and China’s ruling elite.
“If you’re a country, as China is, of 1.3 billion people you would want an IT industry as well,” the chief executive said on Monday. “I think some firms find that perhaps frightening. We, though, at IBM... find that to be a great opportunity.”
Rometty’s remarks were among the clearest acknowledgements to date by a high-ranking foreign technology executive that companies must adopt a different tack if they are to continue in China amid growing political pressure.
A number of U.S. technology companies operating in China are forming alliances with domestic operators, hoping a local partner will make it easier to operate in the increasingly tough environment for foreign businesses.
China has been pushing for the use of more Chinese and less foreign-made technology, to grow its own tech sector and in response to ex-U.S. National Security Agency contractor Edward Snowden’s leaks about U.S. cyber surveillance.
IBM’s sales in China have stabilized after a sharp drop that began in the third quarter of 2013 following Snowden’s revelations. The Armonk, New York-based company reported a 1 percent slide in revenue in China during the fourth quarter of 2014, compared with the prior year.
IBM’s new approach allows Chinese companies to build everything from semiconductor chips and servers based on IBM architecture, to the software that runs on those machines.
Last week IBM said Suzhou PowerCore Technology Co will begin producing a version of IBM’s Power8 chip to run on Chinese-made servers. Its POWER line of processors is often used for intensive calculations in financial services, where Chinese banks have been required by new government regulations to use more domestic vendors.
The U.S. company had already announced a series of partnerships with Chinese vendors and now packages its database software with products from Inspur, a server hardware maker and IBM rival, and has also struck agreements with Youyou, a Beijing-based software firm.
Other vendors are making similar efforts.
SAP SE Greater China head Mark Gibbs for instance said in October the company sought to be a “complementary player to the Chinese market” by selling its software on hardware made by Lenovo Inc and Huawei Technologies.COLUMBUS, Ohio -- With school shootings and debates on gun control making headlines all too frequently, the Buckeye Firearms Foundation announces that its training program for teachers and school administrators has reached more than 63 of Ohio's 88 counties.
In its fourth year, the Faculty/Administrator Safety Training & Emergency Response (FASTER) program is expanding to include a new Level Three class that takes place in the actual school district and includes not only armed school staff, but also local and county law enforcement officers, local emergency medical personnel and other school staff who would be at the school should an active killer event occur.
Green counties indicate the 63 Ohio counties with teachers or school administrators who have participated in the FASTER training to prepare for armed intruder attacks.
FASTER has trained more than 400 teachers and administrators from 152 school districts in Ohio since it was created shortly after the December 2012 Sandy Hook shooting in Newtown, Connecticut.
The Buckeye Firearms Association says FASTER presents "a carefully-structured curriculum with over 26 hours of hands-on training over a three-day class that exceeds the requirements of the Ohio Peace Officer Training Academy."
The organization adds that the program's purpose is not to replace police and emergency responders, but to allow teachers, administrators and other personnel on-site to stop school violence rapidly and render medical aid immediately.
In this fourth year, FASTER also includes a Level Two class for advanced training in armed response, trauma medical aid and crisis and emergency management skills. According to a press release, the $150,000 budget consists of small, individual donations to Buckeye Firearms Foundation. The foundation says classes are provided at no cost to school personnel or school districts and that no tax dollars have been spent on this training.
Joe Eaton, FASTER program director, says the response from Ohio educators has been more enthusiastic than they ever imagined.
"When we first announced that we planned to train teachers in armed response and emergency medical aid some people said teachers would never sign up," Eaton said. "But within days of announcing the program, we had 600 apply for training. In weeks, it soared to over 1,000. Today we have nearly 2,000 faculty members from all over Ohio waiting in line for a chance to get this training. And more are contacting us every day."When Scott Morrison traveled to Japan to check out denim in the ‘90s, he had one question: “Why aren’t we making this type of product in America?” At the time, the premium denim market didn’t exist. American denim producers were focusing on manufacturing large quantities of fabric for big name brands. Morrison consequently immersed himself in the world of denim — first founding Paper Denim & Cloth in 1999, then Earnest Sewn in 2004, and then 3×1 in 2011. He became an integral part of the changing denim market. 20 years ago, denim brands focused mainly on their branding. In the past decade that’s shifted, and now the focus rests with the quality of the denim. This change has helped bring back selvedge denim production to the place that started it over 100 years ago: America.
Selvedge denim’s strongest roots can be traced back over 100 years to Cone Mills in North Carolina. Founded in 1981 by Moses and Caesar Cone, Cone Mills became the largest producer of denim in the world by 1908, and began supplying fabric for Levi’s in 1915. “Cone has the most historical significance of any producer in the world of denim,” Morrison said. Shuttle looms were the principal means of denim production in the US for over 50 years, but then, as denim became more popular, manufacturing changed to meet consumer demands. Newer looms that could produce a wider-width fabric more efficiently phased out the older shuttle looms. By the latter decades of the 20th century, the American consumer was focused on buying cheaper denim, and mills had to cater to brand’s needs.
While the American denim market homogenized to accommodate big brands, the Japanese market focused on smaller artisan brands. The Japanese mills studied historical Levi’s garments and originally based their production on an American model. When American designers traveled to Japan in the ‘90s, they rediscovered the unique qualities of selvedge denim, and wanted to bring it back. In the mid-’90s, fewer than five US brands were sourcing selvedge denim. Today, the American selvedge market supplies over 100 brands. “The thing that’s changed over the last twenty years is that our generations are embracing the idea that old can be cool,” Morrison noted.
“The thing that’s changed over the last twenty years is that our generations are embracing the idea that old can be cool.”
In Greensboro, North Carolina, Cone Mills’ historic White Oak plant is a prime example. First opened in 1905, the plant once had 3,000 Draper shuttle looms producing selvedge denim. The plant is a cradle of denim innovation — their long-chain dye range was patented in 1921, and recent innovations include stretch denim, durable dyneema-blend denim, and fabrics that are breathable, moisture-wicking, water-repellent and stain-repellent. In White Oak’s weave room, there is a stark contrast between old and new. Modern rapier and air-jet looms occupy the same space as a battalion of vintage shuttle looms from the ‘40s.
While the modern machines are producing technically-innovative fabrics, the shuttle looms are creating the denim that made Cone Mills famous a century ago. “If you look at this as opposed to anything else you might see in the world, these machines are truly vintage,” said Brad Johnson, the Group Manufacturing Director of Cone Mills. “In this place that’s one-hundred-eleven years old, on that floor space, you’re looking at fabrics like they’ve been made for a hundred years.” The selvedge denim produced at the White Oak plant has a unique character imparted from the Draper looms and the plant’s wooden floors. “The machine inherently has character built into the way it weaves,” said Johnson, of the Draper’s cast-iron cam and spring-controlled harness. “On top of that, you put it into the White Oak plant on the wooden floors, and those floors give and they move. So you’ve got a movement within the machine and a movement within the floor; all that comes back to produce a character in the fabric.”
By the ‘90s, White Oak’s thousands of Draper looms had waned to just a handful in operation. But as the American premium denim market has grown, the plant has increased their selvedge production. They now operate 51 shuttle looms. “The demand in recent years has been the strongest it has been since my involvement,” said Johnson, who originally started at Cone as an intern in ‘86. The average seniority of workers at the plant is 30 years, but with the increased production, there’s a focus on training a new generation of workers to control and maintain the old machines. “We’re doing more training now than we’ve done in many, many years,” Johnson said.
With Cone celebrating its 125th anniversary this year, Morrison wanted to produce a capsule collection that paid tribute to the brand’s historical significance. “In this case it was all about their vision and what was done in the past,” he said. Exploring White Oak’s records, Morrison found notes on the plant’s earliest denim and worked with the team at Cone Mills to produce a limited run of reproduction fabric, dyed with natural (plant-based) indigo. “Historically what people really appreciate about American denim, especially Cone’s selvedge product, is that beautiful, gorgeous red-cast,” he said. This fabric captures the magic in American denim that was lost through decades of mass manufacturing, and it speaks for itself in 3×1’s new collection. “A certain type of customer appreciates things with real value,” Morrison said. “And value is not just money — it’s a story, a quality, a history or a legacy, or something that doesn’t feel so fast and perishable. I think nothing speaks to that better than a great pair of jeans.”Google's heavy investment in lobbying has seen it become one of the 10 biggest spenders in Washington. Led by Susan Molinari, the company spent a record $18.2 million in 2012, attempting to win over lawmakers and regulators in the capital. Although it has been embroiled in a number of antitrust investigations and come under fire for its privacy policies from the likes of Microsoft, Google has spent some of its budget attempting to overhaul US immigration laws, revise US privacy controls, and lobby for Congress to reduce the power of so-called patent trolls.
Google spent a record $18.2 million in 2012
Spending more than $5 million in Q1 2012, Google's lobbying spend saw it overtake Verizon ($4.51 million) and Comcast ($4.55 million), quadrupling its quarterly lobbying spend since 2009. In those three months, it spent more than Apple, Facebook, Amazon, and Microsoft combined. Over the year, its budget even surpassed established companies like US defense contractor Lockheed Martin. Molinari's tactics do appear to be working — Google successfully evaded damages following an investigation by the FTC and it fought against SOPA and PIPA in harmony with public outrage over the bills.
Looking forward, the company will join Mark Zuckerberg's FWD.us lobbying group in pushing for changes to immigration policies that govern how long foreign students can remain in the US after they have finished their education. Molinari and Google will also campaign for the FCC to restrict wireless auctions so it can continue to expand its internet services, which could include a free nationwide Wi-Fi network.Above: An old NES that’s seen better days and doesn’t load games at all. Let’s fix it up together!
What you’ll need:
3.8mm security bit
Brasso
Isopropyl alcohol
Pencil eraser
Q-tips
Cloth rag
Dust, dirt, grime, and what appears to be crusty hunks of dried phlegm. You never know what you’ll find stuck on your cartridge’s connector blade - and that gunk can prevent your games from loading properly. Removing the layer of filth that builds up on the connectors in your carts is the easiest and quickest way to improve your NES experience.
The best way to clean your carts is to open them up so you can really go to town on the connector blade. The tricky bit is getting your hands on a tool that’ll let you open your cartridge so you can give the connectors a serious scrubbing. The tool you’re looking for is a 3.8mm security bit that’ll work with the special screws on your NES games. It’s sometimes called a gamebit, and you can easily find one on sites like eBay and Amazon.com for about $6.00.
Above: You'll need a 3.8mm security bit to open up your NES cartridges
If you get your hands on a security bit, open your cartridge and take the game board out. Then, just give the connector blade a rub with a pencil eraser. It’s that simple. Wipe off the eraser bits when you’re done. You can also go over the connector with a Q-tip dipped in rubbing alcohol. Wipe off any remaining residue with your cloth rag.
Above: Some online will try to sell you "special" cleaning solutions for your NES. Save your money and use a pencil eraser instead
Above: These household items also work just fine
If you can’t get your hands on a security bit, it’s tough to clean the connector blade with a simple pencil eraser. However, you can still clean the blades with some Q-tips, Brasso metal polish, and isopropyl alcohol. Apply the Brasso to your Q-tip and apply the polish to both sides of the blade. Continue swabbing the blade on both sides. Next, go over the blade and surrounding area within the lip of the cart with a Q-tip dipped in alcohol several times to remove any residue from the Brasso. Finally, just go over it one last time with a dry Q-tip to remove any residue from the alcohol.
Above: If you can’t get a security bit, your next best option is to use Q-tips, Brasso, and isopropyl alcohol
Above: Look how much grime we got off with a few quick swabs
What you’ll need:
Phillips screwdriver
72-pin connector
A pencil eraser
Cleaning your carts is only the first step in getting your NES to play games properly again. It doesn’t matter how clean your carts are if the inside of your NES is full of dust bunnies and cat hair. Also, the 72-pin connector, the part that connects with the blade in your games, is notorious for wearing out. So we’re going to walk you through the process of opening upthe console so you can clean it up and replace the 72-pin connector.
Above: A new 72-pin connector is easy to find online and will cost you about $7 or $12, a small price to pay for a near new NESTracking The Economic Impact of U.S. Tariffs and Retaliatory Actions
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Austria needs to pursue comprehensive business and individual tax reform if it wants to remain competitive. Our new guide explores several ways the Austrian government can achieve a simpler, more pro-growth tax code. Read More
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"It's going very well," Menken told EW Radio. "It's in its early stages, and that's probably all I can say. We're really enjoying working on it."
Listen to the full interview below!
The rights to MRS. DOUBTFIRE are owned by 20th Century Fox, which started development on a musical version with Broadway producer Kevin McCollum in 2013.
MRS. DOUBTFIRE first hit movie theaters in 1993 starring Robin Williams and Sally Field, along with Harvey Fierstein in a supporting role. The film was directed by Chris Columbus and featured music by Howard Shore. It won the Oscar for Best Makeup.
The comedy follows Daniel Hillard (Williams), a voice actor in the midst of a divorce, who is denied custody of his children. To see them, he disguises himself as a British nanny called Mrs. Euphegenia Doubtfire and gets hired to run his wife's (Field) household and take care of their kids. All kinds of antics ensue.
No word yet on what kind of music the show will feature, but some of the non-instrumental tunes from MRS. DOUBTFIRE include Aerosmith's "Dude (Looks Like a Lady)", The Four Seasons' "Walk Like a Man", Frank Sinatra's "Luck Be a Lady" and more.
Alan Menken, whose most recent project Galavant is currently airing on ABC, has written the scores for the stage musicals God Bless You Mr. Rosewater, Patch Patch Patch, Real Life Funnies, Atina: Evil Queen of the Galaxy, Little Shop of Horrors, Kicks: The Showgirl Musical, The Apprenticeship of Duddy Kravitz, Beauty and the Beast, A Christmas Carol, Weird Romance, King David, Der Glöckner von Notre Dame, The Little Mermaid, Sister Act, Leap of Faith, Newsies, Aladdin and The Hunchback of Notre Dame. His film musicals include Little Shop of Horrors, Newsies, Life with Mikey, The Little Mermaid, Beauty and the Beast, Aladdin, Pocahontas, The Hunchback of Notre Dame, Hercules, Home On the Range, Noel, The Shaggy Dog, Enchanted, Tangled and Mirror, Mirror. EGOT-winner Menken is the recipient of 8 Oscars, 11 Grammys, 7 Golden Globes, the Tony, the Olivier, the New York Drama Critics Award and more. His upcoming projects include stage musicals of A Bronx Tale and the film Sausage Party.
Lyricist David Zippel has written for Broadway's Liza's at the Palace, The Woman in White, The Goodbye Girl, City of Angels -- which won him a Tony and a Drama Desk in 1990 -- and Barbara Cook: A Concert for the Theatre.
Tony winner Harvey Fierstein, who appeared in the MRS. DOUBTFIRE movie as 'Frank', wrote the book for last year's Casa Valentina on Broadway. Before that, he penned the book for Broadway's Kinky Boots, Newsies, La Cage aux Folles, A Catered Affair, Legs Diamond, Safe Sex and Torch Song Trilogy. He also starred on Broadway in Fiddler on the Roof and Hairspray.
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More Hot Stories For YouGallup is out this morning with a new poll that contains a damning indictment of the mainstream media. 60% of Americans, an all-time high, do not trust the mass media to accurately or fairly report the news. Mind you, that isn’t 60% of Republicans or conservatives, but Americans of all political persuasions.
From Gallup:
The record distrust in the media, based on a survey conducted Sept. 6-9, 2012, also means that negativity toward the media is at an all-time high for a presidential election year. This reflects the continuation of a pattern in which negativity increases every election year compared with the year prior. The current gap between negative and positive views — 20 percentage points — is by far the highest Gallup has recorded since it began regularly asking the question in the 1990s. Trust in the media was much higher, and more positive than negative, in the years prior to 2004 — as high as 72% when Gallup asked this question three times in the 1970s.
Last year, Gallup found that almost half of Americans (47%) believed the mainstream media had a liberal bias. Unsurprisingly, Republicans are the most distrustful of the media. Only 26% felt they could trust the media to accurately report the news. This is actually similar to levels registered in 2008.
The biggest shift is with Independents. Less than a third of Independents, 31%, felt they could trust the mass media. This represents a big drop from 2008.
As a result, only 39% of Americans say they very closely follow the mainstream media for news about national politics this election year. This, too, is a sharp drop from 2008.
The media has long had at least a slight liberal bias, but changes in technology and the market have pushed it much further left. In decades past, the media could act as a gatekeeper and decide what was and wasn’t news. They could push coverage favorable to liberals, but few people realized they were doing this. They were able to give an unnoticed and subtle nudge to politics.
They can’t do that anymore. They may ignore the news that the events in Libya were a terrorist attack rather than a riot, for example, but the information will still get out. They may try to ignore the economic slowdown, but people still feel the results. The media can no longer control information. As a result, rather than gatekeepers, they have become active participants in the political battles. Their liberal partisan bias is now obvious to everyone.
The good news is that fewer people are paying attention.
Note: Gallup’s question only focused on mass market mainstream media, i.e. newspapers, TV and radio. It did not survey internet news operations, where biases are often openly admitted. For example, everyone knows Politico and Huff Post are left-wing, while sites like this one and Daily Caller lean right. It would be interesting to compare trust levels between mainstream and on-line media
Follow me on twitterStory highlights The Office of Congressional Ethics announced Tuesday that it's extending its investigation of Rep. Alan Grayson
Grayson is in a heated Democratic primary battle to seek retiring GOP Sen. Marco Rubio's seat
(CNN) An already nasty Senate Democratic primary fight for the seat of retiring Republican Sen. Marco Rubio got even more heated Tuesday with news that the House ethics committee is extending its probe of Rep. Alan Grayson.
The panel's announcement triggered the release of a report by the outside Office of Congressional Ethics, which outlined half a dozen allegations, including charges Grayson improperly managed a hedge fund while serving in Congress, used official staff for campaign purposes and failed to properly disclose business interests on annual financial forms.
The campaign of his Democratic primary opponent in the Senate race, Rep. Patrick Murphy, circulated the 74-page report shortly after its release.
The report, which was backed by all six members of the OCE, found that "there is substantial reason to believe that Representative Grayson improperly allowed the use of his name by four entities connected to Representative Grayson's hedge fund and Grayson Consulting, Inc. of Virginia, and received compensation through management fees from the Grayson Fund Management Company, LLC." It also found that through Grayson's retainer agreements in his law firms he may have held financial interests in legal proceedings involving the U.S. government while serving in the House, which would be in violation of the rules.
Grayson released a statement saying he welcomed the news that the committee didn't take the step of establishing a formal "investigative subcommittee" to dig into the OCE's allegations and blamed his "political opponents" for instigating the ethics review. He also noted that the report "does not identify any instance where the OCE actually found an ethics violation, or any violation of law."
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"If you're looking for a fight, I'll be happy to give you one."
From the popular anime series 'KILL la KILL' comes a rerelease of Nendoroid Ryuko Matoi! She comes with three different expressions including her standard grinning face, a shouting face to pose her fighting with the Scissor Blade as well as an embarrassed face capturing her feminine side. The characteristic red highlight in her hair has been faithfully reproduced using a semi-transparent material!
Other optional parts include her guitar case as well as special hand parts which allow you to pose her with her hands in her pockets! Senketsu even comes with an alternate eye part which can be switched out to better match your pose, allowing for all sorts of different situations from the series!Facebook says the huge psychological experiment it secretly conducted on its users should have been “done differently” and announced a new set of guidelines for how it will approach future research studies.
In a blogpost on Thursday, Mike Schroepfer, chief technology officer, said the company had been “unprepared” for the negative reactions it received when it published the results of an experiment in June.
Facebook published the results of a 2012 study in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences. Unbeknown to users, Facebook had tampered with the news feeds of nearly 700,000 people, showing them an abnormally low number of either positive or negative posts. The experiment aimed to determine whether the company could alter the emotional state of its users.
News of the research sparked outrage from people who felt manipulated by the company.
“What many of us feared is already a reality: Facebook is using us as lab rats, and not just to figure out which ads we’ll respond to but actually change our emotions,” wrote animalnewyork.com, a blogpost that drew attention to the study in June.
The experiment was designed to assess whether more positive or negative comments in a Facebook newsfeed would impact how the user updated their own page. Facebook used an algorithm to filter content. Researchers found those shown more negative comments posted more negative comments and vice versa.
“It is clear now that there are things we should have done differently,” Schroepfer writes. “For example, we should have considered other non-experimental ways to do this research. The research would also have benefited from more extensive review by a wider and more senior group of people. Last, in releasing the study, we failed to communicate clearly why and how we did it.”
He also announced a new set of guidelines for how Facebook will approach research in the future. Research that relates to content that “may be considered deeply personal (such as emotions) it will go through an enhanced review process before research can begin. The guidelines also require further review if the work involves a collaboration with someone in the academic community,” he said.
A review panel consisting of engineering, research, legal, privacy and policy teams will assess projects falling within these guidelines. Research practices have been added to Facebook’s six-week training “bootcamp” and the company’s academic research will be available for public scrutiny at a single location and regularly updated
“We believe in research, because it helps us build a better Facebook. Like most companies today, our products are built based on extensive research, experimentation and testing,” said Schroepfer. “We want to do this research in a way that honours the trust you put in us by using Facebook every day,” said.Image copyright Jiwei Wang Image caption Robert Wang and a friend came up with the idea for the product
Robert Wang was hoping to make it easier for people to make a decent meal, but didn't expect his new product to attract a cult following.
Last summer on Amazon Prime Day, the online retailer's global 24-hour annual sale event, one of the top-selling products in the US was a multi-function electric cooker.
The item in question is called the Instant Pot, and more than 215,000 of them were snapped up in the US on that single day.
The fact that this countertop appliance was outselling TVs and tablets may come as a surprise to many people, but not to its legions of dedicated fans, who express unabashed adoration.
"If you look at the Amazon reviews, one common word is 'love'," says Mr Wang.
"Americans are very open with their emotions. Love is all over the place. Another one is that 'Instant Pot changed my life'.
"That's actually rewarding to us - understanding that we have created value for society."
Image copyright Instant Pot Company Image caption The Instant Pot has built up an online fanbase
First available to buy in 2010, the Instant Pot has become a veritable craze, a success built through social media word-of-mouth instead of traditional TV or print advertising.
Today, the official Instant Pot Facebook group is nearly 398,000-people strong, and there are thousands of other online enthusiasts. Fans share recipes online and tips for making everything from soups, stews and chilli, to poached eggs, popcorn and cheesecake in the appliance.
Mr Wang says that from the beginning the intention was to let the product speak for itself, and build up sales thanks to customer recommendations rather than pay for advertising.
He describes this as the "build a better mousetrap, and the world will beat a path to your door" marketing strategy.
All-in-one
The Instant Pot is the brainchild of Mr Wang and his friend Yi Qin, who are both veterans of the Canadian technology sector. Mr Wang had worked for the now-defunct telecoms group Nortel, while Mr Qin had been employed by Blackberry.
They were brainstorming ideas for a new project in 2008 and realised people were searching for the same solution they were - a way to cook healthy meals for a family quickly and affordably.
Image copyright Instant Pot Image caption Fans of the Instant Pot post recipes and photos online
That was when their attention turned to kitchen appliances and rebooting the pressure cooker.
They came up with the idea for the Instant Pot, which is a pressure cooker, slow cooker, rice cooker, steamer, saute pan, yogurt maker, warming pot all-in-one unit.
Together with three other partners, they set up a business called Double Insight in Ottawa, the Canadian capital, and the first version of Instant Pot was born in 2010.
"We have tried to automate cooking as much as possible and tried to simplify the cooker," says Mr Qin, who is the firm's vice president of product management. "One press of the button can cook the meal for the family."
Image copyright Courtesy Instant Pot Image caption Yi Qin says that from day one they wanted the product to be as easy as possible to use
The product was, however, not an immediate success. Mr Qin says that one problem was the "stigma" surrounding one of the Instant Pot's main functions: the fact that it can be used as a pressure cooker, which had long since fallen out of favour in North American kitchens.
"Most people have some concept of urban legends of exploding pressure cookers in their grandmother's kitchens," says Mr Qin.
He says they addressed the issue by making product safety a design priority, and making the Instant Pot as foolproof to use as possible.
Thanks to word of mouth, sales were growing well by 2013 when Amazon started to sell the product, and sales shot up further.
"Amazon is a very practical company," says Mr Qin. "They didn't approach us |
Sixers appear to have finally found what The Process ordered: a duo that has the advantage of both being very young and having the sort of size and skill that can’t be taught, a rare combination that the league has seldom seen.
Since the ABA-NBA merger in 1976, only five teams have had a pair of players age 23 or younger who each logged at least 25 minutes per game and posted a Box Plus/Minus of +3.5 or greater: The 1984-85 Portland Trail Blazers, with Clyde Drexler and Sam Bowie ; the 1993-94 and 1994-95 Orlando Magic, with Shaquille O’Neal and Penny Hardaway; the 2011-12 Oklahoma City Thunder with Kevin Durant and James Harden; and, if they keep it up, the 2017-18 Philadelphia 76ers with Simmons and Embiid.
Somewhat lost in the wild stat lines Simmons and Embiid are compiling is the fact that they excel by going against today’s NBA grain. The 6-foot-10 Simmons, much like scoring leader and early MVP candidate Giannis Antetokounmpo, has managed to foil defenses and log triple-doubles without the threat of an outside shot. In fact, through 11 games, Simmons hasn’t even attempted a true jumper of 20 feet or more, yet he is skewering foes with nearly 18 points and eight dimes a game while shooting 50 percent.
Embiid, on the other hand, would appear to be a bit of a throwback. He’s most comfortable in the post with his back to the basket — his 22.5 post-ups per 100 possessions lead the NBA by far, according to data from Second Spectrum — even as he possesses the new-age ability to spot up.
The two display good chemistry, scoring an above-average 0.94 points per pick-and-roll they orchestrate, according to Second Spectrum data. They sometimes catch opponents off guard at the start of possessions, when defenders expect Simmons to come to the 3-point line to get the ball and initiate the offense, but he darts backdoor instead, with Embiid finding him for an easy bucket.
On a separate play against Dallas, Simmons calls Embiid over to set a screen for him, prompting Dirk Nowitzki to take a step or two forward in anticipation of the pick. That allows Embiid the space he needs to dive behind the future Hall of Famer for an easy lob.
In the nearly 200 minutes Simmons and Embiid have shared the court, the Sixers have played like a contender, scoring 106.2 points per 100 plays while surrendering just 97.2, marks that would rank them inside the NBA’s top 10 on both ends of the court.
This duo is clearly the source of Philadelphia’s new identity, but a number of other factors also help explain the team’s promising start.
The club — which for years might have had better shooters in the stands than it did on its bench — is lighting things up from deep, thanks to free-agent addition J.J. Redick and two-way stud Robert Covington (who’s outpacing Klay Thompson as the NBA’s best high-volume catch-and-shoot 3-point gunner so far ). The Sixers have made their plays following timeouts count, scoring 1.05 points per possession in those situations, second-best in the league, per Synergy Sports. And the young defense, still holier than a bible at times, is making an extraordinary effort as it learns the ropes. Philly boasts the NBA’s best defensive efficiency after committing live-ball turnovers, per Inpredictable; that’s noteworthy because the Sixers fumble it away more than any other team.
To be clear, no one is saying that Philadelphia, at 6-5, has it all figured out. Forward Dario Saric and Embiid ranked worst and second-worst in turnover rate, respectively, when being aggressively doubled in the post last season, per Synergy, and Brown said his team still needs to reduce the number of “my bad” situations it finds itself in over the course of each game. Simmons’s reluctance to pull the trigger on jumpers may be an extension of him still figuring out which hand he wants to shoot with on a primary basis. (Simmons, who shoots free throws left-handed, spent time during Thursday morning’s shootaround in Sacramento practicing midrange jumpers with his right hand. He missed the rim four times during a two-minute span.)
Philly’s rim protection crumbles into dust when Embiid goes to the bench, as opponents shoot just 57 percent from the restricted area with him in the game, yet hit a whopping 71 percent — which would rank worst in the league — when he’s sidelined, according to NBA.com. Then, obviously, there’s the question of whether the team’s key pieces can stay healthy, which is far from a given considering their injury histories. (The calculus could also change for the better depending on the status of No. 1 overall draft pick Markelle Fultz and what he’s able to give the Sixers once he comes back.)
But make no mistake: A healthy Sixers team — with Simmons infusing life into the offense by forcing help when he drives to the basket and Embiid bringing the sort of post D that makes players think twice about shooting — will factor into the playoff race this year, with a chance to do far more damage going forward.
Simmons’s creativity on offense is bolstered by his ability to see over the top of the defense. His 10.6 assists per 100 possessions and 2.1 assist-to-turnover ratio compare favorably to the first few seasons of LeBron James’s career. And the Philly point forward, who leads NBA ballhandlers in passes per game, at times has flashed a James-like ability to spray the ball around to shooters.
As for Embiid, whom Brown referred to as his “crown jewel,” his impact can’t be overstated, particularly on the defensive end of the floor. As ESPN stat guru Micah Adams pointed out, teams have seemingly avoided trying to post up Embiid at all this season, perhaps aware of how effective he was at the rim last season, even when compared with the league’s other elite bigs.
Asked if it’s difficult to stay focused on what’s right in front of the team rather than thinking big-picture, Embiid smiled. “I guess I’d just say that I have to trust the process,” he said.Donald Trump and Wilbur Ross. REUTERS/Mike Segar We've heard a lot of disconcerting things about trade from the Trump administration, but in an interview with CNBC on Tuesday, Commerce Secretary Wilbur Ross may have just topped them all.
It was about a new tariff the administration just put on Canadian lumber.
"I wouldn't regard the Canadian situation as being anything like the war with ISIS, but it certainly is a very precise set of tariffs on a very precise set of imports," Ross said. "The reason we're putting it on is Canada's forests are owned by the various provinces, and the provinces charge very discounted, we believe, very subsidized prices to the lumbermen, which in turn lets them get a subsidized low price coming into the US."
He continued (and this is that part that should actually be more upsetting than the ridiculous ISIS reference, emphasis ours): "It simply seems unfair because in the US most of the forests are privately owned and therefore pay full-price market rate for the stumpage."
Oh, now we slap tariffs on countries because something simply "seems" unfair?
That's not exactly how this works.
The privatization of US timberlands goes all the way back to the Homestead Act of 1862. We chose a private model for that industry, and no other country can make us change it. Canadians chose a different model, and no country can make them change it.
As Carnegie Mellon economist Lee Branstetter pointed out to Business Insider, this reality has for a while been a sticking point for the US and Canada for the same reason Ross cited: It seems unfair. But the thing is, according to World Trade Organization rules, it's not.
Here's a relevant passage from the WTO and General Agreement on Tariffs and Trade, from 1947 and 1994, to explain (via Reuters):
"The products of the territory of any contracting party imported into the territory of any other contracting party shall be accorded treatment no less favorable than that accorded to like products of national origin in respect of all laws, regulations and requirements affecting their internal sale, offering for sale, purchase, transportation, distribution or use."
In other words, member nations can't enact laws that favor domestic industries over foreign ones, but this isn't a law. This is simply the nature of Canada's logging industry. It seems unfair. But technically, it's not.
Et tu, Wilbur?
So now we're doing trade policy based on how things feel? I saw this coming from the head of the White House National Trade Council, Peter Navarro, who has repeatedly said he feels our trade with Germany is unfair because it negotiates as a member of the European Union rather than by itself.
But billionaire investor Ross? Less so. Then again, last month he told CNBC he was "horrified to learn that billions of dollars of [WTO] duties that have been won after... hard-fought cases have never been collected."
In other words, he's a newbie here, just like everyone else in the White House now — with a boss looking for wins anywhere they can be found. Maybe that means starting fights out of thin air; maybe it doesn't.
But that's sure what it seems like.Amanda Warren
Activist Post
The horse meat fiasco in Europe has prodded scientists to look a bit deeper into what else we might be consuming. A team of South African scientists have just found traces of human tissue in meat meant for public consumption from 9 provinces.
The issue was revealed to parliament, almost as a side note, during meat inspection briefings on Tuesday.
A University of Stellenbosch scientist and his team conducted a microbial analysis that revealed traces of human elements, but said that slaughterhouse workers sometimes cut themselves... or other things... which could lead to the findings.
If I walked into a factory and the sample I randomly selected to test was a meat sample of which the person de-boning the meat had just picked his nose and then touched the meat, I would get a totally different microbial reading,” he said.
Delicious. Beyond the findings themselves, it brings up the global hot-button topic of the moment: food labeling. How much should we know about what we are consuming?
In addition to the troubling statements above, scientist Louw Hoffman noted that only 15% of the meat being sold in South Africa is correctly labeled, revealing other potentially harmful attributes of which consumers are currently unaware:
“In the labelling regulations it clearly states that allergens have to be mentioned and noted,” said Hoffman.
Allergens like... other people’s genetic signature?
Yet, Hoffman and his team of scientists concluded that the incorrect labeling poses “no threat” to the consumers who eat it, despite some more gems uncovered:
Meat Musical Chairs
Briefing parliament’s portfolio committee on agriculture, forestry and fisheries, University of Western Cape forensic scientist Dr Eugenia D’Amato said nearly 43% of samples she had tested which were labelled as game, were, in fact, beef.
D’Amato said horse meat had also been used as a substitute for springbok in biltong, and pork was found in ostrich sausages.
Download Your First Issue Free! Do You Want to Learn How to Become Financially Independent, Make a Living Without a Traditional Job & Finally Live Free?
Download Your Free Copy of Counter Markets There was also a smaller proportion of kangaroo in samples.
Despite the overall findings that consumers have absolutely no idea what they are eating – including human remnants – in 85% of the products, SA’s Department of Agriculture, Forestry and Fisheries deputy director-general downplayed it by asserting that we are not becoming unwitting cannibals:
It is possible that (if tested) we could find traces of human DNA in meat. However, even if we do find human DNA, it does not mean we are eating human flesh.
Great. Unfortunately, we are evidently eliminating healthy microorganisms in the processing of foods, but since there is an acceptable standard of nasty foreign entities, thanks to our regulatory agencies – we have introduced a variety of contaminants into now weakened guts and immune systems.
We’d like to think that these food scandals are safe from us – overseas, it’s their problem. But, big problems are usually systemic and many of the developed nations are on the same platform. As with most food scandals, they go on for years unnoticed before the beans are spilled.
It doesn’t sound like anyone’s literally being run through the meat grinder just yet, but it’s a startling fact that we don’t know much about what our food comes into contact with. And we have scientists and regulatory agencies continually asserting how safe our food supply is.Breaking News Emails Get breaking news alerts and special reports. The news and stories that matter, delivered weekday mornings.
April 20, 2017, 6:42 PM GMT / Updated April 21, 2017, 4:25 PM GMT By Alex Seitz-Wald
The Democratic National Committee and Vermont Sen. Bernie Sanders are under fire for supporting a mayoral candidate with a mixed record on abortion, highlighting divisions within the party even as the DNC seeks to mend fences with its high-profile unity tour.
Former state Sen. Heath Mello speaks during a debate against incumbent Omaha Mayor Jean Stothert in Omaha, Neb. on April 14, 2017, ahead of the mayoral election, on May 9. Nati Harnik / AP
The tour, which kicked off Monday, seemed to get off to a rocky start. But the biggest bump came when progressives began withdrawing support for Omaha, Nebraska mayoral candidate Heath Mello after discovering that, as a Nebraska state senator eight years ago, he supported an abortion-related ultrasound bill.
That bill, according to the Nebraska Legislature, required that a woman seeking an abortion "be told of her right to request a list of places she can get a free ultrasound," but did not require her to actually get the procedure, as critics initially claimed.
Sanders and DNC Deputy Chair Keith Ellison — subbing in for DNC Chairman Tom Perez, who has headlined others legs of the cross-country unity tour with Sanders — will hold a rally in Omaha Thursday evening to support Mello, a Democrat challenging the city’s incumbent GOP mayor.
DailyKos, the liberal blog that helped Democrat Jon Ossoff raise millions in Georgia’s special congressional election, withdrew its endorsement of Mello Thursday morning.
And NARAL Pro-Choice America President Ilyse Hogue released a statement excoriating the national party for embracing Mello.
“The actions today by the DNC to embrace and support a candidate for office who will strip women — one of the most critical constituencies for the party — of our basic rights and freedom is not only disappointing, it is politically stupid. Today’s action make this so-called 'fight back tour' look more like a throw back tour for women and our rights,” Hogue said.
Contradicting initial reports — and Mello's campaign manager — Planned Parenthood of Nebraska said they never gave Mello a stellar rating. "Planned Parenthood Voters of Nebraska has never endorsed Heath Mello for public office," the group said in a statement.
The reproductive rights group added that Mello "introduced and supported anti-choice legislation" in the legislature, but acknowledged that he said during his mayoral campaign that he would support Planned Parenthood.
The DNC added the Omaha stop to their tour at the request of Sanders allies, including Nebraska's state party chair.
Sanders was criticized on social media Wednesday night for telling the Wall Street Journal that he didn’t know if Ossoff is a “progressive," even as he was preparing to support Mello. While Sanders' endorsement of Ossoff would likely end up in a GOP attack ad in the conservative district, critics accused Sanders of a double standard. Meanwhile, the flap could reignite questions about whether there’s room within the Democratic Party for anti-abortion candidates.
Perez, who is will be in Georgia to campaign for Ossoff while Sanders and Ellison head to Omaha, tried to smooth things over in a statement.
"The Democratic Party’s platform states clearly our support for every woman’s right to make their own choices about their reproductive health and to have access to safe abortion services," he said. "Our job at the DNC is to help Democrats who have garnered support from voters in their community cross the finish line and win — from school board to Senate. The biggest threat to women's reproductive rights is the relentless Republican attacks on women’s health care."
It's not the first hiccup on the tour. Earlier, Perez was met with boos, apparently from Sanders supporters.
This story has been updated to clarify details of the Mello's ultrasound bill.WIMBLEDON, England – The pin-drop quiet of Wimbledon's Centre Court long has showcased women tennis' best players as well as its noisiest.
That could be a thing of the past at the All England Club and elsewhere if a plan agreed upon to expunge unwarranted noise with technology, rule changes and education comes to fruition.
"It's time for us to drive excessive grunting out of the game for future generations," WTA chairman and chief executive Stacey Allaster said.
The umbrella scenario, unanimously green-lighted this month at Roland Garros in Paris by representatives of the four majors, the International Tennis Federation and the WTA players' council, would include:
• The development of a handheld device — a kind of Hawk-Eye for noise — for umpires to objectively measure on-court grunting levels.
• A new rule setting acceptable and non-acceptable noise levels based on acoustical data gathering and analysis.
• Education at large tennis academies, national development programs and at all levels of junior and lower-tier professional events.
"I'm not going to use that word," said Allaster in an interview Monday when asked if the portable device would be akin to the grunt-o-meters sometimes used at Wimbledon to measure egregious offenders such as Monica Seles and top-ranked Maria Sharapova. "The bottom line is that we want to bring forward across all levels of competition an objective rule through use of technology to make it much easier for athletes and chair umpires."
The current generation of players will not be affected by the plan, a decision made by the WTA earlier this year.
Allaster said the WTA had consulted experts in the field of sports science and psychology such as Rick Jensen, founder and director of Florida-based Performance Center; noted coach Nick Bollettieri; and past and present players, from Billie Jean King and Seles to Serena and Venus Williams (both players' council members).
The conclusion: It would be unfair and unreasonable to make today's stars revamp their ingrained motor skills and breathing techniques that the WTA had no hand in developing in the first place.
"What is clear from experts is that it would have a clear, damaging effect on performance of the existing generation," Allaster said.
She gave no timetable about when the plan would be in place.
An outside acoustic consultant will be hired to conduct tests in various conditions, venues and surfaces to develop a cost-effective instrument for umpires on court. The game's various stakeholders will be consulted to determine how the new rule will be written and implemented.
"It's going to take some time," Allaster explained. "I don't want to get ahead of ourselves because it's a collective effort of the sport and we need everyone to buy in."
Nine-time Wimbledon singles champion Martina Navratilova, an outspoken critic of high-decibel levels in the sport, applauded the initiative but scoffed at the pace of implementation.
"I think it's a great idea, but speed it up," she said Monday. "You do not need a year to get used to not making a noise when you play tennis."
The WTA was forced to deal with grunting in the wake of continued negative fan and media reaction. Late last year officials said they would take up the issue in earnest.
Some top players such as former No. 1s Caroline Wozniacki of Denmark and Jelena Jankovic of Serbia called publicly for a crackdown on excessive noise made by the likes of Sharapova and Victoria Azarenka— the reigning French Open and Australian Open champions — because it is disruptive and borders on gamesmanship.
"Good luck trying to make top players" stop, American Bethanie Mattek-Sands, who sits on the WTA players' council said Monday. "More importantly, fans are bothered by it. It's important that we address it quickly."
The criticism leveled at women has caused some to point out that male players also grunt — some quite loudly. The issue is not perceived to be a problem on the ATP World Tour and has not been raised, according to ATP spokeswoman Kate Gordon.
"The women are definitely louder and more abrasive," Navratilova said.
The WTA, which likens its approach to that of the Major League Baseball's gradual phase-out of chewing tobacco, intends to introduce its plan at academies and other training venues on 20 occasions in the next year, including the famed Florida Bollettieri/IMG Academy, where it has already begun. They will talk to players, coaches and parents, too.
"Stacey Allaster and the sport are doing the right thing by focusing on the next generation of players, and are being very, very thorough in their approach," said women's tour founder Billie Jean King in a statement provided by the WTA. "I have full confidence that the sport will put forth a plan that addresses excessive grunting that works for the fans, the players and the tournaments."
The ITF, which oversees the four Grand Slam tournaments and lower-tier Future and Challenger events, will make a presentation to some athletes during Wimbledon.
"We are going to let them know that at a point in time there will be a new rule in place where we are going to bring the noise level down," Allaster said. "The sooner we can get them to alter the breathing technique the more success we can have."
Asked about the hindrance rule, which is already on the books, Allaster said it was too subjective.
"What is too loud?" she said. "What is too long? We need to give the official an objective measurement tool. Can you imagine on a critical point an umpire going, 'Oh, I thought you were too loud.' You have to take all of that out of the equation. It's not fair to athletes, the chair or the sport."Lord Condon said spot-fixing began around the time of the 2003 World Cup © Getty Images
Cricket's former anti-corruption chief, Lord Paul Condon, has said match-fixing was rife during the 1980s and 1990s, and involved all the major nations. He also said spot-fixing began around the time of the 2003 World Cup and has now become "the name of the game".
"In the late 1990s, Test and World Cup matches were being routinely fixed," Condon, who was the first head of the ICC's ACSU, told the Evening Standard. "There were a number of teams involved in fixing, and certainly more than the Indian sub-continent teams were involved. Every international team, at some stage, had someone doing some funny stuff."
There had been plenty of rumour and speculation during the 1980s and 1990s, but it was only when the revelations involving Hansie Cronje emerged in early 2000 that significant action was taken. Condon, though, explained that match-fixing had roots away from the international scene in competitions such as the English County Championship and Sunday League, but not for sums of money.
"If you're Team A and have a higher position in the Sunday league and I'm captain of Team B and my team have no chance in the Sunday League, I might do a deal to ensure you got maximum points in your Sunday league match," he said. "You would reciprocate in the County Championship. These friendly fixes quickly became more sinister, probably in the Eighties."
After the unmasking of Cronje and match-fixing, he said, "the game was in meltdown, sponsors were walking away, demanding their money back." Condon's first major tournament with the ICC was the 2003 World Cup and, though he said it was the event helped eradicate wholesale fixing of matches, he said it may have marked the moment when spot-fixing arrived.
"In one group match during a couple of overs two guys suddenly went from scoring runs in double-figures to just ones and twos. For spot-fixing, that's all you need." The footage was shown to a panel of former Test players, who could not agree if it was corruption. Spot-fixing has been in the news of late with three Pakistan cricketers - Salman Butt, Mohammad Asif and Mohammad Amir - jailed for their parts in deliberately bowling no-balls against England, at Lord's, in 2010. Butt was sentenced to two-and-a-half years, Asif was handed a year and Amir got six months.
They were caught with evidence provided by a News of the World undercover sting operation, a process that the ACSU hasn't been able to use to root out corruption although Condon said it was considered when he was in charge.
"We considered it and a policy decision was taken that, firstly, it would be highly unlikely the police would prosecute," he said. "They would say, 'This is entrapment, the cricket authorities setting up their own people.' The laws of entrapment are pretty clear. And, secondly, in our early education programmes, cricketers were told, 'If you're approached for a fix, this is not some scare by cricket trying to set you up and then giving you a b********g. This will be for real either by fixers or journalists. So, if you get involved, you must take the consequences.'"
Condon added that it was vital that an example was made of the three Pakistan players to show that corruption came with serious punishments, but did have a modicum of sympathy for 19-year-old Amir.
"Amir is an unsophisticated young man," he said. "If you're put in an environment where you think your future career is threatened if you don't do what your captain's asking you to do, and there's no one in the team management you feel you can go to, in that sense you feel sorry for that young man. But that's not to say he doesn't deserve a symbolic punishment. He's the only one I have even a moderate amount of sympathy for. To keep cricket clean sentences have to be exemplary."
© ESPN Sports Media Ltd.We’ve been on a lot of hikes since we set off on our epic world journey, but none of them have compared to the lush green landscape and epic views of Northern Ireland.
Warning: Severe wanderlust inducing content ahead!
Belfast’s weather is notoriously mild and damp, and the day we hiked the Cave Hill Trail was no different. Luckily, the rain held off except for a brief sprinkle at the summit, but it was more refreshing than a nuisance after the fairly rigorous hike up.
The trail may have been steep and slippery, but the views - some of our favorites of any hike we’ve done - were so worth it!
If you visit Belfast, you can’t help but notice this green sleeping giant north of the city center. And getting there was surprising a breeze. You simply take any #1 bus from the city center and get off at the Strathmore stop. From here, you walk up one block and start following the signs for Belfast Castle. Oh ya, did I mention that the trail starts and ends at a castle?! Because it does.
After exploring the Castle grounds for a bit, we started our ascent up to ruins of McArthur’s fort at the top of Cave Hill. The first part of the hike was like walking through a magical jungle. Something reminiscent of Jurassic Park but about 40 degrees cooler and with the happiest dogs rustling in the trees instead of, you know, a t-rex.
The vegetation is thick, green and a bit muddy, but so pretty! One thing we especially loved about the trail is how raw it seemed. It looked like someone had just freshly created the trail with a machete. Sometimes we weren’t sure if we were on the trail or some magical path to Narnia.
About halfway through the hike the trees gave way and the ground became rocky and grassy. That’s when we first noticed the breathtaking views the day had in store. To your right is the ocean, with the castle and city center behind you. Don’t stop for too many pictures here though. Trust us. It gets a lot better!
From here, it’s a short walk to a huge cave opening. Eric was brave (or foolish) enough to climb up into it, but we wouldn’t recommend it! The way in is steep and slippery and according to him, it wasn’t that big inside. We hear there are two other much more easily accessible caves along the path, but this one was the only one we came across. If you ask someone in the visitors center (located in the castle basement), they can point you in the direction of the other two.
Even though this cave was a little too steep to climb safely, if you’re crazy enough to make it inside, it makes for a pretty awesome Instagram picture!
New vlog! We explore caves in Northern Ireland 😍👌💥 LINK IN BIO A photo posted by The Endless Adventure (@theendlessadventure) on Aug 1, 2016 at 11:14am PDT
Once you reach the cave, you only have a few more minutes of hiking to reach the summit, but boy is it a doozy! The path is really steep and slippery, alternating between loose rock and steep rocky stairs. You’ll definitely want to make sure you have some water handy for this part!
After you get past this almost vertical hike, you’ll come up to a gate which is the entrance to McArt’s court. And you’ll want to go ahead and pat yourself on the back, because you made it!! As a reward, it’ll likely be wet and windy at the top which will feel amazing...until you cool off a bit and then you might freeze and hate it. In addition to water, you’ll also probably want an extra sweater or jacket.
Once you arrive at the top, make sure to to spend plenty of time taking in the views, peering over the edge (which is a pretty substantial vertical drop) and imagining you’re fighting off vikings in an epic movie scene!
We decided to take the more gradual path down to the right, but it was just as amazing. This path was a more leisurely stroll through beautiful Irish farmland complete with cows, streams and more happy puppies. Eventually you’ll start getting into denser vegetation and more of the machete-hacked paths which will bring you back to the castle and the end of your hike.
Even though Cave Hill is by no means the hardest or tallest hike, it is definitely one of the most unique and fun hikes we’ve done with an absolutely unforgettable view.
Have you hiked Cave Hill? Were you able to explore the other caves? If so, what’d you think!?
What are some of the best hikes you’ve ever done? Let us know know in the comments section below our let us know on Twitter. Thanks for reading!
If you want to follow along on our journey, you can subscribe to our YouTube Channel or subscribe to our blog. Thanks for reading, we'll see you on the road!Even as the hostage scenario unfolds at Sydney, Australia, India's second largest provider confirmed that one of its employees has been taken hostage.
“We can confirm that one employee is among the hostages at the Lindt Cafe in Sydney. We are also confirming the whereabouts of all our other employees there. We are in constant touch with authorities and Indian Consulate in Sydney for updates on the situation on ground,” said the company in a statement.
The company further said that the family of the employee has been informed and it is extending all possible support to them in this difficult time.
It has been more than nine-hours since a gunmen took 15 people at a popular Cafe in Sydney hostages. Based on the recent development and TV reports the gunman has demanded an flag and wants to talk to Prime Minister
According to the report, the armed man has told the hostages that he planted four bombs.
The gunman said two bombs are planted inside the Lindt Chocolate Cafe in and the others elsewhere in the Central Business District, Sky channel reported quoting Network Ten.
has some 2,500 employees in Australia including many in Sydney. Meanwhile, other major Indian IT which have large operations in the country are trying to get details of their employees and are working on contingency plans to ensure continuity of business.
While a spokesperson said all its employees in Sydney are safe and the company has not issued any advisory so far, said in an email, “We are continuously monitoring the developments in Sydney. Our employees are safe and our business operations remain unaffected and continue as normal.”
An Indian official in Sydney working for one of Australia's leading telecom services provider said that the entire area and the buildings have enhanced the security arrangements and none of the employees are being allowed to leave without advisory from the local police.
“Besides, all the buildings in and around the place where the incident has happened are being evacuated," he said. The person 0added that his company has advised all employees to monitor the situation and if required to work from home tomorrow.He began his Orioles minor league career as a shortstop, but Mychal Givens is now a pitcher - and he could be on a fast track to Baltimore. There are some that feel the Double-A Bowie reliever could even make it to the Orioles roster before the 2015 season ends.
Throwing mid-90s fastballs that sometimes touch the higher 90s from a sidearm delivery, Givens has made rapid improvement since he moved to the mound for the 2013 season. His fastball shows late life with heavy sink at time, and he also has a solid slider and changeup.
While he was tough to hit when he moved up to Double-A Bowie from Single-A Frederick late last June, he really struggled with his control. But a year later, his control is much improved and he remains tough to hit. It’s proven to be a combination that has a lot of people in the organization excited to see what the future will hold for this 25-year-old right-hander.
Givens’ improvement has come about as a result of both his strong desire to get better and the Orioles’ desire to surround him with solid coaching. In the last nine months alone, he has worked with Triple-A Norfolk pitching coach Mike Griffin in the Arizona Fall League, Orioles pitching coaches Dave Wallace and Dom Chiti at the January mini-camp and in spring training, and now he is coached by former Oriole Alan Mills at Bowie.
“Just me with a desire to get better each day and all the help the Orioles have given me,” Givens said when asked why he has improved this year. “Help from the mini-camp during the offseason and big league camp, plus help Millsy has given me and all the pitching staff. They saw things in me and pushed me to get better and I’ve pushed myself. Just learning how to be a pitcher, to go out there every day, and hold up during the grind and attacking hitters.”
In 22 Bowie games this year, Givens is 2-1 with 12 saves in 14 chances and an ERA of 1.69. Over 37 1/3 innings, he has allowed 27 hits with 10 walks, 50 strikeouts and an average against of.201.
That is a strikeout rate of 12.1 per every nine innings, which ranks second in the Eastern League among all relievers, and a walk rate of 2.4 per nine innings. Last season, in 25 1/3 innings at Bowie, Givens walked 23 and fanned 28.
Givens credits a few slight mechanical adjustments that the big league coaches suggested he make back in January for helping him to repeat his delivery more consistently, leading to much better command and control.
“In mini-camp, Dave and Dom tinkered with how I start my delivery and stance,” he said. “Just start from a bit of a crouch when I first come set. It gets me to a better position with my arm. Lets my arm catch up and creates more consistent arm action. I kind of saw immediate results with it.”
Was Givens on board right away with the changes?
“I’m on board with whatever will make me get to the next level and help the Orioles win more ballgames,” he said.
At Bowie this year, Mills said Givens has been very coachable.
“He is always asking questions, always trying to get better and always trying to find a better way to do things,” Mills said. “He’s learning how to pitch to guys, reading bats and swings, and understanding (pitch) sequences. He’s been a pleasure to work with.”
Bowie manager Gary Kendall saw Givens last year and this year.
“Last season, there were flashes of what he is doing this year, but now we are seeing that on a more consistent basis,” Kendall said.
Givens ended the 2014 season ranked by Baseball America as the organization’s No. 27 prospect. He will clearly be ranked much higher after this season.
Givens was selected by the Orioles out of Plant High School in Tampa, Fla., in the second round of the 2009 draft. He was signed to an $800,000 bonus, and the Orioles envisioned him developing into an athletic shortstop that could eventually produce some power.
But when Givens’ offense didn’t come around as they had hoped, the Orioles moved him to the mound. He had pitched some in high school, and Givens could throw with good velocity from a very unique arm slot that is now basically a sidearm delivery.
His pitching career began in 2013 with Single-A Delmarva, and the Orioles limited his innings and basically scripted out his whole year - when and how much he would pitch. In his first two seasons, he pitched 101 innings and walked 58.
Now he has become a multi-innings reliever - he has worked two innings or more in 13 of his 22 outings - and looks at times like he could get big league hitters out right now. The Orioles have begun to have Kendall use him not just to close games, but also pitching in earlier innings as possible preparation for a future role in Baltimore.
Givens said he never looks back, wondering where he may be right now if he had begun his pro career as a pitcher and not a shortstop.
“No regrets,” he said. “It’s not like I just got thrown into the fire as a pitcher, I was a prospect coming out of high school as a pitcher. But didn’t really come along (as a position player) and I had the option to be a pitcher and have a good arm, so I don’t really look back at the past, just toward the future.”
Givens has heard the rumors that he could be on a fast track to Baltimore, but said |
money strengthening and locking in a fossil fuel-based economy is considerable, and reinforces the already damaging approach from the European Commission and national governments that promotes more gas infrastructure, despite signing a global agreement to keep temperature rises “well below 2 degrees” and move away from fossil fuels.
Keep knocking on doors
But as mentioned, these data suffer from a serious weakness: while the type of bonds bought can be deciphered from the ISIN codes available on the ECB’s website, the ECB has no intention of divulging the sums spent on each bonds.
Several parliamentary questions have been asked, both in the European Parliament and in national parliaments, about the purchases of the ECB, but when it comes to the crucial numbers, the door is shut in the face of MPs. For example when German political party Die Linke asked about the bond purchases, it was told, “such an overview is not in the possession of the government”. And when asked about the opinion of the European Commission on the corporate bond purchases, the German government replied that “the Commission respects the independence of the ECB, as does the government”. In other words, the German government is not inclined to even discuss the characteristics of the bond purchases.
Well-oiled corporations and public investments
It does make sense to invest public money in response to the crisis, but the drawbacks of the EU model seem clear. Going merely for “well-oiled corporations” leaves out job-intensive small and medium enterprises. It also helps exacerbate climate change, saving us from one crisis by fuelling another, when it could be boosting renewable energy with the same money. And while the ECB claims investments are decided on the basis of neutral criteria such as investment grade (assessment of the viability and security of an investment), this does entail a political choice. A political choice that does not seem to be affected by the opinions in elected assemblies across the EU.To paraphrase the poet, what a piece of work is Mammo.
Councillor Giorgio Mammoliti – Mammo to City Hall buffs – is often described in newspaper stories as colourful, the word that reporters use when they mean goofy. He has advocated turning the Toronto islands into a red-light district. He once took off his shirt in the city council chamber to protest against a nude beach on Hanlan's Point. He has said he wants to "weed out the communists" from Toronto. In his failed run for mayor in 2010, he called for arming bylaw-enforcement officers and spending billions to build a subway down Jane Street, which just happens to run along the border of his York West ward.
Now, like Mayor Rob Ford, Mr. Mammoliti is in the soup over his campaign spending. At a hearing on the matter Monday, an auditor described "questionable" accounting in a shoebox campaign that had "no idea" what its income or expenses were. Mr. Mammoliti attempted to wriggle off the hook by arguing that the violations were (sound familiar?) inadvertent. If he tried his best to stay within the limit but failed, should he really be prosecuted, asked his lawyer at Monday's audit committee hearing. Are you trying to say that the spending limits prescribed by law are mere guidelines, rejoined a skeptical member of the audit panel. It voted to forge ahead with legal proceedings against Mr. Mammoliti for overspending his limit by more than $12,000.
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All of this would be of minimal interest if he were simply a harmless blowhard in quest of the next headline. Under Mr. Ford, he has become something more than that.
Mr. Mammoliti began his life in politics as an NDPer. After leading a union chapter of maintenance workers, he won a seat in the provincial legislature in 1990 and served in premier Bob Rae's government. He earned a well-deserved infamy by campaigning against spousal benefits for gay couples, breaking ranks with NDP colleagues on the issue.
At City Hall, he swung further to the right but often clashed with Mr. Ford, who represented a next-door ward in suburban northwest Toronto. Mr. Ford famously called him a "Gino Boy." Mr. Mammoliti launched a human-rights complaint.
But this is a man who always has an eye for the main chance. When Mr. Ford became mayor in 2010, Mr. Mammoliti became his new best friend. Any time the mayor was in trouble, Mr. Mammoliti would appear to argue Mr. Ford's side. He even came down to the City Hall Press Gallery to defend Mr. Ford when a woman accused the mayor of giving her the finger from his car. At city council meetings, Mr. Mammoliti would wrangle votes for the mayor by turning his thumb up or down to signal which way Ford allies should vote. Naturally, that led to the creation of a Twitter account called Mammoliti's Thumb.
If there were ever a fair-weather friend, though, Mr. Mammoliti is it. When an initial court ruling ordered Mr. Ford ousted from office over conflict-of-interest charges, the arch-opportunist promptly quit the mayor's executive committee.
Now that the ruling has been overturned, Mr. Mammoliti is singing a different tune. Last month he was musing about coming back on the Ford Team. Weirder still, he was saying he only quit executive in the first place so he could investigate a shadowy plot to do "personal damage" to him and others. The plotters, he suggested, were tampering with phones and trailing their victims. He has yet to produce any proof.
His antics have done Mr. Ford no favours. It was Mr. Mammoliti who popped up to propose the wildly unrealistic idea of replacing a 2-per-cent property-tax increase in the recent city budget with a tax freeze. When the mayor startled councillors by supporting the idea – effectively voting against his own budget – it overshadowed one of his administration's real achievements.
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Mr. Mammoliti has ceased to be an entertaining sideshow act in a mayoralty that produces enough sideshows of its own. If Mr. Ford hopes to move beyond all the goofball eruptions and get back on track, it should steer well clear of him.Britain and France prepare military escalation in Syria
By Robert Stevens
12 October 2016
Britain’s ruling elite are making advanced preparations towards a major escalation of military operations in Syria.
Parliament met in an emergency three-hour session yesterday to accuse Russia of war crimes in Syria and lay the basis for Britain’s involvement in establishing a no-fly zone and possibly sending ground forces into the war-torn country.
Global tensions over Syria are at a boiling point. As parliament met, Russian President Vladimir Putin cancelled a planned October 19 visit to France in response to the accusation made the previous day by French President Francois Hollande that Moscow was guilty of “war crimes” in Syria.
The Syrian army, with the support of Russia, have been attacking the east of Aleppo, where NATO’s Al Qaeda-linked Islamist proxies in Syria are based. With its proxies facing defeat, Washington, backed by its international allies, is calling for the imposition of a no-fly zone in order to save them.
“The population [of Aleppo] is the victim of war crimes. Those who commit these acts will pay for this responsibility before the international court of justice,” said Hollande.
Tensions have been ratcheted up ever since Washington, without any evidence, pinned responsibility on Moscow for an attack on a UN aid convoy and demanded that Russia and Syria ground their aircraft. Russia denies any involvement.
The UK parliamentary debate was initiated jointly by Conservative MP Andrew Mitchell and Labour’s Alison McGovern, who co-chairs the Friends of Syria group and is chair of the main Blairite think-tank, Progress. The initiative was supported by former US commander in Iraq and ex-CIA Director David Petraeus.
The Guardian, one of the main advocates of confronting Russia in Syria, noted that Mitchell “has been arguing for a no-fly zone for many months... In recent weeks some of Mitchell’s advisers have developed this proposal into a call to track Russian jets from UK warships off the coast of Syria, and for a complete no-fly zone for Syrian helicopters over civilian areas. It has been argued that Syrian helicopters are doing all the damage with chemical, napalm and high explosive barrel bombs. One proposal has been to bomb air runways.”
Speaking to BBC radio’s Today programme ahead of the debate, Mitchell said, “What we are saying is very clear. No one wants to see a firefight with Russia, no one wants to shoot down a Russian plane.”
The shooting down of the warplanes of the world’s second nuclear power is precisely what Mitchell is advocating.
He continued, “But what we do say is that the international community has an avowed responsibility to protect and that protection must be exerted. If that means confronting Russian air power defensively, on behalf of the innocent people on the ground who we are trying to protect, then we should do that.”
Asked if the UK should be involved in enforcing a no-fly zone, Mitchell responded, “I think that Britain should explore with its allies how it would enforce a no-fly zone.”
In the debate, Mitchell provocatively compared Russia with fascist Germany and Italy. “The Russians are doing to the United Nations precisely what Italy and Germany did to the League of Nations in the 1930s, and they are doing to Aleppo precisely what the Nazis did to Guernica during the Spanish civil war,” he said.
Mitchell railed against the anti-war sentiment that has grown as a result of the disastrous imperialist wars over the past two decades. “The international community faces a choice,” he asserted. “Are we so cowed and so poleaxed by recent history in Iraq and Afghanistan that we are incapable now of taking action?”
The debate saw Labour’s warmongers compete with the Tories in displays of handwringing over the tragic fate of the Syrian people in order to justify heightened military aggression.
Labour’s official response came from Shadow Foreign Secretary Emily Thornberry, appointed at the weekend by newly elected leader Jeremy Corbyn. Opposing a no-fly zone, she said, “I believe that in a multi-layered, multifaceted civil war such as that in Syria, the last thing that we need is more parties bombing. We need a ceasefire and for people to draw back.”
From then on Thornberry bent with the prevailing political winds. After being heckled by Labour MP Ben Bradshaw, who demanded Thornberry describe Russia’s actions as “war crimes”, she replied, “The actions of the Russians can well be seen as war crimes”, adding that there were, however, also “the war crimes of the jihadis.” Thornberry called on the government to “support French efforts to ensure that more initiatives are taken to bring the parties to international justice.”
The evening prior to the debate, Labour leader Jeremy Corbyn convened a meeting of the Parliamentary Labour Party to make yet another appeal for unity with the Blairite warmongers. Instead he was denounced for refusing to sanction action against Russia. According to the Guardian, “MPs said Corbyn referred to an attack that was ‘apparently’ carried out by the Russians.”
The newspaper cited Angela Smith MP, who said, “It is deeply concerning that Jeremy is unwilling to face up to the role that Putin’s Russia is playing in Syria. The recent criminal atrocities committed in Aleppo make the case for an effective international response overwhelming and Labour needs to show moral leadership on what is an intolerable situation.”
Corbyn’s spokesman later stated that he acknowledged that the evidence “appears to show that Russia was involved in the bombing, if not Russia the Syrian airforce, and all evidence appears to show it was a war crime.” But Corbyn “opposes all forms of foreign intervention in the conflict,” he added.
During the debate, Labour’s Ann Clwyd commended the Guardian’s coverage of Syria and demanded to know, “Where is the rage? Where are the demonstrations that we have seen on so many previous occasions…I want to see—I challenge the people listening to this debate—2 million, 3 million or 4 million people outside the Russian embassy day after day.”
Clwyd was a staunch advocate of the 2003 war against Iraq. The political editor of Rupert Murdoch’s The Sun, Trevor Kavanagh, praised her role in supposedly swinging public opinion behind support for war, while Blair made her his Special Envoy on Human Rights in Iraq.
Clwyd’s call was echoed by Foreign Secretary Boris Johnson, who called on the Stop the War Coalition to organise a demonstration in London against Russia.
Johnson at this stage ruled out support for a no-fly zone, stating it would be impossible to enforce “unless we are prepared to shoot down warplanes.” However, the military options being considered by the imperialist powers were outlined by retired British General Sir Richard Shirreff in an interview in the Daily Telegraph. The former Deputy Supreme Allied Commander of NATO said that British troops should “play a major role” in training professional armed forces in Syria to oppose Assad. “To train properly you’ve got to be able to commit troops, because the whole principle of training other armies is that you live alongside them and if necessary you’ve got to be prepared to fight alongside them, or at least advise them.”
He warned, “[B]e under no illusions about how difficult imposing a no fly zone is. The Syrians have very effective Russian supplied air defence systems and that will require a major effort to suppress it.”
Please enable JavaScript to view the comments powered by Disqus."I am so in," Xochil (pronounced "Social") responded when I sent an email to friends trying to drum up some company. "This body has produced two humans. I can do anything."
With a partner in crime arranged and a meet-up plan determined, I affixed an empty pannier to my bike for the clothes I'd take off, and I headed downtown.
A Nude Among Nudes
When I arrived at the ride start in the waning 9pm light, thousands of people were preparing themselves for the seven-mile pedal. Across the museum's grassy front lawn, they were painting each other's bodies, wrapping strings of lights around the handlebars of their bikes and dancing to music blasted from battery-powered PA systems. Around the base of an elm tree, four topless women arranged each other's pastel tutu skirts, a 60-something man wearing only a red cape and Viking hat adjusted his bike, and a young naked couple posed for pictures, sometimes covering certain parts with helmets, sometimes not.
Still wearing my hoodie and shorts, I felt overdressed, but I couldn't muster the gumption to disrobe just yet. I headed instead for the long line at the museum entrance in hopes of getting inside before I met up with Xochil and began the ride.
Midway through a conversation with the naked man in front of me in line, I was hit with the panic-inducing realization that I would somehow need to remove my clothing before reaching the front desk of the museum to avoid overpaying. I developed a hasty plan that, admittedly, lacked subtlety.
Corey had just finished telling me about his work as an auto insurance agent when I took off my pants. Minutes later, between discussing recent weather patterns and running shoe preferences, I removed my shirt, then my bra.
Our conversation proceeded like nothing had changed. Corey did not seem to notice my sudden strip. Nor did anyone else. I exhaled. I'd done it.
Two minutes later, I entered the white-halled art museum behind other equally bare visitors and headed for Cyclepedia, a collection of particularly innovative bicycles curated by Vienna-based designer Michael Embacher. I tried to concentrate on the explanations of each bike's innovation (the first folding mountain bike! a ski bike designed for ice riding!), but I spent most of the time awed by the fact that no one but the docent was wearing clothes.
The Portland Art Museum offered ride participants after-hours admission to the bicycle-design exhibit Cyclepedia. With an entrance fee scale that encouraged the full buff -- $1 per article of clothing -- the museum fully embraced the spirit of the event. (Christina Cooke)
Skin to the Wind
The art museum's two entrances with views of separate horse statues complicated my reunion with Xochil, but we eventually managed to find each other. Retrieving my bike, which I'd locked to a pole half a block and a dense sea of riders away, proved our next challenge.Hello my sweeties! Happy Friday! Anything exciting going on for you this weekend? I’ve planned a thrilling weekend of binge watching Season 3 of House of Cards. SO excited about that!! Do you watch that show? If not, you NEED to – it’s amazeballs! And sometimes it kind of makes you want to detach from society and live in the woods… in a good way? Anyways, here comes the manicure of the day!
I saw a post from Love Varnish with this amazing manicure combining the fanbrush technique and stamping, and I just adored it! I knew I needed to try it at some point. So when I was brainstorming for my next manicure, I remembered Deborah’s post and decided to do my own version!
I decided that I wanted to use a monochromatic base in different shades with a contrasting bright stamping polish. So I chose blues and pinks, and it totally screams spring colors! I had a difficult time picking out the stamping image and I was debating between this, a crosshatch geometric image, and a floral image. I actually wish that I had chosen a floral image with slightly more coverage because the pink is so pretty that I want more of it! But I had yet to use that steampunk plate from Messy Mansion, which is why I chose it.
And a closeup:
Products used:
Base color: China Glaze Secret Peri-Winkle … I haven’t worn this much, but I love it every time it goes on my nails! It’s a perfect pastel periwinkle, and the formula is great!
… I haven’t worn this much, but I love it every time it goes on my nails! It’s a perfect pastel periwinkle, and the formula is great! Using a fanbrush, I dragged KBShimmer Low & Be Bold across each nail… Low & Be Bold is one of my favorite blue polishes ever. It’s a perfect bright almost neon cobalt blue.
across each nail… Low & Be Bold is one of my favorite blue polishes ever. It’s a perfect bright almost neon cobalt blue. Stamping plate: Messy Mansion MM43
Stamping polish: Rica Pinky Promise… This is a perfect bright pastel pink that leans toward Barbie pink. I love Rica’s stamping polishes so much! Right now, she has some pastels, black & white, and metallics. I hope she puts out a million more because the formula is perfection! Plus, you can wear it on its own too (which can’t be said for most polishes that are marketed primarily as stamping polishes).
What do you think? What kind of image would you have chosen to put over this fanbrush base? Have you tried Rica’s stamping polishes? You could spend the weekend stamping to your heart’s delight while bingeing on House of Cards!
AdvertisementsAn 88-year-old man jailed for carrying a loaded gun as protection against local yobs has been freed because of a legal mistake.
Roy Delph was sentenced to two years amid a public outcry last month after a police officer spotted the antique weapon in his car.
Norwich Crown Court heard he had been "tormented" by youths who had damaged his property and killed his kitten.
The grandfather, who had a firearm licence, insisted he did not intend to cause fear of violence and occasionally used the weapon to shoot vermin on his land.
But after 18 days in prison, he was freed when it emerged that lawyers had incorrectly classified his 124-year-old weapon. It is thought they either labelled it as a double-barrelled gun or got the length wrong, making it seem more powerful.
As a result, it was presented as a more dangerous gun than it was and the judge followed sentencing guidelines that advised a jail term. The pensioner's own barrister Lawren Bruce said he took full responsibility for the error, which he made at an early stage.
'If you are going to put an elderly man in jail for that there should be a good reason. Sounds like they all needed an excuse to reduce the sentence...' - Tony Martin
Mr Delph returned to the same court on Tuesday, where Judge Nicholas Coleman re-sentenced him to two years in jail, suspended for 18 months.
He wept as he was freed and allowed to return home to his wife Jacqueline, 73, who he has been married to for 48 years.
Mr Delph, from Downham Market, Norfolk said: "I was treated well in prison, I was in the hospital ward. But I wasn't expecting to go get a jail sentence, I was very shocked by the whole situation and it just seemed so unfair. I'm so pleased to be home with my wife again, we look after one another."
Mrs Delph, who is housebound, said she believes the wrong gun classification was an "excuse" to reduce the sentence following a backlash in the media.
She said: "After the conviction we wrote letter after letter and I think they just used this as an excuse because they got fed up with it. With Roy's story going so far in the media they probably thought they needed to do something.
"Either way I'm pleased he's home. I found out the night before and it was such a relief knowing he wouldn't have to spend the next six months to a year away from home.
"I mostly look after him because of his health problems but he looks after me too, you do after so many years."
The family are not yet sure whether they are going to seek compensation for the mistake.
Photo: PA
Tony Martin, the Norfolk farmer who served three years in jail for shooting two burglars and killing one, said it was "a good thing" Mr Delph was released.
The 70-year-old said: "The whole thing is a bit strange. Why would it matter if it was a double-barrelled shot gun or a different type of gun? You either intend to go out shooting people or you don't.
"It's good he has been released, if you are going to put an elderly man in jail for that there should be a good reason. Sounds like they all needed an excuse to reduce the sentence. It seems like it's been a bit of a can of worms to me. There is just no understanding in law, there will be these problems with the law being how it is."
Mr Delph was on the A122 near his home last year when he was found with the gun, which he had owned for 50 years.
He had approached a police officer about the antisocial behaviour when the officer spotted the gun and arrested him instead. Mr Delph, who is hard of hearing and walks with a stick, said he did not realise the gun was loaded.
He looked after a number of animals including cats that he feeds daily on his land and was left devastated when his kitten was killed by yobs and he reported it to the RSPCA.
He was also made subject to a 12-month supervision order, his weapons and ammunition were forfeited and destroyed and his licence was revoked.More Sarin Gas In Syria Days After Trump Says US Won’t Depose Assad? Sounds Legit!
Caitlin Johnstone Blocked Unblock Follow Following Apr 5, 2017
In 2013, investigative journalist Seymour Hersh published a story for London Review of Books titled “Whose Sarin?” in which he pointed out some massive plot holes in the official narrative the Obama administration and its corporate media mouthpieces were feeding the public about sarin gas being used in Syria. An important factor Hersh highlighted was that the al Qaeda affiliated jihadist group al-Nusra, which is still fighting in Syria to this day, had sarin gas and the ability to make more of it. This plainly should have made al-Nusra a suspect in the sarin gas use, but as Hersh puts it, the Obama administration “cherry-picked intelligence to justify a strike against Assad” instead.
In the above interview about his investigative piece, Hersh mentions that the so-called “moderate rebels” in Syria had been overrun by terrorist factions many months earlier. Again, this was way back in 2013 and experts were already discussing how the only groups still fighting the Assad government are jihadist extremists. You wouldn’t know it from the corporate media’s coverage of the recent sarin gas attack in Idlib though of course, where the terrorist groups in the area are being referred to as “rebels” and “opposition forces” instead of what they actually are.
So we’ve got a nation full of vicious terrorist groups known to have the ability to manufacture and distribute sarin gas, a media that as Ben Swann and Vanessa Beeley report has been consistently lying to us about Syria, the increasingly-indistinguishable neocons and corporate Democrats pushing for Assad’s removal so aggressively that they can truly be said to be searching for ways to “justify a strike against Assad” as Hersh puts it, a power struggle between the deep state which wants to depose Assad and the Trump administration which has been saying that it doesn’t, and this is all happening days after the administration announced that it had no intention of attempting to remove Assad from power, in a nation whose power establishment has lied to the American people to manufacture consent for military interventions time and time again.
Nope, not suspicious at all.
Does any of this make sense to you? Am I missing something here? The US government was just saying it has no intention of deposing Assad five days ago, the Syrian army has been making significant gains against terrorist fighters in northern Hama, and all of a sudden Assad decides to do the one thing he knows from experience could incite all of NATO against him? On what planet does that make sense? Assad may be a dictator, but there’s no reason to believe he’s schizophrenic or suicidal.
Seriously, how do Americans make these bizarre plot lines work in their minds? Do they imagine the leaders in these countries their government wants to invade as some kind of cartoonish, cackling, mustache-twirling supervillain, saying things like “Hahaha, today since I’m such an evil foreigner, I will use chemical weapons on small children! Heeheeheehee!”? I think that lack of empathy, that inability to put oneself in another’s shoes and come up with a reasonable idea of what they must be going through, is the precise cause of much of the world’s needless suffering today.
And now Trump is blaming the sarin attack on Assad and saying it “cannot be tolerated,” so that’s great. There aren’t enough facts in yet to know the specific implications of that position, but I see no reason to believe they’ll make the world a better or brighter place. There also aren’t enough details to know whether Trump has been duped by a deep state false flag. There are certainly enough details to know that we should be intensely suspicious of the official narrative we’re being given, though.
“Cherry-picked intelligence to justify a strike against Assad.” Governments aren’t supposed to do that, America. Leaders aren’t supposed to go looking for excuses to invade other countries. War is something that should be avoided except in the direst necessity, not sought out to the point where lies are told just to make everyone okay with it. Let’s stop this madness before it eats us all alive.
— -
Thanks for reading! If you enjoyed this, please consider helping me out by sharing it around, liking me on Facebook, following me on Twitter, or even tossing me some money on Patreon so I can keep this gig up.Satanicide is a New York City-based mock metal/glam metal[1][2] band formed in 1999 that styles itself and its music to represent, tongue-in-cheek,[1] the heavy metal music scene of the 1980s in New Jersey.[3][4] Self-described as portraying a lifestyle "where the mullet and kick-ass rock 'n' roll still live," the members sport big hair and spandex and leather stagewear.[3] As part of their presentation, Santanicide plays party anthems and power ballads with a mixture of satire and affection.[3] In 2003, the group were described in The Drama Review as an "irreverent, demonic death-metal turned glam turned cock-rock band".[5] The original four member band consists of frontman Dale "Devlin Mayhem" May, guitarist Phil "Aleister Cradley" Costello, drummer Andrew "Sloth Vader" Griffiths, and bassist Pemberton "The Baron Klaus Von Goaten" Roach.[3] Pemberton was replaced by bassist Jake "Vargas Von Goaten" Garcia in 2003, who was subsequently replaced by Drew Thurlow, followed by Patrick Quade.[6]
History [ edit ]
In the late 1990s, Dale May (a photographer) and Phil Costello[7][8] were in a group called Peanut 23.[1] Peanut 23's quirky original songs were far from successful.[1] One night, both May and Costello put on their girlfriends' wigs and spent the evening "acting like a couple of kids in from Jersey, kicking over trash cans, talking the talk."[1] After a positive reception that night to an uninvited, impromptu performance on a club's stage, May and Costello decided to form their own band.[1] Drummer Andrew Griffiths was recruited from a trip hop band called Puracane, and bassist Pemberton Roach was added to complete Satanicide.[1]
In August 1999, Satanicide played the Maxwell's music club in Hoboken, New Jersey.[9] Previously used to getting perhaps 30 people to come out for a Peanut 23 show, Satanicide brought in hundreds.[1] In January 2003, Satanicide played a gig at the Sundance Film Festival in support of a short film made by the band.[1]
By March 2003, Satanicide was a popular act on the New York music scene.[10] Their humorous stage shows were viewed as creating a certain mood which allowed for improvised audience embellishment.[10] The William Morris Agency agreed to represent Satanicide and worked with the band to produce a film treatment for a television series.[1] However, May and Costello's songwriting chemistry did not translate into scriptwriting chemistry and the treatment was tabled.[1]
Four years after they formed, Satanicide sought to replace bassist Pemberton Roach in August 2003 because Roach "secretly liked Billy Joel."[1][11] In advertising for the bassist position, Satanicide listed the required qualifications as musical "chops"; "hott[sic girlfriend to share with band"; "disposable income to buy coke, booze and whores"; and "when hearing the Dave Matthews Band, must be overcome by impulsive desire to kill."[11] Jake Garcia, of Darediablo took over as the Baron's younger brother Vargas Von Goaten in 2003. The current bassist is Sebastian Von Goaten.[6]
In September 2004, the website heatherband.com was created.[12] In December 2004, Satanicide announced that it had changed its name to Heather, listing heatherband.com as their website.[13] In addition, the group became "the group formerly known as Satanicide", jettisoning the big-hair wigs and at least some of the shtick.[13] In July 2005, Satanicide announced that it was getting together for a reunion performance at the Bowery Ballroom, a music venue in the Bowery section of New York City.[14] Some question whether they in fact broke up in the first place.[14]
By May 2005, Satanicide had appeared in a Cingular commercial and were headlining at the Bowery Ballroom.[7] In April 2007, the Chinese gangsta rap trio Notorious MSG released their Lunch Money EP, with Satanicide's vocalist Dale "Devlin Mayhem" May providing the chorus vocals to the Warlord song.[15]
In 2007, Costello co-founded Tragedy: All Metal Tribute to the Bee Gees and Beyond, with New York City musician Royce Peterson.[16]
In 2008, Patrick Quade became Satanicide's bassist, assuming the stage name "The Baron Klaus von Goaten IV." [17]
From 2012 - 2014, Tragedy's Royce Peterson joined Satanicide on lead guitar, under the stage name "Rolls Royce Peterson." [18]
Presentation [ edit ]
In the Satanicide act, the band members hurl themselves into the crowd to scatter their fans as a way of mocking the rocker practice of stage diving/crowd surfing.[1] They wear Barbie wigs to give them the big hair appearance of a glam metal rocker.[1] In addition to this New York-based band claiming that they are from "Jer-Z," they spout elaborate lies related to casual sex conquests and call to mind This Is Spinal Tap, the 1984 mockumentary directed by Rob Reiner about a fictional renowned metal band.[1] The Satanicide members typically wear sleeveless T-shirts and circulation-inhibiting leather pants while they mimic many styles of metal.[1] Their act calls to mind a mixture of Probot, Tenacious D, The Darkness, The Decline of Western Civilization Part II: The Metal Years, The Upper Crust, and This Is Spinal Tap.[1]
Members [ edit ]
Dale May, lead singer [19]
Phil Costello, guitarist [19]
Andrew Griffiths, drummer [19]
Patrick Quade, bassist
Discography [ edit ]
See also [ edit ]I also traced the very edge with the teal/blue thread for additional security, and to minimize fraying.
The next step is to attach the zipper. Full disclosure: I don't know the proper way to do this, and I did not use a zipper foot (though I think that I have one). So this is my figure it out as you go along (and try to remember the way that a girlfriend showed me to do it ages ago) process.
Start with the zipper most of the way open, and take your front inside piece and your front outside piece. Lay the front outside piece face down on the face up front inside piece (fabric sandwich bread). With the zipper facing inward, pin the zipper to the edge of the two pieces in the middle of your fabric sandwich.Thursday 30 April 2015 – embargoed until 12.00am Friday 1 May 2015
A report to be released on Friday by the Federation of Community Legal Centres has made eight recommendations to address serious concerns over Protective Services Officers exceeding their powers and using excessive force.
‘We are publishing this report to urge constructive solutions to the disturbing issues it raises,’ said Michelle McDonnell, a senior policy adviser with the Federation, today.
Tracking Protective Services Officers: Insights from the first three years details the findings of Your Rights On Track, a community legal project undertaken by the Federation from 2012–15 in partnership with Youthlaw.
‘The report documents cases of Protective Services Officers exceeding their powers by demanding personal information from commuters without legal justification and where no offence has been committed, forcibly searching commuters who do not comply, and using excessive force in a range of circumstances, including against vulnerable people,’ Ms McDonnell said.
Among the report’s eight recommendations are the removal of firearms from PSOs, requiring PSOs to request personal information only when legally justified, better public reporting and independent monitoring of use of force by PSOs and of the fines they issue, and greater flexibility for Victoria Police to deploy PSOs where they are most needed, rather than deploying them on every station, including those where little or no crime occurs.
‘When PSOs exceed their powers, there is more at stake than the violation of people’s rights – there’s a risk of escalation that could lead to the use of excessive force by PSOs. In the worst case scenario, there is a risk of excessive force by PSOs carrying firearms when they are dealing with vulnerable people in mental health crisis on train station platforms that are frequently crowded. These circumstances carry a heightened risk of fatal and avoidable shootings.
‘This report and a series of media reports suggest that excessive force is a continuing concern. Combined with the shorter length of training, less on-the-job experience and supervision PSOs receive compared to police, there’s a strong case to remove the option of lethal force. PSOs carry a range of equipment adequate to deal with the situations they encounter without resorting to firearms,’ Ms McDonnell said.
‘We need to protect the rights of the public, reduce the risk of excessive force by PSOs, and implement robust accountability as we also build the evidence base to assess whether or not PSOs are making a genuine contribution to actual rather than perceived public safety,’ Ms McDonnell said.
The Federation will refer its report to the Office of Victorian Auditor-General, which is currently undertaking an audit of public safety on Victoria’s train system. However, Ms McDonnell said there was a clear need to address the findings and recommendations of its report in the shorter term.
‘There’s a clear basis for action now,’ Ms McDonnell concluded.
Download Tracking Protective Services Officers: Insights from the first three years (PDF)
Download this media release (PDF)
Media contact
Darren Lewin-Hill
Communications Manager
Federation of Community Legal Centres
0488 773 535The anti-social nature of the diatribe was stunning. Service, according to the gospel of Limbaugh, is for suckers, for society's "losers," for people who have committed crimes. In other words, it should be viewed as punishment rather than as something to be applauded and encouraged. To do for community is a fool's errand.
Yet as bizarre as his words may seem at first blush, they actually illustrate with bold clarity the fundamental (and increasingly common) core of the conservative belief system. They speak to the sociopathy that is at the heart of the far-right worldview. It is a worldview that holds, quite simply, that doing for others is contemptible; that doing for self is the purpose of human life; that altruism and service are somehow pathologies pushed by collectivists and should be subordinated to selfishness and greed.
Sound too extreme? Well if so, consider this. Among the most interesting phenomena of the past year--and especially since the inauguration of Barack Obama--has been the explosion of interest in (and sales of) books by the late author, Ayn Rand: most prominently her classic novels, The Fountainhead and Atlas Shrugged. Indeed, the latter had an all-time record year in 2008, and 2009 sales are on a pace to shatter even last year's numbers.
Far from a simple believer in limited government and a free market economy, Rand's philosophy--now being endorsed by tea party protesters and anti-Obama minions across the nation (indeed the Ayn Rand Center for Individual Rights was among the sponsors of the 9/12 march on Washington)--was predicated on one overarching notion: that a commitment to selfishness and a rejection |
ilated into Allied forces[8] and served with the Italian Co-Belligerent Air Force. The Germans soon captured the 506s and started using them in Italy, Germany, France, Yugoslavia and even on Greek islands and in Poland.[16] The Cants of 171ª Squadriglia kept on operating air/sea rescue and patrol missions from the military port of Toulon, with mixed Italian/German crews. Some 506s captured by Germans, flown by Italian volunteer crews, operated in 1944 on the Baltic sea, patrolling the area around Peenemünde.[17] Some examples survived in postwar service until 1959.
Variants [ edit ]
Z.506 Prototype, one built. Z.506A Civil version Z.506B Military version, 314 built. Z.506C Civil version, 38 built.[2] Z.506S Air-sea rescue version Z.506 Landplane One aircraft was converted to a landplane for an attempt by Mario Stoppani on an endurance record. It did not take place to due bad weather. Z.509 A larger and heavier version of the Z.506B, three built.
Operators [ edit ]
Spain – Nationalist Forces
Royal Air Force captured one aircraft which was briefly operated from Malta
Postwar Italy
Survivors [ edit ]
One complete, faithfully restored Z.506S is on display at the Vigna di Valle Air Force Museum in Rome, Italy.
Specifications (Z.506B Series XII) [ edit ]
Data from The Encyclopedia of Weapons of World War II[21]
General characteristics
Performance
Armament
Guns:
1 × 12.7 mm (0.50 in) Breda SAFAT machine gun 3 × 7.7 mm (0.303 in) machine guns
Bombs:
1,200 kg (2,600 lb) of general ordnance or 1 × 800 kg (1,800 lb) torpedo
See also [ edit ]
Related development
Aircraft of comparable role, configuration and era
Related lists
References [ edit ]
Notes [ edit ]
Bibliography [ edit ]Second Time’s The Charm: Exclusive Interview with Annie Bersagel Sarah Barker / October 8, 2013
Annie Bersagel, shown here competing at the Rock 'n' Roll San Jose Half Marathon in 2010, ran a massive marathon PR to capture the U.S. title on Sunday. Photo: PhotoRun.net
We caught up with the newly minted U.S. marathon champ before she headed back to Norway.
There was considerable misinformation floating around just after Annie Bersagel broke the tape at Twin Cities Marathon as the 2013 U.S. Marathon Champion. She lived in Victoria, Minn. (her parents do), she lived in Lakeville, Minn. (her grandparents do), she was from Greenly, Colo. (she grew up in Greeley, Colo.), she had attended the University of Minnesota (hadn’t), she’d come out of nowhere (except for that U.S. Half Marathon Championship in 2006 [she won, 1:14:36], and seventh at the 2011 Pan American Games, and the 32:54 10K and…), and that she had just won in 2:31:11 (actual winning time, 2:30:53 — better than her only other marathon finish by some 13 minutes).
And then there’s this whole Norwegian thing — uffda, very confusing.
RELATED: Arciniaga, Bersagel Capture U.S. Marathon Titles
I got hold of the very smart 30-year-old lawyer/U.S. marathon champ via Skype just minutes before her 11+ hour flight back to Norway to clear up some things up. After high school in Greeley, Colo., she attended Wake Forest University where she was a star student and distance runner, earning All-American honors in cross country three times, twice the Atlantic Coast Conference champion in outdoor 10,000 meters and once the ACC champ at indoor 5,000 meters. While she is of Norwegian heritage (thus, the many relatives in Minnesota), her interest in the culture bloomed during her undergraduate years when she took a language course in Oslo and interned for a summer at the U.S. Embassy there. She was named the 2006 NCAA Woman Of The Year, though she had graduated in December 2005 with honors in economics and politics. Bersagel joined training group Team USA Minnesota in January 2006 and won the U.S. Half Marathon Championship in June. Having been with Team USA Minnesota about a year, she earned a Fulbright Scholarship to study peace and conflict resolution at University of Oslo. Through a Minnesota connection, she found Norwegian coach Knut Kvalheim and joined the IK Tjalve running club, but she was plagued by plantar fasciitis for almost a year. Between injury, earning her Masters degree and long hours at a consulting firm, romance happened: She married Øyvind, a physical therapist and competitive mountain runner, in Norway in 2009 and promptly moved a continent away. As a means to an international career, Bersagel matriculated at Stanford Law School in the fall of 2009. This being a marriage of the beautiful minds, Øyvind earned a Fulbright Scholarship of his own to San Francisco State and newlywed bliss was restored in sunny California.
Here, we will pick up our conversation.
You had been out of school for a while, you were married, going to law school — did you think about quitting running?
I’ve always tried to remain competitive. I’ve never thought I’d focus on something else. Running is something I’ve had for myself and it’s something Øyvind and I do together, though mountain running is not my thing. In Norway, they only go up, about 8K on these super steep technical trails. Race directors couldn’t afford the insurance if they went down on those trails. So they race up, finish at the top and jog down. Anyway, my log is not super-impressive, but I run between 80 and 110 miles/week.
Who did you run with at Stanford?
I worked with Dena Evans, a former coach at Stanford, and joined New Balance Silicon Valley. There are a lot of Stanford grads in the group, a lot of fun people. There’s this Pacific regional association of USATF that sponsors cross country races and a road racing series. It’s a really great environment, particularly for people who are a notch below elite level. I probably raced 25 times a year, and was having a lot of fun.
And you entered 2009 Twin Cities Marathon, your first, because?
A number of reasons — it was a U.S. Championship that year too, I have a lot of family in the Twin Cities area and the qualifying time for the 2012 Olympic Trials Marathon, 2:45, seemed a manageable goal. I ran 2:44, it went fine, I was pleased with that effort.
So then, the focus was on the Olympic Trials Marathon?
Yes. Law school was busy but I had control over my time, and I was injury-free so I had a lot of consistency in training. Every summer, I went back to Norway and ran track. I started PRing in 2010 — 9:10 for 3K, 32:54 for 10K, and I PRed at 5K. Leading up to the Trials in January, I’d had a hamstring injury but it was getting better. In the race, I fell at mile one, then collided with another runner at mile eight, pulled the hamstring, and dropped out.
Then what?
I thought my 32:54 would get me into the 10K at the track trials, but not even close. All those women who had been doing marathon training set the bar pretty high. I graduated from law school in June, went back to Norway in July and took up pretty much where I’d left off — running the same routes, training with the same club and Knut (Kvalheim). I work for the International Law and Policy Institute.
Training with a full-time job?
I run twice a day with a long run on Sunday. Every morning at 6:15, I run with my husband and the Norwegian 1500 champ who lives very close. Then again after work. Twice a week, I run with my club. Because there’s no university-based athletics, there are a lot of students. It’s a really nice blend of people. I think the youngest is 15 and the oldest about 34. There are no strictly pro runners in the club, so everyone is working running around school or a job.
Winter in Oslo?
They don’t clear the streets of snow like they do here in the Twin Cities, so in the winter, we often run under Bislett Stadium. It’s like a tunnel, two lanes wide, 545 meters long with a slight hill. We do tempo runs of about 50 minutes down there, which is 25 to 27 laps.
How did 2013 Twin Cities Marathon come about?
I had planned to run Rotterdam (marathon) in the spring of 2013 but I spent the whole month of February in Minnesota studying for the bar. I ran U.S. Cross Country Championships at the beginning and Gate River at the end of the month, underwhelmingly, and determined I was not on track to run Rotterdam. I saw that Twin Cities was the U.S. Championship and I could combine it with a trip home (Minnesota is my U.S. home), so it was very attractive.
What was your training like?
I did road races in the spring, then track, including a PR at 1,500 (4:23.44) and at 5,000 (15:46.16). I started marathon training in June but really, if someone looked at my log, they would think, Is this it? I only hit 110 miles one week, otherwise 80 to 90. A lot of long sub-threshold. I raced a lot — six races in four weeks, with a couple half marathon/10K weekends, and my half-marathon PR three weeks prior to Twin Cities (1:12.01). I think that was key. After a run, Knut might have me do eight hill sprints. That was it. Based on the 1:12 half, we thought just under 2:35 was possible.
You arrived in the Twin Cities on Friday night for a Sunday morning race?
Yeah, about 9 PM. I was a little nervous about that but I was very diligent on the flight, wearing compression socks, walking around the plane every hour. Plus, the time difference was in my favor.
You went through halfway in 1:14 — were you a little freaked out by that?
I thought, This could be trouble, and kept wondering when I would blow up. I could just hear Knut saying, I told you so. But I didn’t come all this way to play it safe. I actually stopped checking my watch and just raced, but I knew I was well under 2:35 pace. A perhaps well-meaning spectator at about 25 miles said second place was gaining on me [in fact, Laura Portis was three minutes back] and there was so much cheering, I thought there must be someone right behind me. I wouldn’t have made it under 2:31 if I had known I was alone. Knut and I had discussed how going out hard would cost something in the end. When I talked to him on the phone after the race, he said, “I saw the video of the finish — it cost something alright.”
$25,000?
Øyvind wants to replace the tiles in the bathroom.Billionaire entrepreneur Elon Musk has gone back to the drawing board with his plans for manned missions to Mars.
Mr Musk says he's hoping to make his current space rockets redundant with a new vehicle code named BFR.
The rocket will stand 100 metres tall with 31 engines to lift a payload of more than 4000 tons into space.
The rocket's interplanetary vehicle will be just 48 metres long and will feature 40 cabins, each capable of carrying three people.
But, Mr Musk says the cost will be much cheaper than other launch vehicles with the added benefit that it can safely return to earth and be reused.
"It's really crazy that we build these sophisticated rockets and then crash them every time we fire," he said in a presentation to the International Astronautical Congress in Adelaide.
"It really shows how fundamental reusabilty is."
(Related video: Elon Musk posts world's most expensive blooper reel.)
Mr Musk said he believed his program could be funded by the money his SpaceX company receives for launching satellites.
He said the BFR would also be able to service the International Space Station as well as establish human colonies on the moon and Mars.
Later on Friday, Mr Musk will travel to Jamestown, in SA's mid north, where his Tesla company is building the battery which will play an integral part of the state's $550 million energy plan to avoid major blackouts and electricity shortages.
The battery is to be located next to a major wind farm and will be used to store power generated by the turbines that can be released into the network to ensure greater stability for the grid.
The Tesla boss previously made the bold promise to deliver the battery within 100 days or provide it for free.
He stood by that promise during his first visit to Adelaide earlier this year.
However it's understood the clock will not start ticking on the 100-day commitment until regulators approve the project, clearing it for grid connection.A 12-year-old girl died on Thursday morning after being allegedly set on fire by a 19-year old man, who is also accused of repeatedly raping her in the last eight days.
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Sunil, 19, allegedly poured kerosene on the girl last night at her residence in Balwinder Singh ka vehra (one-room houses) in Sherpur area following which she was rushed to Ludhiana Civil Hospital with more than 95 percent burns.
The girl named Sunil in her statement before a magistrate and said that he threatened to kill her if she revealed anything to her parents.
[related-post]
Speaking to Indian Express, RS Cheema, Assistant commissioner of police (ACP) south, said, “The girl used to stay at home and the accused was teasing her for days. She was being repeatedly raped since 8-10 days and she did not reveal it to her parents. Yesterday, she decided to tell to her parents but before that Sunil poured kerosene on her and set her ablaze.”
The gynecologist, who performed a medical check up before her death, confirmed to the police that the girl was brutally raped.
She was referred to PGIMER Chandigarh after her condition became extremely critical, but succumbed to burn injuries on her way.
Tension gripped Sherpur area after her family blocked traffic and staged protest with the dead body demanding Sunil’s arrest.
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An FIR has been registered at Focal Point police station in which police has booked the father and two brothers of the accused under section 120-B (conspiracy) of IPC. His father Harish and two brothers, Anil and Laxman (aged 19 and 22), have now been arrested. The main accused, Sunil, is still absconding.Amazon is offering the Nintendo Pokémon GO Plus Bluetooth Bracelet for $29.48 shipped. It’s matched at Walmart, and you can get an extra dollar off if you pick it up. That’s about $5 off the regular price and the best we can find on the rarely discounted iOS/Android Pokémon GO peripheral. Rated 4+ stars from over 860 Amazon customers. You can get a complete rundown of how this thing works in the video below.
Speaking of Pokémon, you’ll want to check out the upcoming Pokéland and the recently released Magikarp Jump for iOS. As always, the rest of today’s iOS deals can be found in our Games/Apps Guide.
The Pokémon GO Plus is a small device that lets you enjoy Pokémon GO while you’re on the move and not looking at your smartphone
The device connects to a smartphone via Bluetooth low energy and notifies you about events in the game, such as the appearance of a Pokémon nearby using an LED and vibration
The Pokémon GO Plus will begin to blink and vibrate whenever you’re within range of a PokéStop; Press the Pokémon GO Plus button to search the PokéStop for items; If you find any items, they’ll immediately be added to your inventory
When a Pokémon is near, the light on the Pokémon GO Plus will flash; It will also flash and vibrate when you pass a PokéStop;In the Martinez case, the guilty plea offer was also signed by the sergeant’s two Army defense lawyers, Maj. Marc Cipriano and Capt. E. John Gregory, who were permitted by Army regulations to sign the plea offer only if they believed at the time that their client committed the crime. The two lawyers later successfully defended Sergeant Martinez at trial.
“They had a conviction handed to them and chose not to take it,” Barbara Allen — the widow of one of the slain officers, First Lt. Lou Allen, and now a single mother of four young boys — said of the Army.
Sergeant Martinez, whose whereabouts are unknown, did not respond to e-mailed requests for comment. His lawyers did not respond to calls and e-mail messages seeking comment on the plea offer.
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Lt. Gen. John R. Vines, the commander of the Army’s 18th Airborne Corps who signed a document rejecting the plea, retired in February 2007 and could not be reached; messages left with his relatives were not returned. Lawyers for the 18th Airborne Corps, based at Fort Bragg, N.C., whose office advised the general on the Martinez case, also did not respond to e-mail and phone messages.
An Army spokeswoman at Fort Bragg said on Friday that no one with knowledge of the plea offer was available to discuss it.
Maj. John C. Benson, a prosecutor of the Martinez case who was not involved in the decision to reject the plea offer, said there was concern within the Army that Sergeant Martinez might have been eligible for parole after 10 years, despite acknowledging murdering two officers.
“The horrible nature of the crime created a lot of conflict about whether to take the plea,” he said in an interview. But given the outcome at trial, Major Benson said, “I wish that the guilty plea had been accepted,” adding later, “I don’t think there can be any doubt whatsoever as to his guilt.”
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Sergeant Martinez’s murder trial was one of only two publicly known cases of enlisted soldiers charged with intentionally killing superiors during the Iraq war. In 2005, Sgt. Hasan K. Akbar of the 101st Airborne Division, was convicted at trial and sentenced to death in a grenade and rifle attack that killed two officers in Kuwait in 2003. General Vines affirmed that sentence in 2006.
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In Sergeant Martinez’s trial, prosecutors argued that he detonated a mine on an American base in the Iraqi city of Tikrit, killing his company commander, Capt. Phillip T. Esposito, and Lieutenant Allen in June 2005. Several soldiers from the 42nd Infantry Division, based at Fort Drum, N.Y., testified that Sergeant Martinez hated Captain Esposito and made several threatening statements about him.
Sergeant Martinez’s plea offer, dated April 3, 2006, came after he and his lawyer learned that a soldier had admitted that weeks before the deaths, she had given him Claymore mines that her unit, about to return home, no longer needed. The soldier, Staff Sgt. Amy Harlan of the Army Reserve’s 350th Psychological Operations Company, later testified at Sergeant Martinez’s court-martial.
The plea offer document stipulated that Sergeant Martinez would tell a military judge “the essential facts and circumstances of the offenses to which I am pleading guilty.” It also stated that the offer, while originating with Sergeant Martinez, could be rescinded by him at any time.
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If the plea offer had been accepted, Sergeant Martinez would have had to describe his criminal conduct in enough detail to convince a judge. Military judges can and sometimes do reject guilty pleas they find unpersuasive.
“Martinez told his lawyer enough that his lawyer believed he could ethically put him up there to answer the judge’s searching questions,” said Walt Huffman, a former Army judge advocate general, now the dean of Texas Tech University School of Law. “Otherwise,” he said of the lawyer, “he would be engaging in unethical conduct.”
Gary D. Solis, a former Marine judge who teaches the law of war at Georgetown University Law Center, said General Vines’ rejection of the plea offer, dated April 4, 2006, was unusual.
“The only reason you should turn this down is if you have an absolutely bulletproof case,” he said. “I can’t imagine why they didn’t take it. You’ve got life in prison in hand.”
In the Army, a soldier serving a life sentence is eligible for parole after 10 years.
In December, the government’s six-week trial concluded. Prosecutors argued that Sergeant Martinez had not only a motive to kill Captain Esposito but also had access to the rarely used mine that killed them.
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Defense lawyers accused the Army of fixating on their client very early on, with only circumstantial evidence to support their arguments. They also attacked the credibility of Sergeant Harlan’s testimony that she had given Claymore mines to Sergeant Martinez, pointing out that she initially had not mentioned to Army investigators that she had given him any mines.
On Dec. 4, after two days of deliberations, the 14-member military jury at Fort Bragg proclaimed Sergeant Martinez not guilty. To convict at trial, a military jury requires a two-thirds majority.
Major Benson, the Army prosecutor in the case, said several factors could have swayed the jury in the sergeant’s favor.
“A strong opposition to death penalty was a definite factor among some of the panel members,” he said. “It’s quite possible that they were not able to separate the conviction from the punishment.”Introducing Luna
Robin Linus Blocked Unblock Follow Following Oct 30, 2017
In our previous blog post we focused on the developments and ongoings around Team Nimiq, so now we feel it’s time to provide a more detailed technical update of the most exciting features of the upcoming Testnet release called Luna.
Overview
Two new client types: light and nano
Schnorr signatures
Memory-hard PoW algorithm
Smooth difficulty calculation
Significant performance improvements
Upcoming Testnet launch
Light Clients and Nano Clients
It takes hours to sync to a conventional Blockchain network such as Bitcoin. We address this problem by using the Mini-Blockchain Scheme to significantly compress the amount of data you need to download. Our Betanet was a basic prototype which wasn’t particularly efficient because it didn’t leverage the full capabilities of the scheme yet. Luna introduces a way more sophisticated implementation, which is optimized for three client types: Full Nodes, Light Clients and Nano Clients.
Full Nodes simply download the full Blockchain just like in conventional protocols. Professional miners will probably favor this client.
Light Clients fully verify the complete state by syncing just a fraction of the total Blockchain data. Even with a billion users that would be less than a gigabyte. Hobby-Miners, block explorers or merchants will probably favor this client.
Nano Clients verify their own balances and transactions by syncing just about a megabyte of Blockchain data. This is the most light-weight way to use the network without trusting a third party. Most users will use wallet apps based on such Nano Clients.
Sublinear Header Chain
The Mini-Blockchain Scheme enables us to compress the current state of accounts’ balances, but it still has to download the full headers chain which grows linear in time. That means a naive Nano-Client implementation would need to download 10 MB per year since launch, which would become unusable for low-end devices quite quickly. To solve this we’ve first implemented the ideas behind Proofs of Proofs of Work with Sublinear Complexity and then the enhanced version Non-Interactive Proofs of Proof-of-Work which compresses the headers chain to almost constant size. This was the final protocol ingredient for Nano Clients to truly sync by downloading less than a megabyte.
Schnorr Signatures
Most Blockchains use secp256k1 for signatures. We are excited to be one of the first protocols to leverage the benefits of the more modern Ed25519 Schnorr signatures. Our benchmarks have shown that Ed25519 compiled to WebAssembly is 30% faster than the native WebCrypto secp256r1 implementation. Additionally the public keys are just 32 bytes long which enables more compact transactions and therefore a higher Tx/s rate.
Another great feature of Schnorr signatures are Multiparty Signatures of constant size which allow even better on-chain scalability of the Nimiq protocol.
PoW Algorithm
Being the active community members you are, you may have already read in our Telegram or Discord about Cuckoo Cycle and our initial intents to use it as the PoW algorithm for the Nimiq Blockchain. If you paid attention you might even recall that some news discouraged us to use cuckoo cycle after all, and we have now finally made the decision to dismiss it altogether. While its asymmetric nature allows for ultra-quick verification, it’s just too slow for mining in Nimiq’s specific case, since a single run can take up to 90 seconds. Furthermore, we underestimated the difference between GPU / CPU mining in regards to browser mining and had to accept that mining via CPU is the more productive and reasonable approach if we want to achieve our goal of having a full, and efficient, mining node in the browser.
For Luna, we considered the CryptoNight algorithm next. We evaluated CryptoNight and came to the conclusion that it is too slow for verification as well (WebAssembly, single thread: ~17 H/s on a desktop browser, ~3 H/s on a mobile browser).
The final decision is to base our PoW on Argon2, which is significantly quicker than CryptoNight (about 20x-40x according to our tests), while also being symmetric. As of this post, we’re still considering customizing the Argon2 algorithm, though, to make it more fitting for our purpose. there’s no definitive decision on the customization specifics but we’ll keep you updated about the progress.
Smooth Difficulty Adjustment
As always we appreciate miners who continue to support our Betanet (shout out to the Miner Pioneers who received a commemorative T-Shirt). We’ve received feedback from miners about problems with the current difficulty calculation algorithm.
To fix this we’ve made some changes: instead of updating the difficulty every k blocks, we now update the difficulty every block according to the time it took to mine the last 100 blocks. This should result in a more fluid validation process.
Core Performance Improvements
Pascal’s JungleDB which we detailed in our last development update and in VLOG 30, is now finished, completely tested and integrated into the Nimiq core. One of the main reasons for creating JungleDB was that other databases couldn’t handle transactions the way we were imagining it. Now that it’s finished, anyone using both LevelDB (NodeJS) and IndexedDB (Browsers) will be able to use and benefit from it.
Regarding the use of JungleDB in Nimiq’s Blockchain, we got rid of lots of old and unused code and finally finished integrating JungleDB within Nimiq’s core. We also added additional features that were meeting new requirements that had come up during development (e.g. concerning how transactions were processed).
Furthermore, we adjusted some of our internal data structures not only to make use of advanced JungleDB features, but also to half verification time of blocks. This, for example, includes a restructuring of the accounts tree, which is part of the Mini-Blockchain scheme and holds the accounts’ balances. Our new data structure offers significantly better verification and retrieval performance. It also allows us to efficiently sync the tree to light clients.
Upcoming Release
The upcoming launch of Luna won’t be just a hard-fork but a full reset of our previous Betanet.
Luna will be almost fully feature complete such that we can start our in-depth security and scalability tests as final preparation for our Mainnet launch.
Our private Testnet was already launched last week and we feel reasonably confident to release it to the public in November.
Stay Tuned
You can expect more technical updates concerning Luna so stay tuned for more Nimiq News!
Cheers to our Community, and specially thanks to Sinarnb for creating awesome Nimiq emojis for Telegram and Discord. Below his favorite creation.JOHN McDonnell has pleaded for Labour and Britain to be "more positive about Brexit" as he admitted he shared some of Donald Trump's concerns about globalisation.
The shadow chancellor used a speech today to slam the government claiming the fall in living standards was set to hit working people hard.
PA:Press Association 3 John McDonnell is calling on the chancellor to ditch "failed" austerity politics in the autumn statement
Mr McDonnell said he accepted that "too much of the EU [was] putting the interests of big business over ordinary people" and the party accepted the result of the referendum.
He added that Mr Trump's election showed people in Western democracies who had been left behind are rejecting the status quo, and it was up to Labour to provide an alternative.
The Tories said Labour had "zero credibility" when it came to safeguarding the economy, and that the shadow chancellor completely failed to mention immigration or borders throughout his speech.
Reuters 3 Theresa May spoke at the Lord Mayor's banquet last night
"We must embrace the enormous opportunities to reshape our country that Brexit has opened for us," Mr McDonnell said.
"In that way we can speak again to those who were left behind and offer a positive, ambitious vision instead of leaving the field open to divisive Trump-style politics.
"It's time we were all more positive about Brexit," he added. "Labour wants to see an ambitious Brexit Britain."
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He promises that "if Article 50 needs to be triggered in parliament, Labour will not seek to block or deny it," after concerns that Labour would set down red lines on supporting the motion.
However, the shadow chancellor was also asked on Radio 4 this morning if Mr Trump's view on immigration was one he shared.
"Of course it is, but he says it as an election slogan and will not deliver on it. He simply did it to garner votes to win an election," he replied.
AP:Associated Press 3 President-elect Donald Trump wants to put tariffs on foreign goods to keep jobs in America
Last night Theresa May insisted that “liberalism and globalisation have left too many people behind”, and also called for “a modern version of the responsible approach to business”.
Mr McDonnell insisted he wanted to see "freedom of trade" and tariff-free access to the single market, but that the US election has shown that people were "discontent with what the economy delivers".
In his speech Mr McDonnell will say that "we understand the price for failure... when decade after decade the rich get richer and the ordinary people see their incomes stagnate, something snaps."
He adds: "Donald Trump's victory has underlines the point that the old, rigged economy working just for those at the top has failed."
Responding to John McDonnell’s speech on Brexit, Dominic Raab MP said:
“Labour have absolutely zero credibility when it comes to safeguarding our economy.
“But what is truly astonishing is that John McDonnell completely failed to mention immigration, or control of our borders, in his vision of post-Brexit Britain.
“This is yet more evidence of how out of touch Labour are with the values of working people in our country.
“Only the Conservative Party can deliver the best possible deal as we leave the EU - and that must mean controls on the number of people that come to Britain.”U.S. President Donald Trump on Monday proposed privatizing the nation's air traffic control system, saying reforms are needed to cut air travel times and fuel costs and curb annoying delays for travelers.
Trump said the government-run Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) "is stuck painfully in the past," adding that it was designed decades ago for a country with an annual total of 180,000 air passengers, not the nearly one billion travelers it has now.
"The FAA has been trying to upgrade our nation’s air traffic control system for a long period of years, but after billions and billions of tax dollars spent and the many years of delays, we’re still stuck with an ancient, broken, antiquated, horrible system that doesn’t work," Trump said. "Other than that, it’s quite good.”
Trump said air traffic inefficiencies cost the country as much as $25 billion annually and called on Congress to create a private, non-profit company to run the system. Privatizing U.S. air traffic control is an idea that in the past has met resistance from some lawmakers or stalled as more pressing issues took precedence.
"Under this new plan, the Federal Aviation Administration will focus firmly on what it does best: safety," Trump said. "A separate non-profit entity would be charged with ensuring route efficiency, timely service and a long-awaited reduction in delays." Trump also said, "Our plan will get you where you need to go more quickly, more reliably, more affordably. And yes, for the first time in a long time, on time. We will launch this air travel revolution by modernizing the outdated system of air traffic control. It’s about time. “
Improving infrastructure
Trump's announcement came on the first day of what the White House said would be a series of events in the coming days calling attention to his ideas to improve the nation's infrastructure.
Later in the week, Trump is scheduled to travel to the midwestern state of Ohio to discuss improvements to levees, dams and locks that are key to agriculture shipping.
There is also a planned meeting with a group of governors and mayors to discuss their plans, and the president is due to visit the Department of Transportation on Friday to talk about regulatory reforms related to roads and rail.
"It doesn't matter who you are, whether you are a farmer in the Midwest, or a mother driving your kids to and from school, or a worker or a college kid flying back and forth to school, you're affected by infrastructure," Gary Cohn, Trump's chief economic adviser, told reporters in advance of the air traffic announcement.
Campaign promise
During his run for the White House, Trump called for a $1 trillion program to fix the nation's infrastructure. His budget proposal issued last month included $200 billion for infrastructure that the administration hopes will lead to other investments. The White House has also discussed incentivizing local governments to sell existing infrastructure to private firms.
Senator Brian Schatz, a Hawaii Democrat, says that approach is "literally the opposite of an infrastructure plan" and is "dead on arrival."
Rep. Rick Larsen, the ranking Democrat on the House aviation subcommittee, called the proposal to privatize air traffic control "another idea worth killing."
"Congress will have much to say about this," Larsen wrote on Twitter.Robert Ménard is outraging the left in France, who view his policies in Béziers as ‘pure provocation’ against secularism and immigration
In the bullring of Béziers, with 8,000 people crammed into the stands and fanning themselves in the heat, an extraordinary spectacle began. France’s most controversial mayor, glancing up at the adoring crowds, solemnly paraded around the ring in an elaborate holy procession following an effigy of the Virgin Mary and a dozen horse riders in flamenco dresses watched over by priests. It was, he said, about reaffirming France’s Christian roots.
The vast, town hall-sponsored, public Catholic mass is unheard of in fiercely secular modern France, which has strict laws on the separation of church and state. It caused outrage on the left, which has accused the mayor of turning this picturesque but poverty-stricken Mediterranean town into an increasingly polarised “laboratory of the far right”.
Robert Ménard, 62, was once best known as the outspoken founder of the international journalists’ group Reporters Without Borders (RSF), which he headed for nearly 25 years before becoming a TV current affairs star. When younger, he held memberships to the Communist Revolutionary League then the Socialist party. But since his shock election in Béziers last year on a far-right ticket, he has become the focal point of a raging debate in France about anti-immigration feeling, diversity and stigmatisation.
“No other mayor in France would imagine doing this,” Ménard told the Guardian in his town hall office, speaking of his idea for the Catholic mass. He dismissed what he deemed France’s “ayatollahs of secularism”, and said he was not stigmatising any other religion. The French League of Human Rights last year lost its court battle to stop him installing a large Christmas nativity scene in the town hall.
Facebook Twitter Pinterest A nativity scene displayed at Béziers city hall in December 2014. A French court overruled regional authorities and the French League of Human Rights who demanded its removal. Photograph: Pascal Guyot/AFP/Getty
Controversy has surrounded Ménard since he took the helm of this historic town in the southern region of Languedoc-Roussillon, which was once rich from wine production but has suffered decades of unemployment and is now one of the poorest towns in France.
First he imposed an 11pm curfew on minors. Then he banned people from hanging washing from balconies in the historic centre, run-down parts of which are home to a large population of north African origin and settled Gypsy communities – many of whom have been French for generations. Next he banned spitting in public. “So I was told it’s a tradition in a certain number of countries to spit. All very well, but it’s not a tradition here, therefore it’s banned,” he said. “I caught a youngster hoicking in the street the other day. His excuse was that he had a cough. I said: |
shortener? If not, this article by Kovshenin can help you get started with integrating it into WordPress, and you can also check out a couple of plugins that have popped up around it.
Google Chrome / Developer Tools
Google Chrome is now responsible for more than 10% of all browser usage, more than Safari and Opera combined. It has a great reputation for being extremely fast and very stable — like most Google stuff, I’d say. One of the only complaints I tend to see from web developers is that it doesn’t have all the fun extensions that Firefox has. But it is getting close.
Chrome comes with a built in pack of Developer Tools, that some say is better than Firefox’s Firebug. Chrome also has Firebug lite and a lot of other awesome extensions that are similar to Firefox’s offerings. I made the switch to using Chrome as my default browser a few months ago, and I now I think I have as much power in the Chrome Developer Tools and extensions as I had in Firefox.
Google Website Optimizer
Split-testing can be extremely valuable for your landing and sales pages. We even heard from Obox how a small change in their sales page made a drastic difference in theme sales. Google Website Optimizer helps you create experiments to see what works best for your site.
Website Optimizer is pretty advanced stuff (in my opinion at least). If you are looking for a simpler option, you may want to look at the MaxA/B free WordPress plugin that lets you compare WordPress pages in a matter of minutes. But if you want to dive into all the details of multivariate split-testing, Google’s product is a great place to start.
Google Libraries API
Google keeps minified libraries of a lot of code frameworks. Using simple scripts, you can use these libraries with WordPress. Even if WordPress already loads a framework, like it does with jQuery, you can still register and use the Google version. There is some argument about how good of an idea this is, but many claim it’s faster than using the WordPress packaged version. It’s obviously a good idea for any library not already bundled in WordPress.
The Google Libraries API currently supports Chrome Frame, Dojo, Ext Core, jQuery, jQuery UI, MooTools, Prototype, script.aculo.us, SWFObject, Yahoo! User Interface Library (YUI), and WebFont Loader. Learn more with the developer guide.
The easiest way to get started with integrating Google hosted libraries and WordPress is to use a plugin, but you can also go the manual route, which can be fun. The basic idea would be the following (credit: Frederick Townes):
php
wp_deregister_script(‘jquery’);
wp_register_script(‘jquery’, ‘http://ajax.googleapis.com/ajax/libs/jquery/1/jquery.min.js’);
wp_enqueue_script(‘query’);
?>
This method is best to use in a custom extension or plugin, if anywhere. New themes will likely not allow registering jQuery this way.
Google Font Directory
The Google font directory is one of the most exciting new things to using non-standard fonts in our websites. The font directory does all the dirty work of implementing the CSS @font-face technique, including all of the best practices for making it cross-browser compatible.
The directory is entirely free to access, takes one line of code to implement, and you can use the fonts just like any other in your stylesheets. They started with just a few available fonts, but now there are dozens and more and more show up all the time.
This is my single favorite Google resource right now. You can implement the font directory multiple ways. For personal and client projects you could use a plugin or just use a simple @import command at the top of your css file and then just use the font name in your stylesheet. It could look like this:
@import url(‘http://fonts.googleapis.com/css?family=Droid+Sans’);
#body { font: normal normal normal 14px/20px ‘Droid Sans’, Arial, sans-serif; }
Google Checkout
Google checkout is a cart solution similar to PayPal. It may not be the most familiar checkout option to WordPress users, but it is at least a viable solution to work alongside PayPal and other third party options.
The biggest positive of Checkout is the deep integration with Google Adwords and Google Product Search. One drawback is that Google Checkout doesn’t play well outside of the United States and United Kingdom, and by not play well I mean isn’t available.
There are a couple of plugins worth considering that can help you integrate this shopping cart application into your WordPress site.
Google Chart Tools
I’ll be honest. I just discovered Google’s chart tools. With these, you can pretty easily use Google Docs to create interactive charts for use on your website. There is a lot of power and potential behind these tools, and the sky is pretty much the limit with what you can do. Assuming the sky is limited to charts, of course.
Google Docs
Google Docs is a great way to bring office tasks to the web. It is easy to share documents, spreadsheets, presentations and even forms. One of my favorite features is the ability to live-edit a document with a public or private group.
Ryan did this with a spreadsheet to line up interviews for WordCamp Phoenix. He simply invited people to sign up for a time on the shared Google spreadsheet. Awesome, right?
You can also embed Google Docs right into your WordPress posts and pages. All in all, it’s a nice, online-friendly alternative to Microsoft Office.
Google Custom Search
Google’s custom search feature lets you create just that, a custom search engine, and implement it on your own website. You can set up all sorts of features, such as making it just search your site, or a select number of sites, exclude certain results, and many other things. You can also connect your adsense account to the ads that display at the top of search results in the free version. The paid version includes the ability to remove the ads, and starts at $100 per year.
You get all of the power of Google in your own search engine. It’s really a nice alternative to WordPress search, which to be honest, could use a facelift.
Google Maps
There are a slew of Google Maps related plugins, but MapPress will allow you to do a basic, but thorough, integration of Google Maps into your WordPress site. Google Maps is an extremely powerful tool that almost everyone uses in everyday life, and thanks to other people’s efforts, we can also use Google Maps to assist us in our development projects.
YouTube
YouTube is good for a lot more than watching funny cats and bros getting tazed (although I do love those). It is a great platform to upload and share all types of videos. And because YouTube bears the burden of the heavy lifting, we can spend less of our own bandwidth serving up the video itself.
WordPress has made it easier than ever to embed YouTube videos, so that now all you have to do is enter the url of the video on its own line and WordPress takes care of the rest. Of course, if you want more control, you may like TubePress or Viper’s Video Quicktags.
You can also take advantage of using your YouTube channel to expand your social profile and get visitors to your site.
Gmail
You may think I’m strange for including Gmail in a post about Google products and WordPress, but I’d venture to say a majority of WordPress developers use Gmail as their base account.
It’s really easy to have all of your emails consolidated to a single Gmail account. You can have your main account, forward emails from different domains to that account, and then use a ton of tools to organize and manage your emails. I have about half a dozen email accounts that all forward to my single Gmail account.
Google Reader
Google Reader is really one of the only free web-based RSS feed tools available. It’s a pretty decent system, and it’s always nice to keep all the sites you like in one place. But, I personally recommend you still come and visit the real world every now and then ;).
In WordPress, keep in mind that you can change your RSS settings to either show the full content or just excerpts. Personally, I get annoyed when I can only view the excerpts, and I actually tend to visit the real site even less than when the author shows me the full content in my Reader. I know right, the opposite of the intended effect. Something to think about for those of you that only allow excerpts in feed readers!
You may also be interested in this post by Jamie Thinglestad that shows how to easily add your WordPress site as a “send to” link in Google Reader so you can quickly and easily blog about posts in your feed.
Google Adsense / Adwords
If you are going to use ads and don’t have a high-traffic site, Google Adsense is one of the simplest ways to do it. There are fifty bagillion tutorials online as to how to best target ads to fit your content, so check out some of those. You can also see some of the plugins in WordPress designed to make it easier for you to implement Adsense with WordPress.
Certainly one of the coolest things about Adwords, whether you use them for buying ads or not, is the keyword search tool. It’s simple to see how often specific words and phrases are searched for, both globally and locally.
Feedburner
Feedburner is a great tool that can redirect your WordPress feeds through their system so you can track your subscribers in many different ways. It also helps you customize your feeds and has tools for things like managing email subscriptions.
Tentblogger has done an outstanding job explaining in detail how to set up Feedburner. Even if you’ve set up Feedburner half a dozen times, it’s worth a read.
Google Project Hosting
Want to maintain a project online? Google Project Hosting could be your answer. Similar to the idea of Github, it allows you to host projects (up to 2 GB) for free, and uses subversion, issue tracking, project wikis, and the ability to star projects and developers.
I noticed quite a few WordPress projects tagged, such as Carrington, Thematic, and NextGen Gallery.
Google Summer of Code
While not really an extension or tool, Google has a very cool program for students called the Google Summer of Code. WordPress has participated since 2007, and a lot of great developments have come from it. You can check out all of the awesome WordPress stuff from the 2010 GSoC and learn how to apply on the codex.
You can also view the participants for the upcoming GSoC 2011.
Wrapping it up
It’s pretty clear that there are a plethora of tools that Google has that can assist us in our WordPress projects. Which of these do you use? Or maybe I should ask which ones don’t you use? Also, let me know of any I missed, which I’m sure there are many.
I hope you enjoyed the list, and be sure to bookmark this post to refer back to it for your future projects.The MMUN Program
Maria Montessori supported the work of the League of Nations and its successor the United Nations as a forum where peace could be created. She recognized the hope for peace lay in the education of children.
Montessori Model United Nations has partnered with the United Nations to create a program for Montessori students who at the sensitive period for reason, justice and morality can participate in a life changing experience.
The Montessori Model United Nations program culminates classroom or after school study with a two day global education simulation experience at the United Nations that enables students in upper elementary, and middle schools to learn about the operations of the United Nations and its role as the world’s largest international peacekeeping and humanitarian organization. In addition, like the high school and university Model United Nations Programs, MMUN provides students from 9-15 years of age an opportunity to:
Learn about cultures, governments and peoples of nations throughout the world.
Use research skills, writing skills and written & oral communications skills.
Develop critical thinking skills, problem solving skills and evaluative skills.
Debate current global issues and world problems.
Practice and use leadership skills in a real life global situation.
Understand the need for peace and conflict resolution throughout the world while developing their own conflict resolution and debating skills.
Through the process of role-playing, each student becomes a delegate of a selected nation. They write, present and debate issues affecting their nation and peoples of the world. By assuming the character of a citizen of their selected country they fully develop an understanding of the needs of a people and the importance of accepting differences.
Questions?
If you have questions that are not addressed on our FAQ page or elsewhere on the website, please contact us at info@nullmontessori-mun.orgFinally, Android on the iPhone Nick Lee Blocked Unblock Follow Following Jun 7, 2016 You heard me. The holy war is over, brethren. At Tendigi, we’ve designed and built a case that allows iPhone devotees to sample the best Mountain View has to offer. Join me as I outline the steps taken to achieve this feat, as well as the numerous pitfalls encountered along the way.
(click video to play)
Eureka?
Choosing the Hardware While there are many embedded Android development boards on the market, my criteria substantially narrowed the list of suitable candidates. I settled on the following requirements: Horsepower: the device must capture, compress, and transmit the screen’s contents in realtime at high frame rates.
Compatibility: the device must run the latest version of Android (version 6.0.1 Marshmallow at the time of this writing).
Size: the board must be small and thin — approximately the dimensions of a credit card, the height of a USB connector.
Connectivity: The board needs built-in Wi-Fi and Bluetooth because I don’t want to write drivers to bridge these to the iPhone’s connections. Also, it needs built-in USB 2.0 for a high-speed, reliable connection to the host iPhone. With these criteria in mind, I chose the Lemaker HiKey. While its 8-core, 64-bit ARM Cortex-A53 processor has more than enough power to run virtually any Android app on the market, it sports a unique party piece: it’s the official reference board of the Android Open Source Project. As a result, most of the HiKey’s necessary components are included directly in the AOSP source tree (a lifesaver). That said, getting my custom AOSP build to run successfully was still a tall order, requiring me to (among other things) recompile the kernel with performance-oriented tweaks to the USB driver.
Say hello to my little friend
For power, I purchased a 650 mAh lithium-polymer battery pack with an integrated protection circuit (to avoid this). Since the HiKey requires an 8–18 volt supply, I used a boost converter to increase the voltage from the battery pack’s native 3.7 volts. Yo dawg, I heard you like mad power so I put a turbo on your turbo so you can boost while you boost While the initial power-on was successful, complete system failure occurred upon connecting a lightning cable between my iPhone and the HiKey. After some multimeter-fueled investigation, I concluded that the iPhone was simply drawing too much current, and the battery couldn’t supply enough to run the HiKey and charge the phone. No biggie — I added a resistor between the USB port’s +5V pin and the lightning cable, limiting the current to a reasonable amount. I couldn’t simply clip the 5 volt line as iOS seems to disable USB data transfer unless power is also connected. Life lesson: V=IR is your friend. Designing the Enclosure As the electronic component of this project came together, one thing quickly became apparent: my original plan to gut a Mophie Juice Pack wasn’t going to work. Knowing that, I shifted my focus to the production of a 3D printed enclosure for the electronics. Starting with absolutely zero 3D modeling or printing knowledge, I was up-and-running with SketchUp in a matter of hours. Rather than model the case from scratch, I used this excellent iPhone 6 Plus case model from Thingiverse as a base, making modifications as needed.
Some early renders of the case’s parts
Once the models were complete, the next challenge presented itself: actually printing the thing. After calling a few 3D print shops in the NYC area, it became clear to me that (at $50+ per print) this would quickly become an expensive proposition, given the trial-and-error process I anticipated. Seeing no viable alternative, I bit the bullet and purchased an XYZprinting da Vinci 2.0 Duo 3D printer. Somehow, B&H manages to keep a huge assortment of 3D printers in stock at their Manhattan location. A short Uber ride later, I was in business.
The most awkward UberPOOL in history
Setting up the printer was relatively straightforward — I was able to make a test print within half an hour of unboxing it. What was not straightforward, however, was the process of exporting clean-looking models from SketchUp. In my case, the issue was that my model had many reversed faces (sometimes called inverted normals). If you plan to 3D print from SketchUp, I highly recommend reading this article: 3D Printing with SketchUp: 10 Tips and Tricks. Once my objects were sufficiently cleaned up, I hit the print button and crossed my fingers. A few hours later, I had a (very thick) iPhone case!
There’s a Gabriel Iglesias joke in here somewhere
The initial component placement went well — the HiKey board, boost converter, and battery fit well with plenty of room to spare. As a result, I was eventually able to shed the mid-nineties-putty-white-brick feel by printing a (much) thinner case. Thick-cut bacon is my favorite snack The Final Product Once I had a clear idea of component size and layout, I scaled the 3D model to a more reasonable size and added openings for the SD card, HDMI and USB ports. It’s not too much thicker than the average battery case 🙃Have you ever purchased a book or a course on a subject you wanted to learn out of curiousity? Suppose you digested all the content, tried out some examples and moved on. A couple of months later, a problem may arise where the topic you learned about may come handy. Sure enough, you set up an application and you are ready to code... but your mind is not. You have to look up even the most simplistic examples to see how to get started. What happened to the skills you were supposed to acquire?
Conscious Incompetence
The good news is, you are already on the right track. At least you exactly know what you don't know. This state is called Conscious Incompetence, and it is the second stage in the four stages of competence.
Four stages of competence: Unconscious Incompetence: you are not aware of lacking skills and knowledge to solve a problem. For instance, when your friend offers you his help in mounting your freshly ordered bed and it collapses after two days, you know that you got help from an unconsciously incompetent person, assuming that your friend had no bad intentions. Conscious Incompetence: same as stage 1, except that you are aware of what skills and knowledge have to be acquired to become competent in a field. When a new Javascript library becomes viral, most likely you become consciously incompetent by the time you want to use it for the first time. Conscious Competence: this is the state where professional solutions can be delivered. The only problem is that you need to actively concentrate and pay attention during the process. This stage is still sufficient most of the time. In fact, some people never reach step 4. I recall an old-fashioned shop I visited during my holidays. I purchased 3 products, each costing 1 Euro. I saw the cashier guy reached for his calculator and entered 1 times 3. Then he asked for 3 Euros. The process is fully bulletproof. It is in fact anchored into him. Yet, he has to think about it, while most people would just ask for the 3 Euros, without even consciously thinking. Unconscious competence: this is where your skills shine. You solve problems without making a conscious effort. In fact, this state of competence is required in emergency situations. You may know everything about traffic rules, but it takes a lot more to successfully avoid an accident or detect aquaplaning on time.
Learning resources come handy as they can give you a boost in leveling up your level of competence. Worst case you learn that you will never deal with a subject due to lack of motivation. Alternatively, you can develop points of reference so that there will be resources to turn to once a skill will be needed. The very best resources may even give you conscious or unconscious competence in a given field, but many of them are hardly enough on their own for reaching conscious incompetence. Why?
Knowledge is not power
Our parents and especially our grandparents lived in a different age. Back in the days, it was a lot harder to access information than now. My grandmother always told me that I should learn history and literature so that I would be the star of Jeopardy or Who wants to be a millionaire one day. While I do respect people with amazing lexical knowledge, I rather took my own path: the path of problem solving.
The act of problem solving in practice is the exact area where most teaching materials fail. Reading a book on isomorphic applications gives you knowledge. In software development related topics, this knowledge is not even sufficient for conscious competence. This is why I am amazed when people tell me that the reason why they prefer printed books to ebooks is that they can read it on their way home or in bed. Then the same people go to forums in a stressed out state saying that they cannot keep up with the latest technologies because there is too much stuff to learn. If you have the impression that Javascript related topics are evolving too quickly for you to keep up, maybe the right approach is not to speed up, but to slow down. Being competent in some areas is a lot better than being consciously incompetent in everything that comes up.
In addition, being competent in some areas makes it easier for you to reach conscious or even unconscious competence in others. For instance, my best programming teacher at high school decided on teaching us C instead of Pascal. Then I learned Pascal at the university. Needless to say, years of practice in C made it a piece of cake for me to write Pascal programs, I just had to look up the proper syntax. The same is happening now with EcmaScript 6. You may have met similar features in CoffeeScript, while knowing Lambda Calculus and lazy evaluation comes handy in others.
We can conclude that theoretical knowledge is not power: it is just potential power. Applied knowledge is power. Think about this when reading a programming book away from your computer, without the plan of applying what you learned.
Books are not bad
A good tech book can do miracles in the right hands. Suppose that you are fed up with hours of manual testing before deployment and you want to learn test driven development. You read a lot and then you find an excellent book about the subject. Even though the book is the best you could find, all examples are in Java, while your team is using Javascript. In addition, the book makes the server render all pages while we tend to shift logic to the client side. Some people find these hurdles discouraging, while others become excited and take the differences in technology as an opportunity. All concepts still apply, therefore translating the whole problem domain including all examples in the book into Javascript is the perfect challenge for you to increase your competence in the subject. If you don't know about Java, maybe it's time to learn just enough to be able to read the code. While one person goes the extra mile and applies the concepts of the book, another may just read the concepts and place the book on his shelf thinking that he did everything that was reasonable to learn test driven development. The second approach is not bad either. In fact, it is significantly better than buying a book and never going past the first chapter. What is the difference between these approaches? The answer lies inside the learner: motivation.
Entertainment + education
If you would rate all your learning experiences lately from 0 to 10, 0 meaning that you feel physical pain even when thinking about the topic and 10 meaning ultimate pleasure, where would you rate your subjects? The closer you are to 10, the less motivation you need to keep going without taking shortcuts. Sometimes it takes a miracle to link any form of pleasure with a subject. This is when entertainment kicks in.
For instance, I was not a big fan of information theory at the university. I mean, there is not too much fun in learning about theorems and proofs like this, especially if your specialization is software. It was still something I had to pass. I soon realized that the topic was so far with how my brain organized itself that targeting the "barely passed" grade would have taken more time than going for the best one. The why was there, I just had to figure out the how. Whenever I got bored or demotivated, I started entertaining myself with the most hilarious things possible. I took the challenge and came up with jokes related to the subject. You may not laugh about hasseling the huff(man tree) or coming up with the name Shannon Stone, but in case of emergency, every little helps. The key point is building neuro associations with things you can relate to. What is easier? Relating to things or people like David Hasselhoff or relating to an abstract concept you have absolutely no connections with? Once momentum is achieved, associations come easier. I could relate to probability and coinflips back then. The same holds for lossless compression techniques. Of course the first day was the hardest one, but after 3 days, everything just made sense. It took me significantly less time to complete the course than I initially estimated and more importantly, my problem solving skills were also challenged, as I managed to construct many of the proofs myself, just by learning some hints. In fact, when the professor saw that I was making up the proofs myself instead of writing something down I had memorized, he immediately started thinking with me for the purpose of helping me. This is when I realized that most people went for the minimum and they did not figure out why they failed the exam 3 times after investing 5 times as much time in the subject than for example me.
Believe me, it is not hard to learn anything if you have the right approach and the motivation. If I want to learn something badly, I will find a way no matter how hard the subject is. For the rest of the topics, even I need to keep my motivation level high with artificial techniques. This is why I sometimes pay money to someone who can keep me entertained and focused while I learn something new. There is a huge and continuously growing market for education bundled with entertainment, so it is not hard for you to find entertaining education in case you need help.Marshall Green (1916–1998) was a United States diplomat whose career focused on East Asia. Green was the senior American diplomat in South Korea at the time of the 1960 April Revolution, and was United States Ambassador to Indonesia at the time of the Transition to the New Order. From 1969 to 1973, he was Assistant Secretary of State for East Asian and Pacific Affairs, and, in this capacity, accompanied President of the United States Richard Nixon during President Nixon's visit to China in 1972.
Biography [ edit ]
Marshall Green was born in Holyoke, Massachusetts on January 27, 1916. He was educated at Groton School, graduating in 1935, and then at Yale University, graduating in 1939.[1]
After university, Green became the secretary of United States Ambassador to Japan, Joseph Grew in Tokyo. Shortly before the Attack on Pearl Harbor, Green returned to the United States to study for the exam to join the United States Foreign Service. With the entry of the U.S. into World War II, Green enlisted in the United States Navy, where he served as a Japanese language translator (he had learned Japanese during his time in Tokyo).
After the war, Green was discharged from the Navy and joined the Foreign Service. His first posting was as Third Secretary at the Embassy of the United States in Wellington. Over the next decade, Green rose rapidly through the ranks of the Foreign Service, ultimately becoming principal assistant to Secretary of State John Foster Dulles; he was Dulles' principal assistant at the time of the Second Taiwan Strait Crisis, which brought the United States and China to the brink of war.
Green was then appointed Deputy Chief of Mission at the Embassy of the United States in Seoul. He was the senior American diplomat chargé d'affaires in South Korea at the time of the 1961 coup d'état that brought Major-General Park Chung Hee to power. During this time, Green maintained the position that the U.S. continued to back ousted but democratically elected Prime Minister Chang Myon (John M. Chang). Green served as U.S. Consul General to Hong Kong, at the Consulate General of the United States in Hong Kong from November 1961 until August 1963.
President of the United States Lyndon B. Johnson nominated Green as United States Ambassador to Indonesia on June 4, 1965, and Green presented his credentials to the Indonesian government on July 26, 1965. He was met with an anti-Vietnam War protest organized by Sukarno, the President of Indonesia, under the slogan "Go Home, Green". Only weeks later, Green witnessed first hand the Transition to the New Order, an anti-Communist purge in which Suharto led a coup against Sukarno and in the course of which an estimated 500,000 Indonesians were killed. Green endorsed the Indonesian military "destroying PKI" through executions, noting in an October 20, 1965 telegram that he had "increasing respect for its determination and organization in carrying out this crucial assignment."[2] According to Mark Aarons, he is "seen as one of the principal officials involved in encouraging the slaughter."[3][4] Green was Ambassador to Indonesia until March 26, 1969; during his four years in Indonesia, he practiced what he called "low-profile diplomacy".
President Richard Nixon nominated Green as Assistant Secretary of State for East Asian and Pacific Affairs in 1969, and Green held this office from May 5, 1969 until May 10, 1973. He did most of the background work for President Nixon's visit to China in 1972, and he was one of thirteen State Department officials who accompanied Nixon during this trip.
In 1973, President Nixon selected Green as United States Ambassador to Australia, a post he held until 1975 and was implicated in the dismissal of the Whitlam Government by Australia's Governor General, John Kerr. In 1975, he became Coordinator of Population Affairs in the United States Department of State.
Retirement [ edit ]
Green retired from government service in 1979, joining the board of Population Crisis Committee, a non-profit committed to combating overpopulation. In retirement, he wrote three books dealing with his time in East Asia.
Green died of a heart attack on June 6, 1998. He was father to three sons: Marshall W., Edward C., and Brampton S., and husband to Lispenard Crocker Green.
Works [ edit ]UTF-Sets
A while ago I came up with a simple new data structure I call a UTF-Set. This data structure isn't exactly revolutionary, but it is pretty neat, and it can reveal some interesting characteristics of the UTF-8 encoding. The example implementation I've written is a mere 52 lines of standard C.
Let's say we have a stream of UTF-8 text, and we want to print a list of all distinct Unicode codepoints ('runes') in the stream. (For simplicity I'm going to use the full UCS character space, up to U+7FFFFFFF, which UTF-8 was originally designed for.) For example, if we were to read in the 5-rune, 18-byte emoji 👩👩👧 then we would print out its 3 distinct runes: U+200D, U+1F467, U+1F469. To do this we need a set to keep track of the runes we've seen. A bitmask is a simple and compact implementation for a set, with one bit per rune, but this bitmask would take up 256 MiB, generally mostly empty, with most runes clustered towards the lower end (the Basic Multilingual Plane).
This is similar to the scenario in which UTF-8 thrives. UTF-8 is efficient when runes tend to be smaller numbers, but if we were to write out every rune in sequence then it would take up 10.62 GiB, whereas UTF-32 would use only 8 GiB. UTF-Sets use a similar tactic, with a worst case of 260 MiB which is only marginally larger than the 256 MiB bitmask, and it will generally be much more efficent. Compared to generic sets, UTF-Sets benefit from the neat ability to use less space while storing common (smaller) codepoints, as well as an extremely simple implementation.
Structure
A UTF-Set is organised into a tree of blocks, each of 512 bytes (the same size as a Unix block), split into 64 words of 64 bits each. The number 64 will come up a lot; the reason is that, if we ignore ASCII for the moment, the top two bits of a UTF-8 byte are unused except for self-synchronisation: a leading byte starts with 11, and a continuation byte with 10, but if we assume that the UTF-8 stream is valid then we may as well only look at the bottom six bits. 26 = 64. In a way, UTF-8 is a 6-bit character coding with a 2-bit synchronisation & compression header.
(Incidentally, every non-ASCII UTF-8 codepoint of length n can be uniquely identified by a Base64 string of length n, e.g. 😸 = wfY4.)
1 typedef struct block UTFSet;
The most distinctive feature of a UTF-Set is its root block, which corresponds to the leading byte of a UTF-8 codepoint, and mimics its characteristic bit pattern. The number of continuation bytes to follow a UTF-8 leading byte can be determined by counting leading ones (i.e. set bits) in its 6-bit 'payload'. I implemented this as a small lookup table. (Note that the last two entries would not make legal leading bytes.)
2 const char clo[64] = { 3 0, 0, 0, 0, 0, 0, 0, 0, 0, 0, 0, 0, 0, 0, 0, 0, // 00xxxx 4 0, 0, 0, 0, 0, 0, 0, 0, 0, 0, 0, 0, 0, 0, 0, 0, // 01xxxx 5 1, 1, 1, 1, 1, 1, 1, 1, 1, 1, 1, 1, 1, 1, 1, 1, // 10xxxx 6 2, 2, 2, 2, 2, 2, 2, 2, 3, 3, 3, 3, 4, 4, 5, 6, // 11xxxx 7 };
In a UTF-Set, the number of leading set bits indicates the height of the tree at that word position in the root block. That is, how many branching nodes (blocks) we must descend through before we reach the boolean leaf values (which indicate whether the corresponding rune is in the set). There is a clear parallel here between the height of the tree and the length of the UTF-8 sequence.
The first 32 words of the root block, having 0 leading set bits, could then each be a pointer to 64 boolean leaf values; the following continuation byte would identify the corresponding leaf. However, as we're working with booleans, we can instead embed a 64-bit bitmask directly in the root block, occupying the space that would otherwise store the 64-bit pointer.
The remaining 32 words of the root block each then point to an additional 'branching' block. All blocks except for the root block are homogeneous: they have the same type of value stored in all their words. If the leading byte had 1 leading set bit then all of the sub-block's words are bitmasks; if it had 2 then they are all pointers to sub-sub-blocks, all of whose words are bitmasks; and so on.
8 struct block { 9 union child { 10 struct block *ptr; 11 uint64_t bits; 12 } blk[64]; 13 };
(The challenge of writing a generic UTF-Map in C++, with a template specialisation for the boolean case, is left as an exercise for the reader.)
Insertion
Now let's see how this tree structure works when you add a UTF-8 sequence to the set. As arguments, we will take the UTF-Set and a UTF-8 string; we will parse the first UTF-8 codepoint from the string, add the codepoint to the set, and return a pointer to the next character in the string. For simplicity, I will assume that the UTF-8 sequence is valid.
14 char *addutf(UTFSet *set, const char *s) 15 {
The first case we'll look at is a UTF-8 leading byte. In this case, we start at the word corresponding to the leading byte's 64-bit 'payload', count its leading set bits to find the number of continuation bytes, and then traverse one level of the tree for each continuation byte, save the last. By the end of this we have a pointer to the bitmask containing the boolean leaf value appropriate for the final continuation byte, which we have not yet read.
16 union child *tp; 17 unsigned char c = *s++; 18 if (c >= 0300) { 19 tp = &set->blk[c % 64]; 20 for (unsigned int n = clo[c % 64]; c = *s++, n > 0; n--) { 21 if (!tp->ptr) 22 tp->ptr = calloc(1, sizeof(struct block)); 23 tp = &tp->ptr->blk[c % 64]; 24 } 25 }
(Note that we write UTF-8 byte literals in octal, as is natural given their 6-bit true nature.)
Now let's look at an ASCII byte. As I mentioned before, UTF-8 effectively has a 2-bit synchronisation & compression header; the topmost bit is for compression. What I mean by this is, any ASCII byte 0xxxxxxx can be expanded to a 2-byte 'overlong' UTF-8 sequence 1100000x 10xxxxxx. It might be inefficient to do this with a UTF-8 stream, but in a UTF-Set no space |
the basement, and transit screens in the lobby. It prods local employers to subsidize transit cards and bike-share memberships.
Through all of this work, Hamilton's office calculates that 42,000 trips a day in the county that would otherwise take place in a single-occupancy vehicle now occur in other modes instead. Three-quarters of those trips are taken by mass transit. All of that has come through lowering the barriers or increasing the appeal of alternative transportation. That's an impressive number. But when asked if he wouldn't rather the county just tax the heck out of parking, Hamilton laughs. He knows that would make his job much easier. "We wouldn't have to do any of this," he says. A creative city might be able to make a disincentive feel like an incentive. Piatkowski points to a "parking cash-out" law in California that requires employers to give workers a cash allowance to not use parking. "The stick then becomes missing out on the reward," Piatkowski says. But why not just wield disincentives as what they honestly are? "Behavior change" sounds vaguely manipulative (whether we're talking about behavior involving automobiles or thermostats). But in this context, the disincentives are really about removing subsidies and distortions from the market. Parking isn't really free. Gas taxes don't actually cover the costs of maintaining our roads. So why is it so hard to disincentivize driving at the same time that we incentivize the alternatives, at least until they're in some better kind of equilibrium? "Because we're afraid," Hamilton says. "Because we don't have the guts to pull the levers on what we want. We know that we want a walkable, bikeable, transit community. We're building it. But we're afraid to push the disincentive lever too hard." This article is part of 'The Future of Transportation,' a CityLab series made possible with support from The Rockefeller Foundation.This article is about the cellular process. For other uses, see Autophagy (disambiguation)
(A) Diagram of autophagy; (B) Electron micrograph of autophagic structures in the fatbody of a fruit fly larva; (C) Fluorescently labeled autophagosomes in liver cells of starved mice.
Autophagy (or autophagocytosis) (from the Ancient Greek αὐτόφαγος autóphagos, meaning "self-devouring"[1] and κύτος kýtos, meaning "hollow"[2]) is the natural, regulated mechanism of the cell that disassembles unnecessary or dysfunctional components.[3] It allows the orderly degradation and recycling of cellular components.[4][5]
Three forms of autophagy are commonly described: macroautophagy, microautophagy, and chaperone-mediated autophagy (CMA). In macroautophagy, targeted cytoplasmic constituents are isolated from the rest of the cell within a double-membraned vesicle known as an autophagosome.[6][7] The autophagosome eventually fuses with lysosomes and the contents are degraded and recycled. In disease, autophagy has been seen as an adaptive response to stress, which promotes survival, whereas in other cases it appears to promote cell death and morbidity. In the extreme case of starvation, the breakdown of cellular components promotes cellular survival by maintaining cellular energy levels.
The name "autophagy" was coined by Belgian biochemist Christian de Duve in 1963 based on his discovery of the functions of lysosome.[3] The identification of autophagy-related genes in yeast in the 1990s let researchers figure out the mechanisms of autophagy,[8][9][10][11][12] which eventually led to the award of the 2016 Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine to Japanese researcher Yoshinori Ohsumi.[13]
History [ edit ]
Autophagy was first observed by Keith R. Porter and his student Thomas Ashford at the Rockefeller Institute. In January 1962 they reported an increased number of lysosomes in rat liver cells after the addition of glucagon, and that some displaced lysosomes towards the centre of the cell contained other cell organelles such as mitochondria. They called this autolysis after Christian de Duve and Alex B. Novikoff. However Porter and Ashford wrongly interpreted their data as lysosome formation (ignoring the pre-existing organelles). Lysosomes could not be cell organelles, but part of cytoplasm such as mitochondria, and that hydrolytic enzymes were produced by microbodies.[14] In 1963 Hruban, Spargo and colleagues published a detailed ultrastructural description of "focal cytoplasmic degradation," which referenced a 1955 German study of injury-induced sequestration. Hruban, Spargo and colleagues recognized three continuous stages of maturation of the sequestered cytoplasm to lysosomes, and that the process was not limited to injury states that functioned under physiological conditions for "reutilization of cellular materials," and the "disposal of organelles" during differentiation.[15] Inspired by this discovery, de Duve christened the phenomena "autophagy". Unlike Porter and Ashford, de Duve conceived the term as a part of lysosomal function while describing the role of glucagon as a major inducer of cell degradation in the liver. With his student Russell Deter, he established that lysosomes are responsible for glucagon-induced autophagy.[16][17] This was the first time the fact that lysosomes are the sites of intracellular autophagy are established.[3][18][19]
In the 1990s several groups of scientists independently discovered autophagy-related genes using the budding yeast. Notably, Yoshinori Ohsumi and Michael Thumm examined starvation-induced non-selective autophagy;[9][10][11] in the meantime, Daniel J Klionsky discovered the cytoplasm-to-vacuole targeting (CVT) pathway, which is a form of selective autophagy.[8][12] They soon found that they were in fact looking at essentially the same pathway, just from different angles.[20][21] Initially, the genes discovered by these and other yeast groups were given different names (APG, AUT, CVT, GSA, PAG, PAZ, and PDD). A unified nomenclature was advocated in 2003 by the yeast researchers to use ATG to denote autophagy genes.[22] The 2016 Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine was awarded to Yoshinori Ohsumi,[13] although some have pointed out that the award could have been more inclusive.[23]
The field of autophagy research experienced accelerated growth at the turn of the 21st century. Knowledge of ATG genes provided scientists more convenient tools to dissect functions of autophagy in human health and disease. In 1999, a landmark discovery connecting autophagy with cancer was published by Beth Levine's group.[24] To this date, relationship between cancer and autophagy continues to be a main theme of autophagy research. The roles of autophagy in neurodegeneration and immune defense also received considerable attention. In 2003, the first Gordon Research Conference on autophagy was held at Waterville.[25] In 2005, Daniel J Klionsky launched Autophagy, a scientific journal dedicated to this field. The first Keystone Symposia Conference on autophagy was held in 2007 at Monterey.[26] In 2008, Carol A Mercer created a BHMT fusion protein (GST-BHMT), which showed starvation-induced site-specific fragmentation in cell lines. The degradation of betaine homo-cysteine methyltransferase (BHMT), a metabolic enzyme, could be used to assess autophagy flux in mammalian cells.
Process and pathways [ edit ]
There are three main types of autophagy, namely macroautophagy, microautophagy and Chaperone mediated autophagy. They are mediated by the autophagy-related genes and their associated enzymes.[6][7][27][28][29] Macroautophagy is then divided into bulk and selective autophagy. In the selective autophagy is the autophagy of organelles; mitophagy,[30] lipophagy,[31] pexophagy,[32] chlorophagy,[33] ribophagy[34] and others.
Macroautophagy is the main pathway, used primarily to eradicate damaged cell organelles or unused proteins.[35] First the phagophore engulfs the material that needs to be degraded, which forms a double membrane known as an autophagosome, around the organelle marked for destruction.[28][36] The autophagosome then travels through the cytoplasm of the cell to a lysosome, and the two organelles fuse.[28] Within the lysosome, the contents of the autophagosome are degraded via acidic lysosomal hydrolase.[37]
Microautophagy, on the other hand, involves the direct engulfment of cytoplasmic material into the lysosome.[38] This occurs by invagination, meaning the inward folding of the lysosomal membrane, or cellular protrusion.[36]
Chaperone-mediated autophagy, or CMA, is a very complex and specific pathway, which involves the recognition by the hsc70-containing complex.[36][39] This means that a protein must contain the recognition site for this hsc70 complex which will allow it to bind to this chaperone, forming the CMA- substrate/chaperone complex.[37] This complex then moves to the lysosomal membrane-bound protein that will recognise and bind with the CMA receptor, allowing it to enter the cell.[citation needed] Upon recognition, the substrate protein gets unfolded and it is translocated across the lysosome membrane with the assistance of the lysosomal hsc70 chaperone.[27][28] CMA is significantly different from other types of autophagy because it translocates protein material in a one by one manner, and it is extremely selective about what material crosses the lysosomal barrier.[35]
Mitophagy is the selective degradation of mitochondria by autophagy. It often occurs to defective mitochondria following damage or stress. Mitophagy promotes turnover of mitochondria and prevents accumulation of dysfunctional mitochondria which can lead to cellular degeneration. It is mediated by Atg32 (in yeast) and NIX and its regulator BNIP3 in mammals. Mitophagy is regulated by PINK1 and parkin proteins. The occurrence of mitophagy is not limited to the damaged mitochondria but also involves undamaged ones.[29]
Lipophagy is the degradation of lipids by autophagy,[31] a function which has been shown to exist in both animal and fungal cells.[40] The role of lipophagy in plant cells however remain elusive.[41] In lipophagy the target are lipid structures called lipid droplets (LDs), spheric "organelles" with a core of mainly triacylglycerols (TAGs) and a unilayer of phospholipids and membrane proteins. In animal cells the main lipophagic pathway is via the engulfment of LDs by the phagophore, macroautophagy. In fungal cells on the other hand microplipophagy constitutes the main pathway and is especially well studied in the budding yeast Saccharomyces cerevisiae[42]. Lipophagy was first discovered in mice and published 2009.[43]
Molecular biology [ edit ]
Autophagy is executed by autophagy-related (Atg) genes. Prior to 2003, ten or more names were used, but after this point a unified nomenclature was devised by fungal autophagy researchers.[44] Atg or ATG stands for autophagy related. It does not specify gene or a protein.[44]
The first autophagy genes were identified by genetic screens conducted in Saccharomyces cerevisiae.[8][9][10][11][12] Following their identification those genes were functionally characterized and their orthologs in a variety of different organisms were identified and studied.[6][45]
In mammals, amino acid sensing and additional signals such as growth factors and reactive oxygen species regulate the activity of the protein kinases mTOR and AMPK.[45][46] These two kinases regulate autophagy through inhibitory phosphorylation of the Unc-51-like kinases ULK1 and ULK2 (mammalian homologues of Atg1).[47] Induction of autophagy results in the dephosphorylation and activation of the ULK kinases. ULK is part of a protein complex containing Atg13, Atg101 and FIP200. ULK phosphorylates and activates Beclin-1 (mammalian homologue of Atg6),[48] which is also part of a protein complex. The autophagy-inducible Beclin-1 complex[49] contains the proteins p150, Atg14L and the class III phosphatidylinositol 3-phosphate kinase (PI(3)K) Vps34.[50] The active ULK and Beclin-1 complexes re-localize to the site of autophagosome initiation, the phagophore, where they both contribute to the activation of downstream autophagy components.[51][52]
Once active, VPS34 phosphorylates the lipid phosphatidylinositol to generate phosphatidylinositol 3-phosphate (PtdIns(3)P) on the surface of the phagophore. The generated PtdIns(3)P is used as a docking point for proteins harboring a PtdIns(3)P binding motif. WIPI2, a PtdIns(3)P binding protein of the WIPI (WD-repeat protein interacting with phosphoinositides) protein family, was recently shown to physically bind Atg16L1.[53] Atg16L1 is a member of an E3-like protein complex involved in one of two ubiquitin-like conjugation systems essential for autophagosome formation. Its binding by WIPI2 recruits it to the phagophore and mediates its activity.[54]
The first of the two ubiquitin-like conjugation systems involved in autophagy covalently binds the ubiquitin-like protein Atg12 to Atg5. The resulting conjugate protein then binds Atg16L1 to form an E3-like complex which functions as part of the second ubiquitin-like conjugation system.[55] This complex binds and activates Atg3, which covalently attaches mammalian homologues of the ubiquitin-like yeast protein ATG8 (LC3A-C, GATE16, and GABARAPL1-3), the most studied being LC3 proteins, to the lipid phosphatidylethanolamine (PE) on the surface of autophagosomes.[56] Lipidated LC3 contributes to the closure of autophagosomes,[57] and enables the docking of specific cargos and adaptor proteins such as Sequestosome-1/p62.[58] The completed autophagosome then fuses with a lysosome through the actions of multiple proteins, including SNAREs[59][60] and UVRAG.[61][62] Following the fusion LC3 is retained on the vesicle's inner side and degraded along with the cargo, while the LC3 molecules attached to the outer side are cleaved off by Atg4 and recycled.[63] The contents of the autolysosome are subsequently degraded and their building blocks are released from the vesicle through the action of permeases.[64]
Functions [ edit ]
Nutrient starvation [ edit ]
Autophagy has roles in various cellular functions. One particular example is in yeasts, where the nutrient starvation induces a high level of autophagy. This allows unneeded proteins to be degraded and the amino acids recycled for the synthesis of proteins that are essential for survival.[65][66][67] In higher eukaryotes, autophagy is induced in response to the nutrient depletion that occurs in animals at birth after severing off the trans-placental food supply, as well as that of nutrient starved cultured cells and tissues.[68][69] Mutant yeast cells that have a reduced autophagic capability rapidly perish in nutrition-deficient conditions.[70] Studies on the apg mutants suggest that autophagy via autophagic bodies is indispensable for protein degradation in the vacuoles under starvation conditions, and that at least 15 APG genes are involved in autophagy in yeast.[70] A gene known as ATG7 has been implicated in nutrient-mediated autophagy, as mice studies have shown that starvation-induced autophagy was impaired in atg7-deficient mice.[69]
Xenophagy [ edit ]
In microbiology, xenophagy is the autophagic degradation of infectious particles. Cellular autophagic machinery also play an important role in innate immunity. Intracellular pathogens, such as Mycobacterium tuberculosis (the bacterium which is responsible for tuberculosis) are targeted for degradation by the same cellular machinery and regulatory mechanisms that target host mitochondria for degradation.[71] Incidentally, this is further evidence for the endosymbiotic hypothesis. This process generally leads to the destruction of the invasive microorganism, although some bacteria can block the maturation of phagosomes into degradative organelles called phagolysosomes.[72] Stimulation of autophagy in infected cells can help overcome this phenomenon, restoring pathogen degradation.
Infection [ edit ]
Vesicular stomatitis virus is believed to be taken up by the autophagosome from the cytosol and translocated to the endosomes where detection takes place by a pattern recognition receptor called toll-like receptor 7, detecting single stranded RNA. Following activation of the toll-like receptor, intracellular signaling cascades are initiated, leading to induction of interferon and other antiviral cytokines. A subset of viruses and bacteria subvert the autophagic pathway to promote their own replication.[73] Galectin-8 has recently been identified as an intracellular "danger receptor", able to initiate autophagy against intracellular pathogens. When galectin-8 binds to a damaged vacuole, it recruits an autophagy adaptor such as NDP52 leading to the formation of an autophagosome and bacterial degradation.[74]
Repair mechanism [ edit ]
Autophagy degrades damaged organelles, cell membranes and proteins, and electing against autophagy is thought to be one of the main reasons for the accumulation of damaged cells and aging.[75]
Programmed cell death [ edit ]
One of the mechanisms of programmed cell death (PCD) is associated with the appearance of autophagosomes and depends on autophagy proteins. This form of cell death most likely corresponds to a process that has been morphologically defined as autophagic PCD. One question that constantly arises, however, is whether autophagic activity in dying cells is the cause of death or is actually an attempt to prevent it. Morphological and histochemical studies so far did not prove a causative relationship between the autophagic process and cell death. In fact, there have recently been strong arguments that autophagic activity in dying cells might actually be a survival mechanism.[76][77] Studies of the metamorphosis of insects have shown cells undergoing a form of PCD that appears distinct from other forms; these have been proposed as examples of autophagic cell death.[78] Recent pharmacological and biochemical studies have proposed that survival and lethal autophagy can be distinguished by the type and degree of regulatory signaling during stress particularly after viral infection.[79] Although promising, these findings have not been examined in non-viral systems.
Exercise [ edit ]
Autophagy is essential for basal homeostasis; it is also extremely important in maintaining muscle homeostasis during physical exercise.[80][81] Autophagy at the molecular level is only partially understood. A study of mice shows that autophagy is important for the ever-changing demands of their nutritional and energy needs, particularly through the metabolic pathways of protein catabolism. In a 2012 study conducted by the University of Texas Southwestern Medical Center in Dallas, mutant mice (with a knock-in mutation of BCL2 phosphorylation sites to produce progeny that showed normal levels of basal autophagy yet were deficient in stress-induced autophagy) were tested to challenge this theory. Results showed that when compared to a control group, these mice illustrated a decrease in endurance and an altered glucose metabolism during acute exercise.[80]
Another study demonstrated that skeletal muscle fibres of collagen VI knockout mice showed signs of degeneration due to an insufficiency of autophagy which led to an accumulation of damaged mitochondria and excessive cell death.[82] Exercise-induced autophagy was unsuccessful however; but when autophagy was induced artificially post-exercise, the accumulation of damaged organelles in collagen VI deficient muscle fibres was prevented and cellular homeostasis was maintained. Both studies demonstrate that autophagy induction may contribute to the beneficial metabolic effects of exercise and that it is essential in the maintaining of muscle homeostasis during exercise, particularly in collagen VI fibres.[80][81][82]
Work at the Institute for Cell Biology, University of Bonn, showed that a certain type of autophagy, i.e. chaperone-assisted selective autophagy (CASA), is induced in contracting muscles and is required for maintaining the muscle sarcomere under mechanical tension.[83] The CASA chaperone complex recognizes mechanically damaged cytoskeleton components and directs these components through a ubiquitin-dependent autophagic sorting pathway to lysosomes for disposal. This is necessary for maintaining muscle activity.[83][84]
Osteoarthritis [ edit ]
Because autophagy decreases with age and age is a major risk factor for osteoarthritis, the role of autophagy in the development of this disease is suggested. Proteins involved in autophagy are reduced with age in both human and mouse articular cartilage.[85] Mechanical injury to cartilage explants in culture also reduced autophagy proteins.[86] Autophagy is constantly activated in normal cartilage but it is compromised with age and precedes cartilage cell death and structural damage.[87] Thus autophagy is involved in a normal protective process (chondroprotection) in the joint.
Cancer [ edit ]
Oftentimes, cancer occurs when several different pathways that regulate cell differentiation are disturbed. Autophagy plays an important role in cancer – both in protecting against cancer as well as potentially contributing to the growth of cancer.[76][88] Autophagy can contribute to cancer by promoting survival of tumor cells that have been starved, or that degrade apoptotic mediators through autophagy: in such cases, use of inhibitors of the late stages of autophagy (such as chloroquine), on the cells that use autophagy to survive, increases the number of cancer cells killed by antineoplastic drugs.[89]
The role of autophagy in cancer is one that has been highly researched and reviewed. There is evidence that emphasizes the role of autophagy both as a tumor suppressor as well as a factor in tumor cell survival. However, recent research has been able to show that autophagy is more likely to be used as a tumor suppressor according to several models.[88]
Tumor suppressor [ edit ]
Several experiments have been done with mice and varying Beclin1, a protein that regulates autophagy. When the Beclin1 gene was altered to be heterozygous (Beclin 1+/-), the mice were found to be tumor prone.[90] However, when Beclin1 was overexpressed, tumor development was inhibited.[91] Care should be exercised when interpreting phenotypes of beclin mutants and attributing the observations to a defect in autophagy, however: Beclin1 is generally required for phosphatidylinositol 3- phosphate production and as such it affects numerous lysosomal and endosomal functions, including endocytosis and endocytic degradation of activated growth factor receptors. In support of the possibility that Beclin1 affects cancer development through an autophagy-independent pathway is the fact that core autophagy factors which are not known to affect other cellular processes and are definitely not known to affect cell proliferation and cell death, such as Atg7 or Atg5, show a much different phenotype when the respective gene is knocked out, which does not include tumor formation. In addition, full knockout of Beclin1 is embryonic lethal whereas knockout of Atg7 or Atg5 is not.
Necrosis and chronic inflammation also has been shown to be limited through autophagy which helps protect against the formation of tumor cells.[92]
Tumor cell survival [ edit ]
Alternatively, autophagy has also been shown to play a large role in tumor cell survival. In cancerous cells, autophagy is used as a way to deal with stress on the cell.[93] Once these autophagy related genes were inhibited, cell death was potentiated.[94] The increase in metabolic energy is offset by autophagy functions. These metabolic stresses include hypoxia, nutrient deprivation, and an increase in proliferation. These stresses activate autophagy in order to recycle ATP and maintain survival of the cancerous cells.[95] Autophagy has been shown to enable continued growth of tumor cells by maintaining cellular energy production. By inhibiting autophagy genes in these tumors cells, regression of the tumor and extended survival of the organs affected by the tumors were found. Furthermore, inhibition of autophagy has also been shown to enhance the effectiveness of anticancer therapies.[95]
Mechanism of cell death [ edit ]
Cells that undergo an extreme amount of stress experience cell death either through apoptosis or necrosis. Prolonged autophagy activation leads to a high turnover rate of proteins and organelles. A high rate above the survival threshold may kill cancer cells with a high apoptotic threshold.[95][96] This technique can be utilized as a therapeutic cancer treatment.[76]
Therapeutic target [ edit ]
New developments in research have found that targeted autophagy may be a viable therapeutic solution in fighting cancer. As discussed above, autophagy plays both a role in tumor suppression and tumor cell survival. Thus, the qualities of autophagy can be used as a strategy for cancer prevention. The first strategy is to induce autophagy and enhance its tumor suppression attributes. The second strategy is to inhibit autophagy and thus induce apoptosis.[94]
The first strategy has been tested by looking at dose-response anti-tumor effects during autophagy-induced therapies. These therapies have shown that autophagy increases in a dose-dependent manner. This is directly related to the growth of cancer cells in a dose-dependent manner as well.[93][96] This data supports the development of therapies that will encourage autophagy. Secondly, inhibiting the protein pathways directly known to induce autophagy may also serve as an anticancer therapy.[94][96]
The second strategy is based on the idea that autophagy is a protein degradation system used to maintain homeostasis and the findings that inhibition of autophagy often leads to apoptosis. Inhibition of autophagy is riskier as it may lead to cell survival instead of the desired cell death.[93]
Negative regulators of autophagy [ edit ]
Negative regulators of autophagy, such as mTOR, cFLIP, and EGFR are orchestrated to function within different stages of the autophagy cascade. The end-products of autophagic digestion may also serve as a negative- feedback regulatory mechanism to stop prolonged activity.[97]
Parkinson disease [ edit ]
Parkinson disease is a neurodegenerative disorder partially caused by the cell death of brain and brain stem cells in many nuclei like the substantia nigra. Parkinson's disease is characterized by inclusions of a protein called alpha-synuclien (Lewy bodies) in affected neurons that cells cannot break down. Deregulation of the autophagy pathway and mutation of alleles regulating autophagy are believed to cause neurodegenerative diseases.[citation needed] Autophagy is essential for neuronal survival.[citation needed] Without efficient autophagy, neurons gather ubiquitinated protein aggregates and degrade.[citation needed] Ubiquitinated proteins are proteins that have been tagged with ubiquitin to get degraded. Mutations of synuclien alleles lead to lysosome pH increase and hydrolase inhibition. As a result, lysosomes degradative capacity is decreased. There are several genetic mutations implicated in the disease, including loss of function PINK1[98] and Parkin.[99] Loss of function in these genes can lead to damaged mitochondrial accumulation and protein aggregates than can lead to cellular degeneration. Mitochondria is involved in Parkinson's disease. In idiopathic Parkinson's disease, the disease is commonly caused by dysfunctional mitochondria, cellular oxidative stress, autophagic alterations and the aggregation of proteins. These can lead to mitochondrial swelling and depolarization.[100]
Significance of autophagy as a drug target [ edit ]
Since dysregulation of autophagy is involved in the pathogenesis of a broad range of diseases, great efforts are invested to identify and characterize small synthetic or natural molecules that can regulate it.[101]
See also [ edit ]
References [ edit ]Several major media outlets have published the results of an investigation into the financial dealings of the rich and powerful, based on a vast trove of documents handed over by an anonymous source.
The International Consortium of Investigative Journalism (ICIJ), a nonprofit group in the US, said the cache of 11.5 million records detailed the offshore holdings of a dozen current and former world leaders, as well as businessmen, criminals, celebrities and sports stars.
You're talking about a massive number of people who are hiding money of one type or another. Charles Intriago, offshore banking expert
Among the sitting world leaders named in the leak are Argentine President Mauricio Macri, Iceland's Prime Minister Sigmundur Davíð Gunnlaugsson, and Ukraine's President Petro Poroshenko.
The documents link at least 12 current and former heads of state and 143 other politicians to illicit financial transactions.
WATCH: Taking on the tax havens
Some 140 offshore companies named in the documents are connected to politicians or public officials and their families.
Several reports say the documents show details of how Russian President Vladimir Putin’s inner circle became wealthy. A close friend of Putin's, Sergei Roldugin, is alleged to be at the centre of a scheme in which money from Russian state banks is hidden offshore.
"I think it raises further questions for the political class as a whole because European countries, the US, the OECD, have been talking about greater transparency.. there's been a series of scandals," Luke Harding of Britain's The Guardian newspaper, who published reports based on the leak, told Al Jazeera.
"But it turns out that, actually, offshore companies are still very popular."
Investigators in the US believe one of the offshore companies mentioned in the documents supplied fuel for jets the Syrian government used to bomb and kill tens of thousands of people.
Also revealed in the documents was a shell company in Panama owned by the football star Lionel Messi and his father. Spanish investigators are currently probing Messi for tax evasion.
Laundering and evading
A co-founder of the secretive Panamanian-based law firm, Mossack Fonseca, where the documents originated, confirmed the authenticity of the papers being used in articles published by more than 100 news organisations around the world.
Ramon Fonseca told Panama's Channel 2 television network that the documents were obtained illegally in a hacking attack.
Though the files appear to show how the firm - the world's fourth biggest provider of offshore services - helped clients launder money and evade tax, the company says it has never been accused of any wrongdoing.
German newspaper Sueddeutsche Zeitung said it first received the data more than a year ago. The Munich-based daily was offered the data through an encrypted channel by an anonymous source who requested no monetary compensation and asked only for unspecified security measures, Bastian Obermayer, a reporter for the paper, said.
The documents, dubbed the Panama Papers, were then shared by the newspaper with the ICIJ and international news outlets. In total, some 107 media outlets in 78 countries investigated the material.
With "2.6 terabytes of data, 11.5 millions documents, and 214,000 shell companies: The Panama Papers are the largest data leak journalists have ever worked with," Sueddeutsche tweeted on Sunday.
WATCH: Dirty money
Charles Intriago, an expert in offshore banking, told Al Jazeera that there may be 60 to 65 other countries besides Panama where such activities were taking place.
"Let’s not forget that here’s a relatively small country that is a major banking centre but it’s only one country through one law firm," he said.
"So if you multiply that times 60, including some of the major secrecy havens like Switzerland, Liechtenstein, the Caribbean islands and others, you’re talking about a massive number of people who are hiding money of one type or another," he said.
The ICIJ said the documents included emails, financial spreadsheets, passports and corporate records detailing how powerful figures used banks, law firms and offshore shell companies to hide their assets. The data spanned a timeframe of nearly 40 years, from 1977 to the end of 2015, it said.Show full PR text
Silverado High Country: HD Pickups with All-Day Comfort
2014-04-09
- Rugged luxury with heavy-duty capability, Silverado dependability
- Choice of gas, diesel or CNG power
- Advanced chassis controls for more capable, confident towing
DETROIT – When you spend long days on the worksite or long nights towing a heavy trailer, comfort and capability are hardly a luxury.
With its quiet, well-appointed interior and advanced technologies that bring extra confidence to the most challenging towing situations, the 2015 Silverado High Country HD has what it takes to make the tough jobs easier.
Silverado High Country HD, Chevrolet's first premium heavy-duty pickup, combines the refinement and convenience of the Silverado 1500 High Country with the rugged capability of the new Silverado 2500HD and 3500HD pickups.
Luxury for go, not for show
Unique content includes a chrome grille with horizontal bars, and body-color front and rear bumpers – including Chevrolet's CornerStep rear bumper. All models include 6-inch tubular chrome assist steps, High Country badges on the doors and tailgate and High Country logos on the door sill plates.
Silverado 2500HD High Country models also feature a unique 20-inch chrome wheel. Single-rear-wheel 3500HD models have an 18-inch chrome wheel, while dual-rear-wheel models use a 17-inch forged polished aluminum wheel.
Inside, Silverado High Country HD features an exclusive saddle brown interior. Heated and cooled perforated premium leather front bucket seats with High Country logos on the headrests are standard, along with Chevrolet MyLink connectivity with an 8-inch touch screen, Bose premium audio and front and rear park assist.
Options include a sunroof, navigation system and a rear-seat entertainment system with a BluRay/DVD player, as well as a High Country Premium Package that includes heated steering wheel, driver alert package and power adjustable pedals.
New trailering mirrors available
Also available on the Silverado HD High Country are Chevrolet's new up-level trailer tow mirrors. The chrome-capped mirrors manually extend for wider trailers and feature power adjust with memory and power fold. They include heat and turn signals in the glass. They also incorporate auxiliary clearance lamps and auxiliary cargo lamps to help make backing a trailer easier.
Engineered for capability, built for dependability
Under the skin, the new High Country models are 100 percent Silverado HD, engineered to tame the toughest tasks and validated by the team that has helped make Silverado the most dependable, longest lasting pickups on the road.
The High Country comes in 2500HD and 3500HD crew cab models in both two- and four-wheel-drive. The 3500HD High Country will be available in single- or dual-rear wheel models, with maximum tow ratings of up to 22,900 pounds for fifth wheel/gooseneck towing, and up to 19,600 pounds for conventional towing.
Like other Silverado HDs, the High Country HD will offer a choice of three powertrains:
- A 6.0L V-8 specifically tuned for heavy-duty trucks, rated at 360 horsepower and 380 lb-ft of torque.
- A bi-fuel version of the 6.0L V-8 that can seamlessly switch from gasoline to Compressed Natural Gas (CNG).
- The 6.6L Duramax turbodiesel teamed with the Allison 1000 six-speed automatic transmission. Rated at 397 horsepower and 765 lb-ft of torque, the Duramax V-8 features a variable-vane turbocharger that acts as an exhaust brake, helping control speed on downgrades for more confident towing.
The foundation of the 2015 Silverado HD lineup is a family of fully boxed frames, which use large cross sections, hydroforming and high-strength steels in key areas. The stiffness of the frames contributes to improved handling and ride comfort while the strength of the frames enhances payload and towing capability.
The Silverado HDs employ an independent front suspension specifically engineered for HD pickup use. Torsion bars tailored to the weight ratings of the trucks allow easier trim height adjustments. In the rear, asymmetrical leaf springs balance ride-and-load carrying and improve control of axle hop.
The new Silverado HDs are engineered to bring new levels of confidence to tough towing through further refinement of Silverado's available cruise control, auto grade braking, and diesel exhaust brake. Integrating these features helps the 2015 Silverado HD maintain a set speed up and down grades, even when towing a heavy trailer in mountainous terrain.
Silverado 2500HD and 3500HD High Country models will be available starting this summer.
About Chevrolet
Founded in 1911 in Detroit, Chevrolet is now one of the world's largest car brands, doing business in more than 140 countries and selling more than 4.9 million cars and trucks a year. Chevrolet provides customers with fuel-efficient vehicles that feature spirited performance, expressive design, and high quality. More information on Chevrolet models can be found at www.chevrolet.com.A desperate search is on for a dog who's gone missing in Middlebury. He fled after his owner was hit by a car, and many in town are now turning out asking "Where's Willie?"
It's been a tough week for Doug Anderson. His beloved 3-year-old golden retriever, Willie, has been missing after a freak accident while the two were out for a walk.
Anderson and Willie were crossing busy Route 7 at a crosswalk Monday afternoon. One truck stopped, but a second car did not. Anderson was hit, and Willie took off. "He totally freaked out by that, and went charging across the green faster than any dog I've ever seen. His leash trailing behind him," Anderson said.
Willie was spotted headed south |
signals that St. Louis may move Carpenter back to third. Encarnacion and Trumbo aren't great defenders but have enough experience on the infield (and outfield in Trumbo's case) that it should suffice. Three years older than Trumbo, Encarnacion, 34, will end up having a shorter and thus less-expensive contract than Trumbo.
Story continues
With a deep and talented power-bat market, Encarnacion's stock hasn't gone above three years and $60 million thus far, according to Yahoo Sports. With teams in a wait-and-see mode to find out the prices for Justin Turner, Jose Bautista and Chris Carter, the Cardinals could sweep in and land Encarnacion, who was optimistic to have a deal in place before the Winter Meetings.Eagle-eyed readers may have spotted I haven't been writing this column for a while. Roughly two people noticed its absence, until the other day when a paragraph in Private Eye claimed I'd asked Alan Rusbridger, editor of the Guardian, to switch off the reader comments underneath my articles (not true), and that he'd refused to do so (also not true), so I'd quit (not entirely true). This led to an intense flurry of activity, by which I mean four people asked me about it.
Although the Private Eye story wasn't completely wrong – I have stopped doing this particular column for a while, for reasons I'll explain in a moment – I was all set to write to their letters page to whine in the most pompous manner imaginable, something I've always secretly wanted to do, when I figured I might as well respond here instead, for money.
Incidentally, I'm aware this is Olympic-level navel gazing, but you're a human being with free will who can stop reading any time. Here, have a full stop. And another. And another. There are exits all over this building.
Anyway, I haven't quit the newspaper, but I have, for the meantime, stopped writing weekly, partly because my overall workload was making that kind of timetable impossible, and partly because I've recently been overwhelmed by the sheer amount of jabber in the world: a vast cloud of blah I felt I was contributing to every seven days.
If a weatherman misreads the national mood and cheerfully sieg-heils on BBC Breakfast at 8.45am, there'll be 86 outraged columns, 95 despairing blogs, half a million wry tweets and a rib-tickling pass-the-parcel Photoshop meme about it circulating by lunchtime. It happens every day. Every day, a billion instantly conjured words on any contemporaneous subject you can think of. Events and noise, events and noise; everything was starting to resemble nothing but events and noise. Firing more words into the middle of all that began to strike me as futile and unnecessary. I started to view myself as yet another factory mindlessly pumping carbon dioxide into a toxic sky.
This is perhaps not the ideal state of mind for someone writing a weekly column in a newspaper. Clearly it was time for a short break.
Reader comments form part of the overall wordstorm described above, and it's true I'm not a huge fan of them, but that's chiefly because I'm an elderly man from the age of steam who clings irrationally to the outmoded belief that articles and letters pages should be kept separate, just like church and state. I guess conceptually I still think I'm writing in a "newspaper", even though the reality of what that means has changed beyond measure since I started doing it. So now I'm sitting grumpily in a spaceship with my arms folded, wearing a stovepipe hat. Ridiculous.
These days most newspaper sites are geared towards encouraging interaction with the minuscule fraction of readers who bother to interact back, which is a pity because I'm selfishly uninterested in conducting any kind of meaningful dialogue with humankind in general. I'd say Twitter's better for back-and-forth discussion anyway, if you could be arsed with it. Yelling out the window at passersby is another option.
When it comes to comments, despite not being as funny as I never was in the first place, I get an incredibly easy ride from passing wellwishers compared with any woman who dares write anything on the internet anywhere about anything at all, the ugly bitch, boo, go home bitch go home. Getting slagged off online is par for the course, and absorbing the odd bit of constructive criticism is character-building. The positive comments are more unsettling. Who needs to see typed applause accompanying an article? It's just weird. I don't get it.
But then right now I don't "get" most forms of communication. There's just so much of it. Everybody talking at once and all over each other; everyone on the planet typing words into their computers, for ever, like I'm doing now. I fail to see the point of roughly 98% of human communication at the moment, which indicates I need to stroll around somewhere quiet for a bit.
After my break, and a rethink, I'll quietly return later in the year, to write something slightly different, slightly less regularly (probably fortnightly). In other words, I'm reducing my carbon emissions. And whatever the new thing I'm writing turns out to be, it'll appear both online, still accompanied by the requisite string of comments, and in the newspaper, which is a foldable thing made of paper, containing words and pictures, which catches fire easily and is sometimes left on trains.
Now get out.Robert Pires says that Mesut Ozil is one of the best players he has ever seen.
Ozil has been in fine form since returning from a three-month spell on the sidelines, claiming four goals and four assists in 15 appearances for Arsenal.
The World Cup winner curled in an inch-perfect free-kick against Liverpool on Saturday and Pires believes he deserves praise for another impressive performance.
Read the latest edition Read more from Robert in the new issue of the Arsenal Magazine, out next week Click here to subscribe
“For me, the man of the match was Mesut Ozil,” the former Gunner told the Arsenal Magazine. “And I am so glad that he proved his critics wrong.
“Too many people have criticised him this season and overall since he arrived at Arsenal. I train with him regularly and I can tell you that he is one of the best players I have seen.
“He loves this club and cares a lot about it. He wants to win trophies here and wants to make the fans happy, like he did against Liverpool. First, there was his wonderful pass for Aaron on the first goal. Then he scored that wonderful free-kick for the second goal.
“Again, I am not sure Mignolet can do much better because the strike is so clinical and goes out before coming back in. But Mesut also worked hard for the team, he defended, he was precious on the ball and he was simply instrumental.
“You can see that his understanding with Aaron, Santi, Alexis or Olivier is perfect. I love seeing Mesut, Aaron and Olivier exchanging those short passes.Nothing. I repeat. Nothing is sacred. Tonight, numerous sources are reporting that audiences will be asked to swallow the blue or red pill again.
With Keanu Reeves recently saying he'd be interested in a revisit to the Matrix if the project was right, word comes down tonight that Warner Bros. is officially on board with rebooting the franchise. Whether or not this will be a hard reboot or some type of continuation remains to be seen but the words'reboot' are definitely in the cards for the return to the Matrix.
Official sources are saying that the original masterminds, The Wachowskis are not involved in the project in the least and that Joel Silver is the one that approached the studio to get this project kick started. Although, he sold all his rights to the saga back in 2012, he's ready to start it all over again, apparently with Michael B. Jordan in the crosshairs to star in new theatrical entry.
Although the last two films didn't really appease fans or make them crave more adventures with Neo, the studios are currently hungry for profitable franchises, and The Matrix Rebooted might just be their next box office blockbuster.I had a not-super-stellar experience with my first RedditGifts exchange, but Emilolz absolutely made up for it. I got a lovely message right after matching asking if I had a wishlist of any kind, and a little apology for ill health. No worries!
...then, a week or so ago, I got another little message asking if I'd be OK with some 8-bit art. I was super pumped, and couldn't wait to see what my mysterious gifter would come up with.
Getting the package today was super exciting, and the wait was so worth it! I wasn't sure quite what to expect—digital art? A cross-stitch? And then, to find a painting! So cool!
One of the little things I had in my wishlist was the Ygritte "You know nothing..." sketch, and Emilolz took that as inspiration for this! I got a card along with it, telling me that it's her first try at an ASOIAF or GoT character/theme. It takes about 2-5 hours to do each one! Goodness, goodness.
She got me a Tully patch, as well! I said in my profile that I'd probably be a Tully if I fit into Westeros (out of the Great Houses, anyway (and I am very aware that that's not exactly a compliment to myself)), and I think I'll iron it on to a jacket that was given to me four years ago.
I'm so happy with my gift/s. Handmade, thoughtful, sweet! And such good communication, too.
Thank you so much, Emilolz!UPDATE (11/29/12): Snippet of “Tell Me What They Mad For” below. The provided lyrics don’t match, though…
Pusha T always speaks his mind, whether subliminally or directly (he detailed to HHW how his “New God Flow” verse was about Birdman)). The G.O.O.D. Music rapper, and one half of the Clipse, fires more shots at Lil Wayne and Birdman in a verse from a new Ludacris record called “Tell Me What They Mad For.”
DaJaz1 posted a snippet of the track, but it appears to have since been removed. However, Push A Ton’s bars from the song, which also features Swizz Beatz, have been transcribed. Although he doesn’t name any names, it’s obvious who he is rapping.
With your baby mama f-cking every rapper in the business Ni–as saying you was better when the drugs was in your system Now your crack swag gone ever since u came from prison Got you tweeting all stupid, is you skatin’, is you dissin’ Found out your Ghost leased and your Phantom just rented Won’t leave it in your name like Pac when he went missing Makaveli lives on so I’m riding on you b-tches.
Damn.
Since Ludacris has had issues with Big Sean and Drake, the finished product, which will appear on his forthcoming Ludaversal album, should be full of shots. We just hope if Weezy does respond in kind, it will be better than “Goulish.”
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—
Photo: Pusha TMichael Moore said Hillary Clinton ran “a disgraceful campaign.”
In an interview with Variety published Tuesday, the 62-year-old director said the reason she lost the election has nothing to do with Russia.
“We need an investigation into the hacking, but the Democrats should not be thinking that they lost because of the Russians,” Moore said. “The Democrats lost because of the Democrats. It’s the second time now in 16 years where the Democrats won [the popular vote] but lost. That is so revolting that the old guard of the Democratic Party should all resign. They let us down, the majority, now twice. I’m done with it.”
“I’m going to help lead the charge to take over the Democratic Party.” (RELATED: Michael Moore Gets Shut Down After Saying ‘Majority Of Americans Didn’t Want Donald Trump’)
“There were people like me who live in Michigan who were crying out to the Clinton campaign, ‘Please come to Michigan, Ohio, Wisconsin.’ They decided not to play by the game. It’s a bad game. The electoral college should be changed, but it wasn’t gotten rid of, so why were they ignoring these states? It’s disgraceful.”
Moore — who met Trump in 1998 — said people need to start taking him seriously.
“I’ve taken him literally and seriously since day one,” Moore continued. “That’s why I’ve been able to be active and energized since the election. I went through my five stages of grief months and months ago when I realized he was going to win.” (RELATED: Michael Moore Claims He Knows ‘For A Fact’ That Donald Trump Doesn’t Want To Be President)
“You do have to take Trump at his word. I still hear people say, ‘Oh, he’s not really going to build the wall.’ Oh, he is going to build it. He knows that he’s got to deliver at least a version of the wall.”
When asked if he thinks Trump will ban Muslims from entering the country, Moore said “absolutely.”
“What you’re going to see is, on day one, he’s going to rescind a dozen or more of Obama’s executive-branch regulations,” he said.
“On day two, Republicans will start printing laws the way you print fliers for a homecoming dance. Before the liberals and the Democrats can get their heads screwed on straight, they’ll have 20 laws passed. Building a wall. Creating a Muslim ban. He’s shown how he’s going to do it. He’s going to get away with it by making it a ban on Muslims who come from the following countries. He needs just enough cover for his crowd to say, ‘Oh, he’s being reasonable there. He’s not banning all Muslims.'”Nvidia today rolled out its next-generation 200-series GPUs, the GeForce GTX 260 and GTX 280.
The series name is at last a concession to the bewildering naming scheme Nvidia has played with in the vast array of GeForce graphics chips. That is — starting now. Customers will still wade through the convoluted model numbers with older offerings.
The 200-series GPUs are fabricated by the Taiwan foundry, TSMC, on a 65nm process that uses 1.4 billion transistors. It's an enormous 576 square millimeters chip and the largest GPU that TSMC has manufactured to date. To compare, the G92 chip (used in the GeForce 8800 and 9800 GPUs) measures 330 square millimeters.
Tony Tamasi holds up the 200-series chip
Of course, the wafer real estate required for each chip means greater manufacturing cost, and you can probably guess where that expense is ultimately shouldered. That said, the GPUs pack a lot of punch.
They use a double-slot design that measures 26.67cm (10.5 inches) in length. You might want to break out the measuring tape on your box, and also make sure you've got 6-pin and 8-pin power connectors to feed the GTX 280 board's 236W demands. The GTX 260, meanwhile, needs two 6-pin connectors for 182 watts board power.
GeForce GTX 280
The big GTX 280 sports a 512-bit memory controller — an upgrade from the previous generation 384-bit controller — connected to 1,024MB GDDR3 memory running at 1107MHz. The chip has 240 processing cores (which used to be called shader units) and 32 edROPs (raster operations processors), and clocks at 1296MHz. Nvidia is selling its new big GPU for $649 (£333) beginning tomorrow.
GeForce GTX 260
The GTX 260 has a 448-bit memory controller connected to 896MB GDDR3 memory clocked at 999MHz. The chip has 192 processing cores and 28 ROPs, running at 1242MHz (that's pretty darn close to the GTX 280.) The smaller GPU is $399 (~ £205) and goes on sale June 26.
All said, Nvidia claims the GPUs on average give a 1.5x performance boost over GeForce 8 or 9 series GPUs.Image copyright Reuters Image caption A nerve gas attack on the town of Khan Sheikhoun in April killed more than 80 people
Russia has vetoed a UN Security Council resolution that would have extended an international inquiry into chemical weapons attacks in Syria.
It is the 10th time Moscow has used its veto powers at the UN in support of its ally since the conflict began.
US ambassador to the UN, Nikki Haley, accused Russia of undermining the organisation's ability to deter future chemical attacks.
The Russian ambassador dismissed the criticism.
The Joint Investigative Mechanism (JIM) was set up in 2015 to identify perpetrators of chemical attacks. It is the only official mission investigating the use of chemical weapons in Syria.
Moscow strongly criticised the inquiry when it blamed the Syrian government for a deadly nerve agent attack on the town of Khan Sheikhoun in April. Syria denies using banned chemical weapons.
Mrs Haley described the latest Russian veto as "a deep blow".
"Russia has killed the investigative mechanism which has overwhelming support of this council," she said.
"By eliminating our ability to identify the attackers, Russia has undermined our ability to deter future attacks."
What is the Joint Investigative Mechanism?
Created in 2015 with unanimous backing from the UN Security Council and renewed in 2016 for another year
Involves the UN and the Organisation for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons
Has previously concluded that Syrian government forces used chlorine as a weapon at least three times between 2014 and 2015
It has also found that Islamic State militants used sulphur mustard in one attack.
The Security Council rejected a Russian-drafted resolution to extend the inquiry but with changes to membership of the panel. The draft also called for the panel's findings on Khan Sheikhoun to be put aside.
Russian ambassador Vassily Nebenzia said it was Western countries who had sabotaged the inquiry.
"Some council members refused to support our draft and now they have full responsibility for terminating the JIM," he said.
"This just proves again that the anti-Damascus fever is the only real priority for them and that they have manipulated the JIM for their own purposes."
Image copyright Reuters Image caption US ambassador Nikki Haley accused Russia of undermining efforts to stop chemical attacks
Japan later tabled a draft resolution that would extend the JIM for another 30 days, as opposed to the one-year extension in the US-written draft blocked by Russia. The council was due to vote on the new resolution later on Friday.
Russia, the UK, China, France and the US all have veto powers at the Security Council.
The attack on Khan Sheikhoun in April left more than 80 people dead and prompted the US to launch missile strikes on a Syrian airbase.
Last month a UN Human Rights Council inquiry concluded a Syrian air force jet was responsible, dismissing statements from Russia that the jet had dropped conventional munitions that struck a rebel chemical weapons depot.
Syrian President Bashar al-Assad has said the incident in Khan Sheikhoun was a "fabrication".
Media playback is unsupported on your device Media caption Abo Rabeea says he is still suffering from the suspected chemical weapons strike in Khan Sheikhoun
Arms-control setback
By Jonathan Marcus, BBC News Defence Correspondent
The demise of the Joint Investigative Mechanism (JIM) is a small but significant milestone in the wider unravelling or undermining of a whole network of arms-control agreements. Syria was in a sense a laboratory in which to carry out a stress-test on the Chemical Weapons Convention, and it has failed.
Damascus signed and ratified the international treaty banning chemical weapons. It was "disarmed" under international supervision and still people are dying from chemical attack.
The JIM investigators have concluded that the Syrian government was responsible for a number of nerve agent attacks and that so-called IS has used sulphur mustard at least twice. But now its activities have been halted by Syria's patron, Russia.
What, many may ask, is the point in having international norms against chemical weapons unless the practical investigative and legal structures to unmask their use are given full and solid support?As more women continue to come forward accusing Harvey Weinstein and other powerful figures in Hollywood of sexual harassment, sexual assault and rape, another decades-old issue facing Hollywood has come to light.
In a thorough article for The Daily Beast, writer Ira Madison III outlines some of the accusations that have been floating around the industry, like the increase in criticism over director Victor Salva, who pleaded guilty to five felony accounts after sexually abusing a 12-year-old on the set of 1988's "Clownhouse."
SEE ALSO: Bob Weinstein accused of sexual harassment by TV showrunner
Salva has continued to nab work in Hollywood, including directing the "Jeepers Creepers" trilogy.
In the wake of the allegations against Weinstein, other male stars have been coming forward about their own experiences in Hollywood, too.
James Van Der Beek said last week that older powerful men harassed him and cornered him "in inappropriate sexual conversations when [he] was much younger."
Elijah Wood spoke out about the childhood sexual abuse in an interview last year, saying that he knew of fellow child actors who had been "preyed upon" by "vipers."
"Clearly something major was going on in Hollywood," he said. "It was all organized. [...] There is darkness in the underbelly. What bums me about these situations is that the victims can't speak as loudly as the people in power. That's the tragedy of attempting to reveal what is happening to innocent people: They can be squashed, but their lives have been irreparably damaged."
Wood later clarified that he had not experienced or observed any such abuse firsthand.
SEE ALSO: Reese Witherspoon emotionally recalls being sexually assaulted at 16, says this wasn't an 'isolated incident'
And in 2011, Corey Feldman told "Nightline" that pedophilia is "the big secret" in Hollywood.
"I can tell you that the No. 1 problem in Hollywood was and is and always will be pedophilia," he said at the time. "That's the biggest problem for children in this industry."
Feldman also alleged that trauma from childhood sexual abuse led to his friend Corey Haim's death.
The star tweeted that it wasn't Weinstein who had molested him or Haim, later adding that he wished his best friend was here to witness “the turning of the tide” on this issue.
HOWEVER 4 THE RECORD I WOULD LIKE 2 SAY NO HARVEY WEINSTEIN WAS NOT THE MAN WHO MOLESTED ME OR MY FORMER ACTING PARTNER. OBVIOUSLY PEDOS — Corey Feldman (@Corey_Feldman) October 13, 2017
More from AOL.com:
Jennifer Lawrence opens up about 'humiliating' nude lineup in front of Hollywood producer
Laura Dern steps out with her gorgeous family: Meet son Ellery, 16, and 12-year-old Jaya
Harvey Weinstein resigns from Weinstein Co. board as company struggles to surviveThey hate us. They really, really, hate us.
Well, maybe Canadians don’t hate the United States, but they certainly appear not to like their southern neighbors as much as they once did.
According to a new poll by the Environics Institute, a Canadian polling firm, Canada’s current public opinion of the U.S. is currently the lowest it has been since tracking began 35 years ago.
The poll finds that 44 percent of Canadians hold a positive view of the U.S., down from 68 percent as recently as 2012. Only nine percent have a “very favorable” view of the U.S., with 35 percent classifying their feelings as “somewhat favorable.”
The authors of the poll found President Donald Trump primarily responsible.
“The unexpected election of Donald Trump to the U.S. Presidency last fall delivered a major jolt to that country’s political and cultural fabric, and has also had a dramatic impact on how Canadians view their neighbor to the south,” the poll authors wrote.
Further, Canadians say they’re less likely to visit the U.S. Eighteen percent of Canadians have changed their travel plans to the U.S. this year, while another eight percent report that they haven’t done so yet, but are considering it.
Canadians also do not think their country is becoming like the U.S. as much as it used to. In 2002, 58 percent thought Canada was becoming more like the U.S., while only 9 percent believed it was becoming less like the U.S. Now? Canadians are split 28-27 on the question.
[image via Hannahmariah – ShutterStock.com]
——
Follow Joe DePaolo (@joe_depaolo) on Twitter
Have a tip we should know? tips@mediaite.comIf you've reached the point in life where your Facebook feed has become a steady stream of pictures of babies you can't tell apart, you've likely seen plenty of proof of just how far some new parents are willing to go to make sure they're doing everything they can for their children.
There's obviously nothing wrong with wanting to make sure your baby is safe and comfortable, but in my experience, there's something about having a kid that makes a lot of people go to fairly crazy lengths to make sure they're parenting the "right" way.
Thanks to the help of the Chicago-based company Contours, one of those "lengths" now includes climbing inside an adult-sized replica of a baby stroller to ensure it provides the lumbar support your child requires.
Daily Mail
Contours recently took advantage of parents' inherent need to care a little too much about the comfort of their kids when it commissioned a 7-and-a-half-foot tall replica of its Bliss model and allowed prospective customers to take a short test ride to decide whether or not it's suitable for their offspring.
Daily Mail
Now all we have to do is add a motor to one of these and we can take the first big step toward the glorious future we were promised in "WALL-E."
Citations: You big baby! Stroller company makes a giant pram for ADULTS so parents can road-test the buggies on behalf of their babies (Daily Mail)From OpenZFS on OS X
Installer
1.8.2
Read Changelog please.
OpenZFS_on_OS_X_1.8.2.dmg 2018-10-30 Changelog file size : 62914560 bytes md5 : 8cb4e125bc78ae4374f9bd27ea9f8613 sha256 : d1f23704127e22ead62972ba668d3dfce0718b9f7ee1092dec014244eff73f61
1.8.1
OpenZFS_on_OS_X_1.8.1.dmg 2018-10-18 Changelog file size : 62914560 bytes md5 : e049dffde67167d9dd8f1b8648e6c6f5 sha256 : 6faebbb38ff46ff3ac250ddbfc5f1f69cd2b7cd494bec1c3f43e4107da6801fa
1.8.0 BETA
Forum BETA release only. Changelog file size : 62914560 md5 : 56a248bfa9a8722f762ebb18b0e6c8c1 sha256 : 35358fca7217f3a9107f80e5cd45a3d765f7321c635d40351ddccd40e6c0073d
1.7.4 BETA
1.7.3 BETA
Download here: https://openzfsonosx.org/forum/viewtopic.php?f=20&t=3155 Changelog file size : 7506433 bytes md5 : 85622a927be744470002b882f4aa71cc sha1 : de2bc2898e5a42b2e29cbbb3df9592a2516e8a33 sha256 : 712d0701539ef6a6b79213ad98fd919be27ea44221826e92fc23b9ebbd4472dc
1.7.2
OpenZFS_on_OS_X_1.7.2.dmg 2018-03-24 Changelog file size : 45106930 bytes md5 : cea54c5aabacc133fca4c8de6f687078 sha1 : ba1e96ecf360aa8b4223d6b409db994920613bcd sha256 : b2deddbd0cf899db99c3c4dbd449101a881c744d3e2ab2c1f8bd6637296601ad
1.7.1
OpenZFS_on_OS_X_1.7.1.dmg 2018-03-13 Changelog file size : 42390242 bytes md5 : 1b434044c39801e0fbd389cba02eb63e sha1 : 3000b1dff909cfc24c3021afe8577b2c76cd94e9 sha256 : 49c6bb76f8ba9196f9c3ea34d0f7adce8db643c4c4a3d0280a22e614d02ac3f0
1.7.0
Download here: https://openzfsonosx.org/forum/viewtopic.php?f=20&t=3082 Changelog file size : 7019005 bytes md5 : 4acc4b47fd9a36a228ce0c02e8358153 sha1 : dea0253a0417694e671cf31c5353f796719c1dd3 sha256 : 9826e2b8fc3319421f2def81e5df04c213eb4a32fa1fec4586ceb2ed93db25c6
1.6.1
OpenZFS_on_OS_X_1.6.1.dmg 2017-02-10 Changelog file size : 32480434 bytes md5 : ea730c3c08b6eb85a1c48ed5c781bb54 sha1 : 500418f24081dedfbb30bdd4f00af4e6de3434f5 sha256 : 126ce9215ec060b2eb60db0609b29acad334f0d1c30c5ef2ab97cb251f374c39
1.5.2
OpenZFS_on_OS_X_1.5.2.dmg 2016-04-29 Changelog file size : 22490701 bytes md5 : f3b82dd439a87f2b7387995952b5723a sha1 : 48d1067d1f42e495c3bc747d652e474b1cefc121 sha256 : 185d20242bacd14cd609ccfb8f89736e1ea0ca6dec6475fd9eb7703c17ab5413
1.4.5
OpenZFS_on_OS_X_1.4.5.dmg 2015-10-19 Changelog file size : 21063530 bytes md5 : 3db03baf69d43e4a01ffc799abb36ce4 sha1 : 3742703ab7b044ed6fb46e0c931816d55379c51b sha256 : 9ad0b21bc54c5453a90427d478533f530ff9bb98744d17f2fcb127a81af18169
1.4.2
OpenZFS_on_OS_X_1.4.2.dmg 2015-09-24 Changelog file size : 16009726 bytes md5 : f1a1768fdfe9aea79942e481352a79c7 sha1 : ef97bd3f3216c29a7f371b96523676d2bc2ab410 sha256 : 189fc9bfe231cf51b65dac2665cecb65f632979fd13bcafa3f4e3b486880237f
1.3.1-r2
OpenZFS_on_OS_X_1.3.1-r2.dmg 2015-04-08 Changelog file size : 10869017 bytes md5 : 7d5e78e842b2c98f82379ff673551fca sha1 : b5a0ef2d1c3b66174a1e60283abec07a5c764c83 sha256 : 7d0001f318e70f7a5ee87273a1f1cc7912908677ea9565702d05282c1ebca8b8
Note: Please see 1.3.1 note below regarding unlinked drain.
1.3.1
OpenZFS_on_OS_X_1.3.1.dmg 2015-04-01 Changelog file size : 10807672 bytes md5 : 5f9e271dd8c0e8bce8ff7a93721591dc sha1 : 6defabfb154287b39bea992fdc607866df12ee93 sha256 : 05827dd562da12f2d66a28d43e1bb62070003ed69f1534f7b92222c6b003743c
Note: Previous versions of O3X (1.3.0 and earlier) never processed the unlinked-drain list. We finally have support for this, but this means the very first import will finally process the unlinked-drain list. This can take quite a while.
You can watch the /var/log/system.log file for progress.
For example,
tail -f /var/log/system.log | grep ZFS
Current record is about 8 million records, which took 2 hours.
1.3.1-RC5
Forum build: https://openzfsonosx.org/forum/viewtopic.php?f=20&t=2147
1.3.1-RC4
Forum build: https://openzfsonosx.org/forum/viewtopic.php?f=20&t=2131
1.3.1-RC3
Forum build: https://openzfsonosx.org/forum/viewtopic.php?f=20&t=2123
1.3.0
OpenZFS on OS X 1.3.0.dmg 2014-07-24 Changelog file size : 10570082 bytes md5sum : 34938fb69d2d43b461f268c739f7e100 sha1sum : 3a53187c214db95ac72919f3f3952f96c55a27b7 sha256sum : a0030181a91ecace2d31cfab26d10b2284602e2b442f71a344a9da11165cb6c7
1.2.7
OS X Yosemite compatible! OpenZFS on OS X 1.2.7.dmg 2014-05-15 Changelog file size : 12731205 bytes md5sum : 622d3151d1f0239f29617a9184a43304 sha1sum : 39663423b3be86297ee83fe8ffc05d879b911f73 sha256sum : 6b7fff2f54e29ca95ac003e22c962a94f29afb9d9cb52be4995337a5e53038fe
1.2.0
OpenZFS on OS X 1.2.0.dmg 2014-03-13 file size : 15029124 bytes md5sum : 1da051edf6f32c6ddd8e172262cb902e sha1sum : 069a16c1823c8498094cd402c7de430f9ac966a7 sha256sum : 94f0da31bf73de8ff5205299449789b7bbb751808e94770f9ee3e5d86b99fb31A travel website catering to people looking for affordable adventure won the sixth Startup Weekend Spokane.
That idea, with the business name Go-Kefi, earned three months of free office space, the chance to make a pitch to a Spokane investment group, and 40 hours of website development.
About 150 people attended Startup Weekend at Gonzaga University during the past weekend. Nearly 50 made pitches to the group, followed by a vote that chose a dozen or so to compete for the top three awards.
Second place went to Kegstarter, a team looking to develop a web app for people to recruit party contributions; and third went to Duul Software, an online gaming network that promotes online game tournaments.
The Go-Kefi team was led by Washington State University senior Amanda Scott. She developed the idea with fellow WSU students Monica Bomber and Troy Carpenter.
Instead of catering to people who start with a travel location, their site would ask customers the type of experience they’re seeking and their projected travel budget, Scott said.
“About 50 percent of people using travel sites start by not knowing exactly where they want to go,” she said.
She said they chose the name “kefi” for the company name because the Greek word translates loosely as “living life fully.”
Also on the team were Joe Snodgrass, Kaitlyn Aliota, Stephen Johnson, Adam Parish, Alex Puryear and Johnny Wang.
The goal is to launch Go-Kef |
wrote. “I want to live a healthy, happy life. I want to have a healthy, happy family in the future too. Help me pay for therapy to deal with the stress of racism. Please don’t let racism shorten my life or kill me.”US President Donald Trump signs his first executive orders at the White House in Washington January 20, 2017. — Reuters pic
WASHINGTON, Jan 22 — Keeping his election campaign pledge, the new US President Donald Trump announced, on his first day in office, that the
US would withdraw from the Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP) agreement which Trump’s predecessor Obama administration, along with 11 Asia-Pacific potential member countries, had signed in Auckland, New Zealand.
Malaysia was one of the signatory states to the TPP agreement.
An announcement on the US withdrawal from the TPP, issued soon after Trump’s presidential swearing-in ceremony on Friday, was posted on the new president’s website.
The move came with Trump’s emphasis on protecting jobs of American workers amid widespread fears of trade unions that the TPP, like the North American Free Trade Agreement (Nafta), which comprised the US, Canada and Mexico, will wipe out American jobs as, increasingly, dependence on foreign suppliers for goods and services would grow.
“For too long, Americans have been forced to accept trade deals that put the interests of insiders and the Washington elite over the hard-working men and women of this country,” it said. The statement said “tough and fair agreements” on trade could be used to bolster US economic growth and thus bring back millions of jobs to America.
“This strategy starts by withdrawing from the Trans-Pacific Partnership and making certain that any new trade deals are in the interests of American workers.”
The TPP, which remained unratified by the US Congress, was conceived as the economic fulcrum of the Obama administration’s much-publicised “pivot” to the Asia-Pacific region and as a response to China’s growing assertiveness in the huge Asia-Pacific geographic expanse.
The TPP’s demise has fuelled fears among its supporters that US withdrawal from the agreement, which was finalized after painstaking negotiations that lasted several years, was now going to give added leverage to China which could use its economic strength to eventually bring the other countries in the region under its political dominance.
China is also aggressively pushing its own trade partnership deal called Regional Comprehensive Economic Partnership (RCEP) with the Asean member states and some other countries.
Trump has been critical of China’s manipulative trade practices — Beijing has been vocally criticized by a number of industries in the US, including the steel sector which accuses it of giving subsidies to its suppliers and also manipulates its currency by keeping its value much lower in relation to the US dollar — and threatened to impose punitive tariffs on Chinese exports to the US.
At a discussion Thursday night at the Asia Society in New York on “Apec and Free Trade in Asia Pacific”, Wendy Cutler, a former deputy US Trade Representative who is currently the vice president of the Asia Society’s Policy Institute, told Bernama that one could not be sure about the TPP’s revival in the future, given Trump’s intention to withdraw from the pact.
She was responding to a question whether the TPP could be revived later after Trump had settled down in office.
The panel discussion featured Wendy Cutler, Vu Tien Loc, Chairman and President, Vietnam Chamber of Commerce and Industry, Monica Hardy Whaley, President, National Centre for Apec and Farisa Zarin, Managing Director and Global Head of and Public Affairs, Moody’s Corporation.
Meanwhile, it was revealed that six US ambassadors in the Asia-Pacific
countries — the six ambassadors, all political appointees whose terms ended with the replacement of the Obama administration — had written what is described as an “open letter” to the US Congress calling on its members to endorse the TPP agreement to ensure that the US leadership position was not eroded in the region, and not to simply give away that role to China which was not a prospective TPP member.
The six envoys’ “parting shot”, as some are calling the diplomatic representation, has so far not produced any positive reaction from Congress, and it remains to be seen whether the Trump administration will, at some point in the future, review the letter of the six diplomats who point out the benefits the TPP would have for the US economy.
The “open letter”, which retraces American presence in the region since 75 years, warns that “walking away from TPP may be seen by future generations as the moment US chose to cede leadership to others in this part of the world and accept a diminished role”. Chinese President Xi Jinping’s remarks that Asia should be left to Asians, are also seen as a clear warning about China’s ambitions in the region.
The six US envoys are Max Baucus (ambassador to China), Nina Hachigian (Asean), Caroline Kennedy (Japan), Mark Lippert (South Korea), Mark Gilbert (New Zealand and Samoa) and Kirk Wagar (Singapore).
The letter points out that the alternative to a TPP is not the status quo.
Others were actively engaged in setting the rules of commerce in the Asia-Pacific region without the United States.
Describing the RCEP as a much lower-standard agreement, the six say that, in TPP’s absence, it would serve as the template for economic integration in Asia and shift trade away from America, which would face higher tariffs, resulting in less US exports and migration of more jobs overseas.
Unlike the RCEP, the TPP would compel stronger intellectual property rights, limits on subsidies to state-owned enterprises, and protection of worker rights, the environment, and a free and open internet.
These enforceable commitments would place US companies at an advantage because they already adhere to high standards and provide a powerful lever for change that we are unlikely to replicate in any other form in the near future. — BernamaI never knew Aaron Swartz, though his photo looks familiar, and he’s worked for friends of mine. And while suicide is always, I suspect, a complicated matter, when you bring the full force of the US government down on the head of a 26 year old kid, and he ends up killing himself, some questions need to be asked and answered by all parties involved.
So it’s good news that both the senior Republican and Democrat on the House Committee on Oversight and Government Reform have joined together in writing the Justice Department, seeking answers on its investigation of Aaron Swartz.
If you don’t know the back story, Wikipedia has a quick synposis:
On January 6, 2011, Swartz was arrested by federal authorities in connection with systematic downloading of academic journal articles from JSTOR. Swartz opposed JSTOR’s practice of compensating publishers, rather than authors, out of the fees it charges for access to articles. Swartz contended that JSTOR’s fees were limiting public access to academic work that was being supported by public funding.
A few more salient points in this discussion, again via Wikipedia:
Shortly before Swartz’s death, JSTOR announced that it would make “more than 4.5 million articles” available to the public for free. The service was capped at three articles every two weeks, readable online only, with some downloadable for a fee.
Interestingly, that’s about the same number of documents Aaron is accused of stealing (“over 4 million,” DOJ alleged). So there’s a serious question of no-harm-no-foul involved here, potentially.
And this:
U.S. Attorney Ortiz asserted after the 2011 indictment that “stealing is stealing, whether you use a computer command or a crowbar, and whether you take documents, data or dollars.”
Okay a few points here:
1. I’m not sure I like the idea of condoning anyone taking documents that people have for sale. Yeah, you don’t agree that the documents are for sale, you think they should be free. Okay. But they are for sale, and it is stealing to take something that’s for sale and Robin-Hood it to the masses for free. Having said that, I’m open to hearing more arguments about why this isn’t stealing. And there’s still a question as to what the real monetary damage was of this “theft” anyway.
2. Even if it is stealing, this is hardly akin to robbing a bank, or a bank robbing the rest of us (see point 4, below). Prosecutors and US Attorneys are busy people. And anyone who’s ever worked on any crime issues knows that it can be living hell trying to get one to actually take up a case. So the “stealing is stealing” argument is cute, but it’s also pure bs. The US Attorney doesn’t take up a case just because it’s “stealing.” They take up a case because they think it’s a huge matter, or because of political pressure, and I’m not really convinced that downloading these documents was a huge matter, but Aaron Swartz did tick some important people off.
3. I’d be curious if any real attempts were made by DOJ to negotiate a plea. This report from Swartz’ attorney, again via Wikipedia, is disturbing:
Swartz’s attorney, Marty Weinberg, has indicated that prosecutors told him, two days before Swartz’s death, that “Swartz would have to spend six months in prison and plead guilty to [all] 13 charges if he wanted to avoid going to trial.” He has also said that he “nearly negotiated a plea bargain in which Swartz would not serve any time,” but that bargain failed. “JSTOR signed off on it,” he said, “but MIT would not.”
Six months in prison is not a serious plea bargain on a case like this. At Swartz’s age, with his looks, he’d be rape-bait in any prison. That punishment hardly suits this crime. And if it’s true that MIT refused to sign off on a plea bargain that didn’t involve Swartz serving prison time, then the US House should start sending some threatening letters to MIT as well.
4. In 2009, MIT’s endowment suffered a $1.7 billion “investment loss.” And other articles suggest that in fact this nearly $2 billion loss is to be blamed on the economic crash of late 2008. And who got jailed for that?
Just to make things crystal clear, when MIT lost nearly $2 billion in 2009 because of crooks on Wall Street, no one was indicted, and no one went to jail – instead, the government handed the thieves $700 billion of our money.
But when MIT lost a bunch of reports it was trying to sell, and then MIT gave the oh-so-valuable reports away for free anyway, the kid who forced them to give away the reports was quite possibly hounded to death. And I’m going to go on a limb here and assume that MIT did not lose $2bn as a result of Aaron Swartz’s actions, or they wouldn’t be putting the reports out there for free.
Had Aaron Swartz stolen billions and declared himself a bank, he’d have been facing a government bailout rather than an indictment. He’d also quite possibly be alive.J.J. Abrams and his Bad Robot production company have hatched a pretty clever plan to unleash some original sci-fi movies on the world. Last year, they under-the-radar released a sort-of-sequel to Cloverfield by the name of 10 Cloverfield Lane. The movie was a big success, so the "Cloververse" is expanding. This year will see the release of Cloverfield 3, which originally started out as a sci-fi movie called God Particle. Now, screenwriter Oren Uziel has explained how his original movie became the next movie in the Cloverfield movie universe.
Oren Uziel recently spoke with Collider about his upcoming Netflix movie Shimmer Lake. During the course of the conversation, he was asked about God Particle and when it actually became Cloverfield 3. It turns out, his movie was written long before the idea of this Cloverfield universe even existed. Here's what he had to say about it.
"It was written before 10 Cloverfield Lane and the expanded Cloverfield universe even existed as a thing. It was a spec that I wrote probably a year or so after Shimmer Lake, so it definitely existed as its own science-fiction. And then after years of, you know how scripts kind of hang around, people like them but for whatever reason they decided to make it and then suddenly everything fell into place with J.J. [Abrams], Bad Robot, and Paramount. I don't know exactly when it became a Cloverfield movie, but I suspect in this current market where it's just harder and harder to market an original movie of any kind, a science-fiction movie in particular, but I think everyone just knew if it fits, and it does, into that Cloverfield world, it should, and it can only help."
Getting people to go to a movie, unless you're Disney, is very difficult these days. Especially when it comes to original properties. So the idea of putting these original sci-fi movies within the framework of this Cloverfield universe will really help. 10 Cloverfield Lane made more than $100 million at the box office last year, and there is almost no way that would have happened were it not connected, at least in name, to the original Cloverfield. He also talked a little bit about the process of rewriting God Particle to turn it into Cloverfield 3, which was actually a bit of an on-the-fly thing.
"We rewrote during production, but I'm not sure what it means to be part of the expanded Cloverfield universe, other than knowing what kind of quality and feel you're gonna get from something that's coming out of Bad Robot and J.J. Abrams It just sort of helps to give an understanding of like, 'Okay I understand what type of movie this is gonna be.' As far as specifics, I don't think there is one specific thread that makes it a Cloverfield movie, I guess."
Much like 10 Cloverfield Lane, Bad Robot and J.J. Abrams are being pretty secretive about the currently untitled Cloverfield movie, but we do know that the movie will involve astronauts in space who make a shocking discovery. Oren Uziel couldn't say much about it, but he did explain that his movie favors character over obstacles. Here's how he explains it.
Related: Cloverfield 4 Is Still Getting a 2018 Theatrical Release
"I guess for me sometimes those movies tend to be more concerned with whatever the obstacle is, and I'm more concerned with the characters' relationships to each other and that obstacle I guess. So to me, when you say it's a contained astronaut movie, I'm just curious what those astronauts are going through and what they're experiencing and what the character story is, and what specifically the threat is often less of a concern to me."
In addition to the movie formerly known as God Particle, it is rumored that Paramount's war movie Overlord is also going to be part of the Cloverfield universe. It stands to reason that as long as these low-budget sci-fi movies with a loose connection to one another are making money, Bad Robot will keep making them. The untitled Cloverfield movie is currently set for release on October 27, 2017.× Person of interest in Delphi murders faces additional charges of trespassing, assault
EL PASO COUNTY, COLORADO – New charges have been filed against the man who was arrested in Colorado and is now considered a “person of interest” in the murders of two Delphi teenagers.
A spokesperson for the El Paso County Sheriff’s Department confirms additional charges of trespassing and assault were filed against Nations, 31, on October 7. According to KKTV, the charges stem from an incident in which Nations allegedly tried to get in someone’s car and committed assault. The arrest affidavit is sealed, so it’s unclear when the crime occurred.
The new charges are in addition to the charges of possession of a weapon by a previous offender and felony menacing and reckless endangerment charges he already faces.
Nations was arrested Monday, September 25 in Colorado after police say he was driving with expired Indiana plates. He’s also accused of threatening people with a hatchet on a Colorado trail. A few days after his arrest, police in Colorado contacted Indiana State Police about Nations as a possible suspect in the murders of Delphi teenagers, Abby Williams and Libby German.
Indiana State Police sent two detectives to Colorado to question nations about the unsolved Delphi murders. The detectives returned last week and said they have no information that specifically includes him or excludes him as the suspect.
If you have any information regarding the investigation, police are encouraging you to call the tip line at 844-459-5786. Callers can remain anonymous. Tips can also be sent to abbyandlibbytip@cacoshrf.com.There’s something about getting your hands on that first piece of erotica that just changes your life Forever …. And, yes, that was a Jude Blume reference. Need you ask what the first sex scene I read was?
Reading your first sex scene is so much different than watching your first sex scene. It allows you to use your own imagination: You cast the characters, you conjure the images, and you — fourth-grade you hiding under the covers with a flashlight and a copy of Tropic of Cancer that you stole from your dad’s study — are never the same.
We asked some of our favorite writers, editors and literati to reflect on the very first sex scene that they read. It is perhaps not the most highbrow list (no offense, V. C. Andrews), but it’ll make for a very welcome trip down memory lane.The No Way Out pay per view this Sunday is likely to have some drastic changes to its line-up due to recent injuries, and the changes pertain to championship matches.
Reports are indicating that Alberto Del Rio has suffered a concussion at last week’s Smackdown tapings. It’s said that the concussion likely occurred when Sheamus slammed Alberto Del Rio’s head into the base of the WWE logo statue atop the entrance stage. By all indications, the concussion is severe enough that ADR will not be able to challenge Sheamus for the WWE World Heavyweight Championship at NO WAY OUT. An alternate opponent will almost certainly be selected on the upcoming episode of Smackdown, the final WWE event prior to the pay per view itself.
That’s not the only injury affecting a WWE championship.
Currently one half of the tag team champions, R-Truth has suffered a broken foot. Though it’s unclear at this time whether WWE planned to book a match for the tag titles on the NO WAY OUT card, this certainly would require a change to any such plans.
There’s no word as of yet how long R-Truth will be sidelined with the injury, but he was replaced in matches at live events in Spain recently by Zack Ryder and Brodus Clay.
Analysis and Suggestions:
Some have indicated that Kane would be a possibility to replace Alberto Del Rio in the match against Sheamus at NO WAY OUT, but that’s inadvisable and improbable. WWE has spent time building up a three-way match for the WWE Championship on RAW, and the best option is to keep on course with that match and find another opponent for Sheamus.
Who better than Dolph Ziggler? His recent storyline change involved frustration over the inability of his pairing with Jack Swagger to win the WWE Tag Team Championships, and he is starting try to make a name for himself in singles competition again. He is a former World Champion with great mic skills which are on par with his in-ring performances. Ziggler has not built up any significant momentum, so a loss won’t do anything to damage that. With the next pay per view being Money In The Bank, the opportunity exists to hit a reset button on the list of challengers, meaning anything that happens at NO WAY OUT may have limited long-term effects.
As for the tag team championships, the best option would be to strip the belts from Kofi and R-Truth. If WWE wants to have them continue on as a team, this gives them a way to lose the titles without having to lose a match, and then show unity in reuniting once R-Truth is healed and they can track down the belts from whomever currently holds them.
WWE could give Kofi Kingston a replacement partner, but with Money In The Bank coming up next month, he’s best served to prepare for that. In the meantime, this opportunity should be used to give Tyler Reks and Curt Hawkins a chance in the spotlight. The two got considerable support from fans when news was circulating that they might be losing their jobs. They’ve been with the company for a while, and if the powers that be are considering letting them go, they may as well take one final shot to see if they can catch lightning in a bottle – which I believe they will if they give Reks & Hawkins the championships. Have them face Zack Ryder & Santino Marella for the vacant straps, or even work Kofi Kingston into the match somehow, and have Hawkins & Reks win the championships.
Others might consider Titus O’Neil & Darren Young to be a better heel tag team option to hold the straps than Reks & Hawkins, but for fiscal reasons, that’s not the case. O’Neil & Young haven’t been with WWE as long as Reks & Hawkins have, and thus the financial investment made in them is not as great. There is plenty of time for O’Neil and Young to evolve as a team and get the opportunity to run with the championships at a later date. For now, let this put a chip on the shoulders of O’Neil & Young for them to mix into their personas. Once Reks & Hawkins lose the belts down the line, O’Neil & Young can challenge whomever the next title holders may be.Share sale will not be used just to pay off debts as previously suggested
The Glazer family have issued a notice of intent to sell just over 10 per cent of Manchester United on the New York Stock Exchange.
An announcement on Monday evening confirmed their intention to raise around $300million (£191m).
But many will be alarmed that there appears to have been a significant shift in how the proceeds will be used.
It had earlier been suggested that the entire sum would be used to pay off United's huge debts that currently stand at over £400m.
However, the prospectus released to accompany Monday's announcement indicates that only half of the money will be used in that way, with the rest going directly to the Glazer family.
If that proves to be the case it will provoke fury among the United support, who have already seen vast amounts of cash disappear in various charges following the family's takeover in 2005.
The statement read: "Manchester United is offering 8,333,334 Class A Ordinary Shares and the selling shareholder is offering 8,333,333 Class A Ordinary Shares.
"The underwriters have an option to purchase up to an additional 2,500,000 Class A Ordinary Shares from the selling shareholder.
"The Class A Ordinary Shares will be listed on the New York Stock Exchange and will trade under the symbol 'MANU'."Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton released an opinion Thursday saying it’s legal to carry a loaded gun into church as long as there are no signs banning weapons.
The issue arose in the wake of last month’s mass shooting at First Baptist Church in Sutherland Springs, Texas, which left 26 people killed and 20 others injured. Lt. Gov. Dan Patrick had requested the legal evaluation so churches would know their options for improving security.
“If a church decides to exclude the concealed or open carrying of handguns on the premises of church property, it may provide the requisite notice, thereby making it an offense for a license holder to carry a handgun on those premises,” Mr. Paxton wrote. “However, churches may instead decide not to provide notice and to allow the carrying of handguns on their premises.”
The Texas legislature this year also passed a bill to exempt churches from having to pay fees to have their own security personnel. The bill was passed because lawmakers worried it imposed financial hardship on small churches, according to Mr. Paxton’s opinion.
Other private institutions pay fees to the state of Texas for security teams.Ali Qazimaj, 43, (pictured) is accused of stabbing Peter Stuart, 75, nine times 'with extreme force' before attempting to hide his body in tarpaulin in a water-filled ditch
An Albanian asylum-seeker accused of murdering an elderly, millionaire couple told a friend he had 'done a bad thing' shortly before the body of one of them was found, a court heard.
Ali Qazimaj, 43, is accused of stabbing Peter Stuart, 75, nine times 'with extreme force' before attempting to hide his body in tarpaulin in a water-filled ditch near to to his home in Weybread, Suffolk.
He is also charged with the murder of Peter's wife, Sylvia Stuart, 69, even though her body has never been found.
Qazimaj, who claims to be a victim of mistaken identity, was today dubbed a 'lying murderer' after DNA evidence of the victims was found in his abandoned silver Citroen C3.
Grey hairs matching the DNA of Sylvia were found in the boot of his car and blood belonging to Peter was found on the door.
After ditching his car at the port of Dover Qazimaj was located and arrested in Luxembourg on June 16 before being extradited back to England.
He has since denied being Qazimaj, but today the prosecution claimed 'damning forensic results' showed fingerprints meant he was the culprit.
Qazimaj is accused of stabbing millionaire Peter Stuart, 75, nine times. He is also charged with murder of Peter's wife, Sylvia, whose body has never been found (Pictured: The Stuarts)
Qazimaj, who lived in Tilbury, Essex, had gambling debts and was known in bookmakers by the name of Marco Costa.
Ipswich Crown Court was told he now claims to be a man called Vital Dapi, but the finger prints of Qazimaj and Dapi are matching.
The Stuart's daughter, Christy Paxman, dabbed her eyes as she gave evidence and said her father told her an unknown man had approached him in his garden.
She told Ipswich Crown Court her father said to her, in a conversation on May 28, that the man said: 'I understand you want to sell up.'
'But dad was surprised at that, as he hadn't had anyone round to value the house,' said Mrs Paxman. 'He was surprised that this chap knew.
'He didn't know him. He said he had been round twice. He said he had a client who might be interested in the property.'
In her evidence on Wednesday, Mrs Paxman said she was at her brother-in-law's house when he was on the phone to his father Mr Paxman.
'He said that Sid had rung and said this chap Ali had phoned,' she told the court. 'He had been round after work and the gist was he said, 'I've done something terrible'.'
She continued: 'I know of somebody Sid knew called Ali. As far as I know he had befriended him and would take him shopping and to (car) boot sales.'
Karim Khalil QC, prosecuting, said: 'We say that Peter Stuart and Sylvia Stuart were murdered. Peter's body hidden in water covered to try and delay or in order to prevent it from being found.
'When it was found it was clear he had been brutally stabbed to death. Sylvia's body was not found.'
Concerns grew for the Stuarts in June last year when they failed to turn up to their regular line dancing class near their home
He continued: 'The killer is a man called Ali Qazimaj... He was by then already running two identities calling himself Ali Qazimaj and Marco Costa.
'He's no stranger to providing a false account of himself.'
Concerns grew for the Stuarts in June last year when they failed to turn up to their regular line dancing class near their home.
They were last seen alive on CCTV at a food market stall on May 29 and over the following days Mrs Stuart's Barclaycard was used to withdraw cash.
The couple were reported missing on June 3 and officers found 'no signs of a fight' and 'no signs of a struggle' when their house was visited.
Two officers then searched the nearby area and discovered Peter's concealed body.
In the days after the alleged murders, which are said to have taken place between May 29 and June 3, Qazimaj resigned from his job at a recycling centre.
Mr Khalil said: 'He knew the net eventually would start to close around him.'
The jury were told the defendant was known to the couple as he had been a carer to their son-in-law's parents, Nellie and Sidney Paxman, for a number of years.
Mr Khalil said: 'He (Qazimaj) commented to Sidney to the effect that he had done a bad thing and had resigned from Shields (his job). He didn't elaborate further.'
The following day on June 4 Qazimaj was spotted on CCTV at a Paddy Power and Corals in Grays, Essex.
Ipswich Crown Court was told Qazimaj had a gambling habit and was in 'financial difficulties'.
Police investigating Mr Stuart's murder and his wife's disappearance remove evidence
His car was spotted on the Dartford crossing and found abandoned in Dover with a cricket bat and sports bag in the boot with a Morrison's bag in the passenger footwell.
Mr Khalil said: 'They (scientists) found it (the car) was very clean, but the outside edge of the front offside door had traces of blood on it, from which a DNA profile was obtained.
'That DNA profile matched the DNA profile belonging to Peter Stuart.'
Mr Khalil said 'a number of human hairs' were found in the boot which matched to Sylvia.
The court heard fingerprints matching Qazimaj and the man he is claiming to be, Vital Dapi, were found on the Morrison's bag.
Qazimaj, of Tilbury, Essex, claimed asylum from Kosovo in 1999 and became a UK citizen in 2005. He denies two counts of murder.
Mrs Paxman lived in Leicestershire, and said a friend called her on June 2 after her parents failed to attend their regular line dancing classes.
The friend, who lives in the same road as Mrs Paxman's parents, went to the Stuarts' house to investigate and found the house key on a ledge instead of in its usual hiding place, under a cushion for the cat, the court heard.
Mrs Paxman said she called police on June 3 after calling relatives and three hospitals.
Explaining the delay, she said: 'It was because I didn't want to believe something had happened to them.'
The defendant, who was assisted by an Albanian interpreter, was extradited from Luxembourg to the UK to face murder charges.
The trial continues.The standards body that oversees HTML5 has released the results of its first tests designed to measure the level of HTML5 support in web browsers. The results, surprisingly, put Internet Explorer 9 ahead of Firefox, Chrome, Opera and Safari.
Microsoft's IE9 team deserves some major credit for finally building a browser with strong support for web standards. However, despite the impressive showing in the Worldwide Web Consortium's (W3C) tests, it would be pure fiction to suggest that IE9 is that far ahead of its competitors when it comes to supporting HTML5, CSS 3 and other components of the new web.
The reason IE9 tops the W3C's list is that the test looks at only a fraction of the HTML5 spec. In other words, the test is very limited. Even better, it's limited to things IE9 is good at.
The W3C test looks at seven elements of HTML5: attributes, audio, video, Canvas, getElementsByClassName, foreigncontent and XHTML5. While the audio, video and Canvas tags are perhaps the most widely used components in HTML5, that list is a long way from covering the entire HTML5 specification.
Run IE9 against other aspects of HTML5 and the browser would be decidedly behind its competitors. IE9 lacks support for Web Workers, drag-and-drop features, SVG animations and the File API, all of which are vital components for building useful web applications, and all of which enjoy considerable support in other browsers.
IE 9 has some support for CSS 3, but it lags behind other browsers, and it can't handle much of SVG 1.1. From a web developer's viewpoint, that means IE9 will load your Canvas tags, but if you're using transforms or other animations based on CSS 3 tools, IE 9 users won't see what you can show to Firefox, Chrome, Opera or Safari users.
As an aside, running IE9 through the decidedly less formal (but still informative) HTML5Test site, the browser doesn't perform as well as the competition. It scores 90 out of 300 points. Google Chrome scores 231 points and Safari 5 scores 208 points. Firefox 4 Beta 8 slots in at 217 points. The HTML5Test site ranks browsers based not only on W3C-approved components of HTML5, but also some experimental stuff, and some components that aren't in the spec at all but are widely considered important tools for building more powerful HTML5 web applications, like Geolocation.
Perhaps what's most curious about the areas IE9 does look good – the HTML5 Canvas, audio and video tags – is that they're are all areas where Microsoft has previously touted its Silverlight platform as the ideal solution. With IE9, Microsoft is clearly backing away – at least for now – from its proprietary platform and moving toward the open web for these applications.
Internet Explorer 9 may not be perfect when it comes to HTML5 – no browser is – but at least it's making huge strides over its predecessors. Perhaps the development would be more encouraging if its predecessors weren't so firmly entrenched in the dark ages of the early web.
The latest version of Microsoft's browser is expected to arrive in its final form some time during 2011. It is currently in beta release, and if you're running Windows 7 or Vista, you can download it now.
This article originally appeared on Webmonkey.com, Wired's site for all things web development, browsers, and web apps. Follow Webmonkey on Twitter.
This post was updated to reflect Firefox 4 beta 8's score at HTML5Test instead of beta 7 [thanks, David].
More from Webmonkey:The Kochs, Scaifes & others have used their billions to construct a vast “Potemkin Village” (in the words of science historian Naomi Oreskes) of denialism, by funding groups like “Americans For Prosperity”, the “Heartland Institute”, the “Competitive Enterprise Institute” and a whole cadre of other front groups, organizations, and hired guns implicated in the campaign to discredit climate science and climate scientists. I should know since, as I describe in my book The Hockey Stick and the Climate Wars, I found myself at the center of that campaign more than a decade ago because of my scientific work establishing the unprecedented nature of recent global warming. Source: Huffington Post
It seems that Dr. Michael Mann has gone off the rails (again) into the sort of conspiracy theory territory that would be a perfect case study for Cook and Lewandowsky, except that they probably believe every word Dr. Mann has every written. But, after reading it, Mann’s opinion and grasp of facts seems less like a “Potemkin Village” and more like the kind of empty facade buildings we see across the DMZ in North Korea in Kijong-dong, seen at right. Get a load of this:
Billions? Where? I gotta get me some of that. Meh, it’s the same conspiracy theory polka Mann and Oreskes have been doing for years, disguised as a book promotion. Mann doesn’t even have the mental cognizance to separate his imagined #Kochmachine funding from a free Christmas Calendar sent as a gift, printed at COSTCO, using my own credit card.
As far as I can tell, Mann has never actually done any real work like real people do, he’s always been the recipient of some grant, or been attached to some part of the public teat. So it really isn’t any surprise to me that he can’t fathom that somebody might use their own money to send a free calendar, no, in his world that sort of stuff is what you use other people’s money for.
Bishop Hill posits that Mann’s latest entertaining rant is a lot like Green Lizards from Alpha Centauri:
You wonder whether more level-headed upholders of the global consensus are at all embarrassed by this sort of thing. The “big oil conspiracy” theory of global warming scepticism seems to thrive among people like Mann, seemingly requiring absolutely no evidence to sustain it. The left-wing media seems to lap it up without question. But is the tale of sceptics feeding off Exxon’s millions any more credible than green lizards from Alpha Centauri taking over Michael Mann’s brain?
If it is a Green Lizard invasion, I’ll bet their home planet looks a lot like the DPRK from Space, energy for me, but not for thee:
As Dr. Roger Pielke Jr. once quipped:
If Michael Mann did not exist, the skeptics would have to invent him.
Keep ’em coming Mike! With your help, we are winning the Climate Wars.
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RedditSusan Gupka knows first-hand what it’s like to be discriminated against. The transgendered Torontonian has had difficulty applying for credit cards, student loans, identification cards, and accessing health care, employment and housing.
NDP MPP Cheri DiNovo (Parkdale-High Park), centre, and Liberal MPP Yasir Naqvi (Ottawa Centre), left, celebrate with transgendered Ontarians, including Susan Gupka, right, after the Ontario Human Rights Code was amended Wednesday to include "gender identity" and "gender expression." ( ROBERT BENZIE / TORONTO STAR )
So Wednesday’s vote by MPPs to enshrine “gender identity” and “gender expression” in the Ontario Human Rights Code was a landmark moment. “I feel like we’ve pushed an elephant up a mountain and we’ve been successful,” Gupka said, moments after the legislature passed the bill on a voice vote. “I’m thrilled that all parties came. What we’ve learned in the last month or so is that together we can deliver on trans-human rights.”
Article Continued Below
The human rights code, which marks its 50th anniversary Friday, is now expanded beyond just prohibiting prejudice based on “race, ancestry, place of origin, colour, ethnic origin, citizenship, creed, sex, sexual orientation, age, marital status, family status or disability.” It took New Democrat MPP Cheri DiNovo (Parkdal—High Park) six years and four attempts to get the amendment passed. “I’m proud, so proud, to be an Ontarian and so proud to be a Canadian and so proud to be part of an assembly where we’re all on the same page about this,” |
ock repeatedly censured crowd outbursts. Near the end of the event, when 8-year-old Jillian Mao asked a question about the proposed wall on the Mexican border, McClintock cautioned her against adopting the tactics of the people around her.
“I hope you are not going to emulate, copy the kind of behavior you have seen here today,” he said, before voicing strong support for the wall. He added that he doubted Mexico would pay for it, as Trump has said, but that the expense would be “well worth it.”
One of the more emotional moments came when El Dorado Hills resident Doris Romero asked what she should do to become an American citizen. Romero, 20, said she was brought to the United States at age 5 by her Salvadoran parents. She registered and received protected status under Obama’s Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals program, which offers renewable two-year deferred action from deportation. That program may be ended under Trump, and she asked what McClintock would do for so-called Dreamers like her.
“I was raised with American morals, and I know to do the right thing,” she said. “I want to know what you are going to do for the Dreamers, for the people that didn’t have a choice and for the people who love this country and respect it.”
McClintock responded that Romero and other Dreamers needed to follow existing laws and later said she should return to El Salvador and begin an immigration process there.
“There is a legal path to citizenship, and it’s followed by millions of immigrants,” McClintock said. “I would urge each and every one of them... if they truly want to become Americans, to avail themselves of the path to citizenship that is followed by countless legal immigrants who obey our laws.”
The crowd erupted with chants of “Help her,” even as Romero broke into tears.
Ryan Thoms, a 17-year-old student at Oak Ridge High, asked if McClintock would vote in favor of the First Amendment Defense Act, a bill that aims to protect groups that oppose same-sex marriage. It was introduced in 2015, and a new version may be introduced in coming weeks. Thoms said that gay, lesbian and transgender people in McClintock’s district feel “disenfranchised” and afraid.
McClintock took a hard line on that issue, as well, voicing support for allowing religious organizations to decline services to same-sex couples. “I have no moral judgments at all, quite the contrary,” he said. “But there is a big difference between exercising your own rights and forcing somebody to provide a service when it’s against their own beliefs.”
El Dorado County Sheriff John D’Agostini, who stood at the main door greeting people, said there were no disturbances requiring police intervention at the event, though somewhere “between 30 and 100” sheriff’s deputies and Highway Patrol officers were present. He declined to give an exact number.
For his part, McClintock said he appreciated the town halls as a way to hear the “minority” viewpoint during a “profound” political shift.
“I find it very exciting,” said McClintock. “Change is controversial.”Dixon Speaks Out On Juvenile Crime
As C4 took calls from listeners on the spate of juvenile incidents in Baltimore, somebody with experience decided to chime in--former mayor Sheila Dixon.
"It's been on my heart and mind ever since I heard about the incident on Halloween...and hearing about other incidents happening," Dixon said. "We've got to really deal with this. When we talk about 'It takes a village to raise a child,' today it's a whole different society than it was when we were growing up."
Dixon said the city needs holistic services both to identify youth in need of mental health or other services, and to identify parents who are unable or unwilling to do enough for their children, and hold them accountable.
"Something happened years ago with these kids that we have to identify early on," Dixon said. "We're not doing it and it seems like those who could really push and make this kind of a difference, what are they doing? Sitting on their hands?"L ike most would-be academics, I had dreams of a library book with my name on it. A book with a colon in the title and footnotes at the back. A book lodged in some quiet corner of a university library, to be discovered generations hence by an earnest graduate student researching the influence of intelligent design on Charles Darwin, and/or the poetry of Emily Bronte (my scholarly interests were somewhat in flux.)
Alas, it was not to be. I dropped out of grad school to write poetry. I still think the reasoning was sound. Given the state of the faculty job market, I figured I could spend another seven years in a history program, fail to find a teaching position, and have to find another job. Or I could just leave academe immediately and have to find another job. Why wait?
For the most part, I haven’t regretted that decision, even if the poetry thing didn’t exactly work out (the market for clerihews was less expansive than I’d hoped.) I eventually managed to cobble together a living doing work-for-hire writing, arts criticism, and other freelance gigs. I still missed having my own academic tome somewhere out there on the road that bunches of other people had taken. Writing a whole book on some obscure obsession? It sounded lovely, even if unattainable outside an academic setting.
And then, somewhat to my surprise, I attained it. Colon in the title and everything.
As long as university presses rely on academic salaries to pay authors, it's going to be extremely difficult for nonacademics to write scholarly books.
In 2009, I saw a sequence from the original Wonder Woman comics (William M. Marston/Harry G. Peter) for the first time, posted on The Comics Journal’s website. The image showed our heroine in a gimp mask, musing on the history of bondage in France. I was flabbergasted. Then I was intrigued. Then I was obsessed. I scrounged around to find reprints and back issues, and eventually started blogging my way through every issue of the original monthly Wonder Woman comic.
I began connecting with other Wonder Woman enthusiasts, including scholars. And when Rutgers University Press started a comics-culture series, several folks asked me to submit a proposal. I did, and they liked it, and my little blogging obsession turned into that book I’d dreamed of before I became a grad-school drop out — Wonder Woman: Bondage and Feminism in the Marston/Peter Comics, 1941-48, available online and nestled expectantly in a university library near you.
So is this a tale of how the internet has opened the doors of academe to people of all walks of life, no matter their credentials?
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Well … not exactly. After writing for three years about Wonder Woman on my blog, I had a vast store of ideas and prose at hand when I started to put together my book. Even so, looking back, I’m not sure how I did it. Rutgers gave me a (very) small advance, but still, the project was really a hobby — like the blog itself. Academics are paid a salary to do research and writing. I wasn’t an academic, so payment was down to book royalties. I’ve tried not to calculate what my per-hour rate was, because that way lies weeping and hurling of author’s copies. But let’s just say Bernie Sanders would be outraged on my behalf.
As a frustrated wannabe academic, I was willing to call my Wonder Woman book a vanity project — and one that maybe helped me get some other paying gigs (like this one!). But to do it again? I did have a press approach me about writing another comics-themed book. I even signed a contract — but I can’t for the life of me see how I’ll ever manage to write it. There is no advance at all in this case, and finding the time seems impossible, what with other projects and the general freelance scrabble for income.
I have written a second academic-oriented book (with a colon) — just not through a university press. Instead, I collected some of my more academic-y essays and self-published Fecund Horror: Slashers, Rape/Revenge, Women in Prison, Zombies and Other Exploitation Dreck as an Amazon ebook, funded partly through Patreon.
Books about exploitation film and gender theory are not, as it turns out, Amazon bestsellers. Still, since I’m self-publishing, I make substantially more per sale than I do from my Wonder Woman book. I’m not sure yet whether the new book will pay for itself. But I know a university press book wouldn’t.
Academics, and academic presses are, in my experience willing, and even eager, to work with folks who lack conventional credentials. Comics has a history of fan scholarship, but the truth is: The internet has made all kinds of connections easier for everyone, in every field. Academics read blogs, bloggers read academics, and they’re both on social media, for better or worse. The ivory tower is less tower-like than it’s ever been.
But while the university presses may be ideologically willing to open the gates to the uncredentialed rabble, economic reality swings those gates right back shut. As long as university presses rely on academic salaries to pay authors, it’s going to be extremely difficult for nonacademics to write scholarly books.
That is obviously not the most pressing budgetary issue confronting the student-debt-ridden, ever-adjunctifying university system.
Still, it’s a reminder that, when universities are insular, it’s not necessarily a function of ill will on the part of anyone in particular. Those books with their colons, nestled in their libraries, are the products of a particular closed economic system. Making space on the shelves for people with different backgrounds requires more than good intentions. It requires money — which is why my first university press book, proud as I am of it, is likely to be my last.We had a brief spell of actual Summer last week, 3 glorious days of sun! It’s not something we’re particularly used to up in the grim north of England, so we took full advantage and had 3 BBQ’s in a row.
I thought I’d experiment a little for BBQ #2 and came up with the following which was utterly delicious. The mini peppers are so out this world sweet!
Ingredients
(will feed 2 hungry adults, or 1 @snetty)
4 lamb leg steaks
4 large garlic cloves
4 sprigs rosemary
tablespoon olive oil
4 finger pinch of sea salt
Dozen mini sweet peppers (whole)
Method
Strip the rosemary from the stalks and roughly chop. Roughly chop the garlic cloves and and add to a pestle and mortar with the rosemary and sea salt. Grind to a paste and add the olive oil.
Place the lamb steaks into a largish food bag and add the marinade you’ve just created. Seal the bag shut and smoosh around until everything is nicely coated. Place in the fridge until later. Ideally, marinade overnight, but I found that 1 hour was sufficient.
Coat the peppers in a little olive oil (you can use low cal spray) and place on the BBQ. They will char heavily if you let them, but don’t worry about it because the skin will easily slough off leaving you with the delicious “meat” beneath. Grill the Asparagus in a similar fashion, but pay a bit more attention as burnt asparagus is crime against food.
Set aside your veg and making sure the BBQ is screaming hot, add the lamb steaks and grill on each side for about 3 minutes until the meat is medium rare.
Serve up with a portion of your favourite beans/lentils. Insert resulting food into face and reap benefits of providing your spouse with delicious food.
AdvertisementsRare 6ft mammoth tusk discovered off the coast of Mersea Island
A mammoth tusk found off the coast of West Mersea. Picture: Citizan Archant
Archaeologists have uncovered a rare, 6ft long mammoth tusk off the coast of Mersea Island.
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The discovery, by volunteers at the Coastal and Intertidal Zone Archaeological Network (Citizan), was made thanks to low tides in the area at around 7am today.
Project manager Stephanie Ostrich said she was “shocked” to see the tusk, which the team came across by chance more than half a mile away from Cooper’s Beach.
The expert, who often goes out on excavations with the Mersea-based team, said: “It was a crazy thing to see just lying there.
“We normally find quite a few interesting items when tides are low, but this tusk was particularly rare.
“We’ll need to do more tests to see exactly how rare it is and how old it is.
She added: “It was in good condition surprisingly – who knows how long it has been there – but it was a little fragile so we left it where it was.”
Mammoths roamed the Earth more than 100,000 years ago and most populations of the ancient animal were wiped out by the most recent Ice Age.
They were roughly around the size of African elephants, weighed around six tonnes and were up to 10 feet tall.
Rings contained within mammoth tusks can help researchers to discover how old they are, something Citizan volunteers in London will be doing over the next few months.
Samples taken from the tusk are also to be sent off for further tests.
Miss Ostrich said: “It will be very interesting to see its history, and we’ll be able to make a 3D image of it with the photographs.
“We actually found it nearly a kilometre away from the beach which is also unusual.”
Once the tests are completed they will be able to see how it compares with other rare finds in East Anglia.
The team, made up of volunteers and members, form part of a nationwide community archaeology project working in areas of England exposed at low tide but covered at high tide.
West Mersea, on Mersea Island, was hand-picked by the Citizan team.
Keep up to date with the team’s progress here.A gay rights advocacy group filed a complaint yesterday against the judge who handled the case of a gay man stranded in India with the twins he fathered, who were born to a surrogate mother there.
Jonathan Ger, who heads the Jerusalem Open House for Pride and Tolerance, submitted a letter of protest on the group's behalf to the judiciary ombudsman, former Supreme Court justice Eliezer Goldberg, accusing Family Court Judge Philip Marcus of discrimination based on sexual orientation.
"We are appealing to you with a heavy heart and from a sense of humiliation and grievous harm caused by a Jerusalem Family Court judge," wrote Ger, whose complaint also accused Marcus of discriminating against two other gay fathers attempting to bring their children into the country from India.
"Disturbingly, these three fathers of children who were born via surrogacy are discriminated against in a legal proceeding solely due to their sexual preferences," the complaint said.
The twins - a boy and girl born to an Indian woman who was serving as a surrogate mother for the father, Dan Goldberg, and his partner - were denied entry to Israel because Marcus ruled that he did not have the authority to approve the paternity test that would allow the children to become Israeli citizens. Goldberg and his children have since arrived in the country.
In all three cases cited in the complaint, Marcus said he did not have the authority to approve a paternity test for children born to surrogate mothers from India, even though other Israeli judges have routinely authorized the test for dozens of other gay couples.
In the Goldberg hearing, Marcus said if one of the men seeking to raise the children turns out to be "a pedophile or serial killer, these are things that the state must examine."
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Marcus' ruling left Goldberg stranded in a Mumbai hotel with the babies, Itai and Liron, until Goldberg won the case on appeal. Media reports of the case sparked outrage last month, and prompted Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu to instruct the Interior Ministry to "relax the law" and permit the family to return to the country.Last year the Obama administration updated Washington’s official position on what forms of expression are legal. “Whether a given category of speech enjoys First Amendment protection,” Solicitor General Elena Kagan argued in U.S. v. Stevens, “depends upon a categorical balancing of the value of the speech against its societal costs.”
In April the Supreme Court treated this cost-benefit approach to the Bill of Rights’ very first proscription on federal power with the derision it deserved. Writing for an 8-to-1 majority that overturned a 1999 law restricting depictions of animal cruelty, Chief Justice John Roberts called Kagan’s argument “startling and dangerous.” The First Amendment, he explained, “does not extend only to categories of speech that survive an ad hoc balancing of relative social costs and benefits. The First Amendment itself reflects a judgment by the American people that the benefits of its restrictions on the Government outweigh the costs.”
Kagan’s claim was a timely reminder that government, everywhere and always, seeks to balance controversial speech against various counterweights: national security, concerns about the influence of money in politics, the desire to protect society from the coarsening effects of obscenity. And if a child plays any role in the cost-benefit calculation—when school safety is supposedly at issue, or in a custody battle—the counterweight is deemed very heavy indeed.
Many, perhaps most, restrictions on speech are popular when they’re enacted. The reasons aren’t hard to understand. When your overriding goal is to prevent something most decent people find abhorrent (child pornography, corporate malfeasance, terrorism), and when distasteful speech is seen to obstruct that goal, that’s when people start to say, “Normally, I’m a First Amendment absolutist, but…”
So it was that the putative free speech champions on the New York Times editorial board praised the Supreme Court’s “respectful treatment of the First Amendment” in the Stevens case but in the very same editorial pilloried the Court’s 5-to-4 ruling in Citizens United v. FEC, which rejected federal censorship of a political documentary produced by a conservative group organized as a nonprofit corporation. Why the support for crush videos but not for corporate-sponsored political speech? Because legalizing the latter “opened the floodgates for big business and special-interest dollars to overwhelm American politics.” And catastrophic floods are no time for arcane constitutional debates.
Fortunately, the Framers understood that political passion too often trumps principle and that the natural reflex of people with power is to accumulate more. That is why the courts’ enforcement of constitutional restrictions is so important.
If you read one article about the Supreme Court this summer, make it Associate Editor Damon W. Root’s cover story, "Conservatives v. Libertarians." While the mainstream press continues to shoehorn all legal philosophies into a right-left spectrum, Root explores an underappreciated but equally important fault line: the split between conservatives who champion “judicial restraint” and libertarians willing to toss out even decades-old precedents if they flout the Constitution.
As Root’s article details, the tensions between these two tendencies can be found not only between established wings of the conservative legal movement but even within the minds of individual justices, especially Antonin Scalia. How those struggles play out on the Roberts court—including the unsettled question of Roberts’ own appetite and justification for overturning precedent—will go a long way in determining legal safeguards at a time of enormous government expansion.
This battle has repercussions far outside the courtroom, with echoes every time someone offers a consequentialist argument for limiting our freedom of expression. The patron saint of conservative judicial restraint, Robert Bork, shares an important trait with The New York Times and other censorious voices on the left: a belief that citizens are powerless to protect themselves from the consequences of unpleasant speech.
“Liberty in America can be enhanced by reinstating, legislatively, restraints upon the direction of our culture and morality,” Bork wrote in National Review in 2005. “Censorship as an enhancement of liberty may seem paradoxical. Yet it should be obvious, to all but dogmatic First Amendment absolutists, that people forced to live in an increasingly brutalized culture are, in a very real sense, not wholly free.”
Seeing individuals as powerless in the face of choice, or as empty vessels too easily overwhelmed by nefarious content, is a key component of paternalism. This view denies citizens their basic agency and autonomy, reinforcing the long-discredited but still popular notion that mass behavior is dictated from the top down.
“What we are facing,” President Barack Obama hyperbolized about Citizens United in early May, “is no less than a potential corporate takeover of our elections. What is at stake is no less than the integrity of our democracy.” It was a gross if common overestimation of corporate influence on our minds, and a grosser underestimation of the American people’s ability to think for themselves. Such a mindset explains how MSNBC blowhard Keith Olbermann could say something as profoundly stupid as his comment that Citizens United “might actually have more dire implications than Dred Scott v. Sandford.”
A similar note has been repeatedly sounded during the last two years of liberal anxiety over Tea Parties and allegedly resurgent right-wing violence. In April, on the 15th anniversary of the Oklahoma City bombing, former President Bill Clinton wrote a New York Times op-ed that echoed his unforgivably cynical reaction to the bombing when it transpired. Then as now, he linked the murderous act with the words of nonviolent political commentators.
The bombers, Clinton wrote, “took to the ultimate extreme an idea advocated in the months and years before the bombing by an increasingly vocal minority: the belief that the greatest threat to American freedom is our government, and that public servants do not protect our freedoms, but abuse them.…As we exercise the right to advocate our views, and as we animate our supporters, we must all assume responsibility for our words and actions before they enter a vast echo chamber and reach those both serious and delirious, connected and unhinged.”
Such talk doesn’t just serve the partisan purpose of marginalizing political opponents. It reflects an unseemly condescension to the consumers of political media, and it suggests a path toward censorship. Time’s Joe Klein has accused several critics of Obama—including Sen. Tom Coburn (R-Okla.), Sarah Palin, Glenn Beck, and Fox News in general—not just of “hate speech” but of the more legally serious “borderline sedition.” After Coburn warned that some citizens might be saying, “ ‘I give up on my government,’ and rightly so,” Klein charged that the senator’s statement “comes dangerously close to incitement to violence.” Needless to say, Klein wasn’t talking about criminalizing dissent back in the Bush-Cheney years.
Suppressing peaceful speech to prevent potential violence is a kind of pre-emptive heckler’s veto. We saw it in another context that same month, when Comedy Central heavily censored a South Park episode that depicted the prophet Muhammad. We see it when partisans try to silence the opposition and when the government weighs the costs and benefits of free expression.
The good news is that the Roberts Court so far is shaping up as a strong defender of the First Amendment. The bad news? Just before this issue went to press, Obama announced as his next Supreme Court appointment the same person who proposed that outrageous “categorical balancing” test for free speech: Elena Kagan. Here’s hoping some vigorous political speech influences the selection process.
Matt Welch (matt.welch@reason.com) is editor in chief of reason.Hamas killed hundreds of children in the construction of its extensive tunnel network, built partly to carry out attacks on children across the Gaza border in Israel. That report–confirmed by Hamas itself–emerged in 2012, not from the Israeli government, but the sympathetic Journal of Palestine Studies, in an article that otherwise celebrated the secret tunnel system as a symbol of Palestinian resistance to the Israeli “siege” of the Gaza Strip.
The article, “Gaza’s Tunnel Phenomenon: The Unintended Dynamics of Israel’s Siege,” was published in the Summer 2012 edition of the Journal by Nicholas Pelham, who writes for the Economist and the New York Review of Books, according to his bio. It is receiving new attention thanks to Myer Freimann of Tablet, an online journal of Jewish affairs, whose post about Hamas’s use of child labor has gone viral in social media.
Pelham wrote that despite the economic success of the tunnels underneath the Egyptian border, which enriched Hamas through a thriving black market as well as arming it with new weapons, there were a few drawbacks. One of these was a “cavalier approach to child labor and tunnel fatalities,” he noted. “During a police patrol that the author was permitted to accompany in December 2011, nothing was done to impede the use of children in the tunnels, where, much as in Victorian coal mines, they are prized for their nimble bodies. At least 160 children have been killed in the tunnels, according to Hamas officials” (emphasis added).
Though some children likely worked voluntarily, the fact that there were public complaints about child deaths, to which Hamas felt compelled to respond at least superficially, is evidence of some amount of coercion. The number of deaths since 2012 has yet to be reported, but almost certainly exceeds the number Pelham reported.
To sum up: Hamas is not only using child labor, but likely child slavery, in building its terror tunnel network. While the world worries obsessively over the child casualties of Israeli attacks on Hamas targets in Gaza, it has ignored Hamas’s deliberate killing of hundreds of Palestinian children, over the objections of the local populace.
The knowledge that Hamas used children to dig tunnels for smuggling and terror up to 25 meters below ground changes the moral calculation of the war significantly. Not only does Hamas show extreme indifference to the lives of Palestinian children by using them as human shields, placing rockets in UN schools and the like, but it actively destroys those lives by sending Palestinian children to die underground in 19th century conditions.
Those defending the Palestinian resistance to Israel–and, equally, those demanding a ceasefire that would leave the Hamas tunnel network in place–are effectively defending a slaveholding regime more odious in moral terms than any the world has seen since the child soldiers of Joseph Kony’s brutal Lord’s Resistance Army in Uganda, or the forced labor camps of the Nazis in the Second World War, who set children to work for the war effort.
It is rather ironic that President Barack Obama, who touted his own election in 2008 as an answer to the moral stain of slavery in America, would insist today on shoring up a Hamas administration that demonstrably uses child slavery. The Israeli government was reportedly shocked at how closely Obama’s ceasefire terms reflect the Hamas position. The American public ought to be shocked at how cynically Obama has cast morality aside.
Photo: Adel Hana/APThe Fenix3 aims to further blend the multisport watch realm (previously dominated by the Garmin Forerunner series), with the outdoor watches (such as the Fenix1 & Fenix2, as well as outdoor handhelds). To that end the Fenix3 is effectively a Garmin FR920XT with additional features aimed primarily at the outdoor and hiking crowd – more than the triathlon crowd. But, the appeal to triathletes since launch as clearly been the more normal watch looking feel, versus the plastic and blocky feel of the Forerunner 920XT units.
I’ve been using the Fenix3 for quite some time, and after a month on a final production unit with final production version – I’ve got enough data and detail for the in-depth review. Which…is what you’ll find below. The good, the bad, and the ugly.
To be clear, I’ve been using a Fenix3 provided by Garmin to test with (final production unit). Like always, I’ll be shipping that back to them in Kansas in the next little bit and going out and getting my own via regular retail channels. That’s just the way I roll.
Lastly, at the end of the day keep in mind I’m just like any other regular athlete out there. I write these reviews because I’m inherently a curious person with a technology background, and thus I try and be as complete as I can. But, if I’ve missed something or if you spot something that doesn’t quite jive – just let me know and I’ll be happy to get it all sorted out. Also, because the technology world constantly changes, I try and go back and update these reviews as new features and functionality are added – or if bugs are fixed. So – with that intro, let’s get into things.
Unboxing & Versions:
There are a number of versions of the Fenix3 that have different exterior surfaces. However, inside, all versions are identical. Again, there is no software differences between them – instead, it’s purely the materials used on the outside. Additionally, some Fenix3 variants are sold in bundles, which include the heart rate strap (HRM-RUN). Let’s do a bit of a walk-through on an unboxing of one version. All versions contain the same pieces and just vary in terms of which bundle you bought.
First up we’ve got all the parts pulled out of the box:
You’ll see you’ve got the USB charging clip (new/different for the Fenix3), the watch itself, and the HRM-RUN heart rate strap. Additionally, you’ve got some paperwork stuffs.
Here’s a closer look at the charging clip. It’s a new design for the Fenix3, which is a touch bit slimmer than previous designs. It features a bit of a slide in/out locking mechanism. Easily works to wear it while using the watch, should you want to charge on the go.
The box also includes a USB wall adapter. But fear not, you can use the unit with any USB port you’ll find on this planet:
Next, is the HRM-RUN strap. This is the strap that includes additional Running Dynamics metrics that were introduced with the FR620. I recently wrote an entire post dedicated to the HRM-RUN strap, which you can read here.
Then there’s some quick start guide information and legal documents:
And finally, the Fenix3 unit itself:
For those looking for a video-walkthrough of the box situation, here’s an unboxing video I did of the Fenix3 Grey Edition:
And then, another unboxing I did of the Fenix3 Sapphire. You’ll note that in the US there isn’t yet a Fenix3 Sapphire HR bundle (in the UK there is). However, the Sapphire edition does have one minor difference: It includes a spare set of plastic straps in case you get tired of the metal strap. Outside of that, same-same.
Here’s an unboxing video I did of the Sapphire edition:
And, just for clarity on all the editions, here’s a photo I shoot with the Fenix3 Red/Silver Edition:
With that, let’s briefly discuss some Sapphire specific notes before going through size specific comparisons.
Sapphire Edition Notables:
The Sapphire edition has a few tiny things that make it different, enough so that I’m going to very briefly cover them. First is that the glass is different. It’s a sapphire glass, which watchmakers sometimes use to increase scratch protection. Now, that said, I really haven’t seen any issues with scratches on the regular unit I’ve been wearing 24×7 for months. I’ve banged the crap out of it on surfaces and haven’t seen anything.
The second item to consider is that the Sapphire edition has metal links like numerous other high end watches. That means that you can’t separate the two ends like a lower priced watch bands. Further, you’ll need to resize the band by removing links. You can do that by bringing it to any jeweler, or, you can get this $2.30 tool and do it yourself.
Rather than put a bunch of pictures here, I just shot a quick video of how it works, which you can find below.
As you can see, it’s silly simple. Seriously, I shot that video within the first few minutes of opening that bag. It’s that simple, and, you can resize any other watch whenever you’d like.
As for deciding between the Sapphire and regular? Well, I’ve mostly been using the regular over the Sapphire, and to that extent I’ve been happy. The thing with the Sapphire is that it’s double the weight of the regular. So obviously it’s gonna feel heavy. For me personally, it takes a week or two to get used to that kinda weight on my wrist (when I’ve done it for regular wrist watches). But, more than that, it’s really limiting if you want to mount it to a bike.
Ultimately, I wouldn’t let the scratch-resistance be the driver of that decision. I’d honestly focus on your personal style preferences and whether or not the bike mount situation is of importance (see bike section on that).
Size & Weight Comparisons:
The Garmin Fenix3 is slightly slimmer than previous Fenix editions, which is easily seen when settled next to another unit (the Fenix3 is up front, the Fenix2 is towards the back):
It’s slightly thicker however than the Garmin FR920XT – at least without the 920XT quick release kit applied. Not much thicker, but a touch bit:
Meanwhile, looking at the front of the unit, here’s how things shake out against other watches in the category.
Left to right: Garmin FR910XT, Garmin FR920XT, Garmin Fenix3, Garmin Fenix2, Suunto Ambit3, Polar V800, Garmin FR620, Epson 810, Fitbit Surge
Next is weight, I’ve measured two of the three models, and taken the official stats for the third model:
Fenix3 Sapphire: 175g (with 4 links removed for my wrist)
Fenix3 Sapphire with rubber strap instead: 85g (Garmin weight)
Fenix3 Grey: 82g
Fenix3 Silver/Red: 82g (Garmin weight)
This compares to the FR920XT, Ambit3, Polar V800, and Fenix2 weights as follows:
FR920XT: 61.6g
Ambit3: 86.0g
Polar V800: 80.8g
Fenix2: 85.6g
Here’s a quick pic of them on the scale:
Finally, when it comes to wrist sizes, you’ll see plenty of my wrist throughout the review, but nonetheless, as a starting point here are the two editions on my wrist (which is 17cm, or about 6.5 inches):
And for The Girl’s wrist, I figured I’d include that here. At 5’2” tall, she’s fairly petite. Her wrist measures 14cm (or 5.5 inches). Here’s a few shots on her wrist:
I haven’t resized the Sapphire yet for her, but once I do, I’ll include that in here.
Running:
There are numerous modes and sport profiles available within the Fenix3, all of which are highly customizable. For this review I’ll start with running and talk about many features within the running section. But keep in mind that virtually all of the functions (such as alerts, data page customization, etc…) are applicable to all modes.
To begin though, you’ll head outside and choose an activity type. Technically these are now called ‘Apps’, and there’s an app for each sport (i.e. Run, Bike, Bike Indoor, etc…). This also makes the structure more extensible to 3rd party apps as those are released.
Assuming you’ve selected a sport mode that’s GPS-enabled, such as running outdoors, the unit will start to find satellite. The ring around the outside will slowly grow to 100%, in red first, and then green once complete.
The satellite acquisition time on the Fenix3 is based on a cached database that is updated each time you sync with your phone, computer, or WiFi. That database enables faster acquisition so that acquisition times only take a few seconds, especially if you’re in the same spot as your last activity ended:
As you were finding satellites you’ll have noticed that the unit would have found any ANT+ sensors that were paired. This would show a small icon at the top for the sensor type – such as heart rate straps.
With everything all set it’s time to actually run. At this point you’ll press the start button (the one with the red ring) and then it’ll start recording. Your pace, distance and any other data fields you’ve configured will appear on the display:
I’ll discuss data fields a bit later on, but you can customize them quite a bit including changing the number of metrics per page as well as the number of pages.
When it comes to pace, the Fenix3 is like the FR620, FR920XT and other recent Garmin watches that shows pace in 5-second increments, but slightly smoothed. This is done to ensure a smoother pace metric. Ultimately, all GPS watches have to smooth pace data in some manner. Either they’re doing it in a visible way (i.e. 5-second increments), or in a non-visible way (smoothing the data further behind the scenes). So the discussion on methods is somewhat academic.
Nonetheless, here’s a look at instant pace reaction times on the Fenix3 during a recent run where I was running along at a long-run pace, and then stopped for traffic for a moment, and then continued running again:
As you can see, it’s reasonably quick – even despite going under a large steel structure holding up the Parisian Metro/Subway system.
Within running (and all activities), you have a variety of functions you can enable such as Auto Lap – which automatically triggers laps on a preset interval, such as every 1-Mile or 1-Kilometer. I tend to use this on long runs, but I don’t use it on interval runs as I manually trigger the laps instead using the lap button in the lower right corner.
Anytime a lap is triggered though the Fenix3 supports customized lap banners. This means that you can change which metrics are shown anytime a lap is triggered.
Next there’s other common Garmin functions like Auto Scroll and Auto Pause. Auto Scroll will iterate through your data pages like a carousel. Whereas Auto Pause will automatically stop and start the timer when you stop/start running. This is more useful for city running or riding.
One new unique feature to the Fenix3 is Auto Climb. Auto Climb works by showing a different set of data fields when you start to climb (go uphill). This feature can be used on any profile including cycling. The feature works by configuring a set of |
Deeper By: Alehkhs On: February 18th, 2017 As our submersible descended, the waters grew darker around us. Looming teeth, some as long as a man’s leg, skirted the edge of our floodlights. The captain was sure this area held caves filled with golden bounty, but to those creatures of the deep it was our flesh and blood that were the true prizes… As someone who’s both a fan of marine exploration and co-operative gameplay, I have been having a blast playing Deli Interactive’s first commercial title, We Need to go Deeper. Imagine Lovers in a Dangerous Spacetime, only set in the crushing, inner space of our dark oceans. Billed as “a multi-player submarine rogue-like set in a Verne-inspired underwater universe,” We Need to go Deeper places you and up to 3 other players in command of a submarine and charges you to work together to plumb the depths in search of riches and glory. It’s not a simple matter of pointing and clicking however, as the various roles in the submarine – taking the helm, firing torpedoes, balancing power, patching leaks, and repelling tentacles – can’t be done all at once by a single player. That’s where your fellow crew members come in, each taking up a station in a frantic attempt at teamwork. As Deli Interactive explains, “We Need to go Deeper was created under the mindset of having friends scream at each other.” As your crew makes its way to the bottom, they will come across various caves scattered along the seafloor. Once a cave has been found, the action moves outside the submarine as the players don diving suits and explore the caves in search of gold and other rewards. All the while, both in the submarine and on foot, dangerous creatures of all sizes and shapes swarm and attack. Though it has only recently entered Early Access on Steam, We Need to go Deeper already offers a wonderful submarine odyssey that you can share with your friends. A lobby system even allows for you to join with strangers, and the developer has set up a Discord server specifically for sole players looking for a crew. If the promise of riches, teamwork, and/or painful death in the deep sea appeals to you, you can grab a copy on Steam or at the game’s official website!
A Good Bundle – This is Fine By: Tof Eklund On: November 22nd, 2016 A Good Bundle is a rag-tag alliance of a great many indie game devs, from big dogs to folks with one smallish title to their name. It’s a game bundle, sure, but it’s not your typical bundle. There are 151 games (& tools) by 115 devs in here, and it’s all for charity: split 50/50 between Planned Parenthood and the ACLU. Tagline: “A Good Bundle is a bunch of creators sharing their works to combat some of the ugliness in our world.” Read the rest of this entry »
Fantastic Arcade 2016 By: Tof Eklund On: September 26th, 2016 This year’s Fantastic Arcade is happening right now, so if you’re in Austin or a short drive away (n.b., a “short drive” in Texas is anything under 8 hours), you should go. Admission is free, gas is cheap, and Shine Boch actually tastes good if you drink it in the Lone Star State. There’s a complete schedule of events here. Festivities started on the 22nd and run through this Thursday (the 29th). If there’s a tear in your beer (Shiner or otherwise) because, like me, you can’t go, you can play the games of Fantastic Arcade (some of them) at home with this itch.io bundle, presented by Juegos Rancheros in conjunction with Fantastic Arcade, and benefiting the Juegos Rancheros nonprofit. Unlike Fantastic Arcade itself, the bundle’s not free, but for $15 you get five new games by Moppin, Takahashi, Saltzman, Klondike, Lawhead and SOKOP. Viva los independientes!
Synonymy By: ithamore On: August 15th, 2016 “Synonymy is a non-profit, educational word game narrated by Richard Dawkins in which players are challenged to find the paths between random words through their network of synonyms. By taking the synonym of a word, and then a synonym of that synonym, and so on, you can ultimately arrive at any other word in the English language.” It is rare when I’m impressed by a word game, and I love word games. The Steam demo is also a good example of a tastefully crafted demo, so please take note.
DevLog Spotlight: Leilani’s Island By: Derek Yu On: July 28th, 2016 I started work on it around a year ago on a whim because I was reading a lot of game design articles and couldn’t resist the idea of a small platform game. It’s really expanded a lot beyond that though! I’d like to start showing it to and discussing it with more people as I continue. The aim of the devlog is to show new exciting things that go in, but also discuss some of my design processes and that kind of thing. Leilani’s Island lavishes attention to its details – watching Leilani roll into an enemy close-up reveals all kinds of design considerations at play, from particle effects to physics. You can just tell that it feels really good to control. This attention to detail is a quality that’s also reflected in the devlog – creator Ishi has been updated the log at least once a week since February, 2015, revealing the game’s influences and evolving design. According to Ishi, Leilani’s Island draws some inspiration from the personality and physics of Wario Land and Donkey Kong Country, but in the animated gifs he’s posted Leilani promises to be even more intricate than the games from either of those series. The artwork, animation, and music (by Leila “Woofle” Wilson) should be at least as good as Nintendo and Rare’s work on those titles.
Preview: Highfleet By: Derek Yu On: July 18th, 2016 The other day, I was wondering to myself: “What ever happened to the guy who made Hammerfight? I liked that game.” Hammerfight, released in 2009 by Russian game-maker Konstantin Koshutin, is an action game about piloting flying vehicles armed with medieval weapons like hammers, maces, flails, and swords as well as the occasional long-range cannon. Its dusty Steampunk world was beautifully rendered – bashing it out with mutant bugs and other pilots was often as lovely as it was brutal, with colorful faction banners streaming about and little people cheering you on in the background. I quite enjoyed knocking my enemies about, too, since a meaty hit could send someone’s airship smashing into a wall, with bricks flying everywhere. Unfortunately, the physics-based movement also took its toll on my poor wrists and constantly swinging my mouse around in circles became painful and repetitive after awhile. Koshutin’s newest project, Highfleet, seems to share some things in common with Hammerfight: mid-air duels in a dusty, lovingly-rendered world. Instead of floating ships with melee weapons, however, it looks as though you’ll be piloting more traditional aircraft and engaging in dogfights not dissimilar to Vlambeer’s Luftrausers (but slower-paced). From browsing the game’s Facebook page and Twitter, it looks like there will be a lot more to the game, too, like an overworld map and ship construction. Could be really cool (and a lot easier on my wrists). No release date for the game has been announced.
Momodora: Reverie Under the Moonlight By: Derek Yu On: July 7th, 2016 It’s become a joke to talk about Cave Story and Dark Souls when describing other games, but in the case of Momodora: Reverie Under the Moonlight, I’d be remiss not to: the series has never been shy about its influences. In Reverie, the fourth game of the Momodora series, rdein has done a fantastic job joining the simple charm and tidy aesthetic of Daisuke Amaya’s little masterpiece with the methodical combat mechanics and level design of From Software’s Souls games. The result is something of a “perfect” Metroidvania, which feels neither meandering nor linear, frustrating nor dull. And it’s easy to see why rdein considers this to be his best-looking and most polished game yet: out of all the many beautiful animations and effects in the game, there’s not a single pixel that seems out of place. In this bustling age of indie game development, it can be refreshing to see a title that shows restraint in its design without being minimalist or abstract. You’ll love Reverie if you enjoyed any of its influences. At this year’s Summer Games Done Quick (going on right now), it produced one of the marathon’s most heartfelt and inspiring runs: Read the rest of this entry »
*Looks Around* By: Derek Yu On: June 23rd, 2016 “Are they all gone yet?”One of the very first posts I ever wrote for this blog, and I stand by every word of it. There is no such thing as rape culture, and holding men accountable for what drunk women do is the very definition of ‘patriarchy’.
Coyote ugly. It’s a phrase men use to describe the experience of waking up, hungover as shit, in bed next to a girl so ugly you’d rather chew your arm off than have her stir. Yep, another night of too many shooters and very poor judgement. Well played, tequila. I’m willing to bet that every single varsity athlete or high status (medicine, engineering, computer science) male on any given college campus has had the experience. Why? Because they get hunted. All the time. By women. You see these guys staggering bleary-eyed into the dorm rooms the next morning, bro-punching their friends and saying “Dude, how could you let me do that?”
The walk of shame. A right of passage. One that men seem to relish, enjoy and get over pretty damn quickly. Yeah, you fucked an ugly chick. Or a fat chick. Whatever. You drank too much, lost all your reason and tumbled into bed with someone you wouldn’t normally touch with a ten yard pole. Ho hum. Where we going tonight, bros?
Women, on the other hand, are completely fucked in the head in this exact same situation. They get dressed up in their best whore clothes, head out to a frat party, drink their faces off, end up in bed with some guy they wouldn’t normally touch with a ten yard pole, wake up the next morning feeling like a total slutbag and then it happens. Someone must be to blame for this. I can’t possibly have gotten shitfaced and exercised some really poor judgement. Moi? Ce n’est pas possible! I am an innocent blushing virgin with impeccable moral standards. Why, only whores get smashed and fuck random guys in a frat house, and I am not a whore so JESUS MOTHER OF GOD I WAS RAPED!
Bitch, please. You weren’t raped. You were trashed. Why is it that men are held responsible for their actions no matter what their state of inebriation, but women get a pass? It doesn’t matter if you were drunk, stripped naked, straddled the guy in your best cowgirl and fucked like a banshee. You were drunk. You can’t consent. You were raped.
Dude might have been just as pissed up as you, but he can’t cry rape because rationality. Only men are rational creatures? Really? Bull. Shit.
There are women so delusional they actually think we live in a “rape culture”. What the fuck? No, we don’t live in a rape culture. We live in a ‘Don’t You Bitches Have Any Friends’ culture. Me and Pixie have our fair share of experience dancing like madwomen in our lingerie in night clubs filled with horny men starting looking like the cast of Ocean’s Twelve after that last appletini. Many nights ended with crazy slobbery make-out sessions with the DUDE WHO LOOKS EXACTLY LIKE BRAD PITT.
Here’s the thing. We protected each other. Not from Brad Pitt. From our own BAD JUDGEMENT. Rape culture holds men, and only men, responsible for what women do. And thanks, but I prefer to be responsible for my own fucking behaviour. And when I’m about to do something really stupid, that I will regret the next morning, I rely on my friends to save me FROM MYSELF.
So go ahead. Wear those fishnets and hoochie shorts. You look fucking hot! Play beer pong! Strip for that guy. Go ahead and fuck him. Make all those decisions BUT UNDERSTAND THEY ARE YOUR DECISIONS. You don’t get to wake up the next day feeling like a whore and ruin a man’s life because YOU ARE A SLUT. Women–and men–who really were violently brutalized by strangers, totally against their will, aren’t helped by your idea of a rape culture. In fact the rape culture YOU created makes it worse for them by equating a truly violent and awful crime with bad decisions made while drunk.
So embrace your slut. Or trust your friends when they tell you it’s time to say nighty-night to Brad. Or you know, shut the fuck up.. Take your pick.
Lots of love,
JBUsually I try to keep a balance between fixing bugs, improving old things and adding new things, but occasionally it’s necessary to just focus for a while on fixing and improving. This week was nothing but fixing bugs for me, and since the others are on well-deserved vacation currently that means there are no exciting pictures of cool new things this week I’m afraid.
The week started with a bunch of patches for Alpha 16 before I moved on to some less urgent problems. There was one bug in particular (janitors are occasionally unable to pick up some trash until the savegame is reloaded) that was especially tricky - it has a fairly low and random chance to happen and only appears under certain circumstances. Figuring out what was going on there was a very slow process since I had to leave the game running for hours just to see the issue happening once, so in the end it took roughly two days to understand what the problem was. Once I knew, the fix itself took just a couple minutes, which is how it oftentimes goes with bugs.
That’s why I usually ask people reporting a bug if they know how it can be triggered :) It can really save a ton of time and frustration.
There’s still some more left to work through, so next week looks like it’ll be more of the same.Written by and photos by Nadia Ibanez
I never used to be one who would attack a brand new city with a bunch of touristy things. But when you’re trying to tackle a city like Chicago in just a few days, sometimes you just gotta sign up for a tour and go along for the ride. During my trip to the Windy City, I went on a handful of Chicago tours both within the downtown area and beyond.
From tame architecture and history tours, to sexy red light district tours, here’s a list of some of the Chicago tours you can go on while exploring this amazingly beautiful city.
Historic Chicago Walking Bar Tour with Chicago Detours
History lessons have never been my strong suit. I have trouble listening to someone chatter about history while I’m in a new city, let alone a classroom, because I’m busy looking around at all of the sights. But, Chicago Detours is a company you want to get to know if you’re seeking a Chicago history lesson with some booze and bites.
We started our tour at the Tribune Tower and the Intercontinental Hotel where we learned a brief history of the city, who helped to build commerce in the area, what industries fared well during growth, and more. After wandering the streets and learning more about the secret life of drinkers and booze during the prohibition era, we stepped inside the original Billy Goat Tavern.
Any old school Saturday Night Live fan will immediately yell, “Cheezborger, Cheezborger! No Pepsi…Coke!” in their heads upon hearing about this pit stop. The Billy Goat Tavern was definitely my favorite stop on this tour mostly because of the people watching, the fantastic bar and bartenders, historic memorabilia all over the walls, and of course, the cheeseburgers.
By the time the tour was over, not only did we learn about how booze shaped the city in nearly every decade, but we also boozed at every stop. From beers at Billy Goat, to wine and appetizers at the Tortoise Club and a historic mansion, we experienced the booze culture in nearly every way imaginable.
Pizza & Cocktails Tour with Chicago Pizza Tours
Pizza and booze in Chicago is like peanut butter and jelly to the rest of the country; it just goes together and there’s no explanation. Chicago’s deep dish pizza is globally famous and I had to get my hands on all of the pizza I could. If you’re in town for a short period of time and want to try all of the famous pizza spots in the area, I highly recommend booking a Pizza & Cocktails Tour with Chicago Pizza Tours.
Our group met at Flo & Santos, a thin-crust pizza spot favorited by local Chicagoans. We ordered up some cocktails and local brews while our table was flooded with huge thin-crust pizzas with toppings inspired by local tastes. The Flo’s Polish was topped with Polish Kielbasa, sauerkraut and bacon, while Marco’s Italian Beef was topped with shaved beef, giardiniera, caramelized onion and roasted tomatoes. We all shared our stories and what brought us to Chicago, before we headed to the next joint.
Throughout the evening, we stopped by Pizzeria Serio in the Lakeview neighborhood for Neapolitan-style pizza, the famous Lou Malnati’s in the Gold Coast neighborhood for a taste of history, and Pizano’s for Oprah’s favorite deep dish and dessert. The drinks continued to flow throughout the night and we all naturally befriended each other by the end of the tour.
If you’re traveling solo, this tour is perfect for you. There’s nothing like a few too many gin and tonics to open up even the most timid of travelers. The pizza was all fantastic and I totally get why people have Chicago pizza shipped to their homes after visiting these spots. Not only do you get a taste of Chicago history on these tours, but you also get a sense of why this city attracts all walks of life.
Lincoln Park Food Tour with Chicago Food Planet
I’m always one to try and discover hip and up-and-coming neighborhoods while traveling and I had been hearing a lot about Lincoln Park. Located about 20 minutes outside of the Chicago Loop and downtown area, Lincoln Park is an adorable neighborhood offering culture, historical sights, delicious food, shopping and more.
I signed up for the two-hour Lincoln Park Food Tour with Chicago Food Planet, which specializes in walking tours of Chicago’s best neighborhoods outside of heavily-touristed areas. This tour company takes guests around Chicago’s neighborhoods while educating travelers about how the local food culture came to be and how artists, immigrants, students, professionals, and everyone else has shaped the area.
Deemed one of Chicago’s most diverse and largest neighborhoods, we learned all about Lincoln Park’s history with our tour guide, Jackie. We heard about the area’s history and people, while tasting specialty, locally-made items like popcorn, cupcakes, bagels, luxury chocolate and stuffed pizza. (PS: The pizza from Bacino’s was out of this world!) Lincoln Park is a great city for eating, drinking and shopping so if you feel like you’ve tackled downtown Chicago and want a glimpse into the ‘burbs, make sure to add this neighborhood to your list.
Chicago Food Planet operates tours in other parts of town, including the Gold Coast, Old Town, Bucktown, Wicker Park and Chinatown. Our guide, Jackie, was absolutely lovely and super smart and we couldn’t have asked for a better guide. If you fall in love with one of the stops on the tour, Chicago Food Planet offers discounts at the shops or restaurants for purchases after the trip concludes.
Red Light District Tour with Weird Chicago
If you really want to see a part of Chicago with the perfect blend of grit, boozy history and scandal, check out Weird Chicago tours immediately. This tour brought some light into the sex and kink scene of today and the bygone era. Fancy a trip to a sex dungeon? Ever wanted to meet a man who custom manufactures bustiers and thigh-high leather boots? Or, do you need to freshen up your education on today’s sex toys? Then look no further than the Red Light District Sex Tour.
This Chicago tour is a bit difficult to put into words, especially if you’re tame at heart, because the intel that I gathered on this trip would make anyone blush. Join the group as an open-minded individual, with your friends, or significant other. And be prepared for some silly, while also incredibly intriguing, narration. Let’s just say that by the time the tour was over, I found myself in a swing in the middle of a sex dungeon, tried on some vintage-inspired bustiers, and got a glance into electro-magnetic stimulation at a sex shop.
I guarantee you’ll end the night all hot and bothered with a new wealth of information about the Chicago local sex industry. But if sex dungeons and toys aren’t totally your thing, Weird Chicago also offers tours about the city’s ghosts, criminal history, gangsters and “Murder Castle.”
Architecture Tour with Shoreline Sightseeing
If you’re looking for a relaxing Chicago tour of the downtown area’s architecture and skyscrapers, I suggest an Architecture Tour with Shoreline Sightseeing. This 75 minute tour, great for those in a time crunch, takes you down the Chicago River and among the most notable towers and skyscrapers. You’ll learn about the engineering of these buildings, who made them, who occupies the space now, and so much more. Ever wondered about the uniquely-shaped round parking structure in the middle of the Loop, or the Aqua high rise apartment building that mimics the image of waves when viewed from atop each balcony? Or the history behind the champagne-bottle shaped Carbide & Carbon building? You’ll learn all about these landmarks and more on this tour.
I hopped on the Architecture River Tour, which launches off from two different locations, and we saw more than 40 different, distinctly Chicago landmarks. I highly recommend going on the tour right around sunset, or at least while the sun is out, as the boat is uncovered and offers amazing views.
Design your own Self-Guided Tour at the Art Institute
The Chicago Art Institute tops everyone’s list of must-see places but with almost a million square feet of explorable space, the idea of seeing everything can be daunting. From modern art and photography, to marble sculptures and Picassos, there’s something here for everyone. I only had a few hours to spend at the Art Institute and luckily there were a few options to help maximize my time.
Before you visit, check out the website’s section for themed mini tours. Or, download the Art Institute app or opt for an audio guide. Whatever your speed, you’ll find a ton of interesting exhibits.
Editor’s Note: Thank you to ALL of the tour companies who allowed me to join your group outings! Thank you for your generosity and hospitality. See you soon!Share:
Father overdoses on heroin to teach addict son a lesson
BROOKLYN, New York (WSVN) — When a father in New York found his son’s heroin stash, he decided to teach him a dangerous, unforgettable lesson.
“I told him if you’re not going to stop, I will do the same as you do,” Sergey Gnatovskiy, 45, told The New York Post. “I [tried] to send him to rehab. He promised me he was going to go, and I found it again.”
Sergey used his son Maykl’s heroin, and passed out on their living room floor, where the 23-year-old found his father Wednesday afternoon.
Maykl had to use CPR and Narcan to revive his father, which Sergey had to do for Maykl on four different occasions. It was a risky move, but Sergey says it paid off: Maykl agreed to go back to rehab after seeing his father overdose.
“After seeing this, I definitely want to go. I’ve been doing this since I was 15. I’m 23 now, I can’t keep doing this,” Maykl told the Post.
Sergey said Maykl’s mother kicked him out of her house when he was a teenager because of his drug use. He has tried to help his son ever since, but until now, has struggled to get through to him.
“My son was screaming at me, ‘Pop, Pop, are you crazy, you almost died,’” he said.
But Sergey said he was willing to do just about anything to save his son’s life… including risking his own.
“If I lose you — I don’t know. Look what you made me do yesterday? I’ll give you my home, my car, my heart. I don’t want to lose you,” he yelled.Uncovering Lisp
Most programming languages have several syntax rules. Lisp has one: everything is a list. The first element is a function name, and the rest are its arguments. Thus, the language is simply a collection of compile- and run-time functions, trivially extensible.
foo(1, 2, 3); const a = 1; if (a == 1) foo(); else bar(); const b = (a == 1)? 2 : 3; (foo 1 2 3) (def a 1) (if (= a 1) (foo) (bar)) (def b (if (= a 1) 2 3))
But parentheses in Lisp are infamous for bunching together at the end of long expressions. This indentation convention can be jarring at first if you are used to curly braces in other languages being on their own lines:
(defn foo [a b] (let [ x (+ a b) ] (println "The sum is" x) ) ) (defn foo [a b] (let [x (+ a b)] (println "The sum is" x)))
The idea behind this convention is to make every line inform with content rather than just parens. Readability is helped by employing a Python-like indentation style. This achieves a sort of balance— Indentation allows you to skim while the parens allow you to inspect:
(defn foo [a b] (let [x (+ a b)] (println "The sum is" x))) (defn foo [a b] (let [x (+ a b)] (println "The sum is" x)))
Though both perspectives are visible at once, we must focus on one at a time. A LEGO analogy helps here. Imagine each list in the previous example as a LEGO block stacked over its parent. Checking the sides to see the layers below is like checking the parens at the end of a line.
This is a physical analog to the way we read Lisp code. Now let's look at the space of tooling solutions that we use for writing Lisp code and specifically how Parinfer can help.British defence and technology firms are exporting advanced spy tech, including powerful surveillance devices and telecommunications interception technology, to authoritarian regimes across the world. The firms, including subsidiaries of British defence giant BAE Systems, were licensed to sell the spy products since early 2015.
Some of the companies licensed to export the products were also granted approval to sell them to authoritarian regimes, such as Saudi Arabia, UAE, Turkey and Egypt which have been criticised for abusingsurveillance technology and for having poor human rights records.
According to information gleaned from documents obtained by Motherboard via the Freedom of Information Act, companies such as Pro-Solve International, ComsTrac, CellXion, Cobham, and Domo Tactical Communications (DTC) have applied for licences to export products and detailed the kind of devices that were shipped.
"At a time when the use of these surveillance tools is still highly controversial in the UK, it is completely unacceptable that companies are allowed to export the same equipment to countries with atrocious human rights records or which lack rule of law altogether. There is absolutely a clear risk that these products can be used for repression and abuses," said Privacy International research officer Edin Omanovic.
Mass surveillance products
Among the devices sold are IMSI-catchers, also better known as "stingrays", which pretend to be mobile phone towers to trick nearby communications devices to connect to it. The documents reveal that 31 of the devices were licensed for export to Indonesia and Turkey.
"IMSI catchers are probably one of the most controversial and yet more demanded pieces of surveillance technology marketed today. They are of dubious legality and their use raises serious ethical and privacy concerns due to their invasiveness and wide reach," said Claudio Guarnieri, an Amnesty International technologist.
According to documents obtained from the Danish Business Authority by Lasse Skou Andersen of the Danish newspaper Dagbladet Information, there is an ongoing contract between the BAE Systems' subsidiary and the UAE government, dating as far back as December 2014. The contract reveals an internet surveillance product with "IP monitoring and data analysis" capabilities for "serious crime" and "national security" investigations.
The device can also be used to track a target's social media activities, obtain personal information and communications such as voice and video recordings, messages and more from various devices.
Government surveillance
"This comes at a crucial time, just before the European Commission [EC] is set to decide whether or not it proposes updates to regulations regarding the export of surveillance technologies," Omanovic told the Intercept. "The fact that the export license was granted by the Danish authorities to the UAE, where human rights abuses are well established, and that this information was not publicly available, underlines why these reforms are urgently needed."
BAE Systems said, "It is against our policy to comment on contracts with specific countries or customers. BAE Systems works for a number of organisations around the world, within the regulatory frameworks of all relevant countries and within our own responsible trading principles."
A spokesperson from the British Department for International Trade said, "The UK government takes its arms export responsibilities very seriously and operates one of the most robust arms export control regimes in the world. We rigorously examine every application on a case-by-case basis against the Consolidated EU and National arms export licensing Criteria. We draw on all available information, including reports from NGOs and our overseas network as a key part of our assessment."
Cyberspace Cold War
The authoritarian countries that the spy tech products have been shipped to have in the past have been accused of abusing surveillance technology to specifically target journalists and dissidents. For instance, a journalist in Turkey, who was jailed on terrorism charges was later found to have been framed by hackers who infected his computer with malware.
Another instance revealed how UAE dissidents were being targeted with spyware by a cyberespionage group called Stealth Falcon, which was found to have links with the UAE government. In May, Iran's counter-cyberwarfare group claimed that Saudi Arabia-based hackers were behind a targeted cyberattack on the government's websites, which resulted in a temporary outage of services.
ESET security researcher told IBTimes UK, "Cyberspace can definitely be considered a conflict zone, and it has been one for some time. Many scholars consider the 2007 cyberattacks on Estonia as the beginning of the era of cyber conflict. Clearly, the level of conflict has escalated in recent months and I would not be surprised if this became the 'new normal' facing companies and governments who are in any way involved with data that could be of value to adversaries."CBS Just more than a day after the White House released 100 pages of emails relating to September's terrorist attack in Benghazi, it's clear that Republican-leaked emails portraying bombshell revelations about the White House's involvement are misleading.
CBS' Major Garrett called out Republicans for those emails in a report Thursday, saying the GOP-leaked versions of the emails clearly try to downplay the CIA's role in shaping the talking points and place more emphasis on the State Department.
In particular, the GOP-leaked emails centered on correspondences from National Security Adviser Ben Rhodes and State Department spokeswoman Victoria Nuland.
Here is what multiple outlets, including CBS, reported last week that Rhodes had written:
"We must make sure that the talking points reflect all agency equities, including those of the State Department, and we don't want to undermine the FBI investigation."
The actual email released by the White House differs significantly and places no emphasis on the State Department:
"We need to resolve this in a way that respects all of the relevant equities, particularly the investigation."
Here is the GOP-leaked version of one of Nuland's emails:
"The penultimate point is a paragraph talking about all the previous warnings provided by the Agency (CIA) about al-Qaeda's presence and activities of al-Qaeda."
The actual version released by the White House, however, makes no mention of al-Qaeda:
"The penultimate point could be abused by members to beat the State Department for not paying attention to Agency warnings."
This aligns with a CNN report from Jake Tapper on Tuesday, which purported that an ABC report of the emails seemingly "invented the notion" that members of the State Department wanted their concerns specifically addressed.
The emails released by the White House, however, do show a significant amount of concern on the part of the State Department. Brendan Buck, the spokesman for House Speaker John Boehner, said the emails showed the "political nature" of the State Department's talking-point changes.
This article and its headline have been updated to reflect the fact that CBS' Major Garrett did not specifically mention an ABC report.
You can watch the full CBS report here:1. Donald Trump
Mr. Mime: A goofy-haired clown obsessed with creating barriers.
Loudred: His greatest weapon is his loud, amplified voice.
Darkrai: The political establishment's worst nightmare with a gravity-defying combover.
Conkeldurr: Experience putting up buildings.
Aegislash: Quick to change stances if it means victory.
Emboar: Literally a huge pig who's great at making SICK BURNS.
2. Bernie Sanders
Dugtrio: Has support at the grassroots level from ground-types (hippies).
Porygon-Z: Gained notoriety thanks to weirdos from the Internet.
Omanyte: Strangely adorable despite being a living fossil.
Delibird: Eager to give away presents like free college and single-payer healthcare.
Abomasnow: A frozen creature with a proclivity for grass... aka "the entire population of Vermont".
Jynx: Both unintentionally made large amounts of black women furious.
3. Jeb Bush
Vanillite: Milky, white, and flavorless.
Vanillish: The direct result of an organization really struggling for new ideas.
Vanilluxe: The third iteration of something you just saw two times before.
Braviary: All about that Red, White, and Blue.
Meowth: Really good at scrambling for gold.
Yanmega: A giant flying insect that could murder me, thus representing Florida.
4. Hillary Clinton
Charmander: The most predictable, boring choice.
Kangaskhan: A mom who wields an impressive amount of power.
Jigglypuff: Grows angry and vengeful when the audience stops paying attention to her.
Mewtwo: Perceived as an omnipotent supervillain, but is probably just misunderstood.
Eevee: Constantly changing into different forms depending on what's in front of her.
Pikachu: Peaked in popularity in late 90's, has refused to go away ever since.
5. Bobby Jindal
...An FBI poster showing a composite image of retired FBI agent Robert Levinson. (Photo11: Manuel Balce Ceneta, AP)
WASHINGTON (AP) — A senior U.S. senator suggested on Sunday that the CIA has not been forthcoming with Congress on details about an American who disappeared while on a secret intelligence mission to Iran.
Iran's foreign minister asserted that Robert Levinson is "not incarcerated by the government and I believe the government runs, pretty much, good control of the country."
An Associated Press investigation published this past week found that Levinson was working for the CIA — investigating the Iranian government. The U.S. long has publicly described Levinson as a private citizen who traveled to an Iranian island on private business.
Republican Sen. John McCain told CNN's State of the Union that "the CIA did not tell the truth to the Congress" about Levinson.
McCain said he is confident the U.S. is doing all it can to learn what has happened to Levinson. But he said he is disturbed the Obama administration has not been more forthcoming with information about him.
He said he doesn't "think there's any doubt" about whether Iran knows Levinson's fate.
But Iranian Foreign Minister Javad Zarif, asked on CBS television's Face the Nation where Levinson is, replied: "I have no idea."
"If we can trace him and find him, we will certainly discuss" returning him to the United States, he added, though he made clear that "we have no traces of him in Iran."
Secretary of State John Kerry dismissed a suggestion by Levinson's family that the U.S. government was not doing enough to find out what happened to Levinson.
"There hasn't been progress in the sense that we don't have him back. But to suggest that we have abandoned him or anybody has abandoned him is simply incorrect... and not helpful," he told ABC television's This Week.
"The fact is I have personally raised the issue not only at the highest level... but also through other intermediaries. So we don't have any meeting with anybody who has something to do with Iran or an approach to Iran where we don't talk to them about how we might be able to find not just Levinson, but we have two other Americans that we're deeply concerned about."
Right now, "we're looking for proof of life," Kerry said.
Iran's press counselor at the United Nations called on Washington to explain Levinson's mission in Iranian territory, after the AP investigation revealed that he had been on an unauthorized assignment for the CIA when he vanished on Iran's Kish Island in March 2007.
U.S. officials have raised the Levinson case with Iran repeatedly over the years. But until the AP investigation was published, it was not known that Levinson was hoping to gather information in his role as an independent contract investigator who expected to be compensated by a group of analysts at the CIA.
After he vanished, the CIA at first told lawmakers he had previously done contract work for the agency, but he had no current relationship with the agency and there was no connection to Iran. However, in October 2007, Levinson's lawyer discovered emails in which Levinson told a CIA friend that he was working to develop |
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For many people a trip abroad might mean a small hire car with the occasional luxury addition.
But for one man desperate to maintain his reputation, a holiday in London means just another place he can show off his impressive vehicles.
Britain's flashiest tourist, from Saudi Arabia, arrived in the capital over the weekend with a fleet of gold cars worth more than £1million.
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Britain's flashiest tourist, who is thought to be from Saudi Arabia, arrived in the capital this week with a fleet of gold cars worth more than £1million. Above, his gold £350,000 Rolls-Royce Phantom Coupe and Lamborghini Aventador, also worth £350,000
His vehicles include a £370,00 Mercedes G63, a six-wheel off-roader, a Bentley Flying Spur, worth £220,000, a £350,000 Rolls-Royce and a £350,000 Lamborghini Aventador SV.
They were spotted parked outside the five-star Mandarian Oriental hotel near Hyde Park over the Bank Holiday weekend before being driven through Kensington. Their journey also took them to Cadogan Place, where the average house price is just over £5.2million.
It is not known how much it costs to cover the cars in gold chrome wrap, but previous reports suggest it is in the region of £4,000 per vehicle.
The pictures signal the start of the city's supercar season, when wealthy Arabs flee the scorching hot temperatures of the Middle East and cruise around the British capital in their ostentatious vehicles.
The arrival of the supercars has become a regular event in recent years, with rich Kuwaitis, Saudis and Emiratis seeking to out-do each with their souped-up vehicles.
They are often spotted waiting in gridlocked traffic in some of central London's most popular areas or parked up outside designer shops and luxury boutiques, including Harrods.
PARKING COSTS £50 A DAY... SO IT'S CHEAPER TO GET A FINE Money is clearly no object to the Saudi owner of the golden supercars. When it comes to parking, however, there are savings to be made. The bay in Knightsbridge where three of the vehicles were left yesterday costs £4.60 an hour and can be used for a maximum of two hours. However, all three cars had been parked there for more than six hours. As a result, the owner was fined £80 per car (right) – which can be reduced to £40 if paid within 14 days. It means getting booked is cheaper than parking in one of the nearby car parks. Just 50m away there is an NCP car park where the charge for a 24-hour stay is £50. The Jumeirah Carlton Tower Hotel also charges £50 a day for leaving a vehicle in its underground car park. A spokesman for Kensington and Chelsea Council said that tickets issued to foreign cars and drivers are followed up to ensure they are not ignored.
The vehicles include a £370,00 Mercedes six-wheel off-roader (pictured), which looks more suited to the sand dunes than the congested streets of Kensington
The six-wheel vehicle, which includes a 5.5-litre V8 engine, was impossible to miss as passers-by wondered through the streets of Kensington over the weekend
A gold Mansory Bentley Flying Spur worth £220,000 was spotted parked up on the streets of London's wealthiest borough
The Bentley's wheels also feature a gold inner ring, with the car boasting a top speed of 200mph and the ability to go from 0-60mph in 4.6 seconds
The Rolls-Royce was spotted turning onto Cadogan Place later in the day, where the average house price is just over £5.2million
The Rolls-Royce, which also included gold around the logo on the wheels, matched the other vehicles in the fleet but stood out once parked up outside these central London houses
With a 6.75-litre engine, this £350,000 uber-coupe - described by the British manufacturer as being perfect for transcontinental adventures - will do 155mph
It is thought owners pay in excess of £20,000 to fly their vehicles around 3,000 miles to London. Qatar Airways is one of the operators that facilitates the transportation, with airport staff securing vehicles to the floor of the relevant aircraft before flight.
Last year, following numerous complaints, the Royal Borough of Kensington and Chelsea introduced a Public Spaces Protection Order in Knightsbridge.
Motorists are now banned from revving their engine, rapidly accelerating, racing, performing stunts, sounding horns or causing obstructions. They are also prohibited from leaving the engine of a stationary car running.
The PSPO came into place to deal with the 'excessive level of noise nuisance, annoyance, danger or risk or harm or injury' caused by the drivers.
Motorists who breach the order face a maximum £1,000 fine or fixed penalty notice of £100. Over the past three weeks seven drivers have been handed fixed penalty notices.
Council leader Cllr Nick Paget-Brown said: 'It's too early yet to judge the success of the PSPO but the police and the council will continue to ticket drivers who breach it until the message gets through that our residents are not to be disturbed by supercars.'
The cars were photographed outside the five-star Mandarin Oriental Hyde Park hotel, which, on its website, boasts 'world-famous restaurants' and a'stunning spa'
The pictures signal the start of the city's supercar season, when wealthy Arabs flee the scorching hot temperatures of the Middle East and cruise around the British capital in their ostentatious vehicles
The supercars - including the two above - are often spotted waiting in gridlocked traffic in some of central London's most popular areas or parked up outside designer shops and luxury boutiques, including Harrods
It is not known how much it costs to cover the cars in gold chrome wrap, but previous reports suggest it is in the region of £4,000 per vehicle
Last year, following numerous complaints, the Royal Borough of Kensington and Chelsea introduced a Public Spaces Protection Order in Knightsbridge, which bans motorists from making unnecessary noise and causing obstructions. Above, the tourist's MercedesBritish journalists could be treated as spies, and given up to 14 years in prison for handling state secrets, if proposals by the UK's Law Commission become law.
In 2015, the Commission, whose remit is to review and recommend reforms to UK legislation, was asked to examine laws relating to official data. Its recommendations, published last week, suggest the definition of the offence of espionage is changed so that it is "capable of being committed by someone who not only communicates information, but also by someone who obtains or gathers information" (PDF).
It would also lift restrictions on who can commit espionage. They would no longer have to be employees of the state, but could include journalists, NGOs or whistle-blowers, who wouldn't be able to use a public interest defence to protect themselves.
We don't have to look further than the 2013 Snowden leaks to understand the implications of the proposed changes - in fact they can be seen as a direct attack on the newspaper that broke the story.
'Criminalising journalism'
In June 2013, the Guardian published the first of many articles that showed that the UK and United States had been engaging in the mass surveillance of the world's digital communications.
The source of these claims was whistle-blower Edward Snowden, a former National Security Agency (NSA) contractor, who had stolen millions of files from his former employer.
Other media outlets including the Washington Post, The Intercept and Der Spiegel also published original stories using the leaked documents.
If the Law Commission's proposals had been in place, the Guardian's editor of the day, Alan Rusbridger, and other journalists would almost certainly have been charged with criminal offences for handling the Snowden files, never mind publishing stories based on them.
As it was, Rusbridger was hauled before a Home Affairs Select Committee to answer questions about his loyalty to the state and Government Communications Headquarters (GCHQ) technicians were dispatched to the Guardian's offices to smash up two computers that had stored the leaked Snowden documents.
This was a futile act, given that copies of the documents were stored elsewhere, but it symbolised the British government's frustration at its inability to control information in the digital age.
Or as the Law Commissioner, David Ormerod, put it: "Before the digital era, anyone engaging in espionage would be limited as to how much information they could access. But now, online communications and storage means the volume of information and associated risk is of a very different scale."
When democracies pass laws that threaten the freedom of press, they provide justification for authoritarian regimes to pass their own repressive laws, often in the name of national security.
The destruction of the Guardian's computers was a contributing factor in the UK's fall by three places to 33rd in the World Press Freedom Index.
More recently, a draconian surveillance law, the Investigatory Powers Act, has been condemned by the National Union of Journalists because it threatens the ability of journalists to keep their sources secret.
National Union of Journalists (NUJ) general secretary, Michelle Stanistreet, has also criticised the Law Commission's proposals for threatening public interest whistle-blowing and journalism ever further: "We have already faced many challenges and attacks on our right to report in the last few years. Could this be intended as another step taken to curtail the media in the UK?"
Consequences beyond the UK
If the UK Law Commission's proposals become law, there could be consequences for free speech beyond the UK.
When democracies pass laws that threaten the freedom of the press, they provide justification for authoritarian regimes to pass their own repressive laws, often in the name of national security.
OPINION: The IP Act - UK's most extreme surveillance law
The British prime minister, Theresa May, has tried to distance herself from the proposals, insisting that they were initiated under her predecessor David Cameron's leadership.
Given that the Home Office were a key part of the pre-consultation process, and May was serving as the Home Secretary during Cameron's second term in office, this lacks credibility.
However, the government is now aware of the scale of opposition to these proposals. The Law Commission needs to bring the laws regarding official data up-to-date, not drag them back into the last century.
The last thing the UK needs is a blanket ban on reporting wrongdoing at agencies which are already barely accountable to the public.
Jim Killock is executive director of Open Rights Group, which campaigns for privacy and free speech.
The views expressed in this article are the author's own and do not necessarily reflect Al Jazeera's editorial policy.HAVANA, Cuba — The US government is using a sophisticated cell phone program in a failed effort to spark anti-Castro demonstrations on the island, according to Cuban officials and a US expert.
The US Office of Cuba Broadcasting (OCB) sponsors a cell phone service called "Piramideo" (roughly translated as Pyramid), which spreads propaganda through text messages, according to Nestor Garcia, a former Cuban diplomat who now teaches at the Institute for International Relations in Havana.
"My students started getting text messages on their cell phones with news reports about demonstrations that never happened," Garcia said. "The US is trying to create a climate to protest against the Cuban government."
Piramideo, which has received little media coverage, is just one skirmish in an internet war between the American and Cuban governments, included ZunZuneo, a Twitter-like program secretly backed by USAID from 2010-12. USAID contractors developing ZunZuneo discussed plans to spark anti-government demonstrations.
In 2009 the Cuban government arrested Alan Gross, a USAID contractor, for distributing satellite phones aimed at establishing WiFi hotspots to be used by Cuba's small Jewish community. He was convicted of spying, sentenced to 15 years, and remains jailed in Havana.
The OCB publicly announced the existence of Piramideo in June 2013, and it continues to operate today.
Cubans with a cell phone capable of accepting text messages can sign up on Piramideo for free. They type in information on the Piramideo webpage or call a toll-free number to register by phone.
Users choose a name for their "pyramid" and then type in phone numbers for everyone they want to contact. They can then send free text messages through Piramideo to reach all their contacts at once. The service could be used to announce a family birthday party or call for illegal demonstrations.
Carlos Garcia-Perez, director of the OCB, denied that Piramideo aims to stir up dissent in Cuba. "We encourage people in Cuba to connect," he said in a phone interview from Miami. "What they communicate in Piramideo, it's entirely their business."
However, the OCB also oversees Radio Marti, TV Marti, and other programs that do encourage Cuban dissidents. André Mendes, Director of Global Operations at the Broadcasting Board of Governors — the OCB's parent body — told US Congress that "OCB works with dissidents in Cuba, the blogging community, and civil activists to improve access to the internet and information in Cuba…."
The US has a long history of attempting to overthrow the Cuban government, starting in the 1960s. The US sponsored numerous assassination attempts against Fidel Castro. Today it imposes a unilateral economic embargo on Cuba, which prohibits American trade or tourism. In recent years the US maintains that it helps promote democracy in Cuba through TV, radio and the internet.
Cuba blocks access to OCB media such as TV Marti. So the US government is constantly trying to find new methods to reach the Cuban public with pro-US messages.
A small number of conservative Cubans and CIA officials still believe these messages can have impact in Cuba, according to Nelson Valdes, a Cuba expert critical of US policy and sociology professor emeritus at the University of New Mexico in Albuquerque. "The real purpose of Piramideo is to stir up agitation against the government," he said.
Some 2 million Cubans now have cell phones and 2.6 million have some internet access, out of a population of 9.25 million over 14 years old. Cuba has one of the lowest per capita rates of internet usage in Latin America.
The OCB’s Garcia-Perez said he considers Piramideo a success because it has signed up 12,000 Cubans to date. He said the OCB doesn't track how the mostly young Cubans actually use the service.
Cuban exile groups also distribute free smart phones on the island in hopes of encouraging an anti-government uprising. Radio Marti also distributes free phones as part of station giveaways.
Nestor Garcia's students received free phones with a year's service from friends of friends. The phones were preprogrammed with Piramideo. They immediately started receiving anti-government text messages, which he claimed they deleted.
Piramideo and similar programs have little impact on the island, according to Cuba expert Valdes. He said most young Cubans ignore politics whether from their own government or the US.
"I'm not surprised that users ignore the messages," he said, adding that young Cubans "are depoliticized."
That aversion to political messages was confirmed by an internal evaluation of the US ZunZuneo program. A contractor hired by the USAID sent out satirical, anti-Castro tweets in a test phase, but got a negative reaction, according to an Associated Press investigation.
The contractor analyzed messages that responded to the satire. Only 3 percent were "anti-revolutionary," according to the AP. Most users were suspicious of the anonymous nature of the tweets. ZunZuneo closed in 2012 when USAID funding ran out, and the agency was unable to find anyone to continue it.
Piramideo and the various US programs hope to capitalize on Cuban complaints about the country's mobile phone and internet services. Until 2008 the Cuban government prohibited citizens from owning cell phones. When the law changed, hundreds of thousands signed up.
In May, Cuba's state owned phone company launched a new email system for smart phones called Nauta. Subscribers could send and receive emails but not search the web. The initial crush of emails overwhelmed the phone company and crashed the entire cell phone system for some days. Cubans report that Nauta is now operating again, albeit slower.
Cubans also complain about the high cost and slow speed of internet connections. Cubans can visit government internet sites and pay $4.50/hour for a slow connection. Others can access a dial up connection from home. Hotels in Havana charge $7/hour for a WiFi connection that is considerably faster, although still slow by international standards. On average Cubans earn $20/month, so any of these options are very expensive.
Government officials blame the island's internet problems on the US embargo. US phone companies are prohibited from connecting broadband cables from Florida to Cuba. That forces Cuba to rely on a Canadian satellite broadband connection, which is both limited and expensive.
So the island looked forward to better service after Venezuela finished laying a new broadband cable to Cuba in 2011. But it took another two years to become active and, even today, its operation has never been officially announced. It has improved connectivity but not nearly enough to meet the growing demand, according to Cubans interviewed at random.
Esteban Martinez owns a small business with his gay partner Luis Benitez. They pay $60/month for a dial up connection that takes forever to connect, according to Martinez. He reads Spanish language news from Spain, Latin America and even occasionally peruses the stridently anti-Castro Spanish edition of the Miami Herald.
The Cuban government blocks various websites, including pornography and some ultra-right wing, anti-Castro groups. It intermittently blocks some news sites, dissident bloggers and an eBay-like site called Revolico.com because it sometimes offers illegal items for sale.
Martinez said he has plenty of complaints about the Cuban government. For example he and his partner would like to see gay marriage legalized in Cuba.
But they ignore the websites of dissidents such as blogger Yoani Sanchez.
In Martinez' view, Sanchez is tainted by her association with the US and its embargo of Cuba. "I want to see discussion of problems, but the US encourages discussion for its own motives," he said.
A Cuban in his mid-20s disagreed. He has internet access through his work as a low-level government employee. He learned about Sanchez from foreign news broadcasts and is curious about her views. But he would never access her blog from work, fearing possible retaliation from superiors.
He acknowledged that few Cubans have actually read her blog although it hasn't been blocked since 2011. He said most Cubans don't care about her, and even if they had internet access, it could take 20 minutes to call up her homepage.
Cuba expert Valdes noted that Cubans on the island don't generally visit the websites of anti-Castro groups or dissidents. When they connect, he said, they view the same sites as young people everywhere. "They want to know if Colombians are as scantily clad as Cubans," he said.
Cubans remain sharply critical of their country's cell phone and internet systems, but aren't gravitating towards alternatives promoted by the US, according to Valdes.
Retired diplomat Garcia said Piramideo will suffer the same fate as previous US efforts to undermine the Cuban government. He suspects that his students knew the free phones came from US sources. They were just happy to get a free phone for a year.
"They still have the cell phones," he said.
And they just keep deleting the text messages.
Reese Erlich has reported from Cuba since 1968. He is author of Dateline Havana: The Real Story of US Policy and the Future of Cuba.Sen. Ted Cuz (R-Texas) took to Twitter to reply to actor Charlie Sheen, who suggested they run on a ticket together for the next presidential election.
"Glad to see @charliesheen embracing conservative principles, but Americans just rejected another political dynasty,” Cruz tweeted, with a photo of Martin Sheen from the hit political TV show “The West Wing.”
Cruz’s joke referenced Charlie Sheen’s father’s role as President Jed Bartlet in "The West Wing," and also took a swing at president-elect Donald Trump Donald John TrumpREAD: Cohen testimony alleges Trump knew Stone talked with WikiLeaks about DNC emails Trump urges North Korea to denuclearize ahead of summit Venezuela's Maduro says he fears 'bad' people around Trump MORE’s presidential rival Hillary Clinton Hillary Diane Rodham ClintonREAD: Cohen testimony alleges Trump knew Stone talked with WikiLeaks about DNC emails County GOP in Minnesota shares image comparing Sanders to Hitler Holder: 'Time to make the Electoral College a vestige of the past' MORE.
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Cruz and Sheen have traded tweets back and forth since the actor posted wished death upon Trump.
He tweeted Wednesday to his 11.8 million Twitter followers: “Dear God; Trump next please!”
Cruz then replied to the post:
"Glad to see @charliesheen seeking God & following the admonition of 1 Timothy 2:2, but somehow I don't think that's what the verse means," he wrote.
Glad to see @charliesheen seeking God & following the admonition of 1 Timothy 2:2, but somehow I don't think that's what the verse means.... https://t.co/8aihNrwGmn — Ted Cruz (@tedcruz) December 29, 2016
That’s when the actor responded to the former Republican presidential candidate, calling on him to revive his presidential aspirations for a joint run. “In 4 years, we can unseat this guy!!” Sheen tweeted. “You bring the AWESOME, I’ll bring the WINNING!!"Put away that crystal ball: the future is almost here. Daedalic Entertainment is excited to announce that forthcoming futuristic thriller State of Mind will launch on PlayStation 4, Xbox One, Nintendo Switch and Steam for PC, Mac and Linux on 15th August, 2018.
Developed in Unreal Engine, State of Mind takes a sharp look at the immense technological promise of today by jumping us forward to Berlin in 2048. Players take on the role of Richard Nolan, a journalist whose life is starting to fall apart. His wife and child have disappeared and his memories are slipping away.
State of Mind boasts a unique low-poly visual style - designed to represent the fragmented nature of Richard’s world - as well as several playable characters and about 15 hours of engaging gameplay.
The world is on the brink. Lack of resources, polluted air and water, crime on the rise, and rampant wars have left populations disillusioned with and detached from reality. Drones and humanoid robots replace humans in the public sector; everything is interconnected, and surveillance has become omnipresent.
It’s down to Richard to find out what’s going on, both in his own life and in the world around him. It’s an investigation that draws him closer to the new and supposedly perfect virtual world “City 5” that more and more people depressed with their real lives are embracing. What happens when he discovers that his life in the real world is somehow linked to that of a complete stranger living out their days in this new virtual one?
“State of Mind is a game about transhumanism and its all-in bet on the future,” explains the game’s author, Martin Ganteföhr. “It is, however, not a game about the technology of tomorrow, but about tomorrow’s people. In the center of this narrative is the motif of separation and reunion. What happens, if the future creates fractures between body and mind? Between reality and constructs? Between biological and virtual ego?”
The game’s main protagonist, Richard Nolan, is one of the few journalists openly criticizing this development. When he wakes up in hospital after an explosion and finds that his wife and son have mysteriously vanished, Richard realizes: he and his family have become more than just bystanders in a storm of rivaling ideas pertaining humankind’s salvation between dystopian reality and digital utopia. Instead, they find themselves right at the center of it.
Ganteföhr continues: “State of Mind picks up the idea to make something whole from fragments. Richard, our protagonist, has to rearrange and sort out his life. He has to endure disruptions of social, technological and very personal nature. The motif of fragments, clearly visible in the key visuals and style, transcends the whole game: it is embedded in the narrative structure, the visuals, the main characters’ core concepts and even in the mechanics of ‘Reconstruction’.”
State of Mind features:
An unsettling vision of the near future players can throw themselves into
Dive into a multi-layered Sci-Fi thriller, where dystopian reality and digital utopia are intertwined
Unravel a global conspiracy in a society of ubiquitous digitalism, surveillance and transhumanism
Explore a world with a rich and unique visual style, combining realistic environments with low-poly characters
Take on the role of journalist Richard Nolan, as well as five additional playable characters
Use dexterity, deductional skill and research to reconstruct Richard‘s past
State of Mind is now available for preorder on Steam and GOG. The MSRP for the PC, Mac and Linux version is 29,99 Euro/USD and 39,99 Euro/USD on consoles.By Ian C. Brackman
Picture this.
R.A. Dickey is standing on the top step of the home dugout watching Noah Syndergaard, the top prospect he was traded for, pitch to Jose Reyes.
The first pitch is a ball in the dirt, deftly blocked by Travis D’Arnaud, the former Blue Jay uber-prospect and the other piece of the Dickey deal.
The 6’6 Syndergaard comes set, delivers. Reyes swings and hits a line shot to third base. David Wright, the Mets captain manning the hot corner, sprawls to his left knocks the ball down and fires to first, robbing his former teammate of a hit.
Did I mention this was all happening at the Stade Olympique in Montreal?
Gary Carter’s old number 8 hangs in the rafters. Pedro Martinez, Larry Walker, Moises Alou, John Wetteland, Cliff Floyd, Marquis Grissom and other members of the 1994 Montreal Expos are looking on.
Whispers of an Expos return hum through Olympic Stadium.
Blue Jays GM Alex Anthopoulos got his first baseball gig with the Expos. Now, criticisms of the GM for not signing Ervin Santana, Ubaldo Jimenez, or Matt Garza buzz through the bleachers and the twitter sphere.
A “Let’s Go Expos” chant choruses through the stadium. Noah Syndergaard strikes out Colby Rasmus.
Yes, the Blue Jays and Mets exhibition series in Montreal on March 28, 29 will be an intriguing one for all Canadian baseball fans. The crossover between the three teams in question is abundant with story lines galore.
The Gary Carter – David Wright connection might be the coolest. Gary Carter is the first player ever inducted into the Baseball Hall of Fame wearing an Expos hat. Carter, of course, went on to lead the Mets to a World Series victory in 1986. The late Carter is also one of only four players ever to be named Mets captain along with Keith Hernandez, John Franco, and current third baseman, David Wright.
On the 28th a tribute for Carter will be held prior to the game.
The next night is dedicated to the 1994 World Series Champion Montreal Expos. OK, they didn’t actually win it, but they would have had the season not been cut short due to a strike. The Expos carried a record of 74-40 that year and were the best team in all of baseball. It’s one of the great tragedies of baseball that they didn’t get a chance to play that season out.
The Olympic Stadium games will be a chance to reflect on the golden years of baseball in Canada. The early 90’s, with the Blue Jays magical back to back Championships in 1992 and 1993, and then the torrid Expos of 1994. It’s hard to believe that was 20 years ago, eh?
The Jays haven’t been in the playoffs since, the Expos are now in Washington, so enjoy the games Canadian baseball fans. Enjoy watching players being trod out on the Big O turf again and a possible Youppi appearance.
Enjoy all the weirdness watching teams that aren’t the Expos play at Olympic Stadium. Try to remember the good times and good teams who took to the turf over the years. Because this series could be as good as it gets for Expos and Jays fans this year.
Ah, the Big O. You gotta love it.
_________________________
AdvertisementsThe inaugural European GP in Azerbaijan will be a twilight race after a 6pm local start time was confirmed for June's Baku event.
With the timings for 2016's record 21-race calendar released, Azerbaijan has been listed to start at 6pm local time for both qualifying and the race on June 18-19, which is 2pm BST.
Sunset in Baku, Azerbaijan's capital city, will not occur until 9.15pm in mid-June, making the grand prix the sport's latest twilight event.
The Trump Tower at dusk in Baku
The start times of five races were moved forward by an hour last year after recommendations by the Accident Panel which looked into Jules Bianchi's accident at Suzuka in 2014. They requested that GP start times shall not be less than four hours before either sunset or dusk, unless they are designated night races.
The scheduling of Azerbaijan's F1 debut has provoked controversy with race day clashing with the finale of the Le Mans 24 Hours. The prestigious endurance race concludes at 2pm BST on Sunday June 19.
Elsewhere on the calendar, the session times largely remain the same as 2015.
Sky F1 viewers will be able to watch the season-opening Australian GP, which is exclusively live on the channel, at 5am on March 20.
Bahrain and Singapore remain F1's two full night races, starting at 6pm and 8pm local time respectively, while the traditional European races, including the British GP in July, begin at 1pm UK time as usual.
2016 F1 grands prix - UK start times
March 20: Australia - 5am (GMT)
April 3: Bahrain - 4pm (BST)
April 17: China - 7am (BST)
May 1: Russia - 1pm (BST)
May 15: Spain - 1pm (BST)
May 29: Monaco - 1pm (BST)
June 12: Canada - 7pm (BST)
June 19: Azerbaijan - 2pm (BST)
July 3: Austria - 1pm (BST)
July 10: Great Britain - 1pm (BST)
July 24: Hungary - 1pm (BST)
July 31: Germany - 1pm (BST)
August 28: Belgium - 1pm (BST)
September 4: Italy - 1pm (BST)
September 18: Singapore - 1pm (BST)
October 2: Malaysia - 8am (BST)
October 9: Japan - 6am (BST)
October 23: USA - 8pm (BST)
October 30: Mexico - 7pm (GMT)
November 13: Brazil - 4pm (GMT)
November 27: Abu Dhabi - 1pm (GMT)Known as "The BLT" - Baloo the American black bear, Leo the lion and Shere Khan the Bengal tiger have been living together in an enclosure at an animal shelter for the last 15 years.
The three were found only a few months old by police during a drugs raid in Atlanta, Georgia, in 2001.
They were discovered malnourished and underweight, cowering in cages under the house.
We’ll tell you what’s true. You can form your own view. From 15p €0.18 $0.18 $0.27 a day, more exclusives, analysis and extras.
Ever since, they have lived together in an enclosure at Noah's Ark Animal Sanctuary, which now includes a creek and a wooden home complete with a wrap-around porch.
The suburban sanctuary, south-west of Atlanta, said of the trio: "Baloo, Leo and Shere Khan eat, sleep, and play together and even seek out grooming and affection from one another, head rubbing and licking each another.
"Their terrifying early months in life bonded the three together and they are truly inseparable despite their obvious differences."
Shape Created with Sketch. Lion, bear and tiger live together Show all 7 left Created with Sketch. right Created with Sketch. Shape Created with Sketch. Lion, bear and tiger live together 1/7 Leo, Baloo and Shere Khan - "brothers" since cubs Noah's Ark Animal Sanctuary 2/7 Leo watching Shere Khan wade through their enclosure's creek Noah's Ark Animal Sanctuary 3/7 Leo and Shere Khan Noah's Ark Animal Sanctuary 4/7 The BLT (Leo, Baloo and Shere Khan) while still cubs Noah's Ark Animal Sanctuary 5/7 Baloo licking Shere Khan's nose Noah's Ark Animal Sanctuary 6/7 Baloo nuzzling his "brother" Shere Khan Noah's Ark Animal Sanctuary 7/7 (From left) Shere Khan, Leo and Baloo on the verandah of their enclosure den Noah's Ark Animal Sanctuary 1/7 Leo, Baloo and Shere Khan - "brothers" since cubs Noah's Ark Animal Sanctuary 2/7 Leo watching Shere Khan wade through their enclosure's creek Noah's Ark Animal Sanctuary 3/7 Leo and Shere Khan Noah's Ark Animal Sanctuary 4/7 The BLT (Leo, Baloo and Shere Khan) while still cubs Noah's Ark Animal Sanctuary 5/7 Baloo licking Shere Khan's nose Noah's Ark Animal Sanctuary 6/7 Baloo nuzzling his "brother" Shere Khan Noah's Ark Animal Sanctuary 7/7 (From left) Shere Khan, Leo and Baloo on the verandah of their enclosure den Noah's Ark Animal Sanctuary
The only time the three were separated was during surgery on Baloo to cut him out of the harness his former captors had placed him in.
Noah's Ark said of that time: "Shere Khan the tiger and Leo the lion became extremely agitated because of it, pacing and vocalizing for the lost member of their family to return.
"After his surgery, Baloo was returned to his brothers and the three have been together ever since, with hardly a quarrel between them."
We’ll tell you what’s true. You can form your own view.
At The Independent, no one tells us what to write. That’s why, in an era of political lies and Brexit bias, more readers are turning to an independent source. Subscribe from just 15p a day for extra exclusives, events and ebooks – all with no ads.
Subscribe nowThe U.S. Federal Bureau of Investigation has found more attempts to hack the voter registration systems of states, ahead of national elections.
The agency had reportedly found evidence in August that foreign hackers had breached state election databases in Illinois and Arizona, but it appears that there have been other attempts as well, besides frequent scanning activities, which the FBI describes as preludes for possible hacking attempts.
"There have been a variety of scanning activities, which is a preamble for potential intrusion activities, as well as some attempted intrusions at voter registration databases beyond those we knew about in July and August," FBI Director James Comey told the House Judiciary Committee on Wednesday.
Comey said that the systems that could be at risk were the voter registration systems that are connected to the Internet. The vote system in the U.S., in contrast, is hard to hack into “because it's so clunky and dispersed,” he added. He advised states to get the best information they can get from the Department of Homeland Security and ensure their systems are tight as there is "no doubt that some bad actors have been poking around."
“We are doing an awful lot of work through our counter-intelligence investigators to understand just what mischief is Russia up to in connection with our elections,” Comey said. U.S. officials have hinted that they believe Russia is behind recent attacks on servers of the Democratic National Committee, which led to the leak of embarrassing emails through whistleblowing website, WikiLeaks. But the U.S. government has not directly attributed the attacks to Russia.
Security experts and Democratic party president candidate Hillary Clinton have blamed Russia for the attack, but Republican party candidate Donald Trump said nobody knows it was the Russians, adding that the hack could have come from Russia, China or a 400-pound hacker working from his bed.
The U.S. government is not sure whether Russia, which is said to have interfered in U.S. elections since the 1960s, aims to influence the outcome of the election or try to sow seeds of doubt about the sanctity of the process, Director of National Intelligence James R. Clapper recently told The Washington Post in an interview.
Clapper said that “there’s a tradition in Russia of interfering with elections, their own and others.” To ensure that hackers don’t get to the electoral system, the DHS is working with state election officials on best practices on security, specially where there is any dependence on the Internet, Clapper said.
So far 18 states have requested the assistance of the DHS, said Secretary Jeh Johnson, in testimony this week before a Senate committee.So after much drama, Gujarat Chief Minister Narendra Modi has finally been declared the BJP's Prime Ministerial candidate.
There's no doubt that Modi has achieved it with great shrewdness and strategy. He has changed the rules of the game in Indian politics by doing everything differently.
After the Congress won in 2009, if anyone had suggested that Modi could be PM in 2014, then it would have been considered impossible at that time.
But the Congress has scored a slew of own goals and Modi has made some smart moves to give himself an outside chance at becoming PM.
A look at those steps...
Step 1: Getting Gujarat on his side
In 2002, Modi was expected to lose the Assembly elections. His win surprised many and cemented his place as the leader of the Gujarati people.
In 2007, an anti-incumbency wave was supposed to set in, but Gujarat supported him solidly.
The 2012 elections were seen as a sort of referendum to find out whether people wanted Modi as PM or not. He won that too.
Step 2: Making India Inc an ally
Corporate Gujarat was one of the first entities to rally around Modi and soon Corporate India followed suit.
Stalwarts like Ratan Tata, Mukesh Ambani and even Narayana Murthy have praised him publicly.
His Vibrant Gujarat Summit has been a huge success in that regard.
Step 3: Refusing to apologize for Godhra
Hypocrites apologize and move on. Soon the people forget |
, gives you nightmares, then you’re the type of person for which Trophy was made, but you’re also the type of person who will find the film unendurable. —Andy Crump / Full Review
Whose Streets?
Director: Sabaah Folayan
Following the murder of 18-year-old Michael Brown by a police officer in Ferguson, Missouri, filmmakers Sabaah Folayan and Damon Davis examine the American media’s biased, racist coverage of the tragedy and the protests in response. Whose Streets? asks that—rather than if black lives matter to prosecutors, or State’s Attorneys or the American police (all culprits in the teen boy’s modern-day lynching)—viewers place their faith in those real heroes, like activists Brittany Farrell and David Whitt. You might go into Whose Streets? expecting to simply see a film about the Black Lives Matter movement and some of the people behind it. And if you are of the opinion that black lives do matter, you might expect to be moved and motivated to either continue on in your activism, or take to the streets for the first time in your life. I, for one, anticipated another powerful, but difficult, film, similar to 13th and this year’s equally excellent The Blood is on The Doorstep. And while I was right, I also had no idea how deeply personal the protestors’ stories would get. The directors frame the film around the very young children of the activists they follow, but Whose Streets? is one of those rare and wonderful experiences in which a piece’s framing manages to both enhance and intensify the central narrative. “Whose Streets?” refers to the protest chant encouraging people to take back their neighborhoods from the cops and racist, classist policies that would seek to destroy them, but the answer to the question is actually more devastating: These streets—whether they’re covered in the blood of slain, unarmed black people, or humming with protestors both peaceful and riotous, or swarming with members of the national guard in tanks, sent in to militarize an entire city—these streets are always seen and experienced through the eyes of those with the least ability to change it, and the most to lose. By personalizing the experiences of their activist subjects, and demanding viewers see how the subjects’ choices and sacrifices directly impact their children and families, Whose Streets? becomes all about the kids and, therefore, all about the the future. And so much of that future, the film seems to insist, is dependent on the emotion and anger that keeps the film’s subjects in the streets, and the cameras in the hands of the filmmakers who also put their own bodies on the line. A political documentary that dares acknowledge rage as a tool as useful as hope or faith: That is one that [Black] America will surely need in 2017, and beyond. —Shannon M. Houston
The Work
Directors: Jairus McLeary, Gethin Aldous
The men of The Work talk, cry and bond over the course of a remarkable four-day group therapy session. This intense, cathartic documentary from Jairus McLeary and Gethin Aldous takes us inside a unique Folsom Prison program in which people from the outside sit side-by-side with hardened criminals in order to get in touch with personal issues. The intimacy of the setting is matched by the candor of these individuals, who unearth buried pain with startling clarity. But the breakthroughs don’t just happen on screen: The Work is revelatory in how it asks us to examine our own prejudices—about masculinity, about those in prison and about the unlikelihood of making a difference in a stranger’s life. You’ll be moved by what you see in The Work, and maybe even restored. —Tim GriersonMan claims abandoned homes are up for grabs A family went out of town only to return home to find a man had moved into their home and changed the locks. And this wasn't the first time this has happened. WLWT News 5's Karin Johnson investigates if the move is legal and what the homeowners can do to get back into their home. Share Shares Copy Link Copy
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WEBVTT RETURNS TO FIND "SOMEONE ELSE"HAS MOVED INTO THEIR HOME OF 21YEARS!THAT PERSON SAYS HE HAS COURTDOCUMENTS TO PROVE THE HOUSE ISNOW HIS.WLWT NEWS FIVE'S KARIN JOHNSONINVESTIGATED.. AND UNCOVERED ADOZEN CASES.. LINKED TO THE SAMEMAN...A SPRINGDALE FAMILY SAYS THEY'RESO SCARED... THEY'VE ASKED USNOT TO IDENTIFY THEM.. THEY'REMOVING TO PITTSBURGH.. AND THEBANK IS FORECLOSING ON THEIRHOME HERE. BUT THEY CAME HOMEONE AFTERNOON TO FIND LOCKS HADBEEN CHANGED, AND NOT BY THEBANK.(victim: we did the only thingfamily should do, we went andtook care of him) CARING FOR ADYING FATHER.. BATTLING HEALTHISSUES... THIS HAS BEEN A ROUGHYEAR FOR THE FAMILY.(it's really been hard) AND ITJUST GOT WORSE.(victim walking and showing usthe window: this is the windowthey broke in, they opened thiswindow and took the airconditioner out) A STRANGER...CHANGED THE LOCKS... AND EMPTIEDTHE HOUSE.....WHENCONFRONTED---(VICTIM: this gentleman said,now I understand why you're soupset you thought you've beenrobbed. DUH! Isn't that what youdid to us?) MEET ROBERT CARR. HESHOWED THE FAMILY A DOCUMENT HEFILED WITH HAMILTON COUNTYCOURTS. IT'S CALLED A QUIETTITLE--- SAYING THE HOUSE THAT'SBEEN THEIRS FOR 21 YEARS, IS NOWHIS.(ALISON WARNER/ATTORNE Y: whathe's looking for is full is fulltitle and ownership of the home)...WITHOUT PAYING A DIME.(WARNER: he's in their home,they don't know when he'sthere. He can be there now.) HEWASN'T AT THE HOME ON SPRINGDALELAKE DRIVE WHEN WE WERE THERE...INSTEAD WE TRACKED HIM DOWN AT AHOUSE ON GENEVA ROAD IN FORESTPARK...(hi, are you mr robert carr?)WHERE'S HE'S DONE THE SAMETHING.(ROBERT CARR: why not? Theproperty's vacant) AND...OURINVESTIGATION FOUND... 11HOUSES... INSPRINGDALE, FOREST PARK,FAIRFIELD AND HAMILTON... WHERECARR HAS FILED THE SAMEPAPERWORK...SEVEN ON THE SAME DAY.(CARR: when you abandon aproperty, bam! Walk away fromit. I ain't never coming back, Idon't want nothing to do withit, right? Somebody can come inohhh mine.) CARR'S EVEN POSTEDNO TRESPASSING SIGNS...(CARR: I don't care about adeed, I don't need a deed.)(karin: you can just come in andchange the locks and becomeowner? Carr: Anybody can,anybody can)(CARR: have a team of people whogo out and I say make sure thehouse is empty, if it's empty,change the locks) CREATINGHEARTACHE... FOR FAMILIES WHOARE ALREADY GOING THROUGH AROUGH TIME.(WARNER: this is stress that hasfallen on their shoulders outof no where, after the death ofa loved one and now they'reresponsible to answer to this)THAT'S ON TOP OF THE FEAR THEFAMILY SAYS THEY NOW LIVE IN.(VICTIM: I feel violated, veryscared ya know, because I neverknow if somebody's going to behere)IN ONE OF THE CASES, CARR HASBEEN CHARGED WITH BREAKING ANDENTERING... A CHARGE HE ISFIGHTING. THIS IS A COPY OF HISINDICTMENT.... WHICH HE REJECTEDAND EVEN WROTE ON THE FRONT"OFFER NOT ACCEPTED."THE F-B-I WON'T COMMENT ON THISSPECIFIC CASE... BUT TELLS US...IT HAS SEEN SIMILAR CASESBEFORE...(KEVIN CORNELIUS/SPECIA L AGENTIN CHARGE, FBI: they'll cometogether as groups to receivetraining, how to conduct some ofthese schemes from a financialstandpoint, to understand whatthey consider the common law andhow they can use that common lawfor their sovereign purposes)SPECIAL AGENT IN CHARGE, KEVINCORNELIUS TELLS US... CLAIMSLIKE THIS... HAVE NO BASIS INTHE LAW.(CORNELIUS: i'm not familiar ofany cases where it's held up incourt. I think that it holds upthe process of the courtsdecision)IF YOU WANT TO CAN READ THEDOCUMENTS CARR IS FILING WITHTHECOURTS... WE HAVE THEMPOSTED.. ON WLWT-DOT-COM.Interview of a senior Russian Foreign Intelligence analyst
source: http://argumenti.ru/toptheme/n481/394395
by Alexander Chuikov, translated by “D”
On the northern outskirts of Moscow, under the reliable protection of the Interior Troops, lies low a former secret Institute of the Foreign Intelligence Service (SVR). Nowadays, on top of its front gate there flaunt golden letters: ‘Russian Institute of Strategic Studies’. But the peaceful name would not mislead the knowing, as more than two hundred employees are forging here the analytical shield of the homeland.
Will there be a new war in the South-Eastern of the Ukraine? Who is behind the US president? Why many of our officials can be called ideological agents of influence? To these and other questions of “AN”, weighing every word as usual, answers the Director of the RISS, Retired Lieutenant General Leonid RESHETNIKOV.
Rivals in the same field
– You used to have a serious “boss”, the SVR. Why were you suddenly declassified?
– We indeed used to be a classified institute of foreign intelligence focusing on the analysis of available information on the near and far abroad. That is, the information that is needed not only by the intelligence, but also by the structures that define the country’s foreign policy. Oddly enough, but in the Administration of the President of Russia (AP) such serious analytical centers didn’t exist. Although there had been plenty of “institutions”, in which there were only a director, a secretary girl and director’s wife serving as an analyst. The AP lacked real professionals, and the intelligence community had to offer some of theirs.
Today, our founder is the President of Russia, and all government research requests are signed by the Head of Administration Sergei Ivanov.
– How much is your analytics in demand? We are indeed a ‘paper country’, everyone writes a lot, but does it have an impact on the final result?
– Sometimes we see actions that resonate with our analytical notes. Sometimes it is amazing that once you speak out certain ideas, and then they become a trend in the Russian public opinion. Apparently, many of them are thick in the air.
– In the US, the Stratfor think tank and the strategic research center RAND Corporation are doing something alike. Which of you is “cooler”?
– When, after been transferred to the AP in April 2009, we were drafting a new charter of the Institute, we were told, as a wish, that we should follow their example. I thought then, “If you finance us, like Stratfor or RAND Corporation are being financed, then we would put all these foreign think tanks to shame.” After all, Russian analysts are the strongest in the world. Especially regional experts, who have more “fresh” minded and unbiased brains. I can talk about it with confidence, after all I’ve done 33 years of analytics, first in the KGB First Chief Directorate (FCD), and then in the Foreign Intelligence Service.
Oh NGO, where art thou taking us?
– It is well known, that RAND Corporation had developed a plan for Ukraine ‘antiterrorist operation’ in the South-East of the country. Did your institute produce information on the Ukraine, in particular the Crimea?
– Of Course. Basically, only two institutes had been worked on Ukraine: the RISS and Konstantin Zatulin’s Institute of CIS countries. Since inception, we had been writing analytical reports on the growth of anti-Russian sentiment in the mainland Ukraine and strengthening of pro-Russian one in the Crimea. We had been analyzing the activity of the Ukrainian authorities. But we were not producing alarmist information, like ‘all is lost’, but rather drawing attention to the growing problem.
We suggested significantly enhancing the work of pro-Russian non-governmental organizations (NGOs), strengthening, as they say now, the pressure of “soft power” policy.
– With such Ambassador, as Zurabov, we need no enemies!
– Activities of any embassy and ambassador is limited by a multitude of constraints. Once one exceeds them, there would be a scandal. Furthermore, lack of professional staff is a real problem in Russia. And not only in the diplomatic field. Public service has depleted, so to speak, there are very few people with a strong core left.
The role of NGOs is difficult to overestimate. A striking example are the color revolutions, which are fomented by foreign, especially American, non-governmental organizations. This was the case in the Ukraine. Unfortunately, attention is not actually paid to the creation and support of such organizations, which would act in our interest. And if they were there, they would substitute for ten embassies and ten even very smart ambassadors. Now the situation has begun to change after the direct instructions by the President. May God grant, that subordinates do not make a pig’s ear of this development.
What if there’s a war tomorrow
– How, in your opinion, the situation will develop in Novorossia in spring and summer? Will there be a new military campaign?
– Alas, the probability is very high. A year ago, the idea of federalization of the Ukraine was feasible. But now Kiev needs only war, only a unitary state. That is for several reasons. The main one is that ideologically anti-Russian people have stood at the head of the country who are not just subordinates of Washington, but literally are on a payroll of the forces that hide behind the US government.
– And what does this notorious “world government” want?
– It’s easier to say what they want not: they don’t want a federal Ukraine, it would be too difficult to control. It would be impossible to deploy there their military bases, and a new tier of missile defense. And indeed, there are such plans. From Lugansk and Kharkov cruise tactical missiles can reach the Transurals, where our main nuclear deterrent forces are located. And with 100% probability they would be able to hit mine-based and vehicle-based ballistic missiles home on the take-off path. Now this area is available to them neither from Poland nor from Turkey nor from the South-East Asia. That is the main goal. Therefore, the US will fight for the Donbass to the last Ukrainian.
– That is, the shale gas fields, which are in the area, don’t really matter?
– The main strategic objective is a unitary Ukraine under their full control to fight Russia. Shale gas, or arable land are just a nice bonus. Collateral winnings. Plus a serious blow to our defense industry due to rupture of relations between Ukraine and Russia DIC. It’s already done.
– So, we’ve been outplayed, “son of a bitch” Yanukovych had to be evacuated with the help of special forces, and Washington has installed his own “sons of bitches”, right?
– From the military strategic point of view, of course, we’ve been outplayed. Russia’s got the Crimea as a “compensation”. And another “compensation” is the resistance of the inhabitants of the South East of the Ukraine. But the enemy has already obtained a vast territory that once was part of the Soviet Union and the Russian Empire.
– What will we see this year in the Ukraine?
– Process of half-decay or even complete decay. Many just grew quiet for the time being in the face of the real Nazism. But the people who understand that the Ukraine and Russia are connected firmly, have not had their say yet. Neither in Odessa or Kharkov or in Zaporozhye, nor in Chernigov. Silence is not forever. And the cover of the boiler inevitably blows off.
– And how will the relations develop between the Novorossiya and the rest of the Ukraine?
– There is an unlikely scenario Transnistria. But I do not believe in it – the territory of the DPR and LPR is much bigger, millions of people have been drawn into the war. Russia is so far able to persuade the leaders of the militia to maintain a temporary respite and a truce. But it is indeed “temporary”. There is no talking about any kind of the Novorossiya rejoining the Ukraine. People of the Southeast do not want to be Ukrainians.
– Since our country has already been isolated by the world because of the adjunction of the Crimea, then why not go for broke in the Southeast? Isn’t one fed up with hypocrisy?
– In my opinion, it’s too early to go for broke. We underestimate the awareness of our President, who knows that some processes protected from prying eyes are currently under way in Europe. They give us hope that we will be able to defend our interests with methods and means.
A front without the front line
– Amid the information flows associated with the Ukraine, we tend to forget about the explosive growth of religious extremism in Central Asia…
– This is an extremely dangerous trend for our country. There is a very difficult situation in Tajikistan. Kyrgyzstan is unstable too. But the first strike could be directed at Turkmenistan, just as your paper wrote. We somehow forget about it a bit, due to the fact that Ashgabat keeps apart. But this “apartment” may collapse first. Do they have enough forces to defend themselves? Or will we have to intervene in a country that keeps us on a fairly remote distance? So that is a difficult area.
And not only due to the penetration of “Islamic state” militants into the region. According to recent data, the US and NATO are not going to leave Afghanistan and will retain their bases there. From a military point of view, five or ten thousand soldiers who remain within a month can be expanded into a 50 to 100 thousand strong group.
This is a part of an overall plan of encircling and putting pressure on Russia, which is carried by the USA to overthrow President Vladimir Putin and divide the country. An ordinary man in the street can, of course, not believe it, but people who have significant amount of information, are well aware.
– What will be the boundaries of the split?
– Initially they plan to pick up what “lies loose”. It does not matter what will break away: Kaliningrad, North Caucasus or the Far East. This will be the detonator of the process would go on as an avalanche. This idea is not propaganda, but real. Such pressure from west (the Ukraine) and south (Central Asia) will only increase. While trying to seep through the western gate, they are also testing the strength of the southern one.
– Where is our most dangerous strategic direction?
– Southern direction is very dangerous. But so far there are buffer states – former Soviet Central Asian republics. And to the west, the war is already at the border. On our territory, in fact.
What goes on there is not a fight between Ukrainians and Russians, but the war of world systems. Some people believe that they “are Europe”, while others associate themselves with Russia. After all, our country it’s not just a territory, but a distinct huge civilization that brought to the world its views on the world order. First, of course, there was the Russian Empire as a model of an Eastern Orthodox civilization. The Bolsheviks destroyed it, but produced a new civilizational idea. Now we have come very close to a third one. In 5-6 years we will see this.
– What will it be?
– I think it will be a good symbiosis of the earlier ones. And our “sworn colleagues” are well aware. Therefore, the attack began from all sides.
– That is, the joint Russian-American fight against terrorism, in particular with ISIS, is a fiction?
– Of course. America creates terrorists, feeds and trains them, and then gives command to the whole pack: “Attack!”. Maybe one “mad dog” from this pack will be shot, but the rest will be incited even more actively.
And Satan Leads the Dance
– Leonid Petrovich, I see, you think that the United States and American presidents are just a tool. Who then decides the policy?
– There are some societies of people virtually unknown to the public who do not just install the American presidents, but define the rules for the whole of the “Great Game”. These, in particular, are the multinational financial corporations. But not only them.
Now there is a redesigning of the financial and economic system of the world under way. There is an attempt to rethink the whole structure of capitalism, without abandoning it. Foreign policy is changing dramatically. Suddenly, the US actually ditched Israel, its main ally in the Middle East, for the sake of improving relations with Iran. Why is Iran more necessary and important than Tel Aviv? Because it is part of a belt encircling Russia. These clandestine forces are determined to liquidate our country as a serious player on the world stage. After all, Russia bears a civilizational alternative to the whole united West.
Especially so now, when there is an explosive growth of anti-American sentiment in the world. Hungary, where conservative right-wing forces are at the helm, and the Greek leftists – initially diametrically opposite forces – in fact united and “bucked” against the dictation of the United States on the Old Continent. There is someone ready to “buck” in Italy, Austria, France and so on. If Russia this time stands out, processes in Europe will start that will be disadvantageous to the forces aspiring to world domination. And they understand that perfectly.
– Some European leaders have already lamented that the US sanctions were literally imposed on them. Can Europe escape from the “friendly” US embrace?
– Never. America is firmly holding it on a number of chains: the Fed printing press, the threat of color revolutions and the physical removal of unwanted politicians.
– Don’t you exaggerate with the physical removal?
– Not at all. US Central Intelligence Agency – even in terms of its tasks – is not intelligence service. KGB FCD or SVR is classical intelligence service: to gather information and report to the leadership of the country. For CIA these traditional attributes of intelligence are at the end of the task list. But the main one is removal, including physical, of political leaders and organization of coups. And they do in real time mode.
After the wreck of the submarine “Kursk”, CIA Director George Tenet flew to Russia from Romania. I was tasked to meet him at the airport. Tenet long time did not come out of the plane, but then the ramp was open and I was able to look inside his Hercules. It was a flying command post, computer operation center, fully packed with equipment and communication systems that can monitor and simulate the situation throughout the world. Accompanying delegation numbered twenty. While we used to fly and still do fly scheduled flights in a group 2-5 people. As they say, feel the difference.
– Speaking of intelligence services. Once again there have been talks about the idea of restoring the united Russian intelligence service by combining the SVR and the FSB. What are your views?
– Extremely negative. If we combine the two intelligence agencies – foreign intelligence and counterintelligence, then from two sources of information for the country’s top leadership, we create one. Then the man who commands this “Spring of Information” becomes a monopolist. He can be manipulate it in order to achieve some goal. In the KGB such manipulations with information were evident even to Captain Reshetnikov. For a president, a king or a prime minister – whatever you call the highest official – is advantageous to have several independent intelligence sources. Otherwise, he becomes a hostage of a head of a particular structure or of the structure itself. This is very dangerous.
The authors of this idea think that by such uniting we strengthen ourselves, but in fact we are jeopardizing ourselves.
Anybody sentenced?
– Let’s move on from the global conspiracy “to our muttons.” How to distinguish the official, who did not know what they do, from an agent of influence, who creates consciously?
– There are really not as many agents of influence of serious level in the world, as one might think. Adopting or non-adopting serious strategic decisions contrary to the interests of one’s country are mainly initiated by, so to speak, ideological agents. These are those Russian officials who have found themselves occupying a top-ranking post in our government, but their soul is with the West. They do not have to be recruited as informants or given orders. For these people, all that is done “out there” are the highest achievements of civilization. And the things that are here are the “unwashed Russia”. They do not associate the future of their children with this country, and send them abroad to study. And this is a more serious sign than accounts in western banks. These “comrades” dislike Russia from their heart, regardless of the fact that Russia’s “development” is what they are required to administrate.
– How accurately you’ve drawn a portrait of some of our ministers. How will we manage to pass through 2015 with them?
– With or without them, the year will be difficult. Most likely, the next one will not be easier. But then will start a confident march of the new Russia.
Biography: Leonid Reshetnikov. Born February 6, 1947 in Potsdam (GDR) in the family of a military serviceman. He graduated from the Faculty of History of Kharkov State University and standard doctorate of Sofia University (Bulgaria). From 1974 to 1976 he worked at the Institute of World Socialist System Economy of the USSR Academy of Sciences. From April 1976 to April 2009 worked in the analytical units of foreign intelligence. His last post was the Head of Information and Analytical Department of Russian Foreign Intelligence Service, a Member of the Board of the SVR, Lieutenant General. In April 2009, was transferred to the reserve due to reaching the age limit for military service. Member of the Research Council of the Russian Security Council. He speaks Serbian and Bulgarian languages fluently, can communicate in Greek. Decorated with state awards (Order of Courage, Order of Honour), awards of the Russian Orthodox Church (Order of Holy Prince Daniel of Moscow, Order of Saint Prince Dmitry Donskoy), as well as medals and honorary signs.WASHINGTON, Dec. 17 - The government said Friday that it had asked an immigration judge to deport John Demjanjuk, a Ukrainian immigrant and retired autoworker who is accused of working as a guard at several Nazi camps.
Mr. Demjanjuk, who was once thought to be the sadistic Nazi death camp guard known as Ivan the Terrible, has been found guilty of lying to gain entry to the United States. In April, a federal appeals court affirmed a lower court decision revoking his American citizenship on multiple grounds, including his "willing" service in a unit "dedicated to exploiting and exterminating" Jewish civilians in Nazi-occupied Poland.
A document filed Friday by the Justice Department and the Department of Homeland Security seeks Mr. Demjanjuk's deportation for his participation in Nazi-sponsored persecution while serving as an armed SS guard and because he lied about his wartime job and residences when he applied for an immigration visa in 1952. It was not clear where he might be sent.
The United States accused Mr. Demjanjuk in 1977 of being Ivan the Terrible at the Treblinka death camp. Extradited to Israel, he was tried and sentenced to death. But subsequent evidence from the former Soviet Union undermined eyewitness testimony, and Israel's supreme court freed him in 1993.I’ve wanted to play Battlefield 1 and Fallout 4 since they came out but I’ve just been too busy. With the Christmas holidays upon on us it was the ideal opportunity for some well earned gaming time!
Unfortunately I’ve not got access to my main gaming system (LZ7 with i5 and GTX 1070), however I do have a spare GTX 960 without a home. In desperation I’ve had to try and re-purpose some older parts to build some kind of machine that can run these games.
Here is the GTX 960 Graphics Card that I’m going to use:
The only problem is the spare processors I have are lacking in power compared to modern desktop CPU’s, this gave me the idea to run an experiment whilst trying to enjoy the games (if this was possible with low-end CPUs).
This is what I aim to find out:
Can you play modern games on old or low powered hardware when using a modern Graphics Card?
How much CPU power do you need to get a playable experience?
Can you build a cheap (console price) gaming PC to play the latest games?
Hopefully these questions can be answered in the article below.
TEST SYSTEM 1 – AMD ATHLON 5350 + GTX 960
First up is a 25W TDP quad core Athlon 5350 with a very slight overclock at 2.1Ghz running on an MSI AM1i with 8Gb of (Single Channel) DDR3 1600 RAM and the GTX 960 sat snug in an LZ7 on my desk:
You may notice the cup of tea and Mince Pie, how very British!
But probably more interesting is the Xbox One Elite Controller, this was a really cool Christmas present off……. myself! On a serious note though, this controller feels absolutely amazing to hold, the quality is off the chart incredible. From a looks and feel perspective this is by far the best controller I’ve ever seen or held. But that’s exactly what you would expect given its high price tag, I wonder if it performs as well as its built:
TEST SYSTEM 2 – INTEL i3-3240 + GTX 960
The second system is a 55W Intel Core i3-3240 running at 3.4Ghz on an Asrock B75 motherboard with 8Gb of (Dual Channel) DDR3 1600 RAM.
This system is my server PC which was already built up, I just dropped in the same GTX 960 for the purpose of this testing. Excuse the messy cable management, its usually sat out of sight in a cupboard:
RESULTS – BATTLEFIELD 1
GTX 960 + AMD Athlon 5350 @ 2.1Ghz Quad Core:
Single Player @ 1080p
Low Settings = 30 FPS (Average)
Medium Settings = 27 FPS (Average)
High Settings = 23 FPS (Average)
Ultra Settings = 21 FPS (Average)
Multiplayer @ 1080p
Low Settings = 15 FPS (Average)
Medium Settings = 14 FPS (Average)
High Settings = 14 FPS (Average)
Ultra Settings = 13 FPS (Average)
GTX 960 + Intel Core i3-3240 @ 3.4GHz Dual Core:
Single Player @ 1080p
Low Settings = 60 FPS (Average)
Medium Settings = 58 FPS (Average)
High Settings = 49 FPS (Average)
Ultra Settings = 44 FPS (Average)
Multiplayer @ 1080p
Low Settings = 53 FPS (Average)
Medium Settings = 49 FPS (Average)
High Settings = 45 FPS (Average)
Ultra Settings = 42 FPS (Average)
RESULTS – FALLOUT 4
GTX 960 + AMD Athlon 5350 @ 2.1Ghz Quad Core:
Campaign @ 1080p
Low Settings = 45 FPS (Average)
Medium Settings = 43 FPS (Average)
High Settings = 37 FPS (Average)
Ultra Settings = 35 FPS (Average)
GTX 960 + Intel Core i3-3240 @ 3.4GHz Dual Core:
Campaign @ 1080p
Low Settings = 60 FPS (Average)
Medium Settings = 60 FPS (Average)
High Settings = 60 FPS (Average)
Ultra Settings = 60 FPS (Average)
PERFORMANCE SUMMARY
To put things into context here are some comparative CPU benchmark scores which can be found on the Passmark website. I’ve dropped in a few modern (Skylake) processors for reference as well:
PASSMARK SCORES
AMD Athlon 5350 (25W – 2.0Ghz Quad Core) = 2,563 (807 Single Thread)
Intel i3-3240 (55W – 3.4Ghz Dual Core) = 4,293 (1810 Single Thread)
Intel Pentium G4500 (55W – 3.5Ghz Dual Core) = 3,971 (1977 Single Thread)
Intel Core i3-6100 (54W – 3.7Ghz Dual Core) = 5,442 (2104 Single Thread)
Intel Core i5-6500 (65W – up to 3.6GHz Quad Core) = 7,124 (1947 Single Thread
Intel Core i7-6700 (65W – up to 4.0Ghz Quad Core) = 10,024 (2157 Single Thread)
As you would expect for its low price and low power draw, the Athlon 5350 is significantly slower compared to modern desktop class processors, especially when you look at the single thread performance. However, the 5350 still managed to to run the 2 modern games I tested with some OK results, all things considered.
The Intel Core 55W i3-3240 isn’t quite up to the same performance levels as the newer Skylake i3-6100, it falls short by around 15% in the single threaded performance scores, but it has more than double the performance per core over the 25W Athlon 5350, this difference is evident when you compare the FPS of each processor.
BATTLEFIELD 1
Playing Battlefield 1 on the Athlon 5350 was a mixed bag, the Single player campaign was able to run at around 30 FPS @ 1080p with the details set to low, this was definitely a playable experience and the graphics still looked pretty good, however it did suffer from frequent frame rate drops into the low 20’s which got a little annoying, but not to the point of being unplayable. Swapping to the Intel i3-3240, the GTX 960 doubled in FPS achieving a stable 60 FPS @ 1080p with details set to low and 49 FPS with the details set to High.
Multiplayer was a different story, the Athlon 5350 simply isn’t powerful enough to run the game and limits the performance of the GTX 960, achieving 15 FPS average @ 1080p on low settings, this is far below acceptable levels for online play and was not an enjoyable experience. Again moving to the i3-3240 resulted in a much more playable frame-rate, upwards of 40 FPS with the settings turned up, not too bad for a state of the art game running on a 5 year old Core i3.
FALLOUT 4
Moving on to Fallout 4, surprisingly the Athlon 5350 put in a good performance averaging 37 FPS on High settings @ 1080p, this felt smooth enough to play the game properly and didn’t dip below 30 FPS very often. However when the GTX 960 is paired with the more powerful i3-3240 the frame rate is consistently above 60 FPS at the same resolution and detail settings, allowing you to turn the settings right up to Ultra level for the full graphical experience.
CONCLUSION
On both games you can see that the Athlon 5350 is limiting the overall capability of the Graphics Card, it is a bottleneck. During BF1 gameplay the Gigabyte software was reporting that the GTX 960 was using less than 40% of its graphics processing capability, whereas when used with the i3-3240 utilisation was above 80%. This shows there is still some bottle-necking happening even with the i3, but no where near as much.
Pairing the 5350 with a lower powered GPU such as the GTX 950 or R7 360 would result in a much more balanced system at a lower price.
It is difficult to recommend the 5350 as a gaming CPU even when you consider its high value for money, it simply isn’t powerful enough for the latest CPU hungry games. If you spend around £25 more you can pick up a much more capable desktop grade Intel Core-i3 and motherboard. At this end of the budget spectrum that extra £25 makes a huge difference in performance, allowing you to play modern games more comfortably.
A CPU with a Passmark score above 3,500 and a Single Thread score of 1,500 or above should be sufficient to play the latest games at 1080p.
Let me know your thoughts in the comments below!
IS BUDGET PC GAMING WORTH IT?
Can you build a gaming PC that can play the latest games for the equivalent price of an Xbox One or PlayStation 4 console?
The parts used in the systems from this article can be purchased second hand on sites such as EBay at good prices, so if you don’t mind using pre-owned stuff you can build a potent gaming PC for a couple hundred pound/euros/dollars equivalent to what I have been testing today:
SYSTEM 1
AMD Athlon 5350 CPU (£25)
AM1 Motherboard (£20)
8Gb DDR3 RAM (£20)
SFX PSU (£15)
500Gb HDD (£20)
GTX 960 (£90)
Case (£10)
TOTAL COST = £200
This configuration is limited by the power of the CPU, but it still manages to deliver playable gaming in modern titles if you don’t mind dialling down the settings.
Lowering the GPU to a GTX 950 will give a more balanced system and reduce the price further. At £200 its a nice budget friendly system, ideal as a first gaming PC for younger family members, or great for playing games from a few years ago with the settings turned up!
Would I recommend this particular system over a current gen console? Not if you want to play the latest games, for around the same £200 price point you can purchase a brand new entry level 500Gb PlayStation 4. A console offers simple and effective hassle free gaming, perhaps not the best graphics, but at this end of the budget spectrum a Gaming PC requires compromise and lots of time tweaking settings to get a smooth playable experience in new games |
consequently shows you who they really are. “This fight is forever,” Emilio told me after we won recognition. “The minute you stop fighting is the minute you lose.”
By the end of the blitz, we had collected signatures for more than 80 of our co-workers, in addition to our 20. I encountered a lot of different reactions in visits that week. Chaquon’s instant fervor was the most positive. The other five ranged from guarded curiosity to frightened confusion to panicked hostility. The procedure was the same for everyone: listen closely; share stories; ask pointed questions; agitate people around their issues; “inoculate” them, or prepare them for retaliation (“I won’t lie to you, the company might fire us. But they might fire us anyway.“) Anyone who’s been to an IWW Organizing 101 training will note the parallels with AEIOU. The last step was always the “push”: issuing a specific personal challenge, daring someone to be brave enough to do something for the campaign. Eddie would often tell me “Organizing is the art of bringing out the best in people.”
Eventually, I got five signatures: one from each person, with the exception of the last one. The last one was a crotchety older cook – let’s call him “Archie Bunker” – who’d taken me under his wing since my first day. We were both transplants from east coast rustbelt cities, and we’d bonded over football and feeling out of place in this fake-ass west coast Babylon. One time, after a night of heavy drinking at a cook-out in his backyard, my mother called me. Realizing I was talking to my mom, Archie Bunker grabbed my phone away from me and bellowed, “I’m gonna look after your boy. I promise. I got his back.”
It had been difficult to keep the campaign secret from him – not only were we close friends, but he was as agitated as they come. There were constant problems with his paychecks, either arriving late or coming up short. He agreed with me that the company was a bunch of shady motherfuckers, and payroll probably committed wage theft on purpose. He’d been working there for going on 10 years and scarcely made more than when he started. He hated all the chefs and practically every other manager. I was sure he’d be a shoe-in. Of everybody I knew in that kitchen, he was the one I was most eager to recruit. So when I confidently walked into his dining room, handed him a petition, and glibly said “Archie, we’re forming a union. We’re gonna fix that place. You down?” – I was in for a disappointment.
“What the fuck?!” he roared in my face. His wife started to say something conciliatory from behind him, but he cut her off with a snarl. “Man, I thought you were better than that! Get the fuck out of my house!” I did just that, more than a little shaken. He followed me onto his porch. There was a vein bulging in his forehead. “What put that shit in your head, man?”
“I don’t know, Archie. Mostly stuff you told me,” I lied. That just threw fuel on the fire. He made a fist and pulled his arm back like he was going to throw a punch. I flinched. He didn’t swing. He was still fuming, obviously, but he looked me in the eye and spoke very softly.
“I promised your mama I was gonna look after you,” he muttered. And then, confusingly, “I care about me, my wife, and my daughter. Get out of here and keep that racist shit away from me.”
For this man to object to something because it was racist was, to say the least, rich. That was the one thing that had always made me uncomfortable about him. Sometimes he was so ridiculous it was almost funny – he’d once commented, philosophically, “Fidencio’s a good dude. But they oughta ship him back to Mexico.” Months later, he finally told me he’d worked in an auto-plant in his youth, and, because he was black, the UAW had refused to protect him. The experience had turned him against the labor movement for 40 years. I’m still not sure, but I think he called a manager and blew our cover that same night. People have a way of surprising you.
The world is a messy place. You can never take anyone’s support for granted, no matter how strong a relationship you have with them. There are no shortcuts; no substitutes for the careful, maddeningly slow process of organizing. Rank-and-file militants ignore this truism at their peril.
Two days after we went back to work, we marched on the boss. It would be the first of seven such confrontational actions. The organizers euphemistically called it a “delegation,” but having spent my teen years in various anarchist organizations, I knew the traditional name. Months later, we did some polite, conversational delegations to management – but when we went public, we clapped and chanted and didn’t let the bastards talk back.
We had a committee meeting the night before to prepare. They showed us footage of other food service workers going public, some who worked for our employer in different shops. A few of the videos were of restrained delegations that ended in dialogue with a manager, but others showed workers chanting and doing “Si Se Puede” claps (the in-unison slow clap that originated in the farmworker struggles of the UFW). Some people were more apprehensive than others. In general the older folks were more hesitant, but that wasn’t true across the board – one otherwise gentle baker in his 60′s was especially itching for a fight. I thought he might have been radical politically, but his English and my Spanish were bad enough that our conversations never got that complex. To conclude the meeting, we did a sort of dress rehearsal. We each prepared a personal grievance we would tell Cruella, the general manager, and we decided the order we would speak in. The only fully scripted part belonged to Charlie – at the end, he would say “We are asking for a neutrality agreement to allow us to organize without retaliation. You have 36 hours to give us an answer.” An organizer played the GM, and we crowded into her office and ran through the motions several times. After some discussion, we agreed ours would be an aggressive delegation – if the boss tried to interrupt us, we would chant to drown her out.
The big day also happened to be St Patrick’s Day. I remember being vaguely put off that our glorious moment would have to take place against the backdrop of paper shamrocks and plastic green hats that littered the college, but now I like to think my Irish trade unionist ancestors would have approved. The plan was to clock out at 3:30pm, meet at the campus chapel, and march to Cruella’s office from there. We would be accompanied by a priest, a rabbi, and a student-labor solidarity group (no, that’s not the set up line for a joke). These outside allies were a crucial element of our strategy: we needed them to pressure the administration of the school, which could then pressure our employer, its subcontractor. An organizer and some of the committee had been meeting with a member of the student group for a couple months. The clergy were from a city-wide solidarity group. As far as I could tell, its sole purpose was to lend out religious figures to unions to give their campaigns an air of moral authority. I scoffed at the idea at the time. In retrospect, I think it worked like a charm. The company had recently had its contracts cancelled at other universities after another union tarnished its image. The threat of bad publicity was the best leverage we had.
It was 3:20pm. The lunch rush was over and I was covering my line with plastic wrap. My gaze darted back and forth across the cafeteria, scrutinizing the other committee members closing their stations. I searched their faces for some hint of resolve, or of cowardice, but found nothing. Is this thing really going to happen? I thought. Will anybody really come through? I could hear my own heartbeat. I was so tense that when somebody socked me in the shoulder from behind, I jumped and dropped a cutting board. Emilio chuckled.
“You scared, bitch?” he asked. He wasn’t just talking about my skittishness.
I looked at the clock. It was 3:25. “Yeah, a little.”
“Well just think about that last time Dante yelled at you,” he said, suddenly very stern. Dante was a sadistic supervisor who rode my ass more than anyone else, and Emilio knew I hated him. I realized he was trying to agitate me. Then I realized it had worked. I was too pissed off to have doubts. “Come on,” he said, motioning towards the timeclock. I silently chided myself for lacking faith in my fellow workers. We clocked out, hurriedly left the cafeteria, and, because I’m a total dork, I started humming the Spanish anarchist anthem A Las Barricadas. Contra el enemigo nos llama el deber.
We met in the campus chapel. I think 17 or maybe 18 of the committee were there. An organizer and a few students were waiting for us, one with a video camera. We held hands in silence, and then the two clergy led everyone in a prayer. The concluding line was something like “God bless the working men and women of all countries. The work of organizing together is holy work. Amen.” We walked back up the hill into the Den, where the GM’s office was. The organizer said she couldn’t come inside with us. We entered from a back door and marched single file up a narrow staircase leading straight to the office door. The older baker started clapping and chanting first, and gradually everyone else joined in: “Que queremos? Justicia!” (most of the committee spoke Spanish as their first language). The kid with the camera was the first to try to go inside. He opened the door, and standing right in front of us was a squat, wide, fireplug of a man: Benito, the district manager. He was above Cruella in the company hierarchy, and we’d had no idea he was going to be there. He slammed the door shut, smacking the student and his camera. Everyone in front pushed against the door, forcing it back open and flooding into the office. We barely all fit. The secretary looked up from her computer, mouth agape. Cruella and Benito were literally backed up into a corner, both trying to shout over us. As rehearsed, we kept chanting until they quieted.
One by one, each of us stepped forward and said our piece. Workers went first, then students. Some people called out abusive managers by name; some said they’d been with the company for over 20 years and still made the same wage as new hires; some listed promises management had broken. One young line cook said “You know I respect you both,” and, rolling up his sleeves to display burns on his arms, “but these have the company’s name on them.” When I spoke, I just talked about my station’s workload and the damn broken dishwasher. Cruella got the message early on that this was our turn to talk, but Benito kept trying to butt in – which was great, because then we could chant at him again at point-blank range. That must have happened upwards of 10 times. Some of us, including a few macho, stoic men, were moved to tears.
After Charlie wrapped it up with the neutrality demand, we did a Si Se Puede union clap, and walked back out into the kitchen. Pandemonium ensued. Everybody was crowded around the door trying to listen in, and when we walked out and mingled with them there was an uproar that was audible from the dining area. Some people were ecstatic, some were terrified, but everyone was interested. I maneuvered my way out of the kitchen and walked up to Tuesday, a cashier I was friendly with, to tell her what had just happened. “You look like you floating!” she exclaimed.
When I came into work at 7am the next morning, there was already a technician there fixing the dishwasher. Chef Ferdinand was doing the dishes. Benito emerged from the office wearing an apron and crawled on his hands and knees to clean out the floor drains. More than one manager made a point of going around to each station and complimenting everyone’s work. It was immensely satisfying to watch. Their desperation was palpable.
Sure enough, no less than 36 hours after D-day, the company signed a neutrality agreement. Pressure from the students had yielded pressure from the administration, and if they wanted to keep their contract with the school, they really had no choice (I suspect the fact that we had video of Benito slamming a door on a student might have helped encourage them, too). This meant it was now illegal for them to run an anti-union campaign. They’d ignore it and campaign against us anyway, but they had to be a little more covert about it, so I think it bought us a measure of breathing room. The union submitted our petitions to the labor board. At the next committee meeting, they told us the election was scheduled for the end of April. The managers kept trying to garner “no” votes, putting on happy faces and wooing us with newfound kindness. The supervisors did their dirty work: intimidation, surveillance, and just generally being cops. We continued to organize around issues. It felt good to finally be out in the open about it.
At first it baffled me that we’d won our first demand without firing a shot, so to speak. What kind of second-rate, off-brand class war was this? Why build power if not to wield it? With one possible exception during the contract fight later that year, we never did anything to inflict direct economic damage on the company. And yet we were winning concessions. How?
Saul Alinsky – certainly no revolutionary, but nonetheless a brilliant tactician – once wrote, “The threat is usually more terrifying than the thing itself.” Capitalists the world over know this well. Fear greases the wheels of production everywhere; every wage worker is driven by perpetual negative reinforcement. Employers can coerce us without resorting to disciplinary action because we know they have power. Turnabout is fair play.
There was nothing special about our campaign. Compared to other organizing drives against the same company, it was utterly unremarkable. Some of those were bitter, protracted conflicts that culminated in strikes, boycotts, lockouts. Our militancy never exceeded a handful of rowdy delegations. Management’s reaction never extended beyond a few bullshit layoffs and firings. We won our election, got some managers fired, kept agitating for a year throughout negotiations, and ended up with affordable healthcare and a reasonably good first contract. But our negotiator settled for a raise of $1.50 over three years: 20 cents less than the minimum offer we had agreed we’d accept. There was at least one private meeting between the union and the company that I know of. For all the organizers’ efforts to involve and mobilize us, the union was still profoundly undemocratic: shop stewards were not elected, but appointed. Eventually, I got fired for being late. By then I didn’t have the heart to fight for my job back.
Full of surprises as ever, Archie Bunker’s had a change of heart since I’ve been gone. Last I heard he was on the committee. Woe to whichever manager is first in his line of fire.
I don’t mean to hold up this campaign as a model for comrades to emulate. There was nothing revolutionary about our fight. It depended on the NLRB. It ended when we got a contract. It was extremely reliant on paid staff, who, while they may have performed admirably, did not equip workers with the skills that would make them obsolete. I wish I could say we bossnapped the GM, we occupied the dining halls, we pushed the level of struggle past its limit…but I can only write about what actually happened. My hope is that fellow workers can learn something from our modest achievements, and go on to accomplish more marvelous feats of rebellion.
If there’s a moral to my story, it’s this: all genuine organizing transforms people. Even the most restrained, mediated campaign takes intensive relational work to get off the ground – and once it has, can awaken workers to our own power. This should be even truer for struggles with revolutionary aspirations.
This article originally appeared on Ideas & Action on February 18th, 2014In my last post I showed several instances of the syntax help that you get when you use get-help or -? with a cmdlet.
For instance:
This help is showing how the different parameters can be used when calling the cmdlet.
If you’ve never paid any attention to these, the notation can be difficult to work out. Fortunately, it’s not that hard. There are only NNN different possibilities. In the following, I will be referring to a parameter called Foo, of type [BAR].
An optional parameter that can be used by position or name:
[[-Foo] <Bar>]
An optional parameter that can only be used by name:
[-Foo <bar>]
A required parameter that can be used by position or name:
[-Foo] <Bar>
An optional parameter that can be used only by name:
-Foo <Bar>
A switch parameter (switches are always optional and can only be used by name)
[-Foo] [-Foo <Switchparameter>] #odd, but you may see this in the help sometimes
So, in the example above we see that we have
parm1, which is a parameter of type Object (i.e. no type specified), is optional and can be used by name or position
parm2, which is a parameter of type Object, is optional and can only be used by name
parm3, which is a parameter of type Object, is optional and can only be used by name
parm4, which is a parameter of type Object, is optional and can only be used by name
With some practice, you will be reading more complex syntax examples like a pro.
Let me know if this helps!
–MikeAsheville and Buncombe County have a lot to offer its citizenry. On the surface it is easy to see the countless restaurants, boutiques, bike shops and breweries, but much like in most cities there is more to this mountain town of ours. Many of these surface offerings aren’t designed to serve those who actually live here and large portion of our community can’t afford or lacks access to participate. At the same time there is an often invisible and unconnected network of initiatives, resources and services supporting our citizens and building community.
Last year Asheville based organization REAL Cooperative, in partnership with Shareable and about 25 community members, decided to map out this unconnected network with a purpose of supporting existing projects, connecting those who would benefit from them and identifying needs and niches yet to be filled. The first community meeting which launched this project in Asheville was covered by Lea Mclellan from Mountain Xpress (How well does Asheville share?)
After 4 months of accepting community feedback and expanding the scope of the project we would like to welcome you to the SHARE Asheville Community Directory and MAP. This list has been and will continue to be “crowd sourced” from the community and we welcome your feedback and suggestions. The directory (and Map) aims to showcase the Sharing Projects, Collaborative Consumption and Common Resources which Asheville has to offer. Scroll through the over 150 offerings in 7 sections: Food, Services, Reuse, Community Health, Community Wealth, Commons and Public Libraries. We will soon be developing a list of “Off the Map” resources serving the community without a physical location.
Have a suggestion for something we should add? Or maybe you think there is something which should be removed?? We rely on feedback from the community to make this a useful resource! Please submit all suggestions through this FORM.
This Map is only a launching point for a larger initiative were calling SHARE Asheville to foster the further development of community serving policy and infrastructure to support the, for lack of a better word, sharing economy.
SHARE Asheville will be hosting our first large event later this Spring. Asheville ShareFest will take place on May 31st at the French Broad Food Co-op and will be a series of interactive co-created events which will take place on Friday, Saturday and Sunday May 30th-June 1st showcasing local organizations, projects, resources and skills while highlighting examples of the sharing economy which nationally has become a (new) social safety net and multi billion dollar industry in the new economic framework. The event will be one of over 25 ShareFests taking place in cities around the world in the months of April, May and June as part of the international campaign coordinated by Shareable, Center for a New American Dream, OuiShare and other organizations. Please let us know if you would like to co-create this event with us by filling out this FORM.
AdvertisementsThe agreement that will join the RadioShack and Leopard-Trek cycling teams at the hip, a bit of macro-surgery that has set the sport on its ear, isn't so much a merger as a splicing together of two organizations. It's still early, but last week the seams were showing.
After weeks of speculation -- and silence from the principals -- European media reports outed the deal and forced the two teams to issue statements that were enthusiastic, if somewhat incomplete. Riders, some faced with the prospect of being left stranded in a game of musical saddles, complained they'd been left in the dark. Flavio Becca, the Luxembourg real estate magnate who will own the new entity, seemed to want distance from the notion of consorting with Americans, even though the team's primary sponsor and marketing arm are based in the former Republic of Texas.
Team Radioshack during the second stage of the Tour de France this year. AP Photo/Laurent Rebours
RadioShack's chief marketing officer, Lee Applbaum, in his first comments on the record about the hybrid team, conceded that things had gotten off to a "less-than-perfect start" from a communications standpoint, but maintained the new venture is "a marketer's dream."
"We discussed this at length with our partners, including Trek, who had a real-time view of working with Mr. Becca," Applbaum said. "He's a passionate sportsman who wants to win, and we prefer that to someone who's passive and just throws money at a team."
The headliner in the deal from a competitive standpoint is Leopard's three-time Tour de France runner-up Andy Schleck. Applbaum said RadioShack's corporate desire to be associated with a Grand Tour champion and the company's familiarity with the staff and management that will stay on outweighed the possible downside of ceding control to a faraway owner.
Becca, who a year ago enticed most of Bjarne Riis' Saxo Bank platoon to defect to his side, will continue to hold the team's professional license. RadioShack's Belgian manager and director, Johan Bruyneel, will run the team's business operations and design its strategy on the road. Capital Sports & Entertainment, the Austin-based company that held RadioShack's license through a subsidiary, will give up that role and become a subcontractor, handling marketing and sponsor hospitality. Trek was already supplying bikes to both teams. Nissan, a secondary sponsor for the RadioShack team, will be promoted to co-title sponsor and get its logo on the jersey.
RadioShack will continue its affiliation with its most famous former rider, keeping Lance Armstrong under a personal services and endorsement contract, according to his agent, CS&E founder and partner Bill Stapleton. (Armstrong also will continue to be under contact with longtime sponsor Trek in 2012, but not with Nissan, Stapleton said.)
The company also will maintain its support of the Livestrong Foundation, which is done tangibly through merchandise sales -- Applbaum said the company has raised $8.5 million for the foundation in the last two years -- and symbolically through the yellow stripe on the jersey. "We don't see this as a traditional sports sponsorship," said Applbaum, whose father died five years ago of lymphoma and whose mother-in-law is a breast cancer survivor.
On paper, there's some logic to the consolidation from Leopard's side. Becca, who had been bankrolling the team substantially on his own, gets the investment from RadioShack and Nissan -- the latter assuming he resolves any unfinished business with current Leopard vehicle sponsor Mercedes-Benz, which issued a brief, irritated press release expressing "surprise" at being supplanted. (A corporate spokesman for Nissan declined comment.) The Schleck brothers, who have four Tour podium appearances between them without a win in the last three years, get the choreographer of nine championships in Bruyneel.
RadioShack Chief Marketing Officer Lee Applbaum. Casey Rodgers/AP Images
Brian Nygaard, the Leopard general manager Bruyneel will replace, declined comment. Through a team spokesman, Becca also declined to be interviewed. Stapleton said he took no offense at Becca's reported comments in a Luxembourg television interview that "nothing about this team will be American except the sponsors.''
Still, the deal seems a little more confusing from this side of the Atlantic.
Why would RadioShack, a company that doesn't do business in western Europe, cede control to an organization based there? "This is not a precursor to expanding" into that part of the world, Applbaum clarified.
And what about the risk to the brand if indictments result from the ongoing federal investigation into doping on the Armstrong-led, Bruyneel-directed U.S. Postal Service teams of a decade ago?
Jim Andrews, senior vice president of Chicago-based IEG, a sponsorships research and consulting firm, said he has no inside knowledge of the factors that led to RadioShack's decision to continue sponsoring the team. Most sponsors faced with a potentially controversial situation, he said, "have sat down and said, 'We know we're taking a calculated risk.'"
"They've seen something there from those who follow the sport most passionately, that there's an association that's positive, and said, 'It's that group we want to market to and engage with,'" Andrews said.
"As for the association with Armstrong, I'd love to be a fly on the wall internally. They may be saying, 'We're already in. Our options are to pull out, cut our losses and not risk any tarnishing of our brand,' or, 'We're in, and rather than lose our entire investment in the sport, we still think there are positive benefits.' There are still people who believe and defend Armstrong and love his story. You know you're going to get criticized either way."
Applbaum said he and RadioShack are comfortable with their commitment. He expressed regret that some riders and staff will lose their jobs, but said he is confident Bruyneel will make the transition smooth.
"He has an incredible track record in Grand Tours. He's a phenomenal manager of people," Applbaum said. "Integrity is a core pillar of our brand, and at this juncture, we continue to monitor the situation. If the investigation changes course, we'll address it at that time."
The core of the RadioShack-Nissan-Trek team will come from the existing Leopard stable led by Andy and Frank Schleck -- who finished second and third in the Tour de France this year. It will also include and classics and time trial strongman Fabian Cancellara of Switzerland and populist hero Jens Voigt of Germany. A roster won't be finalized until later this week at the earliest, but indications are that RadioShack will contribute Americans Ben King, Matthew Busche and 2011 Tour of California winner Chris Horner; Slovenian national champion Jani Brajkovic; and veteran Grand Tour campaigners Andreas Kloden of Germany and Haimar Zubeldia of Spain. American Levi Leipheimer, winner of three important stage races this year, has not announced his intentions.
Any riders who already had signed contracts with Leopard have to stay put. Those who had agreed on terms with RadioShack technically would be free agents because the license-holder is going away, but their chances of finding a slot on an elite team would be bleak this late in the season.
Whatever external factors do or don't come into play, the new Leopard-RadioShack tandem will enter a changed competitive landscape next year featuring several stacked "super-teams" like the U.S./Swiss-owned BMC and Great Britain's Sky.
"It doesn't happen overnight," Garmin-Cervelo majority owner Doug Ellis said of the challenge of melding two organizations, a passage his team underwent last year. "There's an overlap of skill sets -- how do you fit all those guys together? It took us some time to sort out. We didn't perform well in the early classics partly because of that."
Cervelo co-founder Gerard Vroomen said the constantly shifting alliances in cycling have immunized him from being surprised at anything, and he pointed out that the Schlecks were reportedly first courted by Bruyneel a couple of years ago when RadioShack was being formed. Vroomen speculated that Becca became impatient both with the search for a title sponsor and the team's results. "I can't climb into his head, but 12 months ago he was probably sure he was going to win the Tour de France and the spring classics, and he didn't do either,'' Vroomen said. "Someone must have made the suggestion that Bruyneel creates Tour de France winners.''
Andy Schleck is the headliner in the deal from a competitive standpoint. AP Photo/Larry Pierce
Stapleton said the first informal discussions about fusing the two organizations took place in Paris during the last weekend of the Tour and that Armstrong, who was present, was an early advocate. Both Applbaum and Dean Gore, Trek's director of global marketing, confirmed that they were approached by CS&E at that time.
"On our side, what was interesting was a more international roster and younger talented riders, still keeping our focus for our American sponsors on [the stage races in] Colorado and California, which are of paramount importance to them," Stapleton said. "I think what they were interested in was not just our sponsorship dollars but our sports experience, our experience running a team, making sponsors happy with hospitality and marketing programs."
Stapleton and Gore said they intend to continue operating the under-23 team sponsored by Trek, which produced national road and time trial champions King and Taylor Phinney (now riding for BMC) last year.
If the Paris conversations had never happened, Applbaum and Stapleton both contend the RadioShack team would have continued to operate as is; in fact, the team had already applied to renew its license. The obvious fissures in the global economy and the tighter sponsorship market that has resulted didn't propel the deal, Stapleton said.
"We were fully funded at our end," he said. "This is a deal that made sense on both sides. It wasn't done under duress. There was no financial driver or bankruptcy or anything that did it, and there wasn't any sort of outside investigation that influenced it."
Gore declined to comment on the potential impact of the investigation. He said Trek was prepared to continue sponsoring two separate teams, and the company has seen growth in European road bike sales since its association with Leopard. But Trek also sees the value in being behind one beefed-up team, he said.
"Everybody remembers the winner," he said. "No one remembers who finished second. We didn't have the final say in this, but we think it's a really good outcome for all parties involved."
Bonnie D. Ford covers Olympic sports for ESPN.com. She can be reached at bonniedford@aol.com.Sky parental controls break jquery website
The Sky parental controls system recommends that customers leaving on the phishing and malware protection even if disabling all the other elements, but as of 22:30 on Sunday 26th January 2014 this is leading to all HTTP access to code.jquery.com being blocked for Sky customers with the parental controls returning an access denied page.
code.jquery.com may not sound like a mainstream website, as it is really aimed at web and javascript developers but it is pretty common for websites to link to the released javascript (.js) files for jquery and a host of other tools on jquery.com as the site is a CDN for these files, the result being that it is possible many sites may not be performing as expected today.
The advice appears to be for Sky customers to log into their web account, and in the Sky Broadband Shield section turn off the Phishing/Malware filter, or alternatively disable the shield completely.
We will update as and when we hear of any changes and why code.jquery.com has been blocked, i.e. how did it end up categorised as a phishing domain.
Update 8:45am Sky still appears to be blocking code.jquery.com and all files served via the site, and more worryingly is that if you try to report the incorrect category, once signing in on the Sky website you an error page.
We suspect the site was blocked due to being linked to by a properly malicious website, i.e. code.jquery.com and some javascript files were being used on a dodgy website and every domain mentioned was subsequently added to a block list.
For any webmasters affected by the blocking, the solution is to switch to a locally hosted copy of the file, or utilise another CDN e.g. Google jquery CDN.
Update 9:45am It appears that the jquery CDN is unblocked once more on Sky connections where the phishing filter that is part of the parental controls system was enabled.
Update 5:30pm Our enquiry with Sky has elicited a response "“JQuery was temporary blocked this morning having been misclassified. Our review process kicked in shortly afterwards and the site was unblocked just over an hour later." Sky also note they identified the problem at 8:30am, and resolved it by 9:45am. As for why code.jquery.com was categorised as Malware nothing has been confirmed but Sky are talking to Symantec who provide the contest list and updates.
Norton ConnectSafe sounds like a simplified system of what Sky has implemented but since the free service requires you to just change your DNS servers it may prove useful for webmasters as a way to check whether their site is blocked.
Comments
Post a commentThere are some 120 to 187 languages and dialects in the Philippines, depending on the method of classification.[4][5][6] Almost all are Malayo-Polynesian languages. A number of Spanish-influenced creole varieties generally called Chavacano are also spoken in certain communities. The 1987 constitution designates Filipino as the national language and an official language along with English.
While Filipino is used for communication across the country's diverse linguistic groups and is used in popular culture, the government operates mostly using English. Including second-language speakers, there are more speakers of Filipino than English in the Philippines.[7] The other regional languages are given official auxiliary status in their respective places according to the constitution but does not specify any language in particular.[8] Some of these regional languages are also used in education.[3]
The indigenous scripts of the Philippines (such as the Kulitan, Tagbanwa and others) are used very little; instead, Filipino languages are today written in the Latin script because of the Spanish and American colonial experience. Baybayin, though generally not understood, is one of the most well-known of the indigenous Filipino scripts and is used mainly in artistic applications such as on the Philippine banknotes, where the word "Pilipino" is inscribed using the writing system. Additionally, the Arabic script is used in the Muslim areas in the southern Philippines.
National and official languages [ edit ]
The 1987 Constitution declares Filipino as the national language of the country. Filipino and English are the official languages, with the recognition of the regional languages as auxiliary official in their respective regions (though not specifying any particular languages). Spanish and Arabic are to be promoted on an optional and voluntary basis.[9]
Spanish was the official language of the country for more than three centuries under Spanish colonial rule, and became the lingua franca of the Philippines in the 19th and early 20th centuries. In 1863, a Spanish decree introduced universal education, creating free public schooling in Spanish.[10] It was also the language of the Philippine Revolution, and the 1899 Malolos Constitution effectively proclaimed it as the official language of the First Philippine Republic.[11] National hero José Rizal wrote most of his works in Spanish. Luciano de la Rosa established that Spanish was spoken by a total of 60% of the population in the early 20th century as a first, second or third language. Following the American occupation of the Philippines and the imposition of English, the use of Spanish declined gradually, especially after the 1940s.
Under the U.S. occupation and civil regime, English began to be taught in schools. By 1901, public education used English as the medium of instruction. Around 600 educators (called "Thomasites") who arrived in that year aboard the USAT Thomas replaced the soldiers who also functioned as teachers. The 1935 Constitution added English as an official language alongside Spanish. A provision in this constitution also called for Congress to "take steps toward the development and adoption of a common national language based on one of the existing native languages." On November 12, 1937, the First National Assembly created the National Language Institute. President Manuel L. Quezón appointed native Waray speaker Jaime C. De Veyra to chair a committee of speakers of other regional languages. Their aim was to select a national language among the other regional languages. Ultimately, Tagalog was chosen as the base language December 30, 1937, on the basis that it was the most widely spoken and developed local language.[12]
In 1939, President Manuel L. Quezón renamed the Tagalog language as Wikang Pambansa ("national language" in English translation).[13] The language was further renamed in 1959 as Pilipino by Secretary of Education Jose Romero. The 1973 constitution declared the Pilipino language to be co-official, along with English, and mandated the development of a national language, to be known as Filipino. In addition, Spanish regained its official status when President Marcos signed Presidential Decree No. 155, s. 1973.[14]
The present constitution, ratified in 1987, designates Filipino and English as joint official languages. Filipino also had the distinction of being a national language that was to be "developed and enriched on the basis of existing Philippine and other languages." Although not explicitly stated in the constitution, Filipino is in practice almost completely composed of the Tagalog language as spoken in the capital, Manila; however, organizations such as the University of the Philippines began publishing dictionaries such as the UP Diksyonaryong Filipino in which words from various Philippine languages were also included. The present constitution is also the first to give recognition to other regional languages. The constitution also made mention of Spanish and Arabic, both of which are to be promoted on a voluntary and optional basis.
Language map of the 12 recognized auxiliary languages based on Eth |
at the rally handed out copies of the Bill of Rights; some wore costumes of the American revolutionary era.
Paul won only a handful of delegates to the official Republican convention, and says the party refused to give him proper access credentials. Not that he seemed to care much: "I think the two parties have blended together, over many years," he told the Guardian.
Some supporters argued that his defeat in the primaries actually helped. "If we had sent Ron Paul to Washington, he would still have had to battle the machine of everyone else," said Jennifer Riley, from North Dakota.
The very-big-tent approach has attracted controversy: Paul was forced to dissociate himself from racist statements contained in newsletters issued under his name, and he refused to return money donated by a supporter with connections to a white supremacist group. "If somebody sends me money and has a weird belief and I didn't know about it, I don't see that as a big deal," he said. "If they're bad people, why should I give them back their money? I'd rather see us use their money for good things."
The revolutionaries had descended on Minneapolis from across the country, many travelling in bus charters known as Ronvoys; after the rally they were due to decamp to a Minnesota dairy farm for a six-day festival, Ronstock. Paul seemed quietly thrilled to be the incongruous star of the show. "The campaign for the presidency is over, but the enthusiasm is not," he said. "It has really only just begun."Commission says there is no evidence to suggest donations by Bearwood Corporate Services were illegal but expresses frustration at inability to compel either the Tories or Ashcroft to give evidence in person
Tory party officials refused to meet the Electoral Commission in the course of the election watchdog's 14-month investigation into £5m it received from a company owned by Lord Ashcroft.
The commission ruled that the donations did not breach election laws, but it noted that Tory officials declined invitations to explain the details of arrangements in person.
The revelations pose new questions for the Conservatives over their acceptance of the money, which has been ploughed into marginal seats ahead of the election.
Senior figures will be called to give an account of their decision to accept the cash.
In its report, the commission says it cannot conclude whether the Tories complied with their duty to be certain about the identity of the donor because it was unable to question party officers directly.
It notes internal party emails – and sections of Ashcroft's book Dirty Politics, Dirty Times, which suggest the donations were from him rather than his company but it could not make a decision without direct evidence.
The commission also expressed strong frustrations at its inability to compel either the Tories or Ashcroft to give evidence in person and the fact that it could not order Bearwood to release any private documents.
The commission dismissed two charges: that Bearwood was not functioning as a proper company in the UK and that it was in fact a proxy for Ashcroft to make donations. The decision will be a huge relief to the party, which faced paying back £5.1m if the donations were ruled impermissible.
Jenny Watson, chair of the commission, announcing that Bearwood had been cleared, said: "We had concerns, based on some of the evidence, about the degree of certainty within the Conservative party about the identity of the donor, but based on the evidence before us, the commission considered that there was not sufficient evidence to conclude that the party was uncertain about the identity of the donor when they accepted the donations.
"We have asked to meet party officials to ensure that they are clear about their responsibilities for complying with this aspect of the law."
The commission's report describes its powers as "limited", saying it could not require the donor to release documents. "The commission currently has no power to require potential witnesses to attend for interview. Within the limits of its current powers, the commission conducted a thorough investigation."
John Mann, the Labour MP who made the complaint, said: "The report opens up more questions than it answers. There's no surprise that without the powers they needed they couldn't establish the facts."
A Conservative party spokesman said: "Following an 18-month investigation, the Electoral Commission has definitively concluded that donations made by Bearwood, the company in which Lord Ashcroft has an interest, were legal, permissible and correctly reported. It has now been put beyond doubt that donations from Bearwood were entirely legitimate.
"Separately, we also know that Lord Ashcroft is non-domiciled, putting him in exactly the same position as Labour and Lib Dem donors such as Lord Paul.
"This means the Conservative party's clean bill of health with the Electoral Commission remains fully intact."
The spokesman went on to say that continued attacks on Lord Ashcroft were politically motivated.
The decision and the commission's apparent frustration will prompt concerns that the investigators could not unravel Ashcroft's complex financial affairs.
Mann's initial complaint claimed that Bearwood was in breach of electoral law because it was not trading in Britain when it gave money.
Donations from overseas companies are prohibited by law. The ultimate source of the Ashcroft millions that have helped bankroll the Tories in the past appears to be Belize, the Caribbean tax haven that the billionaire has claimed in the past to be his home.
But the route that the money follows on its 5,200-mile journey from the impoverished country to Conservative HQ – and then out to Britain's marginal constituencies – is highly complex.
In recent years, the tycoon's donations to the party have been made by Bearwood Corporate Services (BCS), a company registered in the UK and with a registered office at the offices of its auditors, BDO Stoy Hayward, in Southampton.
During the year ending March 2006, BCS received £4.79m in cash for shares that were bought by its holding company, Bearwood Corporate Holdings.
Bearwood Holdings had received that money by selling shares in itself to another company, Astraporta UK, for £5.54m.
Astraporta, in turn, appears to have received its funds, around £6m, by selling shares to a company registered in Belize called Stargate Holdings. Where Stargate receives its funds is unclear. It is registered offshore – at a registry controlled by an Ashcroft company. When the Guardian visited the registry's offices in Belize City to inquire about Stargate, a registry official said: "You will never know who owns Stargate."
Astraporta and Bearwood Holdings were put into liquidation last year and were formally dissolved on Monday, just as Ashcroft was making his announcement that he was a "non-dom".
This morning it was also announced that Ashcroft will be invited to appear before MPs to explain his version of how he came to be awarded his peerage in 2000 on the basis of a promise to become a permanent resident in the UK and how he subsequently renegotiated that deal to avoid paying taxes on his international earnings.
The Commons public administration committee is to conduct an inquiry before the election, starting with a hearing on 18 March at which senior civil servants will also be quizzed on their role in the affair.The Stanford Cardinal will warm up for the regular season and give fans their first taste of Cardinal basketball action with an exhibition matchup against the Chico State Wildcats on Thursday night at Maples Pavilion.
The Wildcats, an NCAA Division II program, are the reigning NCAA West region champs from last season’s NCAA Tournament, and finished with a 26-8 overall record last season. They finished with a 15-5 conference record, putting them at fourth in the California Collegiate Athletic Association. The Wildcats made their sixth consecutive NCAA Division II Tournament appearance and second elite eight appearance in four years.
Chico State has four returning starters from that team, including senior forward Isaiah Ellis, who led the Wildcats in scoring and rebounding last season, averaging 13.3 points and 6.4 rebounds per contest. Ellis also earned First-Team All-CCAA honors for the second straight season.
Another player to watch for is Jalen McFerren, a senior guard from Oakland who averaged 12.4 points, 5.5 rebounds and 2.6 assists per game last season and also received First-Team All-CCAA recognition. McFerren shoots 44.7 percent from beyond the arc and 92.7 percent from the free-throw line.
Fans will get their first look at an experienced Cardinal squad that includes familiar faces like senior forward and ESPN preseason All-American Reid Travis, senior guard Dorian Pickens and senior forward Michael Humphrey as well as new faces from Stanford’s top-25 recruiting class, including freshmen Daejon Davis, Kezie Okpala, Isaac White and Oscar Da Silva.
The game tips off at 7 p.m. and will be aired on a live stream that can be found on gostanford.com.
Contact Sam Curry at currys ‘at’ stanford.edu.Share. The wireless device will also work with other Xbox One systems and PCs. The wireless device will also work with other Xbox One systems and PCs.
We might not know what the Xbox Project Scorpio looks like, but we do know what the first official headset for the upgraded console looks like.
Meet the officially licensed LS35X wireless gaming headset from LucidSound. Coming out this holiday season, the company claims the device pairs up with Project Scorpio like an Xbox One controller, meaning no cables are necessary.
The LucidSound headset will also work with all other Xbox One systems, as well as PCs. Though for computers, a Xbox Wireless Adapter will most likely be needed.
Last month, Microsoft showed off the Project Scorpio dev kit, which is actually more powerful than the eventual consumer version. The company also revealed the tech specs for the new Xbox console as well.
Now remember, more accessory announcements for the upgraded Microsoft home console are probably on the way. That's because the full Project Scorpio unveiling has been confirmed for E3.
Exit Theatre Mode
Evan Campbell is a freelance writer who scripts the Daily Fix, streams games on his Twitch channel, and chats about movies and TV series on Twitter.Dana Papaj, the Grand Island woman injured by a hit-and-run driver while walking her dog two weeks ago, remains in guarded condition in a coma, unable to speak or focus her eyes.
But she has spontaneously opened her eyes on a few occasions, which has given her family "tremendous hope," according to Steven M. Cohen, the family attorney.
"They are praying around the clock and believe this is in God's hands," Cohen told The Buffalo News. "They believe the prayers and well-wishes of others are going to help her recover and they hope she recovers fully."
Papaj, 53, has been moved out of intensive care and put into a recovery room at Erie County Medical Center, said Cohen and attorney Catherine Aughey, both of the HoganWillig Law Firm. Her condition has stabilized.
Papaj, who recently became a grandmother, is a teacher's aide at Huth Elementary. She was walking her dog, Molly, just after at 8 p.m. June 13 on the west shoulder of East River Road, between Whitehaven Road and Riverwoods Drive, on Grand Island when she was struck by a pickup truck.
There has been no arrest, but police investigators have advised the family they are getting closer to making an arrest, Cohen said.
The pickup truck that State Police investigators believe hit Papaj is registered to a state correction officer, Edward J. Kuebler III of the Town of Tonawanda, Kuebler's attorney has confirmed. State police have not publicly identified who was driving the truck at the time of the accident.
Surveillance footage of the incident shows a pickup truck brake, but not come to a full stop before leaving the scene, according to a source.
Cohen said Papaj's relatives want to thank State Police Investigator Daniel Alaimo and the Erie County District Attorney's Office for their hard work on the case.
"This is one of the most thorough investigations that I have encountered in my almost three decades of practice and that is deeply appreciated by the family," said Cohen.
Grand Island Town Supervisor Nathan McMurray said East River Road is very narrow and it needs to have a pedestrian and bike path built on it to improve safety.
McMurray said after the crash, he reached out to the Radisson Hotel, and the hotel agreed to reroute its buses and delivery trucks away from East River Road to Whitehaven Road.
"We will do anything we can possibly do," said McMurray.The Transwheel drone is a new type of robotic vehicle that could soon be carrying our packages and parcels to our doors, according to designers.
The Transwheel drone uses robotic arms to carry deliveries on single self-balancing wheel.
t would use GPS to navigate between locations and facial recognition software to confirm the identity of recipients.
For larger items, the drones could also work together to share the load.
Kobi Shikar, an engineering and design student at Shenkar School of Engineering and Design in Ramat Gan, Israel, claims they could even replace the need for container lorries.
He said the robotic delivery service could replace the need for large delivery vehicles clogging up the roads but perhaps more usefully it may also remove the need to deliver items during working hours.
Instead the robots would be able to turn up with packages at times more convenient to homeowners.
Mr Shikar said: ‘The Transwheel concept reimagines package distribution as a round-the-clock autonomous service carried out by robotic single-wheel drones that work independently and together to ensure timely, efficient delivery.
‘Each wheel features a self-balancing gyroscopic system, electric arms, and GPS-driven communication capability.
Images and article via The Daily MailNew information about early Native Americans' horticultural practices comes not from hieroglyphs or other artifacts, but from a suite of four gene duplicates found in wild and domesticated sunflowers.
In an upcoming issue of Current Biology, Indiana University Bloomington biologists present the first concrete evidence for how gene duplications can lead to functional diversity in organisms. In this case, the scientists learned how duplications of a gene called FLOWERING LOCUS T, or FT, could have evolved and interacted to prolong a flower's time to grow. A longer flower growth period means a bigger sunflower -- presumably an attribute of great value to the plant's first breeders.
"Our paper shows how gene duplication creates potential for evolutionary innovation not just through creating new gene content but also through new interactions among duplicates," said Ben Blackman, the report's lead author.
Blackman conducted the research as an IU Bloomington Ph.D. student. He is now a postdoctoral fellow at Duke University.
Biologists have long thought the accidental duplication of genetic material provides important fodder for evolution. Less risky than modifying an existing, possibly important gene, duplicates offer an out -- one copy can continue its normal activities while the other copy acquires new functions. That's a hypothesis, anyway. The Current Biology paper suggests reality may be a little more complex.
FT genes play a role in sensitizing flowering plants to seasons, and their expression is usually triggered by changes in day length. Some flowering plants express FT genes early in the growing season as days get longer. Sunflower FT genes are expressed toward the end of the growing season when days are getting shorter. As far as biologists know, all flowering plants have at least one FT gene.
Blackman and his colleagues identified four FT genes in sunflower, Helianthus annuus, which are known as HaFT paralogs. Each of the paralogs, HaFT1 through HaFT4, has a unique genetic sequence, but is similar enough to the others to conclude three of them were the result of DNA duplication events in sunflower's distant past.
"Based on the level of divergence between the various HaFTs and the presence of a single FT copy in lettuce, we inferred that one copy became two during a whole genome doubling event that occurred roughly 30 million years ago," Blackman said. "One of those copies proliferated further through two small-scale duplications that we infer occurred much more recently."
The scientists examined each paralog's expression patterns within sunflower, and by strategically cloning variants of the HaFT genes into the model plant Arabidopsis thaliana, discerned the paralogs' physiological properties in one another's presence.
One of the paralogs, HaFT3, has lost function and is no longer expressed. Countless genome surveys show "non-functionalization" is a common fate for gene duplicates in plants and other eukaryotes, possibly because the extra dose of genetic expression can be wasteful or overtly harmful to the organism.
Two of the paralogs, HaFT2 and HaFT4, are structurally similar to each other and have retained normal function. The proteins they encode are produced in leaves in response to day length. It is believed the HaFT2 and HaFT4 proteins travel down to the stem and up to the shoot tip, where they compel meristem cells to develop into flower buds, but this has yet to be shown conclusively for Helianthus annuus.
HaFT1 isn't produced in the leaves but at the site of HaFT2 and HaFT4's target -- the shoot tip and the green bracts that will radiate out from the flower itself. There are two basic versions of the HaFT1 called alleles. The domesticated HaFT1 allele is distinguished from the wild allele by the omission of a single nucleotide. But what a difference that nucleotide makes. The protein produced from the domesticated HaFT1 is larger than its wild cousin and has a novel domain.
Only two of the 23 wild populations surveyed possess both types of the HaFT1 allele.
That is not the case for domesticated sunflower populations, for which the domestic version of HaFT1 completely (or almost completely) dominates. Modern domesticated sunflowers used in farming are homogeneous for domesticated HaFT1. The scientists also examined "landraces," Native Americans' own domesticated cultivars, some of which are quite old. These too are dominated by domesticated HaFT1.
By comparing the activity of domesticated and wild HaFT1, the scientists learned it is the domesticated version of HaFT1 that lengthens the time period during which flowers grow and mature. This can have a wide variety of effects, from increasing the size of the sunflowers' seed disk to increasing the flowers' total seed mass.
Despite its name, domestic HaFT1 isn't the result of domestication -- its origin likely precedes human cultivation. It is called domestic, because it is the version of HaFT1 that caused traits early Native Americans seem to have preferred as they bred the plants for horticulture. Genetic evidence the scientists collected from a broad survey of domesticated and wild HaFT1 genes suggests domesticated HaFT1 experienced a "selective sweep" around the time early Native Americans would have begun cultivating sunflower.
"Our study is the first to provide both strong functional evidence and strong evolutionary evidence that a particular nucleotide variant in this one gene -- HaFT1 -- was critical for early sunflower domestication," Blackman said.
How HaFT1 was exerting its flower-delaying effects was not clear until the scientists cloned HaFT1, HaFT2 and HaFT4 into Arabidopsis thaliana in different combinations. A. thaliana's own FT gene had been removed. Cloning genes in this way can eliminate complicating factors when scientists are interested in knowing how a few genes (and the proteins they encode) interact.
Domesticated HaFT1 had no impact on flowering in the presence of HaFT2. But HaFT1 did delay A. thaliana flowering in the presence of HaFT4. The scientists concluded the newer HaFT1 and older HaFT4 are interacting, possibly directly, in such a way to interfere with HaFT4's function, thereby delaying flowering.
"In the sunflower story, what is most interesting in my view is how evolution has exploited both recent and ancient gene duplicates in the same gene family to achieve shifts in flowering time and photoperiod sensitivity," said IU Bloomington plant evolutionary biologist Loren Rieseberg, the study's principal investigator.
Rieseberg has dual appointments at IU Bloomington and the University of British Columbia.
Jared Strasburg, Andrew Raduski and Scott Michaels also contributed to the research. It was supported with grants from the National Institutes of Health and the National Science Foundation.After being quiet for much of E3 and not being announced at the Microsoft Conference as many had predicted previously. Developer Damon Grow tweeted out the Joe Montana Football website was live and taking sign ups.
Right now the website is just a sign up for more info, but currently under Damon Grow’s profile you can see Superstar Games is listed as the company developing the game when there was nothing there previously. Definitely some minor developments with Joe Montana 16 after not hearing much from them this E3.
What we know so far about Joe Montana football:
It is being developed by Superstar Games.
Superstar Games is owned by Joe Montana.
Damon Grow works for Superstar Games.
It is being developed in Unreal Engine 4.
It has been in development for 1 year.
It will have no NFL or NFLPA license.
It is “not exclusive to any platform” (which disspells the solely mobile game rumors).
(which disspells the solely mobile game rumors). They are not currently pursuing an annual release development cycle.
Damon Grow has referred to the development process as a “marathon” and not a “sprint”
Customization is one of their main focuses.
It will have multiple modes.
It will have a story mode.
There is a create a stadium feature of some sort.
feature of some sort. Details such as the materials of the seats can affect fan happiness in one of their modes.
Stay tuned to Sports Gamers Online for all of the latest Joe Montana 16 news and the latest from your favorite games!News:
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JEFFERSON CITY, Mo. (ChurchMilitant.com) - The flagship school for the diocese of Jefferson City has updated its handbook with clear Catholic instruction to counter the LGBT agenda being foisted on schools.
Just in time for the new school year, St. Joseph Cathedral School, has posted on their website a handbook, which on page 65 reads, "Students may not advocate, celebrate or express same-sex attraction in such a way as to cause confusion or distraction in the context of Catholic school classes, activities or events."
An inside source, who spoke on condition of anonymity told Church Militant their joy at this surprise turn of events as the LGBT agenda had been pushed so hard on diocesan schools since May by higher-ups in the diocese and in the school system itself. A veritable battle had been waged by concerned parents, teachers and priests, fighting against the policy which sought to admit students from same-sex parenting homes into Catholic schools, without requiring students to live according to Catholic faith and morals both in and outside of school.
The school's Parent and Student Handbook, which was revised August 1 and is prominently published on the school's website, is similar to the student handbook that was revised last year by the Catholic schools in the diocese of Little Rock, Arkansas. Both handbooks attempt to put clear Catholic teaching into practice at their schools.
The student handbook from St. Joseph's Cathedral school makes it very clear that gender ideology will not be tolerated. Page 65 states, "All students are expected to conduct themselves in a manner consistent with their biological gender." The section on "Human Sexuality Education" spells out that all formation will be based on a Catholic understanding of human sexuality. "Children will learn and understand their roles most clearly," it reads, "if this learning is centered with the context of Catholic family life."
One of the concerns parents had with the previous "open-door policy" spearheaded by the diocese was that it had been sprung on parents and teachers without warning. In June, Rick Manson, a member of the diocese, told Church Militant, "This is not a policy to be shoved down the throats of good people who pay tuition to have their children attend a Catholic school instead of public school."
The only person left defending this policy is the bishop himself.
The new handbook, however, emphasizes the role of parents in the formation of their children. Regarding formation on the sensitive topic of human sexuality the handbook stresses:
The school believes that the primary educators of children in human sexuality are the parents. Children will learn and understand their roles most clearly if this learning is centered in the context of Catholic family life. Parental involvement in sexuality education will focus on the individual needs of the child. The school is to play a supportive role in reinforcing Catholic values and teachings.
The recent posting in the diocese of a school handbook imbued with such Catholic principles that are worded so clearly is considered by insiders as an answer to their prayers. The prominence that St. Joseph Cathedral school has in the diocese, also, is a source of great hope to insiders. It's commonly referred to as the "flagship" school of the diocese. The hope is that what happens there will spread to other Jefferson City Catholic schools.
A source very close to the events informed Church Militant that Bp. John Gaydos, who was staunchly backing the pro-LGBT school policy, has been abandoned by everyone in the diocese, owing to the public outcry of his pet policy. In May, the bishop wrote a letter to all his priests, urging them to continue supporting his pro-LGBT initiative in spite of public backlash.
Church Militant's source said, "Principals throughout the diocese do not support the diocesan plan. The bishop called his staff to a meeting two weeks after the news broke to chastise them for their poor handling of the matter." The source added, "The only person left defending this policy is the bishop himself. Everyone who was involved in its development has sought to distance themselves from it."
Church Militant reached out to the Jefferson City Cathedral School for comment but as yet has not gotten a response.
Have a news tip? Submit news to our tip line.While Internet trolls and members of Congress wage war over edits on Wikipedia, Swedish university administrator Sverker Johansson has spent the last seven years becoming the most prolific author…by a long shot. In fact, he’s responsible for over 2.7 million articles or 8.5% of all the articles in the collection, according to The Wall Street Journal.
And it’s all thanks to a program called Lsjbot.
Johansson’s software collects info from databases on a particular topic then packages it into articles in Swedish and two dialects of Filipino (his wife’s native tongue). Many of the posts focus on innocuous subjects — animal species or town profiles. Yet, the sheer volume of up to 10,000 entries a day has vaulted Johansson and his bot into the top leaderboard position and hence, the spotlight.
The bot’s automatically generated entries are not the beautifully constructed entries one would find within the pages of the Encyclopedia Britannica, for example. Many posts are simply stubs — short fragments of posts that require editing and/or additional information — because the bot is dependent on what’s readily available on the web. Being on Wikipedia, nothing stops someone from refining the stubs and editing them into the beautiful prose that would make any human proud.
Whether Wikipedia purists approve of Lsjbot or not, data scraping software that can mass produce articles is increasingly on the rise.
Just last month, the Associated Press announced that it would be using software called Wordsmith, created by startup Automated Insights, to produce stories on the quarterly corporate earnings from US companies. Since October of 2011, Narrative Science has been automatically generating sports and finance stories on Forbes without much fanfare.
It isn’t just companies getting into the automated content game. Recently, a LA journalist utilized a bot to post a report just three minutes after an earthquake. Another academic, Philip Parker, has created over 100,000 ebooks on Amazon through similar software.
Much of this software employs fairly simple search functions to capture the data and reformat it into articles. In other words, very minimal artificial intelligence. Yet, growing interest in machine learning and natural language processing will inevitably mean that the quality of bot-generated content will only increase.
In the very near future, software-created articles will be indistinguishable from a vast amount of human-produced content. Whether that’s a good or bad thing, you can be sure the Wikipedia article on the subject will be furiously edited over time.
[Photo credit: STML/Flickr]Handout picture released by the Mexican Federal Prosecutor for Environmental Protection (PROFEPA) showing dead crocodiles on February 10, 2016, in Chetumal, Quintana Roo State, Mexico. (AFP)
More than 120 crocodiles died from apparently suffocating and crushing each other while being transported across Mexico in a truck, authorities said on Wednesday.The wildlife company Cocodrilos Exoticos, based in the Caribbean coast state of Quintana Roo, could face a fine of between 50 to 50,000 days of minimum wage -- $193 to $193,000, the environmental prosecutor's office said.The 124 reptiles were among 350 Morelet's crocodiles from another farm, Cocodrilos Mexicanos, located in the northwestern Pacific coast state of Sinaloa, the office said in a statement.But inspectors discovered that 124 of the 350 specimens were dead when they arrived at the "Cocodrilia" wildlife conservation facility in the Caribbean coast town of Chetumal. There are 2,550 kilometers (1,580 miles) between the two cities.The crocodiles "presumably died from suffocation and being crushed during the trip," the statement said.Pictures released by the prosecutor's office showed the large truck and a handful of dead crocodiles on the ground, including one with its neck twisted.The company is accused of failing to guarantee "dignified treatment" for the animals under wildlife protection laws.The Cocodrilia conservation site acquired nearly 5,000 crocodiles from the Sinaloa company.Tucker Carlson UNLEASHES on Illegal Alien: ‘You Don’t Have a Right to Demand Anything!’ (VIDEO)
Tucker Carlson unleashed on illegal alien and DACA recipient Ivan Ceja over the unbelievable demands of lawbreaking invaders.
Tucker clearly stated that illegal aliens don’t have the right to demand anything.
As the Gateway Pundit reported earlier, angry illegal aliens stormed House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi’s Dream Act presser on Monday and got in her face chanting, “Democrats deport!” and “Yes or No??”
Illegal aliens got right in Nancy Pelosi’s face screaming, “Yes or No!”–Pelosi tried to make sense of what they were demanding and asked “To what??”
They were also demanding all 11 million (illegal aliens) get citizenship. Who really knows how many illegal aliens are in the United States. The real number could easily be upwards of 20-30 million plus. As they demonstrated today, DACA isn’t enough. Now it’s a free for all and it’s pizza for everyone.
Tucker Carlson pointed out how ungrateful illegal aliens are after they have benefited from our society. They are demanding, hostile, and show ‘lack of gratitude’.
Ivan Ceja actually claimed that elected officials represent their constituents which includes illegal aliens.
Tucker Carlson shot back by saying the U.S. government exists to protect the needs of U.S. citizens. It does not exist to protect non U.S. citizens.
Video:
Watch the latest video at video.foxnews.comMost of the time we focus on helpful tips for Windows users, but today’s article will also appeal to anyone with a Chromebook. A company named Cameyo is known for its software that lets you run Windows program from a USB stick, but it also offers a virtualization service that lets you run full-blown Windows desktop programs in a browser for free.
Cameyo offers a number of open source programs by default, and if you don’t find what you need you can also upload your own EXE files. Cameyo isn’t perfect. Virtual programs tend to run slowly, some don’t work at all, and using personal files with the apps is not as obvious as it could be.
Nevertheless, Cameyo can come in handy in a pinch when you’re away from your primary PC. Here’s how it works.
Getting started
The first thing you need to do is sign-up for a Cameyo account and then link your Dropbox account to Cameyo. Once that’s done you’ll be able to access files that are saved in your Dropbox folder under \Apps\Cameyo\Desktop while you’re inside virtualized Cameyo apps. Any files you create while using Cameyo will also be saved back to this location.
In the virtual programs themselves, you’ll find your files as though you were navigating through a regular Windows system. In my tests, my files were either under RemoteUser1 or RemoteUser2.
Start a program
Irfanview running in Cameyo.
Firing up a virtual program is simple. Just hover over the program name and click the small play button that appears. The program will start and you can use it as you would on a Windows desktop.
Just remember that when you navigate the file system inside a Cameyo browser program you do not have access to your local files. It’s as though you are running a separate Windows system inside your browser. The only way to access or store files is via the desktop for RemoteUser1 or RemoteUser2, which is connected to your Dropbox account if you set things up properly in the previous step.
Cameyo’s programs
You'll find a ton of programs you can try out in the browser window, but truth be told only a few truly make sense for casual users. VLC, for example, wasn’t worth it in my tests. Any videos I tried to play were choppy and didn’t have sound since the virtual app is in its own sandbox with no access to my PC’s native audio capability. Plus, if you have a video online that you’d like to watch, it makes more sense to try and view it in a cloud service that offers video streaming for saved files.
Program’s I’d recommend trying out in Cameyo are Irfanview for photo editing, 7Zip for compressing files into a zipped format, and Audacity for working with audio files.
Have a look around and you may find other programs that suit your needs. Cameyo is also an excellent place to just try out software without having to download it. And remember you can always try uploading your own EXE files to access specific programs you need.
I wouldn’t recommend relying on Cameyo as an everyday solution, but for those times you need quick access to a desktop program from a Chromebook or browser, it’s a useful service to know about.ISLAMABAD (Reuters) - In a nation long plagued by military coups, the question of who will replace Pakistan’s all-powerful army chief has taken on new urgency this year as the country tries to shake off the legacy of decades of military dictatorship.
Pakistan's Chief of Army Staff General Ashfaq Parvez Kayani salutes during a parade while on a visit to the Sri Lanka Army headquarters in Colombo, in this file picture taken June 28, 2013. REUTERS/Dinuka Liyanawatte/Files
General Ashfaq Kayani, arguably the most powerful man in the nuclear-armed country, is expected to step down after six years in November - presenting Pakistan’s new premier with the toughest of choices yet since coming to power in May.
The army has ruled Pakistan for more than half of its history since independence in 1947. But even during periods of civilian rule, the army has set security and foreign policy.
Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif says he wants to disentangle the military from politics and he has taken over the foreign affairs and defense portfolios in an apparent show of determination to wrest those responsibilities from the army.
But the military is unlikely to relinquish its hold at such a sensitive time. As Western forces prepare to withdraw from Afghanistan by the end of next year, Pakistan is striving to prevent old rival India from increasing its influence there.
Illustrating the difficulties Sharif might face in setting foreign policy, his bid to improve ties with India has been undermined by violence between Indian and Pakistani forces in the disputed Kashmir region. While the two armies trade fire and blame, Pakistan’s civilian government can only look on.
Nevertheless, the Pakistani military has meddled less in politics under Kayani, earning him a reputation as a pragmatic leader willing to ease the military’s grip on political affairs and publicly endorse democracy.
Sharif, himself ousted in a military coup in 1999, has a difficult relationship with the army, and picking Kayani’s successor could be the defining moment of his second term.
“It’s not just that Nawaz wants someone he can trust and who he can use to neutralize the army’s political role,” one retired senior military official told Reuters. “The army also wants someone who will be able to work with Nawaz.”
The job has been at the centre of a drawn-out guessing game and officials would not speculate publicly on it. But in private interviews with army officers, politicians and diplomats, several names have emerged as possible contenders.
Those include Lieutenant General Rashad Mahmood, the current chief of general staff, Lieutenant General Tariq Khan, who is considered pragmatic on U.S. relations, and Lieutenant General Haroon Aslam, the most senior official after Kayani.
Some have even floated the idea that Kayani - whose term was extended for three years in 2010 to the discontent of some of the top brass climbing the ranks below him - might end up staying in the job for another three years.
“NO GUARANTEES”
Kayani, a chain-smoking, unsmiling man known for his low-key manner, is dubbed the Quiet General of Pakistani politics. His public statements in support of Pakistan’s transition to democracy have earned him respect in the West.
In a speech just before the May election, Kayani said a bad democracy was better than the worst kind of dictatorship. And yet his words hardly concealed a warning that the army’s support for democracy would not be available forever.
“Everyone says that under Kayani the army is now transformed and we can trust in its democratic credentials. But let’s not jump the gun,” said a source in Sharif’s administration.
“One era of soft military leadership does not make for a lasting legacy. The civilians will have to work hard to make sure everyone knows their limits.”
But even under Kayani some generals have grumbled quietly over the softer approach, and a new army chief might feel pressure to exert his authority over the civilians.
This could set the military on a collision course with Sharif again, like in 1999 when he was overthrown by General Pervez Musharraf and jailed. Just a year earlier, Sharif had picked Musharraf as his new army chief.
“There are no guarantees the current status quo will last beyond Kayani,” said one diplomat in Islamabad.
Criticizing the top brass has long been taboo. But that too has changed after the Supreme Court ruled last year that the military must stop interfering in politics, eroding the generals’ untouchable status in the eyes of the public.
The army’s standing also took a hit over a secret 2011 operation by U.S. forces to kill Osama bin Laden on Pakistani soil. Ordinary Pakistanis saw |
olen and Macena. Macena obtained the identities from Neal, who had access to the personal information of individuals who had been detained at the Dothan City Jail. Altogether, Bolen filed tax returns claiming more than $300,000 in refunds using the identities that Neal stole from his employer, but the IRS was able to successfully stop a number of the fraudulent returns.
Bolen was sentenced to serve 48 months in prison and Macena was sentenced to serve 34 months in prison.
This case was investigated by special agents of the IRS-Criminal Investigation. Trial Attorneys Jason Poole, Charles M. Edgar Jr. and Michael Boteler of the Tax Division prosecuted the case with the assistance of the U.S. Attorney’s Office for the Middle District of Alabama.The works of J. R. R. Tolkien have served as the inspiration to painters, musicians, film-makers and writers, to such an extent that Tolkien is sometimes seen as the "father" of the entire genre of high fantasy.[1] The production of such derivative works is sometimes of doubtful legality, because Tolkien's published works will remain in copyright until 2043. The film, stage and merchandise rights of The Hobbit and The Lord of the Rings are owned by Middle-earth Enterprises, while the rights of The Silmarillion and other material remain with The J.R.R. Tolkien Estate Ltd.
Do not laugh! But once upon a time (my crest has long since fallen) I had a mind to make a body of more or less connected legend, ranging from the large and cosmogonic to the level of romantic fairy-story... The cycles should be linked to a majestic whole, and yet leave scope for other minds and hands, wielding paint and music and drama. Absurd. J. R. R. Tolkien[2]
Art and illustration [ edit ]
The earliest illustrations of Tolkien's works were drawn by the author himself. In 1937, The Hobbit was first illustrated by professional draughtsmen for the American edition. Tolkien was very critical of these, and in 1946 he rejected illustrations by Horus Engels for the German edition of the Hobbit as "too 'Disnified'".[3]
Milein Cosman illustrated Farmer Giles of Ham in 1948, and Tolkien was not happy with this work, either. In 1949, Cosman was replaced by Pauline Baynes, who became Tolkien's favourite illustrator and who created drawings for The Adventures of Tom Bombadil as well as for Farmer Giles of Ham. In 1968, Tolkien was sent a number of a suite of illustrations of The Lord of the Rings, mostly in coloured ink, by English artist Mary Fairburn; Tolkien said of her pictures: "They... show far more attention to the text than any that have yet been submitted to me.... I am beginning to... think that an illustrated edition might be a good thing." For various reasons the project went no further, and Fairburn's illustrations were unknown until 2012.[4] Crown Princess Margrethe (now Queen Margrethe II) of Denmark, an accomplished and critically acclaimed painter, was inspired to illustrations to The Lord of the Rings in the early 1970s. She sent them to Tolkien, who was struck by the similarity to the style of his own drawings.[citation needed] In 1977, Queen Margrethe's drawings were published in the Danish translation of the book, which was reissued in 2002,[5] redrawn by the British artist Eric Fraser.[citation needed]
Tim and Greg Hildebrandt were also well-known Tolkien illustrators during the first decades after the publication of The Lord of the Rings.
In the 1970s, British artist Jimmy Cauty created a best-selling poster of the Hobbit for the retailer Athena.[6]
Probably the widest-known Tolkien illustrators of the 1990s and 2000s are John Howe, Alan Lee, and Ted Nasmith — Alan Lee for illustrated editions of The Hobbit and The Lord of the Rings, Ted Nasmith for illustrated editions of The Silmarillion, and John Howe for the cover artwork to several Tolkien publications. Howe and Lee were also involved in the creation of Peter Jackson's film trilogy as concept artists — Nasmith was also invited to take part in the films, but was forced to reluctantly decline due to a personal crisis at the time. In 2004, Lee won an Academy Award for Best Art Direction for his work on the film The Lord of the Rings: The Return of the King.[7]
Other artists who have found inspiration in Tolkien's works include Catherine Karina Chmiel, Inger Edelfeldt, Anke Eißmann, Roger Garland, Michael Hague, Tove Jansson (of Moomin fame, illustrator of Swedish and Finnish translations of The Hobbit), Jay Johnstone, Paul Raymond Gregory, Tim Kirk, Angus McBride, Jef Murray, Kay Miner, Billy Mosig, Colleen Doran, Jenny Dolfen, Matěj Čadil and Peter Xavier Price.
Film [ edit ]
The Lord of the Rings trilogy was filmed New Zealand's " Hobbiton " wheretrilogy was filmed
Peter Jackson, director of six Tolkien adaptations, at the site of filming of The Hobbit trilogy
Tolkien originally sold the film, stage and merchandise rights of The Hobbit and The Lord of the Rings to United Artists in 1968, but they never made a film, and in 1976 the rights were sold to Tolkien Enterprises, a division of the Saul Zaentz Company.
In the early seventies John Boorman was planning a film of The Lord of the Rings, but the plans never went further because of movie studio politics. Some of the work done was resurrected for the film Excalibur in 1981.
Ralph Bakshi directed an animated movie adaptation of The Lord of the Rings in 1978 (partly made with the rotoscope technique), which covered only the first half of The Lord of the Rings. Rankin-Bass covered the second half with a children's TV animation The Return of the King (1980); earlier they had made a TV animation of The Hobbit (1977).
The Lord of the Rings was adapted as a trilogy of films (2001–03), directed by Peter Jackson. The Hobbit was also adapted as a trilogy (2012–14), with some elements adapted from The Return of the King's Appendices.
The split of Tolkien's works between Tolkien Enterprises and the Tolkien Estate means that none of the Tolkien Enterprises' products can include source material from outside The Hobbit and The Lord of the Rings, and therefore a film or stage version of The Silmarillion is highly unlikely.
Comparisons have been made to the plot of the science fiction television show Babylon 5 and Tolkien's works.
Games [ edit ]
There are multiple model-based games, trading card games, board games and video games that take place in Middle-earth, most depicting scenes and characters from The Lord of the Rings. In a broader sense, many fantasy role-playing games such as Dungeons and Dragons and DragonQuest were strongly influenced by Tolkien's works. Such games feature creatures such as Orcs, Trolls, Elves, Dwarves, Halflings, Ents which are common to Tolkien's mythos even if they do not take place in Middle-earth.
Video games [ edit ]
The books have been reproduced in video game form a number of times during the 1980s and 2000s, including Melbourne House's Lord of the Rings, Shadows of Mordor, War in Middle-earth; Interplay's Lord of the Rings Vol. 1 and Lord of the Rings Vol. 2.; Electronic Arts' action platformer adaptations of The Two Towers and The Return of the King, real-time strategy games The Lord of the Rings: The Battle for Middle-earth and The Lord of the Rings: The Battle for Middle-earth II, and the role-playing game The Lord of the Rings: The Third Age, all based on the Jackson films; and Sierra Entertainment's action platformer based on The Fellowship of the Ring. There is also a PSP Game titled The Lord of the Rings: Tactics based on the Jackson films, a MMORPG by Turbine, The Lord of the Rings Online: Shadows of Angmar. The Two Towers (MUD) is also set in Tolkien's world. Lego's licensed theme game version had Japanese anime graphics.
Other games [ edit ]
Games Workshop have made a miniature wargame called The Lord of the Rings Strategy Battle Game, which, while part of the film trilogy's merchandise, combines elements from both the books and films. Many of Games Workshop's other battle games that are not directly related to the books have had some key background based on it.
Several other games have been based directly on The Lord of the Rings and related works, including, amongst many, Iron Crown Enterprises' Middle-earth Role Playing game (1982–1999) and Middle-earth Collectible Card Game (1995–1999), as well as The Lord of the Rings Trading Card Game (2001) made by Decipher, Inc. All of these predate Jackson's film trilogy except for Decipher's card game, which is part of the latter's merchandise.
Decipher also created the Lord of the Rings Roleplaying Game, a role-playing game based on the Jackson films.
Board games include Risk: Lord of the Rings Trilogy Edition and another simply entitled Lord of the Rings, as well as the Middle Earth Games from Simulations Publications, Inc. containing the games War of the Ring (strategic, covering all three books), Gondor (tactical, covering the siege of Minas Tirith) and Sauron (covering the decisive battle of the Second Age) in 1977. A more recent strategic game covering all three books, called War of the Ring, was released in 2004. There are also Trivial Pursuit and Monopoly editions based on The Lord of the Rings, as well as a The Lord of the Rings Trivia Game quiz game. Chess sets have also been created with the figures based on people and other characters from The Lord of the Rings. there has also been a game on the Nintendo WII. it was "The Lord Of The Rings, Aragon's Quest" which is a third person game based on Aragon's role in the book.
Homages [ edit ]
The creators of the Dungeons and Dragons role-playing game were also strongly influenced by Tolkien. The game has (clearly Tolkien-influenced) dwarves and elves as playable characters, and formerly had hobbits as well. After being threatened with a lawsuit by the Saul Zaentz company, Tolkien Enterprises, they replaced hobbits with the similar "halflings" — a term also used in The Lord of the Rings, balrogs with 'balor-demons' and other genericized names. In most versions of the game, halflings were especially good at being thieves/rogues, a nod to Bilbo the thief in The Hobbit. His works also indirectly inspired the Warcraft series via their use in Games Workshop's battle games.
Equally common is the use of the term orc for a variety of hobgoblin type creatures in later fantasy although Tolkien popularized this modern usage of the word. Even more removed genre games such as Shadowrun and Warhammer 40,000 use the term, therein spelt Ork, possibly to sidestep possible legal issues (though Tolkien actually preferred -k in late writings).
Literature [ edit ]
Prose [ edit ]
Fantasy writer Terry Brooks, among others, was heavily influenced by Tolkien
Many authors have found inspiration in Tolkien's work as well. Following the success of The Hobbit and The Lord of the Rings in the 1960s, publishers were quick to try to meet a new demand for literate fantasy in the American marketplace.[8] Ursula Le Guin's Earthsea series, beginning with A Wizard of Earthsea in 1968, was one of the first fantasy series influenced by Tolkien. [9][10] Patricia A. McKillip's The Forgotten Beasts of Eld and Jane Yolen's The Magic Three of Solatia were two examples of Tolkien-inspired fantasies for young adults written in the mid-1970s. [11]Ballantine, under the direction of editor Lin Carter, published public domain and relatively obscure works under the banner of the Ballantine Adult Fantasy series, aimed at adult readers who enjoyed Tolkien's works.[8] Lester Del Rey, however, sought for new books that would mirror Tolkien's work, and published Terry Brooks' The Sword of Shannara, David Eddings's Belgariad, and Stephen R. Donaldson's The Chronicles of Thomas Covenant, the Unbeliever. [8] Guy Gavriel Kay, who had assisted Christopher Tolkien with the editing of The Silmarillion, later wrote his own Tolkien-influenced fantasy trilogy, The Fionavar Tapestry. [8] Russian writer Nick Perumov was able to publish several fantasy novels set in Tolkien's Middle-Earth after the events of The Lord of the Rings (due to a loophole in Russian copyright law).[12] Dennis L. McKiernan's Silver Call duology was intended to be a direct sequel to The Lord of the Rings but had to be altered. The Iron Tower trilogy, highly influenced by Tolkien's books, was then written as backstory.[13]
Throughout the next two decades, the term "fantasy" became synonymous with the general aspects of Tolkien's work: multiple races including dwarves and elves, a quest to destroy a magical artifact, and an evil that seeks to control the world. The plot of Novelist Pat Murphy's There and Back Again intentionally mirrors that of The Hobbit, but is transposed into a science-fiction setting involving space travel. J. K. Rowling's Harry Potter has been seen as having been influenced by Tolkien's work, particularly the wizard Dumbledore being partially inspired by Tolkien's Gandalf.[14] The Inheritance Cycle by Christopher Paolini largely rehashed the setting and languages of The Lord of the Rings, as well as creatures such as elves and dwarves having nearly identical qualities to the Elves and Dwarves of Middle-earth (though the plot is much more similar to that of Star Wars). Some people have gone so far as to accuse Paolini of plagiarism.[15] S.M. Stirling's "Emberverse" series includes a character obsessed with The Lord of the Rings who creates a post-apocalyptic community based upon the Elves and Dúnedain of Middle-earth. The same plot point was used by the Russian writer Vladimir Berezin in his novel Road Signs (from the Universe of Metro 2033). Another Russian writer, Kirill Eskov, wrote The Last Ringbearer, about the events in Lord of the Rings from the perspective of Sauron. Stephen King, best known for horror novels, has acknowledged Tolkien's influence on his novel The Stand as well as his fantasy series The Dark Tower. Several other prominent fantasy writers, including George R. R. Martin, Michael Swanwick, Raymond E. Feist, Poul Anderson, Karen Haber, Harry Turtledove, Charles De Lint, and Orson Scott Card, have all acknowledged Tolkien's work as an inspiration for their own fantasy work. [8]
Poetry [ edit ]
Some people were inspired to compose poems in Quenya or Sindarin, the two most developed of Tolkien's created languages. For example, Helge Kåre Fauskanger translated the first two chapters of Genesis into Quenya. Tyalië Tyelelliéva is a journal dedicated to poems in the Elvish languages.
Comics [ edit ]
Cartoonist Jeff Smith was influenced by Tolkien, and the mythologies that inspired his works. His epic 1,300 page graphic novel, Bone has been characterized by him as "Bugs Bunny meets The Lord of the Rings. It's a really long fairy tale with some fantasy elements but a lot of comedy."[16]
Radio plays [ edit ]
Three radio plays based on The Lord of the Rings have been made, broadcast in 1955–1956, 1979 and 1981 respectively. The first and last ones were produced by the BBC.
Music [ edit ]
Numerous songs have been inspired by or refer to the fiction of J. R. R. Tolkien.
Rock music [ edit ]
Progressive rock acts like Rush, Mostly Autumn, Glass Hammer, Bo Hansson and indie rock band Gatsbys American Dream have composed several songs based on Tolkien's characters and stories. Camel's "Nimrodel/The Procession/The White Rider" is obviously about Gandalf. Rock band Led Zeppelin has numerous songs inspired by Tolkien's works (certainly "The Battle of Evermore", "Misty Mountain Hop", and "Ramble On," with debate about some parts of "Stairway to Heaven").[17] Tom Rapp set most of The Verse of the One Ring ("Three Rings for the Elven-kings under the sky...") to music as "Ring Thing" in Pearls Before Swine's second album, Balaklava (1968).[18] Bob Catley, lead singer of the British prog rock band Magnum, released a solo album titled Middle Earth, themed around The Lord of the Rings. Punk quartet Thrice have released a song called "The Long Defeat" about Tolkien's philosophies. The East Texas-based rock band Hobbit has produced multiple albums inspired by Tolkien's work.[19]
Many heavy metal acts have been influenced by Tolkien. Blind Guardian has written many songs relating to Middle-earth, including the full concept album Nightfall in Middle Earth that follows The Silmarillion.[17][20] Almost all of Summoning's songs[21] and the entire discography of Battlelore are Tolkien-themed. Power metal bands like Epidemia, Nightwish[22] (their song Elvenpath features audio clips from the prologue of Bakshi's animated The Lord of the Rings and also their song Wishmaster which includes references to Elbereth, Lorien and the Grey Havens), and others, feature Tolkien-themed songs. "This Day We Fight!", a song by thrash metal band Megadeth from the album Endgame, was based on the mythos of Tolkien.[23] Also, the Italian progressive band Ainur have composed several album inspired by Silmarillion stories in early 2000s.[24] The Irish Celtic metal band Cruachan released a song called the "Fall of Gondolin" on their album Pagan.
The band Sabaton has a song named "Shadows" (of Mordor), focus based on the "Black King" following orders from Sauron to take back the ring.
Some bands and certain musicians used Tolkien legendarium for their stage names. Progressive rock band Marillion derive their name from The Silmarillion,[25] Gorgoroth take their name from an area of Mordor, Burzum take their name from the Black Speech of Mordor,[26] Cirith Ungol take their name from the pass on the western path of Mordor, the dwelling of the spider Shelob[27] and Amon Amarth take their name after an alternative name for Mount Doom.[28] Lead singer of Dimmu Borgir, Shagrath, also takes his stage name from The Lord of the Rings, after an orc captain.[29] The black metal band Summoning has made many songs and albums about The Lord of the Rings, such as their albums Minas Morgul, named after a fortress in Mordor, and Dol Guldur, named after the hill, which features the song Khazad Dum, about the dwarven city.
Jazz music [ edit ]
Australian jazz musician and composer, John Sangster, made a response to Tolkien's work with The Hobbit Suite (1973, Swaggie Records – S1340), and the four double LP/ CD sets The Lord of the Rings: A Musical Interpretation, v. 1-3, recorded 1975-77 (re-released on CD, Move Records, 2002–05), MD 3251, 3252, 3253, and Landscapes of Middle-earth (1987, 2006) MD 3254.
Folk music [ edit ]
Sally Oldfield's first solo album, Water Bearer (1978) was inspired by Tolkien's works, particularly "Songs of the Quendi".
The Hobbitons was the name of a Dutch folk group who released a CD in 1996, containing 16 tracks of poems by J. R. R. Tolkien, from The Hobbit, The Adventures of Tom Bombadil, and The Lord of the Rings. Production was with permission of the Tolkien Estate, with the provision that it would not be sold commercially. The CD is sold out.[30]
Irish singer Enya contributed a song "May it Be" for The Fellowship of the Ring (2001) movie soundtrack. It was nominated for the Academy Award for Best Original Song. She also released a song entitled "Lothlórien", on her 1991 album Shepherd Moons.
In 2001, bluegrass and anti-folk artist Chris Thile released an instrumental album titled Not All Who Wander Are Lost, referencing Gandalf's words to Bilbo and Bilbo's poem about Aragorn. On the album is a song titled "Riddles In The Dark", which is the title of one of the chapters of The Hobbit. The album was released with Sugar Hill Records.
The Celtic foursome Broceliande has released The Starlit Jewel, setting to music selected songs by Tolkien.[31]
Other folk rock and new age musicians inspired by Tolkien include Za Frûmi (singing in Orkish), Nickel Creek, David Arkenstone and Lyriel, among others. The Spanish Neoclassical Dark Wave band Narsilion derived its name from Tolkien's song "Narsilion" about the creation of Sun and Moon[32] and also their albums are thematically inspired by Tolkien's legendarium.
Classical / film score music [ edit ]
Howard Shore composed film score for The Lord of the Rings film trilogy
Donald Swann set music in the British art-song tradition to The Road Goes Ever On, a collection of Tolkien's lyrics and poems. The work was approved by Tolkien himself.[33]
The Norwegian classical composer Martin Romberg has written tree full-scale symphonic poems, Quendi (2008), Telperion et Laurelin (2014), and Fëanor (2017), inspired by passages from the Silmarillion. The works were written on commission by Orchestre national Montpellier Languedoc-Roussillon, Orchestre régional Avignon-Provence and Orchestre Philharmonique de Nice and premiered in Southern France. [34][35][36] Romberg has also set Tolkien's Elven language poems to music in his work "Eldarinwë Liri" for girls' choir. The work premiered in 2010 with the Norwegian Girls Choir and Trio Mediæval at the Vestfold International Festival.[37]
Ensio Kosta composed in 1980–1982 a chamber music series called "Music of Middle-earth", with movements like "Awakening of Shire", "Incantation", "Winding Paths", "Lament of Galadriel", "Riders of Rohan", and "Grey Havens".
Johan de Meij’s first symphony “The Lord of the Rings" is in five movements, each illustrating a personage or an important episode from the novel: Gandalf, Lothlorien, Gollum, Journey in the Dark (The Mines of Moria /The Bridge of Khazad-Dum), Hobbits. The symphony was written between March 1984 and December 1987, and was premièred in Brussels on 15 March 1988.
Jacqueline Clarke's setting Tinuviel (1983), for countertenor solo, SATB choir, and piano accompaniment has been published in score, but not yet recorded.
Leonard Rosenman composed music for the Ralph Bakshi animated movie and Howard Shore composed the music for the three Peter Jackson films (see Music of The Lord of the Rings film series).
Stephen Oliver composed his incidental music score for the 1981 BBC radio drama adaptation of The Lord of the Rings.
Paul Corfield Godfrey has written a large number of works based on Tolkien, the most significant of which is the four-evening cycle on The Silmarillion[38] but also including three operas based on The Lord of the Rings: Tom Bombadil (one act), The Black Gate is closed (three acts) and The Grey Havens. He has also published several sets of songs including Seven Tolkien Songs, Songs of the Mark and Shadow-Bride. His third symphony, Ainulindalë, is based on the opening chapter of The Silmarillion, and there is also a half-hour setting of The Lay of Eärendil based on Bilbo's song at Rivendell (in the expanded version published by Christopher Tolkien in The Treason of Isengard). All the texts were used with permission of the Tolkien Estate and Harper Collins Publishers.
The Tolkien Ensemble published four CDs from 1997 to 2005 with the aim to create "the world's first complete musical interpretation of the poems and songs from The Lord of the Rings". The project was given approval by both the Tolkien Estate and Harper Collins Publishers. Queen Margarethe II of Denmark gave permission to use her illustrations in the CD layout.
Aulis Sallinen, one of the leading classical music composer of Finland, had composed his Seventh Symphony named "The Dreams of Gandalf" in 1996, as a commission by the Gothenburg Symphony Orchestra.
Patrick Flegg, late husband of Tolkien illustrator Mary Fairburn, composed a piano suite, Anduin: The Mighty River, recorded by Wendy Rowlands (2001).[39]
A.R. Rahman collaborated with Värttinä to compose the music for the stage adaptation The Lord of the Rings Musical.
The Loss and the Silence, a string quartet by Ezequiel Viñao (inspired by the story of Aragorn and Arwen.) The piece was commissioned for the 100th anniversary of the Juilliard School and was premiered by the Juilliard String Quartet.
Parodies [ edit ]
Scholarship [ edit ]
Tolkien has also been the subject of a number of academic works. Vinyar Tengwar and Parma Eldalamberon are journals focusing on linguistic study of Tolkien's works[42] while Tolkien Studies focuses on his works in general.
References [ edit ]
Further reading [ edit ]TEHRAN (AFP) – Iran’s President Hassan Rouhani on Tuesday ordered the country’s scientists to start work on nuclear-powered ships in response to the expected renewal of sanctions by the United States.
In letters read out on state television, Rouhani criticised the US move as a breach of last year’s nuclear accord and told Iran’s Atomic Energy Organisation to start work on “planning the design and production of fuel and nuclear power plants for maritime transport.”
The president said he had also ordered the foreign ministry to prepare a legal complaint to the international committee that oversees the nuclear accord.
Under the deal signed in July 2015, world powers agreed to lift international sanctions in exchange for curbs to Iran’s nuclear programme.
But US lawmakers recently voted to renew 10-year-old sanctions legislation against Iran related not just to nuclear issues, but also ballistic missile-testing and human rights.
President Barack Obama is expected to sign the measure into law in the coming days, saying it makes no difference to last year’s agreement because the White House will continue to suspend all the sanctions linked to Iran’s nuclear programme.One fighter shot into the air when customers at a bakery did not let him cut into a long line for bread, Ahmed recalled. Another, he said, was enraged when a man washing his car accidentally splashed him. “He shot at him,” Ahmed said. “But thank God he wasn’t a good shot, so the guy wasn’t hurt.”
Twenty months into what is now a civil war, both supporters and opponents of the government are trapped in a darkening mood of despair, revulsion and fear that neither side can end the conflict. In recent months, both sides adopted more brutal — even desperate — methods to try to break the stalemate, but they achieved merely a new version of deadlock. To many Syrians, the extreme violence seems all the more pointless for the lack of results.
The most significant shift is among the rebels’ supporters, who chant slogans not only condemning the government but also criticizing the rebels.
“The people want the reform of the Free Syrian Army,” crowds have called out. “We love you. Correct your path.”
Small acts of petty humiliation and atrocities like executions have led many more Syrians to believe that some rebels are as depraved as the government they fight. The activist from Saraqib said he saw rebels force government soldiers from a milk factory, then destroy it, even though residents needed the milk and had good relations with the owner.
“They shelled the factory and stole everything,” the activist said. “Those are repulsive acts.”
Even some of the uprising’s staunchest supporters are beginning to fear that Syria’s sufferings — lost lives, fraying social fabric, destroyed heritage — are for naught.
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“We thought freedom was so near,” said a fighter calling himself Abu Ahmed, his voice catching with grief as he spoke via Skype last month from Maarat al-Noaman, a strategic town on the Aleppo-Damascus highway. Hours earlier, a rebel victory there ended in disaster, as government airstrikes pulverized civilians returning to what they thought was safety.
“This shows it was a big lie,” Abu Ahmed said of the dream of self-government that he said had inspired him to lead a small rebel fighting group from his nearby village, Sinbol. “We cannot reach it. We can’t even think of democracy — we will be sad for years. We are losing victims from both sides.”
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A chain of calamities has fueled disgust and frustration on all sides, dozens of interviews with Syrians show.
In July, a rebel bombing killed four senior officials in a heavily guarded Damascus building, bringing new insecurity to government supporters. The rebels’ growing use of large bombs that kill bystanders spurred concerns on both sides.
Poorly executed rebel offensives brought harsh consequences. In September, rebels launched an offensive in Syria’s largest city, Aleppo, an ancient town that stood for centuries as the proud legacy of all Syrians. The fighting failed to achieve the turning point the rebels had promised.
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The government, trying to curb soldiers’ defections and reduce the strain on the military, kept more forces on bases and turned to air power and artillery, flattening neighborhoods with abandon. But the change in strategy did not restore control or security.
After seeing a rebel bombing and small-arms attack on a downtown Damascus government building, a chauffeur for a wealthy businessman complained that conspicuous security measures made him “live in fear” — without being effective.
“I want someone from the government to answer me,” he said. “The government cannot protect its key military and security buildings, so how can it protect us and run the country?”
Even within Mr. Assad’s most solid base, his minority Alawite sect, discontent spilled over last month in a clash that began in a coffee shop in the president’s ancestral village, Qardaha. Some were shaken recently by heavy casualties in the disproportionately Alawite military and militias, according to Fadi Saad, who runs a Facebook page called Alawites in the Syrian Revolution.
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On the rebel side, the Aleppo battle catalyzed simmering frustrations among civilian activists who feel dominated by gunmen. One Aleppo activist said she met with fighters to suggest ways to cut government supply routes without destroying the city, to no avail. “You risked the lives of the people for what?” the activist asked. “The Free Syrian Army is just cutting the nails of the regime. We want results.”
Nominal leaders of the Free Syrian Army say they embrace ethical standards, contend that the government commits the vast majority of abuses and blame rogue groups for bad rebel behavior.
But that did not ease the disgust after last week’s video. It shows men writhing on the ground, staring up and screaming in terror. Rebels stand over them, shouting a cacophony of orders and insults. They move like a gang, not a military unit, jostling and crowding, kicking prisoners, forcing them into a pile. Suddenly, automatic weapons fire drowns out the noise. Puffs of dust rise from the pile, now still.
“All the ugly stuff the regime practiced, the F.S.A. is copying,” Anna, a finance worker in Damascus, said of recent behavior.
She blamed the government for making society abusive, but she said the rebels were no better. “They are ignorant people with weapons,” she said.
In Maarat al-Noaman after the airstrikes, the disappointed fighter, Abu Ahmed, said Syrians would weep to see destruction in the city of “our famous poet and philosopher,” Abu al-Alaa al-Ma’arri.
The poet, a skeptic and rationalist born in the 10th century and buried in the town, wrote often of disillusion, and of the fallibility of would-be heroes: “How many times have our feet trodden beneath the dust / A brow of the arrogant, a skull of the debonair?”
Abu Ahmed said he found the town’s mosaic museum looted and littered first by soldiers, then by rebels. “I saw bodies of both rebels and regime forces, I saw beer bottles,” he said. “Honestly, honestly, words are stuck in my mouth.”Acts joined forces for two day event
The National and Chance The Rapper performed at The Obama Foundation Summit yesterday (November 1).
The two-day leadership event was staged in Chicago for “civic leaders from around the world.”
Chance, who was curating the event, took to the stage alongside Barack and Michelle Obama before performing the Hamilton track ‘Dear Theodosia’ alongside Lin-Manuel Miranda and Francis and the Lights.
“There’s been a lot of amazing, brilliant people working in this city to make this city and the world a better place, but they just need a boost. They need the boost to get there and that’s what the Obama Summit is,” he said.
The National also played three tracks including ‘The System Only Dreams In Total Darkness’ from their recent album ‘Sleep Well Beast’ alongside ‘Bloodbuzz Ohio’ and ‘Fake Empire’. You can watch the performance again here.
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Other performers on the night included Gloria Estefan and Nas.
Chance is set to host Saturday Night Live later this month, with Eminem appearing as the musical guest.
Chance has previously appeared as the musical guest on SNL twice – once in 2015, and again last year when he performed a Run DMC Christmas parody. This will be his first appearance on the show as a host.
The episode – which is set to air on November 18 – will also see fellow Midwest rapper Eminem appear as the show’s musical guest. Other musical guests on the show next month include Miley Cyrus (November 4), and Taylor Swift (November 11), while Larry David and Tiffany Haddish will host the show on November 4 and 11 respectively.First came stickers. Next came wine glasses. Now…pint glasses! Buy yours now.
UPDATE: Hey! We sold out of the RVA pint glasses in just under one day! We’ve got another shipment coming, so keep your eyes peeled.
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First came stickers. Next came wine glasses. Now…pint glasses!
While Richmond is most certainly your thing, perhaps wine is not. Well, don’t worry, we’ve got you covered. We’re in possession of some pretty awesome (if we do say so ourselves!) RVA emblazoned pint glasses. They’re five bucks each, and we take cash or credit cards.
You can pick up the glasses at our office, but if you live out of town and still would like a couple of glasses, we’re willing to work with you for special orders.
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Where: 1520 W. Main Street, Suite 102 (above Baja Bean)
1520 W. Main Street, Suite 102 (above Baja Bean) When: Any weekday between 8:30 AM -5:30 PM
Any weekday between 8:30 AM -5:30 PM How much: $5 / glass
$5 / glass Shipping: Pick up only or email scott@rvanews.com for shipping arrangementsInscribed on a plaque inside the pedestal of the Statue of Liberty is a poem by Emma Lazarus titled “New Colossus.” The sonnet waxes lyrical about how different the Green Goddess is from ancient colossal statues, and how that symbolizes the contrast between American ideals and those of empires since antiquity. The Statue of Liberty is:
“Not like the brazen giant of Greek fame,
With conquering limbs astride from land to land”
This is a reference to the Colossus of Rhodes, a statue long thought to have straddled a great harbor (although this is now doubted), and which was one of the Seven Wonders of the Ancient World.
Empires also arrogantly stand “astride from land to land” with “conquering limbs,” like the famous editorial cartoon depicting a British colonialist standing over the African continent, “striding from Cape Town to Cairo.” In a stroke of great luck for the ironist, the lampooned fellow happened to be named Cecil Rhodes, allowing the clever cartoonist to dub him, “The Rhodes Colossus.”
In contrast, according to Lazarus’s poem, the Statue of Liberty looks upon the world with “mild eyes.” It stands beside the “golden door” of the New World and, on behalf of America, tells the “ancient lands” that they can keep their “storied pomp” of imperial greatness. America would have none of it. Instead, America would take in the victims of that “greatness”: those made “tired” and “poor” by imperial exactions. “Your huddled masses yearning to breathe free…”
The new country would not bestride the world like a colossus, but would, like its great statue, stand straight and stable, holding aloft an illuminating torch: a welcoming beacon of hope and freedom.
Unfortunately this ideal has never been much more than a distant aspiration. From its earliest days, the American Colossus never hesitated to tread upon the Blacks and Indians it found underfoot.
But at least while it was busy acquiring dominion over its own continent, it was indeed quite benign and welcoming to the civilized peoples of the Old World.
But by the late 19th-century, the American Colossus had its fill of local lands and craved more exotic fare |
for unprofitable activities and permitting the private sector to take the profitable activities.
The Monitor-Deloitte report uses cowpea production in Ghana as an example of where the public sector should carry the extremely expensive improved cowpea breeder seed costs to allow the private sector to profit in seed multiplication and distribution. Breeder seed is prohibitively costly because of low multiplication rates and low demand. But the demand that exists is nonetheless lucrative, so the private sector wants to be involved only in the parts of the production process identified as profitable. Where the whole chain is profitable, such as hybrid maize or in closed value chains where there is strong but limited demand and early production processes are also potentially profitable, for example hybrid sorghum for brewing, Deloitte proposes the public sector be locked out of the production process.
Although historically, in Africa and around the world, farmers have been the traditional developers and distributors of improved seeds, the report does not even consider a potential role for farmers in the production or distribution of seed. Indeed farmers are viewed only as passive consumers of seed produced elsewhere.
The meeting in London and the focus of the report expose the agendas of the BMGF and USAID to enable private interests to profit from essential life processes in African agriculture.
Mariam Mayet Director of the African Centre for Biosafety (ACB) in South Africa said:“ACB insists that an equitable and sustainable solution to seed production and distribution can only come from direct engagement with farmers and their organizations to ensure their active involvement in these activities. We further insist that public-farmer partnerships to improve seed that integrates farmer and scientific knowledge will generate a more accountable process, and produce longer-lasting and more meaningful solutions for African agricultural production, than these profit-driven, exclusive and narrow processes.”
Source: Sustainable PulseVenice redfish
Capt. Ron Price's clients are catching piles of redfish at trenasses draining into the passes near Venice. (Ron Price photo)
Two factors are critical to consider right now for anglers who want to load the boat with redfish at the mouth of the Mississippi River near the popular port of Venice: tide direction and river stage.
Capt. Ron Price said the action is the easiest he's seen in years, and it's happening as close as a three-minute run from Venice's marinas. But the tide has to be falling, and the close-in bite will last only as long as the river stays down.
On Wednesday morning, the Mississippi River was at 3.8 feet at New Orleans Carrollton gauge.
To locate the feeding fish, Price is simply looking for trenasses that dump into the passes.
"You've got to find the drains coming out of the marsh that have good water," he said. "As long as that water's falling out, it'll have a better color than everything around it, and it will be loaded up with fish."
Price said during Tuesday's trip, his clients got bites on every cast for three hours.
The fish were plentiful, but they weren't exactly big. Although there were some 7- to 8-pounders in the mix, most of the fish measured between 17 and 18 inches.
"Venice has a lot of small reds this year, for whatever reason," Price said.
Most of the time, Price is appealing to the fish's sense of smell to draw strikes from them, throwing either Berkley Gulp or dead shrimp on a jighead.
"When it's red-hot, you can throw a bare hook out, and they'll hit that," he said. "When it slows down, you can throw a Gulp, but when it gets real slow, they favor the shrimp."
As fast as the bite is on a falling tide, Price said it turns to zip when the tide quits or begins to rise.
"When the tide stops falling, they shut down to nothing," he said. "A rising tide isn't any good. Every now and then, a rising tide will help you with the trout, but typically, for these redfish, by the time the tide stops falling, they're done eating. You can head to the house after that."
On Tuesday, Price and his crew caught some reds at a drain in The Jump. That's how close the fish are right now with the river down. That will change, of course, when the river jumps, but the bite won't slow down at all, Price said.
"These fish will be stacked like this all the way through New Year's," he said. "December is an excellent month to catch fish in Venice, regardless of what the river is doing. You just have to change the areas you fish when the river comes up."
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Todd Masson can be reached at tmasson@nola.com or 504.232.3054.
Follow @ TmassonFISH Tweet to @TmassonFISHFrom the opening scene, L Word Mississippi is on a mission to show that the relatively accepting and glamorous West Hollywood lesbian scene is not reality for most.
“How is being a lesbian in Mississippi different from what you see on TV?”
No public displays of affection. The idea that you’re damned to hell. As one woman says in a thick Southern drawl, “Living here, it has been beaten into you that homosexuality is a sin.”
To say that the past few years have been a watershed period of improvement for LGBT America is an understatement. Since the Supreme Court struck down DOMA last summer, it seems like every week another state overturns a same-sex marriage ban. An NFL season is about to start with the first openly gay player on a team roster. A generation is coming into adulthood having gone to schools with gay-straight alliances and pride weeks.
We’ve spent their hours watching Glee, Degrassi: The Next Generation, and Modern Family. And, of course, there was Showtime’s The L Word, which showcased the romantic, professional, and personal entanglements of lesbians, bisexual, and transgender women in Los Angeles. It was a hot drama more focused on love triangles than hate crimes.
Meanwhile, public opinions have dramatically improved at an unprecedented rate: Nearly 60 percent of Americans support same-sex marriages and believe lesbian and gay relations are morally acceptable, up from 40 percent in 2001.
So it’s easy to forget that there are still large patches of the country where being gay can cost you your job, your family, and your life. There's that not insignificant 40 percent of Americans who think LGBT members are not only second-class citizens, but second-class humans.
L Word Mississippi is an effective, painful reminder of this. The film—produced by Ilene Chaiken, who also did The L Word—acknowledges that for all the immense good that came from television portrayals of lesbians, these shows have often glossed over the hardships, bigotry, and, most frightening, well-intentioned condemnation that plagues these women in many parts of the country.
The immensely strong hold of the Bible Belt culture transcends nearly every aspect of lesbian life in southern Mississippi. Most women interviewed, regardless of age, race, or background have some deep familial connection to church. One woman, BB, is a former pastor who was outed to her congregation before she could even tell her loved ones. Being shamed by her church was tantamount to losing her community and her job. Her partner, Susan, runs a gym that the church instructed the congregants not to use, which cost her about a third of all her business. As part of the “love the sinner, hate the sin” culture, many townspeople are still polite and cordial to their faces. Or, as Susan says, “They don't have the balls to say it to your face. Then they'll see you in Walmart and ask how your mama is.”
The documentary shows how regularly LGBT opponents calmly counter arguments for gay marriage by saying pedophiles and practitioners of bestiality shouldn't be allowed to marry, so why should gays and lesbians? These aren't a crazy minority of Westboro Baptist Church extremists. These are neighbors they meet outside of stores or at BBQ joints who feel what they are stating is no more complicated or controversial than saying the sky is blue.
But these exchanges along with the ample shots of highway chapels and megachurches preaching the “pray the gay away” messages we're all too familiar with isn't what's shocking: it's that many of the lesbians still wrestle with seeing themselves as sinners.
The vast majority of women interviewed pray. A lot. Prayer is said before meals and before bed, and they teach their children to dutifully say the same. Anyone who has read a Gene Robinson article knows that blending Christian spirituality with LGBT acceptance can easily go hand-in-hand, but a number of the women in L Word Mississippi don't believe in this more modern approach and see themselves—as the rest of the Bible Belt does—as violators of God's commandments.
One of these is Cameron, an African-American woman planning a commitment ceremony with Amber, her partner of four years. Amber has two children from a previous relationship, and they love and treat Cameron as their parent, too. The biracial family of four, living a lower-income but happy life in Mississippi, make the landmark Cam and Mitchell of Modern Family look like boringly typical Mike and Carol Brady. But we quickly see that Cameron’s strong religious upbringing plagues her sense of identity as a lesbian.
“The Bible tells me I’m going to hell for being a lesbian, so I repent daily,” she says. “I don’t want to die a lesbian. I want to be a better person.” A shot of her lying in bed next to Amber face-to-face as she prays to God to guide them to improve themselves is heartbreaking. Amber simply says, “We’re gay, baby.”
In another scene, we see Cameron with her gay “family.” Unfortunately, the L Word Mississippi only touches upon the subculture of LGBT “families” in Mississippi that seem like sororities mixed with non-violent gangs. They have names like Loreal, Hilton, Royale, and Per2yon (Cameron’s), and the founding members are called mom and dad with each new degree of members christened a child or a grandchildren of the family. We’re only given the slightest glimpse into this world, which is a shame because it shows how new support and familial structures form when one’s own family abandons you. When Cameron is at a BBQ, she again says of being gay, “We all know it ain’t right.” While her family members disagree with her, Cameron never stops wrestling with her belief that “being a homosexual is an abomination.”
Cameron’s inner struggle pales in comparison to Rene’s, who has taken on a chilling commitment to “fighting” her homosexuality in the name of Jesus. Rene is as stereotypically butch as one could be, and she talks about how she has long had lesbian relationships and, at the same time, desired to be a man so much that she would walk around with a strap-on. However, at a poignant church visit, Rene says, “I rededicated my life. I surrender. I cannot fight this homosexuality.” Thinking “God has a bigger plan,” we see her eagerly trying on new, more traditionally feminine clothes to the approval of her sister and niece. She’s seemingly happy and no longer claims to feel anything sexual toward her longtime friend, Anita.
It would be easy for the documentary to mock Rene and treat her as a delusional Bible-thumper, much as the media shredded Evangelical minister Ted Haggard. Instead, we see there is a painfully innocent happiness to Rene about her spiritual “transformation.” Yet, the viewers can tell how superficial and false it is.
The only person who does call Rene out directly is her son, Devan, who is not introduced until the last half-hour of the documentary. Devan is an openly and proudly gay recent college grad, a dramatic counterexample to his mother’s submission to the Bible Belt culture. Rene feels a tremendous amount of guilt that her son is gay. “I think I am a big part of the reason he is gay,” she says, weeping. “God delivered him from me.”
But Devan says he’s grateful he was raised with a mother who used to never care what people thought of her, which made coming out relatively easy for him. This “new” Rene is disappointing to him. “I do not believe my mother is straight. I think she’s at a phase where it’s going to be conveniently permanent,” he says.
L Word Mississippi illustrates a more subtly sinister side to the Bible Belt culture, one that not only teaches its congregants to hate homosexuality, but teaches people to hate themselves. The scariest battles are not with neighbors, pastors, or family, but within their souls. Attempts of suicide are recalled by different women throughout the film who were, and still are, at times unable to shake their deep-hearted belief that they are sinners. More than the political struggles or communal oppression these women face, the engrained self-hate is the most upsetting insight into being a lesbian in Mississippi.
This film isn’t merely a reminder that Laurel and Hattiesburg are social light-years away from West Hollywood. It’s a warning.
“I’ve prayed to God that if I ever go back to that lifestyle, He’ll take me out before I do,” cries Rene. “Or I’ll take myself out.”Puducherry Lieutenant Governor Kiran Bedi has cancelled a government order stating that government officials should avoid using social media for official communication.
Earlier, Chief Minister Narayanasamy had noted that government officials were using Facebook, WhatsApp and Twitter for official communication and cautioned them against doing so as these organisations have their servers installed abroad and officials documents can be downloaded or tampered with.
Calling this a violation of the Official Secrets Act, Narayansamy had asked government officials to desist from using social media for official communication.
Also read | 'Action woman' Kiran Bedi gets cracking in Puducherry, bans sirens on VIP vehicles
CM Narayanasamy instructed that officials should not be a part of any group such as WhatsApp or interact with seniors bypassing administrative hierarchy and the proper official channel to go about it, failing which disciplinary action would be taken against the officer.
GOVERNMENT ORDER ISSUED ON JAN 2
The order was issued on 2nd January after a high-ranking government officer was suspended for forwarding an obscene video on a WhatsApp group created by Kiran Bedi for official communication purposes.
Tech-savvy Bedi has been using WhatsApp and Twitter to a great extent and encouraging her staff to follow suit.
Also read | Kiran Bedi takes bicycle tour around Puducherry, raises concern over alarming level of pollution in Delhi
Differences between CM Narayansamy and Lieutenant Governor Kiran Bedi surfaced after an IAS officer was suspended and arrested by the police and kept in a police station for a day without being charged.
Chief Minister Narayanasamy had issued the order cautioning government officials against use of social media. But for unexplained reasons, Lieutenant Governor declared the order null and void.
WATCH: Kiran Bedi appointed as Lt General of PuducherryHeather Callaghan
Activist Post
The 4th Annual Hemp History Week still has a couple days left, and you still have time to join in some events. That isn’t to say hemp happenings don’t take place at other times of the year.
I stumbled on the blog of an actress who once played a fashion-savvy valley girl in a popular ’90s movie. A lot of sarcasm is aimed at celebrities, maybe even more so when they join causes. But this one gets a lot of flak for her attachment parenting beliefs and organic vegetarian lifestyle. I just had no idea how she felt about hemp.
Hemp product popularity continues to rise in great popularity in the US even though only a couple of states are just now playing with the idea of legalizing industrial hemp. It became criminalized along with THC-containing marijuana years ago.
Actress and activist Alicia Silverstone sings the praises of hemp and sums up beautifully just one of the reasons we are missing out.
On her blog The Kind Life she writes:
Download Your First Issue Free! Do You Want to Learn How to Become Financially Independent, Make a Living Without a Traditional Job & Finally Live Free?
Download Your Free Copy of Counter Markets Hemp products generate over $450 million in sales each year, yet we’re not allowed to grow it in the United States. It’s so flat out stupid that every other country grows it, but we don’t! American farmers are missing out on that revenue, and importing hemp is prohibitively expensive, meaning consumers have to pay more for this healthy, sustainable material. It’s the most unpatriotic policy you can imagine, right? Ridiculous, on an economic, environmental and health level!
Hemp is not just used to make clothes; it’s also a great source of complete protein with ten amino acids, omega-3 and -6 essential fatty acids, Vitamin E, and iron. Hemp can also be used to make cosmetics, building materials, and auto parts (for real)! The downside is that right now, it’s illegal to grow hemp in the U.S., so hemp product manufacturers have to import their raw materials, and farmers in the U.S. are missing out on an entire industry!
Get Involved
During Hemp History Week, there will be events happening all over the country! Let’s help farmers and ourselves by renewing support for hemp farming in the U.S. and educate our elected officials about the economic benefits of growing non-drug, industrial hemp on American soil.
Visit HempHistoryWeek.com to find out what events are happening near you.
Healing food expert Julie Daniluk is also exuberant about this superfood for its ability to satiate and as a healthy substitute for unhealthy foods. Its creamy nutty flavor makes for a good milk substitute, nut butter, on salads, in soups, dips – or do what I do and just lift a bag of hemp hearts and dump them in your mouth.UPDATE (22nd August 20:00 BST): Updated with comment from Ross Ulbricht attorney Joshua Dratel.
New charges have been filed against Ross Ulbricht, the 30-year-old, Texas native accused of using the alias Dread Pirate Roberts to operate illicit online marketplace Silk Road.
Filed on 21st August, the charges include narcotics trafficking, distribution of narcotics by means of the Internet and conspiracy to traffic fraudulent identification documents.
The latest development in the case follows news that Ulbricht had lost his bid to dismiss the case this July. Ulbricht’s legal team had sought to remove certain money laundering charges levied by Federal prosecutors, arguing that bitcoins were not deemed to be money by the US Internal Revenue Service (IRS).
Ulbricht’s attorney Joshua Dratel, of Joshua L. Dratel, PC, told CoinDesk that the while the US government has added new charges, this doesn’t represent a change in the nature of the evidence that will be provided in the case. Further, he said the defense will not need to conduct any additional discovery.
Dratel explained:
“If that is true, and it’s too early for us to draw a conclusion (having just received it yesterday), these additional charges simply demonstrate the government’s penchant for converting a single alleged course of conduct into a set of multiple similar, interchangeable charges in an effort to improve its chances of having a jury, overwhelmed by the sheer number of charges, agree with the government on at least one.”
Ulbricht was originally charged with drug trafficking, money laundering, computer hacking and for serving as the ‘kingpin‘ on a drug trafficking enterprise, charges he plead not guilty to on 7th February.
The latest filing adds more specifics to the accusations, alleging that Ulbricht personally distributed substances containing methamphetamine, cocaine, LSD and heroin, and conspired to sell fake ID documents, including passports and driver’s licenses.
Ulbricht is currently serving time in New York’s Metropolitan Detention Center, awaiting a trial set to begin 3rd November.
Support effort continues
The charge is also the latest blow to FreeRoss.org, the legal defense fund seeking to raise money for Ulbricht’s defense, as well as the group’s supporters.
Despite continued interest from the mainstream media regarding the case, Lyn Ulbricht, mother of the accused and manager of FreeRoss.org, indicated on 3rd July that this interest had not translated into an uptick in contributions.
Still, grassroots support from the bitcoin community for the group continues. On 7th July, noted bitcoin community member and angel investor Roger Ver started a twitter campaign for Ulbricht that promised $10 would be donated to FreeRoss.org for every retweet.
At press time on 7th July, Ver’s message of support had received more than 16,000 retweets.
Hat tip to The Guardian
Image via MashableCorey Sturmer didn't know much about fluoride in his drinking water until a year ago, when his dentist told him he has fluorisis, a condition that causes white spotting, yellowing and browning of the teeth, and erosion of the enamel.
"I asked my dentist... is there fluoride in the drinking water? And he said, yeah... it's good for your teeth. So then I began to wonder, if it's so good for your teeth, why am I, at 25 years old, having all these issues with my teeth?" Sturmer said.
Sturmer was a college athlete. He eats healthy food and exercises. He started doing research and found evidence that convinced him fluoride might not be as safe as he was led to believe. He came across an I-Team story ABC11 did five years ago in which a Durham dentist told us he believed we're getting too much Fluoride.
"Fluoride in the water is essentially a drug. It's an uncontrolled use of a drug," offered dentist Michael Fleming.
Sturmer said what he learned made him take action.
"That motivated me to reach to you and to continue spreading the word and building up the website and talking to people," said Sturmer.
Sturmer developed a www.durhamagainstfluoride.com website and took his cause to the Durham County Health Department. He's also raising awareness by putting information on cars in downtown Durham.
Sturmer said he's so concerned about the issue that he filters his tap water. His crusade may be limited to Durham, but he's not alone in his fight. A movement to ban fluoride in drinking water is heating up across the country.
In Portland, Oregon this fall, residents protested a city council vote to begin fluoridating tap water next year. They have enough signatures on a petition to take the issue to the ballot box next year. In Wichita, Kansas last week, voters rejected a plan to add fluoride to their public water supply.
"Our task was essentially one of just education. Myself, I thought fluoride was a good thing not long ago," explained Jonathan Hall with Wichitans Opposed to Fluoride.
As the I-Team dug into the science behind the fluoride controversy, we found study after study dating back to the 80s from respected academic and scientific institutions that connect fluoride to health dangers. Some of the studies were funded by the government. They suggest fluoride can be linked to brain, blood and bone deficiencies in humans. This past summer, Harvard University released a report after reviewing 27 studies of children in China exposed to fluoride. It concluded the higher the fluoride exposure, the lower the child's IQ.
One of the most recognized reports was published in 2006 by The National Academy of Sciences. It found fluoride can affect the thyroid gland and potentially lower the intelligence of children.
"EPA's drinking water standards are supposed to protect all persons against anticipated adverse health effects of the contaminant in question," explained Kathleen Thiessen - one of the scientists who worked on the 400-page study. "And we concluded after three years worth of work that the drinking water standard for fluoride was not protected and cannot be assumed to be safe for humans."
Thiessen said the EPA was warned about potential fluoride health dangers by one of its own chemists more than a decade ago. Dr. William Hirzy testified before a Senate subcommittee in 2000. He was representing the views of EPA scientists and staff who analyze hazards in the environment.
"In 1997, we voted to oppose fluoridation, and our opposition has grown stronger as more adverse data on the practice has come in," said Hirzy.
"The CDC and others say whatever beneficial effect there is from fluoride is from topical use. It's not from swallowing it. It never has been from swallowing it," said Thiessen.
The I-Team discovered most western countries do not fluoridate their water. Dental records kept by the World Health Organization show tooth decay in those countries has declined at the same rate as here in the United States - where we do fluoridate our water. The American Dental Association has endorsed fluoridation since it began in this country more than 50 years ago.
"[It] has been shown to be a very safe and very effective preventive measure for treating a disease that is rampant in our population," said Dr. Tim Wright with the UNC School of Dentistry. "There is no public health measure that is as cost effective as water fluoridation to prevent tooth decay... Fluoride is like so many things that in the right amount it's very beneficial, and if you have too much, too much is not a good thing. So are we getting too much?"
Six years ago, the ADA thought infants might be getting too much fluoride and it warned parents not to use fluoridated water - but bottled water - to mix baby formula. Dentists also want to make sure children don't get too much when they brush their teeth.
"That is why we currently recommend a smear or a grain-sized amount. So a very small amount in a child from the time they first get their teeth - which is six months to a year - until they turn 3. And then at 3, the recommendation is to go to more of a pea-sized amount so there's a little bit more," Dr. Wright explained.
Sturmer points to the warning label on toothpaste.
"If you look on the other side of that toothpaste tube, it says 'Do not swallow.' We've been taught as kids, when you're brushing your teeth, do not swallow the toothpaste foam. Why is that?" he asked. "Because fluoride is poisonous... So why is it in the water? Why do we need to drink it?"
The EPA doesn't believe the amount of fluoride in water is causing harm. It has not changed fluoride standards for drinking water more than six years after the report by The National Academy of Sciences, and that frustrates scientist Kathleen Thiessen.
"There probably never was a beneficial effect. Certainly by now when we have fluoride in toothpaste, we have fluoride in mouth rinse, we have fluoride in a number of sources. It is extremely easy to have too much fluoride. It's much harder to control it," she said.
"I think all city governments... need to reconsider water fluoridation. The science is out there, the citizens who are concerned are out there, and they are making their voices known," said Sturmer.
Sturmer has convinced the Durham County Public Health Department to look into the safety of fluoride in the water.
The National Institutes of Health - for the first time ever - is currently funding an animal study to assess fluoride's effect on the brain.
Click here for more information on Fluoride
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Follow @abc11 on Twitter | Become a fan on FacebookWhen you ask for help, try not to ask in the most inconvenient way possible
I just received a bug report by email which had a 6MB attachment. This meant that I couldn't preview it with my mail monitor program, which meant I had to wait until I could launch my regular email client and download the email to decode the attachment.
When I opened it, it turned out to have a PDF file in it, which then contained a 1920x1080 image of the person's entire desktop, in which the only thing interesting to me was VirtualDub's tiny crash dialog in the center -- which says to attach the diagnostic text file instead, because the dialog itself doesn't contain detailed crash information.
Please, folks, when you're asking other people for help, try to be sensible. There are already enough reasons why your email might not be answered; you don't need to give the person another one.News Corp. and Cablevision are currently stuck in a classic cable vs programming "we pay too much, you pay too little" fight. But this time around News Corp. is flexing more muscle by banning Cablevision Internet users from accessing Hulu too.
When the clock struck midnight on Saturday, Cablevision customers could no longer watch FOX on their TV. That's because News Corp. (which owns FOX) and Cablevision couldn't come to an agreement on the fees that Cablevision should pay News Corp. It's something that's happened before with other networks and other cable providers but the new twist is that News Corp. is using their stake in Hulu to ban Cablevision Internet users from accessing FOX content on Hulu as well.
The problem this raises is that if programmers are using a ban of accessing Hulu (an internet website, after all) as leverage against a cable provider for TV fees, it's only going to kill the hope and promise of net neutrality. If cable providers and programmers continue to have their way, the web could turn into the big fucking mess that cable is.
And even worse, what happens when a cable provider and progammer, like for example Comcast—which owns NBC and thus has a stake in Hulu—one day decides that in order to access NBC content on Hulu, you need to have Comcast and other cable providers get locked out? It's a messy situation that's bound to get messier with the new and different avenues of content we can access now. [All Things D]WHO joins the government of Sierra Leone in marking the end of the recent flare-up of Ebola virus disease in the country. As of today, 17 March, 42 days have passed, two incubation cycles of the virus, since the last person confirmed to have Ebola virus disease in the country tested negative for a second time.
This latest flare-up of Ebola brings to 3 590 the number of lives lost in Sierra Leone to an epidemic that devastated families and communities across the country and disrupted every aspect of life.
Today marks another milestone in the country’s effort to defeat Ebola. WHO commends Sierra Leone’s government, partners and people on the effective and swift response to this latest outbreak. From nurses, vaccinators and social mobilizers to contact tracers, counsellors and community leaders, Sierra Leoneans in affected districts mobilized quickly and their involvement and dedication was instrumental and impactful.
The rapid containment of the flare-up was also a real-time demonstration of the increased capacity at the national, district and community level to respond to Ebola outbreaks and other health emergencies and mitigate their impact. Investments made in rapid response teams, surveillance, lab diagnostics, risk communication, infection prevention and control measures and other programmes were put to the test and clearly paid off.
However, WHO continues to stress that Sierra Leone, as well as Liberia and Guinea, are still at risk of Ebola flare-ups, largely due to virus persistence in some survivors, and must remain on high alert and ready to respond.
Strong surveillance and emergency response capacity need to be maintained, along with rigorous hygiene practices at home and in health facilities and active community participation. Care, screening and counselling also need to be provided for survivors as part of improved health services for all.
WHO will continue to work with the Government of Sierra Leone and partners to build a more resilient health system that can prevent, detect and respond to future outbreaks and to revive and strengthen essential health services across the country.AARP Remains Steadfastly Opposed to Health Bill
Plans to hold Members of Congress accountable while renewing opposition in Senate
En español | WASHINGTON, DC — AARP Executive Vice President Nancy LeaMond reiterated AARP’s opposition to the health bill passed in the U.S. House of Representatives that would harm American families who count on access to affordable health care:
“AARP is deeply disappointed in today’s vote by the House to pass this deeply flawed health bill. The bill will put an Age Tax on us as we age, harming millions of American families with health insurance, forcing many to lose coverage or pay thousands of dollars more for health care. In addition, the bill now puts at risk the 25 million older adults with pre-existing conditions, such as cancer and diabetes, who would likely find health care unaffordable or unavailable to them.
“AARP will continue to oppose this bill as it moves to the Senate because it includes an Age Tax on older Americans, eliminates critical protections for those with pre-existing conditions, puts coverage at risk for millions, cuts the life of Medicare, erodes seniors’ ability to live independently, and gives sweetheart deals to big drug and insurance companies while doing nothing to lower the cost of prescriptions.
“We promised to hold members of Congress accountable for their vote on this bill. True to our promise, AARP is now letting its 38 million members know how their elected Representative voted on this health bill in The Bulletin, a print publication that goes to all of our members, as well as through emails, social media, and other communications.”
# # #Sprint Corp., battling to gain high-value customers and bolster its tarnished brand, struck a deal Thursday to add 1,750 retail stores to its network.
The deal — boosting by half the company’s retail footprint — emerged from a bankruptcy filing Thursday by RadioShack and involves the retailer’s largest stockholder, Standard General LP, which plans to buy the stores.
Both companies would operate in the stores, but Sprint’s name would be on the front and its employees would sell the company’s wireless service in about a third of each store’s available space.
The rest of the store would carry RadioShack products, Sprint said in a statement, on the same day it released its quarterly earnings. Other wireless carriers’ products would no longer be available at the stores.
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“Under terms of the agreement, Sprint would effectively operate a store within a RadioShack store,” the statement said. “The stores would be co-branded with Sprint being the primary brand on storefronts and in marketing materials.”
Sprint chief executive Marcelo Claure said in the statement that the companies would benefit from marketing to each other’s customers. He also called the deal a quick and cost-effective path to expand Sprint’s store count in “prime locations.”
The deal requires approval by the bankruptcy court in Delaware. The financial terms of the deal were not disclosed.
Overland Park-based Sprint owns 1,100 stores and has dealers that expand the current footprint to about 3,100 locations. A year ago, the company said it would close an unreported number of less-profitable stores and idle about 300 to 500 employees.
Sprint said Thursday it would need to hire an undetermined number of employees to help staff the new stores from the RadioShack agreement.
Claure had declined previously to comment on recent reports that Sprint had a deal involving RadioShack stores. But he had said that expanding the company’s store count was a priority this year.
“You got to have places where customers can go and shop for mobile phones and connected devices,” Claure said Thursday morning during a conference call with analysts after the company released its quarterly financial results. “Today, we are the carrier with the smaller amount of stores.”
That would be nearly 3,000 fewer stores than industry leader Verizon, about 2,000 fewer than AT&T, and several hundred fewer than T-Mobile, according to Claure’s rough tallies.
“If you’ve got a great offer you got to make it easy for your customers to go and get it,” Claure said. “Store growth is very important for us.”
For RadioShack, the deal adds some life to its plan to emerge from bankruptcy. The 94-year-old consumer electronics chain, with more than 4,000 stores, has struggled against larger retailers Amazon and Wal-Mart as well as a decline in the market for consumer electronics.
Standard General, through a subsidiary, is buying up to 2,400 stores including the 1,750 in which Sprint will be a co-tenant. RadioShack will close the remaining stores under a deal with a liquidator, Hilco Merchant Resources. RadioShack employs about 21,000 people, full and part time.
Earlier Thursday, Sprint reported a $2.38 billion loss during the final three months of 2014. The loss mostly recognized the diminished value of the Sprint trade name or brand, whittled down by an exodus of about 2 million of the company’s most valuable customers during the year.
With 55.9 million network connections at the end of December, Sprint showed an increase of 890,000 subscribers from three months earlier.
But those gains have come from low-revenue connections such as tablets, rather than phones, and wholesale subscriptions through Tracfone and other resellers that use Sprint’s network to sell service under their own brands. Sprint lost 205,000 high-paying Sprint phone customers during the quarter.
The increase in total connections allows Sprint to continue its claim as the third-largest U.S. wireless company, topping the 55 million subscribers at rival T-Mobile US Inc. T-Mobile has been adding subscribers at an aggressive pace for more than a year and substantially closed the gap between the carriers.
An aggressive marketing promotion late in the year helped Sprint entice many high-value Verizon and AT&T customers to switch to Sprint.
But Sprint lost far more of the high-value customers it already had, with December’s count showing 205,000 fewer than at the end of September. That loss came on top of the 1.8 million high-value customers Sprint shed during the first nine months of 2014.
Analyst Craig Moffett, of MoffettNathanson Research, said the mix of subscriber trends demonstrated “the problem with offering a better deal to new customers than existing ones; churn spiked higher.”
Churn is the industry’s measure of how many existing customers depart. Sprint said its churn among high-value customers was 2.3 percent in the fourth quarter. Claure promised a lower churn in the first three months of this year.
Sprint’s financial loss reported Thursday included a $1.9 billion drop in the value of the Sprint trade name. The drop increased the company’s reported net loss, though no cash drained from the company as a result.
A year ago, Sprint reported a net loss of $1.038 billion, or 26 cents a share, in the final three months of 2013. Its recent loss equaled 60 cents a share.
Revenues totaled $8.97 billion in the recent quarter, down from $9.14 billion a year earlier.
Shares of Sprint gained 24 cents, or 5.2 percent, Thursday but remain 43.3 percent lower than a year ago.
The report covers the third quarter of Sprint’s fiscal year, which it changed to end March 31 at the same time as the fiscal year of its parent company. Tokyo-based SoftBank Corp. owns 80 percent of Sprint.
Bloomberg News contributed to this article.0
When Captain America: Civil War was announced, I was worried that meant the Cap (Chris Evans)/Bucky (Sebastian Stan) plotline from The |
on the validity of sentiment analysis, and the various techniques that measure it. I believe sentiment analysis can be useful when trying to get a macro-level feel for the sentiment of a topic or set of topics.
As I mentioned, I’ll be adding the other annotators to the library shortly, and plan to provide code for a simple twitter to Stanford sentiment data collector in Clojure.
Stay tuned!MUMBAI: Misrepresentation of taxes by major power companies meant Mumbaikars had to cough up an extra Rs 434 crore in three years, the Aam Aadmi Party claimed on Wednesday.Releasing another dossier on what they called corrupt practices in the power sector, they alleged that Reliance Infra accrued benefits from the state but did not pass them on to the consumer, and flagged a conflict of interest as the state energy secretary is also chairman of Mahagenco, the holding company for the state power transmission, distribution and generation arms."Power companies pay tax at the rate of 18% but claim the full 33% as part of their remuneration which is paid for by the consumer," said the AAP's Satish Jain, pointing at Rinfra and Tata Power and accusing the power regulator of letting them off easily.Both firms denied the claims, pointing out that MERC had moved the Appellate Tribunal of Electricity, but it had ruled in their favour.AAP said the Maharashtra Electricity Regulatory Commission should have taken the tax mismatch issue to the Supreme Court. "If MERC does not file a case against the companies in the SC, we will," said Jain, adding that AAP's Prashant Bhushan was ready to fight the case in the SC.Tata Power rebutted the AAP claim that 15% more tax was raised by the power companies from consumers by explaining its case as it had in the tribunal while RInfra said this attitude towards the tribunal ruling reflected their (AAP's) disregard for the judicial process (see box).In a fresh onslaught against Reliance, AAP raked up the case of the Vidarbha Power Industries Ltd (VPIL), a 100% subsidiary of Reliance Power, which, it claimed, was given 300 acres of heavily subsidized land to provide power for developing industries in Vidarbha. "On completion in 2012, VPIL contended there was no demand for power in Vidarbha and signed a deal with RInfra's distribution unit in Mumbai. This is how resources are snatched for public good and diverted to purely commercial purposes," said the party.It added that VPIL borrowed $150 million without hedging the loan. Losses due to a sharp depreciation of the rupee were passed on to consumers."In drought-prone Vidarbha, where farmers are committing suicide, VPIL consumed an enormous amount of water and did not deliver on the purpose for which it was set up. Should all the country's public resources be at the disposal of Reliance?" asked Anjali Damania, the Maharashtra convener of AAP."No concessions for land, water or any other facility has been given by the Maharashtra government to VIPL as falsely alleged by AAP," said an RInfra spokesperson.AAP has received a legal notice from Reliance over its earlier allegations implicating the company. Jain, involved in collecting the dossier's data, dismissed it, saying they are not interested in replying to a private company that does not feel the need to provide an explanation for its actions.AAP's allegation of a conflict of interest as Ajoy Mehta is both state power secretary and chairman of Mahagenco and that he has been accused of cartelization by the SC were strongly dismissed by Mehta. "As the energy secretary, I have nothing to do with tariff determination. It is fixed through a judicial process, which is the MERC," he said, denying that the SC had passed strictures against him.NEW YORK -- With his starting spot gone and playing time slashed, Houston Rockets center Omer Asik again has asked for a trade, although the team has informed him it currently does not intend to deal him, sources told ESPN.com.
The issue was revived this week when Rockets coach Kevin McHale decided to take Asik out of the starting lineup after an experiment of playing him and Dwight Howard together yielded only mixed results.
Asik has continually declined to comment on the trade request.
This is essentially a stalemate situation that has been going on since the summer, when Asik made it clear he wanted out of Houston as soon as the Rockets signed Howard. The Rockets, concerned about depth and valuing Asik's defensive and rebounding abilities, told him they had no plans to trade him then, either.
Asik, who previously started all 90 games he played for the Rockets since signing as a free agent in 2012, played only four minutes off the bench on Wednesday against the 76ers and did not play in the second half. He had played in 239 consecutive regular-season games, which was the longest active streak in the NBA, but did not appear in Thursday's 109-106 victory over the New York Knicks at Madison Square Garden.
McHale said Asik sat out because he didn't feel well
Asik is averaging about 10 minutes fewer per game this season compared to last. His scoring and rebounding averages have taken a corresponding dip.
He has two years and $20 million left on his contract.Most people find it pleasant to bike with people they know. But there’s growing evidence that Latino Americans are particularly interested in social biking.
Latinos and Latinas are far more likely than other Americans to say that friends or family are a major factor in their choice to ride.
The most recent study touching on this subject also discovered the obvious: Americans of every background enjoy social biking. But the preference was stronger among black respondents, and far stronger among Hispanic respondents:
Those results came from a 2014 mail survey to residents of the generally lower-income Roxbury neighborhood of Boston, conducted by Anne Lusk and a team at the Harvard Chan School of Public Health and published in May by Preventive Medicine Reports.
BetterBikeShare.org and Streetsblog covered aspects of this study in June.
This finding buried in the larger survey echoes a 2009 focus group of low-income residents of Portland, Oregon. It found that group riding was a major factor in bike use, and riding with children was of particular interest to people identifying as Hispanic or as African immigrants (in this case, Somali):
More recently, a different focus group of Hispanic New Jerseyites led by Charles Brown and James Sinclair of Rutgers University named “bonding with family” as the number one reason to bike.
Brown, who specializes in understanding biking barriers among people of color, said it was one of many such results he’s encountered in person and in research literature.
“Everything I’ve done that has involved Hispanic participants, family has always been number one or number two,” he said.
‘With Latinos, every weekend is family’
We’re not aware of any study that has looked directly at this apparent link, and none of these results are totally conclusive. In particular, it’s possible that they underrepresent the attitudes of higher-income people.
But Tucson Vice Mayor Regina Romero, whose constituents in that city’s first ward include a wide cross-section of Latinos, said the finding “rings true for sure” for Latino Americans of every sort.
“Activities, recreation, always includes family,” said Romero, who is Latina. “In other traditions … family is Christmas, Thanksgiving. And with Latinos, every weekend is family.”
“It’s not just mom, dad, kids,” she added. “It’s mom, dad, kids, cousins, grandma, grandpa.”
Fernando Martinez, a longtime Texas biking advocate who was born in Mexico City and now works in Harlingen, just north of the Rio Grande, said the style of friendship he was raised with involved inviting all your friends to events and expecting them to invite you.
“When you have friends and you don’t invite them to the party, they get mad,” Martinez said. “That’s the Mexican way. You don’t get invited, you don’t have friends any more.”
Wide bike lanes are social bike lanes – but “human infrastructure” matters too
What can policymakers learn from all this? One thing might be that wider bike lanes offer more than just comfort.
In the Harvard Chan School study, Lusk and her co-authors point out that wide bike lanes are also more social than narrow ones:
To comfortably bicycle with someone, the bicyclist would prefer to ride beside and not in front or behind their companion. Therefore, cycle tracks in lower income ethnic-minority neighborhoods should be wide to enable side-by-side riding with family and friends.
Martinez said there might be something to that.
“Every Interstate of any Texas road we have between a 10 and 14 foot shoulder,” he said. “You can ride two abreast. So you’re talking to them while you’re cycling. … We like to have these wide lanes.”
But road infrastructure isn’t the whole story. Urban anthropologist Adonia Lugo, for example, uses the phrase “human infrastructure” to describe the necessary social connections required for bicycling.
Romero said her mind went to marketing and outreach. When Arizona had surveyed Latinos to find out why so few seemed to visit state parks, she said, what stood out was that most of the state’s marketing of the outdoors had emphasized individual exploration.
“They couldn’t identify with the marketing because all the state parks are very individual centered,” Romero said. “They didn’t see themselves or families in those commercials.”
This piece was first published in PlacesForBikes. PlacesForBikes helps U.S. communities build better biking, faster. You can follow us on LinkedIn, Twitter or Facebook or sign up for our weekly news digest about building all-ages biking networks. Story tip? Write michael@peopleforbikes.org.
Filed under: National PoliticsThe Perfecting Church, home to famed gospel singer and pastor Marvin Winans, is having a special dedication ceremony for the congregation's youngest members on Sunday.
Charity Grace, a Detroiter who recently started attending services at the church on East Nevada Street, wanted her only son, two-year-old Joshua Grace, to share in the blessings.
"I want to instill values and morals in my son based upon the word of God," she told Fox 2 Detroit.
But when she called Perfecting Church on Tuesday to sign up Joshua for the ceremony, Charity said she was told by a woman elected in the church that Pastor Winans has a strict policy -- he won't bless the babies of unwed mothers in front of the congregation, Fox 2 Detroit reported.
According to a New York Times report, 36 percent of mothers who reported giving birth in 2011 weren't married.
Grace said she felt degraded by the pastor's decision. She's hoping he reconsiders, even if it means having her son dedicated during the week by a church elder.
Until then, she told Fox 2 Detroit she has no plans to return to Perfecting Church.
"I absolutely would not set foot back in the church right now because I feel like they look down upon me and my kind, meaning single moms and unwed mothers," Grace said.
Pope Francis recently said in May that the Catholic Church should bless children born out of wedlock, because their mothers chose life over abortion.
“'Look at this girl who had had the courage to carry her pregnancy to term.... "What does she find? A closed door," he said, according to Vatican newspaper L’Osservatore Romano. "This is not good pastoral zeal, it distances people from the Lord and does not open doors."
Dr. Jacqui Lewis is the Senior Minister of Middle Collegiate Church in Manhattan's East Village. She told The Huffington Post she was surprised that a child "of any kind" would be denied a blessing from a church, and referenced the Gospel of Mark, 10:10-16:
"People were bringing little children to Jesus for him to place his hands on them, but the disciples rebuked them. When Jesus saw this, he was indignant. He said to them, “Let the little children come to me, and do not hinder them, for the kingdom of God belongs to such as these. Truly I tell you, anyone who will not receive the kingdom of God like a little child will never enter it.” And he took the children in his arms, placed his hands on them and blessed them."
"You want to know what the Kingdom of God is like?" she asked. "Check out the children. Check out their innocence, check out their wide eyed wonder, check out their acknowledgement that they are dependent on others."
Dr. Lewis also noticed something else -- the little boy from Perfecting Church who was denied a blessing is named Joshua. "You know, Jesus's name is really Joshua," she said. "Joshua is Jesus's namesake, and Jesus was born to a mother just like this mother."
The pastor is a member of the Winans family, one of America's most famous gospel clans. He's a gospel singer who has released several albums with the Perfecting Church choir and a recurring member on "Tyler Perry's House of Payne." Winans also memorably delivered the eulogy at Whitney Houston's funeral in 2012. He was carjacked and assaulted outside a Detroit gas station in 2012.
While Dr. Lewis has never met Winans, she said she believes he's a man with a "real heart for Jesus's people." She told The Huffington Post she hopes to someday have coffee with Winans to talk about the issue of withholding blessings.
"The way we think about God and the way we think of what God wants us to do... I think that happens in relationships," she said.
She told The Huffington Post she would ask Rev. Winans this question:
"What would be the harm of blessing those babies, versus the gain? And wouldn't the gain be that they are baptized and greeted into the community? Then, that Mama would have a whole community of Mamas and Daddies, and Aunties and Uncles to help raise the baby. That's actually a strong black church tradition," she added. "It takes a whole village to raise these children."
"You make sure you put my phone number in there, okay?" Dr. Lewis asked.
Rev. Winans, you can contact Dr. Lewis of Middle Collegiate Church here.
The Huffington Post contacted Perfecting Church for comment and will update this story with any reply.When my niece got married last June, she and her spouse found lots of ways to save money. They hired a caterer to serve finger food all night and slashed the rental fees for tables, chairs and cutlery at a sit-down dinner. They had a friend play their personal selection of music with an MP3 player, computer and speakers, eliminating the cost of a disk jockey.
Justin Moy and his fiancee Andrea Lee entered a contest where couples submit a video about their wedding on a budget and can win $10,000. ( Juston Moy )
The bride’s mother baked mini-cupcakes and stacked them on trays to look like a wedding cake, saving hundreds of dollars for a store-bought product. Welcome to the new world of weddings, where brides and grooms shoulder some or all the costs. Excess is out. Extreme frugality is in. Justin Moy and Andrea Lee plan to get married next year. Their original idea was to invite 150 guests to a multi-course Chinese meal at a banquet hall, with a budget of up to $30,000.
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“We just bought a house and we’re crazy in debt,” says Lee, 24. “So, now we hope to keep the cost under $10,000.” While searching for ways to economize, they found they could win $10,000 from ING Direct for a wedding. Couples had to submit a video on the theme: How do you do date night on a budget? The winning couple can use ING’s downtown Toronto café for a ceremony next February, with the $10,000 going toward a reception at another venue. Moy, 24, is a professional video assistant at CTV’s MuchMusic and moonlights as a wedding photographer. His expertly edited video, which shows the couple picking apples, is one of three finalists in the contest. You can vote online for the best video until Oct. 18. The winner will be announced Oct. 21.
“We had almost 1,000 votes in the first four days, showing how engaged people are with the issue,” says Mark Nicholson, head of digital, creative and communications at ING, now owned by Scotiabank. ING ran its first video contest, called the Superstar Saver Search, in 2007. YouTube had just launched in Canada at the time.
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It offered a $10,000 prize in a Superstar Saver Search last May, featuring a Canadian indie band, Walk Off The Earth, doing a cover and video of Madonna’s hit, Material Girl. “Weddings cost a fortune,” says Nicholson, explaining the origin of the latest video contest. “Young people are riddled with debt after college or university and then go further into debt to throw a grandiose wedding. “They need to have these tough conversations about money as they get into a relationship. When you talk to couples, one in five knows nothing about their partner’s finances.” A Canadian wedding is expected to cost $23,458 in 2013, according to Wedding Bells magazine. It rises to $27,658 with the engagement ring included and $32,358 with the honeymoon thrown in. The wedding venue is the biggest expense at $9,430 (or $76 per guest). The photographer accounts for $2,300, the bridal gown $1,975, the florist and décor $1,478 and the DJ or musicians $1,250. When asked about budgets, 69 per cent of brides said they were likely to exceed the amount they had expected to spend on their weddings. ING offers advice to future brides and grooms about not going overboard: Find people you know who can provide services, such as whipping up a wedding cake or growing fresh flowers. Ask yourselves what you want to stand out on your wedding day. Guests usually gab about the food, so you don’t want to skimp there. Build in a contingency fund. Set money aside in case you run into unforeseen expenses. Check your budget status regularly. As you find ways to save money on your wedding, adjust your budget accordingly. Collaborate on costs as a couple, ING advises. Hold each other accountable and keep each other from going “from wedded bliss to financial miss.” Ellen Roseman writes about personal finance and consumer issues. You can reach her at eroseman@thestar.ca or www.ellenroseman.comDo any of us really identify ourselves as members of "hard-working families"? As a rhetorical label used by Labour politicians, it is not winning votes, as critics have pointed out. In a country where 70% of us still identify as working class, most people would agree with Len McCluskey that "ordinary, working class" is a better description of the majority of voters.
"Hard-working families" implies we're only entitled to citizenship (or, as the Tories would have it, the odd game of bingo) if we can prove we're working our fingers to the bone. But no one can work all the time: if you're a pensioner, a single parent, sick, or there is no work to be had, then you're in trouble. And most of us know this, because we're related to them. Sit my extended family around a table and you'd have white- and blue-collar workers, the sick, the old, people in council housing, and families with two cars and a nice house but large debts to pay for them. This is replicated all over Britain. There is no static "underclass" and neither is there a robust middle class: instead, there are a lot of people who have to work for a living and, because of that fact, choose to identify as working class.
There's another reason why the appeal to "hard-working families" is an empty abstraction. Most people don't see hard work as a virtue. They identify as working class because they have to work, not because they want to. Two recurring conversations within my family and among the people I spoke to for my book The People are what they'd do if they won the lottery, and how they can afford to spend less time at work and more with those they love. This is a sensible attitude. Hard work causes stress, poor health and early death. And hard work has never solved poverty. We work longer hours now than we've done for 50 years, yet the gap between the rich and poor has never been wider.
The real history of the working class is of avoiding working for "them" any more than is necessary. That desire shaped collective campaigns throughout the last century, such as the TUC's demand for holidays with pay – a fight finally won in the late 1930s. It was an aspiration that also galvanised workers in ways we don't often hear about. The desire to control how much time was spent working for other people's profits provoked thousands of men to try to get into reserved jobs in factories during the second world war, to avoid armed service: not because they were cowards, but because fighting in 1914 had brought no benefits for ordinary people.
During both world wars millions of women used the expansion of munitions work as a means of escaping domestic service, which paid poor wages and often demanded a seven-day week. In 1945 Labour's guarantee of full employment and a welfare state won the party millions of votes. But the real gains of the postwar years were delivered by ordinary people themselves. It was they who mobilised to improve working conditions and, importantly, to reduce the amount of time they spent at work. The workplace militancy of the decade after 1968 was provoked by workers' frustration that, despite technological innovations, low pay made them reliant on overtime in order to afford a holiday or a car.
People aren't afraid of hard work. It was the understanding that people wanted more control over their time that drove the Tories' electoral successes over the last century. Grammar schools were initially popular with parents who hoped an education would offer their postwar babies what apprenticeships offered an earlier generation: a set of skills that would prove an important bargaining tool, something they could use to negotiate with employers, or to set up on their own. Similarly, in 1979 Margaret Thatcher's promise to make it easier for people to strike out on their own, regardless of their background, by starting their own business and owning their own homes proved very appealing. But promises of social mobility and self-preservation have failed, because only a few can ever possess the wealth and opportunity in a capitalist society. Grammar schools didn't increase most people's opportunities, bankruptcies rose in the 1980s and owner-occupiers suffered record levels of repossession in the 1990s and are burdened with huge, unsustainable debts.
Solidarity, on the other hand, has delivered important victories. Over the past century these have included better working conditions, shorter working hours, an expanded public sector that gave us better jobs and care, democratically controlled housing and free education. Working-class people's ability to mobilise politically has been attacked by the state, but the desire to help each other out has not died – it's just that its only outlet is now in worrying about children's and grandchildren's uncertain futures. Parents are aware that their homes, cars and savings for their children's higher education rely on a highly insecure labour market, in which permanent contracts are elusive.
By showing that collective effort can bring huge gains for all of us, the left could justify the redistribution of income and property, which is the only way to create a truly classless society. Utopian maybe, but less ludicrous than suggesting that "hard-working families" can overcome the inequality perpetrated by a powerful elite determined to hang on to their privilege.
• Selina Todd is author of The People: The Rise and Fall of the Working Class 1910-2010Protesters in San Francisco have stopped a bus filled with Apple employees on their way to work. They've also stopped a Google bus in Oakland.
We're hearing about the blockades via Twitter.
This is the second time this has happened this month. Two weeks ago, protestors stopped a Google bus.
Tech companies like Google, Apple, and Facebook provide buses that take their employees from San Francisco to their headquarters in the suburbs. The buses are free and equipped with WiFi. It's one of those things that is a perk, but also helps employees get more work done.
Protesters are mad at the tech companies for a few reasons.
First and foremost, the wealthy tech employees have driven up the price of housing in San Francisco, which is pricing out some people.
Secondarily, the buses use public transit stops, and some protesters think that's wrong.
The last time this happened, the protesters posted demands that included tech companies kicking in $1 billion for affordable housing.
Here are some photos/tweets:By Erin Murphy, Gazette-Lee Des Moines Bureau
Congressional Republicans and President Donald Trump last week earned their biggest legislative victory since sweeping into complete lawmaking power: a significant overhaul of the nation’s tax laws, including cuts for most in the middle class and sweeping cuts for wealthy individuals and businesses.
Looking forward, the GOP-authored tax cuts are a lock to be a top issue of debate on the campaign trail next year.
Both sides believe it can be a winning issue for them.
Republicans are confident a voter with a lighter tax bill will be a happier voter.
“Letting people keep more of the money they earned is good economic policy,” said U.S. Rep. Rod Blum, a Republican representing Eastern Iowa’s competitive 1st House District.
Democrats are confident voters will be upset with Republicans for passing tax cuts that provide a larger break, percentage-wise, to wealthier individuals and businesses, are projected to add billions to the federal deficit.
Republicans ”have all put a partisan victory for Donald Trump and the Republican Party’s special interest backers ahead of Iowa families with this tax bill. They should be ashamed of themselves,” said Troy Price, chairman of Iowa Democratic Party.
Early public opinion is with the Democrats. Fewer than 1 in 4 Americans said the Republican tax plan was a good idea, according to an NBC News/Wall Street Journal poll published last week. And by a 63-7 percent margin, Americans said the tax plan was designed to help corporations and the wealthiest individuals rather than the middle class, according to the poll.
Multiple polls found more Americans think the tax plan will hurt them more than it will help them.
That likely is coming from the multiple analyses that some low-income and middle-class wage earners will actually see a small increase in their tax bill as a result of the Republican plan, a projection to which Democrats have been calling attention.
But it is a small percentage of the population: just 1.2 percent and 4.6 percent in the two lowest-income brackets and 7.3 percent of middle class wage earners will see a tax hike under the plan in 2018, according to the nonpartisan Tax Policy Center.
More than 90 percent of middle-class wage earners will get a tax break, the Tax Policy Center projects.
Democrats point to that same analysis and projections that in 2027, after some of the tax plan’s provisions end, a majority of middle-class workers then would see a tax increase while the wealthiest 1 percent would continue to receive tax breaks.
But Republicans say future sessions of Congress will have the opportunity to extend the tax cut provisions.
So public opinion could swing to Republicans once people start to see lighter tax bills.
But Republicans also risk damaging any good will from their tax cuts if they opt to reduce spending on popular social programs like Social Security, Medicare and Medicaid.
“We’re going to have to get back next year at entitlement reform, which is how you tackle the debt and the deficit,” House Speaker Paul Ryan said recently on Ross Kaminsky’s talk radio show. “Frankly, it’s the health care entitlements that are the biggest drivers of our debt.... That’s really where the problem lives, fiscally speaking.”
If Republicans manage to win the messaging war over their tax cuts, would they then forfeit that ground if they cut Social Security, Medicare or Medicaid?
Expect that to be litigated on the 2018 campaign trail.
NYC’s mayor IN Iowa
New York Mayor Bill de Blasio spoke last week at a progressive advocacy group’s annual fundraiser in Des Moines.
And no, de Blasio insisted, despite being an out-of-state politician giving a political address in Iowa, he is not planning to run for president.
“I’ve said it 400 times, I’m not one of those candidates,” de Blasio said.
However, de Blasio did during his address make one of those red-flag, “he’s running” type of comments we often hear from presidential hopefuls here: He noted a family connection to Iowa. (He said his grandmother was born in Iowa in 1888.)
De Blasio gave the keynote address at the annual fundraiser for Progress Iowa.
Erin Murphy covers Iowa politics and government. His email address is erin.murphy@lee.net.Share:
ANTALYA, Turkey - World leaders united Sunday to denounce terrorism at a heavily-guarded summit in Turkey after the gun and bomb assaults in Paris, despite divisions over conflict-riven Syria.
US President Barack Obama, Vladimir Putin of Russia, China's President Xi Jinping and other leaders gathered at the Mediterranean resort of Antalya two days after the Paris attacks claimed by Islamic State militants.
Obama condemned the killing of 129 people in Paris as well as a double suicide bombing in Ankara last month as attacks "on the civilised world" and vowed to "redouble our efforts" to eliminate the Islamic State network.
"We stand in solidarity with France in hunting down the perpetrators of this crime and bringing them to justice," Obama declared after talks with his host, Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan.
US President Barack Obama and Russian President Vladimir Putin agreed on Sunday on the need for UN-sponsored peace talks and a ceasefire to resolve years of war in Syria, a White House official said.
The two leaders spoke during a short and unannounced summit meeting over a coffee table on the margins of a G20 summit in the Turkish resort of Antalya.
"President Obama and President Putin agreed on the need for a Syrian-led and Syrian-owned political transition, which would be preceded by UN-mediated negotiations between the Syrian opposition and regime as well a ceasefire," the official told reporters after the meeting.
The two "held a constructive discussion" that lasted about 35 minutes, the official added, calling the need for a solution for Syria "an imperative made all the more urgent by the horrifying terrorist attacks in Paris."
According to Russian news agencies, the pair met for 20 minutes. The two heads of state held the summit in an unlikely venue, nearby a potted palm tree as other delegates wandered by and security agents partially obstructed the view of the television camera.
The Paris killings darkened the mood of the summit of the Group of 20 top world economies, with security and the Syrian conflict now eclipsing an economic agenda that will also deal with the spreading refugee crisis, climate change and tax avoidance.
Erdogan said the summit agenda was now "very different" given the massacre in Paris, with the leaders to condemn the attacks in their communique or a separate statement. "I believe that our stance against international terrorism will find its expression in a very strong, tough message at the G20 summit," Erdogan said. "This terrorist action is not only against French people but all humanity." Russia's Putin said that overcoming global terror was possible only "if all the international community unites its efforts".
Putin is key to the gathering, which is taking place without French leader Francois Hollande who remains home to lead his shaken country in the aftermath of the attacks. Russia launched its own Syrian air campaign in September but the West suspects the Russian bombardment is aimed at propping up the regime of President Bashar al-Assad, a difference that risks driving a wedge through the summit. European Union President Donald Tusk told reporters that Russian actions in Syria must be focused on Islamic State and not the anti-Assad opposition.
The summit offers the possibility of the first encounter between Obama and Putin since Russia launched its Syrian air campaign, although the White House said no formal summit is so far scheduled. Their icy body language at previous encounters has grabbed as many headlines as their comments.
Erdogan wants to use the summit to cement his status as a global leader after winning a resounding victory in an election last month, held three weeks after a twin suicide bombing in Ankara that killed 102 people and was blamed on Islamic State militants.
All musical events, including at the official dinner on Sunday night, have been cancelled as a mark of respect for the Paris victims and Turkish state media said the already tight security at the summit was stepped up.
Turkey is deeply opposed to Russia's air strikes but has received only a lukewarm reaction so far to its proposal for a safe zone free of Islamic State militants to be created inside Syria as a haven for refugees.
Top diplomats gathered in Vienna on Saturday agreed a fixed calendar for Syria that would see a transition government in six months and elections in 18 months but failed to agree on the future of Assad.
The refugee crisis is a key topic at the summit here, with Turkey housing some 2.2 million Syrian refugees from the conflict but the European Union urging Ankara to do more to prevent migrants undertaking risky boat crossings to the EU.
European Commission head Jean-Claude Juncker warned that the attacks in Paris should in no way poison the sensitive debate over refugees.
"Those who organised, who perpetrated the attacks are the very same people who the refugees are fleeing and not the opposite," Juncker said.
Discussions on climate change will assume greater importance than usual coming just ahead of a UN conference in Paris that aims to agree a global pact to curb warming of the planet.I read a rather interesting post yesterday called PHP: a fractal of bad design. It’s been getting a lot of traffic among the PHP community lately because it’s rather inflammatory. But to be honest, it does make a lot of really good points. It also makes a lot of mistakes and misses a bigger picture.
A Few Mistakes
The post makes quite a few mistakes and odd apples to oranges comparisons. Let me point out the major ones that I saw. * No Debugger - PHP has xdebug which works quite well as an interactive debugger.
Lack Of Threading - This is true, but he lists it as a difficulty, and I list it as a positive, since the application lifecycle is per request (I’ll expand more on this shortly).
== Is Useless - Actually, it’s quite useful, if used appropriately. I do admit that I use it less and less as time goes on, but when you need it, it’s quite useful…
Is Useless - Actually, it’s quite useful, if used appropriately. I do admit that I use it less and less as time goes on, but when you need it, it’s quite useful… Scoping Issues with Globals - He lists this as an oddity. Honestly, it’s one of the things that I think PHP got right over almost every other language. Without seeing a global $var declaration in a block, you know the variable is local. So by looking at a function declaration, you can immediately know what external state is needed without having to examine or trace every variable (or have your IDE do it for you).
declaration in a block, you the variable is local. So by looking at a function declaration, you can immediately know what external state is needed without having to examine or trace every variable (or have your IDE do it for you). Constants Are Defined By A Function Call - This is true, but it completely ignores the const FOO = "bar"; syntax, which is also perfectly valid and not a function call.
syntax, which is also perfectly valid and not a function call. Static Variables Inside Instance Methods are Global - This is true, because that’s exactly what a static variable is supposed to be. It’s just like using a variable in Python using obj.__class__.varname …
… PHP Is Naturally Tied to Apache - This is blatantly false, since there are plenty of applications not running Apache. It’s just that Apache comes pre-configured on most platforms with mod_php. But setting up FastCGI with NginX is actually easier IMHO than setting up mod_php with Apache…
There Is No Easy Way To Insulate A PHP App - This is not true, since with suphp and FastCGI, it’s actually easy to have multiple PHP instances running on different versions. Sure, with mod_php you need to have a separate Apache instance, but there are better SAPI’s than mod_php, so it’s not really fair to discount PHP for a limitation in Apache…
to have multiple PHP instances running on different versions. Sure, with mod_php you need to have a separate Apache instance, but there are better SAPI’s than mod_php, so it’s not really fair to discount PHP for a limitation in Apache… The Entire Missing Features Section - This is where I got lost. Up until here, he has been talking about language issues (most of which I agree with). But at this point, he starts to talk about libraries and frameworks. Sure, PHP doesn’t have a template system. But neither does Python or Ruby. Django and Ruby On Rails do, as do Zend and Symfony. PHP doesn’t have an XSS filter, but Python and Ruby don’t either (the frameworks do). PHP doesn’t have routing, but neither do Python and Ruby. It does have a dev server. And it does have interactive debugging (xdebug). The security section is pretty much more of the same…
Now, out of such a long post, that’s a really short list of gripes. I think there’s a lot of good content in there, and once you get past the ranty tone, it’s worth the read.
My Stance
I actually agree with the majority of what he said in his post. PHP is inconsistent. It is verbose. It does have a lot of weird behavior. It does have a lot of problems. It can be ugly. It can be really awkward to work around. It can leave a lot to be desired.
But it’s also incredibly powerful. It’s really easy to write working applications. It’s really easy to create a large scale project. It’s really easy to extend. It’s really easy to get help (in reality it’s one of the largest and most active programming communities on the Internet).
However, there’s one thing that it can do that almost no other popular language can: Be useful to non-developers. All you need to do is look at the open source web application space to see that PHP really wins. I mean in the CMS market alone, PHP dominates by a long shot (Wordpress, Joomla!, Drupal, vBulletin, MODx, TYPO, etc). Pick a web market, and PHP will likely dominate it (if not just have a strong presence). The fact of the matter is simply that PHP is ridiculously easy to deploy. So easy that even a non-developer can do it.
As Brandon Savage points out: It’s About The Customer. And that’s the big missing piece to the original post. Sure, from a developer’s standpoint PHP is lacking in quite a few areas. But since when do developers determine what’s successful? If developers did, software like Wordpress, jQuery |
are excited to move this project forward. Solar is a bankable, proven way to grow KIUC’s renewable generation portfolio and meet the energy needs of Hawaii.” (Source: Solar International)
One megawatt is enough to power about 500 – 1,000 homes, depending on demand, so the twelve megawatt project could power about 8,000 homes. If the average home has 3 persons, 12 MW could provide power to about 24,000 people, which is more than one third of the island’s permanent population. When the new solar plant is operational, it will reduce imported oil consumption by almost 12,000 barrels per year. Over its twenty year life, it will prevent the emissions of 567,000,000 pounds of NOx, SOx, and CO2.
The utility coop wants to have fifty percent of the island’s energy from renewable sources by 2023. Tourism is a huge part of the local economy, so preserving the beautiful natural habitats is of paramount importance. In 2007, over one million people visited Kauai.
Image Credit: Caracas1830 / Wiki Commons
Related Links
Hawaii’s Solar More than Doubled
Hawaiian Hospital Goes SolarThe new Washington Building Code requires 5 percent of parking spaces in apartments, condominiums and some commercial buildings to be “electric vehicle” ready, which means they must be designed with electrical capacity and wiring for a future charging station. No actual charging stations are required. The provision, which took effect July 1, applies to buildings with 20 or more parking spaces.
A roundtable discussion on the future of electric vehicles in the Northwest takes place from 10:45 to 11:45 a.m. Wednesday at the Northwest Power and Conservation Council’s meeting in Olympia. To listen to the discussion, visit this website and click "GoToMeeting" below each day's agenda.
Within two decades, many Northwest residents could be driving electric vehicles, transforming the way the region uses energy.
Modeling by the Northwest Power and Conservation Council suggests that 25 percent of passenger vehicles in Washington, Idaho, Oregon and Montana could be electric by 2035. The prospect has significant implications for Avista Corp. and other utilities, which are eager to understand how electric cars will affect demand for electricity.
Spokane-based Avista will begin installing 272 charging connections in Eastern Washington homes, workplaces and public areas this month to gather information on electric cars and recharging.
Just a smattering of Avista’s Washington customers currently own electric vehicles or plug-in electric-gas hybrids. Rendall Farley, who is in charge of Avista’s Electrification and Transportation Initiatives, said the number is probably between 350 and 400. But ownership is expected to grow rapidly as prices come down, selection increases and public policies encourage ownership of the less-polluting vehicles.
“It’s becoming more and more recognized that if we want to reduce emissions, we have to electrify transportation,” Farley said. “Driving electric means investing in an energy future that’s less expensive and much cleaner for the environment.”
In Washington, about 45 percent of the state’s greenhouse gas emissions come from transportation. Driving an electric vehicle that plugs into Avista’s grid would lower emissions by about 80 percent over a gas-fueled vehicle, Farley said.
More than half of Avista’s electric production comes from hydropower dams and wind turbines. Natural-gas fired turbines, which produce about 35 percent of Avista’s electricity, also emit less carbon than burning gasoline.
The Washington State Electric Vehicle Action Plan, adopted last year by the state Transportation Department, calls for increasing the number of electric vehicles in Washington from the current 16,500 to 50,000 within four years. Adding more plug-in vehicles to government fleets and building public charging stations to make fueling easier for drivers are part of the plan.
Both the utilities and the public stand to benefit from the switch, said Massoud Jourabchi, the Northwest Power and Conservation Council’s manager of economic analysis.
For utilities, electric vehicles represent a new source of revenue, Jourabchi said. Electric vehicle adoption could grow Northwest utilities’ electric revenue by $450 million over the next two decades. Most of the charging is expected to occur at night, when demand for electricity is low.
“People basically go home and plug it in and have their vehicle ready for the next day,” Jourabchi said.
Northwest drivers also would benefit from lower fuel costs, he said. The four-state region spends about $14.5 billion dollars annually on gasoline, and fuel prices for electric vehicles are comparable to buying gas for less than $1 per gallon, Jourabchi said.
Avista doesn’t expect electric vehicle recharging to become a significant revenue source for another five to 10 years, Farley said. But the utility wants to start collecting information about electric vehicles, including whether customers would be willing to forgo charging during times of peak electrical use, said Mary Tyrie, an Avista spokeswoman.
The Washington Utilities and Transportation Commission earlier this year approved Avista’s plan to spend $3 million on the charging station program. The utility expects to recover the cost of the two-year pilot through future electric rates.
Avista will install 120 charging stations in homes over a two-year period. Another 80 charging systems with multiple plug-in ports will be installed in workplaces and public areas.
Electric-vehicle owners can apply to have a charging station installed at their residence at no cost. The equipment and installation is valued at about $1,375 per customer, and it speeds up the rate of recharge. Plugging an electric vehicle into a 110-volt outlet provides about 5 miles of driving distance per hour of charging, compared to about 25 miles per hour of charging with an AC Level 2 charging system.
The ideal candidate for the program is an electric car owner whose employer also is willing to have a workplace charger installed.
“We know that 80 percent of charging occurs at home,” Farley said. “Another 15 percent occurs at work, where people are parked for a long time. The U.S. Department of Energy has found that workplace chargers can be a tremendous incentive and catalyst to driving electric.”
The utility also will install seven DC fast chargers in public areas, which are designed to reduce “range anxiety” in drivers of electric vehicles and encourage them to take longer trips.
The first installations of fast chargers will be in Rosalia, Spokane and Pullman, with later sites determined as Avista learns more about drivers’ traveling patterns. Drivers will pay by the minute for the charge, with an hourlong charge at one of the sites providing about 200 miles of driving.
Besides gathering information for the utility, the pilot could help speed up awareness and acceptance of electric vehicles, Farley said.
In Washington, most electric vehicle ownership is clustered in the Puget Sound area and along the Interstate 5 corridor, Jourabchi said. Ownership rates drop off in rural areas, where commutes tend to be longer.
Farley recently bought a used Nissan Leaf to give himself personal experience with driving electric. The Leaf has become his commuter car, replacing the SUV he once used for the 15-mile round trip from his South Hill home to Avista’s headquarters on Mission Avenue.
Farley has driven the Leaf to Fort Spokane to test the car’s performance on longer drives. But for most longer trips, he still relies on the SUV.
He can see other Spokane families eventually adding an electric vehicle for town trips, while keeping their gas vehicles for the occasional longer drives.
“Most people don’t drive more than 30 miles per day,” Farley said.While Europe has been busy fretting about Russian meddling in its politics, a few Americans have been quietly doing their part to boost the continent’s far right.
Wealthy American conservatives have poured large sums into the electoral campaign of far-right leader Geert Wilders of the Netherlands’ Dutch Freedom Party, in support of his anti-Islam, anti-EU views.
Three American donors gave €141,668 ($150,430) to Dutch political parties between 2015 and 2017, according to campaign finance documents released this week by the Dutch interior ministry. Two of these donors funded the far-right Dutch Freedom Party.
Americans rarely give money to Dutch political parties, and the sums wouldn’t amount to much in a US election. But as Dutch parliamentary elections approach on March 15, there is concern about the impact of foreign donations in a system heavily reliant on public funding.
The report showed that the PVV had three donors registered since 2015. The largest donor by far was the David Horowitz Freedom Center, a California-based think tank run by right-wing activist David Horowitz, who has called Wilders “the Paul Revere of Europe.” The think tank’s aim is to combat “the efforts of the radical left and its Islamist allies to destroy American values.”
The Center donated just over €108,244 in 2015, the largest individual contribution to a Dutch political party that year. The third donor, J.A. de Keizer, who gave a total €18,700 between 2015 to 2017, was based in Dordrecht.
The foreign support may be waning. According to the latest campaign disclosure report, last year’s contribution by Horowitz to Wilders’ campaign dropped to €22,036. Wilders, who was convicted of hate speech last year, has recently slid in the polls. (Horowitz rallied behind Wilders when he was put on trial and acquitted for inciting hate against Muslims in 2010.)
The PVV is currently projected to win 16% of the vote, or between 24 to 28 seats in the Dutch parliament, down from a prediction of around 20% in January, according to the Dutch Polling Indicator, which combines opinion polls into one estimate. Current prime minister Mark Rutte’s conservative liberal VVD is leading in the polls.
A record 81 parties registered to compete in the Dutch elections, of which 12 may get a spot.
Wilders is running on a one-page manifesto to withdraw all residence permits already granted to asylum seekers, ban all asylum seekers and immigrants from Muslim countries, close all mosques, and leave the European Union. Keen to build on US president Donald Trump’s recent electoral success, Wilders was one of the first European leaders to ape Trump’s infamous slogan.
The third US donor was Chris Rufer, who founded the Morning Star Packing company and serves as president of California Fruit and Tomato Kitchens company. Rufer gave over €4,535 to the small Dutch Libertarian Party, who has yet to win any seats in parliament.BABYMETAL Release Metal Resistance Details
By Larry Petro, News Monkey
Monday, February 22, 2016 @ 7:00 AM
Set For April 1 Release - advertisement - BABYMETAL--2015's breakout all-girl-fronted Japanese heavy metal/teen-pop hybrid group--revealed the cover art and track listing for their sophomore album Metal Resistance, set for release April 1 via RAL/Sony Music Entertainment (in the U.S.). The first single from the album, "Karate", will premiere and be available as an instant grat track on February 25. Metal Resistance is available now to pre-order via their official webstore as a standalone CD and special pre-order bundles. BABYMETAL will support the album on their "Babymetal World Tour 2016", kicking off May 4 at Playstation Theater in New York and making stops in Detroit (5/11), Chicago (5/13), San Francisco (7/14) and Los Angeles (7/15), among other cities. See a full list of confirmed U.S. tour dates below and all dates are on sale now at http://en.babymetal.jp/schedule/. 2015 was a breakout year for BABYMETAL, the young trio of 17-year-old SU-METAL (Vocal, Dance) and 16-year-olds YUIMETAL (Scream, Dance) and MOAMETAL (Scream, Dance), backed by a four-piece band packing a heavy metal arsenal: they re-released their 2014 chart topping self-titled debut album (released digitally 5/12/15 and physically on 6/16/15 via RAL/Sony Music Entertainment), were the most sought-after band at Rock On The Range (U.S.'s premiere rock festival) and completed sold-out dates at Chicago's House of Blues and New York City's Hammerstein Ballroom (part of their 2015 world tour); they've won several awards including the "Breakthrough Act" award at the 2015 Metal Hammer Golden Gods, the "Spirit of Independence" award at the 2015 Relentless Kerrang! Awards, MTV Europe's "Wildcard Best Japanese Act" and several LOUDWIRE Awards. In addition, they were awarded the "Discovery Prize" at GQ Japan's "Men of the Year 2015" Awards and the "Women of the Year" Award at VOGUE Japan's "Women of the Year 2015" Awards. In July, 2015, they became the first Japanese artist to appear on the cover of METAL HAMMER. Since forming in 2010, BABYMETAL have already achieved two major debut singles: "Ijime, Dame, Zetta!" and "Megistune", both of which ranked in the Top 10 Oricon Chart in Japan. Their first studio album Babymetal also earned the #1 spot on Japan's album chart and Billboard's World Album Chart The official live music video for their debut album's lead single "Gimme Chocolate!!" has garnered over 42 million views on YouTube. 2014 saw BABYMETAL headline numerous sold-out shows from New York to London, including the 20,000 capacity Saitama Super Arena in Japan. They performed at major festivals in multiple countries such as the UK's massive Sonisphere in front of 65,000 festival-goers and supported LADY GAGA on her "Artrave: The Artpop Ball" tour. Track listing for Metal Resistance: "Road Of Resistance" "Karate" "Awadama Fever" "Yava!" "Amore" "Meta Taro" "From Dusk Till Dawn" "GJ!" "Sis. Anger" "No Rain, No Rainbow" "Tales of The Destinies" "The One" - English ver.
U.S. tour dates confirmed for the "BABYMETAL WORLD TOUR 2016": 5.4 - Playstation Theater - New York, NY
5.5 - House Of Blues - Boston, MA
5.7 - Electric Factory - Philadelphia, PA
5.8 - Monster Energy Carolina Rebellion (Festival) - Concord, NC
5.10 - The Fillmore - Silver Spring, MD
5.11 - The Fillmore - Detroit, MI
5.13 - House of Blues - Chicago, IL
5.14 - Northern Invasion (Festival) - Somerset, WI
7.12 - Showbox SoDo - Seattle, WA
7.14 - Regency Ballroom - San Francisco, CA
7.15 - Wiltern Theater - Los Angeles, CA
7.17 - Chicago Open Air (Festival) - Bridgeview, IL Note: All dates are now on sale, details available at http://en.babymetal.jp/schedule/.
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Message:Truman Everts awoke from his bed of pine needles stiff and alone. It was September 10, 1870, and a typical late summer day in the northern Rockies—sunny and warm with a chance of snow flurries. Everts, a 54-year-old bureaucrat from the Montana Territory was 120 miles south of Bozeman, in a corner of the newly created Wyoming Territory that was, for all intents and purposes, terra incognita. The pure wilderness upon which Everts gazed—towering waterfalls, columns of steam rising hundreds of feet in the air, and pines as far as the eye could see—was one of the last remaining blank stretches on the map of the continental United States. And, though he refused to admit it to himself, Everts was lost.
Three weeks earlier, 19 Montana explorers, including Everts, had taken it upon themselves to finally map “the Yellowstone country,” as the region was called. Since the days of Lewis and Clark, mountain men and trappers had been spinning tall tales about a part of the Rockies filled with boiling lakes, spitting geysers, and petrified forests. The men, several of whom would become household names of their generation, called themselves the Washburn Expedition. With the aid of a few U.S. Army soldiers, they vowed to explore this “strange and marvelous” uncharted land, according to Nathaniel Langford, the expedition’s organizer and the future first superintendent of Yellowstone National Park who wrote about the expedition in Scribner’s Monthly later that year. The judges and generals on the trek would name mountains, hunt for the source of the Yellowstone River, and carry out some of the last true exploration in the lower 48.
“Our company, composed of some of the officials and leading citizens of Montana, felt that if the half [of the tall tales of the region were] true, they would be amply compensated for all the troubles and hazards of the expedition,” Langford wrote.
Everts, however, was no explorer, and the “troubles and hazards” he faced on the expedition, in Langford’s words, would become the stuff of campfire legend and national fascination, according to Yellowstone National Park historian Lee Whittlesey who wrote a book about Everts’ exploits in the 1995 book Lost in Yellowstone: Truman Everts’s “Thirty-Seven Days of Peril.”
A desk-jockey all his life, Everts had run the Montana Territory’s Internal Revenue department in Helena for the past five years. The Grant administration wanted its own man collecting taxes in Montana, though, and by the summer of 1870, the taxman had been unemployed for seven months. Enamored with the idea of exploring the unknown with Montana’s fellow leading citizens, the middle-aged widower enthusiastically joined the Washburn Expedition. The jaunt into the unknown was to be “sort of a between-jobs vacation for him,” Whittlesey says. Little did Everts know his holiday would become a comic wilderness odyssey—think The Revenant meets National Lampoon’s Vacation—of grit, luck, and utter incompetence that would, against all odds, help lead to the creation of the nation’s first national park.
Daylight broke over Everts’ sad pine-needle bed a little before 7:00 am. Though he was wholly lost, Everts was not particularly worried. The career bureaucrat had fallen behind the expedition the evening before—a trail clogged with fallen trees and his profound nearsightedness were apparently to blame—and decided to make camp once night fell. Despite the discomfort, Everts, a man of limitless confidence and self-assurance, later wrote that he “had no doubt of being with the party at breakfast.”
Though Everts had lived the last five years on the frontier in Montana, he had little experience roughing it. A Vermont native, Everts spent the Civil War tending to wounded Union soldiers and, according to the late Yellowstone National Park historian Aubrey Haines, was politically savvy enough to be appointed federal Tax Assessor of the new Montana Territory by Abraham Lincoln. As the first rays of sunlight began to cast shadows in the great pine forest, Everts lowered himself from his horse—his eyesight was so poor he needed to dismount frequently to search the ground for signs of the expedition—left the mare unhitched, “as had always been my custom,” and ambled off into a clearing. Moments later he heard a crack and turned in horror to see his horse “disappearing at full speed among the trees.” With the animal went his blankets, guns, fishing tackle, matches, food, and canteens—just about everything he’d brought with him. Desperate, he stumbled after the horse, but the creature was out of his sight within moments.
Everts’ cheery disposition quickly faded. Anxiety gave way to alarm as he faced the prospect of another night alone in the woods—this time without fire, food, or shelter. He took stock of his inventory: two butcher knives, an opera glass, and the light clothes he was wearing. “Naturally timid in the night, I fully realized the exposure of my condition,” he wrote.
A cold night and another day passed with no sign of the expedition. Unable to hunt or fish, Everts’ hunger became unbearable. He began wandering blindly along the southern shore of Yellowstone Lake, trying to retrace his steps to find his companions. The next day, delirious with hunger, he saw the sails of a ship on the horizon above the lake and ran to the shore, overjoyed. But he soon deflated, realizing he’d placed his hopes on a large pelican skimming the water. He became “quite unmanned,” and broke down.
That night, probably the 13th of September, Whittlesey thinks, as Everts shivered under a tree, a mountain lion began to stalk him. Everts, terrified and weak, was also defenseless: he’d lost both of his remaining knives in the bush earlier in the day. He scrambled up the pine and, “clasping the trunk of the tree with both arms, I sat perfectly still,” he wrote. “Moments passed with me like hours” and he spent the night thinking of his beloved daughter, Elizabeth, the belle of Helena society, about to be orphaned.
The next morning, a snowstorm blew in.
Although the United States was approaching its centennial, the Mountain West of the country was still sparely populated and mysterious in 1870. Montana, essentially frontier land with some very promising gold and silver mines, wouldn’t become a state for 19 years; Wyoming had officially become a Territory just two years earlier. The Washburn Expedition was the first professional effort to chart the unmapped northwestern quadrant of the new Wyoming Territory. “Everybody knew there was something weird in the northern Rockies,” says Montana State University historian Kim Allen Scott, an expert on the expedition. “But nobody really knew what was in those particular mountains. It lent a mystique to it.”
A smaller excursion into what is now Yellowstone a year earlier had piqued interest in region, but the Washburn Expedition was to be a serious affair. Henry Washburn, a former congressman and general in the Union Army, was the Surveyor General for the Montana Territory and his party included some of the most respected citizens on the country’s northern frontier. Everts had signed on early, eager for the adventure, along with Warren C. Gillette, a young man very much enamored with Elizabeth Evert who considered himself Truman’s future son-in-law.
The “Yellowstone country,” at the time, was still a mystery to Americans. Though people from 26 different tribes had lived off the land for up to 10,000 years, few whites had ever seen the geysers and hot springs. The stories whiskered trappers brought back from the region seemed fantastical. Even as Everts and the rest of the expedition made their way up the Yellowstone River, the explorers had their doubts. “A column of steam rising from the dense woods to the height of several hundred feet, became distinctly visible,” wrote Lt. Gustavus C. Doane, an army officer with the expedition, in a report that would become required reading in Washington. “We had all heard fabulous stories of this region and were somewhat skeptical as to appearances…Some one noticed that the vapor rose in regular puffs, and as if expelled with a great force. Then conviction was forced upon us. It was indeed a great column of steam, puffing away on the lofty mountainside, escaping with a roaring sound, audible at a long distance even through the heavy forest. A hearty cheer rang out at this discovery and we pressed onward with renewed enthusiasm.”
Weeks later, according to the late historian Aubrey Haines, the expedition stumbled across a stunningly large, startlingly regular geyser. Mesmerized, they dubbed it “Old Faithful.” A short way down the Firehole River, the group built a campfire and, rumor has it, declared that the region should be preserved as a national park, which would make it the first in the world. In the coming months and years, the members of the expedition would go on to play integral roles in the founding of the park—even Everts, who, by this time, the entire expedition assumed had frozen to death.
Everts’ first meal in five days came on wings benumbed by cold. Lying under a tree as a blizzard blanketed the region, a small, confused songbird landed right in front of him. “I instantly seized and killed it, and, plucking its feathers, ate it raw,” he wrote. “It was a delicious meal for a half-starved man.”
With the September storm raging, Everts abandoned hope of being found by his fellow explorers. He stumbled through what he estimated were ten miles of mush and snow—park historian Whittlesey puts it at closer to three or four—until he found a collection of hot springs at the foot of what he called Mount Everts. Freezing and soaked through, he lay down beside the blistering springs for warmth. There he stayed for seven days, waiting out the snow. He’d discovered he could eat a local thistle (now known as the Everts Thistle) and began boiling them in a nearby spring, which he called his dinner pot. He sharpened a belt buckle from his vest into a knife, made a fishhook from a pin and created a line from some string he found in his pocket. “I was enveloped in a perpetual steam-bath,” he wrote. “At first this was barely preferable to the storm, but I soon became accustomed to it, and…actually enjoyed it.” Three nights into his stay at the hot spring, however, Everts rolled over in his sleep and directly on to a vent. The scalding his received on his hip would become the cause of “unceasing pain.”
Around this time, Everts realized he could make fire with his opera glasses by concentrating the sun’s rays. The glorious discovery boosted his spirits immensely and allowed him to leave his hot spring den. But in stormy late September, the sun didn’t always shine and Everts was terrified to let his fire die. Now, as he prepared for a 100-mile journey north, hobbled by frostbitten feet—he’d turned his shoes into slippers as they began to fall apart—he would resolve to carry a branch lit by fire all the way.
At this point, Everts had survived two weeks alone in the frigid wild, subsisting on nothing but a songbird and thistles. Gaunt and nearly mad with hunger, the days blended together. He spent half a day trying to catch a grasshopper and failed. The third degree burn on his hip from the hot spring meant he could only sleep sitting up; one night, as he nodded off, he fell forward and directly into his campfire, burning his hand. His mind began to escape him. Old friends appeared, counseling him on which direction he should take. “My arms, legs and stomach were transformed into so many traveling companions,” he wrote. “For hours I would plod along conversing with these imaginary companions.” The disembodied spectral version of his stomach “complained incessantly of the roots I fed him;” his legs “implored me for rest.” He grew to like his hallucinations and rely on them. “I was constantly traveling in dream-land, and indulging in strange reveries such as I had never known before.”
A few days later, white caps and foam on Yellowstone Lake signaled the wind was picking up. Worried about another sleepless night in the cold, Everts collected pine branches, stacked them to create a small shelter and lit a cracking fire. He awoke some indeterminate time later to a wall of flames. His shelter and the surrounding trees were a roaring blaze and much of his hair had burned off in his sleep. He sprinted toward the water, but “on, on, on traveled the destructive element, until it seemed as if the whole forest was enveloped in flame.”
Scorched but alive, he realized he’d left behind his few remaining possessions. “Among the disasters of this fire, there was none I felt more seriously than the loss of my buckle-tongue knife, my pin fish-hook and tape fish-line.”
The next day, the ghost of an old friend appeared and suggested Everts follow the Yellowstone River out of the region. “Delighted with the idea of having a traveling companion,” he pushed the thoughts of death from his mind and plodded on. A day or so later, he came across a warm spring filled with minnows and, drinking deeply and eating the fish raw, quickly succumbed to violent food poisoning.
The expedition spent a full week searching for Everts. They set signal fires at night, fired guns into the air each day and left notes and caches of food for Everts along the lake. The man courting Everts’ daughter Bessie, Warren Gillette, stayed out all night hunting for his potential father-in-law and was, at one point, within four miles of Everts, according to Lost in Yellowstone. The party had discussed what to do if a member was lost and agreed to a meeting point along Yellowstone Lake, but Everts, for reasons unknown, never appeared.
On the “gloomy morning” of September 17th, a week after Everts’ disappearance, the expedition finally moved on. Gillette and two soldiers stayed behind for another three days, to no avail.
“Has he met death by accident, or may he be injured and unable to move, and be suffering the horrors of starvation and fever?” wondered Langford, the future park superintendent. “Has he wandered aimlessly hither and thither until bereft of reason? As I contemplate all these possibilities, it is a relief to think that he may have lost his life at the hand of some vagabond Indian.”
Jack Baronett raised his rifle and prepared to fire. Baronett, a gold prospector who panned in the upper Yellowstone country, was on the trail of a wounded bear. It was October 16—37 days since Everts’ disappearance—and his dog had picked up the scent of the beast first. Now, as he took sight of the bruin, he paused. “When I got near it, I found it was not a bear, and for my life could not tell what it I was. It did not look like any animal that I had seen, and it was certainly not a human being,” he later told an author.
Everts had been crawling for an unknown number of days. He had lost his shoes, broken his glasses, and weighed no more than 50 pounds. His feet were worn to the bone and he was black with burns and frostbite. Looking up from the hillside, he saw the sharp reflection of burnished steel. “Are you Mr. Everts?” someone asked. “Yes. All that is left of him,” he replied and fell into his savior’s arms.
Baronett and another mountain man had been hunting for Everts. The Washburn expedition had already returned to Montana and a prominent judge had offered a reward for anyone who found Everts’ remains. Unbelievably, the pair had stumbled across the man himself—a full 50 miles from where he had first been lost. (Contrary to Everts’ account of his rescue, Baronett says Everts mumbled incoherently when found and was “constantly delirious” for days; he was also incapable of holding down new food—the fibrous “Everts thistles” had apparently backed him up—until he was given a laxative of pure bear fat. “All in all,” writes Whittlesey, “he was a thoroughly wasted and irrationally being.”)
The story of Everts’ improbable survival became national news. His rescuers took him to Bozeman, where he recuperated and wrote a riveting firsthand account of the ordeal for Scribner’s Monthly, "Thirty-Seven Days of Peril." The episode lent “great publicity and support to that burgeoning movement” to establish a national park at Yellowstone, Whittlesey writes, and combined with a national lecture tour by Langford, the country became fascinated with the mysterious, boiling lands. In 1872, after one final expedition photographed the Yellowstone basin, the country’s first national park was created by an act of Congress. Everts, by this time fully recovered, was offered the honor of becoming first superintendent. He declined, citing the job’s lack of pay, and the role went to Langford, the expedition’s organizer.
Everts eventually left the frontier and moved back East. He took a job with the U.S. Post Office and settled back into obscurity. He would die 30 years later, of pneumonia, at his home in Hyattsville, Maryland.
Today, a hundred years after the founding of the National Park Service, Everts is little remembered for his role in the creation of the country's national park service. Perhaps it's because Everts, after his safe return, rarely talked about his ordeal, according to descendants interviewed by Haines and Whittlesey. Case in point: When Jack Baronett, Everts’ rescuer, visited the bureaucrat in New York a few years after the ordeal, Everts was so rude that the mountain man, upon leaving the meeting, said he “wished he had let the son-of-a-gun roam.” Baronett, for his part, never received his reward for Evert’s rescue, either. The Montana judge who offered the $600 bounty said it was Everts’ job to pay since he was found alive.
Everts flatly refused.
“He would not pay me,” Baronett recounted, “because he said that if I had left him alone he would have found his way out.”Systematic ‘fake news’ Planted By Britain’s Intelligence Services
By Jonathan Cook – Is the CIA editing your newspaper? Here is a great overview by Ed Jones of OpenDemocracyUK of why corporate media are the arch-exponents of “fake news”. The media are overwhelming owned and controlled by billionaires and gargantuan corporations, who depend on the support of other corporations for ad revenue, and employ journalists from a narrow, privileged class whose careers depend on maintaining access to elite sources. It would be simply astounding in these circumstances if we had anything resembling a pluralistic media.
The data concerns UK outlets, but the same principles apply in the US.
One section makes especially disturbing reading. It is the little-discussed matter of the intelligence services’ deep penetration of most western, and in some cases non-western, media organisations. In short, US intelligence services – and to a lesser extent British ones – have for many decades fed information to sympathetic journalists in key positions inside the “free” media, working with them hand in glove. Additionally, the CIA has sought to put its own people into publications to shape directly editorial content and influence public opinion. In some cases, these people may have reached very senior positions.
Nick Davies, of the Guardian, dedicated a whole chapter of his book Flat Earth News to documenting these practices. Strangely, that chapter is rarely mentioned. Journalists who praise the book instead concentrate on his less revealing concept of “churnalism” – journalism compromised by constraints of time and resources.
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Jones adds other sources who make much the same point: Richard Keeble, professor of journalism at the University of Lincoln, … has written on the history of the links between journalists and the intelligence services. … He quotes Roy Greenslade, who has been a media specialist for both the Telegraph and the Guardian [and is a former editor of the Mirror newspaper], as saying: “Most tabloid newspapers – or even newspapers in general – are playthings of MI5 [Britain’s FBI].” Keeble goes on to say:
“Bloch and Fitzgerald, in their examination of covert UK warfare, report the editor of ‘one of Britain’s most distinguished journals’ as believing that more than half its foreign correspondents were on the MI6 payroll [the British equivalent of the CIA – my emphasis]. And in 1991, Richard Norton-Taylor revealed in the Guardian that 500 prominent Britons paid by the CIA and the now defunct Bank of Commerce and Credit International, included 90 journalists.”
Keeble has given many more examples in his book chapter of the intelligence services infiltrating the media and changing the politics of the time, including around the miners strikes and Arthur Scargill in the 1980s and during the lead-up to the Iraq war in 2003. …
David Leigh, former investigations editor of The Guardian, wrote about a series of instances in which the secret services manipulated prominent journalists. He claims reporters are routinely approached and manipulated by intelligence agents and identifies three ways – providing examples for each in his article – in which they do it:
They attempt to recruit journalists to spy on other people or themselves attempt to go under journalistic “cover.”
They allow intelligence officers to pose as journalists “to write tendentious articles under false names.”
And “the most malicious form”: they plant intelligence agency propaganda stories on willing journalists who disguise their origin from readers.
Remember that those who should be exposing the intelligence services’ manipulation of the mainstream media are the very same mainstream media that are already compromised.
In other words, this story of is almost impossible for the media to tell because it would expose a very uncomfortable reality: that they are not, as they claim, watchdogs on power, but rather the lapdogs of the powerful.
If all this still seems hard to believe, please watch this video of a senior German journalist admitting that he was recruited by the US intelligence services (h/t Antonio Nascimento). Udo Ulfkotte covered the Middle East for the Frankfurter Allgemeine for 12 years, and says he regularly acted as a conduit for CIA propaganda. He adds that many of his colleagues were doing the same, willingly promoting CIA disinformation.The people have spoken! Behold the Hall of Fame: Class of 2014, a monster collection of the year’s best as determined by the UM faithful. Clocking in at 22 tracks, unfolding over four and half hours, it’s the deepest HOF offering to date. We’ve taken more of your top picks than ever and turned them into a two-set show (and a behemoth of an encore) that encapsulates the essence of live UM: raw, energetic and inspired. Heavy on improvisation and stylistically diverse, it’s what you’ve come to expect from Umphrey’s McGee.
Hall of Fame: Class of 2014 Foil Stamped Cover
As always, the Hall of Fame is curated by the people, for the people. Your selections this year include everything from UMBowl Raw Stewage debuts to tracks from our 2,000th show. Cities represented span from coast to coast |
patrolled the streets to inspect men’s attire too, to make sure that sharia laws were followed. It was forbidden to smoke and those who did were subjected to lashings in the event of being caught by so-called security units. It was also compulsory for me to go to mosque to perform prayer five times a day.
ANF spoke to two women from Manbij, Fatima Mihemmed and Rabia Hassan, who lived under IS occupation for two years.
Where were you born and where did you grow up?
My name is Fatima Mihemmed. I was born in Manbij and have lived here since.
I have been trying to continue my life under IS occupation since 2014. In the wake of the operation launched by the fighters of the Manbij Military Council to end the IS occupation in our land, I fled the city and took refuge in the areas liberated during this military campaign.
What sort of a life did women in Manbij lead?
Women in Manbij dress in accordance with Islamic culture, like in all the other societies of the Middle East. However, this Islamic culture is not like that claimed and imposed by Islamic State.
After occupying our region, IS created an Islamic model in line with their own ideology. This model is monolithic and in regards to dress accepts only completely black dress. Women couldn’t go out without men. Nor could they smoke or even visit a neighbor.
How did the Rojava revolution make you feel?
Women were also oppressed during the Baath regime, and subjected to continuous pressure, similar to the typical Middle Eastern society.
But life for women became more oppressive with the emergence of jihadist gangs such as IS, Al-Nusra, Ahrar Al-Sham and Jaysh Al-Islam during the Syrian civil war. Claiming to be fighting for Islam and Allah, they subjected our people to massacre, torture, rape and exile.
This emerging situation affected women more than anyone else. The Rojava Revolution arose under such circumstances, and it affected me like the other women in Syria and even around the world. I can say that the Rojava revolution tore down all the taboos in Middle Eastern societies, especially the taboos identified with women.
This is why I felt hope, emancipation and freedom in the Rojava Revolution, and I believe that all the other women are of the same opinion with me.
Mrs. Rabia Hasan, where were you born and raised?
I was also born and raised in Manbij center. I will continue living in my hometown once it is liberated. I will, however, be living in a free Manbij from now on.
What did you experience under IS occupation, what has changed in your life?
The peoples of the region were in fear after IS occupation. We knew they burned people alive, beheaded and severely tortured them. In the nature of things, one obeys their rules in order to remain alive.
During IS occupation, we saw a mentality that ignores women, makes them sex slaves, decides on how they dress and grants them a right to life only in line with their principles. Life for women became unbearable after IS occupation.
We were trying to continue living in our houses and couldn’t go out. Our lives became a prison. We were also having difficulty meeting our daily basic needs. We couldn’t afford anything due to financial difficulties, and what’s more the gangs were determining the prices of basic needs as they wished.
Theu were imposing heavy taxes on the locals involved in agriculture and animal husbandry. They were seizing the agricultural products and animals, in addition to collecting money from villagers under the name of charity and alms.
We have heard of fatwas issued by IS against women. What were these fatwas like?
The fatwas ordered women to marry IS members. The wives of killed IS members were ordered to marry other members. These were just some of the fatwas issued by them.
We saw you screaming with joy after taking shelter in liberated areas. What do you have to say in this regard?
Using Islam as a pretext, IS ruined the lives of women. We were overjoyed when our villages were liberated, and taking off our niqabs and burqas, we ran towards the fighters. We were dancing the dance of freedom and screamed with joy. We thank all the fighters, they rescued us from IS occupation at the cost of their lives.
The peoples of Syria are multi-ethnic and multi-voiced. Gang groups like IS, Al-Nusra, Ahrar Al-Sham and Jaysh Al-Sham will not be able to destroy this plurality. No power can fade the color of women.
Read the original interview on the Kurdish Question here." It seems like this is imminent, but I think the industry has grasped that it's not going to happen soon." - Jack Nerad
"Autonomous parking isn't exciting. It's not what we're waiting for." - Amnon Shashua
It's been a banner month for self-driving cars. At CES, at least a dozen companies made significant announcements related to autonomous vehicle development. They showcased cars that parked themselves, introduced computers capable of processing trillions of driving scenarios per second and paraded self-driving demonstrations along the Las Vegas Strip. For a few days, the future of transportation was there for anyone who cared to step away from a blackjack table to witness.Not to be outdone, the federal government followed last week by announcing revised policies that put autonomous vehicles in the regulatory fast lane. Federal transportation officials proposed $4 billion in funding and committed to a six-month timeline for proposing guidance on safely operating fully autonomous cars to the auto industry. "We're bullish on autonomous vehicles," Transportation Secretary Anthony Foxx said, speaking in Detroit.With all the enthusiasm and urgency, it'd be easy to believe fully autonomous vehicles – the kind that allow an occupant to read a book or watch TV while en route to their destination – will be coming around the corner at any moment. That's not necessarily the case.In Las Vegas, many automakers committed to bringing semi-autonomous features to the marketplace by 2020. A few, like Tesla Motors and Volvo, are bringing autonomous features today. But when it comes to Level 4 automation, which the government defines as a car that can make all critical decisions for an entire trip, it's going to be a longer wait. Automotive executives who spoke during CES and the North American International Auto Show say it's at least a decade away. Maybe longer."That's 20 to 25 years," said Magna International chief technology officer Swamy Kotagiri."We won't see full autonomy in the next decade," said Bosch CEO Volkmar Denner. Kia joined the autonomous party at CES, making the first major announcement related to its development of autonomobiles. The South Korean automaker, which recently started testing a Kia Soul electric vehicle on Nevada roads, said the arrival of its first fully autonomous vehicle is targeted for 2030.Questions over liability in the event of accidents are one roadblock. Volvo, which will deploy semi-autonomous features in its new S90 sedan, made headlines in October when it announced it would accept responsibility for accidents caused by its autonomous technology. Mercedes-Benz and Google followed suit, but so far, other automakers haven't embraced that responsibility.Regulatory hurdles and outdated provisions in the federal motor vehicle safety standards are another. Regardless of when the technology arrives, Foxx, at the podium in the picture above, is prudent to address policy now, before states do that themselves and automakers face an uneven patchwork of ever-changing laws. Last month, California took a step in this direction, issuing preliminary rules that require a driver be capable of intervening if needed in the operation of a vehicle, a development that made Google, which envisions a car without a steering wheel, "gravely disappointed."But the problems are also technical. Though there's a common refrain throughout the auto industry that technology is ready to be deployed, recent documents released by the California Department of Motor Vehicles suggest that's not accurate. Seven automakers who operated autonomous cars on the state's roads in 2014 were recently required to report incidents in which autonomous technology disengaged and driving acts required human intervention.Six companies reported 2,894 total disengagements on California public roads between September 2014 and November 2014, according to documents submitted by the companies. Mercedes-Benz operated two autonomous vehicles in the state and reported 1,051 total disengagements. Google, which operates the nation's largest fleet of autonomous cars at 53, reported 341 total disengagements."There's too many technical difficulties," said Jack Nerad, executive market analyst for Kelley Blue Book. "It has to drive in the right weather conditions, on clear roads during the daytime in a place where it understands the road signs.... It seems like this is imminent, but I think the industry has grasped that it's not going to happen soon."Tesla Motors reported zero disengagements, but the company declined to say how many cars it tested on public roads or how many miles its fleet had logged. That doesn't mean the company is without autonomous challenges. Last week, it rescinded certain aspects of its semi-autonomous Autopilot system that had been installed via over-the-air updates in October. The most recent update restricted Autopilot operations to roads that contained a divider Tesla also updated the cars so they would slow down while navigating curves in the road, mimicking the same actions as a human driver.Amnon Shashua, chief technology officer at Mobileye, a tier-two supplier that makes components for several parts of Tesla's Autopilot and advanced safety systems, laments the long road toward full autonomy. Initial advances like Autopilot aren't as exciting to him as the disruptive potential of Level 4."Autonomous parking isn't exciting. It's not what we're waiting for," he said at CES. "Autonomous driving is exciting because it has the potential to transform transportation.... Having an Uber or Lyft type vehicle that picks up passengers without a driver, that's a very attractive business case. Our cities being swarmed by pods shuttling people back and forth. This requires full autonomous, and this is where the excitement comes. Not on the highway."WASHINGTON (Reuters) - The former National Security Agency contractor who revealed the U.S. government’s top-secret monitoring of Americans’ phone and Internet data fought back against his critics on Monday, saying the government’s “litany of lies” about the programs compelled him to act.
Edward Snowden told an online forum run by Britain’s Guardian newspaper that he considered it an honor to be called a traitor by people like former Vice President Dick Cheney, and he urged President Barack Obama to “return to sanity” and roll back the surveillance effort.
Taking questions from readers and journalists, Snowden talked about his motivations and reaction to the debate raging about the damage or virtue of the leaks. Snowden remains in hiding, reportedly in Hong Kong.
Snowden said disillusionment with Obama contributed to his decision but there was no single event that led him to leak details about the vast monitoring of Americans’ activity.
“It was seeing a continuing litany of lies from senior officials to Congress - and therefore the American people - and the realization that Congress... wholly supported the lies,” said Snowden, who had worked at an NSA facility in Hawaii as an employee of contractor Booz Allen Hamilton before providing the details to the Guardian and Washington Post.
Snowden referred to Director of National Intelligence James Clapper’s testimony to Congress in March that such a program did not exist, saying that seeing him “baldly lying to the public without repercussion is the evidence of a subverted democracy. The consent of the governed is not consent if it is not informed.”
The Justice Department has opened a criminal investigation into Snowden’s actions, and U.S. officials promised last week to hold him accountable for the leaks.
Since Snowden went public in a video released by the Guardian on June 9, many U.S. lawmakers have condemned his actions and intelligence officials have said the leaks will compromise national security.
Some lawmakers have been more restrained. Republican Senator Rand Paul, a Tea Party favorite, has said he is reserving judgment about Snowden’s methods, and separately encouraged Americans to be part of a class-action lawsuit against the U.S. government for the surveillance programs.
Snowden, who traveled to Hong Kong before details of the programs were published, has promised to stay in the China-ruled former British colony and fight extradition.
China made its first substantive comments on Monday regarding Snowden’s revelations. A Chinese Foreign Ministry spokeswoman said that Washington should explain its surveillance programs to the world, and she rejected a suggestion that Snowden was a spy for China.
Snowden said during the online forum on Monday that he does not believe he can get a fair trial in the United States.
“The U.S. government, just as they did with other whistleblowers, immediately and predictably destroyed any possibility of a fair trial at home, openly declaring me guilty of treason and that the disclosure of secret, criminal and even unconstitutional acts is an unforgivable crime. That’s not justice,” he said.
Obama and administration officials have defended the program as an effective tool in its effort to protect Americans from terrorist attacks and said it was instrumental in helping to disrupt dozens of potential attacks.
General Keith Alexander, director of the NSA, will testify on Tuesday at a House of Representatives Intelligence Committee hearing on the programs.
Officials have promised to make public details on some of the thwarted attacks, and a U.S. government source familiar with the matter said more than 25 cases were on a list that spy agencies were trying to declassify for Tuesday’s hearing.
During his question-and-answer session with Guardian readers, Snowden rejected criticism from defenders of the surveillance programs - including Cheney - that he was a traitor for leaking the details.
‘THE HIGHEST HONOR’
“Being called a traitor by Dick Cheney is the highest honor you can give an American, and the more panicked talk we hear from people like him... the better off we all are,” Snowden said. Cheney was instrumental in the expansion of surveillance programs after the September 11, 2001, terrorist attacks.
Snowden said he had not had any contact with the Chinese government, and he took care not to reveal any U.S. operations against military targets.
A bus passes by a poster of Edward Snowden, a former contractor at the National Security Agency (NSA), displayed by his supporters at Hong Kong's financial Central district during the midnight hours of June 18, 2013, while Snowden is engaged in a live chat online believed to be in Hong Kong. REUTERS/Bobby Yip
“I pointed out where the NSA has hacked civilian infrastructure such as universities, hospitals and private businesses because it is dangerous,” he said.
Snowden answered about 18 questions on the Guardian’s website during the session, which lasted more than 90 minutes and drew more than 2,000 comments and questions.
He said he was disappointed that many of Obama’s campaign promises had not been realized.
“He closed the door on investigating systemic violations of law, deepened and expanded several abusive programs, and refused to spend the political capital to end the kind of human rights violations like we see in Guantanamo, where men still sit without charge,” Snowden said.
He also called on Obama to appoint a special committee to review the surveillance programs.
“This disclosure provides Obama an opportunity to appeal for a return to sanity, constitutional policy, and the rule of law rather than men,” he said.
“He still has plenty of time to go down in history as the President who looked into the abyss and stepped back, rather than leaping forward into it.”
Snowden said he was encouraged by the public debate over privacy rights and the limits of government that sprung up in the aftermath of the disclosures.
But now, he said, the media was more concerned with “what I said when I was 17 or what my girlfriend looks like rather than, say, the largest program of suspicionless surveillance in human history.”
Snowden’s father, Lonnie, said in an interview on Fox News that he hoped his son would return to the United States to fight any potential criminal charges.
“I would like to see Ed come home and face this. I shared that with the government when I spoke with them. I love my son,” he told Fox, adding “I hope, I pray” that he does not commit any acts that could be considered treason.
A poster supporting Edward Snowden, a former contractor at the National Security Agency (NSA) who leaked revelations of U.S. electronic surveillance, is displayed at Hong Kong's financial Central district June 17, 2013. REUTERS/Bobby Yip
“I sense that you’re under much stress (from) what I’ve read recently, and (ask) that you not succumb to that stress... and make a bad decision,” Lonnie Snowden said in an interview published on the channel’s website.
He denied press reports that his son was a high school dropout, saying that after a lengthy illness at the start of his sophomore year, his son enrolled in community college and eventually got a high school equivalency degree.When yokozuna Hakuho was interviewed ringside on Sunday, after wrapping up his first title in a year, he congratulated the people of the Philippines on the imminent promotion of Takayasu to ozeki. It was a nice nod to the Taganoura stable man’s mother, who hails from an island in the south of the country.
Television cameras later showed Takayasu’s parents applauding the comment as well as Hakuho’s wife and children celebrating the day 15 win that sealed the yokozuna’s record 13th perfect tournament.
Both men have in the past credited family as being responsible for a large part of their success, and a point that sometimes gets lost in a sea of training session and injury reports is just how significant a solid support structure is to a rikishi’s prosperity.
For foreign wrestlers in particular, finding themselves in a strange land at a young age, separated from peers and unable to speak the language, family takes on an even greater importance. Parents and spouses become islands in a turbulent ocean of intense physical training, constant mental pressure and never-ending media scrutiny.
Indeed the just-completed Summer Basho may have had an entirely different outcome were it not for Hakuho’s wife and father. In 2015, after overtaking the legendary Taiho in career tournament titles, the yokozuna was struggling to find motivation to continue his career. Admitting that he had come close to quitting, he said it was his wife that had convinced him to stay on, and he found the motivation he needed in his father’s career records.
Hakuho’s father, Jigjidiin Monkhbat, is an Olympic medalist who also won six Naadam championships in Mongolian wrestling. Since Naadam is held only once a year and sumo has six basho, Hakuho reasoned that 36 titles would be equal to what his father achieved. And while sumo isn’t an Olympic sport, the yokozuna knows that if he can hold on until 2020, he may be able to “participate” in them — as Akebono did in the 1998 Nagano Olympics — by performing a ring-entering ceremony.
Even if Hakuho is no longer around as yokozuna three years from now, don’t bet against sumo’s newest ozeki reaching the rank by then.
A close examination of Takayasu’s record since joining sumo reveals a career path very similar to yokozuna Kakuryu. Both men are well-rounded rikishi that, while not spectacular in any one department, are solid in all of them. It would be no surprise to see Takayasu with the white rope around his waist in 2020.
Needing 10 wins this past tournament to ensure promotion to sumo’s second-highest rank, the Ibaraki native stormed out to an 11-2 record before dropping his last two fights. That focus and ability to ignore the pressure was something that was evident from a young age.
When he was 15, Takayasu decided to dedicate himself to sumo, telling his mother, “we won’t be able to meet every day but let’s persevere.” He knew it would be difficult as they were particularly close.
“Ever since my business and life became successful while I was pregnant with him, I’ve called him my lucky baby,” Bebelita Takayasu told The Japan Times on Tuesday. “Even now I text him daily when I wake up or before going to sleep. Just simple things like how is his day or what did he have for lunch. I don’t talk to him about sumo. If I am worried about him he always tells me it’s OK.”
Takayasu may have been born and raised in Japan but his close relationship with his mother means he takes an active part in helping her native country. After promotion to sekitori, he began regularly donating money to help orphans as well as buying uniforms and textbooks for elementary school kids in the Philippines.
It’s no surprise that when he took up the sport. Takayasu chose the Taganoura (then known as Naruto) stable. Sumo stables generally are closer to families than they are to sports teams but some, like the Chiba-based outfit, are particularly tight-knit.
The former stablemaster, who passed away in 2011, didn’t allow his apprentices to train at other stables (normally a common sumo practice) or even to socialize with outside rikishi. As a result, Takayasu, Kisenosato, and the other wrestlers in the stable developed a very tight brother-like bond. That bond and family-like support has allowed Kisenosato and Takayasu to focus on their sumo, ignore outside distractions and maximize their potential.
That was illustrated by Kisenosato’s championship victory in the March tournament, which he achieved in his debut basho at sumo’s top rank. It is rare for newly promoted yokozuna to win their first tournament as they are generally exhausted and distracted by overwhelming levels of media attention in the preceding two months.
That’s something that Takayasu will have to face now that his new rank is official. On Tuesday morning, he had his promotion announcement at a central Tokyo hotel and he’ll have countless interviews, functions and parties to attend between now and July 9, when the Nagoya Basho gets under way.
His mother, of course, will provide him with a consistent non-sumo oasis, and “big brother” Kisenosato will be able to advise him on how best to pace himself and handle the increased attention.
Both men should be in good condition and ready when the entire sumo world relocates to central Japan in late June. Standing in their way will be that other family man, Hakuho. The legendary champion, refreshed and revitalized, has already passed the mark his father set, but seems to be gaining new motivation as a parent himself.
Indeed, with his own son having already put on a mawashi and competed, perhaps these family ties will stretch into another generation.In a shocking development Thursday evening, 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 (D-Nev.) triggered a rarely used procedural option informally called the “nuclear option” to change the Senate rules.
Reid and 50 members of his caucus voted to change Senate rules unilaterally to prevent Republicans from forcing votes on uncomfortable amendments after the chamber has voted to move to final passage of a bill.
Reid’s coup passed by a vote of 51-48, leaving Senate Republican leader Mitch McConnell Addison (Mitch) Mitchell McConnellHouse to push back at Trump on border Democrats block abortion bill in Senate Overnight Energy: Climate protesters storm McConnell’s office | Center-right group says Green New Deal could cost trillion | Dire warnings from new climate studies MORE (R-Ky.) fuming.
The surprise move stunned Republicans, who did not expect Reid to bring heavy artillery to what had been a humdrum knife fight over amendments to China currency legislation.
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The Democratic leader had become fed up with Republican demands for votes on motions to suspend the rules after the Senate had voted to limit debate earlier in the day.
McConnell had threatened such a motion to force a vote on the original version of President Obama’s jobs package, which many Democrats are against because it would limit tax deductions for families earning more than $250,000 a year. The jobs package would have been considered as an amendment.
McConnell wanted to embarrass the president by demonstrating how few Democrats are willing to support his jobs plan as first drafted. (Senate Democrats have since rewritten the package to pay for its stimulus provisions with a 5.6 surtax on annual income above $1 million.)
Reid’s move strips the minority of the power to force politically-charged procedural votes after the Senate has voted to cut off a potential filibuster and move to a final vote, which the Senate did on the China measure Tuesday morning, 62-38.
Reid said motions to suspend the rules after the Senate votes to end debate — motions that do not need unanimous consent — are tantamount to a renewed filibuster after a cloture vote.
“The Republican senators have filed nine motions to suspend the rules to consider further amendments but the same logic that allows for nine such motions could lead to the consideration of 99 such amendments,” Reid argued before springing his move.
Reid said Republicans could force an “endless vote-a-rama” after the Senate has voted to move to final passage.
He said this contradicts the rule the Senate adopted 32 years ago.
“This potential for filibuster by amendment is exactly the circumstance that the Senate sought to end by its 1979 amendments,” Reid said.
Reid appealed a ruling from the presiding officer that McConnell did not need unanimous consent to force a vote on his motion.
More news from The Hill:
Watch: Reid, McConnell spar over ‘nuclear option’
Sen. Graham paves way for Senate passage of China currency bill
Obama concerned China currency bill violates WTO obligations
Sen. Mark Begich Mark Peter BegichFormer GOP chairman Royce joins lobbying shop Lobbying world Dem governors on 2020: Opposing Trump not enough MORE (D-Alaska), who was acting as chairman at the time, ruled according to the advice of the Senate parliamentarian that Republicans had the right to force a vote on suspending the rules and proceeding to the president’s controversial jobs bill.
A Senate GOP source disputed Reid’s argument, however, arguing that the debate time after the Senate has voted to cut off a potential filibuster is limited to 30 hours.
The GOP source said that Republicans might be able to force votes on 30 amendments during that time but argued it would be impossible to force 99 votes, as Reid suggested.
A Democratic parliamentary expert rejected this Republican argument as based on false information. The Democratic source said motions to suspend the rules after the Senate has voted to cut off debate would waive time limits and germaneness requirements.
Republicans had considered using Reid’s maneuver, dubbed the “nuclear option,” in 2005 to change Senate rules to prohibit the filibuster of judicial nominees. Democrats decried the plan under consideration by then-Senate Majority Leader Bill Frist (R-Tenn.) as a bomb that would decimate Senate traditions.
That crisis was resolved by a bipartisan agreement forged by a group of rank-and-file senators known as the Gang of 14.
McConnell, visibly angry and shaken, said Reid’s action Thursday evening threatened the powers of the minority that distinguish the upper chamber from the House of Representatives.
“We are fundamentally turning the Senate into the House,” he cried on the Senate floor. “The minority’s out of business.”
One Democratic source noted that former Republican Senate Majority Leader Trent Lott (Miss.) used Reid’s nuclear tactic on May 17, 2000, when he overturned a ruling from the chairman to ban non-germane sense-of-the-Senate amendments from being offered to appropriations bills.
Reid defended his action as necessary because filibusters and other dilatory actions have tied the Senate up in knots. Many junior members of his caucus, including Sens. Tom Udall Thomas (Tom) Stewart UdallHillicon Valley: House panel takes on election security | DOJ watchdog eyes employee texts | Senate Dems urge regulators to block T-Mobile, Sprint deal | 'Romance scams' cost victims 3M in 2018 Dems urge regulators to reject T-Mobile, Sprint merger Dems wary of killing off filibuster MORE (D-N.M.) and Sheldon Whitehouse Sheldon WhitehouseThis week: Congress, Trump set for showdown on emergency declaration Senate reignites blue slip war over Trump court picks Democrats brush off GOP 'trolling' over Green New Deal MORE (D-R.I.), have become extremely frustrated by the length of time it takes to complete even the chamber's routine business.
Reid said he was willing to allow votes on germane amendments to the China bill but would not let Republicans force a political show vote to embarrass the president, which halted floor action throughout the day.
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“Senator McConnell wanted to offer an amendment on the president’s jobs bill,” Reid said. “That in effect tied us down because he wasn’t willing to let us move to any other amendments. I was wiling to move to other amendments.”
A Democratic aide said Reid did not strip Republicans of a crucial prerogative of the minority.
“Motions to suspend the rules after cloture are not a tactic that is central to minority rights in the Senate. A motion to suspend the rules has not succeeded since 1941, according to the Senate Historian’s office. This is simply a delay tactic the minority has used to derail even bills with broad, bipartisan support,” the aide wrote in a memo briefing reporters.
Reid said he resisted pressure from junior Democrats to “massively change” the Senate rules in the 112th Congress, when Democrats had a larger majority in hopes that Republicans could be persuaded to ease their use of obstructionist tactics.
But Reid admitted that he did not take the action lightly and could regret it in the future.
“Am I 100 percent sure that I’m right?" he asked. "No, but I feel pretty comfortable with what we’ve done. There has to be some end to the dilatory tactics.”
Senate Republicans said Reid is right to worry.
“Just wait until they get into the minority!” one GOP staffer growled.
— This story was originally published at 7:00 p.m. and has been updated.FLAGSTAFF
Klee Benally said more than 50 people who protested the opening of the Arizona Snowbowl have been arrested within the past four years.
“Some of them multiple times,” said Benally, an environmental activist who’s also been arrested a number of times for rallying the use of reclaimed sewage on the San Francisco Peaks.
More than a dozen individuals on Nov. 20 rallied against the opening of Snowbowl once again outside Flagstaff City Hall, arguing that the wastewater snow poses risks to public health and the ecology of the Peaks, which is considered sacred by at least 13 American Indian tribes.
“We have to stand here,” said Christopher Jocks, a Kahnawake Mohawk professor in the applied indigenous studies at Northern Arizona University, who canceled one of his morning classes to take part in the protest.
“I don’t care how many years and how many times we come here, we have to keep standing here.”
Through a megaphone, Benally shouted slogans such as “stop exploitation of public lands,” “for respect, for cultural survival,” “to respect Mother Earth,” “to respect the cultures of 13 indigenous nations,” “for environmental integrity of the San Francisco Peaks,” “don’t ski on pee,” “no desecration for recreation,” and famously, “boycott Snowbowl!”It wouldn't seem outside the realm of possibility for Cowboys owner Jerry Jones to stun the football world in Week 1 with a dominant defensive performance only to add one of the greatest pass rushers in NFL history back to his roster.
Unfortunately, DeMarcus Ware is only kidding when he says something like this to the Dallas Morning News:
"If Jerry calls me, I'll answer the phone," Ware said.
The future Hall of Famer elaborated a bit:
"I was one day away from coming back and signing with the Dallas Cowboys," Ware said. "But my body just told me it's time. It's time to stop playing. I still have the drive to get out there and the want to play, but you've got to think about family, think about what's important and I just decided it's time to hang up the cleats and put a suit on."
While DeMarcus Lawrence, Charles Tapper and Benson Mayowa all logged either quarterback hits or sacks in Sunday night's prime-time win over the Giants (looking far better than expected in the process), Jones would probably still trip over himself to get to the phone if Ware ever expressed an interest in coming back.
Defensive coordinator Rod Marinelli has been elevating the collective play of this defense for the past few seasons, but if he's able to maximize a pass rush that hinges on Lawrence and whatever bonus he can get out of younger players like rookie Taco Charlton (the first-round pick played 26 snaps Sunday), he truly deserves recognition as a primary reason for this team's success.
Ware has been wonderful on television and will certainly be great in whatever he chooses to do off the field -- but he has to know that, even by joking about the call, he's planted the seed. Jones would welcome him back any time.Three of New Zealand's most offensive and controversial place names will be changed if the public supports a proposal before the New Zealand Geographic Board.
Photo: NZ Topo Map screenshot
Three place names using the 'n-word' - Nigger Hill, Niggerhead and Nigger Stream, which are all in the foothills of the Southern Alps - are likely to be replaced.
The names have been in use for 150 years and there is no well-known story behind why they were chosen.
The proposed replacement names are Kānuka Hill, Tawhai Hill and Steelhead Stream, which have been suggested by the person who submitted the proposal because they represent native trees in the area and also a type of trout, the steelhead.
But it's likely Ngāi Tahu will submit its own suggestions to the board during the consultation period, which runs from the end of October through to January.
There is also a Darkie Creek in Auckland, and three other 'Darkies' names in Westland. These appear to be named after 'Darkie' Addison, a highly successful African-American prospector who made three major gold discoveries in the 1860s. There are no proposals to alter any of those names.
Other potential changes announced by the New Zealand Geographic Board (NZGB) include changing the name of Rainbow Mountain to Maunga Kākaramea.
Another proposes to correct the spelling of three names in South Otago from Tokomairiro River to Tokomairaro River.
NZBGB's secretary Wendy Shaw says, "While both spellings were used from the mid-1800s, the NZGB accepts that Tokomairaro is correct and describes the method of pushing waka (canoes) or mōkihi (rafts) along the river with a pole".
And one of the Wairarapa's oldest settlements, Lake Ferry may have its name reconsidered in another proposal currently before the board.
Yesterday the Waitangi Tribunal recommended that Whanganui be spelt on all occasions with the 'h', and never as Wanganui. The Tribunal said there is only one correct way of spelling the place name.
The NZGB has also recommended that macrons are added to a number of place names, but other Maori place names, which are misspelt, remain unchanged.
Meanwhile, there is one place name that could be quite easily spelt wrong: New Zealand is home to the longest place name in the world -Taumatawhakatangihangakoauauotamateaturipukakapikimaungahoronukupokaiwhenuakitanatahu.
It contains 85 letters, 27 more than the next longest name in Wales which is Llanfairpwllgwyngyllgogerychwyrndrobwllllantysiliogogogoch.
Misspelt Māori names that remain unchanged:
Remuera - Remuwera
Hataitai - Whataitai
Maitai - Mahitahi or Maitahi
Motueka -Motuweka
Wakatipu -Whakatipu
Wanaka -Wānaka
Petone -Pito-one
Epuni -Te Puni
Waihola -Waihora
Tolaga Bay -Uawā
Macrons
The NZGB has recommended macrons are added to the following names on maps and charts. These are recorded (not official) names:
Hapuku Reef -Hāpuku Reef
Kaka Island - Kākā Island
Kakapo River - Kākāpō River
Kakapo Saddle - Kākāpō Saddle
Kakapo Spur - Kākāpō Spur
Kuri Creek - Kurī Creek
Maori Gully - Māori Gully
Maori Point - Māori Point
Marahau -Mārahau
Marahau River - Mārahau River
Mariri - Māriri
Mokihinui Forest - Mōkihinui Forest
Nakahi Stream - Nākahi Stream
Ngarua Caves - Ngārua Caves
Oparara - Ōpārara
Otuwhero Inlet - Otūwhero Inlet
Otuwhero River - Otūwhero River
Rata Hill - Rātā Hill
Rip and Tear Pakihi - Rip and Tear Pākihi
Totara Rocks - Tōtara Rocks
Umukuri -UmukurīOver the past 24 hours, two extraordinary speeches have happened. The County Executive and I wanted to address them. And to share, clearly, our thoughts as we draw closer to the St. Louis County grand jury's decision and any reaction to it.
Yesterday, United States Attorney General Eric Holder, whose Justice Department is currently investigating Ferguson police officer Darren Wilson and Ferguson police department practices, took the nearly unprecedented step of addressing this local judicial situation and police responses to it. His statement acknowledged that the vast majority of police officers across this country honorably defend their fellow citizens on a daily basis. They are dedicated to public safety. He said that the federal Justice Department had issued new guidelines to help federal, state, and local enforcement officers safeguard the Constitutional rights of protesters while maintaining public safety. And, he called on protesters to conduct themselves peacefully.
Also yesterday, Michael Brown, Sr., in a courageous new video that many of you have now seen, issued the same call as Attorney General Holder for peace and change. "No matter what the grand jury decides," he said, "I don't want my son's death to be in vain."
And, I'm here to tell you that it can't be. And, it won't be. For the past hundred days, Charlie and I - and our police commanders - have engaged in many conversations with community leaders and with some of the protest leaders about the days to come after the grand jury decision.
That is because we believe in would be imprudent not to plan for protests, regardless of the grand jury's decision.
We |
centuries of persecution, is it not the time for Assyrians and other persecuted Christians to finally have their own government?" Uzay Bulut, a journalist born and raised in Turkey, is currently based in Washington D.C. She is a writing fellow of the Middle East Forum. © 2019 Gatestone Institute. All rights reserved. The articles printed here do not necessarily reflect the views of the Editors or of Gatestone Institute. No part of the Gatestone website or any of its contents may be reproduced, copied or modified, without the prior written consent of Gatestone Institute. Related Topics: Iraq, Persecution of Christians Recent Articles by Uzay Bulut Turkey: Uniting an "Army of Islam" to Defeat Just One Country, 2019-02-21
Turkey's 'Food Terrorism': Blaming 'Global Powers' for Country's Ills, 2019-02-20
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Turkey: Imprisoned Former Opposition Lawmaker Symbol of Unjust Justice System, 2019-02-12
Turkey: Erdoğan's Unofficial Paramilitary Groups to 'Monitor' Elections?, 2019-02-04 receive the latest by email: subscribe to the free gatestone institute mailing list enProgressive Conservative MPP Lisa MacLeod says she won’t abandon her support for the LGBTQ community, no matter what the political cost. “Our party has turned a corner and there may be some people who don’t like it... I am not going to kowtow to people who don’t share my values,” MacLeod (Nepean-Carleton) told the Star on Monday.
Progressive Conservative Leader Patrick Brown, second from right, marches in the annual Pride Parade as it took over the downtown core on Sunday. ( Rick Madonik / Toronto Star )
Nick Vandergragt, a night time talk show host for CFRA in Ottawa, criticized her and fellow MPP Jack MacLaren on Facebook for marching in Toronto’s Pride Parade Sunday along with Tory Leader Patrick Brown. It was the first organized showing by provincial and federal Tories in the parade. “Both of these people are supposed to represent the small-c conservatives like me who don’t want walking porno displays disguised as ‘parades’ in our countries (sic) cities,” he stated in the Facebook posting and in similar comments on his show Sunday evening. “Did they think we wouldn’t find out? Or did they... take the (social conservative) vote for granted? I expected this out of (open John Tory's policard)John Tory (open John Tory's policard). I even expected this out of Patrick Brown. But never these two. If it where (sic) up to me, I would toss both of them out of the building over this and never let them back in. Talk about a sell out.”
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Vandergragt told the Star he has one regret, which he apologizes for: saying he would toss them out of the building, which he said was a euphemism for the Progressive Conservative party. “That was said in the heat of the moment and it’s something I don’t have the power to do anyway,” he said. Vandergragt said, however, he does not have any regrets about criticizing MacLeod and MacLaren for turning their backs on social conservatives — “nobody likes to be taken for granted” — and for marching in a parade that he says features public nudity. On his show Sunday night Vandergragt said, “I will challenge anybody to call and tell me what right the gay community does not have that they still need to fight for. They can get married, they can adopt, they can be judges, they can be teachers, they can be anything they want to be so where is this ongoing fight required?” “They can have the parade but stop walking around naked... I am a parent of eight children and I wouldn’t go within a country mile of that parade,” Vandergragt said.
Bell Media, which owns CFRA, stood by Vandergragt’s right of free speech. “While some may not agree with the comments made by Mr. Vandergragt, we believe that they were a legitimate expression of his own opinion, to which he is wholly entitled,” Matt Garrow, a spokesperson for Bell Media, said in an email statement, which described Vandergragt as an independent contractor who does two weekend evening talk shows.
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“We consider it our responsibility at CFRA to present varying points of view, and during our talk show broadcasts we solicit calls from our listeners so that they can express their opinions in an open forum. In this case, several listeners were afforded the opportunity to call into the show and offer their viewpoints on the segment — many of which (were) in direct disagreement with Mr. Vandergragt’s position,” Garrow stated. MacLaren said he found walking in the Pride Parade “a very positive experience” and was disappointed at Vandergragt’s comments. “We were never quite as narrow-focused or narrow-minded as some people might have thought. We have always cared about people,” MacLaren said. “It is our job to represent the people in our communities. I have never had any problem with people who are gay or transgendered in representing them. They are Canadians, they are taxpayers so they have rights just like all the rest of us,” he said. MacLeod cautions that “no one should confuse bigotry with conservatism.” She said she has received overwhelming support from her constituents and from those within the party for showing support for the LGBTQ community, marching side by side with provincial and federal colleagues and loyalists wearing LBGTory T-shirts. “If I lose a few votes... this is about doing what is right,” MacLeod said, adding she will no longer go on Vandergragt’s show. “I am not going to pander to people who want me to hate other people.”
Read more about:Inspired by the fantasy of taking a ride on a kite board, the Kitamaran concept by designer Daniel Julier offers a sustainable way to travel using a kite. By designing a new kind of water sports equipment that can provide an extreme board riding feeling as well as the opportunity of going on a journey, the Kitamaran allows the rider to ride the board in a partly standing partly sitting while the board follows the movement of the rider thanks to specially designed suspension system.
By providing the rider with optimum stand all the time, the board maximizes its ability to absorb shocks while riding under rough conditions. The Kite itself is fixated on a centre line with two control lines on each side making it easily steerable. The height of the kite itself can be controlled by twisting the handle ends towards- or away from the body and just in case the rider loses grip over the handle, the kite will simply collapse and therefore loose its power allowing the rider to gain control again.
The board itself is constructed in glass fiber with soft neoprene inlet while the boat hull crafted in stiff glass fiber. The soft seat is made in neoprene coated glass fiber lid with handles for removing it and allowing storage for kite and equipment underneath which further emphasized the design’s motives of being a long haul craft.
Source: Product Design ForumsThis tutorial is part of a series illustrating basic concepts and techniques for machine learning in R. We will try to build a classifier of relapse in breast cancer. The analysis plan will follow the general pattern (simplified) of a recent paper.
This follows from: Machine learning for cancer classification - part 1 - preparing the data sets. This part covers how to build a Random Forest classification model to predict relapse in breast cancer from microarray expression data. We make the assumption that the data sets will be in the correct format as produced in part 1. The data sets in this tutorial are the 'training data' from the prior tutorial, retrieved from GSE2034. In a subsequent tutorial we will apply the classifier built here to the 'test data' (GSE2990) also downloaded in part 1. To avoid the hassle of Copy-Pasting every block of code, the full script can be downloaded here. But, first, let's review the basic principles of the Random Forests method.
Figure 1. A Random Forest is built one tree at a time.
A Random Forest is a collection of decision trees. Each tree gets a "vote" in classifying. There are two components of randomness involved in the building of a Random Forest. First, at the creation of each tree, a random subsample of the total data set is selected to grow the tree. Second, at each node of the tree, a well-performing gene from a random subset of all genes is chosen as a "splitter variable". The splitter variable attempts to separate patients in one class (e.g., Response) from those in the other class (e.g., Non-Response). The tree is grown with additional splitter variables until all terminal nodes (leaves) of the tree are purely one class or the other. This tree is then "tested" against the 1/3 of patients set aside, the "out of bag" (OOB) patients. Each OOB patient traverses the tree, going down one branch or another depending on his/her gene expression values for each splitter variable. These OOB patients are assigned a predicted class based on where they land in the tree (a vote). The entire process is repeated with new random divisions into 2/3 and 1/3 patient sets and new random gene sets for selection of splitter variables to produce additional trees and ultimately a forest. In each case a different subset of patients is used to build the tree and test its performance. At the end, each patient will have contributed to the construction of ~2/3 of all trees and been tested in the other ~1/3. Each "test" tree gives a vote for whether the patient will relapse or not relapse. The fraction of votes for relapse is an estimate of the probability of relapse and all patients will be predicted as either a relapse or non-relapse (using probability of 0.5 as the threshold). By comparing these predictions based on the OOB data to their known class, estimates of the accuracy of the overall forest can be obtained. The forest can then also be applied to independent test data or patients of unknown class (see next Figure 2).
Figure 2. To predict new patients, each tree gets a vote...
Figure 3. Variable importance is a feature of random forests
Now, let's proceed with the exercises. Install and load the necessary packages (if not already installed).
Set the working directory and file names for Input/output
setwd("/Users/ogriffit/git/biostar-tutorials/MachineLearning") datafile="trainset_gcrma.txt" clindatafile="trainset_clindetails.txt" outfile="trainset_RFoutput.txt" varimp_pdffile="trainset_varImps.pdf" MDS_pdffile="trainset_MDS.pdf" ROC_pdffile="trainset_ROC.pdf" case_pred_outfile="trainset_CasePredictions.txt" vote_dist_pdffile="trainset_vote_dist.pdf"
Next we will read in the data sets (expecting a tab-delimited file with header line and rownames). These were the outputs from the previous tutorial mentioned above. We also need to rearrange the clinical data so that it will be in the same order as the GCRMA expression data.
data_import=read.table(datafile, header = TRUE, na.strings = "NA", sep="\t") clin_data_import=read.table(clindatafile, header = TRUE, na.strings = "NA", sep="\t") clin_data_order=order(clin_data_import[,"GEO.asscession.number"]) clindata=clin_data_import[clin_data_order,] data_order=order(colnames(data_import)[4:length(colnames(data_import))])+3 #Order data without first three columns, then add 3 to get correct index in original file rawdata=data_import[,c(1:3,data_order)] #grab first three columns, and then remaining columns in order determined above header=colnames(rawdata) rawdata=rawdata[which(!is.na(rawdata[,3])),] #Remove rows with missing gene symbol
Next we filter out any variables (genes) that are not expressed or do not have enough variance to be informative in classification. We will first take the values and un-log2 them, then filter out any genes according to following criteria (recommended in multtest/MTP documentation): (1) At least 20% of samples should have raw intensity greater than 100; (2) The coefficient of variation (sd/mean) is between 0.7 and 10.
X=rawdata[,4:length(header)] ffun=filterfun(pOverA(p = 0.2, A = 100), cv(a = 0.7, b = 10)) filt=genefilter(2^X,ffun) filt_Data=rawdata[filt,]
We will assign the variables that pass this filtering process to a new data structure. Extract just the expression values from the filtered data and transpose the matrix. The latter is necessary because RandomForests expects the predictor variables (genes) to be represented as columns instead of rows. Finally, assign gene symbol as the predictor name.
#Get potential predictor variables predictor_data=t(filt_Data[,4:length(header)]) predictor_names=c(as.vector(filt_Data[,3])) #gene symbol colnames(predictor_data)=predictor_names
As a final step before the Random Forest classification, we have to set the variable we are trying to predict as our target variable. In this case, it is relapse status.
target= clindata[,"relapse..1.True."] target[target==0]="NoRelapse" target[target==1]="Relapse" target=as.factor(target)
Finally we run the RF algorithm. NOTE: we use an ODD number for ntree. This is because when the forest/ensembl is used on test data, ties are broken randomly. Having an odd number of trees avoids this issue and makes the model fully deterministic. Also note, we will use down-sampling to attempt to compensate for unequal class-sizes (less relapses than non-relapses).
tmp = as.vector(table(target)) num_classes = length(tmp) min_size = tmp[order(tmp,decreasing=FALSE)[1]] sampsizes = rep(min_size,num_classes) rf_output=randomForest(x=predictor_data, y=target, importance = TRUE, ntree = 10001, proximity=TRUE, sampsize=sampsizes, na.action = na.omit)
The final blocks of code produce various forms of output for analysis of the classifier, and final classification results. First, save the RF classifier with save(). This allows you to later load the saved model. This can be useful if you wish to rerun later parts of this script without the time-consuming model building. More importantly though it will allow you to apply the model you have built to new, independent samples for classification purposes.
save(rf_output, file="RF_model") load("RF_model")
RandomForest calculates an importance measures for each variable. Let's save them to a new object for later use:
rf_importances=importance(rf_output, scale=FALSE)
The following lines will give an overview of the classifier's performance. Specifically, they will generate a confusion table to allow calculation of sensitivity, specificity, accuracy, etc.
confusion=rf_output$confusion sensitivity=(confusion[2,2]/(confusion[2,2]+confusion[2,1]))*100 specificity=(confusion[1,1]/(confusion[1,1]+confusion[1,2]))*100 overall_error=rf_output$err.rate[length(rf_output$err.rate[,1]),1]*100 overall_accuracy=1-overall_error class1_error=paste(rownames(confusion)[1]," error rate= ",confusion[1,3], sep="") class2_error=paste(rownames(confusion)[2]," error rate= ",confusion[2,3], sep="") overall_accuracy=100-overall_error
Next we will prepare each useful statistic for writing to an output file
sens_out=paste("sensitivity=",sensitivity, sep="") spec_out=paste("specificity=",specificity, sep="") err_out=paste("overall error rate=",overall_error,sep="") acc_out=paste("overall accuracy=",overall_accuracy,sep="") misclass_1=paste(confusion[1,2], rownames(confusion)[1],"misclassified as", colnames(confusion)[2], sep=" ") misclass_2=paste(confusion[2,1], rownames(confusion)[2],"misclassified as", colnames(confusion)[1], sep=" ") confusion_out=confusion[1:2,1:2] confusion_out=cbind(rownames(confusion_out), confusion_out)
Finally, we print all of these to an output file. Note, we will be appending with multiple writes to the same file. This may generate a warning.
write.table(rf_importances[,4],file=outfile, sep="\t", quote=FALSE, col.names=FALSE) write("confusion table", file=outfile, append=TRUE) write.table(confusion_out,file=outfile, sep="\t", quote=FALSE, col.names=TRUE, row.names=FALSE, append=TRUE) write(c(sens_out,spec_out,acc_out,err_out,class1_error,class2_error,misclass_1,misclass_2), file=outfile, append=TRUE)
For a simple visualization, we create a representation of the top 30 variables categorized by importance.
pdf(file=varimp_pdffile) varImpPlot(rf_output, type=2, n.var=30, scale=FALSE, main="Variable Importance (Gini) for top 30 predictors") dev.off()
An MDS plot provides a sense of the separation of classes.
pdf(file=MDS_pdffile) target_labels=as.vector(target) target_labels[target_labels=="NoRelapse"]="N" target_labels[target_labels=="Relapse"]="R" MDSplot(rf_output, target, k=2, xlab="", ylab="", pch=target_labels, palette=c("red", "blue"), main="MDS plot") dev.off()
A common method of assessing a classifier's performance is to create an ROC curve and calculate the area under it (AUC). We use the relapse/non-relapse vote fractions as predictive variable. The ROC curve is generated by stepping through different thresholds for calling relapse vs non-relapse.
predictions=as.vector(rf_output$votes[,2]) pred=prediction(predictions,target) #First calculate the AUC value perf_AUC=performance(pred,"auc") AUC=perf_AUC@y.values[[1]] #Then, plot the actual ROC curve perf_ROC=performance(pred,"tpr","fpr") pdf(file=ROC_pdffile) plot(perf_ROC, main="ROC plot") text(0.5,0.5,paste("AUC = ",format(AUC, digits=5, scientific=FALSE))) dev.off()
Produce a back-to-back histogram of vote distributions for Relapse and NoRelapse.
options(digits=2) pdf(file=vote_dist_pdffile) out <- histbackback(split(rf_output$votes[,"Relapse"], target), probability=FALSE, xlim=c(-50,50), main = 'Vote distributions for patients classified by RF', axes=TRUE, ylab="Fraction votes (Relapse)") barplot(-out$left, col="red", horiz=TRUE, space=0, add=TRUE, axes=FALSE) barplot(out$right, col="blue", horiz=TRUE, space=0, add=TRUE, axes=FALSE) dev.off()
Finally, we save our case predictions
case_predictions=cbind(clindata,target,rf_output$predicted,rf_output$votes) write.table(case_predictions,file=case_pred_outfile, sep="\t", quote=FALSE, col.names=TRUE, row.names=FALSE)
After running this script you have generated a Random Forest Classifier of Relapse for breast cancer Affy data. Next, we will apply this classifier to the independent test data set. See Machine learning for cancer classification - part 3 - Predicting with a Random Forest Classifier. You also have a case_predictions file on which you can perform survival analysis, which will be the subject of a later tutorial. See Machine learning for cancer classification - part 4 - Plotting a Kaplan-Meier Curve for Survival Analysis.I have a friend who is so Kansas we call him "Lawrence."
Before the Dance began, he went in search of the so-fresh Jayhawks Trefoil track jacket to wear during the round of 64, the three-striped track jacket to wear during the Sweet 16 and asked me if I had a connect with Bill Self or the equipment manager to see if I could request the alternate camo jersey with "Beware of The Phog" inscribed on the inside for him to rock during the Final Four.
But once "Lawrence" saw what the University of Michigan did to VCU, he gave me a call: "Yeah brah, I think you can hold off on trying to get that KU jersey for the Final Four. I don't think I'll be needing it."
Trey Burke and Tim Hardaway Jr. are first and second, respectively, in scoring and assists for Michigan. Gregory Shamus/Getty Images
He saw what I'd said long before this tournament began: "If the truth holds that guards and/or guard play is what wins NCAA championships, then hand Michigan the trophy early because they have the best backcourt in college basketball."
Tim Hardaway Jr. and Trey Burke are the new Dereck Whittenburg and Sidney Lowe, maybe better. Of all of the backcourts that have helped make that theory true about guards winning the tournament (funny how that is rarely said about the NIT or the women's tournament) over the past 15 years -- a list that includes Charlie Bell and Mateen Cleaves at Michigan State, Jay Williams and Chris Duhon at Duke, Juan Dixon and Steve Blake at Maryland -- none is collectively as strong and talented as Burke and Hardaway.
It's only a question of whether Burke and Hardaway can put together four more wins the same way the above mentioned duos did.
What separates them from say, Peyton Siva and Russ Smith of Louisville or "Lawrence's" own Elijah Johnson and Ben McLemore (although Johnson is technically playing out of position and McLemore is currently in an ugly slump), the other tandems of greatness left in the tournament, is what Hardaway and Burke did last Saturday and whom they did it against.
VCU's "Havoc" pressure defense, as coach Shaka Smart likes to call it, was possibly the best baseline-to-baseline defense in the country, the most worrisome Michigan is going to face all tournament.
"Usually we get the other team to get out of control," VCU guard Rob Brandenberg said after the loss. "We dictate the pace." Neither Burke nor Hardaway allowed that to happen. And even though Burke had seven turnovers in the first 25 minutes while trying to figure out the Rams' defense, he still found a way to make breaking down the defense look almost elementary en route to blowing VCU out of the Palace.
(In its first game of the tournament, VCU won by 46 points, then turned around and lost to Michigan by 25. That 71-point difference from winning one game to losing the next is the largest in the history of the NCAA tournament.)
And with Hardaway dropping 3s (he had five in the first tournament win over South Dakota State) and doing breakaway-cradle-reverse dunks like he did last weekend, the sky's not the limit for them, heaven is.
No dishonor to the Durand Scotts and Shane Larkins (Miami) or Keith Applings and Gary Harrises (Michigan State) of the college basketball world, but Hardaway and Burke are playing on a different plateau right now.
While Hardaway has the Hall of Fame gene pool thing working (his father, Tim Hardaway, was named as a finalist for induction into the Naismith Basketball Hall of Fame earlier this year), Burke is a finalist for the 2013 Naismith Player of the Year award and was just named Sports Illustrated National Player of the Year.
Them peaking and balling at this level at this time is a lethal, dangerous, better-hope-and-pray-both-of-them-have-bad-games-at-the-same-time combination that opposing coaches are going to have problems finding ways to stop.
Marshall Henderson (Ole Miss) and Khalif Wyatt (Temple) probably were the only players who could do a Kemba Walker and win games by themselves in this tournament. Now that they are no longer in any team's way, Burke and Hardaway are the strongest candidates left who can "win it all by themselves."
But not all great backcourts win this thing. There was Michael Redd and Scoonie Penn at Ohio State in the late '90s, the legendary Ricky Grace and Mookie Blaylock at Oklahoma in the late '80s, Jameer Nelson and Delonte West at Saint Joseph's almost a decade ago.
Derrick Rose and Chris Douglas-Roberts came a few free throws and a Mario Chalmers 3-pointer short of going down as one of the greatest backcourts ever (hell, they stopped Russell Westbrook and Darren Collison of UCLA from advancing and being in this conversation). The 2005 Deron Williams-Dee Brown backcourt for Illinois (along with Luther Head as the third guard) is still considered by many as the best guard package of this generation, but that group ran up against a UNC whip that no team in this current tournament could share the court with for 20 minutes -- let alone try to hang with for 40.
Steve Blake, left, and Juan Dixon led Maryland to a title in 2002. Doug Pensinger/Getty Images
Losses happen.
But a team at this point is going to have to come with a helluva lot more than an acclaimed, decorated, highly touted, NBA-ready backcourt to beat what Hardaway and Burke have going. Those loses in the Big Ten (including two to Indiana) mean nothing now. TB and TH2 have found their groove and it also might be too late for teams to try to find an answer to counter them.
Plus, it's not as though Burke and Hardaway don't have help. Freshman forward Mitch McGary was the player of the game/hero in the most recent win that got them to the Land of 16. Nik Stauskas, the team's third-leading scorer and leading 3-point shooter, is capable of having a big game at any moment. And Glenn Robinson III is showing flashes of heredity (his father being the great former NBA vet Glenn Robinson), scoring 21 in the first tourney win against South Dakota State. They could be the toughest out left standing. (Sorry, FGCU.)
The Wolverines aren't two-dimensional, they just have two dimensions in the backcourt that may prove to be impossible for any team to match or defeat. (Sorry again, FGCU.)
If it is true that "guards win NCAA tournaments," then between Siva and Smith in Louisville and Johnson and McLemore in Kansas (whom Michigan has to go through Friday to survive and advance), the duo of Burke and Hardaway has legit competition for the throne. They are Burke and Hardaway's potential Bruce Lee moments, their Games of Death; they are, on paper, the only other guard tandems left in the Dance that in any given 40 minutes have the ability to outplay and outshine the Wolverines' guards.
But Burke and Hardaway would both have to have a pretty bad 40 minutes of basketball for that to happen. They may will themselves -- and their team -- to a place that won't allow that to happen.
Not this year.
Because if their first two games are any indication of what their future in the backcourt together holds, then we can go ahead and just add their names to the top of the list of guards in NCAA history who made that "guards win NCAA tournaments" theory truth.Akamai Technologies will consolidate its six offices into a single campus-like facility in Kendall Square.
Akamai Technologies, one of the biggest companies in Cambridge, has decided to consolidate its six offices into a single campus-like facility in Kendall Square. The decision means one of the largest potential prizes for landlords in Boston hoping to fill their new office towers with a premier corporate name is no longer available.
At nearly 500,000 square feet, Akamai is one of the biggest tenants in the market for Boston-area office space, and in a year-long search looked at potential headquarters sites on both sides of the Charles River, as well as suburban satellite locations.
But the company has decided to remain in the neighborhood where it grew up, said Erica Chapman, Akamai’s vice president for global real estate and workforce productivity.
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“There’s a level of comfort here,” Chapman said.
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She said Akamai hasn’t settled on an exact location, but hopes to have a deal in place by the end of the year. The company considered commuting patterns, talent recruitment and the chance to be alongside cutting-edge neighbors in Kendall Square, Chapman said. But it also wants to consolidate employees, now spread across six buildings, into one place, to boost collaboration and corporate culture.
So Akamai’s in the market for a new building – or buildings – in Kendall, looking for 500,000 square feet, and maybe more. She said Akamai hasn’t settled on an exact location, but hopes to have a deal in place by the end of the year.
It should have no shortage of choices. There are several big projects in the pipeline at that size in the booming business district, as well as space that could open up if other tenants move. The company is considering both new construction and existing office space, Chapman said.
“We’re having preliminary conversations with several developers and landlords,” she said. “It’s very easy. They just reach out to me.”
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Most of Akamai’s current leases expire in 2019, meaning any move is likely three years away.
As for paying the rent in one of the most expensive office markets on the East Coast – Class A office space in East Cambridge hit a record of $70 per square foot in 2015, according to real estate firm JLL – Chapman said the price is worth it if it helps the company perform better.
“It’s a premium market,” she said. “But it’s less about the premium rent and more about making sure that we’re optimizing the space as best we can.”
Tim Logan can be reached at tim.logan@globe.com. Follow him on Twitter at @bytimloganPosted by Chris on March 28, 2016
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Photo by Paul J. Richards/AFP/Getty Images
One of the funniest Facebook posts I read Tuesday morning came from an Arlington, Va., voter who simply quoted her 5-year-old daughter telling her kindergarten teacher that her mom and dad were “voting for the man who doesn’t think women are stupid.” I also liked Laura Galgano, the owner of a local diner, who simply posted: “That’s right. I voted. With my lady parts.” Or John Higgins: “Today, Virginia voters will decide the future of oral sex in their state.” My friend Lisa posted, “Cuccinelli: bad for vaginas, oops bad for Virginia.”
There will be a lot of finger-pointing and blame-throwing about Virginia’s gubernatorial race in the coming weeks, mainly in the key of regret (and relief, from the McAuliffe camp): Depending on what you feel like hollering about, Ken Cuccinelli’s loss proves that the Tea Party has had its day, that money is the only thing that counts, that you can’t govern from the extreme right in a purple state, and that he was tragically saddled with his crazy-talking lieutenant governor, E.W. Jackson. Blame will be ladled out to Libertarian candidate Robert Sarvis, who will pull a not-insignificant proportion of votes from the right; to the government shutdown, which soured some Republican Virginia voters on the Tea Party; and to the Virginia ethics scandal, which swept in Cuccinelli with the gifting and the vacationing.
But don’t let that distract from what really happened in Virginia on Tuesday: an official who consistently used his elected office to promote policies that shamed, marginalized, and patronized women and other minorities was met with a “no.” This wasn’t just about money, or the shutdown, or Star Scientific, or Terry McAuliffe’s fancy Clinton-era friends. It was about voters and what they know to be true. The vote may have been close, but in the end Virginians, especially women, showed that they simply don’t believe that the commonwealth of Virginia should be in the business of discriminating against homosexuals, legislating an extreme anti-sodomy agenda, shuttering Planned Parenthood clinics, pressing an invasive transvaginal ultrasound law, and supporting a draconian illegal immigration law.
You can dismiss all the Virginians—men and women—who posted on Facebook today about their lady parts, and their aversion to forced ultrasounds, and the weird feeling they get when the state regulates consensual sodomy as silly sheep who were led astray by an expensive McAuliffe smear campaign. But most of them knew a year ago, sometimes much earlier than that, what Gov. Cuccinelli would mean for their freedom to do what they wanted, with whom they wanted, without government’s oversight.
Cuccinelli was proudly and self-avowedly one of the most activist attorneys general the commonwealth had ever seen. From the very outset, his political ambition was to impose upon the state a social and religious code that may have made perfect sense to him, his supporters, and his conscience but came across as extreme, hateful, and intrusive to most everyone else. It didn’t help that Cuccinelli then had to combine his fate with that of the unfortunate E.W. Jackson, who calls Democrats “anti-Christian, anti-Bible, anti-family, anti-life, and anti-God.” But long before Jackson came along, Cuccinelli was on the record opposing abortion for survivors of rape and incest, refusing to support the Violence Against Women Act, browbeating state entities into closing abortion clinics, denying equal protection for gay workers at state schools, and insisting that unconstitutional state sodomy laws need to stay on the books to protect children. He endorsed “personhood” laws that would have limited access to at least some forms of birth control. He urged people to go to jail to protest women’s access to contraception. He has pushed to keep state funding for sex education focused on “abstinence-only” programs and favored putting armed guards in schools after Sandy Hook. And women who may have balked at any of that eventually tended to balk at him.
In a Quinnipiac University poll released Monday, Cuccinelli trailed McAuliffe by six percentage points, but female voters broke for McAuliffe by a 14-point margin. An October Washington Post–SRBI poll found voters trusting McAuliffe by 57 percent to 30 percent to handle “issues of special concern to women.” That’s not a surprise. Whether you want to call it a war on women or just a battle over who gets to decide what’s truly important to women, most female voters don’t want the government telling them what women care about and who’s going to regulate it.
Throughout the campaign, Cuccinelli has insisted that he is not attempting to push radical legislation on women, that the criticisms are all lies. As recently as Monday, his spokeswoman charged that Vice President Joe Biden’s recent statements about Cuccinelli’s record on women “encapsulates a campaign for governor on the part of Democrats littered with absurdities and falsehoods.” Cuccinelli thought that by continuing to insist that his approach didn’t shame and marginalize women and minorities, it would magically come to be true. He ran ads featuring an African-American woman calling McAuliffe’s attacks on his social stances “ridiculous.” He repeatedly claimed that McAuliffe was lying about his record. Here is Mallory Quigley, media coordinator for a pro-Cuccinelli group, Women Speak Out Virginia, asserting that “these ads lie about [Cuccinelli’s] record and insult women by reducing them to only a few issues,” thus, reducing women to only her issues.
In recent weeks, Cuccinelli has tried to deflect attention from his radical attacks on women’s reproductive privacy by claiming that he did lots of important work to protect women from domestic violence and human trafficking. He did, and he should be credited for that. But therein lies the problem: Government acting to “protect” women is only half the story. Trusting them is the other half, and that’s the part that’s gone missing here in Virginia and around much of the country in recent years.
Ken Cuccinelli never, ever seemed to understand that all the phony Targeted Regulation of Abortion Providers (TRAP) laws used to close abortion clinics and the mandatory ultrasounds and the bogus counseling and the clinic closures and the other policies styled as “protection” for Virginia’s vulnerable women are not protective. They are condescending. And pretextual. Most women know that policies and laws aimed at protecting them when they are vulnerable (like VAWA) are not comparable or interchangeable with laws that treat them as incapable of making autonomous, informed choices about abortion and birth control.
Virginia women, who were mostly affronted by talk of transvaginal ultras |
tea culture"). The word cha (茶) denotes the beverage that is derived from Camellia sinensis, the tea plant. Prior to the 8th century BCE, tea was known collectively under the term 荼 (pinyin: tú) along with a great number of other bitter plants. These two Chinese characters are identical, with the exception of an additional horizontal stroke in the Chinese lettering 荼, which translates to tea. The older character is made up of the radical 艸 (pinyin: cǎo) in its reduced form of 艹 and the character 余 (pinyin: yú), which gives the phonetic cue.
Tea drinking customs [ edit ]
A set of equipment for drinking tea
A hostess serves tea at a traditional Chinese tea house.
There are several special circumstances in which tea is prepared and consumed in Chinese culture.
A sign of respect In traditional Chinese society, members of the younger generation show their respect to members of the older generation by offering a cup of tea. Inviting their elders to restaurants for tea is a traditional holiday activity. In the past, people of a lower social class served tea to the upper class in society. Today, with the increasing liberalization of Chinese society, this rule and its connotations have become blurred. Sometimes parents may pour a cup of tea for their children to show their care, or a boss may even pour tea for subordinates at restaurants to promote their relationship; however, on formal occasions, the basic rule remains in effect. Family gatherings When sons and daughters leave home for work or marriage, they may spend less time with their parents; therefore, going to restaurants and drinking tea becomes an important activity to reestablish ties at family gatherings. Every Sunday, Chinese restaurants are crowded with families, especially during the holiday season, for this reason. This phenomenon reflects the function of tea in Chinese family values. To apologize In Chinese culture, tea may be offered as part of a formal apology. For example, children who have misbehaved may serve tea to their parents as a sign of regret and submission. To show gratitude and celebrate weddings In the traditional Chinese marriage ceremony, the bride and groom kneel in front of their respective parents and serve them tea and then thank them, which is a devout way to express their gratitude for being raised. On some occasions, the bride serves the groom's family, and the groom serves the bride's family. This process symbolizes the joining together of the two families.
Finger tapping [ edit ]
Four Chinese tea cups
Light finger tapping is a customary way to thanking the tea master or tea server for tea. After one's cup is filled, the bent index and middle fingers (or some similar combination) are knocked on the table to express gratitude to the person who served the tea.[1] This custom is common in southern Chinese cultures, like the Cantonese. In other parts of China, it is only acceptable if the person wishing to express gratitude is preoccupied with conversation or cannot actually say "thank you" when the cup is filled.
This custom is said to have originated in the Qing dynasty when the Qianlong Emperor traveled in disguise throughout the empire and his accompanying servants were instructed not to reveal their master's identity. One day in a restaurant, after pouring himself a cup of tea the emperor filled a servant's cup as well. To that servant it was a huge honor to have the emperor pour him a cup of tea. Out of habit, he wanted to kneel and express his thanks to the emperor, but he could not do this since that would reveal the emperor's identity. Instead, he bent his fingers and knocked the table to express his gratitude and respect. In this sense, the bent fingers supposedly signify a bowing servant, one finger representing the head and the others the arms.
In formal tea ceremonies nodding the head or saying "thank you" is more appropriate.
Brewing Chinese tea [ edit ]
The different ways of brewing Chinese tea depend on variables like the formality of the occasion, the means of the people preparing it, and the kind of tea being brewed. For example, green teas are more delicate than oolong teas or black teas; therefore, green tea should be brewed with cooler water. The most informal method of brewing tea is to simply add the leaves to a pot containing hot water. This method is commonly found in households and restaurants, for example, in the context of dim sum or yum cha in Cantonese restaurants. Another method for serving tea is to use a small lidded bowl called a gaiwan. The Hongwu Emperor of the Ming dynasty contributed to the development of loose tea brewing by banning the production of compressed tea.
Gongfu cha (Kung fu tea) [ edit ]
Gongfu cha, meaning "making tea with skill", is a popular method of preparing tea in China. It makes use of small Yixing teapots holding about 100–150 ml (4 or 5 fl.oz.), the size being thought to enhance the aesthetics and to "round out" the taste of the tea being brewed. Brewing tea in a Yixing teapot can be done for private enjoyment as well as to welcome guests. Depending on the region of China, there may be differences in the steps of brewing as well as the tools used in the process. For example, Taiwanese-style gongfu cha makes use of several additional instruments including tweezers and a tea strainer. The procedure is mostly applicable to oolong teas, but it is some used to make pu'er and other fermented teas.
Influence on Chinese culture [ edit ]
Tea has had a major influence on the development of Chinese culture, and Chinese traditional culture is closely connected with Chinese tea. Tea is often associated with literature, arts, and philosophy and is closely connected with Taoism, Buddhism and Confucianism. Roughly since the Tang Dynasty, drinking tea has been an essential part of self-cultivation. Chinese Chan (similar to Japanese Zen) philosophy is also linked with drinking tea.
Teaware [ edit ]
Traditionally, tea drinkers were regarded as the 'academic' and 'cultural elites' of the society. The practice of drinking tea was considered to be an expression of personal morality, education, social principles, and status. Increased enthusiasm for tea drinking led to the greater production of teaware, which significantly popularized Chinese porcelain culture.
Teahouse [ edit ]
Ancient Chinese scholars used the teahouse as a place for sharing ideas. The teahouse was a place where political allegiances and social rank were said to have been temporarily suspended in favor of an honest and rational discourse. The leisurely consumption of tea promoted conviviality and civility amongst the participants. The teahouse is not only a minor by-product of Chinese tea culture; it offers historical evidence of Chinese tea history. Today, people can also sense a kind of humanistic atmosphere in Beijing's Lao She Teahouse and in other teahouses in East China cities like Hangzhou, Suzhou, Yangzhou, Nanjing, Wuxi, Shaoxing, Shanghai, and other places. The teahouse atmosphere is still dynamic and vigorous.
Modern culture [ edit ]
In modern China, virtually every dwelling—even down to the simplest mud hut—has a set of tea implements for brewing a cup of hot tea. They are symbols of welcome for visitors or neighbors. Traditionally, a visitor to a Chinese home is expected to sit down and drink tea while talking; visiting while remaining standing is considered uncouth. Folding the napkin in tea ceremonies is a traditional act in China performed to keep away bad qi energy.
Tea was regarded as one of the seven daily necessities, the others being firewood, rice, oil, salt, soy sauce, and vinegar. There are several types of tea: green tea, oolong tea, red tea, black tea, white tea, yellow tea, puerh tea and flower tea. Traditionally, fresh tea leaves are regularly turned over in a deep bowl. This process allows the leaves dry in a way that preserves their full flavor, ready for use.
See also [ edit ]Debbie Wasserman Schultz Defends Rigging of Elections
Tim Canova Blocked Unblock Follow Following May 11, 2017
Tim Canova, Chair, Progress For All
At this difficult time, when we must unite against the dangerous and inhumane policies of the Trump administration, Debbie Wasserman Schultz has reminded us of her central role in preventing progressive reform and bringing on the implosion of the Democratic Party.
At a time when many Democrats are calling for unity, Wasserman Schultz continues to divide the party, most notably in recent cable TV appearances.
Prior to her resignation in disgrace as chair of the Democratic National Committee (DNC), Wasserman Schultz actively worked to undermine the presidential campaign of Bernie Sanders. Recall that Bernie Sanders and another candidate, former Maryland Governor Martin O’Malley, complained bitterly about the lack of debates that Wasserman Schultz had scheduled. And not surprisingly, Wasserman Schultz dodged debates against me for as long as she could before finally relenting to one early Sunday morning debate when few voters would be watching, let alone awake.
As chair of the DNC, Wasserman Schultz should have been recruiting a deep field of candidates and scheduling many debates to showcase to millions of voters across the country. That’s exactly what the Republicans did!
Anyone with eyes to see knew that Wasserman Schultz was doing her best to clear the field for one candidate — and unfortunately that was a candidate who was under FBI investigation and with the lowest favorability ratings of any Democrat in modern history. Of course, Wasserman Schultz has denied this, even after the Wikileaks email disclosures confirmed her role and that of her DNC. As a result of those revelations, Bernie Sanders supporters filed a class-action lawsuit for fraud against Wasserman Schultz and the DNC. Last week, in federal court, lawyers for Wasserman Schultz actually argued that the DNC was under no obligation to abide by its own charter provisions requiring neutrality and impartiality in the conduct of the party’s presidential nominating process.
In fact, Wasserman Schultz’s lawyers argued that the DNC could legally rig the nomination in a “smoke-filled backroom deal.”
This is the same Wasserman Schultz who recently claimed on cable TV that it was “mind boggling” that Bernie Sanders “was complaining about the number of debates.” She went on to say, “I will be frank with you, if I was trying to rig the outcome of the primary, trust me, I could have.”
Who talks like this? Who boasts of their ability to rig elections as a defense to allegations that they rigged an election? And then in court, claims a right to rig elections? Only someone with utter contempt for democracy and the rights and interests of the American people.
I voted twice for Barack Obama for president. I have never relished criticizing him, but I believe it is our duty as citizens to speak honestly about the policies and practices of government officials. That’s exactly what Senators Elizabeth Warren and Bernie Sanders did when they expressed concern that Mr. Obama is now taking $400,000 a speech from Wall Street banks and health industry firms. No one has criticized the Obamas for pulling in about $65 million in book contracts. But to be cashing in with Wall Street firms is unseemly at best, and a reflection of the same “Revolving Door” between Wall Street and Washington that has undermined people’s confidence in the Democratic Party. And perhaps all the criticism of these corporate speaking fees was constructive. Just days later, the Obamas announced a $2 million donation to support summer jobs in Chicago’s South Side.
What was Wasserman Schultz’s reaction? It was to go on national TV and publicly say to Bernie Sanders and Elizabeth Warren: “It’s None of Your Business!”
Once again, Debbie Wasserman Schultz is just plain wrong: the “Revolving Door” between Washington and Wall Street is everyone’s business!
Wasserman Schultz’s most recent attack on Bernie Sanders was not surprising given the fact she has taken millions of dollars from Wall Street banks and other huge corporate interests. All the money she’s taken from insurance firms and Big Pharma companies also explains her opposition to H.R. 676, the Medicare For All, single-payer bill introduced in the House.
Sadly, Wasserman Schultz’s latest remarks are a reminder of how divisive she is for Democrats across the country, and what a failure she was as DNC chair, during which time Democrats suffered historic losses at every level of government — national, state, and local — thereby leaving the party in its weakest position since 1920. It’s a reminder of why I ran against her last year.
It’s also a reminder that as long as Wasserman Schultz remains in public life, there will be no party unity — and that’s because she has learned absolutely nothing from the setbacks and failures that she helped engineer.A review of published evidence suggests there may be some risk of cancer from using a mobile phone
Radiation from mobile phones has been classified as a possible cancer risk by the World Health Organisation after a major review of the effects of electromagnetic waves on human health.
The declaration was based on evidence in published studies that intensive use of mobile phones might lead to an increased risk of glioma, a malignant form of brain cancer.
The conclusion by the WHO's International Agency for Research on Cancer (IARC) applies to radio-frequency electromagnetic radiation in general, though most research in the area has centred on wireless phones.
The findings are the culmination of an IARC meeting during which 31 scientists from 14 countries assessed hundreds of published studies into the potential cancer risks posed by electromagnetic fields. The UK was represented by Simon Mann from the Health Protection Agency's Centre for Radiation, Chemicals and Environmental Hazards in Oxfordshire.
Jonathan Samet, a scientist at the University of Southern California, who chaired the group, said: "The conclusion means that there could be some risk, and therefore we need to keep a close watch for a link between cellphones and cancer."
In designating radio-frequency fields as "possibly carcinogenic", the WHO has put them on a par with around 240 other agents for which evidence of harm is uncertain, including low-level magnetic fields, talcum powder and working in a dry cleaners.
The report found no clear mechanism for the waves to cause brain tumours. Radiation from mobile phones is too weak to cause cancer by breaking DNA, leading scientists to suspect other, more indirect routes.
"We found some threads of evidence telling us how cancers might occur but there are acknowledged gaps and uncertainties," Samet said.
Christopher Wild, director of the IARC, said that in view of the potential implications for public health, there should be more research on long-term, heavy use of mobile phones. "Pending the availability of such information, it is important to take pragmatic measures to reduce exposure such as hands-free devices or texting," he said.
There are around 5bn mobile phone subscriptions globally, according to the International Telecommunication Union, a UN agency for information and communication technologies.
The IARC group reviewed research investigating potential health risks from electromagnetic fields associated with technologies such as radio, television, wireless communications and mobile phones.
The committee decided the fields were possibly carcinogenic to humans, a finding that will feed through to national health agencies in support of their efforts to minimise exposure to cancer-causing factors.
The IARC has evaluated nearly 950 chemicals, physical and biological agents, occupational exposures and lifestyle factors where there is either evidence or suspicion that they may cause cancer.
The report on radio-frequency electromagnetic radiation comes a year after the WHO published its much-delayed Interphone study, which found no solid evidence that mobile phones increase the risk of brain tumours, but pointed to a slightly higher risk among those who used mobile phones the most. The report was held up for several years because scientists failed to agree on its findings and whether to issue a warning about excessive use.
Exposure from a mobile phone base station is typically much lower than from a handset held to the ear, but concerns over the possible health effects of electromagnetic waves have extended to base stations and wireless computer networks, particularly in relation to schools.
According to the British Educational Communications and Technology Agency, half of all primary schools and 82% of secondary schools make use of wireless computer networks.
Wi-fi equipment is restricted to a maximum output of 100 milliwatts in Europe at the most popular frequency of 2.4 gigahertz. At that level, exposure to radiowaves should not exceed guideline levels drawn up by the International Commission on Non-Ionising Radiation and adopted in the UK.
A Health Protection Agency study led by Mann in 2009 found that exposure to radiowaves from wi-fi equipment was well within these guideline levels.Photo
After downing 70 chicken wings in about an hour, Andrew Walen realized he had a problem.
Oh, he had known something was wrong over the years. Normal people don’t consume 4,500 calories worth of food in one sitting, or order takeout for four when dining alone. But it took a maniacal feeding frenzy for him to finally accept the reality: He was a binge eater, and he had absolutely no control around food.
“Ultimately, it was about numbing out and self-loathing,” said Mr. Walen, now 39 and a therapist in Columbia, Md. “There was this voice in my head that said, ‘You’re no good, worthless,’ and I turned to food.”
Mr. Walen is one of an estimated eight million men and women in the United States who struggle with binge eating, defined as consuming large amounts of food within a two-hour period at least twice a week without purging, accompanied by a sense of being out of control.
While about 10 percent of patients with anorexia and bulimia are men, binge eating is a problem shared almost equally by both sexes. A study published online in October and then in the March issue of The International Journal of Eating Disorders found that among 46,351 men and women ages 18 to 65, about 11 percent of women and 7.5 percent of men acknowledged some degree of binge eating.
“Binge eating among men is associated with significant levels of emotional distress, obesity, depression and work productivity impairment,” said Richard Bedrosian, a study author and director of behavioral health and solution development at Wellness and Prevention Inc., which works with employers and health plans.
But while binge eating is challenging for women who suffer from it, the perils are perhaps greater for men, who rarely seek treatment for what many believe is a “women’s disease.” Unlike bulimia and anorexia, binge eating does not even have a distinct listing in the current D.S.M., as the diagnostic guide for mental health professionals is known.
“Guys generally don’t come forward for any reason,” said Ron Saxen, 49, author of “The Good Eater,” a memoir of his struggle with binge eating, which began when he was about 11. At his worst, Mr. Saxen was consuming 10,000 to 15,000 calories’ worth of Big Macs, French fries, chocolate milkshakes, candy bars, ice cream and M & Ms, often within an hour-and-a-half window.
Those men who do seek treatment often have difficulty finding a facility or therapist to work with them — even the literature is predominantly female-centric. Before Vic Avon was given a diagnosis of anorexia in 2006, for example, he scoured the Web for information relating to men and eating disorders. “Everything I saw was written for and by women,” said Mr. Avon, 29, a building contractor in Brick Township, N.J.
Mr. Avon seesawed between anorexia and binge eating (not uncommon), at one point weighing 300 pounds. “I was so ashamed because it was a girl’s illness, I thought. I didn’t have any guys to look to.”
Many binge-eating men do not even recognize that anything is wrong. About 70 percent of people with binge eating disorder are overweight or obese, but a higher weight is generally more culturally acceptable for men than for women.
“There’s nothing wrong with a college guy eating a whole pizza by himself, but with women they would be horrified,” said Roberto Olivardia, a clinical psychologist who specializes in the treatment of body image disorders and eating disorders in men and is an author of “The Adonis Complex.”
Even if they are disturbed by their food intake, few men make the connection between gorging and emotional distress. “With men it’s usually a disconnect,” said Mr. Walen, the former binge eater turned therapist. “It’s about ‘I want to eat,’ not ‘I’m coping with an emotional trauma.’ ”
Adam Lamparello’s binge eating was both physical and psychological, the result of the starvation that ensued during his six-year bout with anorexia, and his attempt to fill the “emptiness, loneliness and emotional void” that he felt in his life.
“Those with binge eating disorder often do not have meaningful relationships with other people, are isolated, believe that life has no purpose or have suffered prior traumatic events and turn to food for emotional comfort,” said Mr. Lamparello, 36, a lawyer in Hasbrouck Heights, N.J., who recently published “Ten-Mile Morning: My Journey Through Anorexia Nervosa.”
Men like Mr. Avon and Mr. Walen often struggle to find help. But the tide may be slowly turning as awareness about men and binge eating grows. Chevese Turner, founder and chief executive of the Binge Eating Disorder Association, said about 20 percent of the calls she receives are from men, up from 5 percent when she started the organization in 2008.
In general, cognitive behavioral therapy is the most successful treatment for binge eaters, said Sarah J. Parker, the director and a founder of the Reeds Center, an outpatient mental health center in New York that treats men and women who have anxiety and eating disorders. Treatment often begins with efforts to recognize distorted, all-or-nothing thinking and to begin monitoring one’s eating, sleeping and exercise patterns. Since many binge eaters restrict food intake during the day and binge at night, the goal is to get them to eat three meals a day and a snack.
Whether or not one can be fully cured of binge eating depends on one’s definition of “cured.” An October 2011 study in The Journal of Consulting and Clinical Psychology reported a 51 percent remission rate for patients a year after using cognitive behavioral therapy. Therapy did not lead to weight loss, however.
“Do people stop binge eating and basically not binge eat again? Yeah,” Ms. Parker said. “Is it O.K. to have an episode once a month? For some people that might be a cure.”
Mr. Saxen finally went to a therapist at age 40. While he no longer binges, “I’m in the camp of A.A. — you’re always recovering,” he said. “There are times when bad things are happening, and I have my moments.”
After the chicken wing incident, Mr. Walen also sought treatment. He has not had a full-on, out-of-control “big B” binge since 2006 — but he has had “little B” moments. “I would say that most people have ‘little B’ binges where they go, ‘I know I overate, but it didn’t come with a lot of guilt shame stuff.’ I think almost everyone goes through that a few times a year,” he said.
Perhaps the greatest challenge, experts say, is to persuade more men to come forward and seek treatment. “You have to have alternative means of getting men to acknowledge the problem,” Dr. Bedrosian said. “We need to find alternative ways for men to get screened, we have to encourage the screening for all eating disorders in primary care,” with an emphasis on making sure men as well as women receive attention.
He added, “If I were training medical students today I would say, ‘When you’re discussing weight loss programs with an obese patient, make sure you ask them about binge eating behavior.’ ”I suppose it's a natural oddity of social media and the wider internet - the focus on the quick'share' the quick 'tweet' or the quick 'like'. But is it just me that is desperate for more new CONTENT? New ideas, new opinions rather than just quick fixes? When it comes to the ukulele community I certainly am.
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Don't get me wrong - the beauty of social media these days is built on the ease of'sharing' stuff. It's become the backbone of a big part of it. The ease of anyone to see something for a fleeting moment, giggle, and then click 'like' or'share' so they immediately feel part of a club or group... like they now 'belong'. I do it myself, and it makes me smile quite often. But something I have noticed in the interest group that this website belongs to (the ukulele) is a drive toward that kind of content being the 'norm' with actual real content becoming lost in the noise. I don't mean individuals using social media for the way it was intended - I mean the websites and bands who seem to be using it as a replacement for actual content.In the last few years I have noticed a significant increase in this. Whether they are Facebook ukulele pages with 'like counts' that are growing exponentially, posts on voting sites that get more 'up votes' than anything else or Tweets that are being'retweeted' more than anything else - the ones that fit that description share one thing more often than not. They are not actually sharing anything at all. It's content in the most basic sense (a 'funny' picture or quote) but it's all been shared before. Bands are starting to fill their Facebook pages, not with footage of the band itself, but with the same memes knowing that they will generate 'likes'. Surely we don't need any more memes that rehash the same old same old 'you need more ukuleles' or 'they ukulele is magical' theme?What I mean is.. there is actually very little real fresh content that helps the reader beyond that short and transient quick'meme'. An awful lot of pages now that seem to thrive on sharing pictures of animals / sad looking children / hipsters with beards on beaches or surfboards / inspiring landscapes / old time pictures of music hall artistes who never expected to appear in a meme / random photographs of instruments / pictures of teddies with ukuleles thrust into their mitts / and so on... all complete with a hollow 'inspirational' quote about how the ukulele is 'happy/ funny / all you need' and the like typed in a 'kooky' font. Those are the'memes'. You've all seen them. You've probably shared them.And if it isn't the memes, it's the growing habit of sharing Amazon review scores to create some sort of faux review page for instruments. In other words, pages that say'my advice on what ukulele to buy is based on a bunch of reviews from strangers on Amazon'. We can read Amazon for that...Of course people are absolutely right to share and post whatever they like, and they readers are free to like / retweet / up vote whatever they like too. That's fine. The majority wins of course. But when pages and bands are using that tactic as the main source of content to garner likes, what is going on here?It's well known that many groups, such as financial scammers are using sites like Facebook to 'farm' 'likes' in order to sell such pages on for profit (a gathering of contact details from hundreds of saps who click on those'share this when you spot the letter C' or 'what is the first word you saw', or the 'What Disney Princess are you?' posts.) They are all devices to generate 'likes' that can then be traded on. But I actually don't think that is what is happening in ukulele circles at all.I see ukulele pages, clubs and bands that do this who appear to have genuine aspirations for building their names in the community and from whom I get no sense that selling a page on for a profit has ever occurred to them or is part of their plan. They are merely on the drive for 'likes'. And actually, I suppose there is nothing wrong with that either I guess, assuming you are not using likes for some evil plan we don't know about... Likes on pages mean that posts on pages are more likely to appear on other peoples timelines. Run a page with no likes, you may as well be shouting your content into an empty field - nobody is listening. But to choose to gain that popularity by using lowest common denominator stuff seems to be missing an opportunity to create something that really makes people think or is really helpful. Surely? And with bands - what do you want to see on a band page? Content of the band (music, videos etc) or generic memes about rainbows and ukuleles? Why not try and build the fanbase with actual content?But this is all avoiding my real point. If you are like me, you enjoy NEW content on the internet that relates to your interest. I WANT to read more stuff, opinions, reviews, interviews, ideas, tips, lessons, you name it connected to the ukulele. I WANT to see new bands and in particular I want to see and hear their performances. I want to be challenged with new ideas. I want to see differing ideas about things I have written about - different perspectives. Yet, the sad fact is, that with only a small number of exceptions, those getting the BIG likes are sharing nothing more than generic, meaningless (and most importantly) unhelpful stuff. What's worse is that I see that sites where people are actually going to the trouble of actually trying to write and create interesting new content, when I can see they have spent hours on writing an article, are not getting the same responses as the lazier site who merely shared a picture of a unicorn with a ukulele on it's back replete with an inspirational quote. The limited content out there is not getting through. Is that just a case of 'tough cheese'? Perhaps, and sad if it is.Are readers lazy? Do readers not have enough time? Are readers not interested in anything other than the meaningless and quick? Are the true content writers actually not of any interest? I actually don't think any of those things are really true, but it can appear that way. I've certainly considered hanging up my keyboard on this site on many occasions. But I keep going because I think readers are always desperate for new and interesting information on the internet, but most are getting no further than the 'quick fix' of the tepid and meaningless in the fast world we now live in. And it concerns me where that will end.Hang on Barry - this is clearly a push for your own site? Well in part, yes, I suppose so, but only insofar as Ithink that I don't share stuff on here willy nilly that doesn't have awork behind it. But I am not the only one. The point of the post (if you have read this far..) is to actually champion the sites that ARE actually writing stuff that I think is helpful and relevant. In other words, it's not just me trying to do this.Most readers of Got A Ukulele will know the daddy of ukulele websites in the form of Ukulele Hunt. Al Wood continues to drive that site forward - always original, always useful andpointless or trite. But what of newer sites? Another fairly recent newcomer is the work of Dave at 'Ukulele Go' - one of the few sites that has prompted me to actually bookmark them in recent years. It's great to see another take on artists and instruments and he has created some great beginner posts as he shares his development with the ukulele and his desire to help others. Simon Taylors 'Cool Cat Ukes' also springs to mind (some great reviews and interviews, just wish he would do more) and Tim Szerlongs Ukeeku (a site that persuaded me to get into doing instrument reviews) also fits the bill as a page with genuine content.Of course there are probably others, and if they are absent in my mentions here I am afraid that is probably more likely to do with them being lost behind the noise of the meaningless that pervades social media channels. Please, don't be offended.If, on the other hand, you enjoy sharing pictures of kittens with ukuleles please continue to do so. It can be fun I guess, and it makes the world go around. If you are not a website writer or band, absolutely you should have fun with these things and this post isn't suggesting that you stop that. Providers of content though? Ask yourselves this... What if that was all there was? What if all those giving up their time writing about artists, instruments, teaching and the instrument in general just stopped tomorrow? What if the only thing that was left were memes of sunsets, kittens and people on boats in lakes with ukuleles coupled with a quote that doesn't really mean anything? What if nobody was actually sharing an opinion about anything save for copied and pasted Amazon instrument reviews and a general assumption that everything in ukulele land is wonderful? No thanks.Surely the majority of us want more than that?Support real content. This stuff takes time. And at times it can be sorely tempting to give this all up and leave the ukulele channels to the meaningless.Get the latest news and videos for this game daily, no spam, no fuss.
State of Decay 2 was recently unveiled, but the original game is still getting some attention: Nordic Games announced today that it'll release a boxed version of the first State of Decay on PC.
In a press release, Nordic announced that State of Decay: Survival Edition, which includes the two expansion packs for the game, will come to retail on August 9. It'll cost $20 and will include a clamshell case, the game on DVD (requires redemption of a Steam code), a poster, and the game's soundtrack on CD. You can check out a picture of the contents of the release below.
The game originally launched as a downloadable title on PC and Xbox 360, and was later ported to Xbox One. When it first launched in 2013, GameSpot gave it an 8/10, with critic Leif Johnson writing, "State of Decay serves up a near constant barrage of suspense and immersion that leaves even the briefest jaunts away from your home base tinged with the threat of death."
At E3 2016 this year, developer Undead Labs and Microsoft announced State of Decay 2 with a short trailer. Not much else is known about the game right now except that it's planned for release sometime next year.Fallen Legion: Rise to Glory coming to Switch in 2018
(It's a collection including Sins of an Empire and Flames of Rebellion.)
NIS America and YummyYummyTummy have announced Fallen Legion: Rise to Glory for Switch. It will launch in 2018.
Though its subtitle is unique, Fallen Legion: Rise to Glory is a collection including Fallen Legion: Sins of an Empire and Fallen Legion: Flames of Rebellion, just like the upcoming Fallen Legion+ for PC. Both titles are currently available for PlayStation 4 via the PlayStation Store, and the latter is also available for PS Vita. (Update: The Switch version will reportedly include new routes for both titles.)
An “Exemplary Edition” of Fallen Legion: Rise to Glory including a copy of the game, hardcover art book, soundtrack, “Medallion of Honor,” and collector’s box is currently available for pre-order at the NIS America Online Store.
Here is an overview of the title, via NIS America:
About Fallen Legion: Rise to Glory chronicles the story of Legatus Laendur and Princess Cecille. What side will you choose to decide the fate of Fenumia? Fallen Legion: Sins of an Empire – Join Princess Cecille (and a saucy, talking grimoire) on her journey home as she fights hordes of monsters and a coup led by Legatus Laendur. A crumbling empire is in your hands. Will you restore glory to Fenumia?
– Join Princess Cecille (and a saucy, talking grimoire) on her journey home as she fights hordes of monsters and a coup led by Legatus Laendur. A crumbling empire is in your hands. Will you restore glory to Fenumia? Fallen Legion: Flames of Rebellion – Legatus Laendur, a brilliant tactician beloved by the people, fought on the frontlines the Fenumian Empire, but when he discovers why it is rotting from within, he vows to overthrow the royal family. Fenumia devoured his homeland – will you fight to reclaim it? Key Features Reclaim the World of Fenumia – Follow Princess Cecille or Legatus Laendur and experience the stories of Sins of an Empire and Flames of Rebellion.
– Follow Princess Cecille or Legatus Laendur and experience the stories of Sins of an Empire and Flames of Rebellion. A Legion Under Your Command – Control four characters simultaneously and master devastating combo attacks in furious real-time battles.
– Control four characters simultaneously and master devastating combo attacks in furious real-time battles. Ascend to the Throne – While clashing with rebel armies, make split second decisions on how to rule your kingdom. Will you side with the mercenary Prime Legion, the palatine Council of Princes, or the cabalistic March Congress?
– While clashing with rebel armies, make split second decisions on how to rule your kingdom. Will you side with the mercenary Prime Legion, the palatine Council of Princes, or the cabalistic March Congress? Magnificent 2D Artwork – From the fangs on the menacing manticore to each brick in Fenumia’s castle, all of the artwork has been hand-drawn to create a stunning world.
Watch the announcement trailer below.DALLAS, TX – Just one day ahead of their first preseason game, the Stars have announced that the 9,000 seats making up the lower bowl section at American Airlines Center have been completely removed to make way for a "fan pit".
The muddied area boasts a loose capacity of 26,000, bringing the arena's maximum attendance to a league-leading 35,000.
"The seats down there were barely getting used, so we tried thinking of the best way to take advantage of the space," team spokesman Joel Altidore said.
"By opening up the arena's lower bowl, we're able to cram in fans who are willing to fight each other for a view of the action at a fraction of the price."
A single ticket to the fan pit will cost $10, but no bathroom privileges will be given.
The team hopes that the action on the ground level will give fans in other parts of the arena an added spectacle to keep themselves interested during the games.
Fans with tickets in the upper tiers will be given one piece of rotten produce upon entry, and will be encouraged to fling it at the people below during the intermissions.
The team says it is now accepting applications for its "Dirt Crew".
Like us on Facebook and Twitter to keep up with all the latest news.New NBA commissioner Adam Silver revealed in an interview with ESPN Radio that Miami Heat star LeBron James is among the players who have personally asked him to make the league's annual All-Star break |
the transit agency said.
Humans? They don’t all drive the same way. Some speed up too quickly or slow down too abruptly, or both — giving strap-hangers the jostling sort of ride that daily Metro patrons have become familiar with since 2009, when the subway went to manual operation.
And there’s this announcement — commonplace nowadays — when an operator pulls up short at a Metro platform: “Stand back. Train moving forward.”
The role of automation in the operation of trains became a hot topic after a Manhattan-bound commuter train derailed Dec. 1 in the Bronx, killing four passengers. The man at the controls, a locomotive engineer for a decade, took the train into a curve at 82 mph, where the speed limit was 30 mph, authorities said.
The federal Rail Safety Improvement Act, passed in 2008, requires commuter and freight railroads and Amtrak to implement a computerized system known as “positive train control” by the end of 2015. If a train began traveling above the speed limit, the system would slow the train. In theory, positive train control would have prevented the Bronx derailment.
The rail safety law doesn’t apply to subway trains. Excessive speed normally isn’t an issue when a subway train is being operated by a computer. As for subway trains that operate in manual mode, such as Metro’s, electronic systems are in place that automatically enforce speed limits.
Some subways that were built long before the computer age — in Chicago and Philadelphia, for example — operate in manual mode. In New York’s subway, the nation’s biggest, computers drive trains on only one of the system’s 25-plus lines.
Among newer systems, the Los Angeles subway, opened in the early 1990s, also runs in manual mode. But the subways in Atlanta and San Francisco — which, like Metro, were built in the 1970s — use automatic train operation.
Although Metro was designed for automatic operation, the system has been running in manual mode for so long that a vast majority of Metro train operators haven’t experienced computer-driven trains. Of the agency’s 535 operators, a Metro spokeswoman said, 417 started their jobs after the 2009 crash, when automatic train operation was halted.
When computers eventually take charge of Metro trains again, those operators, after years of being in control, will be in a strange position. Imagine sitting, more or less passively, in the front cab of a crowded, eight-car rush-hour train — 400 tons of metal and humanity barreling along the rails at up to 65 mph — with little to do as an operator but surveil the tracks ahead while a computer console does the driving.
“I think, yes, the newer operators, who’ve only been in manual mode, are going to feel some apprehension at first,” said Jackie Jeter, president of the union representing Metro’s train operators. “Even if you’re an old operator like me” — that was Jeter’s job in the 1980s and ’90s — “that accident in ’09 shook your confidence in what automatic train operation is able to do. I mean, I couldn’t have fathomed that happening.”
For an operator, placing life and limb in the hands of an automated system that has failed tragically “will take some getting used to,” she said. “But we’ll get there.”LAS VEGAS — With Carmelo Anthony officially on board, Knicks rookie coach Derek Fisher guaranteed the Knicks will be a playoff team this season, and will eventually compete for a championship with Anthony as the “anchor.’’
The Knicks missed the playoffs during a miserable 37-45 campaign last season that nearly led Anthony out the door. Anthony had told confidants he didn’t want to ever experience a season like that again.
“My opinion is, based on our roster and who we’re going to become, we can compete for playing in the playoffs and playing for a championship in the Eastern Conference,’’ Fisher said Monday after the Knicks’ summer-league victory over Charlotte, in his first remarks since Anthony’s signing became official. “When that happens, putting dates on it, that’s not my job.’’
As constituted, the Knicks’ starting five may be Samuel Dalembert at center, either Amar’e Stoudemire or Andrea Bargnani at power forward, Anthony at small forward and J.R. Smith and Jose Calderon in the backcourt. Knicks president Phil Jackson may be viewing Stoudemire as a backup, and has told confidants he thinks Bargnani will have a big season in his contract year.
“I believe in our guys,’’ Fisher said. “Even if nothing else changes, we’re good enough to be a playoff team in the Eastern Conference, but we have to go out and prove it.’’
Fisher’s theme since getting hired last month was that basketball experts are underrating the Knicks’ talent.
“A lot of people feel everybody around Carmelo needs to be different,’’ Fisher said. “I don’t necessarily agree with the mind-set. We have some very good basketball players on our team.’’
Fisher has not spoken to Anthony since Sunday’s official announcement, but in their two meetings, the rookie coach has impressed upon Anthony that this season the offense won’t be all about him, as it was under Mike Woodson.
“I haven’t gotten to that point analyzing his individual game in terms of strengths and weaknesses,’’ Fisher said. “What I most thought about it [was] how much easier the game will be for him. We won’t just give him the ball and say, ‘Save the day.’ We’ll utilize guys around him to be successful, build trust, build chemistry, build a fun way to play for guys, and that will make our defense better.
“That’s what he wants. … He wants to be in an environment where everybody is effective. He wants a balanced basketball team.’’
Jackson has said the team still needs to add another rebounder and perhaps a another backup small forward in case rookie Cleanthony Early isn’t ready. Jackson could offer the $3.27 mini mid-level exception, but doesn’t want to dole out a long-term deal to cut into cap space in 2015 and 2016.
Fisher said he wants to build a strong relationship with Anthony.
“Whether player to player or coach to player, it’s about the relationship,’’ Fisher said. “I’m not nervous about building the type of relationship with Carmelo we both need for us to be successful. We’re human beings and grown men. We’ll talk and work together. I’m not nervous about being myself.
Fisher and Anthony weren’t friends when Fisher was still a player.
“I think there’s a great deal of respect that’s gone both ways,’ Fisher said. “Hopefully that will help us build a mutual respectful relationship. It’s a great opportunity not just for me, but for Carmelo. We spoke in person twice about what a coach could provide. He’s comfortable with that part. The toughest part for him was: Will our roster be competitive enough to win?’’When I hear other people talking about procrastination, I find myself getting proprietorial: surely their fleeting pauses are as nothing to mine. Procrastination is the main way I express anxiety and depression, if I can use these medicalised, dignifying terms. It’s franker to say that I put things off because much of the time I’m frightened and sad (too frightened and sad for procrastination to be enough of an outlet: I also have an array of psychosomatic symptoms: rashes, headaches and stomach disorders – not that the line between procrastination and illness is necessarily sharp, if it’s there at all). I can remember putting off projects at primary school – chronically illegible handwriting as much as anything, I think – and a reluctance to put things down on paper dogged me through school and university; learning to type didn’t stop it pursuing me into a career in newspapers, an industry helpfully rife with deadlines and consequences, which meant that I was always forced to produce something in the end. Still the procrastination persisted, and as I eased into middle age it got worse. Every task took longer than it should have, and felt less finished. Other things got pushed back; I failed to make phone calls, send letters and emails, do household chores, repair things, turn up for things, fulfil promises. The career drifted away around 2009. Against a background of falling circulations, vanishing revenues and global financial crisis, I can’t make out how far my difficulties with deadlines were a factor – a lot of newspaper careers were drifting away back then – but I remember a lot of uncomfortable conversations with editors.
Job gone, I sat around trying to write, managing bits and pieces, but earning very little. And then my marriage drifted away too, leaving me, in Alan Partridge’s phrase, clinically fed-up boo-hoo. My wife, having said she would leave, took two and a half years to find a way of doing it – there is a small consolation in not being the only procrastinator in the relationship. While this was going on the LRB commissioned me to write about Richard Hughes, who wrote A High Wind in Jamaica. I like Hughes and it seemed like a job I could get on with. I cheerfully settled to the research, reading the novels I hadn’t read, rereading the ones I had. Then I started writing, or that’s what I told myself: some paragraphs, some sentences, a sketch of a plan, then some rewriting, rearranging, scrubbing, more rewriting, more scrubbing, pauses to reconsider. Then I did some more research: the short stories, the children’s stories, the poems and plays, the journalism, Richard Perceval Graves’s biography, then back to the rewriting …
Hughes himself was notoriously unproductive – four novels of variously uneven brilliance over 45 years or so. After A High Wind in Jamaica, it took him nearly ten years to produce In Hazard; then a gap of 23 years before The Fox in the Attic (the nominal focus of my piece), which was conceived as a self-contained story but ended up as the first volume of a trilogy: getting started is half the problem; knowing when to stop is the other. The second volume, The Wooden Shepherdess, took another 12 years and, though it has its moments, feels messy and unresolved; 12 chapters into the third volume, ill-health forced him to give up writing for good. It seems to me that Hughes wanted to be a writer more than he wanted to write; the difference isn’t always obvious, even to the person doing the wanting, and talent, which you feel ought to be a clue, may be a red herring. During the war, he became an effective civil servant at the Admiralty, and turned down an offer to stay on – how dreadful to admit that bureaucracy is your true vocation. I’m tempted by the idea that Hughes set me a bad example, but it’s not as if I needed one. At any rate, I wasn’t writing anything else; and after a while I wasn’t writing this. I began to wonder whether it made any sense to think of myself as a writer at all, though I didn’t have anything else to offer people who asked me what I did. The Hughes piece became a rather uneasy joke between me and the LRB, eventually giving way to an admission of defeat.
For the Romantics inspiration was instantaneous: to put off writing a poem was not just to waste time but to lay waste to art. That’s the context for Coleridge’s complaint about the person from Porlock. I’m with Stevie Smith, though: ‘The truth is I think he was already stuck/With Kubla Khan.’ We may not now believe so confidently in genius, or in a carpe diem version of creativity. All I hear are admonitions to stick at your desk and keep sweating, but any writer can tell you that if you sit on an idea long enough the fun goes out of it – one of the things I liked about working in newspapers was that ideas rarely lasted that long. If poetry rests on spontaneity, that might explain the lack of poetry about procrastination; the only poem I can think of that deals explicitly with the theme is Edward Young’s ‘The Complaint’, better known as ‘Night-Thoughts’:
Be wise today, ’tis madness to defer;
Next day the fatal precedent will plead;
Thus on, till wisdom is pushed out of life:
Procrastination is the thief of time,
Year after year it steals, till all are fled.
But Tennyson too, an indefatigable revisitor of themes and redrafter of poems, often seems obsessed by the vis inertiae: ‘Mariana in the Moated Grange’, the Lady of Shalott pointlessly weaving, ‘The Lotos-Eaters’, ‘Tithonus’, the endlessly dozing kraken which self-destructs as soon as it tries to do anything. I can’t come up with a Tennyson poem that doesn’t seem to glance at procrastination, aside from ‘The Charge of the Light Brigade’, and even that could be said to be about not knowing when to stop.
Contemporary psychology gets many of its ideas on the subject from the American Psychiatric Association’s Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders, where it is listed as a symptom of ‘passive-aggressive disorder’, a diagnosis that is itself a hangover from US military training manuals of the Second World War. Some see procrastination as a rational preference: the procrastinator has chosen immediate over deferred gratification, pleasure over work. But generally the failure to work goes along with a failure of appetites: a lot of the time I’m chained to my desk as a ghost is chained to the spot they haunt. It doesn’t even have the glamour of writer’s block.
I don’t know why I do it (or don’t do it), or even if the language of action is more appropriate than the language of affliction: why it happens to me. One explanation, or characterisation, of procrastination is that you fail to identify sufficiently with your future self. A friend suggested that all this Oblomovism or Chilcotism is self-creative rather than self-destructive, creating space in which we can find out who we are. It’s true that a certain anxiety about identity goes with writing: is that how I sound? Is that what I think? Is that who I am? Or perhaps we indulge in the irrational, the self-harming, because we want to harm ourselves and we crave irrationality – it’s self-flagellation, or resistance to a reason or reasons we find oppressive. The idea of procrastination as resistance is not new: slaves in Saint-Domingue disrupted work by shuffling their feet, even poisoning themselves. I distrust the heroic aspect this gives procrastination, strength of will rather than torturous weakness.
Bartleby is my hero, endlessly preferring not to, but though I find him sympathetic, he – along with all the ‘writers of the no’, writers who turned their backs on writing, Rimbaud and Walser among them – is not in the same game as me. Or if we are in the same game, I’m not playing it right. I don’t turn my back on writing. I don’t say no. I say yes and fail to follow through. I sit suspended between preferring not to and not preferring to enough – I’m hung on a peg. Writing that, I remember that I was once actually hung on a peg by a changing-room mob at school: the sensations of helplessness and humiliation were not that different from my life in deadlines. The broken promises, the unprofessionalism, the evasions and quasi-explanations you offer to others, the outright lies you tell yourself: better leave this till after the weekend; I’ll have it finished by the end of Tuesday; they won’t mind getting it on Wednesday … Achilles, never catching up with that fucking tortoise. Reading as a way of putting off thinking; thinking as a way of putting off feeling.Radio host Steve Deace during a December 2013 appearance.
Conservative columnist Steve Deace descended into self-parody by complaining that the Obama administration had somehow used the first openly gay NFL prospect to distract from Benghazi.
University of Missouri defensive lineman Michael Sam publicly announced last month that he was gay in advance of the scouting events that precede the annual NFL draft.
Although Sam failed to impress pro scouts last week during the annual combine in Indianapolis, Deace sensed political – not historic – motives for sportswriters covering the event.
“The leftist media’s latest contrived attempt to distract the American people from the daily failures of the president who they cover for daily,” Deace said in a Washington Times column published Monday. “Mr. Sam generated headlines from shills and wannabes who just couldn’t get enough of the first ‘openly gay football player.’”
The columnist, who is also the author of “Rules for Patriots: How Conservatives Can Win Again,” complained that these same NFL beat writers “have been trying to kill football the past two years because it’s too dangerous.”
“Now they can’t wait to rally around the rainbow flag,” Deace said. “And they wonder why their credibility is about as low as that of Congress.”
President Barack Obama expressed support for Sam during an interview he gave with former NBA star Charles Barkley before the pro league’s All-Star Game, which Deace saw as an intentional distraction.
“Not to be outdone, a flailing president who seemingly has no time to give answers to the families of four dead Americans at Benghazi, or the millions he broke a promise to that they could keep their current health insurance if they liked it, couldn’t wait to jump on Mr. Sam’s bandwagon,” Deace said.
Journeyman center Jason Collins became the NBA’s first openly gay player last week, months after announcing his status, and several former pro athletes have also announced they were gay once their athletic careers were over.
“As the media fawned and genuflected to Mr. Sam simply because he’s another star homosexual athlete, there was no time for serious questions about what this paradigm change means for the NFL or American culture at large,” Deace sneered. “No time for debate. No time for a difference of opinion.”
The columnist wondered whether Sam’s prospective teammates should feel comfortable with him in the locker room and shower, although his former teammates and roommate have said they knew the player was gay and had no problems with him.
“If you’re making the case we should undo the moral foundations of Western civilization and rewrite the Constitution to make way for your beliefs, shouldn’t you have to answer these sorts of questions first?” Deace asked.Here’s a story the liberal media will happily ignore. According to a survey of police chiefs, 76 percent agreed that armed citizens actually reduce crime.
MRCTV reported:
Survey: 76% of Police Chiefs Say Armed Citizens ‘REDUCE’ Violent Crime
While liberals call for more gun control to stop violence, three-fourths (76%) of the nation’s police chiefs and sheriffs say armed citizens actually “reduce violent criminal activity,” the 28th Annual Survey by the National Association of Chiefs of Police shows.
Trending: CNN Told By South Korean Official: “Clearly Credit Goes To President Trump” (VIDEO)
Asked, “Can qualified, law-abiding armed citizens help law enforcement reduce violent criminal activity?” while under one in five disagreed:
Yes: 76.0%
No: 18.6%
N/A: 5.4%
Fully 87.9% say “any vetted citizen” should “be able to purchase a firearm for sport or self-defense,” while only 8.9% said “No” and 3.2% replied “N/A.”
What’s more, nearly one in five (18.0%) police departments actually help put guns in the hands of Americans by selling the firearms they confiscate.
U.S. police departments also overwhelming “support nationwide recognition of state issued concealed weapon permits”:
Yes: 86.4%
No: 10.6%
N/A: 2.9%
Despite this reality, watch Democrats make gun control one of the central pillars of their convention next week.
They’ve never dealt with facts on this issue before, why start now?&amp;amp;lt;span id="selection-marker-1" class="redactor-selection-marker"&amp;amp;gt;&amp;amp;lt;/span&amp;amp;gt;&amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;lt;span id="selection-marker-1" class="redactor-selection-marker"&amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;gt;&amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;lt;/span&amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;gt;&amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;lt;span id="selection-marker-1" class="redactor-selection-marker"&amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;gt;&amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;lt;/span&amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;gt;&amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;lt;span id="selection-marker-1" class="redactor-s&amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;lt;span id="selection-marker-1" class="redactor-selection-marker"&amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;gt;&amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;lt;/span&amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;gt;election-marker"
In this video we explore how to save bad videos so that you can still use them within your project. It’s important to remember first however that there is no substitute for re-shooting your video. The mentality of “fix it in post” is rarely a good one to have. But there are times when you are left with no other choice and you need to find a way to make your footage look better. If that’s the case, there are 5 ways that we suggest trying to fix bad or broken footge.
1. Out Of Focus Video
Unless you’ve got access to some absolutely stellar video cameras, you’re not going to be able to change the focus of your video after the fact, but there are a couple of things you can do to make it less noticeable.
Step one is to use the sharpen effect. In your lumetri color panel and under the creative section, there’s a slider for sharpen. You can increase this slider to achieve a post-sharpening.
The second piece is to mask around your subject and add a gaussian blur. This basically makes your subject look more in focus by comparison to the background. Duplicate your footage and stack it directly on top of itself. On the top clip, mask around your subject and keep them in the shot. Underneath on the bottom clip add your gaussian blur. This will blur out everything that your mask didn’t include. Less is more with this, so keep it subtle. Play around with the mask feather to make it more naturally fade towards your subject.
It goes without saying, the more your subject moves, the more work you’ll have to do, and the more likely you’ll have to bring this into after effects. And if there’s people or objects on the same focal plane as your subject, you’re going to have to account for that too.
2. Shaky Video
If you’ve got unnecessarily shaky footage that you want to settle down, Warp Stabilizer is your tool. Select the clip you need to stabilize and search for your warp stabilizer effect inside the effects panel. For best results I would suggest selecting detailed analysis, enhanced reduction of rolling shutter, and dropping the smoothness way below 50%. Test out what you like but what I’ve found is that anything between 1-5% can actually still look amazing and keep your footage looking like it was never tampered with. If you push it too much, you might start to get a jello effect, which doesn’t look that great. You can also do this with footage that’s not really that shaky, but adding warp stabilizer can give it an absolutely smooth feel.
3. Overexposed Video
One of the most frustrating things you can do is overexpose your video! This is less because it looks bad and more because if you truly overexpose a shot, what’s happening is your camera sees everything that’s overexposed as pure white with no information or detail to recover. Everything else has information that can be manipulated, raised, lowered, and nuanced, but your overexposed sections are permanently white forever. Unless there’s still some detail hiding underneath. Your milage may vary, but here’s what to do with an overexposed shot:
Start by going to your lumetri color section. Then, lower the exposure and see if at any point you can bring back detail from the white sections of your clip. If you can, great! Here’s what you do next:
Take your highlights slider and drop it down until you see it starting to show detail in the whites. You can also try using curves and see if you can get any luck by lowering the highlight section. It will start to impact other sections of your clip though, and if it does, but you still need to push it farther, try duplicating your clip and masking around the overexposed area. Then push the highlight drop even more. Make sure to feather your mask, otherwise it’ll look even worse than being overexposed
4. Embrace Mistakes For Style
Sometimes when your shot is broken by something that’s distracting, the only thing to do is to tell your audience, “I totally meant to do that. It was an artistic choice.”
But how do you go about doing that?
Take what’s “wrong” in the shot and follow a bit of a natural logic to it. If your shot is overexposed in parts then you’ve likely got a lot of light in the shot. Add some light leaks and now your shot it’s “overexposed”, it’s “heavenly!”
Is your shot too dark? Maybe your subject is brooding with their inner conflict. So push it to the max and maybe even add some stylized glitches and grunge.
The key is that sometimes, when your footage is beyond recovery, you just have to get creative and be confident. Maybe it wasn’t the best shot, but you’re a great filmmaker, and you can find a way to make it work within your project.
5. Hide Your Mistakes With Distractions.
Some things are hard to say that they were intentional. Like for example, a lot of noise in a shot or a white balance that is terribly far off.
If you don’t want to pay for solutions like denoising software, one solution can be to add overlays on top of your footage. This could be elements like fake film grain, dust, or scratches. This can sometimes result in hiding undesired elements like noise among other elements that distract your audience from seeing mistakes.
Or if your coloring is very distracting and hard to salvage, you can just go with the stylish option of black and white. This will hide the problem entirely.
Really at the end of the day, filmmaking is actually a lot of problem solving. If something is broken, and I can’t fix it, how can I get creative so that I can still present it?
We hope you enjoyed this video. If you have any questions, please ask them below in the comments section. Also, be sure to check out all of our other awesome tutorials.
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Bethesda has announced a limited-edition series of Dragonborn statues for The Elder Scrolls V: Skyrim.
Designed by GamingHeads, the polystone figures are hand-painted and hand-finished, says Bethesda, and measure approximately 16 inches tall. The model is based on Skyrim's recognisable key art of the Dragonborn standing atop a dragon's tail.
Two different figures will be available. The standard model, which features the Dragonborn holding a sword in his right hand and a dagger in the left, costs $299.99 and is limited to 1,000 units worldwide. The exclusive edition, however, is priced at $329.99 and is limited to 500 units, and it features an additional interchangeable arm which holds a pulsing fireball.
The models can be preordered now and are expecting to ship in Q4 2013, "just in time for the holidays," according to Bethesda.
Both models also feature a certificate of authenticity and a numbered base. International shipping is also available. For more information, check out GamingHeads.ASSOCIATED PRESS Costa Rica's Raquel Rodriguez (left) holds off American midfielder Carli Lloyd during a World Cup qualifying match in October 2014. Both teams qualified for the World Cup, the first time Costa Rica had done so.
BALTIMORE -- As a girl in Costa Rica, Raquel Rodriguez knew she wanted to be a professional soccer player. But in a country that had achieved little success on the international level and where she had to compete against boys because not enough girls played, there were few indications that was even possible.
"I didn’t have a soccer role model necessarily. I was just kind of a dreamer," Rodriguez said. "I kept telling my mom what my dreams were, and kind of hoping she’d tell me good news about my dreams."
On Friday, that dream became real when Sky Blue FC made Rodriguez the second overall pick in the National Women's Soccer League's college draft (Virginia's Emily Sonnett went first overall to Portland).
The pick followed a stunning year on the field for Rodriguez, who scored Costa Rica's first-ever Women's World Cup goal this summer and the goal that clinched Penn State's first national championship before winning college soccer's women's player of the year award this fall.
I want to be that role model and take that much responsibility."
Rodriguez is not the first Costa Rican woman to reach professional soccer. Shirley Cruz, her teammate on the country's national team, plays for Paris Saint-Germain in the French league, and others have recently joined teams in Spain.
But the vast majority of women's pro soccer players still come from the handful of countries that traditionally dominate on the international level, and as she enters NWSL, Rodriguez hopes to show young Costa Rican girls that they belong too.
"My hope is to be that role model that in the past, my generation did not have," Rodriguez said at the draft Friday. "I hope that this just helps grow the game. I want to be that role model and take that much responsibility."
"The World Cup, that was the huge booster," she added. "And me joining that professional group of players, I think it’s great in every sense.... Just growing the networking, and growing the belief in some players that this is what you can achieve, we are tangible examples of that dream."
NICHOLAS KAMM via Getty Images Raquel Rodriguez (left) celebrates after scoring Costa Rica's first-ever Women's World Cup goal during a match against Spain in 2015.
While women's soccer has grown steadily -- particularly at the international level -- in the biggest countries, investment and opportunities to play have lagged in many smaller nations. According to a report published by FIFA last year, for instance, countries in the top 20 of the world rankings invest on average nearly four times more in their women's teams each year than those ranked between 21st and 40th (Costa Rica is currently ranked 34th). Just a quarter of the world's national federations, the report found, had staff devoted to the women's teams.
Costa Rica has in some ways tried to buck that trend over the last two decades, as its national soccer federation increased its efforts to develop women's soccer and build its women's national team into a contender to qualify for the 2015 Women's World Cup, which it reached by finishing second to the United States in regional qualifiers in 2014.
Las Ticas failed to advance out of the World Cup's group stage but secured two draws in three matches, driving excitement into the sport that Rodriguez says she noticed even during her final year at Penn State. Media members and fans back in Costa Rica, she said, followed her college season and watched online live streams Friday to find out where she would be drafted.
"The media at home, this is the first time I’ve ever felt so announced in Costa Rica," she said. "They’re very aware, and in that sense I can see that change.... People already know what happened [at the draft]."
That success could provide an example to countries that have failed to invest in the women's game, including federations in the North and Central American region that struggled just to finance their national teams' travels to World Cup qualifiers last year.
But more progress needs to be made in Costa Rica too, and Rodriguez is hopeful her success will continue to drive more interest and funding to the women's game there.
"The mentality that has to change in Costa Rica is we have to invest to see results. There has to be interest," she said. "I think that’s growing. But as more girls start involving in women’s soccer, and the population is now more involved in women’s soccer, I think that’s the key."
"It has to increase, hopefully to the point that it’s like the men’s coverage," she added. "But I’m also aware that it takes time. It’s a process."
Also on HuffPost:UPDATE: Sheriff says Georgia inmates who helped deputy to get shorter sentences Copyright by WSAV - All rights reserved Video
CEDARTOWN, Ga. (AP) - A Georgia sheriff says he will reduce the sentences of inmates who stepped in to help a deputy when he collapsed on the job.
The Polk County Sheriff's deputy, who asked not to be identified, tells media outlets he woke up on June 12 not feeling well. While on work detail at a local cemetery with six inmates, he says he began experiencing "coughing spells" before fainting.
The inmates opened the deputy's shirt, removed his bulletproof vest and began performing CPR.
One inmate grabbed the deputy's phone and called 911.
Polk County Sheriff Johnny Moats says he'll take off one-fourth of the inmates' sentences for helping the deputy. The deputy's family also prepared a special lunch for the inmates. The deputy was taken off work detail and placed on patrol.Hey there, everyone.
Before we start today, a bit of signal-boosting: Digital Love Child is putting together an ebook collection on gun games and has put out a call for submissions, deadline sometime mid-September.
Also, the new videogame StoryBundle is out, containing books by Anna Anthropy and Zoya Street as well as the first six issues of Five Out of Ten magazine. You should get it.
Now that that’s out there, let’s bring it in close and get comfortable today. I have a long one for you and you might need to take a few breaks.
I don’t often dedicate This Week in Videogame Blogging to a single topic, but in this case it was more or less unavoidable. There were a few articles on other subjects, but they would be drowned out by the conversation which follows below, so I’ve bookmarked them for next week. Don’t worry, nothing’s been lost.
I also want to note that this edition of the roundup has a general content warning for at least the following: sexual harassment, stalking, rape threats, death threats, and misogynist slurs, with a liberal peppering of ableist slurs thrown in for good measure. Please use your discretion when proceeding.
Additional article-specific content warning markers will be noted after relevant links.
Tropes vs Anita Sarkeesian
Additional content warning: graphic sexual violence.) If you haven’t seen it yet, Anita Sarkeesian’s Tropes vs Women in Videogames series has released the second in its two-part episode on “women as background decoration.” graphic sexual violence.)
The release of Sarkeesian’s video, amidst the ongoing tensions and attacks on women in the industry, has led to Sarkeesian receiving credible death threats on her and her family, forcing her to leave her home. It’s also led to quite a bit of discussion elsewhere, mainly on the subject of the sustained harassment against her.
While not referencing Sarkeesian specifically, this post by former GameSpot critic Carolyn Petit does a good job at countering the argument that games are beyond cultural criticism:
Games are not politically neutral. Neither are mainstream romantic comedies, or action films, or any novel I’ve ever read. They may sometimes appear politically neutral if the values they reinforce mesh with the value systems of the larger culture, but our culture is not politically neutral, either, and it is not outside of the role of a critic to comment on or raise questions about the political meanings embedded in the works one evaluates. In fact, it is often impossible to review something apolitically, because to not comment on or challenge the political meanings in a work in your review is to give them your tacit endorsement.
A lot of the fear I see about feminism comes from the idea that giving in to feminists means giving in to censorship. For some, that fear takes its shape in nonsensical arguments about threats to masculinity or stealing of power from one group to another [...] Those who fear censorship could read my posts as an argument to “clean up” narratives… to remove sources of conflict in order to avoid disturbing female gamers who play these games. But I believe women are made of tougher stuff than that, and most of us want a good story as much as the next gamer. It’s not that I want games to be without conflict or to always end with some moralistic theme. I just want more stories.
At The Verge, Adi Robertson also expounds on this theme, in particular the assertion that depictions of women in games can be defended as “realistic”:
“Why is it video games need to be politically and societally [sic] correct? The whole point of video games is to escape reality and have fun.” |
instance. Mountain View told us "just to make this absolutely clear, the (bug) was reported to Microsoft on September 30 (along with) the 90-day disclosure deadline statement... which in this instance has passed."
Still, some observers have raised questions about whether Project Zero does more harm than good if Google isn't flexible with its publishing deadline. Others argued that Microsoft had plenty of time to fix the bug, and Google was firm about its policy. "Project Zero's disclosure deadline... allows software vendors a fair and reasonable length of time to exercise their vulnerability management process, while also respecting the rights of users to learn and understand the risks they face." But it also added that "we're going to be monitoring the affects (sic) of this policy very closely."
Meanwhile, Microsoft said that it's currently "working to release a security update to address an Elevation of Privilege issue." For full statements from both companies, see below.
Microsoft:
We are working to release a security update to address an Elevation of Privilege issue. It is important to note that for a would-be attacker to potentially exploit a system, they would first need to have valid logon credentials and be able to log on locally to a targeted machine. We encourage customers to keep their anti-virus software up to date, install all available Security Updates and enable the firewall on their computer.
Google:This report is for media and the general public.
In Kharkiv the Security Service of Ukraine (SBU) arrested a group accused of organizing terrorist attacks in the region. Internally displaced persons (IDPs) described the impact of the conflict in the town of Pervomaisk, Luhansk Region. Protests against mobilization continued in Chernivitsi.
Representatives of the Security Service of Ukraine (SBU) and Ministry of Internal Affairs informed the SMM in Kharkiv that on 16 August six individuals, allegedly belonging to a terrorist organization, had been arrested. The suspects are accused of two unsuccessful terrorist attacks, one against a cargo train near Zmiiv (40 km to the south) on 7 July, and the other against Kharkiv’s tank factory on 3 August.
On 17 August the SMM observed a rally held in front of the General Consulate of the Russian Federation, where around 100 Maidan activists participated. The event was in support of Siberian activists in Novosibirsk (Russian Federation) advocating for the creation of an “Autonomous Siberian Republic”. Those attending the rally held Ukrainian and Siberian flags as well as posters calling for the creation of a “Siberian Republic”. Other posters read: “Respect for the sovereignty of the Russian Federation’s subjects!” The rally passed without incident.
On 16 August the SMM visited Popasna (90 km east of Luhansk), the last town controlled by the Ukrainian Army before Pervomaisk, which is currently under the control of irregular armed groups. In Popasna the SMM met with the mayor, who stated that at least a hundred suspects had been arrested. Earlier on 12 August the Head of Luhansk Regional Police explained that the police have a list of suspects at each checkpoint. The suspects are divided into two categories: the first includes “criminals” who have taken up arms or used violence or committed any crime during the conflict. These are detained by the Police. The second group includes those suspected of “separatism” – for example, organizing the 11 May referendum or other activities related to the insurgency. Suspects from this group are arrested at checkpoints and handed over to the SBU.
In Popasna the SMM also spoke to IDPs. They estimated that 60 to70% of the buildings in the nearby town of Pervomaisk, had been hit by shelling. IDPs also said that they believe many residents of the town may be trapped there, mostly hiding in basements. The town continues to be without water, gas and electricity, including the hospital and maternity clinic, according to the IDPs.
On 16 August the SMM met with representatives of the Border Guard outpost in Novoazovsk (120 km to the south of Donetsk) where it observed a one-kilometre long queue of various vehicles, reportedly with IDPs fleeing the country, and other long freight trucks. Many cars had the word “children” in Russian written on their windows. The Deputy Commander of the Border Guard outpost informed the SMM about an increased movement of civilians across the border with the Russian Federation after recent security developments in Uspenka (60 km to the south-east), where the so-called “Donetsk People’s Republic” (“DPR”) had taken control over the area, establishing a new roadblock there. As a result, most of the IDPs preferred the Novoazovsk Border Crossing-Point instead of the Border Crossing-Point located close to Uspenka. He also added that IDPs were coming mainly from Snizhnoe, Torez, Donetsk, Shakhtarsk and Yenakiieva.
The SMM met on 15 August with representatives of Kryvyi Rih municipality (150 km south-west of Dnepropetrovsk) who stated that they had received 1,907 IDPs from the Donetsk and Luhansk regions in the past three weeks. According to the interlocutors, the recent influx of IDPs has not generated any problems thus far. The SMM also met with a Roma member of the local Evangelist church, who stated that they are currently providing support to 40 Roma IDPs originating from the Donetsk region.
In Kherson and Odessa the situation remained calm.
In Chernivtsi the SMM observed that protests against mobilization have continued. On 16 August a crowd of around 70 people, both men and women, gathered again in front of the city’s military barracks, where the SMM observed that 12 tents had been erected as part of the ongoing protest. On 17 August the tents were still in place. In the Babyn and Yurkivtsi villages (30 km to the north), the SMM was informed that on 30 July protests against mobilization had taken place in both locations.
The situation in Ivano-Frankivsk, Lviv and Kyiv remained calm.I am incredibly excited to be able to share some amazing news with you today. For the last few years, Private Internet Access has been a dedicated supporter of the freenode project and we are delighted to be able to announce that freenode is now officially part of the PIA family.
freenode has been providing services to Free and Open Source Software projects, peer-directed projects and other projects that have a broadly licensed output for the past 18 years, and there is a great deal of overlap between the visions and missions of the two organisations, as well as the projects and organisations the two organisations have supported, albeit in very different ways over the years.
Rob (lilo) founded freenode with the aim of providing a useful service to Free and Open Source Software communities, peer-directed projects and others and I think he would be proud of the growth we have experienced over the years if he were still here to see it.
When I took over freenode following his death, my personal circumstances were very different from what they are now. I had time—oodles of it—and volunteering for freenode was very much a pleasure (by all means, it still is! Otherwise I wouldn't be here). However, over the years, times changed, the project grew, demands grew, my own responsibilities changed, both professionally and personally and I, along with several other senior freenode volunteers, found that we no longer had quite the same amount of time and energy to dedicate to the project.
Following discussion and deliberation we have decided to formally (and legally) ally ourselves with PIA. Freenode will continue to operate as a not-for-profit entity under the same management, with the same principles, but PIA's involvement going forwards will provide us with opportunities and resources that we could previously only dream of. PIA will provide an operating budget, mentorship and support that will allow freenode to implement some of the projects and ideas that have previously been on the backburner due to constraints in terms of volunteer time and resources.
Private Internet Access is committed to bringing the internet back to its original state, where being online meant being in your own private world, exploring, learning and creating. PIA is serious about supporting organisations and individuals that it considers to be in alignment with its mission and freenode is one such project.
The founders of PIA feel that freenode has helped a number of open source projects progress, that freenode helps the community produce the pieces that make the internet work smoothly, piece by piece, and that it empowers people.
For PIA, this is about giving back, giving back to freenode and to the communities that they consider vital to their success and to their mission.
The freenode project would be nothing without its communities. All of our volunteers come from projects that use freenode, projects we are passionate about and projects we want to see continue to succeed.
As part of the PIA family, we can guarantee that the freenode project will continue to operate and that we will have the support and resources to further improve the services that we offer to FOSS communities and others, doing our bit to ensure that you can all continue doing what you do best—making the internet and the world a better place.
There will be few noticeable changes in terms of day-to-day operations, the freenode project will continue to operate with much the same structure and volunteer base as it does now. We anticipate that group registration will become a quicker process and we look forward to implementing and announcing new features in the future.
On a personal level, I have joined PIA as a full-time employee and I will be holding a dual role. I will continue to head up the freenode project and you will no doubt see and hear more of me as my availability and involvement increases. Some of you might also find yourselves dealing with me in my new role as Director of Sponsorship and Events at Private Internet Access, where I will be heading up the work we undertake to support organisations, campaigns and events globally.
This means that you may bump into me at various conferences throughout the year, and if you do, please do come have a chat—whether about PIA, freenode or the weather!
On the subject of conferences, I am also extremely happy to announce that freenode #live will be taking place at At-Bristol in Bristol, UK on 28-29th October 2017. We will shortly be making a separate announcement as we open up registration and call for papers and I look forward to seeing you there.
Please do not hesitate to drop me a line ( /msg christel ) on IRC if you have any questions.
Do keep an eye out for more exciting news!How many people does it take to deliver universal access to water and sanitation?
July 29th, 2013
Tom Williams & Kirsten de Vette, International Water Association, the Netherlands
The short answer is: we don’t know. Collected data on human resources in the water and sanitation sector are so sparse that many countries don’t know existing capacity let alone what the future demand is to enable universal access.
The need for Human Resource (HR) development to support water and sanitation services was formally recognised as a priority as long ago as 1977 at the UN Water Conference in Mar del Plata (Argentina). Over the past two decades, a number of influential reports focused on water and sanitation have again highlighted the urgent need to develop adequate HR. The UK International Development Committee1 stated that “beyond lack of finance investment, a lack of institutional, organisational and individual capacity at national and local level is more serious”.
Employing the right number and calibre of people in a suitably enabling environment to facilitate service delivery is a crucial ingredient in the process of meeting MDG target 7c (“Halve, by 2015, the proportion of the population without sustainable access to safe drinking water and basic sanitation”) and, beyond 2015, universal coverage. The health2 and education3,4 sectors have collected evidence on HR development needs, but the nature and magnitude of staffing needs for water and sanitation services remain largely unknown.
Generally, the research required to elucidate HR gaps has received relatively little attention due to the fragmentation and inherent complexities of water and sanitation systems and services. This is highlighted by the 2012 UN-Water GLAAS report5 where nearly half of the countries surveyed were unable to answer how many staff are working in the sector and only a third of the respondents were able to give projections of staffing needs for 2016.
Since 2009 IWA has developed and applied a methodological framework and Excel-based tool to collect data on HR gaps (skill) and shortages (number of workers) at the national level in the water and sanitation sector. On the basis of a sample of private-, public- and non-governmental organisations in the countries, the methodological framework guided the process of collecting information on HR demand (the ideal human resource composition) to construct, operate and maintain and mobilise communities, and compared that with existing capacity as well as the supply (from the education sector). The Excel-based tool, using population rates (including growth) and coverage figures, estimated the numbers at national level^. The results and conclusions of assessments in 10 countries are presented here.
Human resource capacity gaps
The study results indicate significant shortages and gaps, with great variations in numbers due to varying contexts, coverage rates, mechanisms/methods of delivery, definitions of professionals and other factors. Overall, there was a significant shortage, especially for technically qualified staff disciplines at mid- and engineering levels*. Additionally, many of the countries reported a high shortage of social development personnel. Over-supply in personnel was particularly found in the management and finance disciplines, with a focus on administrative personnel.
What we now know
The following key points represent clear findings that provide a point of departure for making informed decisions and on-going support to bridge HR capacity gaps for water and sanitation services:
1. Any future investments to improve and sustain water and sanitation services will be severely undermined unless immediate steps are taken to incrementally address HR demands in the medium- to long-term.
2. Decentralization of responsibilities is not being accompanied by appropriate financial or HR to effectively take on those additional responsibilities at the local level. Developing cooperation between local governments and/or consolidation of HR across neighbouring districts/municipalities would alleviate some of the inefficiency associated with replicating services in adjacent local jurisdictions.
3. There is a clear disparity in the HR requirements for rural versus urban water and sanitation services. This divergence in needs requires separate strategies, funding mechanisms and supporting initiatives to ensure that the HR demands can be met. However, such strategies should identify areas of joint action at the interface of urban and rural systems, such as peri-urban settlements.
4. The mismatch between supply (shortage and skills of professionals entering the job market) and demand (the number and skills or workers required) is one of the key factors significantly undermining the sustainability of the water and sanitation sector. Partnerships between universities, training institutes and employers in the sector need to be established and financed for both technical and administrative functions.
5. Sanitation services are significantly undermined by a poor supply of professionals to the sector. In urgent need of attention is the low level and inadequate quality of curricula covering sanitary engineering in universities in low and middle income countries. Greater efforts need to be made in establishing courses and incentives put in place to attract students.
What we think we know
The following key points represent unconfirmed findings that require further clarity and understanding:
1. Consideration should be given to the non-financial incentives and motivations to attract newly qualified and skilled personnel and to retain experienced personnel so they are not lost to other sectors, such as mining, construction, banking sectors.
2. Appropriate public policies need to be in place to support job creation, such as investing in skills to support labour supply and enabling private sector engagement to stimulate an increase in labour demand.
3. Low levels of access to and inadequate coverage of courses in tertiary education institutes is a significant bottleneck to meeting HR demands. Professional Vocational Training institutes may help in meeting these demands.
4. The dependence on communities, volunteers and semi-skilled workers in rural areas is not sustainable without adequate institutional and operational support from local government and structured, formalised support from the professional sector.
5. The water supply and sanitation sector will benefit greatly from increased gender equality that translates into more women being active in service provision. Whilst they have consistently been excluded from entering the sector and contributing to planning, implementation and operational aspects of water supply and sanitation management, we should further investigate women’s role in decision making as they have extensive knowledge on what service provision is required.
6. Operation and maintenance of water and sanitation systems are chronically and universally neglected, with inadequate financial and HR support. The appropriate education and skills requirement to operate and maintain specific technologies has not been appropriately assessed and would greatly benefit the sector.
7. From a national public sector perspective, strengthening the HR base for the delivery of water and sanitation services will, through reduction of water-related diseases, alleviate the pressure on HR (doctors, health workers etc)as well as financial resources in the public health sector – investing in WASH HR development is investing in health.
What we don’t know
The following key points represent significant knowledge gaps that once elucidated will strengthen the evidence based for informed decision making and on-going support to bridging HR capacity gaps:
1. Data on the HR requirements for water and sanitation services is to a large extent unavailable. This is a major limitation in estimating what HR are available in which sector and across which skills set. Without credible data to estimate the real HR shortages across all components and segments of water, sanitation and hygiene provision, the sector will not be able to attract the needed attention.
2. There is no information available on the current or needed levels of funding required to support capacity development, either in totality, from government or the donor community. Work should be conducted to ascertain the current level of funding dedicated to capacity development and the funding gap.
3. Effective policies for improving HR capacity at a national level are not well documented. More work needs to be done on distilling and synthesising lessons learned from countries who have made significant advances in addressing HR capacity gaps.
What next
The IWA HRCD study results, as presented in this article, will be used to advocate globally for investment in HR capacity in the sector. IWA will continue to strengthen the evidence base to support HR planning and development, and will work with in-country champions to catalyse and/coordinate the development of National Capacity Development Plans.
Table Footnotes:
A1In Ghana the extreme high shortages in the sanitation field are due to the very low coverage rate for sanitation, as well as the fact that the study included unskilled (or not professionally educated) staff to construct all the facilities.
A2The surplus in MDGs (and water) is due to the management and finance disciplines. There is a small shortage in technical personnel and larger shortage in the social development category.
A3In the Philippines, the complexity of the data collection did not allow the same method to be used as in other countries. Therefore this table only presents total figures that are based on Water and Sanitation technical field personnel and para-technicians only. This case study distinguished between low and high productivity.
A4In Sri Lanka the country team saw a larger surplus on sanitation personnel in the long run (for universal coverage) than in the short run, which may have been due to current construction needs.
A5The shortages have been derived from the samples within the countries. Negative figures indicate surpluses in professionals.
Footnotes:
^The numbers are estimations, generalizing the sample data to nationally representative shortages. The numbers should be interpreted as trends rather than absolute shortages.
*WATSAN Technical field, and other technical fields were the disciplines according to IWA’s methodological guidance.
References:
1. International Development Committee (2007), “Sanitation and Water Sixth Report of Session 2006-07 Volume I Report”, together with formal minutes Ordered by The House of Commons.
2. WHO (2006), The World Health Report 2006: working together for health. World Health Organisation Press, Geneva, Switzerland.
3. UNESCO (2009), “Projecting the global demand for teachers: Meeting the goal of universal primary education by 2015”, UIS Technical Paper No. 3 at: http://unesdoc.unesco.org/images/0018/001863/186397e.pdf.
4. UNESCO (2010), Education for all Global Monitoring Report 2010. UNESCO Publishing, Paris France and Oxford University Press, Oxford United Kingdom.
5. UN-Water (2012), UN-Water global assessment of sanitation and drinking-water (GLAAS) 2012 report: The challenge of extending and sustaining services. World Health Organisation Press, Geneva, Switzerland.
Tom Williams is the Programmes Director for the International Water Association. Tom has been with IWA since 2003 and has a background in public health and microbiology. Tom is based in the Hague office and is responsible for the programmes group who coordinate the six thematic programmes of the Association. Kirsten de Vette is a Programmes Officer for the International Water. Kirsten joined IWA in 2009 as a project officer in support of programmes focused on low and middle-income countries. Kirsten, now a programmes officer, is based in the Hague office and coordinates programme Human Resources and Capacity Development, as well as the activities of the IWA Young Water Professionals. The IWA Human Resource Capacity Development programme aims to contribute to improving the evidence based in regards to human resource capacity gaps and needs in the sector. The programmes puts ‘local’ institutions, such as training institutes and membership associations, at the forefront of understanding and responding to local capacity development requirements. For further information see http://www.iwahq.org/themes/hrcd.
The views expressed in this article belong to the individual authors and do not represent the views of the Global Water Forum, the UNESCO Chair in Water Economics and Transboundary Water Governance, UNESCO, the Australian National University, or any of the institutions to which the authors are associated. Please see the Global Water Forum terms and conditions here.Baghdad, Iraq (CNN) They came in groups, or individually, to the still-smoldering wreckage that was, just a few days ago, a busy stretch of road in the Baghdad neighborhood of Karrada. As they approached the charred skeletons that line the street, their faces go slack with shock. Jaws drop.
Among them was Sami Hadi, a government employee looking for two of his cousins and their three children who had come here Saturday evening to buy clothing for Eid al-Fitr, the holiday that follows the holy month of Ramadan.
Photos: Suicide bombing kills at least 200 in Baghdad Photos: Suicide bombing kills at least 200 in Baghdad Women react Monday, July 4, at the site of a suicide bombing that took place a day earlier in Baghdad, Iraq. At least 200 people were killed by a truck bomb in the Karrada neighborhood. ISIS claimed responsibility for the attack. Hide Caption 1 of 13 Photos: Suicide bombing kills at least 200 in Baghdad A man mourns in Najaf, Iraq, during a funeral for Karrada victims on Sunday, July 3. Hide Caption 2 of 13 Photos: Suicide bombing kills at least 200 in Baghdad A woman walks by a building that was damaged in the Karrada blast. Hide Caption 3 of 13 Photos: Suicide bombing kills at least 200 in Baghdad Firefighters work at the scene in Karrada early on July 3. Hide Caption 4 of 13 Photos: Suicide bombing kills at least 200 in Baghdad A body is carried away from the site of the blast. Hide Caption 5 of 13 Photos: Suicide bombing kills at least 200 in Baghdad People who lost their relatives mourn after the bombing. Hide Caption 6 of 13 Photos: Suicide bombing kills at least 200 in Baghdad Iraqi security forces look for victims. Hide Caption 7 of 13 Photos: Suicide bombing kills at least 200 in Baghdad People look for victims after the explosion. Hide Caption 8 of 13 Photos: Suicide bombing kills at least 200 in Baghdad An Iraqi woman grieves at the scene of the Karrada blast on July 3. A second bomb exploded Sunday at an outdoor market in the Shaab neighborhood of southeastern Baghdad, killing one person and wounding five others, police said. Both Baghdad strikes are a sign of the Sunni-Shiite tension in the Muslim world. Sunni-dominated ISIS claimed it was targeting Shiite neighborhoods. Hide Caption 9 of 13 Photos: Suicide bombing kills at least 200 in Baghdad The Karrada attack was the deadliest incident in Baghdad in years. Hide Caption 10 of 13 Photos: Suicide bombing kills at least 200 in Baghdad People hug near the site of the Karrada blast. Hide Caption 11 of 13 Photos: Suicide bombing kills at least 200 in Baghdad Men mourn after losing five members of their family in the Karrada bombing. Hide Caption 12 of 13 Photos: Suicide bombing kills at least 200 in Baghdad People light candles at the scene of the Karrada bombing. Hide Caption 13 of 13
Sami had scoured floor after floor for a trace of them. "There are only charred pieces of flesh," he told me, his voice flat with exhaustion. "We can't recognize anyone."
It's an overused cliché that Baghdad is accustomed to violence and bloodshed. It's not. Death is death, and when it visits your home and rips away the lives of loved ones, that pain is as intense here as it is anywhere else.
Sami actually did find a trace of his relatives. He found a phone that looked familiar, checked the SIM card and discovered it belonged to one of his cousins. With that discovery, he left, refusing to say another word.
Read More[I am posting below a short essay by my friend and colleague Brett Frischmann of Cardozo Law School concerning the “net neutrality" rules now being considered by the FCC. I’ve stayed largely away from the whole net neutrality debate over the years — too much inside [FCC] baseball for my taste — but Brett’s been in the middle of it for some time, and I think he draws attention below to a simple, but very profound, problem at the heart of the approach the agency is taking: the distinction it is drawing between “edge providers” (suppliers of content) and “end users” (recipients of content). One can hardly imagine a more inappropriate distinction one could draw on the Internet that we now have, so much of whose power has come from its “end-to-end” design: all senders are recipients, all recipients are senders, and all IP addresses are equal. But I’ll let Brett fill in more of the details./DGP]
The key to an open Internet is nondiscrimination and in particular, a prohibition on discrimination or prioritization based on the identity of the user (sender/receiver) or use (application/content). I explain why at length in my book, Infrastructure: The Social Value of Shared Resources (2012). Unfortunately, the rules now being considered by the FCC don’t come close to implementing this simple and important benchmark. There are many reasons for this, but perhaps the most fundamental is a simple misconception, one that persists in the work of the FCC but also of proponents and opponents of network neutrality. It is the false distinction between what they call “edge providers” (YouTube) and “end users” (people who watch videos on YouTube).
The currently proposed FCC rules for an open Internet are based on the following definitions:
Edge Provider. Any individual or entity that provides any content, application, or service over the Internet, and any individual or entity that provides a device used for accessing any content, application, or service over the Internet. End User. Any individual or entity that uses a broadband Internet access service.
The basic distinction suggested by these definitions is that some distinguishable subset of end users use broadband Internet access to provide content, applications, or services (or devices to access content, applications, or services), and these end users are edge providers.
Who exactly are the end users that are not edge providers? In other words, who uses the Internet but does not provide any content, application, or service? The answer is no one. All end users provide content as they engage in communications with other end users, individually or collectively. YouTube content, for example, comes from end users uploading it. But even passive “consumers” communicate and exchange data. That is the beauty of the Internet architecture; on the Internet all end-points on the network are equally capable of exchanging content/applications/services with all other end-points. Think of all the startups and small businesses run from people’s homes on home Internet connections, using WordPress tools or Amazon hosting services. Are they “end users” when they email their friends but “edge providers” when they switch windows to check their business metrics?
What is the point of the provider/user distinction? It appears to draw a line between (commercial) entities that generate a lot of traffic (and revenue) and those who don’t, but that is confused. In truth, traffic is generated jointly by many actors communicating with each other. Besides, that line ignores the fact that the Internet provides a smooth, scalable path that allows all end users to grow businesses and become future YouTubes, Amazons and Googles.
The provider/user distinction is not only false, but misleading and not a helpful foundation upon which to build a regulatory regime for Internet communications. Everything that occurs on the Internet can be understood as a conversation between end users. When I interact with a website I like, whether Amazon.com, Georgetown.edu, or icann.org, or when I send an email to the firms that own those websites or to a friend, or when I engage in a teleconference using Skype, I am having a conversation with other end-users. The contents of our conversations and nature of our interactions and relationships may vary, but those are all higher-layer considerations that have nothing to do with the infrastructural facilities we use to connect and have our conversations. All of us end users necessarily rely on access networks to have our conversations.
But when you use the Internet, do you have a conversation with your access network? It makes sense to frame my interactions with Amazon.com, Georgetown.edu, or icann.org as conversations, but no one besides the access networks themselves believes the access networks are part of these conversations. The access networks simply provide what the telecommunications act defines as a telecommunications service, which is one good reason why the FCC should reclassify broadband Internet access service as a telecommunications service.
The FCC should cast aside the false distinction between edge providers and end users. There is a better way for the FCC to implement a nondiscrimination principle to keep the Internet open and innovative. Management of the Internet should be based on quantity and timing of traffic and other related cost factors, not on a false distinction. A nondiscrimination rule that precludes discrimination or prioritization based on the identity of the user or use leaves more than sufficient room for traffic management that is based on quantity of traffic generated, timing of traffic generation, and other related cost factors; in other words, usage-based pricing, congestion pricing, and other cost-based management techniques are not precluded, despite persistent misrepresentations by opponents of nondiscrimination rules.
Some people find content delivery networks like Akamai confusing. I don’t understand the confusion, to be honest. Akamai is an end user. Like the rest of us end user / edge providers, Akamai has relationships and conversations with various end users, and to do so, it relies on various access providers. Though we might not describe ourselves as such, many of us who use peer-to-peer file sharing applications also act as content delivery networks, although perhaps on a smaller scale and in a more distributed fashion. Neither Akamai nor those of us who use peer-to-peer applications is thereby transformed into a broadband Internet access service; we are simply end users.
In these confused discussions of “edge providers” and “end users,” some folks at the FCC also point to “two-sided market” theory. This theory, expressed by the FCC Chairman once as involving Netflix and a cable company, oversimplifies the webs of relationships that exist among end users to create the Internet ecosystem and overstates the role of access providers in facilitating those relationships. The idea of “two-sides” does not account for the many (many) sides of the markets and non-markets on the Internet, and it also largely ignores the spillovers from user generated public and social goods that are perhaps the most important reasons that an open Internet is socially valuable (see my book, Infrastructure). When we use WordPress or Wikipedia to have extended conversations with many different end users distributed around the world, the access providers that we rely on (Comcast, Cogent, etc.) are not mediating a two-sided market; nor is WordPress or Wikipedia or Tumblr. To frame our conversations and relationships as though there are two parties in a market-mediated transaction distorts and cheapens them.
Embedding the false distinction between edge providers and end users in law not only distorts the law and the Internet environment we share, but it also, over time, solidifies the distinction and becomes our reality. It shapes the environment, and we tend to fit the mold provided. The danger of accepting the false and misleading distinction between edge providers and end users today is that it will help the distinction to become reality tomorrow.
I realize that my argument is at odds with the 2010 Open Internet Order, the 2014 NPRM, and the proposals of some open Internet advocates (e.g., Mozilla and others who have proposed creative ideas for regulating only the “edge provider” side of things). So be it. Those same advocates admit that their proposals might not be the best path forward. The FCC has a track record of losing unanimously in court with creative legal gymnastics, and should abandon the entire framework of distinguishing between giant companies and the little guys. All of us pay for Internet access and the FCC needs the authority—whether it uses that authority or not—to ensure that access remains open and free.
The wonderful thing about the Internet and its end-to-end architecture is that we all are capable of being providers, having conversations at the edge without having to include access providers in our conversations.The Deeper Meanings of Cyprus (March 18, 2013)
The deposit-confiscation "bailout" of Cyprus reveals much about the Eurozone's fundamental neocolonial, neofeudal structure. At long last, Europe's flimsy facades of State sovereignty, democracy and free-market capitalism have collapsed, and we see the real machinery laid bare: the Eurozone's political-financial Aristocracy will stripmine every nation's citizenry to preserve their power and protect the banks and bondholders from absorbing losses. The deposit-confiscation "bailout" of Cyprus confirms the Eurozone's fundamental neocolonial, neofeudal structure and the region's political surrender to financialization. The E.U., Neofeudalism and the Neocolonial-Financialization Model (May 24, 2012) Let's list what Cyprus reveals about the true state of financial-political power in Europe: 1. The Core-Periphery terminology masks the real structure: the E.U. operates on a neocolonial model. In the old Colonialism 1.0 model, the colonizing power conquered or co-opted the Power Elites of the periphery regions, and proceeded to exploit the new colonies' resources and labor to enrich the Imperial core. In Neocolonialism, the forces of financialization (debt and leverage controlled by State-enforced banking cartels) are used to indenture the local Elites and populace to the financial core: the peripheral "colonials" borrow money to buy the finished goods manufactured in the core economies, enriching the Imperial Elites with A) the profits made selling goods to the debtors B) interest on credit extended to the peripheral colonies to buy the core economies' goods and "live large", and C) the transactional skim of financializing peripheral assets such as real estate and State debt. In essence, the core banks of the E.U. colonized the peripheral nations via the financializing euro, which enabled a massive expansion of debt and consumption in the periphery. The banks and exporters of the core exacted enormous profits from this expansion of debt and consumption. Now that the financialization scheme of the euro has run its course, the periphery's neocolonial standing is starkly revealed: the assets and income of the periphery are flowing to the core as interest on the private and sovereign debts that are owed to the core's central bank and its crony money-center private banks. This is not just the perfection of neocolonialism but of neofeudalism as well. The peripheral nations of the E.U. are effectively neocolonial debtors of the core (quasi-Imperial) banks, and the taxpayers of the core nations (now reduced to Germany and The Netherlands) are now feudal serfs whose labor is devoted to making good on any bank loans to the periphery that go bad. Though we can term the E.U. a plutocracy or oligarchy, the neofeudal structure compels us to distinguish a class of those holding wealth and political power that is not limited to national border: this is an Aristocracy. Serving the Aristocracy is a well-paid technocrat class of factotums, lackeys, toadies and enforcers. Below this well-compensated caste of technocrats is the larger class of debt-serfs, enslaved to interest payments on either their own debts or the debts of others, and bound by their class powerlessness to protecting banks and bondholders from losses. Cyprus merely adds an expropriation twist to this well-oiled plunder: deposits will be expropriated directly to insure no Imperial (core) banks or bond holders lose money on their absurdly risky loans to periphery nations and serfs. 2. This is a supranational plunder. While commentators can wile away years debating how much Germany benefited from the euro, the real core is not national, it is supranational banks and the political machinery of the E.U. the banks have effectively captured. The citizenry of Germany may approve or disapprove of the Cyprus expropriation, but it doesn't matter either way: their own serfdom to banks and bondholders is simply being masked: the bailouts of periphery nations are transparently bailouts of core banks and bondholders. The nation-states of the neocolonial periphery are simply convenient propaganda placeholders, useful misdirections aimed at the naive and sentimental, hollowed-out national structures propped up to mask the ugly neocolonial reality of servitude and plunder. 3. Democracy is a fiction when no matter who you vote for, the banks and bondholders win control of the national income stream and private wealth. Democracy in Europe is a travesty of a mockery of a sham, an absurd play which is acted out as a form of blood-sport circus to distract the masses from their powerlessness and debt-serfdom. Democracy is a fiction when the policies protecting banks and bondholders from losses remain in place regardless of which political party, coalition |
totally private if you want them to be. The company offers end-to-end encryption if users turn on the app’s “secret chat” feature and thus can’t read those user messages. Regular messages are stored on Telegram’s servers. The app benefited immensely from Brazil’s temporary WhatsApp ban. Telegram claims that it added 5.7 million new users on the day WhatsApp was blocked.
Signal: Owned by Open Whisper Systems, Signal is also end-to-end encrypted. The company explicitly states on its website that it “does not have access to the contents of any messages sent by Signal users.”
Line*: Line offers end-to-end encryption, but only if both the sender and recipient of a message turn on a feature called “Letter Sealing.” This will encrypt your messages so the company can’t read them, but regular messages without the feature are not end-to-end encrypted and Line may have to hand them over if required by Japanese law.
Cyber Dust: Cyber Dust messages are encrypted end-to-end and the company claims they never even touch company servers. They’re also deleted from user phones as soon as they’re read (a la Snapchat). That means the company cannot hand over messages to authorities, even if a formal warrant was provided. “Once it’s gone it’s [gone],” CEO Ryan Ozonian told Re/code.
These Companies Can Read Your Messages
Kik*: Kik also gets an asterisk here. Messages are not end-to-end encrypted, so the company can theoretically read them. But Kik claims it deletes user messages from its servers as soon as they’re delivered to a user’s device. That means it wouldn’t be able to share your messages with authorities if requested, and the length of time during which it could read your messages is extremely short.
Facebook (Messenger and Instagram): Both Facebook Messenger and Facebook-owned Instagram encrypt messages only when they are en route between a user’s device and company servers where they are stored. This means Facebook might have to hand over private messages if required by law.
Google: Messages sent via Google Hangouts are also encrypted en route and even on the company’s servers, but Google can still read them if needed. Encrypting the messages while on Google servers is intended to keep others from jacking in and reading them, but Google itself has the encryption key. This means Google might have to hand over private messages if required by law.
Snapchat: Like Google, Snapchat messages are encrypted while at rest on Snapchat’s servers (though the company has the encryption key if needed). Snaps are deleted from the servers as soon as they’re opened by the intended recipients, and Snapchat claims these delivered messages “typically cannot be retrieved from Snapchat’s servers by anyone, for any reason.” But unopened Snaps are kept on the servers for 30 days before being deleted. That means Snapchat might have to hand over unopened, private messages if required by law.
Twitter: Direct messages on Twitter are not end-to-end encrypted. The company might have to hand over private messages if required by law.
Skype: Microsoft-owned Skype does not offer end-to-end encryption for instant messages. They are stored on Skype’s servers for a “limited time,” which means Skype might have to hand over private messages if required by law.
We’ll continue to add to this list as we hear back from more companies.
**The Telegram section was updated to include distinction that end-to-end encryption is only available for the app’s “secret chats.”The relentless collapse in the price of oil over the past few months has come as a big shock not only to the Russian economy, but also to its political system. As the price falls from its peak earlier in the year of $115 a barrel to below $50, the government faces some harsh choices. Fifty-two per cent of Russia’s budget revenues are derived from the energy sector. And even though the energy sector comprises only 27% of its total economy, the crisis has deflated much of Russia’s self-confidence, and will in the immediate term force the adoption of some drastic economic measures. In the long term, it may set Russia on a new political path.
The administration is facing a perfect storm of negative economic indicators. In his traditional end-of-year interview on 10 December 2014, Dmitry Medvedev, the prime minister, stressed that Russia had not entirely recovered from the great recession of 2008-09, noting that “negative trends have been adding up in our economy for the past few years” and that “there were signs of crisis in the economy all along”. In addition to falling oil prices and “outside pressure”, the rouble crisis had been provoked by “speculation in the national currency”. He admitted that “the sanctions have cost our economy tens of billions of dollars”.
While the country managed to bounce back from the 9% drop in GDP in 2009, it won’t recover from this crisis so easily. Since 2012 the GDP growth rate has been declining sharply, and in 2014 registered a rise of barely 0.5%, with all forecasts predicting at least a 5% fall this year. A one-point interest rate rise in early December has done little to stop the precipitous decline.
Sanctions and the continued downward momentum of oil prices have inflicted powerful economic damage on Russia. Further government actions halted the slide, notably pumping capital into the banking system and ruling out capital controls. This maintained confidence in the banks and prevented panic withdrawals by depositors. Yet if interest rates were kept at 17% the economy would be ruined. Investment, already low, would fall further.
The oligarch class is deeply opposed to the imposition of capital controls, but the government may well soon be running out of other options. Exchange controls would greatly restrict the options of the business class, who until now have used western banks and various offshore holdings to manage their Russian investments and to limit their exposure to political risks emanating from the Russian regime. Thus capital controls represent a fundamental game-changer for the Putin system.
The so-called policy of “deoffshorisation” and nationalisation of the elites has been at the heart of Putin’s third-term presidency, and it is now accelerated by the sanctions and the economic crisis as a whole. The likelihood of a potential split between Putin and the economic elite is low, yet we know that when a bank run starts, it is almost impossible to stop. Typically, Putin is using the actions of adversaries to advance his own agenda, so far fostering elite consolidation at the top and a mass rallying around the flag more broadly.
The man himself has done his best to not to let it show in personal appearances. In his annual presidential address to the federal assembly on 4 December 2014, Putin outlined the key challenges facing Russia in his trademark confident manner. In a rather surprising move, he indicated that rather than intensifying state controls, the crisis would force Russia to liberalise and to develop a more dynamic small and medium business sector by removing the deadweight of the bureaucracy. Above all, he suggested that Russia would not turn to the past for models of its future.
The speech was a surprisingly coherent and measured response to the challenges at that time. It refused to accept that Russia was isolated, and it outlined a surprisingly liberal trajectory for Russia’s development – at a time where many in the west were expecting Putin to tighten the screws and isolate itself further. Instead of turning to greater state involvement in investment decisions and a more autarchic model of economic development – something advocated by his nationalist and neo-Soviet critics – there has been a shift towards supporting small and medium entrepreneurs. Already moves have been taken to reduce the regulatory and inspection burden, and to strengthen the rule of law when it comes to defending property rights.
The system, however, is built to sustain inertia, and operates within the framework of balancing the various factions. The crisis may precisely force a breakout from the economic dead end and political stalemate to achieve a meaningful rejuvenation of the polity and the economy. Putin is a master at the unexpected feint and démarche, and as a result of this crisis he may well surprise us yet.
The Putin system has thrived by the pragmatic use of the various materials to hand, and although there is no question of him backing down under western pressure, he is intelligent enough to avoid the trap in which the Soviet system found itself. Delaying reforms too long and upping defence spending in response to the exaggerated western threat drove the Soviet Union into oblivion. Today there are no ideological obstacles to reforms that would meet the expectations of what some have taken to calling the rising middle class. This would mean more competitive elections and a more vibrant and pluralist public sphere. Stranger things have happened.Milan 2014: holes and tunnels in the top of this wooden desk by Hong Kong-based designer Hao Ruan of LYCS Architecture have been designed to provide a playground for cats (+ slideshow).
Made from a solid piece of wood, the table top features a series of openings and tunnels that have been carved out by hand to create spaces for a cat to satisfy its curiosity and allow pet owners to share their work space with a feline friend.
"People who live with cats always have these kind of experiences: putting away the cat from your laptop was like a sentimental ritual of temporary farewell," explained the design team at LYCS Architecture in a statement. "A proper sized hole could be so irresistible to cats. Their curiosity would be greatly satisfied through repetitively exploring the unknown path behind the hole."
"The design of CATable was a fusion of those experiences, as well a locus where the interaction occurs. It is a table for us, and a paradise for cats."
The table also features angled wooden legs that have been stained with a darker pigment. It was shown in an exhibition at Milan University as part of Milan design week.
Ruan's creation is the latest case of a designer offering a response to a perceived demand for animal-orientated furniture.
Previous examples include the Architecture for Dogs project curated by Muji's creative director Kenya Hara, who commissioned a series of well-known architects and designers to create downloadable templates for dog kennels. Contributors including Toyo Ito, MVRDV, Shigeru Ban and Konstantin Grcic were tasked with creating solutions that altered the way people interacted with their dogs.
Update: CaTable has now gone into production and is available to purchase.S0L, better known as the classy gentleman Steve Lycett of Sumo Digital, has issued a proposition on Sega’s forums to Sega’s many fans. If everyone can come together and decide on three characters on their own, he will present the top three choices to Sega with the possibility that they may be included as future DLC.
Needless to say, the fans answered back.
However, there are a few rules to the challenge. For the characters to be eligible to even be considered, their respective petition must reach 1,000 signatures. Suspicion of duplicate entries will nullify the character entirely, so no cheating. That said, you can vote for as many characters as you want, but only once per character. The deadline for voting is Dec. 1.
Look down below for the whole list of characters who qualify. And yes, you should totally vote for Segata Sanshiro because who wouldn’t want to see a Japanese man in a gi riding a Sega Saturn controller and judo throwing those unfortunate enough to get in his way?
–Alis Landale (Phantasy Star)
–Opa-Opa (Fantasy Zone)
–Space Harrier (Space Harrier)
–Ristar (Ristar The Shooting Star)
–Vectorman (Vectorman)
–Bonanza Bros. (Bonanza Bros.)
–Axel Stone (Streets of Rage)
–Blaze Fielding (Streets of Rage)
–ToeJam & Earl (ToeJam & Earl)
–Sakura Shinguuji (Sakura Taisen)
–Chu Chus (ChuChu Rocket!)
–Ryo Hazuki (Shenmue)
–Arle Nadja (Puyo Puyo)
–Amitie (Puyo Puyo)
–Billy Hatcher (Billy Hatcher & The Giant Egg)
–Welkin (Valkyria Chronicles)
–Selvaria (Valkyria Chronicles)
–Segata Sanshiro
–Phantom R (Rythm Thief)
–Ash (Hell Yeah!)
–Bayonetta (Bayonetta)
–Hatsune Miku (Vocaloid/Project DIVA)Most of the tools I push to github are created out of something that I needed at the moment but could not find a good alternative for. cprop was one of such libraries. It sat there on github all alone for quite some time, and was used only by several people on my team, until it was integrated into Luminus.
Suddenly I started talking to many different people who found flaws in it, or just wanted to add features. I learned a couple of interesting usages from Heroku guys, as well as the importance of merging creds with Vault, coexisting with configs from other fault tolerant and external services such as Consul and more.
One of the useful cprop features is merging configs from various sources. Which is quite an open extension point: i.e. once cprop does its work and comes up with an app config, you can decide how and what will be merged with it before it really becomes a thing. It can be a local map, a.properties file, more ENV vars, more system properties, more configs from anywhere else, including remote/external resources, result from which can be converted to an EDN map.
To enable this merge extension point cprop has several tools that in practice could be really useful on its own: i.e. can be used outside of the (load-config) scope.
Loading from various sources
Could be used as OS, file system and edn oriented I/O tools. Also quite useful in the REPL.
Loading form a classpath
( require'[ cprop. source :as cs ] ) ( cs/from-resource "path/within/classpath/to-some.edn" ) (require '[cprop.source :as cs]) (cs/from-resource "path/within/classpath/to-some.edn")
Loads an EDN file anywhere from within a classpath into a Clojure map.
Loading from a file system
( require'[ cprop. source :as cs ] ) ( cs/from-file "/path/to/something.edn" ) (require '[cprop.source :as cs]) (cs/from-file "/path/to/something.edn")
Loads an EDN file from a file system with an absolute path into a Clojure map.
Loading from system properties
( require'[ cprop. source :as cs ] ) ( cs/from-system-props ) (require '[cprop.source :as cs]) (cs/from-system-props)
Loads all the system properties into a Clojure map. i.e. all the properties that are set with
-Dkey=value, or programmatically set with System.setProperty(key, value), etc.
System properties are usually separated by. (periods). cprop will convert these periods to - (dashes) for key separators.
In order to create a structure in the resulting EDN map use _ (an underscore).
For example:
-Dhttp_pool_socket.timeout= 4242 -Dhttp_pool_socket.timeout=4242
or
System. setProperty ( "http_pool_socket.timeout" "4242" ) ; System.setProperty("http_pool_socket.timeout" "4242");
will be read into:
{ :http { :pool { :socket-timeout 4242 } } } {:http {:pool {:socket-timeout 4242}}}
notice how. was used as - key separator and _ was used to “get-in”: i.e. to create a hierarchy.
Loading from OS (ENV variables)
( require'[ cprop. source :as cs ] ) ( cs/from-env ) (require '[cprop.source :as cs]) (cs/from-env)
Loads all the environment variables into a Clojure map.
ENV variables lack structure. The only way to mimic the structure is via use of an underscore character. The _ is converted to - by cprop, so instead, to identify nesting, two underscores can be used.
For example:
export HTTP__POOL__SOCKET_TIMEOUT = 4242 export HTTP__POOL__SOCKET_TIMEOUT=4242
would be read into:
{ :http { :pool { :socket-timeout 4242 } } } {:http {:pool {:socket-timeout 4242}}}
Notice how two underscores are used for “getting in” and a single underscore just gets converted to a dash as a key separator. More about it, including type inference, in the docs
Loading from.properties files
( require'[ cprop. source :as cs ] ) ( cs/from-props-file "/path/to/some.properties" ) (require '[cprop.source :as cs]) (cs/from-props-file "/path/to/some.properties")
Loads all the key value pairs from.properties file into a Clojure map.
The traditional syntax of a.properties file does not change. For example:
. means structure
four.two=42 would be translated to {:four {:two 42}}
_ would be a key separator
fourty_two=42 would be translated to {:forty-two 42}
, in a value would be a seq separator
planet.uran.moons=titania,oberon would be translated to {:planet {:uran {:moons ["titania" "oberon"]}}}
For example let’s take a solar-system.properties file:
## solar system components components = sun,planets,dwarf planets,moons,comets,asteroids,meteoroids,dust,atomic particles,electromagnetic.radiation,magnetic field star = sun ## planets with Earth days to complete an orbit planet.mercury.orbit_days = 87.969 planet.venus.orbit_days = 224.7 planet.earth.orbit_days = 365.2564 planet.mars.orbit_days = 686.93 planet.jupiter.orbit_days = 4332.59 planet.saturn.orbit_days = 10755.7 planet.uran.orbit_days = 30688.5 planet.neptune.orbit_days = 60148.35 ## planets natural satellites planet.earth.moons = moon planet.jupiter.moons = io,europa,ganymede,callisto planet.saturn.moons = titan planet.uran.moons = titania,oberon planet.neptune.moons = triton # favorite dwarf planet's moons dwarf.pluto.moons = charon,styx,nix,kerberos,hydra ## solar system components components=sun,planets,dwarf planets,moons,comets,asteroids,meteoroids,dust,atomic particles,electromagnetic.radiation,magnetic field star=sun ## planets with Earth days to complete an orbit planet.mercury.orbit_days=87.969 planet.venus.orbit_days=224.7 planet.earth.orbit_days=365.2564 planet.mars.orbit_days=686.93 planet.jupiter.orbit_days=4332.59 planet.saturn.orbit_days=10755.7 planet.uran.orbit_days=30688.5 planet.neptune.orbit_days=60148.35 ## planets natural satellites planet.earth.moons=moon planet.jupiter.moons=io,europa,ganymede,callisto planet.saturn.moons=titan planet.uran.moons=titania,oberon planet.neptune.moons=triton # favorite dwarf planet's moons dwarf.pluto.moons=charon,styx,nix,kerberos,hydra
( cs/from-props-file "solar-system.properties" ) (cs/from-props-file "solar-system.properties")
will convert it to:
{ :components [ "sun" "planets" "dwarf planets" "moons" "comets" "asteroids" "meteoroids" "dust" "atomic particles" "electromagnetic.radiation" "magnetic field" ], :star "sun", :planet { :uran { :moons [ "titania" "oberon" ], :orbit-days 30688.5 }, :saturn { :orbit-days 10755.7, :moons "titan" }, :earth { :orbit-days 365.2564, :moons "moon" }, :neptune { :moons "triton", :orbit-days 60148.35 }, :jupiter { :moons [ "io" "europa" "ganymede" "callisto" ], :orbit-days 4332.59 }, :mercury { :orbit-days 87.969 }, :mars { :orbit-days 686.93 }, :venus { :orbit-days 224.7 } }, :dwarf { :pluto { :moons [ "charon" "styx" "nix" "kerberos" "hydra" ] } } } {:components ["sun" "planets" "dwarf planets" "moons" "comets" "asteroids" "meteoroids" "dust" "atomic particles" "electromagnetic.radiation" "magnetic field"], :star "sun", :planet {:uran {:moons ["titania" "oberon"], :orbit-days 30688.5}, :saturn {:orbit-days 10755.7, :moons "titan"}, :earth {:orbit-days 365.2564, :moons "moon"}, :neptune {:moons "triton", :orbit-days 60148.35}, :jupiter {:moons ["io" "europa" "ganymede" "callisto"], :orbit-days 4332.59}, :mercury {:orbit-days 87.969}, :mars {:orbit-days 686.93}, :venus {:orbit-days 224.7}}, :dwarf {:pluto {:moons ["charon" "styx" "nix" "kerberos" "hydra"]}}}
Converting for other sources
Most Java apps store their configs in.properties files. Most docker deployments rely on ENV variables. cprop has some open tools it uses internally to work with these formats to bring EDN closer to non EDN apps and sources.
EDN to.properties
( require'[ cprop. tools :as t ] ) ( t/map- > props - file config ) (require '[cprop.tools :as t]) (t/map->props-file config)
Converts config map into a.properties file, saves the file under temp directory and returns a path to it.
For example, let’s say we have a map m :
{ :datomic { :url "datomic:sql://?jdbc:postgresql://localhost:5432/datomic?user=datomic&password=datomic" }, :source { :account { :rabbit { :host "127.0.0.1", :port 5672, :vhost "/z-broker", :username "guest", :password "guest" } } }, :answer 42 } {:datomic {:url "datomic:sql://?jdbc:postgresql://localhost:5432/datomic?user=datomic&password=datomic"}, :source {:account {:rabbit {:host "127.0.0.1", :port 5672, :vhost "/z-broker", :username "guest", :password "guest"}}}, :answer 42}
( t/map- > props - file m ) (t/map->props-file m)
would convert it to a property file and would return an OS/env specific path to it, in this case:
"/tmp/cprops-1483938858641-2232644763732980231.tmp" "/tmp/cprops-1483938858641-2232644763732980231.tmp"
$ cat /tmp/cprops- 1483938858641 - 2232644763732980231.tmp answer = 42 source.account.rabbit.host = 127.0.0.1 source.account.rabbit.port = 5672 source.account.rabbit.vhost = /z-broker source.account.rabbit.username = guest source.account.rabbit.password = guest datomic.url = datomic:sql://?jdbc:postgresql://localhost:5432/datomic?user=datomic&password=datomic $ cat /tmp/cprops-1483938858641-2232644763732980231.tmp answer=42 source.account.rabbit.host=127.0.0.1 source.account.rabbit.port=5672 source.account.rabbit.vhost=/z-broker source.account.rabbit.username=guest source.account.rabbit.password=guest datomic.url=datomic:sql://?jdbc:postgresql://localhost:5432/datomic?user=datomic&password=datomic
EDN to ENV
( require'[ cprop. tools :as t ] ) ( t/map- > env - file config ) (require '[cprop.tools :as t]) (t/map->env-file config)
Converts config map into a file with ENV variable exports, saves the file under temp directory and returns a path to it.
For example, let’s say we have a map m :
{ :datomic { :url "datomic:sql://?jdbc:postgresql://localhost:5432/datomic?user=datomic&password=datomic" }, :source { :account { :rabbit { :host "127.0.0.1", :port 5672, :vhost "/z-broker", :username "guest", :password "guest" } } }, :answer 42 } {:datomic {:url "datomic:sql://?jdbc:postgresql://localhost:5432/datomic?user=datomic&password=datomic"}, :source {:account {:rabbit {:host "127.0.0.1", :port 5672, :vhost "/z-broker", :username "guest", :password "guest"}}}, :answer 42}
( t/map- > env - file m ) (t/map->env-file m)
would convert it to a property file and would return an OS/env specific path to it, in this case:
"/tmp/cprops-1483939362242-8501882574334641044.tmp" "/tmp/cprops-1483939362242-8501882574334641044.tmp"
$ cat / tmp / cprops- 1483939362242 - 8501882574334641044.tmp export ANSWER = 42 export SOURCE__ACCOUNT__RABBIT__HOST =127.0.0.1 export SOURCE__ACCOUNT__RABBIT__PORT = 5672 export SOURCE__ACCOUNT__RABBIT__VHOST = / z-broker export SOURCE__ACCOUNT__RABBIT__USERNAME =guest export SOURCE__ACCOUNT__RABBIT__PASSWORD =guest export DATOMIC__URL =datomic:sql: //?jdbc:postgresql: // localhost: 5432 / datomic? user =datomic & password =datomic $ cat /tmp/cprops-1483939362242-8501882574334641044.tmp export ANSWER=42 export SOURCE__ACCOUNT__RABBIT__HOST=127.0.0.1 export SOURCE__ACCOUNT__RABBIT__PORT=5672 export SOURCE__ACCOUNT__RABBIT__VHOST=/z-broker export SOURCE__ACCOUNT__RABBIT__USERNAME=guest export SOURCE__ACCOUNT__RABBIT__PASSWORD=guest export DATOMIC__URL=datomic:sql://?jdbc:postgresql://localhost:5432/datomic?user=datomic&password=datomic
notice the double underscores to preserve the original map’s hierarchy.
.properties to one level EDN
( require'[ cprop. source :as cs ] ) ( cs/slurp-props-file "/path/to/some.properties" ) (require '[cprop.source :as cs]) (cs/slurp-props-file "/path/to/some.properties")
Besides the from-props-file function that converts.properties file to a map with hierarchy, there is also a slurp-props-file function that simply converts a property file to a map without parsing values or building a hierarchy.
For example this “solar-system.properties” file:
## solar system components components = sun,planets,dwarf planets,moons,comets,asteroids,meteoroids,dust,atomic particles,electromagnetic.radiation,magnetic field star = sun ## planets with Earth days to complete an orbit planet.mercury.orbit_days = 87.969 planet.venus.orbit_days = 224.7 planet.earth.orbit_days = 365.2564 planet.mars.orbit_days = 686.93 planet.jupiter.orbit_days = 4332.59 planet.saturn.orbit_days = 10755.7 planet.uran.orbit_days = 30688.5 planet.neptune.orbit_days = 60148.35 ## planets natural satellites planet.earth.moons = moon planet.jupiter.moons = io,europa,ganymede,callisto planet.saturn.moons = titan planet.uran.moons = titania,oberon planet.neptune.moons = triton # favorite dwarf planet's moons dwarf.pluto.moons = charon,styx,nix,kerberos,hydra ## solar system components components=sun,planets,dwarf planets,moons,comets,asteroids,meteoroids,dust,atomic particles,electromagnetic.radiation,magnetic field star=sun ## planets with Earth days to complete an orbit planet.mercury.orbit_days=87.969 planet.venus.orbit_days=224.7 planet.earth.orbit_days=365.2564 planet.mars.orbit_days=686.93 planet.jupiter.orbit_days=4332.59 planet.saturn.orbit_days=10755.7 planet.uran.orbit_days=30688.5 planet.neptune.orbit_days=60148.35 ## planets natural satellites planet.earth.moons=moon planet.jupiter.moons=io,europa,ganymede,callisto planet.saturn.moons=titan planet.uran.moons=titania,oberon planet.neptune.moons=triton # favorite dwarf planet's moons dwarf.pluto.moons=charon,styx,nix,kerberos,hydra
by
( cs/slurp-props-file "solar-system.properties" ) (cs/slurp-props-file "solar-system.properties")
would be converted to a “one level” EDN map:
{ "star" "sun", "planet.jupiter.moons" "io,europa,ganymede,callisto", "planet.neptune.moons" "triton", "planet.jupiter.orbit_days" "4332.59", "planet.uran.orbit_days" "30688.5", "planet.venus.orbit_days" "224.7", "planet.earth.moons" "moon", "planet.saturn.orbit_days" "10755.7", "planet.mercury.orbit_days" "87.969", "planet.saturn.moons" "titan", "planet.earth.orbit_days" "365.2564", "planet.uran.moons" "titania,oberon", "planet.mars.orbit_days" "686.93", "planet.neptune.orbit_days" "60148.35" "dwarf.pluto.moons" "charon,styx,nix,kerberos,hydra", "components" "sun,planets,dwarf planets,moons,comets,asteroids,meteoroids,dust,atomic particles,electromagnetic.radiation,magnetic field" } {"star" "sun", "planet.jupiter.moons" "io,europa,ganymede,callisto", "planet.neptune.moons" "triton", "planet.jupiter.orbit_days" "4332.59", "planet.uran.orbit_days" "30688.5", "planet.venus.orbit_days" "224.7", "planet.earth.moons" "moon", "planet.saturn.orbit_days" "10755.7", "planet.mercury.orbit_days" "87.969", "planet.saturn.moons" "titan", "planet.earth.orbit_days" "365.2564", "planet.uran.moons" "titania,oberon", "planet.mars.orbit_days" "686.93", "planet.neptune.orbit_days" "60148.35" "dwarf.pluto.moons" "charon,styx,nix,kerberos,hydra", "components" "sun,planets,dwarf planets,moons,comets,asteroids,meteoroids,dust,atomic particles,electromagnetic.radiation,magnetic field"}A testimony is a spiritual feeling we get from the Holy Ghost that tells us that a certain spiritual principle is true or good. In the above video, many modern followers of Christ share with us how they have increased their testimony through the Holy Spirit.
President Dieter F. Uchtdorf explains that the blessings of gaining a stronger testimony are “perspective, motivation, and a solid foundationon which to build a life of purpose and personal growth.”
He also said: “We all know that it is easier to talk about a testimony than to acquire one. The process to receive one is based on the law of the harvest: ‘For whatsoever a man soweth, that shall he also reap’ (Galatians 6:7). No good thing comes without effort and sacrifice. If we have to work hard to obtain a testimony, it will make us and our testimony even stronger. And if we share our testimony, it will grow” (“The Power of a Personal Testimony,” Oct. 2006 general conference).
In order to gain, maintain, and deepen a testimony, we have to work to feel the Spirit on a daily basis. Forming testimony-building habits will help you to receive a personal testimony.
Modern prophets and leaders have shared how to build a testimony.
President Uchtdorf counsels: “Desire to believe. The Book of Mormon encourages us: ‘If [you] will awake and arouse your faculties, even to an experiment upon my words, and exercise a particle of faith, … even if [you] can no more than desire to believe’ (Alma 32:27)” (“The Power of a Personal Testimony”).
Elder Richard G. Scott encourages scripture study: “Pondering a passage of scripture can be a key to unlock revelation and the guidance and inspiration of the Holy Ghost” (“The Power of Scripture,” Oct. 2011 general conference).
The prophet, President Thomas S. Monson, said, “Prayer surely is the passport to spiritual power” (“Your Celestial Journey,” Apr. 1999 general conference).
Mary N. Cook said: “How can attending [church]—particularly sacrament meeting—bless you and your family? Regularly partaking of the sacrament will help you keep your baptismal covenant. As you live worthily and renew this covenant weekly, you will qualify for the guidance of the Spirit. The Holy Ghost will guide you and will teach you what you should do to bless your family” (“Strengthen Home and Family,” Oct. 2007 general conference).EAST LANSING - After introducing Michigan State's 2018 recruiting class during the first day of the early signing period Wednesday, coach Mark Dantonio addressed the close of the 2017 season.
The No. 16 Spartans (9-3, 7-2 Big Ten) will face No. 18 Washington State (9-3, 6-3 Pac-12) in the Dec. 28 Holiday Bowl in San Diego and Dantonio said the majority of the team will make the trip. He later elaborated about absences when asked.
Redshirt junior defensive end Robert Bowers is no longer on the team while redshirt freshmen safety Austin Andrews and true freshman defensive end Lashawn Paulino-Bell are suspended for the Holiday Bowl.
Bowers, from Walnut Ridge High School in Columbus, Ohio, appeared in eight games this season and had two tackles and a quarterback hurry. He was listed as a backup on the depth chart before Michigan State's 40-7 win at Rutgers on Nov. 25 but had apparently had already been off the team for a couple weeks.
"Robert Bowers (is) no longer on the team following the Ohio State game," Dantonio said of the 48-3 loss at Ohio State on Nov. 11 in which Bowers played. "Separated from the team."
Andrews, from St. Francis DeSales High School in Columbus, Ohio, redshirted last year and has appeared in just one game this season with one tackle. Paulino-Bell, from St. Thomas Aquinas High School in Fort Lauderdale, Fla., has not appeared in a game this year while taking a redshirt. He was injured in a jet ski accident in April but arrived on campus in July.
"It's not related to academics," Dantonio said of the suspended freshmen. "Lashawn Paulino-Bell will not make the trip, nor will Austin Andrews. Separate incidents. I suspended them for the bowl game."A squabble over who stole the magic marker seems more fitting for a classroom than a courtroom. But a federal judge has sided with T-Mobile in a recent trademark lawsuit, saying that Aio Wireless, an AT&T subsidiary, isn't allowed to use colors resembling T-Mobile's promotional "magenta" color.
The Texas court has ordered AT&T to stop using Pantone 676C, a.k.a "plum," over fears that it might cause consumers to confuse the two brands. According to the presiding judge, T-Mobile successfully argued that letting Aio continue to use a variant of magenta would cause it irreparable harm.
In a statement declaring victory, T-Mobile called AT&T's actions a "transparent effort to infringe" and that the court rightfully defended T-Mobile's sole ability to use the color magenta.
A spokesperson for Aio, Alejandra Arango, said the company has already given up using its controversial color of choice.
"While we disagree with the court's decision, it addresses advertising and store designs that we are no longer implementing. Accordingly, this decision has no effect on our advertising plans," Arango said.
T-Mobile's claim stems from its parent company, Deutsche Telekom, which in the 2000s trademarked a pinkish hue known as RAL 4010 for its promotional campaigns. A side-by-side comparison back in August showed that what T-Mobile argues is "magenta" seemed pretty distinctive from the wine-colored tone that Aio used. In fact, T-Mobile's definition of magenta appears to have expanded beyond its original trademark; rather than owning a specific shade of pink, the company is now claiming nearby colors, as well.
With due respect to the importance of trademarks, if there were an Academy Award for silly lawsuits, this one might qualify. After all, few things speak more loudly than price and service quality |
manager of product marketing at Illumina.
Flatley says the new machine can partially sequence five human genomes in a day. A complete run takes three days, during which time it can produce 16 human genomes at a quality level widely accepted by the sequencing community.
This means that if just four labs were running 10-unit installations of the new machines in 2014, they could produce more human genome sequences than had ever been produced by all the other labs in the world, says Flatley.
The first three customers are all powerhouses of genome sequencing: Macrogen, a genomic services company in Seoul; the Broad Institute in Boston; and the Garvan Institute of Medical Research in Sydney.James Shore, whose work I greatly respect, wandered Twitter one day asking
Agile folks: The term “velocity” (the prediction mechanism) has been coopted. We need to come up with a new term. Ideas? — James Shore ( @jamesshore ) December 18, 2015
I had the impulse to tell him that the name doesn’t matter, but I stopped myself, because I really meant that I didn’t mind the name very much on its own, and if James is looking for a different name, then certainly he is dealing with a significant problem. He doesn’t rename concepts for fun.
So what’s so wrong with “velocity”? It reasonably accurately describes, as James later put it, “the sum of the estimates of the stories that were started and 100% completed in the previous iteration”. I consider this the “current” or “recent” velocity, whereas when I think of “velocity” in general, it brings to mind the trend of velocity per iteration over time. This all sounds reasonable to me. So why the need to change the name? Presumably, because some people—at least, the people James was thinking of at the time he tweeted—are or were doing strange things and invoking “velocity” to support those strange things.
I think we can guess some of those strange things. The most common strange thing seems to be using velocity as a goal, rather than as information with which to, you know, manage the project.
I wrote about this at length years ago, so if you find yourself in the mood for a longer-form rant from 2008, then click here.
Does Anyone Remember Planning to Capacity?
When I first read about “velocity” (or “load factor”, if you want to go back far enough into history), I think I read something about how to use it as a way to plan based on the observed capacity of the team. I even remember reading about individual load factor! I remember reading that measuring individual load factor helped identify overloaded team members so that we could redirect work away from those people until they had a more balanced workload. It all sounds very reasonable to me, and looking back, very Theory of Constraints-like.
I do not remember recommending that we use load factor as a way to punish slow, ineffective, unskilled programmers. Why do you have those, anyway? It sounds like a risky way to invest your department’s hiring budget. I do not remember recommending that we use velocity as a way to pit teams against one another, nor as a way to establish an organization-wide ranking system for team productivity. Why would you need that, anyway? It sounds horrible—even demeaning.
What stands out most in my memory of this: the principle of yesterday’s weather. I remember some trite metaphor related to how easily one can accurately predict today’s weather: predict that it will be the same as yesterday’s weather, enjoy being right 70% of the time, then go about your day. Quick, easy, good enough. Accordingly, if we assume that the team managed to produce 21 points of stuff this past iteration, then maybe they have a 70% chance of producing 21 points of stuff in this next iteration, so we should probably plan accordingly.
Please don’t rush past that last sentence. Read it again. Let me help you.
Accordingly, if we assume that the team managed to produce 21 points of stuff this past iteration, then maybe they have a 70% chance of producing 21 points of stuff in this next iteration, so we should probably plan accordingly.
WE SHOULD PROBABLY PLAN ACCORDINGLY.
(I need Garrett Morris at a time like this.)
The Source of Our Trouble with Velocity?
I suspect that we can trace the vast majority of our problems with velocity to one simple truth: we don’t handle bad news well. We hear “you’re not going to get what you want when you asked for it” and we lose our minds. I can think of a number of good reasons for reacting this way.
We make important plans based on projecting a team’s velocity.
We feel pressure to deliver, but we’ve been forced to delegate some of that responsibility to others that we don’t entirely trust.
We have good reason not to entirely trust some of the people doing some of the important work.
We blame unreliable people even in spite of the fact that we know that not all their unreliability is their fault.
We accept pressure to deliver, even though we recognize that a lot of it is nothing but false urgency.
We know that we have too many programmers, and we have no better way to evaluate their work, and “something is better than nothing”
…
…
It becomes very complicated very quickly, with a lot of positive feedback loops of negative feelings. We can’t fix that problem overnight. Some of those problems we will never, ever fix. So what do we do?
Planning to Capacity is the Best Defence
Forget about “a good offence”. The best defence in this situation is to plan to capacity, because that’s the best measure of flow of value you have. While you figure out how to deal with all the other problems, you really should take your team’s velocity seriously, and stop treating it like a configuration setting you can change at will. It just doesn’t work that way. Instead, when you see how slowly (sorry) value is flowing out of your team, plan accordingly. Don’t just beat them over the head. Don’t just tell them to work harder. Plan accordingly while you look for ways to help the team improve their work systems.
In the meantime, if the people around you are spinning their wheels, wasting precious energy yelling about “velocity”, then you could start talking about “capacity”. Maybe that might help. “How do we increase the capacity of the team?” feels like it might lead in a more productive direction than “Can’t the team go any faster?!?!” In this respect, I agree: forget “velocity”, while you’re helping your organization figure out to really forget velocity.New Delhi: Breaking his silence, Prime Minister Narendra Modi on Thursday "strongly disapproved" of Union Minister Sadhvi Niranjan Jyoti's controversial remarks, saying such language should be avoided.
With Opposition stalling proceedings in Rajya Sabha for past three days demanding sacking of the minister, Modi appealed to members to allow the House to function in national interest as she has already apologised.
"I was informed about the statement which caused the controversy on the day BJP Parliamentary Party was to meet. In the meeting I strongly disapproved of the remarks and I said we should avoid using such language," he said.
In election heat, he said, leaders should avoid using such language.
Modi said after the minister's apology the matter should rest and the House resume in normal functioning.
The Prime Minister said Jyoti is a first time minister and a new member of Parliament and the House should show magnanimity by accepting her apology considering this.
"When the Minister has apologised, I appeal and request the House (to resume normal business)... In national interest, we must carry forward work (of the House)," he said, adding members should maintain decorum.
Modi said he shared the view that after the minister's apology, the matter should be considered closed.
The 47-year-old minister joined the Modi government on November 09, taking charge as minister of state for food processing. Addressing a crowd in west Delhi, she had said, “You have to decide. Do you want a government of Ramzadon or Haramzadon (illegitimate-born)?”
The Minister of State for Food Processing has already expressed "deep regret" and apologised for her actions but the Opposition has been demanding her sacking.
Modi came to the House when it reassembled after a 15-minute adjournment forced by the opposition members demanding resignation of the minister.
As soon as the House met for the day, the entire opposition was on its feet to press for the demand.
As Deputy Chairman P J Kurien asked ministers to lay the listed papers, slogan shouting Congress members trooped into the Well.
The slogan shouting continued even after he took up Zero Hour mentions.
With members unrelenting, he adjourned the House for 15 minutes.
When the House reassembled, Parliamentary Affairs Minister M Venkaiah Naidu said the Prime Minister wants to make a statement and he be allowed to do so.
After Modi's statement, Anand Sharma (Cong) said the Prime Minister should take strong action against the minister as the Constitution does not permit such utterances.
Finance Minister and Leader of House Arun Jaitley said the Opposition had been demanding that the Prime Minister come to the House and make a statement. Now that Modi has made the statement, the House should get on to its business, he said.
Sitaram Yechuri (CPI-M) said the minister had not apologised and had merely expressed regret.
"Assuming that she has apologised... you apologise only when you have done some wrong," he said, demanding action against the minister.
As opposition members refused to resume their seats and treasury benches objected to the repeated disruptions even after Prime Minister's statement, Kurien said members were yesterday complaining that their Zero Hour concerns could not be taken up due to disruptions. "You are losing Zero Hour. Don't blame me," he said.
Kurien said the issue has been under discussion for three days and no further discussion can be allowed. "You cannot have discussion on the same subject every day," he said.
When Tiruchi Siva (DMK) asked as to why the Chair was depriving opportunity to one side to speak, Kurien shot back saying, "Don't cast aspersions on the Chair... You are depriving right of 15 members (who gave Zero Hour notice)."
Kurien said he has allowed Sharad Yadav (JD-U) to speak as he is a senior member and after his statement Zero Hour will be taken up.
Yadav (JD-U) said this is not the first time that such a statement has been made and there have been several such statements to vitiate communal atmosphere.
As pandemonium continued, Kurien adjourned the House till noon.
Similar scenes were witnessed again during the Question Hour and the House was adjourned twice.
As Chairman Hamid Ansari took up the first listed question, Leader of the Opposition Anand Sharma requested him to allow members to "speak their mind" which was objected by members of the treasury bench.
When Ansari did not allow them, Congress, SP and JD-U members trooped into the Well leading to a brief adjournment. Ansari criticised their action as "utterly disgraceful".
Scenes did not change when the House reassembled as protests from the opposition resumed.
When the opposition members rushed into the Well once again Ansari observed, "This is a very sad state of affairs." He then adjourned the House till 2 pm.In the largest epidemiological study conducted in the developing world, researchers found that as exposures to fine particulate air pollution in 272 Chinese cities increase, so do deaths from cardiovascular and respiratory diseases.
The researchers reported their results in "Fine Particulate Air Pollution and Daily Mortality: A Nationwide Analysis in 272 Chinese Cities," published online ahead of print in the American Thoracic Society's American Journal of Respiratory and Critical Care Medicine.
"Fine particulate [PM2.5] air pollution is one of the key public health concerns in developing countries including China, but the epidemiological evidence about its health effects is scarce," said senior study author Maigeng Zhou, PhD, deputy director of the National Center for Chronic and Non-communicable Disease Control and Prevention, Chinese Center for Disease Control and Prevention. "A new monitoring network allowed us to conduct a nationwide study to evaluate short-term associations between PM2.5 and daily cause-specific mortality in China."
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The researchers found: * The average annual exposure to PM2.5 in the Chinese cities was 56 micrograms per cubic meter (μg/m3)--well above the World Health Organization air quality guidelines of 10 μg/m3. * Each 10 μg/m3 increase in air pollution was associated with a 0.22 percent increase in mortality from all non-accident related causes. * Each 10 μg/m3 increase in air pollution was associated with a 0.29 percent increase in all respiratory mortality and a 0.38 percent increase in chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD) mortality. * Mortality was significantly higher among people age 75 and older and among people with lower levels of education. * The association between PM2.5 levels and mortality was stronger in cities with higher average annual temperatures.
The researchers speculate that differences in educational attainment may result in environmental health inequalities and access to health care that affect mortality. In warmer cities, the authors hypothesize residents may spend more time outdoors and open windows, increasing their exposure to PM2.5.
The researchers said their study suggests a weaker association between increases in PM2.5 and mortality than studies conducted in Europe and North America. They suggest a number of possible explanations for this difference, including that in most Chinese cities there was a plateauing of mortality at the highest levels of pollution and the components of PM2.5 pollution in China may be less toxic than the components in Europe and North America. Crustal dust from arid lands and construction make up more PM2.5 pollution in China than it does in Europe and North America.
In 2013 China began introducing PM2.5 monitoring in urban areas. The current study analyzed available data between 2013-15. For nearly half the cities in the study, there was only one year of PM2.5 data available, and the authors note that a limitation of their study is that it does not look at the cumulative effect of PM2.5 over many years.
"Our findings may be helpful to formulate public health policies and ambient air quality standards in developing countries to reduce the disease burden associated with PM2.5 air pollution," said study co-author Haidong Kan, MD, professor of public health at Fudan University in China. "Further massive investigations, especially looking at the long-term effect studies, are needed to confirm our results and to identify the most toxic components of PM2.5 in China."
#Paper Reviewed
Esper, J., Duthorn, E., Krusic, P.J., Timonen, M. and Buntgen, U. 2014. Northern European summer temperature variations over the Common Era from integrated tree-ring density records. Journal of Quaternary Science 29: 487-494.
In a paper published in the Journal of Quaternary Science, Esper et al. (2014) write that tree-ring chronologies of maximum latewood density (MXD) "are most suitable to reconstruct annually resolved summer temperature variations of the late Holocene." And working with what they call "the world's two longest MXD-based climate reconstructions" - those of Melvin et al. (2013) and Esper et al. (2012) - they combined portions of each to produce a new-and-improved summer temperature history for northern Europe that stretches all the way "from 17 BC to the present." And what did they thereby learn?
As the international team of researchers from the Czech Republic, Finland, Germany, Greece, Sweden and Switzerland describes it, this history depicts "a long-term cooling trend of -0.30°C per 1,000 years over the Common Era in northern Europe" (see figure below). Most important of all, however, they note that their temperature reconstruction "has centennial-scale variations superimposed on this trend," which indicate that "conditions during Medieval and Roman times were probably warmer than in the late 20th century," when the previously-rising post-Little Ice Age mean global air temperature hit a ceiling of sorts above which it has yet to penetrate.
Northern Europe summer (June, July, August) temperature reconstruction. Data shown in°C with respect to the 1961-1990 mean. Adapted from Esper et al. (2014). Northern Europe summer (June, July, August) temperature reconstruction. Data shown in°C with respect to the 1961-1990 mean. Adapted from Esper et al. (2014).
And so we continue to collect ever more real-world evidence for the fact, that there is nothing unusual, unnatural or unprecedented about the Earth's current level of warmth.
References
Esper, J., Frank, D.C., Timonen, M., Zorita, E., Wilson, R.J.S., Luterbacher, J., Holzkamper, S., Fischer, N., Wagner, S., Nievergelt, D., Verstege, A. and Buntgen, U. 2012. Orbital forcing of tree-ring data. Nature Climate Change 2: 862-866.
Melvin, T.M., Grudd, H. and Briffa, K.R. 2013. Potential bias in 'updating' tree-ring chronologies using Regional Curve Standardization: reprocessing the Tornetrask maximum-latewood-density data. The Holocene 23: 364-373.In this photo taken from video footage, Andre Spicer, father of five-year-old girl who was stopped by council officers from selling home-made lemonade, talks to a reporter in London, Friday, July 21, 2017. A British man and his young daughter have gained international attention for being fined 150 pounds ($195) for selling lemonade without a license near their home in London. (ITN via AP)
LONDON (AP) — A British man and his young daughter have gained international attention for being fined for selling lemonade.
Andre Spicer said his 5-year-old daughter was left in tears after local council officers fined her 150 pounds ($195) for selling lemonade without a license near their home in London.
The girl was selling home-made lemonade to fans attending the Lovebox dance festival when she was fined.
The four officers approached the girl and began speaking in technical legal terms, telling her that her lemonade stand infringed on local business rights.
Halfway through the interaction with the officers, Spicer said his daughter burst into tears and said “I’ve done a bad thing, daddy. I’ve done something wrong.”
“I think initially she was a bit shocked and sad,” Spicer said. “And then I suggested we try it again with a permit. And she said: ‘Oh, it’s a bit scary.’”
He hopes that his daughter will overcome the “heart-wrenching” experience and continue to pursue entrepreneurial ideas.
Spicer wrote an article about the incident for the Daily Telegraph that garnered hundreds of comments and shares online.
Local officials said the fine will be cancelled immediately. They have apologized to the family.
In a statement Friday, the council said it was “very sorry” about what happened and that its enforcement officers are expected to “show common sense, and to use their powers sensibly. This clearly did not happen.”Wayne County Circuit Court Judge Prentis Edwards once again declared the Detroit International Bridge Company in contempt of court this morning for failing to complete the Gateway Project.
The project, intended to better connect the Ambassador Bridge with interstate highways, cost Michigan taxpayers over $200 million and was supposed to have been completed by April 2008.
However, the DIBC and the Michigan Department of Transportation locked horns over the project’s scope of work. The Gateway Project remains uncompleted.
In February 2010, Judge Edwards ruled the DIBC must “construct a two-lane access road, relocate conflicting structures, and complete its portion of the Ambassador Bridge Gateway Project Agreement in accordance with plans attached to the Performance Bond and the Maintenance Agreement.”
In January 2011, Edwards ruled DIBC was in contempt of court for failing to comply with his order, and briefly jailed DIBC President Dan Stamper.
The ordered work still has not taken place to the court’s satisfaction because DIBC again finds itself in contempt of court. Edwards said there was “clear and unequivocal evidence” that the DIBC failed to comply with the February 2010 order.
“We are approximately three-and-a-half years past the latest anticipated completion date for this project,” Edwards said, when making his ruling. “It’s been over a year-and-a-half since the February 1, 2010 order was entered, almost ten months have passed since the January 10, 2011 order was entered. There still remain significant differences between the construction, the proposed construction plans, and the approved design.”
Edwards scheduled a January 12, 2012 hearing to impose sanctions. He further ordered DIBC owner Matty Moroun and company executives to appear in his courtroom for the hearing. He did not rule out the possibility of jailing Moroun or DIBC officers.
MDOT is requesting the appointment of an independent receiver to complete the Gateway Project in place of DIBC. Edwards scheduled a December 1 hearing to hear arguments on that potentiality.
After today’s hearing, MDOT engineer Tony Kratofil said the DIBC has not moved fast enough to complete the project as initially agreed upon. He cited DIBC’s delays in removing disputed duty-free store and gas station (the “conflicting structures” mentioned in the court order) as an example.
“They had started doing some work on the gas pumps,” said Kratofil. “They removed the canopy. They removed the pumps. That’s like taking the faucets off the sink when you were told to take the house down. They’ve begun superficial work. But, clearly, they’ve had a couple years to really do this. If that’s all they can get accomplished, then clearly their intent is not to get this done.”
Neither Stamper, who attended today’s hearing, nor DIBC lawyers would comment after the ruling.
Edwards also ordered DIBC to perform necessary construction work between now and the scheduled January 12, 2012 hearing to comply with the initial court order.CLOSE Police said a firefighter was in the back of the stolen ambulance.
Michael Lopez (Photo: Goodyear Police Department)
Goodyear police have arrested a man in his late 30s after they say he stole a Buckeye Valley Fire District ambulance parked outside a West Valley hospital and drove it to his Avondale home, according to a department spokeswoman.
Patient Michael Lopez "escaped" the hospital and stole the ambulance that was parked outside, Goodyear police spokeswoman Lisa Kutis said.
Police attempted to pull Lopez over, but he refused, Kutis said. Authorities later found the ambulance at Lopez's home in the 100 block of East Southern Lane.
Lopez is facing charges of theft, felony flight, failure to yield to police and disorderly conduct, Kutis said.
Read or Share this story: http://azc.cc/1w1Ff7jLe Petit Jardin (Photo courtesy of Celine Sopelo)
One local restaurant has taken the plunge and started accepting bitcoins, the preferred currency of internet-dwellers.
Celine Sopelo, the owner of Le Petit Jardin, started taking bitcoins a few months ago for her business that is one part French-inspired bistro and one part flower shop. Sopelo says that a friend visiting from Germany introduced her to bitcoins and suggested that she started accepting the currency from her customers. She put up a sign in the window three months ago letting customers know bitcoin was accepted there.
She says she's still learning about bitcoins, but she already sees some big pros as a small business owner: "No bank fees, it's very easy, it's easier than taking credit cards."
She's also noticed an interesting phenomenon: She says that while not many of her customers have been paying with bitcoins, some people come to her just so that they can pay using bitcoins.
Some of the local businesses advertising that they take bitcoins (usebitcoins.info)
Restaurants and bars in NYC and other cities have caught onto the new, digital currency, but this is the first we've heard of in L.A (if you know of some, leave them in the comments). There are some other local businesses advertising the fact they take the coins on this website.
Businesses are taking them for the same reasons it interested Sopelo—it's cheaper to take bitcoins than credit cards. Farmers have shown an interest in it, because their businesses run on such low margins. (That includes a grocer that sets up shop at farmers market in San Diego.)
The New York Times did a story a few weeks ago about the "much-hyped and much-doubted" currency's slow move into the mainstream. The price of bitcoins have fluctuated wildly, which has worried some people, but Sopelo is optimistic that it will be a good investment in the long run: "In the meantime, I'm benefitting, because I think the bit coin is going to go up, it's not going to go down."On College Campuses, Suicide Intervention Via Anonymous App
We've heard a lot about how people get ugly online — abuse others and bully because they don't have to stand behind their words. But there's an upside to anonymity on the Internet, too: Good things can happen when you don't have to say your name.
On the app Yik Yak, for example, college students are asking for help when they're feeling desperate or even suicidal — and the anonymous crowds are responding with kindness.
Samantha Braver, a rising sophomore at the College of William & Mary, describes herself as a frequent user of Yik Yak. The app allows you to post things anonymously. People physically nearby, within a 5-mile radius, can view and respond.
Braver was scrolling through her feed about an hour before NPR's interview, and she stumbled across a post that concerned her.
Enlarge this image toggle caption Samantha Braver Samantha Braver
She sent a screen shot: "I want to turn my emotions off. There's very little left for me to be happy about and it's only a matter of time before those things fade too."
Braver's school, based in Williamsburg, Va., has had three student deaths on campus in the last year, including two confirmed suicides. The fact that students can and do hurt themselves is not a joke.
In response to this specific Yak, as they're called, others urged the person to get help. One post said: "I had a friend kill himself a few years ago and I would have gladly heard his s*** and a lot worse if it would have made the difference."
The person seemed unmoved. Braver chimed in too: "You are loved. Please don't do this."
Across college campuses, students and counselors say that students are posting their suicidal thoughts. Some are subtle, not explicitly about feelings. Emily Reiling, a student at Villanova, outside Philadelphia, recalls when someone simply posted: "If I were to put up my laptop for free or for sale, would anyone buy it?"
Yik Yak users started responding yes, they'd buy or take it.
Then the turning point came. "Somebody asked where they could pick up this free stuff," Reiling recalls. "The student said, 'at the hospital.' So then people were concerned. Why would she or he be at a hospital?"
The comments on the thread changed. Yakers down-voted previous responses about freebies. With five down votes, a post gets automatically deleted. People offered an ear to listen, a hug, free cookies.
And even after weeks went by, there was follow-up. Reiling reads the thread, in which one person recently posted, "I hope summer is really good to you" and the original poster responds, "You guys are sweet, thank you."
In March, a student at the University of Mary Washington in Virginia took his own life. Jessica Reingold, who just graduated, recalls a very explicit Yik Yak post in the days after, saying something like: I'm super lonely; I think I'm going to kill myself.
People immediately posted supportive words and the number to a suicide hotline. Reingold went a step further. "I said if you need anyone to talk to, I'll meet up with you."
She didn't give her contact information and say "call me." And the person in trouble didn't reply. But if he or she did, Reingold says, "I would have posted a time and then like a meetup place somewhere on campus. And that's how people usually would meet up — to do other things."
Enlarge this image toggle caption Yik Yak Yik Yak
By "other things," she means make out. Yik Yak is famous and infamous on college campuses for enabling casual hookups, gossip and rumors. The platform auto-searches for threatening words in posts and moderates certain Yaks reported.
Still, it remains a place where catty kids, rival sports teams and bullies go to talk trash. Barrages of racist and sexist comments have prompted a handful of campuses to ban the app.
Suicide Is Unique
Yik Yak has become an unlikely safe space for people with suicidal thoughts — a place where, students say, responses are consistently helpful, not mean. Reingold says that could be because the conversation offline is consistent, "because we've been educated to never assume that they're joking; you always take them seriously."
That's in clear contrast to another serious issue: rape and sexual assault.
Braver says when people post that they're victims, they get Yaks back like, "What was the person wearing or how do we know this is true, there's no proof. This person just wants attention."
But there is another important difference. Sexual assault is typically something that's already happened. Suicide is a crisis on the horizon, something that can still be prevented. "For suicide there's more of an immediacy to the comments, and for rape it's definitely less of a 'this has to be taken care of right now,' " Braver says.
Fairly Or Really Depressed?
Mental health counselor Nancy Stockton at Indiana University says it's great that students have a new place to find support. But if someone says he's swallowed a half-bottle of pills, Yik Yak is not the solution.
"If they were talking with a suicide hotline that has a way of knowing who's called, 911 emergency personnel could be dispatched immediately," Stockton says.
There's a big difference between people who are kind of depressed, and people seriously on the brink. Counselors hope Yik Yak users will encourage the latter group to get real help.Wrongly accused May Day protest photographer sues Seattle police
A videographer arrested at a May Day protest and wrongly charged with assault has sued the Seattle Police Department, claiming officers violated his civil rights.
Filing a lawsuit in federal court earlier this week, attorneys for Joshua Garland claim he was injured in a May 1, 2012 clash with police and then arrested on allegations trumped up by a Seattle police officer.
Garland was charged with assault of a police officer – a felony that would likely have carried a two-month jail term – only to see charges dropped a week later after video of his arrest surfaced, undercutting Officer Stephen Smith’s claims. Attorneys for the Seattle man now say Smith wasn’t investigated or disciplined for lying in the report.
The annual May Day demonstrations took a violent turn that year, with groups of black-clad protesters smashing windows and antagonizing police. Garland was among a dozen protesters charged following the downtown Seattle demonstration.
Smith claimed Garland – described in the lawsuit as a photographer for Seattle’s Real Change newspaper – grabbed his hand as the officer stopped Garland from approaching a demonstrator who was being arrested. Under penalty of perjury, Smith said Garland hurt his hand during the altercation, which occurred near the intersection of First Avenue and Pike Street in downtown Seattle.
“Garland grabbed my left hand with his hands and squeezed tightly and twisting, causing pain,” Smith said in the sworn statement. “Garland used his grip on my hand to try to pull me away from the officers and into the angry crowed.”
Third-degree assault charges were filed against Garland but dropped after prosecutors acknowledged video of the incident appeared to contradict Smith’s account.
In the lawsuit, Garland’s attorneys claim Smith shoved the photographer without provocation before pulling him out of the crowd and throwing him onto the ground.
“Officer Smith’s conduct was unlawful, malicious and had no purpose, other than to punish the plaintiff and inflict pain,” attorneys Simeon Osborn and Susan Machler said in court papers.
Garland suffered a knee injury in the arrest, as well as bumps and bruises, the attorneys claim. Beyond the physical injuries, he was humiliated and the arrest nearly cost him his job, they say.
Osborn and Machler contend the Seattle Police Department also failed to discipline Smith.
“No investigation was conducted into the arrest of the plaintiff or into the conduct of Officer Smith, whose sworn statement was directly contradicted by video evidence,” the attorneys said in court papers. “To the best of (our) knowledge, no discipline or retraining was performed with respect to Officer Smith’s false statements and the unlawful arrest.”
A spokeswoman for the Seattle City Attorney’s Office declined to comment on the allegations.
Garland’s lawsuit follows a similar action brought by Maria Morales, an emergency medical technician also arrested and later cleared in the 2012 protest.
Accused of assaulting a police officer, Morales saw the charges against her dismissed after video of her violent arrest surfaced. Now she, like Garland, has claimed a Seattle police officer lied in sworn statements.
Arrested minutes before Garland at the same location, Morales was among the first demonstrators charged after the riotous protest.
The allegations – publicized on seattlepi.com and elsewhere – cost Morales her job and apartment, as well as thousands of dollars in attorneys’ fees, according to her lawsuit. They were also baseless; video of the scene refuted the police account and prompted prosecutors to drop the case.
“It’s a complete fabrication, and the reason that we know that is because it was on video,” attorney Darryl Parker said previously. “The statement of probable cause that led to her arrest is completely false.”
The city now contends Officer Sonya Fry believed Morales punched her when the protester pushed on the handlebars of the bicycle the officer was holding. Fry, attorneys for the city contend, believed she was being attacked when she pulled Morales over the bicycle wall and arrested her.
An Office of Professional Accountability review faulted one of the officers involved in Morales’ arrest for dousing her with pepper spray. While video shows the officer’s arm extended at Morales when the pepper spray was discharged, the officer contended the pepper spray firing was accidental.
OPA Director Pierce Murphy found the other officers involved in the arrest acted in a manner “appropriate and consistent” with Seattle Police Department policies.
Morales’ lawsuit remains ongoing before U.S. District Judge John Coughenour.
Of the others charged in King County Superior Court, four have been convicted and two – Kellen Linnell and Jason J. Michaels -- are currently the subject of arrest warrants. Two protesters were also convicted in U.S. District Court of vandalizing a downtown federal courthouse.
Check the Seattle 911 crime blog for more Seattle crime news. Visit seattlepi.com's home page for more Seattle news.
Seattlepi.com reporter Levi Pulkkinen can be reached at 206-448-8348 or levipulkkinen@seattlepi.com. Follow Levi on Twitter at twitter.com/levipulk.FORT WORTH — U.S. Sen. Ted Cruz easily won the presidential preference straw poll held at the Texas GOP’s state convention Saturday, crushing outgoing Gov. Rick Perry and several other early contenders for the 2016 nomination.
Cruz took 43.4 percent of the vote, according to results announced at the close of the convention. Ben Carson, a columnist and neurosurgeon from Michigan, came in second with 12.2 percent, edging Kentucky U.S. Sen. Rand Paul, who came in third place with 12.1 percent. In something of a surprise, Perry, who made a failed presidential attempt in 2012, came in fourth place with 11.7 percent.
Attendees cast ballots on secure iPads over the course of the convention at a pair of kiosks on the convention center grounds.
With the 2016 presidential field far from being defined, voters faced a ballot with 14 names. Some names, like Perry and Cruz, were very familiar. Others, like Ohio Gov. John Kasich and Iowa Congressman Steve King, maybe weren’t as familiar.
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So early in the game, the excitement for the poll concerned how well Cruz and Perry would do. The sense was that Cruz, who was a high-profile presence at the convention on Friday, would win easily. He followed up an enthusiastically received speech in the morning with an extended stay in the exhibit hall, where he held court at an eye-grabbing booth in the center of the floor. He was joined by his father, Rafael Cruz, who is a Tea Party favorite in his own right.
Perry, meanwhile, kept his footprint at the convention small. After giving his speech on Thursday, which was also well received, he left for Austin, where he got back in time to tweet a photo of himself from the X Games competition. Perry’s speech was widely viewed as a table-setter for a second run for the White House.
Paul spoke at the convention on Friday afternoon and projected a more casual air, roaming the stage sans jacket. He mixed barbed humor — including a joke that President Obama should have traded five Democrats instead of five Taliban for captured soldier Bowe Bergdahl — along with a slightly muted version of the libertarian stances of his father, former U.S. Rep. Ron Paul.
The poll results on Saturday punctuated an eventful two years for Cruz. He came to the state convention in 2012 locked in a runoff contest with Lt. Gov. David Dewhurst for the Senate seat being vacated by then-U.S. Sen. Kay Bailey Hutchison. Cruz had lost the first round of voting. But the convention confirmed that he had captured the momentum that would drive him to victory in July of that year.
The other rumored 2016 contenders on the straw poll, such as Chris Christie or Jeb Bush, didn’t have a presence at the convention.
Bush was in fifth place with 3.3 percent, well behind the first group of candidates. He was followed by Scott Walker (2.9 percent), Marco Rubio (2.6 percent), Paul Ryan (2 percent), Rick Santorum (1.9 percent), Bobby Jindal (1.7 percent) and Christie (1.3 percent).
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The remaining three — Mike Pence, Kasich and King — all received less than 1 percent of the vote.The courier in question.
Someone has bought an in-game Dota 2 item for an eye-watering $38,000.
Dota 2 |
country on Israel’s behalf is consonant with the duties of American citizenship.
Finally, I wish to directly refute Mr. Schoenfeld’s claim that I “cast aspersions on American Jews.” I do not cast aspersions, I forthrightly damn, and pray that God damns, any American Jew, Catholic, Evangelical, Irish, German, Hindu, hermaphrodite, thespian, or otherwise who flogs the insane idea that American and Israeli interests are one and the same. The nation-state of Israel is an intolerable burden to the treasury and security of the United States, and Washington’s current relationship with Israel sanctioned by the AIPAC-funded political leaders of both parties is one of several factors that are leading to full-scale American participation in other peoples’ religious wars, religious wars that David Horowitz’s recent “Islamofascist Awareness Week” manifestly wants to bring to the streets of the United States.
Read more by Michael ScheuerBurlington, Iowa (CNN) Hillary Clinton, her voice softened and tone contemplative, stressed to Iowa voters in Burlington on Wednesday night that while this campaign has not been easy, she knows how to "what it is like to be knocked down but not knocked out."
The race in Iowa, which is nearing its final sprint towards the February 1 caucuses, has been tightening in the last few weeks, and the pressure is mounting on Clinton to avoid a loss in the first in the nation caucus. The pressure on her Iowa operation was ratcheted up even more on Tuesday when a CNN/WMUR New Hampshire poll found Clinton down by 27 points to Vermont Sen. Bernie Sanders, her unexpectedly stout opponent.
Clinton opened her first appearance since the poll by focusing on her own personal struggles and ability to bounce back from tough times.
"I have had a few hard times. I don't know anybody in this audience that have not had their own share," Clinton said. "It is not whether you get knocked down, it is whether you get back up. And I have gotten back up time and time and time again."
The tone was surprising to many in the audience, including some of Clinton's aides who were taken by their candidate's candor about her personal struggles.
"It has not all been a bed of roses. It is tough," Clinton said about the race. "The politics in our country can be pretty harsh. I think I have been called nearly everything. I understand that. It is a competitive process. I wish it wasn't so mean-spirited. I don't think this reflects well on us. But we have to keep forging our way forward and try to bring people back to together again."
Clinton started the 2016 campaign as the prohibitive favorite to win the Democrat's nomination, someone whose ability to organize, fundraise and turnout voters all but guaranteed her the nomination.
But spurred by anti-establishment anger and an ability to raise big money online, Sanders has risen in the polls and become someone who credibly could beat Clinton in Iowa and New Hampshire, something that would have been considered outrageous months ago.
The possibility of her falling behind Sanders in Iowa and New Hampshire is now raising the specter of a protracted nomination fight between the two rivals, meaning Clinton-aligned Democrats, who had long hoped their candidate could save money while Republicans spent millions bludgeoning each other with negative ads, now expect the race to bleed into the spring and possibly longer.
While some of Clinton's aides are sensing the urgency in the final 12 days, the former secretary of state responded by thanking the voters of Iowa.
"I just want to say thank you," Clinton said at the opening of her appearance. "You certainly have informed me, made me a better candidate, gave me a lot more to think about than I even had before I started... I believe, thanks to you, I will be a better president."
Clinton urged the voters in the room to "carefully who is prepared, ready, able to do that job that waits" and closed her speech by arguing that country needs "a president who can do all parts of the job."
The former first lady contrasted herself against Sanders with her desire to build on what President Barack Obama has done, especially on health care and regulating Wall Street.
"We have differences and it is that time in the campaign when he's making contrast and I am as well," Clinton said.
Clinton spent barely any time on the rope line of the organizing event in Burlington, shaking a few hands when she closed the speech and then quickly exiting.
Even still, audience members said they appreciated the seriousness she brought to the event.
"I think she seemed serious and it is a serious job she is looking at," Kelly Samberg, a 56-year-old nurse from Burlington who plans to caucus for Clinton. "It is not all fun and games."
Dan Reeder, a professor from Oklahoma who drove 8 hours to catch Clinton's event, said he, too, was struck by her tone.
"I am leaving here even more of a supportive than I was before," said Reeder. "My initial thoughts were she is really taking this seriously."I spent the afternoon playing around with Google Gears in order to get a basic feel for how it works. Specifically, I wanted to see how much work it would take to add support for offline viewing for tostring.org (an online book site).
I used the Gears LocalServer API which "allows a web application to cache and serve its HTTP resources locally, without a network connection". The implementation can be though of as a small web server that intercepts requests for remote resources and serves them (seamlessly) from a local cache. This has a couple of advantages:
Can access content offline
Even when online, content is pulled from cache, so access is very fast
The main disadvantages are related to #2. Since content is pulled from the local cache, even when online, users may view stale content. This can also make it a bit of a hassle to develop, as you have to remember to clear the Gears cache of the content when trying to view changes.
Gears will periodically check for updated content and sync anything that is updated. It also provides an API to allow developers to force checks for new content, as well as fine grained control over what content is cached / synced locally.
It took me most of the afternoon to implement the functionality, but the vast majority of that time was spent writing python and Django code (which I was a little rusty on), and learning some of the jQuery JavaScript library which I used to provide visual feedback while the syncing was occurring. The actual Gears implementation was pretty trivial and took maybe a total of 30 minutes (which included learning the APIs and implementing them).
Here is the complete JavaScript code (half of which provides feedback to the user while the pages are being synced).
function hasGears () { return ( window. google && google. gears ); } function updateProgressField ( msg ) { $ ( '#progress' ). text ( msg ); } function onSyncProgress ( event ) { updateProgressField ( Math. ceil ((( event. filesComplete / event. filesTotal ) * 100 )) + "%" ); } function onSyncComplete () { updateProgressField ( "Sync Complete." ); } function onSyncError ( event ) { updateProgressField ( "Error Syncing." ); } function storeForOffline () { var localServer = google. gears. factory. create ( 'beta.localserver' ); var store = localServer. createManagedStore ( 'tostring-store' ); store. manifestUrl = '/gearsmanifest' ; store. onerror = onSyncError ; store. oncomplete = onSyncComplete ; store. onprogress = onSyncProgress store. checkForUpdate (); } function onStoreClick ( event ) { event. preventDefault (); storeForOffline (); } function onReady () { if ( hasGears ()) { $ ( "#offline_span" ). css ( "visibility", "visible" ); $ ( "#offline_span" ). click ( onStoreClick ); } } $ ( document ). ready ( onReady );
When a user who has Gears installed visits the site they are be presented with a link titled "Save Offline" (top right). Users who do not have Gears will not see this link. If the user clicks the link, they are presented with a Gears dialog asking for permission (I can customize this, but did not). If they allow the action, then the Gears library loads a JSON based manifest file with information on how the site should be synced (including which specific resources should be included).
You can view the full manifest for tostring.org at:
http://www.tostring.org/gearsmanifest
Here is a snippet:
{ "betaManifestVersion" : 1, "version" : "2008-08-27 14:18:04", "entries" : [ { "url" : "/" }, { "url" : "/translating/" }, { "url" : "/about/" }, { "url" : "/dmedia/books/scripts/grids-min.css" }, { "url" : "/dmedia/books/css/styles.css" }, { "url" : "/dmedia/books/scripts/jquery.min.js" }, { "url" : "/books/adobe-air-for-javascript-developers-pocketguide/1.0/sv/introduktion-till-adobe-air/" }, ]}
Gears remembers the version string, and periodically checks to see if it has changed. If it has, it will resync the content (you can do some more advanced stuff with server responses to tell Gears that a particular piece of content has not been updated).
While the content is syncing, I present a small progress indicator to the user.
Once the sync is complete, the content is viewed from the cache, regardless of whether the user is online or offline. You can test this in Firefox via File > Work Offline.
All in all, it was very easy to implement and I am impressed with the results.
Couple of issues:
There does not appear to be a way to detect whether the page is running online or offline, and it doesnt look like Google plans to add it. It is definitely a tricky problem, but I think that Adobe AIR handles it well, and at least makes it easier for the develop.
There is not a way to detect whether content has already been cached (at least not without prompting another security dialog)
There is no indication or UI indicating whether you are viewing "live" content or cached content.
You can only cache / sync pages from the same domain that the web page originated from. This means is you are loading any remote libraries or resources (such as remote JavaScript libraries), you will need to start hosting them yourself if you want them to be synced with your content.
It seems that calling any of the APIs will result in a security / permission dialog being raised (even though some of the docs suggest otherwise). Which ist the best experience when using multiple APIs.
One interesting thing about the API is that it can be used for more than just making web content available offline. You could also use to to cache frequently used assets to:
Speed of loading of web pages and applications
Reduce load and bandwith on the server
Indeed, WordPress is using Gears to help make their admin application more responsive.
The next step will be to add a desktop shortcut for the application using the Desktop API. This also looks to be pretty trivial although I am concerned that the user might be presented with two permission dialogs.
If you have Gears installed, you can see this example in action at tostring.org.
If you have any questions or suggestions, or find any errors in my code (likely), then post them in the comments.Nice country you got there Holland, be a pity if something happened to it!
The Turkish paper “Yeni Akit” headline reads:
AKP-leaning newspaper: “Holland has 48.000 soldiers, and 400,000 Turkish fellow citizens live there…”
H/T: EK
NOTE: My Turkish source tells me that Ali Utlu is a Turkish twitter user in Germany who is against Erdogan and his government. Which reminds me of Erdogan’s earlier quote:
How much is the population of the Netherlands?
Following the scandalous decisions the Netherlands has taken today, what is the population of the Netherlands? ‘How many Turks are there in the Netherlands?’ ‘What is the military power of the Netherlands?’ The questions became the curiosity of the citizens.
After the scandal in the Netherlands, what is the population of the Netherlands? ‘How many Turks are there in the Netherlands?’ ‘What is the military power of the Netherlands?’ The questions became the curiosity of the citizens.
WHAT’S THE POPULATION OF THE NETHERLANDS?
The estimated population of the Netherlands in 2015 according to Wikimedia information is 17 million 59 thousand.
HOW MANY TURKS IN THE NETHERLANDS?
According to the latest statistics issued by the Dutch Central Bureau of Statistics, the number of Turkish population increased from 395,000 to 237,000 in 2015, reaching 397,600. A total of 397 thousand 600 Turks, 205 men and 192 women live.
WHAT IS THE MILITARY POWER OF THE NETHERLANDS?
According to Anadolu news agency’s news in 2012; The Netherlands has 48,000 troops. The Netherlands, a NATO member, is entering the top 10 in terms of money spent on military spending among NATO member countries, with $ 11.3 billion in military spending. Dutch military spending is divided by 1.3 percent. Among the NATO member countries, Turkey has a share of 28.6 percent in the share of weapons and equipment purchases in defense expenditures, compared to 13.6 percent in the Netherlands.
More in TurkishBritain's plan to build its first nuclear plant in two decades finally got a green light following the uncertainty cast by Brexit. But it comes with wariness over foreign control of a critical infrastructure and skepticism about its effectiveness in reducing carbon emissions – even as supporters tout the benefits of the low-carbon source of energy.
The project, known as Hinkley Point C, will be funded by the China General Nuclear Power Corporation, a state-backed Chinese investor, and built by EDF, a French utility company that is largely state-owned. According to Bloomberg, the price tag of the project is expected to reach $23.6 billion. The plant is set to generate electricity for an area twice the size of London and reduce emissions by 9 million metric tons of carbon dioxide per year, helping the UK to meet its climate targets.
“This also marks the next generation of nuclear power in Britain, which has an important part to play in contributing to our future energy needs and our longer term security of supply,” former prime minister David Cameron said of the plan in a press release two years ago when the plan was first conceived.
But critics are wary of placing a critical infrastructure – especially a nuclear power plant – in the hands of foreign companies, especially with Chinese companies that could be vulnerable to alleged state-sponsored hackers. The cost of the plant, which may potentially be the most expensive in Britain's history, also has some worried. Others are concerned about nuclear waste disposal, as revealed by a recent BBC investigation of improperly stored radioactive material in a rundown nuclear site. The cost and associated hazards, some argue, are not worth it when there are cheaper and safer alternatives such as renewable energy.
The controversies stirred by the plan might not be felt by the UK alone. Nuclear energy is increasingly being discussed as a solution to reducing carbon emissions. Renewable energy input can be intermittent and unable to meet the electricity demand, while nuclear can provide a steady load. But these discussions trigger anxiety especially after the 2015 plant meltdowns in Fukushima, Japan. Nuclear power plants can pose security concerns, nuclear waste can be improperly disposed and cause health hazards, and nuclear plant construction is notorious for cost overruns and delays.
Some countries remain undeterred. For example, a number of African nations, as The Christian Science Monitor previously reported, are considering nuclear energy to address shortage of electricity, despite infrastructure difficulties faced by some countries. The United States has a growing movement pushing for nuclear energy, with both leading presidential candidates supporting the notion.
Other countries are taking the opposite tack. Germany, for instance, chose to phase out nuclear energy by 2022 and to rely on coal energy while it transitions to renewable energy.
Leading climate scientist James Hansen argued in an opinion piece for The Guardian last year that nuclear power is a “uniquely scalable and environmentally advantageous” solution to dealing with climate change.
“Nuclear energy can power whole civilisations, and produce waste streams that are trivial compared to the waste produced by fossil fuel combustion.… However, nuclear does pose unique safety and proliferation concerns that must be addressed with strong and binding international standards and safeguards,” he wrote.
Jacopo Buongiorno, associate head at MIT’s department of nuclear science and engineering, said in a phone interview with The Christian Science Monitor that while the biggest challenge in expanding nuclear energy is the cost, it is still the most reliable zero-carbon emission source. It is also proven to be safe, with standards tightened after the Fukushima incident.
“Nuclear and renewables complement each other well,” Buongiorno says. “Nuclear is baseload and renewable is intermittent.”
As for concerns about countries under-equipped to manage nuclear plants, Buongiorno says there are partnerships between countries, such as South Korea and the United Arab Emirates, that allow them to share resources and knowledge.
On the other hand are those who find nuclear power plants too expensive or too slow to build. There is also the challenge of dealing with radioactive nuclear waste, of which there are concerns about the potential for reprocessed waste to be turned into nuclear weapons and, in the United States, locating a long term repository for the fuel.
“If you’re thinking about climate change as an urgent threat, something to deal with as soon as possible, then nuclear power will not be a good strategy,” M.V. Ramana, an associate research scholar at the Princeton Nuclear Futures Laboratory, tells The Christian Science Monitor in a phone interview. “If you’re serious about mitigating climate change you have to evolve a strategy that is economic and realistic.”
Dr. Ramana recommends developing renewable energy such as solar and wind, storage technology, improving efficiency standards, and increasing flexibility of consumer energy usage instead as more effective solutions.
For the UK, its decision to go with nuclear by building this plant and phase out coal by 2025 was a tough one.
The Hinkley Point C plan was signed on by former Prime Minister David Cameron in 2013 but its status came into question over security concerns after the Brexit vote. In July this year, the new prime minister Theresa May made a surprising decision to hold the project for review hours before the contract was to be signed, Time reports.
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Thursday's decision to approve the plan comes with the government’s assurance of safeguards that will prevent the foreign companies involved in the construction to gain control of the power plant without government approval.
“Having thoroughly reviewed the proposal for Hinkley Point C, we will introduce a series of measures to enhance security and will ensure Hinkley cannot change hands without the Government’s agreement,” said UK Secretary of State for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy Greg Clark in a press release. “Britain needs to upgrade its supplies of energy, and we have always been clear that nuclear is an important part of ensuring our future low-carbon energy security.”JOHANNESBURG, South Africa — Tanzania, with potential reserves of 5 billion tons of coal, is planning its first coal-fired power plant. Kenya wants to build for its own coal-powered plant, while Ghana and Nigeria are eyeing expanded use of coal for electricity. Landlocked Botswana is building a 1,000-mile railway to transport coal to a port in neighboring Namibia for export to the world.
If there’s a “war on coal” in Africa, coal may be winning.
The concerns about coal expressed by environmentalists and climate researchers in the West are voiced here mostly by white expatriates and foreign nongovernmental organizations. Coal in Africa is an abundant resource for a continent still hustling to catch up with the developed world. South Africa, the economic engine of the region, gets 93 percent of its electricity from coal, one of the highest percentages in the world.
John Owusu, a retired engineer originally from Ghana, worked for 50 years across all regions of Africa and was an early disciple of clean energy. He understands Africa’s appetite for a fossil fuel that is in decline in the U.S. and other advanced economies, as well as the reluctance to embrace alternative fuel sources.
“People think of this continent as jungle and sunshine, but we have a long rainy season in the tropics, more like a monsoon, and there’s no sun for days,” Mr. Owusu said. “That makes it hard to rely on something like solar. Wind turbines make more sense, but you still need batteries to store the power.”
Tanzania, with a gross domestic product of just $50 billion a year — roughly comparable to North Dakota’s — has a population of 52 million, 85 percent of whom are not linked to the power grid.
“If you cook on an open fire, have no electricity and go to bed hungry, you don’t lie awake wondering about the virtue of coal, gas or solar,” said Mr. Owusu. “And if there’s no electricity in your town, there’s not much investment and no new jobs.”
There’s even a health effect from uncertain energy sources: “Vaccines, snakebite serum, even HIV drugs should be kept in a fridge. In many places, that’s just not possible,” he said.
Defending coal
Africa’s appetite for coal has some high-profile defenders.
Former U.N. Secretary-General Kofi Annan recently told the Ghana News Agency that coal and other fossil fuels are critical at least in the short term to bridge the continent’s massive energy gap. Mr. Annan chaired a report from the Africa Progress Panel on energy this month that concluded an abrupt shift away from coal was simply not realistic for most African governments.
“What we are advocating is that African governments harness every available energy option, in as cost-effective and technologically efficient manner as possible, so that no one is left behind,” Mr. Annan told the news agency.
There also is lingering resentment that developed countries, whose wealth historically has relied heavily on coal and other fossil fuels, are telling Africans not to exploit their vast coal reserves. Analysts say African nations have an estimated 35 billion tons of recoverable coal reserves that could supply the continent’s current needs for more than a century.
“We in Nigeria have coal, but we have a power problem. Yet we’ve been blocked because it is not ‘green,’” Nigerian Finance Minister Kemi Adeosun told a joint IMF-World Bank meeting late last year. “There is some hypocrisy because we have the entire Western industrialization built on coal energy.”
Coal’s enduring sway is evident even in South Africa, with its gold mines, German-style highways, a sophisticated financial sector and daily flights connecting Johannesburg to capitals around the world. The country has a nuclear power station, and nearly all of its people have lights at the flick of a switch, though cutoffs are common for nonpayment.
But the overwhelming majority of electricity power comes from coal-powered utilities, and South Africa has some of richest seams of coal in the world.
Deserts like the Sahara or Kalahari are perfect to make energy from the sun, but on a continent where a third of the population lives under the official U.N. poverty line, solar power users need to hire armed guards to prevent the coveted panels from being stolen.
Maria Vanderwalt runs a small winery north of Cape Town. Three years ago, she converted to solar power.
“It was a wonderful 10 months,” she recalled, “though on cloudy days we used a diesel generator. Then one night, a truckload of robbers arrived with guns, tied up my staff and took the panels and half my batteries. We’re now back on the grid.”
Her tale is common across Africa, Asia and even Brazil. In the rural districts near Mumbai on the west coast of India, nearly 2,000 villages and smaller settlements were electrified for the first time in 2012 using solar power, some of it funded by aid projects.
Since then, nearly all the equipment has been broken or stolen and the government is putting the region on the coal-powered grid. India gets more than half of its electricity from coal.
Room to grow
Outside South Africa, coal is still used at relatively low levels in many African countries compared with China and the U.S. In a single week, China imports 60 times more coal than Tanzania mines in a year.
But the picture may be changing.
Kenya has commissioned its first coal-fired power station near Lamu, one of region’s oldest settlements founded by Arab slavers in 1370. Although Kenya is East Africa’s largest and most modern economy, 60 percent of Kenyans have no access to the power grid.
In the Congo basin, forests are being cleared twice as fast as in the Amazon, and much of the wood is used for cooking and heating. Researchers say Nigeria has lost three-quarters of its trees in the past 40 years.
On the world’s poorest continent, the lack of power is seen as a greater public crisis than the relative environmental virtues of coal compared with solar, natural gas, wind or other power sources.
At Mtwara, an unused port originally developed by the British in the 1940s for an ill-fated peanut farming venture, Tanzania has refurbished the docks to export coal from nearby mines. A power station is also on the cards, with barely a word of protest.
While Americans — hardly any of whom have lived a day without electricity — debate President Trump’s plan to reopen pits in Wyoming and mines in Kentucky and West Virginia, Africa mines and uses fossil fuel in ever greater quantities.
But could the “clean coal” technology that the Trump administration has touted be part of a U.S. aid package to African nations?
In response to a question from The Washington Times, Griffin Thompson, acting deputy assistant secretary of state for energy resources, said it might.
“It is the prerogative of every country to determine their energy mix,” he said. “Whether it’s coal or natural gas or renewable energy, we see it as to the pathway toward greater economic growth.”
Mr. Thompson said there was a need to look at “what would be required to facilitate the sort of coal technology” other countries may need.
Copyright © 2019 The Washington Times, LLC. Click here for reprint permission.As many of the local Jindalee community is aware, Elroy the Police puppy is living at the Centenary North Police Beat for the first year of his life as he begins his journey to become a police dog. A lot of people have asked how Elroy is going, especially with the recent heat wave we have experienced in Brisbane.
For those that don’t know Elroy is a black German Shepherd who will be fostered at the Beat as part of the Queensland Police Service’s puppy development program.
Under the program, specially bred puppies find temporary homes with police families so that they can learn the socialisation skills necessary to become part of the community. During the foster period, puppies increase their confidence by visiting schools and shopping centres where there are crowds and plenty of activity.
Staff at the Beat, along with Elroy’s foster family, will socialise him in safe and secure environments to ensure he is well equipped to become a fully-fledged police dog. Every three to four weeks, he heads back to Dog Squad HQ at Oxley to undergo preliminary training. Elroy was born in early September as part of the “E” litter (all puppies – six males and six female – have names starting with E).
Now the update. Most community members last saw Elroy before Christmas at our Neighbourhood Watch group’s ‘Paws on Patrol’ day. He has grown significantly since then and loves chewing on things especially towels, clothes on the clothes line and anything else he can get his paws on including my arm. He has been going great guns at his monthly training and is quickly learning how to track down offenders by following their scent. Elroy has also been out in the community visiting school and community groups. He has also started venturing out at night to learn how to navigate underground car parks and stairs in the dark.
Due to the recent hot weather Elroy has been spending plenty of time in the Beat office in the air conditioning or lazing about in his pool.
It is really important with this hot weather that we take the time to look after not only ourselves but also our pets to ensure they are not suffering.
The RSPCA website has a wealth of information on how to look after our pets during hot weather. Please view here.
Stay tuned for more Elroy updates – as he gets older and the weather gets cooler he will be out and about visiting some of our local schools and community groups.Leucine (symbol Leu or L)[2] is an essential amino acid that is used in the biosynthesis of proteins. Leucine is an α-amino acid, meaning it contains an α-amino group (which is in the protonated −NH 3 + form under biological conditions), an α-carboxylic acid group (which is in the deprotonated −COO− form under biological conditions), and a side chain isobutyl group, making it a non-polar aliphatic amino acid. It is essential in humans, meaning the body cannot synthesize it: it must be obtained from the diet. Human dietary sources are foods that contain protein, such as meats, dairy products, soy products, and beans and other legumes. It is encoded by the codons UUA, UUG, CUU, CUC, CUA, and CUG.
Like valine and isoleucine, leucine is a branched-chain amino acid. The primary metabolic end products of leucine metabolism are acetyl-CoA and acetoacetate; consequently, it is one of the two exclusively ketogenic amino acids, with lysine being the other.[3] It is the most important ketogenic amino acid in humans.[4]p. 101
Leucine and β-hydroxy β-methylbutyric acid, a minor leucine metabolite, exhibit pharmacological activity in humans and have been demonstrated to promote protein biosynthesis via the phosphorylation of the mechanistic target of rapamycin (mTOR).[5][6]
Dietary leucine [ edit ]
As a food additive, L-leucine has E number E641 and is classified as a flavor enhancer.[7]
Requirements [ edit ]
The Food and Nutrition Board (FNB) of the U.S. Institute of Medicine set Recommended Dietary Allowances (RDAs) for essential amino acids in 2002. For leucine, for adults 19 years and older, 42 mg/kg body weight/day.[8]
Sources [ edit ]
Health effects [ edit ]
As a dietary supplement, leucine has been found to slow the degradation of muscle tissue by increasing the synthesis of muscle proteins in aged rats.[10] However, results of comparative studies are conflicted. Long-term leucine supplementation does not increase muscle mass or strength in healthy elderly men.[11] More studies are needed, preferably ones based on an objective, random sample of society. Factors such as lifestyle choices, age, gender, diet, exercise, etc. must be factored into the analyses to isolate the effects of supplemental leucine as a standalone, or if taken with other branched chain amino acids (BCAAs). Until then, dietary supplemental leucine cannot be associated as the prime reason for muscular growth or optimal maintenance for the entire population.
Both L-leucine and D-leucine protect mice against seizures.[12] D-leucine also terminates seizures in mice after the onset of seizure activity, at least as effectively as diazepam and without sedative effects.[12] Decreased dietary intake of L-leucine promotes adiposity in mice.[13] High blood levels of leucine are associated with insulin resistance in humans, mice, and rodents.[14] This might be due to the effect of leucine to stimulate mTOR signaling.[15] Dietary restriction of leucine and the other BCAAs can reverse diet-induced obesity in wild-type mice by increasing energy expenditure, and can restrict fat mass gain of hyperphagic rats.[16][17]
Safety [ edit ]
Leucine toxicity, as seen in decompensated maple syrup urine disease, causes delirium and neurologic compromise, and can be life-threatening.
A high intake of leucine may cause or exacerbate symptoms of pellagra in people with low niacin status because it interferes with the conversion of L-tryptophan to niacin.[18]
Leucine at a dose exceeding 500 mg/kg/d was observed with hyperammonemia.[19] As such, unofficially, a tolerable upper intake level (UL) for leucine in healthy adult men can be suggested at 500 mg/kg/d or 35 g/d under acute dietary conditions.[19][20]
Pharmacology [ edit ]
Pharmacodynamics [ edit ]
Leucine is a dietary amino acid with the capacity to directly stimulate myofibrillar muscle protein synthesis.[21] This effect of leucine arises results from its role as an activator of the mechanistic target of rapamycin (mTOR),[6] a serine-threonine protein kinase that regulates protein biosynthesis and cell growth. The activation of mTOR by leucine is mediated through Rag GTPases,[22][23][24] leucine binding to leucyl-tRNA synthetase,[22][23] leucine binding to sestrin 2,[25][26][27] and possibly other mechanisms.
Metabolism in humans [ edit ]
Leucine metabolism occurs in many tissues in the human body; however, most dietary leucine is metabolized within the liver, adipose tissue, and muscle tissue.[medical citation needed] Adipose and muscle tissue use leucine in the formation of sterols and other compounds.[medical citation needed] Combined leucine use in these two tissues is seven times greater than in the liver.[33] In healthy individuals, approximately 60% of dietary L-leucine is metabolized after several hours, with roughly 5% (2–10% range) of dietary L-leucine being converted to β-hydroxy β-methylbutyric acid (HMB).[31][34][32] Around 40% of dietary L-leucine is converted to acetyl-CoA, which is subsequently used in the synthesis of other compounds.[32]
The vast majority of L-leucine metabolism is initially catalyzed by the branched-chain amino acid aminotransferase enzyme, producing α-ketoisocaproate (α-KIC).[31][32] α-KIC is mostly metabolized by the mitochondrial enzyme branched-chain α-ketoacid dehydrogenase, which converts it to isovaleryl-CoA.[31][32] Isovaleryl-CoA is subsequently metabolized by isovaleryl-CoA dehydrogenase and converted to MC-CoA, which is used in the synthesis of acetyl-CoA and other compounds.[32] During biotin deficiency, HMB can be synthesized from MC-CoA via enoyl-CoA hydratase and an unknown thioesterase enzyme,[28][29][35] which convert MC-CoA into HMB-CoA and HMB-CoA into HMB respectively.[29] A relatively small amount of α-KIC is metabolized in the liver by the cytosolic enzyme 4-hydroxyphenylpyruvate dioxygenase (KIC dioxygenase), which converts α-KIC to HMB.[31][32][36] In healthy individuals, this minor pathway – which involves the conversion of L-leucine to α-KIC and then HMB – is the predominant route of HMB synthesis.[31][32]
A small fraction of L-leucine metabolism – less than 5% in all tissues except the testes where it accounts for about 33% – is initially catalyzed by leucine aminomutase, producing β-leucine, which is subsequently metabolized into β-ketoisocaproate (β-KIC), β-ketoisocaproyl-CoA, and then acetyl-CoA by a series of uncharacterized enzymes.[32][37]
The metabolism of HMB is catalyzed by an uncharacterized enzyme which converts it to β-hydroxy β-methylbutyryl-CoA (HMB-CoA).[28][32] HMB-CoA is metabolized by either enoyl-CoA hydratase or another uncharacterized enzyme, producing β-methylcrotonyl-CoA (MC-CoA) or hydroxymethylglutaryl-CoA (HMG-CoA) respectively.[31][32] MC-CoA is then converted by the enzyme methylcrotonyl-CoA carboxylase to methylglutaconyl-CoA (MG-CoA), which is subsequently converted to HMG-CoA by methylglutaconyl-CoA hydratase.[31][32][37] HMG-CoA is then cleaved into acetyl-CoA and acetoacetate by HMG-CoA lyase or used in the production of cholesterol via the mevalonate pathway.[31][32]
Synthesis in non-human organisms [ edit ]
Leucine is an essential amino acid in the diet of animals because they lack the complete enzyme pathway to synthesize it de novo from potential precursor compounds. Consequently, they must ingest it, usually as a component of proteins. Plants and microorganisms synthesize leucine from pyruvic acid with a series of enzymes:[38]
Synthesis of the small, hydrophobic amino acid valine also includes the initial part of this pathway.
Chemistry [ edit ]
S)-Leucine (or L -leucine), left; (R)-leucine (or D -leucine), right, in zwitterionic form at neutral pH )-Leucine (or-leucine), left; ()-leucine (or-leucine), right, in zwitterionic form at neutral pH
Leucine is a branched-chain amino acid (BCAA) since it possesses an aliphatic side-chain that is not linear.
Racemic leucine had been subjected to circularly polarized synchrotron radiation to better understand the origin of biomolecular asymmetry. An enantiomeric enhancement of 2.6% had been induced, indicating a possible photochemical origin of biomolecules' homochirality.[39]
See also [ edit ]
Leucines, the isomers and derivatives of leucine
Leucine zipper, a common motif in transcription factor proteins
Notes [ edit ]
^ [28][29] This reaction is catalyzed by an unknown thioesterase enzyme.Image: Pixabay/tookapic
Online news sites track users across the web with more third-party tracking code than any other type of site, a new study has found.
Using a custom open-source measurement tool, Princeton researchers analyzed the top 1 million websites ranked by the web analytics firm Alexa. What they found is that news sites |
. First, his wife Marla was brought back from the dead, and now his adopted daughter, Mattie Franklin, a.k.a. SPIDER-WOMAN, is alive again as well!
• It should be a time for celebration, but Cindy Moon, a.k.a. SILK, is feeling anything but festive, especially since her boss’ entire family has been resurrected and is setting off her spider-sense!
32 PGS./Rated T …$3.99
PROWLER #3
SEAN RYAN (W)
JAMAL CAMPBELL (A)
Cover by TRAVEL FOREMAN
Variant Cover by TBA
THE CLONE CONSPIRACY TIE-IN!
• Prowler continues to wrestle not only with the meaning of his existence, but also the underground army of unruly super villains the Jackal has created!
32 PGS./Rated T+ …$3.99
AMAZING SPIDER-MAN #22
DAN SLOTT & CHRISTOS GAGE (W) • GIUSEPPE CAMUNCOLI (A)
Cover by ALEX ROSS
XCI Variant Cover by TBA
Variant Cover by TBA
CLONE CONSPIRACY TIE-IN!
• Miles Warren, a.k.a. the Jackal, has been a thorn in Peter Parker’s side since college.
• What spurred his latest rebranding and master plan? FIND OUT HERE!
32 PGS./Rated T …$3.99
INFAMOUS IRON MAN #3
BRIAN MICHAEL BENDIS (W) • ALEX MALEEV (A/C)
Variant Cover by STEVE EPTING
• Some people from Tony Stark’s past have a VERY big problem with Victor Von Doom taking the mantle of Iron Man.
• One of those people is Pepper Potts, a.k.a. Rescue!
• She is back and she is pissed! Where has she been?
32 PGS./Rated T+ …$3.99
AVENGERS #2
MARK WAID (W) • MIKE DEL MUNDO (A)
Cover by ALEX ROSS
VARIANT COVER BY SIMONE BIANCHI
XCI Variant Cover by TBA
• KANG WAR TWO! The Vision is hell-bent on revenge against Kang and if the Avengers can’t hold the synthezoid back, all of history is in jeopardy!
32 PGS./Rated T+ …$3.99
AVENGERS #2.1
MARK WAID (W) • BARRY KITSON (A/C)
VARIANT COVER BY NEAL ADAMS
VARIANT COVER BY YASMINE PUTRI
Action Figure Variant Cover by JOHN TYLER CHRISTOPHER
• More on the Secret History of the Avengers!
• A stranger has come to New York — and the Avengers may have to draft a new member to help them defeat him!
32 PGS./Rated T+ …$3.99
INVINCIBLE IRON MAN #2
BRIAN MICHAEL BENDIS (W) • STEFANO CASELLI (A/C)
Variant Cover by ANTHONY PIPER
Teaser Variant Cover by MIKE DEODATO
XCI Variant Cover by TBA
• Riri Williams has new armor technology that just might change the face of the Marvel Universe forever… if she survives the experience. The biggest story in comics starts to unfold right here.
32 PGS./Rated T+ …$3.99
THE TOTALLY AWESOME HULK #13
GREG PAK (W) • LUKE ROSS (A)
Cover by BERNARD CHANG
DIVIDED WE STAND VARIANT COVER BY TBA
GUEST STARRING BROOKLYN NETS’ JEREMY LIN!
• Amadeus Cho can calculate parabolas all day…but can he hit one from downtown?
• A classic Hulk villain returns, but not like you remember: Meet QUASI/MO/DO!
• Hulk’s on fire! Boom Shakalaka!
32 PGS./Rated T …$3.99
CHAMPIONS #3
MARK WAID (W) • HUMBERTO RAMOS (A)
COVER BY HUMBERTO RAMOS
VARIANT COVER BY ART ADAMS
Classic Action Figure Variant Cover by JOHN TYLER CHRISTOPHER
Marvel NOW! Action Figure Variant Cover by JOHN TYLER CHRISTOPHER
XCI Variant Cover by TBA
• What began as an idea and an ideal has now become a movement! But the problem with movements is that not even the Hulk can control them!
32 PGS./Rated T …$3.99
THE MIGHTY THOR #14
JASON AARON (W) • STEVE EPTING (A)
Cover by RUSSELL DAUTERMAN
• The War of the Realms has spread to every branch of the World Tree!
• Thor and the new League of Realms have fought valiantly to restore the peace, but the road is fraught with challenges they’d not anticipated.
• Malekith has formed a wicked union of his own, calling on Loki and the all-new KURSE to take down Thor and her band of heroes!
32 PGS./Rated T …$3.99
THE UNWORTHY THOR #2 (of 5)
JASON AARON (W) OLIVIER COIPEL (A/C)
Variant Cover by KRIS ANKA
Variant Cover by JIM CHEUNG
TEASER VARIANT Cover by MIKE DEODATO
• The Realm of Old Asgard has vanished, taking with it Odinson’s hope for redemption.
• But good tidings from Beta Ray Bill might breathe new life into the quest. For Bill knows the fate of the Realm Eternal.
• To win back Odinson’s honor, the brothers in arms must infiltrate the fortress of THE COLLECTOR.
32 PGS./Rated T …$3.99
CAPTAIN AMERICA: SAM WILSON #16
NICK SPENCER (W) • PAUL RENAUD (A/C)
• Do NOT call her a sidekick: Misty Knight takes matters into her own hands.
• #takebacktheshield takes things a little too far.
32 PGS./Rated T …$3.99
CAPTAIN AMERICA: STEVE ROGERS #8
NICK SPENCER (W) • JESUS SAIZ (A/C)
TEASER VARIANT COVER BY MIKE DEODATO
• The trial of Maria Hill begins here.
• As Hydra rises, S.H.I.E.L.D. collapses from within.
32 PGS./Rated T+ …$3.99
GREAT LAKES AVENGERS #3
ZAC GORMAN (W) • WILL ROBSON (A/C)
Variant Cover by ERICA HENDERSON
• With Mister Immortal back from the grave (literally), the team finds themselves in a real pickle (figuratively) while trying to decide on a new team leader.
• Things go from bad to double bad when the GLA gets shut down by the city right when they’re needed the most!
• Also, fighting…finally! And a special look into Flatman’s secret origin!
32 PGS./Rated T …$3.99
OCCUPY AVENGERS #2
DAVID F. WALKER (W) • CARLOS PACHECO (A/C)
Variant Cover by DECLAN SHALVEY
• Clint Barton wasn’t looking for trouble, but trouble found him. Caught in the clutches of the enemy, Clint and Red Wolf face certain death — which is too bad, because they would’ve made a great team.
32 PGS./Rated T+ …$3.99
UNCANNY AVENGERS #17 & 18
GERRY DUGGAN (W) • PEPE LARRAZ (A)
COVERS BY STEVE McNIVEN
CIVIL WAR II AFTERMATH!
Issue #17 –
• The former Avengers fight a rampaging zombie Hulk and ninjas in Japan.
• It’s brother versus brother! Voodoo takes on his scheming brother in a climactic battle.
• And for 17 issues the Red Skull has plotted, lurked and waited for the time to destroy the Unity Squad. His wait is over…
Issue #18 –
• The Unity squad is on the verge of collapse after their wars with Ultron and The Hand…
•…but they won’t get a vacation because The Red Skull springs his trap and turns The Avengers Mansion into a house of horrors.
• Plus, Rogue gives Deadpool an order that is without question the hardest thing he will ever have to do.
32 PGS. (EACH)/Rated T …$3.99 (EACH)
SPIDER-MAN/DEADPOOL #12
PAUL SCHEER & NICK GIOVANNETTI (w) • TODD NAUCK (a)
Cover by DAVE JOHNSON
• A special guest-issue while Joe Kelly and Ed McGuinness prime the grand climax of their first uber-arc!
• It’s the holidays and both our heroes are alone…
• …which means they’re the only ones who can SAVE CHRISTMAS!
• That’s right, the holiday is under attack…from the least likely of places!
32 PGS./Rated T+ …$3.99
SPIDER-MAN #11
BRIAN MICHAEL BENDIS (W) • SARA PICHELLI (A/C)
• The untold history of MILES MORALES’ FATHER!
• What was life like for Jefferson Davis before his son was born…
• …When he was an agent of S.H.I.E.L.D.?!
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AMAZING SPIDER-MAN: RENEW YOUR VOWS #2
GERRY CONWAY (w) • RYAN STEGMAN (a/C)
VARIANT COVER BY J. Scott Campbell
• The Mole Man attacks NYC and only the Spider-Family can stop him!
• Mary Jane Watson Parker gets her first real test as a full-fledged super hero!
32 PGS./Rated T …$3.99
SPIDER-WOMAN #14
DENNIS HOPELESS (W) • VERONICA FISH (A)
Cover by JAVIER RODRIGUEZ
SCARE TACTICS CONTINUES!
• Jessica Drew is in the fight of her life against THE HOBGOBLIN!
• Jessica is pushed to the absolute brink physically, mentally and emotionally, as Hobgoblin does the unthinkable…
32 PGS./Rated T+ …$3.99
VENOM #2
MIKE COSTA (w) • GERARDO SANDOVAL (a/C)
VARIANT COVER BY TBA
• Venom was doing so well as a cosmic hero…
• …but now he’s back on Earth in the gutter.
• Who has taken possession of the symbiote and turned him back into the slathering, fanged monster?
32 PGS./Rated T+ …$3.99
SPIDER-MAN 2099 #18
PETER DAVID (W) • WILL SLINEY (A)
Cover by FRANCESCO Mattina
• With Elektra’s help, Spidey has made some headway in tracking down THE FIST, an extremist anti-government off-shoot of THE HAND, responsible for placing Miguel’s girlfriend in a coma.
• But little do they know, that the Hand has upped the ante, calling in an ANCIENT evil to help them bring about the end of the entire world!
• How can Spidey save the world from certain doom when Armageddon is in written in the cards?
32 PGS./Rated T+ …$3.99
CARNAGE #15
GERRY CONWAY (W) • MIKE PERKINS (A)
Cover by MICHAEL WALSH
• It’s all been leading to this…Chthon rises!!
• Carnage’s odyssey has finally taken him to the mother of all dark gods. Will he survive long enough to meet the maker of the Darkhold?
32 PGS./Rated T+ …$3.99
SPIDER-GWEN #15
JASON LATOUR (W) • ROBBI RODRIGUEZ (A/C)
ICX VARIANT BY TBA
• It’s time for Gwen Stacy to stop running from Matt Murdock.
• After all, Earth-65’s Kingpin of Crime might have a thing or two to teach the budding Spider-Woman…
32 PGS./Rated T …$3.99
UNCANNY INHUMANS #17
Charles Soule (W) • R.B. Silva (A)
Cover by Jeff Dekal
• Their mother’s resurrection was a dream come true for Auran’s daughters.
• Though mother seemed different, their family was finally whole. And that’s what matters, right?
• But the cost of cheating death is high, and now all of New Attilan must pay for the pure intentions of two girls.
32 PGS./Rated T+ …$3.99
MOSAIC #3
GEOFFREY THORNE (W) • KHARY RANDOLPH (A)
Cover by KERON GRANT
Variant Cover by Mike Del Mundo
XCI Variant Cover by TBA
• The newest Marvel super hero continues to learn what he can do.
• Mosaic’s personal life comes crashing down in the wake of his Terrigenesis.
• And don’t miss Mosaic’s first takeover of a MAJOR Marvel character!
32 PGS./Rated T+ …$3.99
POWER MAN AND IRON FIST #11
DAVID F. WALKER (W) • SANFORD GREENE (A/C)
THE FUNKY DRUMS OF WAR!
• Luke and Danny make headway in healing the civilian wounds of CIVIL WAR II.
• But war is coming to Harlem, and there may not be anything our heroes can do to stop it!
32 PGS./Rated T+ …$3.99
POWER MAN AND IRON FIST: SWEET CHRISTMAS ANNUAL #1
DAVID F. WALKER (W) • SCOTT HEPBURN (A)
COVER BY JAMAL CAMPBELL
Variant Cover by TREVOR VON EEDEN
Variant cover by Kris Anka
Variant Cover by TBA
YOU BETTER NOT POUT, YOU BETTER NOT CRY!
• ’Cause you’re getting an extra helping of POWER MAN AND IRON FIST! This Christmas will be sweet, indeed!
• But not for Luke Cage, who is feeling neither holly nor jolly.
• Surely Danny can change that! Or maybe these demonic toys will! Wait, demonic toys?! OH, NO!
40 PGS./Rated T+ …$4.99
CAGE! #3 (of 4)
GENNDY TARTAKOVSKY (W) • GENNDY TARTAKOVSKY (A/C)
Variant Cover by BILL PRESING
• Trapped with Misty Knight, Iron Fist and a bevy of guest stars on the Island of No Return, Cage and his cohorts are forced to battle strange beasts who walk like men! It’s outasight!
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JESSICA JONES #3
BRIAN MICHAEL BENDIS (W) • MICHAEL GAYDOS (A)
Cover by DAVID MACK
Variant Cover by NEN CHANG
VARIANT COVER BY STEPHANIE HANS
XCI Variant Cover by TBA
• Jessica Jones’ new secrets start to unfold. How far did Jessica go to uncover a deadly secret in the Marvel Universe?
• From the original creators comes an all new chapter in the world-famous private eye’s ongoing adventures.
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BLACK PANTHER #9
TA-NEHISI COATES (W) • BRIAN STELFREEZE (A/C)
Connecting Variant Cover A by PAOLO RIVERA
XCI Variant Cover by TBA
THE BEGINNING OF THE END!
• Regular artist BRIAN STELFREEZE returns!
• Ramonda’s bombing injuries worsen and recovery is starting to seem like an impossibility…
• Plus: Shuri returns from the Djalia…but is she still herself? Or something more?
32 PGS./Rated T …$3.99
BLACK PANTHER: WORLD OF WAKANDA #2
ROXANE GAY & TA-NEHISI COATES (W) • ALITHA E. MARTINEZ (A)
Cover by AFUA RICHARDSON
Variant Cover by TREVOR VON EEDEN
Variant Cover by MARGUERITE SAUVAGE
TRAINING DAY!
• Ayo and Aneka are given their first assignments as Dora Milaje: protect Queen Shuri at all costs!
• Meanwhile, T’Challa the former king lies with bedfellows so dark, disgrace is inevitable.
• See a major plot point from Hickman’s NEW AVENGERS run from a completely new point of view: one that changes everything…
32 PGS./Rated T …$3.99
DOCTOR STRANGE #15
JASON AARON (W) • CHRIS BACHALO (A/C)
Cover by Kevin Nowlan
ICX Variant Cover by TBA
• “Blood in the Aether” continues as Doctor Strange’s Rogues’ Gallery all take their shot at a weakened Sorcerer Supreme!
• Back during ORIGINAL SIN, the Watcher was killed and his eyes were removed. One eye fell into the hands of the Orb!
• With that immense power, the Orb has set his sights on Doctor Strange!
32 PGS./Rated T+ …$3.99
DOCTOR STRANGE AND THE SORCERERS SUPREME #3
ROBBIE THOMPSON (W) • JAVIER RODRIGUEZ (A/C)
VARIANT COVER BY Declan Shalvey
• One of the Sorcerers Supreme dies at the hands of the Forgotten!
• The biggest magical threat to the world is on the rise, and none of the Sorcerers have ever felt this weak before!
32 PGS./Rated T+ …$3.99
DOCTOR STRANGE/PUNISHER: MAGIC BULLETS #1 (of 4)
JOHN BARBER (W) • ANDREA BROCCARDO & JASON MUHR (A)
Cover by MICHAEL WALSH
Variant Cover by TBA
The team-up to end all team-ups is here, as two of the most different Marvel characters worlds’ collide! What new mafia threat is so great that the Punisher needs Doctor Strange’s help? Find out as the Sorcerer Supreme teams with the One Man War on Crime!
40 PGS./Rated T+ …$4.99
THANOS #2
JEFF LEMIRE (W) • MIKE DEODATO (A/C)
Variant Cover by Dustin Nguyen
• Thanos is pure evil.
• Thanos is unstoppable.
• It’s time to take him down.
32 PGS./Parental Advisory …$3.99
GWENPOOL, THE UNBELIEVABLE #9
CHRISTOPHER HASTINGS (W) • GURIHIRU (A)
Cover by David Lopez
• Gwen has found herself in serious trouble with M.O.D.O.K.’s mysterious client.
• But not just that, the authorities are after her, too!
• And what’s this about a flashback to the early days of the Marvel Universe?
32 PGS./Rated T+ …$3.99
Gwenpool Holiday Special: Merry Mix-up
CHRISTOPHER HASTINGS, RYAN NORTH, NICK KOCHER, KARLA PACHECO, CHYNNA CLUGSTON-FLORES (W)
CHYNNA CLUGSTON-FLORES, Myisha Haynes, Nathan Stockman & More (A)
Cover by SALVA ESPIN
Variant Cover by Ron Lim
Variant cover by Chip Zdarsky
Variant by Erica Henderson
It’s the holidays yet again, and that means it’s time to join EVERYONE’S FAVORITE GWEN (take that, Stacy!) and celebrate good times, come on! Only problem is…somehow this year’s festive traditions seem to be a little…off…and Gwen’s the only one who notices. FEATURING: Gwenpool (duh), Spider-Man, Red Skull, Punisher and even Deadpool! This is one present you know you gotta buy yourself!
64 PGS./Rated T+ …$5.99
THE PUNISHER #8
BECKY CLOONAN (W) • STEVE DILLON (A)
Cover by DECLAN SHALVEY
OVER THE RIVER AND THROUGH THE WOODS…
• Frank gets help from an unlikely source.
• But trouble’s not far behind!
• If you go out in the woods today, you’re sure for a big surprise…
32 PGS./Parental Advisory …$3.99
GHOST RIDER #2
FELIPE SMITH (W) • DANILO BEYRUTH (A)
Cover by FELIPE SMITH
Variant Cover by TBA
Variant Cover by TBA
MONSTER SQUAD!
• The all-new fanfare following the Ghost Rider heats up!
• Robbie Reyes isn’t exactly a team player, so what’s he supposed to do with Amadeus Cho, a.k.a. the HULK, following him around?
• And who’s that hot on their heels? None other than the WOLVERINE!
32 PGS./Rated T+ …$3.99
THUNDERBOLTS #8
JIM ZUB (W) • JON MALIN (A/C)
Things that will be broken this issue: • A jail
• Bones inside the human body
• A promise
• (And maybe, just maybe, your heart)
32 PGS./Rated T+ …$3.99
FOOLKILLER #2
MAX BEMIS (W) • Dalibor TALAJIC (A)
Cover by DAVE JOHNSON
VARIANT COVER BY TBA
TEASER VARIANT COVER BY MIKE DEODATO
• Foolkiller versus a bunch of skinheads!!
• Alone with an arsenal of weapons against an army of Red Skull sympathizers…what could be more fun??
32 PGS./Parental Advisory …$3.99
PATSY WALKER, A.K.A. HELLCAT! #13
KATE LETH (W) • BRITTNEY L. WILLIAMS (A/C)
• Hellcat’s had enough bad luck with Black Cat crossing her path, but now that Felicia’s got a whole girl gang in her claws, how can Patsy possibly win this cat fight?!
• Especially with her best friend on the fence, and distracted by an old flame...
32 PGS./Rated T …$3.99
ULTIMATES 2 #2
AL EWING (W) • TRAVEL FOREMAN (A)
Cover by CHRISTIAN WARD
Variant Cover by MARCO RUDY
• It’s deep, dark December. A time for long nights, jingle bells...and ghost stories.
• Now imagine the Ultimate Ghost, haunting the largest house of all. A specter that haunts a whole reality.
• The Shaper’s Ghost is at the door of Taa II — and the Ultimates have to catch it!
32 PGS./Rated T+ …$3.99
SILVER SURFER #10
DAN SLOTT (W) • MICHAEL ALLRED (A/C)
“Unheralded”
• There’s only one reason the Silver Surfer would ever serve Galactus again...
•...if the Universe itself hung in the balance!
• Will this be the final straw that breaks up Marvel’s most cosmic couple?
32 PGS./Rated T+ …$3.99
MOON GIRL AND DEVIL DINOSAUR #14
AMY REEDER & BRANDON MONTCLARE (W) • NATACHA BUSTOS (A)
Cover by AMY REEDER
Teaser Variant Cover by MIKE DEODATO
“THE SMARTEST THERE IS” PART TWO!
• Lunella Lafayette has always been the smartest person in the Marvel U, but now she’s gotta prove it!
• There used to be another guy at the top of the list, but he’s traveling apparently…
• Good thing his best pal BENJAMIN J. GRIMM’s here to defend his pole position!
32 PGS./Rated T …$3.99
SQUADRON SUPREME #14
JAMES ROBINSON (W) • LEONARD KIRK (A)
Cover by ALEX GARNER
• BLUR and THUNDRA may be the prisoners of JIM HAMMOND and S.H.I.E.L.D., but their rescue seems imminent when NIGHTHAWK reappears to free them. But how will the resurrection of NAMOR affect their bid for freedom? Will he be friend or foe to the SQUADRON SUPREME?
• Plus: HYPERION and DOCTOR SPECTRUM each make decisions about their futures with the Squadron.
• And as one hero returns from the dead, will another fall? The startling fate of Jim Hammond.
32 PGS./Rated T+ …$3.99
THE UNBEATABLE SQUIRREL GIRL #15
RYAN NORTH (W) • ERICA HENDERSON (A/C)
• When the TASKMASTER comes to town - and brings with him his ability to DUPLICATE ANYONE’S SWEET MOVES – who stands between him and total domination?
• See, I can tell you’re glancing at the title of this comic and whispering “Well, it’s PROBABLY Squirrel Girl,” but guess what? This time it’s actually Nancy’s cat Mew, who has NO POWERS WHATSOEVER!
• THRILL as Mew loafs around the house! GASP as Mew chases a mouse and then has a nap! BOGGLE as you wonder how we possibly managed to pitch “an issue entirely from the cat’s point of view” to Marvel, a multinational corporation with a LOT invested in our comic continuing to star a squirrel and/or girl!
• They knew the risks when they let Hawkeye have that Pizza Dog issue though, so this was clearly inevitable.
• MEW ISSUE, BRING YOUR TISSUES!
32 PGS./Rated T …$3.99
MOON KNIGHT #9
JEFF LEMIRE (W) • FRANCESCO FRANCAVILLA, GREG SMALLWOOD, JAMES STOKOE, WILFREDO TORRES (A)
Cover by GREG SMALLWOOD
A MEETING OF THE MOON KNIGHTS!
• The many iterations of Marc Spector converge!
• In the clash of personalities, who will emerge victorious?!
32 PGS./Rated T+ …$3.99
SOLO #3
GEOFFREY THORNE & GERRY DUGGAN (W) • PACO DIAZ (A)
Cover by MIKE HAWTHORNE
VARIANT COVER BY TBA
• Solo’s caught in the middle of a civil war!
• No, not THAT civil war…but it’s a fight to the death between two rival biker gangs, and if Solo doesn’t get his act together, they might turn their attention toward him!
32 PGS./Parental Advisory …$3.99
BLACK WIDOW #9
CHRIS SAMNEE & MARK WAID (W) • CHRIS SAMNEE (A/C)
THE RETURN OF BUCKY BARNES!
• Natasha’s living in a world without secrets, and Bucky’s got a pretty big one…
• You can’t go home again…particularly when there’s a deadly killer targeting you!
32 PGS./Rated T+ …$3.99
DAREDEVIL #14
CHARLES SOULE (W) • RON GARNEY (A)
Cover by DAN PANOSIAN
THE CONCLUSION OF “DARK ART”!
• Muse’s sadistic art installations strike close to home and there’s nothing Matt Murdock can do about it!
• Daredevil’s mentee Blindspot is forever changed…
• The darkest chapter begins here.
32 PGS./Rated T+ …$3.99
A YEAR OF MARVELS: THE UNCANNY #1
JEREMY WHITLEY, TODD CASEY & ELLIOTT CASEY (W)
LAURA BRAGA & PAUL DAVIDSON (A)
Cover by JAMAL CAMPBELL
• It’s Halloween in the Marvel U! What does that mean for KATE BISHOP, A.K.A. HAWKEYE? Well, I can’t tell you here but I CAN guarantee it involves a haunted house, some witty one-liners, and a bad guy shot full of arrows…
• Then it’s time to give thanks for…THE PUNISHER?! When an op goes south, Frank Castle finds himself in a subterranean game of cat and mouse! It’s a life or death tale that’ll satisfy more than any turkey dinner!
40 PGS./Rated T+ …$4.99
SCARLET WITCH #13
JAMES ROBINSON (W) • Stephanie Hans (A)
COVER BY DAVID AJA
• In search of answers about her mother and her own past, Wanda (and Agatha Harkness) once more set foot on the Witches’ Road for a perilous journey to the very end of it and the heart and soul of witchcraft itself.
• Along the way Wanda must face friends and foes from her bizarre life – all of whom conspire to stop her in her quest!
32 PGS./Rated T+ …$3.99
ALL-NEW WOLVERINE #15
TOM TAYLOR (W) • NIK VIRELLA (A)
Cover by DAVID LOPEZ
Connecting Variant Cover C by BENGAL
“ENEMY OF THE STATE II” CONTINUES HERE!
• Welcome to beautiful MADRIPOOR! Home to white sand beaches, five-star cuisine and a bustling criminal enterprise…
• WOLVERINE sails on the high seas with pirates, heading to the seedy city to search for information on the slaughter in Daylesville.
• Will she find those who forced her to kill? Or will this tropical hellhole be the final nail in the All-New Wolverine’s coffin?
32 PGS./Rated T+ …$3.99
ALL-NEW X-MEN #16
DENNIS HOPELESS (W) • MARK BAGLEY (A/C)
• THE ALL-NEW X-MEN throw down with THE GOBLIN QUEEN!
• And when repressed Idie finally lets loose, there’s hell to pay!
• Plus: One X-Man will do the unthinkable to save the day…
32 PGS./Rated T+ …$3.99
OLD MAN LOGAN #15
JEFF LEMIRE (W) • FILIPE ANDRADE (A)
Cover by ANDREA SORRENTINO
WHEN IN ROMANIA, DO AS THE ROMANIANS DO – STAKE VAMPIRES!
• It’s up to LOGAN and the greatest supernatural hero squad the world has ever seen, the HOWLING COMMANDOS, to stop DRACULA from a dastardly plot that endangers the whole world.
• But when JUBILEE is in trouble, can the Commandos trust Logan to make the tough calls?
32 PGS./Parental Advisory …$3.99
X-MEN ‘92 #10
CHRIS SIMS & CHAD BOWERS (W) • ALTI FIRMANSYAH & Cory Hamscher (A)
Cover by DAVID NAKAYAMA
• It’s an X-traordinary final issue!
• How will our favorite X-Men survive their biggest threat yet – Apocalypse?!
• And will Scott Summers and Jean Grey make it back from the year 2099?
• This is one giant-size finale you don’t want to miss out on!
40 PGS./Rated T …$4.99
DEADPOOL & THE MERCS FOR MONEY #6
CULLEN BUNN (W) • Brian Level (A)
COVER BY IBAN COELLO
Variant Cover by TBA
Character Variant Cover by TBA
• There’s a new leader in the Mercs for Money and she goes by the name Domino.
• But that doesn’t mean Deadpool can’t still have a say on the team’s uniform!
• Rainbow Deadpool Squad is back – new and improved!
32 PGS./Parental Advisory …$3.99
DEADPOOL #23
GERRY DUGGAN (W) • MATTEO LOLLI (A)
Cover by TRADD MOORE
New Secret Comics Variant Cover by Scott Koblish
• Madcap’s web of revenge tightens around Deadpool…
• Deadpool takes matters into his own hands.
• TIME TO GET EVEN WITH THE EVEN GETTING.
32 PGS./Parental Advisory …$3.99
DEADPOOL: BACK IN BLACK #5 (of 5)
CULLEN BUNN (W) • SALVADOR ESPIN (A/C)
Variant Cover by RON LIM
• Deadpool’s adventures in the Venom symbiote conclude!
• Guest-starring…black costume Spider-Man?!
• That’s right – we’ve got everyone’s favorite symbiotic relationship…
• …and the symbiote is there, too!
32 PGS./Parental Advisory …$3.99
DEADPOOL: TOO SOON? #3 (of 4)
JOSHUA CORIN (W) • TODD NAUCK (A)
Cover by PEPE LARRAZ
Variant Cover by TBA
• Deadpool and Howard the Duck investigate why their friends keep losing their heads.
• Literally! Someone is chopping off their friends’ heads!
• Maybe Doctor Strange can sniff out the culprit with his magic?
32 PGS./Parental Advisory …$3.99
DARK TOWER: THE DRAWING OF THE THREE - THE SAILOR #3 (OF 5)
ROBIN FURTH & PETER DAVID (W) • Juanan Ramirez (A)
Cover by JAY ANACLETO
STEPHEN KING’S EPIC TALE CONTINUES WITH THIS MIND-BENDING ISSUE!
• The Gunslinger is the truth.
• The Lady of Shadows is the truth.
• The Prisoner is the truth.
• So where does JAKE CHAMBERS fit, and what do his visions mean?
• What are we talking about? Find out in THE SAILOR #3!
32 PGS./Mature …$3.99
MAX RIDE: FINAL FLIGHT #4 (OF 5)
JODY HOUSER (W) • MARCO FAILLA (A)
Cover by DAVID NAKAYAMA
JAMES PATTERSON’S HIT SERIES SOARS WITH A REVEAL THAT RENDS MAX’S WORLD ASUNDER!
• MAX RIDE is reeling from last issue’s shocker—but will she let this revelation shatter her world for good?
• And with the fate of the Earth at stake, can the Flock band together to prevent the launch of Itex’s BY-HALF PLAN?
• Or are they truly as obsolete as the DIRECTOR claims?
• Plus: the mystery of the Voice in Max’s head is finally revealed! Don’t miss it!
32 PGS./Rated T …$3.99
ENCHANTED TIKI ROOM #3 (OF 5)
JON ADAMS (W) • HORACIO DOMINGUES (A)
Cover by BRIAN KESINGER
VARIANT COVER BY TOM MORRIS
CONNECTING VARIANT COVER BY JASON GRANDT
ACTION FIGURE VARIANT COVER BY JOHN TYLER CHRISTOPHER
THE MYSTERY WILL DEEPEN WHILE AGNES AIN’T SLEEPIN’!
• Can AGNES find her lost dog outside the Tiki Room at night? SPOILER: Nope. But what she does find will terrify her. And YOU!
• WALLY teaches himself to snorkel...with more success than when he taught himself to saw a woman in half. And also, with more soul-searching.
• PENELOPE reveals a big secret to her family. Will they forgive her? Will they turn on her? Will they emancipate themselves?
• Based on the fan-favorite Disney attraction, our tale hits a new high note with love in the air, danger around the corner and…JOSE’S new song!
32 PGS./RATED T …$3.99
Elements based on Enchanted Tiki Room © Disney.
STAR WARS: CLASSIFIED #1 & 2
KIERON GILLEN (W) • KEV WALKER (A/C)
Issue #1 - Cover by KAMOME SHIRAHAMA
Issue #1 - Variant Cover by Jamie McKelvie
Issue #1 - Variant Cover by Elsa Charretier
Issue #1 - Droids Variant Cover by Rod Reis
Issue #1 - CLASSIFIED STORY THUS FAR VARIANT COVER BY SALVADORE Larroca
Issue #1 - Action Figure Variant Cover by JOHN TYLER CHRISTOPHER
Issue #1 - Blank Variant Cover also available
Issue #2 - VARIANT COVER BY Annie Wu
Issue #2 - Droids Variant Cover by Declan Shalvey
Issue #2 - VARIANT COVER BY DAVE DORMAN
An all-new, TOP-SECRET ongoing Star Wars series begins this December…
ISSUE #1 - 40 PGS./Rated T …$4.99
ISSUE #2 - 32 PGS./Rated T …$3.99
Star Wars © Lucasfilm Ltd. & TM. All rights reserved. Used under authorization. Text and illustrations for Star Wars are © 2016 Lucasfilm Ltd.
STAR WARS: POE DAMERON #9
CHARLES SOULE (W) • PHIL NOTO (A/C)
Variant Cover by Mike Hawthorne
• Poe Dameron is on a secret mission from General Organa herself…
• …to escort none other than C-3PO on a dangerous mission to the planet Kaddak!
• Also: a sneak peek into Terex’s past…
32 PGS./Rated T …$3.99
Star Wars © Lucasfilm Ltd. & TM. All rights reserved. Used under authorization. Text and illustrations for Star Wars are © 2016 Lucasfilm Ltd |
m "Initial version" Push the mq repo to Bitbucket: hg push --mq ssh://hg@bitbucket.org/fmarier/mozilla-central-mq-BUGNUMBER Make the above URL the default for pull/push by putting this in.hg/patches-BUGNUMBER/.hg/hgrc : [paths] default = https://bitbucket.org/fmarier/mozilla-central-mq-BUGNUMBER default-push = ssh://hg@bitbucket.org/fmarier/mozilla-central-mq-BUGNUMBER
Working on a bug
I like to preserve the history of the work I did on a patch. So once I've got some meaningful changes to commit to my patch queue repo, I do the following:
Add the changes to the current patch: hg qref Check that everything looks fine: hg diff --mq Commit the changes to the mq repo: hg commit --mq Push the changes to Bitbucket: hg push --mq
Switching between bugs
Since I have one patch queue per bug, I can easily work on more than one bug at a time without having to clone the repository again and work from a different directory.
Here's how I switch between patch queues:
Unapply the current queue's patches: hg qpop -a Switch to the new queue: hg qqueue BUGNUMBER Apply all of the new queue's patches: hg qpush -a
Rebasing a patch queue
To rebase my patch onto the latest mozilla-central tip, I do the following:
Unapply patches using hg qpop -a Update the branch: hg pull -u Reapply the first patch: hg qpush and resolve any conflicts Update the patch file in the queue: hg qref Repeat steps 3 and 4 for each patch. Commit the changes: hg commit --mq -m "Rebase patch"
Credits
Thanks to Thinker Lee for telling me about qqueue and Chris Pearce for explaining to me how he uses mq repos on Bitbucket.
Of course, feel free to leave a comment if I missed anything useful or if there's a easier way to do any of the above.Restaurant owner kicks out Arab MK who justified kidnapping out of his establishment, calls her 'you little traitor.'
Knesset Chairman MK Yuli Edelstein (Likud) may have said Monday that he can't dismiss Arab MK Hanin Zoabi (Balad) from the Knesset for her shocking comments justifying the abduction of three Israeli teenagers - but one plucky restaurant owner decided to dismiss her from his establishment.
In a video filmed on a cell phone, the Arab MK can be seen being kicked out by the owner, who called her "traitor" several times in the course of the interchange.
At the start of the video, the owner can be heard asking Zoabi sarcastically if they don't have his restaurant in Gaza, to which she responds by saying "no, they're bombing in Gaza."
The owner then tells her he's kicking her out, calling her "you little traitor. I can do it (remove you), it's my democratic right."
After Zoabi shouts back, the owner continues "that's what it is, if you talk like that definitely that's what you'll get. You don't deserve equality." After a momentary silence, the owner again calls her "traitor."
Zoabi sparked rage last Tuesday in a radio interview, justifying the terrorists who abducted Naftali Frenkel (16), Gilad Sha'ar (16) and Eyal Yifrah (19) two weeks ago.
Speaking about the terrorist kidnappers, Zoabi said "they are not terrorists, I do not agree with you! They have seen no other way to change their reality and they have to resort to these measures until Israel sobers up a bit and feels the suffering of others."
The police on Sunday recommended investigating Zoabi over her comments.
Zoabi's tone got even wilder on Monday, when she said "I did not break any laws. On the contrary - I am fulfilling my moral, human and political duty, the obligation for which I was sent to the Knesset: to fight oppression, and for justice."Age of Empires II – The path forward
Happy Birthday!
Updates
[windows.microsoft.com]
[windows.microsoft.com]
Development Roadmap
New Content
[aslxdw.dm2302.livefilestore.com]
Ryan Chaply here (aka Ryz0n) - the producer on AOE II HD - and we've got a big announcement! It’s hard to believe, but April 9th marks the two year anniversary since the release of Age of Empires II: HD on Steam. In those two years, players have amassed over 10,000 items in the Steam Workshop, and spend more than fifty million hours building armies, converting units, and chopping trees. In fact, more people have played over 50 hours in AOE II than the entire population of Little Rock – the state capital of Arkansas. It’s clear that the franchise has a hugely dedicated user base, and today I’m excited to talk about where we’ll be taking the title through 2015.If you’re reading this in the steam client, the first step in that journey has likely downloaded in the background already. Age of Empires II: HD will be updating to version 3.9 today, with several user facing, and under the hood changes to the game. From the gameplay side there was a focus on improving how teams get handled in games. To that end, real world maps now have a ‘team together’ option designed to ensure those 2v2 games are more about team battles. Additionally the team lock checkbox functionality has been improved to ensure the correct status is displayed when scenario files are used during game creation. If you’re creating a scenario, putting team lock in your scenario will now properly ensure users can’t break the scenario by switching teams.The number one request we see on the forums, and in feedback from the community, is a desire to continually improve the performance of the title, especially as higher numbers of units / objects appear on screen. It proves especially tricky with this type of project where so much occurs in-line in code, as opposed to much more compartmentalized system design found in more modern games. It’s been a big needle-in-a-haystack hunt since early development, and we’ve found quite a few needles since launch. We’re still hunting, and today many users should see another improvement to performance within their game. The biggest changes should be visible when large numbers of units and trees are on screen simultaneously, and we’ve seen some very large framerate jumps on lower end systems. This can also help with scrolling speeds and perception of ‘lag’ in multiplayer games since more users will be running the simulation at higher speeds. But don’t take my word for it – go ahead and give it a shot. If you’re curious about your framerates, hit F11 twice in the game (once is the in-game clock) to see what framerate the render engine is running at.There is one final change with today’s patch, and that affects individuals playing on unsupported operating systems. Exactly one year ago today, on April 8, 2014 – support for Windows XP officially ended. Incredibly it’s nearly as old as the original Age of Empires II games, and while it was a great operating system for the time; times have indeed changed. Starting today, and moving forward with development on AOE II HD, Windows XP will not be supported for new updates. We are making a XP branch publically available you may select to continue playing content, however strongly encourage that the remaining XP diehards consider upgrading. Running unsupported and vulnerable operating systems is not a great idea, and puts both yourself and your data at risk. According to the steam hardware survey, this will affect only a very small percentage of users. For more information about the Windows XP end of life, check out the Microsoft Support Page. The Windows 10 technical preview is also available for easy download if you want to test it out. As with any preview software, that is of course at your own risk.Over the last few months we’ve been laying some groundwork in development builds towards a roadmap I’m very excited to give some visibility into today. Let’s start with the most important piece of information:I hinted at this during our April Fool’s day joke thread, but in case some people thought it was part of the gag – rest assured, I’m very excited for the future of AOE II. At the moment, I want to focus on where we’re going in the relatively near future.When Age of Empires II was released, Valve’s workshop was still in relative infancy. Storage and update calls functioned very differently than they do now, and of course Age did not have much in the way of inherent support for mods. In the original game, people would mostly overwrite files to make changes, and with the core release of Age2 – the workshop functioned in a somewhat similar fashion. While it works, it’s not the ideal route.Fast forward to today, and Skybox has done workshop integration for a number of games – with vastly improved SDKs from valve’s side. Our goal in the upcoming months is to make some dramatic improvements to the Steam workshop for Age of Empires II to make the experience much better for users. This includes a mod manager in-game to reprioritize loading and making mods active / inactive, improved file sizes and update capabilities for mod authors to prevent users from needing to subscribe to multiple packs, and enhanced mod capabilities for certain files types within the game. It will mean unsubscribing from a mod will be more immediate and effective than the current model. Expect a few bumps as we move to the updated workshop model, but we’ll be as open as possible with beta branches to help mod creators and users make the transition.The second big item we’re focusing on developing right now addresses some lower level systems. At the moment customers looking to play multiplayer must choose either vanilla or AoF exclusively. With a larger potential pool of players in the base game, it creates a negative feedback loop of fewer lobbies showing in the expansion. I’d like to give a shoutout to the enterprising community members who created aoe2.net to help alleviate the lobby issue via a useful external site. In the future we’ll be working to adjust the data structure within the game to allow all game lobbies to be listed inline within the game, loading the appropriate game information on the fly instead of clicking a banner manually. Likewise, you won’t have to flip between game modes to play base campaigns or expansion ones. There’s a lot of work to be done here behind the scenes, and many questions to be answered, for example if you don’t have the expansions what happens to all of the additional ones? At the end of the day though, our goal is to make getting into a fun game quick and easy, as well as encourage people to host the newest content without fear of not getting players to join. After all, the best part of the game is actually playing it!There are a bunch of smaller items, bugs, and improvements that will be made before we get to the next stage, but that’s a peek at some of our shorter term priorities. Skybox will be explaining in more depth some of the changes we’re making with workshop and lobby functionality as we continue development, so stay tuned to the steam announcements and game launcher.Back in 2013 we had this crazy idea, work closely with a group born out of dedicated community members to do something very unusual – make an official expansion. Despite being somewhat uncharted territory, Forgotten Empires became a great content addition that both stayed true to the AOE spirit and moved the franchise forward. Transitioning from a community collective into more rigid timeline schedules and people management of development team often is where projects can break, but the FE team had great discipline, and awesome content ideas as we brought new bonus campaigns to the expansion through last summer.So with all of that said:I am extremely excited to reveal that we’ll be working with the Forgotten Empires team to formally bring ato the Age of Empires franchise later this year.We’ll be detailing the expansion throughout the year in developer blogs directly from the team – including one soon revealing the first new civilization. I’ll leave you with a teaser the team sent from one of the new units being worked on. As with the Forgotten Expansion, you can anticipate a lot packed in there, including new civs, campaigns, game modes, units, and more. If your focus is more on the original AOEII experience, the new content development means you can look forward to additional support and features that benefit every owner. Since launch, AOE II HD has come so far – and with the help of the FE team and Skybox, this year is going to be the best yet.So there you have it! Make sure to check out the update today, and head over to the forums if you’ve got questions. If you want to talk about the short term roadmap, we’ve got a conversation thread up and running for that too! Finally, because I know there will be plenty of speculation as to the next expansion, let’s go ahead and centralize it into this thread. We won’t be answering much yet, but will give replies where we can.From petitions and forums threads to today, it’s been an incredible journey to see what Age of Empires II: HD has become. I think the future looks brighter still, for the sun never truly sets on a classic.ANAHEIM, Calif. -- The unofficial successor to Alex Rodriguez as Yankees designated hitter didn't seem too interested in talking about his contributions to a 5-1 win over the Los Angeles Angels on Saturday night.
Brian McCann didn't even mention his two-out, two-run single in the first inning, which was big at the time. And for a guy who can be pretty funny, he didn't throw out any one-liners making fun of his wheels on a night he stole his first base since he was with the Atlanta Braves in 2012.
Why Gary Sanchez will hit for average
What McCann wanted to talk up during his brief post-game interview were the Yankees' young guns, which once again was the fuel that made this a winning night.
McCann acted as if he could have talked all night about rookie right-hander Luis Cessa, who worked six shutout innings in his first big-league start even though it was Gary Sanchez behind the plate calling the game.
And while not mentioning Sanchez by name, McCann made it clear that he's having a blast watching all of the Yankees kids try to help make something of a season that is on life support because of the old regime.
He's loved watching 6-foot-8, 270-pound right fielder Aaron Judge, a big leaguer as of last weekend, homer in his first two games.
He likes what he's seen from just-up-from-Triple-A first baseman Tyler Austin, who homered in his first big-league at-bat last weekend one batter before Judge did the same.
He really likes the two rookies who are new to the Yankees rotation, Cessa and Chad Green, whose last start was pretty special, too... six shutout innings, 11 strikeouts and no walks in a 1-0 win over AL-East leading Toronto last Monday night at Yankee Stadium.
Oh, and the guy that McCann seems to be most fond about is the one who has come up from Triple-A a little more than two weeks ago and stole his job. Sanchez is a beast at the plate and behind the plate, and he showed off both talents in Saturday's win by hitting first-inning homer, No. 6 in his 15 games, by getting the most out of Cessa and by picking a runner off first base with his cannon right arm.
Summing up everything he's taken in over the last two weeks, McCann smiled and said, "These guys aren't coming up to just fill spots. These guys are coming up to be impact baseball players hitting in the middle of the order, starting big games and it's great to see."
That's quite an endorsement, and it's impressive that McCann is embracing management's decision to go young even though it likely means his days as a Yankees starting catcher are over.
His days as a Yankee probably are short, too, even though he's under contract for $17 million per in 2017 and 2018 with a full no-trade clause.
There were hot rumors just before this year's July 31 trade deadline that the Braves wanted McCann back to help sell tickets for their move to a new ballpark next season. Nothing happened, but look for this to get done after the season, although the Yankees surely will have to pay most of the remaining money and perhaps a $15 million club option for 2019, too, to get McCann to agree to a deal.
Meantime, McCann is having fun adapting to DH while watching Sanchez play like a young Johnny Bench behind the plate.
"I'm getting used to it more and more," said McCann, a.248 hitter this season with 16 homers and 48 RBIs in 97 games. "It took me a while, probably four or five days to get a routine down, but it's coming along. It's almost like every at-bat is a pinch-hit. You're inside hitting."
McCann probably already misses working with pitchers during games, especially the two rookies. No matter, sitting in the Yankees dugout on Saturday night and watching Cessa do his thing was pretty enjoyable.
"I thought he changed speeds extremely well with his heater," McCann said. "Early in the game he was throwing 91-92. When he reached back, he was hitting 97-98. When you can change speeds like that and change eye levels with that slider he had and the changeup... he had everything going tonight. That was an unbelievable performance he put on. He made some guys look bad."
A lot of new Yankees who are just up from Triple-A have been doing that.
"This is the best young group I've seen," McCann said.
Randy Miller may be reached at rmiller@njadvancemedia.com. Follow him on Twitter @RandyJMiller. Find NJ.com on Facebook.Woo hoo! I was worried about the package thieves in our neighborhood, but I didn't need to be - Santa sent it to my wife's office. Well played, Santa, well played. Lots of travelling treats and some good NYE gear - and by gear, I mean mustaches! Kids confiscated 'em as soon as I opened it. My son also stole the beanie, damnit.
Also - and this is, well, kinda bizarre: there's a Thai phrasebook included. I haven't told anyone but my wife, but there is a greater-than-average chance I'll be going to Thailand in the next six months.
Dude, that kinda freaks me out.
Well done, kind Santa, well done!
UPDATE: Also included was a Negra Modelo flash drive... I opened it up, and it had a link to youtube titled "The Meaning of Life." This is where the link took me.
Oh, and thank you :)AutoGuide.com
Cadillac is hard at work on the next-generation CTS-V high-performance model as these spy photos reveal.
It seems the 2016 version of the car will likely feature a twin-turbocharged V8 engine instead of a supercharged unit as was speculated. How do we know this? Well, the provided shots seem to indicate the car has a pair of intercoolers tucked behind each corner of the front bumper.
Of course intercoolers are vital to turbocharged engines as they keep performance-robbing – and potentially engine-damaging – heat at bay.
For improved performance and reduced fuel consumption turbocharging is the way to go. Sure, superchargers can crank out BIG numbers but automakers are adopting exhaust gas-driven blowers in ever-greater numbers.
SEE ALSO: Cadillac Elmiraj Concept is so Awesome You Won’t Believe Your Eyes
But how big will this turbocharged V8 be? Will it displace a whopping 6.2-liters or less than that? Of course the Cadillac Elmiraj concept coupe featured a 4.5-liter twin-turbocharged two-by-four, which seems like an appropriate size.
No matter what the engine specifics are it has to deliver at least 550 hp to compete with cars like the BMW M5 and Mercedes-Benz E63 AMG.
Design-wise the new CTS-V features an interesting grille with a sort of fan-like arrangement of the slats as well as some massive wheels and an aggressive stance. The 2016 Cadillac CTS-V is expected to go into production sometime in the middle of next year.
GALLERY: 2016 Cadillac CTS-V Spy Shots
Discuss this story on our Cadillac forum.A federal court in New York is expected to hear oral arguments this week in a lawsuit that alleges President Trump's restaurants and hotels have benefited unfairly by doing business with foreign governments.
The law firm Gupta Wessler PLLC will argue on behalf of the government watchdog group Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics in Washington and others on Wednesday that Trump violated the Emoluments Clause, which bars the president from accepting gifts or other benefits from foreign leaders without congressional consent, Deepak Gupta tweeted.
I'll present oral argument in our Emoluments Clause case this Wednesday (not Tue) morning in NYC. Background here: https://t.co/TH4k8jOUYk https://t.co/bRzBmigLtl — Deepak Gupta (@deepakguptalaw) October 15, 2017
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"We argue that the President is violating these clauses in a number of ways, including through patronage by foreign and domestic governments at the Trump International Hotels in Washington, D.C. and New York, leases held by foreign governments at New York's Trump Tower, and other business dealings in foreign countries," the law firm said on its website.
Trump and the White House have dismissed the suit and similar, saying that he has not violated the clause because he handed over management of his family’s companies to his children and handed over ownership of his personal trust.MINNEAPOLIS -- The Minnesota Vikings kept two of their players from reaching free agency by agreeing to deals with safety Andrew Sendejo and defensive tackle Kenrick Ellis on Saturday.
Sendejo agreed to a four-year contract, a person with knowledge of the deal told The Associated Press. The person spoke on condition of anonymity because the move had not been officially announced.
Andrew Sendejo started all 13 games in which he played in 2015. Ezra Shaw/Getty Images
Sendejo could have tested the free-agent waters beginning on Wednesday, but instead elected to return for a sixth season in purple.
The Vikings gave Sendejo a contract extension in 2013, largely for his special-teams work at that point, but he turned himself into a serviceable NFL safety who enjoyed his best season in 2015.
Sendejo started 13 games for the Vikings last year after beating out Robert Blanton for the starting job opposite standout Harrison Smith. He had 74 tackles and one interception.
Coach Mike Zimmer said at the NFL combine that the Vikings were looking for another playmaker to allow Smith some more freedom and acknowledged he wasn't sure if that player was on the roster. It's not immediately clear if Sendejo's deal, which was first reported by Fox Sports, will keep the Vikings from looking for another safety or if they plan to give the job to Sendejo.
Ellis got a one-year deal, agent Drew Smith said. Ellis joined the Vikings last October after being let go by the New York Giants and played in nine games for Minnesota. He was a third-round draft pick by the New York Jets in 2011.
ESPN Vikings reporter Ben Goessling contributed to this report.20 SHARES Share Tweet Pin +1
How to Bleach Your Skin? Skin Bleaching is a popular method for Whitening Skin at Home. Generally, people go to Beauty Salons and get Bleaching Treatments there. Well, that is nothing objectionable either. Also, Beauty Salons are professionals, they know many things about Beautification better than any normal person. Still, if you are not a Huge Salon Fan, or are about to be too busy to visit a Parlour, this post will help you know How to Bleach Skin.
So, keep reading to find out the Best, and the Easiest ways to Bleach your Skin at Home.
What is Skin Bleaching? Why Bleach Your Skin? (How to Bleach Your Skin?)
What is Skin Bleaching?
Skin Bleaching is one way to Lighten the skin tone, using Cosmetics at Home or at a Beauty Salon. The chemical/product which is used for the purpose is Bleaching Powder. It’s Chemical Name is Calcium Hypochlorite. And it is an active ingredient of many Detergents as well, as it can turn pale color, to Bright White.
And Skin Bleaching as I said above also, is the Process, which you can use to Lighten Your Skin Tone. But, if you still wonder for the Reasons to Bleach your Skin, then there you go.
Why Bleach Your Skin?
Well, if you reached this page by yourself, I am sure you already know why you want to Bleach Your Skin. Still, for the sake of people who are unaware, I will give Reasons to Bleach Your Skin.
There are many people around the world who have an uneven skin tone. You too might know what it feels like having Dark arms and fair shoulders. And things get worse when you get a Natural Face Tan during summer. This makes your face looks darker than the rest of your body.
What actually happens is that Sun’s UV Rays attack your skin, and hence the body creates more melanin. This Melanin makes your skin look darker. This is a defense Mechanism of your body, to protect the delicate Skin Cells from Sun Burn. But, all those things are good, until you get a dark face tan. To avoid the situation of having a Darker Face and a Lighter Body color, Skin Bleaching or Skin Whitening is one solution.
How to Bleach Your Skin? Fast Cosmetic Methods for Skin Bleaching:
Okay, so coming to the point, which this article is about. If you are on this webpage, then I am sure that you are looking for ways to Bleach Your Skin. Having the question on your mind How to Bleach Your Skin, you are looking for a legit answer.
Well, let me tell you that there are two answers to this question. The first one includes Cosmetic Treatments and the Second one Includes Natural Home Remedies on How to Bleach Your Skin.
Laser Skin Whitening Treatment: This is one option that you have to Whiten Your Skin by Bleaching. The Laser is powerful and will peel off the dark or tanned layers of your skin. This will leave behind the White Tone Skin of yours.
This is one option that you have to Whiten Your Skin by Bleaching. The Laser is powerful and will peel off the dark or tanned layers of your skin. This will leave behind the White Tone Skin of yours. Chemical Bleaching Treatment: Apart from the Laser Treatment for Whitening Skin, there is one thing that you can try. That is Cosmetic Bleaching Creams to Bleach Your Skin. Although, I would still recommend you to use the Natural Home Remedies to Bleach Your Skin, still if you want results the quickest, then these Creams are a Good Solution.
So, these were the Cosmetic Methods of Skin Bleaching. I hope you choose wisely between these Cosmetic Remedies and the Natural Home Remedies on How to Bleach Skin at Home.
How to Bleach Your Skin? Natural Skin Bleaching, Natural Skin Lightening Methods!
In the sections above you got to read about the What is Bleaching and about different Cosmetic Skin Bleaching Techniques. Although you might have found those the Best, still you need to have a look at the Home Remedies for Bleaching Skin.
1). Use Lemon for Skin Lightening:
Lemon is one of the Best and the Most Effective Natural Skin Whitening Ingredients. It is very rich in Vitamin C and cleanses the pores from depth. This is How it helps remove Tan as well and gives you a Lighter Skin Tone.
Steps to Use:
Cut the Lemon into 2 Halves, and Rub one on Your Darker Skin Now leave it like this for around 10-12 Minutes Wash off with Coldwater and wipe with a Towel Repeat at least once, and at most twice every day
Note: Don’t expose your skin to Sun, with Lemon on it.
You might also like to Read How to Get Rid of Scars on Face?
2). Milk for Natural Skin Bleaching:
You sure know there are Hundreds of Health Benefits which you get from milk. As a Great Source of Protein, Calcium and other Vital Nutrients, milk makes a Great Food for Growth. And, the best thing is that you can use Milk to even cleanse and Bleach your Skin. Using Milk for Bleaching Your Skin can give you Mind Blowing Results soon.
Steps to Use:
To One Teaspoon of Milk, add a Teaspoon of Honey Mix it up gently and make a Face Pack Apply this Face Pack by Gently Massaging your Face in circular motion, and leave for around 20 Minutes Wash off with mild water and dab gently with a Towel Repeat once every day (If possible, or once in 2 days)
3). Egg Face Mask:
Eggs are a great source of different useful Nutrients. You know that Eggs are very rich in Protein and everything important as Potash, and Zinc as well, but did you know that you can use an Egg Face Mask to Whiten Your Skin Naturally? Well, here you go then.
Steps to Use:
Simply break a Raw Egg into a Cup, and beat it till it becomes Fluffy Now, that it is fluffy, what you have to do is apply it on your Face with a Brush or anything that comforts you Then Leave it like this for around 20 Minutes Wash off with a really mild Soap Repeat every day
4). Fruit Face Pack:
Fruits are Natural Sources of Vitamins, Minerals and all the other Vital Nutrients. If you consume a glass of Fresh Mix Juice every day, you will be doing a lot of good to yourself already. And, apart from that, you can even use a Fruit Face Pack to Whiten your Skin Tone naturally.
Steps to Use:
Take a Bowl and add freshly cut Papaya, Cucumber, Avocado, and Preferable Aloe Vera Gel to it Blend all these ingredients thoroughly and add two teaspoons of cream to it, to make a Paste Now, apply this face pack on your Darker Skin Areas and leave for around 20 Minutes Rinse your face now with warm water and tap with a dry towel Repeat daily for Best Results
5). Papaya Mask for Natural Skin Whitening:
If you are looking for a legit answer to How to Bleach Skin, Papaya is a Good Candidate. Papaya is rich in Vitamin C and is good for exfoliating and nourishing your skin. This way it can easily Lighten your Skin Tone Naturally.
Steps to Use:
Peel off a Fresh Papaya, and cut it into smaller slices Now blend these slices and form a Thick Smooth Paste Apply this paste on your Face (Darker Skin Areas) Gently, and leave for another 15-20 Minutes Wash off with slightly warm water and tap with a Dry Towel
6). Using Gram Flour Mask as a Skin Tone Lightening Agent:
Gram Flour is very useful for Exfoliating your skin Naturally. With a Good Gram Flour Face Pack, you can instantly Gain a Whiter Skin Tone. It will remove the Dead Skin Cells and hence encourage Newer Cells to come up. See how it works.
Steps to Use:
Add two tablespoons of Gram to a small amount of water to make a Thick Paste Apply this smooth paste on your Face and let it dry Wash it off after it dries and pat dry with a Towel
7). Fuller’s Earth (Multani Mitti) For Natural Skin Whitening:
I don’t believe that there would be many people who have not used the Fuller’s Earth to Get Rid of Acne or Pimples on their Face. It has many medicinal Benefits and works amazingly to Treat Skin. It is a great answer to How to Bleach Your Skin. So, read and the steps below to make it work for you.
Steps to Use:
Simply add two tablespoons of Fuller Earth to a Small Quantity of Water, and make a thick-smooth paste Now apply this paste on your Darker Skin and leave it to dry Wash off with cold water and pat dry with a clean Towel Repeat Daily for Best and Quickest Results
8). Hot Oil Body Massage:
You might be unaware of the Fact that a hot Oil Body Massage can Lighten your Skin tone exceptionally. The reason behind the success of this Home Remedy is that it Exfoliates the Skin Greatly and hence your Skin begins to feel better and look Lighter.
Steps to Use:
Choose one of these Oils:
Coconut Oil, Almond Oil, or Olive Oil Warm the Oil of Your Choice to a warm temperature, which is warm enough to just be comforting to your skin Preferably add Tulsi or Neem Leaves after Crushing those nicely Use this Oil to Massage your Body for around 30 Minutes Repeat once a week for Best Results
Also Read about Getting Rid of Baby Hairs Fast!
9). Using Turmeric to Lighten Skin Tone:
Turmeric has so many Health Benefits for Skin, Scalp, Throat and what not? You can use it for almost everything. It is like another Apple Cider Vinegar (I am missing that right now, though). Anyway, you can use Turmeric Powder with Fresh Lemon Juice for Bleaching your Skin.
Steps to Use:
Mix a Tablespoon of Turmeric Powder to three teaspoons of Lemon Juice Make a semi thick paste, and apply it all over your Darker Skin Areas which you want to Whiten Wash off with warm water after 15 Minutes and pat dry with a clean Towel Repeat Regularly for the Best Results
10). Yogurt Face Pack:
We all know that Yogurt being a Dairy Product is very rich with Vitamins and other Nutrients. And apart from that, it is a Probiotic, which is why it is very effective for Cleansing skin also. You can use Yogurt any day as a Natural Face Pack to Lighten Your Skin Tone.
Steps to Use:
Add Two Teaspoons of Fresh Yogurt, to One Teaspoon of Honey Mix these Ingredients in order to make a semi Thick Paste Now apply this paste on your Face and leave it for around 15 Minutes Then wash it off with cold water Pat dry with a Clean Towel Repeating Everyday will show results in 10 Days
11). Use Rosewater:
Rosewater is very useful to Make Skin Tone Light. Also, it can soften your skin, and nourish it effectively to make it become fresher. These properties of Rosewater make it eligible to be one answer to How to Bleach Your Skin. Read and implement the Steps below.
Steps to Use:
Make a Natural Facepack at your Home (Choose any Facepack which I mentioned about in this article, if you don’t have any other ideas) Add Rosewater to that Facepack Apply the Facepack and wash off after 15-20 Minutes with water Pat dry with a clean towel and repeat regularly for Best and Fast Results
12). Use Tomatoes for Natural Skin Bleaching:
You came with the Question How to Bleach Your Skin, and expected Tomato to not be on the list? Well, if you did, then you were wrong. Tomatoes are amazing Nourishing agents and are extremely Good for Skin. With Tomatoes, you can Get Rid of Scars, you can exfoliate your skin and also Turn your Skin White Naturally.
Don’t believe me? Try Implementing the steps below.
Steps to Use:
Mix the Tomato Pulp with a little bit of Lemon Juice Apply this Paste to your Face or any other Body Part, where’s skin you want to Lighten and leave for 20 Minutes After 20 Minutes, wash off with cold water Use a Dry and Clean Towel to wipe off gently Repeat this Remedy every day, in order to get Best and Fast Results
13). Coconut Water as a Natural Skin Bleach:
Coconut water has many health benefits and is very refreshing during the summer. But apart from that, it has amazing Anti-fungal and Anti-bacterial Properties, which make it a good candidate for Bleaching your Skin.
To make this Home Remedy for Bleaching Skin work for you, all you need to do is apply Tender Coconut Water on your Face, twice every day for 15 Minutes. That’s it, this will eventually Lighten Your Skin Tone Naturally, and impressively.
How Effectively Does Skin Bleaching Actually Work?
Well, this is an Important Question which might trigger your mind before you go onto Implementing any of the Steps above. And that is no Problem, I have answers to all the Questions.
Talking of the Effectiveness of Skin Bleaching, the results are somewhat contradictory sometimes. But, after researching everything important about Skin Bleaching and the Cosmetic Skin Bleaching Techniques, I can say that these work. But the effectiveness depends on the Quality of the products which you use.
Say, if you are using a Cosmetic Cream for Skin Bleaching, then you need to research about that particular brand’s quality. If the reviews are good, the Product will most probably suit you. And the same goes for Home Remedies for Bleaching Skin too. If you are using a Stale Tomato or Papaya, it can cause side effects on your skin.
Also, Read How to Whiten Teeth Naturally?
So, you know the answer to How to Bleach Your Skin is not very difficult. The Effectiveness totally depends on the Quality of Products that you use.
Is Skin Bleaching Safe? Complete Guide on How to Bleach Skin!
After you have known How to Bleach Your Skin and How Effective is Skin Bleaching, you need to know is it really safe to Bleach your skin?
And the Answer to this question is “YES”. Skin Bleaching is Totally Safe if you do it carefully. Also, it is always recommendable to take help from a Professional for Bleaching Your Skin. This way you will be able to make sure that you don’t do anything wrong and invite any Side Effects.
Index of the Article – Complete Guide on How to Bleach Your Skin!
Okay as we always say that Index is important, so you can make sure that you didn’t miss on anything important in this article. Below here is the Index of this article. Read below and verify whatever you read was the whole, or not.
You might also want to read about How to Get Rid of Wrinkles?
Index:
What is Bleaching?
Why Bleach Your Skin?
Cosmetic Skin Bleaching Methods
15 Tips on How to Bleach Skin?
1). 2 Medical Treatments to Bleach Skin
2). 13 Home Remedies to Get Lighter Skin Tone
1). 2 Medical Treatments to Bleach Skin 2). 13 Home Remedies to Get Lighter Skin Tone Effectiveness of Skin Bleaching
How Safe is it to Bleach your Skin?
So, this was it for now. In this article, you read everything about How to Bleach Your Skin. I hope now you really know How to Bleach Skin, and can |
out a political solution to the ongoing crisis and safeguard the territorial integrity of Syria.Abraham Lincoln is elected the 16th president of the United States over a deeply divided Democratic Party, becoming the first Republican to win the presidency. Lincoln received only 40 percent of the popular vote but handily defeated the three other candidates: Southern Democrat John C. Breckinridge, Constitutional Union candidate John Bell, and Northern Democrat Stephen Douglas, a U.S. senator for Illinois.
Lincoln, a Kentucky-born lawyer and former Whig representative to Congress, first gained national stature during his campaign against Stephen Douglas of Illinois for a U.S. Senate seat in 1858. The senatorial campaign featured a remarkable series of public encounters on the slavery issue, known as the Lincoln-Douglas debates, in which Lincoln argued against the spread of slavery, while Douglas maintained that each territory should have the right to decide whether it would become free or slave. Lincoln lost the Senate race, but his campaign brought national attention to the young Republican Party. In 1860, Lincoln won the party’s presidential nomination.
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In the November 1860 election, Lincoln again faced Douglas, who represented the Northern faction of a heavily divided Democratic Party, as well as Breckinridge and Bell. The announcement of Lincoln’s victory signaled the secession of the Southern states, which since the beginning of the year had been publicly threatening secession if the Republicans gained the White House.
By the time of Lincoln’s inauguration on March 4, 1861, seven states had seceded, and the Confederate States of America had been formally established, with Jefferson Davis as its elected president. One month later, the American Civil War began when Confederate forces under General P.G.T. Beauregard opened fire on Union-held Fort Sumter in South Carolina. In 1863, as the tide turned against the Confederacy, Lincoln emancipated the slaves and in 1864 won reelection. In April 1865, he was assassinated by Confederate sympathizer John Wilkes Booth at Ford’s Theatre in Washington, D.C. The attack came only five days after the American Civil War effectively ended with the surrender of Confederate General Robert E. Lee at Appomattox.
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ADVERTISEMENT Thanks for watching! Visit Website
For preserving the Union and bringing an end to slavery, and for his unique character and powerful oratory, Lincoln is hailed as one of the greatest American presidents.Politicians exploit public ignorance. Few areas of public ignorance provide as many opportunities for political demagoguery as taxation.
Today some politicians argue that the rich must pay their fair share and label the proposed changes in tax law as tax cuts for the rich.
Let’s look at who pays what, with an eye toward attempting to answer this question: Are the rich paying their fair share?
According to the latest IRS data, the payment of income taxes is as follows.
The top 1 percent of income earners, those having an adjusted annual gross income of $480,930 or higher, pay about 39 percent of federal income taxes. That means about 892,000 Americans are stuck with paying 39 percent of all federal taxes.
The top 10 percent of income earners, those having an adjusted gross income over $138,031, pay about 70.6 percent of federal income taxes.
About 1.7 million Americans, less than 1 percent of our population, pay 70.6 percent of federal income taxes. Is that fair, or do you think they should pay more?
By the way, earning $500,000 a year doesn’t make one rich. It’s not even yacht money.
But the fairness question goes further. The bottom 50 percent of income earners, those having an adjusted gross income of $39,275 or less, pay 2.83 percent of federal income taxes.
Thirty-seven million tax filers have no tax obligation at all. The Tax Policy Center estimates that 45.5 percent of households will not pay federal income tax this year.
There’s a severe political problem of so many Americans not having any skin in the game. These Americans become natural constituencies for big-spending politicians. After all, if you don’t pay federal taxes, what do you care about big spending?
Also, if you don’t pay federal taxes, why should you be happy about a tax cut? What’s in it for you? In fact, you might see tax cuts as threatening your handout programs.
Our nation has a 38.91 percent tax on corporate earnings, the fourth-highest in the world. The House of Representatives has proposed that it be cut to 20 percent—some members of Congress call for a 15 percent rate.
The nation’s political hustlers object, saying corporations should pay their fair share of taxes. The fact of the matter—which even leftist economists understand, though they might not publicly admit it—is corporations do not pay taxes.
An important subject area in economics is called tax incidence. It holds that the entity upon whom a tax is levied does not necessarily bear its full burden. Some of it can be shifted to another party.
If a tax is levied on a corporation, it will have one of four responses or some combination thereof. It will raise the price of its product, lower dividends, cut salaries, or lay off workers. In each case, a flesh-and-blood person bears the tax burden.
The important point is that corporations are legal fictions and as such do not pay taxes. Corporations are merely tax collectors for the government.
Politicians love to trick people by suggesting that they will impose taxes not on them but on some other entity instead. We can personalize the trick by talking about property taxes.
Imagine that you are a homeowner and a politician tells you he is not going to tax you. Instead, he’s going to tax your property and land.
You would easily see the political chicanery. Land and property cannot and do not pay taxes. Again, only people pay taxes. The same principle applies to corporations.
There’s another side to taxes that goes completely unappreciated. According to a 2013 study by the Virginia-based Mercatus Center, Americans spend up to $378 billion annually in tax-related accounting costs, and in 2011, Americans spent more than 6 billion hours complying with the tax code.
Those hours are equivalent to the annual hours of a workforce of 3.4 million, or the number of people employed by four of the largest U.S. companies—Wal-Mart, IBM, McDonald’s, and Target—combined.
Along with tax cuts, tax simplification should be on the agenda.So-called "cool parents" who knowingly let teens host boozy parties at their homes now run the risk of being sued if an underage drinker gets hurt or hurts someone else, Maryland's highest court ruled Tuesday.
The Court of Appeals has generally been reluctant to hold third parties such as bar owners responsible for the actions of drunken people, but said in Tuesday's opinion that the law ought to be different when children are involved.
"Underage persons are not solely responsible for drinking alcohol on an adult's property because they are not competent to handle the effects of this potentially dangerous substance," Judge Sally D. Adkins wrote for the court.
For two decades, it has been a crime in Maryland for adults to allow underage drinking at their homes. Tuesday's ruling adds another potential layer of legal accountability for parents who let teens get drunk and brings Maryland into line with at least 31 states that have similar laws covering civil cases.
Lawyers for the plaintiffs in the two cases covered by the Court of Appeals opinion called it a groundbreaking step, and activists against underage drinking said the ruling will help dissuade adults from providing alcohol to minors.
"The criminal penalty has been on the books for a while, and it still happens," said Adam P. Janet, an attorney for a plaintiff in one of the cases. "This is one more disincentive."
In 2013, the controversy over how parents should approach their teenage children's interest in drinking engulfed Maryland's then-attorney general, Douglas F. Gansler. The Baltimore Sun obtained pictures of Gansler at a rented vacation house in Delaware, surrounded by teens in the middle of a raging party. He initially said he had no reason to intervene, but later said he had handled the situation poorly.
While some parents might think they are keeping teens safer by letting them drink at home where adults can keep an eye on things, Lisa Spicknall, director of the Maryland branch of Mothers Against Drunk Driving, said the group believes alcohol abstinence for underage people is the only safe approach.
"Reality shows that children die each and every day in impaired driving crashes caused by underage drinkers leaving parties that are hosted by parents," she said.
The Maryland court's ruling covered two similar cases. The first, from Howard County, involved 17-year-old Steven Dankos, who got drunk at a party at a friend's house in 2009 and then got a ride in a pickup truck with a 22-year-old man who also was drunk. The driver got into a crash and Dankos was killed.
Dankos' mother sued Linda Stapf, the woman in whose home the party was held. According to court documents, Stapf's house was known among students at River Hill High School as a "party house" and teens went there to drink almost every weekend.
Timothy F. Maloney, a lawyer for Dankos' mother, said his client wanted to discourage other parents from holding parties for underage drinkers.
"This has become almost an epidemic in some areas of the state," Maloney said. "I think this is really going to change the social consciousness of parents throughout the state."
The other case, from Baltimore County, was brought by Manal Kiriakos, a woman who was out walking her dogs when she was hit by an 18-year-old who had been drinking at the home of a man he worked with. Kiriakos suffered severe injuries that required spinal surgery and left her in severe pain, according to her attorneys.
"The Court of Appeals recognized what we all know: Individuals that are underage lack the judgment and competence to decide whether to drink," said Janet, who represented Kiriakos.
The Court of Appeals rulings are not the final verdict in the two cases. The judges sent both back to the trial courts for further consideration. Lawyers for the defendants in the cases could not be reached for comment.
The issue of who can be held responsible when a drunken person gets into an accident or hurts someone has come before the court in other contexts. The Court of Appeals recently ruled that bar owners generally cannot be sued over the actions of their drunken customers.
Adkins wrote that normally the court follows the rule that people, whether they're drunk or sober, are responsible for their own conduct. "But this rule does not extend to the circumstances here — an underage person consuming alcohol on the adult's property with the adult's complicity," she wrote.
The appeals judges looked to the wording of the criminal law against hosting underage drinkers, which prohibits adults from "knowingly and willfully" letting drinking go on. The judges concluded that the same standard should apply in civil suits, so parents whose children sneak into their home with alcohol would likely not be held responsible in court.
The criminal law also has an exception for people who let members of their family drink at home. While that issue did not come up in the cases considered by the appeals court, it is likely that the caveat would also apply in civil cases, lawyers said.
Steve Klepper, an attorney who runs a blog covering the Court of Appeals, noted that the new ruling sticks closely to the language in the criminal law. Klepper said that means it probably will not open up avenues for people who provide alcohol under other circumstances to be found responsible in civil cases.
"At a gut level, it feels like a departure from earlier cases that have refused to recognize liability for bars," he said. "But on the other hand, the court was able to limit its rationale."
iduncan@baltsun.com
twitter.com/iduncanThe U.S. intelligence community will prepare a National Intelligence Estimate on the implications of the continuing decline in U.S. manufacturing capacity, said Rep. Jan Schakowsky (D-IL) citing recent news reports.
“Last month Forbes reported that the continued erosion of the U.S. manufacturing base has gotten so serious that the Director of National Intelligence has begun preparation of a National Intelligence Estimate… to assess the security implications of the decline of American manufacturing,” said Rep. Schakowsky, a member of the House Intelligence Committee.
“Our growing reliance on imports and lack of industrial infrastructure has become a national security concern,” said Rep. Schakowsky. She spoke at a March 16 news conference (at 28:10) in opposition to the pending U.S.-Korea Free Trade Agreement.
The Forbes report referenced by Rep. Schakowsky was “Intelligence Community Fears U.S. Manufacturing Decline,” by Loren Thompson, February 14. The decision to prepare an intelligence estimate was first reported by Richard McCormack in “Intelligence Director Will Look at National Security Implications of U.S. Manufacturing Decline,” Manufacturing & Technology News, February 3.
Rep. Schakowsky told the newsletter Inside U.S. Trade (March 25) that she hopes a “declassified portion” of the NIE will be publicly released.
But according to the Congressional Research Service, that may be unlikely. “There seems to be an emerging consensus that publicly releasing NIEs, or even unclassified summaries, has limitations. Some of the nuances of classified intelligence judgments are lost and there are concerns that public release of an unclassified summary of a complicated situation does not effectively serve the legislative process.” See “Intelligence Estimates: How Useful to Congress?” (pdf), January 6, 2011.
“With 14 million Americans out of a job we should not be considering a trade deal that will ship additional jobs overseas,” said Rep. Schakowsky, referring to the U.S.-Korea Free Trade Agreement.
“Instead, we need to work to rebuild the American manufacturing sector, creating jobs at home. And instead of approving FTAs (free trade agreements) that will offshore more American jobs, we need to establish a trade policy that benefits American workers and the entire American economy,” she said.
The CRS (pdf) cited a study which concluded that overall changes in aggregate U.S. employment attributable to the US-Korea agreement “would be negligible given the much larger size of the U.S. economy compared to the South Korean economy. However, while some sectors, such as livestock producers, would experience increases in employment, others such as textile, wearing apparel, and electronic equipment manufacturers would be expected to experience declines in employment.” Accordingly, the “U.S. beef sector” supports the agreement, while some labor unions oppose it.
See “The Proposed U.S.-South Korea Free Trade Agreement (KORUS FTA): Provisions and Implications,” Congressional Research Service, March 1, 2011. See also “Free Trade Agreements: Impact on U.S. Trade and Implications for U.S. Trade Policy,” January 6, 2011.Court Says Password Protection Doesn't Restore An Abandoned Phone's Privacy Expectations
from the 1.-throw-in-ditch-2.-go-to-Mexico-3.-move-to-suppress? dept
In a decision reached recently by a Florida federal court, a person has no expectation of privacy in a phone that was thrown away. [h/t Orin Kerr] In this case, the defendant was sought in connection with a missing child investigation. He was questioned by police and released. A few days later (when he was supposed to be meeting detectives at his house), the defendant (allegedly) went for a walk in the rain and got lost. He discovered his phone was wet and, according to his testimony, threw the phone in a ditch because he believed the wet phone was completely useless.
The defendant's phone was recovered by someone else. The police traced the phone back to the phone's (temporary) new owner. The phone was then subjected to a warrantless search. Police were hoping to find information about the missing child as phone records obtained earlier showed the defendant's phone had been in the area. (They also exposed inconsistencies in the defendant's assertions about where he had and hadn't been.)
Instead, the police found something else: child porn. The defendant moved to have the evidence suppressed, arguing that while he may have abandoned the phone, he did not abandon his privacy interest in the phone's [contents]. From the decision [PDF]:
Although the abandonment doctrine has long been in place, Defendant argues that this case does not align with current precedent. This is because, according to him, the item discarded was a passcode-locked cell phone. To be clear, Defendant concedes that he ditched the physical cell phone on May 31. But he argues that he still had a reasonable expectation of privacy in the phone’s contents because the phone was password-protected and because he would not have discarded it but for his belief that the phone was broken. (Doc. 56 at 13). In other words, he asserts that even if the phone worked when he discarded it, the contents were not accessible without his passcode, and thus he maintains standing to challenge the search of his phone’s contents.
The court calls this argument "novel," and it sort of is. As the decision states, abandoned items -- including containers -- lose their privacy interest immediately. But not every court has seen it this way when it comes to password-protected cellphones. The court notes the Supreme Court's Riley decision, which instituted a warrant requirement for cellphone searches because the vast amount of information stored in today's cellphones makes them more analogous to a person's house than the contents of a person's pockets (as the government argued).
But the argument isn't completely novel, as the Florida state appeals court arrived at the opposite conclusion late last year.
While we acknowledge that the physical cell phone in this case was left in the stolen vehicle by the individual, and it was not claimed by anyone at the police station, its contents were still protected by a password, clearly indicating an intention to protect the privacy of all of the digital material on the cell phone or able to be accessed by it. Indeed, the password protection that most cell phone users place on their devices is designed specifically to prevent unauthorized access to the vast store of personal information which a cell phone can hold when the phone is out of the owner’s possession.
The court here cites the state court decision, but ultimately abandons it. (It has no precedential value in a federal court anyway, seeing as the state court decision didn't rely on Florida state law, but rather a Supreme Court decision.) As it notes, that decision was one of several related to abandoned cellphones, but it was the only one to arrive at this expectation of privacy conclusion.
Defendant urges this Court to adopt the logic of K.C. and the dissenting opinions in Brown and Samalia. The Court respectfully declines to do so. To start, K.C. is not binding on this Court. And for the reasons previously stated, the Court does not agree that the reasoning in Riley for why cell phones should not be subjected to a warrantless search incident to arrest applies to abandoned cell phones with or without a passcode. Recall that the Supreme Court was concerned about the capacity to store private information on a cell phone that far exceeds that of other physical objects. But abandonment is about intent, and when a person abandons a physical object, he maintains no right of privacy in the contents. This is fundamentally different from a search incident to arrest, and the decision in K.C. does nothing to persuade this Court otherwise. Also telling, the Supreme Court in Riley did not require law enforcement officers to obtain a warrant to search every phone that falls into their possession.
The court goes on to note that the phone being thrown in a ditch simply for being wet isn't a very credible assertion. First, the defendant made no effort to retrieve his phone, not even after he knew who had recovered it and that it was in working condition. Other testimony indicated several calls went unanswered before the phone was literally ditched by the defendant because it was too wet to use. And the court gives testimonial credit as to the phone's condition to the person who found the phone since he didn't know the defendant or have any details about the investigation. Then there's the defendant's apparent attempt to leave the country, which was uncovered by investigators.
In contrast to the state court ruling the federal court has no obligation to adopt, the defendant's phone wasn't merely left behind, but rather an affirmative effort made by the defendant to distance himself from his cellphone by throwing it into a ditch while "lost" in the rain (and apparently avoiding detectives coming to speak to him).
Chances are, this might have gone a little more the defendant's way if he hadn't tossed his phone out, immediately replaced it, and hightailed it towards Mexico. The court doesn't sound like it's making an across-the-board ruling on cellphone privacy, but rather responding to the circumstances of this particular case and the defendant's lack of credibility.
Filed Under: 4th amendment, abandoned phone, passwords, privacyThe Government suffered an embarrassing defeat in the Seanad tonight in advance of Friday’s referendum to abolish it.
Four Labour senators, John Kelly, John Whelan, Denis Landy and Jimmy Harte, failed to show up to support the Coalition on a vote on a private member’s Bill moved by Independent Feargal Quinn to abolish upward only rent reviews. The Bill was passed by 27 votes to 23 and will now go to committee stage next week.
Fine Gael Senators Deirdre Clune and Tom Sheahan were paired, according to party sources, as was Fianna Fáil’s Jim Walsh. Fianna Fail’s Averil Power and Sinn Féin’s Kathryn Reilly were also absent but were understood to be paired.
The major talking point was the absence of the Labour Senators who had supported the legislation paving the way for the referendum. Mr Kelly and Mr Whelan were particularly active in canvassing for a No vote during the campaign.
Labour sources said that a full party whip was imposed for the vote.
There were cheers from a number of Senators when the Government lost the vote. There was mixed views among those Senators who turned up for the vote on the outcome. Some felt it was a damaging political stunt in advance of the referendum while others believed it was a legitimate political exercise.
Introducing his Bill, the Upward Only Rent Bill,Mr Quinn said the exigencies of the common good lay in favour of a legislative measure which carefully balanced the rights of small business as against the rights of banks and institutional investors to ease the burden on small businesses.
“It is true that this Bill would be depriving individuals and companies of an important contractual right without compensation, but this is very often a consequence of regular and ordinary legislative activity,’’ he added.
Minister of State Michael Ring, representing Minister for Justice Alan Shatter, said the Government was opposing the Bill.
“Senators will be aware that the Government announced in December 2011 it had decided not to proceed with the legislation to abolish upward only rent reviews,’’ he added. Points of conflict with the Constitution were identified during the development of the legislation and on the advice of the Attorney General it was not possible to proceed with it, he added.HE has built his election campaign around Hillary Clinton’s lack of integrity — and those 33,000 missing emails — but it turns out Donald Trump uses similar tactics to frustrate his opponents trying get him before the courts.
According to thousands of documents obtained by Newsweek Trump’s tactics include destroying documents, hiding emails, official documents and digital records to frustrate litigants in the dozens of lawsuits he faces year-in year-out.
The Republican presidential candidate’s tactics also include building legal hurdles — forcing his plaintiffs to spend massive sums in legal fees — as the cases drag “on for years”.
There’s dozens of litigants with stories to tell about the Trump family’s infamous stall tactics, but the most notorious case involved two American Indian casinos in Florida and a real estate developer called Cordish Cos. Literally as the doors to the casinos opened after their construction in 2005, Trump sued in the state court, claiming in his lawsuit that the companies had conspired with his former associates to cheat him out of the deal.
Trump’s lawsuit argued that the casinos should be handed over to him. Eventually, Trump and his company dropped their litigation but only after years of court battles where it was claimed Trump’s staff and companies wiped their computers clean every year in deliberate attempts to thwart the legal process. As Newsweek stated in its news feature; “The Trump strategy was simple: deny, impede and delay, while destroying documents the court had ordered them to hand over”.
The Newsweek investigation comes in the same week The New York Times finally answered the question Americans all wanted answered: what tax mechanism did Trump use to write off US$915m in debt in his 1995 tax return?
Trump’s tax returns — or failure to disclose them — have been used by Hillary Clinton as a counter to attacks on her integrity, but it turns out Trump’s 1995 tax return was legitimate, allowing him to turn a $915m loss into a plus.
“I was able to use the tax laws in this country and my business acumen to dig out of the real estate mess,” Trump said on Monday in a campaign appearance in Colorado. “Few others were able to do what I did.”
The tax loophole, which has since been closed, is simple: companies which report a loss can offset those losses against future earnings. More than 500,000 other businesses took advantage of the same law in 2005, it’s just that Trump’s loss was on an almost unheard-of scale. The scheme used by Trump’s lawyers was called ”stock for debt” swap (equity for debt), a clever tax manoeuvre which allowed Trump to avoid paying tax for the next 18 years, but which left his creditors millions of dollars out of pocket.
WHY GOOGLE SAYS CLINTON IS A ‘LIAR’
Trump’s been calling Hillary Clinton a liar for months, and now it appears Google agrees with him.
The Democrat presidential candidate’s face and profile appears in the top results when users enter the keywords “pathological liar”. Next to an image of Clinton is a description explaining the disorder.
“It is a stand-alone disorder as well as a symptom of other disorders such as psychopathy and anti-social, narcissistic, and historic personality disorders, but people who are pathological liars may not possess characteristics of the other disorders. Excessive lying is a common symptom of several mental disorders,” the description reads.
The results are further embarrassment for the Democrat candidate, whose integrity has been questioned again this week after the FBI reopened an investigation into private emails found on the laptop of former Congressman Anthony Weiner.
Naturally, Twitter erupted over the Clinton news:
@HillaryClinton I chose the one that's not under FBI investigation nor a pathological liar — dailycosmicnews (@dailycosmic) October 31, 2016
@HillaryClinton We the people of the USA say "THAT IS A LIE"... we all know you are a PATHOLOGICAL LIAR! #NeverHillary #draintheswamp — Needy Deplorable Eli (@elianselmi) October 31, 2016
Hillary Clinton’s Picture Is Next To ‘Pathological Liar’ On Google https://t.co/l3zcLA6zlC via @chicksonright — Creighton Burns (@hoosierceb1) October 31, 2016
The fact that if you look up "pathological liar" on Google and the first thing that pops up is an article on Hillary Clinton — Dillon Frazier (@dillonfrazier98) October 31, 2016
CNN CONTRIBUTOR FILED OVER CLINTON LEAK
It was a long time coming, but CNN has finally parted ways with election contributor Donna Brazile, who has been accused of leaking two primary event questions to the Clinton camp in March. Her deal had previously been suspended in July when she became the interim head of the DNC
CCN released a statement which read: “On October 14th, CNN accepted Donna Brazile’s resignation as a CNN contributor.”
“CNN never gave Brazile access to any questions, prep material, attendee list, background information or meetings in advance of a town hall or debate. We are completely uncomfortable with what we have learned about her interactions with the Clinton campaign while she was a CNN contributor.”
CNBC reports that the announcement coincided with multiple media agencies reporting on a second WikiLeaks email purporting to show Brazile leaking the primary event information to Clinton’s camp, although there are threats of lawsuits to test the validity of those claims.
TRUMP’S RUSSIAN BUSINESS TIES SCRUTINISED
An ABC News (US) investigation claims it has evidence that Donald Trump has “numerous ties” to Russian interests, and that despite his July 27 tweet claiming that “For the record, I have ZERO investments in Russia”, he actually earns millions through investments.
According to the report Russian businessmen were “happy to invest with and work with Donald Trump”, resulting in hundreds of millions of dollars to the Republican candidate’s US businesses.
The profits are apparently through his Miss Universe contest in Moscow in 2013 and selling Trump-branded real estate to “large numbers” of Russian buyers.
These business dealings “obviously present a great conflict of interest between the personal finances of a potential President and the foreign policy of our nation, which seeks to curtail the disruptive and corrupting influences of the Russian oligarchs and put a check on Russian territorial aggression in Eastern Europe”, reported Occuopy Democrats.
TRUMP FAILS TO PAY ANOTHER CONTRACTOR
Trump has also reportedly refused to pay a pollster, to whom he allegedly owes US$766,756 (AU$1,008,080), according to the Washington Post.
The Federal Election Commission is involved in the matter, in which Trunmp is contesting the bill from polling firm Fabrizio, Lee and Associates.
Trump has a long history of failing to pay contractors and vendors, with Newsweek claiming the list numbers “in the hundreds”.
The most public of these was his refusal to pay for a microphone set-up at a recent rally.
“I believe in paying, but when somebody does a bad job like this stupid mic, you shouldn’t pay,” he said at a campaign event in January.
“And you gotta be tough with your people because they’ll pay, they don’t care. They’ll pay. So we’re not going to pay. I guarantee I’m not paying for this mic.”
According to filings with the Federal Election Commission Trump did not pay Fabrizio until September, months after he was hired. The pollster’s firm claims it is also owed $55,300 in addition to the larger amount.They always make a grand entrance, banging on drums and chanting a series of cleverly crafted songs.
As Ottawa Fury FC has grown, so has the club’s official supporters groups, the Bytown Boys and Stony Monday Riot. They occupy Section W at home games, gather at the pub to catch road games and setup shop at team events, working to convert newcomers to the Fury cause.
There to both cheer the home team and heckle the visitors, the groups exist to offer like-minded individuals a social outlet preaching inclusiveness and centres around one common theme.
Though relatively young and still growing, both groups are loud and have successfully created an entertaining soccer atmosphere bound to attract bigger numbers.
"For us, the big motivation has always been being able to reach out to different types of people in the city," said Stony Monday Riot president Matt Hawkins. “Whenever we have a gathering, we have so many members that go out and just walk up to someone and say, ‘Hi, what’s your name? What do you like about football? Lets share a drink.’ People feel welcome that way.”
The groups are basically social clubs spending days between games planning for the next one. Writing new songs, painting flags, signs and talking soccer is always on the agenda.
The excitement created by Stony Monday Riot and Bytown Boys can turn even a dull game into great entertainment.
“The biggest part is you’re engaged in the game,” Hawkins said. “You get the rhythm of the drums pounding through you, you’ve got songs and chants going on. It’s a chance for you to really say something in the stadium; you can express yourself, whether it’s pure joy at a beautiful goal, anger at the referee or just silly banter to lighten the mood in the tense moments of a game.”
Members of both Stony Monday Riot and the Bytown Boys know each other well and that familiarity mixed with a slightly different way of doing things has made for a healthy rivalry. Both are cross-sections of the Ottawa community, with the ages of members as diverse as what they do for a living. But they all share at least one common interest and that’s good enough.
“It makes the section stronger,” Hawkins said. “Obviously there’s a rivalry but it allows for different types of people to have different forms of expression. There’s more diversity. Sometimes I think a rivalry, even within the supporters’ section, pushes people to be a bit more out there, a bit more creative and attached to what’s going on.”
It helps that both groups share one common objective: Making soccer a success in Ottawa and getting more people out to games. It’s a process that won’t happen overnight, but everyone is optimistic.
“People who have said they weren’t big soccer fans before have come out and turned into fanatics because of the experience and the connections they’ve made.”
For more information on both Stony Monday Riot and the Bytown Boys, visit their websites, StonyMondayRiot.com and BytownBoys.ca.It’s no secret that President Obama and his Democratic Party want to restrict the Second Amendment right to keep and bear arms.
In addition, First Amendment religious-freedoms protections have been challenged by Obamacare.
And freedom of speech? That’s just fine as long as it lines up with the “same-sex marriage” social agenda.
Now, a case is posing a challenge to the Fifth Amendment’s property rights and due process protections along with the Sixth Amendment’s assurance of counsel for those accused of crimes.
The U.S. Supreme Court now is posed with the question: Does the government have the right to charge you with a crime and then seize your bank accounts, checkbook, savings and other assets so that you cannot afford to hire a lawyer to defend yourself?
The Rutherford Institute has filed a friend-of-the-court brief arguing that the nation’s Founders – who wrote the Fifth and Sixth Amendments – would be horrified by the idea.
“It is Dangerous to be Right when the Government is Wrong,” explains the new American case for personal freedom, by Judge Andrew Napolitano.
“If the government can arbitrarily freeze, seize or lay claim to your property (money, land or possessions) under government asset forfeiture schemes, you have no true rights,” said constitutional attorney John W. Whitehead, president of the Rutherford Institute.
“Protecting their property from governmental abuse was just as vital to the Founding Fathers as preserving their lives and liberties, hence the Fifth Amendment.”
Whitehead said that what makes the current case so critical is “that if the government is allowed to freeze a person’s untainted – i.e., legitimate – assets, the government can essentially render them penniless and unable to hire an attorney of their choosing in order to preserve their life and liberty, which renders the Sixth Amendment utterly useless.”
The government routinely confiscates the proceeds of proven illegal activity, such as drug money.
But the new case challenges the government’s decision to take away funds that were not alleged to be part of any criminal activity. Not as a fine; just confiscation.
A second friend-of-the-court brief, filed by Michael Connelly of the United States Justice Foundation and William J. Olson, Herbert W. Titus and others of William J. Olson, P.C., frames the dispute.
“In violation of the Fifth Amendment, the district court improperly seized assets of the petitioner over which the government has no valid, current property interest, denying her the right to retain counsel of choice to fight for her rights in violation of the Sixth Amendment.”
The filing continues: “As Congress and the courts have cooperated in the vast expansion of federal asset forfeiture powers, federal prosecutors have been given tools that no one in government should have – powers which put the American people in fear not of punishment for crime, but in fear of the exercise of arbitrary power by their own government.”
The case arose during a suspected Medicare fraud case in which the government froze $45 million in assets belonging to Sila Luis, who runs health-care businesses in Florida.
She was indicted three years ago for alleged schemes to pay illegal kickbacks for patient referrals and to bill Medicare for unnecessary services.
The government claimed the businesses received about $45 million in Medicare reimbursements and sought to recover the full amount in the criminal prosecution.
But Rutherford said the businesses also earned at least $15 million in untainted funds from sources other than Medicare – and the government moved to take those funds as well.
Attorneys for Luis objected, saying the government’s decision to deprive her of her own funds too violated the Sixth Amendment. Her right to due process, they contend, would be violated by such a move.
The case is pending before the Supreme Court.
The Rutherford Institute argued in its brief that the Constitution’s Sixth Amendment provides the accused the right “to have the assistance of counsel for his defense.”
“When Congress ratified the Sixth Amendment, they understood the constitutional right to counsel as the right to counsel a defendant could afford to retain. This was evidence because the right to appointed counsel had not yet been recognized as fundamental in all criminal cases,” the brief explains.
The brief says the “forfeiture at issue here is fundamentally inconsistent with the Founding Fathers’ understanding that criminal defendants had a right to choose any counsel they could afford.”
“By depriving petitioner of legitimate and untainted funds, the forfeiture prevents her from securing chosen counsel by making it impossible for her to pay that counsel.”
The Sixth Amendment “has always encompassed the core right of securing one’s counsel of choice at one’s own expense,” the brief says.
“If fact, it was the only understanding at the time it was ratified. The idea that the government could trample on this fundamental right with a tool that was despised by the Founders is inconceivable,” Rutherford said.
One year ago, the Supreme Court affirmed that defendants do not have a right to a hearing where they can plead for permission to use the money that the government alleges is tainted. In the case, the government said it was targeting the unconnected funds because the defendant “already has spent the ill-gotten gains on luxury items and travel.”
Rutherford argued that if the case is not reversed, the Sixth Amendment requirement for due process, specifically the right to counsel, will be blown apart.
“The government asks this court to endorse an abusive practice the Founders explicitly rejected and which contradicts their understanding of the limited seizures the government could undertake prior to a finding of guilt,” the brief contends. “In so doing, the forfeiture improperly undermines petitioners’ Sixth Amendment right to counsel of her choosing.”
The filing by USJF and Olson contends the government’s claims are based “exclusively on hearsay and a finding of mere ‘probable cause.'”
“Demonstrating no reluctance to assert highly aggressive statutory interpretations, as well as positions that impair petitioner’s rights protected by the U.S. Constitution at each turn, the government seeks every possible |
some sex slaves.
So the movie achieves two things - becoming the best Asylum movie ever made and reminding us why the cast is still stuck in the C-list bracket. The acting can be quite bad, especially from Vivica A. Fox who reprises her role from Sharknado 2 as Hammered Shit. Cynthia Rothrock helps out by playing the top of the CIA, but choose the worst hair style of all time, usually found on 16 year girls from small towns in Nevada. Zoe Bell dons a poopy face through the whole thing because I guess that looks tough. However, Kristanna Loken, Nicole Bilderback and Brigitte Nielsen surprisingly do a really good job especially Nielsen who dispute going to hell in the looks department plays a very sinister and maniacal villain.
There's some pretty rad parts of the films. The fight/actions scenes are pretty wild particularly the final chase/shootout and when the free the sex-slaves and let them attempt to get their vengeance from their captors. The dialogue is pretty solid for a cheesy action movie, specifically Cynthia Rothrock's explanation of the mission and Kristanna Loken's security guard seduction tactics.
So as a whole, it's a unexpectedly decent action movie. It's silly and hooky here and there but executes its goals well especially with Christopher Olen Ray's directing. He honors his father well and we hope to see more from him in the future.
Individual Ratings:
Over the top action:
Cheesy effects:
Horrendous acting:
Laugh-out-loud-ability:
Ridiculous stunts:
Gratuitous nudity:
Memorable one-liners:
Overall Ratings:
Good Movie Quality:
Bad Movie Quality:pyScss, a Scss compiler for Python Author: German M. Bravo (Kronuz) <german. mb @ gmail. com>
About pyScss compiles Scss (Sass), a superset of CSS that is more powerful, elegant and easier to maintain than plain-vanilla CSS. The library acts as a CSS source code preprocesor which allows you to use variables, nested rules, mixins, and have inheritance of rules, all with a CSS-compatible syntax which the preprocessor then compiles to standard CSS. Scss, as an extension of CSS, helps keep large stylesheets well-organized. It borrows concepts and functionality from projects such as OOCSS and other similar frameworks like as Sass. It’s build on top of the original PHP xCSS codebase structure but it’s been completely rewritten, many bugs have been fixed and it has been extensively extended to support almost the full range of Sass’ Scss syntax and functionality.
Support pyScss is fully compatible with SCSS (Sass) 3.2 …it has: Compass : Compass 0.11 Support
: Compass 0.11 Support Nested rules
Keyword arguments
Mixins : @mixin, @include
:, Functions : @function, @return
:, Inheritance : @extend
: Conditions : @if, @else if, @else
:,, Loops : @for, @each
:, Variables : $, @variables, @vars
:,, Sprites : sprite-map(), sprite(), sprite-position(), sprite-url(), …
:,,,, … Images : image-url(), image-width(), image-height(), …
:,,, … Embedded (inline) images : inline-image()
: Colors handling : adjust-color(), scale-color(), opacify() / transparentize(), lighten() / darken(), mix(), …
:,, /, /,, … Math functions : sin(), cos(), tan(), round(), ceil(), floor(), pi(), …
:,,,,,,, … CSS Compression: @option compress:yes;
Requirements python >= 2.5
Installation pyScss should be installed using pip or setuptools: pip install pyScss easy_install pyScss
Usage Usage example: from scss import Scss css = Scss() css.compile("a { color: red + green; }") Or compile from the command line: python scss.py < file.scss Interactive mode: python scss.py --interactive
Examples Nested Rules Example: @option compress: no;.selector { a { display: block; } strong { color: blue; } } …produces:.selector a { display: block; }.selector strong { color: #00f; } Variables Example: @option compress: no; $main-color: #ce4dd6; $style: solid; $side: bottom; #navbar { border-#{$side}: { color: $main-color; style: $style; } } …produces: #navbar { border-bottom-color: #ce4dd6; border-bottom-style: solid; } Mixins Example: @option compress: no; @mixin rounded($side, $radius: 10px) { border-#{$side}-radius: $radius; -moz-border-radius-#{$side}: $radius; -webkit-border-#{$side}-radius: $radius; } #navbar li { @include rounded(top); } #footer { @include rounded(top, 5px); } #sidebar { @include rounded(left, 8px); } …produces: #navbar li { border-top-radius: 10px; -moz-border-radius-top: 10px; -webkit-border-top-radius: 10px; } #footer { border-top-radius: 5px; -moz-border-radius-top: 5px; -webkit-border-top-radius: 5px; } #sidebar { border-left-radius: 8px; -moz-border-radius-left: 8px; -webkit-border-left-radius: 8px; } Extend (using @extend ) Example: @option compress: no;.error { border: 1px #f00; background-color: #fdd; }.error.intrusion { background-image: url("/image/hacked.png"); }.seriousError { @extend.error; border-width: 3px; } …produces:.error,.seriousError { border: 1px red; background-color: #fdd; }.error.intrusion,.seriousError.intrusion { background-image: url("/image/hacked.png"); }.seriousError { border-width: 3px; } Sprites (using sprite-map() ) Example: @option compress: no; $icons: sprite-map("sociable/*.png"); // contains sociable/facebook.png among others. div { background: $icons; } @each $icon in sprites($icons) { div.#{$icon} { width: image-width(sprite-file($icons, $icon)); height: image-height(sprite-file($icons, $icon)); background-position: sprite-position($icons, $icon); } } …generates a new sprite file and produces something like: div { background: url("/static/assets/u8Y7yEQL0UffAVw5rX7yhw.png?_=1298240989") 0px 0px no-repeat; } div.facebook { width: 32px; height: 32px; background-position: 0px 0px; } div.twitter { width: 32px; height: 32px; background-position: 0px -32px; }... Interactive mode Example: $ python scss.py --interactive >>> @import "compass/css3" >>> show() ['functions','mixins', 'options', 'vars'] >>> show(mixins) ['apply-origin', 'apply-transform',... 'transparent'] >>> show(mixins, transparent) @mixin transparent() { @include opacity(0); } >>> 1px + 5px 6px >>> _
Sass Sassy CSS pyScss is a Scss (Sass) implementation for Python. Currently it implements @mixin, @include, @if, @else, @for, and @import… it also implements many of the Sass functions including color functions like hsla(), hsl(), darken(), lighten(), mix(), opacify(), transparentize(), saturate(), desaturate(), etc.) as well as sprite-map(), sprite-file(), image-width(), image-height() and the others. In the file scss.py, by the top, you can configure the LOAD_PATHS to point to your Sass frameworks path (I have sass/frameworks/compass/*.scss and sass/framework/blueprint/*.scss files in my project directory: /usr/local/www/project/, where scss.py lives, so it defaults to use the sass/framework/ path, relative to the scss.py file) or configure using the command line –load-path option, see python scss.py –help. I have succesfully compiled some Compass using python scss.py < myfile.css the following myfile.css : @option compress: no; $blueprint-grid-columns : 24; $blueprint-grid-width : 30px; $blueprint-grid-margin : 10px; $font-color : #333; @import "compass/reset"; @import "compass/utilities"; @import "blueprint"; // Stuff goes here...
Benchmarks pyScss has been optimized for speed. Compiling Compass 0.11.beta.2 ( compass/doc-src/content/stylesheets/screen.scss ) …using Sass 3.1.0.alpha.221: Compilation took 2.683s (w/o cache) Compilation took 1.35s (cached) …using pyScss 1.0 beta: Compilation took 0.614s
Bug tracker If you have any suggestions, bug reports or annoyances please report them to the issue tracker at http://github.com/Kronuz/pyScss/issues
Contributing Development of pyScss happens at github: https://github.com/Kronuz/pyScss
License MIT License. See LICENSE for details. http://www.opensource.org/licenses/mit-license.phpMicrosoft's Bing search engine takes center stage in Windows 8.1. Windows 8 already shipped with a bunch of apps—things like News, Weather, and Sports—developed by the Bing team, using Bing services, but that's all they were: apps that ran on the operating system, rather than integral features of the operating system.
In Windows 8.1, Bing has a deeper integration. Some of this is immediately visible; other parts are more subtle. Together, they suggest that Microsoft is not the company it once was. It's a better one.
Bing now powers Windows 8.1's search. Head into the search charm (or invoke it directly, with Win-S, for Search), type a search term, and hit return, and you'll be taken to a full-screen search app. This will include relevant local hits (files, apps, and settings), but it goes a lot further than that, thanks to data taken from Bing.
Pretty much any search term will result in Web search results. This is the most obvious thing for Bing to do, of course, since at its heart it is a search engine; however, they're not the only thing that you can find.
Bing doesn't just index Web content. It tries to extract structured, meaningful information from Web pages, using this information to construct entities. Consider, for example, the search for Holly Willoughby I took a picture of here. Bing knows that "Holly Willoughby" is not merely a sequence of letters; it knows that it's the name of a particular person with an age, a place of birth, a picture, and a Wikipedia page. It knows that she's been in a number of specific TV shows, that there are videos that feature her, and that people who search for her often also search for her various co-presenters on the shows she's been in.
The search tool shows Web results alongside the structured entities. It has been reported that it will eventually show advertising along with these results, which will be an odd juxtaposition. On the one hand, it's normal for Web search results to show ads, and in principle, those ads can even be useful (especially for things like searches for products). On the other hand, I expect lots of people will argue that ads have no place in a commercial operating system.
These structured results (called "Search heroes" by Microsoft) can also link into applications. So the Holly Willoughby Wikipedia link doesn't take you to her Wikipedia entry on the Web; it takes you to the corresponding place in the Wikipedia app. If you don't have the app, you're prompted to install it.
This deep linking is currently at Microsoft's discretion. Bing knows which apps are popular and well-regarded, and will link to them when appropriate. There isn't, however, any way for an application to declare "I know about Movie entities," say, and have that show up in relevant searches automatically. This is different from Windows Phone, which does let apps declare that they understand certain kinds of information, ensuring that they get wired up to search results.
The search results are the most visible part of Bing's integration, but not the only part. As part of its modelling and analysis, Bing builds language models. These are then used to inform the autocomplete corrections that the Windows 8.1 soft keyboard uses. Bing knows the hot topics of the day and the names and places that people are talking and typing about, and it can adjust its language model data accordingly. Windows 8.1 then downloads this data daily. In this way, the keyboard behavior can change, albeit subtly, to stay current.
Microsoft isn't the only company to build this kind of search-driven, data-driven capability into its operating system. Windows 8.1 uses Bing in a reactive, user-directed way. Google has arguably gone a step further with Google Now. Google Now pulls data from, for example, appointments in your calendar to proactively show structured information that it assumes will be useful: weather, driving directions, that kind of thing.
Microsoft isn't doing that proactive searching just yet. Members of the Bing team tell us that the difficulty for this kind of system is proper handling of mistakes. If the system generates mistakes—for example, giving you useless driving directions explaining how to drive home, even though you've flown across the country for a week to go to a conference—then users will lose confidence in it and stop using it.
Both ensuring that those mistakes are rare and giving users a good way to fix mistakes remain challenging. To continue the example, users need to be able to tell the system, "I don't care about that set of driving directions" while still not disabling the ability to show directions in general.
Google building search-driven features into Android isn't surprising. It's what Google does. Microsoft building Bing-driven features into Windows shouldn't be surprising. But it is.
Microsoft has traditionally been a company that made internal divisions painfully visible to outsiders. In fact, this aspect of the company has become an object of ridicule: It's joked that the company's org chart has a bunch of divisions pointing guns at each other, such is their hostility to one another.
For example, the Office team pointedly refused to do anything to enable the core Office products (Word, Excel, PowerPoint, and Outlook), or do anything to support the Windows team's decade-long attempt to produce a tablet operating system. Even the very latest Office 2013 makes only minimal concessions to tablet usage.
A comment that an ex-employee posted on Ars in the wake of departure of Steven Sinofsky, former President of the Windows Division tells a similar story: good, popular products and teams were destroyed if they weren't serving the Windows division.
The Bing integration in Windows 8.1 is a sign that the company is working to put those days behind it. The Bing group's knowledge and expertise—collection and processing of vast amounts of data, extraction of semantic meaning—is being used to make another group's product—Windows—better. This is the approach Microsoft should have had all along: build the best products, regardless of which division or team was responsible for a particular piece of technology.
When Sinofsky left last November, there were widespread rumors that he'd been pushed out precisely because of difficulties in achieving this kind of collaboration. CEO Steve Ballmer wants Microsoft to be more collaborative as part of its transition to a "Devices and Services" company, and the rumors claim that Sinofsky was seen as an impediment to this.
There's some irony in that; Sinofsky himself is credited with saying "Don't ship the org chart;" that is, don't make internal divisions apparent in the shipping product, while being blamed for an apparent inability to overcome those same internal divisions.
Microsoft is believed to be planning an internal reorganization to further the "Devices and Services" ambitions. In the old Microsoft, this reorganization would be significant for employees and customers alike, as the structure of the organization would directly impact the design of its products.
But Windows 8.1 shows that it might not be such a big deal for anyone outside the company after all. The Bing integration in Windows 8.1 gives a hint that the collaboration and company-wide agendas that Ballmer wants to promote are already starting to materialize and are already yielding better products. The reorganization might formalize a new Microsoft that pulls together as one, but signs are that the hard work has already begun.Back when the BRICs were the source of marginal global growth, the punditry couldn't stop praising them. However, in the past year, now that China's housing bubble has burst and its shadow banking system has imploded, those who remember what BRIC actually stood for are about as rare as those who recall what it means for the Fed to hike rates. Which is precisely why nobody in the mainstream financial media has commented on the absolutely abysmal economic update reported earlier today out Brazil.
We are happy to do so because today's data follows up quite well to our article from a month ago "Brazil's Economy Just Imploded" and as the earlier article on the crashing Brazilian Real hinted, things for the Brazilian economy how gone from imploding to, well, worse because not only did the twin fiscal and current account deficits rise even more, hitting a whopping 11% of GDP - the worst since August 1999, but its government debt soared to 63.4% in 2014, up from 56.7% a year ago, and the highest since at least 2006. In short - the entire economy is now on the verge of total collapse.
This is what happened in a few bullet points:
The fiscal picture has deteriorated very sharply since 2011 at both the flow (fiscal deficit) and stock (gross public debt) levels. The primary and overall nominal fiscal surpluses at year-end 2014 were at levels last seen in the late 1990s.
. The primary and overall nominal fiscal surpluses at year-end 2014 were at levels last seen in the late 1990s. The steady decline of the public sector savings rate is leading to a wider current account deficit despite weaker growth and low investment. In fact, the twin fiscal and current account deficits are now tracking at a combined, very troublesome 10.9% of GDP, the worst picture in 15 years (since August 1999). Repairing the severely unbalanced macro picture would require a deep, structural and permanent fiscal and quasi-fiscal adjustment and a significantly weaker BRL.
Repairing the severely unbalanced macro picture would require a deep, structural and permanent fiscal and quasi-fiscal adjustment and a significantly weaker BRL. The new economic team faces, among other things, the very significant challenge of repairing the severely deteriorated fiscal picture.
The steady erosion of the fiscal stance pushed net and gross public debt up. Furthermore, fiscal and quasi-fiscal activism undermined the effectiveness of monetary policy, contributed to keep inflation very high and drove the current account deficit to a very high level despite weak growth.
More details from Goldman:
The overall public sector fiscal deficit widened to a very high 6.7% of GDP (from 3.25% of GDP in 2013 and the highest fiscal deficit since August 1999) given the very high 6.1% of GDP net interest bill and steady erosion of the primary fiscal surplus. Given the BRL depreciation during the month, the interest on the stock of Dollar swaps issued by the central bank reached R$17.0bn (adding to the R$8.7bn accrued in November). Gross general government debt rose to 63.4% of GDP in 2014, up from 56.7% of GDP in 2013 and 53.4% of GDP in 2010 (the highest level since at least 2006). The consolidated public sector posted a very large and worse-than-expected R$12.9bn deficit in December, driven by the unexpectedly large R$11.3bn deficit recorded by the States and Municipalities. The state-owned enterprises also posted a large deficit in December: R$2.3bn surplus. Overall, the consolidated public sector posted a 0.63% of GDP primary deficit in 2014, down from surpluses of 1.9% of GDP in 2013, and 2.4% of GDP in 2012. This is the worst fiscal outturn in 16 years (since November 1998) and very significantly below the 1.9% of GDP primary surplus promised by former Finance Minister Mantega. The erosion of the primary surplus in recent years was driven chiefly by the weak fiscal numbers of the Central Government, whose primary balance declined from 1.55% of GDP in 2013, to a deficit of 0.40% of GDP in 2014. However, the primary surplus of subnational government (States and Municipalities) has also been eroding, a reflection of the authorizations given by the Treasury since 2011 for increased borrowing by the States. For instance, the States and Municipalities posted a 0.15% of GDP deficit in 2014, down from 0.80% of GDP surplus in 2011.
In charts:
And the key numbers:
The Consolidated Public Sector (CPS) posted a significantly worse-than-expected R$12.9bn primary deficit in December, driven by local governments and state-owned enterprises. The Central Government posted a R$755mn surplus but the States and Municipalities recorded a very large R$11.3bn deficit and the state-owned companies an also large R$2.3bn deficit. Overall, the primary balance of the CPS worsened to a 0.63% of GDP deficit in 2014 from a 1.9% of GDP surplus in 2012 and 2.4% of GDP surplus in 2012. The overall fiscal deficit (primary surplus minus interest payments) deteriorated further: to a very high 6.7% of GDP given the large 6.1% of GDP net interest bill. This is the largest overall fiscal deficit since August 1999. Net public debt worsened to 36.7% of GDP in 2014, up from 33.6% in 2013. Gross general government debt rose to a high 63.4% of GDP in December, up from 56.7% of GDP in 2013.
Good luck Brazil.SANTA ANA – A 60-year-old man who with the help of his son beat a Huntington Beach police officer during a bicyle stop has been sentenced to six years in prison.
The policeman’s daughter had been on a ride-along with her father and saw the incident, which left the officer unconscious.
Darryl Keith Headrick on Friday pleaded guilty to a felony count of assault and a misdemeanor count of resisting a police officer, while also admitting to a sentencing enhancement for inflicting great bodily injury.
According to prosecutors, the officer stopped Bryce Headrick, who was also on a bike, for a possible alcohol-related violation shortly before 11:30 p.m. on Feb. 9, 2016. While the officer was talking to Bryce Headrick, the father came up behind the officer and attacked him, knocking him to the ground.
Both the father and son punched and kicked the officer in his head and his body while the officer was on the ground, prosecutors said. The officer lost consciousness at one point, and both Darryl and Bryce Headrick fled.
The officer was taken to a hospital to be treated for a concussion, among other injuries.
The father and son were found and arrested by other officers. The father was located near the crime scene, and the son was tracked down several hours later.
Last year, Bryce Headrick pleaded guilty to the same assault and resisting charges as his father, and was sentenced to seven years in prison.
At the sentencings, the officer told the court that the attack was particularly hard on his daughter, who had been on a ride-along with her father the day of the traffic stop, and had witnessed the two men beat him, according to the Orange County District Attorney’s Office.
Huntington Beach police officials, shortly after the initial arrests of the two men, had noted that a 21-year-old woman who was on a ride-along with the officer had yelled at the two men to stop attacking him, and other people in the neighborhood had described hearing a blood-curdling shriek. Police did not specify that it was the officer’s daughter.
The officer remains on active duty with the department.A LinkNYC kiosk, which provides free Wi-Fi, domestic calls and phone charging will be coming to spots in Long Island City and Astoria. View Full Caption DNAinfo/Camille Bautista
LONG ISLAND CITY — The city is adding more than a dozen LinkNYC kiosks to streets in Long Island City and Astoria, where users can access Wi-Fi, charge their devices and make free phone calls.
The digital devices — which the city is using to replace its network of old pay phones — have already been installed along Jackson Avenue earlier this month, with 11 kiosks put up between Vernon Boulevard and 44th Drive.
All are expected to be Wi-Fi accessible in the coming weeks, a LinkNYC spokeswoman said.
More kiosks will be installed in Astoria on Broadway, between 21st and 49th streets, in the coming weeks, according to the spokeswoman. She did not provide exact locations or how many are being added.
There are already several LinkNYC devices operating in other parts of Queens, largely along Queens Boulevard and a portion of Jamaica Avenue.
Residents can use the sidewalk kiosks to connect to Wi-Fi, charge their phones or tablets, access city maps or make phone calls to any place in the U.S. free of cost.
The stations originally allowed users to browse the web on built-in tablets, though that service was disabled in September following complaints about people using the kiosks to watch porn or squatting at the locations for hours.
More than a million people used the devices during LinkNYC's first year, according to the city.STATEN ISLAND, N.Y. - A 72-year-old Tottenville woman and her two sons who ran a yellow school bus fleet contracted by the city have been charged in a multi-million dollar bank and tax fraud scheme.
On Thursday, federal prosecutors in Brooklyn announced the indictment of Laraine Castellano, 72, and her sons, Thomas and Dennis Scialpi, 51 and 44, who were executives at USA United Holdings Inc., a conglomerate of bus companies that did $310 million in business with the city from 2004 to 2011.
Those companies took out two loans in 2004 and 2007 for a total of $14 million, purportedly to create an employee stock ownership plan for non-union workers, prosecutors allege in their indictment.
Except the employees never found out such a fund existed, and never received any money from it, and the bus companies wound up defaulting on the loans, prosecutors allege.
Thomas Scialpi was living on Staten Island in 2007 when he and his wife took out another fraudulent loan, for more than $700,000 to pay for a yacht, prosecutors allege. He's since moved to Saddle River, N.J.
He directed a man not identified in the indictment to create false corporate income tax returns for one of the bus companies, United Tom Tom -- including a document that claimed, falsely, his wife worked for the company -- to secure that yacht loan, prosecutors allege. He allegedly defaulted on that loan as well.
Prosecutors also accuse Castellano and Thomas Scialpi of creating a labyrinth of "professional employer organizations," or employee leasing companies, to fleece the government out of more than $10 million in payroll taxes.
"Companies owned and operated by Laraine Castellano, Thomas Scialpi, and Dennis Scialpi received more than $300 million from city contracts to transport children to New York City public schools. But that was not enough for these defendants," said Acting United States Attorney Kelly Currie in a prepared statement. "As alleged, they used their companies to defraud the federal government and financial institutions of tens of millions of dollars, all to enrich themselves."
Their holding company included USA United Fleet, Inc., also known as Shoreline Fleet, Inc; USA United Transit, Inc., also known as Shoreline Pupil Transit, Inc, United Tom Tom Transportation, Inc., also known as Shoreline Buses, Inc.; USA United Bus Express, Inc., also known as Shoreline Bus Express, Inc.; and United Fleet, Inc., prosecutors said.
The holding company and its subsidiaries filed for Chapter 11, then Chapter 7 bankruptcy in July 2011, as they were embroiled in a dispute with its more than 1,100 union workers over unpaid benefits.
Published reports in 2011 numbered the company's fleet at more than 400 yellow buses.
Federal prosecutors charged the company's comptroller, William Moran, with fraud and tax evasion in June 2014, and its certified public accountant, George Silverman, with fraud this past March. Both have taken guilty pleas.
Castellano's lawyer did not return a phone call seeking comment.
Peter Tomao, who represents Thomas Scialpi, said his client has been released on bond.
"He's pled not guilty, and he's going to fight the case in court," Tomao said.
Read the full indictment below.Wollf believes for female drivers to succeed in motorsport, more young girls need to start karting from an early age
Susie Wolff is launching an initiative aimed at increasing the number of women involved in motorsport.
The Scot, who retired from racing last year, is joining forces with UK motorsport authority the MSA for the scheme.
The former Williams test driver said: "I knew I wanted to give something back when I stopped racing."
The scheme will start with motorsport, but there are plans to expand it into other male-dominated environments.
Wolf said: "I never set out to become a role model but somehow I did.
"The opportunities are out there. We aim to inspire female talent to ensure in the long term our sport is diverse."
It will be officially launched at the Autosport International Show at Birmingham's NEC on Thursday 14 January.
Wolff spent three years involved in test and development work at Williams, and took part in four practice sessions at grands prix over the 2014 and 2015 seasons.
Before that, she spent seven years driving for Mercedes in the German touring car championship (DTM).Written by Admin Published in General News
The Namibian Rugby Union has welcomed the inclusion of a Namibian team in next year’s Vodacom Cup competition.
NRU President Bradley Basson, confirmed on Tuesday this week that the South African Rugby Union (SARU) star has agreed to the union’s request to be included in the 16-team competition that will run from early March until end of May next year.
“It is the best thing that could have happened to Namibian rugby in our build-up towards the Rugby World Cup. We have a number of locally based players who are not exposed to high level rugby and they will benefit from this,” said Basson from Carcavelos, Portugal.
The final fixtures need to be ratified by SARU Executive council next month but Basson believes there are strong indications that Namibia will be allowed to play all eight of their matches in Windhoek.
“The other good thing is that SARU has convinced teams to play all the games against us in Windhoek, so our players who are all amateurs can continue to do their daily jobs, train in the mornings and evenings and be ready for the match over the weekend. It will also save the NRU a lot of expenses and at this stage, we really do have to look at our finances as we will need a lot of resources to prepare for the World Cup.
“It will help with the players’ conditioning, they will be exposed to high intensity rugby and with eight of these matches, they will be much better prepared for the tests we plan in June in the CAR Competitions as well as World Rugby’s Nations Cup and off course for the World Cup in September,” said an enthusiastic Basson.
According to Basson such a venture will also present NRU with the ideal opportunity to generate interest in the Namibian team before they head off for England.
“That is one of the most important aspects that we will be able to get the locals behind the team and in the process lure spectators back to rugby.”
Basson said the inclusion of Namibia in the Vodacom Cup competition was a result of a very strong relationship with SARU.
“They remain our big brother and we are immensely grateful to SARU and those teams who have agreed to travel to Windhoek. We promise them Namibian hospitality at its best.”
The details of which group Namibia will be playing in and against which teams as well as the final dates will be confirmed by SARU next month.
Happy return… Namibia’s rugby XV, the Welwitschias (in blue), are set to make a return to the Vodacom Cup competition when the event gets underway next year.
By Staff Reporter
Courtesy of New EraThe Kennedys and McCarthyism
J oseph Kennedy had befriended McCarthy because he found him to be a likable fellow Irish-Catholic who had all the right ideas on the domestic communist menace. These warm feelings were quickly transferred to the entire Kennedy family. JFK liked the fact that McCarthy went after the "elites" in the State Department whom JFK regarded with contempt. (13) Even before McCarthy made accusations against the State Department of subversion, JFK had already aligned himself with the militant anti-communists who blamed the Truman State Department for the "loss" of China. So JFK declared on the House floor in January 1949.
"The responsibility for the failure of our foreign policy in the Far East rests squarely with the White House and the Department of State." (14)
Small wonder then, that at the same Harvard seminar where he cheered Nixon's victory to the Senate, that JFK expressed the view that McCarthy "may have something" to his charges of domestic subversion that had by then become vocal. (15)
There were also other deep personal bonds between JFK and McCarthy by the time McCarthy reached the peak of his power in 1952 and 1953. Not only had McCarthy been a frequent guest at the Kennedy compound in Hyannis, but McCarthy had also dated two Kenendy sisters, first Eunice (the mother of Maria Shriver) and then Pat (who later married actor Peter Lawford). McCarthy was invited to the wedding reception for Eunice and Sargent Shriver, and even presented Eunice with a silver cigarette case inscribed "To Eunice and Bob from one who lost." (16)
The ties with Bobby were forged when he gave RFK a job as minority counsel to his Senate committee investigating domestic communism. Though RFK would later have an intense falling out with McCarthy's other counsel Roy Cohn, the younger Kennedy brother would maintain a deep loyalty to a man he loved enough to make the godfather of his first child. In 1955, Bobby displayed his residual feelings of loyalty for McCarthy even after the Senator's fall into disgrace at a dinner meeting described by the court historian of Camelot himself, Arthur Schlesinger, Jr.
"Still his Irish conception of loyalty turned him against some he felt had treated McCarthy unfairly. In January 1955, Edward R. Murrow [who had issued a famous anti-McCarthy telecast the previous year] spoke at the banquet honoring those, Kennedy among them, who had been selected by the Junior Chamber of Commerce as the Ten Outstanding Young Men of 1954. Kennedy grimly walked out." (17)
JFK's warmth for McCarthy was not as great as Bobby's, but he still felt enough of McCarthy to have performed a similar act three years earlier at the 100th Anniversary of the Harvard Spree Club dinner. Robert Armory, who had been at the dinner and who later worked in the Kennedy Administration recalled in an oral history at the JFK Library that when a speaker had likened McCarthy to the convicted Soviet spy Alger Hiss, JFK rose to his feet and declared "How dare you couple the name of a great American patriot with that of a traitor!" and walked out. The incident has never been denied by anyone who was there, and is accepted by JFK biographers Herbert Parmet, Thomas Reeves and Chris Matthews.
McCarthy, likewise considered JFK a supporter. So much so that in 1952, as JFK took on Henry Cabot Lodge for the Senate, McCarthy privately supported JFK. McCarthy already had an intense dislike of Lodge, and had such a good rapport with the Kennedys that the decision was easy for him. Lodge would be the *only* Republican Senate candidate that McCarthy made no active campaign for, and William F. Buckley, Jr. was present when McCarthy received from a phone call from the RNC asking McCarthy to make an appearance for Lodge. But when McCarthy hung up, he told Buckley that his preference was for Kennedy. (18)
Two years later, when McCarthy's support collapsed and the Senate took up a resolution of censure, JFK was absent from the debate, recuperating from back surgery. He would be the only Democratic Senator not to publicly declare support for McCarthy's censure, even though he could easily have declared his feelings for the public record. As it was, he had instructed Ted Sorenson to draft a statement of support for censure on very narrow grounds, in which, as Schlesinger and Reeves note, made no mention whatsoever of civil liberties, and had more to do with McCarthy's employment of Roy Cohn. In the undelivered statement, JFK was quick to distance himself from the resolution's assertion that McCarthy's actions had harmed America's image abroad, and also stressed the long period of support he had given to McCarthy and his cause.
"This issue involves neither the motives nor the sincerity of the Junior Senator from Wisconsin. Many times I have voted with Senator McCarthy for the full appropriation of funds for his committee, for his amendment to reduce our assistance to nations trading with communists, and on other matters. I have not sought to end his investigations of communist subversion, nor is the pending measure related to either the desirability or continutation of those investigations." (19)
JFK could easily have delivered this statement from his hospital bed, but in the end, he couldn't |
immigrants typically know little of their heritage because their ancestors purposely hid their indigenous culture to avoid discrimination from the dominating Scandinavian or Nordic culture. Though some of these Sami are diaspora that moved to North America in order to escape assimilation policies in their home countries, many continued to downplay their Sami culture in an internalization of colonial viewpoints about indigenous peoples and in order for them to try to blend into their respective Nordic cultures. There were also several Sami families that were brought to North America with herds of reindeer by the U.S. and Canadian governments as part of the "Reindeer Project" designed to teach the Inuit about reindeer herding.[121] There is a long history of Sami in Alaska.
Some of these Sami immigrants and descendants of immigrants are members of the Sami Siida of North America.
Organization [ edit ]
Sápmi demonstrates a distinct semi-national identity that transcends the borders between Norway, Sweden, Finland and Russia. There is no movement for complete autonomy.[citation needed]
Sami Parliaments [ edit ]
The Sami Parliaments (Sámediggi in Northern Sami, Sämitigge in Inari Sami, Sää'mte'ǧǧ in Skolt Sami) founded in Finland (1973), Norway (1989) and Sweden (1993) are the representative bodies for peoples of Sami heritage. Russia has not recognized the Sami as a minority and, as a result, recognizes no Sami parliament, even if the Sami people there have formed an unrecognised Sami Parliament of Russia. There is no single, unified Sami parliament that spans across the Nordic countries. Rather, each of the aforementioned three countries has set up its own separate legislatures for Sami people, even though the three Sami Parliaments often work together on cross-border issues. In all three countries, they act as an institution of cultural autonomy for the indigenous Sami people. The parliaments have very weak political influence, far from autonomy. They are formally public authorities, ruled by the Scandinavian governments, but have democratically elected parliamentarians, whose mission is to work for the Sami people and culture. Candidates' election promises often get into conflict with the institutions' submission under their governments, but as authorities, they have some influence over the government.
Norwegian organizations [ edit ]
The main organisations for Sami representation in Norway are the siidas. They cover northern and central Norway.
Swedish organizations [ edit ]
The main organisations for Sami representation in Sweden are the siidas. They cover northern and central Sweden.
Finnish organizations [ edit ]
In contrast to Norway and Sweden, in Finland, a siida (paliskunta in Finnish) is a reindeer-herding corporation that is not restricted by ethnicity. There are indeed some ethnic Finns who practice reindeer herding, and in principle, all residents of the reindeer herding area (most of Finnish Lapland and parts of Oulu province) who are citizens of EEA countries,[122] i.e., the European Union and Norway, Iceland and Liechtenstein, are allowed to join a paliskunta.
Russian organizations [ edit ]
In 2010, the Sami Council supported the establishment of a cultural center in Russia for Arctic peoples. The Center for Northern Peoples aims to promote artistic and cultural cooperation between the Arctic peoples of Russia and the Nordic countries, with particular focus on indigenous peoples and minorities.[123]
Border conflicts [ edit ]
Land rights for grazing reindeer
Sápmi, the Sami traditional lands, cross four national borders. Traditional summer and winter pastures sometimes lie on different sides of the borders of the nation-states. In addition to that, there is a border drawn for modern-day Sápmi. Some state that the rights (for reindeer herding and, in some parts, even for fishing and hunting) include not only modern Sápmi but areas that are beyond today's Sápmi that reflect older territories. Today's "borders" originate from the 14th to 16th centuries when land-owning conflicts occurred. The establishment of more stable dwelling places and larger towns originates from the 16th century and was performed for strategic defence and economic reasons, both by peoples from Sami groups themselves and more southern immigrants.
Owning land within the borders or being a member of a siida (Sami corporation) gives rights. A different law enacted in Sweden in the mid-1990s gave the right to anyone to fish and hunt in the region, something that was met with skepticism and anger amongst the siidas.
Court proceedings have been common throughout history, and the aim from the Sami viewpoint is to reclaim territories used earlier in history. Due to a major defeat in 1996, one siida has introduced a sponsorship "Reindeer Godfather" concept to raise funds for further battles in courts. These "internal conflicts" are usually conflicts between non-Sami land owners and reindeer owners. Cases question the Sami ancient rights to reindeer pastures. In 2010, Sweden was criticized for its relations with the Sami in the Universal Periodic Review conducted by the Working Group of the Human Rights Council.[124]
The question whether the fjeld's territory is owned by the governments (crown land) or by the Sami population is not answered.[citation needed]
From an indigenous perspective, people "belong to the land", the land does not belong to people, but this does not mean that hunters, herders, and fishing people do not know where the borders of their territories are located as well as those of their neighbors.[80]
National symbols [ edit ]
Although the Sami have considered themselves to be one people throughout history, the idea of Sápmi, a Sami nation, first gained acceptance among the Sami in the 1970s, and even later among the majority population. During the 1980s and 1990s, a flag was created, a national song was written, and the date of a national day was settled.
Flag [ edit ]
Sami flag
The Sami flag was inaugurated during the Sami Conference in Åre, Sweden, on 15 August 1986. It was the result of a competition for which many suggestions were entered. The winning design was submitted by the artist Astrid Båhl from Skibotn, Norway.
The motif (shown right) was derived from the shaman's drum and the poem "Paiven parneh" ("Sons of the Sun") by the South Sami Anders Fjellner describing the Sami as sons and daughters of the sun. The flag has the Sami colours, red, green, yellow and blue, and the circle represents the sun (red) and the moon (blue).
The Sami People's Day [ edit ]
The Sami National Day falls on February 6 as this date was when the first Sami congress was held in 1917 in Trondheim, Norway. This congress was the first time that Norwegian and Swedish Sami came together across their national borders to work together to find solutions for common problems. The resolution for celebrating on 6 February was passed in 1992 at the 15th Sami congress in Helsinki. Since 1993, Norway, Sweden and Finland have recognized February 6 as Sami National Day.
"Song of the Sami People" [ edit ]
"Sámi soga lávlla" ("Song of the Sami People", lit. "Song of the Sami Family") was originally a poem written by Isak Saba that was published in the newspaper Sagai Muittalægje for the first time on 1 April 1906. In August 1986, it became the national anthem of the Sami. Arne Sørli set the poem to music, which was then approved at the 15th Sami Conference in Helsinki in 1992. "Sámi soga lávlla" has been translated into all of the Sami languages.
Coats of Arms of Sami Communites [ edit ]
Religion [ edit ]
Copper etching (1767) by O.H. von Lode showing a noaidi with his meavrresgárri drum
Widespread Shamanism persisted among the Sami up until the 18th century. Most Sami today belong to the state-run Lutheran churches of Norway, Sweden and Finland. Some Sami in Russia belong to the Russian Orthodox Church, and similarly, some Skolt Sami resettled in Finland are also part of an Eastern Orthodox congregation, with an additional small population in Norway.
Traditional Sami religion [ edit ]
Traditional Sami religion was a type of polytheism. (See Sami deities.) There was some diversity due to the wide area that is Sápmi, allowing for the evolution of variations in beliefs and practices between tribes. The old beliefs are closely connected to the land, animism, and the supernatural. Sami spirituality is often characterized by pantheism, a strong emphasis on the importance of personal spirituality and its interconnectivity with one's own daily life, and a deep connection between the natural and spiritual "worlds".[125] Among other roles, the Sami Shaman, or noaidi, enabled ritual communication with the supernatural[126] through the use of tools such as drums, chants, sacred objects and fly agaric.[127][128] Some practices within the Old Sami religion included natural sacred sites such as mountains, springs, land formations, as well as man-made ones such as petroglyphs and labyrinths.[129]
The Sami cosmology divides the universe into three worlds. The upper world is related to the South, warmth, life, and the color white. It is also the dwelling of the gods. The middle world is like the Norse Midgard, it is the dwelling of humans and it is associated with the color red. The third world is the underworld and it is associated with the color black, it represents the north, the cold and it is inhabited by otters, loons, and seals and mythical animals.[130][131]
Sami religion shared some elements with Norse mythology, possibly from early contacts with trading Vikings (or vice versa). Through a mainly French initiative from Joseph Paul Gaimard as part of his La Recherche Expedition, Lars Levi Læstadius began research on Sami mythology. His work resulted in Fragments of Lappish Mythology, since by his own admission, they contained only a small percentage of what had existed. The fragments were termed Theory of Gods, Theory of Sacrifice, Theory of Prophecy, or short reports about rumorous Sami magic and Sami sagas. Generally, he claims to have filtered out the Norse influence and derived common elements between the South, North, and Eastern Sami groups. The mythology has common elements with other traditional indigenous religions as well—such as those in Siberia and North America.
Missionary efforts [ edit ]
Samiske kirkedager A sermon at the 2004
The term Sami religion usually refers to the traditional religion, practiced by most Sámi until approximately the 18th century. Christianity was introduced by Roman Catholic missionaries as early as the 13th century. Increased pressure came after the Protestant Reformation, and rune drums were burned or sent to museums abroad. In this period, many Sami practiced their traditional religion at home, while going to church on Sunday. Since the Sami were considered to possess "witchcraft" powers, they were often accused of sorcery during the 17th century and were the subjects of witchcraft trials and burnings.[132]
In Norway, a major effort to convert the Sami was made around 1720, when Thomas von Westen, the "Apostle of the Sami", burned drums, burned sacred objects, and converted people.[133] Out of the estimated thousands of drums prior to this period, only about 70 are known to remain today, scattered in museums around Europe.[127] Sacred sites were destroyed, such as sieidi (stones in natural or human-built formations), álda and sáivu (sacred hills), springs, caves and other natural formations where offerings were made.
In the far east of the Sami area, the Russian monk Trifon converted the Sami in the 16th century. Today, St. George's chapel in Neiden, Norway (1565), testifies to this effort.
Laestadius [ edit ]
Around 1840 Swedish Sami Lutheran pastor and administrator Lars Levi Laestadius initiated among the Sami a puritanical pietist movement emphasizing complete abstinence from alcohol. This movement is still very dominant in Sami-speaking areas. Laestadius spoke many languages, and he became fluent and preached in Finnish and Northern Sami in addition to his native Southern Sami and Swedish,[134] the language he used for scholarly publications.[133]
Two great challenges Laestadius had faced since his early days as a church minister were the indifference of his Sami parishioners, who had been forced by the Swedish government to convert from their shamanistic religion to Lutheranism, and the misery caused them by alcoholism. The spiritual understanding Laestadius acquired and shared in his new sermons "filled with vivid metaphors from the lives of the Sami that they could understand,... about a God who cared about the lives of the people" had a profound positive effect on both problems. One account from a Sami cultural perspective recalls a new desire among the Sami to learn to read and a "bustle and energy in the church, with people confessing their sins, crying and praying for forgiveness... [Alcohol abuse] and the theft of [the Samis'] reindeer diminished, which had a positive influence on the Sami's relationships, finances and family life."[135]
Neo-shamanism and traditional healing [ edit ]
Today there are a number of Sami who seek to return to the traditional Pagan values of their ancestors. There are also some Sami who claim to be noaidi and offer their services through newspaper advertisements, in New Age arrangements, or for tourist groups. While they practice a religion based on that of their ancestors, widespread anti-pagan prejudice has caused these shamans to be generally not viewed as part of an unbroken Sami religious tradition.[citation needed] Traditional Sámi beliefs are composed of three intertwining elements: animism, shamanism, and polytheism. Sámi animism is manifested in the Sámi's belief that all significant natural objects (such as animals, plants, rocks, etc.) possess a soul; and from a polytheistic perspective, traditional Sámi beliefs include a multitude of spirits.[133] Many contemporary practitioners are compared to practitioners of neo-paganism, as a number of neopagan religions likewise combine elements of ancient pagan religions with more recent revisions or innovations, but others feel they are attempting to revive or reconstruct indigenous Sami religions as found in historic, folkloric sources and oral traditions.
In 2012, County Governor of Troms approved Shamanic Association of Tromsø as a new religion.[136]
A very different religious idea is represented by the numerous "wise men" and "wise women" found throughout the Sami area. They often offer to heal the sick through rituals and traditional medicines and may also combine traditional elements, such as older Sami teachings, with newer monotheistic inventions that Christian missionaries taught their ancestors, such as readings from the Bible.
Genetic studies [ edit ]
Sami mother with her children
Anthropologists have been studying the Sami people for hundreds of years for their assumed physical and cultural differences from the rest of the Europeans. Recent genetic studies have indicated that the two most frequent maternal lineages of the Sámi people are the haplogroups V (neolithic in Europe and not found in Finland 1500 years ago[137]) and U5b (ancient in Europe). "The Y-chromosomal variety in the Saami is also consistent with their European ancestry. It suggests that the large genetic separation of the Saami from other Europeans is best explained by assuming that the Saami are descendants of a narrow, distinctive subset of Europeans."[138] Y-chromosome haplogroup N-VL29 makes up 20%, came from Siberia 3500 years ago or more likely much later. Y-chromosome N-Z1936 makes up 20%, likely came from Siberia with Sami language later. This tallies with archeological evidence suggesting that several different cultural groups made their way to the core area of Sami from 8000 to 6000 BC,[139] presumably including some of the ancestors of present-day Sami. The "Nganassan" autosomic component now makes up more than 25% in the Sami, but was 50% in the 3500-year old Kola population.[140] The Mesolithic "Western European hunter-gatherer" (WHG) component is close to 15%, while that of the Neolithic "European early farmer" (LBK) is 10%. 50% is the Bronze Age "Yamna" component, the earliest trace of which is observed in the Pit–Comb Ware culture in Estonia, but in a 2.5-fold lower percentage.
History of scientific research carried out on the Sami [ edit ]
Ad for an 1893/1894 ethnological exposition of Sámi in Hamburg -Saint Paul
The genetic makeup of Sami people has been extensively studied for as long as such research has been in existence. Ethnographic photography of the Sami began with the invention of the camera in the 19th century.[141] This continued on into the 1920s and 1930s, when Sami were photographed naked and anatomically measured by scientists, with the help of the local police—sometimes at gunpoint—to collect data that would justify their own racial theories.[142] Thus, there is a degree of distrust by some in the Sami community towards genetic research.[142]
Examples of discriminatory actions include the Statens Institut for Rasbiologi compulsory sterilization project for Sami women, which continued until 1975,[143] and Sami graves being plundered to provide research materials,[144][145][146] of which their remains and artifacts from this period from across Sápmi can still be found in various state collections.[76][146][147][148] In the late 19th century, colonial fascination with Arctic peoples led to human beings exhibited in human zoos. Sami people were exhibited with their traditional lavvu tents, weapons, and sleds, beside a group of reindeer at Tierpark Hagenbeck[149] and other zoos across the globe.
Notable people of Sami descent [ edit ]
Science [ edit ]
Louise Bäckman (1926–present) Born in Tärnaby, Ume sami speaker. Professor emeritus. She has carried out several studies that have given insights into the pre-Christian religion and has made important contributions in several other related fields.
Inga Maria Mulk (1950–present) She has published several important papers on archaeology, historical geography, ethnographic studies etc., and is a Lule sami speaker.
Israel Ruong (1903–1986) Born in Arjeplog. A Swedish-Sámi linguist, politician and professor of Sámi languages and culture at the University of Uppsala in Sweden. Israel Ruong spoke Pite Sámi as his mother tongue.
Ande Somby (1958–present) Born in Buolbmat. A University Researcher, artist, cofounder of DAT.
Jacqueline Marechal (1987–present) Born in Calgary. Geologist.
Explorers and adventurers [ edit ]
Samuel Balto (1861–1921), Arctic explorer—one of the first people to cross Greenland on skis (together with Nansen)—and gold miner. The very famous dog Balto was named after Samuel Balto.
Lars Monsen (1963–present) adventurer, explorer, journalist and author.[150]
Literature [ edit ]
Music [ edit ]
Film and theatre [ edit ]
Politics and society [ edit ]
Visual arts [ edit ]
Sports [ edit ]
Other [ edit ]
See also [ edit ]
Sami culture [ edit ]
Sami films [ edit ]
Pathfinder ( Ofelaš ), 1988 film nominated for the Academy Award for Best Foreign Film. Filmed in Norway featuring Sami actors speaking in Sami.
( ), 1988 film nominated for the Academy Award for Best Foreign Film. Filmed in Norway featuring Sami actors speaking in Sami. The Kautokeino Rebellion (2008) is a feature film that concerns the ethnic-religious Sami revolt in Guovdageaidnu of 1852.
(2008) is a feature film that concerns the ethnic-religious Sami revolt in Guovdageaidnu of 1852. The Cuckoo ( Kukushka ) (2002), film set during World War II with a Sami woman as one of the main characters
( ) (2002), film set during World War II with a Sami woman as one of the main characters Give Us Our Skeletons a 1999 documentary about the scientific racism and racial classification movement carried out on the Sami.
a 1999 documentary about the scientific racism and racial classification movement carried out on the Sami. Wolf, an examination of how the traditions of the Sami villagers in northern Sweden is confronted with modern-day society.
, an examination of how the traditions of the Sami villagers in northern Sweden is confronted with modern-day society. Last Yoik in Saami Forests? (2007) made for the United Nations, a documentary about land rights disputes in Finnish Lapland
(2007) made for the United Nations, a documentary about land rights disputes in Finnish Lapland Herdswoman (2008), a documentary about land rights disputes in reindeer grazing areas.
(2008), a documentary about land rights disputes in reindeer grazing areas. Suddenly Sami (2009), the filmmaker finds out that her mother has been hiding her Arctic indigenous Sámi heritage from her.
(2009), the filmmaker finds out that her mother has been hiding her Arctic indigenous Sámi heritage from her. The Sami, a Mushkeg Media documentary about the state of aboriginal languages.
, a Mushkeg Media documentary about the state of aboriginal languages. Magic Mushrooms and Reindeer: Weird Nature. A short video on the use of Amanita muscaria mushrooms by the Sami people and their reindeer produced by the BBC. [166]
. A short video on the use of mushrooms by the Sami people and their reindeer produced by the BBC. Sami Blood (2016), a movie chronicling the life of a Sami girl taken into a Swedish boarding school to be assimilated as a Swede. [167]
(2016), a movie chronicling the life of a Sami girl taken into a Swedish boarding school to be assimilated as a Swede. Midnight Sun (2016), a crime series which ravels around Sami culture and conflicts of Sami culture with the modern Swedish society.
References [ edit ]
Citations [ edit ]
Further reading [ edit ]
Sami books [ edit ]There has been some squabbling in the Senate over the appointment of members to a conference committee with the House try to iron out the differences between the chambers over their separate version of the FY 2014 budget. Conservative members of the Senate — led by Sens. Ted Cruz (R-TX), Rand Paul (R-KY), and Mike Lee (R-UT) — have objected to the appointment of conferees over concern that a budget agreement would be used for a backdoor national debt increase.
Sen. John McCain (R-AZ) once again attacked these fiscal conservatives. “What we’re saying here on this side of the aisle is we don’t trust our colleagues on the other side of the Capitol who are in the majority,” said McCain, according to Bloomberg.
Cruz responded to McCain yesterday on the floor of the Senate, noting that the fiscal mess in which the United States finds itself is the creation of both parties.
“Madam President, [McCain] urged the body to trust the Republicans,” said Cruz. “Let me be clear — I don’t trust the Republicans. And I don’t trust the Democrats. And I think a whole lot of Americans likewise don’t trust the Republicans and the Democrats, because it is leadership in both parties that has gotten us in this mess.”
“You know, my wife and I have two little girls at home, they’re 5 and 2. When Caroline was born, our national debt was $10 trillion,” he noted. “Today, it’s nearly $17 trillion. In her short five years of life, the national debt has grown by over 60%. Madame President, what we are doing to our kids and grandkids, I think, is immoral.”
Watch the full video of Cruz’s response to McCain below:
McCain is quickly making himself a target for a primary challenge in 2016, should he decide to run for re-election. The Senate Conservatives Fund, which has been a force in primary races around the country, sent around a e-mail yesterday yesterday openly floating the prospect of a conservative challenge to McCain.
“How much longer can we tolerate John McCain and his hostility toward conservatives and our principles?” the conservative organization asked. “He already lashed out at Senators Paul, Lee, and Cruz earlier this year, calling them ‘wacko birds’ for standing up for the Constitution. Now he’s at it again.”
The e-mail included a link to a poll asking members if they believe that McCain should be primaried in 2016.Sacramento's biggest and busiest shopping mall, Arden Fair, has experienced a dramatic decline in crime, especially car thefts.Thieves seem to be getting the message: Don't try it here.Watch report: 'Investment' pays off at Arden Fair; Crime rates show itIn 2007, 77 cars were stolen from the mall parking lot. Last year, there were eight car thefts.So far in 2014, there has been only one.Steve Reed, head of mall security, said the dramatic reduction is the direct result of an investment."We brainstormed," Reed said. "We needed a state-of-the-art camera system. Now we have the HD cameras (where) you can actually zoom in and see a freckle on a person’s face."Reed used to work for the Sacramento Police Department.Since 2008, mall owners have spent $2 million on security technology, including license-plate readers."In five years, we've recovered 117 vehicles," Reed said. "People who have driven here in stolen vehicles, there have been 93 arrests."The Sacramento Police Department partners with mall security."It's remarkable," said Doug Morse, a department spokesman. "It's extremely remarkable, and it's a testament to our partnership, and it's a testament to Steve Reed's hard work out there.... Technology is allowing us to put people in jail and build cases on people, we wouldn't be able to do."
Sacramento's biggest and busiest shopping mall, Arden Fair, has experienced a dramatic decline in crime, especially car thefts.
Thieves seem to be getting the message: Don't try it here.
Advertisement
Watch report: 'Investment' pays off at Arden Fair; Crime rates show it
In 2007, 77 cars were stolen from the mall parking lot. Last year, there were eight car thefts.
So far in 2014, there has been only one.
Steve Reed, head of mall security, said the dramatic reduction is the direct result of an investment.
"We brainstormed," Reed said. "We needed a state-of-the-art camera system. Now we have the HD cameras (where) you can actually zoom in and see a freckle on a person’s face."
Reed used to work for the Sacramento Police Department.
Since 2008, mall owners have spent $2 million on security technology, including license-plate readers.
"In five years, we've recovered 117 vehicles," Reed said. "People who have driven here in stolen vehicles, there have been 93 arrests."
The Sacramento Police Department partners with mall security.
"It's remarkable," said Doug Morse, a department spokesman. "It's extremely remarkable, and it's a testament to our partnership, and it's a testament to Steve Reed's hard work out there.... Technology is allowing us to put people in jail and build cases on people, [which] we wouldn't be able to do."
AlertMeNew season, new players and new qualifying venue as Monday sees the start of the 2015 Australian Goldfields Open qualifiers from the K2 in Crawley.
Click here to view the tournament draw at snookerorg
With the event coming so early in the season, it is not surprising to see that a number of professionals have opted to sit the event out and the result is that a large number of places in the draw have been awarded to top up players from the Q School Order of Merit.
Without wanting to fully explore the debate as to top up players here, their inclusion has been a subject of some debate on social media during the course of the last few days. For me, while it is perhaps not ideal to see the mixture of professional and amateur players that we have, the scenario is infinitely preferable to the alternative of having several byes that would otherwise be the case.
Looking at the draw, world number 26 Martin Gould is the top seed in qualifying, highlighting that there are nine players above him in the rankings who have skipped the event, notably Ding Junhui, Ronnie O’Sullivan, Barry Hawkins and Mark Williams from the top 16, as well as Graeme Dott, Ryan Day, Liang Wenbo, Alan McManus and Anthony McGill outside of that bracket.
Other members of the top 64 to miss the event are Matthew Stevens, Kurt Maflin, Dechawat Poomjaeng, Thepchaiya Un-Nooh, Yu Delu, Cao Yupeng and Robin Hull, while although he had entered, IBSF world champion Yan Bingtao has unfortunately not been granted a visa to enable him to play his first tournament as a professional.
Turning to the format, the first round in theory sees seeds 65-96 take on 97-128, although due to the numerous non-entries there will in fact be only 29 professionals involved, all up against amateur top ups, while there are even a few all-amateur match-ups.
From there, the winners take on those seeded 33-48, before the winners of those matches play each other and then finally those seeded 17-32 play their only match in the final qualifying round.
In terms of points of interest, it is often the case at these early season events that those players who have either just qualified from, or have at last played at Q School are even more of a threat to their professional opponents, who can be rusty at this time of year, the majority not having played a competitive match since the World Championship qualifiers in early April.
I will also be interested to see how a few of the newcomers get on, as well as the like of Hossein Vafaei Ayouri and top up player Zhao Xintong, who begins against fellow amateur Kuldesh Johal. If you fancy them to do well, check out these free bet codes and take a look at the latest odds.
As ever at this event, matches will be played over the best of nine frames from Monday, through to the fourth and final qualifying round on Friday.
In terms of rankings, please note that at this stage I am unable to published a new projected seedings list, pending confirmation of this season’s seeding cut-off dates from World Snooker.Full party customizations, infinite dungeons to explore & unlockable skill trees make the perfect cross-over game
Far off in the mountains, the small village Aslarga becomes a hub for adventurers looking for fame and fortune from the Mystery Dungeons. But dire challenges await even the most stalwart adventurers in Etrian Mystery Dungeon, a turn-based action RPG roguelike developed by ATLUS and Spike Chunsoft.
The Nintendo 3DS™ exclusive mixes Etrian Odyssey’s vast RPG party and skill customization aspects, and Mystery Dungeon’s infinitely random dungeon adventures. The action/turn based combat means that battling monsters is not just about using the right skills, but becomes an elegant Pas de Quatre of strategic positioning. Players form their parties with familiar Etrian Odyssey classes, customize individuals using Etrian-style skill trees, and then take up to four members into the dungeons. Always randomized with various levels and paths, the dungeons require plenty of exploration, not to mention the incredible loot rewards -- just be wary of what waits among the deepest depths.The practice is common enough that New Jersey recently passed a law outlawing job ads that bar unemployed workers from applying. New York and Michigan are considering the idea, and similar legislation has been introduced in Congress. The National Employment Law Project, a nonprofit organization that studies the labor market and helps the unemployed apply for benefits, has been reviewing the issue, and last week issued a report that has nudged more politicians to condemn these ads.
Given that the average duration of unemployment today is nine months — a record high — limiting a search to the “recently employed,” much less the currently employed, disqualifies millions.
The positions advertised with preferences for the already-employed run the gamut. Some are for small businesses, and others for giants, including the commercial University of Phoenix (which, like some other companies, removed the ads after an inquiry by The New York Times ) or the fast-food chain Pollo Tropical. They cover jobs at all skill levels, including hotel concierges, restaurant managers, teachers, I.T. specialists, business analysts, sales directors, account executives, orthopedics device salesmen, auditors and air-conditioning technicians.
“It is really a buyer’s market for employers right now,” said Harry J. Holzer, an economist at Georgetown University and the Urban Institute. One consequence is that the long-term unemployed will rack up even more weeks of unemployment, Mr. Holzer said, and will find it harder to make the transition back to work.
Even if Congress passed a measure forbidding companies from making current employment a requirement for job applicants, companies could still simply decide not to hire people who are out of work. Discrimination would be difficult to prove.
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After all, there are legitimate reasons that many long-term unemployed workers may not be desirable job candidates. In some cases they may have been let go early in the recession, not just because business had slowed, but because they were incompetent.
Idle workers’ skills may atrophy, particularly in dynamic industries like technology. They may lose touch with their network of contacts, which is important for people in sales. Beaten down by months of rejection and idleness, they may not interview well or easily return to a 9-to-5 schedule.
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“We may be seeing what’s called statistical discrimination,” said Robert Shimer, a labor economist at the University of Chicago. “On average, these workers might be less attractive, and employers don’t bother to look more closely to pick out the good ones.”
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Employers receive so many applications for each opening that some may use current employment status as an easy filter. In some cases — as with Ms. Wiedemer, of Westminster, Colo. — recruiters merely assume employers do not want jobless workers.
“Clients don’t always tell us ‘we don’t want to see résumés from unemployed workers,’ but we can sense from what people have interested them in the past that they’re probably looking for somebody who’s gainfully employed, who’s closer to the action,” said Dennis Pradarelli, a talent acquisition manager for Marbl, a recruiting firm in Brookfield, Wis. Many of the job ads posted by his firm seek workers who are “currently employed or only recently unemployed.”
Many firms that are not intentionally screening out the unemployed may still disqualify such applicants for having bad credit histories after having fallen behind on the bills — which they of course need a job to pay.
It’s not clear what can be done to pull workers out of this unemployment trap.
Government incentives for companies to hire unemployed workers have met with limited success. One such tax incentive from last year was poorly publicized, so most employers did not know about it. Better publicity may not suffice, either. An experiment from the 1980s found that telling companies that the unemployed were eligible for generous wage subsidies actually made employers less likely to hire such workers.
Job counselors often encourage the long-term unemployed to go back to school or volunteer to demonstrate that they are still productive, engaged members of society. But absent the actual acquisition of marketable skills — which many retraining programs do not provide — it’s not clear such efforts improve the chances of being hired.
“Mentally, it may be good for the candidate, but I think companies are still in a position to say ‘O.K., we’re looking for a candidate with the most up-to-date skills,’ ” Mr. Pradarelli said. “If you’ve been out of pocket for two years, going back to school sounds nice, but it doesn’t make or break the situation.”
The best solution, economists say, would be to encourage job growth more broadly, which may initially involve poaching people from other companies but could eventually draw even the least desirable workers back into jobs. During the boom years of the late ’90s, the labor market was so tight that ex-convicts had relatively little trouble finding work.
In the meantime, people like Ms. Wiedemer — who has been out of work for three years — are exhausting their benefits and piecing together what support they can from food stamps and family members. And they are stuck hoping that economic growth manages to outpace their own descent into permanent economic exile.
“I worry that unemployment may eventually come down, not because older workers who have been unemployed for a year or two find jobs,” Professor Shimer said, “but because older workers finally give up and drop out of the labor force.”Rep. Adam Schiff Adam Bennett SchiffHouse Democrats file legislation to ensure Mueller report released Hannity echoes Bill Maher, invites Schiff to appear on show Curtain rises on 3 days of Cohen drama MORE (D-Calif.) called out President Trump for his “broken promises” after the president declared that Mexico will still pay for a wall along its border with the United States.
Trump’s promise to make Mexico pay for the wall was a key pledge of his campaign.
But since then, Trump’s rhetoric on the wall has softened. After his election, Trump said it was more likely that Mexico would reimburse the U.S. for costs associated with building the wall rather than fund it outright.
He tweeted Sunday about the issue.
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“Eventually, |
of the appropriatecall. Recall that thetactic proves a propositionwhen given a proof term of precisely type
even_256' = partialOut (
: check_even 256) isEven 256 We can see a constant wrapper around the object of the proof. For any even number, this form of proof will suffice. The size of the proof term is now linear in the number being checked, containing two repetitions of the unary form of that number, one of which is hidden above within the implicit argument to partialOut What happens if we try the tactic with an odd number? We can see a constant wrapper around the object of the proof. For any even number, this form of proof will suffice. The size of the proof term is now linear in the number being checked, containing two repetitions of the unary form of that number, one of which is hidden above within the implicit argument toWhat happens if we try the tactic with an odd number?
prove_even_reflective. User error: No matching clauses for match goal Thankfully, the tactic fails. To see more precisely what goes wrong, we can run manually the body of the match.
exact ( partialOut ( check_even 255)). Error: The term "partialOut (check_even 255)" has type "match check_even 255 with | Yes => isEven 255 | No => True end" while it is expected to have type "isEven 255" As usual, the type checker performs no reductions to simplify error messages. If we reduced the first term ourselves, we would see that check_even 255 reduces to a No, so that the first term is equivalent to True, which certainly does not unify with isEven 255. Thankfully, the tactic fails. To see more precisely what goes wrong, we can run manually the body of theAs usual, the type checker performs no reductions to simplify error messages. If we reduced the first term ourselves, we would see thatreduces to a, so that the first term is equivalent to, which certainly does not unify with
Abort.
prove_even_reflective is reflective because it performs a proof search process (a trivial one, in this case) wholly within Gallina, where the only use of Ltac is to translate a goal into an appropriate use of check_even Reifying the Syntax of a Trivial Tautology Language We might also like to have reflective proofs of trivial tautologies like this one: Our tacticis reflective because it performs a proof search process (a trivial one, in this case) wholly within Gallina, where the only use of Ltac is to translate a goal into an appropriate use ofWe might also like to have reflective proofs of trivial tautologies like this one:
Theorem True /\ True ) -> ( True \/ ( True /\ ( True -> True ) ) ).
tauto.
Qed.
Print true_galore.
true_galore : () -> (->).
true_galore =
fun H : True /\ True =>
and_ind ( fun _ _ : True => True /\ ( True -> True )) I ) H
: True /\ True -> True \/ True /\ ( True -> True ) /\=>=> or_introl /\ (->))/\->\//\ (-> As we might expect, the proof that tauto builds contains explicit applications of natural deduction rules. For large formulas, this can add a linear amount of proof size overhead, beyond the size of the input. To write a reflective procedure for this class of goals, we will need to get into the actual "reflection" part of "proof by reflection." It is impossible to case-analyze a Prop in any way in Gallina. We must reify Prop into some type that we can analyze. This inductive type is a good candidate: As we might expect, the proof thatbuilds contains explicit applications of natural deduction rules. For large formulas, this can add a linear amount of proof size overhead, beyond the size of the input.To write a reflective procedure for this class of goals, we will need to get into the actual "reflection" part of "proof by reflection." It is impossible to case-analyze ain any way in Gallina. We mustinto some type that weanalyze. This inductive type is a good candidate:
We write a recursive function to reflect this syntax back to Prop. Such functions are also called interpretation functions, and we have used them in previous examples to give semantics to small programming languages.
Fixpoint tautDenote ( t : Prop :=
match t with
| True
| TautAnd t1 t2 => t1 /\ tautDenote t2
| TautOr t1 t2 => t1 \/ tautDenote t2
| TautImp t1 t2 => t1 -> t2
end.
taut ) ::= TautTrue =>=> tautDenote => tautDenote => tautDenote -> tautDenote
tautDenote It is easy to prove that every formula in the range ofis true.
Theorem tautTrue : forall t, tautDenote t.
induction t ; crush.
Qed.
tautTrue To useto prove particular formulas, we need to implement the syntax reification process. A recursive Ltac function does the job.
Ltac tautReify P :=
match P with
| True => TautTrue
|? P1 /\? P2 =>
let t1 := tautReify P1 in
let t2 := tautReify P2 in
constr :( t1 t2 )
|? P1 \/? P2 =>
let t1 := tautReify P1 in
let t2 := tautReify P2 in
constr :( t1 t2 )
|? P1 ->? P2 =>
let t1 := tautReify P1 in
let t2 := tautReify P2 in
constr :( t1 t2 )
end.
:==>|?=>:=:=:( TautAnd |?=>:=:=:( TautOr |?->?=>:=:=:( TautImp
tautReify available, it is easy to finish our reflective tactic. We look at the goal formula, reify it, and apply tautTrue Withavailable, it is easy to finish our reflective tactic. We look at the goal formula, reify it, and applyto the reified formula.
Ltac obvious :=
match goal with
| [ |-? P ] =>
let t := tautReify P in
exact ( tautTrue t )
end.
:=| [ |-?] =>:=
obvious We can verify thatsolves our original example, with a proof term that does not mention details of the proof.
Theorem True /\ True ) -> ( True \/ ( True /\ ( True -> True ) ) ).
obvious.
Qed.
Print true_galore'.
true_galore' : () -> (->).
true_galore' =
tautTrue
( TautImp ( TautAnd TautTrue TautTrue )
( TautOr TautTrue ( TautAnd TautTrue ( TautImp TautTrue
: True /\ True -> True \/ True /\ ( True -> True ) TautTrue ))))/\->\//\ (-> It is worth considering how the reflective tactic improves on a pure-Ltac implementation. The formula reification process is just as ad-hoc as before, so we gain little there. In general, proofs will be more complicated than formula translation, and the "generic proof rule" that we apply here is on much better formal footing than a recursive Ltac function. The dependent type of the proof guarantees that it "works" on any input formula. This benefit is in addition to the proof-size improvement that we have already seen. It may also be worth pointing out that our previous example of evenness testing used a function partialOut tautTrue taut A Monoid Expression Simplifier Proof by reflection does not require encoding of all of the syntax in a goal. We can insert "variables" in our syntax types to allow injection of arbitrary pieces, even if we cannot apply specialized reasoning to them. In this section, we explore that possibility by writing a tactic for normalizing monoid equations. It is worth considering how the reflective tactic improves on a pure-Ltac implementation. The formula reification process is just as ad-hoc as before, so we gain little there. In general, proofs will be more complicated than formula translation, and the "generic proof rule" that we apply hereon much better formal footing than a recursive Ltac function. The dependent type of the proof guarantees that it "works" on any input formula. This benefit is in addition to the proof-size improvement that we have already seen.It may also be worth pointing out that our previous example of evenness testing used a functionfor sound handling of input goals that the verified decision procedure fails to prove. Here, we prove that our procedure(recall that an inductive proof may be viewed as a recursive procedure) is able to prove any goal representable in, so no extra step is necessary.Proof by reflection does not require encoding of all of the syntax in a goal. We can insert "variables" in our syntax types to allow injection of arbitrary pieces, even if we cannot apply specialized reasoning to them. In this section, we explore that possibility by writing a tactic for normalizing monoid equations.
It is easy to define an expression tree type for monoid expressions. A Var We add variables and hypotheses characterizing an arbitrary instance of the algebraic structure of monoids. We have an associative binary operator and an identity element for it.It is easy to define an expression tree type for monoid expressions. Aconstructor is a "catch-all" case for subexpressions that we cannot model. These subexpressions could be actual Gallina variables, or they could just use functions that our tactic is unable to understand.
Next, we write an interpretation function.
We will normalize expressions by flattening them into lists, via associativity, so it is helpful to have a denotation function for lists of monoid values.
Fixpoint mldenote ( ls : list
match ls with
| nil =>
| x :: ls' => x + mldenote ls'
end.
A ) : A :==> e =>
The flattening function itself is easy to implement.
Fixpoint flatten ( me : list
match me with
| nil
| Var x => x :: nil
| Op me1 me2 => me1 ++ flatten me2
end.
mexp ) : A := Ident =>=>=> flatten
denote This function has a straightforward correctness proof in terms of ourfunctions.
Lemma flatten_correct' : forall ml2 ml1,
mldenote ml1 + mldenote ml2 = mldenote ( ml1 ++
induction ml1 ; crush.
Qed.
Theorem flatten_correct : forall me, mdenote me = mldenote ( flatten
Hint Resolve flatten_correct'.
induction me ; crush.
Qed.
ml2 ). me ).
Now it is easy to prove a theorem that will be the main tool behind our simplification tactic.
Theorem monoid_reflect : forall me1 me2,
mldenote ( flatten me1 ) = mldenote ( flatten me2 )
-> me1 = mdenote me2.
intros ; repeat rewrite flatten_correct ; assumption.
Qed.
-> mdenote
mexp We implement reification into thetype.
Ltac reify me :=
match me with
| Ident
|? me1 +? me2 =>
let r1 := reify me1 in
let r2 := reify me2 in
constr :( r1 r2 )
| _ => constr :( me )
end.
:= e =>|?=>:=:=:( Op =>:( Var
monoid monoid_reflect mldenote change tactic replaces a conclusion formula with another that is definitionally equal to it. The finaltactic works on goals that equate two monoid terms. We reify each and change the goal to refer to the reified versions, finishing off by applyingand simplifying uses of. Recall that thetactic replaces a conclusion formula with another that is definitionally equal to it.
Ltac monoid :=
match goal with
| [ |-? me1 =? me2 ] =>
let r1 := reify me1 in
let r2 := reify me2 in
change ( mdenote r1 = mdenote r2 );
apply monoid_reflect ; simpl
end.
:=| [ |-?] =>:=:=);
We can make short work of theorems like this one:
============================ a + ( b + ( c + ( d e ))) = a + ( b + ( c + ( d e ))) Our tactic has canonicalized both sides of the equality, such that we can finish the proof by reflexivity. Our tactic has canonicalized both sides of the equality, such that we can finish the proof by reflexivity.
reflexivity.
Qed.
It is interesting to look at the form of the proof.
Print t1.
t1 =
fun a b c d :
monoid_reflect ( Op ( Op ( Op ( Var
( Op ( Op ( Var Var
( eq_refl (
: forall a b c d : A, a + b + c + d = A => a ) ( Var b )) ( Var c )) ( Var d )) a ) ( Op b ) ( Var c ))) ( Var d )) a + ( b + ( c + ( d e ))))) a + ( b c ) + d The proof term contains only restatements of the equality operands in reified form, followed by a use of reflexivity on the shared canonical form. The proof term contains only restatements of the equality operands in reified form, followed by a use of reflexivity on the shared canonical form.
End monoid.
ring and field tactics that come packaged with Coq. A Smarter Tautology Solver Now we are ready to revisit our earlier tautology solver example. We want to broaden the scope of the tactic to include formulas whose truth is not syntactically apparent. We will want to allow injection of arbitrary formulas, like we allowed arbitrary monoid expressions in the last example. Since we are working in a richer theory, it is important to be able to use equalities between different injected formulas. For instance, we cannot prove P -> P Imp Var P ) Var P ) P To arrive at a nice implementation satisfying these criteria, we introduce the quote tactic and its associated library. Extensions of this basic approach are used in the implementations of theandtactics that come packaged with Coq.Now we are ready to revisit our earlier tautology solver example. We want to broaden the scope of the tactic to include formulas whose truth is not syntactically apparent. We will want to allow injection of arbitrary formulas, like we allowed arbitrary monoid expressions in the last example. Since we are working in a richer theory, it is important to be able to use equalities between different injected formulas. For instance, we cannot proveby translating the formula into a value like, because a Gallina function has no way of comparing the twos for equality.To arrive at a nice implementation satisfying these criteria, we introduce thetactic and its associated library.
index comes from the Quote library and represents a countable variable type. The rest of formula The quote tactic will implement injection from Prop into formula quote into not noticing our uses of function types to express logical implication, we will need to declare a wrapper definition for implication, as we did in the last chapter. The typecomes from thelibrary and represents a countable variable type. The rest of's definition should be old hat by now.Thetactic will implement injection fromintofor us, but it is not quite as smart as we might like. In particular, it wants to treat function types specially, so it gets confused if function types are part of the structure we want to encode syntactically. To trickinto not noticing our uses of function types to express logical implication, we will need to declare a wrapper definition for implication, as we did in the last chapter.
Definition imp ( P1 P2 : Prop ) :=
Infix no associativity, at level 95).
) := P1 -> P2 " -->" := imp 95).
Now we can define our denotation function.
Definition varmap Prop.
Fixpoint formulaDenote ( atomics : f : Prop :=
match f with
| Atomic v => varmap_find False v atomics
| True
| False
| And f1 f2 => atomics f1 /\ formulaDenote atomics f2
| Or f1 f2 => atomics f1 \/ formulaDenote atomics f2
| Imp f1 f2 => atomics f1 --> formulaDenote atomics f2
end.
asgn := asgn ) ( formula ) ::==> Truth => Falsehood =>=> formulaDenote => formulaDenote => formulaDenote
varmap type family implements maps from index values. In this case, we define an assignment as a map from variables to Prop s. Our interpretation function formulaDenote varmap_find function to consult the assignment in the Atomic varmap_find is a default value, in case the variable is not found. Thetype family implements maps fromvalues. In this case, we define an assignment as a map from variables tos. Our interpretation functionworks with an assignment, and we use thefunction to consult the assignment in thecase. The first argument tois a default value, in case the variable is not found.
Section my_tauto.
Variable atomics : asgn.
Definition holds ( v : index ) := varmap_find False v atomics.
) :=
We define some shorthand for a particular variable being true, and now we are ready to define some helpful functions based on the ListSet module of the standard library, which (unsurprisingly) presents a view of lists as sets.
Require Import ListSet.
Definition index_eq : forall x y : index, { x = y } + { x <> y }.
decide equality.
Defined.
Definition add ( s : set index ) ( v : index ) := set_add index_eq v s.
Definition In_dec : forall v ( s : set index ), { In v s } + { ~ In v s }.
Local Open Scope specif_scope.
intro ; refine ( fix F ( s : set index ) : { In v s } + { ~ In v s } :=
match s with
| nil => No
| v' :: s' => v' v || F s'
end ); crush.
Defined.
) () :=),) ::==>=> index_eq );
We define what it means for all members of an index set to represent true propositions, and we prove some lemmas about this notion.
Fixpoint allTrue ( s : set index ) : Prop :=
match s with
| nil => True
| v :: s' => v /\ allTrue s'
end.
Theorem allTrue_add : forall v s,
allTrue s
-> v
-> add s
induction s ; crush ;
match goal with
| [ |- context [ if? E then _ else _ ] ] => destruct E
end ; crush.
Qed.
Theorem allTrue_In : forall v s,
allTrue s
-> set_In v s
-> varmap_find False v atomics.
induction s ; crush.
Qed.
Hint Resolve allTrue_add allTrue_In.
Local Open Scope partial_scope.
) ::==>=> holds -> holds -> allTrue v ).| [ |-] ] =>->->
forward Or The forward forward f known hyp cont known hyp Now we can write a functionthat implements deconstruction of hypotheses, expanding a compound formula into a set of sets of atomic formulas covering all possible cases introduced with use of. To handle consideration of multiple cases, the function takes in a continuation argument, which will be called once for each case.Thefunction has a dependent type, in the style of Chapter 6, guaranteeing correctness. The arguments toare a goal formula, a setof atomic formulas that we may assume are true, a hypothesis formula, and a success continuationthat we call when we have extendedto hold new truths implied by
Definition forward : forall ( f : known : set index ) ( hyp : formula )
( cont : forall known', [ allTrue atomics f ] ),
[ allTrue atomics atomics f ].
refine ( fix F ( f : known : set index ) ( hyp : formula )
( cont : forall known', [ allTrue atomics f ] )
: [ allTrue atomics atomics f ] :=
match hyp with
| Atomic v => Reduce ( cont ( add known v ) )
| Reduce ( cont known )
| Yes
| And h1 h2 =>
Reduce ( F ( Imp h2 f ) known h1 ( fun known' =>
Reduce ( F f known' h2 cont ) ) )
| Or h1 h2 => f known h1 cont && F f known h2 cont
| Imp _ _ => Reduce ( cont known )
end ); crush.
Defined.
formula ) () ( known' -> formulaDenote ), known -> formulaDenote hyp -> formulaDenote formula ) () ( known' -> formulaDenote known -> formulaDenote hyp -> formulaDenote :==> Truth => Falsehood =>=>=>=> F =>);
backward forward function implements analysis of the final goal. It callsto handle implications.
Definition backward : forall ( known : set index ) ( f :
[ allTrue atomics f ].
refine ( fix F ( known : set index ) ( f : formula )
: [ allTrue atomics f ] :=
match f with
| Atomic v => Reduce ( In_dec v known )
| Yes
| No
| And f1 f2 => known f1 && F known f2
| Or f1 f2 => known f1 || F known f2
| Imp f1 f2 => f2 known f1 ( fun known' => known' f2 )
end ); crush ; eauto.
Defined.
) ( formula ), known -> formulaDenote ) ( known -> formulaDenote :==> Truth => Falsehood =>=> F => F => forward => F );
backward A simple wrapper aroundgives us the usual type of a partial decision procedure.
Definition my_tauto : forall f : formula, [ formulaDenote atomics f ].
intro ; refine ( Reduce ( backward nil f ) ); crush.
Defined.
End my_tauto.
);
intro all quantifiers that do not bind Prop s. Then we call the quote tactic, which implements the reification for us. Finally, we are able to construct an exact proof via partialOut my_tauto Our final tactic implementation is now fairly straightforward. First, weall quantifiers that do not binds. Then we call thetactic, which implements the reification for us. Finally, we are able to construct an exact proof viaand theGallina function.
Ltac my_tauto :=
repeat match goal with
| [ |- forall x :? P, _ ] =>
match type of P with
| Prop => fail 1
| _ => intro
end
end ;
quote formulaDenote ;
match goal with
| [ |- m? f ] => exact ( partialOut ( my_tauto m f ))
end.
:=| [ |-:?] =>=>=>| [ |- formulaDenote ] =>))
A few examples demonstrate how the tactic works.
Theorem mt1 : True.
my_tauto.
Qed.
Print mt1.
mt1 = partialOut ( my_tauto ( Empty_vm Prop ) Truth )
: True We see my_tauto varmap, since every subformula is handled by formulaDenote We seeapplied with an empty, since every subformula is handled by
Theorem mt2 : forall x y : nat, x = y --> x = y.
my_tauto.
Qed.
Print mt2.
mt2 =
fun x y :
partialOut
( my_tauto ( Node_vm ( x = Empty_vm Prop ) ( Empty_vm Prop ))
( Imp ( Atomic End_idx ) ( End_idx )))
: forall x y : nat, x = y nat => y ) () ())) ( Atomic ))) y --> x Crucially, both instances of x = y End_idx. The value of this index only needs to appear once in the varmap, whose form reveals that varmap s are represented as binary trees, where index values denote paths from tree roots to leaves. Crucially, both instances ofare represented with the same index,. The value of this index only needs to appear once in the, whose form reveals thats are represented as binary trees, wherevalues denote paths from tree roots to leaves.
Theorem mt3 : forall x y z,
( x < y /\ y > z ) \/ ( y > z /\ x < S y )
--> y > z /\ ( x < y \/ x < S y ).
my_tauto.
Qed.
Print mt3.
fun x y z :
partialOut
( my_tauto
( Node_vm ( x < S Node_vm ( x < Empty_vm Prop ) ( Empty_vm Prop ))
( Node_vm ( y > Empty_vm Prop ) ( Empty_vm Prop )))
( Imp
( Or ( And ( Atomic ( Left_idx End_idx )) ( Right_idx End_idx )))
( And ( Atomic ( Right_idx End_idx )) ( End_idx )))
( And ( Atomic ( Right_idx End_idx ))
( Or ( Atomic ( Left_idx End_idx )) ( End_idx )))))
: forall x y z : nat,
x < S S y ) nat => y ) ( y ) () ()) z ) () ())))) ( Atomic ))))) ( Atomic ))))))) ( Atomic ))))) y /\ y z \/ y z /\ x y --> y z /\ ( x y \/ x Our goal contained three distinct atomic formulas, and we see that a three-element varmap is generated. It can be interesting to observe differences between the level of repetition in proof terms generated by my_tauto tauto for especially trivial theorems. Our goal contained three distinct atomic formulas, and we see that a three-elementis generated.It can be interesting to observe differences between the level of repetition in proof terms generated byandfor especially trivial theorems.
Theorem mt4 : True /\ True /\ True /\ True /\ True /\ True /\ False --> False.
my_tauto.
Qed.
Print mt4.
mt4 =
partialOut
( my_tauto ( Empty_vm Prop )
( Imp
( And Truth
( And Truth
( And Truth ( And Truth ( And Truth ( And Truth
: True /\ True /\ True /\ True /\ True /\ True /\ False --> False Falsehood )))))) Falsehood ))/\/\/\/\/\/\-->
Theorem mt4' : True /\ True /\ True /\ True /\ True /\ True /\ False -> False.
tauto.
Qed.
Print mt4'.
->
mt4' =
fun H : True /\ True /\ True /\ True /\ True /\ True /\ False =>
and_ind
( fun ( _ : True ) ( True /\ True /\ True /\ True /\ True /\ False ) =>
and_ind
( fun ( _ : True ) ( True /\ True /\ True /\ True /\ False ) =>
and_ind
( fun ( _ : True ) ( H5 : True /\ True /\ True /\ False ) =>
and_ind
( fun ( _ : True ) ( H7 : True /\ True /\ False ) =>
and_ind
( fun ( _ : True ) ( H9 : True /\ False ) =>
and_ind ( fun ( _ : True ) ( H11 : False ) => False_ind False H11 )
H9 ) H7 ) H5 ) H3 ) H1 ) H
: True /\ True /\ True /\ True /\ True /\ True /\ False -> False /\/\/\/\/\/\=>) ( H1 /\/\/\/\/\) =>) ( H3 /\/\/\/\) =>) (/\/\/\) =>) (/\/\) =>) (/\) =>) () =>/\/\/\/\/\/\-> The traditional tauto tactic introduces a quadratic blow-up in the size of the proof term, whereas proofs produced by my_tauto Manual Reification of Terms with Variables The traditionaltactic introduces a quadratic blow-up in the size of the proof term, whereas proofs produced byalways have linear size.
quote tactic above may seem like magic. Somehow it performs equality comparison between subterms of arbitrary types, so that these subterms may be represented with the same reified variable. While quote is implemented in OCaml, we can code the reification process completely in Ltac, as well. To make our job simpler, we will represent variables as nat Step one of the process is to crawl over a term, building a duplicate-free list of all values that appear in positions we will encode as variables. A useful helper function adds an element to a list, preventing duplicates. Note how we use Ltac pattern matching to implement an equality test on Gallina terms; this is simple syntactic equality, not even the richer definitional equality. We also represent lists as nested tuples, to allow different list elements to have different Gallina types. The action of thetactic above may seem like magic. Somehow it performs equality comparison between subterms of arbitrary types, so that these subterms may be represented with the same reified variable. Whileis implemented in OCaml, we can code the reification process completely in Ltac, as well. To make our job simpler, we will represent variables ass, indexing into a simple list of variable values that may be referenced.Step one of the process is to crawl over a term, building a duplicate-free list of all values that appear in positions we will encode as variables. A useful helper function adds an element to a list, preventing duplicates. Note how we use Ltac pattern matching to implement an equality test on Gallina terms; this is simple syntactic equality, not even the richer definitional equality. We also represent lists as nested tuples, to allow different list elements to have different Gallina types.
Ltac inList x xs :=
match xs with
| tt => false
| ( x, _ ) => true
| ( _,? xs' ) => inList x xs'
end.
Ltac addToList x xs :=
let b := inList x xs in
match b with
| true => xs
| false => constr : ( x, xs )
end.
Now we can write our recursive function to calculate the list of variable values we will want to use to represent a term.
Ltac allVars xs e :=
match e with
| True => xs
| False => xs
|? e1 /\? e2 =>
let xs := allVars xs e1 in
allVars xs e2
|? e1 \/? e2 =>
let xs := allVars xs e1 in
allVars xs e2
|? e1 ->? e2 =>
let xs := allVars xs e1 in
allVars xs e2
| _ => addToList e xs
end.
We will also need a way to map a value to its position in a list.
Ltac lookup x xs :=
match xs with
| ( x, _ ) => O
| ( _,? xs' ) =>
let n := lookup x xs' in
constr :( S n )
end.
formula index is replaced by nat The next building block is a procedure for reifying a term, given a list of all allowed variable values. We are free to make this procedure partial, where tactic failure may be triggered upon attempting to reify a term containing subterms not included in the list of variables. The type of the output term is a copy ofwhereis replaced by, in the type of the constructor for atomic formulas.
Note that, when we write our own Ltac procedure, we can work directly with the normal -> operator, rather than needing to introduce a wrapper for it.
Ltac reifyTerm xs e :=
match e with
| True => constr : Truth'
| False => constr : Falsehood'
|? e1 /\? e2 =>
let p1 := reifyTerm xs e1 in
let p2 := reifyTerm xs e2 in
constr :( p1 p2 )
|? e1 \/? e2 =>
let p1 := reifyTerm xs e1 in
let p2 := reifyTerm xs e2 in
constr :( p1 p2 )
|? e1 ->? e2 =>
let p1 := reifyTerm xs e1 in
let p2 := reifyTerm xs e2 in
constr :( p1 p2 )
| _ =>
let n := lookup e xs in
constr :( n )
end.
:==>=>|?=>:=:=:( And' |?=>:=:=:( Or' |?->?=>:=:=:( Imp' =>:=:( Atomic'
Finally, we bring all the pieces together.
Ltac reify :=
match goal with
| [ |-? G ] => let xs := allVars tt G in
let p := reifyTerm xs G in
pose p
end.
A quick test verifies that we are doing reification correctly.
Theorem mt3' : forall x y z,
( x < y /\ y > z ) \/ ( y > z /\ x < S y )
-> > z /\ ( x < y \/ x < S y ).
do 3 intro ; reify.
-> y
Abort.
More work would be needed to complete the reflective tactic, as we must connect our new syntax type with the real meanings of formulas, but the details are the same as in our prior implementation with quote.
Building a Reification Tactic that Recurses Under Binders All of our examples so far have stayed away from reifying the syntax of terms that use such features as quantifiers and fun function abstractions. Such cases are complicated by the fact that different subterms may be allowed to reference different sets of free variables. Some cleverness is needed to clear this hurdle, but a few simple patterns will suffice. Consider this example of a simple dependently typed term language, where a function abstraction body is represented conveniently with a Coq function. All of our examples so far have stayed away from reifying the syntax of terms that use such features as quantifiers andfunction abstractions. Such cases are complicated by the fact that different subterms may be allowed to reference different sets of free variables. Some cleverness is needed to clear this hurdle, but a few simple patterns will suffice. Consider this example of a simple dependently typed term language, where a function abstraction body is represented conveniently with a Coq function.
Inductive type : Type :=
| Nat : type
| NatFunc : type -> type.
Inductive term : type -> Type :=
| Const : nat -> Nat
| Plus : term Nat
| Abs : forall t, ( nat -> NatFunc
Fixpoint typeDenote ( t : type ) : Type :=
match t with
| nat
| NatFunc t => nat -> t
end.
Fixpoint termDenote t ( e : term
match e with
| Const n => n
| Plus e1 e2 => e1 + termDenote e2
| Abs _ e1 => fun x => e1 x )
end.
:=->->:=-> term Nat -> term Nat -> term, (-> term t ) -> term t ).) ::= Nat =>=>-> typeDenote t ) : typeDenote t :==>=> termDenote =>=> termDenote
Here is a naive first attempt at a reification tactic.
Ltac refl' e :=
match e with
|? E1 +? E2 =>
let r1 := refl' E1 in
let r2 := refl' E2 in
constr :( r1 r2 )
| fun x : nat =>? E1 =>
let r1 := refl' E1 in
constr :( fun x => r1
| _ => constr :( e )
end.
:=|?=>:=:=:( Plus =>?=>:=:( Abs => x ))=>:( Const
? X only matches terms that do not mention new variables introduced within the pattern. In our naive implementation, the case for matching function abstractions matches the function body in a way that prevents it from mentioning the function argument! Our code above plays fast and loose with the function body in a way that leads to independent problems, but we could change the code so that it indeed handles function abstractions that ignore their arguments. To handle functions in general, we will use the pattern variable form @? X, which allows X to mention newly introduced variables that are declared explicitly. A use of @? X must be followed by a list of the local variables that may be mentioned. The variable X then comes to stand for a Gallina function over the values of those variables. For instance: Recall that a regular Ltac pattern variableonly matches terms that. In our naive implementation, the case for matching function abstractions matches the function body in a way that prevents it from mentioning the function argument! Our code above plays fast and loose with the function body in a way that leads to independent problems, but we could change the code so that it indeed handles function abstractions that ignore their arguments.To handle functions in general, we will use the pattern variable form, which allowsto mention newly introduced variables that are declared explicitly. A use ofmust be followed by a list of the local variables that may be mentioned. The variablethen comes to stand for a Gallina function over the values of those variables. For instance:
Reset refl'.
Ltac refl' e :=
match e with
|? E1 +? E2 =>
let r1 := refl' E1 in
let r2 := refl' E2 in
constr :( r1 r2 )
| fun x : nat => @? E1
let r1 := refl' E1 in
constr :( r1 )
| _ => constr :( e )
end.
:=|?=>:=:=:( Plus => @? x =>:=:( Abs =>:( Const
E1 as a function from an x refl' as a function over the values of variables introduced during recursion. Now, in the abstraction case, we bindas a function from anvalue to the value of the abstraction body. Unfortunately, our recursive call there is not destined for success. It will match the same abstraction pattern and trigger another recursive call, and so on through infinite recursion. One last refactoring yields a working procedure. The key idea is to consider every input toas
Reset refl'.
Ltac refl' e :=
match eval simpl in e with
| fun x :? T => @? E1 x + @? E2
let r1 := refl' E1 in
let r2 := refl' E2 in
constr :( fun x => r1 r2
| fun ( x :? T ) ( y : nat ) => @? E1 x
let r1 := refl' ( fun p : T * nat => E1 ( fst snd in
constr :( fun x => fun y => r1 ( x, y ) ))
| _ => constr :( fun x => e
end.
:=:?=> @?@? x =>:=:=:(=> Plus x ) ( x )):?) () => @? y =>:==> p ) ( p )):(=> Abs =>))=>:(=> Const x ))
@? X patterns. The abstraction |
interest rate upwards. The very large local government deficits go against the notation of a hard budget constraint to reform the fiscal administration.
Therefore, not matter how attractive the music sounds to the PBoC’s ears, it should refrain from making it too easy for local governments and leveraged corporations to avoid being confronted with the need to restructure and, therefore, with the need to reform. Flooded with liquidity, neither SOEs nor local governments will feel the pinch, eliminating market forces. If this concern is generally true, it is even more so for doubtful projects– which is what a potential QE in China would end up supporting. All in all, too much easing from the PBoC– let alone full-fledged quantitative easing – can only foster financial fragilities. By that token, if financial stability become the key concern, China’s much needed reform process will need to be postponed once again to manage financial fragilities first.Sen. John McCain John Sidney McCainGOP lobbyists worry Trump lags in K Street fundraising Mark Kelly kicks off Senate bid: ‘A mission to lift up hardworking Arizonans’ Gabbard hits back at Meghan McCain after fight over Assad MORE (R-Ariz.) is pledging to break his silence on President-elect Donald Trump Donald John TrumpHouse committee believes it has evidence Trump requested putting ally in charge of Cohen probe: report Vietnamese airline takes steps to open flights to US on sidelines of Trump-Kim summit Manafort's attorneys say he should get less than 10 years in prison MORE next year.
"On the first of January, I promise to start answering these stupid, idiotic questions," he told reporters on Tuesday.
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McCain has largely refused to talk about Trump for months, despite a constant stream of questions from Capitol Hill reporters.
A reporter on Tuesday again began to ask McCain about Trump, but McCain interrupted him, reiterating he wouldn't talk about the incoming president.
"I'm not talking about Trump. I'm not talking about Trump. I am not taking about Trump," he said. "I don't know how many times i have to tell you."
McCain dropped his support for Trump's presidential campaign after a 2005 tape surfaced of the nominee discussing groping and kissing women without their consent.
Shortly after the tape was published in October, McCain told a Politico reporter to get off the Senate subway train if he intended to ask a question about Trump.
He also told reporters last week that they were wasting their time asking him about Trump.Sorting data in parallel CPU vs GPU
The code for this post is on GitHub: https://github.com/sol-prog/Sort_data_parallel.
You can read the second part of this article.
For many programmers sorting data in parallel means implementing a state of the art algorithm in their preferred programming language. However, most programming languages have a good serial sorting function in their standard library. It appears to me, that the obvious thing to do is to first try to use what your language library provides. If this approach is not successful, you should try to find an existing library that is used, and consequently well debugged, by other programmers. Only as a last resort, you should implement a new sorting algorithm from scratch.
In the case of C++, we have a well tested sorting function in the STL, std::sort, unfortunately std::sort will use only a fraction of the processing power available in a modern multicore system.
Suppose now, that you have two sorted arrays and your task is to combine them as a single sorted array. We are fortunate enough to have a function made just for these kind of situations - std::merge. This means, in a nutshell, that when we need to sort some data, we can split this data in a few pieces, sort each piece of data in a separate thread and use std:merge to combine the sorted pieces - a poor man’s parallel merge-sort algorithm.
In the next figure I’ve tried to exemplify the above idea. We start, for e. g., with a ten elements array. We split this array in four chunks, after this, each chunk of data is passed to std::sort in a separate thread. We end up with four chunks of sorted elements. Now, we can use std::merge to combine the sorted data also in parallel, in pairs, we do this until we end up with a single piece of data. Please note that the numbers in the next diagram represents array indices:
We can take a concrete example to see how the algorithm works:
In order to implement the above algorithm in C++, we start by implementing two helper functions, one for partitioning the data and one for filling an array with random numbers:
1 //Split "mem" into "parts", e.g. if mem = 10 and parts = 4 you will have: 0,2,4,6,10 2 //if possible the function will split mem into equal chuncks, if not 3 //the last chunck will be slightly larger 4 std :: vector < size_t > bounds ( size_t parts, size_t mem ) { 5... 6 } 7 8 //Fill a vector with random numbers in the range [lower, upper] 9 void rnd_fill ( std :: vector < double > & V, const double lower, const double upper, const unsigned int seed ) { 10... 11 }
You can see the complete code for the above functions on the Github repository for this post.
Next, we list the C++ functions that implements our version of the parallel merge-sort algorithm:
1 //Use std::sort 2 void test_sort ( std :: vector < double > & V, size_t left, size_t right ) { 3 std :: sort ( std :: begin ( V ) + left, std :: begin ( V ) + right ); 4 } 5 6 //Merge V[n0:n1] with V[n2:n3]. The result is put back to V[n0:n3] 7 void par_merge ( std :: vector < double > & V, size_t n0, size_t n1, size_t n2, size_t n3 ) { 8... 9 } 10 11 // Combine std::sort and std::merge to sort data in parallel 12 double run_tests ( std :: vector < double > & V, size_t parts, size_t mem ) { 13 14 //Split the data in "parts" pieces and sort each piece in a separate thread 15 std :: vector < size_t > bnd = bounds ( parts, mem ); 16 std :: vector < std :: thread > thr ; 17 18 auto start = boost :: chrono :: steady_clock :: now (); 19 20 //Launch "parts" threads 21 for ( size_t i = 0 ; i < parts ; ++ i ) { 22 thr. push_back ( std :: thread ( test_sort, std :: ref ( V ), bnd [ i ], bnd [ i + 1 ])); 23 } 24 25 for ( auto & t : thr ) { 26 t. join (); 27 } 28 29 //Merge data 30 while ( parts >= 2 ) { 31 std :: vector < size_t > limits ; 32 std :: vector < std :: thread > th ; 33 for ( size_t i = 0 ; i < parts - 1 ; i += 2 ) { 34 th. push_back ( std :: thread ( par_merge, std :: ref ( V ), bnd [ i ], bnd [ i + 1 ], bnd [ i + 1 ], bnd [ i + 2 ])); 35 36 size_t naux = limits. size (); 37 if ( naux > 0 ) { 38 if ( limits [ naux - 1 ]!= bnd [ i ]) { 39 limits. push_back ( bnd [ i ]); 40 } 41 limits. push_back ( bnd [ i + 2 ]); 42 } 43 else { 44 limits. push_back ( bnd [ i ]); 45 limits. push_back ( bnd [ i + 2 ]); 46 } 47 } 48 49 for ( auto & t : th ) { 50 t. join (); 51 } 52 53 parts /= 2 ; 54 bnd = limits ; 55 } 56 auto end = boost :: chrono :: steady_clock :: now (); 57 58 return boost :: chrono :: duration < double, boost :: milli > ( end - start ). count (); 59 }
run_tests will return the time, in milliseconds, in which we can sort in parallel the vector V.
The above code is 100% portable on any modern operating system that has a standard C++11 compiler.
Suppose now, that your machine has a CUDA capable GPU. What will be the easiest way to sort an array of data on the GPU? With CUDA 5 and Thrust we can sort an array in a few lines of code:
1... 2 3 std :: vector < double > V ; 4 thrust :: device_vector < double > d_V ; 5 6... 7 8 //use the system time to create a random seed 9 unsigned int seed = ( unsigned int ) time ( NULL ); 10 11 rnd_fill ( V, 0.0, 1.0, seed ); 12 d_V = V ; // Transfer V on GPU 13 14 cudaEvent_t start, stop ; 15 cudaEventCreate ( & start ); 16 cudaEventCreate ( & stop ); 17 18 //Start recording 19 cudaEventRecord ( start, 0 ); 20 21 thrust :: stable_sort ( d_V. begin (), d_V. end ()); 22 23 //Stop recording 24 cudaEventRecord ( stop, 0 ); 25 cudaEventSynchronize ( stop ); 26 float elapsedTime ; 27 cudaEventElapsedTime ( & elapsedTime, start, stop ); 28 29 cudaEventDestroy ( start ); 30 cudaEventDestroy ( stop ); 31 32...
I’ve benchmarked the above codes, CPU and GPU, on an Intel i7 Q740, 16 GB RAM, NVIDIA GeForce GT 445M with 3 GB RAM machine that runs Ubuntu 12.04. The test data was a random array of double precision numbers with 10 to 10 millions elements. The CPU code was tested in serial (single thread) and parallel (eight threads) mode.
I’ve used three C++ compilers: gcc-4.6.3 which is the default compiler on Ubuntu 12.04, gcc-4.7.2 and Clang-3.3svn with libc++. If you are interested in building from sources gcc-4.7.2 and Clang-3.3 you can consult this and this. Each test was repeated one hundred times, the data was averaged and we’ve calculated the standard deviation.
Next image presents the raw data - time versus number of elements for CPU 1/8 threads and for the GPU:
Here, we’ve used the GPU time to normalize the data for the CPU:
Next figure presents the data for CPU only, where we’ve used the parallel data to normalize the results:
The last image suggests that using the building blocks of the STL we can obtain about 2.5 speedup for sorting data in parallel versus the serial version.
In the next table, we present the size in bytes of the executable generated by each compiler:
Compiler Gcc-4.7.2 Gcc-4.6.3 Clang-3.3svn Nvcc Executable size
[bytes] 36926 48860 25575 826378
I’ve received a few messages about not taking into consideration the cost of moving data from CPU to GPU and the other way around. Your complaints were heard. In the next set of figures the GPU time contains the cost of moving the data back and forth. Also, I’ve replaced the data for the single thread test with a single call to std::sort. The original and the modified code is on Github. Without further ado let’s see the figures.
The raw data - time versus number of elements for CPU 1/8 threads and for the GPU:
Here, we’ve used the GPU time to normalize the data for the CPU:
Last image presents the data for CPU only, where we’ve used the parallel data to normalize the results:
If you are interested in learning more about the C++11 Standard Library, I would recommend reading The C++ Standard Library: A Tutorial and Reference (2nd Edition) by N. M. Josuttis:
or Professional C++ by M. Gregoire, N. A. Solter, S. J. Kleper 2nd edition:WASHINGTON, DC — Filipino Americans were among the hundreds of thousands who packed the streets of the capital during the Women’s March on Washington Jan. 21.
It was important for me to be present and support the march not only as a woman, but to show solidarity with all of people of color, immigrants, sexual orientations and multiple identities.
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It’s important also to recognize that Filipino American showed the highest number of support for Trump among Asian American voters, according to the National Asian American Survey.
But for me, the purpose of the march was not strictly to oppose the president, but also to stand together to show respect for one another as human beings.
Here are more reflections from the march from other Filipino participants:
Gisela Camba
“I marched to get hope back. After Inauguration Day, it was disheartening because it seems to validate that more people in this country are against us, but the women’s march gives you hope that that isn’t the case and there are more people out there that believe in women’s rights than we might have thought.”
Jhett Arzadon Epp, Alexandria, Virginia, mother of two sons and a program manager
“As a woman and an immigrant, with diverse friends from all religious backgrounds and race, as well as friends and family who are in the LGBTQIA community, I stand in solidarity with those who believe in basic human rights. This President and his administration need to know that every single human being should be treated with respect and dignity. They need to know that we will be watching, opposing and defending our friends and family whose basic rights may be violated. We’ve come too far. We can’t be pushed back. We won’t allow it to happen. Our voices will be heard!
Mitzi Pickard, Alexandria, Virginia, Filipino American community leader
“Throughout the campaign, Trump insulted women. His rallying cry against Hillary was ‘that nasty woman,’ which he applied to women as a whole. We’ll be watching Trump and his administration to make sure that rights of women, immigrants, migrant workers, laborers, special needs, LGBT community, are protected. This march will be a testimony to the rich, diverse country America is. We are the FORCE indeed.”
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Robert Reyes
“I came out to show my support and solidarity for women’s rights and black lives matter. One key takeaway it was great to see how crowded it was and how many people also support this issues and there was definitely a lot of positive energy.”
Sarah Coloma
“I marched because the girls I’ve mentored deserve a much better world than what Donald Trump and people that rally around his regressive beliefs are offering. I marched because millions of people and I benefit every day from quality, comprehensive and affordable health care because of Obamacare. I marched because the day after the election, my friends and colleagues felt less safe in their own skin. Ultimately, I had to stand in solidarity with others who felt that Donald Trump went after their dignity and self-worth and the policies that have protected that dignity and self-worth.”
Raymond Partolan, program associate, Asian Americans Advancing Justice – Atlanta:
“As a Filipino American, I marched in solidarity with millions across the globe on Saturday, January 21, to demonstrate that a united people are strong and resilient. As an undocumented immigrant and DACA recipient, I marched for the over 700,000 DACA recipients, their friends, and their families who would be negatively affected if President Trump were to dismantle the program with a stroke of his pen. As a person of color, I marched for every single one of my brothers and sisters who have historically been marginalized. Overall, the experience was empowering and inspirational.”
April Siruno
“There’s so much at stake when it comes to upholding our liberties for all people in this new administration, a true test of our democracy. I marched for women’s health and equality, access to affordable healthcare, for freedom of religion, immigration reform, standing up for the marginalized, protecting the environment, fighting poverty in inner cities to dying economies in rural America, the right to marry the one you love, and the right for people to plan and choose when to have a child.”
Dr. Amie Beloy, Pediatrician, Leesburg, Virginia
“I’m marching to protest everything that Trump stands for: anti-immigrant, anti-LGBT, anti-Obamacare, anti-climate change. As a doctor, I am seriously concerned about his plan to repeal the Affordable Care Act and its devastating impact on the lives of millions of Americans.”
What kind of actions can we take after the march
Moving forward, we should all commit to volunteering our time, energy and resources to organizations that are working day in and day out to protect the rights of our communities. We should also continue to share our own stories because it really does make a difference.
The official Women’s March on Washington website recommends to take 10 actions for the first 100 days. All over the country, events and rallies are being planned to continue to mobilize communities and advance justice and equity, and make sure that voices from every perspective are not silenced.
Read NextGone are the days when ambassadors dedicated their time to negotiating bilateral treaties, writing secret reports to capital and in general led a life far away from the public eye. In those days discretion was the key word and the expression “silent diplomacy” was the best description of the trade.
Today nations are competing for attention. Governments have had to take an interest in the brand name of their country and consultants are making millions from measuring the value of countries’ reputations. Today we all follow international indexes according to various criteria and celebrate when our country is among the top five in innovation, culture, school results etc.
And it has become the job for most ambassadors to lead the promotion of his or her country’s image or “brand name” in the country where they are stationed. For Swedish ambassadors this means that we do not only dedicate ourselves to promoting Swedish exports or investments in Sweden. No, we are also a “communications bureau” for the country of Sweden. This means is that we do not only communicate with the government in the country where we are stationed. Of course, we still talk to our colleagues in the Foreign Ministry, in the Prime Minister’s office or in other ministries about Swedish points of view and try to win Spanish support for Swedish initiatives and ideas.
We are also a “communications bureau” for the country of Sweden.
But we also have to try and win the hearts and minds of the general public and of important lobby groups, organizations, media and opinion makers. This means trying to create an interest in Sweden, in its products and services, in its ideas and policies, in investing in Sweden, in studying in Sweden or to come and work and live in Sweden. What we want to do is create a positive image of our country, create an interest that makes people we want to reach start making a connection with Sweden.
In this endeavor digital diplomacy has become one of the most important instruments.
For the Swedish Foreign Service it was a fairly natural step into the social media. Sweden is a very “connected” country and with our tradition of openness and little hierarchy, the decision to let our Ambassadors and diplomats loose on blogs and Facebook was easy to take. To start with the embassies’ webpages where written in both Swedish and the language of the host country, while Facebook and blogs where primarily in Swedish and directed towards a Swedish public. The idea behind this was to use digital media to reach the Swedish public in order to explain to them and provide a view of the daily life of a Swedish embassy, to give the Swedish taxpayer a possibility to see more in depth what they were getting for their tax money.
Today all Swedish embassies or ambassadors are on Twitter
A great difference was also that through blogs and Facebook, for the first time, proper communication was possible. A person could write comments –critical or positive– or ask questions and the conversation would focus on what people were interested in, not only what the Ministry wanted to convey.
Today all Swedish embassies or ambassadors are on Twitter, our Facebook pages are in several languages, Instagram, Flicker and other digital instruments are used daily to communicate with the countries where we are stationed.
What is then the strategy for the digital communication of an embassy? The aim is to reach as many a possible that we feel are interested in Sweden, that are receptive for Swedish values and policies or that have the possibilities to help us spread our message. Most ambassadors use their Twitter to disseminate good news about Sweden, political decisions that may be of interest, information or articles that we feel are important to spread and sometimes more personal tidbits. From my point of view, I think it is important that although the Twitter account is an official one –I twitter in my function as the Swedish ambassador– it is important to have a personal touch to your communication. It’s important to be personal, but never private.
Part of the gain with the social media, is that you get instant feedback on what you say. We may not be able to convince everyone that follows us that our ideas or positions are the rights ones, but I think everyone respects the fact that you are open about them and are ready to engage in a dialogue on the issues. The fact that our diplomats are out there presenting their thoughts and Swedish policies is a testimony to our strong commitment to transparency and genuine openness to new ideas.
Initiating or participating in campaigns on Twitter, the so called “hash tag campaigns”, is one way of contributing to the international debate on issues of importance to Sweden. Hash tag campaigns may not solve the issues, but it provides a good opportunity to keep issues, which are in line with Swedish policies, on the agenda and in the public eye. Therefore campaigns like #UnitedforUcraine or #BringBackOurGirls are natural for a Swedish ambassador to engage in.
Finally it should be stressed, that social media, especially Twitter, is a fantastic tool for keeping oneself informed, to get instant news and to follow the “buzz” in the circles one is interested in. Social media has become one of the new diplomacy’s most important instruments and is here to stay.Ottawa will commit another $3.5-billion in funding aimed at improving the health of moms and kids in low-income countries, a major boost for a program the Prime Minister has identified as a signature priority.
Stephen Harper announced the funding, which goes beyond what non-governmental organizations had requested, during a summit on maternal and child health in Toronto on Thursday. The money will go toward improving nutrition, strengthening health care services and reducing the spread of diseases, according to the Prime Minister's Office.
Mr. Harper has said the issue is Canada's top international development priority and a "moral imperative" in which Canada believes it can make a significant difference.
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"There is a moral imperative to saving the lives of vulnerable women and children in some of the poorest countries around the world when it is in our power to do so," Mr. Harper said in a press release issued on Thursday. "It is unacceptable that these vulnerable global citizens die from preventable causes which can be addressed with proven, affordable and cost effective solutions – some costing mere pennies."
The new funding would be made available between 2015 and 2020 with the goal of ending all preventable deaths of mothers and children under five. The next stage of funding will place an increased focus on interventions during the first month of a newborn's life, on boosting efforts on immunization and improving civil registration and the collection of vital statistics, according to a press release from the Prime Minister's Office.
Canada's maternal and child health initiative was announced in 2010 as a core focus for the G8 summit in Muskoka, Ont. At that time, Canada said it would provide an additional $1.1-billion in funding for global efforts to reduce deaths of mothers and children and $1.75-billion in money that was already committed to the cause, and rallied other G8 countries to contribute as well.
That funding commitment is set to expire in 2015, and non-governmental organizations had pressed Ottawa for an additional commitment of $3.25-billion. At $3.5-billion, the funding package announced on Thursday goes beyond what NGOs had requested.
Canada has so far focused its maternal and child health funding on a select group of 10 low-income countries, seven of which are located in Africa. The Prime Minister's Office said it would maintain a geographic focus in an effort to tailor projects to support the specific needs a country has identified.
It was not immediately clear if the priority countries for maternal and child health would remain the same or if Canada would seek other countries to work with.
The focus areas announced on Thursday do not make any mention of reproductive rights, something philanthropist Melinda Gates has flagged as an integral part of maternal, newborn and child health.
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Media were not permitted to attend a number of panels during the maternal and child health summit, despite talk from the government about the importance of transparency in its signature development initiative.
Several of the speeches were open to the media but reporters were not permitted to report on the remarks by the World Health Organization's director-general, Margaret Chan, who spoke to the summit on Thursday morning.
Officials with the Prime Minister's Office said the panels were closed to allow participants to have a more frank and open conversation. However, they did not explain why reporters were barred from Ms. Chan's speech.
The new funding will continue to focus on improving nutrition in low-income countries, which the government said has emerged as a "far more important factor in maternal and child mortality than had been originally appreciated. The United Nations Children's Fund says under-nutrition is an underlying cause in close to half of all deaths of children younger than five.
Ottawa will also look to improve health systems in developing countries, including training workers and expanding access to facilities and services. The PMO indicated that Canada would work with the World Bank, UNICEF and others to work on supporting civil registration and vital statistics systems in developing countries to ensure that all births are counted.
The government said it would also put significant effort into funding vaccination efforts in developing countries. Seth Berkley, the head of the GAVI Alliance, told The Globe and Mail in a recent interview that much of the progress on maternal and child health is related to increased use of vaccinations.
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"The big picture, of course, is that immunization is the single most successful intervention. It touches more lives than any other intervention and, you know, at some point in history has touched virtually every person on earth," Mr. Berkley said.
A new call for proposals for NGOs to receive funding for projects will be set for the fall of 2014, the government said.
Canada has frozen its overall aid budget to 2015, and it was not clear from Mr. Harper's announcement if the government would increase the overall budget after that year. Canada's overall aid budget is approximately $5-billion per year and includes base funding for humanitarian crises and multilateral organizations.
The government said it would continue to work with the Canadian Network for Maternal, Newborn and Child Health, an umbrella organization for 70 non-governmental organizations, as well as the private sector and civil society.
The government also said Canada would work to keep maternal and child health on the global development agenda when the millennium development goals expire in 2015.
Where Canada focuses its maternal and child health aid:
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But which cases have the legs to run the full course and actually change how college sports operate? We've assigned each a rating on a scale from 1 to 10, from least to most likely to entirely change the NCAA. A threat level, if you will.
The premise: Former Northwestern quarterback Kain Colter and a group of other Wildcat football players created the College Athletes Players Association this winter and petitioned the National Labor Relations Board for union status. A seal of approval from the NLRB would allow the players collective bargaining rights under federal labor law. Players could negotiate salary and benefits with their schools, conferences, or the NCAA.
The status: The regional NLRB in Chicago heard the Northwestern case in February. Colter essentially argued that he was a professional football player for Northwestern, and that his education was a secondary concern. Northwestern countered with ample evidence to show that it takes academics seriously, an argument that could have began and ended with, "We're Northwestern." The NLRB decision is still pending.
More: Northwestern both the best and worst battle ground
The odds: Low. For one, the NLRB's decision will have no effect on state schools, as public institutions are not governed by the Board. For another, the NLRB's decision would be appealed to the national board regardless of the decision. The final arbiter, which could technically be the Supreme Court, would have to find that players are university employees, a contention that flies in the face of the language of the letter of intent.
The union idea could be used to advance some positives -- better postgraduate healthcare, for one -- but it's unlikely to make a serious dent.
RATING: 2.0/10.0
The premise: Athletes got concussions and the NCAA didn't do anything about it. Those players now have medical problems and need some help.
The status: The first NCAA concussion case was brought by Adrian Arrington, a former defensive back and rover for Eastern Illinois, in 2011. Since then, players from across the country have filed their own cases, and not just in football; hockey players and women's soccer players have also filed.
In January, attorneys for the former players and NCAA agreed to unite the cases in one court, in order to prevent different results across jurisdictions and centralize the settlement process. Much like with the NFL's concussion litigation, it is expected that the parties will wait until all potential plaintiffs get into the case, then settle.
The odds: There's little doubt that the NCAA faces some liability here. In a 2010 email, an NCAA government relations officer asked the organization's top health and safety official whether concussion recommendations in youth sports exceeded those of college sports. The health officer replied, "Well since we don't currently require anything all steps are higher than ours." That's not good.
With that said, the issue -- player health -- is far less controversial than the underpinnings of amateurism, and the potential class of athletes is much smaller. So, as with the union case, progress toward player safety wouldn't necessarily crumble the NCAA.
RATING: 4.0/10.0
The Shawne Alston case
The premise: Alston, a former West Virginia football player, filed suit against the NCAA and five major conferences in early March, alleging that the schools have violated antitrust laws by limiting an athletic scholarship below the "full cost of attendance." Alston, who is represented by two lawyers who have been involved in the O'Bannon case, says he was forced to take out additional loans to cover the cost of attending West Virginia while his coach made in excess of $3 million a year.
The antitrust claim arises from the fact that every university uses the same basic scholarship formula and will not increase it to meet the cost of attendance, which looks a lot like collusion to keep costs down.
The status: The suit was just filed, so we have a long way to go.
The odds: Fairly high. Former Oklahoma quarterback Jason White filed essentially the same suit against the NCAA in 2006, a case that settled for $10 million two years later. But $10 million isn't a game-changer for just about any AQ-conference school, let alone the NCAA.
The case could be resolved by the NCAA simply agreeing to allow for full cost of attendance scholarships going forward and setting aside funds to help former players pay off loans and debts. The increase in scholarship amount has been floated by Big Ten commissioner Jim Delany and supported by other large conferences, though mid-majors and FCS conferences have objected that it will drive their costs too high. If Alston's suit leads to a resolution of that conflict, he and his lawyers will likely be happy.
RATING: 6.0/10.0
The Jeffrey Kessler antitrust case
The premise: Where other lawsuits nibble at the edges of the NCAA's rules and regulations, this one strikes straight at the heart of the matter.
Jeffrey Kessler, a famous New York antitrust attorney, filed a class action antitrust suit earlier this week against the NCAA and five major conferences. Kessler is not seeking damages, but rather an injunction that would prevent the NCAA and conferences from limiting the amount of financial aid that can be given to an athlete. He alleges that the NCAA, Big Ten, Big 12, SEC, ACC, and Pac-12 have colluded to fix the price of players.
The status: Again, it is just filed.
The odds: This isn't a new concept. The White suit alleged essentially the same thing, and Alston is making a similar claim now.
Kessler is not out to make money. He's trying to blow up the entire system.
The NCAA has even been previously found to violate antitrust. laws. In a 1984 case, the University of Oklahoma alleged antitrust violations by the NCAA with regard to television broadcast rules that prohibited a football program from appearing on television too often. When Oklahoma showed up on TV more than the rule allowed, it was cited by the NCAA, leading Oklahoma to file suit. The NCAA lost, leading to the deregulation of television rights.
That deregulation is what has led to the absurd amounts of television money filling the coffers of universities across the country today, the millions of dollars that players are now trying to get.
Where it is different is the remedy. Kessler is not out to make money. He's trying to blow up the entire system. The fact that he (and his plaintiffs) are not seeking damages mean that a simple settlement from the NCAA and conferences does not look immediately feasible, because Kessler isn't interesting in a pile of cash. He has the resources and clout to make it happen, too.
There are problems, though, beginning with the fact that equitable remedies such as those requested by Kessler are not available when monetary damages can suffice. Kessler will have to establish that the proverbial bag of cash would be insufficient to fix the problem, a proof that could be difficult given the result of previous cases. Still, Kessler's resources and expertise make this the best credible threat to the NCAA's system outside of Ed O'Bannon.
RATING: 7.5/10.0
The premise: Initially brought as a case against the NCAA, EA Sports, and the Collegiate Licensing Company for the improper use of player likenesses in EA's NCAA-related video games, the O'Bannon suit has morphed into an attack on the source of the NCAA's largesse: Television revenues. A group of former and current football and basketball players is asking that a portion of television revenues be put aside to go to players, since it is those players' likenesses that are making the television rights so lucrative.
The status: After years of litigation and myriad challenges from both teams of attorneys, U.S. District Court Judge Claudia Wilken rejected the final challenges to the suit in February and forced the parties into settlement talks in March. Attorneys for the players have indicated that the settlement negotiations could involve more issues than just the likeness question at the heart of the case, including player pay and scholarship limitations.
Trial is set to start June 9.
The odds: If the plaintiffs get their way, it could be financially catastrophic for the NCAA. The exact structure of a win for the players isn't quite clear, but it likely would involve a considerable payment to a fund that would pay players after they exhausted their eligibility.
Some athletic directors have said it would bust their budgets and force them to cancel non-revenue sports, a claim that rings somewhat hollow for programs that were sponsoring gymnastics and rowing long before the conferences got their own networks.
With that said, Judge Wilken has appeared equally skeptical of the parties throughout the case, and could well find that the pursuit of television revenues is a bridge too far. If so, an already-accepted settlement of the video game claims will have to suffice.
RATING: 8.0/10.0The news keeps coming out of Millarworld. The comic company founded by prolific scribe Mark Millar was recently acquired by Netflix, and earlier this month Millar announced The Magic Order, his first new comic under the Netflix banner. But that doesn’t mean Millar is done with his older, established properties. Next year, Millar will launch a new Kick-Ass comic, 10 years after the original run first began. This one will be published by Image Comics instead of Marvel’s Icon imprint, but even more importantly, it will also feature a brand new character underneath the green-and-yellow costume.
“When we sold Millarworld to Netflix, two properties weren’t part of the deal. Kingsman and Kick-Ass both had unique arrangements with Matthew Vaughn and it made sense for these to continue, so in the year or so where we were preparing the sale I came up with this great idea for a whole new take on Kick-Ass,” Millar tells EW. “The entire story was all completely written in that year and it’s a monthly book, launching in February for the title’s 10th anniversary. It’s crazy to think that in the 10 years since it was created, Kick-Ass has spawned two Hollywood movies, video-games, toys, key-rings, PEZ dispensers, and even an upcoming board game. So the idea of it lying dormant was just insane and to be honest it’s the most fun I’ve ever had writing anything. I really love that world.”
In this new Kick-Ass, Dave Lizewski (played by Aaron Taylor-Johnson in the two film adaptations) has given way to a new character in the title role: Patience Lee, a black military veteran with young children. “I don’t think I’ve ever created a better [character],” he says. “I love mom heroes. I did it in Empress and I’ve done it again here.”
Millar has written a lot of superhero stories over his career, and he tells EW he’s fascinated by the “legacy” characters, heroes who inherit the mantles of predecessors.
“The original four volumes of Kick-Ass, the Dave Lizewski story, got tied up a couple of years ago and this is a brand new character. I’d always wanted to do what Doctor Who or The Flash does and create a legacy character, Kick-Ass being designed for that. The idea is that he inspires other people to do what he did, just putting on |
/secularism’ and all it entails in reifications when it comes to the ‘War on Terror’ and Samuel Huntington’s [xxiv] thesis; in other words, that ‘Islam is against the West and is incompatible with liberal modernity and its values of freedom, democracy and liberty’. Let us not conflate then the term ‘Islamist’ or ‘political Islam’ with the Muslim Brotherhood (also not a homogenous group) when the Noor Party consisting of Salafis, and who practice an even more orthodox breed of Islamism are also present on the Egyptian, Arab, and Muslim landscape and scene. If anything, such calls for the eradication of ‘political Islam’ or misunderstanding what it is, is an indication of an internalized ‘Islamphobia’ by Arabs, Muslims, and others, heightened post-9/11.
Islamism aside then, if by ‘political Islam’ what is being suggested is that Islam is NOT inherently political and gets politicized by ‘fanatics’ then that is also a problematic assumption, as any faith based movement is, arguably, inherently political through the socially just pillars it establishes in relations to issues of social justice (think of the forbiddance of interest in Islam, let alone the concept of Khalifahs used in the plural form in the Quran as opposed to its singular authoritarian form, let alone the function of Ramadan, & hadeeths of the Prophet advocating for racial equality, let alone the Quranic verses addressing gender rights/relations and I certainly don’t mean to homogenize Islam here, as many do, with its 73 or so odd interpretations). There is no getting rid of Islam’s cultural and religious influence in the Middle East; indeed, there is no getting rid of Islam’s political and ethical existence, in a society as Egypts’. What needs to happen is that Islam needs to be redefined in terms of its ethical and political contours and orientations by its practitioners, in my opinion towards anarchism. Muslims and Arabs need to decolonize their identities, discourses, and traditions. Besides which it’s impossible to make people ‘forget’ this spiritual component that informs a central part of their identity and that certainly exceeds culture when it comes to issues as gender relations, queerness etc. Therefore, there is NO sidelining ‘political Islam’, and that arguably will remain a palpable force to be reckoned with globally.
b) To clarify further, what I mean by saying that the Muslim Brotherhood was ‘set-up’ is the fact that the fulool (members of Mubarak’s ex-regime) have continued to exist, and given the way the Muslim Brotherhood was organized more than any portion of the Egyptian masses prior to the uprising, the Muslim Brotherhood represented the biggest obstacle for the fulool’s ongoing agenda to return, whatever shape or form that attempt at a return takes. The fulool must be reveling in this scenario where everyone (from the Muslim Brotherhood to the Military to Tamarod) is being played for a fool as we all partake in proxy and asymmetric wars against members of our own society and communities, these splits even causing divisions and rifts within our own families. As for what hope lies with Tamarod, this broad coalition of a Rebel Campaign (that truly has yet to become rebellious) and that, as stated, consists of everything from police officers to the army, to (neo)liberals, to Nasserites, to revolutionary socialists, to anarchists, to the un-politically oriented, even disenfranchised Muslim brotherhood members themselves, well, Tamarod will be subject to infighting soon enough. Of course, the Salafis of the Noor party, more neo-orthodox ‘Islamists’ than even the brotherhood, too are on the playground, towing the line between the Muslim Brotherhood and Tamarod, as everybody tries to bed Al-Sisi and the military in this over-zealousness to attain and reach power. Each group has their own particular interests and schemes, given that we as Egyptians, Arabs and Muslims have internalized the colonial Manichean/Machiavellian logic of ‘divide and conquer’ and have not, as stated, partaken in the decolonization and re-indigenization of ourselves, our societies and our communities, choosing instead to model ourselves socially, politically, economically on Western societies as we try and prove to ourselves and the rest of the world that we’re not savages but rather civilized beings.
To this end, how can Tamarod not fragment when it rallies around a ‘single-issue’ cause (of getting Morsi and the Muslim brotherhood out) at a time when politics has never been more fluid? For even when Tamarod claims [xxv] what they’re against, they hardly claim the ethical and political framework for which they stand for, let alone the means to concretely achieve those objectives at the grassroots (referring merely to the buzz words ‘social justice’, ‘freedom’, ‘bread’, and ‘democracy’ that have become nothing more than empty rhetoric, impossible to reconcile amongst the broad coalition spectrum established). Tamarod has yet to truly become rebellious in the radical sense of the word. After all, a ‘revolution’ [xxvi] is not about seizing power but rather knowing what to do with the power seized after; how will you organize socially, politically, economically, your communities and how will you do so autonomously; what will you do with a nuclear power plant, let alone how will you deal with issues as recycling and garbage; how will you deal with your crises of identity; how will you build a movement that centers on more than just a ‘superficial’ collectivity of people engaging in direct action or is that all we Egyptians, Arabs, and Muslims are capable of and have mastered now? No wonder the simulacrum of images of millions to Westerners have become too old and no longer eye-catching enough to warrant attention in comparison to two years ago; indeed, where’s the substance that sustains and exceeds such mass gatherings in ethics and politics, needed to truly dazzle the eyes? You do not kill God as Friedrich Nietzsche teaches without a thousand upon a thousand demagogues rising, fighting amongst each other! Those directly involved with Tamarod will sell out or will be brought out, radical or not, young and old, enticed and given posts and positions with whatever vertical social order is reestablished after this tumultuous period in our history, as the pyramid and Egypt’s hierarchical political-economic structures are rearranged and reorganized. The crackdown on ‘Islamists’ will begin yet again, indeed they will become worse than during Mubarak’s time, given the legitimacy members of the Muslim Brotherhood feel they had and were robbed of despite the narrow vision of democracy being applied, as defined through the ballot box.
It is unfortunate, but I expect the Muslim Brotherhood to become even more essentialist, more hegemonic and aggressive, as vengeful attempts are made by state apparatuses to drive them underground. Indeed, I wouldn’t be surprised if ‘terrorist’ attacks started again, sadly enough. In fact, if one were following one would notice the initial security reports of the retaliatory acts that have already begun against Churches, with Sinai yet again burning and on high alert, as regular Palestinians and Gazans are used by almost everyone as scapegoats for the ongoing events in Egypt. Muslim brotherhood members have already begun throwing [xxvii] people off rooftops in Alexandria, Egypt, as a Military responds with disproportionate force towards Muslim brotherhood protestors killing [xxviii] at least 51 of them.
All these events are, in part, a distractive war from what’s going on externally outside Egypt. Indeed, these events are built on the colonial and imperial desire to see Egypt constantly unstable at least internally; that is, to see Egypt too preoccupied to get involved in anything except its own affairs. This is a continuing war of all against all in the Middle East, a war that will pre-occupy the Egyptian military, a war that will take place on Egypt’s streets, and that will result in nothing less – irrespective of the calls for compassion, dialogue, reconciliation and calm – than further schisms amongst Egyptians, Arabs and Muslims. I expect splits amongst Islamists themselves (across their broad spectrum), only for that to produce fundamentalist extremes on all sides. The ultimate colonial and imperial entrapment that we have brought into is what’s been stated above given that we have not undergone decolonization and re-indigenization. We need to move beyond the logic of a capitalist nation-State as a mode by which we as Arabs, Muslims and Egyptians socially, politically and economically organize.
th, 2011, by colonial understandings of nationalism, (in Arabic, Wattaniyyah ) as opposed to ethical and political commitments that are clear in their orientation and that should be what binds people together. Of course, it’s not possible to understand these ethical and political commitments without decolonization and re-indigenization, as I discussed in my previous work titled Arab and Muslim Crises of Identity as we, Arabs and Muslim, are caught between two sets of identifications and loyalties i.e. identifying as being pan-Arab and pan-Muslim. And so, where to go from here? This is important, after all, given that what happens in Egypt ripples across the region and subsequently across the world — not only because it’s the largest Arab-Muslim society in the Middle East but also because of its geopolitical cartographic evolution and as such its historical influence and significance. Tamarood will tear each other apart despite being an exemplary example of a people’s power given ‘this people’s power’ is and was only held together, as were the 18 days of January 25, 2011, by colonial understandings of nationalism, (in Arabic, [xxix] ) as opposed to ethical and political commitments that are clear in their orientation and that should be what binds people together. Of course, it’s not possible to understand these ethical and political commitments without decolonization and re-indigenization, as I discussed in my previous work titled [xxx] as we, Arabs and Muslim, are caught between two sets of identifications and loyalties i.e. identifying as being pan-Arab and pan-Muslim. And so, where to go from here?
As Gustavo Esteva teaches:
We need to overcome our need for and dependency on the health and education systems. We must take these into our own hands, autonomously, without waiting for corporations and the State to do it for us. We need to escape the medical-pharmaceutical industrial system, where doctors and hospitals create more diseases than they cure.
We need to realize that we are: a network of relations, not individuals. This is the way to develop wisdom. We cannot in one day invent autonomous schools and hospitals, but we have to think about what it is to heal and live in health. ‘I want to live with dignity in my house and not with tubes that are uselessly prolonging my life’. Some technologies are necessary, but we need a collective redefinition about living healthily. For us to indeed heal ourselves, we need to redefine the body and soul: it is about becoming well, physically, emotionally, and mentally so that we may ourselves renew the nourished capacity to rebel every moment and every day. Millions of people go to bed with empty stomachs. The rest of us know that our bodies are full of toxic agro-chemicals, which have come from our food. We are either afraid of hunger or afraid of eating.
We must propose how we will challenge the institutional production of truth. Will we wait for the government to change things? We need to define for ourselves what we eat, not have the market or the State define these things for us.
We need to produce our food ourselves, by ourselves. We must recuperate our food autonomy, and realize its importance in the construction of another world. We need to produce our own food, to decide what we eat, and how we can organize to define our own food. Each of us needs to ask every day, what did I do to begin to advance the production of my own food, to define what I eat?
The corporations, the market, and the State will do everything possible to impede transformation and autonomy. As for labor, for the Left, heir to the protestant work ethic, work has become an idol. The word labor comes from torture. They torture us with work. We need to stop working and reactivate our lives and engage in activities that reproduce our ability to live.
We are the words that we use. Words have been placed in our heads without our permission being asked and we use these words without knowing what these words mean; we have to reclaim the words we use through decolonization and re-indigenization. We have to recover the ‘we’, and in every ‘we’, we are not individuals, we are relations, we are part of different communities. We need to define what our ethical and political commitments are, and to define these commitments, we must know them, and we must understand and have a conviction in them. We can recreate community relations starting with a few friends, to create a new society, like the inverted roots of a tree that germinate and spread in all directions and to no ends without a center; a rhizome. One of the sins of the Left was an inability to work together because of schisms and disagreements. If we are boiling with horror and rage, and confusion, feeling that we can’t connect with others, we must get past that misconception and re-conceptualize our struggle, understanding how we can ethically disagree amongst ourselves and others.
Moreover, we need to recognize that anti-capitalism today must also mean anti-patriarchy. We need to recognize that capitalism is patriarchal. We need to re-invent new worlds, creating new types of societies to liquidate the sexist and patriarchal regimes that already fester deep within us. Gender is a fundamental site of struggle that we need to center our societies around. With the feminization of politics, women can recover the histories of our peoples, indeed our sense of being people still learning what it is to become human and for us to commit ourselves as such to this task is pivotal. It is women who will take us forward into the new world (Esteva, 2013) [xxxi]
To conclude on a positive note, it is the constant Bakhtian “carnivalesque” [xxxii] element of this people’s power nonetheless, indeed its ability to oust anyone seated in an impatient moment’s notice, even with a few days over a year in power, that I see hope. Indeed, I see hope that a people are able to this day, still, to organize themselves horizontally and without a leader (even if most of them are yet searching for one, not realizing that all power is to the people and that we are all leaders, rulers and ruled by the laws that we determine on the street between us ourselves and not through a hierarchical capitalist-State or its apparatuses’ interventions between us). That is what offers promise, us, the people, and no one else. The ‘revolution’ will not arrive today, or tomorrow, but rather the day after if and only if people choose to remain honest, critical and conscious, indeed if they/we are willing to learn through reading and experimentation, always already mobilized with a cause, not in need of waiting for one to appear, or harkening to party and vanguard politics for that matter.
Zapatistas. Indeed, let’s exercise direct democracy not for a day or two or three but everyday of our lives, no longer harkening to build the Egyptian State, or its institutions, with what endless bureaucratic laws they bring, but rather alternatives to them, as we exercise non-hierarchical forms of horizontalist economic-political-and social organizing, where no one is in power and where everybody is in power to see through a true people’s power rising. Let’s refrain from vanguard practices and their associated party politics because political factions will never benefit us nor will they look to causes beyond their own! Let’s take control of our own lives together, holding each other’s hands, outside the dominant orders of capitalism and the nation-State, asking each other what each of us knows, so that we can walk together, leaving no one behind, and so we can build together with compassion, love and humility, becoming forever radical rebels in rebellion and revolt! In the end, we need to recognize that resisting is like breathing, so let us look to new horizons, beyond our own conception, of what radical, hopeful, ‘revolutions’ could mean, and let us learn from examples as that set by the [xxxiii]. Indeed, let’s exercise direct democracy not for a day or two or three but everyday of our lives, no longer harkening to build the Egyptian State, or its institutions, with what endless bureaucratic laws they bring, but rather alternatives to them, as we exercise non-hierarchical forms of horizontalist economic-political-and social organizing, where no one is in power and where everybody is in power to see through a true people’s power rising. Let’s refrain from vanguard practices and their associated party politics because political factions will never benefit us nor will they look to causes beyond their own! Let’s take control of our own lives together, holding each other’s hands, outside the dominant orders of capitalism and the nation-State, asking each other what each of us knows, so that we can walk together, leaving no one behind, and so we can build together with compassion, love and humility, becoming forever radical rebels in rebellion and revolt!
Hetero-patriarchy and the Three Pillars of White Supremacy http://loveharder.files.wordpress.com/2009/08/andrea-smith.pdf [xi] For further details on what a Military Industrial Complex is see Andrea Smith’s Also Dwight D. Eisenhower’s speech warning against the military industrial complex’s political and economic influences here: http://coursesa.matrix.msu.edu/~hst306/documents/indust.html
[xiv] For further details see Fahmy’s text and Ufford’s review titled ‘Modern Army? Modern State’ available here: http://www.h-net.org/reviews/showrev.php?id=7489
Discipline & Punishment (1979: 169). “Napoleon had changed the paradigm from battles of attrition to battles of annihilation with warfare changing from the dynastic duels of the eighteenth century to the total warfare with which we are familiar in this century. War itself has come to rely on the complete mobilization of a society’s industrial and human resources. While the armies of Frederick the Great were composed mostly of expensive mercenaries, who had to be carefully used in the battlefield, the Napoleonic armies benefited from the invention of new institutional means of converting the entire population of a country into a vast reservoir of human resources. Although technically speaking the French revolution did not invent compulsory military service, its institutional innovations did allow its leaders to perform the first modern mass conscription, involving the conversion of all men into soldiers, and of all women into cheap laborers. As the famous proclamation of 1793 reads: ‘..all Frenchmen are permanently requisitioned for service into the armies. Young men will go forth to battle; married men will forge weapons and transport munitions; women will make tents and clothing and serve in hospitals; children will make lint from old linen; and old men will be brought to the public squares to arouse the courage of the soldiers, while preaching the unity of the Republic and hatred against Kings’… Even before that, in the Dutch armies of the sixteenth century, this process had already begun. Civilians tend to think of Frederick Taylor, the late nineteenth century creator of socalled “scientific management” techniques, as the pioneer of labor process analysis, that is, the breaking down of a given factory practice into micromovements and the streamlining of these movements for greater efficiency and centralized management control. But Dutch commander Maurice of Nassau had already applied these methods to the training of his soldiers beginning in the 1560’s. Maurice analyzed the motion needed to load, aim and fire a weapon into its micromovements, redesigned them for maximum efficiency and then imposed them on his soldiers via continuous drill and discipline… This is but one example of the idea of militarisation of society. Recent historians have rediscovered several other cases of the military origins of what was once thought to be civilian innovations. In recent times it has been Michel Foucault who has most forcefully articulated this view. [xvi] Excerpt is from Michel Foucault’s(1979: 169). “Napoleon had changed the paradigm from battles of attrition to battles of annihilation with warfare changing from the dynastic duels of the eighteenth century to the total warfare with which we are familiar in this century. War itself has come to rely on the complete mobilization of a society’s industrial and human resources. While the armies of Frederick the Great were composed mostly of expensive mercenaries, who had to be carefully used in the battlefield, the Napoleonic armies benefited from the invention of new institutional means of converting the entire population of a country into a vast reservoir of human resources. Although technically speaking the French revolution did not invent compulsory military service, its institutional innovations did allow its leaders to perform the first modern mass conscription, involving the conversion of all men into soldiers, and of all women into cheap laborers. As the famous proclamation of 1793 reads: ‘’… Even before that, in the Dutch armies of the sixteenth century, this process had already begun. Civilians tend to think of Frederick Taylor, the late nineteenth century creator of socalled “scientific management” techniques, as the pioneer of labor process analysis, that is, the breaking down of a given factory practice into micromovements and the streamlining of these movements for greater efficiency and centralized management control. But Dutch commander Maurice of Nassau had already applied these methods to the training of his soldiers beginning in the 1560’s. Maurice analyzed the motion needed to load, aim and fire a weapon into its micromovements, redesigned them for maximum efficiency and then imposed them on his soldiers via continuous drill and discipline… This is but one example of the idea of militarisation of society. Recent historians have rediscovered several other cases of the military origins of what was once thought to be civilian innovations. In recent times it has been Michel Foucault who has most forcefully articulated this view.
[xvii] For further details see: http://foreignaffairs.house.gov/press-release/chairman-royce-and-ranking-member-engel-release-joint-statement-ongoing-events-egypt
[xviii] Indeed, how are we to ever forget “the link between [an ongoing] colonialism and the conversion of many world areas into food supply zones for Europe (from the creation of sugar plantations to the taking over of the photosynthetically most active areas of the world by Europe’s ex-colonies) we can realize that this state of affairs does have consequences for equity and justice” (De Landa).For further details see: http://www.ctheory.net/articles.aspx?id=383 ). The key point as Manuel De Landa says is “not to oversimplify: the Green Revolution, for example, failed not because of the biological aspect, but because of the economic one: the very real biological benefits (plants bred to have more edible biomass) could only be realized under economies of scale and these have many hidden costs (power concentration, deskilling of workforce) which can offset the purely technical benefits”. In the end, it’s corporate conglomerates that “are encroaching around the most sensitive points of the food chain [and which] is dangerous: they direct the evolution of new crops from the processing end, disregarding nutritional properties if they conflict with industrial ones; the same corporations which own oil (and hence fertilizers and herbicides) also own seed companies and other key inputs to farming; and those same corporations are now transferring genes from one species to another in perverse ways (genes for herbicide resistance transferred from weeds to crops)”.
On Usul al’Ikhtilaf & Usul al’Dhiyafa (otherwise known as an Ethics of Disagreements & an Ethics of Hospitality) & Epithets on Love here: [xxi] For further details see the blog entryhere: http://mohamedjeanveneuse.blogspot.ca/2013/06/on-usul-alikhtilaf-usul-aldhiyafa.html
Arab and Muslim Crises & Other Vexations: From Zapatismo to Islamatismo/anarca-Islam here: [xxii] See the following blog entry titled:here: http://angryarab.blogspot.ca/2013/07/a-coup-not-revolution.html?spref=fb
Anarca-Islam here: Also see the thesis titledhere: http://theanarchistlibrary.org/library/mohamed-jean-veneuse-anarca-islam
[xxiii] Briefly, the Doctrine of Manifest Destiny is the Christian religious fervour spawning “the Second Great Awakening”, and that led many European settlers to believe that “God himself blessed the growth of the American nation” at the expense of the genocide of Indigenous peoples of the Americas. In other words, “Native Americans were considered heathens. By Christianizing the tribes, American missionaries believed they could save souls and they became among the first to cross the Mississippi River” and build their new world. For more details, see: ~ http://www.ushistory.org/us/29.asp [xxiv] For further details see: http://www.hks.harvard.edu/fs/pnorris/Acrobat/Huntington_Clash.pdf
[xxvi] As I’ve written before: I believe revolutions require a double movement (internal and external transformations of individual-communitarian-societal character). Revolutions will always remain indefinitely incomplete because of the power dynamics, differentials and relations that will forever undermine/underpin them, and that sustain oppression while also providing liberatory potentials with them. All one hopes for in the end is delineating power differentials between us, as individuals and communities, not getting rid of them. I therefore don’t believe Egypt nor the Middle East has undergone a revolution yet, preferring instead terms/concepts like ‘revolt’, or ‘uprising’, even ‘insurrection’, but certainly not revolutions. This is because I believe in the need to differentiate and distinguish between the way revolutions are documented (or written about historically) and people’s revolutionary becomings (i.e. what ontologically and epistemologically changes/takes place/happens when a people rise – physically, emotionally, mentally, individually, collectively and that leads to certain transformations of consciousness individually and collectively). The two, the way revolutions are documented and people’s revolutionary becomings, are two different things, because they relate to two different sets of people in the process of casting off a shame or responding to that which is intolerable. ’Revolutions’ ought be premised on dealing with practical questions – how are you going to deal with recycling, garbage, what are you going to do with a nuclear plant, the army, indeed how are you going to reconceive your relationship to land through decolonization and reindigenization & beyond the individualist sense of self and land, indeed this earth’s utilitarian use.
“I have been thinking about the notion of perfect love as being without fear, and what that means for us in a world that’s becoming increasingly xenophobic, tortured by fundamentalism and nationalism”. As I have previously argued, the territorial concept and post-colonial Arabic notion is a problem as it plays upon sentimentalist hearts, as it always acknowledges an absent consensus on the legitimacy of the colonial and imperial European idea of modern States, the most active contributors, and agents of hetero-patriarchy, for they legalize it through law (Piscatori, 1986: 77; Habeeb, 2011, emphasis added). For as Al-Barghouti writes, “just as ‘Ummah’ was mistranslated into ‘nation’ by Europeans, Arabs have had problems with translating the term ‘nationalism’ into Arabic” (2008: 178). And thus though presently, the word for ‘nation’, “has two Arabic translations that are sometimes seen as mutually exclusive: ‘Qawmiyyah’ and ‘Wataniyyah’”, this book defers and distinguishes between the two, with Qawmiyyah referring to belonging to “a certain group of people, ‘qawm’” whereas “Wataniyyah, on the other hand, means belonging to the homeland, to a certain territory: ‘watan’” (2008: 178). It’s modern States that manipulate nationalistic sentiments, imprison their imaginings, when it is possible to imagine nations, but more so peoples, no longer obsessively bound by statist imaginaries that facilitate the evocation and morphing of nationalism through the shameless conformist promotion of loyalty and devotion, to create exclusionary territories while producing the commoditized patriotic rhetoric and phantasies that accompanies it. [xxix] I take Wattaniyah as ‘patriotism’ and not strictly ‘nationalism’ not solely because of the term’s connection with a certain territory, but rather a statist logic, that assumes a homogenous populous, even if the term also signifies that that populous, as Al-Barghouti notes, opposes “foreign invasion” and do “not hold much content regarding the political identity of the form of government” they share (2008: 179). The term in fact only refers in reality to the bond “among different groups of people that have little in common other than being against colonial domination” and living on what’s constructed and perceived to be a common territory (Al-Barghouti, 2008: 179). Make no mistake about it, only the most politically naïve and trusting would wager that nationalism nowadays carries coherence, and isn’t philosophically bankrupt, when even its avid and most sympathetic of students, Tom Nairn, acknowledges that ’Nationalism’ is a: “Pathology of modern development history, as inescapable as ‘neurosis’ in the individual, with much the same essential ambiguity attaching to it, a similar built-in capacity for descent into dementia, rooted in the delimmas of helplessness thrust upon most of the world (the equivalent of infantilism for societies) and largely incurable” (2003: 347; Anderson, 2006; Hobsbawm, 1983). Nations are invented, imagined, enmeshed in contradictions no less than ‘tradition’. Indeed, imagined as political communities and as “both inherently limited and sovereign”, for “even the smallest nation will never know most of its fellow-members, meet them, or even hear of them, yet in the minds of each lives the image of their communion” (Anderson, 2006; Hobsbawm, 1983). Nationalism “is not the awakening of nations to self-consciousness: it invents nations where they do not exist” (Gellner, 1964: 169, Anderson, 2006; Hobsbawm, 1983). This concoction isn’t to be thought of as “‘fabrication’ and ‘falsity’, rather than ‘imagination’ and ‘creation’”, even if it exudes elements of both, because in imagining – what is fabricated or ‘the narrative’ established – ‘falsities’ and ‘truths’ are recreated and re-envisioned (Anderson, 2006: 6; Hobsbawm, 1983). In the words of the wise Bell Hooks writes:. As I have previously argued, the territorial concept and post-colonial Arabic notion is a problem as it plays upon sentimentalist hearts, as it always acknowledges an absent consensus on the legitimacy of the colonial and imperial European idea of modern States, the most active contributors, and agents of hetero-patriarchy, for they legalize it through law (Piscatori, 1986: 77; Habeeb, 2011, emphasis added). For as Al-Barghouti writes, “just as ‘Ummah’ was mistranslated into ‘nation’ by Europeans, Arabs have had problems with translating the term ‘nationalism’ into Arabic” (2008: 178). And thus though presently, the word for ‘nation’, “has two Arabic translations that are sometimes seen as mutually exclusive:’ and’”, this book defers and distinguishes between the two, with Qawmiyyah referring to belonging to “a certain group of people, ‘qawm’” whereas “, on the other hand, means belonging to the homeland, to a certain territory: ‘watan’” (2008: 178). It’s modern States that manipulate nationalistic sentiments, imprison their imaginings, when it is possible to imagine nations, but more so peoples, no longer obsessively bound by statist imaginaries that facilitate the evocation and morphing of nationalism through the shameless conformist promotion of loyalty and devotion, to create exclusionary territories while producing the commoditized patriotic rhetoric and phantasies that accompanies it.
Arab and Muslim Crises of Identity please refer to: [xxx] On what I call theplease refer to: http://mohamedjeanveneuse.blogspot.ca/2013/06/arab-muslim-crises-other-vexations.html
[xxxii] Mikhail Bakhtin’s famous ‘Carnival and Carnivalesque’ offers four categories of what he calls the “carnivalistic sense of the world: 1. Free and familiar interaction between people: in the carnival normally separated people can interact and freely express themselves to one another. 2. Eccentric behavior: behavior that was otherwise unacceptable is legitimate in carnival, and human nature’s hidden sides are revealed. 3.carnivalistic misalliances: the free and familiar attitude of the carnival enables everything which is normally separated to connect – the sacred with the profane, the new and old, the high and low etc. 4. Sacrilegious: the carnival for Bakhtin is a site of ungodliness, of blasphemy, profanity and parodies on things that are sacred. For Bakhtin, these categories are abstract notions of freedom and equality, but rather a lived experience of the world manifested in sensual forms of ritualistic acts that are played out as if they were a part of life itself”. See: http://culturalstudiesnow.blogspot.ca/2011/07/mikhail-bakhtin-carnival-and.html
[xxxiii] For a brief introduction to the Zapatistas see: http://www.zapatistarevolution.com
Also see John Holloway’s essay Urban Zapatismo here: http://www.squiggyrubio.net/documents/hjsr/HollowayZapatismoUrbano.pdfYear on the Binge
Netflix Originals and Why the Water Cooler Still Might Matter
In 2013, I worked from home. The entire calendar year.
It was, at times, an adjustment: the wonky hours, the cabin fever, the post-lunch revelations that pants might be called for. But there was one home office side effect I hadn’t counted on: the television. My God, the astounding, incessant, embarrassing amount of television zero commutes and lunch hour in your living room allows you. Do you know me? Have you recommended I watch a TV show in the past five years? Chances are, in 2013, I finally watched it (still not Dexter and Lost, though, you crazies).
In some ways, it felt fortuitous: 2013 was a pretty kick-ass year for TV. Established prestige shows like Mad Men, Boardwalk Empire, and Sons of Anarchy churned out stellar seasons. Import series like Top of the Lake, The Returned, and The Fall made impressive debuts. Even curiosities like Sleepy Hollow, Agents of SHIELD, and Hannibal were worth a gander. Sometimes even multiple ganders.
But the biggest television happening of the year was the rise of Netflix Originals. You know the ones: Eli Roth’s Hemlock Grove. Jenji Kohan’s Orange is the New Black. The infinitely awaited revival of Arrested Development. And of course, the flagship series, Kevin Spacey’s House of Cards, which just returned last month for a second smarmy season. All of them high-profile. Star-studded. And, if you ask Netflix, successful. The company keeps its numbers under wraps, but the headlines were everywhere: this whole Netflix Originals thing could be the end of the ol’ boob tube as we know it. And we watched the heck out of it.
So it’s likely that, at some point in 2013, you had a conversation like this:
This kind of riveting discourse happened because Netflix Originals aimed for a phenomena the company itself helped popularize: Binge Viewing. We’ve all done it. One episode turns into two, two into three, and before you know it, it’s 2:39am and you’re down a whole bag of Flamin’ Hot Cheetos and an amount of wine you’re definitely going to feel in the morning (editors note: a 2010 Cab is a recommended pairing here).
Binge viewing is fun. Cathartic. Convenient. And Netflix knows it. To capitalize on these perks, they made the decision to release each of its original shows an entire season at a time. When, how, and at what pace you watch them is a completely customized experience tailor-made for You™.
It’s a ballsy move for Netflix, but a calculated one. The company not only used Big Data to help select its projects, but also inform its all-at-once distribution model. That’s right, all our deepest hopes and dreams can now be Moneyball’d into hour long increments and streamed directly into our living rooms for $7.99 a month, all via some simple head counts. Yay, the future?
While it’d be hard to argue that this distribution model hasn’t generated viewership, it’d be even tougher to prove that it hasn’t been at the cost of something less quantifiable. Something that can’t just be crunched by a computer or Nate Silver’d into fruition. Because while Netflix was keen to enable me to watch this new kind of TV, and you to watch it, they forgot about us watching it. “Us” as in the pretty well-documented fact that watching television can be a culturally communal experience.
They forgot about the water cooler.
It sounds like an antiquated term, but the power of the water cooler has reigned over TV audiences for a quite a while. Lucy and Ethel in the candy factory. The death of Colonel Blake. Who Shot JR? Bob Newhart’s dream. Yadda yadda yadda. Ellen coming out. The maybe-sorta death of Tony Soprano. WE WERE ON A BREAK. These pop culture moments became touchstones not just because they aired, but because we experienced them together. And for the most part, we still do. The water cooler never went away. We just call it something different now.
Because, Jesus, what is the Internet if not a giant, bubbling hub where fans come together to cooperatively experience, dissect, bitch about, and celebrate EVERYTHING, television included? Blogs and op-eds and recap |
how quickly he reacts to the defense, but he is very athletic and stronger than his size implies. Were the Vikings to switch to this look, Ballard would certainly remain on the team.
For the most part, it's easy to say that the under tackles the Vikings have fit the wider scheme requirements, even if there are tweaks here and there that need to be done with their skill sets to make them prototypes at the position. The Vikings wouldn't necessarily get rid of their nose tackles, either. No team runs a base Wide 9 without also getting into other packages that feature a nose tackle, and the Vikings could also run a tackle heavy goal line package as well. On the interior, they will want the bigger heavies on the line.
The Ends
The defensive ends line up extremely wide in this set. To get you a better understanding of it, here's a screenshot from the first game of the season:
In the Daily Norseman picture database, I've labeled the above picture as "the Eagles line up wider than your mom's legs" just for Kyle.
As you can tell, the defensive line splits are fairly extreme. To be fair, this was an obvious passing situation—no backs in the backfield and it was 3rd and 9. Neither the Eagles nor the Lions tend to use the double 3-technique on the majority of their snaps, although they will still use them much, much more often than most—the Eagles used it more than anyone else in 2011, and had more than a third of their snaps in this alignment.
Given that a number of teams don't use their "base defense" on the majority of their snaps (thanks to the evolution of the slot receiver and the nickel corner), it doesn't really detract from the overall argument about its alignment. In high leverage situations, the Eagles employed wide sets with the center uncovered.
I've noticed that the Eagles and the Lions also tend to employ a 2i technique much more than a 1 technique when playing with a nose tackle (again, a natural 3-tech playing nose, that is) and they'll often shoot the B gap and leave the A gap uncovered. It's not too different, although it is a bit easier for the center to double-team.
They don't often stay in the 2-technique and will often move, presnap to either a 2i look or a 1-technique look. They will also move to a true double 3-technique look out of this stance.
The Wide 9 gets its name from the defensive ends in that they line up in the "9 technique" stance wide of the tight end. That's what we'll talk about. Some defensive ends seem perfectly suited to the system, and Kyle Vanden Bosch and Jason Babin thrived on the Wide 9 and the advantages it offered.
For the most part, Wide 9 ends are relatively light. Aside from the Vikings and the Wide 9 teams, 4-3 defensive ends tend to weigh between 270 and 280. This isn't a hard and fast rule—John Abraham is listed at 266, for example—but for the most part tend to come in above 260 pounds.
The Wide 9 ends all tend to be below 270 (with the exception of Vanden Bosch). Most of this is a result of the consistent emphasis on speed that the Wide 9 has, putting their ends in a "track stance" to develop speed and put tackles in an awkward position. Many times, the defensive end approaches the tackle having taken four steps.
This emphasis on speed generally means that most of the starters (again, aside from Vanden Bosch) in the system ran a 10-yard split of 1.6 seconds or faster. This is great for players that have good flexibility and can sink their hips on the curve (as evidenced by the fact that no player in these Wide 9 systems, as far as I can tell, had a 3-cone time slower than 7.1 seconds).
These widened lanes are designed to take full advantage of speed and require a lot less of defensive ends than most systems. While they do need to be fast, they don't need to be as savvy at the line or as powerful. Much of the speed can be turned into power for a bull rush, so strength is simply not a big requirement of the Wide 9 end. Having an array of moves is helpful but not a priority, so long as the defensive end can disguise their intentions during the run up.
Most concerns about an explosive first step or getting skinny are not as relevant to Wide 9 ends, simply because of the stance and run up that they take. The transition from speed to power remains an important skill and they need to do it in a way that doesn't lose momentum, but for the most part it creates production where there originally might not be any.
The wide alignment actually makes it somewhat difficult to bounce outside, because tackles and ends don't have the ability to block the defensive ends down. At the same time, however, zone runs to the outside create enormous lanes and it is easy for a defensive end to allow the running back to slip underneath. For the most part, it does a good job preventing runs into the D gap or alleys and they tend to see many more attempts inside. Knowing that the majority of the runs they see will follow a specific pattern, they can prepare for the run game a bit better.
I noticed that nearly every Wide 9 team, every year, had elite run defense on one outside direction but not the other. It was an interesting contrast, because the underperforming outside edge would often be among the worst three in the league. According to Football Outsiders, the Eagles ranked 31st in the league for runs off the right end, but were 2nd in runs off the left end in 2011.
In 2012, Detroit ranked 28th defending runs off the right tackle and 2nd in runs off the left tackle. In 2011, they ranked 1st in defending runs off the left end and 31st in runs off the right end. Tennessee had the same pattern in 2010, where runs off the left end (ranked 28th) did not match the performance of the right end defense (ranked 5th).
I'm sure this has more to do with linebackers than it does defensive ends, but it does speak to a specific issue that they may want to resolve.
The relatively extreme alignment of the defensive ends has long been credited for increasing sack production and its easy to see why. Washburn coaches his ends to transition to run defense only if completely necessary, and the mad run to the quarterback is one of many reasons. In addition to giving the defensive ends momentum against tackles still working to set their pass protection, they force the tackles to kick out, testing their agility and balance. With that, they almost always create an isolated block between just themselves and the tackle, leaving him on an island. This makes it an ideal blitzing formation.
Both the defensive ends and the under tackles are tasked with aiming themselves at the point where the quarterback would be if they completed their five-step drop, which is a bit different than some systems that simply find ways to put players in the backfield and make plays themselves.
I'm not so sure that the Vikings have the perfect defensive ends for the system, nor do I think it would maximize sack production if employed in total. Jared Allen isn't a slow guy, but he's definitely lost a step in long speed and acceleration. With a lot of length and the ability to move his 270 pound body with ease, losing his advantage in an explosive first step would not really be optimizing what he does. Allen has a great mental game in the trenches, and he affords himself a wide variety of move sets when played closer to the line. Sacrificing his ability to play against the run and contain the outside may not be worth it, especially when his natural bull rush is still powerful.
From my game tracking last year, I also thought he was simply a worse player the wider he lined up. He's better when he can threaten a realistic inside move to counter against the outside, and he does a better job dipping under pass protectors when they take longer to read him.
On the other hand, Brian Robison and Everson Griffen do fit the prototype well. Robison is extremely fast and quick off the snap (posting a mind-numbing 1.49 10-yard split, which was as fast as Sam McGuffie and around the same speed as Tavon Austin and Ryan Swope. Only four wide receivers posted a faster 10-yard split than Robison, and that would serve him extremely well in a wide role. Beyond that, he's agile and has good change-of-direction skills.
Robison is a much better speed rusher than bull rusher, and also has good awareness. As a run defender, he's solid, and I think he's better reacting on the fly more than reading to play contain. He can set an edge and pursues with good get-off speed and final velocity. He has a few technical weaknesses that would be hidden by the Wide 9, and I'm not so sure he has too many strengths that would be wasted in a wide stance.
More than Robison, Griffen does well when split out wide. Robison probably has more short-area athleticism, but I don't think anyone would disagree that Griffen would be beastly with a runup. I think the fact that he doesn't do a great job getting off the snap would make him an ideal candidate for a Wide 9 base stance, because if he has a half-second of leeway, he should be relatively unstoppable. He has even more technical hand work to improve upon, and I think his pursuit capability and leg drive make him a good fit within the scheme.
With that in mind, I think the ideal Vikings formation from the defensive line should be to line up the left defensive end wide, but keep Jared Allen tucked closer to the line of scrimmage. Jim Washburn did the same thing his first few years at Tennessee, and I honestly think he did much better with that system. I'll get to the stats a little bit later, though.
This should also make tackle-tackle stunts and stunts from the right defensive end (Jared Allen) a bit easier. Above, I have Sharrif Floyd lined up in the 2-technique, but I don't think he should play as a two-gapper. Instead, he'll be assigned a gap as a result of the play call and move to shoot it as soon as the snap happens. This preserves the philosophy of creating one-on-one matchups when he moves outside but also keeps confusing the blockers. It also makes it difficult for the offensive line to consistently run up the middle.
I've also change the aiming points to make it more consistent with Allen's playing style and to keep contain on the run game. Here, he's lined up as a true 5-technique. Adding a tight end shouldn't change too much. A tight end on Jared's side would simply force him to play 6-technique head-up over the tight end. A tight end on Robison/Griffen's side would not change much of anything.
The Back Seven - Run Game
Most critical to this scheme are the linebackers. They do not have time to read blocks and therefore must react with instinct and decisiveness against the run. Because of the "2" technique I put Floyd in (and Ballard in rotation), the middle linebacker will have to work in concert with the "2" more than in a traditional double 3-technique.
Generally, I've seen the middle linebacker play a sort of two-gap role against the center in many versions of the double 3-technique alignment, but otherwise I've seen a safety walk down into the box in what amounts to a 4-4 alignment to cover both A gaps.
It really depends on the call at the line, which is why this defense will be even more demanding of its linebackers than most. While defenses will always need to be cognizant of what's happening up front, having functionally two base defenses will create some serious stress.
In order to keep the alignments looking the same so as not to tip off the offensive line on the 2-tech's movement, I had to mess around with run looks and also look at what Detroit did. I saw a lot of strong safety support, but I wanted to change it a little bit based on what I think our strong safety (Jamarca Sanford) can do. More than that, I think it is wasting Chad Greenway's talents to treat him like DeAndre Levy.
Classically, in the double 3-technique, the middle linebacker will walk up to the line to threaten an A gap blitz, but will also mug up in order to play the run game a bit better, like so:
Here, he functionally operates as a nose guard in a 5-2 monster, bringing back the 1940s in football. If the strong safety doesn't walk up into the box, the middle linebacker would functionally two-gap the center. This is because the Will linebacker needs to handle the gap on the weak side defensive end, given the pass-only focus of the ends.
The modified Wide 9 I proposed above has a bunch of different options, but in order to preserve some coverage principles and disguise the run fits based on generic lineups, I looked mostly at the following:
The fits are different based on the strong side, which is what the top and bottom halves represent. The 2-technique tackle gap defines the left and right sides. When Jared Allen lines up on the strong side, the Sam linebacker has to read Allen and take the gap that Allen doesn't shoot through.
I've decided to line up the strong safety behind the Will linebacker, and the two of them can trade run responsibilities if need be. Alternately, if the Vikings are confident in their middle linebacker, they can two-gap the center and leave the strong safety high (which they should do in some sets for downs where the pass is more likely or to confuse blockers).
For the most part, the free safety will clean up the run and will need to keep clean alleys when defending the run. The corners are not as important in the run game in this setup as they are in the Tampa-2 or the basic Cover 2 scheme, although the coverage principles I would like to employ require physical corners and are generally the type that make an impact in the run game. What's nice is that while the corner to the strong side (when the strong side is Allen's side) would be tasked with keeping the D gap clear, the Sam linebacker and extra defender (strong safety) can keep things clear.
Here, the wide fit of the weak side defensive end will need to contain the plays into the C or B gap, putting a lot of stress on the Will linebacker or the strong safety to play with range in those alleys. If not, the strong safety can make sure the C gap is secured, like in the lower right-hand run fit.
In the case of the lower left-hand run fit (strong side lined up with Jared Allen and the 2-tech shooting the A gap), the Will and Strong Safety can switch off run responsibilities, depending on their respective ranges. Similarly, the Strong Safety can take the weakside B gap and shift the linebacker gap responsibilities towards the strong side. The possibilities are nearly endless and can come out of congruent formations.
The requirements of the middle linebacker are nearly as numerous as those of the Tampa 2, although not necessarily of the same mold. Like in the Tampa 2, there is a high priority on the middle linebacker maintaining discipline and reading the play correctly. Falling for a play-action pass or a draw play could be deadly. More than anything else, this alignment needs a linebacker that can take care of draw plays.
The offensive line won't be held back by the defensive line as much as it will be in other 4-3 systems or most 3-4 systems, so capable linebackers are a must. That means the middle linebacker must also be good at shedding blocks and also wrapping up. Because he won't be protected by the line, he'll need to do identify the gap being attacked quickly, almost as soon as the ball is snapped.
Moving quickly downhill, the middle linebacker will also have to stick it to lead blockers—perhaps as often as the Sam linebacker generally does in the Tampa 2 system. A film rat with run-stuffing chops is ideal.
I really like Michael Mauti in this system. He has instinctive vision and gets to his run assignment with speed and decisiveness. He has a great feel for running plays, and is lauded more for his read and react capability than anything else. His take-on skills are excellent too, although he is in all honesty better when someone has cleared through the traffic for him. Nevertheless, he does not often give ground on blocks unless there's a strategic reason to do so.
He maintains excellent form when taking those blocks on, and does a good job getting rid of lead blockers. Unfortunately, I'm not sure he has the lower body strength to be consistently good at taking some of those blocks on, but if he can keep clear of guards, he'll be alright. Many of the centers he will go up against do not have the type of take-on strength that will cause him problems. They tend to weigh about 20 pounds less than their peers on the interior of the line, so if the under tackles do their job, they should be fine. He will do better against fullbacks, who weigh about what he does.
Audie Cole would not fare too badly as a run defender here, either. He's a 7th round pick for a reason, but he has good instincts in the run game and can read the run quickly enough to get to the ball. His ability to move past blockers and attack the line of scrimmage is impressive, although once he's locked up, he'll need to be a better technician. Given how often he'll be a key player on dive plays in this defense, I'd like him to have improved these last two offseasons at getting off of blocks, particularly given his potential two-gap responsibilities.
His ability to stick it to blockers and stay where he is, however, is good. His experience as a Sam linebacker in NC State could be useful in this specific role for the Mike. If he doesn't give ground, he may be doing his job while allowing the Will and strong safety to clean things up. He's a strong guy (despite his bench press) that can be a real menace if he works on his technique. Coupled with intelligence and athleticism, he has most of what you want for the Mike in this system.
I do think that his tackling technique needed work coming out of college. He sometimes brings his head down into the tackle, but he does roll his hips and drive through players. His wrap-up is loose, though and I don't really think he did well in the open field. That last bit is not that important in this particular system, however and his length should help. He's a solid pass-rusher with flexibility, and I expect that to have some impact in this scheme.
Given that I saw some speculation last year that he would go late in the third round, he may have more talent than people are giving him credit for. Of course, the issue with Cole is not what he can do in the run game, so it's not a surprise he hasn't been given a lot of love at the middle linebacker position for the Vikings, who need their middle linebackers to play impressively in the deep third of the field.
The Sam linebacker will often find himself tasked with taking on the lead blocker like in any other scheme, and won't need the range against the run that the middle linebacker or weakside linebacker will need. He will typically be the strongest linebacker, but with fewer and fewer runs actually going to the strong side of the formation (unless the team is up against San Francisco) this is less important than before. Nevertheless, a strong downhill linebacker will be crucial.
Playing lined up over the tight end, the strongside linebacker will want to force the ball inside, much like the defensive ends. This focus on routing plays to the middle is designed, along with everything else in this defense, to limit the offense from spreading the ball out horizontally and congesting the game. He has the tough assignment of splitting the duties of the two traditional Sam linebacker prototypes—those lined up head-up over the tight end, and those lined up outside the tight end.
And "8" or "7" Sam (think of the technique assignments for the defensive line) will generally protect the middle linebacker from tight ends or fullbacks veering inside but will also allow the tight end to block him down towards the center so he can close gaps against zone plays. He's much more reactive as a blocker, letting the play come to him. Those lined up outside (a "9" Sam) play containment on the outside but doesn't prevent the tight end from moving inside and therefore doesn't protect the middle linebacker.
The primary responsibility of the strongside linebacker in this front will always be to keep the play from bouncing outside, but the secondary and almost equally important responsibility will be to keep traffic clear of the Mike and Will 'backers.
In this case that will mean making sure that the tight end doesn't gain outside leverage to block him down. He won't have help from the corners, so he needs to funnel runners inside and play as a contain man. At the same time, however, he needs to make sure the tight end can't make the play on the Mike linebacker, which means he might need to engage his blocker longer than generally ideal for a playmaking linebacker. Pushing that blocker back into the running lanes while keeping outside leverage will be an important skill.
For that, Chad Greenway is perfect. Not only does he do a great job sticking it to fullbacks and tight ends, he has a natural understanding of running lanes and angles. When forced into backside pursuit when the play runs to weak side, Greenway does an excellent job anticipating the running back and making the play.
Most importantly, he know when and how to release from his block. Most players are willing to shed their blocker right away in an attempt to make the play, but it often runs counter to the scheme's design and philosophy and could end up allowing a big gain if the tackle misses. The key here is to force the running back into congestion. Releasing the block late is a good way to direct the running back before making the play, even if it doesn't have a splash impact.
At the weakside linebacker, the Vikings currently have Erin Henderson, although Gerald Hodges could easily push for that spot. Henderson strikes me as a massively underrated—more underrated among the Vikings faithful than among national media, it seems. I'll get to his skills in a second, but right now outlining his responsibilities in this system will help illuminate what needs to happen in this particular 4-3 defense.
Unlike the Sam linebacker, the Will 'backer will flow to the ball to try and make the play. They shouldn't do that immediately, as they have gap responsibilities and need to be aware of—it's important that they prevent a running back from using a cutback lane, so they can't abandon a backside gap at will.
His responsibilities in this scheme are somewhat heavy. He needs to read the play as well as or even better than the Mike linebacker and must maintain excellent communication with him as they move forward on the play. Given how often the Mike linebacker may need to walk up or play two-gap against the center, the Will and the Mike have to move in sync.
In almost all schemes, the Will needs to sift through trash in order to make plays and has to have a good sense not just of where the ball will be, but how to get there. With this, he not only needs to do that, but he and the Mike should both have the range to man the enormous B gap opened up by the left defensive end starting out from wide.
One of the flaws in my chess game is that I play openings to muddy up the board, but I can't navigate closed spaces in the midgame. I'm strong on opening theory and try to gain advantages there, but I have very little board sense. Henderson will have to complete that set of skills—Greenway and Mauti/Cole will need to close up and clutter the field, so the weakside linebacker has to have the field intelligence to cut through the debris and make the play.
Unlike in chess, however, outflanking an opponent is a smart move, so outside contain is important. I don't want my primary tackler to be involved in containment, which is what the strong safety will be tasked with, unless the flow of the ball is to the outside. In that case, they will attempt to prevent the backside of the play from being exposed. The free safety should probably roll down as soon as they reliably determine that it is not a play fake of some sort.
In order to do this, not only does the Will linebacker have to be a sound tackler, he has to have the ability to avoid or shed blocks quickly, read the play quickly and accurately, and tackle with solid fundamentals. In addition, he must have the range to make plays across the field.
Henderson has all of those skills and then some. In run support, I solidly believe that Erin Henderson would be the best weak side linebacker in the league, were it not for Lavonte David. That means his run support is on par or better than Kevin Burnett, K.J Wright and even the much more popular Lance Briggs. Part of this is because he rarely misses his tackles. According to Pro Football Focus, Erin Henderson was the second-most efficient 4-3 outside linebacker in the league (and the most efficient Will linebacker), with only 3 missed tackles. That is, he made over 20 tackles for every tackle he missed. In 2011, he was the 4th most efficient 4-3 outside linebacker, and the third most efficient weak side linebacker.
Part of this is because of his tackling technique. While he's not the perfect technician, he makes every tackle look the same, even when he's forced to take awkward angles or fight through traffic. Although I dislike his tendency to leave his feet, he knows that with every hit (and he's underrated as a hitter) he needs to wrap up and club the arms. Along with that, he plays downhill on the balls of his feet, making sure to roll his hips forward with every tackle. He squares himself, even in limited space, and generally finishes the play. What might be underrated about his tackling ability are his extremely strong hands, holding on to a ballcarrier with even the most tenuous of grips.
Along with that, he has a good instinct to flow to the ball and avoid the mess in the middle. Even when caught up with blockers, he looks more like a Sam linebacker than a Will, approaching the point of attack with good leverage and a strong punch. He stacks and shed blockers well, keeping them at a distance until he needs to disengage. More than anything, he's fairly slippery against blocks and sifts through the field well.
Honestly, Erin Henderson has more skills than you want in a Will 'backer and I would not be too surprised to see him be the backup to Chad Greenway at the Same while they put Hodges in his spot if Greenway were to go down for whatever reason. Again, this assumes that Mauti takes the middle linebacker spot. As a middle linebacker, I trust his take-on skills not to be too worried there. Aside from my concerns about Henderson in a Tampa-2 system, this is a system I would not be too worried about him in the middle. In fact, given the coverage responsibilities, it may be better for him.
Gerald Hodges is a classic Will linebacker, and even has the stereotypical strong safety experience that you almost expect out of weak-side linebackers. I don't like his ability to shed blocks, but that should be irrelevant if he does his job correctly. At Penn State he showed an ability to cut through the noise and get to the ballcarrier, and almost all of his ball experience has been on the weak side.
I've said before that one of Hodges' best features is his versatility and ability to play any linebacker position, but he really does best as a Will in the Tampa-2 and a Will here. He navigates himself through a cluttered field well, and does get to the ballcarrier, although not with the same efficiency as Henderson. More problematic is that Hodges doesn't play with the physicality that Henderson does, so while he has good tackling form, I'm not so sure he can drive through the better ballcarriers in the league. He does wrap up, though, and can help in slowing down a back for gang tackling.
For run defense, the strong safety is very important. They'll be tasked with funneling the runs inside or providing a safety net to the aggressive Will linebacker. Much like a "9" Sam, they will consistently need to find ways to gain outside leverage on the edge of plays, but generally on the weakside—except when the Will reads the keys to move outside, in which case they'll protect the backside gaps to prevent cutback lanes from burning them. For run defense, the strong safety will need to have much the same skillset of the Will linebacker, except they won't usually be running through traffic.
Jamarca Sanford doesn't take the best pursuit angles, but that weakness will be hidden when he's asked to plunge to the edge of the play or maintain depth against the backside gaps. For the most part, Sanford does a good job identifying his run fits and getting to his spot, but I don't know if he can develop the chemistry he'll need with the Will backer. That's not to say I think he won't, just that it's an important enough consideration that I'd pay particular attention to his ability to read those keys and work in tandem with the Will.
My biggest worry is that Sanford isn't the strongest open field tackler, which is pretty important in this defense. He is a bit of a liability when breaking down a tackle when the ballcarrier has space to take advantage of any agility mismatches that might come from having the relatively average athleticism of Jamarca Sanford put up against a premier running back.
For what it's worth, Sanford's tackling efficiency ranks at about average for safeties, so he's not a disaster, but many of his positive tackles came in smaller spaces than would be encouraged in this particular run defense. I do like Sanford's ability to club the arms and create fumbles, however, and his better-than-average ability here should make up for some of the tackling issues.
Gerald Hodges could transition back to strong safety here and might even be a better fit. Starting Mauti, Hodges, Henderson and Greenway could make for an incredible run defense. Given Hodges' abilities in coverage, this actually would not worry me too much.
Coverage
The principle question for any coverage scheme is to figure out whether or not it is a zone scheme or a man coverage scheme at its base and move from there. Because corners aren't as important in run support, and because the strong safety might be walked into the box on a number of plays, there aren't as many strong reasons to stick with zone coverage necessarily. Instead, the man and zone cover philosophies should be evaluated independently of the fact that it was the primary coverage in the previous scheme.
The ultimate philosophy should be to complement what's happening up front. We're primarily concerned with increasing sack production and pressure on the quarterback, so a scheme that disrupts the timing of the receivers is ideal. From there, a press-oriented scheme would be best—particularly given the personnel the Vikings have on the roster.
There are a number of advantages that you forgo when switching from zone to man coverage, so it's not easy to choose between the two. Given how well Seattle has been able to integrate zone coverage and press techniques, it's not as simple as choosing the best coverage to fit the ability to jam receivers overall.
Should the Vikings choose to stick with the zone defense, they'll probably help their interception total because they won't play off of receivers (although the current zone scheme doesn't seem to produce interceptions anyway). It will also demand a bit less in terms of gameplanning and preparation, as well as making sure to decrease confusion about the scheme. Finally, they would have to worry less about gain per completion because everybody reacts to the ball in the air and flows to the receiver.
In man coverage, a good set of tacklers at cornerback is necessary because long gains will kill the defense. They do have advantages in making sure they can reduce completion percentages given how closely they can mirror receivers. They will also generally reduce passing windows, so that they can potentially make the quarterback wait longer.
The final advantage of man coverage is the ability to send additional players as blitzers to increase pressure. I'm not so sure this is important, however, as the defense is designed (like the Tampa-2) to create pressure by sending just four rushers.
They will also need to consider the fact that their priorities will in large part be dictated by the Vikings offense and what looks they'll see from their opponents as a result of the scoreboard and time remaining. If the Vikings continue to (and I see no reason why they wouldn't) strive for early scores and few possessions—and they've spent more time with a lead than every other team except the Patriots—then the defense will be biased in favor of allowing smaller gains over quick strikes.
Generally speaking that might mean keeping two safeties up top in deep zones, but the shell doesn't necessarily dictate the coverage underneath. So if the Vikings are concerned about giving up the big play on defense but still want too maximize their defense personnel, how should they go?
Initially, I wanted to implement a man coverage system here, as that happens to be the forte of the two presumed starters at corner, as well as the type of coverage Hodges does much better in. I've seen Mauti do well in man coverage too, so it seemed to be the simplest solution.
But because the big play is a killer against the Vikings' overall philosophy and because I think turnovers are the best way to take advantage of pressure that the front four will generate that the zone defense is schematically better. But that doesn't mean all of the advantages that the Vikings have at cornerback need to be wasted, especially because the physical nature of the secondary plays well to the necessity for disrupting timing.
For this, I drew from Seattle's defense. They play a primary Press Cover 3, although will also play Press Cover 1 Man on several occasions. The key in that defense is to simply not get beat downfield. It requires a lot of chemistry, but it's fundamentally solid. It also is why the rangy and physical corners that Seattle drafted worked.
Now the Vikings have corners that seem to fit the exact description that Seattle's corners do, but with more fluidity.
Here, the corners jam the receivers to disrupt timing and then move to the deep zones. What's interesting is that they can provide a man coverage look as they move up, but they shouldn't react to receiver routes until they hit their markers 15 yards out. The key is staying on top and not letting anything go past. For the most part, receivers will be funneled in so the inside help (usually Harrison Smith, but occasionally the underneath zones) can bracket receivers or provide seamless transitions. That means, generally, that the corners will have outside leverage until they settle into their zones, which is relatively difficult but absolutely why you draft lengthy corners with speed.
There are other base plays the Vikings can steal from the Seattle defense—one that was developed when Gus Bradley and Pete Carroll (a Monte Kiffin disciple) wanted to find ways to a) maximize the value of underrated players like Richard Sherman and Joey Browner and b) maintain the 4-3 principles he's learned with the 3-4 type players he has on the roster.
Here's an alternate "Robber" look out of the Cover-1 man defense
In this nickel defense, all receivers will stay with their man, although they'll work to make sure everybody continues to be funneled inside. The Will linebacker has a "green dog" call on the halfback. That is, he'll go into man coverage against the running back, but will blitz if he stays in the backfield to block.
This set requires, much like the cover three, physical receivers who have developed trust throughout the secondary. In addition, the "robber" look might be a good one to keep on the docket.
Designing those coverages did expose one fundamental flaw, however. The Vikings carry their only true man-to-man linebacker as what looks to be the weakside linebacker. Without the ability of Hodges to line up against the tight end, there are potential problems with Chad Greenway and/or Michael Mauti picking up the end. So when up against teams with premier tight ends, the Vikings could rotate their personnel and maintain their philosophy. For example, should the Vikings face off against the Patriots in the Super Bowl and need to deal with a healthy Gronk and Hernandez, they could line up like so:
This simply walks out the strong safety to cover the tight end, who in this case is probably Gronkowski. When this happens, the end should know his responsibility will change slightly to account for a weakside run, and the Will has a lot of area to patrol because of the run. In this case, making the Will the "green dog" on the running back simplifies his keys. He only has to read the running back (although he will also read the offensive linemen to determine true run/pass).
This defense will have to watch out for the possibility of Hernandez motioning to the right (defense's left) or into the backfield. He was the pitch man in Florida's triple option for a reason, and I would not be surprised if Belichick tried to take advantage of this defense by doing that.
At any rate, I could spend all day diagramming plays. Really, what I want to emphasize is that a style that keeps a consistent shell up top will benefit the most from the Wide 9 alignment with the offense the Vikings currently have. Maintain the lead and let them try to grind it out. Given that the Cover 3 is just a different version of the Tampa-2, that's not surprising.
The requirements for this system include a rangy free safety who has some fluidity and a good nose for the ball. Further, he has top read the quarterback well. Manning a centerfield while the corners are busy pressing before heading into deep zones takes a lot of skill, concentration and athleticism. Luckily Harrison Smith has those in abundance and should be a good fit for the defense.
Despite not playing a big part in run support, the corners still need to be physical and aware in zone coverage. They need to be able to play with outside leverage, but break on the ball when they know it's coming in (generally when receivers signal by turning their head, stiffening their body or widening their eyes). Preventing the big play is their first priority, so ball skills are less important than overall awareness, recognition and tight coverage. Breaking to the ball is definitely important, and closing speed—as always—is critical.
Generally speaking, I'm not a huge fan of how the starting corners have done in their time in zone coverage, but Cook has definitely improved. I feel like the Vikings were wasting him with how much off coverage they've played |
, in the new edition, the quality of copies such as "Marnie" but they didn't. The discs are exactly the same. The images in "Marnie" are good but they are not up
to blu ray standards. Even if the transfer of some of the films to blu ray wasn't to a high standard it doesn't mean that the images are
bad, unwatchable. They are good and they are better than their dvds' counterparts. "Frenzy", for example, looks much better on blu ray than on dvd.
7. It is much easier to handle the discs from the new collection, "The Ultimate", as each film has its own case. The discs are also better protected what would be the main reason why customers who were unhappy
with the placement of discs in paper slots, as they are on the first set, would consider ordering this set. Each metal case has the film title on the front and on the side making it very easy to find what you are looking for.
The films are in order of their year's production, like in the older set.
8. I checked the blu ray disc "To Catch a Thief" and Amazon is selling it for £7.50. That disc has several extra features, unlike the one in this collection. I wonder why.
Both box sets are, as far as I know, the best sets of films on disc ever made. It is definitely worth ordering the collection, even if you have
Hitchcock's films on dvd, because the blu ray discs are of better quality than the dvds and
are put together in cleverly, beautifully designed boxes.
I still didn't decide if I will keep the new set and will get rid of the old one or if I will return the new set but, if you don't have the first set then the newest one is definitely the best choice because of price, number of films and
quality of cases. It is just a shame that they did such a poor job with "To Catch a Thief" in the new box set, "The Ultimate Filmmaker Collection".
It is an easy guess that everybody considering this set have already watched most of its films but we can always come back to Hitchcock, reason why he is one of the great masters of cinema. Away from noisy crowds and smelly food
that now populate cinemas, you can watch Hitchcock's movies with blu ray quality ( mostly... ) in your home.
The sets have a few faults. I know that and pointed them out but the main thing is that both sets are of unique quality and they really are extraordinary.
Thank you, Universal, for all the work and care shown in the excellent "Masterpiece" and "Ultimate" sets.
Winter is coming and, as film experiences go, there is nothing like watching Hitchcock in a rainy, cold day, whilst having tea and cakes and biscuits
and blueberry jam...Pitchers and catchers are finally reporting! Getting past that anticipated milestone means the 2017 MLB season is just around the corner and will graciously be upon us soon. The only way for those of us not fortunate enough to live in Arizona or Florida to get our minds off winter and on baseball is to prepare for the upcoming season with vigorous, warmth-giving research before fantasy drafts commence. After going over the Top 100+ Starters last week, Pitcher List will now be examining the best fantasy hitters across The Show to complement coverage of starting rotations. The analysis starts now with a rundown of which catchers’ bats should yield the most fantasy dividends this year.
Tier 1: C.R.E.A.M. of the Backstop Crop
1a. Kyle Schwarber (Chicago Cubs) – I’m paraphrasing, but I believe the expression is “catching rules everything around me.” As such, we begin our rankings with a group of exceptional catchers less than half the size of Wu-Tang Clan in number, and you’d be wise to end up with a member of this quartet on your roster. To anticipate your question and then nip it in the bud, yes, Yahoo has made an exception for Kyle Schwarber and he will be eligible at catcher despite not meeting normal criteria for minimum games played at the position last season. He poses arguably the biggest power threat of anybody playing the position. Willson Contreras figures to be the more frequent starter at the 2 for the Cubs, but Schwarber should still get a lot of playing time in the outfield and his bat will still prove immensely valuable in fantasy lineups for this reason. He’s also set to lead off ahead of Kris Bryant and Anthony Rizzo, and they’re, uh, pretty talented at baseball as well. What I’m saying is Schwarber will circumstantially be getting a shot to score a ton of runs and you’ll want a piece of that action.
1b. Buster Posey (San Francisco Giants) – Before you remonstrate with his spot over Gary Sanchez who was unbelievably white-hot last year, consider this: Posey’s hard contact percentage has been ascending for five straight seasons. FIVE. He slotted in at 36.1% last year, coupled with an appealing 15% soft contact rate. Posey always sports an indispensably sterling batting average, and in his career as a full-time Giant he’s never posted less than a.284 on the season and that was during his injury-shortened 2011. The guy is consistency embodied, and the RBI will be there. He has 1B eligibility also, but there are better options available at that position. He is your best available catcher in ESPN leagues.
2. Gary Sanchez (New York Yankees) – This guy has been waiting for his chance in the Yankees’ farm system for several years now. With Brian McCann now shipped out to Houston and just an average-at-best Austin Romine to compete with, a starting spot with the Bronx Bombers is Sanchez’s to lose. To put in perspective what he accomplished in 2016, Sanchez got his first MLB hit on August 3rd and was beat out for Rookie of the Year only by an 11-win Michael Fulmer who got three more months to accumulate experience and statistics on his résumé. Sanchez’s absurd ISO of.358 amassed during 53 games played last year will come back down to Earth. To clarify, his power is no fluke, but we just don’t have a big sample set yet. He improbably crammed a very productive bit of slugging (20 homers…!) into a short period of time and sustainability of that rate over his first full season would be historically freakish. Put it this way: if at his 1,000 career game mark Sanchez’s ISO is lingering around.250, he’d tentatively be ranked among the top 30 power hitters of all time right next to Hank Aaron (per Baseball Almanac). Lots of time is needed for Sanchez’s sabermetrics to normalize. But he should absolutely compete with Schwarber for best power bat of eligible players. He might score slightly fewer runs because Didi Gregorius and Starlin Castro are just a hair too far away from Sanchez’s 3-spot in the lineup to drive him in. Owners of Brett Gardner and Jacoby Ellsbury will be happy to have the promising Sanchez on deck behind them, though. Monster pick if you can land him, but square away your bullpen and most other positions first.
3. Jonathan Lucroy (Texas Rangers) – After vetoing his chance to join the eventual AL Champion Indians last season, Lucroy left the Brewers and is now the main dude donning the facemask for the Texas Rangers. He should continue to be a playing time hog, and Robinson Chirinos will spell him whenever a maintenance day is necessary. Lucroy’s numbers this coming season should be essentially comparable to Posey’s, with a nitpicker needing to side with Posey’s potential in most categories. He should figure to have the second-best BA of catchers behind Buster, and he’s similarly good for a mid-teens number of home runs. Hard contact percentage has been mid-30s for several seasons now, but keep an eye on his soft contact numbers as 2017 launches. Good news that his HR/FB ratio spiked in 2016: monitor this also to ensure it wasn’t anomalous. Take the transplant if you can.
Tier 2: The Guys Behind THE Guys
4. Willson Contreras (Chicago Cubs) – Another member of the Cubbies is top of the next echelon, and there is certainly no shortage of “Swingers” of bats here. Good grief, they’re stacked in Wrigleyville. Contreras didn’t have quite the rookie breakout that Sanchez enjoyed, but I’ll take 12 jacks and a.363 wOBA secured by way of a.282 average all day. What sweetens the deal at the top of this tier is that the four unequivocally excellent catchers are off the board, and the value that this next cadre brings you in later rounds could be excellent. Contreras’ numbers were from 76 games played so, again, temper your expectations slightly like you may need to for Sanchez. But the guy is clearly talented and I had my eye on him last year right around the call-up from AAA Iowa and he did nothing to make me think I had wasted my vigilance. He will be a steady producer and you should view him as a highly coveted fantasy asset.
5. Salvador Perez (Kansas City Royals) – Perez should outhit Contreras in the home run department but should also probably have a less competitive average. Steamer projects a.263 for Sal on the year, while I’m more conservatively thinking.255. The guy does rake and I’d like to see his slugging percentage continue to increase. He will get at least 100 hits and can be penciled in for 70 RBI and inked for 60. His wOBA bears monitoring for sure, but his offensive numbers are still going to be solid and you could be rejoicing if he falls into your lap in a later round. You’ll have nothing to worry about if he is your guy.
6. Yasmani Grandal (Los Angeles Dodgers) – An advantage a frequently swinging power hitter like Grandal brings to the plate is he’ll still reach base rather often: his BB/K ratio is better than the three guys ahead of him on this list. Now, granted, unless he subsequently scores a run, a lot of that logic will be lost on a fantasy player playing in a 5×5 format. Getting 15-20 HRs is entirely doable for Grandal, which makes him worth consideration in and of itself. But his spot in the lineup also follows a hell of a trio in Corey Seager, Justin Turner and Adrian Gonzalez so those homers and extra-base hits could end up meaning a little more. Again, despite a.230-ish batting average lowered by strikeouts, he’ll have a chance to succeed and approach an OPS of.800 or better. For disclosure’s sake, I’m admittedly more excited in my gut about Grandal this year than I am about Perez, but he should trail his Royal counterpart in average, slugging and BABIP. As such, the numbers must be respected. I’m really keen on his blossoming career in L.A., he should be a marvelous play on most days.
7. Russell Martin (Toronto Blue Jays) – He seems at this juncture to be cut from the same cloth as Grandal, in terms of his approach and what we can reasonably expect statistically from each player. Martin may be getting close to gray hair territory at the ripe old age of 33, but it’s tough to argue with the fact that he’s hit 20 or more home runs and more than 70 RBI in both years he has spent with the Jays. He struck out a career-high 148 times last year, so that’s certainly a concern for his average. But there’s a recurring theme in this tier: Jose Bautista and Troy Tulowitzki could be on base when Martin steps to the plate, so keep RBI in mind all over again in 2017. Martin is balancing how he spreads the ball around the park better than some of his predecessors in this list, pulling less and spraying opposite-field more than he did in Pittsburgh. “Ah, but PNC Park is notoriously stingy toward right-handed batters, so you’re reading into stats that don’t mean that much.” No, actually. He is indeed a right-handed batter going yard at the hitter-friendly Rogers Centre, but in so doing, he has gotten his push-pull numbers back to what he was already doing at traditionally LHB-favorable Yankee Stadium and Dodger Stadium. So, even as he ages, Martin is showing he’s able to take advantage of a good hitting scenario like a strong, consistent batter should. Mark him down for a worst-case scenario of 16 bombs and high-50s in RBI with an average languishing around the mid.220s, as each metric will likely be higher than that floor. He won’t be a disappointment to his owner in your league.
8. Stephen Vogt (Oakland Athletics) – He’s never had a BABIP deviate from the.275-.300 range, he’s hitting teens of home runs in Oakland lately, and his average isn’t the liability that Martin’s or Grandal’s could be. Vogt is no longer 1B-eligible but he’s still an extremely strong candidate to start at catcher for your fantasy team. His contact inside the strike zone is exceptional at 90.7% over his career, with a true-to-form 90.8% last year alone; his numbers here rival those of Posey, Lucroy and Perez, while they all outdo him in the hard/soft contact ratio department. Vogt saw his infield flyball percentage spike last year to 10.5%, and his HR/FB ratio suffered as a result. Other than wanting to see a little more power and that he might have worked on his swing to address recent concerns, I really like Vogt and am of the opinion that he can be counted upon for a surefire 50 runs and 50 RBI. He should realistically hit between.255 and.265, and racking up more than last year’s 14 homers is attainable. A fantastic guy to quietly go with in non-flashy fashion during the draft.
9. Evan Gattis (Houston Astros) – This is where things get interesting if you’re a fantasy schemer and brutal if you’re Evan Gattis. Ex-Yankee Brian McCann, who’s literally next on this list, happens to now be on the same team as Gattis and is slated to start him. And Gattis has DH eligibility, which you might see as a potential relief valve for playing time a la Schwarber to OF when Contreras is catching. Unfortunately that is not a surefire gig either, since Gattis’ path to at-bats is also obstructed by an apparently ageless Carlos Beltran starting for the ‘Stros at DH. Gattis may end up needing to be your phenomenal below-the-radar snag in late rounds for a UTIL spot. Crazy to think we’re saying this about a guy who knocked in 32 homers and 72 RBI with a.257 ISO last year. We just simply don’t know how and when his opportunities will be coming amid this stacked order, so if you can accept those terms and conditions then he could still be somewhat helpful to you. The versatility of having C/DH eligibility absolutely comes in handy but it’s also going to take some gambler’s luck to slot him into your lineup if and when he goes. He could pinch-hit for Beltran, and he’s a RHB as contrasted with the left-handed ways of McCann so there’s that to consider. Steamer has him projected to play in a meager 98 games for 21 HR and a.244 average. In other words, better power/BA numbers over the long haul than Russell Martin with, lamentably, fewer RBI and runs because of the aforementioned roster clog. This is where we like him because of his skill set, but feel free to demote him here and on draft day as you see fit with the prognosis in Houston.
10. Brian McCann (Houston Astros) – I’m going to be calling him the Sinister Kid because a) the Black Keys are awesome, b) sinister is an archaic term for being left-handed, and c) he has cruelly ousted poor Evan Gattis from his previously higher perch in fantasy relevance, for the time being. Seriously, though, McCann has a good opportunity to do well with Houston. He’s valued defensively far higher at the position than Gattis so perhaps A.J. Hinch wants to shore up things catching-wise and rely on this iteration of the lineup to do big things even without Gattis’ bat. This type of thinking does not mean McCann is a slouch at the plate, though. He should be good for numbers just under what Grandal is projected to do: high teens in HR, perhaps.240 as his ceiling BA to go along with low 50s in both runs and RBI. He’s pulled at or above 50% the last two years at lefty-friendly Yankee Stadium, but expect that metric to regress a bit since normally Minute Maid Park helps right-handed pullers instead (read: if McCann is terrible, Gattis could steal his spot for this reason). Soon turning 33, McCann’s hard contact was 35.5% in 2016. Excellent option with which to start your season.
11. J.T. Realmuto (Miami Marlins) – Far less controversy down in Little Havana than what’s transpiring in Houston. Realmuto is not in danger of losing his job to A.J. Ellis, and he would honestly soar up these rankings if he could just improve his power. He was batting.303 last year and scored 60 times. But barely cracking double digits in HRs dooms you a little even when you hit brilliantly for average. His run total will probably dip, but Marcell Ozuna and Justin Bour could reach base before he steps to the plate, expect JTRRBI to comfortably approach the 50s. (Sidenote: Jay Tribbie sounds like the name of a real estate tycoon or a sports agent.) The true advantage he brings in 5×5 over mostly every other catcher on this list is stolen bases. He’s nabbed 20 bags over the last two years combined. Realmuto is a dreamcatcher (see what I did there?) in a points league because he’s a reliable for hits and still has a great BA despite striking out a fair amount, and THEN you add the steals. Anyway, I want to put him higher but projecting 40 runs and 40 RBI doesn’t make my hair stand on end particularly. That and a lack of power thereby necessitate his spot here. A fun fact that speaks to my intuition is that his slash line from last year outpaced McCann’s and is slated to do so again. A fun fact that confirms he belongs beneath McCann is that Realmuto’s BABIP flukishly leapt to.357 last year so I’m anxious to see if he can maintain his level of play and earn folks some fantasy wins. Keep your eye on him and pull the trigger if he’s available when your draft is about 50-60% complete.
Tier 3: The Designer Duds
12. Yadier Molina (St. Louis Cardinals) – Here we draw an arbitrary line had to be drawn somewhere to separate the true contenders from solid catchers who are putting up competitive numbers with a notable flaw, much like sharp name-brand clothing items relegated to the clearance rack because of a small stain or tear. Realmuto occupies the last spot of the previous tier because his steals are what set him apart, whereas the dependable Molina is top of this heap because he is awesome at everything EXCEPT hitting home runs. His scoring and RBI will be on pace with McCann’s but he doesn’t steal and he doesn’t go yard. If he could boost his power to go with his projected.284 average, he’d vault up to Tier 2 in a heartbeat. But history shows that he hasn’t passed the 10 HR mark since 2012, so we’re curbing our enthusiasm a bit, and Yadi stays put right here. Ebert and Roeper would give this film one thumb up, and you should be fine with Molina, but maintain an active watch list just in case.
13. Travis d’Arnaud (New York Mets) – He’s in a boat quite similar to Molina’s, but this sloop’s name is “EXPECTATIONS” and it’s unfortunately a little smaller. An ISO of significantly lower than.100 last year is d’Arnaud’s Achilles’ heel summed up very succinctly (goodness, that was a lot of apostrophes). Now if he could regain some of the stuff he was showcasing here and there in 2014 and 2015, we’d be in business and Travis would probably be nominated for promotion to Tier 2. As it stands, the 40s are likely the ceiling for runs and RBI. A.250ish average sounds about right as well. In summary, good but not great.
14. Wellington Castillo (Baltimore Orioles) – To extend the nautical metaphor, and ships of short keel are less impressive. Castillo’s chilling on a tiny speedboat with an outboard motor compared to the humble yacht of d’Arnaud that could maybe sleep four. It is seriously peculiar, though, how close together these three guys are in terms of what we should see: competitive averages, but they don’t really hit for power too much and their RBI/run totals could exhibit respectable quality without requiring you to shout about them from the fantasy rooftops. Castillo is a talented catcher with scintillating hard contact numbers from last year. He should get to enjoy some stability in Baltimore with the embarkation of Matt Wieters on a longer free agency cruise than he or we expected. Get excited for Castillo’s runs to pile up if his fellow Oriole bats can do him some favors: Chris Davis, Mark Trumbo and Jonathan Schoop precede him in the heart of the order. He’s an above-average value grab who could settle in nicely.
15. Cameron Rupp (Philadelphia Phillies) – Act 2 of this particular the-catch-rical production—get used to the puns because I will unrelentingly barrage you with them—features the guys in the tier whose fatal flaw is a weirdly low batting average. A positive BABIP oscillation for Rupp, reminiscent of Realmuto’s, has me gunshy on expecting a repeated.252 average and 16 four-baggers from him this season. Cracking into the low teens and hitting in the.230s is probably more reasonable. 2016 saw Rupp’s HR/FB ratio spike five percentage points to 16.8%, and his hard contact vaulted six percentage points from a so-so 28% the year prior. If he continues to evolve and this upward trend is not an aberrant outlier, he’ll be a brilliant asset to own. Philly needs him to score more, however, and d’Arnaud is slated to beat him in both runs and RBI. You won’t be in bad shape if you pick him up to start the season, but he’s not your best bet if you can get away with sensibly drafting another guy above Rupp.
16. Mike Zunino (Seattle Mariners) – He’s a damn good catcher but readers from the Deep South might say, “Aw, bless his little heart” when they look at Zunino’s batting average. In four career years in the bigs, he is weighing in at a paltry.199 if you round up. That’s what’s known as a red flag. And in 2014, the year in which he hit 22 home runs, his BA was exactly the same as that career number. So what we’re saying is even with his best power, and optimists would perhaps hope for 15 jacks in 2017, it’s going to come with the severe risk of him tanking you in the batting average realm. 2014 saw 60 RBI and 51 runs as he bashed his head into his own ceiling, while last year he hit just 31 and 16, respectively, behind the now-departed Chris Iannetta. I foresee Zunino comfortably attaining numbers in the 30s this year. Proceed with caution is the recommendation here.
Tier 4: Time for an Urgent Trip to the Pharmacy (Plan B)
17. Matt Wieters (Free Agent) – You’ve made it this far into your fantasy draft, and everything’s looking pretty shipshape (ooh, the streak continues) until you realize that you focused way too much on outfielders and relievers for approximately 10 rounds after Posey and Sanchez fell off the board. You are not a happy place anymore. You need Plan B, hence the name of this fourth and lowest tier of truly relevant fantasy catchers. Wieters leads the list of guys with whom you can probably tread water (yep, still going) if you are still down a catcher. At the time of publication, he hasn’t signed with a team yet. After living the professional baseball version of paycheck-to-paycheck with his slew of one-year contracts, the Os have opted to go with the aforementioned Castillo. If Wieters can find a home soon, I’d realistically send him up to Tier 3 with the noted proviso that he’s pretty decent at everything but not great at anything. We’d love to see return to 20 HR form but that ship has likely sailed (I’m even surprising myself with the breadth of these nautical references). He slots in roughly behind Muto and Yadi with the combination of a decent average and OK power, but the fact that his SLG and ISO numbers have been regressing since 2014 is a concern. He doesn’t steal bases. Finally, we have no concept of where Wieters might play so it’s impossible to predict scoring scenarios and thus the numbers he could put up. Scoop him up if you can, but keep a wary eye on news of his signing before doing so.
18. Derek Norris (Washington Nationals) – I made my mind up to avoid this guy like the plague in fantasy the last couple of years if I could help it because he was so darned inconsistent. Full disclosure: these evasions of the Norrisvirus were for H2H and roto points leagues, so the argument may be null and void for 5×5 formats because he certainly does accumulate runs and RBI. His horrendous average last year of.186 seems not in keeping with previous seasons, and that is confirmed by an inexplicable tumble in BABIP down to.238. I think he rights the ship in Washington to an extent (Oh, my God, the nautical jokes just keep coming). His career average is a serviceable.233, so we’re going to give him the benefit of the doubt with a fresh start. Accepting that he’ll bomb 10 into the stands and hoping that he’ll push for 20 means that you are hoping the 2016 increases in Norris’ HR/FB ratio and hard contact percentage will not plateau or fall off a cliff in 2017. Again, I want to suspend my disbelief in Norris if he gives me reason to, but my advice to you is to not necessarily go out on a limb for him unless your options at catcher are dwindling.
19. Devin Mesoraco (Cincinnati Reds) – Mesoraco has to accept his fate in this echelon because he’s effectively a poor man’s Wieters in that he projects to play like a jack-of-all-trades with lesser numbers. He’s been injury-riddled with hip and labrum issues so it’s really tough to take stock of where he is in his professional athletics story arc right now. The sample set during the last two seasons is just too small to really extrapolate much on what he is capable of. If he can stay healthy, gunning for a.230 or.240 average with 10-15 HRs would be a dream come true for owners who can effortlessly snag him for proverbial pennies on a dollar’s return. Runs and RBI could be hard to come by, though: I don’t see Mesoraco eclipsing 40 in either category. This is a high-risk investment: whether he can and will be back to being his talented self is as yet entirely unknown. Buy low and sell high if you’re feeling frisky.
20. Francisco Cervelli (Pittsburgh Pirates) – For the ADP he’s expected to register and the commensurate value I think he could bring your team, this guy is my No. 1 sleeper pick of this entire list. I don’t think he’s a player you hang your hopes on, which is why he’s in Tier 4, but the upside if he’s on his game this year could be monumental. For consideration: Steamer predictions slot Cervelli in to finish as the ninth-best catcher in weighted runs created behind the likes of Posey, Schwarber, Sanchez, Grandal, Lucroy, Contreras, Vogt and d’Arnaud. Eighth in wOBA, to boot, if you were curious. He decided he likes stealing the odd base here and there last year, and because of that I subsequently like the fact that he’s been an OBP monster consistently throughout his time in the majors (to the tune of.370 or higher during the last four years). He’s sporting a decent BB/K ratio of late, and the region of.250 or.260 for his average are likely his floor, which is exceptional considering where in the draft you’ll probably stand to nab him. His one true huge shortcoming is an abject lack of power. Now, having said that, if you’re unrealistically hoping for 15 homers from late-round utility personnel, you may need to reevaluate your draft strategy altogether. Cervelli is worth your time to invest in as a sneaky producer, but obviously don’t go about structuring your roster around him. He is undeniably capable of 40 runs and 40 RBI.
21. Jason Castro (Minnesota Twins) – This guy has sort of quietly crept up on the process that is assembling these rankings, as he has taken over the starting job that Kurt Suzuki left vacant in Minnesota after being a key contributor in Houston. Target Field is kinder to RHB than to lefties like Castro, but the move north should still prove favorable to his power numbers. His plate discipline with regard to contact in the strike zone need a serious overhaul to compete with the league’s best, but he should reasonably be pushing for 40 runs and 40 RBI just like Cervelli could. His BB/K ratio also needs work, but no matter what, he should be counted upon to crank 10 or so out of the park while slashing for roughly.220/.300/.370. His HR/FB ratio is on the up and up over the last three seasons since a career-high 16.8 percent in 2013, so that’s a medium-to-long-term positive trend. There’s nothing truly dynamite in his arsenal but certainly worthy of streaming if you’re really thin at the position.
22. Tyler Flowers (Atlanta Braves) – Mesoraco might be able to be attain a fantasy catch grade of B- if he stays 100% healthy, and the possibility of reward on the risk is why he’s at No. 19; conversely, Flowers is a surefire grade of B. He’s a safer, less flashy bet, if you will. Within this tier, he’s the trusty government bond to Mesoraco’s more volatile junk bond. I am of the opinion that even with the Braves having signed Suzuki this month, the platoon seesaw is ultimately going to tilt the younger Flowers’ way. You should be able to depend on him for a.240 average as his floor (career is.232) and his hard contact percentage was a whopping 43.8 last year. Flowers reaching Rupp/Zunino-caliber numbers in the 30s for runs and RBI is what could very possibly happen, but the homer count is not going to approach Tier 3 standards. His BABIP has been north of.300 for three seasons now, all while his plate discipline has improved quite drastically. The takeaway here is that I like where his evolution as a batter is headed. Again, like Cervelli, he should provide good value for low cost.
23. Austin Hedges (San Diego Padres) – The Tier 4 theme of decent tapering down to last resort guys continues with Hedges. He was fantastic last year…in AAA. He’s a young guy still trying to find his legs in the bigs, and he’s currently in skill set purgatory between major and minor league legitimacy. I personally like his microscopically low soft contact percentage, but he leaves a lot to be desired from consistency and power standpoints. He’s playing in the batting nightmare that is Petco Park, however, so patience may be required as Hedges develops. Steamer projects a BA of.244, whereas I think expecting.225 with the potential to be pleasantly surprised is a better way to go about an evaluation of Hedges. Ten homers would actually surprise me, while high 20s to low 30s for both runs and RBI is probably going to end up being dead on. You’re sticking your neck out there for a relatively unproven and inexperienced fellow at this point.
24. Wilson Ramos (Tampa Bay Rays) – One would hope it is quite evident Ramos is only languishing down in the ranks of the backup catchers due to the devastating knee injury he sustained in September 2016. He otherwise would have appeared somewhere in Tier 2 between Grandal at No. 6 and McCann at No. 10. What should be focused upon here is twofold: firstly, that the Rays signed him to a two-year deal just a couple of months into his convalescence is a testament to what a talent he is, and secondly, Ramos is certainly still valuable to fantasy owners in a limited fashion. What I mean by that is somebody intelligent in your league is going to draft him way lower than a healthy Ramos would ever dip to because most people want results NOW. The patient ones will stash him on their DL and wait for the dividends that can and will come when he’s back to full strength. We had to rank him this low because he’s not even a viable DH until June at the earliest, and then he has to get back to catching form on a repaired knee so his 2017 fantasy value is situationally limited. That remarkable value will hopefully be consolidated in to a short span in which you can legitimately use him after having subsisted the first half of the fantasy season with an aforementioned catcher from this list. Ensure that the intelligent fantasy owner that uses a late-round pick to keep Ramos tucked away for midseason is you. He’s still slated to put up numbers a shade better than Norris and d’Arnaud even with his shortened season, but that obviously doesn’t help you in head-to-head matchups for the first several months.
25. James McCann (Detroit Tigers) – A woeful BB/K ratio is dooming McCann’s OBP, wOBA and batting average, but he’s got the tools to succeed if he can just start putting them to use. Despite a comparatively dreadful ISO of.137 last year, he still knocked in 12 home runs, so the hard contact is there if only sporadically yielding results for Detroit. A return to a.300-plus BABIP that McCann enjoyed in both 2014 and 2015 would certainly tip the scales back his way, and you can probably count on him to get 30 runs and 35 RBI with hopes for more. His fundamentals need to improve over the span of a couple hundred at-bats to start the season for him to ascend within these rankings, however. Draft him low if there’s no one else.
The On-Deck Circle — Honorable Mentions
Sandy Leon (Boston Red Sox) – Fenway faithful are bound to freak out about how low Leon is on this list, but the fact of the matter is Leon’s.310 BA last year was coupled with a flash-in-the-pan.392 BABIP. He strikes me as a Hedges who inspired far less with his AAA track record, and while the 36 runs and 35 RBI from last year are impressive for occupying this spot and this tier, a lack of power once again dashes fantasy hopes. Chris Iannetta didn’t even make our top 25 and he’s projected to have higher SLG numbers than Leon. Also, the Cubs’ third-string catcher in Miguel Montero is supposed to hit about the same number of homers, so that’s just kind of where we are. However, I should say Leon’s run count should stay highly competitive because of who follows him in Boston’s order. Dustin Pedroia, Andrew Benintendi, Xander Bogaerts and Mookie Betts are on deck successively after Leon bats, meaning that there could frequently be two-out, RISP situations in which the catcher could score on the regular. It works in his favor that he’s a switch hitter, so the Green Monster doesn’t necessarily pose a unilateral deterrence to his swing. Leon needs to continue to respectively boost and lower his hard and soft contact. I’d steer clear for now. He’s a serviceable start in two-catcher leagues, but you could do better.
Tony Wolters and Tom Murphy (Colorado Rockies) – Murphy is going to be fantastic when he gets a full-time job, and Wolters is probably one of the next five guys I would have ranked right now based on currently holding the starting honors. Murphy is inexperienced but has gigantic upside and simply needs volume to work his magic, while Wolters is just average with a chance of a.250 BA, maybe six or seven home runs (YOU PLAY AT COORS FIELD, BRO) and mid-20s in runs and RBI. Maybe outdoes Leon in BA by a shade but I don’t like this platoon for fantasy purposes right now, so take one of these catchers as a reserve if you must. I’d make it Murphy and then be patient because he’ll be great once he takes the reins.
Andrew Susac and Jett Bandy (Milwaukee Brewers) – The idea is the same here: platoons are not your friend. This one makes even less sense because at least in Colorado the two members of the backstop tandem bat on opposite sides of the plate, providing strategic flexibility in the Rockies’ order for certain pitcher matchups. Susac is the clear starter here and yet is weirdly projected for a smaller-than-usual number of games for this split-time scenario. Susac is the guy to pick up here because his numbers are comparable to those of Wolters without a star waiting in the wings to violently usurp his throne once and for all. But wouldn’t it be better if Bandy was going to be amazing? Instead, he is capable of mid-20s too in the runs and RBI departments, unfortunately rendering both of these guys simultaneously real-life helpful and fantasy forgettable for the time being.
Yan Gomes (Cleveland Indians) – I’m admittedly a Tribe fan |
with his new show business career rather than his medical one (in part because doing the required years residency would have been financially crippling). Along with John Cleese, Chapman quickly got a job writing for television, including That Was The Week That Was, some episodes of the Doctor series (no doubt Chapman’s medical training coming in handy), Ronnie Corbett’s series Look Here Now, gags for The Petula Clark Show, additional material for the film The Magic Christian (starring Ringo Starr and Peter Sellers) and the movie The Rise and Rise of Michael Rimmer. Along with Cleese, Graham Chapman was recruited into the writing team for The Frost Report, alongside fellow Pythons Eric Idle, Michael Palin and Terry Jones. After the Frost Report, Chapman moved on to be a writer and performer in At Last The 1948 Show (with John Cleese, Tim Brooke Taylor, Aimi MacDonald and Marty Feldman). Then a man called Barry Took came along, assembled 6 comedy writers and comedy history was made…
All throughout this time, Chapman struggled with the problem of alcoholism, which had steadily escalated since his time at Cambridge. By the time of filming Monty Python and The Holy Grail, it was so bad that it sometimes affected his performances (according to Terry Gilliam, Chapman would forget his lines, and was so drunk during filming that he was unable to make it across the Bridge of Death, requiring the assistant cameraman to double for him), and that if he went without drinking for any length of time he would go into withdrawal. Saying that it had to be said that Chapman’s drinking did help avert a mutiny on set. Because of the conditions everyone was filming in at the time - cold and wet, everyone was getting so miserable they started threatening to leave. At this point Chapman bought everyone a drink in the local pub and led them in a rousing sing-song, thus reuniting the team spirit.
One of Chapman’s greatest supports during this period was his long-term partner David Sherlock (who was also joint guardian of Chapman’s adopted son John Tomiczek). Chapman had been a practising homosexual since his mid-twenties (he was openly gay way before it was considered socially acceptable), and he embraced his sexuality, becoming a founder member of Gay News and an active campaigner for gay rights.
In 1977 Chapman (with frankly superhuman effort) gave up drinking almost overnight. Even without the drink, Chapman’s humour was always the most surreal of any of the Pythons – after all who else would turn up to a speaking engagement dressed as a giant carrot, and stand in silence for 10 minutes before leaving again? Still, his next Python role, in The Life of Brian, could is considered by many to be the peak of his career.
Post-Python
Graham Chapman in (the sadly unmade) Jake's Journey
Unlike the rest of the Python team, Chapman did not move on to anything even half as successful. His only solo movie project, the film Yellowbeard, was a critical and commercial failure. A potential series for US television called Jake's Journey never made it beyond a pilot (although given that it would have also starred Peter Cook, the question as to be asked - why wasn't it made?) The only real post-Python success came in America and Australia, on college lecture tours formed out of the question and answer sessions started Chicago whilst plugging his autobiography A Liar’s Autobiography., In them he spoke about such differing subjects as his time with Monty Python, his homosexuality, his friendship with The Who's Keith Moon, hurtling down a mountain in a gondola with the Dangerous Sports Club and the hilarious game "shitties". A recording of one has since been released under the title Looks Like A Brown Trousers Job.
In November 1988, Chapman was diagnosed with throat cancer. This swiftly spread to his spine. Despite prolonged and painful treatment, Chapman continued working, appearing in the Python compilation Parrot Sketch Not Included. In September 1989, the cancer was declared incurable and two months later on October 4, he died, Michael Palin and John Cleese by his side.
The rest of the Python team decided to stay away from his funeral, to avoid it becoming a media circus and to give Chapman’s family some privacy (although they sent a wreath in the shape of the famous Python foot, with the message “To Graham from the other Pythons. Stop us if we’re getting too silly”). Instead they held a memorial service two months later in St Bart’s Hospital Great Hall, with choruses of “Always Look On The Bright Side of Life” and Chapman’s favourite “Jelusarem” (the Chinese version of Jerusalem, reading "… Bling me my speal, oh crowds unford. Bling me my chaliots of file…", and with John Cleese’s address including the immortal words “Graham Chapman is no more. He has gone to meet his maker. He has run down the curtain and join the choir invisible” (Cleese was also the first person to say “fuck” at a memorial service). Eric Idle, choking back tears, also said of Chapman that he had thought that Michael Palin talked too much and had died rather than listen to him any more.
It was a send-off appropriate for a man, who more than any other Python, lived the lunacy that the show depicted.Get the biggest daily stories by email Subscribe Thank you for subscribing See our privacy notice Could not subscribe, try again later Invalid Email
A schoolgirl was stunned when when she looked into the sky to see an enormous unexplained black ring.
Georgina Heap, 16, was playing tennis with mum Jo when she was stopped in her tracks by the fascinating sight.
Gazing into the sky, the pair saw a clearly defined black circle which looked like a giant smoke ring.
The UFO remained there for around three minutes before it disappeared completely.
Georgina, who is studying for her GCSEs, said: "I looked up at it and thought, 'what the hell?', it was amazing.
"It was just floating there like a cloud and then it disappeared. It wasn't birds either.
"There were about ten of us who stopped what we were doing and watched. It is the weirdest thing I have ever seen."
The spectacle, which appeared near Leamington Spa, on Friday evening, has stumped officials.
Warwickshire Fire and Rescue Service said there were no reports of fires around that time.
The Met Office also said it did not believe the ring was related to the weather.(Adds details from court order, background, byline)
By Andrea Shalal
WASHINGTON, Jan 13 (Reuters) - The U.S. federal claims court on Tuesday denied a motion by United Launch Alliance seeking dismissal of a lawsuit filed by privately held SpaceX against the company and the U.S. Air Force.
Judge Susan Braden said she denied the motion because the case was still ongoing, and none of the actions taken by Congress or the Air Force in recent weeks invalidated the SpaceX lawsuit. SpaceX is challenging the Air Force’s decision to award 36 rocket launches to United Launch Alliance, a venture of Boeing Co and Lockheed Martin Corp.
In a four-page decision, Braden said the court had been briefed on two earlier motions to dismiss filed by the U.S. government, and SpaceX’s request for a judgment on the administrative record, which was filed on Dec. 19.
She said the court would not rule on pending motions for discovery or on the merits of the case until after the end of a mediation process that is due to begin this month.
Officials at SpaceX and United Launch Alliance had no comment on the court order. The judge in August barred the parties from discussing the closely-watched lawsuit.
There has been growing interest in SpaceX’s U.S.-based rocket launch capabilities given mounting congressional concern about the cost of ULA launches and the company’s use of Russian-built engines to power one of its two launch vehicles.
But the effort to certify SpaceX, or Space Exploration Technologies, to compete for some military and intelligence satellite launches has taken longer than expected.
The Air Force last week said it hoped to certify SpaceX no later than mid-2015, six months later than initially expected.
It also announced it was launching an independent review of its certification process, also to be completed by mid-2015.
It said SpaceX was making substantial progress toward certification and had met 80 percent of the required criteria. (Reporting by Andrea Shalal; Editing by Lisa Shumaker)Rumours of infiltration and interference in the workings of the Labour party by the Israelis have long been rumoured – rumours that were rarely spoken aloud because of the likely pavlovian response.
Now, thanks to undercover work by Aljazeera, the Israelis themselves have admitted:
to working to ‘take down’ MPs they considered troublesome or unfriendly to their interests
that they don’t want Corbyn to be Labour leader
to setting up groups within the Labour party to further their interests
to ‘helping’ those groups achieve their ends
Now consider the facts that:
the group ‘Labour Friends of Israel’ (LFI), specifically mentioned in the undercover recordings, supported antisemitism smears against the Labour party. Many smears specifically blamed Jeremy Corbyn for the supposed increase in antisemitism
LFI and other Jewish groups shamefully attacked Shami Chakrabarti after her investigation did not support the smears
the Jewish Labour MP who ‘fled in tears’ from the Chakrabarti report press conference did so over comments that were not antisemitic or aimed at Jewish people
the same Labour MP has been funded by LFI and used to work for a pro-Israel campaign group, BICOM (and was also considered a ‘strictly protected’ source by US Intelligence)
funded work considered many of the most vehemently anti-Corbyn faction are closely associated with LFI. Michael Dugher, who writes for right-wing rags against Corbyn, Gloria de Piero, who infamously appealed to Sun readers to join the party to defeat Corbyn (both pictured below with Ruth Smeeth and Tom Watson on an LFI junket), are listed officers.
Gloominaries such as Ian Austin, Jess Phillips, Chris Leslie, Chuka Umunna, Conor McGinn, Wes Streeting, Margaret Hodge, John Spellar, John Woodcock and others are ‘supporters’
Deputy leader Tom Watson is not only a supporter but on the LFI website asGloominaries such as Ian Austin, Jess Phillips, Chris Leslie, Chuka Umunna, Conor McGinn, Wes Streeting, Margaret Hodge, John Spellar, John Woodcock and others are ‘supporters’Deputy leader Tom Watson is not only a supporter but keynote speaker at LFI’s 2016 ‘annual lunch’ and praised LFi for being ‘fearless in its support for the state of Israel’
listed LFI supporter Tom Watson appointed LFI supporter and former vice-Chair Michael Dugher to head a ‘fake news inquiry’ that is plainly an attack on pro-Corbyn independent media
At least one of the two Labour MPs on the Commons Home Affairs Committee (CHAC) – Umunna – is an LFI supporter, while the other is Jewish but not listed as a supporter. David Burrowes on the CHAC is an officer of Conservative Friends of Israel, a group to which at least 80% of Tory MPs below, so it’s highly likely that all of the other 5 Tories on the CHAC are supporters
Umunna The CHAC issued statements smearing Labour as having an antisemitism problem on the basis of a CHAC report, even though the end of their own report unequivocally concludes that it does not
The Israeli ambassador to the UK has issued an apology and the government says that makes it ‘case closed’. This is self-evidently not so.
The Labour leadership and some senior Tories are calling for a full government inquiry. Given the government’s readiness to accept ‘oops, sorry’ from the Israeli embassy as enough for ‘case closed’, they shouldn’t hold their breath.
However, that does not prevent Labour having its own inquiry into these goings-on and the following actions should ensue:
The Labour members of the CHAC should be instructed to hand in their resignations from that committee immediately
Labour Friends of Israel should be disbanded/proscribed immediately
Tom Watson and Michael Dugher at the very least should be immediately suspended pending investigation
any MPs found to have colluded with/worked for the Israelis to discredit the Labour party or its leadership should be required to resign not just the whip but their seats immediately.
What’s more, as a glance at the LFI officers/supporters list shows, membership of LFI and membership of anti-Corbyn right-wing ‘party within a party’ Progress are almost contiguous. The SKWAWKBOX has been calling for the proscription of Progress for a long time and this should be done at the same time.
Enough is enough – and we’ve put up with more than enough.
The SKWAWKBOX is provided free of charge but relies on the generosity of its readers. If you can afford to, please click here to set up a one-off or modest monthly donation via PayPal. Thanks for your support.
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Like this: Like Loading...Copyright by WCMH - All rights reserved Cody Morris (Washington County Sheriff's Office)
Copyright by WCMH - All rights reserved Cody Morris (Washington County Sheriff's Office)
NBC4 Staff - SPRINGDALE, AR (WCMH) - An Arkansas teen is facing a felony charge after he put soda in a water cup at McDonald's.
According to Springdale police, 18-year-old Cody Morris and two friends ordered cups of water in the drive-thru, dumped out the water, then came inside and refilled the cups with soda.
The manager realized what was going on and asked the trio to return the drinks.
Police said two of the three gave back the cups, but Morris did not.
KHBS reported the manager stood behind Morris' car and tried to stop them from leaving. He was struck by the car as they tried to leave.
The manager was hit again as he continued trying to block the escape.
Police later arrested Morris and charged him with felony robbery.With Andrew on the road and David in Mexico, the guys get together late Sunday night to put a bow on the weekend. Kei Kamara and Federico Higuain certainly weren’t exchanging gifts after a contentious draw that saw Columbus Crew SC’s Designated Players fight over a penalty kick (then air grievances in the media). Sporting KC’s Peter Vermes used the media to challenge his team after another loss, Toronto opened the new BMO Field in style, Jordan Morris can’t stop scoring and the Rapids (!!) are first in the West and the Supporters’ Shield standings.
On Friday, LAFC got the go ahead on their sparkling stadium in South Los Angeles. To celebrate, club president and co-owner Tom Penn joined Andrew to give the lowdown on the design and the future of the club on and off the field.
The mailbag begins with a Mother’s Day story then the guys mull Cyle Larin’s future and Frank Lampard’s legacy (so far) with New York City FC.
Don't forget to join the ExtraTime Radio MLS Fantasy Manager league with code 202-548!
DOWNLOAD THE SHOWWales coach Warren Gatland would probably be the best person to coach the British and Irish Lions on their tour of New Zealand next year, according to former Ireland captain Brian O’Driscoll.
New Zealander Gatland controversially dropped O’Driscoll for the final test when he led the Lions to a series victory over Australia in 2013, preferring instead to use an all-Welsh combination of Jamie Roberts and Jonathan Davies in the centres.
The Lions hammered Australia 41-16 to clinch the series 2-1, a result which ultimately cost Wallabies coach Robbie Deans his job.
O’Driscoll, who retired from international rugby in 2014 having notched 133 test caps for Ireland and another eight with the Lions, however, felt Gatland would be ideal for the job again given the short time the team had to gel before the tour.
“You have to think its between Gats (Gatland) and Joe Schmidt,” O’Driscoll told The Telegraph newspaper in Britain.
“I think having been under Gats in 2013 -- and he was a coach in 2009 as well -- his style is probably something that lends itself to the short lead-in time.”
Gatland, who was forwards coach under Ian McGeechan on the Lions tour of South Africa in 2009, has said he would relish the opportunity to lead the Lions on their tour of his homeland.
Ireland coach Schmidt and Scotland’s Vern Cotter are also possibilities for the job. All three are New Zealanders.
England’s Grand Slam-winning coach Eddie Jones has already ruled himself out of contention and backed Gatland for the role.
The Lions will play 10 matches on their tour next year, playing all five Super Rugby franchises, the Maori All Blacks, a provincial union selection and three tests against Steve Hansen’s All Blacks.
The Lions coach is expected to be named after the northern hemisphere sides’ tours in June, with Wales touring New Zealand, Ireland heading to South Africa and England playing in Australia. Scotland will face Japan.
The Lions have won just one of 11 series in New Zealand, with the 1971 side coached by Carwyn James and led by centre John Dawes clinching the four-match series 2-1, with the fourth test at Eden Park a 14-14 draw.Author’s note: There is offensive language in this column. None of it is mine.
Since I religiously follow my own recommendation to my readers that you should read the writings of the Left to understand the arguments they are making, it is clear that there is a strain of thinking that people like me are inherently racist.The in-vogue position is that we are white supremacists and benefactors of white privilege. This line of thinking perpetuates racial stereotypes and in itself is racist.
One of the elements of these arguments purports that only white people can be racists. That is because whites experience white privilege and only the “disadvantaged” can experience racism against them. I believe that is the essence of the argument. But who can be sure because it is so inherently illogical on its face, it is difficult to logically describe.
That is why I was thankful for Yuli Gurriel. You may remember he is the first baseman for the Houston Astros.Yuli is a 33-year-old rookie from Cuba. In game three of the 2017 World Series, he hit a home run off the Los Angeles Dodger pitcher from Japan, Yu Darvish. Yuli then went back to the dugout where he was seen making the now-famous slant-eye motion to his teammates belittling Yu’s ethnicity. Thank you Yuli for forever putting to rest the inane argument that only whites can be racist.
The newest darling of the Left is Ta-Nehisi Coates. He is a black man who apparently thinks, from reading his writings, that America is a racist country and we whites are all guilty. Lately his most vivid argument is that the lead racist is President Trump and that anyone who voted for Trump is a racist (white supremacist). His lengthy column in The Atlantic titled The First White President lays out his case for this. If you can meander through the leftist jargon he uses to comprehend what he is attempting to communicate, he states in this piece that the people who elected Trump did so to overturn Obama’s actions because they are racists. He does not seem to consider that we who voted for Trump did so for two primary reasons: 1) His deplorable opponent; and, 2) We deeply disagreed with President Obama’s policies that had nothing to do with the color of his skin.
The pivotal paragraph in the column by Coates is:
“For Trump, it almost seems that the fact of Obama, the fact of a black president, insulted him personally. The insult intensified when Obama and Seth Meyers publicly humiliated him at the White House Correspondents’ Dinner in 2011. But the bloody heirloom ensures the last laugh. Replacing Obama is not enough—Trump has made the negation of Obama’s legacy the foundation of his own. And this too is whiteness. “Race is an idea, not a fact,” the historian Nell Irvin Painter has written, and essential to the construct of a “white race” is the idea of not being a n*gger. Before Barack Obama, n*ggers could be manufactured out of Sister Souljahs, Willie Hortons, and Dusky Sallys. But Donald Trump arrived in the wake of something more potent—an entire n*gger presidency with ni*gger health care, n*gger climate accords, and n*gger justice reform, all of which could be targeted for destruction or redemption, thus reifying the idea of being white. Trump truly is something new—the first president whose entire political existence hinges on the fact of a black president. And so it will not suffice to say that Trump is a white man like all the others who rose to become president. He must be called by his rightful honorific—America’s first white president.”
I cannot think of anything I have ever read that is both more inherently racist and wrong.The fact that a publication like The Atlantic, one with such a rich journalistic history, allowed him to publish this and then proudly boasted about it is despicable.
Today’s public communication has generally been degraded particularly with the use of Twitter. People have started to use words in the public arena that would never have been used before.If you want to guess what the words are then refer to George Carlin’s Seven Dirty Words. That The Atlantic would allow this to be published is also inherently racist. They would not publish something from me that uses the same verbiage; why should they publish it at all? Someone who writes something like this has a deep hatred for not only Trump, but all who voted for him. That is racist at its core.
Then there is Professor Ekow Yankah, Benjamin Cardoza School of Law at Yeshiva University, who published a column in the NYT titled “Can My Children Be Friends with White People?” After telling us how bad it is for black people in America, particularly Trump’s America, Yankah writes, “I will teach my boys to have profound doubts that friendship with white people is possible. When they ask, I will teach my sons that their beautiful hue is a fault line.” Maybe this man lives in a different country than I do. Maybe I should tell all my black relations and my black niece, I didn’t mean it; is just a mirage that we have a relationship devoid of the issues of race.
These people and their enablers who publish them on The Left are sustaining a divisive mentality emanating from their own racist thoughts; or, in the case of the whites who support this, a misguided guilt for the failures of some in the black community.
Most of America today has washed itself of these racial tendencies. If you don’t want to believe that then take a time machine back to 1960 and see what the divide between races was like then.Though people in a mixed-race society like America will never be free of racial overtones, it is not because this country is inherently racist. It is because in a country of 330 million people we will always have knuckleheads.
I was recently reading a book, “Flash Boys” by Michael Lewis. In it he writes of a Canadian of Japanese descent who is transferred to New York to work for the Royal Bank of Canada (RBC). He never really experienced any recognition of his ethnicity in Canada.
While he was in New York, RBC decided to enhance their diversity by calling a meeting of their non-white employees. Lewis writes “Going around the table, people took turns responding to a request to ‘talk about your experience of being a minority at RBC.’ When Brad’s turn came he said ‘To be honest, the only time I’ve have ever felt like a minority is this exact moment. If you really want to encourage diversity you shouldn’t make people feel like a minority.’ Then he left.”
That is exactly what we should all do when these race-baiting racists spew their filth.If you know some Leftist who wants to continue this trash, first try to enlighten them, then let them know they are the people who should be branded as racists. Not me and hopefully not you.Last night, actor/comedian Cheech Marin (“Cheech & Chong” and “Lost”) placed third in the “Jeopardy!” Million Dollar Celebrity Invitational Tournament, winning $100,000 for the Hispanic Scholarship Fund (HSF) for this final round.
HSF is the nation’s leading Hispanic scholarship organization and provides support to Hispanic families and students through education workshops, scholarships, college retention and career opportunities. Frank Alvarez, president and CEO of HSF, said, “Cheech has long believed in the importance of Latino college completion. By choosing us as his nonprofit partner, he is helping low income, academically qualified Latinos realize their dreams.”
Marin’s total "Jeopardy’ wins of $150,000 will help fund students pursuing master’s and doctoral degrees in performing arts and entertainment. A longtime advocate of HSF and board member, Marin said, “This generous donation will have such an enormous impact on the American landscape. HSF empowers and educates so many worthy Latinos.”
Marin faced off in the finals against actress/comedienne Jane Curtin (“SNL,” “3rd Rock from the Sun” and “Kate & Allie”) and actor Michael McKean (“Laverne and Shirley” and star of Broadway’s “Superior Donuts”). McKean placed first and won the $1 million grand prize on behalf of the International Myeloma Foundation, and Curtin came in second and received a quarter million dollars for the U.S. Fund for UNICEF. These earnings are in addition to the $50,000 each received during the quarterfinals.
Host Alex Trebek said, "I think it’s really remarkable that Cheech Marin, who won our very first Celebrity “Jeopardy!” competition 18 years ago, hasn’t lost a step. In fact, he not only made the finals of the Celebrity Invitational, but he is the only player who came up with the correct Final “Jeopardy!” response in the deciding game. He should be congratulated on his fine performance."
Since its September kick-off, the tournament has hosted 27 celebrity contestants who competed in a series of monthly quarterfinal matches. A total of over $2.5 million has been donated to local and national charities selected by the stars.It has been nearly two years since Michael Brown’s death in Ferguson, Mo., and the rise of the Black Lives Matter movement. It has been nearly two years of activists putting themselves on the front lines as police officers continue to act against black lives with impunity. At the same time, according to The Guardian, there have been 560 people killed by police in the United States in 2016.
Tuesday night I heard about Mr. Sterling’s death, and I felt so very tired. I had no words because I don’t know what more can be said about this kind of senseless death.
I watched the cellphone video, shot by a bystander and widely available online, of the final moments of a black man’s life. I watched Alton Sterling’s killing, despite my better judgment. I watched even though it was voyeuristic, and in doing so I made myself complicit in the spectacle of black death. The video is a mere 48 seconds long, and it is interminable. To watch another human being shot to death is grotesque. It is horrifying, and even though I feel so resigned, so hopeless, so out of words in the face of such brutal injustice, I take some small comfort in still being able to be horrified and brought to tears.
We know what happens now because this brand of tragedy has become routine. The video of Mr. Sterling’s death allows us to bear witness, but it will not necessarily bring justice. There will be protest as his family and community try to find something productive to do with sorrow and rage. Mr. Sterling’s past will be laid bare, every misdeed brought to light and used as justification for police officers choosing to act as judge, jury and executioner — due process in a parking lot.
In the video, a police officer can be heard shouting that Mr. Sterling had a gun (Louisiana is an open-carry state). The National Rifle Association is likely to stay silent because the Second Amendment is rarely celebrated in these cases. The Department of Justice will investigate this case. Perhaps things are changing because the investigation was announced immediately. Charges might be brought against the two officers involved, but, as history both recent and not shows us, it is rare for police officers to be convicted in such shootings.Court Orders Halt To New York Law Demanding Online Access To Pawn Shop Acquisition Records
from the best-I-can-do-is-a-couple-of-lawsuits-for-your-heavily-used-general-warrant dept
Pawn shops -- like scrap metal dealers and junkyards -- are "closely regulated" businesses. What this means is they are compelled to track acquisition information and make it available for law enforcement to view without a warrant. The nexus of these businesses to criminal activity is undeniable. But that doesn't necessarily mean everything law enforcement demands, it gets. Some demands exceed the diminished Fourth Amendment protections afforded to these businesses.
The "closely regulated" language comes from the US Supreme Court. In a decision affecting a New York junkyard owner, the Supreme Court found that:
A business owner's expectation of privacy in commercial property is attenuated with respect to commercial property employed in a "closely regulated" industry. Where the owner's privacy interests are weakened and the government interests in regulating particular businesses are concomitantly heightened, a warrantless inspection of commercial premises, if it meets certain criteria, is reasonable within the meaning of the Fourth Amendment.
"Our responsibility in the judicial branch is not to respond to these temporary crises or to shape the law so as to advance the goals of law enforcement, but rather to stand as a fixed citadel for Constitutional rights."
RCNY §21-03(a) and (b), §21-04(a) and (c), §21-07(a)-(f), and § 21-08, promulgated as a result of Local Law No. 149 require pawnbrokers and dealers in second-hand merchandise to create electronic transaction records and upload the same to a web-based electronic transfer service designated by the NYPD known as Leads Online, who then makes those records available to the NYPD.
[T]he foregoing statutes fail to prescribe limits for the review of the records required to be disclosed and, in fact, in requiring the daily disclosure of those records seem to vest with the NYPD the unbridled discretion which even the court in Glenwood TV, Inc., would invalidate a statute authorizing warrantless searches (103 AD2d, 322, 330).
[...]
Specifically, at this stage, it is hard to fathom how the foregoing statutes - bereft of any standards on the frequency of searches, setting virtually no limit on how said searches will be conducted and thus, conferring unfettered discretion upon the defendants suffer from the very afflictions the court in Keta held afflicted VTL § 415-a(5) - can, in light of their facial unconstitutionality born by this record, be constitutionally applied.
Plaintiff here alleges that Defendants have “effectively singled out Gem from other pawnbrokers and secondhand dealers and have done so with malice and bad faith.” (Am. Compl. ¶ 152.) Plaintiff further alleges that pawn brokers who choose not to use Leads Online are subject to additional onsite inspections for “administrative purposes,” and that Plaintiff has experienced continual visits to its stores, warrantless searches, holds on jewelry, criminal summonses and over all harassment. (Id. ¶¶ 36–133.) Defendants raise no argument as to this element of Plaintiff’s selective enforcement equal protection claim, instead relying on the fact that the NYPD is permitted to perform administrative inspections. The Court finds that Plaintiff’s detailed description in its Amended Complaint of the actions taken beyond mere administrative inspections, including various in-store visits from the NYPD, statements made to Gem employees, subsequent requests for jewelry holds, and the seven misdemeanor summons received, (see id.), are adequate to demonstrate at the pleadings stage a malicious or bad faith intent to injure Plaintiff. The Court therefore finds that Plaintiff has stated a plausible claim for violation of the Equal Protection Clause and Defendants’ motion to dismiss is, therefore, denied.
A decision in the New York Supreme Court () seemingly went against the US Supreme Court's precedent. It narrowed the broad exceptions to the Fourth Amendment somewhat, with the presiding judge (Vito J. Titone) noting But "advancing the goals of law enforcement" still seems to be the goal. Officers are free to inspect acquisition records without a warrant, as well as seize stolen goods in plain sight, but most other actions (including searches of safes, etc.) still require additional paperwork.In order to expedite police inspections of pawnbrokers, New York legislators passed a law making it even easier for law enforcement check in on "closely regulated" businesses Because this law compels (sort of…) the upload of information to a database that can be accessed at will by law enforcement and other entities, it does not conform to the standards set by the NY Supreme Court'sdecision.The court mentions the " means to an end " approach the NYPD is rather fond of. Simply having on-demand, warrantless access to on-site inspection of "closely regulated" businesses' records wasn't enough. It wanted to enjoy the same privileges without leaving the office. Now, these "inspections" -- along with others permitted under the same set of statutes -- have been halted until further notice This compelled database of acquisition information is the centerpiece of another lawsuit against the city and the NYPD. It appears from the allegations made in this suit that the NYPD expresses a certainwith those that don't opt-in to the online database. ( The law requires creation and storage of electronic records, but does not actually mandate the use of Leads Online by affected businesses, stating only that ".")This lawsuit was filed before Local Law 149 was passed and enacted, suggesting there was a pre-legislation push by the NYPD to move these records to an online database. As of this point, the lawsuit is still ongoing, having survived the city's motion to dismiss. The codes cited in the lawsuit don't specify anything more than the sort of records to be maintained. In accordance with the new law, these records are to be maintained electronically, but nothing specifically mandates the use of an online database.As the court sees it here, this demand to participate in the online collection of these records -- which can be perused at the sole discretion of law enforcement officers and others with access to the database -- falls dangerously close to being a "general warrant." Compelled production of records during periodic inspections and/or suspicion of illegal activity is one thing. Providing at-will "inspections" with no corresponding guidelines turns "close regulation" into a prime fishing spot for law enforcement, who will no longer be participating in periodic inspections and searches, but rather trolling databases simply because they have unfettered access to the information.Obviously, this has its parallel in the recent incident involving Motel 6's faxing of guest information to local law enforcement nightly. Motels and hotels are businesses that are subject to routine inspection of collected records, but nothing about this sort of regulation demands proactive measures on the part of the businesses involved, other than the collection and maintenance of the required records. The rest is dependent on law enforcement not abusing these privileges, which wander outside the protections of the Fourth Amendment -- supposedly in the "public interest," i.e. fighting crime.The necessary limitations -- and there are only a few -- are subverted by instantly-accessed, central collections of this information. The Supreme Court may have lowered the Fourth Amendment standards for these businesses, but New York's highest court stills sees at least a minimal amount of privacy implications in this sort of regulation. These are in place to help law enforcement combat theft, but these noble ends are not a justification for "by any means necessary" approaches.
Filed Under: new york, pawn shops, police, records, surveillanceThe relationship between cannabis and anxiety is a complicated one. For some, a small puff of cannabis provides unrivaled relief of worry, panic, stress, and other anxiety-related symptoms. Unfortunately others experience heightened paranoia and exacerbated anxiety with cannabis. This common reaction can be attributed to a strain’s THC content, but what many people don’t realize is there are many strains now that have little to no THC. These low-THC, high-CBD strains are changing the game for anxiety sufferers, but that doesn’t mean there aren’t strains rich in THC that can’t also help.
The first step to picking a good strain to combat your anxiety is recognizing your tolerance and sensitivity, and step two involves experimenting with new strains to determine which best suit your symptoms. This guide is meant to help you through the discovery process as it points out the nuances to look for the next time you visit your local dispensary.
Best Cannabis Strains for Generalized Anxiety
Granddaddy Purple eases you into a peaceful mindset while urging your body to release all that stress and tension. Sink in and let a blissful mindset take over.
A high-THC strain can be hit or miss when it comes to anxiety; they can have racy cerebral effects that tug at anxiety rather than help it. But Jack Herer is different in that its euphoria tapers in gently with calming effects.
For the THC-sensitive, we recommend the high-CBD hybrid Cannatonic. This strain typically has a CBD profile that sizes up to its THC content in a 1:1 ratio, which helps blunt the anxious edge that a lot of anxiety-sufferers experience with cannabis. Cannatonic tends to also boast high levels of the terpene myrcene, which contributes to this strain’s deeply relaxing attributes.
“I’m not very good when it comes to marijuana with high THC contents as the effects give me anxiety. Cannatonic is high in CBD and low(er) in THC and is a great combination! It helps relieve stress and anxiety… without causing any!”
Best Cannabis Strains for Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD)
GSC (f.k.a Girl Scout Cookies) has numerous Cannabis Cup awards to back up its reputation for containing staggering amounts of THC. While this may seem like a panic attack waiting to happen, studies have shown that people with PTSD often have a deficiency of a naturally occurring THC-like compound called anandamide, which plays a role in memory. When we consider the fact that THC can replenish these compounds for therapeutic benefit, it’s easy to see why so many PTSD patients sing GSC’s praises.
“Great for PTSD-related symptoms. Vaped last night and slept really well (no night terrors) after a relaxed |
If the input exceeds 10 characters, it will display, otherwise it will remain hidden.
Moving on to a more advanced example, we can return to our Todo application. A trimmed down KnockoutJS View for this, including all the necessary data-bindings may look as follows.
<div id="todoapp"> <header> <h1>Todos</h1> <input id="new-todo" type="text" data-bind="value: current, valueUpdate: 'afterkeydown', enterKey: add" placeholder="What needs to be done?"/> </header> <section id="main" data-bind="block: todos().length"> <input id="toggle-all" type="checkbox" data-bind="checked: allCompleted"> <label for="toggle-all">Mark all as complete</label> <ul id="todo-list" data-bind="foreach: todos"> <!-- item --> <li data-bind="css: { done: done, editing: editing }"> <div class="view" data-bind="event: { dblclick: $root.editItem }"> <input class="toggle" type="checkbox" data-bind="checked: done"> <label data-bind="text: content"></label> <a class="destroy" href="#" data-bind="click: $root.remove"></a> </div> <input class="edit" type="text" data-bind="value: content, valueUpdate: 'afterkeydown', enterKey: $root.stopEditing, selectAndFocus: editing, event: { blur: $root.stopEditing }"/> </li> </ul> </section> </div>
Note that the basic layout of the mark-up is relatively straight-forward, containing an input textbox ( new-todo ) for adding new items, togglers for marking items as complete and a list ( todo-list ) with a template for a Todo item in the form of an li.
The data bindings in the above markup can be broken down as follows:
The input textbox new-todo has a data-binding for the current property, which is where the value of the current item being added is stored. Our ViewModel (shown shortly) observes the current property and also has a binding against the add event. When the enter key is pressed, the add event is triggered and our ViewModel can then trim the value of current and add it to the Todo list as needed
has a data-binding for the property, which is where the value of the current item being added is stored. Our ViewModel (shown shortly) observes the property and also has a binding against the event. When the enter key is pressed, the event is triggered and our ViewModel can then trim the value of and add it to the Todo list as needed The input checkbox toggle-all can mark all of the current items as completed if clicked. If checked, it triggers the allCompleted event, which can be seen in our ViewModel
can mark all of the current items as completed if clicked. If checked, it triggers the event, which can be seen in our ViewModel The item li has the class done. When a task is marked as done, the CSS class editing is marked accordingly. If double-clicking on the item, the $root.editItem callback will be executed
has the class. When a task is marked as done, the CSS class is marked accordingly. If double-clicking on the item, the callback will be executed The checkbox with the class toggle shows the state of the done property
shows the state of the property A label contains the text value of the Todo item ( content )
) There is also a remove button that will call the $root.remove callback when clicked.
callback when clicked. An input textbox used for editing mode also holds the value of the Todo item content. The enterKey event will set the editing property to true or false
ViewModel
The ViewModel can be considered a specialized Controller that acts as a data converter. It changes Model information into View information, passing commands from the View to the Model.
For example, let us imagine that we have a model containing a date attribute in unix format (e.g 1333832407). Rather than our models being aware of a user's view of the date (e.g 04/07/2012 @ 5:00pm), where it would be necessary to convert the address to it's display format, our model simply holds the raw format of the data. Our View contains the formatted date and our ViewModel acts as a middle-man between the two.
In this sense, the ViewModel might be looked upon as more of a Model than a View but it does handle most of the View's display logic.The ViewModel may also expose methods for helping to maintain the View's state, update the model based on the action's on a View and trigger events on the View.
In summary, the ViewModel sits behind our UI layer. It exposes data needed by a View (from a Model) and can be viewed as the source our Views go to for both data and actions.
KnockoutJS interprets the ViewModel as the represtation of data and operations that can be performed on a UI. This isn't the UI itself nor the data model that persists, but rather a layer that can also hold the yet to be saved data a user is working with. Knockout's ViewModels are implemented JavaScript objects with no knowledge of HTML markup. This abstract approach to their implementation allows them to stay simple, meaning more complex behaviour can be more easily managed on-top as needed.
A partial KnockoutJS ViewModel for our Todo application could thus look as follows:
// our main ViewModel var ViewModel = function (todos) { var self = this; // map array of passed in todos to an observableArray of Todo objects self.todos = ko.observableArray(ko.utils.arrayMap(todos, function (todo) { return new Todo(todo.content, todo.done); })); // store the new todo value being entered self.current = ko.observable(); // add a new todo, when enter key is pressed self.add = function (data, event) { var newTodo, current = self.current().trim(); if (current) { newTodo = new Todo(current); self.todos.push(newTodo); self.current(""); } }; // remove a single todo self.remove = function (todo) { self.todos.remove(todo); }; // remove all completed todos self.removeCompleted = function () { self.todos.remove(function (todo) { return todo.done(); }); }; // writeable computed observable to handle marking all complete/incomplete self.allCompleted = ko.computed({ //always return true/false based on the done flag of all todos read:function () { return!self.remainingCount(); }, //set all todos to the written value (true/false) write:function (newValue) { ko.utils.arrayForEach(self.todos(), function (todo) { //set even if value is the same, as subscribers are not notified in that case todo.done(newValue); }); } }); // edit an item self.editItem = function(item) { item.editing(true); };..
Above we are basically providing the methods needed to add, edit or remove items as well as the logic to mark all remaining items as having been completed Note: The only real difference worth noting from previous examples in our ViewModel are observable arrays. In KnockoutJS, if we wish to detect and respond to changes on a single object, we would use observables. If however we wish to detect and respond to changes of a collection of things, we can use an observableArray instead. A simpler example of how to use observables arrays may look as follows:
// Define an initially an empty array var myObservableArray = ko.observableArray(); // Add a value to the array and notify our observers myObservableArray.push(‘A new todo item’);
Note: The complete Knockout.js Todo application we reviewed above can be grabbed from TodoMVC if interested.
Recap: The View and the ViewModel
Views and ViewModels communicate using data-bindings and events. As we saw in our initial ViewModel example, the ViewModel doesn’t just expose Model attributes but also access to other methods and features such as validation.
Our Views handle their own user-interface events, mapping them to the ViewModel as necessary. Models and attributes on the ViewModel are syncronized and updated via two-way data-binding.
Triggers (data-triggers) also allow us to further react to changes in the state of our Model attributes.
Recap: The ViewModel and the Model
Whilst it may appear the ViewModel is completely responsible for the Model in MVVM, there are some subtleties with this relationship worth noting. The ViewModel can expose a Model or Model attributes for the purposes of data-binding and can also contain interfaces for fetching and manipulating properties exposed in the view.
Pros and Cons
You now hopefully have a better appreciation for what MVVM is and how it works. Let’s now review the advantages and disadvantages of employing the pattern:
Advantages
MVVM Facilitates easier parallel development of a UI and the building blocks that power it
Abstracts the View and thus reduces the quantity of business logic (or glue) required in the code behind it
The ViewModel can be easier to unit test than event-driven code
The ViewModel (being more Model than View) can be tested without concerns of UI automation and interaction
Disadvantages
For simpler UIs, MVVM can be overkill
Whilst data-bindings can be declarative and nice to work with, they can be harder to debug than imperative code where we simply set breakpoints
Data-bindings in non-trivial applications can create a lot of book-keeping. You also don’t want to end up in a situation where bindings are heavier than the objects being bound to
In larger applications, it can be more difficult to design the ViewModel up front to get the necessary amount of generalization
MVVM With Looser Data-Bindings
It’s not uncommon for JavaScript developers from an MVC or MVP background to review MVVM and complain about it’s true separation of concerns. Namely, the quantity of inline data-bindings maintained in the HTML markup of a View.
I must admit that when I first reviewed implementations of MVVM (e.g KnockoutJS, Knockback), I was surprised that any developer would want to return to the days of old where we mixed logic (JavaScript) with our markup and found it quickly unmaintainable. The reality however is that MVVM does this for a number of good reasons (which we’ve covered), including faciltiating designers to more easily bind to logic from their markup.
For the purists among us, you’ll be happy to know that we can now also greatly reduce how reliant we are on data-bindings thanks to a feature known as custom binding providers, introduced in KnockoutJS 1.3 and available in all versions since.
KnockoutJS by default has a data-binding provider which searches for any elements with data-bind attributes on them such as in the below example.
<input id="new-todo" type="text" data-bind="value: current, valueUpdate: 'afterkeydown', enterKey: add" placeholder="What needs to be done?"/>
When the provider locates an element with this attribute, it parses it and turns it into a binding object using the current data context. This is the way KnockoutJS has always worked, allowing you to declaratively add bindings to elements which KnockoutJS binds to the data at that layer.
Once you start building Views that are no longer trivial, you may end up with a large number of elements and attributes whose bindings in markup can become difficult to manage. With custom binding providers however, this is no longer a problem.
A binding provider is primarily interested in two things:
When given a DOM node, does it contain any data-bindings?
If the node passed this first question, what does the binding object look like in the current data context?.
Binding providers implement two functions:
nodeHasBindings : this takes in a DOM node which doesn’t necessarily have to be an element
: this takes in a DOM node which doesn’t necessarily have to be an element getBindings : returns an object representing the bindings as applied to the current data context
A skeleton binding provider might thus look as follows:
var ourBindingProvider = { nodeHasBindings: function(node) { // returns true/false }, getBindings: function(node, bindingContext) { // returns a binding object } };
Before we get to fleshing out this provider, let’s briefly discuss logic in data-bind attributes.
If when using Knockout’s MVVM you find yourself dissatisfied with the idea of application logic being overly tied into your View, you can change this. We could implement something a little like CSS classes to assign bindings by name to elements. Ryan Niemeyer (of knockmeout.net) has previously suggested using data-class for this to avoid confusing presentation classes with data classes, so let’s get our nodeHasBindings function supporting this:
// does an element have any bindings? function nodeHasBindings(node) { return node.getAttribute? node.getAttribute("data-class") : false; };
Next, we need a sensible getBindings() function. As we’re sticking with the idea of CSS classes, why not also consider supporting space-separated classes to allow us to share binding specs between different elements?.
Let’s first review what our bindings will look like. We create an object to hold them where our property names need to match the keys we wish to use in our data-classes.
Note: There isn’t a great deal of work required to convert a KnockoutJS application from using traditional data-bindings over to unobstrusive bindings with custom binding providers. We simply pull our all of our data-bind attributes, replace them with data-class attributes and place our bindings in a binding object as per below:
var viewModel = new ViewModel(todos || []); var bindings = { newTodo: { value: viewModel.current, valueUpdate: 'afterkeydown', enterKey: viewModel.add }, taskTooltip : { visible: viewModel.showTooltip }, checkAllContainer : {visible: viewModel.todos().length }, checkAll: {checked: viewModel.allCompleted }, todos: {foreach: viewModel.todos }, todoListItem: function() { return { css: { editing: this.editing } }; }, todoListItemWrapper: function() { return { css: { done: this.done } }; }, todoCheckBox: function() {return { checked: this.done }; }, todoContent: function() { return { text: this.content, event: { dblclick: this.edit } };}, todoDestroy: function() {return { click: viewModel.remove };}, todoEdit: function() { return { value: this.content, valueUpdate: 'afterkeydown', enterKey: this.stopEditing, event: { blur: this.stopEditing } }; }, todoCount: {visible: viewModel.remainingCount}, remainingCount: { text: viewModel.remainingCount }, remainingCountWord: function() { return { text: viewModel.getLabel(viewModel.remainingCount) };}, todoClear: {visible: viewModel.completedCount}, todoClearAll: {click: viewModel.removeCompleted}, completedCount: { text: viewModel.completedCount }, completedCountWord: function() { return { text: viewModel.getLabel(viewModel.completedCount) }; }, todoInstructions: {visible: viewModel.todos().length} };....
There are however two lines missing from the above snippet - we still need our getBindings function, which will loop through each of the keys in our data-class attributes and build up the resulting object from each of them. If we detect that the binding object is a function, we call it with our current data using the context this. Our complete custom binding provider would look as follows:
// We can now create a bindingProvider that uses // something different than data-bind attributes ko.customBindingProvider = function(bindingObject) { this.bindingObject = bindingObject; //determine if an element has any bindings this.nodeHasBindings = function(node) { return node.getAttribute? node.getAttribute("data-class") : false; }; }; // return the bindings given a node and the bindingContext this.getBindings = function(node, bindingContext) { var result = {}; var classes = node.getAttribute("data-class"); if (classes) { classes = classes.split(' '); //evaluate each class, build a single object to return for (var i = 0, j = classes.length; i < j; i++) { var bindingAccessor = this.bindingObject[classes[i]]; if (bindingAccessor) { var binding = typeof bindingAccessor == "function"? bindingAccessor.call(bindingContext.$data) : bindingAccessor; ko.utils.extend(result, binding); } } } return result; }; };
Thus, the final few lines of our bindings object can be defined as follows:
// set ko's current bindingProvider equal to our new binding provider ko.bindingProvider.instance = new ko.customBindingProvider(bindings); // bind a new instance of our ViewModel to the page ko.applyBindings(viewModel); })();
What we’re doing here is effectively defining constructor for our binding handler which accepts an object (bindings) which we use to lookup our bindings. We could then re-write the markup for our application View using data-classes as follows:
<div id="create-todo"> <input id="new-todo" data-class="newTodo" placeholder="What needs to be done?" /> <span class="ui-tooltip-top" data-class="taskTooltip" style="display: none;">Press Enter to save this task</span> </div> <div id="todos"> <div data-class="checkAllContainer" > <input id="check-all" class="check" type="checkbox" data-class="checkAll" /> <label for="check-all">Mark all as complete</label> </div> <ul id="todo-list" data-class="todos" > <li data-class="todoListItem" > <div class="todo" data-class="todoListItemWrapper" > <div class="display"> <input class="check" type="checkbox" data-class="todoCheckBox" /> <div class="todo-content" data-class="todoContent" style="cursor: pointer;"></div> <span class="todo-destroy" data-class="todoDestroy"></span> </div> <div class="edit"> <input class="todo-input" data-class="todoEdit"/> </div> </div> </li> </ul> </div>
Neil Kerkin has put together a complete TodoMVC demo app using the above, which can be accessed and played around with here.
Whilst it may look like quite a lot of work in the explanation above, now that you have a generic getBindings method written, it’s a lot more trivial to simply re-use it and use data-classes rather than strict data-bindings for writing your KnockoutJS applications instead. The net result is hopefully cleaner markup with your data bindings being shifted from the View to a bindings object instead.
MVC Vs. MVP Vs. MVVM
Both MVP and MVVM are derivatives of MVC. The key difference between it and it’s derivatives is the dependency each layer has on other layers as well as how tightly bound they are to each other.
In MVC, the View sits on top of our architecture with the controller laying below this. Models sit below the controller and so our Views know about our controllers and controllers know about Models. Here, our Views have direct access to Models. Exposing the complete Model to the View however may have security and performance costs, depending on the complexity of our application. MVVM attempts to avoid these issues.
In MVP, the role of the controller is replaced with a Presenter. Presenters sit at the same level as views, listening to events from both the View and model and mediating the actions between them. Unlike MVVM, there isn’t a mechanism for binding Views to ViewModels, so we instead rely on each View implementing an interface allowing the Presenter to interact with the View.
MVVM consequently allows us to create View-specific subsets of a Model which can contain state and logic information, avoiding the need to expose the entire Model to a View. Unlike MVP’s Presenter, a ViewModel is not required to reference a View. The View can bind to properties on the ViewModel which in turn expose data contained in Models to the View. As we’ve mentioned, the abstraction of the View means there is less logic required in the code behind it.
One of the downsides to this however is that a level of interpetation is needed between the ViewModel and the View and this can have performance costs. The complexity of this interpretation can also vary - it can be as simple as copying data or as complex as manipulating them to a form we would like the View to see. MVC doesn’t have this problem as the whole Model is readily available and such manipulation can be avoided.
Backbone.js Vs. KnockoutJS
Understanding the subtle differences between MVC, MVP and MVVM are important but developers ultimately will ask whether they should consider using KnockoutJS over Backbone based in what we’ve learned. The following notes may be of help here:
Both libraries are designed with different goals in mind and its often not as simple as just choosing MVC or MVVM
If data-binding and two-way communication are are your main concerns, KnockoutJS is definitely the way to go.Practically any attribute or value stored in DOM nodes can be mapped to JavaScript objects with this approach.
Backbone excels with its ease of integration with RESTful services, whilst KnockoutJS Models are simply JavaScript objects and code needed for updating the Model must be written by the developer.
KnockoutJS has a focus on automating UI bindings, which requires significantly more verbose custom code if attempting to do this with Backbone. This isnt a problem with Backbone itself par se as it puposefully attempts to stay out of the UI. Knockback does however attempt to assist with this problem.
With KnockoutJS, we can bind our own functions to ViewModel observables, which are executed anytime the observable changes. This allows us the same level of flexibility as can be found in Backbone
Backbone has a solid routing solution built-in, whilst KnockoutJS offers no routing options out of the box. One can however easily fill this behaviour in if needed using Ben Alman’s BBQ plugin or a standalone routing system like Miller Medeiros’s excellent Crossroads.
To conclude, I personally find KnockoutJS more suitable for smaller applications whilst Backbone’s feature set really shines when building anything non-trivial. That said, many developers have used both frameworks to write applications of varying complexity and I recommend trying out both at a smaller scale before making a decision on which might work best for your project.
References/Further ReadingIn 2003, when Egypt was ruled by strongman Hosni Mubarak, then 22-year-old Cynthia Farahat co-founded the party that would become the Liberal Egyptian Party, the first secular, classical liberal political party in the country's modern history.*
"Sharia law is not friendly to women or minorities or gays," Farahat told Reason. "I wanted to fix my country. I wanted freedom. I wanted liberty."
Mubarak's government responded by sending intelligence agents and the secret police to go after Farahat.
"I was under constant, 24-hour surveillance in Egypt for almost a decade," she says. Government agents would routinely call her in the middle of the night and would sometimes play back recordings of Farahat's conversations with friends recorded in her own living room.
Other calls were more sinister, Farahat says. Sometimes she would pick up the phone to hear heavy breathing on the line. The person on the call "would start to talk about the intimate things that he wants to do to my decapitated head—that he's going to keep in his freezer if I don't stop my political work."
The key to survival was to "never show fear."
She sensed that her family was in danger and knew that the government could arrest her at any time. She was eventually placed on an Al Qaeda affiliates' hit list and banned from entering Lebanon because of her political advocacy.
Afraid for her life, Farahat sought political asylum in the U.S. in 2011, which was granted. Today she's a writer, political analyst, and fellow at the Middle East Forum. Her work has exposed secret ties between the Islamists, the military, and governments across the region, which she argues work together to subjugate citizens and uphold theocratic, authoritarian regimes.
Reason's Justin Monticello spoke with Farahat about her mission to bring a true political alternative to the region, why she vociferously advocates for the Muslim Brotherhood to be labeled a terrorist organization, how Coptic Christians in Egypt are persecuted and blamed for American foreign policy, and why she believes people across the Middle East are hungry for civil liberties and free markets.
Produced by Justin Monticello. Cameras by Meredith Bragg and Zach Weissmueller. Music by Silent Partner.
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This is a rush transcript. Check all quotes against the audio for accuracy.
Cynthia Farahat: I wanted liberty. And I knew that the way to get there was through sound ideas that have proven to work. When you look at America, and you look at the Soviet Union, and you look at Egypt, doesn't take a brain surgeon to know which fundamental ideas you need to go with.
Justin Monticello: How did you get put under surveillance in Egypt?
Farahat: So, I was under constant 24-hour surveillance in Egypt for almost a decade. And I knew this is in a very sinister and nasty way. They used to call me at two or three AM. Every single day for 10 years. To this day, I wake up at that time automatically because I'm used to being woken up at this time. One of the times, I said hello, and I heard my own voice on the other end of the line. And, it was a recorded conversation that I had with one of my best friends in my living room. That was super creeper. That's the good phone call. Bad phone calls will tell you hello in the middle of the night and some necrophiliac would be on the other side of the line. And he would start to talk about he intimate things that he wants to do to my decapitated head that he's gonna keep in his freezer if I don't stop my political work.(Newser) – A suicide bomber attacked a volleyball tournament in eastern Afghanistan today, killing at least 45 people. Dozens more were wounded when the bomber, who was on foot and mingling with the crowd, detonated his explosives, said a rep for the governor of Paktika province. He said the attack happened during an inter-district volleyball tournament attended by a large crowd in Yahyakhail district late this afternoon. "There were too many people gathered in the one place to watch the game. Dozens of others are wounded and we have reports that many of them are in critical condition," he said. "We need urgent help from the central government because we might need to transfer wounded people to Kabul for treatment."
Paktika, bordering Pakistan, is one of Afghanistan's most volatile regions, where a Taliban-led insurgency is waging an intensifying war against the government in Kabul. Today's attack is one of the deadliest so far this year, a time when attacks are escalating alongside a contentious election and the inauguration of President Ashraf Ghani in September. Afghanistan's parliament approved agreements today with the US and NATO allowing international troops to remain in the country past the end of this year. Ghani's first act after becoming president was to sign the agreements, which are bitterly opposed by the Taliban and other insurgent groups. (Read more Afghanistan stories.)Political correctness is sometimes dismissed as an overused cliché. But the real thing does exist — and its chilling effects are not limited to college campuses. The latest tale of ideology-driven bullying comes from the world of clinical psychotherapy and science journalism.
Earlier this month, New York magazine science columnist Jesse Singal wrote an extensively researched piece on the destruction of the Child Youth and Family Gender Identity Clinic in Toronto and the “show trial” of its leader, 65-year-old psychologist Kenneth Zucker, who was fired from his job at one of Canada’s largest mental hospitals last December.
Zucker and his clinic had specialized in counseling for children and adolescents with gender dysphoria — the feeling that there is a mismatch between one’s biological sex and one’s gender identity.
In the present cultural climate, these are treacherous waters.
Transgender activists believe all children who express cross-gender identification should be steered toward transitioning. Zucker and other psychologists believe that a child’s identity is often malleable and complicated by such factors as fantasy. They advocate a more cautious approach, including counseling that could help the child adjust to his or her natal gender.
For instance, they say, a boy may feel that he must “really” be a girl because he loves making art and dislikes rough-and-tumble play. The therapist can help him understand that one can be a male with non-stereotypical interests and find him male playmates with a similar play style.
To most transgender activists, any counseling that encourages adjustment rather than transition is comparable to “reparative therapy” to turn gay people straight. Yet Singal makes a convincing case that these are very different issues.
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Gay conversion therapy is thoroughly debunked as worthless. On the other hand, studies consistently show most gender-dysphoric children become cisgender adults (i.e. with a gender identity consistent with biological sex). Interestingly, many grow up gay.
Counseling intended to “cure” a child or teen with a transgender identity can be damaging; in one reported case, such forcible, religiously oriented therapy was blamed for the suicide of transgender Ohio teen Leelah Alcorn. But proposals to ban all therapy oriented toward adjustment to natal gender are a rush to judgment that could hurt real people, like those who see Zucker as a lifesaver.
What Singal documents in his column is a witch-hunt: a hasty review by people with little scholarly expertise who credited uncorroborated — and in some cases, later disproved — claims of misconduct against Zucker and his staff.
The closure of the Toronto clinic was roundly celebrated in left-of-center media. One might think Singal’s devastating report — coming from a journalist squarely on the progressive side in the culture wars — would be cause for second thoughts. Instead, it led, predictably, to nasty attacks on Singal.
The website Feministing asserted, without seeking comment from Singal, that he seems “uncomfortable with trans people existing.” When Singal tried to defend himself on Twitter, he was falsely accused of inciting his critics’ harassment. Prominent left-wing blogger Sady Doyle suggested he was “straight-up harassing women.”
In an email exchange, Singal stressed that he does not regard the attacks as harassment or abuse (he received no threats of violence, for example). Nonetheless, it’s the sort of backlash that can discourage journalists from tackling controversial topics.
How to best help kids with gender identity issues is an important, complex question. It calls for respectful debate, not dogma and witch-hunts.
Cathy Young is a regular contributor to Reason magazine and Real Clear Politics.Soylent’s efforts to replace regular solid food have been derailed. The Silicon Valley startup has been forced to take its flagship meal replacement powder off the market following multiple reports of nausea, vomiting, and other gastrointestinal issues. This is the second product Soylent has pulled in recent weeks because of customer complaints.
The pitch for Soylent is that it’s easier and cheaper than eating regular healthy food. You can get a cheeseburger pretty cheap, but living entirely on fast food isn’t smart. Soylent is designed to include all the fats, carbohydrates, vitamins, protein, and other nutrients you need to consume in a day. So, instead of making dinner or paying someone else to do it, you mix up some Soylent when you have a spare moment and guzzle it down.
Soylent has been gaining popularity, especially in the tech sector. Soylent announced the v2.0 update to its formula last year, but it has only been available as a pre-mixed bottle. The dry powder is the more economical option, and it’s still at v1.6. That’s what has been causing the stomach issues for consumers, but the v1.5 formulation wasn’t doing that. The company contends that only 0.1% of its customers have experienced any problems with the 1.6 powder. Testing has allegedly ruled out any food-borne pathogens or toxic materials.
The recently released nutrition bars were pulled several weeks ago because of similar complaints. So, Soylent says it has narrowed the cause down to one of several ingredients that were added in the v1.6 powder and were present in the nutrition bar. For the time being, you can still buy the Soylent drink, which costs $32 for 12 bottles, but you drink five per day for a full Soylent diet. The powder was only $54 for a month supply.Updated April 17, 2014, at 9:58 a.m. ET with police reportedly saying that text messages sent from the ferry had been faked.
MOKPO, South Korea - Fears rose Thursday for the fate of 287 passengers still missing more than 24 hours after their ferry flipped onto its side and filled with water off the southern coast of South Korea.
A coast guard official said the death toll was now confirmed at nine, but that is expected to rise sharply because the missing have now spent more than a day either trapped in the ferry or in the cold seawater.
There were 475 people aboard - many of them high school students on a class trip - and frantic parents have gathered at their school near Seoul and in Mokpo in the south of the country, not far from where the ferry slipped beneath the surface until only the blue-tipped, forward edge of the keel was visible.
Divers, helicopters and boats continued their search Thursday for survivors, but the high number of people unaccounted for - possibly trapped in the ship or floating in the chilly water nearby - raised fears that the death toll could increase drastically.
A partially sunken ferry is seen off South Korea's southwest coast in this still image from a video released by the South Korean coast guard April 16, 2014. REUTERS TV, Reuters
South Korean news outlets reported that many of the passengers sent text messages to loved ones as they awaited rescue, but on Thursday police told the Yonhap News Agency that those messages had been faked.
Coast guard spokesman Cho Man-yong said Thursday morning that rescuers in a vessel had found another body floating in the sea, raising the confirmed death toll to seven. Hours later, officials said the toll had climbed to nine.
WATCH: South Korean ferry rescue raw video
It was still unknown why the ferry sank. CBS News' Seth Doane reported that many survivors said they heard a loud crash before the ship began to tilt badly. Coast guard officials were interviewing the captain and crew
The Sewol, a 480-foot vessel that can hold more than 900 people, set sail Tuesday from Incheon, in northwestern South Korea, on an overnight, 14-hour journey to the tourist island of Jeju.
The ferry was three hours from its destination when it sent a distress call after it began listing to one side, according to the Ministry of Security and Public Administration.
CBS News
Passenger Kim Seong-mok told broadcaster YTN that after having breakfast, he felt the ferry tilt and then heard it crash into something. He said he was certain that many people were trapped inside the ferry as water rushed in and the severe tilt of the vessel kept them from reaching the exits.
Rescued passenger Koo Bonn-hee, 36, said many people were trapped inside by windows that were too hard to break.
"The rescue wasn't done well. We were wearing life jackets. We had time," Koo, who was on a business trip to Jeju with a co-worker, said from a hospital bed in Mokpo, the nearest major city to the site of the accident, where he was treated for minor injuries. "If people had jumped into the water... they could have been rescued. But we were told not to go out."
Oh Yong-seok, a 58-year-old crew member who escaped with about a dozen others, including the captain, told The Associated Press that rescue efforts were hampered by the ferry's severe tilt.
"We couldn't even move one step. The slope was too big," Oh said.
A family member of a missing student who was on the South Korean ferry Sewol, which sank in the sea off Jindo, attends a candlelight vigil at Danwon High School in Ansan April 16, 2014. YONHAP/ REUTERS
The Sewol's wreckage is in waters a little north of Byeongpung Island, which is not far from the mainland and about 290 miles from Seoul.
"We cannot give up," said South Korean President Park Geun-hye, after a briefing in Seoul. "We have to do our best to rescue even one passenger."
White House spokesman Jay Carney said the U.S. and its 7th Fleet stood ready to assist, including the USS Bonhomme Richard, which was in the region.
The last major ferry disaster in South Korea was in 1993, when 292 people were killed.
TV stations broadcast live pictures Wednesday of the listing Sewol as passengers clambered over the side, jumped into the sea or were hoisted up by helicopters. At least 87 vessels and 18 aircraft swarmed around the stricken ferry.
The water temperature in the area was about 54 degrees Fahrenheit, cold enough to cause signs of hypothermia after about 1 1/2 hours of exposure, according to an emergency official who spoke on condition of anonymity because department rules did not allow talking to the media.
A woman with a loved one aboard a South Korean ferry that sank in the sea off Jindo cries as she waits for news. KIM HONG-JI, REUTERS
Lee Gyeong-og, a vice minister for the Public Administration and Security Ministry, said the ocean was 121 feet deep in the area.The survivors - wet, stunned and many without shoes - were brought to nearby Jindo Island, where medical teams wrapped them in pink blankets and checked for injuries before taking them to a cavernous gymnasium.
As the search dragged on, families of the missing gathered at a nearby dock, some crying and holding each other. Boats circled the sunken ferry into the night, illuminated by red flares.
Angry shouts could be heard when Prime Minister Chung Hong-won visited a shelter where relatives of the missing passengers waited for news. Some yelled that the government should have sent more divers to search the wreckage.
The numbers of passengers, as well as the dead and missing, fluctuated throughout the day. As of early Thursday, South Korean authorities estimated 475 people were on the ferry.
Of that total, there were 325 students and 15 teachers from Danwon High School in Ansan, a city near Seoul. They were headed to Jeju for a four-day trip, according to a relief team set up by Gyeonggi province.
Authorities said the dead included a female member of the crew and two male students. Details on the others were not immediately known. Kang Byung-kyu, a government minister, said 55 people were injured. Coast guard officials put the number of survivors early Thursday at 179.
Many South Korean high schools organize trips for first- or second-year students, and Jeju is a popular destination. The students on the ferry were in their second year, which would make most of them 16 or |
ad’s perfectly conceived drawings. The new version was faithful, all right, but to the wrong source material. “So, I went and found the guy in charge of doing the sets for the film – not the designer but the engineer,” says Castle. “We hired him as a consultant and said: ‘Look, here are the concept drawings of the set for, let’s say Deckard’s office or home, and here’s what’s in the film. How did you get from there to there?’ “He said: ‘Well, we looked at Syd Mead’s stuff and said we’d love to do it, but we don’t have a million dollars to build each set. So, we just went to the scrapyard, these props rooms, and grabbed anything similar and just bolted it on, spraypainted it and whatever we had to do to get it as close as we could.’ With that revelation, I went back to our 3D artists and said: ‘Look, you have access to these 3D libraries with all this stuff you can use, and you’re no longer permitted to make anything from scratch. You can only cull things and modify them; you can cut it, repaint it and scale it, but you can’t rebuild.’ Using that same discipline, we got a look in the game that felt very, very close.”
“Sound’s always been a big part of a game’s atmosphere to me. Mike Legg’s been friends with New Age composer David Arkenstone for a long time; he pulled Arkenstone in to provide some of the game’s original music such as the World Music stuff in the market scenes. Frank Klepacki was the in-house composer; he did perfect covers of some of the Vangelis tunes. I remember a scene where McCoy goes out on his balcony to look over the city; we kicked in one of the Vangelis tunes and it was very atmospheric. Of course, because of the dramatic camera angle McCoy’s slice model was rendering at a magnification he was never intended for, so he looked horrible. That detracted somewhat.” – James McNeill, Core Programmer
E xtraordinarily so, in fact, for a game released while 3D hardware was still finding its feet in the PC market. Just a small handful of sets were used to make the movie, recycled and positioned to look like many more. The game had to build 100, many open to player exploration, “with richness and density in the millions of polygons. Graphics cards at the time could manage, at best, a couple of hundred polygons per frame. Even the highest-end graphics card would have had a terrible time reproducing one character, much less these rich environments with all their lighting effects.” So Westwood built a new technology based on one of gaming’s timeless curios, voxels. Used to make units that could scale and rotate in Command & Conquer: Tiberian Sun, Blade Runner married them to another bleeding-edge invention. In the mid-’90s, a game that attempted 1,000 motion-captured sequences would be rightly considered a dangerous folly; Blade Runner features 20,000. Each of its scenes is essentially a miniature movie, and sees visual and geometric data compressed and uncompressed on a frame-by-frame basis. Opening the door to a primitive yet effective form of dynamic lighting, this lets the game’s voxel objects – the characters and flying Spinner cars – add light to an otherwise prerendered scene. It’s a form of deferred rendering, effectively, introduced years before games like Killzone 2 popularised it. “But where the technology let us down was in the time and energy needed to process the motion-capture,” says Castle. “We were capturing at 60 frames per second, and the characters in voxel space took up so much that we had to go through them, removing those frames by hand using keyframing.” The original voxel objects weighed in at around seven megabytes in size while hardware at the time could manage only about 100K. Automatic optimisation would leave them unbearably blocky, leaving Westwood to do it by hand. Naturally, the studio didn’t have time for 20,000 sequences, which is why some of the game’s objects look plain bizarre. Castle sighs: “It just took too long.”
“We went through a variety of engine concepts: straight-up voxels (a form of this ended up being done in Command & Conquer 2), Gouraud-shaded triangles, and the eventual “slice model” that we settled on. We had migrated to version 1 of 3D Studio Max right around the time I was hired so I plunged straight into writing a custom renderer plugin for Max to generate the models. It involved lots of back and forth with the folks at Autodesk (or whichever company it was at that time) as the APIs for renderers were not well documented.” – James McNeill, Core Programmer
“It was clear we had numerous ‘unknowns’ as we got into production. To stay grounded we tried to address risks early on, and had the bulk of development to work out the kinks. We’d committed to using motion capture and we adopted 3DSMax immediately. There was no out-of-the-box ability to get mo-cap from our Vicon system onto character rigs, so one of our programmers wrote a proprietary plugin that generated an FK rig in Max that could receive mapped marker data. There were some nuances but it was solid and produced results.” – David Austin, 3D Artist
W as dedicated hardware ever considered? “People ask me that,” he replies. “’Why didn’t you just use 3D?’ Well, that’s easy to say now we have full rendering pipelines and shaders, but back then you just didn’t. You had a few vertex-shaded polygons and the texel mapping just wasn’t accurate on a lot of the cards. Nowadays I’d do it all in 3D. But I gotta tell you, the time’s coming when voxels and raytracing will come back into the fold because the rendering pipelines are so complex that we’re flipping back to computational load, a pixel-by-pixel solution. All technology ebbs and flows.” Which is more than can be said for game design methodology. Beyond something like a Police Quest or the odd RPG/point-and-click hybrid – Microprose’s Bloodnet, perhaps, or Esprit Software’s BAT – few other games play anything like Blade Runner. Hopping between on-site and menu-driven detective work, making occasional use of the movie’s Voight-Kampff and ESPER machines and even rarer use of the gun, it knows the darkest secret of adventure gaming – that if you want to be really interesting, sometimes you have to be really quite boring. “Blade Runner creates a very specific emotional experience – not one of horror or action-based fear but one of terror,” says Castle. “There’s actually very little action in that film, but when it happens it’s violent, explosive and deadly. I wanted to make a game where the uncertainty of what’s going to happen makes you quiver with anticipation every time you click the mouse. Things could go horribly wrong but most of the time they don’t; most of the time it’s simple.” Indeed, much of your time as hero Ray McCoy is spent in point-and-click limbo, visiting and revisiting people and places, wondering which overlooked action will open the next chapter. Most of your shots are fired in a training room as part of a routine that includes trading clues with a police mainframe, travelling in lifts, feeding a dog, travelling in more lifts and occasionally getting some sleep. “You had to be doing something that was distracting you from the physical, so when the violence came you were shocked,” says Castle, before describing how he’d apply the same principle to Scott’s other sci-fi classic, Alien: “Most of the time you’d be dealing with the problems of the Nostromo, how to fix it and who the android is. But when the alien appeared, by God you’d have to fight like a devil.”
“The initial prototype of McCoy walking around was a series of traditional animated sprites rendered at eight facings. It looked really sharp but had fairly high memory/disk requirements; I want to say 50mb for the full walk cycle but at this point it’s a wild guess. Eventually we developed various tricks to help integrate the characters better into the pre-rendered backdrops (I think they were four-second loops, rendered at 15 fps): lighting, fogging, skewing to match perspective, and moving-camera backdrops for transitions. One of the big technical changes with that game was the establishment of a motion capture stage at Westwood. I remember that Joe Kucan, our director – better known as the villain of Command & Conquer – provided the swivel-hipped walk of hard-as-nails female cop Crystal Steele. I believe some professionals were brought in for motion capture of the strippers, though.” – James McNeill, Core Programmer
W ho the androids are is, of course, the crux of a Blade Runner story, especially when looking in the mirror. Westwood didn’t want to spend four CDs’ worth of time and money on a game you only played once, so the problem became one of recycling uncertainty. How do you solve the investigation, expose the fugitives and read the script without ripping the game’s heart out? Simple, thought Castle – you make a ‘story simulator’ instead, a script that even the writers can’t predict. “You’d think I’d have learned by now,” he laughs, “not to be seduced by these easy-to-express, difficult-to-execute ideas. A living, breathing city that adapts to what you do? That’s very easily said.” In early prototypes, all of the Replicant identities were randomly assigned, but this proved baffling for playtesters. Have you ever retired a human by mistake? Yes, they answered, after bungling the investigation at the first opportunity. Making the first and last suspects – meathead chef Zuben and the majestic, psychotic Clovis – always be Replicants helped ground the game’s story, but still couldn’t save a valiant QA department from a reported 2,500 playthroughs. The game’s script, penned by Bud Yorkin’s son David and lead designer David Leary, had swollen from 80 to 500 pages. Castle recalls how Yorkin’s first draft, an attempted videogame script, just didn’t work. Instead, he was asked to write a movie script for a hypothetical Blade Runner sequel. This gave Westwood a cast of characters so in keeping with the movie’s bitterness that they’re now considered canon by fans. There’s animal counterfeiter Runciter, troubled teenager and potential Replicant Lucy, hotshot Blade Runner Crystal Steele, and a new band of escaped Replicants, some looking for revenge, others simply looking for a life. “David [Yorkin] might have one line in his dialogue that read: ‘The brownstones looked particularly out of place because they were lost in the 1950s.’ So we’d research all that stuff and build a set based on that one observation,” recalls Castle. And where the locations were too close to warrant cutscene transitions, more were built to connect them. “We did a lot of location stuff in LA, on the sets where they’d done things like the Bradbury building. We included a lot more of that building than was seen in the actual film.”
“To avoid duplication of effort, streamline production and adopt a Hollywood set mentality, we created a library of 3D and 2D assets that were re-purposed throughout creation of our environments. Everything, from street lights with animated volumetric light cones to umbrellas with neon shafts, were a part of the library. We were always adding new models and snagging unique elements from our scenes that could be quickly modified to serve a new purpose. The only real challenges I recall were the quick bloating of scenes or when a plugin caused network render issues.” – David Austin, 3D Artist
B lade Runner had, fittingly, become a colossal undertaking of its own. Castle admits: “It took longer than expected and cost more than we wanted, and there were poignant moments where we said: ‘OK, can we reduce the scope?’ But I’d say that sheer tenacity and a desire to do it right got us through those things. Before we even started we had beautiful work, and as the game came together looking just like it, people were so enamoured that we could have just kept going and gotten any amount of money. Time was our enemy; we just couldn’t get to everything we wanted.” It was a familiar outcome sadly never followed by a ‘final’ or even ‘director’s’ cut. A ‘designer’s’ cut, yes, but that was just a menu option to trim the game’s dialogue. There were “deep discussions” about a sequel, and the game’s success – it outsold 1997’s The Curse Of Monkey Island by three to one, claims Castle, shifting over a million copies – made it seem inevitable. “But even with that kind of volume, the mere fact it was four CDs made it a very expensive game. And the deal we had with the Blade Runner Partnership meant it was not terribly profitable. It didn’t do as well as you might think.” Looking simply at gross sales and ignoring the costs of making, much less publishing such an epic, the Blade Runner Partnership wanted an ever bigger slice of its successor. In the end, Castle himself pulled the plug. “It was untenable, too great a risk. We were under the impression they’d get someone else to do it, but I gather they couldn’t find anyone to go along with the terms they thought were fair.” Want proof? Ask Gearbox. In 2009, the Borderlands creator described how it was offered the licence, calculated it would cost $35m to develop and that it would never make the money back. It would be a game, agrees Castle, to “challenge anybody’s sense of a reasonable business rubric. You’re not going to succeed unless you do it extraordinarily well, and that won’t happen without an extraordinarily good team with an extraordinary amount of money. And then you have a partnership that demands a giant chunk because it’s not their job to take risks. Put that in a recipe and bake it and you don’t end up with cake.” Tragically, and despite the resurrections of games like Beneath A Steel Sky and The Secret Of Monkey Island, there won’t even be a remake. To restore almost a terabyte of assets, whether for new prerendered backdrops or full realtime 3D, would itself cost tens of millions of dollars. What’s worse, you’d have to find them to start with, which might well require a time machine; stored on magnetic platters, most of Blade Runner vanished when Westwood was liquidated by EA in 2003. Lost, you might say, like tears in rain. 0 0 99 0 0Nawazuddin Siddiqui's visit to his village, the hamlet of Budhana in Muzaffarnagar, has turned out to be unusually unpleasant. For a week, he has been countering allegations of assault and dowry harassment levelled by his sister-in-law against him and his family. And now, after he had agreed to play a small role in the local Ramlila of his hometown, the performance was stopped by the Shiv Sena, who objected to 'a Muslim actor being on stage in the Ramlila'.On Tuesday, Nawaz was approached by artists from Budhana's Ramlila, asking him to attend the function. When the actor insisted that he was willing to play even some minor part in the production, the crew arranged for him to play Mareech on Wednesday. 'People had come to invite me for the Ramlila and I asked them if I could play a character in it, since it was something I had always wanted to do. They offered me the role of Mareech, since it was the only one that was to be staged before I had to leave for Delhi,' the actor had happily told us before he went on stage.However, on Wednesday night, minutes before Nawaz was to go on stage, around a dozen activists from the local unit of Shiv Sena asked the organisers to stop the performance because they were against 'a Muslim actor going on stage in a Ramlila'. Mukesh Sharma, the Shiv Sena's Muzaffarnagar vice president, told us, 'In the 50-60 year history of the Budhana Ramlila, no Muslim artist has set foot on the stage. We couldn't allow that now. It's about tradition. On top of that, it is wrong on the part of the Ramlila organisers to chuck out the actor who was initially supposed to play Mareech at the last minute, just so that they could have a famous actor on stage. Moreover, Nawazuddin is a disputed figure here. His sister-in-law has levelled allegations of assault and dowry harassment against him. We shouldn't have such a person associated with the Ramlila.'READ ALSO:After the Shiv Sena's protest, the organisers decided to call off the Ramlila for the night, which meant that Nawaz could not take the stage in front of his home crowd. The organisers say that it was the actors performing in the Ramlila who had spoken to Nawaz, and they were not in the loop on the whole development. Damodar Sharma, president of Budhana's Ramlila Committee, says, 'The committee wasn't informed in time about Nawazuddin playing Mareech. It was a decision taken by the artists. We got to know only two hours before the performance and before we could request for additional police presence, the protesters reached the spot. We realised that given Budhana is a communally sensitive area, it would not be wise to argue with them. Hence, we decided not to proceed with it.'It would have been Nawaz's first performance in his hometown, Budhana, and he had told us that his family and friends were very excited at the prospect of seeing him act. Before the protest, he had told us, 'All day, my family and friends had been texting all our acquaintances in town and everyone is very excited to see me act. Everyone has come. For me, it is special because it is the first time I will be acting in my hometown. That was a desire I had since I was a kid.'READ ALSO:Police officials say that they were not asked for any additional security, and it was the decision of the Ramlila organisers not to go ahead with Nawaz's performance. DK Tyagi, SHO, Budhana, says, 'We had deployed our men there, as we do every year, but there was no law and order issue. It must have been a decision by the organisers not to stage the Ramlila, because there was no insistence or pressure from our side. The two sides talked and reached some agreement themselves. We were not asked to intervene. In fact, if Nawazuddin Siddiqui performs on stage now, we will provide security and ensure there is no problem at the venue.'Before this unfortunate development, Nawaz had told Delhi Times that acting in Budhana's Ramlila had been a childhood dream for him. When asked why performing in the Ramlila meant so much to him, the actor had said, 'When I was growing up here, there was boy named Madan who used to play Ram in the local Ramlila. Even though he was my age, we all used to respect him because of the aura around him, since he was Ram. I used to be fascinated by that. Toh tab se hi khwahish thi ki mujhe bhi Ramlila mein perform karna hai.'Government benefits such as Social Security, Medicare, and unemployment insurance now account for more than a third of all wages in the United States. The social welfare benefits accounted for 35 percent of wages and salaries this year, compared to 21 percent in 2000, CNBC reported In 1960, they made up just 10 percent, according to a study of Bureau of Economic Analysis data conducted by TrimTabs Investment Research. The situation is expected to get worse as waves of baby boomers begin to retire.TrimTabs’ Madeline Schnapp said the “U.S. economy has become alarmingly dependent on government stimulus. Consumption supported by wages and salaries is a much stronger foundation for economic growth than consumption based on social welfare benefits,” CNBC said.In order to get back to a pre-recession rate of 26 percent, Schnapp said “either wages and salaries would have to increase $2.3 trillion, or 35 percent, to $8.8 trillion, or social welfare benefits would have to decline $500 billion, or 23 percent, to $1.7 trillion.”Nonetheless, the United States still trails European countries. As a comparison, Schnapp notes that in the United Kingdom, social welfare benefits make up 44 percent of wages and salaries, CNBC said.Each year on Sept. 26, Turkey proudly celebrates its annual Turkish Language Day with conferences and festive ceremonies around the country. This year was no exception, with many leading politicians issuing statements calling on the Turkish people to continue their efforts to cherish the Turkish sensibility of language for future generations. President Recep Tayyip Erdogan said that Turkish is an “assurance of our people’s unity and solidarity.” Prime Minister Binali Yildirim hailed Turkish as a language that is among the most important and prevalent ones in the world, in terms of its geographical spread, the number of people who speak it and its richness. Kemal Kilicdaroglu, the leader of the Republican People’s Party, extensively praised the heritage Mustafa Kemal Ataturk’s reforms produced for the Turkish language.
As a foreigner who learned Turkish as a fifth language, let me tell you that the Turkish mother tongue is quite difficult to learn — as an example, how about "Cekoslovakyalilastiramadiklarimizdanmissiniz" as one word — but also very beautiful and captivating. What is even more fascinating, though, is the political wars that are waged over the language.
One of the most important fronts in these wars is between the “old” and the “new” Turkish, and the ideologies that both symbolize in Turkish minds. The former reflects loyalty to the Ottoman past, while the latter refers to Ataturk’s so-called language revolution. Today, proponents and opponents of historical changes of the Turkish language continue clashing on the legacy left from the early Republican era.
The root of the problem is modernization. There was no strict language policy in the very diverse and multilingual Ottoman Empire. But in time a huge problem arose, as minorities — allowed to speak their own languages — could not understand Turkish people who spoke folk Turkish, perceived as a nomad language at the time. Moreover, the Ottoman language, a “higher” Turkish with strong influences of Persian (seen as the language of science and literature at the time) and Arabic (for its importance as the language of the Holy Quran), was spoken by the privileged ones in the palace. Something had to be changed. This first came with the Tanzimat (Reform) era that began in 1839. So by the late 19th and early 20th centuries, attempts for language simplification aimed at a “New Language” (Yeni Lisan) that everyone would understand were well in place.
When Ataturk came to power, he launched a “language revolution” as one of the most important tools for homogenizing the nascent nation. In 1928, the Arabo-Persian Ottoman script was changed to the Latin alphabet. Moreover, the Turkish Language Institute (TDK), founded in 1932, engaged in an effort to create “pure Turkish” (oz Turkce) by purging foreign elements and then standardizing to assimilate local dialects and languages. As academic Yilmaz Colak said, “It was one of the constituent parts of the planned secular conversion from the imperial religious to national secular culture.”
As a result of that “linguistic engineering,” speakers of today’s Turkish can choose between different words with the same meaning. Usually, this reflects one’s education, political orientation or background, so that a more religious Turk and practicing Muslim will prioritize usage of Ottoman-, Arabic- or Persian-influenced words. On the other hand, one who is more secular and republican nationalist will probably use “pure” Turkish words introduced by the language reform — or merely use Western words. For example, the words “mustesna,” “ozel” and “spesifik” mean the same thing, but they reflect traditionalism, Ataturkism and Westernism, respectively. One study confirmed how Turkish politicians also choose words attentively and “borrow their words from the languages they associate with their political orientation.”
Erdogan is one such politician who is careful about language. Last year, he stated at the opening of a private university, “It would be more beautiful if we say ‘kulliye’ [Ottoman architectural concept] instead of 'campus.'” It is also not surprising that Erdogan and his Justice and Development Party (AKP) deputies and followers praise Ataturk as a Gazi when they refer to him. Yet Mustafa himself had dropped that title — a word of Arabic origin — when the parliament gave him the name Ataturk (“Father of Turks”) in 1934, soon prohibited by law for any modification or use by anyone else. Expectedly, today the secularists use Ataturk — and rarely ever Gazi — when referring to him.
Another aspect of Ataturk’s language revolution was to force non-Muslims and non-Turkish Muslims (such as Kurds) to speak Turkish. This had a role in the making of “the Kurdish question,” and Kurds rightfully demanded the right to use their language in public, which was banned by Turkey’s past linguistic illiberalism. The list of positive steps that the AKP has taken while in power to offer more freedom for Kurds to practice Kurdish in public is not short. Unfortunately, the Kurdish demands do not end with those related to language, but extend to political claims that the government is unwilling to accept.
The main parties seem united on this matter, but the Nationalist Action Party is more hawkish than others. Its leader, Devlet Bahceli, used Turkish Language Day this year as an opportunity not only to panegyrize the Turkish language, but also to criticiz the government for any accommodation of Kurdish demands like education in their native language as a “wrongdoing” and a “sin.” Bahceli said, “Turkish is an oath; Turkishness is an honor. … Let’s not forget, the dream we saw is Turkish, our ideals are Turkish, our country is Turkey, and the hope and horizon of all of us is Turkey.”
New battles over the Turkish language have lately been added to existing tensions. Since July, Turkey has been traumatized by a failed military coup that the government blames on the Gulen community. Hence, the Foreign Ministry is doing its best to prevent festivals and cultural activities previously organized by the Gulenists from being held.
There are even controversies about patriarchy and misogyny transmitted through language. Earlier this year, the TDK's definition of the word “dirty” caused a flood of anger, because it gave as an example a “[woman] who is menstruating.” Similar reactions occurred earlier for the word “musait,” a Turkish word of Arabic origin meaning “available,” because the TDK explained it as a “[woman] who is available to flirt with and who can easily flirt.” Despite harsh criticisms, the TDK defended itself by claiming these definitions exist among people. Unfortunately, as critics rightly point out, “Through its many proverbs and expressions, the Turkish language has for decades allowed certain ideas about women to normalize actions of violence against them.”
Furthermore, critics complain that every new rule the TDK comes up with only creates more complications in the language. Linguist and writer Feyza Hepcilingirler said, “Instead of dealing with punctuation rules [related to freshly publicized changes for writing names of institutions], [the] TDK should [take] steps [to preserve the] Turkish [language] from degenerating tendencies and attacks from English.” Haberturk daily’s writer Murat Bardakci harshly criticized these changes as “nonsensical, unnecessary and confusing,” suggesting that no language in the world has probably been as pillaged or suffered as much as Turkish. Again, the TDK responded combatively to media criticism for publishing news without consulting them first, stating that this is not a new decision and “even primary school kids know [these punctuation rues].”
But while the TDK receives tough love for its decisions, others successfully promote interest in language and inspire interest for words both new and old. The forgotten words and their beautiful meanings that Banu and Onur Ertugrul have passionately shared on their Lugat 365 social media accounts since 2015 have become a sensation in Turkey, regardless of fans’ identities. The couple intended to popularize words that are no longer used among younger generations — their effort became so popular that the couple’s initiative has spread to a published book and on posters, bags, artistic objects and widely sold T-shirts. Separately from the commercial side, the enthusiastic Ertugruls successfully transmitted their appreciation for the value of old words into meaningful and attractive treasure.
So many different divisions continue to plague Turks. If only the Turkish language, with all its beauty, did not have to suffer from language battles its speakers bring upon themselves.In typical fashion T-Mobile USA has seized the marketing spotlight provided by Apple with its announcement of WiFi calling on the iPhone and launched what it’s calling its ‘WiFi Unleashed’ campaign. The iPhone 6 has been automatically added to the roster of smartphones that support the embedded WiFi calling offered by the US number four mobile operator.
The company says it will have 20 million smartphone customers (iPhone and Android) ready to take advantage of its hybrid plans which will enable 20 million of its customers to make calls across the WiFfi network. To herd the customers in, T-Mobile is going to offer a free upgrade for customers upgrading to its ‘Jump’ plan.
As we pointed out yesterday T-Mobile is a long-term enthusiast for WiFi calling, mostly because it has difficulty penetrating walls with its allotted cell frequencies. As a result it offers a free WiFi router for customers who find themselves in cellular not-spots. As a consequence it’s found itself in the right place at the right time to take first mover advantage of WiFi calling in the US.
According to top Frost & Sullivan Senior Analyst, Sheridan Nye, the move complements T-Mobile’s ‘uncarrier’ positioning and takes advantage of “relatively straightforward option of WiFi calling, while its larger rivals are focused on VoLTE, which is more complex to implement.”
According to Sheridan, the ability to manage the quality of experience, especially in minimising dropped calls and managing Wi-Fi to cellular hand-off is crucial: “Third and fourth-place mobile operators often lack technological depth and R&D investment, whereas T-Mobile can draw on the technological expertise of its parent Deutsche Telekom,” she points out in an advisory.
“T-Mobile’s Wi-Fi push illustrates the importance for operators to have access to a diversity of network options in order to deliver ubiquitous and reliable coverage. Diversity should be a core strategy for all carriers as the most cost-effective means to meet ever-increasing expectations of customers… [and should] … enable operators to reduce the key metric of dropped calls – arguably of more immediate concern to consumers than rapid call set-up, or even enhanced voice quality.”Ghazi Hamad, deputy foreign minister in the Hamas government, is thought to be one of the people spearheading the movement’s pragmatic wing. Two years ago, the secret channel of communication he maintained with Gershon Baskin led to a breakthrough in the protracted negotiations over the release of abducted Israeli soldier Gilad Shalit, in exchange for the release of over 1,000 Palestinians held in Israeli prisons. There can be no doubt that the results of these negotiations earned Hamad a position of honor within the Hamas movement and, more broadly, among the Palestinian public.
Hamad is considered to be very close to Hamas Prime Minister Ismail Haniyeh, whom he once served as spokesman, and to the chief of Hamas' political bureau, Khaled Meshaal, the movement’s newly reelected leader.
In an exclusive interview with Al-Monitor, Hamad analyzes the next steps that his movement will take, now that Khaled Meshaal has been reelected to head its reconstituted political bureau, and following the change within the movement's bureau.
Al Monitor: Does Meshaal’s election signify a change in Hamas' attitudes?
Hamad: First of all, we must remember that these were democratic elections, and as such, they are a credit to the movement. Elections for Hamas' other institutions ended a year ago, and that was the last time that the Hamas movement expressed confidence in its leaders and their proposal to institute changes to Hamas' policy. This included reconciliation with Fatah, among other things.
Al Monitor: When you talk about new policy, do you mean an end to the armed struggle and a transition to what Meshaal calls a "popular uprising"?
Hamad: As leader of the movement, Khaled Meshaal agreed to shift to a popular uprising. All of that began during the reconciliation talks. It emerged from a comprehensive vision of the movement’s future and the type of leadership that the Palestinian people need. And yet, though Meshaal is prepared to make a tactical shift to a popular uprising, armed struggle remains a legitimate right as long as the Occupation continues. At the same time, there is an extensive political and diplomatic program which we must advocate and work toward, and that includes joining the official institutions of the PLO. Those are our objectives, and that is our new approach.
Al Monitor: Does that include agreement to go back to the 1967 borders?
Hamad: Hamas has stated that it is prepared to accept a state within the 1967 borders.
Al Monitor: A two-state solution?
Hamad: We do not say "two states." We agree to the establishment of a Palestinian state with Jerusalem as its capital, within the 1967 borders, and that this would include a solution to the refugee problem. What I can tell you is that all factions in the movement agree to this and are prepared to accept it.
Al Monitor: And there’s no argument about that?
Hamad: I can’t tell you that there are no arguments about it. Some people in Hamas contend that Israel is not prepared to accept this principle [of the 1967 borders], as evidenced by its continued construction program in the settlements. However, in more general terms, I will say that Hamas agrees to a state within the 1967 borders.
Al Monitor: Does that mean recognizing Israel?
Hamad: There is still no change about that. Hamas does not recognize Israel.
Al Monitor: Dr. Hamad, let’s talk about the next steps. You plan to integrate Hamas into the PLO and to hold elections in the Palestinian Authority. What then?
Hamad: We would like to join the PLO, but first of all, we propose a structural change to the movement and the way its representatives are elected. There are plenty of problems that must be resolved first. We want to reform the way elections are held, to reformulate the Charter, etc. What I can tell you is that there are people who are working on that, and that once these problems are resolved, we will hold elections, both for Parliament and the presidency. But all of these steps will be taken in accordance with the understandings reached during our reconciliation with Fatah.
Al Monitor: As Hamas' deputy foreign minister, you are responsible for convincing the American government to remove Hamas from its list of terrorist organizations.
Hamad: That is a very important issue, and we are hard at work on it. It began once we felt a change after the war on Gaza [Israel's Operation Pillar of Defense]. There has been a change, such as the Muslim Brotherhood’s election in Egypt. It is part of the overall mood internationally. We are trying to convince anyone we can that the Hamas movement is not a terrorist organization. We are engaging with certain sectors in Europe, who are prepared to help us with that, and the reason that they are willing to help is because they are already convinced that it will improve the overall mood in the region. The current reality necessitates it.
Al Monitor: On a practical level, are you holding direct talks with the Americans about that?
Hamad: We have no problem conducting talks with the Americans, provided that they are interested. We are prepared to act through all of our institutions to prove that Hamas is not a terrorist organization. Hamas' position is clear. We accept the 1967 borders, and we are active in Europe, where there is a willingness and readiness to help.
Al Monitor: Which European countries? Can you tell us?
Hamad: No, but I have spoken with a lot of people who are convinced that Hamas is not a terrorist organization. Hamas put a stop to its resistance [terrorist attacks]. It respects the cease-fire. There has been a major change in policy.
Al Monitor: Which leads us to the last time missiles were fired from Gaza. Why don’t you stop the Salafist groups, who are firing Qassam rockets and mortars into Israel?
Hamad: I can say that things are under control. There is a cessation of hostilities. All of the factions are prepared to observe it on the basis of the agreements reached in Cairo. But it is true that there are some people who want to disrupt the calm and cause problems. That would not be beneficial to the people.
Al Monitor: What are you doing about them?
Hamad: We do not allow anyone to violate the cease-fire. As long as there is a comprehensive agreement to maintain this cessation of hostilities, everyone must observe it, without exception.
Shlomi Eldar is a contributing writer for Al-Monitor’s Israel Pulse. For the past two decades, he has covered the Palestinian Authority and especially the Gaza Strip for Israel’s Channels 1 and 10, and has reported on the emergence of Hamas.November home sales in the Vancouver area fell 28.6 per cent compared with a year ago as what was once the country's hottest real estate market continued to cool.
The Real Estate Board of Greater Vancouver says sales through its Multiple Listings Service totalled 1,686 for the month, down from 2,360 in November 2011.
Sales were also down 12.7 per cent from 1,931 home sales in October this year.
Despite the sharp drop in sales, the board said the MLS home price index composite benchmark for homes Greater Vancouver was $596,900, down just 1.7 per cent compared with a year ago. The index peaked in May at $625,100.
"Home sellers appear more inclined to remove their properties from the market today rather than lower prices to sell their properties," said Eugen Klein, president of the Real Estate Board of Greater Vancouver.
"On the other hand, buyers appear to be expecting prices to moderate."
Finance minister pleased
On Monday, Finance Minister Jim Flaherty said he was pleased housing was moderating in Canada, a shift |
, have made a judgment, and you, the American people, must take it on faith.”
James Clapper
As for the “shining example” of American democracy at home, Freeman and Reiner are doing the bidding of Clapper, who is directly responsible for shredding the Constitution and the Bill of Rights and establishing a surveillance police state structure that would be the envy of Orwell’s Big Brother.
Moreover, the hacked Democratic Party emails leaked by WikiLeaks during the 2016 election—attributed without any evidence to the machinations of Putin—contained true, not fake, information, which has not been contested by the Democrats or Clinton, about the anti-democratic efforts of the Democratic National Committee and the Clinton campaign to sabotage the challenge by Bernie Sanders, as well as the transcripts of Clinton’s fawning speeches to Wall Street, for which she received millions in speaking fees (i.e., bribes).
Such is the manipulated and anti-democratic character of a political system that enforces the monopoly of two right-wing capitalist parties that are controlled top to bottom by a financial oligarchy.
Have Reiner and Freeman thought about what an actual war with nuclear-armed Russia would mean? Tens of millions of dead, entire cities, regions or perhaps continents made uninhabitable, civilization thrown back decades or centuries. What incredible and contemptible irresponsibility!
It took right-winger Tucker Carlson of Fox News, of all people, to point out to Reiner some of the implications of his pro-war propaganda. On Carlson’s program Thursday, the host asked the actor-director, “How would you respond if President Trump took you seriously and sent the B-52s to St. Petersburg or blockaded the Gulf of Finland? Would you support that?”
Reiner responded disingenuously that “We’re not advocating going to war… or a traditional war with Russia… When we say we are at war, we are talking about a cyber war.” Carlson noted that the video “doesn't make that clear… Morgan Freeman who everyone trusts... [says] we’re at war.”
Foreign policy divisions are a major factor driving the current anti-Russia campaign. Clapper and company view Russia as an obstacle to Washington’s drive for world hegemony and consider the Trump administration too soft or too distracted in this regard.
But for figures like Reiner and Freeman, looming larger is the social situation in the US and their dread of a popular radicalization. Their repugnant efforts coincide with the publication of Hillary Clinton’s book, Google’s efforts at censorship of left-wing websites and the ever more frequent cries heard in the American media and political establishment that “fake news,” which increasingly means anti-establishment opinion, is the source of discontent and social instability in the US.
Thus, the preposterous assertion in Freeman’s video that Putin, “using social media to spread propaganda and false information,” has convinced “people in democratic societies to distrust their media, their political processes, even their neighbors.”
Reiner and Freeman, wealthy celebrities each reportedly worth hundreds of millions of dollars, are intervening to encourage trust in a media and political establishment that is utterly discredited in the eyes of vast layers of the American and world population.
For decades, Reiner has been a big money-raiser for the Democrats in Hollywood. He strenuously campaigned for Clinton in the last election cycle. In November 2015, for instance, Reiner and his wife held a fundraiser at their home in the affluent Brentwood neighborhood of Los Angeles. “Clinton attended a small reception in the Reiners’ entry parlor and later spoke in the garden, with about 350 in attendance,” according to Variety.
The event, “with tickets starting at $500, was billed as a conversation with Clinton.” The account continued: “Those who donated $2,700 got a photo with Clinton, and those who raised $27,000 got access to the host reception.”
Rob Reiner (Photo credit: Neil Grabowsky/Montclair Film Festival)
During the campaign, Reiner attributed the persistence of support for Trump to the racism of white working class males. Speaking of such support, he told the Hollywood Reporter in September 2016, “Look at the demographics: It’s mostly white males who don't have college degrees. And, you know, that’s Archie [Bunker]. Then there’s also a very serious strain of racism that runs through his followers…”
This is the voice of someone a thousand miles from the economic and social suffering of broad layers of the American population.
That Reiner is participating in the McCarthyite anti-Russian campaign has an ironic element. His father, Carl Reiner, veteran comedian, actor and director, had a brush with the anti-communist witch-hunts in the 1950s and even early 1960s.
The elder Reiner, now 95, had sufficient contact with left-wing figures in Hollywood during the time he was writing for and performing on Sid Caesar’s popular television program Your Show of Shows to warrant a visit from two FBI agents in 1954. They inquired about his voting habits and asked, according to Reiner, “Do you know any communists?”
Later, Reiner served as a “front”—someone who took public credit for the writing efforts of figures who were officially unemployable because of their association with the Communist Party—for blacklisted writer Frank Tarloff when Reiner was working on the Dick Van Dyke Show in the early 1960s.
Now his son is taking part in this vile sequel to the McCarthyite anti-Russian hysteria of the 1940s, ’50s and early ’60s.
Please enable JavaScript to view the comments powered by Disqus.General view of the former Olympic Village in Athens, ten years after the games. | Getty Opinion How the Olympics rotted Greece And here’s the obvious question: Should the International Olympic Committee shoulder some of the blame?
There is no better place to contemplate ephemeral human ambition and a crumbling national economy than a ruined building. In the aftermath of Sunday’s referendum, facing national debts of more than $349 billion and a collapsing economy, Athenians have plenty of choice. They can, of course, climb up to the Parthenon, but perhaps a better choice would be the overgrown Olympic tae kwon do, beach volleyball or softball stadia or the waterless Olympic swimming pools and canoe and kayak facilities.
There, and at the majority of other arenas built for the 2004 Games, nothing remains but decay. In those abandoned monuments to misjudgment, the Greeks might ponder Ozymandias: “‘Look on my works, ye Mighty, and despair!’” They might also ask why, on June 30, when Greece missed a payment to the International Monetary Fund, the International Olympic Committee couldn’t have dipped into its petty cash and found $1.7 billion.
Greece owes an awful lot of money to a lot of people.
But the IOC owes Greece.
* * *
Working out exactly how much the 2004 Olympics cost Greece is tricky. In 2013, Yannis Stournaras, then finance minister, argued that the Games had broken even. That August, he also said Greece would not need another bailout. Other estimates put the cost of the Athens Games at more than €7 billion, perhaps a lot more. Those figures may include upgrades to hospitals and archaeological sites. They do not include the cost of infrastructure projects such as a new airport, an extended and renovated subway and light rail systems.
The improved infrastructure is nice but the chief legacy of the Olympic Games is debt for the host. The IOC, on the other hand, reported that it made $985 million from the Athens Games.
Hosting major sporting events is not a paying proposition. Sports fans may travel to see the Olympics or a World Cup, but other tourists stay away. IOC insiders like to say that hosting the Games provides “intangible” benefits, though they have backed away in recent years from the grandiose claims that the 1988 Olympics brought democracy to South Korea.
The project was part of a mismanaged economic fantasy that has helped put Greece in a hole.
The 1992 Barcelona Games, held just 15 years after the restoration of democracy in Spain, are the shining example. The Olympics reinvigorated the city, though at great cost, and advertised that the country was open for business with the world. That vague marketing message is supposedly the chief benefit of hosting the Olympics in the 21st century. It is no accident that the last two Olympics were held in booming Beijing and in the shadow of the Canary Wharf office towers in the East End of London. In retrospect, however, the Athens Olympics, staged three and a half years after Greece joined the eurozone, marked the start of economic free fall.
The project was part of a mismanaged economic fantasy that has helped put Greece in a hole. Yet in this, as in so many of its missteps over the last 15 years, Greece was enabled by an agency in the wealthy heart of Europe. The IOC, nestling comfortably among the banks in Switzerland, should have known better. But the IOC, eager to distribute Olympic profits to its stakeholders (the National Olympic Committees and the international sports federations) and to promote the interests of its corporate partners (the sponsors and broadcasters), seems not to care. It brings its circus to town for 17 days and then, after the final fireworks end the most expensive party in the world, leaves, never to return. The host must clear up the broken bottles.
* * *
The painful Greek Olympic legacy is doubly relevant this month. Just nine days after the Greek referendum, the first test event for the Rio 2016 Olympics, the Volleyball World League Finals, start in the Maracanãzinho arena, in the shadow of the Maracanã soccer stadium.
The Athens Games were so expensive, in part, because the Greeks made such a mess of their preparations. The IOC warned the organizers repeatedly about delays. The late rush to completion escalated the costs. Rio has even bigger problems. In April 2014, John Coates, an IOC vice president, called its preparations the “worst ever,” according to the BBC.
In May, Reuters reported that the Games would cost Brazil $13.2 billion and that only about 10 percent of 56 Olympic projects were finished.
Brazil is already struggling with the legacy of the 2014 soccer World Cup, which cost it an estimated $14 billion and left it with hugely expensive stadiums it does not need. If the jungle reclaims the Arena Amazonia in Manaus, Brazilians will not even have the ruins to contemplate.
Some pundits have called for “austerity Olympics,” the name given to the London Games of 1948. While that might capture the mood of the times, IOC members, like the Greek public, have shown a marked reluctance to vote for austerity.
Yet the IOC could solve the problem of where to stage its increasingly costly Games and provide a helping hand to Greece by putting the Games permanently in Athens. Anyone who attended the 2004 Games has happy memories of the event, hot and humid though they were. The Greeks were good hosts. The country has historical and sentimental appeal. Greece was where the ancient Olympics were born. Athens was where the modern Olympics was reborn. Athens has the facilities. They aren’t being used for anything else. They need work, but putting the Games permanently in one place will allow it to become profitable for the host as well as for the IOC.
And the IOC is one of the few international institutions that owes a debt to Greece.
Peter Berlin covered global soccer for 20 years for the Financial Times and then the International Herald Tribune. He is now a freelance journalist covering soccer for, among others, Sports Illustrated.
Authors:Scace was involved in a civil motor vehicle infraction in July “after he had been drinking alcohol and was en route to purchase more,” according to a probable cause statement prepared by Massachusetts State Police Detective Brian Foley.
Details of that incident weren’t included in the court filing, but it was noted that the Dalton Police Department was notified, which caused Scace “considerable angst.”
Later that evening, Scace became “enraged,” and began destroying property inside the home and smashed the woman’s cellphone to prevent her from calling for help, the report said. The woman left the house, but Scace allegedly followed her outside, threw her to the ground, kicked her in the ribs and wrapped his hands around her neck and throttled her hard enough to cause “significant” bruising.
The woman went back inside the house and saw Scace enter the basement and re-emerge holding a black handgun, believed to be his service weapon.
When he was asked what he was going to do with the weapon, Scace allegedly placed the firearm to the side of the woman’s head, touching it with the end of the muzzle.
The woman told officers she was in fear for her life, the report said. Scace apologized the following morning and said he did not remember what he’d done.
The probable cause statement says this is the second incident in which Scace forcibly prevented a victim from accessing their cellphone to call for help. There is no information in the court file about the alleged earlier incident.Russian archaeologists are conducting an underwater expidition in search of the remains of an ancient civilization at the bottom of the lake Issyk Kul in Kyrgyzstan, Nikolay Lukashov, the president of the Russian Confederation of Underwater Activities, told RIA Novosti Monday.
MOSCOW, August 25 (RIA Novosti) - Russian archaeologists are conducting an underwater expidition in search of the remains of an ancient civilization at the bottom of the lake Issyk Kul in Kyrgyzstan, Nikolay Lukashov, the president of the Russian Confederation of Underwater Activities, told RIA Novosti Monday.
“During the expedition, which is led by Professor Vladimir Ploskikh from the Kyrgyz Academy of Sciences, Kyrgyz and Russian scientists plan to explore underwater archaeological sites to test the hypothesis of the ancient, so-called Andronovo culture, located in the area that is now flooded by the waters of Issyk Kul,” Lukashov said.
According to Lukashov, underwater archeologists are to continue their studies of a settlement that was discovered at the bottom of the lake during the last expedition. Radiocarbon dating has shown the flooded settlement existed for over 3,000 years. Scientists also plan to resume their search for a medieval monastery, which, according to the Catalan Atlas of 1375, is the resting place of apostle and evangelist Matthew.
This year marks 30 years of cooperation between the Russian Confederation of Underwater Activities and Kyrgyz historians. The first joint exploration of Issyk Kul was conducted in 1984 under Stanislav Prapor. Well-known divers, historians and athletes took part in the examination of the lake.
Issyk Kul is one of the largest and deepest lakes in the world, with a top length of 182 kilometers and depth of 668 metres. The lake is located in the northern Tian Shan mountains of eastern Kyrgyzstan.This story appears in the April 17, 2017 issue of SPORTS ILLUSTRATED. To subscribe, click here.
The black Nissan Altima pulls up to the back door of a New Orleans photo studio on an overcast Thursday in March. Inside the car, Leonard Fournette’s six-foot, 240-pound body is wedged into shotgun, slung diagonally, his right shoulder pinned against the door and his left knee crunched into the dashboard. He arrives clad head-to-toe in Under Armour athleisure-wear, on his face the look of polite engagement. The few remaining weeks until the NFL draft are a countdown to the rest of Fournette's football destiny, when a decade of inevitability meets reality.
Since his days at New Orleans’s Goretti Playground, where disbelieving youth league coaches consistently asked to see the boy’s birth certificate, this all seemed fated. He’s the football version of an AAU basketball prodigy: identified prepuberty, followed so avidly through high school and college that when he turns pro it feels anticlimactic.
Fournette has always been on an accelerated path. During one freshman football game at St. Augustine High (grades 7 through 12), he moonlighted at nosetackle and racked up 11 sacks. Soon after, his coach, David Johnson, was called in to see St. Augustine’s principal. The opposing school had accused Johnson of playing a senior. “Ohhhh!” the principal exhaled after Johnson explained. “You could have just told me it was Leonard.” Leonard was still in eighth grade.
By his first varsity snap, when he was a freshman, nearly everyone in the area knew Leonard. Veteran varsity players cowered away from tackling him in practice. After his third game he became the first ninth-grader ever offered a scholarship by LSU. He was 15. “It doesn’t take long to recognize greatness,” Tigers assistant Frank Wilson told a friend at the time.
As a senior he was the nation’s No. 1 recruit. A documentary filmmaker followed him. New Orleans rapper Lil Wayne tweeted about him. Before he ever took a snap in Baton Rouge, Tigers coach Les Miles compared him with Michael Jordan. “When Leonard was in high school, he was bigger than even Drew Brees in New Orleans,” says former NOPD superintendent Eddie Compass, a mentor to Fournette. “No slight to Drew Brees.”
NFL draft Big Board: Fournette No. 10 on SI's top 40 prospects | Full position rankings
Now the mind-boggling amateur ascent is about to collide with professional reality. Fournette, 22, is widely considered the top running back available on April 27, the first day of the draft, and he could go as high as No. 4, to the Jaguars. Could he end up with the Jets at No. 6? The Chargers at 7? Carolina at 8? It would be shocking if he slipped past 10. Inside the photo studio, Fournette patiently models the jerseys of each team. Nothing about the process, about the What-if? speculation, fazes him.
Wherever he lands, Fournette will headline a draft class that has the talent to make running backs chic again in the NFL. The blistering 2016 rookie season by the Cowboys’ Ezekiel Elliott is having a ripple effect; scouts are “putting their retro Jordans back on,” as one player personnel exec explains.
It has been 12 years since three tailbacks were picked in the top 20 of the draft. Can Fournette lead a few of his peers into the first round? “I believe,” he says, “that I’m a big game-changer.”
Dylan Buell/Getty Images
Leonard Fournette wore number 7 at LSU as a tribute to the New Orleans neighborhood where he grew up, the Seventh Ward, a notorious area with a violent crime rate that is estimated to be 217% higher than the national average. Fournette speaks about his childhood comfortably, concluding that top prospects from, say, Texas or Florida lack his perspective. “The dudes you grew up with are killers, murderers,” he says, “but they’re your friends, people you’ve known since you were young.”
Fournette’s family moved to Slidell, just northeast of the city, when Leonard was 10. Recognizing the boy’s talent (and need for discipline), his parents sent him in 2008 to St. Augustine, an all-boys’ school 45 minutes away with alumni that include judges and mayors, former NBA coach of the year Avery Johnson and All-Pro Cardinals safety Tyrann Mathieu. St. Augustine famously allowed corporal punishment until ’11, when it became the last known Catholic school in the U.S. to stop using it—but before that, Fournette says his butt endured countless paddlings. How bad did it hurt? “Depends on who you got hit by,” he says.
St. Augustine is also where a cocoon formed around the young man, protecting him off the field and allowing him to maximize his talents on it. To ease his morning commute, Leonard moved in with Corey Scott, a prominent St. Augustine graduate who lived near the school. (Scott, 35, is now Fournette’s manager; he'll move with him wherever he’s drafted.) Compass, the police superintendent, became Fournette’s personal trainer. A doctor, a chiropractor and a masseuse—all with ties to St. Augustine—began working with Fournette before and after games. Even documentary filmmaker Kenny Chenier, another St. Augustine grad, played mentor while he filmed Road to Stardom: The Leonard Fournette Story. A simple plan emerged, Chenier says: “We’re not going to let you fail.”
As Fournette matured he developed an understanding of his potential, his ability to impact his city beyond the end zone. Johnson implored the young man to respect the “special gift” he had, and so Leonard avoided Bourbon Street. He skipped his junior prom and lived the bizarre teenage reality of knowing a damaging moment was only one tweeted photo away. “It was all about never wanting to fail them or let them down,” Fournette says of his mentors. “I want to be an inspiration to New Orleans.”
That maturity instantly paid off in Baton Rouge, where he broke LSU's freshman rushing record (1,034) and then, as a sophomore, reset the school's single-season marks for yards (1,953) and TDs (22). He rarely went out; he says he only twice visited Tigerland, an infamous Baton Rouge haunt, and only then because teammates called him “bougie.” Fournette always kept the bigger goal in mind, carrying the cocoon mentality over from New Orleans to Baton Rouge. Scott even moved on campus for Fournette’s final season.
Grateful for his carefully choreographed journey, Fournette now wants to return the favor. For starters, he plans to open affordable day-care centers for people in low-income New Orleans neighborhoods. “Where I’m from, it’s a bucket of crabs pulling each other down,” he says. “I want to be the crab who comes out of that bucket and pulls others up.”
Fournette’s ascent to the pros hit a snag last Aug. 16 when he went down in preseason practice, clutching his left foot. On the field, the music literally stopped.
He played in just seven of LSU’s 12 games, hobbled throughout his junior season by an ankle sprain. In the end he averaged an impressive 6.5 yards per carry, but his performances were feast or famine: 284 yards against Ole Miss, 35 against Alabama. In late September, LSU fired Miles. The Tigers finished 7–4, and at season’s end Fournette announced that he would skip the Citrus Bowl to rehab his ankle injury and prepare for the draft. Fournette would later say that interim coach Ed Orgeron was the one who made that call—and, in retrospect, Fournette says he appreciates Orgeron’s choice. “I’m kinda happy he made the decision for me because I wasn’t helping the team,” says Fournette. “I cried about it, but some people were made to tell you what’s right and wrong.”
A few days after Fournette’s announcement, Stanford’s Christian McCaffrey—who added up more all-purpose yards over a two-year period than any back in college football history—announced he too would skip his team’s bowl game. He and Fournette became test cases for the future of elite college players.
They also became targets of second-guessing. Arizona Cardinals coach Bruce Arians said such a decision would “concern” him. Miami Hurricanes coach Mark Richt called their choices “sad.” TV analyst Kirk Herbstreit tweeted, “What happened to LOVING the GAME?”
Sports Illustrated spoke to 10 NFL coaches and front-office execs about college stars skipping their final games, and the consensus was a grudging understanding, given the money at stake. Former Eagles and 49ers coach Chip Kelly pointed to ex–Notre Dame ’backer Jaylon Smith and Michigan tight end Jake Butt. Smith tore his left ACL and LCL at the 2016 Fiesta Bowl, and the projected top five pick fell to No. 34 in the draft, costing him more than $15 million. Butt was one of the country’s top ends, but he tore his right ACL at the Orange Bowl in December. That injury will likely bump him out of the first round and cost him millions. “I understood [their decisions],” Kelly says of Fournette and McCaffrey. “The old-school part of you says, You can get hurt crossing the street. But it’s a personal decision for each individual, and I wouldn’t hold it against them.”
McCaffrey’s coach at Stanford, David Shaw, makes the point that these are two unique players. “Is this going to spill over to a lot of other people?” he asks. “There’s a small group of people who actually [face] that decision.” Adds one NFL personnel director, “I think [Fournette] is smart [for not playing]. He’s got a billion-dollar set of knees. What are you doing playing in a nothing bowl game?”
Fournette enters the NFL at a dark time for backs. Franchise-tag values—essentially the average salary of the top five players at a position—provide a barometer for how NFL general managers gauge a position’s value, and in 2017 running back ranks as the eighth highest paid of 11 positions. (Average salary: $12.1 million.) That puts Fournette & Co. ahead of only tight ends, safeties and kickers/punters.
Part of that can be explained by the NFL’s infatuation with—and dedication of financial resources to—the passing game, and part to the costly investments in some recent first-round flameouts. But the Cowboys took Elliott with the No. 4 pick in '16, and his dynamic rookie season—1,631 rushing yards, 16 total TDs—“has made people go back and take a look at the value of the running back,” says one NFL coach.
In 2017 a bumper crop of projected first-rounders—Fournette, McCaffrey and Florida State’s Dalvin Cook—sits poised to take advantage of that renewed interest. But consider the likelihood that any of those three will have as good an offensive line as Elliott’s (he ran behind three first-team All-Pros), with an elite field-stretching receiver (see: Bryant, Dez) and a dangerous quarterback (Prescott, Dak). Plus, Elliott’s skills are rare. Along with his speed and vision, his pass protection skills are outstanding and his hands are good enough to have caught 32 balls in year one in the NFL. “To be a top back now,” says Kelly, “you have to be Ezekiel Elliott in terms of being on the field all three downs.”
The top running back prospects in this draft are viewed as distinct talents. Fournette is a classic power back with a rare combo of balletic feet and an ability to run over defenders. The two most consistent comparisons from NFL execs: Adrian Peterson and LeGarrette Blount (with breakaway speed). Teams still have questions about Fournette’s hands and his ability to pass protect, but that may be more from a lack of film than from poor performance.
The 5' 11", 202-pound McCaffrey falls on the opposite end of the spectrum; one coach compared him with Patriots receiver Julian Edelman because he can easily split out into the slot and is dangerous as a kick returner. But can he withstand an NFL pounding between the tackles? Cook, who is 5' 10", 210 pounds, is more of a classic three-down back: big enough to grind between the tackles, versatile enough to average 14.8 yards per catch for FSU. Questions linger about his ability to pass protect or to handle a large workload.
But Fournette’s volatile cocktail of speed and stiff-arms set him apart. New Orleans football bard Archie Manning likens his style to Jim Brown’s. If a tailback revolution is upon us, the founding fathers will be Elliott and Fournette.
Two hours after arriving for his photo shoot, Fournette walks into Katie’s, a cozy neighborhood Creole-Italian restaurant in the mid-city section of New Orleans. Heads turn. Fingers point. Two women follow him toward a private room upstairs, but they’re asked at the door to retreat.
Fournette is ambivalent about it all. He won’t stay long; he’s in a rush to get to Baton Rouge to sign the birth certificate for his son, Leonard IV, who was born a few days earlier. (He also has a two-year-old daughter, Lyric, from a prior relationship.) Seated at a table—flanked by his agent, a publicist, Scott (his manager) and Terry Lucas, a former St. Augustine teammate—he matter-of-factly answers questions as the rest of the group listens. Everyone is focused on the soon-to-be-millionaire, including a waiter who lingers at the door, unsure if he should interrupt the proceedings to refill water glasses.
Fournette’s answers are quick and polite, but not particularly introspective. There are a few questions his people have worried about, inquiries about skipping the bowl game and about the fact that, at 240 pounds—five pounds over his LSU weight—he was easily the heaviest back at this year’s combine. On this latter point one NFL coach told SI, “That’s the biggest day of your life. That baffled everyone.” But Fournette casts that off as “water weight,” and when he shows up at LSU's pro day, five weeks later, weighing 228, it eases some concerns. (Says the same coach, “That’s good and bad. It shows he can lose weight. But still, how do you show up at 240?”)
Fournette’s 4.51-second 40 in Indianapolis was the fastest in 15 years for a back that heavy. He points to his 40 time and his production in college when asked what type of runner he envisions being in the NFL. “My talent speaks for itself,” he says.
As the interview grinds to a close, it’s clear that Fournette is ready to move on, to Baton Rouge that afternoon and to the NFL in a few weeks. “To be in that greenroom, man—that’s special from where I’m from,” he says. “To see where I’ve come, from a kid to a young man to a father of two children, waiting for my name to be called.”
He pauses, then says what has been apparent since he was 12 years old: “I’m ready.”The not so new album released by Kendrick Lamar came out on April the 17th, 2017. However, what is it?
Kendrick Lamar's new album is well, an album, but there's something about each project that's different and its the same situation here. The week before the album dropped, Kendrick dropped a line on The Heart Part 4 which got listeners and fans buzzing. If you don't recall it, Kendrick said, "Y'all got 'til April the 7th to get y'all s#@t together", after hearing this line, everyone thought that Kendrick's album was going to drop on April the 7th; but when that day came, people started realizing that they were wrong. Turns out, Kendrick was referring to the, "All-Amerikkkan Badass", album from Joey Badass. However, fans were still bumpin, "HUMBLE", and Joey's new project. After the album ended up dropping, critics quickly praised it for it's content scoring extremely high scores on metacritic by nearly every critic. (check out all the critic's reviews and ratings on metacritic here!) However, "Exclaim", thought differently stating that, 'DAMN. is the first time in Lamar's career that he hasn't broken new ground, explored old themes in new ways or exhibited sonic growth.'. (to see Exclaim's full review, click here!) The album also received a few negative reviews from fans, some coming from the fact that feminists have claimed sexual verbal acts on Kendrick's track, "HUMBLE", but the album is still loved by many loyal fans and new ones too! But it doesn't stop there! Popular YouTuber 'The Needle Drop, A.K.A, "The Internet's Busiest Music Nerd"' is a respected album reviewer and one of my favorite YouTubers. (check him out here and be sure to check out his content) Anyway, Fantano gives us his opinion in a number from a number out of 10, which Kendrick was given a 7, which some people think is quite low, but, some people also think that it's a good number because there were certain flaws in the album.
The album contains tracks featuring the artists:
- Rihanna on LOYALTY
- Zacari on LOVE
- U2 on XXXby
This is kinda embarrassing, but…About a year ago I hired a moving company to move my property from New Jersey to Denver. They quoted me a price based on the weight of my belongings. Seemed reasonable enough until I discovered that not only do they not deliver the stuff themselves, but the freight company they hire charges them by the amount of space in the truck it uses, and the weight is irrelevant. Want to know the price difference? The freight company earned $650 for moving my belongings. The moving company we hired pulled in $2900 on top of that. How do I know? Simple, they took a deposit upfront from me, and had me pay cash to the delivery driver, and than charged my credit card for more money. The truth is I got into a big dispute with the company over the actual weight of my stuff, and because of that I asked the freight driver how much it costs to actually move my stuff and he said, “Well, the $650 cash that you paid me, thats all we get.”
The moving industry is notorious for ripping people off. There are a few other industries with equally bad reputations. Used car salesmen and Mechanics are notorious for taking advantage of your ignorance.
Want an easy way to make money? Tell consumers the truth about how you really make money and watch them flock to you. I don’t mind if you make a buck off of me. I do mind if you charge me a 500% markup.
It’s 2014. The internet has been around for over two decades now. We have access to the worlds information at our fingertips…yet, somehow these predatory businesses manage to keep on cashing in on our ignorance.
If you asked most of these entrepreneurs why they keep their real costs and margins a secret from consumers, most will say they are afraid. Afraid you will no longer pay them the money they make today.
I say… If your only competitive advantage is that you know more about buying services in your industry than I do…than you shouldn’t be in business in the first place.
Every single industry that thrives on lack of information should and could be easily disrupted by transparency, or a young ambitious employee blowing the whistle and starting a business that cares about doing a better job.
You don’t need the best prices or the biggest margins to build a dominant business. You need customers who trust you and love you and evangelize you. Want a quick shortcut to win their hearts and minds?
MAKE AN EMBARRASSING CONFESSION.
Open up about all the things your industry is afraid of their consumers finding out. See if you actually lose any business or if you win fair and square.
Last week on Reddit it was revealed that Beats By Dr. Dre headphones only cost about $14 dollars to make, but sell for upwards of $100. Sure, there are massive branding and advertising costs driving that number up… Regardless, that embarrassing truth empowers consumers, but doesn’t somehow kill demand. If anything it makes you appreciate the branding expense more.
I am ok with you making a profit. Even a very hefty one… but if you want me to love your brand…be open and honest and I will still come around and buy from you.
Want to Win Customers? Ask yourself, “what is my industry trying to hide. What am I too afraid to admit to my customers?”
That’s your shortcut to beating out your competitors… cuz, when everyone else is lying, the guy who tells the truth is King.Gerard has been talking all things MCR.
In a new interview Gerard Way has been talking about My Chemical Romance splitting up.
He first discussed the time between releasing '06's 'The Black Parade' and '10's 'Danger Days'.
“Everybody’s got an opinion, no one gets left alone anymore and it stopped being about the art.”
“I like playing with expectations. I thought, ‘Whatever we do next, everyone’s going to hate it – there’s just no way we can top that [album].’"
“There were a lot of really dark times during that period, and I was drinking again, which I haven’t talked about a lot, but it was a really difficult time for me.”
He then moved on to the feelings within the band when they were actually touring 'Danger Days':
"It was tough on all the guys. We scrapped records, spent millions of dollars, and we were touring on this record, and it didn’t feel like the world needed My Chem anymore."
“When we were breaking out and fighting, there was the Bush administration, wars for oil, and all this stuff, so it was a good time to be counter culture."
“But when 'Danger Days' was out, we had Obama, things were going really well, we were making so much progress."
“I’m able to read the writing on the wall pretty clearly, and I was like, ‘Nobody really needs us now – I think it’s time to finish.'”
He closed by commenting on whether a reunion is on the cards:
“We all got together recently and it was wonderful – we didn’t even talk about the band or playing shows again."
“I don’t know if anything will happen in the future, but what I do know is everyone has a really great life right now."
“I think My Chem will always be there for us if we want it, but it adds a layer of stress."Talented Parramatta back-rower Kenny Edwards is capable of impressive feats on the footy field but is acutely aware that a recent spate of brain snaps has overshadowed some otherwise strong contributions – and has vowed to Eels fans to tighten up his game.
Take the Bulldogs game in Round 17 as an example.
In many ways, Edwards starred for his team on the night. An astute tap-back from a broken play pass near the Eels' line saved an almost certain try in the eighth minute. Edwards played all 82 minutes of the tense 13-12 golden point win with a team-high 46 tackles as well as four tackle busts, three offloads and 94 run metres.
But what fans will mostly remember is a crazy attempted intercept in the 48th minute.
With the Eels having soaked up back-to-back sets at their line and forcing a Dogs team who never looked like scoring to attempt to conjure up something on the final play, Edwards shot out of the line, fluffed the intercept, handed the Dogs another full |
yle is the only manager to have beaten Moyes twice whilst managing a side that went on to be relegated (he was in charge of Burnley when they beat Everton 1-0 before he jumped ship and the Clarets went down).
In May 2009, Moyes led Everton to his one and only cup final. Despite Louis Saha’s goal in record quick time, they went on to lose 2-1 to Guus Hiddink’s Chelsea. 11 years in charge and no trophies on Merseyside. Not to the blue half at least.
The future?
Whether David Moyes signs a new contract for next season and beyond, jumps ship in the summer or takes a year out, football fans will fight for and against on how well he has done at Everton and whether he falls under the good or great category. I hope my statistics will help back up your argument.WASHINGTON — On the campaign trail, Donald Trump successfully wooed many Americans desperate for an end to Obama’s brand of neoliberalism. However, his nationalist “maverick” persona has quickly unraveled as his allegiance to the country’s real decision makers has become more evident with each passing day of his young presidency.
Within his first week, Trump has announced plans to build a missile defense system to guard against attacks from Iran and North Korea and entered into the early stages of moving the U.S. Embassy in Israel to East Jerusalem from Tel Aviv. He’s made clear departures from his promises of anti-interventionism and neutrality in the Israel/Palestine conflict, among other things.
Despite some positive moves, like calling for peace with Russia and removing the United States from the Trans-Pacific Partnership, a deeper look at Trump’s policies reveals a continuation of policies that suit the political elite.
While Trump’s about-face on some issues may come as a disappointment to his supporters, it is not altogether surprising given that the vast majority of past U.S. presidents have conformed to the same general strategy of ensuring the continuity of American imperialism regardless of political party affiliation or campaign trail promises. The most recent example of such a drastic turnaround was Barack Obama’s rejection of his own campaign rhetoric: His promises to bring change and reform to Washington ultimately fell flat as he expanded the drone war, brought catastrophe to the Middle East, and launched a chilling crackdown on whistleblowers and journalists.
This uniform, over-arching agenda is and has been set by the same handful of powerful American oligarchs who rose to unprecedented prominence on the heels of industrialization. Many of these titans of industry and their descendents went on to establish influential foundations and organizations that continue to guide U.S. political consensus. Their hold over not just U.S. politics, but global politics, grew following the formation of oligarch-owned central banks and private international financial institutions such as the World Bank and International Monetary Fund.
While these institutions claim to work for the benefit of all humanity, their actions are directed by a handful of “economic and political heavyweights” who use loans, debt, and other financial tools to force the hands of governments throughout the world. As the chief vehicle for manifesting this imperialist agenda, the United States is no exception. Indeed, private banking interests have had a stranglehold on the American economy since the formation of the Federal Reserve in the early 20th century.
It should come as no surprise that Trump has surrounded himself with Bush-era neoconservatives, including several architects of the Iraq War and signatories of the highly imperialist and pro-war Project for a New American Century. These individuals, John Bolton, Bill Bennett, and James Woolsey among them, consistently proved their dedication to the advancement of U.S. corporate and “deep state” interests during the Bush years. Far from “draining the swamp,” Trump’s actually filling it with an administration that promises to allow the nation’s wealthiest inhabitants to continue to dominate political decision-making.
Allegiance to Washington insiders and elite
But for those who have been paying attention, Trump’s allegiance to Washington insiders and the elite has been evident for some time.
Trump’s shift from populist to globalist was heralded by his numerous meetings with former Secretary of State Henry Kissinger, a war criminal responsible for illegal bombings in Cambodia, a bloody coup in Chile, and the expansion of the Vietnam War. It was Kissinger, in fact, who set the precedent for U.S. foreign policy founded on perpetual war.
In a November interview with CNN’s Fareed Zakaria, Kissinger defended Trump. He urged that “one should not insist on nailing [Trump] into positions he had taken in the campaign” as Trump is undergoing “the transition from being a campaigner to being a national strategist.”
Also indicative of Trump’s true allegiances are the shifting attitudes of pro-Clinton oligarchs and power brokers who are now glowing about the dawning of the Trump era.
Larry Summers, secretary of the Treasury under Clinton and loyal servant to international banking interests, told Bloomberg News on Jan. 20 that he has been “very troubled by the attitude of business people from the U.S.”
“People who were terribly afraid of what [a Trump presidency] would mean for America’s place in the world are now hailing those who surround Donald Trump as great geniuses,” Summers said.
It seems much of that fear was assuaged by Trump’s numerous “flip-flops” on key issues following his election in November.
While many Trump supporters continue to insist that the president has maintained his independence, as evidenced by his attempts to restore diplomatic relations with Russia, for example, much of his action so far ultimately serves the agenda of the American ruling class. This agenda, which aims to ensure the continuation of American hegemony and military superiority, is too important to the global elite to let any one man — president or otherwise — stand in its way.
Trump: President of the Zionist States of America
Former Vice President Joe Biden once said, “You don’t have to be a Jew to be a Zionist. The embrace of Zionism, a belief in the establishment of a Jewish-majority nation in the Biblical “Holy Land,” is a common bond not just among U.S. presidents, but among the nation’s entire political establishment, transcending party affiliation. This explains why U.S. politicians often ignore Israel’s egregious war crimes, illegal activities, and apartheid regime despite the United States’ purported interest in spreading “democracy” and protecting human rights.
The practically unbridled power of the Zionist Israel lobby has ensured the prominence of Zionism in the U.S. political landscape, thanks to its potent influence and near-limitless financial support from many American oligarchs, many of whom are themselves Zionists. The organizations that comprise this lobby, the most well-known of which are the American Israel Public Affairs Committee, or AIPAC, and the JStreet PAC, contribute millions of dollars to politicians annually. JStreet alone contributed $3.4 million to U.S. politicians between 2015 and 2016. Sheldon Adelson, a casino magnate, avowed Zionist, and political mega-donor, contributed more than $92.8 million to conservative politicians during the 2012 election cycle and, together with his wife Miriam, $77.7 million in the 2016 cycle.
Largely for that reason, U.S. presidents have nearly always prioritized Israel’s concerns, which partly explains why Israel continues to receive unparalleled amounts of U.S. military aid — subsidized by U.S. taxpayers — that funds much of its domestic activities and regional war machine.
To the outside observer, Trump’s campaign promises to “Make America Great Again” and “Put America First” seem in clear conflict with the established U.S.-Israel relationship. Indeed, on the campaign trail, Trump shied away from this position, promising to be the “neutral guy” regarding Israel’s continuing occupation of Palestine. A handful of disagreements with Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, as well as the condemnation he received from American Jewish groups over his ties to Steve Bannon, created the perception among many American voters that this would be the case.
However, Trump’s transition from campaign trail persona to commander-in-chief has indeed shown him to be a staunch supporter of Zionist causes. The shift from promised neutrality to Israel’s “true friend in the White House” has been marked most notably by Trump’s announcement of his plans to move the U.S. Embassy from Tel Aviv to Jerusalem, an extreme stance that Trump senior aide Kellyanne Conway insisted was “a big priority” for Trump.
In addition, Trump’s support for Israel’s encroachment of Palestinian lands could bring about the end of the feasibility of the “two-state” solution as right-wing Israeli politicians, particularly those of the Jewish Home party, are already seeking to annex more illegal settlements thanks to Trump’s position on the internationally contentious issues.
Even more troublesome than Trump’s support for Israel’s crimes would be his support for Israel’s long-standing geopolitical goals in the region. If Trump follows the agenda set out for him, it could plunge the world into chaos.
Robbie Martin, a journalist and director of “A Very Heavy Agenda,” a documentary series which explores how neoconservatives tied to the banking and military industries influence the media establishment and political landscape, told MintPress News that “Trump’s recent embrace of Zionism is opportunistic.”
“It speaks to the strong influence of neoconservatives in the Trump administration,” Martin continued.
These same neoconservatives, following the lead of the oligarchs who exert undue influence on U.S. and Israeli affairs, have already pushed Trump and key members of his Cabinet to embrace what Netanyahu has designated the “supreme goal” of the state of Israel: the containment of Iran.
‘Inevitable’ war with Iran & North Korea
Trump, who on the campaign trail painted himself as an anti-interventionist, has recently emerged as strongly hostile toward Iran, continuing the decades-long U.S. policy of isolating the Islamic Republic. Just minutes after his inauguration, the Trump administration announced that it would be developing a state-of-the-art missile defense system to protect Americans from Iran and North Korea.
Leaders of the Gulf monarchies are also “optimistic” that Trump will confront Iran, with some even going as far as to hail Trump as “another Ronald Reagan.” During his first weekend as president, Netanyahu spoke with Trump, focusing mainly on Iran — likely to gauge Trump’s commitment to Israel’s “supreme goal” of stopping the Iranian “threat” despite Israel having an untold number of nuclear warheads at its disposal.
For much of the past few decades, U.S. antagonism against Iran has been a driving force in U.S. foreign policy in the Middle East. Since Iran’s 1979 revolution which ousted the U.S.-installed dictator the Shah of Iran, Iranian politics has been bolstered by the belief that third-world dependence on the West was an intrinsic result of neocolonialism and monopoly capitalism, with the only remedy being “working class internationalism.”
In the process, Iran staunchly spoke out against the new colonialist project in the Middle East: the creation of Israel, its military occupation of historic Palestine, and Western meddling in Iranian politics and industry.
Despite these historical tensions, U.S. and Israeli politicians alike have often expressed their disdain for Iran as born out of concern for the threat of nuclear disaster that presents to Israel, despite the fact that the CIA and Israel’s Mossad have stated that Iran doesn’t have a nuclear weapons program nor has it ever been interested in one.
Though it often goes overlooked, one of the main reasons behind the hostility toward Iran is the independence of Iran’s central bank. Iran is one of the few nations that are not totally beholden to the global oligarchical interests tied to the global banking establishment which constitutes the U.S. empire.
Even more telling is Trump’s stated belief that “we’ll end up going to war with Iran.” In a 2013 interview with Fox Business, Trump said the inevitability of an armed conflict was due to the weak negotiation skills of the Obama administration — the administration which would go on to seal the controversial Iran nuclear deal in 2015.
Although Trump’s presidency remains in its infancy, his posturing thus far reveals the significant oligarchical influence on his developing stance on Iran, a nation that doesn’t have nuclear weapons and has never threatened to attack the United States or Israel.
The illusion of Trump’s independence
Diplomatic relations with Russia plunged to new lows under Obama, and Trump’s work to mend those ties drew supporters across the nation who were weary of Obama’s wars.
From his nomination of Rex Tillerson as secretary of state to his stated goal of working together with Russia in Syria to eviscerate Daesh (an Arabic acronym for the terrorist organization known as ISIS or ISIL in the West), all indications seem to suggest that Trump is genuine in his desire to resolve the tensions that nearly escalated into an armed conflict between the two military powers.
Yet, upon further examination, this too falls in line with the predominating geopolitical strategy of American oligarchs. As journalist Pepe Escobar pointed out in a Jan. 19 piece for The Saker, the ultimate goal of this maneuvering is to “seduce Russia away from its strategic partnership with China, while keep harassing the weakest link, Iran.”
Daniel McAdams, director of the Ron Paul Institute for Peace and foreign policy expert on U.S. empire, echoed Escobar’s analysis in an interview with MintPress, saying that “Trump’s tilt towards Russia is a classic ‘grand strategy’ type of move to attempt to peel Russia away from China” — a textbook case of the divide and conquer strategy.
Indeed, the intelligence community, Congress, and the mainstream media continue to play “bad cop” on the Russians, vilifying Moscow at every turn in order to manipulate them into cooperating with Trump, who plays the role of the “good cop.” Of course, the added bonus of this is that Trump gets to look like a great negotiator, diplomat, and an anti-interventionist of sorts while still allowing him to advance neoconservative goals of containing the threat to American hegemony presented by a China-Russia-Iran alliance.
However, as McAdams noted, it remains to be seen if Russia will ultimately fall for the ruse. That, he said, “depends on how the Russians can balance their desire for improved U.S. relations with a sober look at their long-term regional interests and the veracity of U.S. promises.”
Other commonly cited evidence of Trump’s “independence” from globalist plans has been his efforts to bring U.S. jobs back from overseas. Recently, Ford Motor Co. canceled a planned $1.6 billion factory in Mexico, choosing instead to expand an existing plant in Michigan in what was widely viewed as a capitulation to Trump. In addition, Trump’s removal of the U.S. from the Trans-Pacific Partnership and his promise to re-negotiate NAFTA have often been taken as proof that he is indeed putting America first.
However, an anonymous but high-ranking source told Escobar that U.S. oligarchs need jobs to return to the United States from Mexico and Asia chiefly because the shift of labor overseas is a major reason why the United States has “lost control of the seas and cannot secure its military components during a major war.” Essentially, the same financial elite who grew wealthy as a result of the initial labor transfer also stand to gain financially from shifting jobs back to the United States as part of a strategic decision to mitigate the strength of China and its regional allies.
Serving the establishment, not the people
Many Trump supporters fell for the same promises of “Hope” and “Change” that got Obama elected in 2008. While Trump has a unique persona that sets him apart from prior presidents, his actions so far indicate that he is willfully following a path laid out for him by the nation’s wealthiest inhabitants.
Like Obama, Trump won the presidency through attempts to paint himself as a maverick, an outsider. The widespread condemnations of Trump from the U.S. political establishment and the mainstream media were strategic, granting Trump the ability to appear anti-establishment even when he advances the goals of the establishment.
“This strategic antagonism has given Trump the ability to use the press and U.S. political elite as a foil. This allows him to negate his critics in a way unimaginable in previous administrations,” Robbie Martin warned.
This unconventional setup is just the latest iteration of the public cover needed for a U.S. president to advance the agenda of American oligarchs while convincing his supporters and large swaths of the American public that he’s really working for them.The fatcat ecocrats exposed: Web of 'green' politicians, tycoons and power brokers who help each other benefit from billions raised on your bills
Four of nine-person Climate Change Committee, official watchdog that dictates green energy policy, are, or were until recently, being paid by firms that benefit from committee decisions
Other industries would stand accused of damning conflicts of interest but when it comes to global warming, anything goes...
The Mail on Sunday today reveals the extraordinary web of political and financial interests creating dozens of eco-millionaires from green levies on household energy bills.
A three-month investigation shows that some of the most outspoken campaigners who demand that consumers pay the colossal price of shifting to renewable energy are also getting rich from their efforts.
Vested interest: Lord Deben (John Selwyn Gummer) is chairman of the Committee on Climate Change
Enquiries by this newspaper have revealed:
Four of the nine-person Climate Change Committee, the official watchdog that dictates green energy policy, are, or were until very recently, being paid by firms that benefit from committee decisions.
A new breed of lucrative green investment funds, which were set up to expand windfarm energy, are in practice a means of taking green levies paid by hard-pressed consumers and handing them to City investors and financiers.
£3.8 billion of taxpayers’ money funds the new Green Investment Bank, set up by the Department of Business and Skills. One of its biggest deals involved energy giant SSE selling windfarms to one of the new green funds, Greencoat Wind. The Green Investment Bank’s chairman, Lord Smith of Kelvin, is also chairman of SSE. The bank says it ‘provided expertise’ to enable BIS to take a £50 million stake in Greencoat, which helped fund the SSE sale.
The same bank’s chief executive, Shaun Kingsbury, is one of the UK’s highest-paid public sector employees. His £325,000 salary is more than twice the Prime Minister’s.
Firms lobbying for renewables can virtually guarantee access to key Government policy-makers, because they are staffed by former very senior officials – a striking example of Whitehall’s ‘revolving door’.
Among the most astonishing features exposed by our investigation is the way in which vehement advocates for radical policies designed to curb global warming are making huge sums of money from their work. Here are some of the key figures among the new breed of fat-cat Ecocrats...
Ian Marchant is chairman of Infinis - now the country's third-largest renewable generator, with 7.3 per cent of the market. He received a'signing-on fee' of £322,000 worth of shares
The scourge of the 'deniers'... paid £2.6million last year by his renewable energy firm
In 2009 Ian Marchant founded the Scotland 2020 Climate Group, which unites Scottish politicians, green activists and business people in support of Scotland’s own CO2 emissions target.
At the group’s prestigious annual public lecture in September, speakers denounced scientific sceptics as ‘deniers’.
Marchant, the group’s chairman, said action had to be taken at once to stop extreme weather, and deployed an unusual argument: ‘The increasing layer of greenhouse gases means we are trapping more energy in the atmosphere.
'And if you want to know what happens when you put more energy into a volatile system, try giving a toddler some Irn-Bru!’
Until June, he was chief executive of SSE, the UK’s biggest renewable operator, for which he was paid £2.6 million in his last financial year, up from £1.4 million in 2011-12. He left to become chairman of Infinis – now the country’s third-largest renewable generator, with 7.3 per cent of the market
He received a ‘signing-on fee’ of £322,000 worth of shares. Last month, Infinis shares were floated, raising £780 million. Its offer brochure claimed that it was an unusually safe investment – simply because of the levies on renewables paid by consumers and imposed by Government diktat.
The brochure said that more than half of Infinis revenue is derived directly from renewable subsidies, describing the green levies added to customers’ bills as ‘stable, inflation-linked revenue streams backed by legislation incentivising renewable power’. On that basis, it promised an initial dividend of £55 million, a sum that would rise every year.
An Infinis spokeswoman declined to comment on Marchant’s dual role, confirming he is earning £250,000 a year as part-time (two days a week) chairman.
The architect of green levies - who is advising a £1.2billion solar array project
Lord Stern is the London School of Economics professor commissioned by Tony Blair to write his seminal 2006 review of the economics of climate change – the foundation of many of the policies pursued today.
He is a member of the advisory board of Abengoa, a huge Spanish renewables company. Its biggest project, a solar panel array in Arizona, cost £1.2 billion.
Neither Stern’s spokesman nor Abengoa will disclose how much he is paid.
Lord Stern, architect of green levies, is a member of the advisory board of Abengoa, a huge Spanish renewables company. Its biggest project, a solar panel array in Arizona, cost £1.2bn. Pictured with Tony Blair in 2006
His company, NS Economics, is a vehicle for his public speaking earnings and last year declared assets of £189,000, after one year of trading.
Stern’s agent at Celebrity Speakers said his basic rate for an hour-long talk was £50,000 – with first-class flights on top for a conference in the US, and all extra expenses reimbursed.
Stern’s spokesman at LSE said he openly declared all his interests, and had ‘built his reputation on a track record of high-quality independent research and analysis’.
Green trust boss whose company gets richer... every time power prices go up
One of the biggest of the new breed of specialist renewable investment trusts is Guernsey-registered TRIG (The Renewables Infrastructure Group).
It is chaired by Helen Mahy, former company secretary and general counsel of the National Grid. TRIG buys nearly new renewable plants from their operators at prices that guarantee the operators a healthy profit – typically, about one-and-a-half times the cost of developing and building them. But because the subsidies are so high, everybody wins.
TRIG launched in August with a flotation that raised £300 million. Its prospectus promised investors an immediate 5.5 per cent dividend, rising with inflation.
Like Infinis, TRIG said its income was ‘stable’ because of Government policies: tariffs and levies will account for a staggering 63 per cent of its revenue.
Longer-term, the prospectus added, investors will also benefit from the rocketing price of electricity, which it thinks will rise by 60 per cent over the next 20 years.
TRIG’s prospectus was analysed for The Mail on Sunday by finance and energy expert Rupert Darwall. ‘They have been set up so that investors can get exposure to the renewable energy subsidies,’ he said.
‘They are paying their investors on the basis of the Government continuing to drive up the price of electricity. When these guys do well, consumers are doing badly.’
A TRIG spokeswoman declined to comment.
The £260million green firm milking windfarm subsidies... whi ch you pay for
Darwall also examined Greencoat Wind, which was floated in February and valued at £260 million.
It buys windfarms at a premium and milks the subsidies to skim off its profit and pay out dividends – in its case, six per cent.
A confidential report for investors by Barclays Bank said that by investing in wind energy, Greencoat was taking advantage of ‘the most attractive market fundamentals in Western Europe’ – which meant, said the document: ‘We expect UK power prices to increase progressively.’
According to Barclays, investors could expect an extremely attractive annual 9.1 per cent rate of return, even after paying all fees.
This was because ‘half of revenue comes from largely fixed index-linked Government incentives’ – in other words, levies added to bills.
The report also pointed out that with coal fired power plants being forced to close, ‘supply will fall significantly, but demand won’t... we see large power price increase as an inevitability’.
It forecast an increase of roughly 40 per cent by 2017: bad for consumers, but great for Greencoat investors.
... and how the green interest groups work to gether - to line their own pockets
Not only did Greencoat buy windfarms worth £140 million from SSE, but SSE also owns a £43 million stake in Greencoat.
The Green Investment Bank helped to arrange Greencoat’s flotation, and its chairman, Lord Smith, also chairs SSE.
Its directors also include David Nish of Standard Life, which also has substantial renewable energy assets, and Dame Julia King, a member of the government Climate Change Committee responsible for emissions targets.
A Bank spokesman said it had strict rules and procedures to prevent any conflicts of interest.
As for Greencoat, among its directors is William Rickett, a former director general at the Department of Energy and Climate Change.
Dame Julia King, 59, is also a director of the Green Investment Bank, for which she is paid £30,000 a year on top of her £272,000 salary as vice chancellor of Aston University
How half of key Climate Change Committee is in the pay of green business
No institution plays a greater role in dictating green energy policy than the Committee on Climate Change (CCC) – the body set up by Ed Miliband when he was Labour Energy Secretary through his 2008 Climate Change Act.
The Mail on Sunday’s investigation has established that four of its nine members have recently had or still have financial interests in firms that benefit from its rulings.
Last week, the CCC urged the Government not to water down its ‘fourth carbon budget’. This binds the UK to slash emissions of carbon dioxide to half their 1990 level by 2025.
The budget also says that by 2030, the CO2 emitted per unit of electric power must be less than ten per cent of what it is at present – a cut of more than 90 per cent.
Energy analyst Peter Atherton of Liberum Capital says this will need investment of between £361 billion and £393 billion. Such a policy would also cut emissions from the electricity industry by about two-thirds.
Amazingly, almost half the CCC’s members, whose decisions affect every UK citizen and the entire economy, have been paid by firms with green interests. They are all paid £800 a day for their part-time CCC work, except for chairman Lord Deben, who gets £1,000.
Dame Julia King, 59, is also a director of the Green Investment Bank, for which she is paid £30,000 a year on top of her £272,000 salary as vice chancellor of Aston University.
The bank, funded by taxpayers to the tune of £3.8 billion, has investment in offshore wind as a ‘top priority’.
The more the CCC’s rulings favour renewable subsidies, the better the bank is likely to do. She lives in a house in Cambridge, which she bought for £740,000 in 2002.
Lord May of Oxford, a former Government chief scientific adviser, is paid an undisclosed amount as a member of the ‘Sustainability Board’ of the global banking giant HSBC.
In the section of its website that deals with its ‘sustainability’ work, the bank lists its four biggest green business opportunities.
Top of the list is ‘low-carbon energy production such as bio-energy, nuclear, solar and wind’ – all directly affected by the CCC’s edicts.
A cross-bench peer, Lord May, 71, is an atheist, but his stated belief that climate change is more dangerous than nuclear war has made him suggest that religious leaders ought to persuade people to support the green cause. ‘Maybe religion is needed,’ he said in 2009.
‘A supernatural punisher may be part of the solution.’
Former adviser: Lord May is now paid as a member of HSBC's sustainability board
As this newspaper revealed in January, CCC chairman Lord Deben, 74, was until recently chairman of Veolia Water UK PLC, which connects windfarms to the National Grid.
According to energy expert Professor Gordon Hughes of Edinburgh University, the drive to renewables means new grid investment will reach £25 billion by 2020. Deben has refused to state how much Veolia paid him. Company records say he resigned on November 12.
His spokeswoman said that this was because the firm was being merged with a sister firm.
He remains chairman of his family consultancy firm Sancroft, which advises companies on ‘global environmental policy’. When he took up his CCC post, he resigned as chairman of offshore wind firm Forewinds.
Prof Sam Fankhauser admits he is paid an undisclosed sum as a director of Vivid Economics, which offers business clients advice on how to respond to green Government policies - such as those set by the CCC
Sam Fankhauser, 49, is a professor at the London School of Economics’ Grantham Institute on Climate Change, funded by the radical green billionaire Jeremy Grantham – the world’s most generous donor to green activist groups.
Prof Fankhauser admits he is paid an undisclosed sum as a director of Vivid Economics, which offers business clients advice on how to respond to green Government policies – such as those set by the CCC.
The firm describes itself as a ‘thought leader’ on the ‘economics of climate change’, adding that it offers ‘insights that are not available elsewhere, allowing us to model the effects of policy on prices [and] profits’.
Other CCC members have spent their careers as academics in fields that help fuel green campaigns.
Sir Brian Hoskins, a fierce critic of climate sceptics, is a climatologist at Imperial College, London, where he is director of another institute funded by Grantham.
Jim Skea is also at Imperial, where he is Professor of Sustainable Energy, and was launch director of the Low Carbon Vehicle Project.Swansea have sent scouts to watch Brentford midfielder Alan Judge, according to ESPN.
Judge, 26, joined Brentford from Blackburn Rovers in January 2014 and helped the Bees win promotion to the Championship in his first five months in West London.
Since then he’s become a crucial part of Brentford’s midfield and has scored an impressive five goals so far this season, along with two assists.
After his recent call-up to the Republic of Ireland national team, many believe he’s ready for the step up to the Premier League.
Although, Swansea face competition from fellow Premiership team Bournemouth, who’ve also sent scouts to watch him at Griffin Park.
Judge is commonly known for his flying runs forward, making him a nuisance whilst on the counter attack and with this he’s gained the nickname ‘The Irish Messi’ by Brentford fans. The Irishman has also got a keen eye for goal, and is an engine in the middle of the park.
It’s unlikely that Judge would be a starter for the Swans if he came in January, but he could offer something different of the bench.
Let us know how you feel about the prospect of Swansea signing Alan Judge @ReadSwansea.June 28, 2010 / Brooklyn news ‘What kind of America’? Hate-filled rally to stop mosque The Brooklyn Paper
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If they build it, they will bomb.
Angry Sheepshead Bay residents came out in a show of force on Sunday to protest a planned mosque and Muslim community center in their neighborhood.
“If they build a mosque there, I’m going to bomb the mosque,” said one outraged resident who lives across the street from the proposed house of worship between East 28th and East 29th streets on Voorhies Avenue. The resident, who refused to give his name, identified himself as a former Israeli soldier who had lived on Voorhies Avenue for eight years.
“I will give them a lot of trouble,” he added. “They’re not going to stay here alive.”
Such comments were certainly the most violent, though intolerance was common at the rally, which was organized by the group Bay People. Political correctness was shoved aside as members of the group put out its agenda: We don’t want a mosque here.
There was plenty of lip service paid to concerns about added traffic and noise, with rally organizers saying that they were not “anti-Arab or anti-Muslim,” but the stench of hate filled the air, sometimes with subtle language.
“We cannot tolerate foreign interests coming into our backyard telling us what we are going to do,” said speaker Bob Giovinazzi. “It’s hot today, but things are going to get a lot hotter for people in this illegal structure.”
One of the organizers claimed that the mosque protest was simply about “this specific location and a specific organization [and its] impact on our quality of life.” The organizer, who only gave his surname, Kleinman, added, “We are not against our Muslim neighbors. This is a residential community and we want to preserve it regardless of race and religion.”
But other organizers claimed that the mosque’s builders, the Muslim American Society, has ties to Hamas and Hezbollah. Though few actual links were revealed at the rally, that didn’t stop the venom.
“New York is not Islamabad,” screamed one protestor. Diana, a nurse who refused to give her full name, told those in attendence, “Do not forget 9-11!”
Voorhies Avenue resident Victor Benari further whipped up the audience by adding, “Each Muslim terrorist is tied to a mosque.”
He also took pot shots at Ahmed Allowey, the longtime Sheepshead Bay resident who is bringing the mosque to Voorhies Avenue, along with local politicians who have remained mum on this divisive issue.
None were present to defend themselves, although Benari’s diatribe infuriated local resident Guseyn Ibragimov.
“What right do you have to deny people a place of worship?” asked Ibragimov, whose father is a Muslim. His mother is half-Jewish, half-Christian. “No one protests a church or a synagogue being built in a Muslim neighborhood.”
Rally attendees booed Ibragimov down, ordering him to get off their street.
“This isn’t right, they’re just showing their hate,” Ibragimov said as he stormed off. “They call themselves Americans, but what kind of America is this?”
Updated 5:19 pm, July 9, 2018
©2010Diane Kruger has been madly in love with Joshua Jackson for the past seven years — a source recently told Us Weekly the Fringe actor is planning to propose — but in the August 2013 issue of Marie Claire UK, Kruger reveals her past relationships weren't nearly as solid.
To make sense of her life, The Host star decided to see a therapist six years ago. "For a long time I felt that I was so accomplished. 'Oh I speak three languages, I travel the world, I've seen so many things.' But when I turned 30 I realized I was an idiot," she explains. "I didn't know sh-t about anything."
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The L.A.-based star explains that "therapy's not about getting help; it's facilitating yourself to deal better with life in general." Though it can be a taboo topic in her home country, Kruger has no qualms about discussing her treatment. "My friends ask, 'What's wrong with you?' But here everyone talks about [therapy], and I really like that about America."
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Kruger, who was born and raised in Germany, credits regular therapy sessions with improving her romantic relationships. "Oh, I'm sure I punished many boys for my lack of a father figure. And I'm sure I dated many men who were much older than the men I should have been dating," says the star, who was wed to French actor and filmmaker Guillaume Canet from 2001 to 2006. "But at the end of the day, I'm not bitter. I love men. I want a family myself. I'm not angry with him anymore."
PHOTOS: Dawson's Creek cast, then and now
Life with Jackson is better than ever, though Kruger readily admits that it's not a fairy tale. "All relationships are hard," she reasons. "It doesn't matter what job you have, or how famous or miserable or poor you are. It's about commitment."
"The hard part is the timing. When you meet someone, are you ready to make them your number one priority? There's never going to be a role more interesting than my own life," Kruger, 36, tells Marie Claire UK. "I'm grateful that I met a person who feels the same not just about me, but also about our relationship. But therapy helps, too."
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Want stories like these delivered straight to your phone? Download the Us Weekly iPhone app now!History of Heroin
Heroin, abuse of which has become an epidemic in the U.S in recent years, is not a new drug that just showed up in the late 1960’s, nor are its negative effects unique to modern times. Heroin is an opium derivative and, as with any of the opium derivatives, there is a severe physical/mental dependency that develops when heroin is abused.
The Birth of the American Heroin Addict
In the mid to late 1800’s, opium was a fairly popular drug. Opium dens were scattered throughout what we know today as the wild west. The opium influx during this period was due in large part to the drug being brought into the country via Chinese immigrants who came here to work on the railroads.
Accurate American history tells us that famous names of the period like Wild Bill Hickock and Kit Carson actually frequented opium dens more often than saloons. The stereotyped picture we have of the cowhand bellying up to the bar drinking whiskey straight after a long hard ride on the dusty trail is only part of the story of the old west. Oftentimes the cowhand was not belly up to a bar at all. He was in a prone position in a dim candle-lit room smoking opium in the company of an oriental prostitute. It was not uncommon for some of these cowhands to spend several days and nights at a time in these dens in a constant dream-state, eventually becoming physically addicted to the drug.
Nonetheless, it was true that alcoholism was a bigger problem. Alcoholism was one of the major sources of violence and death during this period. Eventually, however, opium was promoted as a cure for alcoholism by the late 1800’s.
It was from opium that morphine, a derivative, was developed as a painkiller in approximately 1810. It was considered a wonder drug because it eliminated severe pain associated |
as much of the current law as possible. Eventually, within a single week in late July, the Senate voted on three bills: a repeal of major provisions of the ACA without immediate replacement; a relatively comprehensive repeal and replacement of the ACA; and a more modest “skinny” repeal and replacement. Despite considerable political pressure on Senate Republicans from the Trump administration, all three measures failed. Having been unsuccessful in their attempts to repeal and replace the ACA, Republicans in Congress and the Trump administration pursued a series of measures intended to cumulatively undermine the law by making the health insurance it provided less accessible, less affordable, and less effective (through reductions in coverage and other measures), a strategy that Trump described as allowing Obamacare to “explode.” Those changes, some of which predated the failure of Republican alternatives to the ACA in the Senate, included cutting funding for advertising and for assistance with enrollment in Obamacare; drastically reducing open enrollment periods; ending cost-sharing subsidies that enabled insurance companies to reduce out-of-pocket expenses for low- and middle-income Americans; and repealing (effective in 2019) the ACA’s “individual mandate,” which had required all Americans to obtain health insurance or pay a penalty. (The last measure was part of Republican tax legislation drafted in secret and passed without Democratic support in December 2017; Trump signed the measure later that month. A subsequent analysis by the CBO determined that the legislation, which among other things reduced the corporate tax rate from 35 to 21 percent, would increase the federal deficit by approximately $1.8 trillion over a 10-year period.) In November 2017 a study by the CBO had estimated that repealing the individual mandate and making no other changes to the ACA would increase the number of uninsured people by 13 million after 10 years and raise premiums by 10 percent in most years through 2027. Other changes included allowing states to impose work requirements on people receiving Medicaid; allowing the creation of “association health plans” that would offer fewer essential health benefits than plans under the ACA and charge higher premiums to certain enrollees based on factors such as gender, occupation, and age; and permitting the sale of short-term plans that would provide minimal benefits and would not cover medical services for preexisting conditions.
Environmental policy One of the areas in which the Trump administration was able to move quickly to implement its policies was the environment, in part because many of the changes it sought could be accomplished through executive action by Trump or his appointees. Other changes were undertaken through legislation adopted by Congress, whose Republican majority generally shared Trump’s environmental views. In January, for example, Trump signed memoranda to hasten approval and completion of the Dakota Access and Keystone XL oil pipelines, both of which had been blocked by the Obama administration on environmental grounds. In February Trump signed legislation to block an Interior Department rule that would have restricted the dumping of toxic mining waste into streams and other waterways. In March Trump signed an executive order that rescinded various Obama-era policies and programs related to climate change, including a 2016 freeze on new coal leases on federal lands. In the same month, EPA administrator Pruitt withdrew an EPA request that oil and natural gas companies report methane emissions from their facilities and rejected a total ban on the pesticide chlorpyrifos, against the advice of the EPA’s own scientists. Other significant decisions included drastically reducing the size of national monuments created by Obama and Pres. Bill Clinton; rescinding the Obama administration’s Clean Power Plan, a set of EPA regulations that had mandated a 32 percent reduction in carbon emissions by the U.S. power sector between 2005 and 2030; revoking fuel-efficiency standards for cars and light trucks developed by the EPA during the Obama administration; and proposing numerous changes to the Endangered Species Act (ESA) that would weaken legal protections for endangered and threatened animals and make listing species as threatened more difficult. Trump, Donald: oath of office Donald Trump being sworn in as the 45th president of the United States. Encyclopædia Britannica, Inc. Undoubtedly the most momentous environmental decision of the new Trump administration was Trump’s announcement in June that the United States would withdraw from the Paris Agreement on climate change, under which the United States and 194 other countries had agreed to a broad range of measures intended to limit potentially catastrophic increases in global average temperatures during the 21st century and to mitigate the economic consequences of global warming. Trump contended that the agreement would harm the American economy (through government-mandated reductions in the country’s greenhouse gas emissions) and was in other respects unfair and even demeaning to the United States—historically the largest emitter of greenhouse gases and in the early 21st century the second largest emitter after China. Trump’s decision was condemned by government and political leaders, scientists, business executives, and activists throughout the world but praised by Republicans in Congress, who viewed it as a reassertion of American independence in world affairs and a repudiation of the environmental policies of the Obama administration. Like Trump, many Republican lawmakers doubted that climate change was real, while others questioned the human origins of global warming.
Foreign relations A major theme of Trump’s presidential campaign was his view that the United States had long been treated unfairly or taken advantage of by other countries, including by some traditional U.S. allies, and that under Obama’s leadership the United States had ceased to be respected in world affairs. In numerous speeches, tweets, and interviews, he threatened to impose tariffs on countries that engaged in what he deemed unfair trade practices; harshly criticized the World Trade Organization (WTO); and promised to renegotiate NAFTA (the North American Free Trade Agreement), which he called “the worst trade deal” the United States had ever signed. He also criticized NATO (the North Atlantic Treaty Organization), dismissing the alliance as “obsolete” but also insisting that other NATO countries devote more of their budgets to defense spending. In January 2017 he withdrew the United States from the Trans-Pacific Partnership, a regional trade agreement between 12 Pacific Rim countries that had been a major foreign policy achievement of the Obama administration. (Trump’s action was largely symbolic, however, because Congress had never ratified the treaty.) In January and March 2018 the Trump administration announced steep tariffs on imports of solar panels (worth $8.5 billion per year) and washing machines (worth $1 billion), aimed particularly at China and South Korea, and on imports of aluminum and steel (worth $48 billion) made in several countries, most of them U.S. allies (initial exemptions from the aluminum and steel duties granted to Canada, the European Union [EU], and Mexico were lifted in June). Dismissing warnings and criticisms from economists and business leaders that the tariffs could ignite a trade war, Trump insisted in a tweet that “trade wars are good, and easy to win.” In April China imposed retaliatory tariffs on a variety of U.S. goods worth $2.4 billion annually, approximately the dollar amount of Chinese aluminum and steel imports affected by the Trump tariffs. The EU followed suit in June with tariffs on U.S. imports valued at $3.2 billion, as did Canada in July with tariffs on $12.8 billion of U.S. goods. Following its official finding that the Chinese had engaged in unfair trade practices, in June the Trump administration announced plans for tariffs on an additional $50 billion of dollars worth of Chinese products, prompting China to announce comparable duties. Threats and counterthreats of additional tariffs soon followed, and by July the two countries were engaged in a full-blown trade war. Trump’s tariffs and his antipathy to the WTO overshadowed the meeting in early June of the Group of 7 in Quebec, Canada, which was marked by tense disagreement between Trump and other G7 leaders over language regarding free trade in the meeting’s final communiqué, usually a bland formality. Following Trump’s early departure from the meeting, Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau reiterated his country’s reluctant determination to respond in kind to Trump’s tariffs on aluminum and steel. Reacting to Trudeau’s remarks from a flight to Singapore aboard Air Force One, Trump withdrew his endorsement of the communiqué and called Trudeau “dishonest & weak.” In Singapore Trump held a historic meeting with North Korean leader Kim Jong-Un, the first face-to-face encounter between sitting leaders of the two countries. Although Trump declared after the meeting that “there is no longer a Nuclear Threat from North Korea,” it was unclear what concrete commitments North Korea had made to nuclear disarmament. In July Trump attended the annual summit meeting of NATO in Brussels, where in a speech he called other NATO countries “deliquent” and insisted that they increase their defense spending “immediately.” The meeting ended with a joint communiqué in which member countries agreed to continue their efforts to devote 2 percent of their GDP to defense spending by 2024, a goal they had agreed to in 2014.The 2016 election is over. Trump won. Hillary Clinton lost. And now she’s going on a rampage, blaming the FBI, James Comey, Barack Obama, Joe Biden, Russia, the media, sexism, and misogyny for her election defeat. It’s all in her new book What Happened. Well, you didn’t go to Wisconsin or Michigan, lady—that’s what happened, but I digress. Social media has now been brought into the mix, with desperate Clintonites saying that $100,000 worth of Facebook’s ads bought by the Russians upended our great experiment with individual freedom and liberty. I never knew our government’s institutions were that fragile (sarc.). Well, Hillary’s former pollster, Mark Penn, is calling bulls**t on this claim, noting that the majority of the ads ran after the election, and that you cannot buy a presidential race for $100k (via WSJ):
After an extensive review, Facebook has identified $100,000 of ads that came from accounts associated with Russia. Assume for the sake of argument that Vladimir Putin personally authorized this expenditure. Given its divisive nature, the campaign could be dubbed “From Russia, With Hate”—except it would make for a disappointing James Bond movie.
Analyzing the pattern of expenditures, and doing some back-of-the-envelope math, it’s clear this was no devilishly effective plot. Facebook says 56% of the ads ran after the election, reducing the tally that could have influenced the result to about $44,000. It also turns out the ads were not confined to swing states but also shown in places like New York, California and Texas. Supposing half the ads went to swing states brings the total down to $22,000.
Facebook also counted ads as early as June 2015. Assuming they were evenly spread and we want only those that ran the year of the election, that knocks it down to $13,000. Most of the ads did not solicit support for a candidate and carried messages on issues like racism, immigration and guns. The actual electioneering then amounts to about $6,500.
[…]
Then consider the scale of American presidential elections. Hillary Clinton’s total campaign budget, including associated committees, was $1.4 billion. Mr. Trump and his allies had about $1 billion. Even a full $100,000 of Russian ads would have erased just 0.025% of Hillary’s financial advantage.
I have 40 years of experience in politics, and this Russian ad buy, mostly after the election anyway, simply does not add up to a carefully targeted campaign to move voters. It takes tens of millions of dollars to deliver meaningful messages to the contested portion of the electorate. Converting someone who voted for the other party last time is an enormously difficult task. Swing voters in states like Ohio or Florida are typically barraged with 50% or more of a campaign’s budget. Try watching TV in those states the week before an election and you will see how jammed the airwaves are.All party members will have to abide by social media code of conduct banning harassment, hateful language, bullying and discrimination or risk expulsion
Labour is to try to stop a “tsunami of abuse” by making all existing and new members sign a pledge about online behaviour or face being barred from the party.
Labour at impasse over bid to attract MPs back to frontbench Read more
The national executive committee (NEC) agreed to toughen up Labour’s stance on internet abuse during a crucial meeting on Tuesday, which comes as the party’s acrimonious leadership battle draws to a close.
During a session that stretched over eight hours, Jeremy Corbyn expressed disappointment and sadness about the way in which a flood of Labour MPs resigned from the frontbench in protest at his performance earlier in the summer.
The leader agreed to enter talks with senior colleagues – likely to include deputy leader, Tom Watson, chief whip Rosie Winterton and the chair of the parliamentary Labour party, John Cryer – about new ways to form his shadow cabinet. But he refused to sign up to a proposal by Watson, for MPs to be allowed to elect frontbenchers as a means of brokering peace within the parliamentary party.
A motion to place a deadline of Saturday 24 September on the talks, so a new system is in place when the result of the leadership contest is announced, was also narrowly defeated by 16 to 15 votes.
However the group unanimously agreed to a new statement on social media behaviour that will be included as a separate item in the terms and conditions of any membership.
Party members will have to explicitly promise “to act within the spirit and rules of the Labour party in my conduct both on and offline, with members and non-members”.
The statement they will have to sign adds: “I stand against all forms of abuse. I understand that if found to be in breach of the Labour party policy on online and offline abuse, I will be subject to the rules and procedures of the Labour party.”
Punishments could include being suspended from the party or eventually being expelled.
The pledge will be linked to a social media code of conduct, drawn up by the party, which warns that “harassment, intimidation, hateful language and bullying” will not be tolerated. It also lists discrimination on the basis of gender, race, religion, age, sexual orientation, gender identity or disability.
“Abusing someone online is just as serious as doing so face to face. We stand against all forms of abuse and will take action against those who commit it,” it adds, warning against the use of anonymous accounts, trolling, sexualised language, or the publication of private information.
The initiative comes after an MP, Ruth Smeeth, said that she had been subjected to 25,000 incidents of abuse, including a string of antisemitic attacks. The politician, who has been called a “CIA/MI5/Mossad informant” and a “fucking traitor,” said she believed that abuse had become normal for many colleagues.
She also revealed that she had received police protection after facing the vitriol, much of which occurred after she walked out of the launch of Shami Chakrabarti’s inquiry into antisemitism for the Labour party. “I think this is a great step forward,” said Smeeth, about the pledge. “MPs have been subject to a tsunami of abuse. It is unfortunate that we’ve got to this place but given the changing nature of social media I welcome the proposal.”
She praised Watson and Yvette Cooper MP, who chairs the Reclaim the Internet campaign, for drawing up the proposal, which was presented to the NEC but will need to be rubber stamped by Labour conference.
Cooper is expected to say on Saturday at a women’s conference prior to the main meeting in Liverpool that the party needs to go further.
As the committee meeting was taking place at Labour’s Westminster headquarters, Cooper retweeted an abusive message that she received online arguing that it was “not exactly the kinder, gentler politics, comrade... ” The message simply said: “drop dead cooper”.
In a joint statement, Watson and Cooper said the move meant an “active commitment” from every member to the values of decency. “We have a problem, we need to be clearer about our values and about the standards acceptable in the Labour party – and this is an important step in doing so,” they said.
“When you’re signing up to the aims and values of the Labour party, being against abuse and behaving in a comradely manner is implicit. But, with what we have seen in recent months, we think this commitment should now be explicit.”
The pair said the party had a responsibility in the face of rising far-right abuse, online hatred, racism and misogyny which was “silencing people speaking out”.
Labour needed to stand up to that as it always had but “we can’t do that if some in our own party get sucked in as well” they added, saying there was an urgent need to restore decency to political debate.
Some MPs have criticised Corbyn for not taking strong enough action to protect Labour politicians from abuse when it comes from his supporters.
But the party leader fully backed this latest action and has said that he has also suffered abuse and “will absolutely not allow any sort of it, whatsoever, anywhere around our campaign”.
Launching a digital democracy manifesto last month, Corbyn said that he was worried about the impact on young people. “You wouldn’t gather around a young person and all shout abuse at them. That would be seen to be crude, brutal, violent and rude. But they do it on Facebook and they do it on Twitter and they do it online.”
The code of conduct says: “It is perfectly possible to have vehement disagreements without descending into personal abuse, shaming people or exhibiting bullying behaviour. Forcefully made points and criticisms of the political views of others are totally legitimate, personal attacks are not.
“Debates among party members should be comradely, acknowledging that whatever our diverse views, we are one party with shared goals. Derogatory descriptions of the positions of others should be avoided.”
It also says that it is never permissible to use anonymous accounts or hide an identity as a means of abusing someone. “Trolling, or otherwise disrupting the ability of others to debate, is not acceptable nor is consistently mentioning or making contact with others when this is not welcome.”
It makes clear to members that it wants to maximise the debate about the party, including “critical discussion” but warns that people must not feel excluded as a result.Propped up in bed, Phoebe Waller-Bridge stares intently at Barack Obama delivering a speech on her laptop. Without moving her stony eyes, her hand reaches under the covers and she starts vigorously masturbating. A head appears from the other side of the bed. It's her boyfriend. He looks between her and the laptop. "I was watching the news," she says.
Even if you haven't had an Obama wank, you'll recognise the lazy way masturbatory material can arise in the most beige of places. And of course, appreciate that the BBC have acknowledged that women wank at all.
Scenes like this are the reason BBC3's Fleabag is so watchable. When TV tries to show a 20-something female character, it often holds back on vulgarity and cruelness, so falls short. The writers are too scared to take anything far enough for it to actually resemble your sex life or the paranoid, existential conversations you have with yourself. The women of Fresh Meat were agonisingly boring, Drifters relied too heavily on girls-behaving-badly gags, and in comedies such as The IT Crowd, Bad Education and Friday Night Dinner, female characters are used more to explain the male millennial neurosis than anything else.
Fleabag breaks through that. It's a story of a woman whose life is unravelling because she's unable or unwilling to deal with her shit. Waller-Bridge's character is broke and sarcastic, so immature and unlikeable that you can't quite place her age; she could be anything from about 25 to 32, but that's the point, isn't it? She, like us, is living in this millennial Neverland, acting out because she doesn't fit in any learned role.
Originally this was a stand-up show at London's Soho Theatre, conceived and performed by Waller-Bridge, which probably why it succeeds in making you laugh. As is clear from her hilariously expressive face, she hates herself. Better yet, she acts on it with such compulsion it's uncomfortable to watch.
She has sex to fill a void inside of her, but also because she really enjoys it, hopping the lines of that familiar dichotomy. When her on-off relationship ends yet again, she swiftly works out how long she has to shag someone else before it's back on. When faced with the reality of her run-down business, she steals from her step-mum. When her boyfriend wants them to both engage in daily thoughtful acts for the other, she responds with jokes and insincerity.
People would rush to label this a feminist comedy and then retort that it's not representative of many women. And it's not. This is very middle-class north London and aware of that fact. Her character is born and bred in privilege, but Fleabag satirises that as much as it honestly admits it. The wealthy characters are consistently the most despicable. She is struggling to make ends meet, and despite having a father who could keep a roof over her head, he doesn't.
Bill Paterson would win an award for most punchable face as the arsehole half-invisible father; Olivia Colman is perfect as the posho arty step-mother, whose outwardly warm and cuddly presence contradict her passive-aggressiveness brilliantly, and Brett Gelman (recently amazing as Dr. Greg Colter in Netflix's Love) is cringe as the pathetic, sexually frustrated husband of the main character's uptight sister. No one is kind to each other. No one seems happy. The only person who does seem happy is her dead best mate who we see in flashbacks, but she's gone and it was only half an accident.
After episode one you think it's going to be solely dry laughs ahead, but it'll have you hurting in the gut when she's crying on her estranged dad's doorstep to tell him she's realised she's a morally defective dick. He responds, of course, with apathy and bitterness, saying "you get all that from your mother".
Fleabagis only six episodes long and nearly over so it's mostly all on iPlayer to binge-watch. As a comedy, it's far from perfect, but along with Michaela Coel'sChewing Gum,Fleabag is one of only shows that's set out to capture the British millennial lifestyle without a focus on men. It's actually managed to pull it off, too.
@hannahrosewens
More on TV that's not shit:
Jeremy Kyle: the Man, the Show, the Dickhead
'Naked Attraction': the Channel 4 Show Everyone's Talking About
What It's Like to Go On 'Take Me Out'Google this year has been gobbling up Web companies that look nothing like Google, from a social gaming start-up to a firm that powers most online sales for the airline industry.
As the tech giant spreads its reach, it is making new enemies who fear that once Google steps onto their turf it will use its almighty search engine to quash them. Now, these critics are pushing antitrust officials to block some of Google's mergers or build a blockbuster case against the search behemoth, reminiscent of the government's battle with Microsoft.
Yet as Google expands its ecosystem of products - a spread that already includes e-mail, a digital bookstore and cellphone software - it's only become a bigger puzzle for regulators.
Antitrust law was crafted with bricks-and-mortar companies in mind, companies whose business lines fit into neat categories, not a firm like Google whose influence is spreading lightning-quick into different markets that are connected only by the Internet.
Google says its acquisitions help the company build a bigger menu of useful products for consumers. And the tech firm accuses competitors of waging their battles against the company in Washington, rather than going toe to toe on the Web.
"We're a big company. We're disruptive. We're going to get scrutiny from governments around the world, and that just comes with the territory," said Adam Kovacevich, Google's senior manager of global communications and public affairs.
Antitrust enforcers at the Justice Department and the Federal Trade Commission are examining Google carefully with each big merger it proposes. But they have yet to allege the company is acting illegally as a dominant player on the Web.
Regulators in other countries have begun to act. The European Commission said last month that it is investigating charges that Google is suppressing search results for firms offering rival services, such as price comparisons for shoppers. The Texas attorney general is looking into similar allegations.
Antitrust officials everywhere are essentially turning over the same question: Can Google compete fairly with other companies when its go-to search engine determines what users find - or don't find - on the Internet?
Nowhere is the debate over Google's growing reach more apparent than in the Justice Department's ongoing review of Google's $700 million bid to buy ITA Software, a little-known company that probably powered your last online flight search.
ITA's technology, which is used by Web sites such as Orbitz, Kayak and Microsoft's Bing, transformed travel by letting consumers search directly for flights offered by multiple airlines, without the aid of an agent. American, Continental, Southwest and United airlines also depend on ITA for their online flight sales.
Critics say Google will have too much control over searches for flights if it controls ITA. In recent months a number of companies have told regulators that Google - which says it wants to build its own flight-search offering - could manipulate the results from its search engine to give its travel service a higher ranking than its competitors'. They point to the fate of such companies as AOL's MapQuest, which shriveled in the face of Google Maps, which regularly lands at the top of Google searches.TORONTO — Residents of condominiums have a reasonable expectation of privacy in the common areas of their buildings, Ontario’s top court ruled Tuesday.
In upholding the acquittal of an accused drug trafficker, the Court of Appeal said police had breached his rights by snooping around the stairways, hallways and storage rooms of his 10-unit building without a warrant.
“Some limits on police activity are necessary if privacy is to be protected,” the court stated.
“The home is entitled to the greatest degree of protection from unreasonable search, and in my view, the police conduct in this case had a serious impact on the respondent’s privacy rights.”
READ MORE: Toronto condo market ‘on fire’ as sales surge
The case began with police tracking a suspected drug trafficker, who led them to the building in Ottawa where Merith White was a resident. They suspected White was also dealing drugs. As part of their investigation, police made three secret entries into common areas of the four-storey building in December 2010 and January 2011.
Once inside, a detective hid in the stairwell to watch White’s unit and listen to what was going on inside. The officer also viewed the contents of his storage locker.
Based on the information, police obtained a search warrant of the unit and turned up 1.7 kilograms of cocaine, 6.9 kilograms of marijuana and a few grams of crack cocaine. White was also carrying $400 in cash and a small amount of cocaine. They arrested White, then 37 years old, for drug trafficking and possession of property obtained by crime.
READ MORE: New law to impose strict rules on police record checks in Ontario
In obtaining the warrant, police did not tell the judge that the detective had gained entry into the locked building without permission. At trial, they said it was unnecessary because the officer had not done anything wrong by going inside.
The detective testified that he believed he was entitled to enter a multi-unit property as part of an investigation, but conceded he had sought permission to do so retroactively from the condo board.
In April 2013, Superior Court Justice Paul Lalonde concluded police had been wilfully blind or ignorant, and had shown bad faith. Lalonde threw out the evidence based on the covert entries, saying it was obtained in breach of White’s constitutional rights.
He then acquitted White of the trafficking and property charges – but convicted him of possession of the cocaine that he had on him.
READ MORE: Ontario court dismisses claim that gun conviction resulted from racial profiling
In challenging the acquittal, the Crown argued White had no reasonable expectation of privacy in the common areas of his multi-unit building, saying it would be perverse to make such areas a “zone of protection for criminal activity” that would undermine their safety and quality of residents’ lives.
The Appeal Court disagreed.
“There is nothing ‘perverse’ about providing a measure of privacy protection to the many Canadians who live in multi-unit dwellings,” the Appeal Court said.
“They, no less than those who live in detached homes, are entitled to the protection against unreasonable search and seizure the charter provides.”Umpires
Ask the Umpire
Is there one group or one person that sets the ground rules for each park? How are they determined?
-- JB Willis
Under Official Playing Rule 3.13, the home team manager is responsible for announcing the Ground Rules, none of which may conflict with Official Baseball Rules. However, Major League Baseball is working with a group of umpires to standardize Ground Rules, to make them easier for teams and umpires.
I was just watching the Kerry Wood 20-strikeout replay from May 6, 1998 on ESPN Classic, in which a Houston Astros batter asked the home plate umpire if a thrown pitch that the batter missed for strike three would have been a called third strike anyway, had he not swung at it. Is a home plate umpire actually required to respond to the hitter's hypothetical question if posed to him?
This is a frequent occurrence in professional baseball. After striking out, the batter often asks the plate umpire if he swung at a good pitch. The umpire, although not required to answer, normally responds to the batter's question. By the way, Jerry Meals was the home plate umpire in that classic game at Wrigley Field.
Two strike count on the batter. He squares to bunt. Pitch is inside and batter pulls bat backward to avoid bunting. Ball hits bat and goes into foul territory. Umpire rules foul ball, but since batter was no longer trying to bunt under definitions in 2.00, does not call him out for bunting foul on third strike. Defensive coach call for plate umpire to appeal to his partner as in a check swing: Did he go? Since Rule 9.02 states appeal of this nature is allowed on a called ball only, umpire refuses the request to appeal. Coach hot under collar claiming anything other than a strike can be appealed and since the foul occurred on a two strike pitch, it was not a strike. Good call by ump?
-- Alan
If there was a question as to whether the batter offered at the pitch, the plate umpire could -- and should -- appeal to his partner as provided in Official Baseball Rule 9.02(c).
In the American League where they use the DH, can the manager move the starting/relieving pitcher to the DH, then later in the game allow the DH to once again be the pitcher?
-- Ron
No, once the pitcher pinch-hits for the DH (which is the only person the pitcher can pinch-hit for), such a move terminates the DH for the rest of the game. This is provided in Official Baseball Rule 6.10.
With game tied in bottom of the 9th inning, batter hits a home run but fails to touch third base while rounding it. Although the third base coach is yelling at him, he can't hear his instructions due to the noise and jubilation. Coach runs after runner, grabs his arm to gather his attention, and sends him back to touch third base. Since the ball is dead due to the home run, can coach's interference occur on this play?
-- Steve
Yes, and the batter-runner should be called out.
I have a question regarding pitching. Is there any rule that stipulates that a pitcher must be either right-handed or left-handed?
No, there is no such rule.
Based on the answer to the first question: If not, it is feasible to say that a pitcher could deliver the ball right-handed one pitch and then left-handed on the next?
Ambidextrous pitchers are rare but do exist. An example was Greg Harris, who pitched with the Boston Red Sox. When such pitchers pitch in the Major Leagues, they must pitch with the same hand during a batter's entire at-bat. Such pitchers may change pitching hand for the next batter, but again must continue with that arm for that batter's entire at-bat.
If there are glove stipulations, could a manufactured glove that fit either hand be worn?
-- Nicholas K. Kruse
This would be legal under the rules, provided such a glove meets the specifications outlined in Official Baseball Rules 1.14 and 1.15.
What are the advantages/disadvantages to the various umpire positions behind home plate (the chair, the scissors and the knee); and should all umpires use the same position?
-- TC
At the Major League level, we have no restrictions as to which stance an umpire uses behind the plate. Umpires may use any stance they feel best suited to view the pitch and handle other responsibilities such as covering foul pop-ups and covering bases.
I just saw your umpire page on MLB.com. It's great. I have a question which has been bothering me for some time. Following situation: 1 out, runners on second and third. Batter hits single, runner on third scores, runner on second attempts to score but gets thrown out at the plate, batter/runner runs to second on play home. Catcher then throws to first as batter/runner did not touch first base. Appeal is granted and batter/runner is declared out. Does the run count and why? I read this question in a magazine and the answer they gave was that the run would not count as the third out is a force play at first. I don't think that's right but can't find the rule to argue with.
-- jp, switzerland
No runs would score in the play you describe. The answer is found in Official Baseball Rule 4.09(a): "A run is not scored if the runner advances to home base during a play in which the third out is made by the batter-runner before he touches first base." The very play in your question is discussed in the Approved Ruling following Official Baseball Rule 4.09(b).
Can Major League umpires eject a fan? If so, how?
-- TF
Umpires are entrusted with maintaining discipline and order on the playing field, and sometimes fans can interfere with order on the field. Security at the Major League level normally precludes the necessity of an umpire causing a fan to be removed, but this does happen on rare occasion. Umpires are thick-skinned by nature and ignore comments-however inflammatory-from fans.
I just wanted to let the umpires know what a wonderful job they did out there this year. Especially during the playoffs and the World Series. You guys (umpires) don't get a lot of credit and only get noticed if you make a mistake. I wanted to let you all know that you are appreciated for the great job you do out there and how your level of professionalism makes the game as great as it is. God Bless you all and God Bless America. Thanks!
-- NC1 Scott A. McIntosh, USNR-TAR
Thank you for the kind words. In the umpiring profession, we often say that an umpire has done his job well when no one knows he's there.
Hi, name is Geoff Arnold and I am 14 years old and someday hoping to umpire in the Major Leagues. My question is what do you tell a coach if he gets mad and jumpy about a call you made against his team how do you handle the situation?
-- Geoff Arnold
Geoff, best of luck with your umpiring. One thing which is important for umpires to remember is not to tolerate abuse. If a player, coach, or manager is questioning you in a reasonable fashion, you should listen to him and attempt to answer the question. However, if that person's demeanor becomes abusive -- or if profanity or personal comments are directed towards you -- you must put a stop to it.
What is the approximate salary range for umpires from bottom up through the Majors?
-- John Baldridge
Professional umpires currently begin their Minor League career at $1,800 per month. At the Major League level, salaries range from approximately $84,000 to $300,000 per year.This article was first published in the October 2012 issue of BBC History Magazine
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rahamic religions
Codex Gigas, dating to the early thirteenth century Illustration of the Devil on folio 290 recto of the, dating to the early thirteenth century
Satan,[a] also known as the Devil,[b] is an entity in the Abrahamic religions that seduces humans into sin or falsehood. In Christianity and Islam, he is usually seen as either a fallen angel or a jinn, who used to possess great piety and beauty, but rebelled against God, who nevertheless allows him temporary power over the fallen world and a host of demons. In Judaism, Satan is typically regarded as a metaphor for the yetzer hara, or "evil inclination", or as an agent subservient to God.
A figure known as "the satan" first appears in the Tanakh as a heavenly prosecutor, a member of the sons of God subordinate to Yahweh, who prosecutes the nation of Judah in the heavenly court and tests the loyalty of Yahweh's followers by forcing them to suffer. During the intertestamental period, possibly due to influence from the Zoroastrian figure of Angra Mainyu, the satan developed into a malevolent entity with abhorrent qualities in dualistic opposition to God. In the apocryphal Book of Jubilees, Yahweh grants the satan (referred to as Mastema) authority over a group of fallen angels, or their offspring, to tempt humans to sin and punish them. In the Synoptic Gospels, Satan tempts Jesus in the desert and is identified as the cause of illness and temptation. In the Book of Revelation, Satan appears as a Great Red Dragon, who is defeated by Michael the Archangel and cast down from Heaven. He is later bound for one thousand years, but is briefly set free before being ultimately defeated and cast into the Lake of Fire.
In Christianity, Satan is also known as the Devil and, although the Book of Genesis does not mention him, he is often identified as the serpent in the Garden of Eden. In the Middle Ages, Satan played a minimal role in Christian theology and was used as a comic relief figure in mystery plays. During the early modern period, Satan's significance greatly increased as beliefs such as demonic possession and witchcraft became more prevalent. During the Age of Enlightenment, belief in the existence of Satan became harshly criticized. Nonetheless, belief in Satan has persisted, particularly in the Americas. In the Quran, Shaitan, also known as Iblis, is an entity made of fire who was cast out of Heaven because he refused to bow before the newly-created Adam and incites humans to sin by infecting their minds with waswās ("evil suggestions"). Although Satan is generally viewed as evil, some groups have very different beliefs.
In Theistic Satanism, Satan is considered a deity who is either worshipped or revered. In LaVeyan Satanism, Satan is a symbol of virtuous characteristics and liberty.[6][7] Satan's appearance is never described in the Bible, but, since the ninth century, he has often been shown in Christian art with horns, cloven hooves, unusually hairy legs, and a tail, often naked and holding a pitchfork. These are an amalgam of traits derived from various pagan deities, including Pan, Poseidon, and Bes. Satan appears frequently in Christian literature, most notably in Dante Alighieri's Inferno, variants of the Faust legend, John Milton's Paradise Lost and Paradise Regained, and the poems of William Blake. He continues to appear in film, television, and music.
Historical development
Hebrew Bible
Balaam and the Angel (1836) by (1836) by Gustav Jäger. The angel in this incident is referred to as a "satan".
The original Hebrew term sâtan (Hebrew: שָּׂטָן) is a generic noun meaning "accuser" or "adversary", which is used throughout the Hebrew Bible to refer to ordinary human adversaries, as well as a specific supernatural entity. The word is derived from a verb meaning primarily "to obstruct, oppose".[12] When it is used without the definite article (simply satan), the word can refer to any accuser, but when it is used with the definite article (ha-satan), it usually refers specifically to the heavenly accuser: the satan.
Ha-Satan with the definite article occurs 13 times in the Masoretic Text, in two books of the Hebrew Bible: Job ch. 1–2 (10×)[13] and Zechariah 3:1–2 (3×).[14] Satan without the definite article is used in 10 instances, of which two are translated diabolos in the Septuagint and "Satan" in the King James Version (KJV):
1 Chronicles 21:1, "Satan stood up against Israel" (KJV) or "And there standeth up an adversary against Israel" (Young's Literal Translation) [15]
Psalm 109:6b "and let Satan stand at his right hand" (KJV)[16] or "let an accuser stand at his right hand." (ESV, etc.)
The word "satan" does not occur in the Book of Genesis, which mentions only a talking serpent and does not identify the serpent with any supernatural entity. The first occurrence of the word "satan" in the Hebrew Bible in reference to a supernatural figure comes from Numbers 22:22, which describes the Angel of Yahweh confronting Balaam on his donkey: "Balaam's departure aroused the wrath of Elohim, and the Angel of Yahweh stood in the road as a satan against him." In 2 Samuel 24, Yahweh sends the "Angel of Yahweh" to inflict a plague against Israel for three days, killing 70,000 people as punishment for David having taken a census without his approval. 1 Chronicles 21:1 repeats this story, but replaces the "Angel of Yahweh" with an entity referred to as "a satan".
Some passages clearly refer to the satan, without using the word itself. 1 Samuel 2:12 describes the sons of Eli as "sons of Belial"; the later usage of this word makes it clearly a synonym for "satan". In 1 Samuel 16:14-23 Yahweh sends a "troubling spirit" to torment King Saul as a mechanism to ingratiate David with the king. In 1 Kings 22:19-25, the prophet Micaiah describes to King Ahab a vision of Yahweh sitting on his throne surrounded by the Host of Heaven. Yahweh asks the Host which of them will lead Ahab astray. A "spirit", whose name is not specified, but who is analogous to the satan, volunteers to be "a Lying Spirit in the mouth of all his Prophets".
Book of Job
The Examination of Job ( c. 1821 ) by ) by William Blake
The satan appears in the Book of Job, a poetic dialogue set within a prose framework, which may have been written around the time of the Babylonian captivity. In the text, Job is a righteous man favored by Yahweh. Job 1:6-8 describes the "sons of God" (bənê hāʼĕlōhîm) presenting themselves before Yahweh. Yahweh asks one of them, "the satan", where he has been, to which he replies that he has been roaming around the earth. Yahweh asks, "Have you considered My servant Job?" The satan replies by urging Yahweh to let him torture Job, promising that Job will abandon his faith at the first tribulation. Yahweh consents; the satan destroys Job's servants and flocks, yet Job refuses to condemn Yahweh. The first scene repeats itself, with the satan presenting himself to Yahweh alongside the other "sons of God". Yahweh points out Job's continued faithfulness, to which the satan insists that more testing is necessary; Yahweh once again gives him permission to test Job. In the end, Job remains faithful and righteous, and it is implied that the satan is shamed in his defeat.[26]
Book of Zechariah
Zechariah 3:1-7 contains a description of a vision dated to the middle of February of 519 BC, in which an angel shows Zechariah a scene of Joshua the High Priest dressed in filthy rags, representing the nation of Judah and its sins, on trial with Yahweh as the judge and the satan standing as the prosecutor. Yahweh rebukes the satan and orders for Joshua to be given clean clothes, representing Yahweh's forgiveness of Judah's sins.
Second Temple period
During the Second Temple Period, when Jews were living in the Achaemenid Empire, Judaism was heavily influenced by Zoroastrianism, the religion of the Achaemenids.[30] Jewish conceptions of Satan were impacted by Angra Mainyu,[31] the Zoroastrian god of evil, darkness, and ignorance. In the Septuagint, the Hebrew ha-Satan in Job and Zechariah is translated by the Greek word diabolos (slanderer), the same word in the Greek New Testament from which the English word "devil" is derived. Where satan is used to refer to human enemies in the Hebrew Bible, such as Hadad the Edomite and Rezon the Syrian, the word is left untranslated but transliterated in the Greek as satan, a neologism in Greek.
The idea of Satan as an opponent of God and a purely evil figure seems to have taken root in Jewish pseudepigrapha during the Second Temple Period,[33] particularly in the apocalypses.[34] The Book of Enoch, which the Dead Sea Scrolls have revealed to have been nearly as popular as the Torah, describes a group of 200 angels known as the "Watchers", who are assigned to supervise the earth, but instead abandon their duties and have sexual intercourse with human women. The leader of the Watchers is Semjâzâ and another member of the group, known as Azazel, spreads sin and corruption among humankind. The Watchers are ultimately sequestered in isolated caves across the earth and are condemned to face judgement at the end of time. The Book of Jubilees, written in around 150 BC, retells the story of the Watchers' defeat, but, in deviation from the Book of Enoch, Mastema, the "Chief of Spirits", intervenes before all of their demon offspring are sealed away, requesting for Yahweh to let him keep some of them to become his workers. Yahweh acquiesces this request and Mastema uses them to tempt humans into committing more sins, so that he may punish them for their wickedness. Later, Mastema induces Yahweh to test Abraham by ordering him to sacrifice Isaac.[42]
The Second Book of Enoch, also called the Slavonic Book of Enoch, contains references to a Watcher called Satanael.[43] It is a pseudepigraphic text of an uncertain date and unknown authorship. The text describes Satanael as being the prince of the Grigori who was cast out of heaven[44] and an evil spirit who knew the difference between what was "righteous" and "sinful".[45] In the Book of Wisdom, the devil is taken to be the being who brought death into the world, but originally the culprit was recognized as Cain.[46] The name Samael, which is used in reference to one of the fallen angels, later became a common name for Satan in Jewish Midrash and Kabbalah.[49]
Judaism
Rabbinical Judaism
pictured) is believed to symbolically confuse Satan. The sound of a shofar ) is believed to symbolically confuse Satan.
Most Jews do not believe in the existence of a supernatural omnimalevolent figure. Traditionalists and philosophers in medieval Judaism adhered to rational theology, rejecting any belief in rebel or fallen angels, and viewing evil as abstract.[51] The Rabbis usually interpreted the word satan as it is used in the Tanakh as referring strictly to human adversaries[52] and rejected all of the Enochian writings mentioning Satan as a literal, heavenly figure from the Biblical canon, making every attempt to root them out.[33] Nonetheless, the word satan has occasionally been metaphorically applied to evil influences, such as the Jewish exegesis of the yetzer hara ("evil inclination") mentioned in Genesis 6:5.[54] Rabbinical scholarship on the Book of Job generally follows the Talmud and Maimonides in identifying "the satan" from the prologue as a metaphor for the yetzer hara and not an actual entity.[55] Satan is rarely mentioned in Tannaitic literature, but is found in Babylonian aggadah.[34] According to a narration, the sound of the shofar, which is primarily intended to remind Jews of the importance of teshuva, is also intended symbolically to "confuse the accuser" (Satan) and prevent him from rendering any litigation to God against the Jews.[56] In Hasidic Judaism, the Kabbalah presents Satan as an agent of God whose function is to tempt humans into sinning so that he may accuse them in the heavenly court.[57] The Hasidic Jews of the 18th century associated ha-Satan with Baal Davar.[58]
Modern Judaism
Each sect of Judaism has its own interpretation of Satan's identity. Conservative Judaism generally rejects the Talmudic interpretation of Satan as a metaphor for the yetzer hara, and regard him as a literal agent of God.[59] Orthodox Judaism, on the other hand, outwardly embraces Talmudic teachings on Satan, and involves Satan in religious life far more inclusively than other sects. Satan is mentioned explicitly in some daily prayers, including during Shacharit and certain post-meal benedictions, as described in Talmud[60] and the Jewish Code of Law.[61] In Reform Judaism, Satan is generally seen in his Talmudic role as a metaphor for the yetzer hara and the symbolic representation of innate human qualities such as selfishness.[62]
Christianity
Names
The most common English synonym for "Satan" is "devil", which descends from Middle English devel, from Old English dēofol, that in turn represents an early Germanic borrowing of Latin diabolus (also the source of "diabolical"). This in turn was borrowed from Greek diabolos "slanderer", from diaballein "to slander": dia- "across, through" + ballein "to hurl".[63] In the New Testament, the words Satan and diabolos are used interchangeably as synonyms.[65] Beelzebub, meaning "Lord of Flies", is the contemptuous name given in the Hebrew Bible and New Testament to a Philistine god whose original name has been reconstructed as most probably "Ba'al Zabul", meaning "Baal the Prince". The Synoptic Gospels identify Satan and Beelzebub as the same. The name Abaddon (meaning "place of destruction") is used six times in the Old Testament, mainly as a name for one the regions of Sheol. Revelation 9:11 describes Abaddon, whose name is translated into Greek as Apollyon, meaning "the destroyer", as an angel who rules the Abyss.[68] In modern usage, Abaddon is sometimes equated with Satan.
New Testament
Gospels, Acts, and epistles
The three Synoptic Gospels all describe the temptation of Christ by Satan in the desert (Matthew 4:1-11, Mark 1:12-13, and Luke 4:1-13). Satan first shows Jesus a stone and tells him to turn it into bread. He also takes him to the pinnacle of the Temple in Jerusalem and commands Jesus to throw himself down so that the angels will catch him. Satan takes Jesus to the top of a tall mountain as well; there, he shows him the kingdoms of the earth and promises to give them all to him if he will bow down and worship him. Each time Jesus rebukes Satan and, after the third temptation, he is administered by the angels. Satan's promise in Matthew 4:8-9 and Luke 4:6-7 to give Jesus all the kingdoms of the earth implies that all those kingdoms belong to him. The fact that Jesus does not dispute Satan's promise indicates that the authors of those gospels believed this to be true.
Satan plays a role in some of the parables of Jesus, namely the Parable of the Sower, the Parable of the Weeds, Parable of the Sheep and the Goats, and the Parable of the Strong Man. According to the Parable of the Sower, Satan "profoundly influences" those who fail to understand the gospel. The latter two parables say that Satan's followers will be punished on Judgement Day, with the Parable of the Sheep and the Goats stating that the Devil, his angels, and the people who follow him will be consigned to "eternal fire". When the Pharisees accused Jesus of exorcising demons through the power of Beelzebub, Jesus responds by telling the Parable of the Strongman, saying: "how can someone enter a strong man's house and plunder his goods, unless he first binds the strong man? Then indeed he may plunder his house" (Matthew 12:29). The strong man in this parable represents Satan.
The Synoptic Gospels identify Satan and his demons as the causes of illness, including fever (Luke 4:39), leprosy (Luke 5:13), and arthritis (Luke 13:11-16), while the Epistle to the Hebrews describes the Devil as "him who holds the power of death" (Hebrews 2:14). The author of Luke-Acts attributes more power to Satan than both Matthew and Mark. In Luke 22:31, Jesus grants Satan the authority to test Peter and the other apostles. Luke 22:3-6 states that Judas Iscariot betrayed Jesus because "Satan entered" him and, in Acts 5:3, Peter describes Satan as "filling" Ananias's heart and causing him to sin. The Gospel of John only uses the name Satan three times. In John 8:44, Jesus says that his Jewish or Judean enemies are the children of the Devil rather than the children of Abraham. The same verse describes the Devil as "a man-killer from the beginning" and "a liar and the father of lying." John 13:2 describes the Devil as inspiring Judas to betray Jesus and John 12:31-32 identifies Satan as "the Archon of this Cosmos", who is destined to be overthrown through Jesus's death and resurrection. John 16:7-8 promises that the Holy Spirit will "accuse the World concerning sin, justice, and judgement", a role resembling that of the satan in the Old Testament.
Jude 1:9 refers to a dispute between Michael the Archangel and the Devil over the body of Moses.[86][87] Some interpreters understand this reference to be an allusion to the events described in Zechariah 3:1-2.[86][87] The classical theologian Origen attributes this reference to the non-canonical Assumption of Moses.[88] According to James H. Charlesworth, there is no evidence the surviving book of this name ever contained any such content.[90] Others believe it to be in the lost ending of the book.[90][91] The second chapter of the Second Epistle of Peter, a pseudepigraphical letter which falsely claims to have been written by Peter, copies much of the content of the Epistle of Jude, but omits the specifics of the example regarding Michael and Satan, with 2 Peter 2:10–11 instead mentioning only an ambiguous dispute between "Angels" and "Glories". Throughout the New Testament, Satan is referred to as a "tempter" (Matthew 4:3), "the ruler of the demons" (Matthew 12:24), "the God of this Age" (2 Corinthians 4:4), "the evil one" (1 John 5:18), and "a roaring lion" (1 Peter 5:8).
Book of Revelation
The Book of Revelation represents Satan as the supernatural ruler of the Roman Empire and the ultimate cause of all evil in the world. In Revelation 2:9-10, as part of the letter to the church at Smyrna, John of Patmos refers to the Jews of Smyrna as "a synagogue of Satan" and warns that "the Devil is about to cast some of you into prison as a test [peirasmos], and for ten days you will have affliction." In Revelation 2:13-14, in the letter to the church of Pergamum, John warns that Satan lives among the members of the congregation and declares that "Satan's throne" is in their midst. Pergamum was the capital of the Roman Province of Asia and "Satan's throne" may be referring to the monumental Pergamon Altar in the city, which was dedicated to the Greek god Zeus, or to a temple dedicated to the Roman emperor Augustus.
Revelation 12:3 describes a vision of a Great Red Dragon with seven heads, ten horns, seven crowns, and a massive tail, an image which is clearly inspired by the vision of the four beasts from the sea in the Book of Daniel and the Leviathan described in various Old Testament passages. The Great Red Dragon knocks "a third of the sun... a third of the moon, and a third of the stars" out the sky and pursues the Woman of the Apocalypse. Revelation 12:7-9 declares: "And war broke out in Heaven. Michael and his angels fought against Dragon. Dragon and his angels fought back, but they were defeated, and there was no longer any place for them in Heaven. Dragon the Great was thrown down, that ancient serpent who is called Devil and Satan, the one deceiving the whole inhabited World - he was thrown down to earth and his angels were thrown down with him." Then a voice booms down from Heaven heralding the defeat of "the Accuser" (ho Kantegor), identifying the Satan of Revelation with the satan of the Old Testament.
In Revelation 20:1-3, Satan is bound with a chain and hurled into the Abyss, where he is imprisoned for one thousand years. In Revelation 20:7-10, he is set free and gathers his armies along with Gog and Magog to wage war against the righteous, but is defeated with fire from Heaven, and cast into the lake of fire. Some Christians associate Satan with the number 666, which Revelation 13:18 describes as the Number of the Beast.[105] However, the beast mentioned in Revelation 13 is not Satan,[106] and the use of 666 in the Book of Revelation has been interpreted as a reference to the Roman Emperor Nero, as 666 is the numeric value of his name in Hebrew.[105]
Patristic era
Despite the fact that the Book of Genesis never mentions Satan, Christians have traditionally interpreted the serpent in the Garden of Eden as Satan due to Revelation 12:7, which calls Satan "that ancient serpent". This verse, however, is probably intended to identify Satan with the Leviathan, a monstrous sea-serpent whose destruction by Yahweh is prophesied in Isaiah 27:1. The first recorded individual to identify Satan with the serpent from the Garden of Eden was the second-century AD Christian apologist Justin Martyr, in chapters 45 and 79 of his Dialogue with Trypho. Other early church fathers to mention this identification include Theophilus and Tertullian. The early Christian Church, however, encountered opposition from pagans such as Celsus, who claimed in his treatise The True Word that "it is blasphemy... to say that the greatest God... has an adversary who constrains his capacity to do good" and said that Christians "impiously divide the kingdom of God, creating a rebellion in it, as if there were opposing factions within the divine, including one that is hostile to God".[110]
The name Heylel, meaning "morning star" (or, in Latin, Lucifer),[c] was a name for Attar, the god of the planet Venus in Canaanite mythology, who attempted to scale the walls of the heavenly city, but was vanquished by the god of the sun. The name is used in Isaiah 14:12 in metaphorical reference to the king of Babylon. Ezekiel 28:12-15 uses a description of a cherub in Eden as a polemic against Ithobaal II, the king of Tyre. The Church Father Origen of Alexandria ( c. 184 – c. 253), who was only aware of the actual text of these passages and not the original myths to which they refer, concluded in his treatise On the First Principles, which is preserved in a Latin translation by Tyrannius Rufinus, that neither of these verses could literally refer to a human being and must therefore be alluding to "a certain Angel who had received the office of governing the nation of the Tyrians," but was hurled down to Earth after he was found to be corrupt.[118]
In his apologetic treatise Contra Celsum, however, Origen changed his interpretations of Isaiah 14:12 and Ezekiel 28:12-15, now interpreting both of them as referring to Satan. According to Henry Ansgar Kelly, Origen seems to have adopted this new interpretation to refute unnamed persons who, perhaps under the influence of Zoroastrian radical dualism, believed "that Satan's original nature was Darkness." The later Church Father Jerome ( c. 347 – 420), translator of the Latin Vulgate, accepted Origen's theory of Satan as a fallen angel and wrote about it in his commentary on the Book of Isaiah. In Christian tradition ever since, both Isaiah 14:12 and Ezekiel 28:12-15 have been understood as allegorically referring to Satan. For most Christians, Satan has been regarded as an angel who rebelled against God.
According to the ransom theory of atonement, which was popular among early Christian theologians, Satan gained power over humanity through Adam and Eve's sin and Christ's death on the cross was a ransom to Satan in exchange for humanity's liberation. This theory holds that Satan was tricked by God because Christ was not only free of sin, but also the incarnate Deity, whom Satan lacked the ability to enslave. Irenaeus of Lyons described a prototypical form of the ransom theory, but Origen was the first to propose it in its fully developed form. The theory was later expanded by theologians such as Gregory of Nyssa and Rufinus of Aquileia. In the eleventh century, Anselm of Canterbury criticized the ransom theory, along with the associated Christus Victor theory, resulting in the theory's decline in western Europe. The theory has nonetheless retained some of its popularity in the Eastern Orthodox Church.
Most early Christians firmly believed that Satan and his demons had the power to possess humans and exorcisms were widely practiced by Jews, Christians, and pagans alike. Belief in demonic possession continued through the Middle Ages into the early modern period. Exorcisms were seen as a display of God's power over Satan. The vast majority of people who thought they were possessed by the Devil did not suffer from hallucinations or other "spectacular symptoms", but "complained of anxiety, religious fears, and evil thoughts."
Middle Ages
Satan had minimal role in medieval Christian theology, but he frequently appeared as a recurring comedic stock character in late medieval mystery plays, in which he was portrayed as a comic relief figure who "frolicked, fell, and farted in the background". Jeffrey Burton Russell describes the medieval conception of Satan as "more pathetic and repulsive than terrifying" and he was seen as little more than a nuisance to God's overarching plan. The Golden Legend, a collection of saints' lives compiled in around 1260 by the Dominican Friar Jacobus da Varagine, contains numerous stories about encounters between saints and Satan, in which Satan is constantly duped by the saints' cleverness and by the power of God. Henry Ansgar Kelly remarks that Satan "comes across as the opposite of fearsome." The Golden Legend was the most popular book during the High and Late Middle Ages and more manuscripts of it have survived from the period than for any other book, including even the Bible itself.
The Canon Episcopi, written in the eleventh century AD, condemns belief in witchcraft as heretical, but also documents that many people at the time apparently believed in it. Witches were believed to fly through the air on broomsticks, consort with demons, perform in "lurid sexual rituals" in the forests, murder human infants and eat them as part of Satanic rites, and engage in conjugal relations with demons. In 1326, Pope John XXII issued the papal bull Super illius Specula, which condemned folk divination practices as consultation with Satan. By the 1430s, the Catholic Church began to regard witchcraft as part of a vast conspiracy led by Satan himself.
Early modern period
During the Early Modern Period, Christians gradually began to regard Satan as increasingly powerful and the fear of Satan's power became a dominant aspect of the worldview of Christians across Europe. During the Protestant Reformation, Martin Luther taught that, rather than trying to argue with Satan, Christians should avoid temptation altogether by seeking out pleasant company; Luther especially recommended music as a safeguard against temptation, since the Devil "cannot endure gaiety." John Calvin repeated a maxim from Saint Augustine that "Man is like a horse, with either God or the devil as rider."
In the late fifteenth century, a series of witchcraft panics erupted in France and Germany. The German Inquisitors Heinrich Kramer and Jacob Sprenger argued in their book Malleus Maleficarum, published in 1487, that all maleficia ("sorcery") was rooted in the work of Satan. In the mid-sixteenth century, the panic spread to England and Switzerland. Both Protestants and Catholics alike firmly believed in witchcraft as a real phenomenon and supported its prosecution. In the late 1500s, the Dutch demonologist Johann Weyer argued in his treatise De praestigiis daemonum that witchcraft did not exist, but that Satan promoted belief in it to lead Christians astray. The panic over witchcraft intensified in the 1620s and continued until the end of the 1600s. Brian Levack estimates that around 60,000 people were executed for witchcraft during the entire span of the witchcraft hysteria.
The early English settlers of North America, especially the Puritans of New England, believed that Satan "visibly and palpably" reigned in the New World. John Winthrop claimed that the Devil made rebellious Puritan women give birth to stillborn monsters with claws, sharp horns, and "on each foot three claws, like a young fowl."[156] Cotton Mather wrote that devils swarmed around Puritan settlements "like the frogs of Egypt". The Puritans believed that the Native Americans were worshippers of Satan and described them as "children of the Devil". Some settlers claimed to have seen Satan himself appear in the flesh at native ceremonies. During the First Great Awakening, the "new light" preachers portrayed their "old light" critics as ministers of Satan. By the time of the Second Great Awakening, Satan's primary role in American evangelicalism was as the opponent of the evangelical movement itself, who spent most of his time trying to hinder the ministries of evangelical preachers, a role he has largely retained among present-day American fundamentalists.
By the early 1600s, skeptics in Europe, including the English author Reginald Scot and the Anglican bishop John Bancroft, had begun to criticize the belief that demons still had the power to possess people. This skepticism was bolstered by the belief that miracles only occurred during the Apostolic Age, which had long since ended. Later, Enlightenment thinkers, such as David Hume, Denis Diderot, and Voltaire, attacked the notion of Satan's existence altogether. Voltaire labelled John Milton's Paradise Lost a "disgusting fantasy" and declared that belief in Hell and Satan were among the many lies propagated by the Catholic Church to keep humanity enslaved. By the eighteenth century, trials for witchcraft had ceased in most western countries, with the notable exceptions of Poland and Hungary, where they continued. Belief in the power of Satan, however, remained strong among traditional Christians.
Modern era
Mormonism developed its own views on Satan. According to the Book of Moses, the Devil offered to be the redeemer of mankind for the sake of his own glory. Conversely, Jesus offered to be the redeemer of mankind so that his father's will would be done. After his offer was rejected, Satan became rebellious and was subsequently cast out of heaven. In the Book of Moses, Cain is said to have "loved Satan more than God"[167] and conspired with Satan to kill Abel. It was through this pact that Cain became a Master Mahan.[168] The Book of Moses also says that Moses was tempted by Satan before calling upon the name of the "Only Begotten", which caused Satan to depart. Douglas Davies asserts that this text "reflects" the temptation of Jesus in the Bible.
Belief in Satan and demonic possession remains strong among Christians in the United States and Latin America. According to a 2013 poll conducted by YouGov, fifty-seven percent of people in the United States believe in a literal Devil, compared to eighteen percent of people in Britain. Fifty-one percent of Americans believe that Satan has the power to possess people. W. Scott Poole, author of Satan in America: The Devil We Know, has opined that "In the United States over the last forty to fifty years, a composite image of Satan has emerged that borrows from both popular culture and theological sources" and that most American Christians do not "separate what they know [about Satan] from the movies from what they know from various ecclesiastical and theological traditions."[156] The Catholic Church generally played down Satan and exorcism during late twentieth and early twenty-first centuries, but Pope Francis brought renewed focus on the Devil in the early 2010s, stating, among many other pronouncements, that "The devil is intelligent, he knows more theology than all the theologians together." According to the Encyclopædia Britannica, liberal Christianity tends to view Satan "as a [figurative] mythological attempt to express the reality and extent of evil in the universe, existing outside and apart from humanity but profoundly influencing the human sphere."[175]
Bernard McGinn describes multiple traditions detailing the relationship between the Antichrist and Satan. In the dualist approach, Satan will become incarnate in the Antichrist, just as God became incarnate in Jesus. However, in Orthodox Christian thought, this view is problematic because it is too similar to Christ's incarnation. Instead, the "indwelling" view has become more accepted, which stipulates that the Antichrist is a human figure inhabited by Satan, since the latter's power is not to be seen as equivalent to God's.
Islam
The Arabic equivalent of the word Satan is Shaitan (شيطان, from the root šṭn شطن). The word itself is an adjective (meaning "astray" or "distant", sometimes translated as "devil") that can be applied to both man ("al-ins", الإنس) and al-jinn (الجن), but it is also used in reference to Satan in particular. In the Quran, Satan's name is Iblis ( Arabic pronunciation: [ˈibliːs]), probably a derivative of the Greek word diabolos. Muslims do not regard Satan as the cause of evil, but as a tempter, who takes advantage of humans' inclinations toward self-centeredness.[178]
Quran
Annals of al-Tabari showing Iblis refusing to prostrate before the newly-created Adam Illustration from an Arabic manuscript of theshowing Iblis refusing to prostrate before the newly-created Adam
Seven suras in the Quran describe how God ordered all the angels and Iblis to bow before the newly-created Adam. All the angels bowed, but Iblis refused, claiming to be superior to Adam because he was made from fire; whereas Adam was made from clay (7:12). Consequently, God expelled him from Paradise and condemned him to Jahannam. Iblis thereafter became a kafir, "an ungrateful disbeliever", whose sole mission is to lead humanity astray.[181] God allows Iblis to do this,[182] because he knows that the righteous will be able to resist Iblis's attempts to misguide them. On Judgement Day, while the lot of Satan remains in question,[183] those who followed him will be thrown into the fires of Jahannam. After his banishment from Paradise, Iblis, who thereafter became known as Al-Shaitan ("the Demon"), lured Adam and Eve into eating the fruit from the forbidden tree.[184]
The primary characteristic of Satan, aside from his hubris and despair, is his ability to cast evil suggestions (waswās) into men and women.[185] 15:45 states that Satan has no influence over the righteous, but that those who fall in error are under his power. 7:156 implies that those who obey God's laws are immune to the temptations of Satan. 56:79 warns that Satan tries to keep Muslims from reading the Quran and 16:98-100 recommends reciting the Quran as an antidote against Satan. 35:6 refers to Satan as the enemy of humanity and 36:60 forbids humans from worshipping him. In the Quranic retelling of the story of Job, Job knows that Satan is the one tormenting him.
Islamic tradition
Turkish Siyah Qalam depiction of Iblis, appearing as a black man wearing a headcover.
Affiliation
In the Quran, Satan is apparently an angel, but, in 18:50, he is described as "from the jinns". This, combined with the fact that he describes himself as having been made from fire, posed a major problem for Muslims exegetes of the Quran, who disagree on whether Satan is a fallen angel or the leader of a group of evil jinn. According to a hadith from Ibn Abbas, Iblis was actually an angel whom God created out of |
Peace:
Two people were arrested in Belgium on suspicion they were planning attacks in the country’s capital city, Brussels, during the holidays.
The pair had planned to target the city on New Year’s Eve, according to a statement from the country’s federal prosecutor’s office Tuesday.
The investigation revealed “the threat of serious attacks that would target several emblematic places in Brussels and be committed during the end-of-year holidays,” the prosecutor’s office said.
The statement did not specify if the two people were male or female, but said they were arrested after a series of searches on Sunday and Monday in Brussels, the Liege region and Flemish Brabant.
No weapons or explosives were found in the raids, but police reportedly seized military-style clothing and computer equipment.
Islamic State propaganda was also found among the belongings of those arrested. Other information was found on the pair’s computers and the prosecutor’s office is currently investigating them.
Six people were initially taken into custody for questioning, but four were released, the office said.We'll have have an in-depth bike blog post shortly on today's transport select committee report into roady safety. The report reminds us that 3,085 cyclists were killed or seriously injured last year – 15% up on 2010 – and also notes that several of the witnesses the committee interviewed "felt that there was a lack of leadership from Government in the area of cycle safety."
One city that is clearly showing leadership on cycle safety is Copenhagen. In April, it added to its reputation as a cycling mecca with the opening of its cycling'superhighway' network, which the New York Times gave a flavour of on Tuesday:
Several biking innovations are being tested in Copenhagen. Some, like footrests and "green wave" technology, which times traffic lights at rush hour to suit bikers, have already been put into place on the superhighway. Others, like garbage cans tilted at an angle for easy access and "conversation" lanes, where two people can ride side by side and talk, might show up on long-distance routes in the future.
The Cycling Embassy of Denmark also highlights one of its more curious features, "air pumps every 1.7 kilometres."
Copenhagen's superhighways seem to have generally been met with a more positive reaction than London's four cycle superhighways, the first of which opened in 2010. Four more are planned in 2013, with a further two by 2015.
To get a better sense of how the two city's superhighways compare – and to give a idea of what they do or don't contribute to road safety – we'd like you to share your photographs on our bike blog Flickr group. We'll bring the best back on to the Guardian site for a gallery of the cities' superhighways.
Here are a couple of examples:
London
London's cycle superhighway 7, by Jack999 on Flickr
Copenhagen
The superhighway on Nørrebrogade, a main road Copenhagen, by SirPecanGum on FlickrApril 12 is when HTC is expected to announce and introduce their latest handset, the HTC 10. Over the last few weeks the HTC 10 has been the subject of a number of leaks including images that have shown off the design of the phone, as well as a number of leaks looking to confirm various specs. The latest of which is now coming through and confirms some already known details, as well as some new ones too. The image is of a HTC website listing and therefore, should be considered to be fairly accurate, pending any immediate changes.
Firstly, the listing does clarify certain already rumored aspects. For instance, the HTC 10 will come sporting a 5.2-inch display. It has also been rumored that the display will be a Super LCD 5 display and that does indeed now seem to be the case. While the listing also mentions that the HTC 10 will come sporting a curved-edge Gorilla Glass display. The rest of the design of the HTC 10 will boast an all-metal body which comes with “an elegant triple finish”. Moving to the rest of the specs and the listing does confirm that the internal storage will be set at 32GB, with no mention of a 64GB model - which had been suggested by a previous rumor. So unless the HTC 10 storage options are region specific (as this information is largely U.S.-relevant), the HTC 10 will only be available as a 32GB model. While there is no mention of microSD card support, it does seem likely support will be included if there is only a 32GB model available. Last but not least, the camera details do confirm previous rumors, with the inclusion of a 12-megapixel rear camera. One which comes with laser autofocus and Optical Image Stabilization (OIS). It has been recently rumored that the front-facing camera will also come with OIS, although there are no details confirming that particular aspect here.
Moving to the more interesting snippets of information and HTC has been making it clear that the audio capabilities of the HTC 10 are a big deal. According to this information, the HTC 10 will come sporting a Hi-Fi edition of HTC’s BoomSound. Recent images and rumors had suggested the HTC 10 will not sport BoomSound, although a teaser from HTC directly suggested BoomSound would be included and now it seems clear that it will be and in the form of an updated Hi-Fi edition. Another interesting aspect is the information regarding supported carriers, which according to the details are largely GSM carriers including AT&T, T-Mobile and a number of MVNOs who piggyback off GSM networks. Why this is interesting is that there is no clear mentioning of support for any CDMA-operated carriers like Verizon and Sprint. Of course, this could be as simple as the listing not being updated fully and will be updated in due course to reflect a wider carrier availability. Or it could be the case that HTC will be cutting down on models this year and will simply release an unlocked version in the U.S. which is compatible with only GSM networks. Either way, as it currently stands, CDMA carrier support is not being listed. It also seems to be the case that UH OH protection will be on offer with the HTC 10, although the listing does suggest that it might be only available to HTC 10 purchases made directly from HTC.
On a very last important point, while the HTC 10 is largely expected to be unveiled on April 12, according to the listing, pre-orders will not begin shipping until early May. Whether this is the first week or the second remains to be seen, but with the middle of May being only a month after the unveiling, you can expect pre-orders to open very soon after the launch and shipping to commence no more than three to four weeks later.Famine victims have been remembered at a state ceremony at Glasnevin Cemetery in Dublin, some 164 years after the outbreak of the devastating potato blight.
The National Famine Commemoration event included prayers of remembrance, military honours and a wreath-laying ceremony by ambassadors to Ireland.
President Michael D Higgins delivered an address before unveiling a famine cross as a memorial to the more than 1 million people who perished.
The mid-19th century Celtic cross, donated by Glasnevin Trust, will be permanently located outside the mortuary chapel.
After a minute of silence was observed, the national flag was raised to half-mast over the cemetery where dead of all beliefs and backgrounds were buried.
We are gathering in Glasnevin Cemetery today for the annual #Famine Commemoration with President @MichaelDHiggs pic.twitter.com/UryM9807O3 — Heather Humphreys (@HHumphreysFG) September 11, 2016
In his speech, President Higgins said the famine was never only the result of an accident of nature or series of mistakes.
"It took place in the context of empire and an imbedded atmosphere of conflict. It took place in a particular context of land ownership.
"Yes, it took its toll on a population that had massively increased – but hadn’t the population of the whole of Europe itself increased from 140 million people in 1740 to almost 270 million people in 1850?"
While the world today has the capacity to take measures to avoid famine, nearly a billion people still live in conditions of extreme but avoidable hunger, he said.
"The moral challenge of our humanity remains the same: should we adjust our populations to an abstracted economic ideology, or should we, rather, use the best of our reason to craft economic and social models that can anticipate the needs and care for the peoples who share this fragile planet?
"As we consider the Irish famine, it is, then, so important that we take account of the economic assumptions which served as context to it."
#OglaighNahEireann performed ceremonial duties for National Famine Memorial Day Commemoration in Glasnevin today. pic.twitter.com/cQUZLTn1fj — DF Chief of Staff (@DF_COS) September 11, 2016
'Refugee city'
Speaking ahead of the event, Minister for Arts Heather Humphreys described Glasnevin as a fitting location for the memorial.
"Records from Glasnevin Cemetery show that at the height of the famine, 50 to 60 funerals were taking place here daily," she said.
"People from the four provinces of Ireland, those from Dublin and those who made their way there in search of reprieve, are buried throughout Glasnevin Cemetery, making it one of Ireland’s largest famine burial grounds."
The chairman of Glasnevin Trust, John Green, said he hoped such a commemoration would help to ensure the tragedy is never forgotten.
"Visitors to the cemetery are often surprised that it is also a famine burial site but from the midst of our eastern seaboard dominated country and our Dublin-centric economy it is difficult for us all to realise how utterly changed this island was post the famine.
"Dublin became a refugee city, death rates soared," he said.
"In this cemetery, daily burial numbers trebled and tens of thousands are buried here as result of the famine or famine-fostered fevers and diseases."The gang that allegedly plotted to kill Bolivian president Evo Morales was also behind a dynamite attack on the residence of Roman Catholic Cardinal Julio Terrazas last week, it has been claimed.
Bolivia has launched an investigation into the suspected militant group that police say was plotting to kill President Evo Morales, but the opposition slammed the probe as an "international show."
Three suspected mercenaries were killed in a shootout on Thursday in the anti-Morales stronghold of Santa Cruz after police moved to arrest a gang that officials say traveled from Ireland or Croatia to kill leading public figures in the Andean nation.
One of the three was believed to be a man from Co Tipperary. The Bolivian police have named him as Michael Martin Dwyer (24).
"The investigative work is now in the hands of prosecutors. I hope they do their work quickly so we can have clear and concrete information" about who was behind the conspiracy, police chief Victor Hugo Escobar told state television.
Interpol has offered to help Bolivia with the investigation. But opposition Senate chief Oscar Ortiz said investigators "should aim to find the truth, instead of helping the president stage an international show".
Mr Ortiz attacked Mr Morales for "playing the victim" and said the country's first indigenous leader was trying to disparage the eastern city of Santa Cruz because he lacked support there.
Mr Morales has accused right-wing politicians and business leaders in Santa Cruz of organizing violent protests there last year to try to destabilize his government.
On Thursday, he said the rightist opposition wanted to "riddle us with bullets," referring to himself and the vice president.
Government officials said the suspected conspirators had also targeted Santa Cruz Governor Ruben Costas, a fierce Morales' critic. They said the men were likely behind a dynamite attack on the residence of Roman Catholic Cardinal Julio Terrazas earlier this week. The cardinal was not home at the time.
"The terrorist group had a strategy and part of the strategy was to attack the cardinal... and (take) other actions, not only against the president or vice president, but other authorities as well," deputy interior minister Marcos Farfan told the Erbol radio network.
Mr Farfan said the suspected plotters tried to blow up a navy boat on which Morales met with Cabinet ministers two weeks ago and aimed to trigger "a spiral of violence" in Bolivia.
The head of the Organization of American States, Jose Miguel Insulza, condemned the suspected assassination plot on Friday after meeting with Bolivia's foreign minister in Trinidad and Tobago, where Morales was attending the Summit of the Americas.
Pictures of Mr Dwyer taken from his Bebo site have emerged but the site has been subsequently set to private.
Gardaí and Department of Foreign Affairs officials are due to confirm to the Bolivian authorities that the Irishman was one of those killed.
Bolivian authorities have said the deceased’s Irish passport was found among his personal items after he and two of his associates were fatally wounded in what they said was a shoot-out with police in a hotel in the city of Santa Cruz on Thursday morning.
Two other suspects – accused of being part of a group of mercenaries hired to kill president Evo Morales – were arrested and taken in for questioning.
A member of the family of Michael Dwyer (25), from Ballinderry, near Borrisokane, Co Tipperary, confirmed last night that he had died in unexplained circumstances while travelling in Bolivia. The Department of Foreign Affairs confirmed that an Irishman had been involved in a “violent incident” in Bolivia.
An official from the Irish embassy in Buenos Aires, Argentina was travelling to Bolivia to investigate the matter.
In a press conference in Venezuela where he is attending a regional summit, Mr Morales said Bolivia’s police had the group under surveillance since April 3rd and he gave the order to arrest them.
It is understood some of the group had been working in private security in the US. The two other men killed in the shoot-out were a Hungarian man and a Bolivian man with Croatian citizenship who had fought in the Balkan wars.
Mr Morales has accused right-wing politicians and business leaders in Santa Cruz of organizing violent protests there last year to try to destabilize his government. On Thursday, he said the rightist opposition wanted to "riddle us with bullets," referring to himself and the vice president.
Government officials said the suspected conspirators had also targeted Santa Cruz governor Ruben Costas, a fierce Morales' critic. They said the men were likely behind a dynamite attack on the residence of Roman Catholic Cardinal Julio Terrazas earlier this week. The cardinal was not home at the time.
"The terrorist group had a strategy and part of the strategy was to attack the cardinal... and (take) other actions, not only against the president or vice president, but other authorities as well," deputy interior minister Marcos Farfan told the Erbol radio network.
Mr Farfan said the suspected plotters tried to blow up a navy boat on which Mr Morales met with Cabinet ministers two weeks ago and aimed to trigger "a spiral of violence" in Bolivia.Earlier this year, after Michael Bloomberg reasserted control over the company he founded and began to scrutinize its online operations, he suggested in a meeting that perhaps Bloomberg — which makes the overwhelming majority of its money from desk terminals that provide financial data — did not need to have a website.
Joshua Topolsky, the founder of a prominent technology website who had been hired to oversee a glossy reintroduction of Bloomberg’s web properties, responded sarcastically, making fun of the suggestion, according to three people with knowledge of the exchange, who spoke on condition of anonymity.
Mr. Bloomberg, who often challenges subordinates with provocative questions, has grown accustomed to deference, the people said. He was furious, and his relationship with Mr. Topolsky subsequently deteriorated to the point that both decided it was better if Mr. Topolsky left.
In a statement, Mr. Topolsky said that one of the most interesting and exciting facets of his time at the company was Mr. Bloomberg’s engagement, and that “he says what’s on his mind and you can have a frank conversation with him,” a rarity in the media industry.DECATUR, Alabama - Decatur's historic Princess Theatre will present the Bollywood film "Monsoon Wedding," as part of a local cultural exhibit, Hindustan Revealed: The Arts and Culture of Traditional India.
The movie will be shown on Oct. 30, at 7 p.m.
Movie Critic Roger Ebert called "Monsoon Wedding" a "delightful romantic comedy," about a charming family drama during a very chaotic Indian wedding. A wealthy father who is trying to see that his daughter wedding goes off without a hitch. Though familiar with Western ways, he has little patience with them and is dead set on seeing the nuptials done properly and traditionally. It delves into disillusioned relationships, arranged marriages, cold feet, former lovers and a comely 17-year-old cousin coming to terms with blossoming sexuality, while another cousin has a shocking revelation to make.
This film was screened at the 2001 Toronto and Venice Film Festivals. At Venice, "Monsoon Wedding" won the prestigious Golden Lion award. The movie is rated R for mature audiences. General admission tickets are $10 at door or available online with order fees.
The film is a community-wide collaboration that salutes the arts and culture of traditional India at the Carnegie Visual Arts Center. The movie will be shown on the Theatre's big screen and is sponsored by AlphaPet, Inc./Indorama Ventures. It is also made possible by a grant from the Alabama Legislature.
Viveka Awasthi currently lives in Decatur and is a native of India. She worked with the Carnegie and Princess Theatre to present a variety of cultural events, including an art exhibit at the Carnegie from Sept. 30 to Nov. 8.
Hindustan Revealed: The Arts and Culture of Traditional India brings Indian art and culture comes to North Alabama in the form of paintings, drawings, sculpture, textiles, handicrafts and jewelry through Nov. 8. (Contributed by Carnegie Visual Arts Center)
This past Friday, there was a free performance of Bollywood and folk dances and songs by performers in North Alabama on the main stage located on Bank Street at Downtown Decatur's 3rd Friday. Sports games from India such as Kho-Kho and Kabaddi were also demonstrated at 3rd Friday.
For more information, call 256.340-1778 or visit Princess Theatre for the Performing Arts or Carnegie Visual Arts Center.New research has shown that 93% of local authorities have failed to issue financial penalties against landlords and letting agents for failing to disclose lettings fees.
Despite the introduction of the requirement for letting agents to publicize fees in May 2015, only three penalty notices have been issued by councils against letting agents. Even more astoundingly only one of the penalties has been paid in full.
The survey of council enforcement of letting agent fee rules was carried out by London Property Licensing on behalf of the National Approved Letting Scheme (NALS).
Under the Consumer Rights Act 2015, letting agents must prominently display a list of their fees at each of their offices as well as on their website.
Almost two thirds of councils surveyed admitted they do not consider enforcement of letting agent fee rules as a high priority and 45% of councils said they only undertake reactive enforcement measures.
Lack of resources is the biggest problem cited by local authorities for their failure to enforce letting agency fee rules. Thirty-three percent of councils said they had allocated no staffing resources to this work in 2016/17. A further 62% said they do not anticipate any change in the level of staffing they can allocate to enforcement in 2017/18.
Letting fee ban
NALS says it is concerned about the disconnect between the government’s aspirations and the reality of delivery of enforcement. This is likely to deteriorate further with the introduction of bans on letting agent fees charged to tenants announced in the Chancellor’s Autumn Statement.
Sixty-four percent of councils surveyed said they are yet to assess the likely impact on enforcement when the proposed ban on up-front letting agent fees charged to tenants is introduced.
Isobel Thomson, NALS chief executive, asks: “We recognise Trading Standards teams are underfunded and under-resourced, but if local authorities aren’t enforcing the current legislation what will make things different when the fee ban is implemented?”
“Without sufficient robust and coherent enforcement action, we will never stop the criminal element in the PRS,” she says.
“They will continue to operate knowing they won’t face any penalty and it’s the consumer who will continue to suffer. We believe now is the time to start a constructive dialogue with the Chartered Trading Standards Institute and its members on how we can work together to stamp out the rogues.”
Leon Livermore, chief executive of the Chartered Trading Standards Institute (CTSI), adds: “[We] welcome the research produced by NALS and believe that it highlights the issues of the robust enforcement needed for existing regulation that can deliver for the consumer.”
“We look forward to further engagement with NALS.”
CTSI has sent open letters to the political parties underlining that it believes that the current model of trading standards is ‘broken’ and needs to be fixed.
The group claims that under-resourcing and a postcode lottery for protection, alongside a vast remit, means that the model of 192 separate services needs to be changed.
The Renters Alliance helps renters with bad landlords and letting agents. If you have a story you would like to share, please contact the National Renters Alliance through our website or email us at contact@nralliance.co.uk
Full list of local authorities surveyed: Buckinghamshire, Cornwall, Cumbria, Devon & Somerset, East Sussex, Hertfordshire, Lancashire, North Yorkshire, Nottinghamshire, Suffolk, Warwickshire, Worcestershire, Bolton, Manchester, Oldham, Stockport, Trafford, St Helens, Wirral, Barnsley, Rotherham, Sunderland, South Tyneside, Wolverhampton, Sandwell, Walsall, West Yorkshire Joint Services (includes Calderdale), Barnet, Brent, Croydon, Kensington & Chelsea, Richmond upon Thames, Redbridge, Southwark, Bath & North East Somerset, Brighton & Hove, Durham, Herefordshire, Middlesbrough, Nottingham, Redcar & Cleveland and South Gloucestershire.
No response received from: Bexley, Birmingham, Gloucestershire, Lincolnshire, Liverpool, Torbay and Wokingham.The keyboard of a harpsichord by Bernhard von Tucher (Germany). The keyboard has "divided black keys" in order to tune the instrument in two different keys (in meantone temperament).
In this harpsichord built by Clavecins Rouaud of Paris, the two lowest sharps are split, following the broken octave scheme.
Archicembalo keyboard in cents.
A split sharp is a kind of key found in some early keyboard instruments, such as the harpsichord, clavichord, or organ. It is a musical key divided in two, with separately depressible front and back sections, each sounding its own pitch. The particular keys that were split were those that play the sharps and flats on the standard musical keyboard (the "black keys" on a modern piano).
Split sharp. A sharp key divided or'split' into two parts: the front part is about one third the length of the whole. Usually the back part is set slightly higher to facilitate playing. Each part has its own [parts] so that two notes are available. In Italian instruments it was common...to provide split sharps for e♭/d♯ and g♯/a♭. The usual practice was to put on the front part the note that would normally be found there, e.g. e♭ and g♯.[1]
Split sharps served two distinct purposes. First, in the broken octave, they allowed an instrument to include deep bass notes while retaining a short, compact keyboard.
Second, in older music, tuning was generally not done by equal temperament, which treats note pairs such as A♯ and B♭ as the same pitch. Instead, they were assigned slightly different pitches on enharmonic keyboards (particularly in "meantone temperament"). This allowed certain musical intervals, such as the major third, to sound closer to their ideal just value, hence more closely tuned to just intonation.[a]
Split sharps present advantages and disadvantages: "Obviously this would have its advantages under some circumstances in terms of intonation. However, the complexities of fingering and hand position dictated by such a keyboard configuration presented problems."[2] Specifically: "Such devices were obviously an impediment to rapid scale work in the lowest bass register, but this does not matter greatly as Italian seventeenth-century music generally avoids writing of this kind."[3]
In modern usage, split sharps are usually the method of choice for custom keyboards that play 19 equal temperament, which, like meantone, uses different pitches for sharps and flats that are enharmonic in the standard 12 tone.[4]
Notes [ edit ]
^ How Equal Temperament Ruined Harmony (and Why You Should Care) W.W. Norton & Co. 0-393-06227-9. For a recent defense of the older tuning practices, see Duffin, Ross (2006)W.W. Norton & Co. ISBN
References [ edit ]
^ Early Keyboard Instruments, p.243. W. W. Norton. ISBN 9780393305159. Ripin, Edwin M. (1989)., p.243. W. W. Norton. ^ A Guide to Musical Temperament, p.36. Scarecrow. ISBN 9780810854383. Donahue, Thomas (2005)., p.36. Scarecrow. ^ A Guide to the Harpsichord, p.37. Hal Leonard. ISBN 9781574670639. Bond, Ann (2001)., p.37. Hal Leonard. ^ See: www.n-ism.org. "Historically, 19-tone keyboards have been constructed...with the rear of the divided black keys often raised."
Further reading [ edit ]At 3 o’clock in the morning on Sunday, Benjamin Newbern, a gay rights activist in northern Alabama, arrived home from a gay pride dance party he had organized, glanced at his cellphone and spotted an unsettling social media post: “Prayers for our brothers and sisters at the Pulse nightclub in Orlando.”
Mr. Newbern flipped on the television to news, he said, that “just kind of took my breath away.” And instantly, he knew that his life, as an activist and a gay person in America, had changed.
By Sunday afternoon, Mr. Newbern, 38 — who has spent two years trying to build a gay rights community in his home city, Florence, in part by persuading people that it is safe to come out of the closet — was struggling, as were gay people nationwide, to make sense of the worst mass shooting in American history, committed on a Latin-themed night in a gay nightclub by a Muslim gunman.Super Hacker Unit Affiliation China (Fai only) Role Covert ops infantry Protection Body armour Properties Hit points 100 Armour type Infantry General Human Armor Production Cost $625 Build time 0:20 Produced by China Barracks Requires Propaganda Center Hotkey a Combat Speed 20 (10 when badly hurt) Sight range 150-300 Function Abilities Camouflaged
“ Super Hacker, ready for link-up.
- Super Hacker ”
The Hackers in General Shin Fai's employ received advanced training from Black Lotus, enabling them to disable enemy vehicles. They received the honorary title of Super Hacker once they reached this level.
Contents show]
Background
“ Black Lotus has trained us well.
- Super Hacker ”
Like normal Hackers, they still were employed in illegally accessing the insecure bank accounts of unsuspecting Internet users, covertly diverting money into China's military coffers. Their ability to disable enemy vehicles made them much more useful on the front lines.
Abilities
Disable Building The Super Hacker uses a strong computer virus to disable enemy buildings. Hack Internet The Super Hacker sits down and deploys his laptop in order to hack money from the internet. Generates a constant stream of money and experience for the Hacker, but the Hacker is undefended. Disable Vehicle The Super Hacker uses a computer virus to disable a vehicle's electronics.
Game unit
Strategy
“ I'll shut it down!
- Super Hacker ”
If a general could get them into a base they could quickly disable key vehicles that made up the enemy's defense. Because of the fact that they were stealthed, even when walking and hacking cash, was an great advantage in the attack on enemy vehicles. Unlike Lotus, Hackers needed to stay in contact with the vehicle/building to disable them.
Like the normal Hackers they were often trained midway through a battle in order to stop a commander's funds running out and could be protected inside an Internet Center.
Counters
“ Quick, it will only down for a little while!
- Super Hacker ”
If an enemy could get to the Super Hacker they could be taken down easily by anti-infantry fire, although they were usually escorted by guards. Long-range attacks such as Scud launcher or Inferno cannon as well as aircraft were more effective as they could target a Hacker from outside his range. But none of them were as deadly as the Pathfinder snipers of the USA and Jarmen Kell, as they both could detect Super Hackers and kill them off with ease.
Selected Quotes
“ Super Hacker, ready for link-up.
- When emerging from the Barracks ”
“ I'll shut off their vehicles!
- When selected ”
“ Black Lotus has trained us well.
- When selected ”
“ Their vehicles are vulnerable!
- When selected ”
“ That vehicle is an easy one!
- When disabling vehicle ”
“ That one is vulnerable!
- When disabling vehicle ”
“ I'll shut it down!
- When disabling vehicle ”
“ I will get control of their building!
- When ordered to capture building ”
“ Their building will be under our control!
- When ordered to capture building ”
“ I'll get control of it!
- When ordered to capture building ”
“ Okay, their vehicle is out!
- After disabling vehicle ”
“ Quick, it will only down for a little while!
- After disabling vehicle ”
“ Enemy vehicle disabled, General!
- After disabling vehicle ”
“ General, I've captured their building!
- After capturing building ”
“ Hehe, we have control of their building!
- After capturing building ”
“ Enemy building captured, General!
- After capturing building ”
Trivia
“ I will get control of their building!
- Super Hacker's Capture Building unused quote ”
According to the Zero Hour's sound files, the Super Hacker's original third ability was the building capture, the building capture ability was likely removed due to the fact that it would make the Super Hacker to more or less, share the same functions as Super Lotus. Being cheaper to train and mass, it would have unbalanced the game and made Super Lotus redundant.For the computer science concept, see Lazy evaluation
Laziness (also known as indolence) is disinclination to activity or exertion despite having the ability to act or to exert oneself. It is often used as a pejorative; terms for a person seen to be lazy include "couch potato", "slacker", and "bludger".
Despite Sigmund Freud's discussion of the pleasure principle, Leonard Carmichael notes that "laziness is not a word that appears in the table of contents of most technical books on psychology... It is a guilty secret of modern psychology that more is understood about the motivation of thirsty rats and hungry pecking pigeons as they press levers than about the way in which poets make themselves write poems or scientists force themselves into the laboratory when the good golfing days of spring arrive."[1] A 1931 survey found high-school students more likely to attribute their failing performance to laziness, while teachers ranked "lack of ability" as the major cause, with laziness coming in second.[2] Laziness is not to be confused with avolition, a negative symptom of certain mental-health issues such as depression, ADHD, sleep disorders, and schizophrenia.[3][4]
Psychology [ edit ]
Laziness is a habit rather than a mental health issue. It may reflect a lack of self-esteem, a lack of positive recognition by others, a lack of discipline stemming from low self-confidence, or a lack of interest in the activity or belief in its efficacy.[5] Laziness may manifest as procrastination or vacillation. Studies of motivation suggest that laziness may be caused by a decreased level of motivation, which in turn can be caused by over-stimulation or excessive impulses or distractions. These increase the release of dopamine, a neurotransmitter responsible for reward and pleasure. The more dopamine that is released, the greater intolerance one has for valuing and accepting productive and rewarding action.[6] This desensitization leads to dulling of the neural patterns and affects negatively the anterior insula of the brain responsible for risk perception.[7]
ADHD specialists say engaging in multiple activities can cause behavioral problems such as attention/focus failure or perfectionism and subsequently pessimism. In these circumstances laziness can manifest as a negative coping mechanism (aversion), the desire to avoid certain situations in the hopes of countering certain experiences and preconceived ill results.[8] Lacanian thought says laziness is the "acting out" of archetypes from societal programming and negative child rearing practices. Boredom is sometimes conflated with laziness; one study shows that the average Briton is bored 6 hours a week.[9] Thomas Goetz, University of Konstanz, Germany, and John Eastwood, York University, Canada, concur that aversive states such as laziness can be equally adaptive for making change[10] and toxic if allowed to fester. An outlook found to be helpful in their studies is "being mindful and not looking for ways out of it, simultaneously to be also open to creative and active options if they should arise." They point out that a relentless engaging in activities without breaks can cause oscillations of failure,[11] which may result in mental health issues.[12]
It has also been shown that laziness can render one apathetic to reactant mental health issues such as anger, anxiety, indifference, substance abuse, and depression.
Related concepts [ edit ]
Acedia, a state of listlessness.
Avolition
Athymhormia
Aboulia, neurological, with anatomical damage.
Amotivational syndrome, normally in the context of heavy cannabis use.
Procrastination, the delaying of fulfilling tasks.
Counter-productive work behavior
Senioritis, the decreased motivation to study which is said to affect those nearing the end of their studies.
Economics [ edit ]
Economists have differing views of laziness. Frédéric Bastiat argues that idleness is the result of people focusing on the pleasant immediate effects of their actions rather than potentially negative long-term consequences. Others note that humans seem to have a tendency to seek after leisure. Hal Cranmer writes, "For all these arguments against laziness, it is amazing we work so hard to achieve it. Even those hard-working Puritans were willing to break their backs every day in exchange for an eternity of lying around on a cloud and playing the harp. Every industry is trying to do its part to give its customers more leisure time."[13] Ludwig von Mises writes, "The expenditure of labor is deemed painful. Not to work is considered a state of affairs more satisfactory than working. Leisure is, other things being equal, preferred to travail (work). People work only when they value the return of labor higher than the decrease in satisfaction brought about by the curtailment of leisure. To work involves disutility."[14]
Literary [ edit ]
Laziness in American literature is figured as a fundamental problem with social and spiritual consequences. In 1612 John Smith in his "Map to Virginia" is seen using a jeremiad to address idleness. In the 1750s this sort of advocating reached at its apex in literature's. David Bertelson in "The Lazy South" (1767) expressed this as a substitution of "spiritual industry" over "patriotic industry". Writers like William Byrd went to a great extent and censured North Carolina as land of lubbers. Thomas Jefferson in his "Notes on the State of Virginia" (1785) acknowledges a small portion of the people have only seen labor and identifies the cause of this indolence to the rise of "slave-holding" society. Jefferson raised his concerns what this deleterious system will bring to the economic system. Later by the 1800s the rise of Romanticism changed attitudes of the society, values of work were re-written; stigmatization of idleness was overthrown with glamorous notions. John Pendleton Kennedy was a prominent writer in romanticizing sloth and slavery, In Swallow Barn (1832) he equated idleness and its flow as living in oneness with nature. Mark Twain in "Adventures of Huckleberry Finn" (1885) contrasts realist and romantic perspective of "laziness" and calls attention to the essential convention of aimlessness and transcendence that connects the character. In 20th century the poor whites were portrayed in the grotesque caricatures of early southern laziness. In Flannery O'Connor's Wise Blood (1952) and Good Country People (1955) depicts spiritual backwardness as the cause for disinclination to work. Lacking in any social function which was termed equally with luxurious lifestyle was closely portrayed through lives of displaced aristocrats and their indolence. Jason Compson, Robert Penn Warren, William Styron were some of the writers who explored this perspective. The lack of meaningful work was defined as a void which aristocrats needed to fill with pompous culture, Walker Percy is a writer who have thoroughly mined on the subject. Percy's characters often exposes to the emptiness (spiritual sloth) of contemporary life and come to rectify it with renewed resources of spiritual resources.[15]
Religion [ edit ]
Christianity [ edit ]
One of the Catholic seven deadly sins is sloth, which is often defined as spiritual and/or physical apathy or laziness. Sloth is discouraged in (Hebrews 6:12), 2 Thessalonians, and associated with wickedness in one of the parables of Jesus in the Gospel of Matthew (Matthew 25:26). In the Wisdom books of Proverbs and Ecclesiastes, it is stated that laziness can lead to poverty (Proverbs 10:4, Ecclesiastes 10:18).[16][17] According to Peter Binsfeld's Binsfeld's Classification of Demons, Belphegor is thought to be its chief demon.[18]
Islam [ edit ]
The Arabic term used in the Quran for laziness, inactivity and sluggishness is كَسَل (kasal).[19] The opposite of laziness is Jihad al-Nafs, i.e. the struggle against the self, against one’s own ego. Among the five pillars of Islam, praying five times a day and fasting during Ramaḍān are part of actions against laziness.
Buddhism [ edit ]
In Buddhism, the |
he does and didn't want to offend conservative evangelicals.
"I wish the media would press him more for details on any messages from God or about his religious beliefs that affect political decisions (abortion, birth control, same-sex marriage, end-of-life decisions, immunizations, religious exemption for parental neglect)," Susterich said in an email after receiving the response. He's a former longtime FFRF executive board member.
In March 2014, FFRF sent a complaint letter about Walker's tweet "Philippians 4:13" on the governor's official Twitter account. The New Testament verse reads, "I can do all things through Christ which strengthens me."
In 2009, Walker told the Christian Businessmen's Committee in Madison in 2009 that he started his "walk to Christ" when he was 13. He recalled the day he met his wife Tonette: "That night I heard Christ tell me, 'This is the person you're going to be with.' "A nosy neigbor's word was apparently all it took to get a University of Southern California (USC) student kicked out of school for abusing his girlfriend—abuse she vehemently denies ever took place.
According to recent USC graduate Zoe Katz, the inquiry that prompted USC to expel Matt Boermeester, a former kicker on the USC football team, was "horrible and unjust." Katz said she is coming forward now to clear Boermeester's name and push for changes in the way Title IX investigations are conducted.
In a statement provided to the press through her lawyer, Katz alleges that Boermeester was "false accused" of abusing her after a neighbor saw them roughhousing in her front yard.
The two seniors had been dating for more than a year at that point; from the looks of Katz's recent social media posts, they're still together. Katz was a star on the school's tennis team, and Boermeester was the football player who had kicked the game-winning field goal for USC in this year's Rose Bowl.
According to Katz, the neighbor told his roommate what he thought he saw, who told a coach in the USC athletic department, who reported the incident to the school's Title IX office (the unit tasked, per federal mandate, with investigating suspected incidents of sex-based discrimination and violence). The school began an investigation into the allegations in February, at which time Boermeester was suspended from the football team and from school.
At the time, Katz tweeted: "I am the one involved in the investigation with Matt Boermeester. The report is false." Since then, she was mostly silent on the issue in public, until this week's statement. In it, she states unequivocably that she has "never been abused, assaulted, or otherwise mistreated by Matt."
But the school refused to believe her, says Katz. Instead, investigators immediately cast her as someone in an abusive relationship who was too afraid to tell the truth about her situation.
The Title IX crew was "dismissive and demeaning," said Katz. They told her she "must be afraid of Matt," a charge she denied. In classic witch-hunt style, any protestations on Katz's part were taken as further evidence of the exact opposite of what she was saying:
When I told the truth about Matt, in repeated interrogations, I was stereotyped and was told I must be a 'battered' woman, and that made me feel demeaned and absurdly profiled. I understand that domestic violence is a terrible problem, but in no way does that apply to Matt and me.
Ultimately, Katz felt "misled, harassed, threatened and discriminated against" by the school's Title IX office.
During Boermeester's suspension, he was barred from returning to campus and from having contact with Katz. Eventually, he was told not to return.
In a statement to the Los Angeles Times, USC would only say that it had concluded its investigation and could not comment further. "Per the register, [Boermeester] is no longer enrolled at the university," it said.
As Democrats attempt to depict any changes to Title IX policy as some sort of typical Trump attack on women's rights, Katz's story provides yet another example how wrong they are.SHARE
Washington University beat the University of Chicago on a buzzer-beater in both teams' University Athletic Association opener, but not how you'd expect.
WashU had the ball with 12 seconds left, game tied at 68, and kicked the ball out to Jake Knupp who drove into traffic for a potential game-winning layup. He missed and it got tipped out to senior Clinton Cook for an off-balance desperation heave at the buzzer.
Cook also missed.
Or, he would have, if not for a goaltending violation by Chicago's Blaine Crawford. Crawford must have thought the shot was late and the game was headed for overtime, as he went up and deflected the shot above the rim.
Fans, players, and coaches immediately recognized the goaltend and Cook's shot went down as the game-winner. The Bears won 70-68.
WATCH: Nevada Comes Back 14 Points in One Minute to Win
How could this happen? Blame Kevin Garnett. The long-time Minnesota Timberwolves center popularized this move during his time as a Boston Celtic, and since then it's become a thing:
"They call that 'The Garnett' now," the future Hall-of-Famer said. "I saw how it ticked them off, and that's what I was getting off on. I was getting off on ticking you off because you were trying to... you know that's rhythm. Everybody don't understand that -- when a guy gets an extra shot after the whistle, he goes and he's looking at his form and his follow-through, and I like to just break that rhythm up."
Since then, "The Garnett" has become a popular move across all levels of basketball. It was only a matter of time before something like this happened. We'll see if this buzzer-beating goaltend will discourage the move from now on.Get the biggest daily news stories by email Subscribe Thank you for subscribing We have more newsletters Show me See our privacy notice Could not subscribe, try again later Invalid Email
Experts are fearful that a volcano in La Palma could be about to erupt after 40 tremors in just 48 hours at the popular tourist hotspot.
There are concerns that if the volcano blows, it could spark a mega tsunami which would affect Britain, as well as Spain and the US' east coast.
La Palma, in the Canary Islands, has been rocked by dozens of small tremors measuring between 1.5 and 2.7 on the Richter scale.
And it could well be a sign that the active volcano Cumbre Vieja could be set to cause devastation.
Panic has spread among the 86,000 residents on the island after the largest tremor hit on Saturday afternoon, approximately 17.4 miles below ground.
(Image: Universal Images Group)
(Image: Hulton Archive)
It measured 2.7 on the Richter scale, and was followed almost exactly 24 hours later by a magnitude 2.6 tremor, before a third of 2.1 hit on Monday at midnight.
Maria José Blanco, director of the National Geographic Institute on the island, said a similar seismic'swarm' has never been recorded to this date on La Palma.
Despite the frequency of tremors, residents and tourists staying on the island did not feel the earthquakes - due to their depth underground.
The volcano's last two eruptions occurred in 1949 and 1971, a gap of just 22 years.
(Image: Hulton Archive)
(Image: Getty)
But this doesn't mean another eruption is due, as previous to these two dates, the last historical eruption occurred in 1712.
If it was to blow, Cumbre Vieja could cause a mega tsunami. Some experts believe the volcano is in the initial stages of failure, meaning a big enough eruption could cause a massive landslide to enter the Atlantic Ocean.
It could result in waves as high as 600m, travelling at around 450mph meaning the African coast would be submerged within an hour, and the southern coastlines of the British Isles in just three and a half hours.When does a political campaigning body cross the red line of legitimacy and become a party within a party, and then what should be done about it? Detailed recent investigations have raised this question about the role of the Blairite Progress organisation within the Labour Party. But the issue raises much wider matters about corporate involvement in modern politics involving all parties, and as such urgently requires attention.
Progress was first set up as a company limited by guarantee in 1994 and the first director was Derek Draper, then a researcher for Peter Mandelson. It publishes no details of any membership and is controlled by the directors of the company. However it has never released its register of guarantor members, nor its memorandum and articles of association, nor details of its corporate structure. Given this secrecy, should such a private company be operating as a membership organisation inside a political party?
Now this might not matter too much if it was an insignificant body on the outer fringes of politics. But it isn't - it aspires to dominate the Labour Party at the centre - and it has access to huge funding to help it achieve its purpose, out of all proportion to that available to any other such body. It has received just under £3 millions to date in donations over £7,500 (the threshold set by the Electoral Commission). No less than 95 per cent of this has come from a single source - David Sainsbury, who previously funded the Labour Party until Ed Miliband won the leadership, when he promptly pulled out and switched to Progress. Interestingly, donations from the second largest donor to Progress, Michael Montague, totalling £875,000, were made at least two years after his death via a trust whose objectives and trustees are unknown.
Progress has thus raised more money than the Green Party, Scottish Labour or Plaid Cymru. It has raised hugely more than any members' association in the Conservatives and the Liberal Democrats and 122 times more than the next highest in Labour. Clearly Progress is an organisation with the funding and staffing of a minor political party, except that it is operating inside the Labour Party. Yet despite the parlous state of Labour's finances, it has contributed none of the enormous funds it has raised to assist the party it seeks to lead by training parliamentary candidates and running its own candidates for the leadership, London mayoralty and the NEC.
Again, if its objectives were identical to Labour's, this might be easier to understand. Whilst this may have been true for its first decade to 2006 - Tony Blair required the new organisation to be "centred round the leader" - it flipped thereafter into becoming a platform for New Labour supporters against the opposing Brownite faction. After the 2010 election it finally morphed from a political education trust into a fully-fledged factional body self-identifying with New Labour, training its own supporters for parliamentary selections, and complete with its own ideology, policies, candidates and campaigns - a range of key functions taken on by no other organisation within Labour. Moreover this transformation was achieved without any internal democratic mandate. Thus, unlike in its original days when unquestioning loyalty to the leader was the dominant theme, the opposite is now true - that support for the leader is now measured in accordance with how far the leader is supportive of Progress's own distinct ideology.
So what needs to be done? The last time Labour faced an organisation operating as a party within a party was in the struggle against the Militant Tendency in the 1980s. At that time the National Executive Committee resolved to set up a register of groups to be recognised and allowed to operate within the party. Revealingly the terms of eligibility included the requirement that groups had to be open and democratic, and should not be allowed to operate their own internal discipline. Progress is of course an utterly different animal from the Militant Tendency, but the same principles of democratic governance need to apply.
The intrusion of corporate funding into modern politics on a dominant scale, which has long been the case, is now being reinforced by novel operating structures carefully crafted to fulfil the minimum legal requirements necessary, but drawn up also to maximise the opportunities for the exercise of power and influence as a self-standing organisation within an existing political party. Progress is a classic example of this tendency. It has no constitutional structure or apparent membership rights, there are obvious questions about how its decisions on policy and finance are made, it is unclear how the leading appointments were made in the absence of democratic elections or indeed what powers they exercise, and it recruits and trains potential parliamentary candidates that fit its own ideological mould to the exclusion of the broad spectrum that had always previously characterised the Labour Party.
If Progress is to remain within the Labour Party, clearly new rules are urgently needed to bring its fund-raising, governance and political activities wholly in line with Labour's principles. The next NEC meeting is on 20 March.
Michael Meacher is the Labour MP for Oldham West and Royton.
Editor's note: Progress has previously responded to Michael Meacher's allegations here.Members of the LGBT community marched past Trump Tower on Sunday to show solidarity with underprivileged groups.
The rally was originally positioned as a mass make-out session in front of Trump Tower, but kissing was kept to a minimum, in part due to lower-than-expected turnout.
See photos from the rally.
Members of the LGBT community and their allies march along 59th Street in Manhattan on Sunday, Feb. 12, 2017. A leaked draft of an executive order on religious exemptions and the nomination of Judge Neil Gorsuch to the U.S. Supreme Court has members of the lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender community concerned that gains made during the Obama administration will be rolled back by President Donald Trump.
Members of the LGBT community and their allies march along 59th Street in Manhattan on Sunday, Feb. 12, 2017. Members of the lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender community are concerned that gains made during the Obama administration will be rolled back by President Donald Trump.
Mike Hisey, 54, dons a Kellyanne Conway Inauguration Day-inspired coat while standing inside a makeshift kissing booth at the rally on Feb. 12, 2017.
Members of the LGBT community and their allies make out on Fifth Avenue near Trump Tower in Manhattan on Sunday, Feb. 12, 2017.
Members of the LGBT community and their allies march along 59th Street in Manhattan on Sunday, Feb. 12, 2017. A leaked draft of an executive order on religious exemptions and the nomination of Judge Neil Gorsuch to the U.S. Supreme Court has the lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender community concerned that gains made during the Obama administration will be rolled back by President Donald Trump.
Members of the LGBT community and their allies make out on Fifth Avenue near Trump Tower in Manhattan on Sunday, Feb. 12, 2017. The lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender community is concerned that gains made during the Obama administration will be rolled back by President Donald Trump.
Members of the LGBT community and their allies gather and dance near Trump International Hotel in Manhattan on Sunday, Feb. 12, 2017. A leaked draft of an executive order on religious exemptions and the nomination of Judge Neil Gorsuch to the U.S. Supreme Court has members of the lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender community concerned that gains made during the Obama administration will be rolled back by President Donald Trump.
Members of the LGBT community and their allies demonstrate on Fifth Avenue near Trump Tower in Manhattan on Sunday, Feb. 12, 2017. A leaked draft of an executive order on religious exemptions and the nomination of Judge Neil Gorsuch to the U.S. Supreme Court has members of the lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender community concerned that gains made during the Obama administration will be rolled back by President Donald Trump.
Members of the LGBT community and their allies kiss on Fifth Avenue near Trump Tower in Manhattan on Sunday, Feb. 12, 2017. Members of the community rallied near the building to show solidarity for underprivileged groups.
Mike Hisey, 54, donning a Kellyanne Conway Inauguration Day-inspired red, white and blue coat, stands inside a makeshift kissing booth tucked during the rally on Feb. 12, 2017.
Members of the LGBT community and their allies demonstrate on Fifth Avenue near Trump Tower in Manhattan on Sunday, Feb. 12, 2017. A leaked draft of an executive order on religious exemptions and the nomination of Judge Neil Gorsuch to the U.S. Supreme Court has members of the lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender community concerned that gains made during the Obama administration will be rolled back by President Donald Trump.
Ephie Aardema, who identifies as bisexual, attends an LGBT protest in midtown Manhattan wearing an apron full of "vag badges" and pins on Sunday, Feb. 12, 2017.
Members of the LGBT community and their allies gather and kiss near Trump International Hotel in Manhattan on Sunday, Feb. 12, 2017. A leaked draft of an executive order on religious exemptions and the nomination of Judge Neil Gorsuch to the U.S. Supreme Court has members of the lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender community concerned that gains made during the Obama administration will be rolled back by President Donald Trump.
Members of the LGBT community and their allies arrive at a demonstration pen on Fifth Avenue near Trump Tower in Manhattan on Sunday, Feb. 12, 2017. A leaked draft of an executive order on religious exemptions and the nomination of Judge Neil Gorsuch to the U.S. Supreme Court has members of the lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender community concerned that gains made during the Obama administration will be rolled back by President Donald Trump.
Members of the LGBT community and their allies kiss on Fifth Avenue near Trump Tower in Manhattan on Sunday, Feb. 12, 2017. A mass make-out session and rally was planned to show solidarity with underprivileged groups organizers feel are being targeted by the Trump administration.
Members of the LGBT community and their allies march along 59th Street in Manhattan on Sunday, Feb. 12, 2017. A leaked draft of an executive order on religious exemptions and the nomination of Judge Neil Gorsuch to the U.S. Supreme Court has members of the lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender community concerned that gains made during the Obama administration will be rolled back by President Donald Trump.
Mike Hisey, 54, came to the rally donning a Kellyanne Conway Inauguration Day-inspired red, white and blue coat and a makeshift kissing booth on Sunday, Feb. 12, 2017.
Members of the LGBT community and their allies demonstrate on Fifth Avenue near Trump Tower in Manhattan on Sunday, Feb. 12, 2017.
Members of the LGBT community and their allies kiss during a solidarity rally on Fifth Avenue near Trump Tower in Manhattan on Sunday, Feb. 12, 2017.Who wants to join in the fun and play BULLSHIT BINGO with me?
One thing that has often irritated me – alright, I admit it: sometimes it even infuriated me – is the pseudoscientific language of authors writing about alternative medicine. Reading publications in this area often seems to me like being in the middle of a game of ‘bullshit bingo’ (I am afraid that some of the commentators on this blog have importantly contributed to this phenomenon). In an article of 2004, I once discussed this issue in some detail and concluded that “… pseudo-scientific language … can be seen as an attempt to present nonsense as science…this misleads patients and can thus endanger their health…” For this paper, I had focussed on examples from the ‘bioresonance’- literature – more by coincidence than by design, I should add. I could have selected any other alternative treatment or diagnostic method; the use of pseudoscientific language is truly endemic in alternative medicine.
To give you a little flavour, here is the section of my 2004 paper where I used 5 quotes from recent articles on bioresonance and added a brief comment after each of them.
Quote No. 1
‘The biophysical control processes are superordinate to the biochemical processes. In the same way as the atomic processes result in chemical compounds the ultrafine biocommunication results in the biochemical processes. Control signals have an electromagnetic quality. Disturbing signals or ‘disturbing energies’ also have an electromagnetic quality. This is the reason why they can, for example, be conducted through cables and transformed into therapy signals by means of sophisticated electronic devices. The purpose is to clear the pathological part of the signals.’
Here the author uses highly technical language which, at first, sounds very complicated and scientific. However, after a second read, one is bound to discover that the words hide more than they reveal. In particular, the scientific tone distracts from the lack of logic in the argument. The basic message, once the pseudoscientific veneer is stripped away, seems to be the following. Living systems display electromagnetic phenomena. The electromagnetic energies that they rely upon can make us ill. The energies can also be transferred into an electronic instrument where they can be changed so that they don’t cause any more harm.
Quote No. 2
‘A very important advantage of the BICOM device as compared to the original form of the MORA-therapy in paediatry is the possibility to reduce the oscillation, a fact which meets much better the reaction pattern of the child and gives better results’ [3].
This paragraph essentially states that the BICOM instrument can change (the frequency or amplitude of) some sort of (electromagnetic) wave. We are told that, for children, this is preferable because of the way children tend to react. This would then be more effective.
Quote No. 3
‘The question how causative the Bioresonanz-Therapy can be must be answered in a differentiated way. The BR is in the first place effective on the informative level, which means on the ultrafine biokybernetical regulation level of the organism. This also includes the time factor and with that the functional aspect, and thus it influences the material-biochemical area of the body. The BRT is in comparison to other therapy procedures very high on the scale of causativeness, but it still remains in the physical level, and does not reach into the spiritual area. The freeing of the patient from his diseases can self evidently also lead to a change and improvement of conduct and attitudes and to a general wellbeing of the patient’ [4].
This amazing statement is again not easy to understand. If my reading is correct, the author essentially wants to tell us that BR interferes with the flow of information within organisms. The process is time-dependent and therefore affects function, physical and biochemical properties. Compared to other treatments, BR is more causative without affecting our spiritual sphere. As BR cures a disease, it can also change behaviour, attitudes and wellbeing.
Quote No. 4
‘MORA therapy is an auto-iso-therapy using the patient’s own vibrations in a wide range of the electromagnetic spectrum. Strictly speaking, we have hyperwaves in a six-dimensional cosmos with two hidden parameters (as predicted by Albert Einstein and others). Besides the physical plane there are six other planes of existence and the MORA therapy works in the biological plane, a region called the M-field, according to Sheldrake and Burkhard Heim’ [5].
Here we seem to be told that the MORA therapy is a selftreatment using the body’s own resources, namely a broad range of electromagnetic waves. These waves are hyperwaves in 6 dimensions and their existence has already been predicted by Einstein. Six (or 7?) planes of existence seem to have been discovered and the MORA therapy is operative in one of them.
Quote No. 5
‘The author presents an overall medical conception of the world between mass maximum and masslessness and completes it with the pair of concepts of subjectivity/objectivity. Three test procedures of the bioelectronic function diagnostics are presented and incorporated in addition to other procedures in this conception of the world. Therefore, in the sense of a holistic medicine, there is a useful indication for every medical procedure, because there are different objectives associated with each procedure. A one-sided assessment of the procedures does not do justice to the human being as a whole’ [6].
This author introduces a new concept of the world between maxima and minima of mass or objectivity. He has developed 3 tests of BR diagnosis that fit into the new concept. Therefore, holistically speaking, any therapy is good for something because each may have a different aim. One-sided assessments of such holistic treatments are too narrow bearing in mind the complexity of a human being.
The danger of pseudoscientific language in health care is obvious: it misleads patients, consumers, journalists, politicians, and everyone else (perhaps even some of the original authors?) into believing that nonsense is credible; to express it more bluntly: it is a method of cheating the unsuspecting public. Yes, the way I see it, it is a form of health fraud. Thus it leads to wrong therapeutic decisions and endangers public health.
I could easily get quite cross with the many authors who publish such drivel. But let’s not allow them to spoil our day; let’s take a different approach: let’s try to have some fun.
I herewith invite my readers to post quotes in the comments section of the most extraordinary excesses of pseudoscientific language that they have come across. If the result is sufficiently original, I might try to design a new BULLSHIT BINGO with it.According to Jerry Seinfeld, the secret project he was caught on camera filming with Jason Alexander at the iconic Tom’s Restaurant in New York is neither an episode of his web series “Comedians in Cars Getting Coffee,” nor is it a Super Bowl commercial as many, including this site, have speculated. During an interview with WFAN’s Boomer and Carton Thursday morning, the comedians revealed it was a “one and done” Seinfeld reunion, but he wouldn’t give many more details that than.
“It’s a secret project,” Seinfeld said, trying to be as vague as he could be. When pressed by the hosts for more tidbits of information, he confirmed that it does involve Larry David and “other Seinfeld characters” in addition to Alexander’s George Costanza. He called it a “short-ish” form project (though longer than 60 seconds, which probably rules out a TV commercial) that fans will get a chance to see “very soon.”
Asked if the project will be one in a series, Seinfeld said, “I think it’s one and done.”
Watch video below, via CBS Sports:
[photo via screengrab]
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>> Follow Matt Wilstein (@TheMattWilstein) on Twitter
Have a tip we should know? tips@mediaite.comThis offseason might have taken an older generation of Pac-12 football fan back. Not since around the turn of the millennium has Washington football been welcomed into a new campaign with the kind of hype awaiting the Huskies in 2016.
Related: Washington Huskies 2016 Preview and Prediction
Chris Petersen's third season in Seattle opens with Washington ranked No. 14 in the Associated Press Top 25 — one spot behind its place in Athlon Sports’ poll.
A bevy of returning starters on both sides of the ball, one of the most impressive defenses in the Pac-12 and young, talented playmakers on offense fueled the praise burning almost universally for this Husky squad. The difference between that kind of fire and one that warms a hot seat is marginal, however. Had the Huskies not beaten rival Washington State just to gain bowl eligibility, nor topped Southern Miss in the postseason to finish above.500, the narrative this offseason might have been very different.
As tight end Darrell Daniels said, the Huskies "haven't done anything yet."
They'll get the opportunity to validate the praise soon enough.
So will Washington live up to all the preseason hype or fall short? Here is what some Athlon writers and contributors think of the Huskies’ win/loss potential in 2016.
Washington Football Game-by-Game Predictions for 2016
Kyle Kensing (@kensing45)
I won't toot my own horn, but only because I never joined the school band. I secured my spot on the 2016 Washington Huskies "hype train," as defensive back Kevin King called it in July, early in the 2015 season.
The hype train seems to be barreling out of control at this point. Nothing I loved about this team several months ago changed. The defense is still one of the best in the conference, featuring a top-flight secondary of King, Sidney Jones and Budda Baker. Myles Gaskin was a revelation as a freshman running back, and should contend for the Pac-12 rushing crown as a sophomore. Quarterback Jake Browning is only scratching the surface on his lofty potential.
Meanwhile, one of the best conductors in the game, Chris Petersen, is guiding this steaming engine.
While I anticipate Washington's best season since it reached the Rose Bowl in 2000, I am not quite prepared to declare it top Dawg in the Pac-12 North. A nine-win regular season with a great shot at 10 victories in the postseason would be considered a great step in the program's ongoing climb back to the pinnacle, if not for the wild hype prevalent this offseason.
Related: Why the Washington Huskies Will (or Won't) Win the Pac-12 in 2016
Steven Lassan (@AthlonSteven)
Chris Petersen has Washington poised for a breakthrough year in 2016. The Huskies return 17 starters from a team that finished 7-6 but lost three of those games by a touchdown or less — not bad for a program with a true freshman (Jake Browning) at quarterback and a revamped front seven on defense. With Browning and sophomore running back Myles Gaskin back and a full offseason to work as the starters, the offense should take a big step forward. Browning needs more help from his receivers, and the return of John Ross from injury will add a big-play option to that position group. The defense led the Pac-12 in fewest points allowed per game (18.8) in 2015, and this unit could be even better this fall. All-America candidates Sidney Jones (CB) and Budda Baker (safety) anchor the defense, with junior Elijah Qualls (DT) and Azeem Victor (LB) leading the way in the front seven. On paper, the Pac-12 doesn’t have an elite team or a College Football Playoff contender. A three-loss team could win the division on either side. Washington may not challenge for a Playoff spot, but with Stanford and Oregon entering 2016 with their own share of question marks, the timing (and personnel) is right for the Huskies to win their first North Division title.
Bryan Fischer (BryanDFischer)
Washington might just be the program everybody agrees is the preseason team that has drawn the most hype after only a so-so 2015 but, in this case, there's a pretty good reason why. While Chris Petersen has typically drawn attention for great offenses (and the Huskies should have a very good one with RB Myles Gaskin and QB Jake Browning), it's the defense that truly can help the team win the Pac-12 North and make it to the Rose Bowl. It's not just guys like playmaker Budda Baker either, this UW defense is deep. When/if the Huskies lose a game, the naysayers will bring up all the preseason hype but this is a team that is built to turn in an excellent 2016 season and maybe even a bit more.
Related: Pac-12 Not Focused on Missing College Football Playoff
John Coon (@johncoonsports)
A ton of hype is surrounding Washington entering the season. It seems a bit crazy at first glance for a program that last won 10 or more games in a season in 2000. The Huskies seemed poised to finally make a breakthrough this season. Washington returns 17 starters — making the Huskies the most experienced Pac-12 team entering the 2016 season.
Defense will be Washington's strong point again this fall. The Huskies led the Pac-12 in scoring defense a year ago, allowing just 18.8 points per contest. They also led the league in total defense (351.8 ypg). With leading tackler Azeem Victor back to anchor the linebackers and Sidney Jones and Budda Baker headlining the secondary, Washington won't surrender many points.
Offensively, Washington has one of the best quarterback-running back tandems in the whole league. Jake Browning threw for 2,955 yards and 16 touchdowns in his debut season and should be even more productive now that he's comfortable in the offense. Myles Gaskin was a revelation in the backfield, churning out 1,302 yards and 14 touchdowns in just six starts.
The pieces are in place for Washington to take a step forward and make a realistic run at winning the Pac-12 North.
Related: Ranking the Toughest Games on Washington State's College Football Schedule in 2016
Josh Webb (@FightOnTwist)
Chris Petersen is an outstanding head coach. In his first two seasons at Washington, the program has improved its recruiting on a national level, become one of the stingier Pac-12 defenses, and generally look closer to returning to the Rose Bowl days of the Huskies’ glory years. They have yet to find a way to put it all together and get over the hump.
The Huskies should jump out to a 4-0 start, but they run into the Stanford and Oregon buzz saw on back-to-back weeks. The Huskies then go on a bye before traveling to the Bay Area to take on the Cal Bears, another very winnable game. Then the Huskies get a very hungry and determined USC team, but they get that at home. I tend to favor USC here, but the Washington has had the Trojans’ number in the past. From there, UW should run circles around Arizona State before finally finishing off Wazzu for their seemingly annual Apple Cup beatdown of the Cougars in one of the nation’s most awesomely named rivalries.
Related: Ranking the Toughest Games on USC's College Football Schedule in 2016We are told the ongoing WWIII is against ISIS and its mother organisation, Al Qaeda. The US has even declared WWIII on Al Qaeda – aka the War on home-made Terror – while its real purpose to destabilize the Middle East and North Africa to secure Israel and to encircle Russia (Grand Chess Board).
It was passed as a provision to the National Defence Authorisation for 2012 to authorize worldwide war, which has no expiration date and will allow this president – and any future president – to go to war anywhere in the world, at any time, without further congressional authorization. The new authorization wouldn’t even require the president to show any threat to the national security of the United States.
US/NATO/Israel are bombing Syrian homes into rubble fighting ISIS – chasing millions of Muslims towards Europe to smash white culture and nation states as well as for establishing domestic police states. It´s part of the ongoing dirty NWO policy of the Illuminati banksters – the masters of “our” politician stooges.
Bad, bad Al Qaeda, dwhich the US itself created as a cooperative scapegoat. Bad, bad ISIS, dstaging theatre decapitations in the Katz-Studios in Tel-Aviv – and was created and is being utilized by NATO and Israel as well as Saudi-Arabia.
But now the dirty truth comes out:
I: ISIS was led by an Israeli Mossad agent, Al-Baghdadi – who just died in an Israeli hospital after being injured on 18 march 2015.
“Our enemies ISIS and Al Qaeda” are in reality our allies used to crush Syria´s legally elected president, Al Assad, who is opposed by only 10% of Syrians acc. to NATO.
Al Baghdadi was out of a powerful Iraqi Jewish clan
V eterans Today 27 April 2015: Leader of the ISIL terrorist group Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi has died and members of the Takfiri group in Iraq have already sworn allegiance to former physics teacher Abu Ala Afri (below left – his real name is Abdul Rahman al-Sheijlar) as his successor, Arab media reports said on Sunday.
Afri was said to have become Osama Bin Laden’ preferred choice for Emir of al-Qaeda in Iraq, after his two senior al-Qaeda operatives Abu were killed in 2010. al-Qaeda eventually grew into ISIS.
According to two Iraqi news agencies, Alghad Press and Al-Youm Al-Thamen (the 8th Day), as well as sources in the Iraqi city of Mosul, Baghdadi died in an Israeli hospital in the occupied Golan Heights where he had been hospitalized for treatment after sustaining severe injuries during a joint attack of the Iraqi army and popular forces. The Spanish-language Hispan TV television also released a report on April 25 in which it confirmed the death of the ISIL leader.
The sources added that al-Baghdadi has been declared by his Israeli physicians and surgeons as to be now “clinically dead”.
There are also unconfirmed reports that internal ISIS disputes have erupted and gaps among a number of ISIL factions in Syria and Iraq are widening over the appointment of the new leader, as the ISIL branch fighting Syria has rejected Afri’s leadership and are dithering over Baghdadi’s successor.
II: Veterans Today 26 April 2015 Yesterday, a 1200 man force invaded Syria from Turkey, a force armed with American M16 rifles, the latest TOW missiles and advanced Stinger air defense systems. The roads are strewn with burning Syrian tanks while the Syrian Air Force tries to slow their advance through the city of Idlib and into Syria. The armored brigade that invaded Syria was the first unit trained by the US under the command of General John Allen.
This unit was supposed to fight ISIS and Al Nusra. Instead, perhaps no surprise to many, it immediately changed sides, joined ISIS and Al-Qaeda and attacked the Syrian Army, doing exactly what General Allen had promised the Atlantic Council would and could never happen.
Marine General John Allen had been tasked by President Obama to train a 5000 man force inside Turkey. The 1200 were the first unit of them.
It was clear that American training had centered on the TOW missile. These $60,000 weapons rained down on Syrian forces with great accuracy. T
Israel currently has up to 4000 TOW missiles. These weapons have been key to the success of ISIS and have been significant in destroying the morale of the Iraqi Army.
What is most frightening is that the thousands of TOW missiles that Al Nusra/Al Qaeda and ISIS have received from Israeli stocks are currently being replenished by the United States under agreements to replace expended military equipment used by Israel.
Despite rhetoric from Washington and an apparent break between the Obama administration and Tel Aviv, US forces have been training and supplying ISIS and Al Nusra at |
the strongmen of the regime. He speculated as to how and where it might have occurred. Here I feel duty-bound to point out that if my friend has got a self-jeopardizing impulse in him at all it is that he is committed to remaining in Russia to carry out his important work. He was going to return to Moscow after he fully recovered. Evgenia and their three children would remain in Washington.
“Are you sure you want to go back?” I asked him that night. “If they missed the first time, won’t they try again a second?”
“What good can I do here?” he answered. “The whole point is to educate Russians about their country and what it can be before an entire generation grows up with no concept of freedom. How can I do that from here?”
I had no response then, but I now I badly wish he had tried to find out.::: If you like the content I produce and enjoy playing Masterwork, consider supporting it on Patreon. :::
::: It allows me to do regular updates and add more content more quickly. :::
New Update - V1.21New utility: GifCam (Found in \Masterwork V1.21 (43.03)\MasterworkDwarfFortress\Utilities)A small.exe that allows you to easily make gifs of your fort, for community games and such. Use is almost self-explanatory, for more info head over to http://blog.bahraniapps.com/gifcam/ Graphics:- Fixed elven archers, crossbowmen and blowgunners.- Fixed human archers, crossbowmen and blowgunners.- Fixed goblin archers, crossbowmen and blowgunners.- Fixed kobold archers, crossbowmen and blowgunners.- Fixed bins.- Fixed trap stops.- Fixed "children playing make-believe", added animation.- Fixed digging designation numbers. (appeared as solid black tiles)- Fixed furniture designations. (appeared as solid black tiles)- Made stockpiles brighter.- Made water/magma brighter.- Made rocks/inorganics brighter.- Made ramps clearer.Dfhack:- Fixed startdwarf.- Updated TWBT, Mifki made a bugfix update himself. NO MORE CRASHES (!) FROM TWBT.Ingame:- Alchemists guild now properly boosts Alchemy skill to 200%. (Dwarf mode)- Making ashland glass now accepts orthoclase boulders, instead of gems, which didnt exist. (Orc mode)- Buildings no longer accept filled bags/boxes as build-materials. (Orc mode)- Kobold potters can now sieve loamy/sandy/silty clay and get easier access to pure clay/sand. (Kobold mode)- Same for hired kobold workshops in (Human mode).- Javelins can now be made of iron, copper, bronze, silver, platinum or steel, instead of steel-only. (Dwarf mode)I started working on a few animated animal graphics, like this:As well as plants and vermin. Vermin are fine, pretty much all done, but plants are a lot. 4-8 graphics per plant, for 120-ish plants is not a small undertaking.Once I'm satisfied with the tileset, I'll work on a small(ish) goblin or elf mode, to finally get all the vanilla races playable, before heading into harder projects again. Patreon : No new Patrons, again. I think I should start doing more special Patreon projects(?)Cheers,MephRohan Dennis beat Chris Boardman's previous record of an average speed of 55.152 km/h set in 1994
Rohan Dennis rode the fastest individual time trial in Tour de France history to claim victory at the opening stage of this year's race in Utrecht.
The Australian rode 13.8km in 14 minutes and 56 seconds at an average speed of 55.446 km/h, with German Tony Martin five seconds behind in second.
"To wear the Tour de France yellow jersey, it's a dream," Dennis said.
Team Sky's Chris Froome was 50 seconds back as Steve Cummings placed highest of 10 British riders in 10th.
Defending champion Vincenzo Nibali was the best performer among Froome's fellow contenders for overall victory at the 21-stage race, which ends in Paris on 26 July,
Froome finished seven seconds behind defending champion Vincenzo Nibali in Utrecht
Astana's Italian rider finished 22nd, seven seconds ahead of 2013 winner Froome, 15 seconds clear of Spaniard Alberto Contador and 18 seconds ahead of Colombia's Nairo Quintana.
"It's the longer efforts I've been training for and I'm happy to have that out the way," said Froome.
British former Olympic champion Chris Boardman set the previous fastest individual average speed over a Tour de France stage with 55.152 km/h at the 7.2km prologue of 1994.
"Everything went perfectly," said Dennis, who will wear the leader's yellow jersey for the start of stage two on Sunday - a 166km ride along the Dutch coast that is likely to end in a bunch sprint.
"We went with the tactic of going out early and setting a benchmark and making everyone chase me," the 25-year-old BMC rider added on ITV4.
Rob Hayles - BBC Radio 5 live commentator "It's been an incredible stage today. All the talk should be about Rohan Dennis. Five seconds ahead of Tony Martin? It's fantastic. Aside from that it's about the GC riders and they are all there or thereabouts within a few seconds of each other."
Dennis's Swiss team-mate Fabian Cancellara came third with a time of 15 minutes and two seconds, while Britons Geraint Thomas of Team Sky and Alex Dowsett of Movistar came 12th and 13th respectively.
Cummings, 34, last rode the Tour in 2012 and this year is competing for Team MTN-Qhubeka, the first African-based team to tackle cycling's most prestigious race.
Meanwhile, Astana's Lars Boom completed the stage despite suggestions he should be withdrawn for failing a test for low cortisol levels, which can indicate abuse of cortisone.
Geraint Thomas's stage-by-stage guide Stage two: Utrecht - Zelande, 166km (103.14 miles) "This will probably be the most stressful day of the whole year's racing. It's along the coast and if there are a lot of crosswinds, that could split the race into groups." Team Sky's Geraint Thomas's analysis of all 21 stages of this year's Tour de France.
Stage 1 result and general classification
1 Rohan Dennis (Aus) BMC Racing Team 14mins 56secs
2 Tony Martin (Ger) Etixx - Quick-Step +5secs
3 Fabian Cancellara (Swi) Trek Factory Racing +6secs
4 Tom Dumoulin (Ned) Team Giant-Alpecin +8secs
5 Jos Van Emden (Ned) Team LottoNL-Jumbo +15secs
6 Jonathan Castroviejo (Spa) Movistar Team a +23secs
7 Matthias Brandle (Aut) IAM Cycling at same time
8 Adriano Malori (Ita) Movistar Team +29secs
9 Wilco Kelderman (Ned) Team LottoNL-Jumbo +30secs
10 Stephen Cummings (Gbr) MTN - Qhubeka +32secs
Selected others:
12 Geraint Thomas (Gbr) Team Sky +33secs
13 Alex Dowsett (Gbr) Movistar Team +36secs
22 Vincenzo Nibali (Ita) Astana +43secs
33 Simon Yates (Gbr) Orica GreenEdge +46secs
39 Christopher Froome (Gbr) Team Sky +50secs
46 Alberto Contador (Spa) Saxo-Tinkoff +58
57 Nairo Quintana (Col) Movistar +1min 1sec
68 Peter Kennaugh (Gbr) Team Sky +1min 08secs
74 Ian Stannard (Gbr) Team Sky +1min 11secs
97 Adam Yates (Gbr) Orica GreenEdge +1min 18secs
123 Mark Cavendish (Gbr) Etixx - Quick-Step +1min 26secs
180 Luke Rowe (Gbr) Team Sky +1min 54secsfrom Locus Magazine, January 2009
We know that our readers are distracted and sometimes even overwhelmed by the myriad distractions that lie one click away on the Internet, but of course writers face the same glorious problem: the delirious world of information and communication and community that lurks behind your screen, one alt-tab away from your word-processor.
The single worst piece of writing advice I ever got was to stay away from the Internet because it would only waste my time and wouldn't help my writing. This advice was wrong creatively, professionally, artistically, and personally, but I know where the writer who doled it out was coming from. Every now and again, when I see a new website, game, or service, I sense the tug of an attention black hole: a time-sink that is just waiting to fill my every discretionary moment with distraction. As a co-parenting new father who writes at least a book per year, half-a-dozen columns a month, ten or more blog posts a day, plus assorted novellas and stories and speeches, I know just how short time can be and how dangerous distraction is.
But the Internet has been very good to me. It's informed my creativity and aesthetics, it's benefited me professionally and personally, and for every moment it steals, it gives back a hundred delights. I'd no sooner give it up than I'd give up fiction or any other pleasurable vice.
I think I've managed to balance things out through a few simple techniques that I've been refining for years. I still sometimes feel frazzled and info-whelmed, but that's rare. Most of the time, I'm on top of my workload and my muse. Here's how I do it:
Short, regular work schedule When I'm working on a story or novel, I set a modest daily goal usually a page or two and then I meet it every day, doing nothing else while I'm working on it. It's not plausible or desirable to try to get the world to go away for hours at a time, but it's entirely possible to make it all shut up for 20 minutes. Writing a page every day gets me more than a novel per year do the math and there's always 20 minutes to be found in a day, no matter what else is going on. Twenty minutes is a short enough interval that it can be claimed from a sleep or meal-break (though this shouldn't become a habit). The secret is to do it every day, weekends included, to keep the momentum going, and to allow your thoughts to wander to your next day's page between sessions. Try to find one or two vivid sensory details to work into the next page, or a bon mot, so that you've already got some material when you sit down at the keyboard.
Leave yourself a rough edge When you hit your daily word-goal, stop. Stop even if you're in the middle of a sentence. Especially if you're in the middle of a sentence. That way, when you sit down at the keyboard the next day, your first five or ten words are already ordained, so that you get a little push before you begin your work. Knitters leave a bit of yarn sticking out of the day's knitting so they know where to pick up the next day they call it the "hint." Potters leave a rough edge on the wet clay before they wrap it in plastic for the night it's hard to build on a smooth edge.
Don't research Researching isn't writing and vice-versa. When you come to a factual matter that you could google in a matter of seconds, don't. Don't give in and look up the length of the Brooklyn Bridge, the population of Rhode Island, or the distance to the Sun. That way lies distraction an endless click-trance that will turn your 20 minutes of composing into a half-day's idyll through the web. Instead, do what journalists do: type "TK" where your fact should go, as in "The Brooklyn bridge, all TK feet of it, sailed into the air like a kite." "TK" appears in very few English words (the one I get tripped up on is "Atkins") so a quick search through your document for "TK" will tell you whether you have any fact-checking to do afterwards. And your editor and copyeditor will recognize it if you miss it and bring it to your attention.
Don't be ceremonious Forget advice about finding the right atmosphere to coax your muse into the room. Forget candles, music, silence, a good chair, a cigarette, or putting the kids to sleep. It's nice to have all your physical needs met before you write, but if you convince yourself that you can only write in a perfect world, you compound the problem of finding 20 free minutes with the problem of finding the right environment at the same time. When the time is available, just put fingers to keyboard and write. You can put up with noise/silence/kids/discomfort/hunger for 20 minutes.
Kill your word-processor Word, Google Office and OpenOffice all come with a bewildering array of typesetting and automation settings that you can play with forever. Forget it. All that stuff is distraction, and the last thing you want is your tool second-guessing you, "correcting" your spelling, criticizing your sentence structure, and so on. The programmers who wrote your word processor type all day long, every day, and they have the power to buy or acquire any tool they can imagine for entering text into a computer. They don't write their software with Word. They use a text-editor, like vi, Emacs, TextPad, BBEdit, Gedit, or any of a host of editors. These are some of the most venerable, reliable, powerful tools in the history of software (since they're at the core of all other software) and they have almost no distracting features but they do have powerful search-and-replace functions. Best of all, the humble.txt file can be read by practically every application on your computer, can be pasted directly into an email, and can't transmit a virus.
Realtime communications tools are deadly The biggest impediment to concentration is your computer's ecosystem of interruption technologies: IM, email alerts, RSS alerts, Skype rings, etc. Anything that requires you to wait for a response, even subconsciously, occupies your attention. Anything that leaps up on your screen to announce something new, occupies your attention. The more you can train your friends and family to use email, message boards, and similar technologies that allow you to save up your conversation for planned sessions instead of demanding your attention right now helps you carve out your 20 minutes. By all means, schedule a chat voice, text, or video when it's needed, but leaving your IM running is like sitting down to work after hanging a giant "DISTRACT ME" sign over your desk, one that shines brightly enough to be seen by the entire world.
I don't claim to have invented these techniques, but they're the ones that have made the 21st century a good one for me.
Cory Doctorow's website is Cory Doctorow is one of a dozen Locus columnists and reviewers. Every issue, we review dozens of books and magazines, most before they appear in print. A subscription will get you all those as well as the rest of the magazine -- news, People & Publishing, commentary, reports on events, and a list of all books and magazines published that month. Cory Doctorow's website is Craphound.com, and he is co-editor of Boing Boing: A Directory of Wonderful Things
Previous Cory Doctorow columns posted onComments are welcome, but are moderated.Katie Couric broke her silence on Friday on the sexual misconduct allegations against her former "Today" show co-host Matt Lauer Matthew (Matt) Todd LauerCEO of Time's Up anti-harassment group steps down, cites 'family concerns' NBCUniversal CEO regrets putting Megyn Kelly in morning slot: ‘We shouldn’t have done it’ Judge rules Harvey Weinstein sexual assault case can move forward MORE, calling them "incredibly upsetting."
Couric was responding to a comment from an individual on Instagram who was upset she had not yet spoken out about the allegations.
“It’s incredibly upsetting and I will say something when I’m ready to. Thanks for your interest," Couric wrote.
ADVERTISEMENT
Couric worked with Lauer for 15 years on the NBC morning show before leaving in 2006 to anchor the "CBS Evening News."
The former television anchor's comments come after a slew of allegations against Lauer surfaced earlier this month, resulting in his departure from NBC News.
Lauer issued an apology after his termination.
"There are no words to express my sorrow and regret for the pain I have caused others by words and actions," Lauer said in a statement that was read on the "Today" show.
"To the people I have hurt, I am truly sorry. As I am writing this, I realize the depth of the damage and disappointment I have left behind at home and at NBC."
Lauer joined other high-profile men such as Harvey Weinstein, Charlie Rose and Kevin Spacey who lost their jobs after allegations against them came to light.Boston.com Editor-in-Chief Tim Molloy Is Out
The Boston Globe's site is churning through editors and management.
Get a compelling long read and must-have lifestyle tips in your inbox every Sunday morning — great with coffee!
Cha-cha-cha-changes.
According to multiple sources, Boston.com editor-in-chief Tim Molloy is out as the website’s top editor.
Sources report that Molloy’s departure was announced to the newsroom by newly appointed general manager Eleanor Cleverly.
His last day as editor was today and an email sent to his globe.com email address bounced.
“I want to thank Tim for his hard work and many contributions to Boston.com and wish him well as he begins this new chapter,” said Cleverly in a statement.
The news of Molloy’s departure comes just days after Boston.com announced Cleverly was replacing Corey Gottlieb as the Boston Globe-owned site’s general manager.
Molloy was appointed as editor-in-chief in February after the site went through a series of embarrassing missteps. Prior to joining the site, Molloy worked as a digital engagement editor at PBS and as a reporter at a number of outlets like, and the Associated Press.
Former Boston magazine digital editor Kaitlyn Johnston, who joined the site as deputy editor at the same time as Molloy, has been appointed as the site’s new editor-in-chief. Prior to her time at Boston, Johnston worked at Pittsburgh magazine as its digital editor.
Former Bon Appetit.com editor Matt Gross ran the site for two months last fall before quitting Thanksgiving week. Since its formal detachment from the Boston Globe, the site has undergone long stretches without a leader on the editorial side.Gav Thorpe
Gavin Thorpe — more commonly known as Gav Thorpe — is a long-term contributor to the development of both the game and background sides of Warhammer 40,000, as well as other Games Workshop properties.
Biography
Born in Hertfordshire, he joined Games Workshop in 1993.[1] He stayed with the company for fourteen years, holding various positions, ultimately being most well known as a games developer, background designer and author of background fiction. He left Games Workshop in 2008 to concentrate on being a full-time author. He has produced many novels and stories for the Black Library.[2]
Gav Thorpe worked in almost all aspects of Games Workshop, making his way up from assistant games developer to being placed in charge of the Warhammer Fantasy games system for some years. He also contributed to the development and design of several editions of Warhammer 40,000, as well as creating articles for White Dwarf magazine and perhaps most importantly, being the originator and lead developer of the Inquisitor games system. One of his last positions before leaving Games Workshop was an oversight role over all Games Workshop background and IP. His influence on the development of the Warhammer 40,000 background continues at present with the publication of his work for the Black Library.
He currently lives in Nottingham, and should you wish to inquire as to the current status of Dennis, his infamous mechanical hamster, he can be found communicating with fans in various places online.
Games Workshop
Rule Books
Other Books
White Dwarfs
Black Library Works
Single Novels
[[Ghost Warrior: Rise of the Ynnari] (Novel)]
Rise of the Ynnari: Wild Rider (Novel)
Short StoriesIt’s where Linda’s great-grandfather Frederick, an immigrant from Hanover, Germany, settled in the 1850s, becoming a mining engineer and a colonel in the Mexican Army. His son Federico, Linda’s grandfather, was born on a Sonoran hacienda and brought his family to Tucson in 1882. Tucson is where Linda was born, in 1946, second daughter to Gilbert and Ruth Mary Ronstadt, sister to Peter, Suzy and Mike.
You may not have thought of Linda as a Mexican-American singer, but if you’ve heard her, you’ve heard her deep Sonoran roots. Hearing the ranchera singer Lola Beltrán for the first time can bring the shock of recognition to a Linda fan; there’s influence and long tradition behind that lustrous voice. Those old Mexican songs in Linda’s hit 1987 record “Canciones de Mi Padre” were ones she learned before she was 10.
Linda, who is 67, published a memoir this fall, “Simple Dreams,” which touches only briefly on her Arizona girlhood before moving on to her recording career. I knew about Linda the rock ’n’ roll sex bomb, who just made the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame, and I’d gotten to know her through her work in Arizona for civil rights and immigration changes. But after reading her book, I wanted to know more about little Linda the pony wrangler and devotee of Hopalong Cassidy, and the place she grew up in the 1940s and ’50s.
Image Credit The New York Times
I emailed her this summer and asked if she was up for a memory trip. She was — she still has a house in Tucson, and many relatives and friends to see. (Other families have family trees, she told me. “We have a family anthill. Tucson is just swarming with Ronstadts.”) And she was eager to go back down into Sonora, a journey she’d made only a handful of times. We hatched a plan: We’d meet in November, when it’s cooler, see points of Ronstadt interest in Tucson, cross into Mexico at Naco, then head down the Rio Sonora valley to grandfather Federico’s hometown, Banámichi. She wanted to bring some old friends along as guides: Bill and Athena Steen and their son Kalin, who live in Canelo; and Dennis and Debbie Moroney, who raise cattle in Cochise County, near the border. Linda and Bill would meet me in Tucson, and we’d pick up the others on the way, for a truck-and-minivan caravan down memory lane.
The dusty, friendly little Tucson where Linda used to ride to the drugstore in a pony cart is mostly gone. Linda’s father once ran the F. Ronstadt Hardware Company, selling windmills and farm machinery to ranchers. The site is now the Ronstadt Transit Center downtown bus depot.
Some points of interest on the Ronstadt trail remain. There’s the Fox Tucson Theater downtown, where her father sang, billed as Gil Ronstadt and his Star-Spangled Megaphone. Singing is simply what Ronstadts do. Her father wooed her mother with mariachi tunes. Her grandparents cherished opera; her mother loved the American songbook and taught her children those comically bloody lullabies. Peter was an accomplished boy soprano. He, Suzy and Linda used to sing in local clubs as a folk trio, the New Union Ramblers.
That early ’60s club scene is gone, and the Fox, which now screens movies and presents an eclectic mix of musicians, wasn’t quite the place to start.(Image: Wiley Publishing)Scientific American lauds author Chris Mooney “as one if the few journalists in the country who specialize in the now dangerous intersection of science and politics.” Having interviewed Mooney about his first book, the highly praised, “The Republican War on Science,” Truthout/BuzzFlash interviews Mooney about his latest release, “The Republican Brain: The Science of Why They Deny Science – and Reality.” Truthout and BuzzFlash readers can directly obtain “The Republican Brain” and support uncompromised journalism by clicking here.
Mark Karlin: Progressives often say of Fox that they create facts to bolster their opinions. Is this true of the Republican mind set in general?
Chris Mooney: This seems to be very persistent on the right. I do not argue that liberals never do it, but conservatives seem to be engaging in a boatload of biased reasoning today, and also doubling down on false beliefs, on issues ranging from climate change to the debt ceiling. We even have the bizarre phenomenon of the “smart idiot” effect: Educated conservatives being more likely to hold wrong beliefs than less educated conservatives on issues like global warming – which probably partly reflects misinformation coming from Fox.
In light of all this, I think it is far past time to look at what psychology has to say about why the left and right differ, and what this may have to do with our divide over reality and what is true. And that’s what the book attempts to do.
MK: What happened between the ’50s when we engaged in a scientific race with the Soviets to get a man on the moon and the anti-science beliefs of the GOP today? We got the man on the moon, and then seem to have gone in reverse as far as a belief in science as a basis for moving forward.
CM: It’s sad. The country was much more unified behind the idea that science is the way to create a better future. Since then, trust in the scientific community has plummeted among conservatives in particular.
I argue that this is because the conservative movement defined itself in opposition to academia and pointy-headed intellectuals, but also because it has activated a strain of psychological authoritarianism – viewing things in black and white ways without nuance or toleration of uncertainty, which is of course highly incompatible with scientific thinking. In fact, you might argue that authoritarianism and science have been opposed ever since the time of Galileo.
MK: Do you think the notion of the religious right in being anti-evolutionary contributes to the denial of science? After all, science is predicated on humans building upon a foundation of accumulated knowledge, but if everything was created contemporaneously, science is of little value. We are part of the divine order – not of scientific inquiry – their creationist argument goes.
CM: There’s no doubt that conservatism, religiosity, and opposition to science are tied up in a tight little bundle in the US. And the common theme here seems to be psychological authoritarianism and a lack of openness to new ideas.
The denial of evolution is the fundamental centerpiece of an anti-empirical worldview. The irony is massive here when it comes to discussing the focus of the book, by the way.
I discuss the psychological underpinnings of ideology, and of left right differences, in the context of what we are starting to know about human nature. And while the science here isn’t all in yet, and there is much more still to learn, I suspect we are going to find that liberal-conservative differences are partly rooted in who we are as evolved creatures. This is what a lot of researchers are coming to expect; it is also something the moral psychologist Jonathan Haidt argues in his new book.
So denying this research may come very naturally to conservatives – after all, so many of them don’t think we evolved!
MK: How do you scientifically show why the leading ideology of the GOP is a denial of science? After all, every GOP senator denies global warming. Won’t they just deny your scientific proof of their rejection of science?
CM: This is pretty easily done. The polling data show overwhelming that conservatives, much more than liberals, deny global warming, deny evolution, think Obama wasn’t born in the U.S., think Saddam was collaborating with Al Qaeda, and so on. Tea Partiers tend to be the worst on a lot of these.
I don’t honestly think even conservatives would argue back against the polling data – rather, they’ll say that they’re right to question global warming because it’s phony science, and so on.
There is also a separate body of data showing that Fox News viewers tend to be more misinformed about these issues – call it the Fox “effect.” Here, there has been some response, with Fox trying to critique and dismantle the various studies involved. But it just doesn’t hold up. You might be able to undermine one such study, but seven of them? I don’t think so. There’s too much data. Toss out one study, it doesn’t change the big picture.
MK: In your introduction, “Equations to Refute Einstein,” you conclude with remarks about “liberal denial.” You note this might be due to the fear that “it leads to a place that terrifies them [liberals]: an anti-Enlightenment world in which evidence and argument don’t work to change people’s minds.” Would you expand on that? Why is it so important to know the psychology of the right?
CM: Whether or not conservatives pay attention to what we’re learning about the psychology of ideology, liberals and progressives can profit greatly by learning about it. Because this research shows that many of our assumptions about how to reach people different from us are flat wrong.
We can’t count on facts to change minds – emotions and values trump facts almost every time. Nor can we rely on our own natural, nuanced, complex style of communication to reach the public. The research suggests that our very instincts are leading us to only know how to talk to ourselves; conservative styles of communication – decisive, direct – have a great appeal to the right and, likely, the middle. And we can use this research not only to better reach conservatives, but to reach people who are moderate or undecided, but who also have some conservative attributes.
MK: For Truthout readers who may be unaware of it, can you explain “Conservapedia”?
CM: Ha. This is the website run by Andrew Schlafly, the son of the anti-feminist crusader Phyllis Schlafly. I have fun at the beginning of the book noting how factually wrong Schlafly manages to be, about, well, a staggering array of topics. He’s what I call a create-your-own-reality conservative. He thought Wikipedia was too liberal, so he made up his own facts. And the most staggering example of this is his Conservapedia entry trying to take down Einstein’s theory of relativity. The guy even writes equations to try to disprove Einstein. It’s quite the facepalm moment.
MK: How does the open personality as compared to the closed personality affect political outlook?
CM: The evidence here is pretty hard to escape. Across studies, even across countries, scoring high on “Openness to Experience” – one of the big five personality traits – strongly predicts political liberalism. Indeed, in a study I ran myself in the book, the liberalism-openness relationship popped up, just as it always does. So if you’re not open – which means open to trying new things, including new ideas – if you’re closed, you tend more conservative.
I want to emphasize how powerful this finding is. In one study of over 14,000 people, the relationship between liberalism and openness was as strong as, or stronger than, the relationship between social liberalism and higher education, and between economic conservatism and having a higher income. So we’re talking about an effect at least as significant as these factors – education, income – that everybody knows strongly affect ideology.
MK: Since many Republican leaders who are anti-science are very pro-corporate, doesn’t it appear inexplicable that they can champion the scientifically developed genetic modification seeds of Monsanto, but deny the scientific basis of pollution?
CM: No. Conservatives like science fine when it is on their side and supporting their values, and one of their values is the embrace of individualism and private industry, free from government interference. So the science of drilling, the science of nuclear power – they dig that stuff. However, they’re very selective, and if science comes out suggesting that these activities have adverse consequences, of a sort that might require the government to step in … well then science isn’t so admired any more.
MK: History is subject to interpretation to a certain degree. That is what keeps history graduate students busy. But there are historical facts that aren’t arguable when they are written in documents such as the United States Constitution. So how, as you discuss in your chapter on the “Republican War on History,” can leaders of the GOP argue that this country was founded as a Christian nation?
CM: It’s really the same kind of phenomenon as the denial of science. It’s wishful thinking dressed up in very dubious scholarship, and bolstered by biased, motivated reasoning.
Ultimately, I believe that some issues in history are about as open and shut as scientific issues – and this is one of them. The historical consensus is clear about who our founders were and what they thought about church and state, and how the country they created would handle religion.
Conservatives want to believe that the founders are mirror images of who they are today – which is why they style themselves as Tea Party revolutionaries – but I argue that in fact, they are fundamentally betraying our nation’s heritage and who we are. How dare they, frankly. It’s outrageous. It turns out that liberals care about our heritage and our tradition more than conservatives do in this instance.
MK: You end your book by dedicating it “to that unquenchable liberal spirit that will never, ever stop pushing us to be different and better than we currently are.” Can we be better than we currently are without a belief in science?
CM: I don’t think so, no. Since the Enlightenment, science and liberalism have been allied in a quest to use reason to make the world just a little bit better than it was before, and make our lives just a little bit richer than they were in the last generation. But there’s an irony: Now science itself shows us that some people are going to feel a lot less comfortable than others with this quest, and also that they are going to reason in a way that is far from what we would call scientific.
That doesn’t mean giving up on the quest. Rather, it means basing it on a firmer scientific foundation – so we can truly understand the nature of the hurdles ahead.The Chinese bureaucracy has been toughening its stance toward the Democratic People’s Republic of Korea (DPRK) regime, seeking to rein in the latter’s nuclear and missile programs. Specifically, the People’s Republic of China’s Ministry of Commerce (MOFCOM), the Ministry of Industry and Information Technology (MIIT), the General Administration of Customs (GAC), and the China Atomic Energy Authority (CAEA) recently published announcement number 59. The announcement came with a 236-page appendix, which details a comprehensive list of banned exports, and, in particular, dual-use goods and technologies that could contribute to the advancement of the DPRK’s weapons of mass destruction and missile programs.
Hong Lei, a spokesperson for China’s Ministry of Foreign Affairs (MFA), said the restrictions are intended to “encourage de-nuclearization” on Korea’s peninsula. This recent development reflects an unprecedented shift in China’s nonproliferation policies and practices, not only because it targets a specific country with the harshest sanctions to come out of the bureaucracy yet, but also because it covers an extraordinary range of goods and technologies. This significant change in China’s nonproliferation policies and practices provides incisive insight into the bureaucratic complexities and decision-making process of the Chinese system as well as the internal and external factors that drive this policy change. Why did the Chinese bureaucracy take these measures and why now? And what factors have had a more or less impact on this issue in the Chinese mind and why?
Although China observers tend to characterize the Chinese political system as an authoritarian, top-down model with the Standing Committee of the Politburo making the decisions and the relevant bodies implementing the decrees, the classification is an oversimplification. When attempting to grasp how decisions are made for any specific policy in the Chinese system, it is imperative to start with a basic assumption that every bureaucracy that has even the vaguest interest in that policy has been asked to comment on the preliminary proposal. In the case of the DPRK and nonproliferation, the key decision-making agencies include the State Council, the Central Military Commission (CMC), MOFCOM, MIIT, GAC, CAEA, State Administration for Science Technology and Industry for National Defense (SASTIND), the MFA, and state-owned enterprises – specifically the enterprises involved with the manufacture and trade of dual-use goods and technologies. Also part of this agency list is the Chinese military establishment, which since around 2008 has been increasingly integrated into and becoming an important player in shaping China’s nonproliferation policies and practices.
The Chinese bureaucracy could best be described not as a hierarchical decision-making structure but rather as a series of concentric circles, with some circles overlapping. Generally the initial policy proposal sits at the center of the structure. The bureaucracies with the most interest in the policy and its outcome are situated in the circles closest to the center. And those with varying degrees of interest and even the most vague interest in the policy are located in a descending order of interest in each subsequent circle out to the most distant points of the concentric circle schematic.
The concentric circle structure is one that Dr. Pan Wei, a Professor of International Studies at Peking University uses to explain the relationship between Chinese society and state, but I also find it useful to analyze the Chinese bureaucracy decision-making process in other realms, such as nonproliferation. In this unique decision-making environment, the Chinese officials within and among each agency operating within the bureaucracy have disagreements about the policy changes. And counter to conventional wisdom about the process of decision-making in China, the officials engage in negotiations, bargaining, and logrolling with other agencies located within the concentric structure to promote their agendas and interests in the policy under consideration.
Sometimes this decision-making process results in changes in the agency. It also allows officials within the bureaucracy to manipulate the consensus in one direction or another. Whether changes occur within an agency or whether the consensus is manipulated is contingent upon the scope and the importance of the issue at hand. The DPRK is a major national security and foreign policy issue, so it is most likely that both foregoing conditions occurred. |
am enjoying feeling you inside me..
Me: So, after a while I start fucking you Slowly at first, in and out Letting you feel the sensation of me pushing into you, over and over again. Feeling the hardness inside you Then I move faster, and harder Rough, but not painful I grab your hair and pull your head back. My other hand is holding your hip, holding you firmly against the sofa so you can’t move It’s quite fast now. You are moaning alot. Biting your lip. Trying to turn your head around to look at me You want to see your own body. See yourself, how you look when you’re being fucked. You want to know what I see It makes you feel closer to me. But also, it makes you feel more sexy I grab both of your arms. Fold them behind your back and push your face into the cushions Now I’m fucking you really fast and hard. You can’t think of anything You are totally lost on the sea of pleasure You are screaming my name now, and don’t even know you are doing it I slap you butt harder now, and each time you grunt You are moving your hips and butt, trying to match my motion trying to get me deeper inside you I reach my hand around to hold your face, and you start biting and sucking on my finger you feel like you are being invaded. When I push in hard, you feel like my cock is going all through your body and out your mouth enjoying?
Her:..a lot..
Me: heh 😉 Suddenly I pull out of you Abruptly you feel empty all you can think about is “I want more” I grab your hair and pull you towards me, turning you around, and forcing you to your knees Again, it’s rough, violent, forcefull. But not painful You know what to do. You don’t even think You wrap your fingers around my cock, with a big smile of anticipation then you take me into your mouth At the beginning you are too impatient. You want it all, immediately. So you are sucking hard, aggressively, up and down I put my hand on top of your head, which you like. It makes you feel protected and you slow down. Now you are relaxing. Enjoying the feeling of my cock inside your mouth. Experimenting with the sensation. You try kissing the tip. Then licking up and down the length You look up at me, to check I like it I do 😀 You take great care and pride in your work. Showing me how much you like me. I appreciate that You don’t need to think about what you are doing. It’s all coming naturally I like this. But it’s not enough. I have to be inside you again. So I pull your head up, give you a kiss, and lie you down on the sofa You are lying there, in total surrender I decide I want to see more of you. I tell you to stand up. You do I tell you to take off your dress. You do. You are standing there, in front of me. Just your lingerie. Your bra and stockings. I don’t move. I just look at you. You can feel my eyes on your body, like a hot ray of sunshine You feel very self-conscious, but it’s a pleasant feeling It’s pleasant to be desired by me. To feel my desire to have you I tell you to spin around slowly, so I can see all of you. You do. Then I push you down again so you are lying on my sofa, almost naked. Waiting to see what I do next You feel overpowered by my masculine presence. You feel powerless to resist, but totally safe. Tell me something? What you feel or what you want….
Her: I just want to be yours…to be in your complete power..
Me: you are I sit next to you, and run my fingers along your stomach then your breasts, and your face I know you want me inside you, and it will happen soon, but I want to spend a little more time admiring your beauty I grab your breasts. I’m very thoughtful. I just enjoy being close to such beauty, and possessing it I can see you getting impatient, so I let you grab my cock again, and then I enter you again you are lying underneath me, feeling my weight You wrap your legs behind my back, grab me behind my neck, and try to pull me tighter into you I fuck you like this for a while. You completely lose track of time It is like an endless circle of feeling me pushing into you, then out again Then you realise I’m pushing harder and faster I’m going to finish. I’m going to let you draw me into orgasm You start pushing into me with every thrust Biting my shoulder, scratching my back instinctively trying to make me cum. To feel the pleasure, to feel the satisfaction of my temporary loss of control a loss of control that only you can create (in reality, I’d cum inside you, but this is imagination so I’m gonna be a bit wilder, ok?)
Her: ok 😉
Me: Cool. How are you feeling?
Her: as never before.. wish at this very moment we could do it in reality..
Me: we’ll get the chance. It’ll be like this but 10x better So, I’m fucking you really hard again I’m looking deep into your eyes more now. It’s not enough to feel your physical surrender. I want you to feel the force of my character too At first you can’t hold my eye contact. It’s too powerful But then you gradually do. We lock eyes. Now all of your mind is focused on my eyes. You are looking right into me You can feel your body shaking and moving from my power as I fuck you, but it feels further away It’s like I’m mentally fucking you too now You bite your lip, moan I pull out of you again then I sit on your chest and push my cock into your mouth you are frantic, desperate to make me come, to make me happy you are sucking hard, pumping my cock with your hand (I warned you this is a bit wild)
Her: …I prefer to know all your intime fantasies..
Me: I look down and I’m feeling very good. I feel like I completely possess your beauty. The visual image of your face and my cock…. it’s difficult to describe in words but seeing the beauty of your face seeing the girl of your character and emotional depth
Her: then?
[dropped connection for five minutes]
Me: I’m finished. Fell asleep 😛
Her: no.. continue 😛
Me: haha, ok….. where were we?
Her: I dont want to repeat such things (blush)
Me: haha I will So I have my cock in your mouth, and you are sucking it, trying to make me cum It’s at this moment that I feel like I completely possess you. It feels powerful, that I found a girl like you and took you so completely that you are doing this for me. then I feel all of the pressure building up, and I know I am about to come I pull out, holding my cock near your face You know what’s next. You want my come inside you. You open your mouth, try to bend your head forwards to get my cock inside you again underneath me I can feel your body squirming, trying to get something from me then I come I splash it over your face Some of it goes into your mouth, some on your cheek, a little bit on your forehead For you, it feels hot and exciting. You feel owned You can’t believe you’ve done it, and can’t believe how exciting it felt Mostly, you feel satisfied. Satisfied as a woman that you could bring me to this final moment I feel free For some precious moments I feel completely liberated, the comfort of total emptiness in the world Then slowly our minds return to the real world After a bit of… ahem….. “personal organisation”… we go to my room and lie together. Not talking, just comfortable the end 😉
Her: what do you feel?
Me: when? I just told you didn’t I?
Her: yes you told.. but at this very moment?
Me: in the story, or in Starbucks?
Her: in Starbucks
Me: Kinda funny. Like there’s all these people around me drinking coffee and they have no idea what we’ve been doing
Her: 😀
Me: And I really want you here next to me right now I want to do it for real
Her: so do I, but not in Starbucks 🙂
Me: true…. How do you feel?
Her: I feel like I’ve done it… butterflies in my stomach…
If you would like to learn how to seduce girls through Facebook messaging, buy my advanced manual Daygame Mastery here. It has over 130 pages of advanced instructional material including real Facebook and text message chats. It also includes the world’s best advice on what to do on a first date, and how to progress a girl to sex once you are along with her.A horrified family have come up against a very stubborn colony of spiders which appear to have laid claim to their backyard.
Denise and Sean Torkington from Hervey Bay in Queensland were shocked to discover that what they originally thought was a patch of dew beneath their children's trampoline, was actually a gigantic cobweb.
'We thought it was dew to start with from the kitchen window but when we saw it again in the afternoon we needed a closer look and realised it was a spider's web,' Mrs Torkington said.
Having lived at their Piabla property for six years, the'strange phenomenon' was the first they'd ever seen.
Denise and Sean Torkington from Hervey Bay in Queensland were horrified to discover a massive spider web growing in their backyard
Even after Mr Torkington tried to remove the determined arachnids himself, they came back with startling force.
'My husband kicked it away hoping they would move on but they rebuilt it overnight and it was grown everyday since.'
Mrs Torkington turned to a Facebook gardening group on Tuesday night for advice, but left group members stumped and sarcastically encouraging the family to 'burn everything and run'.
She said the neighbours were completely foreign to the freakish occurrence as well.
Denise Torkington (pictured above) explained they originally thought it was a patch of dew beneath their children's trampoline, but later found it was actually a gigantic cobweb.
An arachnophobe herself, Mrs Torkington was terrified to discover what she thought to be baby spiders and eggs within the web.
'This is the thing nightmares are made of,' she said.
The family are enlisting a professional pest removal service to hopefully keep the impostors away from their yard permanently.
'I'm hoping they don't come back that would be a nightmare.'US authorities have shut a sophisticated drug smuggling tunnel recently dug under the US-Mexican border. The tunnel – said to be 2.4 miles long – linked a warehouse in Tijuana to another in San Diego, California.
Derek Benner, head of Homeland Security Investigations in San Diego, said it was equipped with lights, ventilation and an electric rail system. Benner said the zigzag route suggested the builders had gone off course. The tunnel runs about 10.7m (35 feet) below the surface and is about 1.2m high and 90cm wide.
Three people were arrested and more than eight tonnes of marijuana and 147kg of cocaine seized in connection with the "super tunnel", which they said had been closed before it was used for smuggling.
The tunnel was discovered by the San Diego Tunnel Task Force. The unit, set up about five years ago, had reportedly put the warehouse on the US side under surveillance after learning about the purchase of drills and other construction equipment in August and September.
Location of the Tijuana tunnel
Mexican cartels have become more dependent on tunnels, small boats and light aircraft in recent years as the fences along the 2,000-mile frontier become higher, stronger and more extensive.
"These cartels have spent years and tens of millions of dollars trying to create a secret underworld of passages so they can move large quantities of drugs," Laura Duffy, the United States attorney for the San Diego region told reporters.
This particular tunnel was reportedly associated with the Sinaloa drug cartel headed by Mexico's most infamous and elusive kingpin, Joaquín 'El Chapo' Archivaldo Guzmán Loera. A similar tunnel connecting Tijuana and San Diego discovered two years ago, connected with the seizure of 32 tonnes of marijuana, was also associated with the Sinaloa cartel. US autorities say they have discovered more than 75 tunnels crossing the border since 2008, concentrated in California and Arizona.
The San Diego/Tijuana area is a popular place for tunnels because of the ease of digging through the clay-like soil of the area, as well as the existence of areas on both sides of the border filled with nondescript warehouses that help hide both construction and loading and unloading activities.
In other parts of the border, cartels have adapted underground drainage tunnels.Derek Boogaard lived an almost mythic sports story: from pond-hockey on the prairies of Saskatchewan to a first NHL contract in Minnesota to the storied New York Rangers as the most feared enforcer in the league. A gentle young man, he was a brutal fighter on ice skates, capable of delivering career-ending punches and intimidating entire teams. But his death at age twenty-eight from an overdose of painkillers in the wake of a series of concussions helped shatter the silence about violence in professional sports. Boy on Ice is New York Times reporter John Branch's chronicle of Boogaard's tragic life and death. A human story in the tradition of Friday Night Lights and The Blind Side, it's a book that raises deep and disturbing questions about the systemic brutality of contact sports--from peewees to professionals--and damage that reaches far beyond the game. The tragic death of hockey star Derek Boogaard at twenty-eight was front-page news across the country in 2011 and helped shatter the silence about violence and concussions in professional sports. Now, in a gripping work of narrative nonfiction, acclaimed reporter John Branch tells the shocking story of Boogaard's life and heartbreaking death. Boy on Ice is the richly told story of a mountain of a man who made it to the absolute pinnacle of his sport. Widely regarded as the toughest man in the NHL, Boogaard was a gentle man off the ice but a merciless fighter on it. With great narrative drive, Branch recounts Boogaard's unlikely journey from lumbering kid playing pond-hockey on the prairies of Saskatchewan, so big his skates would routinely break beneath his feet; to his teenaged junior hockey days, when one brutal outburst of violence brought Boogaard to the attention of professional scouts; to his days and nights as a star enforcer with the Minnesota Wild and the storied New York Rangers, capable of delivering career-ending punches and intimidating entire teams. But, as Branch reveals, behind the scenes Boogaard's injuries and concussions were mounting and his mental state was deteriorating, culminating in his early death from an overdose of alcohol and painkillers. Based on months of investigation and hundreds of interviews with Boogaard's family, friends, teammates, and coaches, Boy on Ice is a brilliant work for fans of Michael Lewis's The Blind Side or Buzz Bissinger's Friday Night Lights. This is a book that raises deep and disturbing questions about the systemic brutality of contact sports from peewees to professionals and the damage that reaches far beyond the game."Yet GM may have to wait to achieve legal recourse. Venezuela has more than 20 pending cases at the World Bank's arbitration court, the International Centre for Settlement of Investment Disputes (ICSID).
"Despite Venezuela's formal withdrawal from the ICSID on 25 July 2012, and the government's strong nationalist rhetoric, the country has at least 24 bilateral investment treaties (BITs), which remain effective and still guarantee compensation through arbitration procedures," Diego Moya-Ocampos, senior analyst at IHS Markit Country Risk, told CNBC via email.
"Delays in payment had been, until recently, more likely than non-payment, and the administration had so far proved willing to settle with foreign investors, but less so with domestic investors. But as the economy continues deteriorating dramatically non-payment risks following expropriation and arbitration cases are significantly escalating."
Moya-Ocampos says the risk of asset seizures remains high in the near-term outlook and may intensify as the economy deteriorates under President Nicolas Maduro. He added that firms which halt production or are accused of hoarding or price speculation are at risk from expropriation.
"Companies operating especially in the food, basic goods and oil services sector are particularly vulnerable. But in general terms, most companies operating in Venezuela are exposed to being seized due to nationalist populist ideological reasons, if they are legally declared strategic for economic and social development or if somehow are linked with supporting opposition groups," he said.
Reasons for the GM plant seizure are not clear, according to global risk consultancy Verisk Maplecroft. Local reports claim the order was issued by civil court in relation to a 17-year lawsuit between General Motors and a dealership, while other reports state it was an attempt to remove union workers occupying the facilities.
However, Grant Sunderland, Latin America analyst at Verisk Maplecroft, doesn't think this move will lead to a new wave of property rights violations.
"The seizure of unproductive assets is a common practice under the ruling PSUV government," he said in a research note.
"While we do not expect this episode to trigger an escalation in expropriations, the latent threat of asset seizure will maintain Venezuela in the extreme-risk category of our Respect for Property Rights Index for the foreseeable future."
One sector least likely to be affected by seizures is oil and gas, according to Sunderland.
"This is because the cash-starved Maduro government has to maintain a positive relationship with potential investors looking to increase their stake in existing joint ventures."
Follow CNBC International on Twitter and Facebook.Hillary Clinton takes questions after an announcement about her climate change policy in Des Moines on July 27. (Melina Mara/The Washington Post)
This post has been updated.
Democratic presidential front-runner Hillary Rodham Clinton pledged Sunday that if elected she will build on a new White House clean-energy program and defend it against those she called "Republican doubters and defeatists."
Clinton was the first 2016 candidate to respond to the ambitious plan that President Obama will debut on Monday. Details of the program, which aims to cut greenhouse-gas pollution, were released over the weekend. The new regulation will require every state to reduce emissions from coal-burning power plants.
In a statement Sunday, Clinton called the plan "a significant step forward in meeting the urgent threat of climate change."
Environmental issues are playing a larger role in the 2016 election than in any recent cycle and are an increasingly important marker for Democratic candidates.
Former Maryland governor Martin O'Malley, who is also seeking the Democratic nomination but lags far behind Clinton in the polls, praised the Obama plan in a Twitter message.
.@POTUS’s clean power plan is a great step fwd, & I’d expand it to cover large emission sources beyond power plants. http://t.co/GdOejxHFWM — Martin O'Malley (@MartinOMalley) August 2, 2015
He also added a link to his own climate plan.
Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.), who is the only Democratic candidate besides Clinton polling in double digits, said Sunday in a statement, “President Obama understands that climate change is the great planetary crisis facing us and that we must move boldly to transform or energy system away from fossil fuels and toward energy efficiency and renewable energy."
He added, “I have not yet seen all of the details of the president’s proposal but it sounds to me like a step forward in ending our dependence on fossil fuel and I support that effort.”
Sanders picked up an endorsement Saturday from a national environmental group. The political arm of Friends of the Earth, which bills itself as the world's largest grass-roots environmental network, was the first national group to formally endorse Sanders's bid.
Sanders has also won points among progressives for opposing the Keystone XL pipeline, which is widely unpopular on the left, while chiding Clinton for refusing to say whether she backs the proposed Canada-to-U.S. oil line. Clinton says she cannot weigh in as a candidate, because she had a direct hand in beginning the pipeline review process while she was Obama's first-term secretary of state.
[Clinton ducks Keystone question, says she will give an answer when she’s president]
In his statement, Sanders reiterated his opposition to the pipeline project. “We must also kill the Keystone XL pipeline which would facilitate the excavation and transportation of some of the dirtiest fuel on the planet," he said.
Speaking of the new Obama rule, Clinton said, "It sets a smart federal standard that gives states the flexibility to choose how to reduce carbon pollution most effectively."
She added: "It drives investments in clean energy and energy efficiency, reduces asthma attacks and premature deaths, and promotes a healthier environment and a stronger economy. It’s a good plan, and as president, I’d defend it."
The retooled version of the administration’s Clean Power Plan, first proposed a year ago, would speed up the shift to renewable energy while setting tougher goals for slashing carbon emissions blamed for global warming, The Washington Post reported Sunday, citing administration officials briefed on the details.
The rule would regulate carbon emissions as a pollutant and is certain to face legal challenges, as well as fierce opposition from the Republican-controlled Congress. Opponents blasted last year’s proposed regulation, calling it a possibly illegal federal overreach that would impose costly burdens on utility companies and their customers.
“It will need defending," Clinton said. "Because Republican doubters and defeatists — including every Republican candidate for president — won’t offer any credible solution. The truth is, they don’t want one."
Many among the large Republican field have criticized Democratic climate proposals in the past, including the one Clinton unveiled last month in Iowa, and are likely to weigh in on Obama's program. Clinton appeared to anticipate those responses in her statement Sunday.
"They just keep making the same tired arguments they’ve been making for years," she said. "They refuse to accept science."
Republican National Committee Chairman Reince Priebus tied Clinton's support for what he called Obama's "job-killing EPA regulations" to her economic agenda.
“President Obama’s heavy-handed EPA regulations won’t impact the climate, but they will have devastating consequences for our economy," Priebus said in a statement Sunday. "The last three months saw the slowest wage growth in 33 years, and now President Obama and Hillary Clinton want to make it even harder for struggling Americans to make ends meet.... It's becoming clearer by the day that Hillary Clinton doesn’t have answers to get our economy growing again.”
[Effects of climate change ‘irreversible,’ U.N. panel warns in report]
Former Florida governor Jeb Bush, who is seeking the Republican presidential nomination, called the Obama plan "irresponsible and overreaching."
"The rule runs over state governments, will throw countless people out of work, and increases everyone’s energy prices," he said in a statement issued by his campaign.
"Climate change will not be solved by grabbing power from states or slowly hollowing out our economy," Bush added. "The real challenge is how do we grow and prosper in order to foster more game-changing innovations and give us the resources we need to solve problems like this one.”
The new plan sets a goal of cutting carbon pollution from power plants by 32 percent by 2030, compared with 2005 levels. It would reward states and utility companies that move quickly to expand their investment in solar and wind power.
Clinton called the plan "the floor, not the ceiling," and said she would go further.
Her plan contemplates using executive orders if Congress tried to block her proposals.
The Clinton program was praised by some activists, including clean energy evangelist Tom Steyer, but others have said that it doesn't go far enough. It calls for the installation of more than 500 million solar panels across the country within her first term and powering every home in the United States with renewable energy within 10 years.
In a video presentation of her plan, Clinton took swipes at several Republican presidential candidates, displaying some of their past comments questioning whether climate change is real. One attributed to Bush read: "I'm a skeptic. I'm not a scientist." Another, attributed to Rand Paul: "It's absolutely and utterly untrue."
[Why don’t GOP presidential candidates address climate change? Because they want to win.]
Also Sunday, industry and environmental groups weighed in on the Obama plan.
Major coal mining and utility industry groups condemned the final Clean Power Plan details that were reported over the weekend, but some individual companies are already well on the way toward meeting these targets.
Scott Segal, director of the Electric Reliability Coordinating Council, a group of power companies subject to the rule, said the new plan got worse during the drafting process.
"They have made a proposed plan which strains the power system even more restrictive, calling for reliable and cost effective energy sources to be replaced by intermittent, costly sources largely incapable of meeting base load power needs in the U.S.," Segal said in a statement.
The National Mining Association representing the coal industry took a dim view of the widely reported rules the EPA finalized after making some changes from its earlier version. And it said that the EPA, which is leaving flexibility for states to come up with strategies to meet targets, was giving the nation’s governors an unappealing choice.
“These vaunted ‘changes’ matched with tougher standards are like a teaser rate on a costly loan,” said Luke Popovich, a spokesman for the NMA. “The calculation for governors is the change: reject this deal, or accept it and stick consumers with the bill for the president’s ‘legacy.’”
But the chief executive of AEP, the utility that is one of the largest carbon emitters in the country, said that the EPA’s decision to delay implementation of some emissions cutbacks by two years was “positive” and would leave more room for technology developments to ease the path toward the agency’s targets.
“The utility industry is already moving in this direction,” said Nicholas Akins, AEP’s chief executive.
“This is huge in terms of the tentacles it has throughout the industry,” Akins said. “I think the verdict is still out on some key points, but I think it’s positive that they recognize that a delay is necessary on the implementation to allow the states to really take a look at what they need to do, and good that they recognize that we don’t know what the transition path is.” By delaying implementation, he added, “technology can catch up.”
AEP has already trimmed its carbon dioxide emissions by 15 percent compared with 2005, mostly by retiring a quarter of its coal-fired power plant fleet and adding natural gas and renewables. It is already planning to cut coal from 61 percent of its current fuel for electricity to 51 percent by next year and 48 percent by 2026 and boost renewables (including hydropower, wind, solar and pumped storage) to 15 percent from the current level of 8 percent.
Asked whether he supported Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell’s call for governors to ignore the EPA’s call for state plans, Akins said that if the plan “on face value doesn’t pass muster, they have to stand up and say something. But if it’s anything possible, we got to be working with it.”
He said that he expected technology advances to make utility scale solar more economic, but he said the EPA shouldn’t force early retirement of fossil fuels, coal or natural gas. “I’m a little troubled by the notion that we want to get rid of fossil fuels and move heavily toward energy efficiency and the renewable side of things,” Akins said
Fred Krupp, president of the Environmental Defense Fund, praised the climate change plan for addressing what he called the "biggest threat facing us right now."
“With this historic announcement, the United States is making clear that it is no longer acceptable to put unlimited amounts of climate pollution into our air," Krupp said. "The move toward a world safe from climate change is beginning in earnest."
Joby Warrick and Steven Mufson contributed to this report.All-action Brazilian brawler Diego Brandão has signed with Russian promotion Fight Nights Global (also known as EFN) to face undefeated Russian superstar Rasul Mirzaev in December.
The EFN promoter, Kamil Gadzhiev, announced the bout and signing on his Instagram.
*****
The Ultimate Fighter 14 winner, Brandão (20-11) is known for his hard-hitting, highly aggressive style that led him to a 6-4 record in the UFC. A known finisher, Brandão has finished 16 of his 20 wins. In April of this year, Brandão was released from the UFC following an arrest. This will be his first bout since leaving the promotion.
Russian superstar Rasul Mirzaev (17-0) has been one of the most dominant featherweights not signed to a major promotion for the past couple of years. In his last outing, he made quick work of UFC-vet, and current Superior Challenge champion, Diego Nunes. Following an arrest in 2011, Mirzaev was out of action for two years and has gone 12-0 since. He has been a part of the Fight Nights promotion since their debut show in June of 2010.
*****
The two will meet on December 16 in Russia.
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And speaking of Zabriskie Point, I’ve been obsessed with a Pink Floyd bootleg for years now and wanted to call it to your attention, dear readers, chances are that some of you might enjoy it, too.
Apparently the Floyd were at one point to have been the sole composer/musicians for the Zabriskie Point soundtrack. They completed eight numbers for the film, but only three were used. Antonioni added material by The Youngbloods, Roy Orbison, Jerry Garcia, The Kaleidoscope, Patti Page and the Rolling Stones to round out the film’s score. (Oddly, Antonioni visited the Doors in the studio when they were recording the extraordinary “L’America” for L.A. Woman, but the director inexplicably turned down the track, which could have worked spectacularly well in his film.)
Under the titles like “370 Roman Yards” or “A Total Zabriskie Point of View,” you can hear all of the soundtrack music recorded by Pink Floyd for Antonioni that never made it into the film. Whichever name you find it under, these boots purport to be the “lost” Pink Floyd soundtrack to Zabriskie Point with all eight of the tracks recorded for the film appearing in the order of the intended album’s run list. Some of the boots contain all the known outtakes.
It’s an extremely satisfying listen: Some of it sounds like Atom Heart Mother, some of it like Meddle and some of it is reminiscent of “Grantchester Meadows,” Roger Waters’ dreamy, pastoral composition from Ummagumma. “Heart Beat, Pig Meat” was Pink Floyd’s first time using a human heartbeat as a musical instrument (but it would not be the last). It’s one of their most monstrous numbers, truly a mind-blower. Rick Wright contributed a piano number called “The Violent Sequence” which was also unused, but later retooled as “Us and Them” on Dark Side of the Moon. Parts of the score remind me of Erik Satie and it has some of the few Floyd numbers that could be described as “blues rock.” Taken as a whole, it does absolutely sound like a “lost” Pink Floyd album recorded at the end of 1969, because that’s exactly what it is…
This comes from one of the torrents floating around on the Internet…
In the summer of 1969 Michelangelo Antonioni completed the filming of his visionary and prophetic view of America and our society. All that was left was to complete the movie with a good soundtrack. Antonioni was interested in everything that was new and trendy among young people. Don Hall was on the air during his nocturnal DJ program on KPPC FM Pasadena when he was contacted personally by Antonioni at the end of the summer of 1969. Antonioni really liked Don and invited him to have some screenings of the movie. After that Don provided a list of songs he felt would work, most coming from his program. Antonioni asked MGM to hire Don as Music Advisor for the soundtrack and came back to Roma (Don still has a letter from Antonioni, sent from Rome with the list of the songs he’d like to be in the movie, all songs for the radio-desert sequences). Still they had to find how to score all the main sequences: Beginning, Violent, Take Off, Love and Explosions sequences (and eventually more). Antonioni wanted original music for those sequences. Many artists and bands were contacted to write original music for the movie, but none of them was asked to write the whole soundtrack of the movie. In October ‘69 Don was in Rome with Antonioni trying to find a way to score the whole movie in time for Christmas. Near the end of the month it happened that Clare Peploe (co-writer of the movie and Antonioni’s girlfriend at the time) brought to Rome a brand new copy of the new Pink Floyd album, Ummagumma, from London. Antonioni, Don Hall and Clare listened to the new album with a small stereo at Antonioni’s house in Rome. Antonioni REALLY liked Ummagumma and listened several times to the whole album. He liked “Careful With That Axe, Eugene” very much and told Don that he’d like a new version for the final sequence of Zabriskie Point. They decided to try and hire Pink Floyd to record all the original music they needed for the movie. MGM contacted Pink Floyd. After that Steve O’Rourke came to Rome alone during the first days of November ‘69 to check and organize it all. All was done in few days, and Pink Floyd came on the 15th of November with Pete Watts and Alan Stiles, cancelling some shows planned for their present tour. Antonioni and Don showed the movie to them several times with some scenes already scored, highlighting those without. At that point Steve and Roger Waters had a talk and asked Antonioni to try to score the whole movie. He, being enthusiastic about Ummagumma, agreed. Pink Floyd produced a large quantity of music, especially for the Love Scene but Antonioni was not satisfied and the sessions ran longer than planned. In the end Pink Floyd went back to London with some songs to finish. Out of all the entire production of songs, including themes and variations, Antonioni ended up using only three songs. He kept on searching for “something better” till the last days before the premiere of the movie. In London Pink Floyd completed their final versions of eight songs with the intent of them being their eventual album for the Zabriskie Point soundtrack.
You should not have that much of a problem, armed only with Google, of tracking down your own copy of this amazing “lost” Pink Floyd soundtrack album. Here are some highlights:
“Heart Beat, Pig Meat” sees the Floyd do musique concrète (and very well, I might add) over the opening credits:
“The Violent Sequence” which later became Dark Side of the Moon‘s “Us and Them”:
The version of “Careful With That Axe, Eugene” (re-titled “Come in Number 51, Your Time Is Up” here) that accompanies the big explosion scene at the end of Zabriskie Point is one of the great “primal screams” in all of rock and roll—and cinema—history. With the gorgeous Daria Halprin (who was briefly Mrs. Dennis Hopper):Perhaps you got yourself into a home with intentions of making it your own right away, but you've hit a speed bump with unforeseen repairs, extra costs or other projects that take precedent over painting. Maybe you knew you would have to make it work all along for a period of time or maybe you really liked the previous decorator's wall color choices from the get but now find it difficult to makes any kind of sense from Weetie Yellow or Tijuana Teal. Possibly your own decisions in lacquer are driving you up the "wall". I've been in all of these places and the trick to living with and being proud of what you have IS to make it your own...and luckily I've found it isn't as tricky as you may think with a little direction, inspiration, and a break down of the color wheel so your color combos are eye-catching yet eye-pleasing.Kulbhushan Jadhav's wife and mother met the convicted Indian spy at the Ministry of Foreign Affairs after arriving in Islamabad on Monday morning via a commercial flight.
Jadhav's mother, Avanti, and wife, Chetankul, made a stop at the Indian High Commission prior to the 40-minute-long meeting with the spy, Foreign Office (FO) Spokesperson Dr Muhammad Faisal said.
Jadhav thanks the Pakistani government for arranging the meeting.
Avanti and Chetankul Jadhav were accompanied by Indian Deputy High Commissioner JP Singh and three Indian foreign ministry officials, according to Indian media reports.
During the meeting, only Jadhav's family members were present with him, while Singh and FO officials, who were monitoring the meeting, were outside the room, according to the FO.
"They spoke openly during the meeting," Dr Faisal said during a press briefing following the meeting. He added that JP Singh did not hear the conversation that took place between the family members.
Jadhav's wife and mother sitting at the FO in Islamabad. "We honour our commitments," says FO spokesperson. ─ Photo courtesy FO Spokesperson Dr Faisal official Twitter
More about the meeting: 'This is not the final visit,' says FO after Jadhav |
was always a valuation which, if met, would lead to Samba’s departure. Blackburn wanted £15 million but have now accepted £12 million.
Although the 27-year-old Congo international has not played for Blackburn since their 2-1 defeat against Stoke City on Jan 2, the club’s supporters had hoped that he would be reintegrated into the side to help stave off the threat of relegation.
Samba made it clear, however, that he had no intention of playing for Blackburn again, insisting it was time for him to face a “new challenge” and criticising the club’s owners and the lack of progress being made. He has claimed to have suffered from a series of setbacks and injuries in recent weeks.
This prompted a response from Blackburn manager Steve Kean, who said, “he’s not for sale, as simply as that”. The club remarked that Samba, who joined five years ago from Hertha Berlin for a fee of only £400,000, had signed a new deal only last year and was contracted until 2015.
Samba’s departure will anger Blackburn supporters, who had hoped that the closure of the window meant he would stay, at least for now. They are deeply concerned at the apparent draining of talent, and lack of investment, at the club. Junior Hoilett is also expected to depart this summer when his contract expires.
Blackburn are 17th in the Premier League, having hauled themselves out of the relegation places although only goal difference separates them from the bottom three. They face league leaders Manchester City away tomorrow.
Anzhi have just appointed Guus Hiddink as their new coach and are determined, with the backing of billionaire owner Suleyman Kerimov, to become a force in European football. The club have also discussed a move for Arsenal’s Andrei Arshavin but the midfielder is understood to be resistant to the move.
Samba, however, is keen to join Anzhi, who will vastly increase his wages.
He will join players such as Brazil’s World Cup 2002 winner Roberto Carlos, former Chelsea full-back Yuri Zhirkov and striker Samuel Eto’o at Anzhi, who are seventh in the Russian Premier League. Hiddink’s first match in charge is on March 5 against Dynamo Moscow when the season recommences after the winter break.Well-heeled critics take a kind of offense when writers of David Mitchell’s caliber experiment with genre fiction. Nonetheless, the release of 2014’s The Bone Clocks, with its body-jumping Horologists and systematic references to most of his previous novels, proved that Mitchell has embarked on more than an experiment; he is on a Yeatsian search for unity. Late in his life, W.B. Yeats, the famous Irish poet, published A Vision, a collection of cultish metaphysical writings that cast the whole of history as a cycle between order and chaos, the barbaric and the civilized. His poetry of the period also represented the world this way: his famous piece “The Second Coming” culminates with the image of a “rough beast…slouch[ing] towards Bethlehem to be born,” a kind of un-Christ who represents the beginning of a barbaric period in history, the inversion of the Christian era.
The purpose of all Yeats’s late writing, as the scholar Richard Ellmann pointed out in Yeats: The Man and the Masks, was to offer a “unified personality,” to give his readers a sense of cohesion that everyday life lacks by using a consistent set of symbols to discuss, praise, mourn, and process a disjointed reality. For Yeats, symbols like beasts, roses, and winding staircases were touchstones: no matter where his writing wandered, these landmarks offered a sense of direction — they brought him back to A Vision’s unified historical scheme. The poems he made with those images are beautiful and timeless. But A Vision is another story. Supposedly sourced from automatic writings Yeats’s wife received from the spirit world, it reads like an acid trip in a Catholic church, or — appropriately enough — like a scene from David Mitchell’s Slade House: a horror novel set in a dark corner of the newly-minted meta-world that unites all of Mitchell’s books.
Mitchell told fans at 2014’s Edinburgh Book festival that his writing has become “an exercise in world building and cosmology.” With the lengthy and ambitions Bone Clocks, he revealed the extent of that exercise by referencing characters from all of his work, back to his 1999 debut Ghostwritten. Though it would be difficult to gage the extent to which his megaverse was planned, Mitchell has made it clear that a single plot overarches everything, down even to his most quotidian Black Swan Green. Lovers of Cloud Atlas are familiar with Mitchell’s tendency to write novels as a series of interlacing plots, where a young character in one segment might be an old man in another. But what Bone Clocks introduced was design on an altogether different scale: a set of death-defying interlopers engaged in a cosmic war across time, whose antics, it turns out, have been crashing through the scenery of each successive novel.
When he announced that a new, shorter book was set to debut only a year after The Bone Clocks, fans correctly anticipated that Slade House would deepen Mitchell’s investment in that larger scheme. Released just in time for Halloween, Slade House has quickly sparked comparisons to Henry James’s The Turn of the Screw — a literature critic’s ghost story, a haunted-house yarn the glamor of which was underpinned by plot and language that could bear up under the stuffiest academic scrutiny.
Mitchell has been upfront about his exasperation with critics who pit realism against everything else, as if the sort of writing where souls can be eaten and bodies shed like cicada shells needed to earn special literary stripes in order to be taken seriously. He told the Edinburgh Book Festival he likes “to use genre as a tool, like style, structure or a character. Where does it say a book has to remain within a single genre?” and The Paris Review that “When something is two-dimensional and hackneyed, this is how to fix it: identify an improbable opposite and mix it, implausibly, into the brew.” Mitchell has proved himself a master of the improbable brew, but the question is whether the books that have resulted are freshening agents, or just a cheap attempt to spike the punch.
Slade House cooks up its mixture with euphoric technical complexity and flourish. Set at nine-year intervals from 1979 to 2015, it is composed of five interlocking narratives centered around a mysterious “small black iron door,” and the magnificent, trippy, horrifying mansion to which it leads. A succession of sympathetic loners are lured into Slade House by its malevolent occupants, treated to a disorienting phantasmagoria that mixes their deepest fantasies of popularity and inclusion with their worst fears, and finally tricked into bringing about their own demise.
We hear the story through their voices, and each is masterfully rendered, deeply human. The 13-year-old Nathan Bishop, whose autism makes him insensitive to the subtle difference between a quirky hostess and a murderous schemer, the oafish lonelyheart policeman whose subtle racism he would blame on hard experiences on the beat, and the self-conscious college student Sally Timms are each cohesive and distinct.
For every character, Slade House morphs into a tailor-made nightmare. I found Sally’s haunting at a raucous party the most alarming and immediate, perhaps because I grew up listening to some of the same music. But more likely the sting came from her voice’s mixture of devastating self-examination and quippy humor: “Slade Alley can’t be more than three feet across,” she observes on approach to the house, “A properly fat person — fatter than me, I mean — couldn’t get past someone coming the other way.” And when she snuffs a proposition from an attractive partygoer: “Off he goes, and screw you, Isolde Delahunty at Great Malvern Beacon School for Girls and your platoon of body-fascist Barbies…screw all of you, wherever you are this evening, because I…just turned down a bronzed Australian surfer demigod…”
Yet the culmination of each story contains an obligatory nod the meta-world of Bone Clocks, and it is there that Mitchell’s ambition starts to make a messy feast of his talent. Examining Slade House’s grandfather clock, whose face bears no hands but only the words “Time is, Time Was, Time is Not,” Sally Timms quips that the clock is “Highly metaphysical; deeply useless.” At worst, this epithet could be applied to Mitchell’s language just at the passages when Slade House reaches its highest emotional pitch. At key moments in each character’s adventures there are debilitating pauses for exposition, linking Slade House’s dark little nightmare world to the wider one we heard all too much about in Bone Clocks.
Words like “lacuna,” “orison,” and worst of all, “psychovoltage” diffuse the physical terror of Mitchell’s best scenes with obtuse, jargony pinpricks. That the term “lacuna” is lifted from medieval metaphysics and “orison” from Hamlet’s banter with Ophelia in Act III scene i makes them no more interesting: pedigree adds little when species are awkwardly crossed, and there is nothing of Hamlet’s earthy nightmare in the clinical use to which Mitchell puts his meta-world’s argot, explaining away the wonderful ghost stories he’s taken such care to weave in each successive chapter.
At best, “highly metaphysical; deeply useless” might still be said of the interlaced world Mitchell is making. Metaphysical and useless, yes, but nothing is as essential as the inessential, and a little willful suspension of distaste allows us to luxuriate in Mitchell’s superfluities. The Yeats-like unifying project he’s taken on is initially thrilling in its apparent scope. And though his machinations are luxurious, underneath the heavy-handed codswallop is the pungent flavor of raw voices, coming from characters we recognize from the street. As long as his books are populated by such real people, Mitchell will deserve his following, but he is in danger of a fatal shark-jumping accident.
In The Thousand Autumns of Jacob De Zoet, Mitchell allowed himself to suggest the unknown, and the scenes where Orito explores Enomoto’s caves are therefore riper with terror than any of Slade House’s “lacuna” scenes. Narrow paths curve into darkness, statues drip with blood, and Orito takes away only her fear and a growing list of questions about the people who built the tunnels. But Mitchell’s ambition to weave a meta-narrative has forced his newer books to reveal what is best left hinted. With their many external references, The Bone Clocks and Slade House are artsier novels than those that came before, but far less artful. In them Mitchell reads like a remodeler who stubbornly insists that the gaudy corridors he’s built between his mansions are the real architectural triumph.
Admirably, he has left nothing sacred in his conquest of genre-fiction territories, explicitly comparing his work to that of J.R.R. Tolkien, the master world-architect himself. Mitchell even included a character called Bombadil in Slade House’s final chapter, as if to assure us he knows what he’s doing, that no shrines to Tolkien will be left to gather dust during his incursion into hallowed ground. But to throw down that gauntlet is to invite comparison with a man who was a consummate novelist first, and mythology-spinner second. According to accounts from his friends, it took Tolkien 12 years to write and revise The Lord of the Rings, and obsessed with background as he was, most of that time was not spent tightening up a meta-scheme of cohesive self-references (otherwise why would there be so many Unfinished Tales, so many loose ends in The Silmarillion?), but making sure the characters and language were rich, authentic, and human. By contrast, Mitchell looks like a hobbit-sized challenger talking through a tall hat.
Above all, Tolkien knew what to leave unsaid. To name a specific example, the “Watcher in the Water” that guards the entrance to Moria in The Fellowship of the Ring is horrible precisely because we know neither what it is nor how it came to be there, apart from some scrawled suggestions in an abandoned journal. The entry reads: “The Watcher in the Water took Óin. We cannot get out.” More terror is crammed into those two lines then into the whole of Slade House, because Tolkien has left space for our imaginations to populate the darkness. But Mitchell is addicted to ripping back the veil. His evil Grayer twins become less frightening the more we know about them, and their soliloquizing at each chapter’s climax makes them something worse than poorly-written antagonists: they become well-written antagonists too well explained. Their nightmare mansion ultimately disappoints, like a haunted house with all the lights turned on.
With each successive, elaborately explained novel, there is a paradoxical sense that Mitchell’s world is shrinking, because the rigging he’s so intent on fastening between storylines is clogging up the gaps that should be occupied by the unknown. Nothing can swoop down on us without getting caught in the wires. Titles like Cloud Atlas hint that Mitchell is undertaking a quest to map the changeable world, to search for suggestions of coherence among what is cloudy, turbulent, and disordered. But just as the psychedelic gobbledygook of Yeats’s A Vision added nothing to the power of his poetry (it only gave theorists the opportunity to point to some prose passage that was supposedly the origin of a poem, as if that proved anything), Mitchell’s Horologist wonderland seems like an escape from the literary into the clever. Discovering one of his linked plots gives you a Sudoku-solver’s thrill, but this pleasure would be hard to call artistic. Billed as a suggestion about the interconnectedness between us all, such moments register instead as self-satisfied technical flourishes, easter eggs.
As Mitchell gains power and the volume of his work expands, we have to hope he exercises a proportionately large restraint. Tolkien’s world-creating mechanism began with people and with language: He and C.S. Lewis used to play Scrabble in Elvish, a cultural artifact which grew organically alongside Tolkien’s lands and characters, instead of being thrust upon them in literary retrospect in the manner of Mitchell’s Horology. In terms of creative impetus, this retrograde fiddling with Mitchell’s own world could prove to be, as Sally Timms puts it, “a fatal mistake, like Orpheus looking back…”
To demand that Mitchell walk the same road as even his greatest predecessors would be inane when his explicit desire is to innovate, but as he said himself, the watchword of the world-builder, even as he mixes improbable elements, must be a plausibility that outwrestles the improbable. Plausibility means a sense of rightness to experience, and Slade House, in spite of its pristine characterization, forgets that the experience of horror starts with the unknown. Instead of dark shadows, he gives us exposition, and as tempting as it must be to forget, Mitchell should have remembered that readers will always prefer to wander the maze’s edges than to sit down for a lecture at its center.Program founder Korey Dean, left, portrays "anger" as he playfully constrains his son Tytist Dean, 17, during a talk at The Man Up Club in north Minneapolis on Aug. 31, 2017.
"How many of you guys have a temper?" Korey Dean asked the group of 11 young black men and boys one recent Thursday night.
He invited a couple of the men to step on his shoes, but the guys refused — that's something that could lead to a fight, they said.
"Now, you catch my point," said Dean, pointing out that young men often act out violently when they feel disrespected, like if someone steps on a pair of shoes they value. Dean wants the guys to be conscious of how their values influence their anger.
"And remember," Dean said, "at the end of the day, only you can control you."
Ka'Shaun Gage, 23, writes in a journal during a quiet time at The Man Up Club. Courtney Perry for MPR News
They were at a meeting of The Man Up Club, for which Dean is the founder and executive director.
The club is one of several community efforts that will vie for a chunk of $500,000 Minneapolis Mayor Betsy Hodges is requesting in her 2018 budget proposal. The goal of the allocation is to continue funding community-based youth anti-violence programs.
The Man Up Club comprises young black men and boys chosen because they either live in or frequent the West Broadway Avenue corridor, where youth violence is particularly problematic.
The club takes the phrase "man up" and converts it from a saying used to shame men and boys who show vulnerability to one meant to teach them that there's much more to being a man than acting tough.
Dean developed The Man Up Club when he worked in the North St. Paul schools as a student advocate where he helped counsel 500 black students.
Ka'Shaun Gage, 23, is overcome with emotion after sharing that over the past year he has lost six people in his life during a group discussion at The Man Up Club. He expressed appreciation for the support he feels in the club. Courtney Perry for MPR News
During club meetings, the guys get something to eat along with their life lessons. The program also pays the young men between $50 and $120 every two weeks as incentives to have perfect attendance and completed assignments.
Dean said The Man Up Club received $37,000 for its summer program.
One recent night, The Man Up Club had a special guest: Hodges. She told the guys that part of her job is to propose budgets that fund programs like the one they're in.
"And then every once in a while, I get to go somewhere and see that those numbers on the page have an impact on real people and real lives," said Hodges, who is running for her second term as mayor.
The young men take turns telling the mayor about their summers. For 23-year-old Ka'Shaun Gage, being in The Man Up Club is a high point in an otherwise tough year.
Mayor Betsy Hodges embraces members of The Man Up Club during its last summer meeting in north Minneapolis on Aug. 31, 2017. The program focuses on academic discipline as well as social and life skills for young African-American men, and it receives funding from the city. Courtney Perry for MPR News
"In the last two months, I've lost six people that I care about," said Gage.
Gage didn't elaborate on how those people died, but said the group has been a refuge for him.
"Being here is the first time in my 23 years of ever hearing my mom say she's proud of me," Gage said. "I never heard her say that. She's just been so happy since me and my brother been here."
Gage said he's disappointed the regular Thursday night meetings are over — that means he'll have to go back to the "real world."
That world has also been tough for 16-year-old Kerrionte Fair. He lives with a friend because he said his mom is unable to provide a stable home life for him. Fair said being in the club has made it easier for him to cope.
Meek Stalling, 17, left, listens as Keimonte White, 16, shares about challenges and loss during a group discussion at The Man Up Club. Courtney Perry for MPR News
He said there are people his age who don't think they'll live to see 21. Fair didn't think he would either.
He fought back tears as he wondered where his mom might be.
"It's just... life's hard for young black men," said Fair.
As Fair struggled to compose himself, 17-year-old Meek Stalling comforted him.
"Your tears show your character," Stalling said. "It shows you're real, bro.'"
Kerrionte Fair, 16, strives to hold back his emotions as he thanks the mayor for the city's support of The Man Up Club on Aug. 31, 2017. Courtney Perry for MPR News
"I will say, my life hasn't been your life. But I didn't think I was going to live to 21 either," Hodges told the group, explaining that she's a survivor of child sexual abuse and that she became sober at the age of 19.
She told Fair and any other young men who are struggling, to know that while her situation has been different, it is OK to share their pain with others, who will still love and accept them.
Hodges said she would like to see The Man Up Club chosen as part of next year's round of public safety grants. But it's not up to her.
A community panel will pick which programs will be funded. And it's not clear what parts of the city will be targeted in the next round.
Dean said he will apply for the grant next year, but the club will keep going even if it doesn't make the cut.
Program founder Korey Dean, right, laughs at a joke made by Meek Stalling, 17, second from left, during a talk at The Man Up Club in north Minneapolis. Courtney Perry for MPR News
The nonprofit club's future is heavily dependent on their ability to raise funds and develop partnerships, he said, and it's planning a fall fundraising gala.
Still, Dean promises the young men they will always be members of the group.
"You are a lifelong member of The Man Up Club," said Dean. "That doesn't expire. There is no expiration date on that."You’ve worked hard for your rockin’ bikini bod – don’t let your name pack on the pounds! Here’s a list of fat first names and some easy, skinny fixes:
If your name is already hot, act like it! Punctuation marks and accents are like belly button rings; hot, and an assurance that you are skinny.
Stuck with your dumpy given name for religious or legal reasons? Hyphens can help! Hyphens are like a belt for you name. Please note these names are still fat, they just own it:
The thinnest thing possible would be to have no first name at all. Unfortunately we live in the real world, where you’ll need to register for wedding gifts at some point. So, try these names on for size and start filling out the legal documents. You’ll thank us later.IN November, I was found guilty of “racial harassment” for reading a public-library book on a university campus.
The book was Todd Tucker’s “Notre Dame vs. the Klan: How the Fighting Irish Defeated the Ku Klux Klan”; I was reading it on break from my campus job as a janitor. The same book is in the university library.
Tucker recounts events of 1924, when the loathsome Klan was a dominant force in Indiana – until it went to South Bend to taunt the Irish Catholic students at the University of Notre Dame.
When the KKK tried to rally, the students confronted them. They stole Klan robes and destroyed their crosses, driving the KKK out of town in a downpour.
I read the historic encounter and imagined myself with these brave Irish Catholics, as they street-fought the Klan. (I’m part-Irish, and was raised Catholic.)
But that didn’t stop the Affirmative Action Office of Indiana University-Purdue University Indianapolis from branding me as a detestable Klansman.
They didn’t want to hear the truth. The office ruled that my “repeatedly reading the book... constitutes racial harassment in that you demonstrated disdain and insensitivity to your co-workers.”
A friend reacted to the finding with, “That’s impossible!” He’s right. You can’t commit racial harassment by reading an anti-Klan history.
For months, I felt isolated and dejected. Yet I knew that most of the faculty, staff and students at Indiana University were good people. The campus is a growing, thriving part of Indy, where people of all colors and religions come to study.
But the $106,000-a-year affirmative-action officer who declared me guilty of “racial harassment” never spoke to me or examined the book. My own union – the American Federation of State, County and Municipal Employees – sent an obtuse shop steward to stifle my freedom to read. He told me, “You could be fired,” that reading the book was “like bringing pornography to work.”
Shame on the affirmative-action people and my union for displaying their ignorance and incompetence. Their pusillanimous actions, in trying to ban Tucker’s anti-Klan history book, played into the hands of the hateful KKK.
After months of stonewalling, the university withdrew the charge, thanks to pressure from the press, the American Civil Liberties Union and a group called the Foundation for Individual Rights in Education, or FIRE.
Let me be clear: I don’t view this episode as a black-against-white or conservative-vs.-liberal issue. It’s a basic civil-liberties issue.
Martin Luther King Jr. wanted a world where people “will not be judged by the color of their skin but by the content of their character.” The affirmative-action people at Indiana University never saw past the color of my white skin. (Ironically, I detest the Klan and I have dated a woman of color.)
Abolitionist Charles Sumner said, “Prejudice is the child of ignorance. It is sure to prevail where people do not know each other.” The people at the Affirmative Action Office were so myopically intent on finding a Klansman, they failed to see a natural ally standing before them.
The unchecked power of such campus bureaucrats needs to be restrained. And if a union like AFSCME won’t protect its workers’ constitutional rights, it should go out of business.
If they can stop me from reading one book, then they can stop any American from reading any book.
Keith John Sampson is a communication-studies senior and janitor at Indiana Uni-versity/Purdue University-Indianapolis.Grammy-winning rapper Big Daddy Kane recently sat down with VladTV and was challenged to create a list of Hip-Hop's 3 greatest MCs that did not include himself.
Pausing to contemplate the challenge of not being able to include himself on the list, the "Ain't No Half Steppin'" wordsmith insists, "I can't do that," before adding, "Because I'm so f***ing incredible. I gotta be in there."
Eventually, the lists is comprised of himself and two other Golden Era titans, Rakim and KRS-One. Expanding his perspective on why he chose The Alpha and Omega of Hip-Hop and the Teacha, he says, "With Rakim you're talking about someone who helped change and reshape Hip-Hop." Kane quips that several great lyricists have followed Rakim's legacy, but "I haven't seen anyone change the lyrical game like how it changed in the '80s...me, KRS and Rakim, we basically changed the whole way people rhymed in the '80s."
When speaking on The Blastmaster, Big Daddy Kane avows, "His longevity, his diversity, and his battle skills are amazing as an MC [and] as a lyricist." Kane then asserts, "Me, KRS, and Rakim we basically changed the whole way people rhymed in the '80's."
Later on, he states that he considers Rakim, KRS, Nas, Kool G Rap, Biggie, Jay Z, Eminem, and Big Pun to be lyrical geniuses, so narrowing it down to such a small list is difficult. Kane insists, "it's really hard to name three."
Check out the full clip to see what Big Daddy Kane says about Nas and what other MCs inspired today's legends.BEIJING — The Chinese government has rejected the visa application of a veteran American journalist who had been waiting eight months to begin a new reporting job in China for Thomson Reuters, the company said.
The reporter, Paul Mooney, said the Chinese Foreign Ministry told Reuters on Friday that it would not grant him a resident journalist visa but declined to provide a reason. Mr. Mooney returned to the United States last year after the expiration of his previous visa, which was sponsored by The South China Morning Post, a newspaper based in Hong Kong.
The rejection comes at a time of rising tensions between foreign news organizations and the government, which has been using its economic clout, the issuance of visas and Internet controls to express displeasure with coverage it deems unflattering.
“China has been my career,” Mr. Mooney, who has spent three decades covering Asia, the last 18 years based in Beijing, said Saturday in a phone interview. “I never thought it was going to end this way. I’m sad and disappointed.”Oct 8, 2014; Conroe, TX, USA; Adrian Peterson (left) and his attorney Rusty Hardin (right) speak in the Montgomery county courthouse before Peterson
Appeals official Harold Henderson is not expected to announce a ruling on Adrian Peterson’s case until next week, but resolution could come sooner than that if Peterson and the NFL are able to settle the case by negotiating a mutually acceptable deal.
According to PFT, such a deal is actively being sought by all sides concerned.
Mike Florio explains the NFL’s possible motivation in seeking a negotiated settlement rather than a ruling:
Henderson likely will be monitoring any settlement talks before he decides the case. He already has urged the two sides to work something out, which means he’d prefer not to issue a ruling. While the NFL would have realized maximum value by settling the case before Vincent testified, a settlement now would avoid the possibility of another written decision that makes the NFL look bad.
Peterson’s motivation is obvious: he wants to get back on the field as soon as possible. A settlement in the next couple of days would allow him to return to the Vikings for a full week of practice and get back on the playing field against Detroit.
This of course assumes that the Vikings want Peterson back. There is some thought that the Vikings could just cut Peterson if he is reinstated, rather than deal with the public relations backlash that would surely ensue if he suits up again in purple.
It’s believed that some in the Vikings’ front office are strongly against Peterson returning in the event he is reinstated.President Trump has nominated a well-known climate change doubter to the top science job at the Department of Agriculture.
The nomination, which had been expected, was announced in a statement by Agriculture Secretary Sonny Perdue. Sam Clovis, an early campaign adviser to Trump, will serve as undersecretary for research, education and economics.
“Dr. Clovis was one of the first people through the door at USDA in January and has become a trusted advisor and steady hand as we continue to work for the people of agriculture," Perdue said. "He looks at every problem with a critical eye, relying on sound science and data, and will be the facilitator and integrator we need."
Clovis, who does not have a science degree, according to a Washington Post report, takes over a position that it said has generally gone to someone with an advanced degree in science or medicine.
If confirmed by the Senate, he would serve as the USDA’s chief scientist, coordinating the department’s research and education policies and ensuring the “scientific integrity” of the research done at the department.
Clovis is a former college professor who has challenged the general scientific consensus that human activity is the primary cause of climate change. He has called himself a skeptic, telling Iowa Public Radio in 2014 that he is “extremely skeptical" of climate change and claimed “a lot of the science is junk science.”
“It’s not proven; I don’t think there’s any substantive information available to me that doesn’t raise as many questions as it does answers,” he said.
The nomination had been opposed by environmentalist groups.
Ricardo Salvador, director of the Food and Environment Program at the Union of Concerned Scientists, expressed concern about Clovis’s appointment in May, saying in a statement reported by Think Progress that the USDA’s chief scientist should be a scientist, not a political ally.
“If the president goes forward with this nomination, it’ll be yet another example of blatant dismissal of the value of scientific expertise among his administration appointees,” Salvador said. “Continuing to choose politics over science will give farmers and consumers little confidence that the administration has their interests at heart.”
Clovis has degrees in political science, business and public administration, according to the Post.
And Perdue highlighted his career of military service; Clovis spent 25 years in the Air Force.
"Dr. Clovis has served this nation proudly since he was a very young man, and I am happy he is continuing to serve," Perdue said.Kordi, M., Aghaei Meybodi, F., Tara, F., Nemati, M., Taghi Shakeri, M. (2014). The Effect of Late Pregnancy Consumption of Date Fruit on Cervical Ripening in Nulliparous Women. Journal of Midwifery and Reproductive Health, 2(3), 150-156. doi: 10.22038/jmrh.2014.2772 Masoumeh Kordi; Fatemeh Aghaei Meybodi; Fatemeh Tara; Mohsen Nemati; Mohammad Taghi Shakeri. "The Effect of Late Pregnancy Consumption of Date Fruit on Cervical Ripening in Nulliparous Women". Journal of Midwifery and Reproductive Health, 2, 3, 2014, 150-156. doi: 10.22038/jmrh.2014.2772 Kordi, M., Aghaei Meybodi, F., Tara, F., Nemati, M., Taghi Shakeri, M. (2014). 'The Effect of Late Pregnancy Consumption of Date Fruit on Cervical Ripening in Nulliparous Women', Journal of Midwifery and Reproductive Health, 2(3), pp. 150-156. doi: 10.22038/jmrh.2014.2772 Kordi, M., Aghaei Meybodi, F., Tara, F., Nemati, M., Taghi Shakeri, M. The Effect of Late Pregnancy Consumption of Date Fruit on Cervical Ripening in Nulliparous Women. Journal of Midwifery and Reproductive Health, 2014; 2(3): 150-156. doi: 10.22038/jmrh.2014.2772 The Effect of Late Pregnancy Consumption of Date Fruit on Cervical Ripening in Nulliparous Women Article 1, Volume 2, Issue 3, July 2014, Page 150-156 PDF (750 K) DOI: 10.22038/jmrh.2014.2772 Authors Masoumeh Kordi1; Fatemeh Aghaei Meybodi 2; Fatemeh Tara3; Mohsen Nemati4; Mohammad Taghi Shakeri5 1Lecturer, Department of Midwifery, School of Nursing and Midwifery, Mashhad University of Medical Sciences, Mashhad, Iran 2Graduate, MSc in Midwifery, School of Nursing and Midwifery, Mashhad University of Medical Sciences, Mashhad, Iran 3Associate Professor in Obstetrics and Gynecology, Women's Health Research Center, school of Medicine, Mashhad University of Medical Sciences, Mashhad, Iran 4Associate Professor in Nutrition, Department of Nutrition, School of Medicine, Mashhad University of Medical Sciences, Mashhad, Iran 5Professor in Biostatistics, Department of Social Medicine, School of Medicine, Mashhad University of Medical Sciences, Mashhad, Iran Abstract Background and Aim: Cervical ripening before the onset of labor is an important factor for the prediction of delivery mode, and is directly associated with vaginal delivery. The search for a safe, inexpensive, and easy method of cervical ripening is of great significance. Few studies have focused on the effect of date fruit on uterine contractions and cervical ripening. Therefore, the purpose of this study was to determine the effect of late pregnancy consumption of date fruit on cervical ripening in nulliparous women.
Methods: This randomized clinical trial was performed on 210 women with a singleton pregnancy, cephalic presentation, and gestational age of 37-38 weeks. The study was conducted at Omolbanin Hospital, Mashhad, Iran in 2013. The subjects were randomly assigned into two groups of 105 women (experimental and control groups). Since the 37th week of gestation, the experimental group consumed date fruit (70 to 75 gr per day) until the onset of labor pain, and the control group received routine care. Data were collected using demographic questionnaires, fetal movement record form, and the checklist related to daily consumption of date fruit. Data analysis was performed using SPSS version 14, and Chi-square, t student, and Mann-Whitney test. P-value less than 0.05 was considered statistically significant.
Results: The mean Bishop score at admission was higher in the experimental group (7.67 ± 2.28), compared to the control group (5.12 ± 2.77) (P <0.001). Mean cervical dilatation at admission was 4.05 ± 1.63 cm in the experimental group and 2.97 ± 4.63 cm in the control group (p <0/05). Also the success rate of labor induction was higher in the experimental group compared to the control group (P= 0.006).
Conclusion: Mean cervical dilatation was higher in women consuming date fruit, compared to the non-consuming group. Since date fruit is full of energy and nutrients, it is recommended for pregnant women to help with cervical ripening, particularly in the last weeks of gestation. Keywords Bishop Score; Cervical Ripening; Date fruit; Nulliparous women Full Text Introduction Cervical ripening before the onset of labor is an important factor for the prediction of delivery mode, particularly in cases of labor induction. Increased cervical ripeness increases the likelihood of vaginal delivery and decreases the rate of cesarean section (1). For measuring cervical ripeness, Bishop scoring system can be used, which includes the rating of five components: cervical dilatation, effacement, position, and consistency, and fetal station in vaginal examination. Higher Bishop score indicates higher cervical ripening and increased likelihood of vaginal delivery (1-3). Normally, Bishop score ≤ 5 indicates an unfavorable cervix, and Bishop score ≥ 8 indicates a high likelihood of spontaneous labor (3). According to the study of Williams et al. (1997), the ratio of cervical dilatation |
, n.1 colloq. (orig. U.S.). A person or thing that is defunct, dead, finished, in serious trouble, etc. Freq. in proleptic use, esp. in you’re (also I’m, we’re, etc.) toast: you (I, we, etc.) will soon be dead, in trouble, etc. Cf. HISTORY n. The lines in quot. 1983 do not in fact appear in the U.S. film Ghostbusters as released in 1985, since a considerable amount of the dialogue is ad-libbed. The actual words spoken by Venkman (played by Bill Murray) as he prepares to fire a laser-type weapon, are, ‘This chick is toast’; this is prob. the origin of the proleptic construction which has gained particular currency.
1983 D. AYKROYD & H. RAMIS Ghostbusters (film script, third draft) 123 Venkman..: Okay. That’s it! I’m gonna turn this guy into toast. 1985 Omaha (Nebraska) World-Herald 5 May B2/2 Shake, Fedya..because you’re toast! 1989 C. HIAASEN Skin Tight (1990) xxiv. 264/1 I’m calling my banker in the Caymans and having him read the balance in my account. If it’s not heavier by twenty-five, you’re toast. 1991 Sports Illustr. 8 Apr. 87/2 Soon their relationship was toast. He wanted out. 1994 A. HECKERLING Clueless (film script) Green Revised Pages 11 Cher. You get your report card? Dionne… Yeah, I’m toast, you’ll never see me out of the house again. 2002 Mojo Feb. 62/1 Brian at that time was basically a hermit and, to put it mildly, toast. What new meaning of parch are you referring to? [ Edited: 25 September 2009 06:27 AM by aldiboronti Profile
Posted: 25 September 2009 06:44 AM Administrator Total Posts: 6660 Joined 2007-01-03 The OED3 (June 2009) has it as the first definition of parch: 1. trans. To dry (esp. a foodstuff) by exposure to intense heat; to lightly roast or toast (corn, peas, etc.). It Dates to the 14th century--first cite is from a Wycliffite Bible (Bodleian 959), a translation of the Vulgate torreo: Lev. ii. 14 Yif, forsoþe, þou shalt offre... erys yut grene, þou shalt parche hit wiþ fuyr & breke in maner of brysde corn.
(If, in sincerity, you shall offer [...] ears yet green, you shall parch it with fire and break in the manner of dry corn. You’re right; I don’t think parch is used in the slang sense of toast--at least I’ve never heard it. The OED3 (Nov 2002) dates the slang sense to the 1984 film Ghostbusters. (The big dic says it was released in 1985; that is either an error or a reference to the UK release. It hit US theaters in the summer of 1984.) The line in the third draft of the script is: Venkman: Okay. That’s it! I’m gonna turn this guy into toast. The line as Bill Murray utters it in the released version of the film is: This chick is toast. [partially pipped by aldi] Profile
Posted: 26 September 2009 05:14 PM Total Posts: 312 Joined 2007-02-15 In a bizarre twist between script and adlibbed recorded speech, the ‘guy’ turns into a ‘chick’. I mean, ‘come ON’! Who was doing continuity? Profile
Posted: 26 September 2009 06:42 PM Total Posts: 3527 Joined 2007-01-31 Note that it’s a draft of the script. I’d venture to say that either the character referred to changed sex between the draft and the final version, or the adlibbed line was made in reference to a different character than the one in the draft (e.g. Gozer (the chick) vs the Stay-Puft marshmallow man (the guy).) That’s a rewrite, not a continuity error. Actually, the “toast” line is a fairly obvious joke to apply to the Stay-Puft marshmallow man (toasted marshmallows, get it?). Maybe they decided it was too obvious. Or, as I say, maybe Gozer was originally male and they decided to go for a female Gozer instead. Edit: in fact, at IMDB I find this in the trivia for Ghostbusters: “Gozer was originally going to be played by Paul Reubens, who turned down the role. In the original script, Gozer appeared as a normal man in a business suit.” There’s even a bit of dialog that seemingly makes an in-joke about this: Dr Ray Stantz: It’s a girl.
Dr. Egon Spengler: It’s Gozer.
Winston Zeddemore: I thought Gozer was a man.
Dr. Egon Spengler: It’s whatever it wants to be. [ Edited: 26 September 2009 06:51 PM by Dr. Techie ProfileCarlo is in a wheelchair thanks to a condition called myositis. Now that he’s nearing 50 and “almost non-mobile,” he receives home care and lives with his parents who help take care of him. But that’s becoming more difficult: his father has cancer, and his elderly mother has her own health problems. “My mom helps me as best as she can, but she’s pushing 80, she has diabetes,” he says.
He has no siblings and little other support. He’s not sure what will happen when his parents pass away. “I’m sure in a pinch I can get help, even just for a few weeks,” he says. “We’ll cross that bridge when we get there.”
Many adult children with disabilities now live in the community, and are likely to outlive their parents. The push for home care over the past several decades has allowed people who might previously have lived in institutions to stay at home, most notably people with developmental disabilities.
This is a positive shift, as community-based care is more cost effective than institutions, and it’s also preferred by people with chronic health conditions or disabilities. But major cracks have appeared in our system, with clients not getting enough access to respite, supportive housing or home care hours.
In many instances, family members have stepped in to fill the gaps, becoming the de facto front-line health care providers. “It’s often assumed that people with long term chronic conditions have their needs met through primary care, community based mental health, or disability support services, and that families pick up around the edges,” says Michael Bach, executive vice-president for the Canadian Association for Community Living. “But 75% rely primarily on family care.”
So what happens when we all cross that bridge – when those caregivers, many of whom are Baby Boomers, become too old to continue to look after their adult children?
Families stretched thin
The number of adults in Ontario with developmental disabilities is growing, and their health needs are higher, because they develop age-related issues, like frailty, up to 30 years earlier than the general population. That’s increasing the pressure on our system.
“People with developmental disabilities are living longer, productive lives in which they are fully included in their communities,” says David Jensen, communications officer for the Ministry of Health and Long-Term Care. “More need our support out in our communities, along with their families and caregivers.” In response, the Ontario government announced in 2014 it would invest $810 million over three years into developmental services.
Ideally, aging caregivers would be able to lean more heavily on developmental services and home care for support when they’re unable to provide the same level of care as they used to. (People with developmental disabilities receive services both from the Ministry of Community and Social Services and from the Ministry of Health and Long-Term Care.) Unfortunately, both systems are stretched thin.
A 2014 Ontario report from the Select Committee on Developmental Services “heard repeatedly that individuals and families who need developmental services and supports are in crisis. We heard that after struggling to obtain services and enduring waitlists for years, many families feel pushed to the brink of disaster.”
In the most extreme cases, families who have been unable to stitch together a solution have left their adult children at the doorsteps of government offices or at emergency departments. There are no Canada-wide numbers on this, but between 2001 and 2013, 44 people over 11 were “abandoned” in Ontario’s Peel and Halton regions alone.
Concerned about situations like these, and “a surge in complaints to our Office about urgent, disturbing cases where adults with severe special needs were ending up in jail, homeless shelters and hospitals, because no care or services were available for them,” Ontario’s Ombudsman is investigating the services available for adults with developmental disabilities.
His 2014-15 report said 1,300 complaints had been received and found that parents are frustrated that adult children who are living on their own don’t have access to adequate assistance. “We continue to receive complaints from families of adults with developmental disabilities who have been placed in hospitals or psychiatric units while they wait for an appropriate residential placement – sometimes for weeks or even years,” the report reads.
The home care system is also widely acknowledged to be inadequate, with long wait times and inconsistent service depending on client’s locations. Ontario’s home care system is a target for reform under Minister of Health and Long-Term Care Eric Hoskins. A government discussion paper on the subject released in December reads, “Some families find home and community care services inconsistent and hard to navigate, and many family caregivers are experiencing high levels of stress.”
A report out just this week from Health Quality Ontario also found that 33% of primary caregivers in 2013/14 “expressed feelings of distress, anger or depression or were unable to continue providing care,” more than twice as many as did in 2009/10.
Looking for long-term answers
The Select Committee on Developmental Services interim report identified the lack of supportive housing as a key issue to caregivers. “Aging parents are pushed to the breaking point of physical and emotional exhaustion as they continue to care for adult children at home,” it reads.
“It is likely that growing numbers of people with developmental disabilities will outlive their parents and require supportive living arrangements in the community,” it continues. “Aging parents worry that when they die or become incapacitated, their grieving child will be abruptly moved away from their home and community…”
The report says respite care – which many parents describe as a “make-or-break” service – is also limited. Respite care allows parents to care for their children for longer, and it can also be used as a transition to having others care for adult children.
Families in Ontario can also apply for individualized funding through the Passport Program, which lets people with developmental disabilities decide how to spend their money on supports and services. It also includes more residential options for adults with developmental disabilities and urgent needs.
“Different things work for different people,” says Yona Lunsky, a clinician scientist at CAMH who studies the health of people with developmental disabilities and their families. “For some people, having individualized funding might be one way to do it. For others it might be much easier if a community agency is responsible for all the care,” she says.
But over time, inadequate funding has left us with a “reactive” system, Lunsky says. The system prioritizes families in crisis – including those who have an ill caregiver, or whose caregiver has died. And that makes it hard for parents to plan ahead. “We’re often having to deal with the most complex difficult cases in a very reactive manner, and we’re so busy focusing on that that we can’t go upstream and offer more support to families, such as respite or support, to prevent crises,” she says.
“Twenty years ago, people would put an individual’s name on a list when they were young,” says Keith Tansley, executive director of Community Living Mississauga, which supports people with intellectual disabilities. “Maybe it’s 20 years until they get into a group home, and during that time we could work with the family, help the person develop skills.” But families today don’t tend to get access to services until they’ve been prioritized because they’ve reached a crisis point.
Because of that, people can end up in hospitals or long-term care homes for the elderly. In the worst-case scenarios, they can eventually be homeless or in jail. “We’ve heard of people coming to the attention of services for the first time after their parents had a health crisis or even after have died,” says Lunsky.
“The non-senior disabled community and parents of children with disabilities do not favour placement in long-term care homes,” reads the Canadian Healthcare Association’s report on Facility-Based Long-Term Care. “Still, there are younger disabled persons residing there, often inappropriately located in environments with confused elderly residents.”
Instead, the transition away from parental care would ideally be a staged process, where adults minimize their dependence on their parents as other services are put in place. “We have to get better at creating networks of community based support, formal and informal, paid and unpaid, so that as parents age out of being able to provide support, people don’t end up being in either crisis or long-term care facilities,” says Bach.
“We rely on families to be the front-line of care, and as they reach their limits, far too often people end up in the wrong places.”This was originally posted at International Liberty.
It’s not often that I disagree with the folks who put together the Wall Street Journal editorial page. For instance, they just published a great editorial on that cesspool of cronyism and corruption that is otherwise known as the Export-Import Bank.
Isn’t it great that the voice of capitalism actually supports genuine free markets!
That being said, a recent editorial rubs me the wrong way.
It’s about the presumably quixotic presidential campaign of Senator Bernie Sanders. These excerpts will give you a flavor of what the WSJ wrote.
Vermont Senator Bernie Sanders, an avowed independent Socialist, has decided to run for the Democratic presidential nomination… He thinks the American economy is fundamentally unfair, and that government must tax and spend even more heavily… He thinks Social Security should increase benefits, no matter that it is heading toward insolvency. Higher taxes can make up the difference. …He wants single-payer health care, though his own state gave up the experiment as too expensive.
So what’s my disagreement?
I realize I’m being a nit-picker, but I don’t like the fact that the WSJ editorial is entitled “An Honest Socialist.”
My gripe is that Sanders isn’t honest. A genuine socialist believes in government ownership of the means of production. In other words, nationalized factories, government-run businesses, and collective farms. If Sanders believes in these policies, he’s remarkably reluctant to share his perspective.
In reality, Sanders is like Obama. You can call him a statist, a corporatist, or even (as Tom Sowell correctly notes) a fascist.
In other words, lots of redistribution and lots of back-door government control of the private sector, but not a lot of People’s Factory #58 or People’s Farm #91.
Though it is true that Sanders wants the government to directly run the healthcare system (akin to the horrifying U.K. approach), but at most that means he’s a “partial socialist” (or, to modify the WSJ‘s title, a “mostly dishonest socialist”).
Moreover, he doesn’t bring anything new to the presidential race, at least from a policy perspective.
There’s only a trivially small difference, for instance, between Hillary Clinton’s lifetime rating of 10.6 from the National Taxpayers Union and Bernie Sanders’ lifetime rating of 9.4. They both earned their failing grades by spending other people’s money with reckless abandon.
Though it’s worth noting that both Clinton and Sanders are “more frugal” than Barack Obama, who earned a lifetime rating of 9.0. I guess this is why the phrase “damning with faint praise” was invented.
The only difference between Hillary, Obama, and Sanders is tone. Here’s some of what Charles Cooke wrote for National Review.
Sanders does not play games with words…he steadfastly refuses to pretend that he represents moderation. …Sanders is to public policy and professional politicking what Joe Biden is to personality. He is open, blunt, unapologetic, compelling, ready to debate.
Which is in stark contrast to Hillary Clinton’s pabulum.
…the Democratic primary is being dominated by a corrupt, controlling, soulless, cynical, entitled, and mostly synthetic avatar named Hillary Clinton, and, in consequence, it is almost entirely devoid of ideas. …Hillary and her team stick to meaningless and saccharine banalities, almost all of which, one presumes, have been poll-tested within a fraction of an inch. …At no time does she stake out a vision. At no time does she adopt a controversial or momentous position. Instead, she hides behind corporately assembled strings of mawkish, semi-literate tosh.
So the difference between Clinton and Sanders is that he’s proud of his statism and she wants to hide her radical agenda.
But it doesn’t matter what they say or what they call themselves, the bottom line is that their policies are destructive, both economically and morally.
P.S. Since Senator Sanders is from Vermont, it’s both amusing and ironic that the Green Mountain State’s government-run healthcare system self destructed.
P.P.S. Since we’re on the topic of socialism, it’s worth pointing out that Jesus wasn’t in that camp. Though I’m not sure we can say the same thing about the Pope.
P.P.P.S. Heck, Jesus may have been a libertarian.
P.P.P.P.S. If you like socialism humor, click here, here, and here.
P.P.P.P.P.S. Switching to another topic (and one where there’s zero humor), you may remember that I wrote a few days ago about the horror of so-called civil asset forfeiture.
This happens when the government arbitrarily seizes your money and/or property without convicting you of a crime. Or even without charging you with a crime.
Well, here’s a video from the Institute for Justice about a new tragic example of theft by government.This article is about the Roman poet. For other uses, see Lucan (disambiguation)
Marcus Annaeus Lucanus (3 November 39 AD – 30 April 65 AD), better known in English as Lucan (), was a Roman poet, born in Corduba (modern-day Córdoba), in Hispania Baetica. Despite his short life, he is regarded as one of the outstanding figures of the Imperial Latin period, known in particular for his epic Pharsalia. His youth and speed of composition set him apart from other poets.
Life [ edit ]
Three brief ancient accounts allow for the reconstruction of a modest biography – the earliest attributed to Suetonius, another to an otherwise unknown Vacca, and the third anonymous and undated – along with references in Martial, Cassius Dio, Tacitus's Annals, and one of Statius's Silvae. Lucan was the son of Marcus Annaeus Mela and grandson of Seneca the Elder; he grew up under the tutelage of his uncle Seneca the Younger. Born into a wealthy family, he studied rhetoric at Athens and was probably provided with a philosophical and Stoic education by his uncle.[1]
Pharsalia, 1657 Engraved title page of a French edition of Lucan's, 1657
His wife was Polla Argentaria, who is said to have assisted him with his Pharsalia.[2]
He found success under Nero, became one of the emperor's close friends and was rewarded with a quaestorship in advance of the legal age. In 60 AD, he won a prize for extemporizing Orpheus and Laudes Neronis at the quinquennial Neronia, and was again rewarded when the emperor appointed him to the augurate. During this time he circulated the first three books of his epic poem, Pharsalia (labelled De Bello civili in the manuscripts), which told the story of the civil war between Julius Caesar and Pompey.
At some point, a feud began between Nero and Lucan. Two very different accounts of the events have survived that both trivialize the feud. According to Tacitus, Nero became jealous of Lucan and forbade him to publish his poems.[3] According to Suetonius, Nero lost interest in Lucan and Lucan responded by writing insulting poems about Nero that Nero continued to ignore.[4]
Other works, though, point to a more serious basis to the feud. Works by the grammarian Vacca and the poet Statius may support the claim that Lucan wrote insulting poems about Nero. Vacca mentions that one of Lucan's works was entitled De Incendio Urbis (On the Burning of the City).[5] Statius's ode to Lucan mentions that Lucan described how the "unspeakable flames of the criminal tyrant roamed the heights of Remus."[6] Additionally, the later books of Pharsalia are anti-Imperial and pro-Republic. This criticism of Nero and office of the Emperor may have been the true cause of the ban.
Lucan later joined the 65 AD conspiracy of Gaius Calpurnius Piso against Nero. His treason discovered, he was obliged, at the age of 25, to commit suicide by opening a vein, but not before incriminating his mother, among others, in the hopes of a pardon. According to Tacitus, as Lucan bled to death, "(he) recalled some poetry he had composed in which he had told the story of a wounded soldier dying a similar kind of death and he recited the very lines. These were his last words."[7]
His father was involved in the proscription but his mother escaped. Statius's poem about Lucan was addressed to his widow, Polla Argentaria, upon the occasion of his birthday during the reign of Domitian (Silvae, ii.7, the Genethliacon Lucani).
Works [ edit ]
Pharsalia, 1740, 1740
According to Vacca and Statius, Lucan's works included:
Surviving work:
Pharsalia or De Bello Civili (On the Civil War), on the wars between Julius Caesar and Pompey
Often attributed to him (but to others as well):
Laus Pisonis (Praise of Piso), a panegyric of a member of the Piso family
Lost works:
Catachthonion
Iliacon from the Trojan cycle
from the Trojan cycle Epigrammata
Adlocutio ad Pollam
Silvae
Saturnalia
Medea
Salticae Fabulae
Laudes Neronis, a praise of Nero
, a praise of Nero Orpheus
Prosa oratio in Octavium Sagittam
Epistulae ex Campania
De Incendio Urbis, on the Roman fire of 64, perhaps accusing Nero of arson
Notes [ edit ]
^ Suetonius, "Life of Lucan" ^ Hays, Mary (1807). "Polla Argentaria". Female Biography, vol 3. Philadelphia: Printed for Byrch and Small. p. 95. ^ Tacitus, Annals XV.49 ^ Suetonius, "Life of Lucan" ^ Vacca, Life of Lucan ^ Silvae II.vii Statius,II.vii ^ Tacitus, Annals XV.70.1. Scholars have vainly tried to locate Lucan's last words in his work but no passage in Lucan's extant poem exactly matches Tacitus's description at "Annals" 15.70.1. See, e.g., P. Asso, "A Commentary on Lucan 'De Bello Civili IV.'" Berlin: De Gruyter, 2010, p. 9n38.
References [ edit ]
This article incorporates text from a publication now in the public domain: Chisholm, Hugh, ed. (1911). "Lucan" Encyclopædia Britannica. 17 (11th ed.). Cambridge University Press. pp. 91–92.
Further reading [ edit ]Description Learn More JoeBobOutfitters Premium Complete M16/AR15 BCG - Nitride Finish
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These posters will be available tomorrow at a random time at mondotees.com. Be sure to get out to your local comic shop and celebrate Batman Day this Saturday!
Batman: The Animated Series by Dave Perillo
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The New Batman Adventures by Dave Perillo
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Please follow us on Twitter for the on sale announcement. These posters will be available online at a random time on Thursday, September 15th.The holidays can be a challenge for us simple living people. The pressure to buy gifts for an endless list of people is real, and it’s conflict with personal values of trying not to consume “stuff” can be stressful.
But you can make choices to make your holidays simpler. Through some careful planning ahead of time, your holidays can be stress-free and focused on what matters most. Below are my tips on how to create a simple holiday gift shopping season.
Don’t Be a Grinch
Most importantly of all, don’t be a grinch. The holidays are an opportunity to enjoy time with friends and family, as well reflect on the past year. It’s NOT a time to get on your high horse about your simple lifestyle.
It’s important to understand that not everybody shares your values. Don’t judge other people for what they do for the holidays, and hopefully they will do the same to you.
Suggest Simple Gift Exchanges
It’s good to plan ahead of gift giving to set expectations.
My wife has a large family: 14 adults and 5 children in the mix currently. Buying gifts for everybody is expensive and difficult. While in the past we have bought everybody gifts, it’s become less and less feasible as more significant others and children join the family.
To help bring the focus of the holidays back to enjoying each other’s company, and less on gifts, we’ve opted to doing simple gift exchanges. Here are a just a few ideas you can suggest to your friends/family.
Adults Draw a Name and Kids Get a Gift – We usually suggest that the adults draw a name to buy a single gift for another adult, and anybody can buy a kid a present if they want. It’s fun to have the kids open presents, and us adults don’t leave empty handed.
Kids Only – If you are going to a holiday party where the adults don’t care about gifts, you can always suggest gifts for the kids only. This is a fun way to still includes some presents for the kids, who get the most excited, but save on buying needlessly for adults.
Limit Spend ($20 per person) – In the case where you are buying a gift for everyone at a holiday party, you can try to communicate a limited spend to the group before. This could help limit the financial impact a party can have. But to be honest, this is not one of my favorite options, as it puts an unnecessary dollar value on something that is supposed to be a nice gesture.
No Gifts – My favorite holiday get togethers are the ones where we can just bring ourselves. Having a gift-free holiday party is a great way to focus on your relationships, save some money, and reduce consumption. I usually just offer to bring food or drinks to a holiday party.
Budget and Save
Never buy gifts that you can’t afford. If you can’t pay cash for a gift without it effecting your other financial obligations, then don’t purchase it. Always pay cash, and always plan for gifts in your budget.
My wife and I make a spreadsheet every November that lists everybody that we are going to purchase a gift for. We then estimate how much money we think we are going to spend for each person. Once we have our total, we then go back to our monthly budget and allocate that amount.
Simple Gift Ideas For Adults
Sharing gifts with adult friends and family is a great way to show appreciation for your relationship. No matter how much you spend on somebody, it truly is the thought that counts. I try to focus on simple gifts that are useful or improve somebody’s life.
Restaurant Gift Cards – I know many people say that gift cards are lame, but I really enjoy sharing a favorite restaurant. It’s a great way to support a local business, as well as gift a nice dinner to a friend.
Alcohol – Being somebody that enjoys craft beer, I like to gift mix-and-match six packs. I also have friends that are into other alcohol, like wine, bourbon, or scotch, and they too like to gift their favorite drinks. For non-drinkers, quality coffee and tea are options as well.
Concerts/Trips – If you have a good understanding of a person, gifting an experience like a concert or trip is a fun alternative to a product. My wife and I have done this often for birthdays and holidays, as we both don’t have many material needs.
Favorite High Utility Items – “Socks for Christmas again!?” As a kid it wasn’t very fun to get gifts like socks, but as an adult, I love getting some nice wool socks as as present. My other favorite items to gift are water bottles (Hydro Flask), cook ware, and comfy blankets. Do you have favorite items that you like to gift people?
Simple Gift Ideas For Kids
I have two goals when getting gifts for kids: 1) do not burden their parents with more plastic garbage in their home; 2) give the kid something that is meaningful.
Experience – About 30 minutes south of where we live is a very cool cave system. There are guided tours that take you deep into the cave, as well as explain the history of the area. For Christmas two years ago we gifted a trip down to the cave, as well as lunch out with us to our nine year old nephew. We put rock candy and a note in the box for Christmas – he loved it! We’ve done other experience gifts like museum trips, zoos, and laser tag.
Mini Vacation – If you are close with a kid, another fun gift is a mini vacation. We used to spend a weekend with our nieces and nephews from out of town. It was nice break for the parents, and was special for the kids to get our full attention for a weekend.
Favorite Toys – If I’m going to purchase a physical “toy” for a kid, I try to find something similar to a favorite toy from my childhood. This way I can share with them something that brought me joy.
Clothing – Parents love when people gift useful clothes for their kid. The question becomes, does the kid? If you know the kid will get excited with the clothing, or if they are young enough to not care what gift they get, then I think it’s great to gift a useful article of clothing.
Aftermath
The aftermath of holiday gift giving can feel like a hangover for simple living people. Thankfully you budgeted cash for the holiday purchases, so the main stress is what to do with all this “stuff”.
My wife and I do a quick inventory of items that we received as gifts, and then plan to either keep, return, or donate. We do this right away, so that unwanted items don’t sneak their way into our basement or closet. What’s left are the items or gifts that we are excited to have in our lives.
With some planing, you can take control of the holiday shopping and gift giving season.
Please share your tips or suggestions on how to keep holiday shopping simple below in the comments!The players below are among those I have updated on Eklund's Rumor Chart SO FAR today. To view to whole chart and close to 60 players updated with my opinions in real timeHaving allowed the required 36 hours to pass I have officially added the Bruins and Hawks UFA's (and one RFA) to TheRumor Chart Here we go...Besides Rask, Horton is Boston's top priority and while it is hard to imagine Nathan moving anywhere the bidding could get extreme given the fact Boston has to get Rask done. Rask could be an Offer sheet targets if for no other reason than a team really screwing up the Bruins finances..The Blues, Habs and Coyotes are teams who could go very hard after Horton...especially the Blues..He has shown what he means to a team, especially to the young players on that team and I have heard Edmonton and Calgary both mentioned...however given all the cap space the Flyers suddenly have and his relationship to Claude Giroux the Flyers have to be considered.If there were ever a Lou Lamoriello type of forward it is Bickell. The Hawks will certainly try but Bickell may be over priced due to such a fantastic playoff...or he may be just that good.. The Wings, Flyers and Islanders are also teams I have heard mentioned.It is very good bet that Stalberg isn't brought back, but I would be careful to walk away from such a talent. Toronto, already a blazing fast team, is a good bet for a big offer to Stalberg. New Jersey and Minnesota as well...Listen to the HockeyBuzzcast with Mike Augello and Jan Levine at 1:30:More to come..Premature babies fed more breast milk in the first 28 days of life have better brain development by the time their original birth date arrives, and see benefits to IQ and memory skills later in childhood, a new study suggests.
Researchers from Brigham and Women's Hospital in Boston followed 180 babies born before the 30th week of pregnancy, from birth up to age 7. (Full-term is 39 or 40 weeks.) The babies who received more breast milk within the first 28 days of life while they were being cared for in the neonatal intensive care unit (NICU) had increased brain development in certain key areas by the time their original due date arrived, and when measured again later in childhood.
Other studies have shown that breast milk is linked to better health in babies, but the new study offered additional information, said lead author Dr. Mandy Brown Belfort, a researcher and physician in the department of pediatric newborn medicine at Brigham and Women's Hospital.
Breastfed babies have higher IQ and income as adults, study shows
Belfort told CBS News, "We had much longer-term information about the baby's developmental outcomes than other studies done in preterm populations, especially recent studies. And the other difference is that we had MRI scans done on all of the babies, both at term equivalent -- their due date if they hadn't been born early -- but also at 7 years old."
The impact wasn't just detected in MRIs; it was apparent in higher performance on a range of skills tested when the children got older.
"The IQs were higher in babies who had been fed more milk in the NICU during the first month after they born. There is a relationship, a correlation, between volume in certain regions of the brain when the baby reaches their due date and how they'll do later on."
Specifically, the authors said the premature babies who received more breast milk had "larger deep nuclear gray matter volume, an area important for processing and transmitting neural signals to other parts of the brain." By age 7, they performed better in tests of IQ, math skills, language, reading, working memory, attention and motor function.
Premature babies have difficulty latching on to their mother to breast-feed, said Belfort, so milk was expressed by mothers and then fed to the tiny infants via feeding tubes.
"Before about |
. Woods ignored the advice, but all of his significant injuries have been to load-bearing body parts: knee, both Achilles tendons, neck, lower back.
MORE: Tiger’s best, worst and most memorable moments at the Masters
In 2006 and ’07, Woods talked more and more about becoming a SEAL, and Haney became so exasperated by what he felt was an unhealthy obsession that one day in 2007, while they practiced in a bunker at Isleworth, he played his trump card: “Are you out of your mind? What about Nicklaus’s record? Don’t you care about that?”
“No,” Woods replied. “I’m satisfied with what I’ve done in my career.”
Looking back, Haney now says, “That was a big wow. I finally understood he really doesn’t give a s—. It was obvious in the way his work ethic fell off and in his attitude on the course that he had lost a lot of his desire. On some level he was just tired of being Tiger Woods.”
Woods finally gave up his dream of being a SEAL after a meeting with his agent, Mark Steinberg, in August 2007 at the Bridgestone Invitational; the birth of Tiger’s daughter two months earlier was surely a factor as well. Beginning with his victory at that Bridgestone and the following week’s PGA Championship, Woods went on a 10-month run during which he won 10 of 13 tournaments, including two majors. Having given up on the idea of playing soldier, Woods was back to business as usual, and he would have to indulge in another form of escapism.
August 2009
The 2008 U.S. Open was the ultimate myth-making performance for Woods, as he conquered the sport’s most demanding tournament with two stress fractures in his left tibia. He was 32, with 14 major championships in the bank. Knee surgery then sidelined Woods for eight months, but ’06 U.S. Open champ Geoff Ogilvy still says, “At that point I would have bet you every dollar I had that he would break Jack’s record.” Woods spent the 2009 season rounding back into form. By early August he had won five tournaments, but he was uncharacteristically shaky in the majors, failing to convert opportunities at the Masters and the U.S. Open and missing the cut at the British. At the PGA Championship at Hazeltine, Woods forged a two-stroke lead through 54 holes. To that point he was 14 for 14 in closing out a Saturday-night lead at a major, and this ruthless efficiency largely defined his legend. “I studied him long before I began working with him,” says Foley. “On Sundays [at major championships] he would walk onto the range like an emperor. It’s elegant. Guys stopped hitting balls just to watch him walk. He knows that he is going to beat you. You know that he is going to beat you. He knows that you know, and you know that he knows.”
Paired with 37-year-old journeyman Y.E. Yang, Woods battled his putter throughout the final round, and on the 71st hole he faced an eight-footer to save par and retain a piece of the lead. He didn’t scare the hole. “You go back to the U.S. Juniors, and Tiger hadn’t missed a putt he had to make in almost two decades,” says Paul Azinger. Yang closed out Woods with a kick-in birdie at the last.
Two weeks after the stunning defeat at the PGA, Woods made his next start at the Barclays, a FedEx Cup playoff event. On the 72nd hole he stood over a seven-foot birdie putt that would have tied him for the lead. Zach Johnson was sitting on his golf bag near the 18th green at Liberty National, watching the action. When Woods whiffed the putt, Johnson turned to a reporter and said, “I’m in shock. He makes that a hundred times out of a hundred.”
Padraig Harrington, a three-time major champion, has a different take. “The funny thing about golf,” he says, “is that once you miss an eight-footer that matters, it becomes a little bit easier to miss the next one. Even for Tiger Woods.”
August 1991
When he was 15, Woods was part of the Canon Cup, a team event that pits junior golfers from the western U.S. against rivals from the East. His roommate that week in Colorado Springs was garrulous Jason Gore, who would later join Woods on the PGA Tour. “It’s a bunch of teenagers away from home, of course there’s a lot of goofing off,” says Gore. “But Tiger went to bed every night at 7:30. It was like, Dude, what are you doing? I’ll never forget the sight of him with the blankets pulled under his chin, and he’s peeking out in those huge glasses he used to wear. He was Eldrick back then, not Tiger. Take away the money and fame and all that stuff, and deep down he’s just a golf nerd.”
That’s a word that crops up over and over. During the Isleworth years one of Woods’s closest friends was a college golfer at Central Florida named Corey Carroll, who got a nearly perfect score on the SAT; Haney describes him as “a little nerdy.” What did he and Woods discuss in their quiet time together? Says Carroll, “He had a bit of a fascination with cosmology and theoretical physics.” Howell is also reserved and studious. Mention to him that Woods seemed to gravitate toward a certain type, and Howell says, “You mean nerds?” Not for nothing, Woods’s nickname among the Stanford golf team was Urkel after the Family Matters TV character who is, yes, famously nerdy.
In this context Woods’s serial infidelity can be seen as a kind of a high school geek’s wish-fulfillment. His attitudes toward sex, love and marriage were also influenced at home. Lieut. Col. Woods was stationed in Thailand when he wooed Tida. She spoke barely any English and Earl only the slightest bit of Thai. Did this look like a union of equals to their son? Earl was openly disdainful of the institution of marriage, saying, “Let’s face it, a wife can be a deterrent to a good game of golf.” He predicted that if his son married before he was 30, it would “destroy” him. (Tiger was 28 when he wed Nordegren.) Earl also shared with The New York Times, “I’ve told Tiger that marriage is unnecessary in a mobile society like ours.”
In fact, Earl was an unrepentant womanizer throughout his marriage to Tida. In His Father’s Son, the Woods family biographer, Tom Callahan, writes, “Any woman who ventured within fifty feet of Earl was a potential plaintiff.” Earl’s skirt-chasing was an open secret in the golf world. In 1998 he traveled with Tiger to South Africa, the trip during which the two met Nelson Mandela and Earl memorably described it as “the first time Tiger met a human being who was equal to him, who was as powerful as Tiger was.” At the subsequent Million Dollar Challenge in Sun City, players, caddies and tournament staff were clustered in one hotel. One caddie told me, “I was on the same floor as Earl, and all week long there was a parade of girls to his room.”
A much more public parade of this kind would ultimately be Tiger’s undoing. This leads back to Haney’s thesis: “If he’s trapped in a life he doesn’t want, the only way the whole thing can end is if he self-destructs. You have to draw the conclusion that in some way Tiger wanted to be caught.”
April 2010
Six years later it’s easy to forget the intensity with which the scandal raged: the steady stream of exceptionally graphic text messages to his paramours that were leaked to the media; the front-cover treatment in the New York Post for 20 consecutive days; the photograph of Woods at a sex-addiction treatment facility in Hattiesburg, Miss., looking both hunted and haunted.
After four months in exile Woods made his return to the game at the 2010 Masters, to a public shaming from Augusta National chairman Billy Payne. Woods arrived at the 1st tee on Thursday in dark sunglasses, as if he were hiding behind the tinted windows of a limousine, then responded with one of the more remarkable performances of his career. Playing his first tournament in five months, he made two eagles in a first-round 68 and followed with a 70 to sit only two shots off the lead. Along the way he made good on his pledge to be more of a golfing gentleman, at one point high-fiving a little girl in the crowd and toning down the churlish outbursts that in the past had often followed poor shots.
The new Tiger lasted all of 36 holes. Following the second round, “We were walking from the media centre to the practice range,” Williams writes, “when Steinberg told Tiger that if he wanted to win the tournament he had to ‘stop being a nice guy’ and go back to being his old self.”
Woods shot a 70 in the third round and was still in good position, four strokes behind the leader, Lee Westwood. But during his warmup session on Sunday, Woods was sullen, surly and distant with both his caddie and swing coach. Haney became convinced he was just going through the motions. It was as if Tiger was caught between his old self and the new one, unsure of who to be. “Nobody has shown up at a tournament more in character than Tiger Woods,” says Azinger. “He was as much an actor as an athlete. He showed up on Sunday in a shirt the color of blood. After all the problems in his life, what character could he possibly play?”
Woods took all this bad energy onto the course, bogeying three of the first five holes to fall seven behind. But then he holed his approach on the 7th for an eagle and followed with birdies on 8 and 9 to roar back into contention. He still had a chance when he stiffed his approach to seven feet on the 14th hole. But then Woods missed not only that putt but also the ensuing 18-inch tap-in, ending his bid. The carelessness was unprecedented. “I didn’t believe my eyes,” says his playing partner that day, K.J. Choi. “Something strange happened. I still can’t believe he missed that. That’s not the real Tiger Woods.”
June 2010
Steinberg’s comment cuts to the heart of a fundamental question: Would becoming a better person make Woods a worse golfer? The money, the fame, the women — all of it fed a deep sense of entitlement; in his mind, he deserved to win simply because he was Tiger Woods. There was little room for nurturing friendships. Says Gore, “At tournaments he would look at you and burn a hole right through you, like you didn’t even exist. He did that to me all the time, and I’ve know him probably longer than anybody on Tour.” After the scandal Gore could sense that Woods felt a strong need for connection: “He realized there’s more going on in this world than birdies and bogeys. He started asking about my wife, asking about my kids. It was nice to see him be, you know, normal.”
This more human version of Woods was on display in the most surprising of settings: the crucible of the final round of the 2010 U.S. Open, at Pebble Beach. That national championship was always going to be a referendum on Woods’s game; he was returning to the site of his most dominant victory, a 15-shot laugher at the Open a decade earlier. For the first 45 holes he looked overmatched by the moment, but then Woods caught fire on the back nine on Saturday. He rode a series of spectacular shots to a 66 that propelled him to third place.
For the final round Woods was paired with Gregory Havret, a Frenchman who was playing in only his fourth major. He has vivid memories of the round. “Tiger didn’t play all that well,” Havret says, “but we chatted all the way around the course. On hole number 9 it totally surprised me when Tiger said that he knew I had a child, and he asked me how my daughter, Jeanne, was getting on. He asked a few things about what it was like growing up in France. Then on the 16th hole it was quite funny — he said he had read in the newspapers that there was a strike in France, and he asked me to explain who was striking and why.”
Havret bettered Woods by three strokes that day. For him to say his companion didn’t play well is the epitome of Continental good manners; Tiger three-putted the 1st hole, hit a snap hook into a tree off the 3rd tee and knocked it into the ocean on number 6. He bogeyed six of the first 12 holes to blow himself out of the tournament; afterward he moaned about the condition of the greens and blamed three bogeys on Williams’s club selections. Woods’s mistakes in the final round of the Masters, two months earlier, were easily rationalized, but the implosion at Pebble signaled that something had fundamentally changed. In just 10 months Woods had been Y.E. Yang’d, blown a crucial 72nd hole putt at the Barclays, suffered the worst public disgrace of the Internet age, yipped a gimme in crunch time at the Masters and fallen apart at the U.S. Open.
There is the pervasive belief that in the wake of the scandal Woods’s peers were less intimidated, hastening his demise. Harrington believes an inward gaze was more damaging: “He had an invincible air, and then suddenly he had frailties. But it’s not what we thought about the frailties that mattered, it is what he thought. Up to that point he was the most self-confident person I’d ever come across. Invincible, in a sense. I might have kept believing that except it became quite clear that Tiger himself no longer did.”
February 2016
The Tiger Woods Learning Center is a sleek 35,000-square-foot building tucked into a quiet corner of Anaheim. It abuts the Dad Miller Golf Course, one of the scruffy munis where Woods learned the game. The TWLC has a driving range and a mobile unit to conduct clinics, but golf is a miniscule part of the mission. The center is a launchpad to upward mobility.
Every year the foundation hosts students from more than 100 schools across Southern California. (About 90% of those schools are Title 1, meaning a minimum of 40% of their students live below the poverty line.) On a quiet Thursday in February elementary school kids from Hemet, a town 75 miles to the east, filled the various classrooms. There were classes on nutrition, forensic science (including DIY finger-printing kits) and a course on robotics that taught students to learn how to code software. Later they would all get to explore the computer lab, with its 30 gleaming monitors, and visit the state-of-art 150-person auditorium and browse the materials in the academic support area, its walls covered with pennants from dozens of elite colleges. From the soaring atrium that greets visitors to the sparkling classrooms to the effervescence of the staffers, everything about the center is designed to wow the kids. “Honestly, this was the first place I ever felt valued,” says Mehrab Sarwar, who grew up in Anaheim, studied regularly at the center after school and now works as the coordinator of the Earl Woods Scholarship Program. “It’s the first place I ever felt like I had advocates who cared about my future.”
College preparedness is a driving force of the Tiger Woods Foundation; the learning center hosts regular workshops on how to navigate the maze of the application and financial-aid process. The Earl Woods Scholarship Program began in 2006, the year the learning center opened with President Clinton as the keynote speaker. The first class of scholars featured five kids, each of whom received $5,000 annually toward college tuition. This year 131 students will receive the $5,000 stipend, and the goal is to double the number of scholars in the next five years. Thanks to a strong mentoring program, the foundation reports a 100% graduation rate. Says Evan Chang, a scholarship alum who just graduated from NYU medical school, “I’m from a low-income, single-parent household, I’m first-generation to go to college — it’s very humbling that Tiger Woods cares enough to help someone like me.”
The foundation’s good deeds are made possible by Woods’s largess, not to mention his -fund-raising hustle. He kicked in $16 million toward capital campaigns and every year donated his winnings from the World Challenge and two Tour events affiliated with the foundation, which amounted to more than $10 million. When the World Challenge couldn’t secure title sponsorship in 2012, Woods put up $4 million to keep it going. To raise money each year, he hosts the Tiger Jam in Las Vegas and an exclusive pro-am in Pebble Beach. The commitment of time and resources is substantial — he presides over all board meetings, usually in person — but Woods believes that the foundation is a key to his legacy. He declined to be interviewed for this story but agreed to answer questions about his philanthropy by email. “It’s one of my primary purposes,” Woods writes. “I hope people will remember me for what the foundation accomplished, and not as much for what I did on the golf course. There are kids now at the learning center who have no idea that I play golf, and I think that’s great.”
For Woods the work of the foundation is his way of paying tribute to his father, who remains a palpable presence around the learning center, and not just because of the bronze statue in the atrium. Writes Woods, “Mom and Pop always made sure education came first. Family and education were the priorities in our home.” He is trying to impart similar values to his own children: “My kids know that we’re very fortunate, and that there are many people who could use some help. Also, like my Pop said to me, and what I say to Sam and Charlie, care and share.”
In recent years Woods has spoken more openly about his children, with whom he shares custody with his ex-wife. “He and Elin are good friends,” says Jesper Parnevik, who remains close to his former nanny. “He’s a great dad. He spends a lot of time and does a lot of fun stuff with the kids.” Parnevik helped broker the romance between Woods and Nordegren, and when the scandal broke, he was the most vociferous of any pro golfer in his criticism of Woods. It’s a measure of how far Tiger has come since then that Parnevik now says, “All I hear are positive things.”
March 2012
After going winless for more than 900 days, Woods prevailed at the Arnold Palmer Invitational, beating Graeme McDowell on a taut Sunday. McDowell is a U.S. Open champ and a Ryder Cup hero, but he turns into a gushing fanboy remembering that day: “It’s nice to have played with him when he’s been close to his best. When it’s all said and done, it’ll be a great memory to say I had a few chances to stand toe-to-toe with perhaps the greatest player of all time.”
Over the next 17 months Woods would win seven more times, a great career for most guys. But even as he summited the World Ranking again, a glum reality could not be denied: He was now a demonstrably lesser player. In 2012 and ’13, Woods had five realistic chances to win a major, but he could not close the deal; his weekend scoring average was significantly higher than in the first two rounds. The metaphysical challenges were significant. Foley, Woods’s swing coach in that period, says, “Tuesday at a major is one of funniest places to be because everyone is so anxious as they have laid the seeds of expectation for many months. Common sense says that Tiger was affected too. Those tournaments meant so much to him.”
But the problems were not just in his head. In the preceding five years he had sustained numerous dings and injuries, robbing him of practice time and some of his athleticism. Woods’s revamped swing under Foley had much more shaft lean at impact; the trajectory of Tiger’s irons became lower, and off the tee he struggled to play a draw. The PGA Tour’s strokes gained statistic illustrates how many shots per round a player is picking up or losing to the competition in every facet of the game. Less powerful and less accurate with the longest clubs, Woods lost more than a shot per round in strokes gained driving from 2009 to ’13, falling from 15th on Tour to 92nd. This shortcoming was magnified at the major championships, with their steeper penalty for errant tee shots, just as his less versatile ball flight became more problematic coming into firmer greens. And whether it was frayed nerve endings or deteriorating technique, Woods was also losing his scoring touch. In 2009 he picked up.99 strokes per round with his putting. In ’12 and ’13 that number dropped to.43 and.52, respectively. The efficiency of his chipping and pitching also plummeted; in the strokes-gained-short-game stat Woods’s advantage was.71 strokes per round in ’09, but that fell off to.27 in ’12 and.31 the following year. Factor in the driving, chipping and putting, and the postscandal Woods was essentially eight strokes per tournament worse than he had been in 2009, which is not even one of his seven or eight best seasons.
“For the first dozen years of his career Tiger always played the correct shot,” says Golf Channel’s Chamblee. “He had the skill and technique and fearlessness to pull it off when others were afraid to even try. When he came back [after the scandal], he was a different golfer. He was more one-dimensional, and he played much more defensively. He seemed to have a fear of missing left, so everything was a trap-cut. He had so much know-how he learned to play around these deficiencies and still find ways to win, but the majors exposed all of his weaknesses. He may have been the player of the year in 2013, but the gap between him and everybody else was closing rapidly.”
And then Woods’s back gave out.
August 2015
After the chip-yips at the Phoenix Open, Woods’s next start came a week later in La Jolla, outside San Diego. His play around the greens was nearly as horrific as it had been in the desert, and he withdrew after 12 holes, saying he wasn’t able to “activate my glutes,” a phrase that immediately passed into legend. Woods took the next two months off and by his own account hit tens of thousands of chips in his backyard. He returned to action at Augusta National, which, with its extremely tight lies and crazy greens could not have offered a more stressful test. It is a monument to Woods’s grit that he survived the week without a single relapse. But the chip-yips live inside you forever, like a virus. For the rest of the year Woods was much more wary when chipping. His scrambling percentage of 46.77% would have comfortably ranked dead last on Tour if he had played enough rounds to qualify for the statistic. (In 2009, Woods led the Tour in scrambling, getting up and down 68.18% of the time.)
The 17th-place finish at the Masters seemed like something to build on, but two months later Woods cratered. At the Memorial, where he has won five times, Tiger shot a third-round 85, the worst score of his professional career. His next appearance came at the U.S. Open, and he started with an 80. He missed the cut at Chambers Bay and then at the British Open and the PGA Championship. His season ended in August, as he failed to earn enough points to be one of the 125 players who qualified for the FedEx Cup.
In September, Woods had microdiscectomy surgery, the same procedure he’d undergone a year and a half earlier; this second operation was to correct a disk fragment that was pinching a nerve. But the discomfort remained, and last October he went under the knife again.
MORE: An oral history of Tiger Woods’ historic 1997 Masters win
It is a testament to the cult of personality Woods created that despite years of poor play and bad health, there are still a lot of true believers out there; for these fans and players and reporters it remains disorienting to see the depth of Woods’s struggles, and ignoring reality is less painful than admitting his competitive mortality. “He’s still Tiger Woods, and he has an imprint to play great golf, and he will do it again,” says Howell. “If the guy were to get off his couch and show up at the Masters and win, I would not be surprised, because that’s who he is.”
Haney is a clear-eyed critic on many things about Woods, but even he feels a similar tug: “I would never say he can’t win again, because he’s so great. Every time he tees it up, I think he’s going to win. Still. I mean, he’s Tiger Woods. These other guys” — Spieth, Rory McIlroy, Jason Day, et al. — “they’re good, but they’re not even close to what Tiger was.”
Yet Haney also recognizes this is a convenient time for Woods to call it quits. He writes in his book that Woods considered injuries to be “an athletic badge of honor. To him, injuries were a way of being accepted into the fraternity of superstars who played more physical sports than golf.” Says Haney, “If he walks away now, the narrative is that injuries cost him a chance to catch Jack. That sure sounds a lot better than he lost the desire or he threw it all away with reckless behavior in his personal life.”
So many things are working against a comeback, but the public fascination with Woods remains as intense as ever. In late February, during the week of the Honda, he posted on social media a clip of himself swinging a short iron very gingerly. The Internet practically melted. “It got more attention than anything happening here,” McDowell said from the Honda. “It’s a reminder of how big he was, and still is.”
Indeed, all of us were lucky to witness the greatest golf ever played. What happened? Even Woods might not be able to answer that. A better question might be, Why can’t we let go?
“He epitomizes a power in the universe that we don’t understand,” says Ogilvy. “He did stuff that science, common sense and golf history can’t explain. The guy was incredible in every way, but Ernie Els was just as good physically as he was, Greg Norman was just as good physically, Rory McIlroy is too. There are hundreds of guys who are, really, but why is Tiger the guy who won every time? How did he make every putt, how did he always pull off the shot? We don’t get how he did it, and we want to know why he lost it and where it’s gone and why he can’t get it back. Maybe even Tiger doesn’t know. I know we all want to see him do it one more time, to be reminded of how special it was. He certainly has nothing left to prove to anyone. It just feels like he deserves a different ending.”Long Island congressman Peter King can’t stand Ted Cruz — but don’t tell anybody.
King ranted against the Texas senator during a radio interview Thursday, trashing him for everything from his voting record to his cowboy boots.
“Let me say something about the New York primary,” King said on the Joe Piscopo Show on AM 970 The Answer.
“Any New Yorker who even thinks of voting for Ted Cruz should have their head examined, Really, here’s a guy who refused to sign onto the 9/11 health care act for the cops and fireman. Here’s a guy who talks about New York values.”
Then King turned it up a notch, before trying to turn down the volume.
“New York keeps going forward,” King continued, citing the city’s response to 9/11. “We’re tough, and to have some guy like Ted Cruz with cowboy boots walk around criticizing us. Listen, I hope he gets the cold shoulder and other things from every New Yorker. Send him back where he belongs. He’s a phony.”
“That was all off the record by the way,” he told the listening audience. “I don’t want anyone listening. That was all off the record.”
Of course, that didn’t stop him from ranting.
“I just can’t stand that guy,” he added.
James Keivom/New York Daily News Ted Cruz was met with Bronx cheers during his Wednesday tour of the borough.
King, who backed Marco Rubio, has already expressed his disdain for Donald Trump. He said he woud “wait and see” who he would support in the April 19 primary.
“John Kasich is a good guy,” King said.
“To me, the best debate is between Kasich and Trump. Not between Cruz with that smooth talking, how he loves everyone and is gonna wear the armor of God as he’s into battle and all that. Come on. Give me a break.”The resignation of President Hosni Mubarak of Egypt has prompted a flurry of writing about other Middle Eastern monarchies and dictatorships, past and present. Indeed, across the region people are discussing, debating and in some cases taking to the press and the streets to protest oppressive forms of government.
On the other hand, the seemingly unlikely fall of Mr. Mubarak has also been cause for reflection on exactly how effective he was as an authoritarian leader. Thirty years in power in a country of nearly 80 million people is no small feat, especially when bordered on one side by a volatile Israel and Palestine, a disintegrating Sudan to the south and an unpredictable Libya to the west.
Of course, authoritarian and undemocratic leadership is not restricted to Egypt or the Middle East. Traditional and hereditary government enforced by threats of violence or exile has long been a facet of human political and social organization. Especially during times when stability and internal coherence were (often rightly) deemed to be the keys to survival of a group, nation or tribe, strong central leadership prevented dissent or personal ambition from endangering the whole group.
In today’s world, however, stability and progress are often invoked as rationales for longstanding and dictatorial regimes regardless of their applicability. In some cases driven by personal ambition, and other times by genuine belief in one’s ability to be the transformational leader needed by his or her people (regardless of the reality), dictators today range from the iron-fisted Teodoro Obiang of Equatorial Guinea, who has ruled since 1979, to Frank Bainimarama, the controversial Fijian naval officer who took power in his country in a 2006 coup, but has since battled with the national courts over its legality.
Even deciding who is a dictator and who is not is a tricky business. Much like the distinction between “freedom fighter” and “terrorist,” the difference between a “dictator” and a “stable and progressive monarchy” is a matter of perspective. Many American analysts are quick to call Fidel Castro and Ali Khamenei dictators of the worst kind, while leaving the monarchies of Jordan and Saudi Arabia alone and ignoring “friendly” oil-producing West African dictators in Angola, Gabon or Equatorial Guinea.
With that said, I would like to introduce you to the Dictator Index, a measure of the relative effectiveness of national leaders with authoritarian tendencies in the last 40 years or so. The initial list of candidates for Best Dictator ran more than 70 people long, making it necessary to set a few cutoffs for inclusion. Only people who were in power since 1970 have been included (some began their rule before that), and only leaders who managed to stay in power for 15 or more years have made it to the final round of evaluation. Apparently, if you want to be counted among the elite of authoritarian rulers, you must put in a good 20 or 30 years – no small feat, indeed.
The 34 potential dictators have been measured in six main categories that define well-executed despotic rule. First, as alluded to by the cliché, “Possession is nine-tenths of the law,” the number of years a leader was in possession of national power is an important factor. Second, allowing elections and/or democratic processes is ranked on a 0 to 5 scale, with 5 being free and fair elections and 0 being absolutely none. Candidates, naturally, receive Dictator Index points for being less democratic. Similarly, tolerance of opposition or the publication of opposition ideas is ranked on a 0 to 5 scale, with 0 being no tolerance of opposition, and 5 being a free and influential opposition. The fourth factor is the level of development that the country achieved during the rule of the dictator, as compared with its local region and/or comparable countries. This is measured using the United Nations Development Program’s Human Development Index (HDI) and where those data are not available, Life Expectancy at birth as measured by the United Nations Department of Social and Economic Affairs. Fifth, the candidates are measured on how much wealth they were able to expropriate through their charge as a national leader. Again, this is based on a 0 to 5 ranking, using lifestyle and broad brackets of proven personal wealth. It is quite challenging to get exact figures on each person, however we can clearly differentiate between the wealth of a Mobutu Sese Seko from Congo, who embezzled every cent he possibly could, and Kim Il Sung of North Korea, who while rather unbalanced, did not actually embezzle that much. Lastly, the Dictator Index takes into account the size of each country, assuming that it is generally harder keep hold of a huge country like Egypt or Indonesia than a small principality like Brunei or Swaziland.
So without further ado, I am pleased to present the award of Best Modern Dictator to Muammar el-Qaddafi of Libya, who topped a very competitive list of authoritarians.
Rank Leader Country Dictator Index 1 Muammar al-Qaddafi Libya 81.0 2 Francisco Franco Spain 72.3 3 Hassanal Bolkiah Brunei 69.4 4 Kim Il Sung North Korea 62.6 5 Fahd bin Saud Saudi Arabia 61.2 6 Hafez al-Assad Syria 61.1 7 Fidel Castro Cuba 60.7 8 Saddam Hussein Iraq 59.3 9 Mobutu Sese Seko DR Congo 56.9 10 Hosni Mubarak Egypt 55.3 11 Omar Bongo Gabon 54.7 12 Kim Jong-il North Korea 54.2 13 Suharto Indonesia 54.2 14 Hussein bin Talal Jordan 54.0 15 Nicolae Ceauşescu Romania 53.0 16 Teodoro Obiang Equatorial Guinea 47.4 17 Todor Zhivkov Bulgaria 46.3 18 Gnassingbé Eyadéma Togo 43.9 19 Paul Biya Cameroon 43.3 20 Mswati III Swaziland 43.1 21 Hastings Banda Malawi 41.9 22 Saparmurat Niyazov Turkmenistan 40.5 23 Ahmed Sékou Touré Guinea 40.0 24 José Eduardo dos Santos Angola 39.9 25 Jean-Claude Duvalier Haiti 39.8 26 Ali Khamenei Iran 38.4 27 Augusto Pinochet Chile 36.7 28 Islom Karimov Uzbekistan 33.2 29 Zine Ben Ali Tunisia 31.8 30 Daniel arap Moi Kenya 29.8 31 Than Shwe Myanmar 22.4 32 Robert Mugabe Zimbabwe 20.5 33 Idriss Déby Chad 19.7 34 Omar al Bashir Sudan 17.1
In second place is the controversial Francisco Franco of Spain who led a highly oppressive regime for 39 years, though presided over a post-World War II economic boom that was called the Spanish Miracle. Third place is occupied by the Sultan of oil-rich Brunei, Hassanal Bolkiah, who has overseen two decades of economic expansion, though at the price of political and social freedoms in the small kingdom. Kim Il Sung, the father of the current North Korean leader Kim Jong Il, led a highly oppressive regime for 45 years, which made up for his relatively low accumulated wealth and the stagnant economic and health situation that existed during this rule. Rounding out the Top 5 is the enormously wealthy King Fahd bin Saud of Saudi Arabia, who, like his brothers before him, allows virtually no opposition to his rule and certainly no elections.
The rest of the Top 10 are not surprising, with Saddam Hussein, Mobuto Sese Seko, Hosni Mubarak, Hafez al-Asad and Fidel Castro – who led the list with 47 years in power – taking positions 6 through 10 on the index.
Surprise underperformers on the index include Robert Mugabe, who while having spent more than 30 years at the helm in Zimbabwe, has actually overseen several contested elections, has a fairly active opposition, and has seen a crash of all the development indicators of health and education in the country. Similarly, Augusto Pinochet of Chile and Omar al-Bashir of Sudan, while maintaining reputations of being men of iron, did indeed allow elections or referenda that strongly challenged their rule (Pinochet was actually removed from power democratically, and al-Bashir is within weeks of losing the southern portion of Sudan to independence).
In conclusion, while there are many oppressive governments around the world, there is only one Qaddafi, who manages to mix Leader for Life status, an enormous quantity of oil wealth, an impressive wardrobe and just enough craziness to keep his enemies and opponents on their toes.
Below the break is a full table that includes the ratings for each of the six factors.Higher education is a lifetime sentence of debt If a college degree is the new high school diploma, then we need to overhaul our school financing model accordingly
Whether or not President Obama's recent education-themed speeches are in direct response to Matt Taibbi's must-read Rolling Stone article on the college loan crisis, it is great news that the White House is now taking the crisis more seriously. The credit bubble in college loans has ballooned into a systemic threat to the nation's economy. Additionally, as Taibbi documents, economic and political trends are now forcing an entire generation into a truly no-win |
for several hours to find evidence that could lead to the assailant.
The case follows a series of recent acts of sexual violence in Italy, including in the capital.Image copyright Thinkstock Image caption The EU says most vacuum cleaners waste too much energy
Anyone wanting to buy a powerful vacuum cleaner has only 10 days left to be certain of getting one - following new EU rules that come in next month.
From 1 September, companies in the EU will be banned from making or importing vacuum cleaners above 1600 watts.
Hoover - based in South Wales - said that most of its cleaners were in that category.
Since July it has been replacing its models with less powerful versions, but a few of the old ones are still left on the shelves.
Elements of the directive are being challenged by the Dyson group.
The consumer organisation Which? says many of the models involved were rated as "best buys" by its researchers.
In one recent study, five of the top seven cleaners had motors of more than 1600 watts.
Image copyright Hoover Image caption Models like this Hoover will no longer be available
The new European rules are part of the EU's energy efficiency directive, designed to help tackle climate change.
Among the models which will soon no longer be available are:
Hoover Spirit TSP2101 (2100w)
Miele S5281 (2200w)
Samsung CycloneForce Sensor (2100w)
Bosch BSG8PRO1 ( 1800w)
No models made by Dyson are affected, as all the motors on their machines are below 1600w.
However manufacturers are bringing in new models, which they say are much more energy-efficient, and just as effective.
Court Challenge
The new EU directive on energy efficiency will also require manufacturers to put an energy rating on the box.
From 1 September, vacuum cleaners will be given seven different ratings, from A to G.
This includes measuring the performance on hard floors, carpets, and how much dust is emitted.
But the Dyson group is challenging this aspect of the new rules, and has applied for a judicial review of the EU directive.
It argues that the performance criteria do not include testing a vacuum cleaner when there is already dirt inside it - what it calls "dust-loaded".
Dyson also says that 126 million cleaner bags and filters from new vacuum cleaners end up in landfill across the EU every year.
Yet the new labelling system does not reflect the impact of used bags and filters on the environment.
The rules will get even tougher in three years' time.
From 1 September 2017, all vacuum cleaners will have to be less than 900w.I finally started a new project using React Router 4. It’s no secret that the churn between versions has been pretty high, and version 4 is no different. However, I think the team at React Training has come a long way, and this version is definitely the best, and worth your time to learn.
For someone picking up React Router 4 for the first time, it’s probably very intuitive. For the rest of us, we may be getting hung up on the basics because we didn’t realize the fundamental change…
“Routes” aren’t really routes, they are just components.
Re-read that. Let it sink in. Repeat. Again.
Routes are now more like components that simply conditionally show or hide a target component or element based on whether the current URL matches the given path. If you focus on this key point, all the features and functionality that the new format gives you become so much more intuitive to understand.
Let’s take a look at a basic example before we dive too much further in:
Apply what you already know about Router to BrowserRouter (hence the named import), and Link works the same as well.
To get a deeper understanding of Route, I highly recommend diving directly into the API docs. The quick start and basic examples sections skim over a lot of the details. You have three different ways (through props) to tell a Route what to render: a target component, or functions in render or children that return valid nodes. Note that children always returns the given node whether there is a match or not. It’s convenient for animation and cases like when we only want to modify a className based on the route but everything else still needs to render.
We call the BrowserRouter once in an application, usually at a high level (just above where we first need to start defining routes and links).
In the “old” days, we typically defined routes all in one file. Now, you can put them closer to where they should belong, composing your application based on the URL match logic. For example, say two different geographical areas of your application need to contain content that varies based on the URL. You can define two routes (or as many as you need) to match the same URL in different parts of your application.
A Route helps you compose your React applications in a more “React” way. No more mental acrobatics to try fit a traditional routing model with a React component tree model. Remember…
“Routes” aren’t really routes, they are just components.
The opportunities are endless.
If you liked this story, give it a💚 to share the love.A utility worker was pulled from a trench Tuesday afternoon after being trapped for nearly seven hours.
Rescue personnel were called to the area of 130th and Hawthorne Court around 9:45 Tuesday morning when the trench collapsed on worker later identified as Drew Johnson.
Omaha and Elkhorn rescue crews both assisted in efforts to free Johnson from the estimated 8 foot deep hole. WOWT 6 News crews on location Tuesday could hear screaming from the trench.
Rescue crews said Johnson's feet were stuck in the trench. MUD crews used a compressor to free compacted dirt around Johnson's right foot.
Johnson, a utility worker, was working on a sewer main project for the home when dirt caved in on him around his legs. He was unable to get himself out of the hole.
Throughout the rescue, Johnson remained alert and was able to talk with rescue workers. Officials told WOWT 6 News they were concerned about hypothermia. Johnson was taken to a local hospital. It's unclear what if any injuries he may have sustained.
WOWT 6 News spoke with Johnson's mother immediately after he was freed.
"Thank you Jesus, he saved him,"Joan Johnson told WOWT 6 News.
"When he was pulled out of there I can only imagine what it felt like for you," said reporter Brandon Scott.
"Exhilaration! Very thankful. Very thankful for everyone who came and helped," she said.
"Did he say anything as he came out of the hole?" asked Scott.
"He said 'tell my mom I'm OK.' I knew if I just kept trusting Jesus he'd be OK," she said.Izvor: N1
"Jedina sreća izgubljenih ratova je što mi nemamo neki nov SUBNOR. Hrvati žive u jednom teroru tih domobrana, koji mogu blokirati ulice i imaju sva prava", kaže Veljko Lalić, glavni urednik "Nedeljnika".
Citirajući kolumnista "Nedeljnika" Zoran Panovića, Lalić kaže da se "Srbija mogla odreći Miloševića, a Hrvatska ne može Tuđmana jer je on napravio Hrvatsku državu".
"Mi ne možemo razumjeti njihovu "pojačanu priču" o Tuđmanu", kaže Lalić.
Urednik "Nedeljnika" kaže da Srbija s Hrvatskom "cijelo proljeće gubi u tenzijama".
"Ako morate držati Tuđmana zato što vam je napravio državu, nevjerojatno je da se netko danas vraća na ustaštvo i da na taj način priča o Stepincu", kaže Lalić.
"Smiješno mi je da se junačim ispred svojih kolumni"
Govoreći o izložbi "Necenzurirane laži", gdje su izložene i kolumne "Nedeljnika", Lalić kaže da zna da njihovi naslovi nerviraju neke.
"Smiješno je da se junačim i slikam ispred svojih kolumni. Ne doživljavam novinarstvo kao hrabrost i politički aktivizam", kaže Lalić.
Lalić dodaje da postoji teza da živimo najbolje u modernoj povijesti.
"U posljednjih sto godina, vjerojatno u ovih posljednjih 25, živimo najlošije. Spomenuli smo Miloševića, pošto se i on rehabilitira danas. Nije isto kada uzmete onakvu zemlju i uništite je. Vi danas stvarate strukturu da je petog kolovoza sve uništeno, a ljudi zaboravljaju da je zemlja tad imala rast", kaže Lalić.
"Ako se hvalite, hvalite se s izravnim stvarima", dodaje Lalić.
"Srbija je do raspada Jugoslavije bila prvorazredna nacija. Od raspada Jugoslavije polako postaje drugorazredna. Mi se danas natječemo s 'trećerazrednima'. I dalje smo iznad Makedonije i Bosne, za Crnu Goru više nisam siguran. Male zemlje mnogo lakše mogu napredovati od velikih", kaže Lalić.
"Nisam očekivao LDP u vladi"
Lalić kaže da su izbori imali zadatak da smire tenzije, koje se ne smiruju.
"Najavljeno je bilo više promjena nego što očekujemo sada u novoj vladi. Vidimo da se vrlo teško ide prema tome da se smijene ministri. Treba prihvatiti realnost da masa ljudi neće ni ući u politiku zato što je takva kakva je. Ne znamo koga je premijer htio imati u vladi i s kim je pregovarao", kaže Lalić.
Dodaje da nije očekivao LDP u vladi jer bi to bilo "skupo", i jednim i drugima.
N1 pratite putem aplikacija za Android | iPhone/iPad | Windows| i društvenih mreža Twitter | Facebook | Instagram.Torg Eternity Preview #6 – Spells, Miracles, and Psionics
This week we get a bit more in depth with the new mechanics, specifically those dealing with spells, miracles, and psionics. For the sake of this preview, we’ll collectively call them “powers.” They’re described in separate chapters in Torg Eternity, but they have similar characteristics.
As mentioned in our first preview, we wanted to reduce the number of sub-systems while keeping the Torg flavor. This is one of the places where that philosophy has its biggest impact.
A Unified System
The divergent sub-systems in Original Torg are now combined into one system, though each of the categories of supernatural powers has their own tweaks on the general framework.
Each type of power has these features in common:
Available Powers: In the core book, each cosm has a list of spells, miracles, or psionics that is available to a native of that cosm. There may be multiple lists for a cosm, and these are significantly expanded upon in the cosm sourcebooks. The ability to invoke powers, and the powers themselves are purchased as Perks.
In the core book, each cosm has a list of spells, miracles, or psionics that is available to a native of that cosm. There may be multiple lists for a cosm, and these are significantly expanded upon in the cosm sourcebooks. The ability to invoke powers, and the powers themselves are purchased as Perks. Skill: Each power requires a certain skill at a required level in order to select it.
Each power requires a certain skill at a required level in order to select it. Concentration: Some powers have a duration of Concentration, and if your character takes damage or are affected by an interaction attack, she must make a concentration test. If that test is failed, all powers she’s currently concentrating on end.
Some powers have a duration of Concentration, and if your character takes damage or are affected by an interaction attack, she must make a concentration test. If that test is failed, all powers she’s currently concentrating on end. Failure: If the character fails at the skill test when invoking a power, some consequence happens. For miracles and psionic powers, she takes 2 Shock on a failure, 4 Shock on a Mishap.
If the character fails at the skill test when invoking a power, some consequence happens. For miracles and psionic powers, she takes 2 Shock on a failure, 4 Shock on a Mishap. Success: Powers strongly leverage the success level system described in the first preview, and each spell has an upgraded effect if the caster gets a Good or Outstanding Success.
Magic
All four of the original magic skills are still in Torg Eternity: alteration magic and divination magic (based on Mind), and conjuration magic and apportation magic (now based on Spirit).
The spell lists included in the core book are:
Aysle Mage
Core Earth Dabbler (includes some spells above Core Earth’s Magic Axiom)
Cyberpapacy Witch
Orrorsh Occultist
Tharkold Acolyte
The Nile Empire is not included in the core book as far as spellcasting goes, as we’re looking at doing something a bit different for pulp sorcerers and other Nile Empire archetypes.
Failing any sort of power test has a consequence, such as “Backlash” for magic. Regardless of cosm, the caster suffers 2 Shock, and if he rolls a Mishap, suffers an additional effect as well, such as:
Aysle: The caster also becomes Very Vulnerable.
The caster also becomes Very Vulnerable. Cyberpapacy: The caster suffers a bonus die of Shock instead of 2 Shock.
The caster suffers a bonus die of Shock instead of 2 Shock. Orrorsh: Nothing! The Gaunt Man wants Orrorsh’s spellcasters to explore the dark arts!
One additional item of note is that if you’re casting a contradictory spell, and you get a Mishap, you take the additional backlash and disconnect.
Over 30 spells are included in Torg Eternity, along with several improvised magic spells for Aysle.
Here’s an example spell:
and here’s an Improvised Spell:
Miracles
Miracles are invoked using the faith skill (still based on Spirit). Focus is no longer a skill in Torg Eternity. Additional believers can support the invocation by making a Combined Action, and grant the invoker a bonus depending on how many assist. The reason for only having one skill to invoke miracles is that miracles tend to be less diverse in their effects compared to magic and psionics.
There is no longer a spiritual struggle if a miracle is invoked on a person who has faith in a different belief. In addition, atheism no longer suppresses the invocation of miracles.
The miracle lists include:
Aysle (The Exemplars)
Core Earth (All religions, but for the core book they all pick from the same list)
Cyberpapacy (The Church)
Living Land (Keta Kalles)
Nile Empire (Amaatism)
Orrorsh (Saccelum)
There are over a dozen miracles in the core book, including: bless, healing, hellfire, and pillar of salt.
Here’s a sample miracle:
Psionics
Psionic powers are manifested using one of three skills: kinesis (based on Spirit), precognition (based on Mind), and telepathy (based on Charisma).
The power lists given in the core book include:
Core Earth
Pan-Pacifica
Tharkold
Although the Nile Empire has a Social Axiom high enough to support some psionic powers, it hasn’t actually had any psis manifest as yet, unless they are trappings for what is actually a pulp power.
Torg Eternity has over 20 psionic powers, including: choke pinch, combat prediction, hide, and pyrokinesis.
Here’s an example psionic power:
Do You Want to Know More?
I’m sure this preview will spark lots of discussion and questions, so head on over to our forums and ask away!Sen. Ted Cruz, R-Texas, joined the growing chorus of lawmakers calling on Congress to forego its August recess until it passes legislation to repeal and replace ObamaCare.
"It’s crazy that we would be taking a recess," Cruz told Fox News' "Hannity" Monday night. "There are a bunch of us, myself included, that have been urging leadership back from January [to] not take any recesses.
"Let’s work every day, let’s work weekends, let’s work until we get the job done," Cruz added. "We have a job to do and a short window of time, and so we ought to stop taking recesses, stop taking time off and just keep going until we get it done."
The former presidential candidate has found himself at the center of the Senate GOP's internecine warfare over healthcare legslation after Majority Leader Mitch McConnell, R-Ky., postponed a vote on legislation he had written largely in secret.
Cruz has proposed an amendment letting insurers sell any policies they wish, so long as they also offer polices that cover a list of services required by ObamaCare. Vice President Mike Pence endorsed the amendment Monday on Rush Limbaugh's radio show.
Cruz told host Sean Hannity Monday night that his amendment was "the knob of the battle" in the Senate. "[It] says you, the consumer, you have the right to choose what health insurance you want to buy."It's back to the FunHouse as Doug attempts to piece together the past weekend in Phoenix at the All Things Comedy COMEDY FEST. Hennigan, Becker, Chad and Chaille help him fill in the blank spots.
Recorded Oct 29th, 2017 at the FunHouse in Bisbee, AZ with Doug Stanhope (@DougStanhope), Mat Becker (@houdini357), Brian Hennigan (@MrHennigan), Chad Shank (@HDFatty), & Ggreg Chaille (@gregchaille). Produced & Edited by Chaille.
Pre-Order a SIGNED copy of Doug's NEW book, " This Is Not Fame: A "From What I Re-Memoir"" at - http://bit.ly/2AwBH3y
This episode is sponsored by Blue Apron Wine - Start discovering new wines today! Get $25 off your first wine box—by going to BLUEAPRON.com/STANHOPEWINE
You will never miss out on Stanhope's 2018 Tour Dates if you get on the Mailing List. http://www.dougstanhope.com/
Closing song, “Springwater”, by Birdcloud. Available on iTunes.
LINKS: - Chad Shank Voice Over info at AudioShank.com - Support the Innocence Project - http://www.innocenceproject.org/ - Guys We Fucked Podcast with Corinne Fisher & Krystyna Hutchinson here - http://www.sorryaboutlastnightcomedy.com/guys-we-fucked/ - Get “F--ked: Being Sexually Explorative and Self-Confident in a World That's Screwed”, by Corinne Fisher and Krystyna Hutchinson. Available on Amazon.com - https://www.amazon.com/cked-Sexually-Explorative-Self-Confident-Screwed/dp/0062666916/ref=tmmhrdswatch0?encoding=UTF8&qid=1509667372&sr=8-1Admittedly this is conspiracy theory speculation that might suggest I’m in need of a fitting for a tin-foil hat. Still……
There was “bigly” news yesterday. Two big items in fact. One was that our erstwhile President demonstrated yet again what a vile, misogynistic P.O.S. he his - even a boatload (a big one too) of Republicans took part in the push back. The other was that a Wall Street Journal reporter (Shane Harris) published what could turn out to be an explosive piece about a GOP researcher named Peter Smith. He’s not someone who before now has been in the public consciousness, but here’s a short story that tells a little more about him - http://www.ibtimes.com/who-was-peter-w-smith-gop-operative-implied-michael-flynn-tie-seek-clinton-emails-2559672
In a diary I published last night I focused on how the information in Harris’ article meant that Mike Flynn was screwed. I didn’t start writing until after watching Rachael Maddow’s show, during which she had a chat with Mr. Harris. It was noted both before and during the interview that Smith himself is now silent – he died ten days after his interview with Harris. Not much was, or has been made of how he died – he was after all up there in years. If I remember correctly his age was noted & somewhere around eighty years old. So on the face of things, his death could reasonably be expected to have been from natural causes related to his age.
OTOH, these are not normal circumstances. Smith actually sought out the reporter (Harris) and was quite open about what he’d done as well as firm in his belief it was all proper and in the service of what was to him (Smith) a worthy cause. Harris admitted he would liked to have talked more. However, he was well into his reporting on the story (a longer, more complicated discussion I won’t get into here) and since he’d gotten plenty from Smith to that point he moved on to other aspects of his work on the story, assuming he’d get to talk more with Smith. But Smith died.
As I said, Smith was old & if he apparently just up & died that in and of itself wouldn’t be all that surprising. But it’s important to again note that Smith sought out the reporter. Smith was open and frank about who he spoke to and the actions he took to try and get Russian help to hack/obtain more Clinton emails, and how to make sure they were released. That included discussing the Flynn link and the fact he (Smith) had been open with others about what he did and who was involved. Is it tin-foil hat time to wonder if Smith was just as open with friends about having spoken with the WSJ, and more importantly what he’d told the reporter? After all, Smith not only wasn’t making any attempt to hide the fact he was working to get Russian help to obtain still more Clinton emails. He was PROUD of his efforts, and as I keep saying enough so he sought out a reporter he’d heard was working on the story and spoke on the record about it.
This is the first (public at least) meaningful link to a key Trump person talking/working with someone who was getting help from Russian hackers. Another tantalizing aspect of Harris’ conversation with Maddow last night is that there’s more that is possible, even likely been going on with investigators looking that might not even be about Smith! Anyway, I can’t help but think about Putin’s history and ruthlessness.
First of all we know Putin was actively involved in the Russian interference in our election – he didn’t merely order it but orchestrated and took an active part as it was happening. We also know that a lot of people who have crossed Putin have wound up dead. There are many examples of brutal murders (and attempted ones) of people Putin wanted silenced – that were public in the sense that he wanted to send a “this can/will be you” message to critics. He’s of course denied any responsibility for shootings, poisonings and so on but everyone knows who was responsible. However, one must also keep in mind two things – most of these but importantly not all have taken place in Russia or Russian spheres of influence. Some assassinations have taken place in western Europe. But the second thing is even more important to consider – Putin will murder people to protect his own butt/interests but he’s ex-KGB. He was also Spetnaz which is Russian Special Forces. IOW he’s well acquainted with all manner of ways to cause death, and even doing so in a way that makes it look like an accident. Or natural causes. The KGB “wet-works” department put a lot of effort into killing people and making it look like they just, to use a phrase I used earlier “up and died.”
Is it so crazy to think that if Putin got word that some old guy, even an American was not just talking to a reporter from a respected news outlet, but doing so openly and on the record AND naming names that included a big one (Flynn) already being targeted by investigators looking for collusion between the Trump Campaign and Russia? And that he (Putin) would want the guy shut the hell up? Remember, Smith was proud of what he’d done and clearly eager to get public credit for it. Now, some might say that Putin ordering the murder of an American on American soil would be “crossing the line.” To that I say it’s virtually certain that the Soviet Union did that type of thing (albeit quietly – as might have happened to Smith) in the past. More to the point though is that Putin has already gotten away with so much. Is it crazy to think he’d figure that as long as it was made to look like “natural causes” he’d get away with it now? After all, Smith was old and outside select GOP circles not well known. His death could easily be dismissed as just another older person dying. Without a really good autopsy with someone looking for specific things Smith’s death stood good odds of passing forensic muster.
I have no problem believing Putin would order a hit on Smith before he could do any more talking to the WSJ or anyone else. Putin has proven over and over again he will do whatever he has to including order deaths (and back when he was younger personally carry them out) to protect his interests. Given the institutional expertise the KGB was known to have, and given some of the public assassinations that have been carried out with poisons (radioactive and others) that have proven impossible to trace it’s clear all those files weren’t destroyed. So what if it crosses the line? So what if it’s audacious? Given what he’s gotten away with so often on so many fronts (IOW matters having nothing to do with the U.S.) Putin’s no more immune to hubris than anyone else. In fact, he’s probably far more susceptible than most leaders to succumbing to it. But if Putin did order Smith murdered it won’t wind up biting him in the hind-end unless some serious forensic work was done when Smith died. Even now it might not be too late, although it would be that much tougher to prove a month later.
So tell me, is it time for me to put on a tin-foil hat?SMORES and off-season comics again! Back to making the filly stuff.You know I think this is like the 4th smores type of comic I've done so far ever. Although this one isn't a Derpy one...how sad.Instead I got a Coloratura one and AJ and Camp Friendship. I am EXTREMELY tempted to turn these into a new comic series like I do with the filly Derpy/Spitfire series. These 2 have a lot of odd scenarios I can put them in cause I did used to go to camp a couple of years when I was younger. I didn't care for it back in the day.Anyway I hid the usual muffin in it. Gotta look carefully.Anyway so this comic I actually got 1/2 way done on this comic before Season 6 began. However I had to abandon it to work on the episode comic for season 6. I knew I would have to come back to this one at some point to finish it and pump it out but I needed the mid-season break to do that.hehe you can see a slight style difference from when I linearted this back in March.I will say this that Rara was actually easier to make than I expected. The problem is that damn tail...it's really annoying to get right and there's a lot of colors in her hair that added to the annoying part with her. I will mention though the backgrounds on this one were fun as hell. IDK what it is with night-time backgrounds but they start off hard but in the end they are some of my favorite ones to do and look really good in the end.So yeah I am likely gonna turn this into a camping series with AJ and Coloratura at some point. There's a lot I can do with them at the Camp cause you have to imagine this is probably for a few months or even a couple of years they went (although it's not specified in the show that). Also i like makong almost canon backstories and filly stuff. Anyway that I will worry about later....for now hope you like this one and it's back to a new antro pic next week....the one I have next is BY FAR the one is one of my favorite anime characters of all time and Twilight gets a crack at this one...it's perfect for her hair wise and stuff. Applejack, Coloratura © HasbroArt © MeThere may be no such thing as a Jewish gene, but communities can definitely have defining characteristics, and one such community is Jews with roots in central and eastern Europe.
A model based on the genetic sequencing of 128 Ashkenazi Jews concludes that today’s Ashkenazim descend from the fusion of European and Middle-Eastern Jews during the medieval era, between 600 to 800 years ago.
The math also indicates that today’s sprawling community of Ashkenazi Jews — there are more than 10 million around the world — derived from just 350 people or so. That previously postulated population bottleneck — a drastic reduction in population size — occurred between 25 to 32 generations ago, the scientists say.
The study was published Tuesday in the journal Nature Communications by a team headed by Columbia University’s Shai Carmon.
A number of genetic characteristics are associated with Ashkenazi groups, as opposed to other Jewish populations and other contemporary Middle-Eastern and European peoples.
Certainly they are genetically distinguishable. “Compared with European samples, our Ashkenazi Jewish panel has 47 percent more novel variants per genome,” write the scientists.
Unfortunately, Ashkenazim are also associated with no less than 19 genetic disorders, according to the Center for Jewish Genetics. Many are fatal and arise from single-gene mutations. The list includes forms of breast and ovarian cancer, Tay-Sachs disease and so-called maple syrup urine disease, in which the pee of affected children smells sweet.
Compared with Europeans in general, Ashkenazi Jews have a slightly greater deleterious mutation load, as it were. (Sephardi Jews have illnesses of their own, including the genetic disorder Wolman’s disease and an allergy to fava beans – the ful so loved by non-allergic Israelis.)
Equality cult ideology, if you distil it down, says that "people are all the same" in their genetic essence. If there are marked differences in the behavioural patterns of recognisable groups, it can only be because their lifetime experiences have affected their "equal" genetic potential in different ways. This is the reigning religious dogma of our age. I say religion because, in my view, the ideology of Equality, and the various social and political movements, it has spawned, exhibits the anthropological and historical characteristics normally associated with what are called "religions".The Jews, of course, know that this is a crock. They cherish their own distinctiveness, the sense of themselves as being a unique and superior people, indeed a "master race". Usually, they are extremely guarded about expressing this idea in public but it is not hard to find examples of it here and there, and we have seen it even in the comment sections on my blogs. They attach themselves to the Equality cult movement not because they really believe in it but because their find it useful for their own ethnic purposes.But if a population derives from as few as 350 people only a few hundred years ago, how can it seriously be argued that "people are all the same"? Any population bottleneck of that nature gives rise to what are called "founder effects". Founder effects occur when a population, for whatever reason, loses its natural genetic variety. This might happen, for example, if a smaller group breaks away from a larger population and migrates to a new territory, where it is then genetically segregated from the original population. Or it can happen if a significant percentage of an original, larger population dies, leaving behind a much smaller group to continue the "tribe".Whether because the new, smaller population has specific characteristics that caused them to leave the original group or allowed them to survive the catastrophe that severely diminished its numbers, or simply through sheer randomness, a group as small as 350 is going to be genetically distinctive. It will not have the normal distribution of characteristics that you would find in a much larger population. And whatever those distinctive characteristics are will, of course, be transmitted to the group's descendants using the normal mechanisms of genetic inheritance.This could, for example, explain the higher average intelligence of Ashkenazi Jews, which has been measured at 112-114, against the European norm of 100. It could be that the surviving group of 350 just happened to be unusually intelligent. Or perhaps their intelligence allowed them to survive some catastrophe while the less intelligent perished. It doesn't really matter. What does matter is that this new revelation completely legitimises the attribution of distinctive characteristics to "Ashkenazi" Jews, most of which will not be as readily measurable as IQ. No population that was bottlenecked down to 350, 600 years ago, is going to be able to recover the full range of normal genetic variety through the simple processes of mutation from then until now, especially when the group practises an ideology that prohibits mating with outsiders.So if you think Jews are unusually manipulative, contemptuous of freedom, paranoid, devious, ugly, beautiful, whatever your pet theory is, you now have carte blanche to advance it. Because this "bottleneck" revelation blows away the theory that "people are all the same" and establishes the certainty that founder effects of some sort, and therefore an unusual set of characteristics among Ashkenazi Jews, must exist.on •
Last year I took a Skeptours cruise with two dozen friends, around the Mediterranean. Our embarkation was from Istanbul.
Istanbul has been on my bucket list for decades, and was a place that I never thought I would get to visit. Although our stay here was short, I was not disappointed. Several of my fellow travelers planned to arrive a few days before the ship departed, so that we would have extra time to tour the city.
The trip from the airport gave me a hint of the treasures of the city. Although we wound our way through busy streets typical of any large city, I could see glimpses of the ancient city peeking through the signs advertising cell phones and soft drinks. As we entered the Sultanahmet District, the path turned into a rabbit’s warren of narrow streets.
I studied enough French in high school that I can make my way around France, and can puzzle out some Spanish. I know a smattering of German nouns. This is the first time I have ever felt like I was truly in a foreign country. Although they use the Latin alphabet, the Turkish language held no clues, and the culture was unlike any I have been in so far. I spent several days trying to perfect my pronunciation of teşekkür ederim (thank you) only to be corrected (albeit kindly) at every turn.
I read several books about Turkey and Istanbul before my trip (Istanbul’s Bazaar Quarter and National Geographic’s Traveler Guide are good starts), but once we arrived, we more or less winged along. My friends Chris and Irena had also arrived early, so we took the opportunity to see some of the mosques and the markets before the weekend crowds arrived.
The two things I most enjoy about traveling are looking at the architecture and signs, and new foods.
My photographs tend to reflect this interest. Here, I show some of the foods and colors we found in Istanbul. Chris found a great restaurant that had a balcony overlooking the Bosporus and the Blue Mosque. We sat all evening, watching the scene change from bright blue through shades of rose, coral, and pink, and then illuminated only by the electric lights.
Chris ordered a traditional chicken dish ‘testi’ which was delicious and filling.
I referred to the night we had ‘chicken testicles’ the rest of the trip, which I found hilarious but others, not so much. We also had meze with several meals. Meze is an assortment of small dishes, both hot and cold, that can be served as appetizers, with drinks, or for a meal. Eggplant is a common ingredient. I also found the prices quite reasonable, especially compared to my trips to London and Paris. The three of us enjoyed a bottle of wine, entrees, meze, and dessert, for under $100, and half of that was the wine.
I am lucky to have such easy-going travel companions. Irena was especially great, because as a world traveler she knew how to haggle with the shopkeepers and helped me buy scarfs and a small carved box that I might have paid the posted price for. Haggling wears me out, and I don’t enjoy it, but she is an artist!
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Categories: Art, Food, Friends, Skeptic, TravelAlmost 5,000 people were killed in Syria in January alone, according to new figures reported on Sunday which underscored the escalation of hostilities in a country thousands are fleeing every day.
The latest death toll – the second-worst month in the two-year conflict – was reported by the UK-based Syrian Observatory for Human Rights, a dissident group whose casualty estimates have been consistently confirmed by the UN. Its director, Rami Abdulrahman, said his researchers had recorded the deaths of 4,851 people in January, of whom 1,030 were members of the Syrian regular security forces while 3,305 were civilians or rebel irregulars.
The dismal figures – which come amid a growing refugee crisis in the |
regulators and investors to do so.”
Concerns have also been raised over Shell’s ability to clean up a spill in an area covered by sea ice for much of the year.
Pat Pourchot, who worked closely on Shell’s programme as the US Department of Interior’s special assistant for Alaska affairs from 2009 until February this year, told the Guardian that if a large spill did occur: “It’s really tough to talk about effective clean up. I don’t think anybody should have illusions. Clean up will be extremely modest.”
Shell has said it has mitigated the risks of a large spill as much as possible.Irish lock Ultan Dillane looks set to miss the start of the Six Nations with an ankle injury picked up in Connacht’s pre-Christmas loss away to Ulster.
Irish lock Ultan Dillane looks set to miss the start of the Six Nations with an ankle injury picked up in Connacht’s pre-Christmas loss away to Ulster.
The 23-year old is facing at least five to six weeks on the sideline and could be out for longer if he has to undergo surgery.
Connacht coach Pat Lam said that Dillane, who has chalked up eight caps since making his debut against England in Twickenham in Six Nations last season, is to see a specialist to establish the best way to resolve the injury.
“He is seeing an ankle specialist to determine that treatment plan. The best case scenario is five or six weeks, whether he is going to go down for surgery or no surgery recovery,” said Lam.
Dillane looks unlikely to be available for the Six Nations opener away to Scotland on February 4, with Ireland travelling to Italy a week later.
Meanwhile, Connacht coach Lam is again struggling to count fit bodies as the Pro12 champions strive to prevent a third league loss in a row when they head to Swansea on Saturday to take on high-flying Ospreys.
Captain John Muldoon has been ruled out with a hamstring injury picked up in training, while flanker Nepia Fox-Matamua also joins the unavailable list after dislocating a rib in the weekend home loss to Munster.
But the new crisis area for Connacht is at out-half with replacement scrum-half Caolin Blade put on standby duty to fill in if Jack Carty is unable to play.
Carty, who was called into his first Irish squad session this week, is struggling with a calf injury, with the other three number tens Marnitz Boshoff, Craig Ronaldson and Shane O’Leary all out of action.
“Jack can’t train at the moment, so Caolin has been in there covering but thankfully we haven’t had to use him there yet. But if Jack can’t play this week Caolin Blade will play 10,” added Lam.
Online EditorsPADUCAH, Ky. -– Sitting at a mahogany table on her new campaign bus, Democrat Alison Lundergan Grimes used her first substantive interview on issues to toss a nasty jab at her foe, Republican Sen. Mitch McConnell, and to begin unveiling her own positions in the high-profile Kentucky Senate race.
With an icy smile, the 34-year-old Grimes scoffed at the notion that she was philosophically or politically close to President Barack Obama, who is so unpopular here that he is mentioned by Kentucky Democrats fewer times than Voldemort ever was at Hogwarts.
“The president and I disagree on a lot of things,” she said. “Sen. McConnell will use the same tactics that the GOP has used in other red states, and try to claim that I was a cheerleader for President Obama.
“Well, I am as much a cheerleader for President Obama as Sen. McConnell is a Chippendale dancer.”
It was funny -– and definitely not nice. Even the thought of the doughy, 71-year-old McConnell in a dancer’s outfit might be enough to cost him a sixth term.
In a wide-ranging, half-hour interview, Grimes, the Kentucky secretary of state and presumptive Democratic Senate nominee for 2014, told me that she was pro-choice down the line on abortion, and that she would delay the Affordable Care Act’s requirement that small businesses provide medical coverage to their employees.
The two statements were her first substantive comments on policy matters. Until now she has spent most of her time attacking McConnell as the embodiment of all that is corrupt and unproductive about Washington.
The interview took place on the eve of the 133rd annual Fancy Farm Picnic, a church-sponsored day of politicking and speechifying on a rural expanse in the far-western Purchase region of Kentucky.
Grimes is one of five daughters in a devout Catholic family in Lexington. “I am a practicing Catholic,” she told me. “But I’m also for separation of church and state. I am supportive of the Supreme Court decision in Roe v. Wade. And I think that this is the kind of choice that has to be up to the woman, her God and her doctor.”
On the Affordable Care Act -– Obama’s signature legislative measure -– Grimes was cautiously critical. “I am troubled by some of the provisions,” she said, and for the first time said exactly which one.
“There are 700,000 businesses in Kentucky and I am concerned that especially the smaller ones are overburdened,” she said.
Her suggestion: delay the imposition of the coverage mandate on small business, as the president already has done for larger corporations.
“The mandate will not work for many small businesses in Kentucky,” she said, “so I believe that a delay is the right course so that changes can be made.”
She also blasted McConnell for wanting to abandon the law altogether, pointing out that the state’s health ratings are among the worst in the nation, and that other provisions in the law will extend coverage to an estimated 600,000 more Kentuckians.
“Unlike Sen. McConnell, I don’t want to throw the baby out with the bath water,” she said. Of course McConnell is being blasted by tea party conservatives for his refusal -– so far -– to sign a letter that would force the issue by tying the next budget and debt-ceiling bills to the “defunding” of the ACA.
“He has a tightrope to walk,” Grimes observed, not sympathetically.
Her opening gambits on the issues are revealing for what they show about her beliefs and the strategy -- disagree with Washington Democratic orthodoxy when she can; hew to it when it is useful.
A pure pro-choice view is a must in the Democratic Party, if for no other reason than so many women activists are motivated to vote for –- and work for -– the party because of their strong belief in that view.
Grimes clearly wants to tap the fast-growing power of women in the Democratic Party, a phenomenon with a surprisingly long history in Kentucky politics.
She stressed the female mentors in her life -– a teacher who taught her rhetoric, her mother and grandmothers, her four sisters. She proudly stated that she is the “youngest female secretary of state in the nation.”
It sounded like a rather obscure claim when she made it at the Marshall County Bean Supper in nearby Kentucky Lakes on Friday night.
But it drew a big round of applause -– even bigger than the one Marshall County Judge/Executive Mike Miller got when he auctioned off a donated “whole hog” for $350.
Her speech was primarily sound-bitten attacks on McConnell. It was well received, if only because Democratic loyalists deeply despise McConnell.
But to win -– she is in a dead-heat in some recent polls –- she will have to come of age on the fly in the midst of a grueling, 15-month race from here to November 2014.
Nobody really knows who she is or what she really stands for, but she began the process of saying so Friday night.A white tiger from the Cincinnati Zoo. Photo by Jim Larimore.
A white tiger is a striking creature. Tigers are always impressive animals, but when you take away the orange, the result is a big cat that looks like a phantom out of a dream. They seem almost magical, and yet I firmly believe that the world would be a better place if there was not a single white tiger in it.
There are only about 4,000 tigers, at most, remaining in the wild. Yet there are probably tens of thousands of captive tigers around the world (there is no official census). This would appear to make a compelling case for the existence of zoos and private collections. If tigers can survive and breed well in captivity, then perhaps more can be introduced to the wild when safe habitat becomes available. Yet that system isn’t working the way we think it does. A huge number of the captive tigers are hybrids of various subspecies and are so inbred that they will never be suitable for reintroduction to the wild. No tigers are more emblematic of this problem than white tigers.
I recently asked friends on Facebook to write down their thoughts about white tigers without searching for any new information. Some very intelligent people were under the impression that white tigers are a variety of Siberian tiger, camouflaged for a snowy climate. Others applauded zoos with white tigers for supporting conservation of white tigers while lamenting a lag in reintroduction efforts. Only one out of 27 respondents knew that white tigers are not a subspecies at all but rather the result of a mutant gene that has been artificially selected through massive inbreeding to produce oddball animals for human entertainment.
This level of misinformation should not come as a surprise. Many of the venues that display white tigers have a long history of shading the truth about their mutants. The Cincinnati Zoo, an otherwise respectable institution, labels their white tigers as a “species at risk!” Nowhere on the zoo’s website or at its tiger enclosures does it point out that this species at risk is in fact an ecologically useless hybrid of Bengal and Siberian strains, inbred at the zoo’s own facility for big money. The Cincinnati Zoo repeatedly bred closely related animals over the past few decades to produce more of the white tigers, which they sold for around $60,000 each.
One of the Cincinnati Zoo’s biggest sales was to the illusionists Siegfried and Roy. The Vegas duo bought three white tigers from the zoo in the early 1980s (along with stock from other sources) and quickly set up their own breeding program. Incorporating the white tigers into their act, Siegfried and Roy introduced the breed to millions of Americans. They referred to the cats as “royal white tigers” and, out of what was probably a good intention, gave the public the impression that this was an endangered species that they were helping to protect. Their famous Las Vegas show ended in 2003 when Roy Horn was mauled on stage in front of a horrified audience by one of his own white tigers. To date, Siegfried and Roy continue to claim on their website that their white tiger breeding program is part of a conservation effort aimed at saving “an endangered species.”
White tigers are white because they have two copies of an extremely rare recessive gene found in Bengal tigers (the gene has never been seen among pure Siberians or other subspecies). A very few white tigers were seen in the wild in the early 20th century. On the face of it, being a white object in the Bengal tigers’ tropical habitat of India and Southeast Asia can’t be good for a predator that needs to be camouflaged.
Other, more subtle problems that go along with the white coat would also prevent white tigers from ever becoming established as a wild population. The mutation (which is not albinism—white tigers can still produce melanin) also causes serious defects. White tigers in captivity tend to have problems with the way that their brains control their eyes and process visual stimulation. The animals are often cross-eyed in one or both eyes, bump into objects, and have trouble understanding spatial relationships when they are young. Animals with defects like these couldn’t survive for long in the wild, even though they have long lives in captivity. Other disorders, such as kidney problems, club feet, and shortened tendons, come from the severe inbreeding required to keep this recessive gene around.
Not all of the cubs produced in white tiger breeding schemes are white. Inbred, hybridized tiger cubs with an assortment of health problems aren’t good for much of anything except roadside attractions. Some are kept in hopes that they carry a copy of the white tiger gene that could be expressed in offspring. Carole Baskin, director of Big Cat Rescue, has taken in some breeding-project duds, including a cross-eyed white tiger born without an upper lip.
Every white tiger in a zoo is occupying an enclosure and a budget for food and veterinary care that could be used as part of a legitimate breeding program to protect the genetic diversity of endangered subspecies of tigers. There are fewer than 700 Sumatran tigers left on the planet, in captivity or in the wild. The Siberian tiger numbers no more than 1,000, at best. The survival of both subspecies is in jeopardy due to both habitat loss and a looming genetic bottleneck. We could safeguard the genetic diversity of both types of tigers with the cooperation of zoos and perhaps maintain them in captivity until the political issues that threaten their habitat can be alleviated. Some zoos, such as the National Zoo in Washington, D.C., and the Minnesota Zoo, do this now as part of a broad species-protection plan. But every zoo that devotes an enclosure to white tigers under the cover of a lie about conservation represents one more place where a legitimately endangered tiger could be kept.
In 2011, the Association of Zoos and Aquariums banned member zoos from breeding white tigers, lions, and cheetahs (PDF). This ban should prevent top-tier zoos from continuing to breed white tigers, and the Cincinnati Zoo has recently stopped selling white tigers. But it doesn’t prevent member zoos from continuing to display the animals. And as long as there is demand, those top-tier zoos may still obtain white tigers from other sources. Meanwhile, the white-washing of white tigers by major institutions helps maintain not only ticket revenue from a misled public but also misguided support for the rescue of a nonexistent endangered species.
As William Conway, former director of the New York Zoological Association put it many years ago, “White tigers are freaks. It’s not the role of a zoo to show two headed calves and white tigers.”
A white tiger that has already been born does not have a vote in the matter and cannot apologize for existing. Humanity has a collective responsibility to care for the two-headed calves and white tigers that we create for our own entertainment, but do we really need to be creating more of the genetic disasters that pull resources away from truly endangered species? There is no good reason to breed another white tiger. We can choose to keep every remaining white tiger in comfortable isolation. Tigers are solitary in the wild (unlike lions, which are social animals that normally live in prides). They do not need the company of other tigers in order to lead happy lives either in the wild or in captivity. We can choose a future in which white tigers disappear into memory and hopefully one in which truly endangered subspecies of tigers maintain enough genetic diversity to be successfully reintroduced into a wild that can sustain them.Guion from RGE: How did you and your team first decide to switch to plain-text emails?
It was in December 2015. We were approaching our Mac app launch. I prepared the release checklist, and as part of it, we looked at our welcome email after almost a year. I hated it. It was such a dense HTML email!
I went to our UX lead to ‘fix’ it. We were discussing on how to change the theme. The whole theme of the release was to keep things simple and distraction-free, just like our Mac app. During the discussion, I said — “why don’t we have a simple, plain-text email? It goes well with what we are doing”. He nodded. “Also, less work for the design and the development team!” I said, tongue-in-cheek.
From then on, the way we looked at our email campaigns changed. All drip (life cycle) emailers are now plain-text. Our users loved it. The response rate to our emails went up by 156%. Even for our newsletters, we try to keep things simple with just one image.
Old (Early 2015):
This feels one-directional if your goal is to start a conversation.
Current:
Response rates for this are up 156% over the HTML version! That’s change we can believe in.
Can you talk about the “all emails being conversations” ethos a bit?
At Newton, we are user-centric and are known for providing exceptional customer support. For us, every user matters. Everyone at Newton, including our CEO, responds to the customer tickets. We want to talk to our users, hear what they have to say.
Email is the best source of communication for us, and hence we strive to make every email we send conversational. Here are a few things that we follow:
We never send ‘No reply’ emails, even when we’ve to share the news with millions of our subscribers.
We encourage users to reply to all our emails, newsletters included.
We respond to all queries within a few minutes, even on holidays.
Here’s an example of an email we’ve sent to gather user feedback:
What have you found to be most valuable about your switch to plain-text email?
Better relations with the users. With a plain-text email, they know that they are talking to a human on the other end. It encourages them to reply more, share their thoughts/feedback freely. What’s more valuable to a young, growing company than their users’ feedback?
We discussed some types of businesses/email strategies that plain-text might not be preferable for (bank statements, sales promos, digests, etc). What’s an example of a time where you felt this tension for Newton (i.e. wanting to send an email campaign that could have really used HTML?)
There are a couple of instances: we ran a Thanksgiving offer, and another when we needed to share a lot of features as part of our new update. Even in such cases, where visual elements make your communication better, we try to keep things very simple. We either use a single, simple header image or convey the feature using of a GIF. We always stick to the simple/minimal nature of our brand.
Plain-text puts us right where we want to be: learning from our customers directly about how our product can serve them better.
If you could make your case for plain-text communication with customers using only one email from Newton’s last year, what would it be?
Our welcome email makes a strong case for plain-text emailers. But, let me better it.
There was a rare instance when one of our iOS updates started crashing for few users. We pushed an immediate fix, but still felt it was our responsibility to reach out to the users and offer an apology. And we did with this simple plain-text email:
We expected our users to abuse us, leave one-star reviews in the stores, and maybe leave us for our competitors. But, what followed is a different thing altogether: most of them only had kind words to say. Yes, the love for the product and the team behind it is the one reason they stuck with us. I’d also like to give credit to the no-nonsense, plain email we’ve sent them.
Plain-text puts us right where we want to be: learning from our customers directly about how our product can serve them better.Members of fraternal orders and their wives have carved and embroidered lodge regalia and ritual props that can befuddle outsiders. Curators, historians and dealers are decoding motifs on these objects, which often surface on the market as lodges close.
“The Badge of a Freemason: Masonic Aprons From the Scottish Rite Masonic Museum & Library,” written by Aimee E. Newell, director of collections at the Scottish Rite Masonic Museum & Library in Lexington, Mass., analyzes the textiles that members tie around their waists for lodge ceremonies. These leather and fabric squares are printed, painted, sewn and beaded with images including columns, stone archways, candelabra, burning bushes, construction tools, beehives and disembodied eyes, all symbolizing different virtues and aspirations. The museum purchased a few of the aprons in the last year. (They typically sell for a few hundred dollars each.)
Ms. Newell has identified the apronmakers, sellers and past owners, including a Union soldier who most likely stole his apron from a North Carolina lodge during the Civil War. Little other scholarship has been published about the Freemasons’ decorative arts, she said, and curators outside the Scottish Rite museum, worried that lodge members might be offended, sometimes shy away from displaying the pieces.
“There’s so much out there that’s still ripe for study,” she said.
“As Above, So Below: Art of the American Fraternal Society, 1850-1930” (University of Texas Press), by the art historian Lynne Adele and the folk art dealer and collector Bruce Lee Webb, explores gear used by groups including the Odd Fellows and the Modern Woodmen of America. Ms. Adele and Mr. Webb studied markings and mottos on gravestones, silk banners, furniture, lodge murals and sequined velvet costumes.A female firefighter in Toronto is coming forward with allegations of years of harassment and discrimination while she worked as a firefighter for Toronto Fire Services.
Jamie Wilson says she was punched at work by a male colleague on multiple occasions. And she says her platoon chief told her she better have "brought her birth control because [she] just got f--ked."
History of abuse with Toronto Fire Services
Wilson became a firefighter in 2006.
"Even when I passed the three-year mark, I kept thinking it would get better," Wilson told the fifth estate's Mark Kelley. "I made it up to seven years and it never really did."
She said the harassment went on for nearly 10 years. When she complained of harassment in 2008, she says she was moved to another fire hall.
Then, when her gear was tampered with, she says she was moved yet again to another fire hall.
By 2010, she arrived at one of the busiest stations in the City of Toronto, but she says she arrived with a reputation.
Frank Ramagnano, president of the Toronto Professional Firefighters Association, said, "we haven't treated her [Wilson] any different than any other member."
"The platoon chief said to me when I got to that hall: 'I hope you brought your birth control because you just got f--ked,' meaning now you're here, and I hear you complained in the past," Wilson told the fifth estate.
"The platoon chief said to me when I got to that hall: 'I hope you brought your birth control because you just got f--ked,' meaning now you're here, and I hear you complained in the past," Wilson told the fifth estate.
It would all come to a head in 2013 when she says she was punched on several occasions by a male colleague.
She says she was so afraid of him and didn't feel that she had support from her co-workers that she slept on a mat in the female washroom on overnight shifts.
"I was just so terrified to be near him," Wilson told the fifth estate.
By the fall of 2013, the City of Toronto hired an external lawyer to investigate the assault allegations relating to Wilson, as well as harassment complaints involving 24 other male firefighters.
The investigation took nine months to complete. It revealed inappropriate comments were made, and confirmed that Wilson was punched on one occasion.
The investigator downplayed Wilson's claims, and concluded that her colleagues were simply kidding around.
However, the investigator added in her report that many of the firefighters she spoke to "were coached prior to their interviews with me."
The investigator concluded many of the individuals "were not as honest and forthcoming as the investigation required."
Union troubles
Even after the investigation was complete, the union took six more months to file a grievance.
She eventually had to hire her own lawyer, who wrote to the union representing Toronto firefighters urging them to file a grievance on Wilson's behalf.
Niiti Simmonds says she wrote several letters and made numerous phone calls in an effort to put pressure on the union.
She says not everyone in the union was on Jamie's side.
"Some of them think that the core job of the union is to protect firefighters from complaints and to stop firefighters from losing their jobs or pay or seniority, and don't really think that investigating or dealing with human rights issues is the core part of what the union is supposed to be doing," Simmonds told the fifth estate.
It would take almost two years for the union to file a grievance on Wilson's behalf.
Toronto Fire Services tweet
Wilson says that's in stark contrast to what happened in 2013 when the Toronto Professional Firefighters Association took up the cause of three men fired by the City of Toronto for breaches in the city's social media policy.
One of the men tweeted: "I'd never let a woman kick my ass. If she tried something I'd be like. 'Hey, you! Get your bitch ass back in the kitchen and make me some pie!"
"They fought for those members. They filed grievances immediately and they had multiple arbitration dates, and two of them were rehired. They fought for them all the way," says Wilson.
"They fought for those members. They filed grievances immediately and they had multiple arbitration dates, and two of them were rehired. They fought for them all the way," says Wilson.
Frank Ramagnano is the president of the Toronto Professional Firefighters Association.
"I was so proud of being a firefighter," Wilson said. "I do love the job, but there's just all the discrimination and retaliation … I just can't go back."
He says in terms of how the association has conducted itself, "we haven't treated her any different than any other member."
But Ramagnano minimized Wilson's claim that she was assaulted.
"I punch my son. No one would say that's abuse. It all depends on the type, so I think you have to be careful when you generalize saying that she was punched."
Simmonds says this case should be a wakeup call for the union and the city.
"It's not just the union's role to prevent systemic discrimination. It's the employer's job," she says. "And what we want is for Jamie and the union to be working together to get the employer to change the work environment because they're the one with the power to make fundamental changes in the workplace."
Toronto Fire Chief Jim Sales refused to comment for this story.
Problems across the country
Wilson's struggle has played out in fire halls across Canada for decades.
Last fall, an investigation by the fifth estate uncovered dozens of complaints from female firefighters who said they were harassed, bullied, and physically and sexually assaulted by their male colleagues.
Jennifer Pernfuss is a coach and consultant on respect in the workplace. She's been hired by fire services across Canada, and says there is a "beast within the fire service" that is harming both women and men.
"In its extreme form, it's violence against women," Pernfuss told the fifth estate. "There is violence against men as well."
"In its less extreme form … [it's] harassment, bullying, discrimination that is causing psychological and physical harm to firefighters."
Jennifer Pernfuss says female fighters can't count on their male colleagues to support them in cases of discrimination.
"It's not unusual," she says. "Bystanders to this kind of conduct don't speak up because they themselves fear reprisal, and again that is justified because they will pay a price for taking on the perpetrators."
She says it creates a culture of silence.
Jamie Wilson now
In September, the City of Toronto offered Wilson a job with fire prevention. But Wilson said that after all she's been through, she doesn't want anything to do with the fire service.
She says she just wants another job working for the City of Toronto.
"I was so proud of being a firefighter," Wilson said. "I do love the job, but there's just all the discrimination and retaliation … I just can't go back."
Wilson has moved back in with her parents. And she has been diagnosed with Post Traumatic Stress Disorder.
"I became more and more isolated and I became afraid to go outside, so I was agoraphobic basically," she said.
"I kept working with my therapist, and just kept exposing myself to crowds and going out and riding the subway, but it just felt like somebody was going to physically assault me," she says.
Despite all that's happened, she feels it's important to speak out.
"I am optimistic that speaking about this. Even if it inspires one other person to come out of that horrible place where I was at where I felt so alone and unable to speak up, if it helps somebody else come out of their misery, then it's worth it," she said.
"I don't want anyone else to experience what I experienced."Media playback is unsupported on your device Media caption Lizo Mzimba takes a look back at James Gandolfini's career
James Gandolfini, the US actor best known for his role as a therapy-seeking mob boss in The Sopranos, has died at the age of 51.
Gandolfini suffered a possible heart attack while on holiday in Rome, the US HBO TV network told the BBC.
The New Jersey-born star had been in Italy to attend the Taormina film festival in Sicily.
He won three Emmy awards for his role as Tony Soprano, a mafia boss juggling his criminal career and family life.
Actress Edie Falco, who played his on-screen wife Carmela, said: "I am shocked and devastated by Jim's passing. He was a man of tremendous depth and sensitivity, with a kindness and generosity beyond words. I consider myself very lucky to have spent 10 years as his close colleague.
"My heart goes out to his family. As those of us in his pretend one hold on to the memories of our intense and beautiful time together. The love between Tony and Carmela was one of the greatest I've ever known."
Family friend Michael Kobald told a news conference in Rome that Gandolfini had experienced "a medical emergency" in his hotel room, where he was found by a family member.
"It is with immense sorrow that we report our client James Gandolfini passed away today while on holiday in Rome, Italy," said his managers, Mark Armstrong and Nancy Sanders, in a statement on Wednesday night.
"Our hearts are shattered and we will miss him deeply."
HBO also said the star of The Sopranos, which ran for six series on the cable channel from 1999-2007, would be "deeply missed".
From bartender to Broadway
James Gandolfini: 1961-2013 1961: Born in Westwood, New Jersey to school dinner lady and a bricklayer, both of Italian descent
Gained BA in Communications from Rutgers University
1993: Played woman-beating mafia enforcer Virgil in Tony Scott's True Romance
1995: Performed in Broadway's On the Waterfront.
1999: Debut appearance as New Jersey Mafia boss Tony Soprano, for which he won three Emmys and a Golden Globe during its eight-year-run
2007: Produced HBO documentary on injured Iraq War veterans and their devotion to America
2012: Executive producer of HBO film Hemingway & Gellhorn, starring Clive Owen and Nicole Kidman
"He was a special man, a great talent, but more importantly a gentle and loving person who treated everyone, no matter their title or position, with equal respect," said its statement.
"He touched so many of us over the years with his humour, his warmth and his humility."
Gandolfini was born in 1961 in Westwood, New Jersey, to a school dinner lady and a bricklayer-turned-school caretaker, both of Italian background.
He graduated with a degree in communications from New Jersey's Rutgers University.
Then he moved to New York, finding work as a bartender and a club manager.
Gandolfini's acting career took off in 1992 when he landed a part in a Broadway production of A Streetcar Named Desire.
His breakthrough role came a year later playing a mobster in the movie True Romance.
Gandolfini's more recent film credits included In The Loop, Zero Dark Thirty and Killing Them Softly.
He was nominated for a Tony theatre award in 2009 for his role in the Broadway hit God of Carnage.
'Genius'
Gandolfini is survived by his second wife, Deborah Lin, a former model from Hawaii, whom he married in 2008, and their daughter, Liliana, born last year.
He also leaves a teenage son, Michael, from his first marriage to Marcy Wudarski, his former personal assistant. They wed in 1999 and split three years later.
Sopranos creator David Chase said Gandolfini was a "genius".
"He is one of the greatest actors of this or any time," he said. "A great deal of that genius resided in those sad eyes."
Image caption Gandolfini with his second wife, Deborah Lin
Lorraine Bracco, who played Tony Soprano's psychiatrist, Dr Jennifer Melfi, in the TV drama, said: "We lost a giant today. I am utterly heartbroken."
Jeff Daniels, who starred with Gandolfini in God of Carnage, said: "If Broadway has a version of a guy you want in your foxhole, Jim Gandolfini was mine."
In a December 2012 interview with the Associated Press news agency, Gandolfini said he had become an actor to overcome his anger.
"I don't know what exactly I was angry about," he said.
"I try to avoid certain things and certain kinds of violence at this point," he added. "I'm getting older, too. I don't want to be beating people up as much."Peter Thiel, the tech industry magnate known for co-founding PayPal and being an early investor in Facebook, on Tuesday launched a new program called Breakout Labs aimed at funding cutting-edge, early-stage science and technology research ideas.
Breakout Labs will be run as part of the Thiel Foundation, the non-profit organization founded by Thiel with a stated mission is to “defend and promote freedom in all its dimensions: political, personal, and economic.” Thiel announced the initiative Tuesday afternoon during a speech at Stanford University.
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Breakout Labs will aim to fund very nascent research proposals — opportunities that are too early stage or radical to attract dollars from VCs or government grants. All types of scientific projects will be considered for support, and funding will typically range from $50,000 to $350,000. The Thiel Foundation says it has begun evaluating proposals and expects to announce the first awards as early as this December.
Lindy Fishburne, who will serve as Breakout Labs’ executive director, explained the program’s modus operandi with the following statement:
“Venture capital firms look for research that can be brought to market within five to seven years, and major funders like the National Institutes of Health have a low tolerance for radical ideas. At Breakout Labs, we’re looking for ideas that are too ahead of their time for traditional funding sources, but represent the first step toward something that, if successful, would be groundbreaking.”
Breakout Labs says it will be set apart from traditional research funds in part because the projects it funds will be entrepreneurial and not beholden to their funding organization. Money earned by successful projects will be expected to assign “a modest portion” of their revenue back to Breakout Labs, but will otherwise be free to run as a standalone business.
It’s a big effort, and it makes sense it’s coming from Peter Thiel, who himself is known for his bold ideas and a willingness to stand out from the crowd. Overall, it seems like Breakout Labs will be an exciting program to watch in the months — and maybe even years — ahead.Aaron Chapman’s latest book, The Last Gang in Town, was launched at the Biltmore a couple of weeks back. I didn’t make it to the launch, but did manage to catch up with Aaron last week and interview him about the book.
I also enjoyed reading about the years when the Clark Park Gang was the most infamous of Vancouver’s “park gangs.” They were always brawling with police and others. They became the focus of a special police task force that the gang dubbed the H-squad.
Aaron also put me in touch with former gang member Danny “Mouse” Williamson who told me that he always figured their lives in the 60s and 70s would make a good book.
“We’ve always been talking about doing it because people just wouldn’t believe the stuff that happened. I see stuff in the movies and say `hey we had stuff like that happen but it was even better than the movies.’”
Here’s my story:
In Vancouver’s scrappy days, the Clark Park Gang ruled East Van
Growing up in East Vancouver, Danny “Mouse” Williamson was taught to be tough and stand up for himself, even against the police.
“We didn’t trust the police. My dad had been arrested for different things. He was always a fighter and a drinker and he always taught me not to take shit off anybody,” Williamson recalled last week.
Now 63 and living in Grand Forks, Williamson is one of the original members of the Clark Park Gang that battled both police and rivals from other Vancouver “park” gangs in the 1960s and 1970s.
“We were young, rambunctious and thought we were undefeatable. And that included the police. … We either ran like hell and got away from them or we stood our ground and beat them fair and square.”
The story of the infamous Clark Park Gang has been told by Vancouver writer and historian Aaron Chapman in his new book The Last Gang in Town.
Chapman interviewed Williamson and other former Clark Parkers and pored over news archives, police records, court transcripts and other documents in researching his latest book.
He also interviewed retired Vancouver police officers charged with disrupting the gang, which could mobilize hundreds on short order for a street brawl.
Chapman said in an interview that he’s been interested in the history of the Clark Park Gang since the 1980s.
“As somebody who was born and raised here, I’d thought about it in high school since the night I was at a house party where people who were apparently the Clark Park Gang showed up and trashed the place and beat up a bunch of people and I escaped out a back window,” Chapman said.
In fact, the party crashers were just using the name of the mythical gang, which had largely dispersed by the late 1970s.
“It was one of the great unknown stories of Vancouver — the Clark Park gang and that name and who they were was such a myth for so long,” Chapman said. “It’s one of those old sort of secret stories of Vancouver.”
What he learned was that the Clark Parkers emerged from Vancouver’s east side when the city was very different than today.
“It all hearkens back to |
so as to allow for intricate modification and control of a fragment’s trajectory. The cargo operator’s display allows for a variable magnification zoom, which is necessary since attractive and repulsive forces are applied at the precise location denoted by the target cursor. Application of force to a fragment’s extremity, then, will typically result in generating a rotation on the object rather than any significant change in its direction. Thus, considerable skill – including the ability to quickly estimate an object’s approximate center of mass – is required in order to efficiently apply forces and guide fragments along the desired path.
Refinery operator
The position of refinery operator only exists on mining ships that contain an integrated refinery. Refineries allow raw ore to be gradually converted into their purified component forms, with the undesirable elements being ejected back out into space in the form of dust. Purified materials consume a small fraction of the storage space of their unrefined counterparts, which is of particular concern when dealing with low quality asteroid fields that possess valuable elements only in a highly diffused form, or when attempting to minimize the number of return trips back to a trading or storage facility. The refinery operator controls the routing of ore to a variety of specialized processing units, each of which has a different role to play in the separation of one material from another. Operator errors in the refinement process can cause sensitive equipment to fail, stalling the conversion process and costing valuable time until the affected item is replaced, typically with a surplus part stored in the ship’s inventory.
All of the aforementioned specialist positions may be helmed by either a player or an NPC, with more experienced NPCs performing their duties in superior fashion, but usually at the expense of demanding a higher monthly salary.
Selling Your Cargo
The final step in the mining process is converting your meticulously collected ore or refined materials into payment for your efforts.
If you accepted a job, you’ll want to return to the agent that hired you and complete the transaction, resulting in your account being credited for the promised amount and a bump in your reputation for successfully completing the task. The agent will only purchase the specific type and quantity of materials that you promised to deliver, though, so you’ll likely want to head to the local TDD to convert any surplus materials into credits.
For players that elected to operate as freelance miners, the path is often a bit less clear. Different TDDs at different landing zones may offer dramatically different prices, so you’ll often want to do a bit of due diligence and ensure that you’re not leaving any money on the table by quickly accepting whatever’s being offered at the closest landing zone. The really significant scores, though, are often made by extracting a common material of limited value in one star system, and then transporting it to another where it’s in shortly supply and the prices are much higher. It’s your choice as to whether you want to operate exclusively as a miner, or do double duty as a transport freighter by lugging your own valuable cargo across the galaxy, and whether the risks you’ll face in that endeavor – as you get ever closer to an area where your material is highly valued, you’ll become a much more tempting target – are justified by the richer potential payday.
One last option that some miners might wish to undertake is related to speculation. If you’re inclined to gamble, some landing zones will offer storage facilities that you can purchase on a monthly basis. Rather than selling your cargo immediately, you might wish to hold on to it, with the hope or expectation that – perhaps as a result of actions you’re planning to initiate with the aid of your organization – prices might rise significantly in the near future.
“Ultimately, that’s what Star Citizen is all about – every player making their own unique decisions as to how they want to proceed at every step of the way.”Jameis Winston of the Tampa Bay Buccaneers watches from the sidelines of the NFL game against the Arizona Cardinals on September 18, 2016 in Glendale, Arizona. (Photo by Christian Petersen/Getty Images) Jameis Winston of the Tampa Bay Buccaneers watches from the sidelines of the NFL game against the Arizona Cardinals on September 18, 2016 in Glendale, Arizona. (Photo by Christian Petersen/Getty Images)
- Sexual assault allegations are swirling around Tampa Bay Buccaneers quarterback Jameis Winston after an Uber driver claims Winston touched her between her legs without consent during a car ride back in 2016.
Winston’s accuser, a woman who called herself “Kate,” told Buzzfeed News she picked up Winston from a popular party section of Scottsdale, Arizona.
She claims Winston was alone and hopped in the front seat but during the trip, Kate says Winston was screaming homophobic comments at pedestrians.
Once they stopped at a drive-thru for food, Kate says Winston, “reached over and put his fingers on my crotch. It wasn't accidental.”
She claims he kept his hand there for about three to five seconds.
LINK: Read the BuzzFeed report
This marks the second time the quarterback has been accused of sexual misconduct. In college, a woman said he raped her, but that case was settled in a civil court.
As for this accusation, both Winston and his reps responded to the woman's accusation by saying the statements she made were false and that the Bucs star wasn't alone in the car.
In a statement Winston has since tweeted, he said in part:
“I believe the driver was confused as to the number of passengers in the car and who was sitting next to her. The accusation is false, and given the nature of the allegation and increased awareness and consideration of these types of matters, I am addressing this false report immediately.”
Kate says she filed a complaint with Uber but not the police because she was afraid of getting negative attention.
Winston says he refuted the allegations to Uber back in 2016, but the ride share service ultimately banned him anyway.
The Buccaneers organization put out a statement saying partly, “We take these matters seriously and are fully supportive of the investigation that is being conducted by the NFL.”
Winston did say he apologizes to the woman if he made her feel uncomfortable and does not want to get into a public debate with her.
The NFL confirmed to TMZ Sports the league is investigating the situation, and the Buccaneers issued a statement saying they were "supportive" of the NFL's investigation.
LINK: Read the latest from TMZ SportsThe importance of Bayes statistics, explained with predictive policing
Julian Carpenter Blocked Unblock Follow Following Jul 1, 2017
Originally published at welivein.space on July 19, 2017.
Due to limitations on Medium, the plots and equations are rendered as png.
Visit my blog at welivein.space to see them in as they are intended.
Why statistics?
All of the hype about machine learning, neural networks, A.I. and what-not is in it’s core pure statistics.
We are living in the age of big data. And despite being at the center of societal interests, most people know very little about how we make sense of huge amounts of information. In this article I want to present and explain a simple statistical model (Bayes theorem) and motivate it with a real-world application: Predictive policing.
Complex statistics are becoming more and more a part of our daily life, although we are not aware of this most of the time. All the recommendations we get from Amazon, Google, Facebook and so on, they are part of what we consume, part of how we perceive our environment. All of the hype about machine learning, neural networks, A.I. and what-not is in it’s core pure statistics. It’s always about probability distributions, metrics, f-divergences, likelihood functions, and regression problems. I will talk about all of that in subsequent articles, but for now we stick to the basics. In order to better understand what is presented to us all the time, we need to understand what statistics are and should be able to interpret a sentence like: The probability of something is so and so.
The case
Let me start by motivating the topic of this article with a reference to a science-fiction movie: Minority Report. In this movie three children have the psychic ability to foresee crimes which the police uses to prevent these crimes before they happen. But of course there is a problem. The children, called precogs, see sometimes different outcomes for potential crimes. So in short they are not 100% sure about the suspect. This is of course unacceptable and — spoiler alert — the program shuts down in the end. Later on in this article I will make the case that even a tiny deviation from a 100% success rate — or true positive rate — bears large consequences for the list of potential suspects.
Predictive policing in Minority Report
With the rise of computational power and big data, police forces saw the need to get a “precog” system on their own and so: Predictive policing was born. There are a lot of competing ideas how statistics and machine learning can support police work and I want to point out that I am not writing this article to discredit any of them, there was a very thorough discussion about ethical and feasibility issues in the New York Times, ProPublica and the MIT Technology review, all of them are highly recommended. My goal here is to emphasize that we have to pay very close attention when it comes to statistical inference these days, because it is everywhere and sometimes counter-intuitive. I also highly recommend you take a look at Algorithm Watch, a Berlin-based non-profit that’s trying to shed some light on complicated algorithmic processes that otherwise would go unnoticed. But let us get back to predictive policing.
In February 2014 the Chicago police department (CPD) was sending police officers to the homes of potential suspects most likely to be involved in a crime because of a list called the “Heat List” on which these people appeared. This list was not compiled manually but by a machine learning algorithm who took several factors into account. The CPD claimed this list would contain the “400 most dangerous people in Chicago”, but never fully disclosed how their algorithm predicts potential suspects. One official statement was that it is “based on empirical data compared with known associates of the identified person” but the Conference on Civil and Human Rights concluded in their 2014 report that there “… is no public, comprehensive description of the algorithm’s input.”
The funding for the CPDs predictive policing project came from the National Institute of Justice (NIJ) who made millions of dollars available in 2009 for “the application of analytical techniques — particularly quantitative techniques — to identify likely targets for police intervention and prevent crime or solve past crimes by making statistical predictions”. Back to 2014, on the first field test, one person on the list was Robert McDaniel, who never committed a crime but had the wrong social connections and was visited by the police who offered “social services and a tailored warning”. McDaniel said in an interview with the Chicago Tribune: “I haven’t done nothing that the next kid growing up hadn’t done. Smoke weed. Shoot dice.”
Pressed on how reliable the predictions of the CPD algorithm were, Miles Wernick, the technical lead of the CPD predictive policing program, answered: “These are persons who the model has determined are those most likely to be involved in a shooting or homicide, with probabilities that are hundreds of times that of an ordinary citizen”. Or as Steven Caluris, the Deputy Chief of Crime Control Strategies of the CPD, put it:
“If you end up on that list, there’s a reason you’re there”.
The first quote, by Wernick, will be the base for our calculations which will show that the second quote, by Caluris, is a dangerous statement and mostly incorrect.
We need some math
First, we’re trying to make an educated guess about the probability that someone who is on this list was never part of a violent crime. Since Wernick stated that the algorithm would take the criminal history into account and implied normal citizens would not appear on this list, we can relate criminal records directly to the prediction capabilities of the algorithm. If you never committed a violent crime and then someday the police is standing at your door, saying you might one day become an offender because statistics told them, you have to agree, then this is highly problematic. Second, we will make a guess about a way more serious allegation, the possibility that an actual future murder is on the list. But for both we need to take a look at some math:
In statistics there is one very fundamental theorem, it’s called Bayes theorem and it looks like this:
A and B are so-called events and:
P(A) and P(B) are the probabilities of observing one of the events without regard to the other. P(A)is called the prior and P(B) the marginal.
and P(B) the. P(A|B) is the conditional probability of observing event A given that B is true. This is what we’re interested in and it is called the posterior.
. P(B|A)is the conditional probability of observing event B given that A is true, it’s often called the likelihood.
We will go through every term and develop an interpretation about how to understand this equation. In Short: Bayes theorem is about how probable some event is, given that a theory is true and affected by a new piece of information. So lets start with our first question:
1. How probable is it that someone on this list has never committed a violent crime?
So, A and B are events. That means they are a set of outcomes and for our first question A and B have two possible outcomes each:
We are interested in: P(“no criminal record”|“on list”) that is: The probability that: It is true that someone is on the list without having a criminal record for violent crimes.
Finding the likelihood
In this scenario we presume a binary criterion for the list, either you’re on it or you’re not. We are looking for the likelihood P(“on list”|“no criminal record” and for that we use the quote of Miles Wernick who promised that a suspect on this list had a probability to be involved in a violent crime “hundreds of times that of an ordinary citizen”. We make a conservative guess and state that the true positive and the true negative rate of the CPDs algorithm is 99.8 %. This means that if your name is on the list the algorithm is 99.8% sure that you’re a future criminal. People on this list have then a probability that is 500 times higher than of an ordinary citizen, this should be sufficient to satisfy Miles Wernicks statement.
In this scenario we presume a binary criterion for the list, either you’re on it or you’re not. We are looking for the likelihood P(“on list”|“no criminal record” and for that we use the quote of Miles Wernick who promised that a suspect on this list had a probability to be involved in a violent crime “hundreds of times that of an ordinary citizen”. We make a conservative guess and state that the true positive and the true negative rate of the CPDs algorithm is 99.8 %. This means that if your name is on the list the algorithm is 99.8% sure that you’re a future criminal. People on this list have then a probability that is 500 times higher than of an ordinary citizen, this should be sufficient to satisfy Miles Wernicks statement. Finding the prior
Now this is a bit tricky. Sadly there is no publication — or at least I was unable to find one — about the number of citizens with a violent crime record. Instead we start with the Strategic Plan of the Bureau of Justice Statistics that states that nearly 68 Million American citizens have a criminal record may it violent or not. This is actually a pretty insane number, for instance it is higher than the entire U.S. population of 1900 and it is also on par with the number of Americans who have a Bachelor’s Degree, see also here. Now we look at the percentage of all crimes that were violent crimes, this is in the yearly crime report of the F.B.I.. It states that arrests for violent crimes accounted for 4.7% of all crime-related arrests in 2015. This translates to roughly 3.2 Million Americans, or 1.3%, who most probable have a violent criminal record, and 98.7% who haven’t.
Now this is a bit tricky. Sadly there is no publication — or at least I was unable to find one — about the number of citizens with a violent crime record. Instead we start with the Strategic Plan of the Bureau of Justice Statistics that states that nearly 68 Million American citizens have a criminal record may it violent or not. This is actually a pretty insane number, for instance it is higher than the entire U.S. population of 1900 and it is also on par with the number of Americans who have a Bachelor’s Degree, see also here. Now we look at the percentage of all crimes that were violent crimes, this is in the yearly crime report of the F.B.I.. It states that arrests for violent crimes accounted for 4.7% of all crime-related arrests in 2015. This translates to roughly 3.2 Million Americans, or 1.3%, who most probable have a violent criminal record, and 98.7% who haven’t. Finding the marginal
To find the marginal P(B), this is P(“on list”) and P(“not on list”), we need to find a substitute. We don’t know the probability to appear on the heat list without regard to a criminal record, but we know both the likelihoods P(B|A) and P(B|¬A) and we also know the prior for having a criminal record or having no record P(A) and P(¬A). We therefore can write:
Let’s think about this again and write it out for one outcome. For the case “on list” this statement means that the probability to appear on the list, without regard of a criminal record, is equal to the sum between appearing on the list with a record and appearing on the list without one. Since you can only have one of these two outcomes, all scenarios are covered.
Now it’s time to put everything together, our final equation looks like this:
And we’re ready to insert all the numbers:
Please bear in mind that these are all rough estimates based on conservative initial guesses mainly aiming to provide an intuition for statistical processes, but the bottom line here is:
While the algorithm is 99.8% sure that someone is about to commit a crime, the chances that this person was never arrested for a violent crime are 13.2%. This means on the CPDs original list of the 400 most dangerous people were, under this assumptions, approximately 53 people who never even were arrested for a violent crime.
Very important here to remember is that the CPD never explicitly said they would only consider citizen without a violent crime record. Therefore these 53 people are maybe on purpose there. This arguably is controversial at the least. We will now look at a more serious crime and then give an intuitive explanation for these numbers.
2. How probable is it that an actual future murderer is on this list?
If someone in January 2015 decided to become a future murderer then we would have by the end of 2015 a record of that. We therefore can look at all murder crimes conducted in that year and make a guess about how high the chances are this person would have appeared on the heat list in January 2015.
The number of murder crimes throughout 2015 was which corresponds to a murder rate of 4.9 per inhabitants. We’re claiming that every murder was committed by different person. This is probably not true but it gives us an upper boundary for calculations. We also need to state that the algorithm is in principle able to identify a future murder with a reasonable accuracy. This is also not necessarily true but we presume it has the same true positive and true negative rate as in our previous calculation. Both were 99.8%, we derived this based on the statement of Miles Wernick.
In statistics there is a funny name for a very useful thing. The confusion matrix. It gives you an overview about the true/false positive/negative rates in a compact form. Here is ours:
Let’s think about this again. We are not only saying that this algorithm is almost perfect in predicting a future murder out of a pool of people that really were about to became a murderer (True Positives), we are also saying that it is almost perfect in predicting you are an ordinary citizen without murderous intentions (True Negative).
So, given all boundary conditions, lets see how the chances are that an actual future murder is on the list. The math hasn’t changed so we just plug in our numbers into Bayes theorem:
And there you have it:
The chances that our algorithm will find an actual future murderer are only 19.66%.
So it has a questionable usefulness. Well, how can that be? If you paid attention you realized that our future murderer prediction probability is directly proportional to the violent murder rate. Therefore it’s interesting to make this calculation for all the years where there’s violent murder data, and in fact it proves true: The more murderers in general, the better our algorithm works, this can be seen here:
The probability to find an actual future murderer is in red and uses the right y axis.
The violent murder rate is in blue and uses the left y axis. Data taken from here.
The probability to find an actual future murderer is in red and uses the right y axis. The violent murder rate is in blue and uses the left y axis. Data taken from here.
To understand this we need to have a look at base rates.
The base rate fallacy
The base rate is essentially the question: “…out of how many?”. Here is an easy example: Some test for having a cold is always 99% right and out of people actually have a cold. You would think, that if you get a positive test result, you have a 99% chance to have a cold. But in truth it is only roughly 50% because the test correctly identified 990 from the 1000 as having a cold, but it also turned out positive for 1% of the healthy people. So from the people with a positive test, only 990 really had a cold.
Base rates are very important in statistic but are often neglected. There is research (here, here and here) that most people seem to even prefer Non-Bayes explanations. This is troublesome because it leads always to wrong conclusions and expectations.
Let us look at our police algorithm example in a simplified way. First we assume the algorithm has a true positive rate and a true negative rate of 100% and furthermore we state that 100 people are classified as a future criminal out of a pool of 500. We can plot this, where blue dots are people who actually went on to became a future criminal and red dots are ordinary citizen:
We see, every future criminal is correctly identified and the chance of a future criminal to be on the list is 100%.
Now let us consider the case that the true positive rate is still 100% but the true negative rate is only 50%. This would look like this:
The algorithm miss-classified some future criminals as citizen. Although every single person on our heat list is actually going to be a future criminal, there is now a considerable amount of criminals who are not on the list. Even worse, the number of criminals who are not on the list is two times higher than the criminals on the list. This means: Out of 500 People, 300 are future criminals but only 100 are labeled as such. Therefore if you are a future criminal, chances that you’re on the list are only 40%. And this despite the fact that our algorithm is never wrong when he labels someone a future criminal. So we see, base rates are a significant factor when it comes to conclusions from statistics.
“Bayes thinking” is also important for every-day scenarios, like the real chances that you are drunk when you get a positive test result from a breathalyzer or how likely it is that you have cancer after you get a positive test result. The wikipedia has an article about it for further information and I recommend reading it.
In reality you never have a true positive rate of 100% and since we’re talking about huge statistics, the size of the American population, even a tiny deviation from 100% would directly affect millions of citizens. So the actual prediction (True Positives) is sketchy to begin with and on top of that you will always have very high base rates that need to be taken into account or otherwise you end up making the wrong conclusions, just like Steven Caluris did when he was stating that there would be a reason for being on the list. Very often there isn’t one, just statistics.
Please bear in mind that this article is not an accurate assessment of the usefulness, or morality, of predictive policing but merely an introduction to Bayes thinking. I hope it will help you when you need to draw conclusions for your own reflections.Global poll reveals skepticism about data breach disclosures and anticipated hiring challenges due to cybersecurity skills gap
Rolling Meadows, IL, USA (11 January 2016) — Close to two-thirds (63%) of global IT professionals oppose giving governments backdoor access to encrypted information systems, and similar numbers (59%) feel that privacy is being compromised in an effort to implement stronger cybersecurity laws. The survey by global IT and cybersecurity association ISACA of 2,920 members in 121 countries also reveals marked skepticism about the likelihood of organizations sharing data breach information voluntarily as called for by the recently passed U.S. Cybersecurity Information Sharing Act of 2015.
ISACA’s January 2016 Cybersecurity Snapshot shows mixed attitudes toward sharing information after a data breach. Eighty-three percent of those polled favor regulation requiring companies to notify customers within 30 days of the discovery of a data breach – a 10-point increase in little more than a year. Nearly three-quarters (72%) of US respondents say they are in favor of the U.S. Cybersecurity Information Sharing Act of 2015, which encourages cyberthreat information sharing between the government and the private sector. Yet, only 46% believe their own organization would do so voluntarily if it experiences a data breach.
“The Cybersecurity Snapshot shows that the professionals on the front lines of the cyberthreat battle recognize the value of information-sharing among consumers, businesses and government, but also know the challenges associated with doing so,” said Christos Dimitriadis, Ph.D., CISA, CISM, CRISC, international president of ISACA and group director of information security at INTRALOT. “Cybersecurity has become a high-stakes, boardroom-level issue that can have crippling consequences for any C-suite executive who lacks knowledge about the issues and risks. Strong public-private collaboration and ongoing knowledge-sharing are needed to safeguard our organizations from cybercriminals.”
Top Three Threats for 2016
The three threats that global IT and security professionals are most concerned about for their organization this year are:
Social engineering (52%) Insider threats (40%) Advanced persistent threats (APT) (39%)
These items outranked options frequently associated with cyberattacks, including malware, unpatched systems and distributed denial-of-service attacks.
Cyber Skills Gap Still a Big Problem
According to the findings, the cybersecurity skills gap continues to pose a significant obstacle to organizations seeking to expand their cyber workforce. Close to half (45%) of those surveyed worldwide report that they are hiring more cybersecurity professionals in 2016, yet fully 94% of those hiring say it will be difficult to find skilled candidates. Identifying who has adequate skills and knowledge will also be difficult, say more than six in 10 survey participants.
“The aggressive increase in cyberattacks worldwide is feeding a growing chasm between demand and supply in the cybersecurity talent wars. It is also shedding light on a critical problem in our industry: identifying job candidates who are truly qualified to safeguard corporate assets in a landscape that is highly complex and constantly evolving,” said Eddie Schwartz, CISA, CISM, CISSP-ISSEP, PMP, international vice president of ISACA and president and COO of WhiteOps.
ISACA was the first to combine skills-based vendor-neutral cybersecurity training with performance-based exams and certifications to address the cyber talent shortage with the launch the CSX Practitioner certification in August 2015.
New Report Added to Cybersecurity Legislation Watch
To help organizations understand the implications of the new U.S. legislation, ISACA today added a new report to its Cybersecurity Legislation Watch center, part of Cybersecurity Nexus (CSX). The report, US Enacts Cybersecurity Information Sharing Legislation, analyzes the Cybersecurity Act of 2015 (P. L. 114-113), which was recently passed by the US Congress and signed by President Barack Obama. The report includes a look at the background of the act, its expected impact on business and criticisms from privacy advocates. To view the special report, visit www.isaca.org/cybersecurity-legislation.
ISACA launched Cybersecurity Nexus (CSX) in 2014 to help address a growing worldwide cybersecurity skills crisis. CSX is a central location of cybersecurity research, guidance, certificates and certifications, education, mentoring and community. ISACA recently introduced skills-based training with performance-based exams and CSX certifications to help professionals build and evolve their careers in cybersecurity. Last year marked the successful debut to a sold-out crowd of the North America CSX 2015 Conference, dedicated specifically to cybersecurity. In 2016 ISACA is expanding the cybersecurity event to Europe and Asia.
About ISACA
ISACA (isaca.org) helps global professionals lead, adapt and assure trust in an evolving digital world by offering innovative and world-class knowledge, standards, networking, credentialing and career development. Established in 1969, ISACA is a global nonprofit association of 140,000 professionals in 180 countries. ISACA also offers the Cybersecurity Nexus (CSX), a holistic cybersecurity resource, and COBIT, a business framework to govern enterprise technology.
Twitter: https://twitter.com/ISACANews
ISACA on LinkedIn: ISACA, https://www.linkedin.com/company/isaca
Facebook: www.facebook.com/ISACAHQ
Contact:
Joanne Duffer, +1.847.660.5564, news@isaca.org
Kristen Kessinger, +1.847.660.5512, news@isaca.org
Sara Bosco, +1.646.935.4366, sara.bosco@ketchum.com- Advertisement -
Note: Version with additional graphics can be found at:
www.newagecitizen.com
Please take a moment to look at the following screenshot from Obama's transition website: www.change.gov
The screenshot was taken on 12/20/2008 and I've preserved it because I will bet that he will bury this "skunky corpse" in a matter of days. Why?
Because it illustrates that Obama has absolutely no intention of bending to the will of the American people. The screenshot shows that the most requested "change" that the American people want to see is the Re-Legalization of Marijuana.
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Let's think about this for a moment. Nearly 20,000 Americans offered nearly 10,000 suggested changes and Marijuana Re-Legalization received the most support of any other suggested change.
So here was how the suggested change--that received the most support of ANY other question--was worded:
"Will you consider legalizing marijuana so that the government can regulate it, tax it, put age limits on it, and create millions of new jobs and create a billion dollar industry right here in the U.S.?"
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And here is the insulting response we got to the most supported suggestion for change, from President Elect Obama's transition team:
President-elect Obama is not in favor of the legalization of marijuana. Transition Team, Washington, D.C.
So Obama thinks he can just "blow us off" on the issue of Marijuana Re-Legalization despite the good that Marijuana Re-Legalization could bring:
(1) It would destroy the Mexican Drug Cartels and local drug gangs.
(2) It would provide some counterbalance to the liberties lost through the Patriot Act and other legislation that received bi-partisan support from Republicans and Democrats alike.
(3) It would erase the criminal records of millions of upstanding American's whose only crime was to use a harmless non-alcoholic drug.
But of course that is exactly why Obama will not Re-Legalize Marijuana. Most of his campaign money came from the very interests that are opposed to Marijuana Re-Legalization. Consider the following:
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* Attorneys will loose out on profiting from the near 840,000 Marijuana arrests each year.
* Drug testing labs will loose huge amounts of revenue.
* The Prison Industrial Complex will be gutted and the US will no longer have the largest per capita number of its citizens behind bars or in some other form of judicial control
* The Multi-National Banks that launder billions in drug money, each year, will loose significant revenue
* Drug gangs, and drug cartels alike, will collapse as Re-Legalized Marijuana has a "Gatekeeper" effect (e.g., since users will be able to "brew" their own Marijuana they will have less contact with those that sell harder drugs such as Heroin, Cocaine and Methamphetamine.
* The government will no longer be able to doing anything with all that surveillance data they insist on accumulating on each American Citizen.
* Clemency for all non-violent drug use will reduce the absurd amounts of money spent on the Prison Industrial Complex and the number of felons will be reduced drastically.
Yep, the same scumbags that financed his campaign are those most opposed to Re-Legalizing Marijuana. That is why Obama is "just saying no." Obama is the marionette and they are the ones pulling the strings.
It is up to us to ensure that his renouncement does not stand. It is time to stand up and be counted. Demand that Marijuana is completely Legalized by May 1st, 2009 through the MERP Model:
Next Page 1 | 2 | 3 | 4Palmer Luckey, founder of Oculus and former front-man for the VR company (which is owned by Facebook), recently left the company this year. This came after a tumultuous media blitz during the 2016 election season, where the media labeled him as a racist, sexist, Trump supporter, and smeared him and his girlfriend in a concentrated attempt to cost him his job and reputation in the public sphere. It worked.
Blake Harris from UploadVR is working on a book about the resurfacing of VR in today’s culture and burgeoning growth of VR during this generation of technology. While doing research for his book about Oculus, he recounted the events that led to Palmer Luckey being ousted from Oculus, and he realized something everyone with common sense already knew: the fake news media machine spearheaded by the mainstream media cost Luckey his job through propaganda malfeasance and misinformation.
The media claimed Luckey was a supporter of Trump; Luckey actually supported Gary Johnson. The media claimed he was a racist because his girlfriend was a Trump supporter, and they claimed both Luckey and his girlfriend were sexists because she was a #GamerGate supporter. The media established a harassment campaign against Luckey and his girlfriend over her affiliations with #GameGate (a movement about establishing better ethics in media journalism), forcing her to shut down her social media accounts, and forcing her off Twitter.
According to Harris, all of this vitriol kicked up over Luckey and his girlfriend all came from the media purposefully misconstruing his funding of Nimble America, a small political action committee who made a single billboard that said “Too Big To Jail” with a picture of Hillary Clinton on it.
In doing research into the matter for his book, Harris explains…
“Nimble America was not responsible for creating or spreading any memes online.
Nimble America’s goal was to take meme-like images [like the billboard above] and put them into the real world (via billboards, t-shirts and stickers). “There is no evidence—nor, based on my research, do I see any reason to believe—that this organization promoted any sort of racist, sexist, misogynistic, anti-Semitic or white supremacist agenda. Neither is there any evidence of Nimble America engaging in any sort of trolling, harassing or “astroturfing.” “Milo Yiannopoulos had no affiliation with Nimble America other than to endorse the cause and, in his capacity as a moderator of the The_Donald subreddit, verify that there was indeed a wealthy backer [Luckey] who had donated to the organization [a little less than $10,000].”
That didn’t stop the media from dragging Luckey and his girlfriend through the mud, so much so even the SPJ President, Lynn Walsh, commented that such baseless invectives were “not ethical”.
However, the media managed to do exactly what they set out to do: strike fear into the hearts of anyone not willing to toe the regressive line and support the candidate of their choosing, Hillary Clinton.
Luckey was made an example of, even though all he did was financially support a political action committee that made one billboard that said “Too big for jail”.
Contrast Luckey’s anti-support of Clinton to other celebrity endorsements for Clinton, such as Joss Whedon and the Avengers coming out and badmouthing Trump and talking up Clinton in an advertisement that gets deconstructed and lambasted appropriately by YouTuber DuckSpeak.
None of the Avengers cast were dragged through the mud for openly badmouthing Trump, nor were their careers or fame put in jeopardy at the behest of the mainstream media. Instead, they received support for their actions.
The media’s response to the anti-Trump PACs were supportive and positive, saying the Avengers were assembled to “Save the Day”.
Luckey paid in less than $10,000 to an anti-Clinton ad without adding any sort of personal message, and he was labeled as a racist, sexist, Trump-supporting misogynist.
Harris was disgusted at the media’s clear bias and “fake news” propaganda, writing…
“Ars Technica’s How your Oculus Rift is secretly funding Donald Trump’s racist meme wars or Boing Boing‘s Facebook ‘near-billionaire’ Palmer Luckey secretly funding racist pro-Trump hate meme machine—as well as the social media assassination of Palmer Luckey (and his girlfriend). “An assassination that, by the way, I’d argue would have been warranted…if what was described in those headlines had actually been true. But that’s just not the case. Not even close.”
Unfortunately, calling out the media’s lies now is too little, too late.
Journalists who should have got out in front of the news and took to task the other unethical journalists driving the smear campaign through the driveway of Palmer Luckey’s reputation. Instead, people like Blake Harris sat back and watched just until it served his own interest to fact check for his own book.
This isn’t the first or last time the media will run such smears, but don’t expect journalists like Harris to speak up until it serves their own interest. Besides, it appears the only people who care about ethics in media journalism have to fight tooth and nail to get the issue into the public sphere, only to be condemned as “sexist misogynists” and have their freedom of speech impeached by bomb threats.Feb 27, 2017; Mesa, AZ, USA; Chicago White Sox starting pitcher Lucas Giolito (27) throws during the second inning against the Chicago Cubs during a spring training game at Sloan Park. |
relevant card in this tier simply because it’s an answer to Winter Orb, should you have drawn it. Judgement for a creature is much less important.
Terminus is a card that you can play around with many of your draws – if you don’t open yourself up to two-for-one’s, it’s not that bad, considering how much work it takes for your opponent to set it up. However, if you have an aggro draw with multiple creatures, you sometimes have no choice but to play into Terminus, and then it’s worth countering more often than not.
Here’s my rule for Swords to Plowshares: There’s more where that came from. It is the most easily replaceable removal spell given the presence of Snapcaster Mage and unlike Terminus, it requires no set-up, so if your opponents start with two copies, they have two copies, end of story. On top of that, Swords is also the hardest removal spell to counter. On the plus side, Swords are not super relevant, given the fact that we have Nimble Mongoose.
If you look at the section of relevant cards so far, you will see that the only one that interacts reasonably with Snapcaster is Swords to Plowshares, which is already not a very important card for us to deal with. Especially if one copy of Swords already resolved, it’s not uncommon that the second copy does not have any targets. It can be correct to counter Snapcaster when you’re racing and close to victory though, which is why I am including it here. Otherwise, tacking a three-point lifegain on another card for the cost of two mana is not something I am concerned with.
This card is honestly not relevant. It costs your opponents one mana per turn, which I think is great. Further, extra copies are dead weight, so once you start countering Tops, you’re giving your opponents free cards. The only reason I’m including it here is the fact that many players feel Top is relevant and I don’t want to make it seem like I forgot about it.
2. Countermagic Powerranking
Now that we have established which cards are worth interacting with, we can take a look at how to prioritise and sequence our countermagic. I am aware that we are still in the preboard-section of this article, but I will include our sideboard countermagic as well because this ranking does not actually change during sideboarding. However, some cards can situationally move up a slot or two, I will try to cover those scenarios.
Flusterstorm is, without doubt, our worst counterspell in this matchup. To the extent that I don’t even have a single copy in my stock list – it is barely a consideration for the flex slot. The reasoning here is simple. The only business spell Flusterstorm counters is Entreat the Angels, but Entreat the Angels is not actually the problem. If Entreat happens, that is symptomatic of a game that is already going South – your opponent got to develop their mana and they have the luxury of taking the time to cast Entreat.
Flusterstorm is great at countering removal spells, but that is rarely what we want to be doing anyway. It’s still worth keeping in mind though, and if you have ample counters under Winter Orb, keeping a Flusterstorm for an opponent’s Wear // Tear or Council’s Judgment is perfectly reasonable.
Spell Pierce mostly hits Counterbalance and Jace, so it’s usually worse than Pyroblast and, given Jace’s mana cost, also worse than Snare. However, some opponents run Blood Moon or even Ruination, which you can’t hit with Snare or Pyroblast, so keeping a Pierce can come in handy.
As with Flusterstorm, Pierce hits all the removal for Winter Orb, which is very relevant.
The number one target for Spell Snare is Counterbalance. Given that this is your opponents’ most important card, Spell Snare has a lot of merit. Snapcaster Mage and Counterspell are further notable targets that are situationally relevant. You rarely want multiple copies of Spell Snare in hand though, especially if you have other options to cover Counterbalance. The last copy of Snare is more valuable than both Flusterstorm and Spell Pierce, but if you have two Snares and a Pierce, I like using Snare on an early Counterbalance.
As does Snare, Pyroblast hard counters Counterbalance, Snapcaster Mage and Counterspell. On top of that, it hard counters Jace, Force of Will and opposing Snares (for your Winter Orb). Pyroblast doesn’t hit Rest in Peace, but I am usually not concerned with that card (see Section 5. Postboard Threatlist). Thus, Pyroblast is one of the better cards to keep in hand.
Our most volatile counter. If you have Winter Orb, Daze is one of your best cards – it can hard counter a spell while untapping a land in your next turn. That is really good. If you don’t have Orb though, Daze can become pretty bad pretty quickly, so often you want to use it early.
Just don’t blindly Daze spell whenever you can though. If your opponent has two lands and taps out for a Swords to Plowshares during your end step, keeping Daze and Spell Snare is better than keeping Pierce and Snare. The first option covers both Mentor and Counterbalance, while the second only covers Counterbalance (plus Force).
The original. You almost never want to use Counterspell before any of your other counters – unless it’s the only thing that works, of course. It’s great to deal with Mentor at an advantage, and Counterspell offers just that.
There are two reasons to use Force last. The first is that it’s a hard counter that hits anything and as a general guideline, you want to use your more flexible counters last. The second is that it costs you another card or a bunch of mana, so you want to use when you either have useless cards to pitch (late game Dazes, for example) or the mana to hard cast it.
3. Preboard Gameplans
One of the most important aspects of Magic is having a plan – if you just randomly jam your spells when you can, you’re likely not putting yourself in the best position to win. Canadian Threshold is a very flexible deck that can play full control in one game and super fast aggro in another. Sometimes, you will even switch plans in the midst of a single game.
Against Miracles, you have two-and-a-half plans before sideboarding:
3.1 Delvering Them
This is perhaps the facet of Canadian Threshold the majority of players are most familiar with. You play a creature or two and then counter everything your opponent does while you’re beating them down. If this is your path to victory, you better be aware of that fact because you need to value your own and your opponent’s cards differently than with other plans.
A good indicator that you should Delver your opponent is the presence of Lightning Bolts in your hand. The more Lightning Bolts you draw, the more valuable extra combat damage is. One thing I have talked about in the past is turning your cards into Lava Spikes. You might be surprised by the number of games that I have played a turn one Delver, countered a couple removal spells and then closed out the game with a pair of Bolts.
If you don’t counter your opponents’ removal spells when you have Lightning Bolt draws, you will end up with a bunch of useless cards in hand. This is not to say that you should ignore your opponents’ other cards when you have these draws – it’s just that Jace and Mentor are much less scary when you’re already threatening lethal damage. Further, if your opponents frequently use their mana for expensive spells (those that cost more than one mana, that is), they will have fewer opportunities to cast removal spells.
You might think that this sounds pretty good – that’s because it is. While this is the kind of game you’re most likely to play, there are issues. For starters, you don’t always get to start hitting your opponents for three starting turn two. Also, if you ever do find yourself with and empty board or insufficient burn spells, there is a very real risk of just completely running dry, being left with a bunch of useless tax-counters and removal spells.
Fortunately, we also have other options:
3.2 Going Canadian Threshold On Them
This one is really simple: You draw a bunch of Stifles and Wastelands, your opponent does not manage to draw enough lands and they die, never doing anything of significance.
In all seriousness, that is actually pretty close to what sometimes happens. We all know that every deck has the potential to randomly die to just one Wasteland; if you add four additional cards to blow up lands, this happens a lot more.
A slightly less brutal version of this draw is when you stunt your opponent’s mana in the first one or two turns and then proceed to Delver them – if they’re low on lands, they can either try to cantrip into the landdrops they need (this will cost them valuable time) or they can try to resolve their removal through your tax-counters (which is rather ambitious).
3.3 Drawing Winter Orb
Every once in a while, you get insanely lucky. In the context of Canadian vs. Miracles, that means you happen to draw your one-off maindeck Winter Orb. For more information on how to play these games, check the postboard-section. Just keep in mind that you still can draw Lightning Bolts and therefore you might have to slightly adjust your game in the direction of Delver draws every now and then.
4. Sideboarding
(-1 Delver of Secrets)
-2 Tarmogoyf
-2 Dismember
-4 Lightning Bolt
+2 Winter Orb
+2 True-Name Nemesis
+3 Pyroblast
+1 Spell Pierce
(+1 Flusterstorm / Surgical Extraction)
You will see why I’m sideboarding like this when I explain my postboard gameplan, but I thought it would make sense to present you with the context of that plan first.
You don’t always board out the one Delver of Secrets, but you should if your fifteenth sideboard card is something with a relevant textbox against Miracles. Surgical for example is mediocre, but it can make games much easier. Delver, on the other hand, is close to being dead weight. Mostly, it pitches to Force of Will; you almost never want to actually cast it.
5. Postboard Threatlist
The first two are pretty simple. If Blood Moon resolves, you are limited to casting Winter Orbs, Pyroblasts and Forces. As good as Winter Orb is, it does not deal any damage and therefore it will not win games on its own. If your opponent casts Moon into Winter Orb and you have a clock going, it can be correct to let it resolve, assuming you still have some countermagic left after Moon. I don’t think I have ever been in that situation though.
Counterbalance does the same thing as it does before sideboarding. Well, almost. It has a hard time stopping you from resolving True-Name Nemesis, so you can steal games that way. The main thing that’s different about Counterbalance after sideboarding is that it basically never resolves though. You now have eleven hard counters for it, plus an additional two Spell Pierces, four copies of Daze to scare them into playing it late and Winter Orb to keep your tax-counters live.
Mentor, just as anything else, has a much harder time resolving after sideboarding. With Winter Orb a frequent presence, three mana is a lot. Therefore, many Mentors simply get Dazed. You do not have any removal spells left after sideboarding, so if Mentor ever should resolve, you will be in serious trouble.
Entreat the Angels, as I mentioned in the countermagic section, is a sympton, not the problem. Often I see players boarding Flusterstorms to fight Miracle spells, but if you let them become relevant, things have already gone wrong. It is still up there as one of the scarier cards though.
Yeah, that’s not happening.
These cards are relevant for one reason only: They kill Winter Orb. You actually never want that to happen. Fortunately, these cards are all really clunky and get hit by Spell Pierce. Wear also gets hit by Snare, which can also often counter Engineered Explosives – they can rarely afford to cast it for X=3 under Winter Orb.
The nice thing here is that if your opponent casts one of these cards, that means you have Winter Orb, so if you get into a counterwar, you will have time to recover your hand because your opponent has just tapped a bunch of lands semi-permanently.
Do not interact with these cards if they are supposed to kill creatures, unless you have a guaranteed kill lined up.
As I said before, many players think Miracles are relevant. I am here to tell you they’re not. I only ever counter Terminus if my opponent is out of untapped lands and below 10 life.
Rest in Peace does nothing, although I do respect countering it for the sole purpose of not getting your time stolen by someone insisting to play three times as many turns.
6. Postboard Gameplan – Winter Orb
In principle, your plan for post-sideboard games is very simple. Set up a scenario where your opponent has no pressure and you have Winter Orb. With Orb on the battlefield, you have the better long game.
In the early game, Canadian is advantaged because it has much cheaper spells than Miracles. Mana-effiency is huge here.
In the mid game, you are still slightly ahead because you have land advantage – if you draw the same amount of cards and your opponent has two more lands than you, that also means they have two less spells than you. This is a real thing.
In the late game, however, Miracles is traditionally ahead. Not only do they have ways to pull ahead on cards, thus offsetting the land advantage, they also gain virtual cardadvantage because your tax-counters lose most of their power.
Winter Orb completely turns the late game around – by shutting it off.
When you have Orb, every cantrip and Top activation permanently costs your opponent mana, keeping your tax-counters alive much longer. Conversely, if they try to cast their spells in batches (not casting cantrips nor activating Top, building up mana for bigger turns), they are still unlikely to win counter-wars. When you don’t have Orb, that usually means they try again the next turn and then you can’t do anything anymore because they have too many cards. When you do have Orb though, that second attempt comes several turns later, allowing you to recover from the counter-war.
All this in mind, the games are very simple:
Step One: Counter everything that would kill you, ignore everything else.
Step Two: Stick Winter Orb. Still counter everything that would kill you, but also protect Winter Orb.
Step Three: Find a creature (Nimble Mongoose or True-Name) and attack. If they remove it, wait for a new creature.
Notably, you do not want to cast Delver of Secrets after sideboarding. The only reason they are still in the deck is that they pitch to Force of Will. Sometimes, you randomly cast Delvers because you would have to discard otherwise. Outside of that, Delver just eats Swords, which they can’t really afford to board out (or so they think). They are inevitably going to draw some Swords, so it’s nice to turn those into dead cards.
7. Miscellanous Guidelines
7.1 Wasteland & Winter Orb
The relation between these two cards is very interesting. When you don’t have Winter Orb, I recommend using your Wastelands very aggressively, especially before sideboarding. After sideboarding, however, it can pay off to not use them.
When you have Winter Orb and an untapped Wasteland, your opponents will tend to untap their basics before their non-basics – they don’t to let their untap step go to waste. This means that you can delay your Wastelands’ effect, which is nice because it allows you to aim them at your opponents’ Volcanic Islands, potentially shutting of Pyroblasts they might have drawn (I have won games this way, it is very relevant and has no cost).
7.2 Tax-Counters & Winter Orb
Just as you are happy when your opponent cantrips under Winter Orb, you might be looking for other ways to attack their mana. I sometimes like to two-for-one myself with tax-counters rather than hard counter an opponent’s spell.
An example would be an opponent casting Counterbalance with two lands remaining untapped. If I have a creature here, I might Spell Pierce and Daze the Counterbalance rather than use Pyroblast. This does not come up very often, but it is something to keep in mind.
7.3 Stifle
For the most part, you want to Stifle fetchlands. As with most things, exceptions can arise from the presence of Winter Orb (which I guess might be ironic here). The only other cards you really want to Stifle are Engineered Explosives and Miracle spells. If you Stifle Explosives, that will usually attack your opponents’ mana harder than Stifle on a fetchland – while also trading for a spell in the process.
Stifle on Terminus mostly comes up when you have started racing. It should be easy to recognise when this is the correct play.
Stifle on Entreat is a little more tricky. If your only reasonable options to deal with Entreat are Force of Will and Stifle, the latter might be the way to go. In both cases you go down a card, only with Force it’s guaranteed, whereas Stifle might actually trade with the Entreat.
The same can be true with Stifle and Counterspell, against either Miracle spell. If those are my only pieces of interaction, I definitely like using Stifle. At worst, I will have to Counterspell the Miracle a turn or two later, but this will also give me additional draws and maybe some extra damage.
Another thing to keep in mind is Rest in Peace’s enters the battlefield trigger. If you already have Threshold, one Stifle can be a reasonable investment to keep your Mongooses big.
7.4 Snapcaster Mage
Just one small thing: Don’t let Snapcaster Mage trade for a creature. That’s the worst. Especially after sideboarding, you don’t always need to attack with your Mongoose. You might miss out on a few points of damage early, but you have a limited amount of creatures in your deck, don’t throw them away.
I also don’t mind getting hit by Snapcaster Mage a couple times. You will draw a creature at some point; you can easily spare 14 or so life and thenset up a blocker.
7.5 Don’t be slow.
Yeah, that’s basically it. Games under Winter Orb can easily take 20+ turns, so don’t waste time and don’t let your opponent waste time either. This is less of a problem on Magic Online because the Miracles players will usually spend more time than you.
This is likely not everything, and I might have to revisit this last section at some point, so please let me know if anything is still unclear.
Until then, thanks for reading!
J
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Donald J. Trump’s Republican rivals will be playing catch-up ahead of the New York primary, according to a new poll released on Wednesday that shows the Manhattan businessman holding a substantial lead in his home state.
A survey from Monmouth University found that 52 percent of likely Republican primary voters support Mr. Trump. Gov. John Kasich, who has only won his state of Ohio, comes in second with 25 percent, and Senator Ted Cruz of Texas trails with 17 percent.
Mr. Trump is showing particular strength in New York City, Long Island and western New York. If the numbers hold up, Mr. Trump could net most of the state’s 95 delegates on April 19.
Although Mr. Trump has been criticized in recent weeks for his comments on abortion and nuclear weapons policy, most New York Republicans were unfazed by the controversies, the poll suggested.
Like many national polls, Monmouth’s survey also shows Mr. Kasich as the strongest candidate in a hypothetical general election contest against Hillary Clinton. However, none of the Republicans are likely to turn New York red in November.
“It is interesting that Kasich would be a stronger nominee in Trump’s home state, but it is purely academic,” said Patrick Murray, director of Monmouth University’s poll. “There is almost no probability that any Republican would be able to win New York’s electoral votes.”August is coming with its intense heat, and we know that doesn’t stop Austinites from looking for something to do. So, come celebrate National Farmers’ Market Week with us at SFC Farmers’ Markets! Join us to celebrate the market, our vendors and you!
National Farmers’ Market week technically runs from August 7th to the 13th, however we will start our festivities on August 6th. This is the perfect time to come to the market for the first time or show your love for everyone’s favorite hardworking vendors.
We have a ton planned for you at all of our markets, so come out and enjoy the week with SFC Farmers’ Markets. You can look forward to a great day of shopping and brunch at market like usual. Hit our Taste the Place booth and sample some of the produce you have never tried. Here is the rest of what we have planned for you:[Episcopal News Service] Members of the Episcopal Urban Caucus gathered in Meriden, Connecticut, for their annual assembly to consider how people of faith can challenge violence in America.
The Feb. 25-28 event, with a particular focus on gun violence, featured an informal conversation with Connecticut Gov. Dannel Malloy. Other activities included visits to two locations where work is underway to reduce violence and 10 workshops that offered stories and described programs to promote reconciliation and peace.
Founded in 1980, the Episcopal Urban Caucus is an association of lay and ordained Episcopalians dedicated to the cause of reconciliation, social justice and peace. The Rev. Canon Robert J. Brooks, who is also vice president of the Associated Parishes for Liturgy and Mission, is the caucus’ president. The caucus gathers every year in February at a different location with cooperation from the local diocese.
This year the group chose to come to Connecticut because of the commitment of the Episcopal Church in Connecticut to work against gun violence in the wake of the tragedy at Sandy Hook Elementary School. The diocese’s Social Justice and Advocacy Committee, led by the Rev. Peter Bushnell of Enfield, offered to help host and organize the event.
Malloy opened the assembly, noting that income inequality and climate change are the two biggest issues facing the United States. As other speakers and participants did throughout the three-day event, he also identified jobs as key to reducing violence. He cited steps he has initiated to keep young people from going to jail and getting a criminal record. Malloy recently signed legislation decriminalizing the possession of marijuana, and said that the change led to 6,000 fewer arrests last year. The governor also talked about the importance of raising the minimum wage and concluded his talk with the observation that “no person working 35 to 40 hours a week should live in poverty.”
During the assembly, participants visited Enfield or Hartford. Enfield’s Educational Resources for Children, an organization that provides innovative after-school programs, was highlighted for its focus on conflict resolution and anti-bullying.
The Hartford group visited the downtown Christ Church Cathedral for a panel discussion on challenging gun violence in the city. The panel was organized by the Rt. Rev. James Curry, recently retired Connecticut bishop suffragan. Panelists included the Rev. Henry Brown, founder of Mothers United Against Violence; the Rev. Stephen Camp, senior pastor of Faith Congregational Church; Bishop John Selders, pastor of Amistad United Church of Christ and assistant chaplain at Trinity College in Hartford; and the Rev. Harlon Dalton, priest-in-charge at the cathedral. The panelists discussed the importance and challenges of raising awareness of social injustice in their congregations, citing stories where the wider community celebrated their work but a few individual parishioners were strongly opposed.
Among the workshops was one with Canon David W. Porter, director of reconciliation for the Archbishop of Canterbury and formerly a peace-building practitioner in Northern Ireland. Porter discussed how he was helping the archbishop pursue his commitment to reconciliation and getting people to “disagree well.” Emphasizing that his focus is on building relationships and offering advice on the best processes to achieve reconciliation, Porter outlined a variety of lessons he had learned over the years, concluding that “reconciliation is always a quest.”
Connecticut Bishop Ian Douglas and Connecticut Bishop Suffragan Laura Ahrens later described the goals of Bishops United Against Gun Violence, a network of Episcopal bishops that encourages and promotes direct action to overcome gun violence through advocacy, community organizing, education, the creation of resources, and collaboration with other groups beyond The Episcopal Church. Douglas and Ahrens outlined the emergence of the network, described some of its initiatives, and invited lay and ordained leaders in The Episcopal Church to imagine how they too might organize for effective action against gun violence.
In another workshop, titled “Community Coping Strategies in Response to Tragedy in Newtown,” the Rev. Kathie Adams-Shepherd, rector of Trinity Episcopal Church in Newtown, discussed how various community organizations and programs have developed since the December 2012 tragedy to assist in healing and also to challenge the pandemic of gun violence in the United States.
The Rev. Molly James, priest associate at the Hartford Cathedral; Diane Pollard, caucus treasurer; and Nell Gibson, caucus board member, discussed in another workshop the resolutions to be offered at the upcoming General Convention that focus on ways Episcopalians can respond to the church’s witness against gun violence.
In addition, Jennifer H. Huebner, the Connecticut coordinator for PeaceJam New England, described how the PeaceJam Foundation mentors young adults hoping to inspire leaders of the next generation. At PeaceJam conferences, Nobel Peace laureates spend two days sharing their experience, skills and stories with youth and offering them inspiration.
The evening concluded with a showing of the film Children of the Light, which tells the story of the life of Archbishop Emeritus of Cape Town Desmond Tutu.
“I am so thankful that the Episcopal Urban Caucus chose to come to Connecticut,” Douglas said. “The presence of sisters and brothers in Christ from around The Episcopal Church helped us to continue the healing process after the tragedy in Newtown and reminded us that we are not alone in challenging gun violence as participants in God’s mission.”
Next year’s assembly will take place in Delaware under the leadership of the Rev. David T. Andrews, rector of the Episcopal Church of Saints Andrew and Matthew in Wilmington.
̶ John Armstrong is a retired IT professional now working as a freelance journalist.Readers Can't Get Enough of Christian Grey
E.L. James has another hit on her hands. Her new book, Grey, which tells Fifty Shades of Grey from Christian Grey's viewpoint has sold 1.1 million copies during the first week of its release in the U.S.
The book broke the record for most adult sales in one week which was held by Dan Brown for. That novel sold 551, 000 in its first week. According to James' publisher,Vintage Anchor, the Grey sold 1.1. million copies in just four days when the ebooks, audiobook and print book sales are totaled. Publisher Anne Messitte said in a statement, "This is an astonishing number of books to sell over a weekend and speaks to the engagement and passion readers have for the Fifty Shades books."Vintage had said earlier it would most likely have to go into a second printing, but those plans have changed. The publisher is now going into its fifth additional print run of the book in order to meet demand.James said that the book came about because her fans have begged her to write the story from Christian's point of view. They really wanted to know what he's thinking during the events of the first book. She said, "Christian is a complex character, and readers have always been fascinated by his desires and motivations, and his troubled past. Also, as anyone who has ever been in a relationship knows, there are two sides to every story."On Tuesday night’s edition of “The Rachel Maddow Show,” host Rachel Maddow informed viewers that Republicans in Congress are being so obstructionist that they are now blocking and filibustering the nominations of their own candidates for federal position as well as members of their own party.
She began by discussing the nomination of Oklahoma Judge Robert Bacharach, who was in limbo for more than 260 days while the GOP declined to vote on his nomination as a circuit court judge.
Oklahoma, Maddow said, is about as red as red states come. Former Gov. Mitt Romney (R-MA) beat President Barack Obama in every county in Oklahoma in 2012. The state has five Congressional districts, all of which are represented by Republicans. Both of the state’s U.S. senators are also Republicans.
“When it came time to nominate a new federal appeals court judge to the 10th Circuit,” Maddow said, Sen. Tom Coburn (R-OK) suggested a judge to the White House, and was seconded by Oklahoma’s other senator, Sen. Jim Inhofe (R).
“And, then…no,” said Maddow. “Apparently that was not okay with Senate Republicans. Giving them what they want and what they ask for is not okay. And it won’t be stood for.”
Judge Robert Bacharach was nominated in January of 2012 and Senate Republicans filibustered him, refusing to allow a vote on his nomination for the better part of a year.
The best part of the story, though, said Maddow, is that when the Senate finally voted on Bacharach, they shooed him through unanimously, 93-0.
“There was no objection to him. Remember, they picked him!” she said. “So why would they object to him?”
But if there were no actual objections, why did the Senate GOP refuse to vote on him for 263 days?
“No reason,” said Maddow. “HULK SMASH!”
Similarly, Republicans were blocking a member of their own party when they filibustered Sen. Chuck Hagel (R-NE)’s nomination as Secretary of Defense. He was finally confirmed on Tuesday and will be sworn in on Wednesday, but not before a thorough hazing from the right side of the aisle, including charges of anti-Semitism and a ginned-up smear that he once made $25,000 for speaking to the mythical group, “Friends of Hamas.”
No one has ever filibustered the nomination of a Cabinet secretary in the history of the U.S. Congress.
“Why do it now?” asked Maddow. “HULK SMASH!”
To the Republicans who obstructed the nominations, Maddow said, “So, Mazel Tov. Congratulations. You have won nothing, but you did further break the institution where you work.”
Watch the video, embedded below via MSNBC:
Visit NBCNews.com for breaking news, world news, and news about the economyFact #1: Every abortion kills an innocent human being. Every new life begins at conception. This is an irrefutable fact of biology. It is true for animals and true for humans. When considered alongside the law of biogenesis – that every species reproduces after its own kind – we can draw only one conclusion in regard to abortion: every single abortion ends the life of an innocent human being.
Fact #2: Every human being is a person. Personhood is properly defined by membership in the human species, not by stage of development within that species. A living being’s designation to a species is determined not by the stage of development but by the sum total of its biological characteristics.
Fact #3: Beginning at conception, every pregnancy involves two or more bodies. No matter how you spin it, women don’t have four arms and four legs when they’re pregnant. Those extra appendages belong to the tiny human being(s) living inside of them. At no point in pregnancy is the developing embryo or fetus simply a part of the mother’s body.
Fact #4: It is just, reasonable, and necessary for society to outlaw certain choices. Any civilized society restricts the individual’s freedom to choose whenever that choice would harm an innocent person. Therefore, it is impossible to justify abortion by simply arguing that women should be “free to choose.”
Fact #5: The right to not be killed supersedes the right to not be pregnant. The comparison between a baby’s rights and a mother’s rights is unequal. What is at stake in abortion is the mother’s lifestyle, as opposed to the baby’s life. Therefore, it is reasonable for society to expect an adult to live temporarily with an inconvenience if the only alternative is killing a child.
Fact #6: Poverty, rape, disability, or “unwantedness” do not morally justify abortion. There are all sorts of circumstances that people point to as justification for their support of abortion. Since none of these circumstances are sufficient to justify the killing of human beings after birth, they’re not sufficient to justify the killing of human beings before birth.
Fact #7: The differences between embryos and adults are differences of degree not of kind. Like toddler and adolescent, the terms “embryo” and “fetus” do not refer to nonhumans but to humans at particular stages of development. Human beings inside the womb are smaller, less developed, and more dependent than human beings outside the womb. These are differences of degree, not differences of kind. We can all point to other people who are bigger, stronger, smarter, or less dependent than we are, but that doesn’t make our life any less valuable or any less deserving of protection.
Fact #8: Less than 1% of all abortions are performed to save the life of the mother. It is an extremely rare case when abortion is required to save the mother’s life. Of course, when two lives are threatened and only one can be saved, doctors must always save that life. However, abortion for the mother’s life and abortion for the mother’s health are usually not the same issue. Since every abortion kills an innocent human being, it is morally abhorrent to use the rare cases when abortion is necessary to save the life of the mother as justification for the millions of on demand “convenience” abortions.
Fact #9: To be only “personally pro-life” is to not be pro-life at all. If abortion doesn’t kill children, why would someone be opposed to it? If it does kill children, why would someone defend another’s right to do it? Being personally against abortion but favoring another’s right to abortion is self-contradictory and morally baffling.Find the right combination! ChessBase 15 program + new Mega Database 2019 with 7.6 million games and more than 70,000 master analyses. Plus ChessBase Magazine (DVD + magazine) and CB Premium membership for 1 year!
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4/26/2014 – Picture a club, which has an important chess match against a rival in the first division. The rival team has spent a considerable sum by bringing in heavy artillery to ensure it is the one to that comes out on top: GM Vladimir Georgiev. His opponent is undecided yet, but on a spur of the moment decision, an unexpected club member decides to take up the challenge.
By all accounts, the match between two Norwegian teams Stavanger and Nordstrand would have gone unnoticed by most, but for that spontaneous gesture by the world champion.
“It was quite an impulse decision, and I was a bit surprised myself. I was in Stavangar on Thursday, and I'm a member of the club there. We talked a little bit about what it means, and the opportunity arose to both meet a grandmaster, and help the club a little”, he explained.
Magnus Carlsen's surprise choice to sit down and play, to the delight of his club mates,
was soon picked up by the press. The full article can be seen (in Norwegian) at Aftenposten.no
Magnus is essentially a member of the club because he has a number of friends there, and the club never tried to get him to represent them in their team events. He is so far above the level, and busy, that it is almost unthinkable. Just having him on the roster, and showing up from time to time is more than enough to boost the prestige of the club. Another factor that needs to be emphasized is how much he stands to lose should he have an off-day. Not only would his record rating be jeopardized, but the news would make the front pages everywhere. None of this served as a deterrent to the world number one, who asked to play.
After the luxurious settings of elite tournaments or the five-star treatment in India for the epic match against Anand, this was a serious throwback to the lighter, less weighty times as they played in a casual club setting, with players and spectators milling around right next to the players as they played. On the floor below, a man was celebrating his 85th birthday to loud singing and cheers, easily heard during the games.
None of this bothered Carlsen, who was quite calm. “It's just nice. I was here and played fourteen years ago, and have not been back since. It's a bit the same way today, and it's nice. I know everyone here, so it's just fine.”
[Event "NOR-chT qual"] [Site "Oslo"] [Date "2014.03.22"] [Round "1.1"] [White "Carlsen, Magnus"] [Black "Georgiev, Vladimir"] [Result "1-0"] [ECO "C78"] [WhiteElo "2881"] [BlackElo "2553"] [PlyCount "79"] [EventDate "2014.03.22"] [EventType "team-match"] [EventRounds "1"] [EventCountry "NOR"] [Source "Chessbase"] [SourceDate "2014.03.28"] [WhiteTeam "Stavanger"] [BlackTeam "Nordstrand"] [WhiteTeamCountry "NOR"] [BlackTeamCountry "NOR"] 1. e4 e5 2. Nf3 Nc6 3. Bb5 a6 4. Ba4 Nf6 5. O-O b5 6. Bb3 Bb7 7. d3 Bc5 8. c3 O-O 9. a4 d5 10. axb5 axb5 11. Rxa8 Bxa8 12. exd5 Nxd5 13. Re1 b4 14. Qc2 f6 15. Nbd2 Kh8 16. Ne4 Be7 17. h3 Na5 18. Ba2 b3 19. Bxb3 Nxb3 20. Qxb3 |
back to Richard Dawkins. I mean, you refer to belief in God as "the God delusion". I'm wondering whether you think that spirituality may have a positive psychological benefit, as the questioner implies?
RICHARD DAWKINS: No, I don't think it has a positive psychological benefit. As to whether religious belief is a mental illness, I don't think it's fair to call it a mental illness because so many people actually do it. On the other hand I think you could say that if you met one person, just one person, who claimed to believe some of the things that religious people as a whole claim to believe, you would think they were suffering from (indistinct). I mean it's just because so many of them believe it that we treat it as normal. But if you actually met somebody who said he believed that water could turn into wine, a man could walk on water, that a man could raise somebody else from the dead, you'd say, "Well, put him away." But because so many people believe it, you take it seriously.
TONY JONES: Okay, I'm told we've got a question come in, a web question. It's from Cassandra Devine in Victoria. It's too Richard Dawkins: "Why do you feel the need to express your views so stridently when they're not always welcome? Isn't it rather like going around to playgrounds and telling children that Santa Claus isn't real?"
RICHARD DAWKINS: In modern English vocabulary, it's more or less impossible to use the word atheist without preceding it with the adjective strident. They simply go together. I am not strident. I am not more strident than anybody else. Now, is it like disillusioning children about Santa Claus? The weird thing is that children manage to grow out of Santa Claus and for some reason...
TONY JONES: Let's throw that to Jacqui, and the questioner says that questioning faith might be a bad thing? It might sort of cause people stop believing in Santa Clause or whatever.
JACQUELINE NINIO: I think we have - as people of faith, we have an obligation to question and to continually be understanding and reinterpreting and trying to find meaning within our tradition and I can say for myself that what I understand and believe about God now was not what I understood and believed about God when I was 10 and it's not what I understood when I was five it won't be what I understand when I'm 90. I think that it's an evolving process to understand God and what God is and how God is in the world, and I think...
TONY JONES: Here's the interesting thing: you keep reinterpreting God as you get older, by the sound of it. Do you ever consider that perhaps God doesn't exist?
JACQUELINE NINIO: No, I don't, but there are those who do and I think for me my faith in God is quite strong but I think for many, many believers it's very - of course you question the existence of God and that sometimes you may come to the position that God doesn't exist and all kinds of things can happen in your life and in the world and the way you view things and there's an amazing Jewish philosopher who said the second you start to define God, you already limit God. God is un-understandable in some ways by humanity and so the second we try and grapple with it, we're already limiting what God is. I think that there's an unfolding understanding of God as you change and as the world changes and all we can do as human beings is to approach it from where we are and from our understanding and what we know in that moment.
TONY JONES: Now, before we come to our questioner down the front who had his hand up, Richard, do you regard that as just clever sophistry?
RICHARD DAWKINS: I was wondering what on earth it meant, I must say.
JACQUELINE NINIO: I preferred clever sophistry, myself.
TONY JONES: Okay. We do have a question down the front here and I'm going to go to you. You had your hand up.
AUDIENCE MEMBER: Yes, my question is for Professor Dawkins. Given that your previous role at Oxford University was about, you know, propagating the knowledge of science to the public, which I think you've done excellently with, you know, the Great Australian Earth and also the BBC documentary that you did were you, you know, exposed the stupidity of homeopathy and so called eastern medicine, don't you think it would have been prudent to stick on that sort of line as opposed to driving a wedge between religious people and science? I mean, in my opinion what you've sort of done, probably inadvertently, is create a situation whereby people like Steve, who are actually in control of, you know, whether our country has an emissions trading scheme, you know, believing in climate change or not have to question science over their faith. Wouldn't it be better to separate the two issues completely and just say, "This is science. This is evidence. You know go out and make the best decisions that you can based on fact and what you, you know, believe in your own personal life should be completely separate"?
RICHARD DAWKINS: It's a familiar line of argument and I've met it often. I think it's - that wasn't supposed to be a put down. It's a genuinely difficult question. It's a question of political expediency. The implication of your question is that there's something about religion which is personal and which doesn't have any bearing - that evidence doesn't have any bearing upon it. Now, as I scientist I care passionately about the truth. I think that the existence of a supreme being - a supernatural supreme being - is a scientific issue. Either there is a God or there isn't. Either there are gods or there are no gods. That is a...
AUDIENCE MEMBER: (Indistinct)
RICHARD DAWKINS: Yes, because it's a supremely important scientific question. If the universe was created by an intelligence, then we are looking at an entirely different kind of scientific theory from if the universe came into existence by natural means. If God or gods had something to do with the creation of life, then we're looking at a totally different kind of biology.
AUDIENCE MEMBER: How so?
RICHARD DAWKINS: So I think you can't just say religion and science have nothing to do with each other. Science can get on and you let people have their own religious - of course you let people believe whatever they like. But you cannot say that science and religion are completely separate because religion makes scientific claims. It certainly makes scientific claims about miracles, as I mentioned before, and you cannot reconcile an authentic approach to science with a belief in miracles or, I suspect, with a belief in supernatural creation. At least the very least you should say is that this is a scientific question.
TONY JONES: Okay. No, I'm sorry, I'm going to interrupt you there, because we've got lots of questions. You're watching Q&A. Remember you can send us your web or video questions to our website. The address is on your screen. But our next question tonight comes from in the audience and it's from Renee Brasier.
RENEE BRASIER: Professor Dawkins, you are clearly against the teaching of creationism in the context of the science classroom, but do you think there is any value in teaching religion studies in schools?
TONY JONES: I won't start with you, if that's okay. I might go to Tony Burke first of all for an answer to that and I'll come back to you.
TONY BURKE: I think on the teaching of religious studies there is a significant role there for parents as to whether or not they want that to be one of the things that's taught to their children. I agree with the comment that religious teaching does not belong in the science room. I do agree with that but I also think, that there's significant issues for parents. Some parents want their children to have a religious education. Some what their children to have a religious education that exposes them to a whole range of different faith belief systems and some don't want to go there at all and I actually reckon that's personal enough for parents to have a significant say in that.
TONY JONES: Let's go to Julie Bishop, because I want to hear, as I said, from the three politicians before we go to the rest of the panel.
JULIE BISHOP: Tony, you might recall there was a debate earlier this year when it was suggested that the Bible should be taught in schools and there was quite a controversy about it. I happen to believe that the Bible is one of the all time best sellers. That's a fact. And it is the basis of so much western morality and thought and history and law and western culture and literature and it doesn't have to be taught in religious classes. It could be taught academically along with - - -
TONY JONES: What about is science classes?
JULIE BISHOP: Well, along with the works of Shakespeare and the Iliad. But, no, I believe that intelligent design is not something that would be taught in a science class. I mean science, as far as I'm concerned, is the search for the natural causes of universe and that's what science should be about. We don't have intelligent design classes as such in Australia, as far as I'm aware in the curriculum, but I think that it should be open to parents and open to schools to choose to offer religious instruction if that's what the schools and the parents wish to have.
TONY JONES: Steve Fielding, they don't have it in many schools, but they do have it in the school associated with your church, where they do teach creationism, Waverley College.
STEVE FIELDING: Look, different schools teach different things. There's Jewish schools, there's Christian schools, there's all sorts of schools. Look, I actually think religion and science are separate. I don't think they should be taught in science, no.
TONY JONES: I noted - I looked at the website of Waverley College. It has a slogan that says, "All your children will be taught by the Lord." What does that mean exactly?
STEVE FIELDING: Look, it may be that you've read more than I have, Tony, but, look, at the end of the - look, for example, I mean my faith if personal. I don't think I've ever really come out and spoken about it. It's the media that have quizzed me more on it than I've actually gone out and actually spoken on it. In actual fact I first met the Prime Minister when I was first elected and it's funny, you know, he sat there, pulled out his Bible out of his top pocket and started to lecture me and give me a sermon and I thought, that's interesting. I've never done that to anyone and here's the Prime Minister, first meeting, never met the guy, he pulls out his Bible. He's probably still got it in his top pocket, I think. But look, it's not - I think it's very personal and I think that, look, I've got my decision making - my core decision-making team. I have a Jew and an atheist. I think you should be making policy on common sense and what is best for Australia. I don't think that, you know, Australians like the idea of having it driven by religion and that is the truth, Tony. I've never raised the issue. It's very personal to me. I've never gone out and done what Kevin Rudd's done - meet someone for the first time...
TONY JONES: Okay. Okay.
STEVE FIELDING:...and pull out the Bible and lecture them.
TONY JONES: I'm going to interrupt you, because once again we've got a web question on this subject. It's from David in Victoria: " Do you believe intelligent design should be part of the science curriculum, taught alongside evolution or do you believe it is non-scientific and should be relegated to the rubbish bin?" And while you're talking Steven Fielding, we'll go to you first?
STEVE FIELDING: What was the question? Sorry, Tony, I missed it. I was thinking about...
TONY JONES: The question was about whether intelligent design should be taught in the science curriculum?
STEVE FIELDING: Look, I actually think that kids are pretty smart and I actually think that there's room, potentially, to be actually taught both and allow the kids to work it out. You know, I mean, I think they're pretty smart.
TONY JONES: Not in the science room. I said before Tony. So in the science room, I've told you before, and I'll say it again, religion and science should be separated. I don't think there's room for that and that's why I'm saying is that, you know, if you really - if parents are concerned then maybe the schools should teach both, but not in the science class, if you know what I mean. I think kids can work it out themselves with their parents themselves from there, but I don't think it should be in science at all. I'll make it quite clear. Religion and science are two separate issues.
TONY JONES: All right, Richard Dawkins, is that a compromise that you're comfortable with?
RICHARD DAWKINS: Well, I'd like to answer the previous question, which was, after all, put to me.
TONY JONES: Yeah, of course you may.
RICHARD DAWKINS: Which was: do we think that religion should be taught in schools not in science classes? Of course it should not be taught in science class, but it certainly should be taught. Religion is a very important part of our culture. As Julie Bishop has said, it's a very important part of literature. She also said it's important for our morals and goodness sake I hope we don't get our morals from it.
JULIE BISHOP: No, I didn't say that. No, I said it's a basis for western morality and thought.
RICHARD DAWKINS: Well, I very much hope it is not the basis for western morality.
JULIE BISHOP: But it has been. I mean, that's a fact.
RICHARD DAWKINS: It is the basis for a lot of western literature and for that reason it's very important to teach it. You can't understand European history without being steeped in religion, because so many of the wars were about it. There's another very good reason for teaching religion, comparative religion, which is that children will then learn that there are lots of different religions and they're all incompatible and they can't all be right and so what is, I think, actually rather wicked is taking children who are too young to know and teaching them, "You belong to this religion". "You belong to - you're a Catholic," or "You're a Muslim," or whatever it might be. That I think it wicked. What you should say is, there are people called Catholics and they believe this. There are people called Protestants. There are people called Muslims who believe that. People called Jews who believe the other. That's important. That's worth teaching. Let children make up their minds when they're old enough but don't tell children that they belong to this religion or that.
TONY JONES: Jacqui? Jacqui, let's hear from you and bear in mind that I think you heard Julie Bishop, former education minister, suggest that teaching of the Bible in schools might be a good idea. I mean are you - I mean, I suppose it depends whether we're talking about Old Testament or New Testament from your point of view.
JACQUELINE NINIO: Yeah, I think that there are many, many religious beliefs and I think it's really important maybe for some of the reasons that Richard suggested to be able to let people know the beliefs of various religious communities and I think that it's really important in order to breakdown the misunderstanding and the prejudice and the division that happens between people when instead of seeing actually the differences between religions that teaching about them can actually find a lot of commonality, as well, and a lot of places where we do agree and we - and we do see things in the same way. But not just teaching religion. I think we should be teaching other moral basis of thought and other philosophy, as well, and I think on the point of not telling your children what religion they are, I think we have an obligation as parents. We are raising our children. We are making decisions for them all the time and I think this is...
TONY JONES: Are you at all worried that in religious schools children get indoctrinated, which I think is one of the points Richard was making?
JACQUELINE NINIO: Well, I don't want to speak for all religious schools but the ones I know I don't feel they're indoctrinated. I think there's a very - well, I don't know. The ones that I know, there's a very healthy spirit of questioning and a lot of opening for children to, you know, to question what's going on and to question belief and to ask - and to not necessarily follow their parents. And, you're right, if they come to an age and a time when they decide that that philosophy or that religion is not for them then they're not going to remain part of it. But I think, you know, as a parent, I want to be giving my child a firm foundation in my beliefs (indistinct).
TONY JONES: All right, let's hear what Patrick thinks about this. Teaching religion in schools, are you comfortable with it? Are there limits? Where do you set them?
PATRICK MCGORRY: I thought you were going to let me off the hook, Tony.
TONY JONES: No, we want to explore who you are.
PATRICK MCGORRY: Yes. Yes. Well, look, I very much agree with what Jacqui and Richard have been saying about the value of teaching comparative religion. I've seen that in my own children. They went to a nominally religious school of one particular domination, but it was extremely liberal and they certainly didn't teach any religion in science classes. They taught it in a comparative religion way. My youngest son learnt a lot about Islam through that process and really noticed the common features, actually, with other major religions. So I thought that was really valuable for him to do that. But I certainly don't think that intelligent design should be taught anywhere, really.
TONY JONES: Okay, you're watching Q&A, the live and interactive forum where you get to ask the question. Our next question comes from in the audience. It's from Hamzah Qureshi.
HAMZAH QURESHI: My question is for Professor Dawkins. Considering that atheism cannot possibly have any sense of absolute morality, would it not then an irrational leap of faith, which atheists themselves so harshly condemn, for an atheist to decide between right and wrong?
RICHARD DAWKINS: Absolute morality - the absolute morality that a religious person might profess would include what, stoning people for adultery, death for apostasy, punishment for breaking the Sabbath. These are all things which are religiously based absolute moralities. I don't think I want an absolute morality. I think I want a morality that is thought out, reasoned, argued, discussed and based upon, I'd almost say, intelligent design. Can we not design our society, which has the sort of morality, the sort of society that we want to live in - if you actually look at the moralities that are accepted among modern people, among 21st century people, we don't believe in slavery anymore. We believe in equality of women. We believe in being gentle. We believe in being kind to animals. These are all things which are entirely recent. They have very little basis in Biblical or Quranic scripture. They are things that have developed over historical time through a consensus of reasoning, of sober discussion, argument, legal theory, political and moral philosophy. These do not come from religion. To the extent that you can find the good bits in religious scriptures, you have to cherry pick. You search your way though the Bible or the Quran and you find the occasional verse that is an acceptable profession of morality and you say, "Look at that. That's religion," and you leave out all the horrible bits and you say, "Oh, we don't believe that anymore. We've grown out of that." Well, of course we've grown out it. We've grown out of it because of secular moral philosophy and rational discussion.
TONY JONES: Tony Burke? The follow up question, I suppose, is from where do you derive your sense of morality? Is it from the Bible or is it from some sort of humanist principles?
TONY BURKE: Okay, you've now got me where I didn't want to be. I guess for me and Richard can say it's cherry picking, the concept a couple of thousand years ago from a bloke who my faith follows that says even if someone is your enemy you ought to love them, for me that's a fundamental part of how people should interact with each other ideally. Fundamental. And I reckon a lot builds from that and some of the principles that build from that aren't that different from the best humanist principles that Richard wants to cherry pick. But I've got to say if you want to look at the worst that people have done in history, you can find religious examples and you can find atheist examples. I don't think Mao Tse Tung's China during the cultural revolution as an atheist regime or Stalin's Russia are great examples of morality either. People have done some shocking things in human history, sometimes in the name of religion. Sometimes in the name of whatever other division they could find but to say that that's an argument against religion, I don't think matches the level of logic that Richard's demanding of everyone else.
RICHARD DAWKINS: I...
TONY JONES: Can I just interrupt you there because what was raised by Tony Burke was obviously the sermon on the mount, the beatitudes, which does provide a kind of moral template for a lot of people. I mean, turn the other cheek, love your enemy as yourself, blessed are the peacemakers, blessed are those who are persecuted because they stand up for what's right, et cetera, the meek shall inherit the earth. Those are principles you could take as a humanist as moral principles, are they not?
RICHARD DAWKINS: I'm delighted to cherry pick those. Jesus said some wonderful things and the sermon on the mount is terrific. Modern morality goes back to that and says, yes, that'll do. That's very good. The Mao Tse Tung point, of course, is religious.
TONY BURKE: And every religious war is not. Come on.
RICHARD DAWKINS: No, the difference is this: we are not counting up the number of good things and bad things that have been done by people who happen to be religious or who happen to be atheist. We're looking at whether there are religious or atheistic motives for doing good or bad things. Is there a logical pathway that leads from religious faith to doing bad things? Sure as hell there is. Is there a logical pathway that leads from atheism to doing bad things? No, you cannot make a logical pathway that way. Nobody would ever say, "Because I'm an atheist I'm going to kill somebody." You could very well say, "Because I am a Christian I'm going to go and kills Muslims." "Because I'm a Muslim I'm going to go to kill Christians." This is something that's happened throughout history. Nobody has ever said, "Because I'm an atheist, I'm going to go and kill somebody."
TONY JONES: Okay, we've got a questioner down the front here and just wait a moment, we'll come to you straight away.
AUDIENCE MEMBER: Professor Dawkins, thanks for your presence here. I think there's a very obvious flaw in the logic that you've used there. You seem to conveniently forget that many of the wars that have been fought in recent years and see, indeed, the most controversial ones, they have been this direct result of the desire to spread these values of capitalism, these values of democracy, which essentially are exactly what you're against in one way, shape or form. So whether it's spreading democracy or spreading capitalism or any of these ways of life or a few decades before spreading communism or whatever, it has to be faced up to that these ideologies were what people used to advance wars, to advance persecution and oppression. So how can you possibly say that it's only in the name of religion that these sorts of acts have been done when...
RICHARD DAWKINS: No, I never said...
AUDIENCE MEMBER:...clearly the reality is the exact opposite.
RICHARD DAWKINS: I never said that. There are plenty of other ideologies. Ideology is what motivates people to do these things, not atheism. Communism could well motivate. Nazism motivated people to do these terrible things. These are things that people believe as a matter of faith, not religious faith in that case but faith, whereas atheism is not that.
TONY JONES: Okay. I'm going to go now to another question from the audience. It's from Andrew Kollington.
ANDREW KOLLINGTON: My question is to Senator Fielding. You're courageously open about your religious and moral beliefs. As a believer in God, do you accept the Bible as the word of God and those who participate in homosexual behavior ought to be shunned or be put to death as the Bible demands? Or do so called'moderate Christians' simply choose to ignore the word of God in this case, picking what passages they feel best suit our social trends of the day?
STEVE FIELDING: Look, I'm certainly not fearful of gays, as someone said just the other night, I think, on 60 minutes. But, look, I don't think gays should be shunned or put to death. That's just a joke. That is just absolutely insulting. It's actually - I find it, you know, really offensive for that to even be even thought of.
TONY JONES: But it is...
STEVE FIELDING: But I'm just is I find that...
TONY JONES: It is....
STEVE FIELDING: Not you yourself...
TONY JONES: Those penalties...
STEVE FIELDING:...but just the question, you know.
TONY JONES: Those penalties are actually cited in the Bible. I think that's the point he was making.
STEVE FIELDING: Yeah. Look, I actually don't believe in that at all, so that gives you...
RICHARD DAWKINS: Well, why not? I mean, it's the Bible. How do you decided then?
AUDIENCE MEMBER: Senator, do you find God offensive?
JULIE BISHOP: I was just saying the Bible is a text some 2000 years old. You've got the Old Testament which, you know, the stories in the Old Testament are fascinating. They are intriguing. The new testament tells the story of a man who tried to do good things and who began this movement of Christianity that is still with us today. He must have been an outstanding person, let's face it. But the beautify of the psalms, the message behind the parables, doesn't mean that you have to be absolutely wedded to each word. It means that there were messages there that live through the ages and I don't have any difficulty with the New Testament at all in that regard. But it doesn't mean that I live my life according to every single chapter of the New Testament.
TONY JONES: Let's hear a brief response from Richard Dawkins?
RICHARD DAWKINS: The New Testament - you believe, if you believe in the New Testament, that God, the all powerful creator of the universe couldn't think of a better way to forgive humanity's sins than to have himself put on earth, tortured and executed in atonement for the sins of humanity? What kind of a horrible, depraved notion is that?
JULIE BISHOP: You know, can I just say one thing?
TONY JONES: Yes.
JULIE BISHOP: You know what disturbs me about this debate and that is that people should respect other people's views. Now, the neo-creationists say that there's no scientific theory or fact and they deny it and the neo-Darwinists deny that there's faith or religion. Let's show some respect for different people's views and then I think the debate will be perhaps much more pleasant.
RICHARD DAWKINS: What is wrong - when you say - you're implying I didn't show respect.
JULIE BISHOP: No, I'm saying that what disturbs me about this debate and we see it often is that there are extremes. And whenever I see extremes I'm concerned.
RICHARD DAWKINS: But the extreme is in the New Testament. I simply told you what is New Testament doctrine. That is St Paul's view, which is accepted by Christianity. That's why Christ came to earth, in order to atone for humanity's sins. If it's extreme, it's not me that's being extreme, it's the new testament that's being extreme.
TONY JONES: No, well, I'm going to jump in here, because is that not a story of sacrifice and therefore has something admirable attached to it which is the opposite of what you suggested?
RICHARD DAWKINS: Do you think it's admirable? You think it's admirable that God actually had himself tortured for the sins of humanity?
TONY JONES: That is the Christian view obviously.
RICHARD DAWKINS: That is the Christian view. If you think that's admirable, you can keep it.
TONY JONES: Okay. Tony Burke, first of all, quickly?
TONY BURKE: I don't think your ridicule of people's faith is much better than what you're criticising. I really don't.
RICHARD DAWKINS: But I just stated it. I didn't ridicule it. I simply stated it.
TONY BURKE: No. No. No. No. Sorry, if you go back over the words you used, once you're stating it you did then ridicule it. You did. And if you want to look at the challenges and the conflicts and making a community around the world work together, then the level of respect that so many religions have not shown for each other absolutely needs to be lifted and your level of respect and tolerance could probably be a bit better too.
RICHARD DAWKINS: Let me answer that. Let me answer that. I did not more than state the Christian doctrine and Tony then said, "That is the Christian doctrine. Isn't it admirable." People said, "Yes, it's admirable." So how is it disrespectful if I simply state what it is and half the audience think it's admirable? What's disrespectful about stating it?
TONY BURKE: Press rewind, hear your own words. You have changed them.
TONY JONES: Okay.
RICHARD DAWKINS: I have not.
TONY JONES: I'm sorry, I'm going to bring in our other panellists quickly to respond to this and we'll start with Patrick. Your thoughts?
PATRICK MCGORRY: Well, I find the whole discussion a bit frustrating, I've got to say, because I'm a minister in the real world. This is very intellectual stuff, you know. I'm thinking about the people that are being tortured these days, you know, and, you know, what's happening to them and so I think - and it's on a whole lot of different bases. I would say ideology rather than faith is the driver of it. You could say faith is a kind of ideology, as Richard probably agree with that. That's the problem and we've got, you know, millions of people around the world that are still suffering these days. Slavery only went out about 100 years ago. We've still got torture. All of these social evils are still with us. So what are we doing about it? I'd like to talk about more practical things. That's my tendency.
TONY JONES: Okay. Well, we do have a - we've got a lot of people with their hands up. We do have a question which relates to one of your practical interests, and it comes from Dennis Colombo. Question nine. Where's Dennis?
DENNIS COLOMBO: It's a different kind of question, Tony. My question is both political parties, the Coalition and Labor, have been severely criticised about their handling of the boat people asylum seekers. I'm wondering if the non-politicians and the audience have got some insight into how they think we should go about it and perhaps lead us in a fresher direction.
TONY JONES: Patrick, let's start with you on this.
PATRICK MCGORRY: Well, this is a subject very close to my heart. I've worked with asylum seekers and refugees since the late eighties and...
TONY JONES: And you've been scathing about immigration detention practices.
PATRICK MCGORRY: I think I've seen the situation deteriorate in Australia since that time. At that point in the 1980s we had a very positive international reputation for looking after refugees and dealing with them in a very humanitarian way and the whole situation deteriorated quite significantly in the last 20 years. We're starting to dig ourselves out of that hole now and I am worried that we're - in the context of the political debate, we might be going to do a u-turn backwards again. So I am concerned about that, particularly from a mental health point of view, because the two things we know about the people that are coming to Australia and seeking asylum are 90 per cent of them are genuine refugees and 50 to 60 per cent of them have been through very extreme experiences. They are not only the most courageous people, but they also are extremely vulnerable and traumatised. So the one thing we have to do as a country is not add insult to injury and make that worse, and there are two things that do that: prolonged uncertain detention. And I'm not saying mandatory detention isn't necessary for certain purposes. Brief detention is quite warranted for health and safety checks. And the second thing, and this is the thing I have most clinical experience with was the effect of temporary protection visas on people. That was just an absolutely devastating experience for people.
TONY JONES: Well, let me ask you this, because the question that's being raised now is whether this government has actually shifted the problem offshore - effectively outsourced it so that the same people who were put in detention in Australia are now largely being kept in detention funded by Australia and in detention centres built by Australia dollars in Indonesia?
PATRICK MCGORRY: Well, I'm just going to stick with the health focus here. The key thing is to make sure that mental health and health facilities are available to them. That's the key issue with the offshore issue. Do they have access to proper mental health care and other types of health care in the locations they are being maintained.
TONY JONES: Do you fear that they may not?
PATRICK MCGORRY: I'm not sure about that. I think there are processes to try to ensure that happens, but I haven't been to the offshore detention centres, so I can't answer it definitely.
TONY JONES: Okay, let's go to Julie Bishop on this. There's been a fair bit of talk about this recently. In fact, the Opposition has pretty much accused the government of shifting the focus of this detention of asylum seekers back to Indonesia and putting the problem in their lap.
JULIE BISHOP: Well, our concern is that the government weakened the border protection laws and has essentially said to Indonesia, "This is now your responsibility to sort it out." The Prime Minister actually rang President Yudhoyono and asked him to intercept a boat that was heading to Australia and asked him to intervene and take it to Indonesia's shores and then essentially said to Indonesia, "It's your problem." Same with the Oceanic Viking. There is nothing humane about a policy that encourages people to go to people smugglers, puts them aboard leaky boats and sends them across the seas. We know that there are 105 Afghanis who were on boat last November coming down from the north and haven't been seen since. We don't know how many other situations there are like that, so there's nothing humane about the people smuggling trade. What we need to do is ensure that Australia meets its obligations to be a humanitarian - a good humanitarian country and we do take our share of humanitarian refugees under an organised program, but we must also ensure that the integrity of our borders are such that we don't have people arriving by boat in circumstances which causes death and injury,
TONY JONES: Very briefly, the logic of that would be to keep them in detention centres in Indonesia, which have been outsourced and built by the Australian Government.
JULIE BISHOP: Well, working with the transit countries and working with the source countries to ensure that they don't get into the hands of the people smugglers.
TONY JONES: Tony Burke?
TONY BURKE: I think the point that we need to discourage seriously people smuggling is inarguable. There's no argument against that. You have a situation and Julie's referred to more recent example. I remember all the discussion following SIEV-X. People drowned on the way here and that's not the way we want people to get here. It's also the case that the solution is not, once people get here, to treat them pretty cruelly and say, "Oh, there you go. We found a deterrent." And under temporary protection visas what we said to people was - Australia said to people was, "Even if you're found to be here genuinely, even if you have ticked every box in being a true refugee, we're not going to give you any certainty possibly ever, and that brought down mental health consequences which weren't in their interest, weren't in Australia's interests and I really hope the opposition is not serious about wanting to bring them back.
TONY JONES: Can I just ask you this. How do you know the same things aren't happening in detention centres in Indonesia, where you have no control but simply provide funding?
TONY BURKE: What they are there in place of is the camps which, in |
out of IP version 4 addresses, they're exhausted. We have done everything possible to extend its life and save it. Everything from classless interdomain routing, or CIDR, and Network Address Translation, or NAT, and subnetting subnets and all that really fun stuff that we've discussed up to this point in our course. But there is just nothing else we can do and at this point in time, we will embrace IP version 6.
Issues with IPv4 addressing workarounds
One of things that helped us so much in IP version 4 is almost completely gone in IPv6 and that is Network Address Translation. You may not have been around for the beginnings of proxy servers and NAT, but let me share with you the nightmare that caused for admins with all of the different applications breaking and eventually, the world got used to working through NAT and the technology has caught up with it. But we're trying to get away from this idea of private and public networks. Instead, we look for global IP addresses, which are equivalent really to public IP addresses and the only local addresses that we have are self-assigned addresses. At least, these are the ones we like to consider private, these local addresses. And so we're moving to much more global network where everybody who connects up to it, is uniquely identifiable and the global network and NAT is extracted here so that we have end-to-end reachability without some intermediary reworking IP addresses on the fly.
What is IPv6? Features
All right, so first and foremost with IP version 6 - we have many, many more addresses. How many? Too many to count, way too many to count. But let's put it in perspective, an IP version 4 was how many bits? Just 32 bits. IP version 6 addresses are 128 bits. That's a significant increase in size.
It's a quadrupling of the bit size, but it grows by 2 to the 96th power, beyond what IPv4 brings to the table. They are 96 bits apart, 2 to the 96, that's a big number, right? And that larger address base affords us a reason to move to this. That scalability. But we don't want to move over to this technology merely because we want a larger address base. That might be the driving factor, but we want some other benefits along with it. It is very flexible. It allows for route summation. It allows us to connect up to networks and have IP addresses in multiple networks. It allows us to be more plug-and-play, self-assigned addresses, renumber for switching service providers, and do that on the fly. Holly molly! A simpler header to make it easier for routers and the core of networks to be able to forward millions, billions, trillions of packets. Security is important. Internet Protocol Security, or IPsec is built into this. If you run IPv6 in some way, you must be capable of working with IPsec.
Transition. We said IPv4 is a thing of the past. Let's elaborate on that. Is it going away tomorrow? No. Is it going away in five years? No. Is it going away in 15 years? Probably not. So we're going to have a hodgepodge. Really it's the best way to think about it. You got the old stuff living with the new and we're going to have to make this work. That means we're going to lean on these transition richness strategies that allows to run both and make that work.
IPv6 addresses
At this point, are you able to pick an IP version address out of a lineup? If we provided you a list, would you know what is valid, what is not valid? That is an important skill to have when it comes to the real world as well as if you are preparing for a certification exam. Let's talk about our IP version 6 format. We already said it is 128 bits long, but we don't break it up in dotted decimal notation, no, not at all.
Examples:
2031:0000:130F:0000:0000:09C0:876A:130B FF01:0000:0000:0000:0000:0000:0000:0001 0000:0000:0000:0000:0000:0000:0000:0001 0000:0000:0000:0000:0000:0000:0000:0000
You see, our IP version 6 addresses utilize hexadecimals, so we have values from 0 through 9 and then A, B, C, D, E, and F that we can find. And we group together four hexadecimal values and then put a colon, and we will do this eight times. So we have eight fields that contain four hexadecimal digits. Let's think about that. How big is each of these fields? Well each hexadecimal value equates to 4 bits, so four time four would be 16 bits. So we have eight 16-bit fields for a total of 128 bits. Look at the example provided. That's a really long address, really long address. We had enough problems remembering 192.168.1.8. Try remembering these. It is much, much more difficult. But is this how they are always represented? No, they are not. There are mechanisms in place to shrink them down, truncate them, to make them more manageable, to make them easier to read and it is not just for us, our devices do this as well. So let's talk about some of these mechanisms here. The first one being to drop leading zeros, drop leading zeros.
Examples:
2031:0:130F:0:0:09C0:876A:130B FF01:0:0:0:0:0:0:1 0:0:0:0:0:0:0:1 0:0:0:0:0:0:0:0
Look inside one of those fields. Anytime a field starts with a 0, you can take that 0 off. If the next value within that field is a 0 as well, you can take that one off as well. You can remove the first three hexadecimal values in a field if they are zeros. You can't remove all four. You can't remove all four, we still have to have a value in there. But we can remove up to the first three leading zeros, so that truncates each of these fields now making it smaller. That's option number one, drop leading zeros. But, I also noticed here that we might have successive fields of zeros, might be two fields, three fields, four fields, but there is a whole bunch of zeros just taking up space, can we shrink that down as well?
We absolutely can. And this is one of those things where it's kind of elastic. It's like a little spring and you put it in and then it, boom, springs out and fills out a bunch of zeros. Here is the thing though. We don't want this address to be too wobbly. Two of these springs, it will get all messy. Here is why.
Examples:
2031:0000:130F:0000:0000:09C0:876A:130B FF01::0001 ::0001 ::
What people don't immediately realize sometimes when they see this at first, is that this rule, the double colon rule, gives us the means of inserting four zeros or substituting for four zeros bounded by colons, everything has to be bounded by colons, four zeros, eight, twelve, sixteen, twenty, all the way to thirty two zeros, the entirety in fact. So it is a variable spring. It will go, but if you were to put two of these springy double colons in, then you wouldn't know where that middle stuff is, what's in the middle. How far to the right, how far to the left is it? You wouldn't be able to tell. There'd be no mechanism and so, you must have a keen eye for this. What if I were to say, maybe an answer in a multiple choice question where they had two double colons in the same address, what should I do with that value?
Well that would be an invalid IP version 6 address. You would ignore that. It's not valid, so if your goal was to have us pick the correct IP version 6 addresses out of a lineup, anything with more than one double colon would be incorrect. I would immediately say, no, not an option.
So now, we have to think about how we melt the two rules together. Two rules for success. The IOS presents it to us in this form. When we enter it, we should be putting it in this form. Drop leading zeros, you can do that all over the place, but don't drop trailing zeros. You might think that some of these examples are a little bit funky. Well they're actually really good examples. Third example looks a little weird, doesn't it? Example three. Look at both rules applied to example three. It does not look like the loopback IP address, but that is what is it. Example three is the loopback IP address. So ping ::1, boom, pinged our loopback IP and then certainly we will be talking about routing. And the last entry would be the address portion of a default route. So we would have ::/0, ::/0. The :: representing all zeros IP address /0, a 0 mask. Wow! This all comes back full circle, doesn't it? But in any case, this is definitely one of the things that we would want you to take away from this discussion. It's definitely a threshold that you've got to cross.This Week at War: The Pakistan Veto
Pakistan shows who’s the boss
In apparent retaliation for a NATO helicopter attack on a Pakistani border outpost this week, Pakistan has closed the Torkham border crossing into Afghanistan to convoys supplying NATO forces. An International Security Assistance Force statement claimed the helicopter attack was a response to an attempted insurgent attack on a coalition base in Afghanistan. Pakistan claimed that the helicopter strike killed three soldiers in its Frontier Corps.
Trucks and tankers bound for NATO bases in Afghanistan are now stuck on the road outside Peshawar. Although this dispute will likely be resolved quickly, it shows that Pakistan has a veto over President Barack Obama’s military strategy in Afghanistan. Specifically, Pakistan has now vetoed the possibility of a U.S. military campaign into the Afghan Taliban’s sanctuaries inside Pakistan. Such a veto is understandable from Pakistan’s perspective, but not so much from those of the NATO and Afghan soldiers who would like to get at the stubborn enemy finding sanctuary inside Pakistan. In a strange irony, the more the United States has built up its forces in Afghanistan, the stronger Pakistan’s veto power over U.S. military decisions has become.
The Sept. 30 helicopter attack that prompted the border closing was the last in a string of such attacks that began a week ago. On Sept. 24, NATO helicopters responded to an attack on a combat outpost near the Pakistan border by firing on insurgents inside Pakistan. Helicopters returned on two following days, were fired on again from Pakistan, and again returned fire.
NATO commanders apparently view these cross-border helicopter strikes as incidents of "hot pursuit" and actions of self-defense while under fire. Pakistani officials, by contrast, no doubt view this string of attacks as a case of NATO probing to see what it can get away with. For Pakistani officials, it became one slice of the salami too much. These officials have accustomed themselves to the CIA’s drone campaign inside Pakistan, a campaign that accelerated sharply in September. If U.S. policymakers thought they could get Pakistani officials to get accustomed to ever more aggressive air raids into the sanctuaries, Pakistan’s closure of the border is designed to bring those thoughts to an end.
According to Foreign Policy‘s Josh Rogin, the Obama administration continues to place Pakistan at the center of its Afghan strategy. The issue for U.S. officials is how to persuade Pakistan’s government to align its behavior with U.S. interests. According to Rogin, the Obama administration has opted for rewards rather than pressure, rejecting the advice of former National Intelligence Director Dennis Blair to conduct airstrikes and raids inside Pakistan as the United States would see fit.
It is sensible to try a strategy of persuasion and rewards first before resorting to pressure and coercion. However, Pakistan’s closure of the Torkham crossing has revealed that the large buildup of U.S. and coalition forces inside Afghanistan has removed the option of applying pressure on Pakistan. Although the United States has negotiated with Russia to obtain an additional supply line into Afghanistan from the north, the tripling of U.S. forces in Afghanistan since Obama took office means that there is no escaping Pakistan’s strong leverage, amounting to a veto, over U.S. military operations. Bob Woodward’s new book Obama’s Wars, describes how National Security Advisor James Jones threatened Pakistani President Asif Ali Zardari with a strong military response (airstrikes on 150 suspected terrorist camps inside Pakistan) should there be a spectacular terrorist attack inside the United States sourced from Pakistan. Jones’s threat is an empty bluff, or at least it has become one now that there are 100,000 U.S. troops dependent on a fragile supply line through Pakistan.
Pakistan’s closure of the Torkham crossing shows that it will allow NATO to execute any military operations it wants just as long as these operations don’t serious threaten the Afghan Taliban, Pakistan’s invaluable proxy ally. Obama and his generals would no doubt like to wield the leverage that Pakistan wields over them. But creating such a reversal of fortune would require a military strategy that doesn’t require endless daily supply convoys snaking through Pakistani territory.
Can Britain resist becoming an American auxiliary?
The British government’s drastic spending cuts have created a moment of truth for the country’s future strategic role in the world. The new Conservative-Liberal Democrat government that came to power in May ordered a broad strategic defense review. But the country’s fiscal crisis has converted that effort into a budget-slashing exercise with a Treasury-imposed 20 percent reduction in defense spending now possible. At stake is whether Britain will be able to exercise an independent foreign and security policy or whether it should instead accept a merger of its foreign and security policy with either the United States or the European Union.
This week, the Daily Telegraph published a previously confidential letter from Defense Secretary Liam Fox to Prime Minister David Cameron. In the letter, Fox warns that the budget cuts the Treasury contemplates will force Britain to withdraw surface naval forces from the Indian Ocean, Caribbean, or Persian Gulf; sharply limit its ability to conduct amphibious operations; and put at risk other maritime operations such as its ability to reinforce the Falkland Islands or conduct some counterterrorism missions. Fox’s warning implies that the price of maintaining a British nuclear deterrent (a new generation of nuclear missile submarines) and a British Army able to contribute to missions like Afghanistan is a permanent hollowing-out of Britain’s other maritime capabilities and its ability to maintain much of a global military prese
nce.
If the top priority for British policymakers was maintaining Britain’s ability to formulate its own policies and resist intimidation from any direction, the top defense priorities would be the nuclear missile submarine deterrent fleet; more naval forces to protect those submarines, British territory and interests, and air power to do the same. British land power, valued by coalition partners like the United States, would be less important if policy independence were key.
U.S. defense officials are growing increasingly alarmed by the developments in London. Washington would no doubt prefer to see the British maintain its army and special operations forces, along with some of its surface warships. British participation in U.S.-led counterinsurgency and stabilization campaigns has added some international legitimacy to those efforts and has spread the burden on ground force deployments. By contrast, U.S. officials (perhaps the Obama administration in particular) might silently prefer the British to scrap its nuclear deterrent. U.S. officials would see such a move as a boost to the cause of nuclear nonproliferation (which favors U.S. conventional military superiority) and would increase Britain’s dependence on the United States for its security.
Becoming mostly a land-power auxiliary of the Pentagon would create tremendous savings for the British Treasury; Britain’s nuclear missile submarine and aircraft carrier programs are hugely expensive. But it would be very surprising if Cameron and his government went this way. U.S. officials are right to be worried. If, as is likely, Britain opts for austerity and policy independence, that won’t leave much left over for more land campaigns alongside the Yanks.The Super Bowl, another target for London, was worth £169m to the New Orleans economy in 2013
A London-based NFL team could be worth more than £100m a year to the UK, says a study published on Wednesday.
Compiled by accountants Deloitte, it says the two NFL games at Wembley in 2013 brought an extra £32m to London.
That could rise to £58m if, as expected, the "International Series" expands to four games a year from 2016.
But the real goal is a full-time London team by 2022, which would mean at least eight games a season, bringing in £102m, according to Deloitte.
The report was launched by Sajid Javid, the Secretary of State for Culture, Media and Sport, and comes a week after Chancellor George Osborne said he would do everything he could to relocate a team to London permanently.
This support is likely to include the type of tax breaks that have been offered to major sporting occasions such as London 2012, the 2014 Commonwealths and next year's Rugby World Cup, but not to one-off athletics, golf and tennis events.
With rates of income tax lower in the US than in the UK, the lack of such a deal for a London team would cause problems for the league and its relationship with the National Football League Players' Association.
William 'The Fridge' Perry was a star attraction of the London Monarchs who folded in 1998 after a previous attempt to export American football
The NFL operates under a collective bargaining agreement between the team owners and the players which limits the total amount each team is able to spend, but also sets minimum salaries based on each player's time in the league.
The agreement, effectively a revenue-sharing deal, also restricts a player's contractual freedom, which could result in problems with European Union employment law.
The BBC understands NFL bosses have started negotiations with the European Commission for an exemption, and not just for one team - if a London franchise was to get off the ground, the NFL would look at expanding elsewhere, with Germany the most likely next venue.
Wembley staged its first International Series game in 2007 and hosted single games every year until 2013, when two games took place.
With seven of those eight contests being sell-outs, the decision was taken to expand the series to three games this year and next.
"The NFL games at Wembley have been a huge success showing that there is a big, growing fan-base for the sport in the UK," said Javid. "If the NFL decide that the time is right to base a team overseas, London and the UK will welcome it with open arms."
The Detroit Lions beat the Atlanta Falcons on Sunday and the Dallas Cowboys, one of the sport's most iconic names, play the Jacksonville Jaguars on 9 November.
This means 17 of the NFL's 32 teams will have played at Wembley by next month, with clubs being given bye-weeks to recover from the time difference, although these measures would not be possible for a London team in the current 17-week regular season.
But with the Football Association also very keen on having American tenants at Wembley, the chance of a £100m annual windfall for the UK economy and no sign of the novelty wearing off for British NFL fans, the case for a London franchise could prove irresistible.Photo credit: Deadline
Another Hollywood Star is now facing serious allegations of sexual assault, as we continue to witness the meltdown of the culturally enriched film industry.
Jeffrey Tambor (born July 8, 1944) is an American actor, voice artist, and comedian widely known for his roles as Hank Kingsley on The Larry Sanders Show (1992-1998), George Bluth Sr. and Oscar Bluth on Arrested Development (2003-), Maura Pfefferman on Transparent (2015-), Tom Manning in the Hellboy series (2004-2008) and the Mayor of Whoville in the live-action adaption of How the Grinch Stole Christmas (2000).
Tambor was born in San Francisco, California, the son of Eileen (née Salzberg), a homemaker, and Bernard Tambor, a flooring contractor. He grew up in a Conservative Jewish family with roots in Hungary and Ukraine.
Tambor is a graduate of Abraham Lincoln High School and San Francisco State University, where he studied Acting and then went on to receive a master's degree from Wayne State University.
Tambor is often remembered as Hank Kingsley, the narcissistic sidekick of fictional talk show host Larry Sanders on The Larry Sanders Show, and also well-known for his role in Arrested Development on Netflix.
Now Tambor is being accused by a transgender co-star from the Amazon Series “Transparent”, Trace Lysette, of rubbing his body against hers in a “sexually aggressive manner” during the filming, and she said that he made multiple inappropriate and unwanted sexual statements.
The tranny star said in a statement to<a href="http://deadline.com/2017/11/jeffrey-tambor-sexual-harassment-claims-trace-lysette-transparent-actress-amazon-1202210145/"> Deadline </a>Thursday that Tambor trapped her and pressed his body against hers in a sexual way on the set of the Amazon show. Lysette urged Amazon in her statement to "remove the problem and let the show go on."
Tambor, who says he can at times be “volatile and ill-tempered,” but he denies the claims that he sexually assaulted the tranny despite its desire to drop the matter entirely in order to continue the series.
This is one of those “just wow” moments, when you have a man who's been in film for decades, now being accused of improperly sexually harassing a tranny.
I'm not sure what to make of this, other than to say Lysette seems intent that the claims are legitimate.
“For the past four years, I’ve had the huge privilege and huge responsibility of playing Maura Pfefferman, a transgender woman, in a show that I know has had an enormous, positive impact on a community that has been too long dismissed and misunderstood,” Tambor said Thursday. “Now I find myself accused of behavior that any civilized person would condemn unreservedly.”
Tambor went on, “I know I haven’t always been the easiest person to work with. I can be volatile and ill-tempered, and too often I express my opinions harshly and without tact. But I have never been a predator ever. I am deeply sorry if any action of mine was ever misinterpreted by anyone as being sexually aggressive or if I ever offended or hurt anyone. But the fact is, for all my flaws, I am not a predator and the idea that someone might see me in that way is more distressing than I can express.”
Lysette was a tranny for some time, who in her late teens Lysette was a track athlete and performed drag in bars around her native Dayton and Columbus, Ohio. She worked as a hairstylist and makeup artist before beginning her acting career with a guest role in an episode of Law and Order: Special Victims Unit.
Apparently, if these claims are true then Tambor is into shemales?
Whatever. At this point, Hollyweird just keeps getting weirder.
This is the second allegation against Tambor, with a former assistant to him also making allegations which he denied as well.
In that case, his former Assistant, Van Barnes, was also transgender. Oddly enough.
“I am aware that a former disgruntled assistant of mine has made a private post implying that I had acted in an improper manner toward her,” Tambor told<a href="http://deadline.com/2017/11/jeffrey-tambor-sexual-harassment-claims-amazon-1202204220/"> Deadline</a>. “I adamantly and vehemently reject and deny any and all implication and allegation that I have ever engaged in any improper behavior toward this person or any other person I have ever worked with. I am appalled and distressed by this baseless allegation.”
Jill Soloway, who is the creator of the series, which is Amazon’s flagship comedy, said the following after the first allegations.
“Anything that would diminish the level of respect, safety, and inclusion so fundamental to our workplace is completely antithetical to our principles,” Soloway said. “We are cooperating with the investigation into this matter.”
—<i>[email protected]</i>
<i>On Twitter:</i>
<a href="https://www.twitter.com/IWillRedPillYou">@IWillRedPillYou</a>
Tips? Info? Send me a message!Ko Kyong-taek was born on the island in 1913 and lived there until he moved to Japan. His daughter Kyong-hui later married then-North Korean leader Kim Jong-il. Ko's background in what had become South Korea was swept under the carpet. The location of his grave was so far unknown.
The graves of North Korean leader Kim Jong-un's maternal grandfather and great-grandfather have been discovered on Jeju Island.
But there is some propaganda mileage in the home of Kim Jong-un's maternal family. On April 3, 1948, Jeju was the scene of a communist revolt that ended with a bloody crackdown. Many people headed to Japan to escape the bloodshed.
Under North Korea's bizarre clan-based communism, Kim Jong-un draws his legitimacy from his direct descent from nation founder Kim Il-sung, what is reverently called the "Baekdu bloodline" after Kim Il-sung's alleged birthplace. But there is also a respected "Halla bloodline" of revolutionaries, borrowing the name of the mountain in middle of Jeju, into which his ancestry could by some stretch be shoehorned.
Records show Ko Kyong-taek moved to Osaka in 1929, long before the uprising, and worked in a munitions factory. He fathered one son and two daughters in Japan, including Ko Kyong-hui. In 1962 he was arrested for human trafficking and deported, choosing North Korea over the South.
His daughter joined the Mansudae dance troupe, where she caught Kim Jong-il's eye in 1971. The two had three children -- Jong-chol, Jong-un and Yo-jong. Ko died of breast cancer in France in 1984.
Her older brother, Dong-hun served as a North Korean diplomat in the 1990s, while her younger sister Yong-suk defected to the U.S. with her husband in 1998 after living in Geneva, where they managed Kim Jong-il's secret funds.The Narendra Modi-government’s move to choke funds for the two NGOs run by the controversial preacher, Zakir Naik is an action long overdue, undoubtedly.
As Firstpost has noted before, much caution needs to be exercised on any individual or organisation seeking to promote the idea of religious supremacy in a secular society.
This government is seemingly convinced that Naik’s speeches and the functions of his two NGOs — Islamic Research Foundation (IRF) and IRF Educational Trust — are detrimental to country’s religious harmony and an inspiration to terror elements, hence the action.
Naik’s style of preaching, which is centered around the supremacy of the 7th-century religion and his clandestine calls to wage war against the ‘enemies of Islam’ have allegedly inspired terror elements both in India and abroad.
Two questions arise at this juncture.
First, why did the Indian government took so long to acknowledge that Naik is a threat and initiate actions? Going by Naik’s own claims, he has been doing it for some 25 years and the content of his speeches have been pretty much same all along. As this website has reported before, during the UPA-rule, in 2013, a communication had gone to the ministry of home affairs from the then Prime Minister, Manmohan Singh, about the potential threat caused by Naik's speeches. This was based on a complaint submitted at the PMO. But, the matter ended there.
It took the July 2016 Dhaka attacks for the Indian government to wake up to the problem (possibly due to media pressure) and initiate actions against the Islamic preacher. Naik is now a bird flown far away from the cage and is unlikely to return anytime soon. The preacher has even avoided attending his father’s funeral ceremony early this week, fearing arrest. As of now, he is out of reach of Indian agencies.
Also, Naik’s name has been linked not just to Dhaka attacks but even to the cases in Kerala where youth have been brainwashed to join the Islamic State of Iraq and Syria. Kerala police has claimed that Arshi Qureshi, guest relations officer of Mumbai-based Islamic Research Foundation, had indeed links with the Islamic State. For years, Naik’s NGOs have been receiving foreign aid. Given the findings of the Police, it is quite possible that these funds have been used for such acts. Only a detailed investigation on the money trail can reveal how this money has been utilised.
But, the point here is that had the investigative agencies acted well in advance, things wouldn’t have worsened to this level. This shows how our surveillance mechanisms are still grappling with problem of sheer inefficiency.
The second question is how prepared is the government to proceed from here in this sensitive case. Since the very beginning, Naik has been playing the victim card. He has termed the actions against him as attacks on Muslim community.
True, India’s larger Muslim community (about 172 million of them as per Census 2011 data), except in certain pockets, do not approve his radical, religious fundamental ideas and the idea of religious supremacy. But even then, a failure from the part of the government to corner Naik with a convincing, foolproof case could result in the preacher yet again shielding himself keeping the community in the front. Then, it could lead to more communal issues like one seen in other Muslim dominated areas of the country and could thus become a bigger headache for the Modi-government, which is already facing flak for its alleged pro-Hindu, pro-RSS ideology. It is in this context that the government should send a strong message that extremist elements, be it of any religious background, will be dealt with iron hand like it is currently doing with Naik.
Zakir Naik’s case is a classic example of government and investigators acting too late. And it is too sensitive a case for Modi-government to handle now. In an open letter he released in September, 2016, Naik had warned that if he and his organisation IRF are banned in India, he would be welcomed by other Muslim countries with a "red carpet" and such an action will be the "biggest jolt to the country’s democracy in recent times". This language is that of a clear warning to the Indian authorities. The government would do well exercising caution while cornering the Salafi preacher.
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 news that the UK, with negative growth in the fourth quarter of 2012, faces the prospect of a triple-dip recession, should be the final blow to the intellectual credibility of deficit hawks. You just can't get more wrong than this flat-earth bunch of economic policy-makers.
They're pretty much batting zero. They failed to foresee the collapse of housing bubbles in the US and Europe and its consequent downturn. They grossly underestimated its severity after it hit. And their policy prescription of austerity has been shown to be wrong everywhere that applied it: in the US, the eurozone and, especially, the UK.
By all rights, these folks should be laughed out of town. They should be retrained for a job more suited to their skill set – preferably, something that doesn't involve numbers, or people.
But that's not what is happening. The people who got it all wrong are still calling the shots in the UK, the IMF, the European Central Bank, and Washington. The idea that job security would have any relationship to performance is completely alien in the world of economic policy. With few exceptions, these people enjoy a level of job security that would make even the most powerful unions green with envy.
Of course, the cynical among us might note that the highest earners have done just fine. High unemployment rates undermine workers' bargaining power, which ensures that almost all gains from economic growth go to those at the top. In the US, the profit share of national income is near its post-second world war high.
Even if this upward redistribution was not a deliberate goal, it certainly affects the urgency with which policy-makers attend to depressed economies and high unemployment. If the stock markets were tumbling, as they were in 2008-09, there would likely be a lot more attention devoted to fixing the economy. (And if you think a plunging stock market has to mean that the economy is going down, you need to study more economics.)
Instead of focusing on glaring issues, like how the economy is down 9m jobs from its trend growth path, or how the typical worker's real wage has risen by just 2% over the last decade, the policy people in Washington are debating how to reduce the deficit. This makes about as much sense as debating the right color to paint the White House kitchen.
Anyone who bothers to look at the data knows that we have large deficits because the economy collapsed. There are people who are paid to yell about "out-of-control" spending, but the numbers don't cooperate with their story. There are also plenty of people who blame large deficits on the wars and Bush tax cuts, but those issues aren't the cause of these deficits, either.
We have large deficits because the economy collapsed, end of story. The folks who claim otherwise are either too lazy to look at the numbers or prefer to tell stories that aren't true.
One of my favorite quirks in the Washington debate is a fear that if we allow our public debt to exceed 90% of GDP, then terrible things will happen to the economy. Remarkably, this sort of Twilight Zone fear – don't cross the 90% line – is taken very seriously in Washington.
The silliness of the figure was made clear in a blogpost by the Institute for Energy Research last week, which claims the government owns more than $120tn in energy resources. There are plenty of reasons to question the numbers from this industry-funded outfit, but let's assume that they are off by a factor of ten. This means that the government owns $12tn in energy resources.
Suppose we sell off half of these assets, netting the government $6tn. This would immediately lower our debt-to-GDP ratio by almost 40%. That would put us way below the 90% twilight zone threshold, and without any cuts to social security, Medicare, or other programs that low- and middle-class people depend upon. We wouldn't even have to raise taxes on "job creators".
This is absurd, of course. It's ridiculous to imagine that the government's financial situation is in peril if we have a debt-to-GDP ratio of 90%, and that everything would be fine if we just sell off our energy assets to reduce our debt to 50% of GDP. But that is what Serious People in Washington believe (or, at least, what they'll claim to believe), until they finally get too embarrassed to spew such nonsense.
The unfortunate reality is that on both sides of the ocean we have policy-makers who are sputtering nonsense about how to remedy the economy. And for the foreseeable future, they will have the political power to keep their jobs – no matter how disastrous their policy might be.Conservative Party backbencher Stephen Woodworth has put forward a motion that will result in a debate in Parliament on abortion in the guise of “when life begins,” in April.
This debate is tentatively scheduled for Monday, April 26th, and will call for the creation of a special committee dominated by Conservatives. The motion calls for 7 of the 12 members to be from the Conservative Party, and all to be selected by the Standing Committee on Procedure and House Affairs. At least two members of this committee are suspected to be current or former members of the semi-secretive Parliamentary Pro-Life Caucus (PPLC), which (along with Woodworth) has vowed to end abortion altogether. I’ll examine their voting records shortly.
Here is the text of Motion M-312:
“That a special committee of the House be appointed and directed to review the declaration in Subsection 223(1) of the Criminal Code of Canada which states that a child becomes a human being only at the moment of complete birth and to answer the questions hereinafter set forth;
“that the membership of the special committee consist of twelve members which shall include seven members from the government party, four members from the Official Opposition and one member from the Liberal Party, provided that the Chair shall be from the government party; that the members to serve on the said committee be appointed by the Standing Committee on Procedure and House Affairs and the membership report of the special committee be presented to the House no later than 20 sitting days after the adoption of this motion;
“that substitutions to the membership of the special committee be allowed, if required, in the manner provided by Standing Order 114(2);
“that the special committee have all the powers of a Standing Committee as provided in the Standing Orders; and
“that the special committee present its final report to the House of Commons within 10 months after the adoption of this motion with answers to the following questions,
” (i) what medical evidence exists to demonstrate that a child is or is not a human being before the moment of complete birth?,
“ (ii) is the preponderance of medical evidence consistent with the declaration in Subsection 223(1) that a child is only a human being at the moment of complete birth?,
” (iii) what are the legal impact and consequences of Subsection 223(1) on the fundamental human rights of a child before the moment of complete birth?,
“ (iv) what are the options available to Parliament in the exercise of its legislative authority in accordance with the Constitution and decisions of the Supreme Court of Canada to affirm, amend, or replace Subsection 223(1)?
News of Motion M-312 has been slowly rolling out, following a public declaration by Jim Hughes last Thursday, claiming that the “perfect storm” has arrived that will result in the abolition of abortion.
Jim Hughes declares the Canadian war on reproductive rights
I guess if any Canadian far-right figure would want to be known as the person who officially declared the Canadian war on women’s reproductive rights, it would be Jim Hughes. Hughes is the |
opposition fighters, alongside Turkish soldiers, artillery and airstrikes, launched an attack to capture al-Bab one week ago. The city, located 30km south of the Turkish border with Syria, is the last major Islamic State (IS) holding in Aleppo province.
But the Islamic State is not giving up easily. Its fighters are “still dug-in inside al-Bab,” said Haithem Hamou, a spokesman for al-Jabha a-Shamiyah, one of the Free Syrian Army (FSA) factions fighting on the ground.
The Turkish-backed forces “control 40 percent” of the city, the spokesman said, adding that over the past week, the fighting has “never paused.”
Hamou’s description of grinding battles against a well-fortified enemy run contrary to separate statements made by Turkey’s Prime Minister Binali Yildirim and President Recep Tayyip Erdogan earlier in the week that al-Bab was “largely taken under control” and that Islamic State fighters were “in the process of entirely leaving al-Bab.”
Ankara launched its Euphrates Shield offensive nearly six months ago to clear Islamic State forces from territories just south of the Turkish border with Syria. By supporting FSA forces with Turkish personnel, airstrikes and artillery to capture the area, the offensive also aims to limit Kurdish territorial expansion in the same area.
The Euphrates Shield attack on al-Bab initially focused on the city’s western outskirts. However, after breaking through IS defenses there last Wednesday and entering the city for the first time after weeks of fighting, the Turkish-backed forces “have not been able to advance into the city center,” said Hamou.
An activist in the same area described “slow progress” by Turkish-backed forces.
IS trenches, tunnels, IEDs, snipers and car bombs stymied the initial advance, driving Euphrates Shield fighters to change their approach.
“Now we are trying to advance from the north,” the rebel spokesman told Syria Direct on Wednesday, claiming that Euphrates Shield forces captured a roundabout there.
Separately, south of al-Bab, Syrian regime forces are continuing their own weeks-long drive towards the city, but their early progress, too, appears to have slowed at Tadef, an IS-held town less than three kilometers south of the city.
‘In ruins’
While Euphrates Shield troops fight to break through dense Islamic State fortifications and capture the remaining 60 percent of al-Bab, hundreds of Turkish airstrikes and shells are falling on the city amidst reports of civilian casualties.
On Wednesday, the Islamic State’s Amaq news agency reported that seven people were killed by Turkish airstrikes and shelling. The agency posted graphic videos and pictures in recent days showing pancaked buildings and the remains of people reportedly killed by the bombing.
Smoke rises over al-Bab city on Wednesday. Photo courtesy of Step Agency.
On Monday, local Facebook news page al-Bab al-Hadath reported that Turkish warplanes bombed a family home, killing 15 people inside. The same day, 20 airstrikes and 200 artillery shells hit the city, the page claimed. Syria Direct could not independently confirm the report.
The United States-led coalition conducted airstrikes in al-Bab in recent weeks, but its last reported raid was last Saturday. Coalition strike reports for Tuesday and Wednesday have not been released.
“We cannot confirm or deny what is happening inside the IS areas,” rebel spokesman Hamou told Syria Direct on Wednesday. “Our information is that al-Bab is essentially empty of civilians in both the areas we control and the IS areas.”
Some 30,000 civilian residents of al-Bab fled the bombing of the city and IS rule since December 2016, according to the United Nations. One displaced resident described a city “in ruins” to Syria Direct earlier this month.
It is not immediately clear how many civilians remain inside the city.One of the projects that I am exploring at RC, is writing a UNIX shell. This is the first part of a series of posts that will eventually follow.
Disclaimer: I am not a subject expert on writing shells and I am sharing my findings as I learn more about this myself.
What is a shell?
A lot has been written about this, so I will not go into too much detail about the definition. However, in one line -
A shell is an interface that allows you to interact with the kernel of an operating system.
How does a shell work?
A shell parses commands entered by the user and executes this. To be able to do this, the workflow of the shell will look like this:
Startup the shell Wait for user input Parse user input Execute the command and return the result Go back to 2.
There is one important piece to all of this though: processes. The shell is the parent process. This is the main thread of our program which is waiting for user input. However, we cannot execute the command in the main thread itself, because of the following reasons:
An erroneous command will cause the entire shell to stop working. We want to avoid this. Independent commands should have their own process blocks. This is known as isolation and falls under fault tolerance.
Fork
To be able to avoid this, we use the system call fork. I thought I understood fork until I wrote about four lines of code using it.
fork creates a copy of the current process. The copy is known as the child and each process in a system has a unique process id (pid) associated to it. Let’s take a look at the following piece of code:
fork.c
1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 #include <stdio.h> #include <stdlib.h> #include <unistd.h> int main () { pid_t child_pid = fork (); // The child process if ( child_pid == 0 ) { printf ( "### Child ###
Current PID: %d and Child PID: %d
", getpid (), child_pid ); } else { printf ( "### Parent ###
Current PID: %d and Child PID: %d
", getpid (), child_pid ); } return 0 ; }
The fork system call returns twice, once for each process. This sounds counter intuitive at first. But let’s take a look at what goes underneath the hood.
By invoking fork we are creating a new branch in our program. This is not the same as a traditional if-else branch. fork creates a copy of the current process and creates a new one out of it. The resulting system call returns the process id of the child process. Immediately after the fork call has succeeded, both the child and the parent process (the main thread of our code) are running simultaneously.
To give you a better idea of the program flow, take a look at this diagram:
The fork() creates a new child process, but at the same time, execution of the parent process is not halted. The child process begins and finishes its execution independent of the parent and vice versa.
A quick note before we proceed further, the getpid system call returns the current process id.
If you compile and execute the code, you’d get an output similar to the following:
### Parent ### Current PID: 85247 and Child PID: 85248 ### Child ### Current PID: 85248 and Child PID: 0
In the block under ### Parent ###, the current process ID is 85247 and that of the child is 85248. Note that the pid of the child is greater than that of the parent, implying that the child was created after the parent. (Update: As someone correctly pointed out on Hacker News this isn’t guaranteed, although the more likely scenario. Reason being that, the OS could recycle older unused process ids.
In the block under ### Child ###, the current process ID is 85248, which is the same as the pid of the child in the previous block. However, the child pid here is 0.
Actual numbers would vary on each execution.
You’d be forgiven for thinking about how can child_pid assume two different values in the same execution flow, when we have clearly assigned a value to child_pid once on line 9. However, recall that invoking fork creates a new process, which is identical to the current one. As a result, in the parent process, child_pid is the actual value of the child process that just got created, and the child process itself has no child of its own, as a result of which the value of child_pid is 0.
Thus, the if-else block we have defined from lines 12 to 16 is required to control what code to execute in the child, vs the parent. When child_pid is 0, the code block will be executed under the child process, while the else block will be executed under the parent process instead. The order in which the blocks will be executed cannot be determined, and depends on the operating system’s scheduler.
Introducing determinism
Let me introduce you to the system call sleep. To quote the linux man pages:
sleep – suspend execution for an interval of time
The interval is in seconds.
Let us add a sleep(1) call to the parent process, which would be the else block of our code:
sleep_parent.c
1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 #include <stdio.h> #include <stdlib.h> #include <unistd.h> int main () { pid_t child_pid = fork (); // The child process if ( child_pid == 0 ) { printf ( "### Child ###
Current PID: %d and Child PID: %d
", getpid (), child_pid ); } else { sleep ( 1 ); // Sleep for one second printf ( "### Parent ###
Current PID: %d and Child PID: %d
", getpid (), child_pid ); } return 0 ; }
And when you execute this, the output would be similar to:
### Child ### Current PID: 89743 and Child PID: 0
and after a span of 1 second, you would see
### Parent ### Current PID: 89742 and Child PID: 89743
And you will see the same behaviour each time you execute the code. This is because we have made a blocking sleep call in the parent process and the OS scheduler in the meantime finds free CPU time for the child process to be executed.
Similarly, if you add the sleep(1) call to the child process instead, i.e. the if block of our code, you will notice that the output of the parent block immediately on the console. But you will also notice that your program has terminated. And the output of the child block being dumped into stdout. It looks like:
$ gcc -lreadline blog/sleep_child.c -o sleep_child &&./sleep_child ### Parent ### Current PID: 23011 and Child PID: 23012 $ ### Child ### Current PID: 23012 and Child PID: 0
The source for this is available in sleep_child.c.
This is because the parent process has nothing to do after the printf statement, and is terminated. However, the child process is blocked on the sleep call for one second after which the printf statement is executed.
Determinism done right
However, using sleep to control your process execution flow is not the best approach, because if you make a sleep call for n seconds :
How do you guarantee that whatever it is that you are waiting for will complete its execution within those n seconds. What if whatever it is that you are waiting for finishes much sooner than n seconds? In that case you are idling unnecessarily.
A better approach here would be using the wait system call instead (or one of the variants). We will use the waitpid system call. It takes the following parameters:
Process ID of the process for which you want your program to wait. A variable which will be populated with information on how the process was terminated. Options flag, to customize the behaviour of waitpid
wait.c
1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 26 #include <stdio.h> #include <stdlib.h> #include <unistd.h> #include <sys/wait.h> int main () { pid_t child_pid ; pid_t wait_result ; int stat_loc ; child_pid = fork (); // The child process if ( child_pid == 0 ) { printf ( "### Child ###
Current PID: %d and Child PID: %d
", getpid (), child_pid ); sleep ( 1 ); // Sleep for one second } else { wait_result = waitpid ( child_pid, & stat_loc, WUNTRACED ); printf ( "### Parent ###
Current PID: %d and Child PID: %d
", getpid (), child_pid ); } return 0 ; }
When you execute this, you will notice that the child block gets printed immediately and waits for a brief moment (we added the sleep after the printf here). The parent process waits for the child to finish execution after which it is free to execute its own commands.
That’s all for part I. All the code examples shown in this blog post are available here. In the next post, we will explore how to take a command as user input and execute it. Stay tuned.
Acknowledgements
Thanks to Saul Pwanson for helping me understand the behaviour of fork and to Jaseem Abid for reading drafts and suggesting edits.
Resources
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DisqusThere is no hiding the fact that New Orleans is a party town. Adult beverages and distractions to your fitness routine are never farther than a block away. Once upon a time, my day solely revolved around happy hour. It was not too long ago (okay, well, it seems like it was not too long ago) that at the stroke of 3:00PM, my girlfriends and I would start calling each other to see which bar or restaurant had the best happy hour specials. As expected, one drink turned into two, which turned into dinner, which turned into another drink or two. Like clockwork.
Then I realized how much time…and money…I was wasting doing this. My skin was starting to look bad and I did not feel good about myself. I gained weight and my clothes got tighter. I was tired all of the time and I didn't even feel like myself anymore. Embarrassed, I knew that I had to get back on the wagon. It was time to start making exercise a part of my daily routine...again.
A funny thing happened though when I started declining happy hour invites from my girlfriends. All of the sudden, I was looked at as strange. Upon declining an invite, the general response was something like, "Oh, well if that's what you'd rather do." I got noses turned up at me...by my friends. It was a little disappointing, to say the least. Here I was trying to improve myself, and I was getting little to no support from those I considered to be closest to me. I even invited them to join me…you know, so that we could all start making lifestyle improvements together. No dice. Before I knew it, I was out of the happy hour club.
At first I was a little upset and felt left out. Then I realized that all things happen for a reason. I was changing my life for what I felt was the better and they clearly wanted no part of this upward movement. Sadly, we grew apart. I no longer feel the NEED to go out and hit the happy hour specials anymore. But these days, I do feel the NEED to run. In addition, running has given me the chance to join social running clubs where I have met NEW friends who share my passion and encourage me to always do my best. I say the trade off has worked in my favor. In fact, I am quite certain that I have traded up!
No more Jack and Diet Cokes for this girl. Bartender, I'll take a Cytomax double in a short glass!
Running IS my happy hour! Feel free to meet me at the bar (for a run) anytime…
Has running ever caused you to sacrifice relationships? Once you started running, did your non-running friends ever discourage you? Do you ever feel like your non-running friends don't "get" your love of running?0 SHARES Facebook Twitter Google Whatsapp Pinterest Print Mail Flipboard
The early ratings are in for Trump’s first speech to Congress, and former President Barack Obama beat President Trump big league. Trump drew 17% fewer viewers that Obama did in 2009.
Variety reported, “Across seven networks — ABC, CBS, NBC, Fox, CNN, Fox News, and MSNBC — Trump’s speech notched a 27.8 household rating in those early ratings. Across these same networks, President Obama’s first address of a joint session of Congress on Feb. 24, 2009, drew an overnight household rating of 33.4, a difference of about 17%. Fox News drew the biggest household rating of these networks, with a 6.4. It was followed by NBC (5.5), CBS (4.6), ABC (4.0), CNN (3.0), Fox Broadcasting (2.3), and MSNBC (2.0).”
The bar has been set so low for Trump among the pundit class that they are praising him for managing to read from a script for an hour without wetting himself in front of Congress.
The brutal truth is that President Trump’s speech didn’t move the needle an inch on policy. The bully pulpit is only effective when the occupant of the White House can utilize the public platform to get things done. Trump didn’t offer any specifics or bring unity towards Republicans on health care. He didn’t build a consensus on tax cuts. He made a bunch of pie in sky promises about child care, his border wall, destroying ISIS, and the economy that are never going to happen.
Trump loves ratings, and the ratings say that Obama was more popular than Trump. Republicans can spin the speech in a million different ways. However, the truth remains that this president is speaking to a much smaller audience that Obama had.
A substantial number of Americans are tuning this president out less than two months into his term.
This is terrible news for Trump, as history suggests that as his term goes on, he is likely to get less popular. If the trend were to continue through his first term, by the time he runs for reelection, Trump’s national audience could be reduced to nothing but Republicans and conservatives.
The numbers don’t lie. Trump is no Obama, and the American people are already ignoring his presidency.
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:In Boston last week to deliver the commencement address at the Berklee College of Music, Jimmy Page, the founder of Led Zeppelin, learned to his surprise that the school had a course in which his guitar licks were minutely analyzed. “They go into all these things and deconstruct them,” he said, “the harmonies and the voicings and the progressions, the arrangements.”
For Mr. Page, who turned 70 in January, the encounter was a reminder not just of his exalted status among guitarists but also of the practical applications of a project that occupied his attention for the better part of the last three years. Track by track, he has been remastering the entire Led Zeppelin catalog of nine studio albums and combing through the group’s archives looking for alternative versions that can illuminate how the band created songs that came to define 1970s rock and influence generations of musicians since.
“I knew it was a long haul, that it would involve hundreds of hours of tape,” he said in an interview in New York on Wednesday. “I had to listen to everything, every bootleg that was out there, too. But it has to be done if you’re going to do something really authoritative. I wanted to be sure this holds up, and I hate to think, if I wasn’t around, what was going to happen.”
The first three records, covering 1968 through 1970, will be released by Rhino Records on June 3, with the rest to follow this year and next, in formats ranging from vinyl to digital. In each case, the original remastered disc is accompanied by another in which songs that are now famous, “Whole Lotta Love” and “Stairway to Heaven” among them, are shown as works in progress. In addition, there are studio jams and live performances, drawn from the original analog tapes.The raid on an al Qaeda compound in Yemen last month that left civilians and a U.S. Navy SEAL dead has not produced any significant intelligence so far, according to a new report.
Senior U.S. officials said they were unaware of valuable information from the Jan. 29 operation, which killed SEAL Ryan Owens and up to 30 civilians, NBC News said Monday.
Monday’s news seems at odds with Pentagon officials' claims that the controversial mission produced “actionable intelligence” about al Qaeda’s affiliate in Yemen.
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A senior congressional official briefed on the matter told NBC Monday that the Trump administration has not yet explained what inspired the rare use of U.S. ground troops in Yemen.
NBC’s source added he was not aware of any new threat from al Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula (AQAP), the affiliate targeted in the operation.
The official and others briefed on the matter also said the raid was designed to capture or kill one or more militants, something the military did not initially acknowledge.
Pentagon officials originally called the mission a “site exploitation mission” aimed at gathering intelligence instead.
Multiple senior U.S. officials additionally told NBC they have not seen evidence to support the administration’s claims of success in the raid.
White House press secretary Sean Spicer earlier Monday said the Department of Defense will conduct a “three-pronged” review into Owens’s death last month.
“There will be three reviews done by the Department of Defense because of the nature of this,” he said during his daily press briefing.
“I can’t possibly imagine what he’s going through in terms of the loss of his son,” Spicer added when asked about criticism from Owens’s father about the incident.
“I can tell him on behalf of the president, his son died a hero, and the info that he was able to help obtain through that raid, as I’ve said before, is going to save American lives. The mission was successful in helping to prevent a future attack or attacks on this nation.”
Owens’s father told the Miami Herald Sunday that “the government owes my son an investigation” into last month’s raid.
U.S. Central Command said it killed 14 AQAP operatives during the mission, which also wounded six other American service members besides Owens.
The Bureau of Investigative Journalism said that at least 25 civilians also perished, including nine children under the age of 13.Editor's note: If you'd like an email notice whenever we publish Ross Ramsey's column, click here.
When you talk about early primary states, remember that you’re sitting in one of them. Texans start voting in the presidential election in eight days.
Iowa is out of the way. New Hampshire voters add their voices Tuesday. And two more states — South Carolina and Nevada — will vote later this month. But Texans start the early voting for the March 1 primaries next Tuesday, and many voters here will cast their ballots before the results in those states are known.
The presidential field is shrinking, but the nominations won’t be decided until Texans have spoken. It’s partly a matter of timing and partly a matter of size.
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Iowa and New Hampshire are important, if only as cutting contests that narrow the number of candidates to a meaningful few. They operate almost like preseason scrimmages, stripping away the speculation and talk and showing, in miniature, how the candidates fare in front of actual voters.
They don’t decide who gets the nomination — that happens when Texas and the rest of the states weigh in. But they separate those who can from those who can’t. They matter to candidates who are gasping for oxygen. A decent showing in the early rounds can keep supporters interested. Interested supporters can keep candidates alive until the real voting starts.
Several governors at the bottom of the Republican pile are hoping for that kind of resuscitation Tuesday in New Hampshire, and for the kind of financial infusion that might make them viable in Texas and the other Super Tuesday states. Four contenders checked out after the Iowa numbers were in. More will probably drop this week.
It’s kind of weird that two states with a combined 10 votes in the electoral college would have this kind of clout. Here’s how many people voted in the Republican caucuses in Iowa: 186,000. And the number of Democratic caucus-goers the same night: 171,000.
For all of the attention that got, those numbers are smaller than the 2014 general election turnout numbers for about a half dozen of the state Senate districts in Texas.
In 2012 — a year when Texas wasn’t really instrumental in the nomination races — 2 million people voted in the party primaries. With neither nomination set this year, the competition might increase that turnout. A decisive win here would really count.
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Size matters.
Ted Cruz won the Iowa GOP caucus with 51,666 votes. Hey, it was enough, right? But it’s a tiny slice of a small state. Here’s some perspective. A candidate with as many votes as Cruz got in Iowa would have been on the losing side in 28 of Texas’ 31 senate districts. His total amounted to less than half of the votes cast in most of those races. In the mid-summer 2012 GOP runoff that put him in the Senate, Cruz got 631,812 votes.
A candidate coming in third or fourth place in Texas this year could easily win more delegates to the national convention than the Iowa and New Hampshire frontrunners combined.
But timing matters, too.
Running in small states is more forgiving to shoestring budgets. Good early performances can attract money. Starting a presidential election in a state like Texas could give rich candidates all of the advantages. It’d be the political version of favoring big business over small business.
It is possible for an unknown, underfunded and scrappy candidate to beat a relatively well-known and wealthy candidate: That’s the 2012 race between Cruz and David Dewhurst. It’s uncommon, but possible.
The presidential candidates get here with one of those problems solved: The voters know their names. Those same voters have early results to look at, too, giving them a read on which campaigns have a little momentum, who’s acting like a loser or a winner, who ought to get the nod.
Marco Rubio looked a little healthier after Iowa, Donald Trump a little less so. A grand total of 2,201 votes separated them. What New Hampshire does Tuesday will change the perceptions a little more. Many of the names on the Texas ballot — which has 13 Republicans and eight Democrats on it — won’t really be in the race by the time voters make their choices.
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That’s the clout of the early little states like New Hampshire: They get to tell the big states like Texas who’s still in the running.Please enable Javascript to watch this video
THORNTON, Colo. -- When Thornton police chased and later arrested the suspect in the Walmart shooting on Thursday morning, FOX31 and Colorado's Own Channel 2 were the only news teams on scene.
Reporter Drew Engelbart and photographer Elliott Trimble captured the moment a SWAT team went into an apartment in unincorporated Adams County that was believed to be connected to 47-year-old Scott Ostrem, who was identified earlier Thursday as the man wanted in the shooting that left three people dead.
The SWAT team went into the apartment at 7121 Samuel Drive but Ostrem was not found. Just before 8 a.m., FOX31 and Channel 2 captured the 2017 red, four-door Mitsubishi Mirage associated with Ostrem drive past the apartment complex.
The crew jumped in a vehicle and followed police as they chased the suspect's car before coming to stop at West 72nd Avenue and Federal Boulevard.
Engelbart and Trimble quickly jumped out and ran to the scene as police surrounded the suspect's vehicle. Live on FOX31 and Channel 2, Ostrem was arrested without incident.
Englebart said as police arrested the suspect, there were people along the sidewalk cheering for police with one woman shouting at the suspect "You killed those people at Walmart, you deserve this."Mixed Signal ASIC: 800K and up <--- most companies avoid this due to cost. Plus it ends up being alot of voodoo. Vendors IP extends to knowing what processes can handle both logic and analog reasonably ie how do you put an ARM core and a RF amplifier together - alot of processes wont like it - the arm will be great but the noise in the RF amp will be crap - stuff like that. Lots of people get burnt here and so there a fewer custom vendors out there to do these jobs.
I would say that Jeri has more of a digital IC background than anything. I think a software developer with the right mindset could morph into a digital IC designer without much of a stretch. Especially if he/she is doing some FPGA work or prototyping first. In fact a software person who understands digital design is an indispensable resource IMO. Analog is quite a bit different simply because understanding device physics is so important.All of that said I wouldn't want Shenandoah to be too discouraged. Just friendly advice that it will take a lot of perseverance.gregariz, great breakdown and for most vendors in the industry, this is very true.So full disclosure, I'm a FAE for Triad Semiconductor and Mixed Signal ASIC design is our business. We do things differently and as a result, we're able to do a mixed signal ASIC design starting around 100K NRE. 800K would be on the far upper end of our spectrum for a custom IC design. We have IP and proven silicon for ARM cores, precision ADC's and all kinds of analog including power management. In the future we think that using our via only approach and our ViaDesigner software that we could get this NRE as low as 10K or 0 if the volume makes sense. But anyway, if interested, send me a PM and we can chat more about it.So now that cat is out of the bag, my best recommendation for the question at hand is that it sounds like you are really dedicated to making this happen. Working your way up is the best thing to do, especially since the world is in need of good IC designers. My advice would be to use your current talents as a segway to do IC design. Maybe that means finding a company that does both (which there are many) get in with your current credentials and start talking to your manager about where you would like to see your career in the next few years. If your manager is good he/she will listen and do whatever to help you fulfill your goals.Saturday night’s Chick-fil-A Kickoff Game was hyped as the Greatest Opener of All Time, but things turned pretty one-sided in the second half as No. 1 Alabama methodically rolled over No. 3 Florida State en route to the 24-7 victory. Worse yet for the Seminoles, their starting quarterback, 2016 ACC Rookie of the Year Deondre Francois, is now out for the season with a knee injury. Is there any hope left for FSU’s season?
First things first: Losing Francois is a huge blow, one that will seriously damage what was one of the nation’s most lethal offenses a year ago. In fact, losing the game and Francois in the same week dropped the Noles to No. 10 in the AP Top 25 Poll. But if there is a silver lining for FSU (and for the other ranked teams that lost their opener, including Florida, West Virginia and Texas) it’s that teams who get a loss out of the way early do have a better chance of making the College Football Playoff than ones who lose late in the season — provided they can run the table from here out.
Going into Saturday’s matchup, we knew one of those two highly ranked teams would emerge from their opener with a loss. And it might have seemed like the stakes were ratcheted up to do-or-die status for the Tide and Noles right out of the gate. After all, no eventual national champ has lost in Week 1 since Miami in 1983. But that’s mainly because contending teams practically never schedule such difficult games to begin the season. According to our Elo ratings, if Alabama wins the national title, they’ll have played the toughest opening-week opponent of any champ since Michigan faced Colorado in 1997. And if FSU can somehow rally with a new QB under center, they’ll have faced the toughest opening foe in the entire AP Poll era.
In reality, losing early isn’t a death sentence in college football — it’s actually better, assuming it ends up being a team’s only loss of the season. That’s especially true in the age of the four-team College Football Playoff, which gives one-loss teams more leeway than the old two-team Bowl Championship Series system did. I collected data on power-conference teams that had only one non-bowl loss in a season going back to the start of the BCS in 1998 and calculated what percentage of the way into their schedule the loss took place. For one-loss teams that ended up in the AP Poll’s pre-bowl top four (a good proxy for who would make the College Football Playoff), the median loss came about 58 percent of the way into the season; for those that didn’t, the loss came 75 percent of the way into the schedule. In a 12-game slate, that’s a difference of about two weeks.
Two weeks might not seem like too much — and, indeed, we can see that sometimes teams lost in their final game before the bowls and still managed a top-four slot in the AP’s rankings. But more often, one-loss teams who finished in the top four did their losing in the early phase of the schedule, when there was more time remaining in the season to reverse the damage.
We can see the negative effect of a loss in each successive week of the season by running a logistic regression on the same data set, using it to predict the probability a one-loss team would finish in the AP’s top four by season’s end, depending on when that loss occurred (and controlling for factors such as the team’s quality and the margin of the loss). Here’s what that model would predict for a team like Florida State, with a 1785 Elo and a 17-point defeat in its loss, if it were to go undefeated in the rest of its games:
All else being equal, an opening-game loss still leaves you with a decent chance of making the top four, whereas a late-season loss all but torpedoes any chance of getting the playoff nod.
Now, the big, obvious assumption here is that a team will win all of its other games. That’s a much tougher proposition if you start the season 0-1 and are staring down the rest of your schedule with little margin for error. (There’s a reason that no team in our data set lost its first game and went on to finish in the AP’s top four by the end of the regular season.) Two-loss major-conference schools can still occasionally make the playoff, but far more often they get lost in the numbers game at the top of the rankings.
In Florida State’s case, their path back to the playoff was made much more complicated by Francois’s injury. ESPN’s Football Power Index only gives the Seminoles a 6 percent chance of winning out against their remaining schedule, which means all of this is probably moot for them.
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But the trends of the past should also ease anxiety levels for hopeful fans of other early-season losers, including those who fell last week and teams like Oklahoma and Auburn, who won in Week 1 but face brutally difficult tests in Week 2 — at Ohio State and at Clemson, respectively — and are unlikely to survive the first two weeks unscathed. History says that, as long as a team keeps winning, an early loss isn’t the end of the world — it might actually be a positive, if they’re vying for the playoff with teams whose losses came much later in the season.Representational Image
Air India has been forced to ground one of its planes after crew spotted rats scurrying around the cabin, The Times of India reported on Tuesday.The plane was on its way from New Delhi to Calcutta when staff became aware of the infestation, the newspaper said."Rats on board an aircraft can lead to a catastrophe if they start chewing up electric wires," the paper quoted an unnamed airline official as saying."If that happens, pilots will have no control on any system on board leading to a disaster."No one at the airline was immediately available for comment, but an Air India official speaking on condition of anonymity said rats on planes were a "common phenomenon" worldwide and could "get in anywhere"."They follow the catering vans into the plane when they smell the food," the official told news agency AFP.It is not the first time that India's loss-making carrier has suffered a rodent infestation.Rats reportedly delayed a domestic flight from Mumbai by almost two hours in February, and in 2009 a flight to Toronto was delayed for 11 hours as staff tried to catch rats.Godfrey Mosby wanted to stay at the office and get some paperwork done.
But when one of the children he works with at the Loving Arms shelter in northwest Baltimore told him she wanted a snack from a nearby gas station, he said he'd leave with her.
He wasn't going to allow the 14-year-old girl to walk there alone, he said. Not when she could be "exposed to things she shouldn't see or catch a bullet that wasn't meant for her."
The two walked nearly half-a-mile to get chips and soda from the BP gas station — the same gas station where, the day before, 22-year-old Louis Young was shot. He died in the hospital from his wounds, police said.
"I'm so disgusted by this," Mosby, 55, said of the violence. "I don't know what to say or do about it. I just try to keep my kids safe, just educate them to keep them out of it."
The first half of 2017 ended Friday with 170 homicides in Baltimore. The next day, Young and one other man were shot and killed in separate incidents.
On Sunday evening, yet another man was killed. A man was found inside of a home in the 1400 block of Argyle Avenue in Upton with a gunshot wound around 8 p.m. He was pronounced dead on the scene.
Northwest District Homicide Investigation On July 1, 2017, at approximately 1:10am, officers were called to the 3300 block of Garrison Boulevard for a report of a shooting. When... |
included Labour politicians, academics, antiwar, antinuclear and union activists. Do they agree with the way Maduro manages the opposition? Is that how they would deal with dissent? Do they approve of the Venezuelan government support of the “colectivos” armed groups that have murdered unarmed protesters? Do they believe that war and violence are legitimate if they come from the left?
Apparently, there is not much you can do about hardliners who still support the madness of the Venezuelan “revolution”. Especially those, like actor Danny Glover, who have received millions of dollars from the Venezuelan government to produce films that, 10 years on, have still not been released.
But what about the dozens of politicians and journalists – including the leader of the opposition – who until very recently lauded the “achievements” of Hugo Chávez and have now gone quiet? They always seemed to suggest that they had the wellbeing of the Venezuelan people at heart. Now that 82% of households live in poverty, they don’t seem interested at all in what’s happening in Venezuela. It is a shame, because their voices could really come in handy as the world calls on Maduro to restore democracy and respect human rights.Looking for news you can trust?
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RealClearReligion posted an interview with Rick Santorum on Monday in which the reporter asked the candidate about Dan Savage, the gay sex columnist who held a contest in 2003 to redefine the word “Santorum.” Savage started the contest after the Pennsylvania senator controversially said the “definition of marriage” never included “man on child, man on dog, or whatever the case may be.” The winning redefinition in Savage’s contest for Santorum was, famously, “the frothy mixture of lube and fecal matter that is sometimes the by-product of anal sex.”
Savage’s redefinition took hold, so much so that his “Spreading Santorum” site quickly became one of the top three Google search results for Santorum’s name. It’s since dropped to the eighth result, but the GOP contender still has a major Google problem.
Asked what he’d say to Savage if the two met, Santorum replied:
I would tell him that I’m praying for him. He obviously has some serious issues. You look at someone like that who can say and do the things that he’s doing and you just pray for him and hopefully he can find peace.
I emailed Savage to see what he had to say about that. He wrote back:Earlier this morning, Matt Maiocco put together a look at the 49ers and Seahawks transactions thus far. It's been a competitive offseason between the two teams, with plenty of time left for both teams to make impact moves.
The most interesting part of the article was actually related to the 2013 NFL Draft. Following the Anquan Boldin trade, the 49ers have 14 draft picks next month.
It led one prominent league source with intimate knowledge of the 49ers to predict plenty of surprises during the three-day draft, which runs Thursday, April 25, through Saturday, April 27. "The 49ers have the firepower to make more moves and influence the draft more than any team in the NFL," the source told CSNBayArea.com. "With all those draft picks, and half of them who can't truly make the 49ers' roster, they will be the most dangerous player in the draft. They'll shake it up like we've never seen before."
What exactly could that mean? A simple trade up in the first round does not strike me as shaking it up "like we've never seen before." After all, the Atlanta Falcons made waves when they moved up to draft Julio Jones two years ago.
Maybe it means the 49ers will be wheeling and dealing all over the place, and really just setting some kind of record for trades in a single draft. Anybody have any thoughts on what this could mean?
For those wondering, here is a look at the Draft Pick Value Chart.
via @NFLosophy
We don't know the value of the 49ers fourth through seventh round picks, given that compensation picks have not been awarded yet. For now, here is the value of the 49ers picks in the first three rounds. It is worth noting two second round picks are forfeited (Cleveland supplemental pick, New Orleans Bounty pick):
1 (31): 600 points
2 (34): 560 points
2 (61): 292 points
3 (74): 220 points
3 (93): 128 points
Based strictly on this value chart, the 49ers could climb as high as 13 with their first two picks. Again, shaking up the draft like never before is not a deal like that. It is much more. Any thoughts?AT&T said its 700 MHz systems are now essentially fully interoperable with those of some smaller carriers, making good on a vow it made to the FCC more than three years ago. And that’s likely good news for T-Mobile and some other operators.
The nation’s second-largest wireless network operator said in September 2013 that it would begin to support 700 MHz interoperability and would begin to offer Band-12 capable devices, marking a surprising about-face from its previous claims that such a move would be costly and unnecessary. AT&T followed that up in March 2015 when it disclosed in an FCC filing that it was working with several smaller carriers to follow through on its commitment to support interoperability between Band Class 17 and Band Class 12 in the 700 MHz band.
AT&T has consistently declined to name those smaller carriers, but they likely include T-Mobile and U.S. Cellular, perhaps among others. In its progress report with the FCC, AT&T said it had met the goal of supporting interoperability in the lower band of 700 MHz airwaves.
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“In the intervening year since the Fourth Progress Report, there is near universal availability of Band 12 devices for smaller carriers and a plethora of new devices have been introduced,” according to AT&T’s filing. “In addition, carriers have continued to roll out Voice over LTE service on 700 MHz A-Block Spectrum.”
AT&T also said that it had completed deployment of multi-frequency band indicator (MFBI) software on its 700 MHz airwaves, which enables its network to operate simultaneously in both Band 12 and Band 17, supporting devices in both band classes. The operator now supports roaming on compatible LTE networks and plans to enable VoLTE roaming “for carriers with an incompatible 3G network” during the first half of this year.
A lack of interoperability has plagued the industry for years. Lower 700 MHz A Block licensees long argued that vendors like Apple made equipment for AT&T's Band Class 17 and Verizon Wireless' Band Class 13, but not for those smaller companies such as C Spire Wireless and U.S. Cellular that hold 700 MHz A Block spectrum in Band Class 12. The FCC auctioned 700 MHz spectrum in several different bands in 2008.
The announcement is good news for AT&T customers who can now roam onto the 700 MHz networks of T-Mobile, U.S. Cellular and perhaps some other smaller operators more easily. It’s also good news for those smaller carriers because it gives them an increased opportunity to monetize their roaming agreements with AT&T.
The news is particularly noteworthy for T-Mobile, which in recent years has been purchasing 700 MHz Band Class 12 spectrum, and is using those licenses to expand its network into new geographic locations.Guardians of the Galaxy, 2014.
Directed by James Gunn.
Starring Chris Pratt, Zoe Saldana, Dave Bautista, Lee Pace, Michael Rooker, Karen Gillan, Djimon Hounsou, Glenn Close, John C. Reilly, Josh Brolin, Benicio Del Toro and Peter Serafinowicz with the voice talents of Bradley Cooper and Vin Diesel.
SYNOPSIS:
In the far reaches of space, an American pilot named Peter Quill finds himself the object of a manhunt after stealing an orb coveted by the villainous Ronan.
Guardians of the Galaxy was always going to have a hard time against the bigger boys of the Marvel Universe. They are a group that aren’t even c-level players, directed by a man with mostly TV credits and cult movies to his name and a leading cast with no big stars that the likes of Iron Man and Captain America have. But it’s a movie that has defied the odds. Every element has come together so brilliantly that you can’t help but grin from ear to ear as the movie plays out in front of you. Guardians of the Galaxy is the most fun you’ll have in a superhero movie since The Avengers.
That’s not to say it’s a better movie than The Avengers because it isn’t – but it’s certainly on the same level of “fun”. It doesn’t focus on the perils of anxiety like Iron Man 3 and it’s not a political thriller like Captain America: The Winter Solider, this is a balls-to-the-wall space opera romp with a likeable and engaging cast of characters, a wacky universe of planets and a light tone that you don’t often see in comic book movies since the rise of “dark and gritty”.
Not only did the movie have to introduce us to 5 brand new characters we know little-to-nothing about, but it has to set up this universe, its planets, its inhabitants, its wars and peace treaties. It’s the equivalent of doing The Avengers without setting up the characters in previous movies. Credit to Gunn’s script and direction, Guardians of the Galaxy doesn’t fall at this first hurdle, but it does feel very rushed. The story zips through from Peter Quill on Earth to 26-years later in space of him going on an Indiana Jones-esque quest for a mysterious artefact in the span of minutes. His time with Yondu (Michael Rooker) is explored briefly later on, but everything about Quill’s life as a human who then lives in outer space is left very vague. But with so many characters to introduce (and there a lot), these kinds of story beats will take a hit, with the idea of exploring them in future instalments.
Similarly, Lee Pace’s Ronin the Accuser is short changed in the villain role. Like Christopher Eccleston’s Malekith in Thor: The Dark World, Ronin isn’t really given much of a character and his motivations are never clearly defined. He has a deal with Thanos (who we see now played by Josh Brolin) and he has a beef with the Nova Corps peace treaty but none of this is every fully explained. We are just expected to look at him and say, “he’s the bad guy, we don’t want him to win”. The same can be said for Benicio Del Toro’s The Collector, who is reduced to nothing more than – for lack of a better term – an extended cameo.
But what this does mean is that more time can be spent with the Guardians and establishing their relationships, dynamics and motivations. This ragtag group of losers (to quote Peter Quill) are forced to work together, but in doing so become friends and teammates. It doesn’t do anything new or particularly creative with this set-up and it follows the story beats you would usually expect, but the chemistry between all five characters is magnificent. Chris Pratt is wonderfully likeable as Star-Lord and Zoe Saldana is excellent in the quiet role of Gamora, but it’s former WWE wrestler Dave Bautista as Drax the Destroyer who steals the show from an acting standpoint. His character gets the majority of the best lines, his fighting scenes are fun and his comedic timing is almost perfect. He stumbles over a few lines here and there, but he actually turns in a better comedic performance that Parks and Recreation and The LEGO Movie’s Pratt. And while he has a great dynamic with Pratt, it’s Bradley Cooper’s Rocket and Vin Diesel’s Groot who are the wonderful odd couple. Cooper is phenomenal in his voice work as Rocket and the script is clever enough so that his looks of a raccoon never overtake his character – Rocket is a character first, toy second. The same can be said for Groot who has just three words in the whole movie, but each line is said with different inflections. Huge credit should also go to Vin Diesel who apparently spent days getting each one his “I am Groot” lines recorded perfectly and his cadence and tone actually convey what Groot is trying to say without it being said.
This of course is helped by the awesome special effects on show which are incredible to look at. Dawn of the Planet of the Apes has wowed audiences with its work with motion capture and will probably remain the best looking film of 2014, but Guardians of the Galaxy is a visual spectacle that never feels like a CGI-laden movie. Groot, Rocket and all of the CGI-altered aliens that walk among Pratt, Saldana and Bautista all look and feel genuine. This isn’t like the Lucas Star Wars prequels where nothing feels tangible, this looks like a real world which people inhabit. The fighter ship battle in the final act (although very standard) looks incredible and you will never look at Groot and Rocket as anything other than genuine characters on set with real-life actors.
Perhaps the most interesting thing about Guardians of the Galaxy is that it feels like its own entity. Unlike the other movies of Phase Two, it’s not tying into The Avengers or building up to Avengers: Age of Ultron, Guardians of the Galaxy is playing in its own ball pit. Eagle-eyed viewers will see the visual references to the Tesseract and the Aether as part of the Infinity Gems, but for all intents and purposes, this is a singular movie that isn’t being an extended trailer for something else. This coupled with its tone and toe-tapping 80s soundtrack means that Guardians of the Galaxy is unlike any Marvel movie we’ve seen up until this point.
As a man who is nearing his 30s, this is a really fun ride that will had me grinning from ear to ear, but a kid would go ballistic for Guardians of the Galaxy. It won’t have the same cultural impact for obvious reasons, but Guardians of the Galaxy is Star Wars for a new generation. You find yourself immersed into this strange and bizarre world and you will want to explore more of it. The possibilities for sequels feels clear as well as cross-over potential with other Marvel properties.
There is a time and place for “dark and gritty” superhero movies and those who do it, do it well. But this is not the time or the place. Guardians of the Galaxy needed to be a fun and light hearted romp and it is just that. The characters are likeable, their dynamics are engaging and the world they inhabit is spell-binding. There are problems with the core story, villain strands and it crams too much into a short space of time, but if you don’t leave the cinema with a grin on your face then there is something wrong with you. It has its flaws, but Guardians of the Galaxy is easily the most fun you’ll have at a cinema this year. They may have been unknown players in the Marvel Universe, but this is a movie that deserves to make them household names.
Flickering Myth Rating – Film: ★ ★ ★ ★ / Movie: ★ ★ ★ ★
Luke Owen is one of Flickering Myth’s co-editors and the host of the Flickering Myth Podcast. You can follow him on Twitter @LukeWritesStuff.Viktor Sarianidi, barefoot at dawn, surveys the treeless landscape from a battered lawn chair in the Kara-Kum desert of Turkmenistan. "The mornings here are beautiful," he says, gesturing regally with his cane, his white hair wild from sleep. "No wife, no children, just the silence, God, and the ruins."
Where others see only sand and scrub, Sarianidi has turned up the remnants of a wealthy town protected by high walls and battlements. This barren place, a site called Gonur, was once the heart of a vast archipelago of settlements that stretched across 1,000 square miles of Central Asian plains. Although unknown to most Western scholars, this ancient civilization dates back 4,000 years—to the time when the first great societies along the Nile, Tigris-Euphrates, Indus, and Yellow rivers were flourishing.
Thousands of people lived in towns like Gonur with carefully designed streets, drains, temples, and homes. To water their orchards and fields, they dug lengthy canals to channel glacier-fed rivers that were impervious to drought. They traded with distant cities for ivory, gold, and silver, creating what may have been the first commercial link between the East and the West. They buried their dead in elaborate graves filled with fine jewelry, wheeled carts, and animal sacrifices. Then, within a few centuries, they vanished.
News of this lost civilization began leaking out in the 1970s, when archaeologists came to dig in the southern reaches of the Soviet Union and in Afghanistan. Their findings, which were published only in obscure Russian-language journals, described a culture with the tongue-twisting name Bactria-Margiana Archaeological Complex. Bactria is the old Greek name for northern Afghanistan and the northeast corner of Iran, while Margiana is further north, in what is today Turkmenistan and Uzbekistan. Through the region runs the Amu Dar'ya River, which was known in Greek history as the Oxus River. Western scholars subsequently used that landmark to dub the newly found culture the Oxus civilization.
The initial trickle of information dried up in 1979 when the revolution in Iran and war in Afghanistan locked away the southern half of the Oxus. Later, with the 1990 fall of the Soviet Union, many Russian archaeologists withdrew from Central Asia. Undeterred, Sarianidi and a handful of other archaeologists soldiered on, unearthing additional elaborate structures and artifacts. Because of what they have found, scholars can no longer regard ancient Central Asia as a wasteland notable primarily as the origin of nomads like Genghis Khan. In Sarianidi's view, this harsh land of desert, marsh, and steppe may instead have served as a center in a broad, early trading network, the hub of a wheel connecting goods, ideas, and technologies among the earliest of urban peoples.
Harvard University archaeologist Carl Lamberg-Karlovsky believes the excavation at Gonur is "a major event of the late 20th century," adding that Sarianidi deserves credit for discovering the lost Oxus culture and for his "30 consecutive years of indefatigable excavations." To some other researchers, however, Sarianidi seems more desert eccentric than dispassionate scholar. For starters, his techniques strike many colleagues as brutish and old-fashioned. These days Western archaeologists typically unearth sites with dental instruments and mesh screens, meticulously sifting soil for traces of pollen, seeds, and ceramics. Sarianidi uses bulldozers to expose old foundations, largely ignores botanical finds, and publishes few details on layers, ceramics, and other mainstays of modern archaeology.
His abrasive personality hasn't helped his cause, either. "Everyone opposes me because I alone have found these artifacts," he thunders during a midday break. "No one believed anyone lived here until I came!" He bangs the table with his cane for emphasis.
Sarianidi is accustomed to the role of outsider. As a Greek growing up in Tashkent, Uzbekistan, under Stalinist rule, he was denied training in law and turned to history instead. Ultimately, it proved too full of groupthink for his taste, so he opted for archaeology. "It was more free because it was more ancient," he says. During the 1950s he drifted, spending seasons between digs unemployed. He refused to join the Communist Party, despite the ways it might have helped his career. Eventually, in 1959, his skill and tenacity earned him a coveted position at the Institute of Archaeology in Moscow, but it was years before he was allowed to direct a dig.Barrett Brown was just released from prison last November after four years behind bars for, among other things, posting a series of videos in which he appears to threaten an FBI agent. How things escalated to that point in the first place is a complicated matter involving email hacks, drug addiction, and the murky world of private intelligence contractors.
Often straddling a line between journalist and participant, Brown's rise to prominence tracks that of the hacker collective Anonymous, perhaps best remembered for its campaigns against Scientology. Media outlets characterized Brown, not always entirely to his liking, as the spokesman for Anonymous, and it would be his association with hackers that would later put Brown on the FBI's radar.
For his part, Brown believes that it was his investigation into several private intelligence contractors following the hack of a firm called HB Gary. Brown and his team discovered in the emails that several of the firms had joined together into a conglomerate called Team Themis, and that one of Team Themis' projects was to develop potential lines of attack against critical organizations like Wikileaks and journalists such as Glenn Greenwald.
Brown sat down with Reason TV in the Dallas headquarters of D Magazine, where he now works covering city council meetings, to talk about life in federal prison, the state of the private intelligence industry, what an ever-leakier world means for the future of U.S. politics and culture, and his plans to create a decentralized activism network based on lessons learned from Anonymous meant to shake up media and governmental institutions.
Approximately 19 minutes.
Produced by Zach Weissmueller. Camera by Mark McDaniel and Alexis Garcia. Music by Kai Engel.
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Subscribe to our podcast at iTunes.Last month at the Techonomy conference in Half Moon Bay, California, a group of technologists explored the ethics of developing web services in the age of artificial intelligence. How much do people really understand about the information they’re giving up in return for a service, an audience member asked, and can they choose not to give up that data?
The question was met, at first, with a quizzical silence. Data is the fuel that makes the Internet work. Without it, online services aren’t as personal, or as useful. Then someone on the panel remarked that, of course, a user has to give up data, but it’s her choice. She could choose, instead, to opt out.
But could she? Can anyone?
To scrape together a living in a knowledge-based economy, you pretty much have to participate. Most people can't afford not to be online.
A decade ago, American Internet refusers were the olds and the luddites. They didn’t really get it, or get why it had value to them. Or they couldn't afford it. Adding the necessary equipment (computer, smartphone) and the monthly hook-up fee was a significant expense. Five years ago, avoiding the Internet was counter-culture. A small number of people chose not to get it, or to value it. Today, however, the only people who can avoid the Internet are the privileged, the people with a trust fund. To scrape together a living in a knowledge-based economy, you pretty much have to participate. Most people can't afford not to be online.
I’m not knocking the ‘net. It has made my personal life immeasurably better. Shortly, I’ll get off a plane, and by the time I hit the concourse, I will have arranged my transportation home and for dinner to be waiting. I'll have ensured my dog is walked, and informed my editor he should publish this piece. That will take a dozen clicks on four apps.
But these technological advances can become coercive, even as they create new opportunities. I often hunger to opt out of the endless noise and distraction of the Internet. (Every August, I take a month off of social media, and invariably, I notice my anxiety level plummet.) And increasingly, I notice the way the apps I patronize subtly inform my behavior.
The Air Around Us
Recently, on a road trip, I plugged my destination into Google Maps. I chose my preferred route, and the Siri-like navigator said, “You have chosen the best route.” What? The fastest route, maybe. But the best route? How does Google know what my best route is? Maybe a better route would be one that stopped off at a friend’s house or passed through a scenic area. And while I can get away with dropping Google Maps (paper maps are so retro) or Facebook for a time, eventually, I will need to log on to the ‘book or pull up a Google search box to fulfill the tasks required of my profession. To participate in today's economy, you need to participate in the Internet.
Here, reader, you may interject that you are not a person who uses Facebook. So there! Or maybe, you use Bing instead of Google. Or clear your cache constantly, and turn off GPS. Even so, the large global Internet services—primarily Google, Facebook, Apple and Amazon—are nearly impossible to sidestep. Even if you don’t use them, they will use you—in ways you likely don’t and can’t track entirely.
The Internet has become as ubiquitous as air, an ambience that surrounds you.
That's because, while the Internet may have lived behind a computer screen for the first two decades of its commercial existence, now it has become as ubiquitous as air, an ambience that surrounds you. Wake up in the morning, turn on your phone, and GPS will note your position, updating all of your apps. Get into any relatively new car, and it’ll record where you are going and how you are driving. Turn on your Nest thermostat, and it’ll record your heat preference. Then there’s your Fitbit, Jawbone Up, Apple Watch, Lynx lightbulb, Dropcam security camera, and on and on. Even if you don’t seek the web out, somewhere an Internet-powered service is logging and analyzing your behavior. There’s no going off the grid, because life is the grid.
Which brings me back to the Techonomy discussion on ethics. We have invented the Internet, and it is now a staple of human life, infusing itself into our daily routines and informing our habits. Smart software companies are harnessing artificial intelligence to improve the products and services they offer up. It’s incumbent upon these companies to put ethics at the center of their product development strategies, because, while the services they offer are commercial, they’ve also become utilities. Most of us have electricity. We have running water in our houses. And we have the Internet. There’s no opting out.A group of five friends from Argentina were among the eight people killed in a terrorist attack in lower Manhattan late Tuesday afternoon.
More than 12 were injured in the attack, New York City Mayor Bill de Blasio said Tuesday.
NBC News said the suspect is Sayfullo Habibullaevic Saipov, a 29-year-old Uzbek national who entered the U.S. in 2010. Saipov was an Uber driver and passed the ride hailing app's background check, according to an Uber statement, the Associated Press reported.
On Tuesday afternoon, the suspect drove a Home Depot pickup truck on the West Side bicycle path, entering at Houston Street before driving southbound, striking bicyclists and pedestrians, said New York Police Commissioner James O'Neill. The truck collided with a school bus at Chambers Street, injuring two adults and two children.
The five Argentinians who died were part of a larger group of 10 friends in New York to celebrate the 30th anniversary of their graduation from school, according to Argentina's ministry of foreign affairs. Another Argentinian was injured and in hospital, the ministry said.
A Belgian national was also killed and three other Belgians injured in the attack, the country's Foreign Minister Dider Reynders confirmed.
The other two victims have not yet been named.Via GEFIRA,
Two years have passed since Yanukovich was deposed and, as it turns out, another ruthless clan of oligarchs has taken power. No wonder then that Ukraine is heading for a new wave of violence and chaos. Oligarchs are fighting each other, the IMF is pulling out of the country, officials issue laws and regulations only to see them repealed within a day or two by others, and raided European companies are leaving the country after being robbed by the so-called pro-Brussels oligarchic elite.
It was evident from the beginning that the US and NATO-sponsored power transition was doomed to fail. Prime Minister Yatsenyuk made no secret on his personal website about his principal partners, NATO and Victor Pinchuk’s foundation. Victor Pinchuk is a link between the Ukraine corrupt oligarchic establishment and the Western political elite. In 2005, the BBC depicted him as a paragon of Ukraine’s kleptocracy:
“Ukraine’s largest steel mill has been bought by Mittal Steel for $4.8bn (£2.7bn) after an earlier sale was annulled amid corruption allegations. The Kryvorizhstal mill was originally sold to the son-in-law (Mr. Pinchuck) of former President Leonid Kuchma for $800m. It was one of the scandals that sparked the Orange Revolution and propelled President Viktor Yushchenko into power.")
Directly after the power transition, European leaders understood that the situation in the Ukraine was unmanageable, which we know from a confidential telephone conversation between Minister Paet (Minister of Foreign Affairs of Estonia) and Mrs. Ashton (High Representative of the Union for Foreign Affairs and Security Policy) that became public. Both politicians understood that the Maidan protesters had no trust in the politicians who formed the new coalition. Mr Paet said, “there is now stronger and stronger understanding that behind snipers it was not Yanukovich, but it was somebody from the new coalition." Their conversation makes it clear that both European politicians understood that, contrary to the official statements coming from Brussels, Europe has no solution for Ukraine’s problems and no trust in its new leaders.
Petro Poroshenko, one of the oligarchs, became the fifth president. In line with his predecessors, he had amassed an astonishing personal wealth by mixing politics and business on behalf of the Ukraine population. He started his career under the notorious President Kuchma and served as a minister under deposed President Victor Yanukovich. One can hardly imagine a more troubled new president for a country that has to reform itself and get rid of corruption.
In 2014 Brian Bonner, the Kyivpost chief editor, wrote: “Allowing prosecution of Kuchma (concerning the murder of a journalist) is acid test for whether Poroshenko will put national interests above his own.". Asking Poroshenko to “kill” his close friend and crony, former President Kuchma and the father-in-law of the powerful Pinchuk is a dramatic plea by the chief editor aimed at forcing President Poroshenko to show whose side he takes. Poroshenko’s answer came quickly: he rewarded Kuchma with a top position in the Minsk negation team.
Within months after the power transition, investigative journalist Tetiana Chornovol, who lead an anti-graft body, quit, calling her time in the government “useless” because there was no political will to conduct “a full-scale war" on corruption.
In the two years that followed rumour of ongoing corruption has not ceased. For Poroshenko and his fellow oligarchs, the biggest threat is not Putin and the separatists in the East, but the pro-Ukraine militia that only on paper were merged with the Ukraine army.
The militia regards the Western-backed oligarchs as the second biggest threat to the Ukrainian nation. We believe the oligarchs are the primary cause of the rot in Ukraine’s government.
Meanwhile, the Brussels elite is trying to sell the Ukraine 2014 power grab and the resultant association treaty as a way to help Ukraine to overcome its political corruption.
The Dutch government wrote in its communique to its citizens: “This cooperation gives Ukraine a chance for a better future. The country wants to become a genuine democracy, without corruption and with a wealthy population. The European association treaty is the foundation for the national reforms.”
Maybe this is the intention of many naive European politicians, it is not the intention of the Ukrainian elite who under Poroshenko consolidate their power. The Swiss-based company Swissport, a leading airport service company, and its French investors learned this the hard way.
In 2012 the UK-based logistic website the “theloadstar” wrote:
“Swissport, the Swiss ground handler stands to lose some $8m in assets in the Ukraine while other foreign investors could shun Ukraine, following an attempt to forcibly strip the company of its majority stake in Swissport Ukraine. In a move alleged to be ‘corporate raiding’, an increasingly common phenomenon in the country, 30% shareholder of Swissport Ukraine, Ukraine International Airlines (UIA), has claimed that Swissport International (SPI) violated its minority rights – a “baseless” allegation, according to the handler. During interim court proceedings the judges were changed twice – at the very last minute – before the hearings.”
During the reign of Yanukovich, Kolomoisky (Poroshenko ally) try to strip Swissport from it assets. It did so by forcing the company to sell its multi-million majority stake for 400.000 Euro, using the corrupt Ukraine administration and the justice system. We cannot blame the company that it believed its problem was solved in 2014. The Washington and Brussels elite presented the new Kiev government as a tool in the fight against inherited Ukrainian corruption. During 2014 Swissport seems to have fought a successful battle against injustice. But at the end of 2014, the highest judicial body in Ukraine ruled that the company had to sell its multi-million investment to Kolomoisky for 400.000 dollars. The company said that it never received the 400.000 Euro from Mr. Kolomysky.
Ihor Kolomoiskyi is the oligarch President Poroshenko installed as governor of Dnepropetrovsk. That Kolomoisky enjoyed the full protection of Poroshenko became apparent as he was not prosecuted after he had orchestrated an armed raid on UkrTransNafta Ukraine state-owned oil firm. To spare President Poroshenko the embarrassment, Kolomoyskyi offered his resignation.
Ihor Kolomoiskyi is the founder of the Brussels-based European Jewish Parliament that served to increase his influence in Brussels. A worrisome sign that Ukraine’s political rot is spreading into the European Union.
Swissport raid and forceful eviction from Ukraine was an embarrassment for those who try to uphold the illusion Ukraine was in the process of becoming a genuine democracy free of corruption.
It could hardly be a surprise that a year after Kyivpost publication that Swissport had left Ukraine, Aivaras Abromavi?ius, Minister of Economics in Poroshenko’s cabinet and one of Washington’s principal allies in Kiev resigned.
After Abromavi?ius it was Deputy Prosecutor General that resigns due to unstoppable corruption. 15 February Deputy Prosecutor General Vitaliy Kasko wrote in his resignation letter:
“…This desire is based on the fact that the current leadership of the prosecutor’s office has once and for all turned it into a body where corruption dominates, and corrupt schemes are covered up. Any attempts to change this situation at the prosecutor’s office are immediately and demonstratively persecuted. Lawlessness, not the law, rules here…..”
A day later General Prosecutor Victor Shokin, who analysts say, is an ally of President Poroshenko, has to quit. Viktor Shokin agrees to step down after President Poroshenko asked him to leave office Western leaders and reform-minded Ukrainian officials have long been calling for Shokin’s resignation.
At the same time, Ukraine headed for a standoff between its two most powerful politicians after Prime Minister Arseniy Yatsenyuk had defied President Petro Poroshenko’s call for his resignation and defeated a no-confidence motion in parliament.
The current chaos in Kiev makes it for the IMF extremely hard to keep Ukraine funded. Brazil’s IMF Director already in 2014 urged not to bend rules for Ukraine. Ukraine had failed the IMF twice before. There is now a sense of panic in Kiev, and so Ukraine leaders start to issue opposite orders. The Central Bank Governor’s ban on money exchange was repealed immediately by Yatsenyuk.
The situation of the population deteriorates rapidly as Ukraine’s currency devalues fast and bond yields spike. Companies start to understand that direct investment can disappear overnight as raided foreign companies are forced to leave the country. Protesters take over Hotels in Kyiv and return to Maidan to demand the resignation of the Ukraine rulers who came to power with the support of Washington and Brussels. Yatsenyuk now becomes a liability for its partner NATO.
It is a just matter of time before the Ukraine nationalistic militias will take power, resulting in a definite split of the country. Poroshenko can postpone the people final verdict by reviving the war in the east, but in the end, he can not escape the day of reconning.About 4pm Montgomery County Sheriff’s Office began receiving calls in reference to a pickup truck dragging a donkey down the road. The first reports came in close to the intersection of FM 1485 and SH 242. Deputies converged on the area assisted by directions given by 911 callers. When they got to the 18000 block of Old Houston Road almost 2 miles south of SH 242 the located the pickup still dragging the donkey. The donkey had a single rope around his neck with the other end wrapped around the trailer hitch. Montgomery County Sheriff’s Deputies arrested Nasim Irsan, 21, of who lived a short distance down Old Houston from where he was stopped. He is being charged with Cruelty to Animals/Livestock.
Montgomery County Precinct 5 Livestock Deputy Marshal responded to the scene and took custody of the donkey. Initial examination did not show any signs of serious injuries.
this is the second time in several years someone has been arrested after dragging a donkey. The last one was in October of 2012 when Marc Richard Saunders was stopped dragging Susie Q down the road causing serious injuries to that animal. He was sentenced to five years in the Texas Department of Criminal Justice for his act.My hunger to play for England and get back in the team is as high as it has ever been. There has been a lot of talk |
11, 2014. All LinkedIn members who use CardMunch and choose to transfer their existing scanned cards into Evernote will receive two free years of Evernote’s premium business card scanning service. Members will be able to quickly and easily migrate their CardMunch data to Evernote. Details can be found here.
CardMunch data is also available in LinkedIn Contacts on LinkedIn.com on the desktop, and in the LinkedIn Contacts app. We recognize that some members may not want to transfer their data to Evernote, so we are also giving all CardMunch users the option to download their CardMunch data (including their business card images).
In addition, LinkedIn members who do not use CardMunch will receive free Evernote business card scanning for one year if they connect their LinkedIn account with Evernote.
A couple of weeks ago when we announced LinkedIn surpassed 300 million members, we noted that strategic partnerships (with companies like Apple, Nokia, Samsung and now Evernote) are a core part of our plan to reach the next three billion LinkedIn members. We’re excited to expand our partnership with Evernote and to bring LinkedIn to their users around the world.
LinkedIn is committed to doing fewer things better and by expanding our partnership with Evernote we can ensure that our members have the best card scanning experience possible while staying focused on what we do best.Makers of the magnetic levitation trains from the US, Europe and Japan have shown interest in a tender floated by Indian Railways to demonstrate the technology in India even as doubts on implementing the expensive project remain.
While the Indian Railways was conducting trials of the Talgo train, three firms—two from the US and one from Japan—approached the railway ministry to try their high-speed train technologies. Following this, the government floated a tender, inviting expressions of interest to run levitation-based trains at a minimum speed of 350 kmph to carry passengers and cargo.
Since then, high-speed transport technology companies from the US, Switzerland, Germany and Japan have shown interest in the ambitious plan, a railway ministry official said on condition of anonymity. Among these are SwissRapide AG of Switzerland, Maglev 2000 of the US and a consortium that includes Tesla Motors Inc. of the US.
Maglev (magnetic levitation) is a technology where the train floats 1-6 inches above the track on a cushion of magnetic power and runs at a minimum speed of 350 kmph and maximum 500 kmph.
Aida S. von Schulman, vice-president and director of business development at SwissRapide, said in an email, “We see a high potential for ultra-high speed Maglev rail systems in particular for India. A high-speed/ultra-high speed rail network would not only be a key factor in supporting the economic development in the country, but would also significantly reduce the carbon footprint in India, as long as the electrical power were to be supplied via renewable energy sources (a strong philosophy of our company)."
Her company operates Shanghai’s Transrapid Maglev since January 2004, and has covered more than 30 million km and transported over 25 million passengers.
Schulman said she would recommend for India the German Transrapid Ultra-High Speed Maglev Rail system, which SwissRapide operates, since it’s significantly more cost-effective and twice as fast as conventional, steel wheel/rail high-speed rail systems.
She added that the Transrapid Maglev rail technology is fully developed for public use and has received safety approvals in Germany and runs at 400-500 kmph, with average speeds of over 400 kmh between stations.
Emails to Maglev 2000 and Tesla remained unanswered till the filing of this report.
“The technology holders are asking usto look forward to more high-end technology like second generation Maglevs and Hyperloops and also extend the time. Since the last date for submitting EOI (expression of interest) is 6 September, Indian Railways will wait for formal responses, and based on that, we will take a call on re-inviting EOI and change some terms and conditions," the rail official quoted earlier said, adding that the companies were requesting Indian Railways not to limit itself and be open to showcasing new ideas.
The current EOI wants the demonstrating company to do the entire design, simulation, testing, validation, building, trials, modifications, operation, running and maintenance of the levitation-based train system for the specified stretch of approximately 200-500 km, which shall include a test and trial stretch of approximately 10-15 km.
The cost of the trial stretch will be borne by the demonstrating company. Once the companies show their proof of concept, Indian Railways will conduct a safety audit and finalize the project.
Indian Railways executive director, mechanical engineering (development) Nitin Chowdhary said, “The train must be of such a design so as to ensure adequate safety of passengers in line with the established norms for high-speed railway systems. The system should be fail-safe even for the levitation system, i.e. in the event of failure of any system of the train track or controls, the passengers/cargo should be safe." He added that permission to build the system beyond the test track shall be granted only after a successful demonstration.
Building a Maglev train in India could be easier said than done. Several nations like the UK and Germany have shelved such projects because of the steep cost. In 2007, the Maharashtra government planned a Maglev and did a pilot study, but there has been no progress since.
An infrastructure expert from consutancy KPMG India called the Maglev project “a waste of time and resources" for Indian Railways. “Before making such a big investment, Indian Railways should also think about project returns. In a country like India, where passenger fares are a political issue and Indian Railways or Delhi Metro Rail Corp. cannot increase it owing to consumer pressure, how would you get the returns for such expensive projects?." He added that no firm would invest in demonstrating proof of concept till they have assurance of a big project.
Schulman said, “Financing infrastructure will be a major hurdle for these projects. A key condition for success is that a positive business case be demonstrated, in order to make private financing of the projects available. Since the total cost of ownership of Transrapid Ultra-Highspeed Maglev technology is about 40% lower than conventional high-speed railway systems, a strong business case is much more feasible for the Transrapid systems. Also, since the Transrapid Maglev is at least twice as fast, we believe implementing the conventional high-speed railway systems would be a move in the wrong direction for your country."
However, on funding, Chowdhary said, “Railways shall provide the land for the project with permission to construct the levitation train system and associated infrastructure to be detailed in the bid document to be issued by the government subsequently. Also, railways shall participate in the joint venture (JV) with suitable equity contribution. Balance funding shall be provided by the private partner of the JV."THE Western Bulldogs’ 62-year premiership drought was snapped in a controversial finale to the AFL grand final. Here’s how the Dogs created history.
Bulldogs react to fairytale premiership THE Western Bulldogs have started the party at the MCG. Bulldogs coach Luke Beveridge kicked it off with his incredible gesture to hand over his premiership medal to injured captain Bob Murphy. “This is yours mate. You deserve it more than anyone,” Beveridge said before he took off his medal and put it around Murphy’s melon. He also paid full respect to the Swans. “Commiserations to the Swans,” he said. “Took their very best. Unbelievable side. Enormous effort by our players, obviously. Thank you to the AFL’s major sponsor, Toyota. Thank you to our major sponsor, Mission, the Victoria university, EML, BLK, and work safe. Here it is pic.twitter.com/7IWHrA44KL — Jon Ralph (@RalphyHeraldSun) October 1, 2016 “This group of players are just incredible. Their hearts are so big. We know how long you’ve waited for some success. And we really thought at half time that it was going to take something extra special, even though they had given their all already. “Absolutely special. Also, a call out to all of our support staff. Especially all of the people that put in so much work over a long period of time.” Norm Smith medallist for the best player in the grand final Jason Johannisen said it was a huge result for the entire club. “I actually can’t believe it,” he said. “I’m so numb right now. It’s just a dream come true. I’m speechless. “I’m just so proud of the football club as a whole. We’ve been on a special ride and we finished it off really well.” After being given his own premiership medal, Robert Murphy walked away from a live interview on Channel 7 to keep celebrating with his teammates. “It’s something else,” he said. “We didn’t even allow ourselves to daydream about this. Sons and daughters of Australia we’re bringing it home. Home!” Share
Swans misery SWANS captain Kieren Jack couldn’t control his emotions after the game. He cried after the game, but composed himself before he was called up to the microphone during the official presentation. “Yeah look, firstly, just a huge congratulations, Luke Beveridge, Easton Wood, the Bulldogs boys, you know, it’s been a really even competition all year,” he said. “You guys playfooty the right way. So well congratulated today. Now boys, we couldn’t get the job done but we will be back, we are going nowhere. Thanks to all the fans for turning up. We are sorry we couldn’t get the job done.” Share
Bulldogs are premiers for first time since 1954 THE Western Bulldogs are premiers of the AFL for the first time since 1954. The sons of the west had to fight for it in a hugely controversial final quarter, but showed a champion’s pedigree to lift when it mattered most and run away with a famous 89-67 win. The brave Dogs ran over the top of the Swans to kick the final three goals of the match and start one of the biggest celebrations the MCG has seen. Rising star Tom Boyd was huge in the second half and finished with three majors, while Liam Picken also finished with three goals. Coach Luke Beveridge said he couldn’t have been prouder of his team — before he had a cooler of Gatorade tipped on his head by his own players. “You know, it all comes down to players,” he said. “So many people have put a lot of work into them. And given them a lot of guidance. Every one who supports them, the club, has got them it is just an amazing performance by the boys and Sydney are an unbelievable side. So it took everything.” He singled out Boyd as one of his side’s key players. “He was amazing,” he said. “Him and Roughy have formed an unbelievable partnership this year. Just to see what he did and probably left his best till last. You know, I suppose it will go down as one of those unbelievable Grand Final performances. Hopefully for him.” Bob Murphy on the siren @mcg #AFLGF #AFLSwansDogs @theheraldsun @superfooty #ruff #bemorebulldog pic.twitter.com/IJSdI2iR5S — Wayne Ludbey (@WLudbey) October 1, 2016 The scenes. 🏆🏆🏆 #bemorebulldog pic.twitter.com/qH6XIXnK8j — Western Bulldogs (@westernbulldogs) October 1, 2016 Share
Bulldogs run away after hugely controversial score review A HUGELY controversial score review could not stop the Bulldogs piling on an epic run of goals in the last quarter. A long bomb from rising star Tom Boyd followed a tough snap from Liam Picken to extend the Bulldogs lead to 81-66 with just five minutes remaining. It came after star Dogs runner James Johannisen had a goal taken off him after a controversial score review. Johannisen’s long bomb appeared to be touched on the line by Swans defender Jeremy Laidler, but the score review official ruled the ball had not completely crossed the line. Share
Swans star goes down after controversial hit SWANS midfielder Dan Hannebery was forced from the field with a suspected knee injury. The key ball-winner appeared in agony and needed to be carried from the field after Dogs’ captain Easton Wood controversially dived down at Hannebery’s ankles when the clashed over a loose ball. After receiving treatment Hannebery tried to run out the injury and was able to come back onto the field with his left knee heavily strapped. He was forced from the field again minutes later, clearly struggling to run with the pain. Swans star Lance Franklin kicked an important goal minutes later to cut the Bulldogs lead to 61-60 mid-way through the final term. This is not a good sign for @SydneySwans - Hannebery off early in the final term #AFLGF pic.twitter.com/vv0icMRUkv — The West Sport (@TheWestSport) October 1, 2016 Now Hannebery gone for low contact and NO FREE KICK. #AFLGF — Quentin Hull (@QuentinHull) October 1, 2016 How is that not a free kick to Hannebery??? — TimGossage (@TimGossage) October 1, 2016 Legs out Hannebery, no free kick Sydney #freekickbulldogs — The Idiot Tax (@TheIdiotTax) October 1, 2016 Share
Three-quarter time THE Western Bulldogs lead by eight points at three-quarter time. The Dogs controlled the end of the third term to have a 61-53 advantage and had a number of late chances to extend their margin. Led by some huge grabs by rising star Tom Boyd, the Bulldogs had the final five scores of the third term. Share
‘Stupid free kick’ THE Swans were gifted the game lead mid-way through the third term when star midfielder Josh Kennedy was handed a 50m free-kick just 30m from goal. Kennedy found himself on the end of a beautiful pass from Lance Franklin and took an almost uncontested chest mark before Bulldog Toby McLean hit him late with his shoulder while running back with the flight of the ball. Geelong premiership star Cameron Ling told Channel 7: “That is stupid play”. “It’s very, very silly football. I know there is a thought that you have to make him earn it, but now it’s a certainty.” Kennedy’s kick put the Swans back in front 53-50 before the Bulldogs snatched the lead back with a goal to Clay Smith to make it 57-53. 3.40pm Nothing in it at half time THE Bulldogs hit back against the flying Swans with a crucial goal just 11 seconds before the half time siren. The tough snap from Toby McLean cut the Swans lead to just two points. Tom Mitchell’s second goal of the half pushed the Swans to 7-3-45, but McLean’s goal got the accurate Dogs back to within one kick at 7-1-43. At half time Josh Kennedy was the busiest man on the field with 22 touches, three tackles and two goals. Dogs speedster Jason Johannisen also picked up 18 disposals. Injured star Lance Franklin had just six touches in the first half and has not kicked a goal. 3.25pm Swans back in front THE Bulldogs went on a four goals to one run early in the second quarter before a long bomb from Swans midfielder Tom Mitchell reduced the Dogs’ lead to 31-21 mid-way through the second term. It came after a brilliant goal from Liam Picken, which was set-up with a daring reverse handball over the top of Lachie Hunter’s head. The Swans then responded with goals to Mitchell, Gary Rohan and a double to Josh Kennedy to take the lead 39-31. Kennedy had 19 possessions midway through the second quarter and was one of the most influential players on the field. Geelong premiership great Cameron Ling Described Kennedy’s performance as: “One of the greatest midfield performances in the first half of a grand final”. Share
Bulldogs lead after tight first term THE Western Bulldogs have done what seemed impossible and put the clamps on the fast-starting Sydney Swans. The Bulldogs led 12-8 at the first break after two late foals from Zaine Cordy and Tory Dickson. Swan Luke Parker kicked the first goal in an incredibly hard-fought opening quarter. Share
Buddy injury update LANCE Franklin is running with an ankle injury. The superstar missed almost 10 minutes of football in the first quarter when he was forced to retreat into the Swans’ dressing rooms to receive treatment. Franklin rolled his ankle when landing on the foot of a teammate during a marking contest early in the match. It remains unknown how serious the injury is. When Franklin returned he appeared to be running without any issues, however Matthew Richardson told Channel 7 it is possible Franklin received a pain-killing injection to deal with the injury. “The feeling from medical people down here is that it’s probably an ankle that he’s had re-strapped or jabbed,” Richardson said. The Bulldogs kicked two quick goals when Franklin returned to lead 12-8 late in the first term. Franklin did not stay with teammates during the quarter-time huddle and again retreated to the Swans’ dressing room for more treatment. He returned from the sheds in the final moments before the start of the second quarter. Share
Buddy’s shock exit LANCE Franklin disappeared from the MCG in the opening exchanges, needing to head into the Swans’ dressing rooms for treatment. Channel 7 boundary line reporter Matthew Richardson said Franklin was taken by a doctor into dressing rooms to have his right foot looked at. Richardson said Franklin walked down the player’s race with just one shoe on. “He came off and took his right boot off on the bench and the doctor said, ‘Na, we’ll get it right down in the rooms’. “The big story down here is that Buddy still hasn’t returned.” Franklin did not return until mid-way through the first term. He appeared to be running fine and picked up an uncontested mark on the wing. In a messy, hectic start neither team was able to use the football cleanly, the Swans kicked the first goal when star Luke Parker slotted the Sherrin through the sticks. Share
No late changes SWANS captain Jarrad McVeigh is a confirmed starter alongside rising star Callum Mills. Defender Aliir Aliir and Harrison Marsh have been left out. The Bulldogs will have the same 22 players that defeated GWS Giants last week. Share
Commentator’s huge call FOOTY commentator Brian Taylor has made an unfortunately ballsy call on today’s AFL grand final. The veteran wordsmith believes Bulldogs star Jake Stringer will explode on the game’s biggest stage by kicking at least four goals. Unfortunately for any fans caught glancing up to the Triple M commentary box after the game, he is prepared to put it all on the line. “I’m telling you now, today at the MCG he is going to explode,” Taylor told Triple M. “If you all wanna meet here after the game — I will hang upside down here in the nude if he doesn’t kick four (goals) today. “I’m telling you now that’s how sure I am.” Sparring partner and AFL great Danny Frawley quickly quipped: “Could this hold 250 kilos, this frame?” Burn! Share
Bulldogs captain’s painful interview BULLDOGS captain Bob Murphy has given an emotional interview before his team’s first grand final appearance since 1961. The injured skipper opened up in an interview from inside his Melbourne home with ABC Grandstand. Having kept control of his emotions about missing one of his football club’s biggest days, Murphy revealed how real the hurt is that he won’t be running out onto the MCG today. “There’s also those little moments you have for yourself where there is an ache,” Murphy said. “That’s the only way I can describe it. There’s a bit of an ache. That you’re not where you should be. I won’t be running out with the boys.” When asked to explain what it’s going to be like watching the game from inside the MCG, Murphy said: “Grab the tissues. Grab the tissues”. “It’s going to be excruciating. It will be a really uncomfortable experience, I’m anticipating. My morning coffee has been uncomfortable. It will be emotional.” He said his pain is rarer because of his club’s success-starved recent history. They have not won a flag since 1954. “The guys who miss out, there’s the pain of he missed out on that premiership team, but a Bulldogs premiership is different to all of those,” he said. “It’s so much bigger than all of that. So I consider myself lucky that I’ll be there. I will be a part of it. “There are moments of utter despair. That you’ve put so much into this part of your life and I won’t get to experience it, but how I would describe it is, there are slivers of despair but there is big old chunks of pride. “I want to walk on the sunny side of the street. I’m not a sad man. “I’m not a sad man. I have moments, but I’m a proud man. There’s a lot of hurt from the hard years, but we’re on grand final day. It’s not a sad day. I refuse to be that person.” Share
Prime minister’s epic burn PRIME minister Malcolm Turnbull has received some serious heat for his clueless footy talk this week, but he got to dish out his own burn at the traditional North Melbourne AFL grand final breakfast. The member for Wentworth was given the honour of stepping up to the podium first when Fox Footy’s live coverage of the event fired up on Saturday morning and he didn’t waste his opportunity. Speaking to an audience that included foreign minister Julie Bishop and opposition leader Bill Shorten, Turnbull fired an unprovoked volley straight at his political rival. It was a direct hit. Speaking about the dilemma of supporting the Swans ahead of the Cinderella story that is the Western Bulldogs’ premiership charge, Turnbull took an unexpected dig at Shorten and his infamous role in the removal of then prime minister Julia Gillard in 2013. “Today my loyalty to the Swans trumps my admiration for the Dogs,” Turnbull said. “Sadly, therefore there can be no unity ticket with Julia Gillard (the former No. 1 ticket holder at the Footscray club). I suppose there’s not much chance of a unity ticket with Bill. Just ask Julia.” His knife-twisting zinger drew plenty of laughter from the crowd and even Shorten couldn’t help but grin at his own expense. Turnbull didn’t get all of his grand final interviews right this week. On Friday he was left looking a like a proper goose when he was unable to sing the Swans’ official club song past the first line. Prime Minister's awkward AFL grand final interview 0:31 Prime Minister Malcolm Turnbull commits clueless footy blunder during interview ahead of 2016 AFL grand final between Sydney Swans and Western Bulldogs. Courtesy: 3AW Mornings with Neil Mitchell Share
AFL grand final preview HARD-charging Sydney expect and the undaunted Western Bulldogs believe. Given what happened in September, they have equal cause for optimism ahead of Saturday’s AFL grand final. The Bulldogs are riding a wave of emotion and sentiment, with everyone’s second- favourite team trying to win their second premiership. Their only flag was in 1954 and their last grand final was 1961. Two years ago, coach Brendan McCartney left, with captain Ryan Griffen soon following, and the Bulldogs were in freefall. But McCartney’s replacement Luke Beveridge has been outstanding, winning the last two AFL coach of the year awards. The Bulldogs have overcome a succession of injury setbacks this season and they are the first team to make the AFL grand final from seventh. Captain Bob Murphy, whose season ended in round three with a knee reconstruction, has continued to have a massive influence on the team with his off-field leadership. But to make history, the ‘Dogs have to beat Sydney. After losing the qualifying final to the Giants, the minor premiers have returned to form with a vengeance and they are the favourites heading into Saturday’s clash They took early control in their semi-final against Adelaide and then turned an expected tight preliminary final into a whitewash. Sydney tore Geelong apart with the first eight goals of the match. It was reminiscent of what Hawthorn did to them at the start of the Swans’ last grand final two years ago. Clearly, Sydney learned those painful lessons well. Beveridge and Swans coach John Longmire were adamant on Friday about their team selections. The Bulldogs are unchanged, while the Swans have recalled co-captain Jarrad McVeigh and Rising Star winner Callum Mills from injury. But late changes would come as no surprise, especially if the weather turns bad at the MCG. ShareThomas Bach delivered a speech at the Rio Olympics closing ceremony
The president of the International Olympic Committee (IOC) Thomas Bach will not attend any of the Paralympics, says the Games' governing body.
Bach had already said he would miss Wednesday's opening ceremony in Rio to attend a funeral.
The International Paralympic Committee "does not see it as a snub", according to director of media Craig Spence.
The opening ceremony starts at 22:15 BST and the Paralympics run for a further 10 days until 18 September.
Inspired to try a new sport? Find out how to get into disability sport with our special guide.
Bach chose not to attend the opening ceremony at the Maracana so he could remain in Germany for the funeral of his friend Walter Scheel, the former West German foreign minister and deputy chancellor, who died last month aged 97.
IOC officials said Bach would now not to travel to Brazil after the funeral because he was unable to reschedule other commitments.
"We fully understand that he cannot reschedule other longstanding engagements to attend the Games here at a later date," said Spence.
"The fact that he can't come is unfortunately a fact of life and shows how busy these presidents and officials are."
The last time an IOC president failed to attend a Paralympics was in 2010, when Jacques Rogge missed all of the Winter Games in Vancouver.Breaking up is hard to do at the best of times, but when your partner is depressed it seems impossible. Here are a few suggestions for breaking up with someone who is depressed to help you end the relationship gently.
You can’t control how your partner takes the breakup, but you can take care of yourself. Break Up Survival and Recovery: How to Get Over a Breakup by Kathleen Rao will help you deal with your feelings and go through the five stages of grief.
To learn more about your depressed boyfriend, read What Depression Feels Like. That article may help you understand your boyfriend’s mood and feelings, as well as how to talk to him. But don’t let your sympathy for his depression and emotional health affect your decision about breaking up. Don’t stay in a relationship with someone who is depressed because you feel pity or guilt. No matter how loving and kind you are, there is no easy way to end a relationship – but you need to do what you know in your heart to be right. These tips will help you break up with someone who is depressed, and may be helpful for both of you after the breakup.
If you take time to learn how to break up with someone who is depressed, you may find it easier to end the relationship gently. But – and I hate to say this – it will be difficult, no matter how much information you have. Depression is a serious emotional health issue, and it will probably complicate the breakup.
Breaking Up With Someone Who is Depressed
Breaking up hurts no matter how gentle, kind, loving, and thoughtful you are. Even if your partner knows that breaking up is the right thing to do, both of you will still hurt for awhile after the breakup.
Free yourself of guilty feelings
I don’t believe anyone should stay in a relationship out of guilt or fear. If you feel guilty that you want to break up, I encourage you to deal with those guilty feelings. It’s your life, and life is too short to stay in relationships that are unhealthy or abusive! Your first step is dealing with your own emotional obstacles to the breakup.
If appropriate, talk to your partner’s counselor or doctor
Does your partner see a psychiatrist or therapist regularly? It may be a good idea to talk to that person, and let them know that a breakup is in the future. This health practitioner may also help you figure out how to break up with someone you don’t love anymore without making the depression worse.
Take time to think about what you want to say
It takes time and energy to carefully, thoughtfully break up with someone who is struggling with feelings of depression. If your partner is seriously depressed or taking medications for depression, things get even more complicated.
Remember that you can’t control how the breakup is received
This may sound contradictory to my first tip on how to break up with someone who is depressed, but that doesn’t mean it’s wrong! Contradictions and paradoxes are part of life. All you can do is prepare yourself to gently, kindly, and lovingly break up. You can’t control how your partner reacts or feels…or what he or she does after the breakup.
Know that breaking up is hard, whether or not depression is a factor
Even if your partner wasn’t depressed, breaking up would still be a huge blog. This may not make it easier, but it’s important to know that depression isn’t the only reason breaking up is hard. Knowing how to break up is complicated for everyone, depressed or not.
Write down what you might say
Need encouragement? Get a beautiful FREE "She Blossoms" 2019 calendar when you sign up for my free weekly Blossom Tips!
You might plan to say something like, “I don’t know how to say this because it’s one of the most difficult things I’ve ever done, but there’s something you need to know.” You may not say those exact words when you’re breaking up with someone who is depressed, but it might help you to write your words down in advance.
Don’t let the breakup last longer than it has to
After breaking up, you may be tempted to keep in touch with your ex because of the depression he or she is experiencing. I don’t know if this is a good idea – it really depends on your partner’s mental and emotional health. It also depends on your ability to cope with the fallout.
Own your feelings and actions
Your partner may automatically feel even more depressed and bad about him or herself. Don’t add to the burden by blaming him. Take responsibility for your actions and feelings in the relationship.
Say things that represent how you feel – not how your partner has been acting. For example, “I don’t have the strength to be in a relationship right now, because I feel overwhelmed by my life” might be more effective than “Your depression is an emotional burden that I can’t handle anymore.” Let your partner blame you for ending the relationship. After all, it doesn’t matter whose fault it is, does it?
If you still feel uncertain and anxious about learning how to break up with someone who is depressed, I encourage you to talk to a counselor. The most loving thing you can do is when you’re ending a relationship is take time to proceed carefully and thoughtfully.
What do you think about my tips for breaking up with someone who is depressed? Please comment below. I can’t offer advice, but it may help you to share what you’re going through.
In How to Let Go of Someone You Love, I share 75 ways to cope with a breakup – it’ll help you heal and move forward.
May you find strength and courage as you carefully consider how to break up with someone who is depressed. I pray for wisdom, peace, and freedom for you and your partner.
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Featuring a modern look and feel, the AccuType wireless keyboard has island-style, ergonomic keys that allow a more fluid, spacious, comfortable and accurate typing experience than standard keyboard designs. With optical mouse pairing, you’ll enjoy all-round precision navigation.“Working nine to five, what a way to make a living / Barely getting by, it’s all taking and no giving / They just use your mind and they never give you credit / It’s enough to drive you crazy if you let it” -Dolly Parton
Everyone knows work is stressful. We’re not talking here just about labour that is creative or productive, but the World of Work in capitals – the thing that the vast majority of people are obliged to do to earn a wage, to survive.
Work-Is-Stressful. I-Am-Stressed-From-Work. As true today as it was for Dolly in 1980, it’s the familiar mournful dirge of working life. But, unjustly, little attention is the thought that work is stress. The practises of modern work necessarily leech off our mental health, as the relentless march towards increasingly precarious, affective and badly-remunerated labour is – according to the ruthless logic of neoliberalism – essential to maintaining profit margins.
If we understand work in terms of the way it is lived by workers; as depression, anxiety, stress and exhaustion, we reject the reactionary terms of the discourse which uses worker status as a shibboleth to divide the employed from the jobless, the immigrant from the fearful precarious worker. Waged work is not a guarantor of dignity. Hard graft is not a marker of moral rectitude. “It’s enough to drive you crazy.” It’s a parasite.
1. Work is stress.
We cannot talk about work without talking about the conditions of low-waged poverty – so often painted as necessary to maintain competitiveness and productivity. UK workers are experiencing the longest wage contraction since the 1870s, a squeezing fist whose grip only tightens with the rising prices of basic necessities. The loudly trumpeted employment statistics are bulked out mainly by work in low-paid sectors. The idea that work is a way out of poverty rings hollower every year; a bad joke in an empty theatre.
This political settlement of general impoverishment is one wrought in the anxiety of those who live it. Poverty – both absolute and relative – has been shown time and time again to hugely increase the risk of suffering from various psychiatric disorders including depression and anxiety. The testimonies of those on the front lines of austerity stand in grim confirmation of the World Health Organization’s studies on poverty and mental health. The everyday is transformed into a series of stresses undertaken to sustain life, to another to work day – navigating the dilemmas of whether or not to turn the heating on, which meals to skip to make sure your kids get breakfast.
2. Work is precarious.
Work has always been precarious; unstable employment proving a reliable weapon in the arsenal of tactics used to suppress wages and bring workers to heel. The thought goes that a worker who is one bad report away from destitution is a pliable worker who is less likely to demand better pay. But in recent years, the rise of short-term and zero-hours contracts has conspired with the programmatic disassembly of employment protections to ensure that this precarity is at the heart of the post-Fordist landscape. An increasing number of employers rely on short-term contracts, low-hours contracts and temp workers, and the level of ‘churn’ (job turnover) in the economy keeps on rising. And so, the precario has taken up the role as the new everyman – the worker at the beck and call of their contractor, engaged in a continuous process of self-surveillance and hyper-vigilance.
All this comes handsomely packaged as flexibility, personal choice, and as the rugged dynamism of a go-getting, hire-and-fire culture. In reality, such flexibility is experienced only by the employer, whilst the employed and the unemployed alike are engaged in the constant anxiety of wondering whether and when they will be able to find work, and how long they’ll be able to keep it. The stresses of this life are manifold and manifest. Unable to depend on an income, unable to budget for rent long-term, unable to plan for childcare (let alone retirement); workers live out this handy little money maker as anxiety and fear.
3. Work is all-encompassing.
Much has been made of the technological demise of the regular working week. As soon as communication and transport allowed workers to be contacted, summoned and dismissed at short notice, the nine-to-five grind was doomed. This is the flipside of precarity: a working timetable that, much like that of the unpaid domestic labourer, asserts itself as soon as you wake up. Better turn your email alerts off when you sleep.
We’re required to live mired in the anxiety of our constant readiness for work, so the stresses and coercive demands of work bleed into everything such that talk of a healthy work/life balance becomes a laughable tautology. Especially when the twin pressures of austerity and an ageing population push the relief of retirement further and further off into the distance. The ruthless hunger of work, the way it so readily chows down on any time we could call ‘free’, is common to the coke-fuelled city boy, the over-worked intern and the zero-hours contracted cleaner alike.
4. Work is affective.
Although talk about the move to a ‘knowledge economy’ is sometimes exaggerated |
This is important for you, and also will allow you to be more prepared and informed when you go for your formal interviews.
Do keep your conversations and language professional.
Don’t drink too much.
Don’t bring up controversial topics. You do not want to risk getting into an argument with one of the residents who may have strong, opposite opinions.
The Interview Day
You will probably have various slide presentations about the program and also a tour. The days can be long and can run together.
Do keep up the energy and interest level. If you can’t even keep your energy up for one interview day, we will have concerns about how you would function on a long string of tiring night shifts.
Do take notes. It will give you something to remember about the program, and also some ideas for questions to ask of the interviewers.
Do dress professionally. You may be eccentric and creative in your dress at home, but for the interview day, you want to fit in when it comes to your attire, and stand out when it comes to your personality.
The Interviews
You will likely have 4 or more interviews of 10-20 minutes each. If you can, know who your interviewers are, whether they are the program director, the chair, a faculty member, or a resident. That way you can tailor your questions to their role.
Do be on time. You’ve probably heard the saying “10 minutes early is on time. On time is late, and 10 minutes late is unacceptable.” Certainly, catastrophes and transportation hiccups can happen, in which case, call the coordinator to let him or her know as soon as possible.
Do start well. Smile, have good eye contact, give a firm handshake, and sit up straight. This is an interview, after all.
Do be excited to be there. If the interviewer asks you how your day is, avoid responses like “pretty good” or “ok, but I’m pretty tired”. Even if your flight was delayed and you are working on 2 hours of sleep, put your best foot forward and answer with how great your day has been and how excited you are to be there. You will have days in residency when you are functioning on little sleep, and we want to know that you can keep up your energy despite being tired.
Do always be honest. If you exaggerate your capabilities, such as saying you are fluent in Spanish, when really you only took a year in high school, you may find yourself caught out if the interviewer is fluent and decides to conduct the interview in Spanish (this has happened). Also, being honest is just the right thing to do.
Do be excited about your activities and accomplishments. An interviewer will probably ask you about the research, teaching, or volunteer experience that you listed on your application. Be able to speak about it articulately and with excitement. Excitement is contagious… so is boredom. Talk about how much you enjoyed the research project and what you learned from it. Avoid saying things like “I was just a tech on that project to meet the research requirement for my school,” or “I learned I hated research.” Always focus on the positive part of the experience.
Do practice your answers to the most common questions. Most of the questions you will be asked are predictable. You will always have a few “off the wall” creative questions, but most of the time, it is standard interview questions (see the end of the post for a list). Have answers that you have thought about and practiced for these. You do not need to memorize your answers, but at least be able to articulate them well.
Do have a plan for after residency. No one expects you to have your life all figured out yet. But at least have thought about your interests: Do you want to work in a rural setting? Do a fellowship in something? Work in a major academic center? Do research? No one will look back in the future and hold you to these answers, but at least it shows that you have thought through your interests.
Do be genuine. We want to find out your personality, who you are, and whether you are a good fit. If you plan to go back to your small hometown and be their ED doc, do not pretend that you want to do a research fellowship and become an NIH-funded researcher. First of all, not all programs are looking for that, and second of all, the interviewer will sense that you are telling them what you think they want to hear, rather than what is true.
Do speak articulately. We all use word fillers such as “like, um, you know”. Avoid these when you can as much as possible. Also avoid inflecting every answer as if you are asking a question. For example, when asked about what your plans are in 10 years, think about what the following would sound like: “In ten years? I really enjoy teaching? So I would see myself working in academics? And I will probably do an education fellowship? And then I would want to be involved in research?”
Do sell yourself. Interviewers may ask about something you are proud of doing, or a major accomplishment. Talk about it! This is your chance to impress them and sell yourself.
Don’t be annoyed if the interviewer hasn’t read your application or has forgotten parts of it, such as where you went to college. Many of the interviewers are coming in to interview on a day they would otherwise have had off. They probably glanced at the applications the night before, but may not have read all of it. Some interviewers read your personal statements, and others do not. Always be polite and respectful in your answers. Even if the interviewer has read your application, they have also likely interviewed 19 other people that day, and the applications can start to run together just as programs start to all look alike to you.
Don’t ramble. When an interviewee starts to ramble, the interviewer may worry that they will ramble when presenting patients on a clinical shift. After all, the interviewer is trying to find applicants who will work well as residents in the ED. A big part of being a good resident is being a good communicator. Hone your communication skills by preparing your answers.
Don’t speak negatively about other programs. If asked about your experience rotating at another place, or even at your home institution, do not speak negatively about them. You can compare and contrast them, but “bad-mouthing” other residents or programs is a big red flag.
Don’t speak negatively about other specialties. It is inappropriate to do so, and you never know if the interviewer’s significant other or parent might be a doctor in that specialty. If you had a challenging experience on a rotation with another specialty, reframe it about what you learned through the challenges.
Don’t be arrogant. You are a medical student. You have a lot to learn, which is why you are applying to residency. Do not criticize practices you have seen in an arrogant way. It is ok to talk about differences in practice, and how you learned from it or read up on it to find out the evidence base for something, but hubris is another big red flag.
Don’t be casual even if your interviewer is a resident. They often have just as much say in the decision of where to rank you and how to score your interview as any of the faculty interviews. So stay professional.
Do have questions. At the end of the interview, most interviewers will ask if you have any questions. This is in part to help answer anything you may have, but also it gives us a sense of how interested and prepared you are. Have a few questions about the program. They can be generic, such as “What are some things you have recently changed about the program?” or “Are there any things you see changing about the program in the future?” Or they can be specific about how the rotations are structured, how much time residents spend in the ICU, etc. Make a list of questions ahead of time that you want to ask about. It can lead to an awkward silence if the interviewee has no questions.
Do end well. Again, the interviewer is probably there on their day off. Make them happy to have spent 15 minutes with you. Thank them for their time or for answering your questions.
After the Interview
Do be honest if you tell a program you are ranking them #1. You can only have one #1. If you change your mind later, let the program know that. If you are ranked in a match-able range, and do not match there, the program leadership will know that you were dishonest. This reflects poorly on you.
Do be professional. It is not required to send a thank you letter. But if you do, make sure it is professional and legible (if hand written). An email is acceptable as well.
Hopefully the “Dos and Don’ts” here will help keep you from committing any major interview faux-pas. Enjoy the time that you have traveling, seeing other programs, and meeting future colleagues. Good luck!
Common Interview Questions
There are many lists of potential questions. For a more extensive one, see the ACP guide, the UNC guide, and the Big Interview guide. The following are some classic questions that you will undoubtedly be asked:
Tell me about yourself.
What attracted you to Emergency Medicine?
What are you looking for in a program?
What would make you a good fit for our program?
Tell me about the job/research/volunteer/teaching/travel experience that you mentioned on your application.
What do you want to do after residency?
Where do you see yourself in 10 years?
Tell me about an interesting case you have had.
Tell me about a challenging situation you had or a time when you disagreed with the management of a patient, and how you handled it.
What are you most proud of doing during medical school/college?
What do you do for fun?
Additional Resources:
Nikita Joshi’s Residency Interview Tips ALiEM blog post (2013) First Aid for the Match, 5th Editors Le, Bushan, Shenvi, McGraw Hill, 2011 [Disclosure: I receive no royalties from the sale of this book] Michael Gisondi’s EM Match Advice: An ALiEM video series (2014-15)
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InstagramAmanda Palmer: If You’re Asking ‘What’s In It for Me?’ Then You’re In the Wrong Business…
The following guest post comes from Amanda Palmer. It’s also the foreword to the 4th Edition of the The Future of the Music Business by music industry attorney Steve Gordon (check out the book at futureofthemusicbusiness.com).
When I was a boy, and I would see scary things in the news, my mother would say to me, “Look for the helpers. You will always find people who are helping.” Mr. Rogers
If you’re reading this, you’re already not normal– normal people generally don’t want to legitimately “work” in the music business. If you’re reading this, you’re either an artist, in which case you’ve taken a decidedly difficult path in life (why not go into insurance sales?), or you’re somehow affiliated with the giant variety of jobs that are supposed to help the connection between the artist and the rest of the world: a club booker, a music lawyer, a producer, a sync agent.
I say “supposed to help” because this basic truth can get lost when people head into the noisy, confusing marketplace of sharing, selling and commodifying music–especially as things are changing at the speed of the internet.
The music business I experienced as a kid was the golden cage/age of the 1980s and 90s, in which the goal was to get signed, and in which the middlemen (the managers, agents, promoters and mainstream media) provided the conduit from the artist to the wide world. The artist’s job was to make music and tour, and it was music business’s job to carry the heavy load of records out the door, make people listen, make people come, make people care.
That era is over.
We now live in a world where artists, if they want to, can skip most of the old-school steps and make their own material (recorded on the relative cheap), release it (uploaded to the net at no cost to the artist), promote their own music and book their own tours (via web tools and email lists); and if their music is any good, they can make a living wage. If they have a strong work ethic and good enough material, and a few thousand fans, they can earn enough to survive without ever being “successful” in the eyes of the mainstream media. You’ll never hear about these people. They are out there, working, and they probably have a small handful of people helping them.
A lot of the jobs that used to be only executed by a manager, agent or producer-engineer are now doable by the small-to-mid-level artist, or the artist’s girlfriend or boyfriend (if the artist’s girlfriend or boyfriend knows basic garage band and/or facebook techniques). Google and email have unlocked of lot of the doors to which only the experts in the music business once had the keys.
It used to be that if you needed to rent gear, only the local promoters knew how to come to your aid. Now, you can google, make a cell phone call from the back of the van (or if you’re well-loved, twitter to fans to please loan you an bass amp…because yours got blown out last night in Chicago).
It used to be that if you had a handful of fans in St. Louis, you used to have to rely on the middlemen to get the word out to those people if you were going to return to town. You needed radio. You needed a label with a street team. Now you can post a PDF to your website and email it to your fans in St Louis, asking them to please hit the coffee shops and college bulletin boards on your behalf.
This may all seem to spell the beginning of a giant DIY culture–and in a way, it does–but in a way, it’s the opposite: no artist can do absolutely everything himself.
Here’s the thing everyone has to bear in mind as we transition from a stiff hierarchy in music to more of a level playing field, with room for a bigger middle class:
Working artists still need HELP.
Someone has to design that PDF. Someone has to make sure it gets to the fans. Someone has to organize and maintain the email list once the artist gets too big to keep track of everything.
People are constantly wondering what’s going to “become” of the labels of yore. They’ve already collapsed. The old majors are shadows of themselves, or they’ve merged into super-structures.
The ones that are succeeding, and the ones that will survive, have to somehow manage, in the thick of things, to find a way to do one, fundamental thing, to fulfill a need that will never vanish. The artists need help.
The companies and individuals who are evolving in the new landscape are able to see that fundamental truth as a ground zero and work upwards from there.
Whether an artist is trying to make a living via Bandcamp and Kickstarter or signing their entire future and firstborn child to Giant-Major-Label-Promoter-Conglomerate (and both of these things are totally legitimate, depending on the artist), they are still the same: they are working artists.
If they’re going to actually work on art:
They need help getting from place to place.
They need help answering calls.
They need help getting the word out.
They need help collecting their paychecks.
They need help sending and delivering goods and services to their fans.
The women and men I know working on the support side of the new-model music industry who are blazing new trails (and blowing by all the people who are bemoaning the past and clinging to the old rules) all have this one thing in common: they want to help. (or, to be honest, they’re really good at faking it–whatever, it works most of the time.)
Those winning in the music business today adopt an attitude of service. They look at the world and locate who wants the music. They assess the crazed artists who want to make a go of it, and they don’t ask: What’s in it for me? They ask: How can I help? And they project this attitude towards those they court and work with.
In 2010, I broke very loudly and openly from my label, Roadrunner Records. I decided not to sign with another label, and instead, I worked with a small team and we sold things directly to my fans. We used Kickstarter. We used twitter. We blogged and emailed up a storm. We went direct, we mailed records to tens of thousands of homes. It was a shit-ton of work. I needed a lot of help. I was on tour. From the ground control of Amanda-central, people had to man the phones, filter the help lines, provide customer service, and arrange ALL sorts of inexplicable things. By the time my Kickstarter was over, at least a couple hundred of my fans were on a friendly first-name basis with [email protected], the guy on my team who helped everyone, tirelessly, with their nitty-gritty order questions.
We didn’t know what kind of help he was going to have to provide for me until the crises happened, but when help was necessary, he helped.
I’ve been through a mill of managers, assistants, agents and publicists. Some of them wanted to make money more than they wanted to help. Some of the members of my extended team have been with me for twelve years, and some have only lasted six weeks.
What’s the general pattern? The ones who wanted to help more than they wanted to make money have stayed with me.
My booking agents used to just call up halls and book gigs for me. Things were simple. Then Twitter and Facebook came along and made flash gigs possible. (I call them “ninja gigs,” and I recommend them to any artist with an acoustic instrument).
After endless phone calls, explanations and arguments, some my agents began to understand that my desire to show up and play a twittered flash-event in a public park on the day before a gig in Detroit is a feature, not a bug. People would come to the free gigs, connect, and then I’d take polls at the ticketed, money-making show the next night. A lot of people came because they were turned onto the information, one way or another, through the existence of the free flash gig the day before. Promoters used to call my agents, screaming that I was sucking away ticket sales. But the numbers would eventually speak for themselves. Now they listen. They even help.
The agents who didn’t listen to me, who didn’t try to help, who fought me… they didn’t last.
Managers used to roll their eyes when I asked them to please, please, please read my blog comments and my twitter feed, so they could understand the day-to-day vibe of the community, so they could listen, and therefore, know how to help me and the fans to connect in the best ways possible.
The ones who never understood this didn’t last.
Publicists used to agonize, telling me to please shut up and lay low whenever I traipsed into a controversial situation. I ignored them, kept talking, arguing and engaging people, and all of that work eventually landed me a TED talk that’s been viewed almost ten million times, my own book deal, and a gig writing this introduction. You can’t force people to want to help you, but you can walk away and gravitate towards those who really do want to help.
And how do you help someone with a big mouth? How do you help an artist who barely wants to talk?
It’s HARD to help an artist. This will also never change.
Artists are inherently weird. Music is intangible. Music isn’t concrete, even though it can sometimes seem to be. You’re dealing in the business of feelings, and a strange kind of exchange that extends far beyond the eye-for-an-eye exchange of most businesses. The grey area between help and coercion is wide, and many artists don’t even know what kind of help they need. Worse, many artists have an allergy to certain varieties of help. Letting the artist take the lead is essential if you’re going to be seriously helpful. You can’t assume that all artists want the same things. Ask first, then attack.
To put it crassly, but it’s a fine analogy: you can’t insist that someone have an orgasm by simply pounding away at them. Asking how they need it may be hard, or awkward, but it’s essential if you’re going to be a good lover.
All of the tools that Steve is laying out and explaining in the pages to come are for your arsenal of tools, artist and helper alike. Keep everything handy, and know that using the right tool in the right moment is what makes you truly helpful (and if you’re an artist: able to help yourself and those around you who need a lift up).
The roles that exist in “music business land” (manager, publicist, lawyer, promoter, etc.) originally developed to serve the artist and the audience. To act as a bridge. A connector. A helper. Through the years, that concept has been obscured in a jangle of label expense accounts, self-aggrandizing gate-keepers and gold chains.
So as the whole system goes up in beautiful new flames, ask yourself: where are you?
In the burning building?
Or are you looking for a way to act as a bridge, somewhere on the long, craggy trek a soulful song takes from a Finnish musician’s heart to the heart of a 16-year-old kid in rural Wisconsin, who’s listening with headphones in a crowded cafeteria or standing in the back of a shitty local bar, having snuck in with her fake ID, crying her eyes out?
Can you imagine yourself thinking – assessing what you’re doing with your time, your energy, your talents, your life – not about your own success, but something even more divine:
I helped make that moment happen.
And if you can’t imagine that moment being the most satisfying moment of your life, more satisfying than making all the money, more satisfying than climbing up the corporate ladder, you probably shouldn’t go into the music business.
Choose something more concrete.
Go into insurance sales.
– Amanda Palmer
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Those who are afraid of heavy facial oils with a greasy textureKOIN 6 News Staff - PORTLAND, Ore. (KOIN) -- Demonstrators with the group Don't Shoot PDX rallied in downtown Portland Friday, marching through the streets and briefly clashing with Malheur Refuge supporters outside the Federal Courthouse.
The group was out to protest the events at City Hall on October 12 and to promote organizer Teresa Raiford as a write-in candidate for Multnomah County Sheriff.
Leaders on megaphones chanted Raiford's name, urging people to "write in Raiford," for Multnomah County Sheriff.
Raiford spoke to those gathered about police brutality and unfair treatment of black people in Oregon.
"We know how corrupt Oregon is, and I think the whole world knows how corrupt Oregon is," Raiford said. "They know that Oregon -- the white utopia, whitelandia -- is racist as f--- right? We all know that right?"
Raiford and others also added "F--- the police" to their chants.
The protesters started on the PSU campus, marched to the U.S. courthouse and eventually moved to outside City Hall where organizer Gregory McKelvey provided the group with a recap of recent demonstrations by their group.
Several people spoke about the October 12 confrontation they had City Hall, when they say they wanted to speak to Mayor Charlie Hales but were met with police brutality.
On that day, several protesters were pepper sprayed and 10 were arrested.
Micah Rhodes with Don't Shoot PDX said he was knocked unconscious, stepped on and maced that day. Rhodes also promoted Raiford's write-in candidacy for Multnomah County Sheriff, saying she doesn't just stand for black people, but for all people.
Rhodes said she's the best person for any position and the best person he knows.
At one point, the group confronted supporters of the Malheur refuge takeover defendants outside the U.S. court house. The 7 defendants, including Ammon and Ryan Bundy, were found not guilty on October 27.
Raiford linked the Malheur verdict to the issue of white privilege, saying police use a "color scheme to figure out who's a criminal and who isn't."
Demonstrators said Friday that if they had taken over a federal facility, they would have been convicted.
At one point, Don't Shoot PDX protesters burned an American flag that organizer Greg McKelvey said was given to them by a Bundy supporter.
The woman who claimed the flag belonged to her was upset that they burned her property.
"Don't you see what you guys are doing?" she said. "This isn't peaceful."
Later McKelvey said it's their 1st Amendment right to burn a flag. He said he wasn't there when it happened but that the flag was given to them, not taken from the woman.Andrei Kanchelskis is a Manchester United cult hero. The Ukrainian winger played a huge part in United’s marvellous mid nineties team – Ferguson’s first great United side. Alongside Giggs, Cantona, Hughes, Ince and the rest, Kanchelskis lightening quick, direct performances down the right flank ensured his place in United folklore. He even scored a derby hattrick against rivals City.
Kanchelskis acrimonious Old Trafford departure in 1995 is one of football’s most intriguing and mysterious tales. Rumoured reasons for his exit are still discussed on Manchester streets to this day 20 years on, with hearsay and gossip spun wildly into webs of urban myths that wouldn’t sound out of place in a Bourne Identity sequel.
Before we talk about the shady end, it is important to discuss the equally shady beginnings. Kanchelskis was recommended to Ferguson by agent Rune Hauge – the same unlicensed agent who was involved in George Graham’s “bung” scandal of 1995. With the help of Hauge and Kanchelskis agent Grigori Yesaulenko, United signed the winger for £1m in 1991 from Shakhtar Donetsk.
In Ferguson’s 1999 book “Managing My Life” he revealed that three years later in 1994, Yesaulenko handed him an unsolicited gift at Manchester airport — £40,000 in banknotes in a shoe box.
“I thought it contained a samovar, or some other typical Russian gift,” Ferguson said. But when he opened the parcel at home, he saw that it was packed with cash. Ferguson decided to put the box in a club safe in the presence of lawyers. The cash sat there for almost a year, before Yesaulenko turned up again and was almost forcibly given back the gift.
Yesaulenko had arrived to talk business though and demanded that United accept an offer from Everton for Kanchelskis. United had earlier rejected an offer, which they felt wasn’t worth enough to the club after the fee had been split according to clauses in Kanchelskis’ contract. Newspaper The Independent obtained a copy of those contract clauses in 1999 which detailed that Shakhtar were to be given 30% of any profit made from any future sale. 30% of any fee was also to go to the player himself.
United’s boardroom wanted to make £5m from the sale and so they pulled the plug on the deal. Yesaulenko, who wanted to make a cut of his own from the transfer, was apoplectic.
In a meeting with United chairman Martin Edwards, Yesaulenko told him “”IF YOU don’t sell him now, you will not be around much longer.” He also told Edwards he would sort out the Shakhtar “problem”, allowing United to keep more of the fee.
A month later, Kanchelskis was sold. Two months after that, Aleksandr Bragin the Shakhtar president and five bodyguards were blown up at Shakhtar’s ground four minutes into a match against Crimean team Tavria. (Bragin was known as “Alik the Greek” in the Ukrainian criminal underworld)
The events which led to his death began after Yesaulenko threatened Mr Edwards and said he would “sort out” the Ukrainians. While the Kanchelskis talks were stalled Mr Yesaulenko sent a fax in English to Shakhtar asking one of the club’s board members, name Kolotsei to forward the fax on club notepaper to Manchester United. The fax, dated 13 July 1995, waived Shakhtar’s rights to their 30% cut of transfer profits and United happily moved Kanchelskis on to Everton.
Aleksandr Bragin and his colleague, Ravil Safioullin, claimed Mr Kolotsei wasn’t aware of what he was forwarding in the fax. In a letter sent to United (dated 19 September 1995) they wrote:
“Mr Kolotsei signed … text in the English language prepared by Mr Yesaulenko … only because Mr Yesaulenko requested and explained that this fax was necessary exclusively for helping Andrei Kanchelskis to solve private problems …”
The controversy surrounding Kanchelskis, caused the Shakhtar board to re-examine the original contract for the 1991 move to United. Clause 3 stipulated they were entitled to even more money: £150,000 after Kanchelskis had played 40 games for United, £250,000 after he had played 80 games, and another £150,000 should Kanchelskis pen a new deal. But a check on their accounts showed the money had not never arrived from United, despite the all the stipulations being met.
Initially the board thought that United were involved in dodgy dealings with Bragin. It emerged that Bragin had sent United a fax, asking them to deposit money in an account in the name of Euro Football Ltd at Coutts & Co in Zurich and not Shakhtar’s usual club accounts based in New York.
Shakhtar maintained that the Euro Football Ltd account had nothing to do with their club. It appeared that Bragin had been attempting to siphon money away.
After Aleksandr Bragin’s death, United and Shakhtar continued to argue over the profits from Kanchelskis Everton transfer. Shakhtar also needed reassurance that United had made the £550,000 payment relating to the appearance clauses in the 1991 contract – money that had “disappeared” thanks to Bragin’s underhanded workings.
In Munich on 23 and 24 January 1996, Maurice Watkins, United’s solicitor, proved to Ravil Safioullin, (Bragin’s successor) that United had been asked to pay the money into a numbered Swiss bank account. The arguments continued until March of the same year, when United made a settlement of £770,000 to bring the chapter to a close. Safioullin claims he was made to sign a confidentially clause after the dispute was eventually resolved.
United declined to make a statement about Bragin’s death and the subsequent contractual controversies.
In 1998 Grigori Yesaulenko was arrested and charged with tax evasion following the sale of Russia midfielder Dmitry Alenichev to Italian Serie A club Roma. Yesaulenko was vice president of selling club Spartak Moscow at the time and was charged with hiding $7m in Swiss banks after the transfer.
It’s easy to see why the Kanchelskis transfer, Bragin’s death and Yesaulenko’s behaviour were strongly linked to involvement with the Ukrainian mafia and criminal underworld from the outset. You get the feeling that we are only scratching the surface of what was one of football’s most unusual set of circumstances.On the morning of April 26, 2002, a 19-year-old who had been expelled from Gutenberg High School in the eastern German city of Erfurt began a deadly rampage. Over the course of two hours, he systematically stalked his former school's corridors and classrooms. The perpetrator killed 12 teachers, one secretary, one police officer and two students before taking his own life. Germany's first school shooting put the country into a state of shock, and triggered an earnest debate on how to toughen gun laws.
Exactly ten years after the massacre, Germany's lower house of parliament, the Bundestag, decided to establish a central weapons registry. It will gather information from the 600 offices that issue weapons permits throughout Germany in one place.
The Erfurt massacre was not in fact the main impetus for the registry. Rather, the Bundestag is aiming to follow a European Union directive calling for every member country to set up a computerized, constantly updated weapons register by 2014.
Germany was also influenced by another massacre. In 2009, a 17-year-old student went on a rampage in Winnenden, killing 16 people.
Better risk analysis
The registry is intended to make it easier for German authorities to get an overview of the roughly 10 million firearms in the hands of private owners. According to the draft of the Bundestag legislation, "the national arms register catalogs weapons as well as weapons permits, exemptions, orders, indemnification and personal prohibitions pertaining to weapons."
Germany's Federal Administration Office is charged with maintaining the registry, which is designed to be quickly available to authorities. The goal is to make it easier to determine whether or not weapons are legally possessed, and to help officials with risk analysis when emergencies come up.
"This brings about a new dimension," said German Interior Minister Hans-Peter Friedrich. But he cautioned against expecting the registry to actually prevent another shooting rampage from taking place.
The validity of that warning is evident in the 2002 and 2009 incidents. The Erfurt killer was armed with a pump gun and a Glock 17, a high-caliber pistol favored by special commandos and often seen on television crime series. The perpetrator bought the weapons with fake papers. In the case of the Winnenden massacre, the shooter used a registered sporting weapon owned by his father.
Ten years ago in Erfurt: flowers piled up at the site of the shooting massacre
Tougher gun laws
Since those tragic incidents, Germany has changed its gun ownership laws several times. In 2002, the minimum age for owning a gun was raised from 18 to 21, while the minimum age for hunting went from 16 to 18.
Moreover, people under 25 who want to fire guns in Germany have to submit to a psychological evaluation. Rules for the safekeeping of weapons have also become stricter. Authorities are allowed to make unannounced visits to gun owners to check whether their rifles and pistols are stored correctly.
People in Germany are still permitted to use high-caliber weapons for sport and recreation. Bernhard Witthaut, the chair of Germany's police union, said he is content with the current gun laws. He described the regulations as complex, but sufficiently strict. Witthaut also said there are not enough police personnel to carry out announced weapons inspections.
Gisela Mayer, the chair of an alliance formed in the wake of the Winnenden shootings, called Thursday's legislation inadequate. She said the need to set up a national weapons registry was obvious.
Author: Heiner Kiesel/srs
Editor: Simon BoneThe two-time Indian champions and the capital outfit will both expect to contend for the title in the new season of the cash-rich league...
BENGALURU FC
Bengaluru FC, one of two new entrants into the Indian Super League (ISL) this year are determined to bring their winning mentality into India's biggest footballing spectacle and show that they can cut it in the cash-rich league. The Blues will be led by the astute Albert Roca and Carlos Cuadrat who led the southerners to the final of the AFC Cup in 2016 and see them going strong in the continental competition this year. While they had a relatively poor I-League campaign this year, there was some reason to rejoice as the Steelmen took home the Federation Cup.
Also Read: Bengaluru FC begin pre-season training with new-look squad
With all the clubs involved in the ISL having relatively greater financial clout and technical strength compared to the clubs in the I-League, it would be interesting to see how BFC can cope with this in their debut ISL campaign.
PLAYERS' ROSTER
One of the key reasons for Bengaluru FC's success since 2013 can be attributed to the stability in the personnel in their ranks. The club have had a strong spine in John Johnson, Eugeneson Lyngdoh and Sunil Chhetri being a regular feature in all of Bengaluru's winning exploits. However, with the ISL allowing only two senior players to be retained from their current squads, it saw the draft taking away a vast portion of the team that had brought many a title to the Garden City club.
Retaining Chhetri was a no-brainer for the Blues
The club opted to retain Captain Fantastic Chhetri along with highly impressive youngsters Udanta Singh, Nishu Kumar, Daniel Lalhlimpuia (for the AFC Cup) and Malsawmzuala. They were also allowed to retain defensive lynchpins John Johnson, Juanan and have brought in foreign reinforcements in the form of Erik Paartalu, Dimas Delgado and Antonio Dovale.
Also Read: How FC Goa and NorthEast United could line up in ISL 4
However, they were determined to buy back as many players from their I-League squad as possible and this was evident when the club drafted Lenny Rodrigues, Harmanjot Khabra, Lalthuammawia Ralte, Alwyn George and Calvin Abhishek for a combined outlay of Rs 169 lakhs. Bengaluru FC fans will sadly have to say a tearful farewell to Eugeneson Lyngdoh, Rino Anto, Sandesh Jhingan and CK Vineeth, all of whom are firm fan favourites and were plucked up by the remaining clubs in the ISL roster. With a healthy mix of star power and young talent, Roca has assembled a squad that is more than capable of challenging for the ISL title in their debut campaign.
TACTICAL SYSTEM (PROBABLE)
Hailing from Barcelona, |
unch on April 30. Also, in regards to full disclosure, I should say that I am a member of Psychologists for Social Responsibility, and while I am not on the steering committee that decided to publish this letter, nor have ever held any leadership position in that organization, I was consulted on the matter of this letter. I am proud that an organization I belong to took a principled stand on this issue.]Rating +195 Delrasha - GR50+ 4pc Delsere's & 6pc Tal Rasha's Regular Hybrid BBCode Link Edit Delete
Skills Teleport Calamity Teleport Cooldown: 11 seconds
Teleport through the ether to the selected location up to 50 yards away. Calamity Cast a short range Wave of Force upon arrival, dealing 175% weapon damage as Arcane to all nearby enemies and stunning them for 1 second.
Energy Armor Force Armor Energy Armor Cost: 25 Arcane Power
Focus your energies, increasing your Armor by 35% but decreasing your maximum Arcane Power by 20. Lasts 10 minutes.
Only one Armor may be active at a time. Force Armor Incoming attacks that would deal more than 35% of your maximum Life are reduced to deal 35% of your maximum Life instead.
The amount absorbed cannot exceed 100% of your maximum Life.
Black Hole Supermassive Black Hole Cost: 20 Arcane Power
Cooldown: 12 seconds
Conjure a Black Hole at the target location that draws enemies to it and deals 700% weapon damage as Arcane over 2 seconds to all enemies within 15 yards. Supermassive Increases the Black Hole radius to 20 yards and damage to 1290% weapon damage as Lightning over 2 seconds.
Slow Time Time Warp Slow Time Cooldown: 15 seconds
Invoke a bubble of warped time and space at your target location up to 60 yards away for 15 seconds, reducing enemy attack speed by 20% and movement speed by 60%. This bubble also slows the speed of enemy projectiles by 90%. Time Warp Enemies caught in the bubble of warped time take 15% more damage.
Magic Missile Glacial Spike Magic Missile This is a Signature spell. Signature spells are free to cast.
Launch a missile of magic energy, dealing 230% weapon damage as Arcane. Glacial Spike Cast out a shard of ice that explodes on impact, causing enemies within 4.5 yards to take 175% weapon damage as Cold and be Frozen for 1 second.
Enemies cannot be Frozen by Glacial Spike more than once every 5 seconds.
Mirror Image Duplicates Mirror Image Cooldown: 15 seconds
Summon 2 illusionary duplicates of yourself that taunt nearby enemies for 1 second, last for 7 seconds and have 50% of your Life.
Spells cast by your Mirror Images will deal 10% of the damage of your own spells. Duplicates Summon 4 Mirror Images that taunt nearby enemies for 1 second and each have 50% of your Life.
Elemental Exposure Elemental Exposure Damaging enemies with Arcane, Cold, Fire or Lightning will cause them to take 5% more damage from your attacks for 5 seconds. Each different damage type applies a stack, stacking up to 4 times.
Elemental damage from your weapon contributes to Elemental Exposure.
Evocation Evocation Reduce all cooldowns by 20%.
Unstable Anomaly Unstable Anomaly When you receive fatal damage, you instead gain a shield equal to 400% of your maximum Life for 5 seconds and release a shockwave that knocks enemies back and Stuns them for 3 seconds.
This effect may occur once every 60 seconds.
Illusionist Illusionist When you take more than 15% of your maximum Life in damage within 1 second, the cooldowns on Mirror Image, Slow Time, and Teleport are reset.
When you use Mirror Image, Slow Time, or Teleport, your movement speed is increased by 30% for 3 seconds.
Kanai's Cube
The Furnace Legendary Two-Handed Mace Primary Stats + (39–47) – (47–59) Fire Damage +3 Random Magic Properties Secondary Stats Increases damage against elites by 40–50 %. One of 3 Magic Properties (varies) +192–245 Strength +192–245 Intelligence +192–245 Dexterity The Furnace
Crown of the Primus Legendary Wizard Hat Primary Stats +270–299 Intelligence +3 Random Magic Properties Secondary Stats Slow Time gains the effect of every rune. Empty Socket Crown of the Primus
Ring of Royal Grandeur Legendary Ring Primary Stats Attack Speed Increased by 2.0–3.0 % +27–60 Life per Hit +2 Random Magic Properties Secondary Stats Reduces the number of items needed for set bonuses by 1 (to a minimum of 2). One of 3 Magic Properties (varies) +24–29 Dexterity +24–29 Strength +24–29 Intelligence Ring of Royal Grandeur
Delrasha is a fun, alternative Wizard hybrid build that's capable of clearing high level Greater Rifts.
[Please note]: Patch 2.4 marks the end of the Delrasha builds. The Delsere 4pc set bonus was changed from previously making Slow Time deal 2000% dmg per second into now providing Damage Reduction for the player and party. Have fun!
[Please note]: Patch 2.3 is out, but most of this information is still relevant. I won't create a new build this time around, but here's two new videos:
GR60 with Ranslor's Folly/Strongarm Bracers and GR61 with Meteor Shower.
Delrasha is reliable first and foremost. Always performs well.
It brings very decent damage to the table while at the same time coming packed with several other benefits:
- Great Crowd Control via Slow Time, Black Hole, Glacial Spike and Calamity.
- Tanks/meat shields via Mirror Images that will taunt and cast the same spells you cast.
- High uptime of both Slow Time and resists/damage stacks from the Tal Rasha set.
- Great for Groups - tons of CC + debuffs and the damage is solid enough.
- Doesn't require a specific weapon, and there's a lot of room for experimenting.
- Fast and fun playstyle that's easy enough to get into, but a bit harder to master.
GR50 was cleared in 10 mins 25 sec in this video, but the potential is a lot higher (please see links to the other videos). My current record is GR56 in 14 mins 59 (!) sec using a variation of this build, but I've also had some attempts at GR57 that weren't too far off. Just didn't have good rift RNG for those runs unfortunately, but I know that it's more than possible. I don't have the mindset to go "extreme fishing" for those "perfect rifts", so I mostly just play the rifts I get. Some have cleared GR57-58 using a variation of this build and GR60 or higher is absolutely within reach for those determined enough to venture that far.
This guide has been updated several times since it was first posted.
-|- See the YouTube playlist for more action (7 videos so far)!
-|- @Twitch: /rebjorn - Please note: Not actively streaming right now.
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Update: GR55 with Crown of the Primus and Devastator. Crown of the Primus is often overlooked in favor of the Nilfur's Boast boots because of the significant boost to +Meteor damage. I wanted to try something different and make the most of the advantages the Crown of the Primus brings to the table. For those who wouldn't mind jumping into a discussion, please see the official D3 forums topic. Some of you might be interested in reading up on what participants in that topic have to say.
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Update: GR50 with Triumvirate and Arcane Orb. Featuring Bogan Trappers, Tusked Bogans and other pesky monsters. Triumvirate is actually a viable option, especially for lower level GRs/speedruns - but isn't half bad at 50+ either. Most importantly, it's different and it kind of works!
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Major update: GR55 with Serpent's Sparker and Mammoth Hydras. This was definitely a challenging run, I literally would have died at any time if I even sneezed or blinked. Winged Assassins, Corrupted Angels, you name it.. a couple of deaths as a result of some particularly nasty poundings. No real benefit from pylons, Eskandiel as the Rift Guardian. For this run I swapped out Evocation for Arcane Dynamo. See the video description for more information.
If there's one recommendation I'd make for players wanting to test this build out, it's to swap Convention of Elements for Unity (with one on the Follower as well of course) and don't spend your highest level keys before you've gotten used to how it works.
Do a few runs and if things are looking good, but you're starting to feel that you're lacking damage, swap out Unity for CoE again.
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Major update: New video - GR53: 12 mins 9 seconds clear with a Stun build, making use of Moratorium, Gizzard, Ancient Parthan Defenders and Stun skills. Text written in peach below is the information pertaining to this video and this alternative build in particular. You can scroll down beyond that to continue reading the original guide (which is still relevant). D3planner snapshot here for those interested.
- /// /// /// /// /// - Molten Wildebeest's Gizzard + Moratorium - /// /// /// /// /// -
These legendary gems are like made for each other. With a high enough level version of both of these gems, they really start to shine. Moratorium basically becomes a -25% to ALL damage taken gem in combination with Gizzard. Some real synergy right here.
Let's say you take 500,000 damage - the 8.40 second Moratorium in the example will reduce that damage to 375,000 with 14,880 damage taken per second over 8.40 seconds. Here's where the Gizzard kicks in - the Gizzard in the example provides 65,000 life per second, meaning that even if you took up to 2,000,000 damage you would still be covered as 14,880x4=59,250. So, as long as you're not biting the dust, Moratorium in this scenario does become a flat -25% damage taken - and that's counting ALL damage - Reflect Damage, Winged Assassins, charging mobs, ranged attacks, melee attacks, many Rift Guardians.. et cetera.
Now, of course there's also the added bonus of Moratorium's 10% chance of resetting the damage taken over time when you kill a monster - this is just icing on the cake in my opinion - what you'll want is to just level the gem up to as high a level as possible. Remember though that for scenarios where you're fighting monsters that spawn a lot of low health minions, you do have an advantage as those lesser enemies will reset the debuff.
Let's get back to how these gems interact with each other. We're not forgetting the Shield that the Gizzard provides - as long as you haven't taken damage for 4 seconds, you gain a shield equal to 200% of your total Life per Second. You can still "take damage" while the shield is active - as long as the total damage taken within those 4 seconds doesn't exceed the total shielding you're gaining within those 4 seconds - if that makes any sense. Thing is, the 4 second timer does keep updating itself, meaning you can take a lot of small hits or damage from the Moratorium ticks - you can basically take this damage forever and still have the shield from Gizzard active.
Of course, there'll be several hard hits that will cause your shield to drop though, but it's a great tool nevertheless. A great thing about it is that you've got a solid indicator by looking at the bubble around your character - if it drops, it means you may want to throttle back a bit. So that's another thing that speaks in favor of using the Gizzard.
Now, another important thing to keep in mind is that in most cases you're not only going to get the Life per Second from the Gizzard - you're also getting some from Paragon points and possibly gear, if you're so inclined. In my case I had 79,590 LPS in the video, but you can of course take this to extremes if you'd like to experiment with that. Remember that the Templar also gives you a little LPS via the Loyalty skill.
I should mention that shielding mechanics will sustain eachother - and this is a little bit off topic - but say you have the Dominance passive in addition to the Gizzard - the Dominance shielding will help sustain the Gizzard and the Gizzard will help sustain the Dominance shielding. It's just great. Now think Krelm's belt which provides +25% Run Speed or the Pride's Fall helm which provides +30% Resource Cost Reduction - both of these items require you to not "take damage" for 5 seconds for the buffs to remain active. Sounds good, right? - It actually works too if you know what you're doing!
You can keep these buffs active basically indefinitely with solid shielding. Of course, the Wizard has more shielding skills to choose from as well, including Galvanizing Ward, Magic Weapon/Deflection and Spectral Blades/Barrier Blades. Again, this is a little off topic, but do experiment with this when you feel like it. It's pretty cool.
- /// /// /// /// /// - Ancient Parthan Defenders, Gems & stuns - /// /// /// /// /// -
Now let's talk about how the Ancient Parthan Defenders (APD) comes into play here. With the Gizzard/Moratorium combination as described above, stuns + APD become yet another layer of interaction that really takes things to another level.
APD gives you a +9-12% damage reduction for each stunned enemy within 25 yards. So, we're going to need some stuns! Slow Time/Point of No Return and Teleport/Calamity is going to do the trick for us. As you can see in the video, there are Slow Time bubbles all over the place, and with the Illusionist passive resetting 3 skills; Teleport, Slow Time and Mirror Images, you've got a lot of on demand tools.
Do keep in mind that the Mirror Images' version of Slow Time will inherit the rune you're currently using - their version of it will also be helping you out with stuns, and with all those Slow Time bubbles covering the playing field, overlapping each other, you've got a very powerful tool. If you look closely, you can see enemies entering or leaving a bubble, getting stunned, moving another couple of yards and then getting stunned again because of the Slow Time bubbles overlapping each other! It's just great - whenever Illusionist resets your skills and you TP in somewhere, pop Mirror Images right after - no need to save the cooldown.
We talked about Gizzard + Moratorium earlier and how they interact with each other. Here's another thing you might want to take into consideration; Illusionist will reset your Teleport, Slow Time and Mirror Images even while you have a shield active! So, as long as you're "taking damage", the shield will still hold (as described earlier) and Illusionist will do its job regardless.
What this means is that you actually do want to "take damage" - as long as you're not biting the dust! This also means that this whole combination of Gizzard, Moratorium, Slow Time/Point of No Return, Teleport/Calamity, Ancient Parthan Defenders and Mirror Images become more powerful the more challenging the difficulty! This build's effectiveness scales with difficulty in other words.
In the video you can often see me actually teleporting in right on top of a larger pack of enemies when I feel that I'm in trouble - this is a tactic used in order to take LESS damage (!). This works basically because of all the things described above. This also means though that the fewer enemies you're fighting, the more damage you're taking. So Hardcore players beware - the RG and lone elites/champions will often be much deadlier than you'd expect. There are two certainties in life; Death and Taxes. This is something that you'll just have to figure out how to best deal with based on personal experience.
Finally, I'd just like to stress that the Mirror Images do play a big role here, not only for the extra stun bubbles, but they also do taunt mobs off of you (for one second on use), they "soak" up enemy hits/missiles and I've seen them take Jailer and Vortex hits for the character as well. This all contributes in a big way to the shield from the Gizzard gem being active more often as well. Don't underestimate this!
- /// /// /// /// /// - Skills used (basic guide continued) - /// /// /// /// /// -
Please note that the Fire damage part is covered by having Fire as the highest +Elemental Damage (in my case on bracers). Delsere's 4pc bonus will cause Slow Time to deal damage based on your highest +Elemental Damage. A key part of the Del Rasha build is the fact that the 2000% Slow Time damage from the Delsere's set is increased by the Tal Rasha's set's damage stacks. The Slow Time damage is updated dynamically depending on your active buffs, including the periodic buffs from the Tal Rasha's 6pc set bonus and the Convention of Elements legendary ring.
The Slow Time damage will keep ticking for as long as the effect is active, no matter how far you are from the action in most cases. It should be noted that for this purpose, Zei's Stone of Vengeance is just great. You can often just drop a bubble and take a spin around the area, only to return to where you dropped the bubble, finding that the Slow Time DoT has been dealing damage all this time. One of the things that really bothers a lot of players about the Firebird's set is the fact that once you have the +3000% Firebird DoT ticking, you're basically locked within 1 to 1 1/2 screens of the mobs you're fighting.
You can of course experiment a little. I've tried a lot of combinations, but this is what I usually fall back to. If you'd like to swap Glacial Spike for a resource spender for example, you can do that, but you'd better be prepared to micro-manage resources a lot. Arcane Orb/Frozen Orb might be a good alternative for some. You could also try swapping Mirror Image for Mammoth Hydra for example, especially if you have a good Serpent's Sparker (SS). Dropping Mirror Image comes at a price though (!).
Naturally, there are many more possibilities - but I advice that if you do want to test things, don't spend your absolute highest keystones for that purpose - it's very easy to find yourself being locked with something that just doesn't work at all, meaning you'll have to abandon your rift. Grab some lower level keys and give it a go!
As for passives, Elemental Exposure is pretty much a given in any build that involves the 6pc Tal Rasha set. Evocation is highly recommended (see notes below), Unstable Anomaly.. well, you're probably going to need it at any challenging difficulty (alternatively, if you don't like UA's unreliability, try Blur).. Illusionist is also a must for this setup, being that we're actually using all 3 skills that it interacts with. Again, feel free to experiment of course.
Paragon Priorities
Core Movement Speed Primary Stat Vitality Maximum Resource Offense Cooldown Reduction Critical Hit Damage Critical Hit Chance Attack Speed Defense Life Armor Resist All Life Regeneration Utility Area Damage Life on Hit Resource Cost Reduction Gold Find
- /// /// /// /// /// - Stat priorities - /// /// /// /// /// -
Paragon points and item stat bonuses for that matter are pretty straight forward. You'll want +25% Movement Speed as always of course, apart from that I'll just mention that no Resource Cost Reduction or extra points in Maximum Resource is needed, and you're going to want to have some Cooldown Reduction for the Del Rasha build.
Yes, Illusionist will reset your Teleport, Slow Time and Mirror Images, in addition to Glacial Spike further helping out with the Slow Time cooldown. But there'll often be times where you juust needed that extra +1 or +2 seconds to keep the Tal Rasha's stacks ticking. It's a matter of preference to some extent, but I'd advice you don't shy away from at least 20-30% CDR total. Black Hole certainly will benefit, if nothing else.
- /// /// /// /// /// - Regarding Weapon choice - /// /// /// /// /// -
I mentioned that you don't really need a specific ancient weapon for this, and this is true. I do however have to stress the fact that once you get into the really high levels (pushing personal records), you might find that time spent fighting the Elites/Champions and the Rift Guardians starts to become your next big hurdle. At this point you may want to go for items such as Sun Keeper, Devastator or Odyn Son - they all have a 1.20 weapon attack speed and this will have an impact on your raw damage dealt. Do focus on optimizing every other aspect of your gear first of all though.
A good Sun Keeper especially will help you a lot vs the Rift Guardian, but a good ancient one is a rare find.
You'll be quite OK with a variety of weapons - apart from the aforementioned ones, honorable mentions are:
Aether Walker - Definitely a great choice if you have an ancient version. I've seen some wizards doing really well with this. Unfortunately I haven't been able to pick up an ancient one yet, but I've cleared quite a few GR50-53 with a non ancient one. Lots of potential.
Thunderfury - The procc has no internal cooldown and the damage part of the procc is buffed by the Tal Rasha's set stacks - the reduced enemy attack speed and the slow from the procc helps a little bit as well.
Gesture of Orpheus - It's decent, but not as good as you might think at first glance - yes, you'll have bubbles all over the place, but keep in mind though that you don't really get much benefit from this in some scenarios, as you'll easily cover the battlefield with bubbles regardless via the 2pc Delsere's bonus and Illusionist. And most importantly, a GoO will in reality provide no benefit at all vs the Rift Guardian.
Serpent's Sparker - using this wand changes the playstyle a little, but those who have a good ancient version of it might find it worth using. Please scroll up to the beginning of the page to see more information about it.
I'll just mention a few more: Exarian, Nutcracker, Azurewrath, Burning Axe of Sankis - these all work just fine as long as you have a decent ancient version of any of them. In short: - Just go with what you got, but be aware that some weapons are better than others.Do you like getting hit by invisible Nidalee's spears?
I don't like getting hit by invisible Nidalee's spears.
In the next PBE push (Sometime after 7/17/2013), you may notice a slight change to skillshot missiles fired from Fog of War.
Specifically, if a missile is moving towards you, Fog of War won't hide it when it's close to you. The intent is that you should always have some warning when you're going to be nailed by a missile. It won't be as much warning as you'd get if you could see the enemy, though.
We're not quite done with this feature, so feedback is welcome. Here's roughly how it should work:
If you're standing behind the baron pit and nidalee throws a spear from where Baron spawns, towards you, you should see it before it hits you. If she throws it towards river, you see no warning about the spear at all. Similarly, if she throws it towards mid or top lane, places you can't see, you won't see the spear either.
The hope here is that we reduce the number of scenarios where players take damage without understanding why it occurred.Force India deputy team principal Bob Fernley says the team will match Mercedes' stance on the engine unfreeze row, but says he is against "an engine war".
A compromise agreement appeared to be reached in Singapore which would have allowed engine manufacturers to bring one performance update to their power units during next season, but Mercedes was accused of reneging on that solution in Russia. Speaking exclusively to Crash.net, Fernley said Force India - a Mercedes customer - is against any changes that could lead to increased costs.
"If it costs us money we're against it, it's as simple as that," Fernley said. "Obviously we're advocating that we need to have cost control and the last thing that we need is an engine war.
"I think there are two elements to it really. One is if it increases costs we're against it, and if it's not a costing issue we will do whatever Mercedes really want us to do because they're our engine supplier at the end of the day and our partners. So we would follow their direction, but first and foremost it would be cost."
And in the wake of Ron Dennis' criticism of Mercedes, Fernley said he feels Force India is well treated as a customer team.
"It's probably a bit harsh from Ron, that one. I think Mercedes of all companies are extremely fair and where possible they give equal equipment across the board. There are always going to be slight disparities because obviously of the development program and the very few engines that we're running.
"So when an upgrade is made clearly the works team are going to get it first and the others are going to get it within the phase of their engines coming through because they're all pre-built. So I think you've got to be pragmatic about it and I'm sure Ron will be running exactly the same system when he is the main Honda customer car."U.S. Navy football via AP Midshipmen Tra'ves Bush, Eric Graham and Josh Tate. A hearing has begun to determine whether the three will face a court-martial on charges that they sexually assaulted a female midshipman.
WASHINGTON — More details emerged about falsified statements three Naval Academy men accused of sexual assault made to federal authorities as the chief investigator on the case took the witness stand Sunday night.
Special agent Jesus Torres, who had led the Naval Criminal Investigation Service’s (NCIS) inquiry into the alleged attack on a female midshipman, described how all three men initially lied about their interactions with the woman the night of the alleged attack, at a party on April 12, 2012.
In addition to sexual assault, all three men are charged with falsifying official statements.
Torres also revealed recollections of some of the other midshipmen who were questioned, including those who heard the accuser make statements that may be crucial to the defense’s efforts to show that the woman engaged in consensual sex with the three men, rather than against her will.
Torres, who was reassigned by the NCIS in October 2012, before the investigation concluded, described how all three of the accused, Trav’es Bush, Eric Graham and Joshua Tate, initially told investigators they did not see the accuser at the April 12 house party.
But after investigators gathered details from other partygoers, including that Bush had posted on a Facebook group page a remark about “doing it with a pharaoh hat on,” (which investigators took as a reference to sexual activity the night of the party), they called back each defendant for further questioning.
Ultimately, all three men disclosed that they had seen the woman at the party. Bush revealed he had been in a sexual relationship with the woman and eventually admitted they had sex the night of the party, though he contended it was consensual.
At this point in the hearing, it has not been established whether or when the other two defendants said they also had sex with the woman.
Torres also testified about a recollection from the accuser’s best friend, Midshipman Kenyon Williams, during his May 5, 2012, interview with NCIS.
Williams told investigators that he met up with the woman the morning after the party and alleged assault and said she told him, “What I did last night, I did it, and I wanted to do it,” Torres said, quoting verbatim from Williams’ statement.
That declaration could complicate the alleged victim’s assertions that she did not remember any sexual activity with the men and was seeking to determine whether any, consensual or not, had occurred.
The academy has come under fire by the accuser’s civilian lawyer, Susan Burke, and other advocates of reforming military sexual assault cases, for “doing nothing” to advance the woman’s case after initial inquiries in 2012, even though the woman did not cooperate fully with investigators until January 2013.
Asking questions seemingly aimed at underscoring the academy’s thoroughness, Cmdr. Warren Record, counsel for Tate, asked Torres whether NCIS had “pulled at every thread as hard as you could,” noting the 100-plus witnesses interviewed and 1,500 total pages of transcripts and notes.
Record also noted the high scrutiny sexual assault cases have been under recently, given the push by President Barack Obama and the Department of Defense to crack down on military sexual abuse cases, reports of which have increased exponentially in recent years.
Torres answered that the scope of the investigation had been vast, with agents poised to question midshipmen who were already at sea or were working civilian jobs.
“NCIS has eyes everywhere,” he said.
The hearing will continue Monday morning with the testimony of the co-accused and accuser’s fellow midshipmen.
Related:(Reuters) - U.S. stocks mounted a late-session rally to close higher on Wednesday after an increase in oil prices helped reduce investors’ fears about banks’ vulnerability to energy companies struggling to pay their debts.
Nine of the 10 major S&P sectors rose, with the materials index.SPLRCM up 0.99 percent.
The S&P energy sector.SPNY gained 0.9 percent, trimming its loss in 2016 to 27 percent after U.S. crude futures settled nearly 1 percent higher.
Crude prices near 2003 lows have hammered the earnings of U.S. energy companies, exacerbated fears of a slowing global economy and created turbulence on Wall Street that has left the S&P 500 almost 6 percent weaker since the start of the year.
The three major indexes moved higher toward the end of the day after trading deep in negative territory.
“You have a tremendous amount of underperformance out there in the hedge fund community,” said Ian Winer, director of trading at Wedbush Securities in Los Angeles. “When the market starts to turn, it starts to feed on itself because people can’t afford to miss out on a rally.”
The S&P financial sector.SPSY, already the worst performing sector this year, fell 0.2 percent, with shares of Wells Fargo (WFC.N) down 1.02 percent.
JPMorgan (JPM.N) ended flat after it flagged declining investment banking revenue and raised its provisions for energy loan losses.
The Dow Jones industrial average.DJI rose 0.32 percent to end at 16,484.99 points and the S&P 500.SPX gained 0.44 percent to 1,929.8. The Nasdaq Composite.IXIC added 0.87 percent to 4,542.61.
Facebook (FB.O) rose 1.34 percent and Apple (AAPL.O) added 1.49 percent. Concerns about slowing iPhone sales had pushed Apple’s stock down 19 percent in the past three months.
After the bell, Salesforce.com (CRM.N) surged 6 percent after its fourth-quarter results reduced fears of a slowdown in software spending.
During the session, Target Corp (TGT.N) climbed 3.99 percent after its quarterly sales showed the store’s turnaround efforts were gaining traction.
Ford (F.N) declined 2.74 percent and General Motors (GM.N) lost 1.84 percent after Credit Suisse said it was a “poor time” to own auto stocks.
Slideshow (2 Images)
Advancing issues outnumbered declining ones on the NYSE by 1,952 to 1,086. On the Nasdaq, 1,759 issues rose and 1,003 fell.
The S&P 500 index showed 11 new 52-week highs and five new lows, while the Nasdaq recorded 22 new highs and 98 lows.
About 8.1 billion shares changed hands on U.S. exchanges, below the 9 billion daily average for the past 20 trading days, according to Thomson Reuters data.CUSTOMER FINANCE
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DAMEN TRADINGIn the voice-AI economy, “skills” are the new apps, and it’s making Amazon a real winner to own the next channel.
They will remain free to Amazon Prime subscribers, however this is actually big news.
If app stores are big business, why can’t voice skills be the next big thing? With several million Alexa devices sold to date, and well over 70% of the market share, Amazon is betting that it will be.
We know that The Google Play Store mobile app revenue will catch up to Apple’s App Store in 2018, but we also know that in the future of voice activated skills in the home, Apple is well behind Amazon and Google.
Amazon Skills are Increasing at an Outrageous Pace
The number of Alexa skills, third-party app integrations and other useful add-ons have increased exponentially, just look at the progression in the chart below. To date as of October 2017, this figure has reached 26,000.
Alexa Dominates Voice Footprint in the Smart Home
Amazon sold roughly 10 million Alexa devices in 2017, and before then at least another 5 million. Given the lineup of Dot, Echo, Echo Show, Spot, Echo Look and so forth, and the fact E-commerce is supposed to out-perform brick-and-mortar shopping this holiday season, one can easily see how voice-AI and its future can be monetized. Early access to deals on Alexa, means Amazon Prime members with such a device, might be tempted to spend more.
The new line of Amazon’s echo devices and a growing skills database means Amazon is the most accessible tech brand in the smart home. Google’s Google Home Mini was a long-time coming to match the price point of the popular Dot device.
Facebook, Samsung, Huawei, Apple (the HomePod isn’t even a contender here), Microsoft (Invoke is not a competitor) and others are all basically late to the party.
Monetizing Alexa Voice Skills
As reported by Sarah Perez of TechCrunch, Amazon says it’s now opening up a way for third-party developers to make money from their voice apps, known as skills, on its Alexa platform. This is a big deal since it signals there’s a future for devs who want to be part of the future of Voice AI.
This represents the first time third-party devs will be able to implement a direct means to monetize skills themselves
will be able to implement a direct means to monetize skills themselves The Jeopardy skill bears the honor of having the first premium content paywall in a Skill
bears the honor of having the first premium content paywall in a Skill Earlier in 2017, Amazon already began rewarding top-performing Alexa skill developers with direct payments.
By implementing a monetization mechanism, Amazon is showing it’s serious about empowering devs to build creative skills that can compete for the attention of consumers.
Voice Apps Have a Bright Future
Alexa skills sometimes are little more than access to existing apps and services, but as voice-AI continues to evolve, they will be able to do more customized things. By giving developers the tools they can take advantage and put them more in control of their voice app’s business model, Amazon is significantly opening its doors to principles of open-innovation that |
holding dangerously high levels of bad debt.
Italy wants a bailout for Monte Paschi, however, the Germans are opposing any such move. Wolfgang Schaeuble, the German Finance Minister, stated in a news conference, in Berlin that Italy intends to stick to the banking-union rules, as was conveyed to him by his Italian counterpart Pier Carlo Padoan.
Italian Prime Minister hits back at Germany
However, Italy did not wait before hitting back at Germany and it came from none other than the Italian Prime Minister, Matteo Renzi.
Mr. Renzi stated that “the difficulties facing Italian banks over their bad loans are miniscule by comparison with the problems some European banks face over their derivatives.” He reminded the Germans that there were other European banks which had much bigger problems than Monte Paschi, in an indirect hint towards DBK.
"If this non-performing loan problem is worth one, the question of ‘derivatives’ at other banks, at big banks, is worth one hundred. This is the ratio: one to one hundred," Renzi stated, according to Reuters.
More troubles ahead for DBK
The bank is likely to lose its’ place in the STOXX 50 index, according to analysts at Societe Generale. The bank will face renewed selling pressure as the index funds will have to reposition themselves, post the change, which is more than likely to bring about a fresh round of selling. According to a statement by the International Monetary Fund, DBK is now the most dangerous bank in the world. DBK is currently the riskiest bank, which will bring down the entire financial banking system globally.
Gold is the key asset to own
The bond king, Jeff Gundlach, stated that “things are shaky and feeling dangerous." Regarding the European banking crisis, the Double Line bond king noted: “Banks are dying and policymakers don’t know what to do. Watch Deutsche Bank shares go to single digits and people will start to panic...you’ll see someone say, 'Someone is going to have to do something.'”
Gundlach stated that “gold remains the best investment amid fears of instability in the European Union and prolonged global stagnation, as well as concerns over the effectiveness of central bank policies,” reports Reuters.
Conclusion
The belief by Wall Street that Germany will not allow DBK to fail is fading. Post the Brexit, tensions are running high among the remaining members as seen in the spat between Germany and Italy. Due to the earlier hard stance of the Germans, it is likely that any move to bailout DBK will face considerable resistance from all of the member nations. If allowed to fail, DBK will cause a "crisis" many times over that of which Lehman Brothers did. The final meltdown commences.
Americans need to pay attention to this European financial crisis because it's very contagious and going to spread here.
Gold remains the asset to invest in, as I have been advising my subscribers for a long time now. DBK is failing and not even the European Central Bank will be able to stop its plunge into oblivion.
Next week, I will share with you another asset class rarely mentioned or invested in which could explode in value going forward and actually become a major asset/currency world wide – stay tuned!Mats Brännström, MD, PhD, was beyond skeptical when a patient undergoing a hysterectomy for cervical cancer in 1998 asked him for a uterus transplant to restore her fertility.
Mats Brännström (right) and colleagues have conducted a clinical uterus transplantation trial, which produced the first successful live birth after uterus transplant. Adam Ihse/AP Images
“I thought she was crazy,” said the professor of obstetrics and gynecology at the University of Gothenburg in Sweden.
But the request set off a more than decade-long effort by Brännström, a fertility researcher and gynecologic surgeon, and his colleagues to determine whether transplanting a uterus was feasible. Meanwhile, groups in Saudi Arabia and Turkey sought to answer the same question. Even though they performed the first 2 human transplants, neither resulted in a successful pregnancy.
By 2013, the Swedish team was close to its goal. A 9-patient trial of uterine transplants launched that year produced the first successful delivery in 2014. Since then, 7 of the 9 women have become pregnant, resulting in 5 successful deliveries.
“We were well prepared as a group because we had done the surgery for many years together in animals,” Brännström said.
The team’s success has inspired others around the globe to attempt the transplants. Two US institutions, the Cleveland Clinic and Baylor University Medical Center in Dallas, have launched their own clinical trials with 5 transplants between them at press time. So far, 4 of the 5 transplanted uteruses have been removed because of complications. The trials have thrust the experimental procedure into the spotlight and sparked debates about the ethics of the procedure, which involves living or deceased donors.
Learning Curve
The Brännström trial is scheduled to wrap up in a year and a half when all 7 of the women who retained their transplants will have given birth. Three women are currently pregnant, including one with her second pregnancy with the transplanted uterus.
The trial enrolled 8 women who were born without a uterus and 1 who had undergone a hysterectomy. All of the donors were living; most were relatives of the recipient. One was a mother-in-law and another a family friend. All donors had at least one normal pregnancy and delivery.
The donors underwent an 11- to 13-hour surgery to retrieve their uterus and “long vascular trees with arteries and veins,” he said. The length of the procedure surprised Brännström and his team, who initially thought it could be done in 5 to 6 hours.
“It’s an extremely difficult surgery,” Brännström said. By comparison, a hysterectomy typically takes 1 to 3 hours.
The transplant itself takes about 4 hours, but it is complex requiring microsurgical connections of the veins and arteries on both sides of the uterus as well as connecting the uterus and securing the uterus itself in place.
“This is one of the most complicated types of transplants because the vessels are small and we are so deep in the pelvis,” he said.
Two of the transplanted uteruses had to be removed shortly after the procedure. One women developed thrombotic occlusion of the uterine artery and the other developed a bacterial infection that did not respond to antibiotic treatment.
“We learned mostly from the failures,” Brännström said. For example, he said some postmenopausal donors older than 60 years might have had uterine blood vessels that were too thin to keep the transplanted organ well nourished.
All recipients underwent in vitro fertilization procedures prior to the transplant. A year after surgery, recipients with successful transplants had individual embryo transfers to try to become pregnant. The trial has begun to reveal risks associated with the procedure. Some of the women who were born without a uterus also have one kidney, which increases the likelihood of preeclampsia, and some of the recipients have developed the condition during their pregnancies, Brännström noted. Some of the neonates have also been delivered several weeks early because of concerns about the risks of continuing the pregnancy. For example, preeclampsia can lead to a stroke in the mother or fetal growth restriction.
Recipients require immunosuppressive therapy for as long as they retain the uterus, although Brännström and his colleagues hope the women will agree to surgical removal after 1 or 2 pregnancies to spare them lifelong immune suppression.
Data on the risks to the fetuses gestated in a transplanted uterus are limited. However, a higher risk of early delivery and low birth weight has been documented in infants of mothers who have undergone kidney transplants relative to those whose mothers had not undergone transplant. Registries that have tracked the rate of major malformations in infants born to kidney transplant recipients on immunosuppressive medications during pregnancy haven’t found higher rates than in the general population. So far, the babies delivered after uterine transplant are healthy and doing well after delivery, Brännström and his colleagues have reported.
As far as the donors, one suffered a ureter injury during surgery that later had to be repaired, he noted. Brännström and his colleagues have followed up with donors for 3 years and plan to follow them for another 2 years. “All are in good health psychologically and physically,” he said.
US Trials
In the United States, uterine transplants have gotten off to a rockier start.
The Cleveland Clinic conducted the first US uterine transplant last year in a 9-hour procedure using a deceased donor as part of a 10-patient trial. The team, which included a transplant surgeon from the Swedish team, chose to use a deceased donor to avoid subjecting a living donor to the risks of surgery.
“We felt in this country, there had to be almost no risk to the donor,” said Tommaso Falcone, MD, a professor and chair of the department of obstetrics and gynecology at the Cleveland Clinic.
Using a deceased donor also allowed for a shorter 2-hour organ retrieval surgery, which was performed after potentially life-saving organs were removed. Another advantage is that the surgeons were able to retrieve larger blood vessels from the donor without risking bleeding, said Falcone. It was hoped the larger vessels would reduce the risk of thrombosis in the recipient.
Unfortunately, the recipient developed a yeast infection and surgeons later removed the uterus.
“We had a complication that was not foreseen,” said Falcone. “Since then, we’ve been working diligently on how to prevent it next time.”
The team sent protocol revisions to its institutional review board and plans to schedule the next transplant later this year. The revisions aim to reduce cold ischemia time for the donated organ and to avoid thrombosis and infection in the recipient.
The Baylor Scott & White Research Institute in conjunction with the Baylor University Medical Center, both in Dallas, also embarked on a 10-patient clinical trial in 2016 that will use both living and deceased donors.
“We felt that this clinical trial was a natural next step in the evolution of transplantation and fertility treatment,” said Giuliano Testa, MD, the principle investigator and chief of abdominal transplantation at Baylor. The Baylor team announced the planned trial in January 2016 and received inquiries from both potential recipients and donors, said Testa.
“The response of the donors has been one of the most uplifting experiences and has positively charged the whole team,” Testa said.
The Baylor team performed 4 transplants—each transplant took about 5 to 6 hours—between September 14 and 22, 2016, using organs from the living donors and modifying the procedure along the way, said Testa. A gynecologist and a transplant surgeon from the Swedish team participated, according to Brännström. Within 3 weeks of the transplants, 3 of the organs had to be removed because of inadequate blood flow. The fourth recipient was still doing well late last year.
Reviews of the 3 failed transplants by the Baylor team and their Swedish colleagues have yielded valuable insights that may change “operative and postoperative management of uterine transplant patients,” said Testa. In particular, he said that the thickness of uterine veins in the donors must be carefully assessed.
“We have learned that additional radiology imaging can assist in determining the quality of uterine veins when in the evaluation phase and that the status of the arteries within the uterus can be a major factor in assuring a good outcome,” Testa said.
Brännström and his colleagues plan to launch a second trial of uterine transplants with robot-assisted surgery, which he thinks will help improve retrieval of the blood vessels.
Meanwhile, Nebraska Medicine is in the early stages of planning its own trial using deceased donors, and Brigham and Women’s Hospital is exploring the possibility of starting a trial.
Donor Debate
As a nonlifesaving transplant, uterine transplants, which may involve risks to the donor, recipient, and fetus, exist in complicated ethical territory.
Women have a long history of taking on serious risks to become pregnant, noted Ana Iltis, PhD, director of the Center for Bioethics, Health, and Society at Wake Forest University in Winston-Salem, North Carolina.
“These women are saying this is worth it to me,” she said. But it also raises “larger societal questions about the value we place on having biological children and the experience of pregnancy.” Recipients must be informed about the potential risks and alternatives to the procedure, such as adoption or use of a gestational surrogate, Iltis emphasized.
But she also noted that it’s important participants know that many risks to uterine transplant recipients, their donors, and their children are unknown.
“We don’t know enough about what it means to gestate in a uterus that was transplanted,” Iltis said.
In Sweden and much of Europe, however, gestational surrogacy is prohibited, Brännström said. He suggested that exploring the feasibility of uterine transplants as a treatment “is a matter of justice,” because it provides a fertility option for women born without a uterus.
Fertility treatments are covered for free in the Swedish health system, he noted. He estimated the cost in the Swedish system to be about $60 000. In the United States, he noted, the cost would be much higher.
The use of living donors has also proved controversial. It is hoped living donors might offer a better quality organ and easier scheduling of surgery, but living donors are exposed to serious risks, noted Iltis.
“The first thing is people need to be incredibly clear that this is not a hysterectomy,” Iltis said. “It’s a much more complicated and involved surgery.”
She said at minimum donors must be fully informed about the known and potential risks and the experience level of the surgeons doing the procedure.
With fewer deceased donor uterine transplants to date, there isn’t yet enough information to decide whether they might provide a viable alternative.
“It’s way too soon to give up on using deceased donors,” Iltis said.
Brännström agreed and suggested that it is important for trials involving both living and deceased donors to continue to allow surgeons to optimize the procedure and to gather information for patients.
Falcone predicted that uterine transplants are here to stay.
“It’s driven by patients, not gynecologists and transplant surgeons,” Falcone said. “As long as patients want it, there will be people trying to figure out how to make it safe and effective.”
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Note: The print version excludes source references. Please go online to jama.com.Much of the discussion this offseason regarding the New York Giants' receiving corps has surrounded the massive need for a No. 2 wideout to pair with Odell Beckham Jr.
Beckham has earned 2,755 yards and 25 touchdowns in just 27 games to begin his career. Eli Manning wants more from OBJ.
"Odell has obviously done great things, but we need him to raise his level as well," Manning said on a conference call Monday, per the New York Daily News.
Manning conceded that asking much more of Beckham is pushing it, after the receiver carried the Giants' offense almost single-handedly last season. The quarterback insists that even slight improvements from Beckham in technique could make a big difference in his Year 3 production.
"There are things he can work on and we ask a lot of him," Manning said. "He's required to know a lot of different routes and a lot of techniques and exactly how to do it. That's the way he's gonna get a lot of balls and be in position to do a lot of things."
With Rueben Randle departing for Philly, the Giants lack an obvious candidate to play that No. 2 role. New York remains hopeful Victor Cruz can return to form, but we're a long ways from that being a given. Dwayne Harris is a No. 3, at best.
"There's some young guys, there's some guys that have been around a little bit," Manning said. "We need them to step up and make some plays for us."
As we sit in early April, if the Giants are to move the ball in 2016, it's going to be on the back of Beckham.“It’s not just about the islands, it’s about New York, it’s about New Orleans, it’s about London, it’s about Venice,” Jumeau said. “There is no way we can compromise on 1.5.”
Jumeau of the Seychelles pointed out that a 1.5°C goal would be achievable, and that adopting and meeting it would benefit rich coastal nations as well as those whose existences may be threatened by rising seas.
While much of the attention on a historic Paris climate meeting in the coming weeks will focus on the confounding task of trying to keep global warming below 2°C, or 3.6°F, a battle over another goal — one that has been forgotten by many — will be playing out in the negotiating halls.Delegates representing island states and others whose homelands are most threatened by rising seas will be pushing for the formal adoption of a long-overlooked goal, one that limits warming to less than 1.5°C, or 2.7°F.
Such a goal would be an ambitious one. Some negotiators and onlookers already seem to have given up hope of limiting warming to less than 2°C, much less 1.5°C. Fossil fuel burning, deforestation and other climate-changing hallmarks of industrialization have elevated temperatures 1°C since the 19th century, pushing tides up more than 8 inches. Pledges submitted by nations ahead of the meeting to take steps to slow climate change could yet allow warming to soar to 3°C or more.
The longing by low-lying nations to limit warming to 1.5°C has been overshadowed since 2010 by a preoccupation by many with the less ambitious goal. On Wednesday, the U.N. released the latest report to confirm that goal — to limit warming to 2°C, compared with preindustrial times — could be reached through massive globally cooperative efforts that overhaul energy supply chains and reform farming and forest management.
“We definitely think that staying below 2 degrees is still very possible,” Christiana Figueres, executive secretary of the U.N. Framework Convention on Climate Change, told reporters as the report was released. “Getting down to the range of 1.5 should not be taken off the table either.”
When climate delegates agreed during meetings in Copenhagen in 2009 that “the increase in global temperature should be below 2 degrees Celsius,” they also agreed that a study would be completed by 2015 comparing the effects of that goal with an alternative one of curbing temperature rises to 1.5°C. During talks a year later, negotiators agreed to consider tightening the 2°C goal to 1.5°C in the “near future.”
Ahead of what could be history’s most highly anticipated round of climate negotiations, the governments of the countries that are most vulnerable to sea level rise believe that future time has arrived.
The study called for in Copenhagen was published by the U.N. in May, based on interviews with some 70 experts. It concluded that adopting the 1.5°C alternative would be technically feasible, and that meeting it would come with a “high likelihood of meaningful differences” compared with allowing earth to warm by 2°C……..
“The scientific finding is that 2 degrees is not enough,” said Ronny Jumeau, a U.N. ambassador from the Seychelles who will negotiate on behalf of small island states during the two-week round of Paris talks, which begin in two weeks. “1.5 is what the low-lying, small island developing states need for their survival.”
The May report warned of the “high” risks that would accompany 2°C of warming, including crop failures, floods, extreme weather events that jeopardize health, and “mass coral bleaching.” But it also pointed out that “there would be significant residual impacts even with 1.5°C of warming.”
It concluded that “most” species would be able to keep up with climate change if warming is kept below 1.5°C. It found, bleakly optimistically, that “up to half of coral reefs may remain” if the planet warms 1.5°C, that sea level rise “may remain below” 3.3 feet, ocean acidification impacts “would stay at moderate levels,” and that it would be easier for communities to adapt to climate change — especially farmers.
Strategies for limiting warming to 1.5°C by century’s end “are similar to those limiting warming to 2°C,” the report noted. It concluded that such strategies would involve “more immediate” actions and “an additional scaling-up” of clean energy and of any technology that captures and stores carbon dioxide pollution, such as at coal power plants.
The conclusions from the May report were consistent with the views of leading scientists……..Mark Jacobson, a Stanford University professor whose research focuses on clean energy, said that a radical enough global switch from fossil fuels to clean energy alternatives could be enough to limit warming to less than 1.5°C — even without the need for carbon capture or nuclear power technologies…….. Jumeau of the Seychelles pointed out that a 1.5°C goal would be achievable, and that adopting and meeting it would benefit rich coastal nations as well as those whose existences may be threatened by rising seas.
“It’s not just about the islands, it’s about New York, it’s about New Orleans, it’s about London, it’s about Venice,” Jumeau said. “There is no way we can compromise on 1.5.” http://www.climatecentral.org/news/the-forgotten-un-climate-goal-19701The Tasmanian government has committed to giving corporations the right to sue protesters for defamation, part of a package of anti-protest laws that included legislation last year which beefed up jail sentences and fines for “unlawful” demonstrations.
The state’s attorney general, Vanessa Goodwin, said the government “remains committed to implementing” the change, which would make Tasmania the only jurisdiction in the country where corporations could seek such redress.
“We know that there are radical environmental groups who make a hobby of spreading misinformation to markets with the aim of destroying Tasmanian jobs,” Goodwin said in a statement.
“We will always support the right to free speech but that right to free speech needs to be balanced by the opportunity to challenge clearly false and misleading claims which have the potential to destroy jobs.”
The president of the Tasmanian Law Society, Matthew Verney, said the proposed laws were unnecessary and “impinged on people’s ability to speak freely”.
Goodwin is yet to table any legislation, but Verney said “the noises that have been made about it suggest that it’s going to be very draconian”.
“Ostensibly it would look like the current state government is trying to limit speech and limit criticism of things like the forestry industry. But the worry for us is that it would go far beyond the forestry industry,” he said.
Nationally consistent libel laws were introduced in 2006 removing the right of corporations to sue for defamation, but retaining their right to make a similar claim, injurious falsehood, where it can be proved that a malicious statement had a financial impact.
It is likely that under any new defamation law in Tasmania, corporations would not need to prove economic loss, only that the reputation of the company was disparaged by a false or misleading claim.
The Tasmanian forestry corporation Gunns infamously used defamation laws to sue a group of 20 activists for nearly $7m just days before announcing a new pulp mill. The case collapsed five years later, with Gunns ordered to pay more than $1m in defendants’ legal costs.
The state Greens justice spokesman, Nick McKim, said the Tasmanian government had “learned nothing” from the Gunns case.
“It beggars belief that [Goodwin] is continuing along a path that threatens the rights of Tasmanians to fully participate in some of the most crucial debates about Tasmania’s future,” he said.
“Corporations have had too much power handed to them by parliaments around Australia over recent years, to the detriment of ordinary people and freedom of speech.”
Peg Putt, from the activist group Markets for Change, said the mooted changes were part of a “vendetta” against forest protesters.
She warned the laws would turn Tasmania into a magnet for lawsuits targeting other campaigns, such as those against sweatshop labour and fracking, or highlighting the environmental impact of mining or dredging on the Great Barrier Reef.
The Tasmanian state government passed legislation in November increasing financial penalties and maximum jail terms for protests that “prevent, hinder or obstruct the carrying out of a business activity”.
The original draft of the bill proposed mandatory three-month jail terms for repeat offenders, but was amended after fierce criticism including from the United Nations, which described the bill as “shocking”.
A historic agreement between the forestry industry and major environmental groups calling for an end to the state’s three-decade “forest wars” was torn up by the Hodgman government in September.
The state’s resource minister, Paul Harriss, argued the agreement put too much forest into reserve and that “the use of our forest assets for economic gain is not something of which we should be ashamed”.I’m particularly proud of Illinois legalizing marriage equality, as I was born in Alton, and then lived outside Champaign/Urbana for a few years as a kid. I can’t really claim it as my “home state,” as I was a nomadic Military Brat, but I’ve always been proud to be from the Land of Lincoln. Now even more so.
Illinois, legislation passes November 5, 2013. Goes into effect June 1, 2014. The “S” may be silent, but gays sure ain’t!
Speaking of being nomadic… Now with same-sex marriage in Illinois, my state of birth, the only other states I’ve lived in that need to get with the program are Oklahoma, Arkansas, Georgia, Texas, Colorado and Virginia. And also Japan. Still a lot of work to be done.
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Speaking of work needing to be done… Did you catch this particularly hilarious segment on The Daily Show about the two states competing to be the last to legalize same-sex marraige? If not, put down your beverage and enjoy:
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I’m posting photos of magnets as new states and countries fall into the AWESOME column on the side of legalized same-sex marriage! If anyone has magnets from any of the countries listed below, send me a photo of it and I’ll post it on the blog and give you credit!
Magnets still needed: Belgium, Spain, South Africa, Mexico (City), Portugal, Iceland, Argentina, Uruguay, Brazil and France.
commentsOn this path of self discovery, I’ve spent some time re-visiting my Meyers Briggs personality type. For those of you who have no clue what I’m talking about, immediately after reading my blog, Google “Myers Briggs Personality Test” and have at it. There are many free versions on the internet, and the questions each require simple answers about your preferences. Although I have had people tell me that in the past websites gave them different results, any test I have taken over the years yielded the same type for me: INFJ, which stands for:
Introversion
iNtuition
Judging
Feeling
Although the words themselves seem self-explanatory, these facets of personality are much more complex than I will explore in this blog, but, again, I encourage you to research them if this piques your interest because it is truly fascinating.
Through my research, I catalogued some quotes that completely encapsulate who I am as a person. It’s important to mention, however, that I did not pick and choose. I can genuinely say that there were not any parts of an article that I read about my personality type that I didn’t relate to: good, bad, or ugly. This could be because I am not in the middle on any part of my type; I am INFJ through-and-through. I just selected the quotes that hit home the most for me, teaching me something important about myself.
“Artistic and creative, they live in a world of hidden meanings and possibilities. Only one percent of the population has an INFJ Personality Type, making it the most rare of all the types.
This particular quote resonated with me because I find it difficult at any moment in time to accept one possible solution to a question. I’m always under the impression that I am, to a degree, ignorant and hungry for new meaning in my life, new answers.
The second part of that quote is just a nicer way of saying that people with my personality type are, well, exceptionally odd human beings. We’re weird, and that’s okay. I must say, though, any source will mention “INFJs are the rarest personality type,” but I have a few close friends who also are INFJs. Either these articles are misinformed, or weirdos attract weirdos.
“INFJs place great importance on having things orderly and systematic in their outer world. They put a lot of energy into identifying the best system for getting things done, and constantly define and re-define the priorities in their lives… [sometimes they may not be] as organized as other Judging types tend to be. Or we may see some signs of disarray in an otherwise orderly tendency, such as a consistently messy desk.”
This quote beautifully conveys the paradox that is the INFJ – put together, perfectionist glory, hiding messy entrails. Outwardly, I am very particular about certain things, my home being front and center as an example. Everything has its place, and it can’t change or be in disarray. Before typing this blog, I noticed my husband had moved our coffee table closer to his chair, and I had to tell him to move it back because it just irked me. I need to come home to a magazine-perfect interior to fully relax.
Conversely, the last sentence of that quote could not be more true, except, instead of my desk, it is my car. At any given moment, my car is a complete disaster. Don’t ask me for a ride on a whim because you don’t want to be a passenger; seriously. It’s not that it doesn’t bother me because I do think about it. I just, for some reason, am not motivated to regularly clean it out. I’m a walking, talking, driving contradiction.
“And the I and J combination, while perhaps enhancing self-awareness, may make it difficult for INFJs to articulate their deepest and most convoluted feelings…Usually self-expression comes more easily to INFJs on paper, as they tend to have strong writing skills.”
In many situations, finding the right words to verbally express myself leads to a jumbled mess of awkward, unorganized thoughts; my train of thought completely derails, and the faces of those listening turns into a blank stare. Writing, however, comes naturally to me, and I can logically piece together my reasoning. I don’t even really have to think about it; my subconscious organizes the information into the story I am telling. I’m not sure why there is such a disconnect in the wiring of my brain where my language is easily accessible one way but not the other. The only exception to this is when I’m speaking about something I’m passionate about, and/or I’m really comfortable. I must say, I’m comfortable in my element as a teacher, and I can be a great orator on the job. This glitch tends to apply to mainly social situations.
“INFJs hold a special place in the heart of people who they are close to, who are able to see their special gifts and depth of caring. INFJs are concerned for people’s feelings, and try to be gentle to avoid hurting anyone. They are very sensitive to conflict, and cannot tolerate it very well.”
“Like a rose, INFJs have many layers. They will probably not reveal all those layers to you right away. However, the longer you are in an INFJ’s life — and if an INFJ trusts you — the more petals you will discover”
These quotes come from different sources but complement one another well and speak to my heart. Friendships truly are about quality to me, and it takes some serious time and patience for me to develop a close relationship. I’m careful about where I expend my limited energy stores, which is probably part of the reason it takes so long for a bond to be intimate.
I’m also horrible with conflict of any kind, which is where the glitch comes back into play – garbled nonsense instead of rational thought in heated moments. This means I am more inclined to avoid these confrontations until it is absolutely necessary. For those people who have stood by my side and peeled back the layers, however, I am completely loyal and a forever friend. Even I, a word smith, cannot find the language to truly express my gratitude for my true, soul-bound companions. I have been blessed with more than I deserve, honestly. Keeping with the aforementioned rose simile, these are the people who allow me to grow and bloom into the most vibrant version of myself.
Finally:
“INFJ is a perfectionist who doubts that they are living up to their full potential.”
“there can sometimes be a “tug-of-war” between NF vision and idealism and the J practicality that urges compromise for the sake of achieving the highest priority goals.”
“INFJs are not idle dreamers, but people capable of taking concrete steps to realize their goals and make a lasting positive impact.”
I’m always inherently aware of my goals and vision for my life. If I don’t have a project that is leading me on that path, I am unfulfilled. However, I do fall into ruts sometimes that leave me feeling desperate. An example would be the desire to get a master’s degree but facing the reality of incurring 20,000+ more dollars in student debt; the practical side of me doesn’t think that’s a viable option, but my heart says different, and I wage war with myself. Here I am, though, on a different road with the same end-goal in mind. I seem to have found an alternative plan, which is filling up my INFJ tank, if you will.
My journey to become a writer, although it began long ago, is truly moving forward now that I’ve conquered my fear of self expression. I’m learning more about who I am, what motivates me, and learning what I can do to push forward on this pathway to self discovery. You are welcome on this journey.
(Don’t forget to research your type! If you do, let me know what you thought of your result in the comments section.)
Sources:
https://www.16personalities.com/infj-conclusion
http://www.personalitypage.com/INFJ.html
http://www.humanmetrics.com/personality/infjGrand Theft Auto 5 takes the top spot in the latest UK sales chart for the 10th time in its history, despite the Rockstar Games title launching over 100 weeks ago.
While Grand Theft Auto 5 has sold well across the world, with 70 million copies shipped globally, the game has done especially well in the United Kingdom. Rockstar Games recently revealed that its open-world crime sandbox has sold six million copies alone in the region. But while GTA 5‘s UK sales figures would be impressive even if they stayed flat at six million, the game’s success in Britain continues to increase as once again the game has hit the top of the UK games sales charts.
In the UK games sales chart for the week ending January 14, GTA 5 was able to pip several other heavy hitters to the top spot, giving the game its 10th ‘number one seller’ title since release. The Rockstar Games release, which launched in the UK 174 weeks ago, was able to outdo several 2016 titles including Call of Duty: Infinite Warfare, FIFA 17, Battlefield 1 and Forza Horizon 3.
It should be noted that the UK sales chart only takes into account physical retail sales, which could skew overall sales figures quite a bit given that many gamers these days download their games rather than buy them in store. However, the fact that GTA V has still been able to outsell the likes of Battlefield 1, which sold phenomenally upon launch and FIFA 17, which was the UK’s best selling game at retail in 2016, is still impressive.
GTA V‘s continued success, even so long after its initial release, is no doubt down to the regular stream of updates to its multiplayer mode, GTA Online. Although GTA Online support for the PS3 and Xbox 360 versions has come to an end, the PC, PS4 and Xbox One versions regularly get new content, with one recent addition including the Import/Export DLC which allows players to make bank by stealing (and delivering) high-end vehicles.
Rockstar Games is able to make bank both from GTA Online microtransactions as players fork out real money to afford the new items that each update adds. The updates also serve as marketing, getting people interested and giving them a reason to buy the game when they hear about a content drop that they like the sound of.
However, some would argue that GTA V sales (and Rockstar’s revenue) would increase even more if the company was to deliver story DLC for the game, instead of just GTA Online content. Unfortunately, it seems that this story DLC has been scrapped for a GTA Online map expansion but who knows, if the growing GTA V playerbase continues to ask for it, then Rockstar may just reconsider.Image copyright Getty Images Image caption The average age of marriage has increased in Spain in recent years
Spain has raised the minimum age for marriage from 14 to 16, having had the lowest marrying age in Europe.
Before the age was raised, boys and girls could marry at the age of 14 with the permission of a judge. It is now level with most European countries.
The change comes only months after the government raised the age of consent from 13 to 16.
The government announced its intention to alter the law in April 2013, but it came into force only on Thursday.
The move was welcomed by officials from Unicef and children's rights groups in Spain.
According to El Pais (in Spanish), only 365 marriages involving under-16s took place in Spain between 2000 and 2014 - with only five in 2014.
In the 1990s, however, there were 2,678 marriages involving at least one under-16 - and 12,867 in the 1980s.
Legal age of marriage in Europe
15 : Estonia (with court's consent)
: Estonia (with court's consent) |
continued. “You come down here for the win, and you want to cap it off, finish it off the right way. You want to enjoy the experience and everything, but you don’t want to take away from your team and why we’re really here.”
You can follow Sam Gardner on Twitter or email him at samgardnerfox@gmail.com.PUNE: Yoga guru BKS Iyengar passed away at a private hospital in Pune today.The 96-year-old yoga exponent was admitted to the intensive care unit of a private hospital here for poor heart function and difficulty in breathing.Iyengar’s heart muscles had become very week following which less blood was being pumped by the heart.“His heart's ejection fraction (capability of the heart to pump blood) was 25 per cent when he was admitted on August 12. Later it dropped to 20 per cent. He had been put on medication to improve the heart function, but it did not show much results,” the doctor said.“The ejection rate of human heart should be in the range of 45 to 55% for proper blood circulation in the body. But low ejection rate of his heart led to decreased blood supply to all the vital organs including brain, kidney and intestines. This has also led to kidney failure,” the doctor said.After the kidney failure on Sunday, the Yoga guru was advised continuous renal replacement therapy (CRRT) by nephrologists from Mumbai-based Jaslok Hospital who visited him on Sunday so that fluid as well as toxins accumulated in blood are removed slowly with the help of CRRT machine.“We had put him on intermittent dialysis from Sunday. He had undergone three cycles of dialysis but his kidneys didn't much respond to the treatment,” the doctor said."Iyengar died at 3.15 am on Wednesday," said a treating doctor.A file photo of BKS Iyengar interacting with students of Krishnamacharya Yoga Mandiram, Institute of Yoga and Yoga Studies at Mandaveli in Chennai. (TOI Photo)Fox’s “X-Men: Apocalypse” and Disney’s “Alice Through the Looking Glass” squared off over Memorial Day weekend, but both blockbuster hopefuls emerged bruised from this box office clash of the titans.
The latest X-Men adventure easily topped the weekend, earning an estimated $65 million. It is on pace to pull in over $76 million over the four-day spell. That’s a solid start, but a significant drop off from the $110.5 million that the previous mutant team-up, “X-Men: Days of Future Past,” racked up over the 2014 Memorial Day holiday.
Fox domestic distribution chief Chris Aronson said he was “exceptionally pleased” with the results, and predicted that the film’s A-minus CinemaScore would set it up for repeat business.
“It’s a challenging marketplace, to be sure, but the domestic opening coupled with the international rollout puts us in terrific shape,” he said.
Overseas, “X-Men: Apocalypse” has made $185.8 million, which will bring its global haul to more than $260 million after the weekend.
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Things were much bleaker for “Alice Through the Looking Glass.” The follow-up to 2010’s “Alice in Wonderland,” which racked up more than $1 billion during its run, stumbled out of the gate, bombing with $28.1 million and a projected $35 million over the four-day period. That’s a disastrous start for a film with an $170 million production budget.
“It’s disappointing and it’s head scratching to a certain degree,” said Dave Hollis, Disney’s distribution chief.
He noted that the studio just passed $4 billion in record time, in part because it has decided to make fewer, but bigger-budgeted films. In the case of “Zootopia” or “Captain America: Civil War” that paid off with two of the highest-grossing hits of the year.
“We’re always striving for higher-quality, branded films,” said Hollis. “We make these big bets and sometimes they really pay off. We took one here, but it did not do the kind of business we were hoping. You have to take everything in stride.”
The fantasy adventure will try to stanch the bleeding overseas, where “Alice Through the Looking Glass” grossed an estimated $65 million from such major territories as Italy, Russia, the United Kingdom, Australia and Brazil. The film has opened in 72% of the international market, with France (June 1), Japan (July 1) and South Korea (Sept. 8) still on deck.
“Alice’s” opening is bad news for Johnny Depp, whose star has waned in recent years, its luster diminished by flops such as “Mortdecai” and “Transcendence.” The actor was in the headlines over the weekend after his wife Amber Heard filed for divorce, alleging abuse, creating public relations headaches for Disney.
Heading into the holiday, some analysts expected “X-Men: Apocalypse” to debut to between $80 million and $100 million, and many box office sages projected an “Alice” launch in the $55 million range. The competition may have taken a chunk out of both film’s ticket sales, although the movies were pitched at different audiences. “X-Men” was intended to draw men, while “Alice” was designed for female moviegoers.
Some analysts believe that the “Alice in Wonderland” sequel couldn’t compete in the crowded summer season. The first film debuted in the spring, when there were fewer major studio releases vying for attention.
“‘X-Men’ destroyed ‘Alice,’ no question,” said Jeff Bock, an analyst with Exhibitor Relations. “That’s what happens when a spring fling attempts to go full-tilt summer blockbuster. We’ve seen this happen in the past and it usually doesn’t work out.”
Sony’s “The Angry Birds Movie” took third place in its second weekend of release, earning $18.7 million, to bring its domestic haul to roughly $66.3 million. In fourth place, “Captain America: Civil War” added $15.1 million to its total. The superhero film has earned $377 million domestically, propelling it past “Deadpool” to become the year’s highest-grossing stateside release. “Neighbors 2: Sorority Rising” rounded out the top five, nabbing $9.1 million to push its domestic gross to $40.4 million after two weeks in theaters.
This won’t be a Memorial Day weekend for the ages. ComScore is projecting that the overall box office will hit $204 million for the four-day period, an improvement over last year’s $194.8 million, but a far cry from a record. In fact, the results won’t even crack the top ten Memorial Day weekends.
“This Memorial Day didn’t blow the doors off,” said Paul Dergarabedian, senior media analyst at comScore. “Memorial weekends are supposed to be this barometer for the health of the industry at this point. It’s sort of a report card.”Every penny counts, and few know that better than those of us working for a company that just filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy protection. So I gathered my pennies from the various drawers, wallets, sofa crevices and suitcases in my office and decided to use them to pick up a few necessities at the PX, the store in the International Zone that caters mainly to the military but also carries items difficult to find in the Iraqi markets that we frequent.
Imagine the disappointment to learn that pennies aren't accepted there, or at any of the fast-food outlets or other shops set up on military bases across Iraq and the world. It turns out the Department of Defense decided many years ago that pennies are "too heavy and are not cost-effective to ship," explained Chris Ward, who rapidly responded to my e-mail asking why no pennies are accepted at on-base shopping centers.
Ward is a spokesman for the Army and Air Force Exchange Service, better known as AAFES, which oversees military retail outlets across the world. The decision not to use pennies is not restricted to Iraq, Ward noted. He said Dallas-based AAFES, which grants concessions for everything from Subway sandwich outlets to exotic carpet stores, depends on the Department of Defense to ship the coins needed to keep its facilities running.
As an alternative, AAFES offers POGs, lightweight round discs worth 5, 10, and 25 cents (no penny POGs exist), and uses a "round-up, round-down" policy for making change. If the last digit of the total purchase ends in three, four, six or seven, the total is rounded to the nearest nickel. If the last digit ends in one, two, eight or nine, the total is rounded to the nearest dime.
What this means is that any time you make a purchase and cannot come up with exact change, you run the risk of ending up with a pocket full of POGs, which are only good at military outlets. The Pizza Hut in the Baghdad International Zone will take them, but the Pizza Hut in Manhattan won't.
POGs were introduced in 2001 and draw their name from a juice of passionfruit, orange, and guava called POG, whose bottlecaps were used in a game that became known as POGs. According to AAFES, the discs, which can be used in bases in the United States as well as overseas, have been popular with troops. Most years bring different POG series featuring various images on the discs. There are pictures of Black Hawk helicopters flying through the sky, Humvees rumbling through muddy water, soldiers on patrol in Iraq, and Richard Nixon in his Navy cap. There are even Elvis POGs.
Not everyone is happy with the POGs, as a letter in the military's Stars and Stripes newspaper in January indicated. The writer, an Army captain deployed in Iraq, said troops should have the choice of using coins or POGs, and he complained that his change was being rounded down too often. "The explanation I was given was that AAFES rounds up just as much as it does down, but that means nothing to the guy who is always being rounded down," he wrote.
-- Tina Susman in Baghdad
Photo: Tina Susman / Los Angeles TimesHAWTHORN has made a mockery of its pre-Grand Final underdog status to smash the Sydney Swans by 63 points at the MCG on Saturday and claim its 12th premiership.
After the Swans kicked two of the game's opening three goals, Hawthorn completely dominated the game, their 21.11 (137) to 11.8 (74) victory clinching back-to-back flags for just the second time in the club's history.
It was the Hawks' wise old heads who led the way, with skipper Luke Hodge, former skipper Sam Mitchell and vice-captain Jordan Lewis ensuring Hawthorn avenged its 2012 Grand Final loss to the Swans.
Although it was hard to split the three stars, Hodge edged his two long-term teammates for the Norm Smith Medal for the best player on the ground. Hodge polled 10 votes to win his second Norm Smith Medal, having also won in 2008, with Lewis and Mitchell each polling nine votes.
The Hawk skipper had 35 possessions and, as usual, did it all for the Hawks, cutting off Swans attacks at half-back, winning clearances in the midfield and drifting forward to kick two goals.
Lewis finished with a game-high 37 possessions and Mitchell had 33 as the Hawks' midfield dominated a Swans' on-ball division widely acknowledged as the best in the competition.
Hawthorn spearhead Jarryd Roughead kicked a game-high five goals to follow up his bag of six against Port Adelaide last Saturday, and, perhaps more satisfyingly, claimed bragging rights over good mate and former Hawk Lance Franklin.
Franklin did his part for his new club with four goals, but was powerless to stop his former team's weight of dominance around the ground.
The Hawks' gamble on recalling Cyril Rioli for his first senior game since suffering a serious hamstring injury in round 15 paid off. The star forward had just nine possessions, but constantly harassed the Swans' defenders until he was substituted from the game early in the final term.
Hawthorn coach Alastair Clarkson said after the game he had never envisaged his team winning so easily against the Swans.
"We've planned for a long time for this. I know that the game materialised in a manner that said everything worked perfectly for us today [but] not in our wildest dreams did we anticipate it was going to be a 10-goal victory for our side this year," Clarkson said. "In actual fact, no one saw it coming in terms of that margin, and many didn't see it coming even in that result because we were the underdogs."
Nick Malceski, who is widely expected to leave the Swans in the free agency period that starts on Friday, was one of the Swans' better performers with 26 possessions.
Josh Kennedy (29 possessions) played a lone hand for the Swans in the midfield as their on-ball division lowered its colours for one of the few times this year.
Swans coach John Longmire said he was disappointed his team hadn't given itself a chance of winning
"We didn't apply the sort of pressure that we hoped to apply early, and we couldn't get it back," Longmire said.
"We didn't play the sort of football we wanted to. We didn't pressure the opposition when they had the ball, we couldn't get our hands on it.
"When we got our hands on it, we coughed it up and the opposition got it.
"We missed tackles and we were on the back foot from the first bounce.
"We were not able to wrest the momentum back at any stage. It was such a disappointing effort."
The Swans headed into Saturday's game as strong favourites after their dominant preliminary final win over North Melbourne and the Hawks' desperate three-point win over Port Adelaide.
However, the Hawks saved their 2014 best for last, stunning the Swans with suffocating pressure that forced the minor premier into a uncharacteristic slew of errors by hand and foot.
At kick-ins, the unlucky Swan with the ball in his hands often looked like a deer in the headlights and just as often coughed the ball straight up to the Hawks.
The Hawks, meanwhile, found time and space to slice the Swans apart with their unrivalled foot skills. And when they were not doing that, the likes of Bradley Hill and Liam Shiels were running the Swans ragged in open space.
In defence, last year's Norm Smith medallist Brian Lake was outstanding on Swans spearhead Kurt Tippett and Josh Gibson racked up 32 possessions.
The Hawks have now won three premierships since 2008, equalling Geelong's tally over the past decade.
The Cats' 2007, 2009 and 2011 flags looked to have stamped them as the dominant team of the post-Brisbane Lions premiership era (2001-2003), but the Hawks (2008, 2012-13) now have a legitimate claim to sharing that title.
Hawks coach Alastair Clarkson is now equal with John Kennedy snr and Allan Jeans as the most successful Hawthorn premiership coach, with the trio each boasting three flags.
Since entering the VFL/AFL competition in 1925, the Hawks had previously won back-to-back flags just once, in 1988-89.
The Swans started Saturday's game well enough and led by six points at the 13-minute mark of the first quarter.
But the Hawks took total control from there, slamming on the final four goals of the term to go into quarter-time 20 points in front.
The Hawks' dominance was reflected in the first-quarter tackle count (22-7), inside 50s (19-7) and uncontested possessions (69-48).
The Swans kicked the first goal of the second term through former Hawk Ben McGlynn to cut their deficit to 14 points.
But this proved a false dawn for Swans supporters as the Hawks piled on the next five goals, with Hodge's goal at the 16-minute mark of the second term putting Hawthorn up by 47 points.
The Swans then kicked consecutive goals for the first time in the game, through Adam Goodes and Franklin, to cut the Hawks' lead to 35 points at the 25-minute mark.
But when Roughead goaled less than three minutes later the Swans went into half-time 42 points down and had to engineer a comeback like Carlton's in the 1970 Grand Final to win.
But where the Blues were able to come back from 44 points down at the main break to beat Collingwood in 1970, the Hawks never allowed the Swans the faintest sniff of victory in the second half.
Grand thrashings: Biggest margins in VFL/AFL Grand Finals
Margin Score Year 119 Geelong 24.19 (163) d Port Adelaide 8.6 (44) 2007 96 Hawthorn 22.20 (152) d Melbourne 6.20 (56) 1988 83 Hawthorn 20.20 (140) d Essendon 8.9 (57) 1983 81 Richmond 23.21 (159) d Collingwood 9.24 (78) 1980 80 West Coast 20.23 (143) d Geelong 8.15 (63) 1994 78 Essendon 26.14 (170) d Hawthorn 14.8 (92) 1985 73 Essendon 18.17 (125) d Carlton 6.16 (52) 1949 73 Melbourne 17.19 (121) d Collingwood 6.12 (48) 1956 63 Essendon 22.18 (150) d Melbourne 13.9 (87) 1946 63 Hawthorn 21.11 (137) d Sydney Swans 11.8 (74) 2014
Will Langford celebrates with his teammates as Josh Kennedy contemplates defeat. Picture: AFL MediaShame used to be an integral part of the justice system. From tarring and feathering to ducking stools, many societies have found it useful to turn the punishment of wrongdoing into a public spectacle. Halfway through his engrossing and terrifying So You’ve Been Publicly Shamed, Jon Ronson uncovers court records from 18th-century America and discovers, among the “various people named Nathaniel [who] had purchased land near rivers”, many accounts of people being whipped for adultery, or confined to the pillory for theft.
But he also finds something else, something altogether more alarming. “The common assumption is that public punishments died out in the new great metropolises because they’d been judged useless,” he writes. “But according to the documents I found that wasn’t it at all. They didn’t fizzle out because they were ineffective. They were stopped because they were far too brutal.” Public punishments fell out of fashion in the US and Britain from the 1830s: judges didn’t have a problem with whippings but they thought it was unnecessarily punitive to carry them out in public.
Now, Ronson says, we are seeing “a great renaissance of public shaming”. Social media, and Twitter in particular, has evolved into a rolling witch-hunt where reputations are smashed irreparably as the result of one ill-judged tweet or Facebook post. In extreme cases, a transgressor’s online identity never recovers: they bear the modern equivalent of being branded on the forehead.
The central incident in the book – what Ronson describes as the “brutal nadir” of internet shaming – is one I remember vividly. In December 2013, a PR executive called Justine Sacco boarded a plane at Heathrow heading for Cape Town, having tweeted from the runway: “Going to Africa. Hope I don’t get Aids. Just kidding. I’m white!”
Who was the butt of the joke: black sub-Saharan Africans, some of whom live in countries socially and economically devastated by a decades-long Aids epidemic? Or was Sacco satirising herself, a white first-worlder smugly imagining that race was a factor in the spread of the disease, rather than poverty or geography? It was hard to tell, not least because Twitter’s architecture – its 140-character limit – encourages abrupt, contextless thoughts to be ejected into the ether. Sacco probably thought that fewer than 170 people (the total number of her followers) would see the tweet, would swill it round in their minds, compare it with the Sacco they knew already, and understand that she wasn’t trying to be racist.
That is not what happened. The tweet was spotted by a Gawker journalist, Sam Biddle, who first retweeted it to his 15,000 followers and then wrote a blog post for the tech industry gossip site Valleywag that was seen by nearly 200,000 people. Most of them were angry. They found the tweet racist, offensive and hurtful. Soon, a hashtag – #hasjustinelandedyet – gained traction.
Now, deep breath. It is not my place as a white person to bang the gavel and tell people who have experienced a lifetime of racial discrimination that they were wrong to feel the joke was racist. But I am prepared to say this: the disproportionate nature of the reaction was demented.
What particularly horrified me was how the shaming played out in real time. Everyone following the saga on Twitter knew that Sacco was on a plane, without internet access, for 11 hours; soon, someone even worked out which flight she was on, based on the time and location stamp on her offending tweet. Self-righteous glee began to permeate the hashtag – Her life is ruined! She just doesn’t know it yet! – and I began to realise how intoxicating a public shaming could be. It delivers all the illicit thrill of sadism, overlaid with self-congratulatory mock-solemnity about how a Lesson Is Being Learned. No wonder Isabella and Ferdinand had no problem recruiting inquisitors, and crowds gather to watch Isis enforcers throw gay people off buildings. Who doesn’t want to do something bad while feeling good about themselves?
Tentatively, at the time, I tried to suggest that perhaps the tweet wasn’t that bad: certainly not bad enough to warrant the rape and death threats that were flooding in. Fellow tweeters began to argue that I was being a typical white, middle-class feminist, sticking up for a powerful PR executive and ignoring the voices of wronged people of colour. So I did something I have been ashamed of (the irony) ever since. I shut up and looked on as Justine Sacco’s life got torn apart. She lost her job, and is now known to millions as the “racist tweet lady”. She cannot date, for fear that someone will google her. Her aunt, a long-time supporter of the African National Congress, told her when she landed: “This is not what our family stands for.”
Lindsey Stone's Facebook photo.
The book has other examples of transgressors who have felt the brunt of an internet shaming. There is Jonah Lehrer, who lost his job at the New Yorker after confessing to plagiarism and fabricating quotations; Lindsey Stone, whose Facebook photo of her sticking up her middle finger in front of the sign at the veterans’ cemetery in Arlington went viral; and Max Mosley, who won damages from the News of the World for its allegation that he took part in a Nazi-themed BDSM orgy (it was a plain old German-themed BDSM orgy). Jon Ronson has made his name as a writer by adopting a naive, nebbish persona, and his specialism is catching awful people off-guard: in Them, his book about extremists, he politely listens to a Klansman explain how he will rehabilitate the white supremacist organisation with the help of advice garnered from slushy airport self-help books. Here, though, the awful people are us. Around his case studies, Ronson weaves historical and psychological research, including a reappraisal of the notorious Stanford prison experiment, to illustrate the cruel and random nature of crowd behaviour.
The big argument in favour of social media as a method of enforcing social norms is that it is more democratic than the old hierarchies. The internet is an attention economy, we are told – say something interesting or outrageous or inspiring enough, and people will listen. But what Ronson’s book shows is that mob rule can be profoundly conservative. He discovers that Mosley experienced few lasting negative effects from having his penchant for spanking covered by a tabloid, whereas many public shamings are “breathtakingly misogynistic”. The shamings of Sacco and Stone, which were accompanied by commentary about how they were “dumb bitches” who deserved everything they got as well as rape threats, are on a continuum with other methods of punishing transgressive women – the fad for “revenge porn”, the “slut-shaming” of teenage girls who are coerced into taking nude photos of themselves, or even websites dedicated to photographing “women eating on public transport”.
To me, public shaming is a symptom of institutional failure. It flourishes when people feel there is no accountability or possibility of redress through other channels. As our legal system matured and the concept of due process developed, we were content to outsource punishment to the state. Now, with trust in our institutions failing, we want to take matters into our own hands again. A year before Sacco’s tweet, an unarmed 17-year-old African-American called Trayvon Martin was shot dead by a neighbourhood watch volunteer who was later acquitted of all charges. Less than a year after the tweet, in the summer of 2014, an asthmatic 43-year-old called Eric Garner died telling an officer, “I can’t breathe,” as he was pinned to the floor in an unapproved chokehold; the following month, police units with military gear were sent in to Ferguson, Missouri, to quell unrest generated by the shooting of another black teenager, Michael Brown. (Neither man’s killer was put on trial.) Against this background of institutional racism in America, is it any wonder that so many tweeters felt unwilling to let what they perceived as a racist provocation pass without comment? One of Ronson’s interviewees says that “dragging down Justine Sacco felt like dragging down every rich white person who’s ever gotten away with making a racist joke because they could”.
This theme (that shaming flourishes when we have lost trust in the system) also runs through Jennifer Jacquet’s Is Shame Necessary?. While Ronson ends sombrely vowing never to take part in another public shaming, Jacquet sees shame as a weapon: powerful, but dangerous in the wrong hands. Her background is in environmentalism and she sees shaming as a way of encouraging good behaviour in firms that can’t be touched by legislators and regulators. If an energy giant is polluting the sea, or a fishing company killing dolphins, shaming them publicly bypasses politicians who might take campaign donations from them, or a legal system that it takes years – and thousands of dollars – to access.
Jacquet comes up with seven rules for who should be shamed, and how. These include the idea that victims of the transgression should be in charge of the shaming, and that there should be a big gap between desired and actual behaviour: she gives the example of direct-action groups of concerned citizens targeting bailed-out banks that give their executives huge bonuses. Shaming should be scrupulous and from a trusted source and should take place only where other methods are ineffective. But perhaps the most crucial point is this: “To keep shaming sustainable into the future, it is also important that individuals or companies who are exposed are given a chance to reintegrate within the group.” In the case of Greenpeace’s ethical seafood campaign, not only are wrongdoers called out, but stores at the top of the list are publicly congratulated, as are those that improve. This is what is missing from many social media shamings: any sense of what the transgressor can do to gain forgiveness or be rehabilitated. Justine Sacco, for instance, went to Ethiopia for several months to help with a maternal mortality prevention programme; but that will never have as much prominence on Google.
The other missing element is that old idea of “hate the sin, love the sinner”. It is comforting and easy to think that racism is perpetrated by a separate category of people – racists – who need to be identified and shunned. Yet we are all complicit in structures of discrimination and repression, and many largely good and well-meaning people act in ways that prop up oppressive systems. Hate the tweet, love the tweeter.
Just in case Ronson’s book doesn’t depress you enough about how new technology is reviving old uglinesses, turn to Andrew Keen’s The Internet Is Not the Answer. This brisk polemic synthesises not only Keen’s previous technosceptic thinking, but the work of almost every theorist who has had a downer on the internet in the past decade. There’s Jaron Lanier pointing out that mere access to social networks is pretty poor reward for all the commercially valuable data we give them; George Packer on how the hyper-libertarianism of Silicon Valley moguls shapes their creations; a dash of “superstar theory” (the idea that digital distribution creates a handful of mega-winners at the cost of the larger ranks of the merely very good); plus a sprinkle of the argument that automation hollows out middle-class jobs. Keen longs for the days when the internet was an academic project rather than a cash cow for three dozen venture capitalists in California. It’s completely one-sided, but all the more enjoyable for that.
You might, like me, finish reading these books and long to go and live in a yurt. Unfortunately, though, all of them are reminders that, whatever is wrong with the internet, it’s our fault. We can’t escape its flaws, because they are our own.St. Louisans were outraged. The well-known lawyer Terry Crouppen aired a 30-second ad that ran in St. Louis during Super Bowl 50 saying of Kroenke’s decision, “We cheered [the Rams] year after losing year. In return, they trashed, then left, us.” The St. Louis Post-Dispatch columnist Benjamin Hochman struck a more optimistic chord when he declared, “They can strip away our NFL team … but they can’t snatch our confidence because, right here, right now, we will harness it, we will cradle it, and we will carry it into the next year and years, because we are St. Louis.”
The Gateway City does have much to boast about. It’s home to world-class centers of learning (Washington University in St. Louis, to name one); nine Fortune 500 companies; a robust medical system (BJC Healthcare); cultural institutions that rival those of cities twice its size (the St. Louis Zoo); and one of the most storied baseball franchises in history, the Cardinals, a team that has won the World Series twice in the last 10 years alone.
Yet while Kroenke’s argument that St. Louis can’t support an NFL team is self-serving, he’s not altogether mistaken about the city’s economic plight. Relative to big metro areas on the coasts, St. Louis has lost ground in recent years. Job growth since the recession has slowed. The city’s population growth has stagnated. Downtown St. Louis sits eerily quiet on most days, despite millions of taxpayer dollars spent on upgrades—including on the Edward Jones Dome, the Rams’ now-vacant home. The city has a nascent tech start-up scene, but struggles to keep its most successful companies from leaving town—the payment firm Square was conceived in St. Louis by two native sons who relocated to San Francisco in 2009. The per-capita income of the St. Louis metro area today has fallen to 77 percent of that of metro New York, down from 89 percent in 1979. And while St. Louis’s nine Fortune 500 corporate headquarters are a lot for a metro area of 2.8 million people, that’s down from 12 in 2000 and (correcting for the way Fortune changed its methodology in 1994) 23 in 1980.
Experts often point to manufacturing decline, offshoring, and racial strife to explain the relative economic weakness of St. Louis and other Rust Belt cities. But these ills hardly have afflicted St. Louis more than they have Chicago, New York, Boston, and Los Angeles—which all have mounted much stronger comebacks in recent decades. Yes, those other cities made the transition from manufacturing to services and technology. But a quarter-century ago, St. Louis was already (and, to some extent, it still is) a hub of many of the post-industrial industries that have gone on to experience the fastest growth, from pharmaceuticals to finance to food processing.
Moreover, St. Louis had an abundance of what regional economic growth theorists such as Richard Florida, Edward Glaeser, and Enrico Moretti argue is the most important ingredient of success for post-industrial America: a large population of educated, professional, creative types who dream up the innovations that drive growth and profits (think software in Seattle and Silicon Valley, biotech in Boston, finance in New York and Charlotte). In 1980, 23 percent of adults living in the St. Louis area had completed four years of college or higher—double the national average and greater than that of economically “hot” cities like Dallas, Charlotte, and San Diego. Even more important, one out of every five residents worked in fields like finance, insurance, real estate, business, health, law, or medicine.Canonical has launched a new app that allows iPhone, iPod touch, and iPad users to stream music from the cloud to their mobile devices. The new iOS version of the Ubuntu One Music app comes a few weeks after the launch of a similar app for Google Android.
The Ubuntu One service is a cloud-based synchronization service which lets you backup and synchronize your data between a computer running Ubuntu Linux and a cloud-based storage solution. That way you can access your files on the go or restore from a backup.
Unfortunately, while Ubuntu One offers users 2GB of free storage and only charges if you need more disk space, the Ubuntu One Music app requires a subscription fee of $3.99 per month or $39.99 per year. There is a 30 day free trial though.
I suppose Ubuntu One Music is cheaper than signing up for a $10/month music-on-demand service, but only if you already have a huge collection of MP3 files you want to upload and stream to your mobile device.
The user interface is a bit sparse at the moment, but Canonical plans to add support for album art in a future release. Support for OGG and AAC files and caching for offline listening are also on the way.
Ubuntu One Music is available as a free download from the App Store.
via Download SquadWhen the Senate took the first of many steps in the Obamacare repeal process this week, Sen. Rand Paul (R-Kentucky) was the only Republican to vote in opposition.
But it's important to understand that what happened this week wasn't a straightforward Obamacare repeal vote, and Paul wasn't voting to keep the law in place. He was voting out of objection to the GOP's debt-laden budget plans.
The vote was the first step in a long and convoluted budget process that Republicans are hope to use as a vehicle for repealing major components of the law. That process, known as reconciliation, is complex and convoluted, and it will take weeks if it goes swiftly, but could easily take much longer.
After the Senate adopts a budget resolution, the House must follow with its own. Then the two must come together, either through a conference process or by adopting the same measure. From there committee instructions are drawn up, and the process splits into two tracks again, with relevant House and Senate committees putting together their own reconciliation bills, each of which must be debated in multiple committees and then passed by the full body, and then unified again, likely requiring yet another conference process. Only then can the bill be sent to the president's desk. (A Roll Call infographic helpfully lays out the basics here.)
Ultimately, there's no guarantee that this process will actually end with the repeal of the health law.
So what we saw this week wasn't the main event. If this were a dinner party, it wouldn't be the meal. It wouldn't even be setting the table. It would be more like deciding that perhaps there should be a meal several weeks or months down the road, with no final agreement about what might be on the menu.
Paul's no vote was an objection to the budget itself—which adds to the national debt and provides no clear path to budget balance—not to repealing the health care law.
Here's how he explained it:
"As a physician, I cannot wait to repeal Obamacare and replace it with a health care system that relies on freedom to provide quality, comprehensive, and affordable care," Paul said in a statement, reports the Lexinton Herald-Leader. "But putting nearly $10 trillion more in debt on the American people's backs through a budget that never balances is not the way to get there. It is the exact opposite of the change Republicans promised, and I cannot support it, even as a placeholder….Not only are we not cutting spending, but we are also proposing an increase at an exponential pace. There is no reason we cannot repeal Obamacare and pass a balanced budget at the same time."
This isn't the only objection Paul has raised to the GOP's plans this year. He has also been among the most vocal GOP legislators in opposing Republican leadership's "repeal and delay" strategy on Obamacare, which would repeal the law but leave it in place for several years while the GOP worked out a replacement plan. It looks as if Paul is deliberately taking steps to distance himself from the party and its leadership in order to preserve a measure of independence.
Paul isn't the only Republican to trash the GOP's budget plans either.
The House is expected to vote on its own budget resolution today, and Rep. Justin Amash (R-Michigan) says he's voting no because the plan would add far too much to the debt. "By nearly every measure," he wrote last night, the current proposal "is the worst budget I've seen as a congressman."We have some serious faux liberal outrage going on today about the way men (conservative men) treat women. Bill O’Reilly and White House Press Secretary Sean Spicer did things that are no big deal but have the leftists freaking the hell out. Hillary Clinton crawled out of the woods to express her extreme displeasure with the way these “horrifying” men act toward women. As of yet |
only so much to defend themselves. However, while the rest of the sister islands’ guns were destroyed, Fort Drum’s guns remained alive against all the odds.
On the occasion of the Japanese Emperor Hirohito’s birthday, the bombings further. Aiming to finally destroy Fort Drum’s guns, the Japanese attacked the fort by glide-bombing it – an attack that continued for the next four days. Surprisingly, however, this attack only affected a minor misalignment of Battery Marshall.
By May 5, all of Corregidor’s guns (bar the 12-inch 1898 mortar of Battery Way and a few roving 155- and 75-mm guns whose positions were never disclosed) had been silenced. On the night of May 5, the Japanese launched their 2-battallion Corregidor invasion force. Although around two-thirds this force was destroyed by the defenders, the remaining one-third successfully continued to attack them.
With the outflanked defenders brutally shelled by Japanese guns to keep them from containing the invaders, General Wainwright was left with no choice but to surrender Corregidor, which he did on May 6.
All this time, however, Fort Drum’s guns continued to blaze – up until minutes before the surrender.
Liberation
Having returned on Oct. 20, 1944, the Americans began the process of liberating the Philippines. By 3rd February 1945, a flying column had reached Manila led to a month-long battle to liberate Manila from the Japanese. Despite the ongoing battle, however, the Americans started began to clear the fortified islands of Japanese to open Manila Bay for shipping, with Fort Drum being the last island to get liberated.
The Americans devised special tactics to liberate Fort Drum. On 13 April, a Landing Ship Medium (LSM) and a Landing Craft Mechanized (LCM) was sent to pull up alongside Fort Drum. The LSM had a specially built ramp on top of it, using which it discharged two platoons of soldiers: while the first platoon consisted of crack snipers to cover every opening where Japanese soldiers may appear, the second comprised engineers assigned to plant demolition charges.
Once the charges were in position, the LCM poured 3,000 gallons of oil into one of the vents and dumped explosives into the other. Both the LSM and LCM were moved to a safe distance after the fuses were lit. With the charges detonated, a series of explosions followed that finally blew Fort Drum’s manhole that was 1 ton in weight and 1 meter in diameter 50 meters up into the air. Finally gaining access to the fort on 18th April, the Americans went on to discover 65 charred bodies.
As of today, Fort Drum continues to stand as an old ruin right at the mouth of Manila Bay. Although no longer in action, it still holds its reputation as being unsinkable.
Unfortunately, though, in spite of all the history, Fort Drum, along with the nearby Fort Frank are still neglected as tourist spots.Team HTC One,
We’ve always been inspired by our customers, and because of our legacy as a pioneer of smartphones, we are fortunate to have the most technology-savvy, discerning, and passionate customers in the industry. While we continue to be a leader in Android innovation and have done "OK" with software updates, we recognize that "OK" is not good enough.
Starting with Android 4.3 (Jelly Bean) last year, we set out to be a leader in delivering the latest software and were successful in quickly rolling out Jelly Bean for the HTC One. With the release of Android 4.4 (KitKat), we embarked on a mission to push KitKat to our HTC One customers across the US and Canada within 90 days of Google's official release of the software.
Additionally, we felt it was important to be as transparent with you as possible, which is why we launched the Software Update page to let everyone know how the process works, and to keep you up-to-date with our progress. We’re excited by the conversation this has generated in the HTC community.
As we approach the 90-day mark, we are getting closer to delivering KitKat and the finish line is becoming more clear. We are currently in the certification phase across all of our carrier partners in North America and they share our enthusiasm for getting this software in your hands. That said, the software development process does not always follow a linear path and we know today that we will miss our self-imposed target. The good news is that we won’t miss by much as it shouldn’t be more than one to two weeks to complete each of the carrier versions of HTC One.
The challenge we gave our teams, in cooperation with our carrier partners, has taught us a lot that will allow us to improve on our upgrade delivery in the future. We remain resolved to provide timely updates and to be transparent about the process and status of our efforts. Support of our customers is a major priority for us and we thank you for your support of HTC!
Jason
Go Seahawks!Mr Anning, who once ran the Sunshine Coast solar installation business Pacific Solar and Heating, once warned of the dangers of climate change in a Sunshine Coast Seniors newspaper advertorial. The paid editorial said greenhouse gases, carbon emissions and conserving energy were "all subjects about which we are concerned today” and promoted government rebates for solar hot water systems. Fraser Anning. Credit:One Nation “The rebates are substantial and the community's awareness about the need for cleaner energy options is growing," Mr Anning said in the article. Mr Roberts has been an outspoken critic of climate science, claiming it was "manipulated" by NASA, the CSIRO and others as part of a global conspiracy.
Fairfax Media attempted to contact Mr Anning, who no longer works for Pacific Solar and Heating, on Friday. While those attempts were unsuccessful, Mr Anning did issue a media statement and there was little love lost for Mr Roberts in its content. "This (High Court) outcome vindicates Pauline Hanson's decision to refer the issue of Malcolm Roberts' citizenship to the High Court," he said. "It is, however, infuriating that the Australian taxpayer has had to stump up millions of dollars to pay for a court decision, just because five polticians couldn't get their act together to do what was required by the constitution. "I can certainly assure all Queenslanders that before I nominated I took all steps to ensure that I was eligible to be a senator and, obviously, as a candidate for an Australian nationalist party, not being a foreigner is a pretty important part of that."
Mr Anning also took aim at One Nation leader Pauline Hanson's recent praise of Mr Roberts. "I fully understand that in recent weeks Pauline needed to express public support for Roberts as long as he occupied a Senate spot, however that naturally changes with the High Court decision," he said. "I have given Pauline unqualified loyalty and supported her for more than 20 years, so naturally I expect this to be reciprocated if and when I am declared elected." Mr Anning's candidate bio on the One Nation website said he had worked in the hotel industry in Gladstone for the past five years and he has reportedly worked in marketing and plane building. Meanwhile, experienced former senator Mr Bartlett, who was in Parliament from 1997 until 2008, said he expected to be formally serving as a Greens senator within two weeks.
Larissa Waters (left) is set to be replaced by Andrew Bartlett (right) as a Greens Senator for Queensland. Credit:Cameron Atfield Mr Bartlett, who pledged to be based in north Queensland if he won a second Senate seat for the Queensland Greens, said he would be instead be based in the south-east corner. “It is not really tenable (to be based in north Queensland) in these circumstances,” Mr Bartlett said. “That was a pledge if I got elected last time as a second senator for the Greens. “We would have had one (office) in Brisbane and one up north, but obviously we will now only have one for the time being and there is an office there that I can move into.
“I can move in at very little cost, whereas if I had to set up in Cairns or Townsville with 20 months left to serve in the term, it would cost taxpayers a lot of extra money, frankly. “It’s nothing against north Queensland, we would love to get up there, but it is not justifiable at this time.” Mr Bartlett praised Ms Waters' service and said the Greens still believed that many of the claims around the Adani coal mine would be exposed. “There are many, many people in regional Queensland who believe that Adani is a con and there is no one else in the Parliament from Queensland who is definitely against Adani,” he said. “We need to have that voice magnified and just properly represented.”Vu1
Vu1 said today the first in its line of efficient light bulbs will be available at retailer Lowes, pitting one more technology against the aging incandescent bulb.
The company's first product is an R30 bulb designed to replace a 65-watt incandescent flood light, which uses about 19.5 watts of power. Vu1 (pronounced "view one") plans to introduce a classic Edison A19 shape bulb as well in Europe and the U.S.
The R30 is less efficient than a comparable compact fluorescent bulb, which uses about 13 watts, but it does not have mercury and has full light instantly. Priced at $14.95, it's less expensive than comparable LEDs. Compared to halogens, Vu1 says its bulbs are more energy efficient and will last longer--about 11,000 hours.
The color rendering index, which is a measure of light quality, is 85 CRI and the color temperature is warm at 2800 Kelvin.
The company calls the technology behind the bulb electronically stimulated luminescence (ESL), a technique that produces the same light quality as traditional incandescent lamps. Like a cathode ray tube, electrons are fired at glass coated with phosphors that are excited to give off light. The technology has been around for years but never fully pursued for lighting, according to the company.
The company has received UL certification for its A-type bulb and R-30 flood light bulb.The Bishopric of Ösel–Wiek (Estonian: Saare-Lääne piiskopkond; German: Bistum Ösel–Wiek; Low German: Bisdom Ösel–Wiek; contemporary Latin: Ecclesia Osiliensis) was a Roman Catholic diocese and semi-independent prince-bishopric (parto of Terra Mariana, i.e. Livonia) in the Holy Roman Empire, covering what are now Saare, Hiiu and Lääne counties of Estonia.
History [ edit ]
The bishopric was created on 1 October 1228 as a Latin rite (initially exempt?) diocese by papal legate William of Modena and simultaneously as a state of Holy Roman Empire—making it a prince-bishopric—by Henry, King of the Romans (1220-1242; not Emperor). Due to the repeated shift of the seat of the bishops, it was also successively known as bishopric of Leal (Lihula) from 1234, Perona (Vana-Pärnu) from 1251, Hapsal (Haapsalu) Castle from 1279, and the seat shifted (alone) to the castle of Arensburg (Kuressaare) on the island of Ösel (Saaremaa); the cathedral and cathedral chapter (canons) remained in Hapsal. It was a suffragan diocese in the ecclesiastical province of the Metropolitan Archbishopric of Riga from 1253.
One of the five members of the Livonian Confederation, the state was administratively divided into two bailiwicks (Latin advocaciae, German Vogteien). The bishop was also the lord of the Teutonic Order over its fiefs on the bishopric's territory. From 1241 until 1343, Ösel (Saaremaa) Island was an autonomous part of Ösel-Wiek prince-bishopric (autonomy renewed 27 August 1255).
The principality ceased to exist in 1560 when its last prince-bishop, Johannes V von Münchhausen, sold it to Denmark, which vested executive power in royally appointed Governors (styled Lensmaend to 1654, then Statthalter). King Frederick II of Denmark's brother Magnus of Livonia, Duke of Holstein, obtained it as an appanage on 15 April 1560 and was elected bishop on 13 May 1560; the Danish dynasty being Lutheran, he abolished the diocese and assumed the secular feudal style Lord of Ösel (Stieffte Ozel und Wieck Herr) on 20 March 1567.
Denmark ceded Wiek (Lääne County) to the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth in exchange for parts of Ösel belonging to the Livonian Order. Later Ösel became a Danish possession.
Episcopal Ordinaries and Prince-Bishops of Ösel-Wiek (Saare-Lääne) [ edit ]
See also [ edit ]
BibliographyViewers of a BBC Three documentary which looked at the rise of female violence have taken to Twitter to criticise the show for offering excuses for the perpetrators.
The Rise of Female Violence, which aired last night at 9pm, aimed to highlight society's skewed perceptions of female-on-male violence versus-male-on female violence.
But by offering alcohol and 'low self respect' as reasons behind women's violent behaviour, people took to Twitter to argue: 'People don't look for all these excuses when a man attacks a woman. So why are we making excuses for women's bad behaviour?'
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Viewers of a BBC Three documentary The Rise of Female Violence, which aired last night at 9pm, have taken to Twitter to criticise the show for offering excuses for the perpetrators, including drinking on nights out
Offering alcohol and 'low self respect' as reasons behind women's violent behaviour Tweeters argued 'People don't look for all these excuses when a man attacks a woman. So why are we making excuses for women's bad behaviour?'
Holly Hunt thought the show was good for highlighting the issue, she added she was, 'Disappointed that it was sympathetic towards abusers! Males wouldn't have that luxury'
The programme, presented by BBC reporter Alys Harte, looked at women who beat their boyfriends, those involved in drunken brawls and teenage girl gangs to find out if females are getting angrier and, if so, why.
But the show has been criticised for offering excuses for women who act violently.
'There's one obvious factor to blame: more of us girls are drinking heavily,' says Alys over footage of 'two for one' offers at bars and a waitress on the dancefloor selling a tray of Jaegerbombs.
'I feel like #riseoffemaleviolence is just blaming alcohol. Sure it makes you violent but some women don't need booze to make them violent,' Tweeted Charlie Adams.
Alys spoke to Izzy for whom 'getting drunk and getting into fights has become a way of life'. Aged 24, she reckon she has around 30 convictions for alcohol-related violence
Referring to 24-year-old Izzy Ash Lucas Tweeted, 'If you react in such a violent way when you drink booze, that's clearly a sign to stop boozing'
'I feel like #riseoffemaleviolence is just blaming alcohol. Sure it makes you violent but some women don't need booze to make them violent,' said Charlie Adams
Chloe B agreed: 'Why is it always blamed on alcohol? Downing 3 blue WKDs is no excuse for vile behaviour.'
Alys spoke to Izzy for whom 'getting drunk and getting into fights has become a way of life'.
Aged 24, she reckon she has around 30 convictions for alcohol-related violence, and her problem started when she attended university.
But Tweeters were unsympathetic.
'If you're violent when drunk, why would you continue to drink?' asked Rose Jessica, later adding: 'The solution would be to stop drinking alcohol?'
Ash Lucas agreed: 'If you react in such a violent way when you drink booze, that's clearly a sign to stop boozing', while Just Jorden offered up the obvious, 'Maybe.... maybe you should STOP DRINKING Izzy!'
And it wasn't just alcohol that took the blame. The show took hefty chunks of time looking at the reasons behind female violence.
'Behind the story of every violent woman there's a story of low self respect or self harm,' said Alys.
And it wasn't just alcohol that took the blame. The show took hefty chunks of time looking at the reasons behind female violence. Chloe Price complained, 'I wish we'd heard more from victims instead of trying to explain away the perpetrator's vile behaviour'
Audrey accused the show of claiming female violence had 'nothing to do with personal responsibility but all to do with external causes/issues'
And this in particular riled Tweeters as it made the show appear to view the female perpetrators in a more sympathetic light.
'People don't look for all these excuses when a man attacks a woman. So why are we making excuses for women's bad behaviour?' asked Kay Whittle.
While Holly Hunt thought the show was good for highlighting the issue, she added she was, 'Disappointed that it was sympathetic towards abusers! Males wouldn't have that luxury.'
Audrey accused the show of claiming female violence had 'nothing to do with personal responsibility but all to do with external causes/issues' and Chloe Price complained, 'I wish we'd heard more from victims instead of trying to explain away the perpetrator's vile behaviour.'
As women account for 15 per cent of arrests in England and Wales, but less than five per cent of the prison population, the programme also asked if females get off more lightly than males when it comes to punishment.
Alys followed the case of Crystal Smith, who was accused of attempted murder after she stabbed her husband Simon (pictured). Crystal was found guilty of the lesser charges of wounding with intent and grievous bodily harm, and sentenced to nine years in prison.
'Wounding with intent and GBH? Seriously? She tried to kill him!' protested Christina Healey
The programme asked if females get off more lightly than males when it comes to punishment. Grace Payton think so. She stated, 'I think the law should be tougher on women, they shouldn't be allowed to get away with such horrific crimes'
Alys followed the case of Crystal Smith, who was accused of attempted murder after she stabbed her husband Simon.
Crystal was found guilty of the lesser charges of wounding with intent and grievous bodily harm, and sentenced to nine years in prison.
'Wounding with intent and GBH? Seriously? She tried to kill him!' protested Christina Healey.
While Grace Payton stated, 'I think the law should be tougher on women, they shouldn't be allowed to get away with such horrific crimes.'
Flowers had '*hugs*' for Simon who was stabbed by his wife, thanking him for sharing his story and praising BB3 for highlighting the issue
Indeed, a number of Tweeters felt the documentary was a needed one. 'Domestic violence against men is a big yet often hidden issue. Well done #bbc3 for highlighting #femaleviolence,' said Laura Nelson
Meanwhile Saffron and Alastair Sloan appeared to have their minds changed by the documentary. Saffron called the show an 'unbelievable eye opener'...
... while Alastair Tweeted, 'Had written off female-on-male domestic violence as an anti-feminist fantasy. This BBC3 doc on #FemaleViolence suggests otherwise. Shocking.'
Flowers had '*hugs*' for Simon, thanking him for sharing his story and praising BB3 for highlighting the issue.
Indeed, a number of Tweeters felt the documentary was a needed one.
'Domestic violence against men is a big yet often hidden issue. Well done #bbc3 for highlighting #femaleviolence,' said Laura Nelson
Meanwhile Saffron and Alastair Sloan appeared to have their minds changed by the documentary.
Saffron called the show an 'unbelievable eye opener', and Alastair Tweeted, 'Had written off female-on-male domestic violence as an anti-feminist fantasy. This BBC3 doc on #FemaleViolence suggests otherwise. Shocking.'The displeasure directed by some in the Modern Warfare 2 PC community toward Infinity Ward isn't limited to petitions. This weekend, YouTube removed a video Infinity posted to its channel, after a modder filed a DMCA takedown notice.
BASHandSlash user PST*Joker has claimed that Modern Warfare 2's AC-130 reward (achieved for a killstreak of 11) was influenced by mods he and other PC gamers made to the original Modern Warfare. Infinity Ward posted a video (above, currently hosted on a non-Infinity Ward account) highlighting the AC-130 bonus in Modern Warfare 2.
So one of the site's community members sent a tweet out to PST*Joker recommending he, as the owner of the content, send a DMCA takedown to YouTube. "See how youtube responds," he said.
Shortly thereafter, the video was pulled, right off of Infinity Ward's official channel.
Advertisement
BASHandSlash says that after the takedown, Infinity Ward community manager Robert Bowling direct messaged PST*Joker about the removal: " "Really? Copyright infringment claim? :sigh:" read the message, according to BASHandSlash.
MW2: IW Gets AC130 Takedown Notice [BASHandSlash.com, thanks Sean H.]Redis is an in-memory key-value data store that provides a small number of primitives suitable to the task of building monitoring systems. As a lot of us are hacking in this space I thought I’d write a blog post summarizing where I’ve been using it in a little Sensu like monitoring system I have been working on on and off.
There’s some monitoring related events coming up like MonitoringLove in Antwerp and Monitorama in Boston – I will be attending both and I hope a few members in the community will create similar background posts on various interesting areas before these events.
I’ve only recently started looking at Redis but really like it. It’s a very light weight daemon written in C with fantastic documentation detailing things like each commands performance characteristics and most documantation pages are live in that they have a REPL right on the page like the SET page – note you can type into the code sample and see your changes in real time. It is sponsored by VMWare and released under the 3 clause BSD license.
Redis Data Types
Normal key-value storage where every key has just one string value
Hashes where every key contains a hash of key-values strings
Lists of strings – basically just plain old Arrays sorted in insertion order that allows duplicate values
Sets are a bit like Lists but with the addition that a given value can only appear in a list once
Sorted Sets are sets that in addition to the value also have a weight associated with it, the set is indexed by weight
Redis provides a few common data structures:
All the keys support things like expiry based on time and TTL calculation. Additionally it also supports PubSub.
At first it can be hard to imagine how you’d use a data store with only these few data types and capable of only storing strings for monitoring but with a bit of creativity it can be really very useful.
The full reference about all the types can be found in the Redis Docs: Data Types
Monitoring Needs
Monitoring systems generally need a number of different types of storage. These are configuration, event archiving and status and alert tracking. There are more but these are the big ticket items, of the 3 I am only going to focus on the last one – Status and Alert Tracking here.
Status tracking is essentially transient data. If you loose your status view it’s not really a big deal it will be recreated quite quickly as new check results come in. Worst case you’ll get some alerts again that you recently got. This fits well with Redis that doesn’t always commit data soon as it receives it – it flushes roughly every second from memory to disk.
Redis does not provide much by way of SSL or strong authentication so I tend to consider it a single node IPC system rather than say a generic PubSub system. I feed data into a node using system like ActiveMQ and then for comms and state tracking on a single node I’ll use Redis.
I’ll show how it can be used to solve the following monitoring related storage/messaging problems:
Check Status – a check like load on every node
Staleness Tracking – you need to know when a node is not receiving check results so you can do alive checks
Event Notification – your core monitoring system will likely feed into alerters like Opsgenie and metric storage like Graphite
Alert Tracking – you need to know when you last sent an alert and when you can alert again based on an interval like every 2 hours
Check Status
The check is generally the main item of monitoring systems. Something configures a check like load and then every node gets check results for this item, the monitoring system has to track the status of the checks on a per node basis.
In my example a check result looks more or less like this:
{ "lastcheck" => "1357490521", "count" => "1143", "exitcode" => "0", "output" => "OK - load average: 0.23, 0.10, 0.02", "last_state_change" => "1357412507", "perfdata" => '{"load15":0.02,"load5":0.1,"load1":0.23}', "check" => "load", "host" => "dev2.devco.net" }
This is standard stuff and the most boring part – you might guess this goes into a Hash and you’ll be right. Note the count item there Redis has special handling for counters and I’ll show that in a minute.
By convention Redis keys are name spaced by a : so I’d store the check status for a specific node + check combination in a key like status:example.net:load
Updating or creating a new hash is real easy – just write to it:
1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 def save_check ( check ) key = "status:%s:%s" % [ check. host, check. check ] check. last_state_change = @redis. hget ( key, "last_state_change" ) check. previous_exitcode = @redis. hget ( key, "exitcode" ) @redis. multi do @redis. hset ( key, "host", check. host ) @redis. hset ( key, "check", check. check ) @redis. hset ( key, "exitcode", check. exitcode ) @redis. hset ( key, "lastcheck", check. last_check ) @redis. hset ( key, "last_state_change", check. last_state_change ) @redis. hset ( key, "output", check. output ) @redis. hset ( key, "perfdata", check. perfdata ) unless check. changed_state? @redis. hincrby ( key, "count", 1 ) else @redis. hset ( key, "count", 1 ) end end check. count = @redis. hget ( key, "count" ) end
Here I assume we have a object that represents a check result called check and we’re more or less just fetching/updating data in it. I first retrieve the previously saved state of exitcode and last state change time and save those into the object. The object will do some internal state management to determine if the current check result represents a changed state – OK to WARNING etc – based on this information.
The @redis.multi starts a transaction, everything inside the block will be written in an atomic way by the Redis server thus ensuring we do not have any half-baked state while other parts of the system might be reading the status of this check.
As I said the check determines if the current result is a state change when I set the previous exitcode on line 5 this means lines 16-20 will either set the count to 1 if it’s a change or just increment the count if not. We use the internal Redis counter handling on line 17 to avoid having to first fetch the count and then update it and saving it, this saves a round trip to the database.
You can now just retrieve the whole hash with the HGETALL command, even on the command line:
% redis-cli hgetall status:dev2.devco.net:load 1) "check" 2) "load" 3) "host" 4) "dev2.devco.net" 5) "output" 6) "OK - load average: 0.00, 0.00, 0.00" 7) "lastcheck" 8) "1357494721" 9) "exitcode" 10) "0" 11) "perfdata" 12) "{\"load15\":0.0,\"load5\":0.0,\"load1\":0.0}" 13) "last_state_change" 14) "1357412507" 15) "count" 16) "1178"
References: Redis Hashes, MULTI, HSET, HINCRBY, HGET, HGETALL
Staleness Tracking
Staleness Tracking here means we want to know when last we saw any data about a node, if the node is not providing information we need to go and see what happened to it. Maybe it’s up but the data sender died or maybe it’s crashed.
This is where we really start using some of the Redis features to save us time. We need to track when last we saw a specific node and then we have to be able to quickly find all nodes not seen within certain amount of time like 120 seconds.
We could retrieve all the check results and check their last updated time and so figure it out but that’s not optimal.
This is what Sorted Lists are for. Remember Sorted Lists have a weight and orders the list by the weight, if we use the timestamp that we last received data at for a host as the weight it means we can very quickly fetch a list of stale hosts.
1 2 3 def update_host_last_seen ( host, time ) @redis. zadd ( "host:last_seen", time, host ) end
When we call this code like update_host_last_seen(“dev2.devco.net”, Time.now.utc.to_i) the host will either be added to or updated in the Sorted List based on the current UTC time. We do this every time we save a new result set with the code in the previous section.
To get a list of hosts that we have not seen in the last 120 seconds is really easy now:
1 2 3 def get_stale_hosts ( age ) @redis. zrangebyscore ( "host:last_seen", 0, ( Time. now. utc. to_i - age ) ) end
If we call this with an age like 120 we’ll get an array of nodes that have not had any data within the last 120 seconds.
You can do the same check on the CLI, this shows all the machines not seen in the last 60 seconds:
% redis-cli zrangebyscore host:last_seen 0 $(expr $(date +%s) - 60) 1) "dev1.devco.net"
Reference: Sorted Sets, ZADD, ZRANGEBYSCORE
Event Notification
When a check result enters the system thats either a state change, a problem or have metrics associated it we’d want to send those on to other pieces of code.
We don’t know or care who those interested parties are we only care that there might be some interested parties – it might be something writing to Graphite or OpenTSDB or both at the same time or something alerting to Opsgenie or Pager Duty. This is a classic use case for PubSub and Redis has a good PubSub subsystem that we’ll use for this.
I am only going to show the metrics publishing – problem and state changes are very similar:
1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 def publish_metrics ( check ) if check. has_perfdata? msg = { "metrics" => check. perfdata, "type" => "metrics", "time" => check. last_check, "host" => check. host, "check" => check. check }. to_json publish ( [ "metrics", check. host, check. check ], msg ) end end def publish ( type, message ) target = [ "overwatch", Array ( type ). join ( ":" ) ]. join ( ":" ) @redis. publish ( target, message ) end
This is pretty simple stuff, we’re just publishing some JSON to a named destination like overwatch:metrics:dev1.devco.net:load. We can now write small standalone single function tools that consume this stream of metrics and send it wherever we like – like Graphite or OpenTSDB.
We publish similar events for any incoming check result that is not OK and also for any state transition like CRITICAL to OK, these would be consumed by alerter handlers that might feed pagers or SMS.
We’re publishing these alerts to to destinations that include the host and specific check – this way we can very easily create individual host views of activity by doing pattern based subscribes.
Reference: PubSub, PUBLISH
Alert Tracking
Alert Tracking means keeping track of which alerts we’ve already sent and when we’ll need to send them again like only after 2 hours of the same problem and not on every check result which might come in every minute.
Leading on from the previous section we’d just consume the problem and state change PubSub channels and react on messages from those:
A possible consumer of this might look like this:
1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 @redis. psubscribe ( "overwatch:state_change:*", "overwatch:issues:*" ) do | on | on. pmessage do | channel, message | event = JSON. parse ( message ) case event [ "type" ] when "issue" sender. notify_issue ( event [ "issue" ] [ "exitcode" ], event [ "host" ], event [ "check" ], event [ "issue" ] [ "output" ] ) when "state_change" if event [ "state_change" ] [ "exitcode" ] == 0 sender. notify_recovery ( event [ "host" ], event [ "check" ], event [ "state_change" ] [ "output" ] ) end end end end
This subscribes to the 2 channels and pass the incoming events to a notifier. Note we’re using the patterns here to catch all alerts and changes for all hosts.
The problem here is that without any special handling this is going to fire off alerts every minute assuming we check the load every minute. This is where Redis expiry of keys come in.
We’ll need to track which messages we have sent when and on any state change clear the tracking thus restarting the counters.
So we’ll just add keys called “alert:dev2.devco.net:load:3” to indicate an UNKNOWN state alert for load on dev2.devco.net:
1 2 3 4 5 def record_alert ( host, check, status, expire= 7200 ) key = "alert:%s:%s:%d" % [ host, check, status ] @redis. set ( key, 1 ) @redis. expire ( key, expire ) end
This takes an expire time which defaults to 2 hours and tells redis to just remove the key when its time is up.
With this we need a way to figure out if we can send again:
1 2 3 4 def alert_ttl ( host, check, status ) key = "alert:%s:%s:%d" % [ host, check, status ] @redis. ttl ( key ) end
This will return the amount of seconds till next alert and -1 if we are ready to send again
And finally on every state change we need to just purge all the tracking for a given node + check combo. The reason for this is if we notified on CRITICAL a minute ago then the service recovers to OK but soon goes to CRITICAL again this most recent CRITICAL alert will be suppressed as part of the previous cycle of alerts.
1 2 3 def clear_alert_ttls ( host, check ) @redis. del ( @redis. keys. grep ( / ^alert: #{host}:#{check}:\d/)) end
So now I can show the two methods that will actually publish the alerts:
The first notifies of issues but only every @interval seconds and it uses the alert_ttl helper above to determine if it should or shouldn’t send:
1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 def notify_issue ( exitcode, host, check, output ) if ( ttl = @storage. alert_ttl ( host, check, exitcode ) ) == - 1 subject = "%s %s#%s" % [ status_for_code ( exitcode ), host, check ] message = "%s: %s" % [ subject, output ] send ( message, subject, @recipients ) @redis. record_alert ( host, check, exitcode, @alert_interval ) else Log. info ( "Not alerting %s#%s due to interval restrictions, next alert in %d seconds" % [ host, check, ttl ] ) end end
The second will publish recovery notices and we’d always want those and they will not repeat, here we clear all the previous alert tracking to avoid incorrect alert surpressions:
1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 def notify_recovery ( host, check, output ) subject = "RECOVERY %s#%s" % [ host, check ] message = "%s: %s" % [ subject, output ] send_alert ( message, subject, @recipients ) @redis. clear_alert_ttls ( host, check ) end
References: SET, EXPIRE, SUBSCRIBE, TTL, DEL
Conclusion
This covered a few Redis basics but it’s a very rich system that can be used in many areas so if you are interested spend some quality time with its docs.
Using its facilities saved me a ton of effort while working on a small monitoring system. It is fast and light weight and enable cross language |
, we would say, “You still gotta pray.” How is she going to escape? Wait til you see episode 8 and 9. I love the construction on it. You won’t believe what happens to her is all I’m going to say.
I remember you telling me that he would be wearing a black teddy over a denim shirt and I didn’t believe you. But he is. Where does this outfit come from?
Well, we get into this in the next episode. This is a serial killer with really really bad mommy issues. It’s explained and it’s somewhat chilling.
So will we meet Thredson’s mother in the flashbacks?
Somewhat. You don’t meet his mother but you meet his mother’s substitute. The one after this episode is called “The Origins of Monstrosity” so it’s a real origins episode for several characters, which include Thredson, Arden, the Monsignor. It really examines ‘”Where does evil come from?”
When Thredson sits Lana down and is feeding her wine, he says he can’t wait for her to tell his story. Does he want Lana to write about him?
Yes. The next episode there’s a flashback where you see that Lana has actually been in the same room with Thredson before. She didn’t know he was there but he overhears her ambitions about wanting to be a reporter so there’s a connection.
I love Paulson and Zach Quinto together because they’re really good friends in real life and then they have to do these horrifying scenes. I think they’re so good because these are two actors who are so comfortable with each other and are able to go to these places because they feel safe. Lana stuck in that lair is some of the most harrowing stuff we’ve done.
And you’ve told me it’s only going to get worse.
The next episode is probably the darkest episode we’ve ever done and I would say it’s the bottom. So from the bottom you start to climb up to the top.
Like Shelley climbing up those stairs!
Child’s play I say! Child’s play!
We talked about this last week but it’s so twisted and funny that Sister Eunice drops off Shelley in a child’s playground.
[Laughs] Because that’s what the devil would do!
And we see Shelley again next week right?
You do. You see Shelley in episode six along with Lily Rabe singing “You Don’t Own Me” to a crucifix.
Cromwell is getting seduced left and right on this show!
He is catnip to women on this show! He and Lily quickly become the Macbeths which I love.
This one felt very DePalma to me especially that final cross-cutting between Jude returning to her drinking ways and Anne Frank’s lobotomy.
Yes there’s definitely some DePalma stuff in there but I think what Alfonso was going for was a cross between Scorsese and a Douglas Sirk thing. I felt when I saw the first cut that it went into this great Far From Heaven/Douglas Sirk stuff that I loved. The next one has touches of that too. I think it’s the period. We were influenced by all of that.
I know you are involved in choosing all the Glee music—do you pick this music too?
You know I don’t. Our writers are so great. The person who picked out the music for this episode was really Jennifer Salt. When she was a little girl, her father — who was Waldo Salt the screenwriter — would play that song [that plays] at the end. So they write this stuff in and I usually leave it unchanged. There’s an episode coming up where Jessica Lange sings the 1964 Shirley Ellis classic “The Name Game” and I will take full credit for that. But other than that, that stuff is pretty specific. The writers are very good about that.
So what will Jude do now that she’s out of the asylum?
Well, at the end of this episode, she’s not really out. She’s a lady in search of a drink. In the next episode, she sobers up and she comes back looking for redemption and that’s when it all goes terribly awry. She’s slipped too far, that Sister Jude.
So it’s gonna get worse for Sister Jude, too?
Oh my God! This is like Disneyland compared to what happens. Jessica was really interested in tracing someone’s descent into madness. So that’s where we start.
Is Alma pregnant with an alien baby?
I’m not saying. Who’s to say that’s even real?
Okay, well, Grace appears to have been experimented on by the aliens. Is she pregnant with an alien baby?
I’m not saying that! I think it’s interesting the aliens come after Kit has sex with women. That’s a really good clue. People should look at that. There’s something about that.
Follow Tim on Twitter: @EWTimStackBecause of our Devcon 2013 meeting we were to busy to put up a decent monthly blog post. So let’s sum up the changes done so far after the September cyle.
September cycle
ActiveAE – A Simpler Approach to Audio
With the September month’s alpha, we are also excited to introduce ActiveAE, an engine for audio that’s based off AudioEngine but designed to be faster, simpler, and lighter on the CPU. ActiveAE relies on FFmpeg for audio conversion and is available now on Windows, Linux, BSD, and Android. Very early work exists to get it working on OSX too, though no set date exists for its incorporation.
Features of ActiveAE include its being an event-based system; CPU load is significantly reduced, allowing for implementation on weaker systems like Android; Resampler quality can be chosen; gapless playback is now working; and E-AC3 is supported. In addition, quite a lot of little, difficult to narrow down bugs have been tracked down and fixed, including code that reaches all the way into SSE. This hopefully solves the issues we had in our Frodo release that a minority of the users experienced and improves the audio experience in general.
The list of individuals responsible for all this work is quite extensive with pieces touched by nearly the entire team, including wiso’s work on Windows and Voyager’s work debugging SSE and giving feedback, not to mention input from almost everyone on the Audio Settings rewrite. Special mention should go to both FernetMenta and fritsch, who led the charge. Finally, an extra special thanks to the many users who provided testing and feedback in the ActiveAE testing thread. This work couldn’t have been done without you.
As a heads up for next month, we have also refurbished the audio settings to make them easier to configure. You’ll be able to see that work now in nightlies or in next month’s alpha.
Of course there were more changes, but those changes mostly contained code re-factoring/improvement and bugfixing.
A complete change log for the interested can be found here
October Cycle
Actually for October there isn’t much to report for new features added. This months list contains a whole list of code re-factoring/improvement and bugfixing which we don’t want to bore you with.
Android MediaCodec:
This allows native use of the Android API for video playback on Android 4.1 (and up) devices
Android x86 architecture support:
We already provided Android build that run on ARM architecture devices however from this month on we will also provide x86 architecture builds.
Ability to development on non-jailbroken devices:
This allows developers who have an Apple developer account (so not for regular users!) to be able to run and development XBMC on non-jailbroken devices. This is however without and video HW acceleration support. So again, this is NOT for normal users, only for developers.
Complete change log for the interested can be found here.
Dealing with OSX 10.9
As many of you may have experienced, 10.9 has caused a number of issues for our current releases. In addition to forcing us to prepare a 12.3 (coming soon), we’ve learned that 10.9 appears to have reset security settings. Now to install XBMC, you need to right click the application after it’s been installed and select “Open” from the list (this need only be done once).
Alternatively, you can go to System Preferences -> Security & Privacy -> General. From there, unlock the lock at the bottom of the window and “Allow apps downloaded from: Anywhere.” This second method is the preferred method, as you will no longer be bothered for future XBMC updates.
Conclusion
So if you feel you are ready to try out a monthly build, it’s time to start downloading. Be aware though, that this is still alpha software which contains potentially several bugs. There is a good chance that this alpha will break on you.
* Official XBMC downloads
Note: blog post image made by Schym Christian
How to Contribute
If you use these builds, we encourage you to submit bugs in Trac, provide support in our Forums where you can, or donate to the Foundation if you like. For a current FAQ on XBMC 13, visit our Gotham FAQ.If you've already forgotten the life lessons that Clarissa taught you when she explained it all, chances are you also forgot about some of your favorite '90s products.
See also: 4 chic alternatives to the sequin dress you wear every year
We've scoured the web to bring you the ultimate blast from the past. Warning: while some of these items will produce positive feelings of nostalgia others will leave you seriously questioning your judgment and life all together.
Grab your Tamagotchis and sticker books as we travel back in time.
Beauty
1. Toy finger tips
If your mom wouldn't let you wear press on nails, these plastic finger tips were the next best thing. Who cares if they didn't match your skin tone. You still looked totally cool.
2. Juice Bar body splash
100% all natural cotton candy. Paraben free, sulfate free, and gluten free. Not.
3. Tinkerbell cosmetics
When Tink wasn't hanging out with Peter Pan and the lost boys she was bottling her pixie dust and stocking your caboodle.
4. Punctuation perfume
From the decade that brought you the artist formerly known as Prince, we bring you "!"
5. Brown Bonne Bell lipstick
Say hello to the original #LipKitByKylie.
6. Malibu Musk
Because all premium body fragrances come in aerosole cans.
7. Sun In
When you weren't allowed to color your hair professionally, you soaked your locks in this stuff. After a few hours of baking in the sun the process was complete and you had rad uneven, brassy orange highlights.
8. Bath & Body Works glitter lotion
If your jellies have glitter your lotion should too.
Clothing
9. Shrunken shirts
When "one size fits all" meant you could share clothes with your American Girl doll.
10. Cropped sweater vests
Cropped sweater vests over long button down shirts were the ultimate styling trick.
11. Puffy paint tees
When DIY was called arts and crafts.
12. Bike shorts
Bike shorts were accepted as proper pants. Remembering this fact shines a whole new light on today's black leggings controversy.
13. School girl plaid
It didn't matter what school you attended, every girl in the '90s wore the same uniform.
14. White tees under sundresses
We had no qualms about showing off our midriffs but wouldn't dare expose our shoulders.
Accessories
15. Pacifier necklaces
These were the days before Posh Spice became Victoria Beckham and Baby Spice was everyone's favorite.
16. Elastic flatform sandals
No that's not a herd of clydesdales you hear, it's just every girl in school flipping and flopping her way to class.
17. Fluttering butterfly clip
Jiggly butterfly clips were Sky Dancers for your hair.
18. Clunky white Sketchers
Here we have Sketchers shape-ups' earliest prototype designed by aliens and the Spice Girls.
19. Bracelet pens
Wearable office supplies were the wearable tech of the decade.
20. Animal backpacks
When shoulders needed a break from JanSport backpacks, '90s kids toted their goodies in wearable teddy bears and unicorns.
21. Pocket critter key chain
Littlest Pet Shop, the travel edition.
22. Velvet chokers
Even though you were only 14 a black choker instantly transformed you into a sophisticated woman.
23. Plastic barrettes
Before we settled on butterfly clips, '90s kids gave every animals a chance.
24. Brown sandals
Weighing approximately 10 pounds each these clunky shoes made your feet smell like moldy salt and vinegar chips.
25. Stick-on earrings
During the height of the sticker book age even accessories were adhesive.
26. Inflatable purses
If pool floats could pass as acceptable living room furniture, why not carry a blow-up purse.
Ali Express
BONUS: 40 ridiculously expensive gadgets for the filthy richIt seems even a spaceship doesn't offer enough space for Apple. According to a report from the Silicon Valley Business Journal, the iPhone maker is in the process of securing a development agreement for a plot of land in San Jose that could hold a campus of up to 4.15 million square feet. By comparison, the Apple Campus 2 (the one with the ring-like spaceship design) takes up 2.8 million square feet of space, which is itself 230 percent bigger than the company's current headquarters at 1 Infinite Loop. Essentially, this new development in San Jose could be absolutely massive.
Unfortunately, this is pretty much all we known at the moment. As the Silicon Valley Business Journal explains, the deal is the latest in a string of sales and leases Apple has made in north San Jose, and the "work toward a development agreement is significant, as it shows Apple is working swiftly — and not piecemeal — to develop the site." However, it's not a done deal:
A development agreement is not an actual project, and does not guarantee all of that space will get built. Apple hasn’t said what it is eyeing the sites for, and it has not yet submitted a formal development proposal.
It's also unclear what purpose the land could be used for, with the development agreement covering a range of functions including "industrial development, including office, research and development, manufacturing and other related and supporting uses." The Business Journal suggests that manufacturing might be on the cards, perhaps even for Apple's electric car — currently predicted for a 2019 unveiling. However, with this much land, it really could be anything.On June 18th, 2015, we had the pleasure of meeting up with Yves Ballenegger from Groovy Yurts as they delivered three yurts to Paul Smiths College which is located near Lake Placid, NY. Bethany Garretson, a teacher at Paul Smiths, will be overseeing an off-grid project at the college where eight students will live in three yurts for the Fall semester. The students will be doing this to document the experience and for some class credit. At the time of delivery, the permitting process was not yet complete so the project for that day was to erect and disassemble one yurt for educational purposes so they could do it themselves once ready.
Even though I had never been to Paul Smiths before, it didn’t take long to find Yves. Who could miss this?
Years ago, Yves would deliver free school supplies to Mongolia via truck from Switzerland. After a while, he started bringing yurts back with him. They sold quickly. Yves now deals exclusively in authentic, hand made yurts produced in Northern Mongolia. He does business with a couple of local Mongolian families and travels there frequently every year. He has been working with the same community for about ten years. While there are other yurt companies offering imported yurts, quality control is always an issue. Yves feels it is important to create a working symbiotic relationship with his partners on an in person basis. Only in this way do you achieve quality, he believes. He falls perfectly into the stereotype of the “quality, quality, quality” demanding Swiss that he is. 🙂
Early on, many importers were bringing in low quality yurts, some which never even survived shipping and this gave traditional yurts a bad reputation. Yves has been working tirelessly to ensure better and better quality each year.
There are many materials that are not allowed to be exported from Mongolia so Yves has also spent a lot of time making sure that not only do they use quality materials, but also the appropriate ones.
The yurts are generally built by the males of the families, while the women do all of the painting and decoration of the structure. As seen in the next few pictures, their skills are masterful.
The wood is tamarack, white pine and other local woods. Traditionally, orange is the color used for yurts in northern Mongolia. They do however offer other colors upon request as you will see.
The Mongolians are a nomadic people, so each piece of the yurt needs to be light enough to be carried by one person. It is amazing that three yurts fit so well in the Groovy Yurts trailer.
After we got everything unloaded, we began putting up the lattice as the first step.
The hand split lattice is connected by using camel rawhide. Each section (or wall) of the yurt are connected using horse hair. The more sections you have, the larger the yurt. These three yurts are six walled. That equates to a yurt that is 21′ in diameter.
The next step is to connect the traditionally South facing door to the lattice. Each door is handmade and unique. This means you usually have to play with the process of attaching it to the lattice each time. After a few minutes, they got it set.
Once the lattice and other parts are temporarily reinforced with some rope, it is time to stand up the toono (center ring). The rafters will be inserted into holes that are carved directly into it.
Once standing, the rafters can be inserted.
It is touch and go at this point because you have to be careful not to push and pull on the center ring too much. It can cause the rafters you already put up to fall. The temporary ropes caught any that slipped during this setup. Fortunately the rafters are lightweight so they don’t stand much of a chance of seriously injuring anyone. After a bit of practice, we got this down to a science. 🙂
With 50% of Mongolians living in yurts, it is understandable that they have refined this design to such wonderful levels of simplicity.
This part of the process took maybe, 15-20 minutes to complete. It probably would have went quicker, but Yves was explaining each step to us which was terrific. He really has a passion for yurts and it came out clearly that day!
Here is a pic of the frame being completed. There is still some temporary rope bracing, but that comes off after we put up the fabric.
Alex is Yves’ right hand man when it comes to Groovy Yurts in this area of NY State. He helps run the Adirondack Wildlife refuge and rehab center in Wilmington NY. In this pic, he is putting up the liner. This is a necessary step because the next layer consists of 100% Mongolian sheep wool for insulation. A light, fluffy and hairy material, without a liner, you would be sneezing and itching every time you entered your yurt. Just like fiberglass insulation, it is better if you don’t come into direct contact with it frequently.
The wool yurt insulation.
We were fortunate it was not very windy that day. 🙂 Traditionally, the center of the yurt roof is open and a fire-pit is in the center of the room. The smoke would exit from the center. A positive part of this was that the smoke would eventually make the wool water resistant. Today however, most in Mongolia use small tin stoves. Since that is the case, the wool is no longer a water barrier. Many will use a construction wrap in this step. In America, think Tyvek or other similar materials. This keeps the water out. Since this was just a demonstration, we didn’t do that part. There is a technique that Yves and Alex use to layer the wrap in such a way that water will not enter the yurt. Though not technically a trade secret, it is one of those things you can only experience if you have a Groovy Yurt. 🙂
Now for the yurt cover. With help from my son Nicholas, they began rolling out the roof.
Just about done.
Traditional yurts like Groovy Yurts, do not have a rope or cable that sits in the lattice and connects to the rafters. Rather, the rafters are lightly fixed to the lattice with small pieces of horsehair rope. The support comes in the next step.
When the fabric is put on, horse hair rope is tied to each end of the door and cinched tight. These ropes are very tight and this is how the rafters are buttressed. It is an elegant design. There are valid arguments on both side about which does better supporting snow loads. If a yurt is occupied during a snowy season, the question is moot as the snow will melt off the structure daily.
While horse hair is the traditional rope used here, many Mongolians these days will use nylon ratchet straps for practical reasons. Like most nomads, they use what they can get their hands on. 🙂
Here are some views from the inside.
There is my cousin Karen holding open the inner door.
Here is Bethany inspecting our work. 🙂
We still have to put the roof cover on.
The cover is partially tied to the existing tension ropes. Alex and Nick are finishing it up.
It was warming up that day so Yves showed us one of the features that traditional yurts have that many engineered yurts do not: Yurt conditioning. 🙂 That is, you can pull up the fabric from the sides to let the cool air on the ground in. Since the warm air is rising out of the center ring, it creates a nice cooling draft.
After making sure we entered the yurt right foot first as custom dictates, Yves then removes the temporary ropes while he explains that in Mongolia, they do not secure a yurt to the ground. They believe they should do as little harm as possible to the Earth. However, since they live in very windy plains, they would tie the yurt in the center to a heavy object like a stone. Today they use practical things like an engine block or whatever else is handy. This keeps the yurt anchored in above average winds.
Finally, Yves gives Bethany the Khatag (pronounced Haa-Tahk). This is traditionally given as a gift with two hands in Mongolia. It is a symbol of good luck and respect. You usually tie it to a North facing rafter.
All together with Yves giving history and construction lessons, this took about two hours. My guess is, if it were just Yves and Alex working without interruption, they would have done it in about 45 minutes to an hour. Yves says that in Mongolia, they erect a yurt this size in about 30 minutes.
We tore down the yurt and stored it in their building and that took about maybe 30 minutes.
The rafters goes down much easier than they go up. 🙂
When we were done, there wasn’t a trace of the yurt left. It works as designed!
It was a fun time. Bethany and crew had to leave for other duties, but we did grab a picture of Yves, Jeff Capron (me), my son Nicholas and Alex in that order. Special thanks to my cousin Karen Capron for all the help and for taking the final pics!
I would like to personally thank Yves and Alex at Groovy Yurts, and Bethany from Paul Smiths for inviting us up to watch the yurt raising. If you are a yurt manufacturer and would like us to document one of your builds, please contact us!
UPDATE:
Bethany and crew finally got their blog about this project: Yurts & Dirt.By Michael Snyder - BLN Contributing Writer
Everything that you own is slowly being taken away from you. It is being done purposely and it is being done by design. Many Americans like to think of themselves as “well off”, but as will be demonstrated below, we don’t “own” nearly as much as we think that we do. The truth is that most of us have to frantically run around accumulating wealth as rapidly as we can so that we can somehow stay ahead of the rate that wealth is being taken away from us. The entire system is designed to take what you have away from you. There are many ways that this is accomplished – taxation, inflation, debt, interest, fines, fees, tickets, government seizures and good old-fashioned corporate greed. If you tried to just sit back and do nothing but hold on to the wealth that you already have you would find out that it would disappear rather quickly. When you take the time to really analyze our system the conclusion is undeniable – everything that you think that you own is being systematically taken away from you.
There is a reason why the wealthiest one percent of all Americans control 40 percent of all the wealth in the United States. The system is designed to funnel all of the wealth to them and to the government. Average Americans are experiencing a declining standard of living and it is not by accident.
Just check out some of the ways that our wealth is being taken from us….
#1 Do you think that you own your house? You might want to think again. Most Americans that “own a home” are paying a mortgage. If you stop paying that mortgage you will lose that home. Over a million American families were kicked out of their homes last year. This year a million more American families will get the boot.
But when those families get booted out onto the street they don’t get their down payments back. They don’t get all the mortgage payments that they have made back. The banks get to keep all of the money and all of the houses.
Perhaps you don’t have a mortgage. Does that mean that you “own your home”?
No, not really. Just refuse to pay your property taxes and watch what happens. At best you can say that you have the right to rent your home from the government.
In any event, the reality is that the banks now own more of “our homes” than we do. During the most recent recession, the total amount of U.S. home equity owned by the banks surpassed the total amount of U.S. home equity owned by the rest of us for the first time ever.
Things used to be far different in this country. Once upon a time American families owned most of the houses and most of the land in this nation.
But now the banks own most of it. Sadly, most American families that believe that they “own homes” are actually enslaved to 20 or 30 year debt contracts.
#2 Do you think that you own your car? You don’t own it if you are still making payments on it. If you stop making payments you will rapidly lose that car.
But even if your car is paid off, you can only operate that car if you do the following….
*You must pay the license fee
*You must pay the car registration fee
*You must pay the emissions inspection fee
*You must pay the property taxes on that car (if that applies in your area)
*You must pay the tire taxes
*You must pay the gas taxes
If you have paid all of those taxes, then you are permitted to drive only where the government allows you to drive and only under the rules that the government sets for you.
But at least you “own” your car, right?
#3 What about your possessions? Do you own them?
Well, yes, you probably own some possessions.
But that doesn’t mean that they are not enslaving you.
After all, did you use a credit card to pay for any of them?
If so, you could end up paying much more for your possessions than you originally thought that they cost.
For example, if you only make the minimum payment on your credit card each month, a $6,000 credit card bill could end up costing you over $30,000 (depending on the interest rate).
#4 Do you own your education? Well, it is undeniable that nobody can ever take it away from you. But if you took out student loans that debt may end up enslaving you for decades.
The borrower is the servant of the lender and student loan debt is more of a financial drain on Americans than ever before. Americans now owe more on student loans than they do on credit cards. As hard as that is to believe, that is actually true. Americans now owe more than $903 billion on student loans, which is a new all-time record.
#5 Will you protect your wealth if you put your money in the bank?
No, in fact your wealth will be systematically destroyed in the bank.
Inflation is a hidden tax on every single dollar that you own. It destroys the value of all dollars in existence. There are some Americans that have been saving money for decades, but those savings are being taxed into oblivion by inflation. Many experts are now projecting that the average price of a gallon of gasoline will hit $5 by the end of the year. So the next time you go to the gas pump just take a moment to think about how your wealth is being drained away by inflation.
#6 Insurance costs continue to soar. After insuring everything in our lives many of us barely have any money left over to actually live our lives with. In particular, health insurance premiums have become completely and totally ridiculous. According to the Los Angeles Times, Blue Shield of California plans to raise rates an average of 30% to 35%, and some individual policy holders could see their health insurance premiums rise by a whopping 59 percent this year alone. So how are American families supposed to survive if they keep on handing over bigger and bigger chunks of their income to thehealth care industry?
#7 State and local governments all over the nation have turned to ticket writing as a primary revenue source. In fact, in some areas of the country traffic citations are soaring at a crazy rate. For example, 110,000 more traffic citations were written in Los Angeles County last fiscal year than were written in the fiscal year immediately prior to the last recession.
The truth is that the police even realize what is going on. Just consider the following quote from from Police Chief Michael Reaves of Utica, Michigan….
“When I first started in this job 30 years ago, police work was never about revenue enhancement, but if you’re a chief now, you have to look at whether your department produces revenues.”
#8 Some states have decided to simply confiscate wealth even if nothing has been done wrong. For example, the state of California is aggressively seizing “unclaimed” safe deposit boxes. If you have a safe deposit box that you have not checked on in a while you might want to make sure that it is still there.
#9 You might end up losing your valuables when you cross the border. It is being reported that U.S. border agents are now regularly seizing laptops and other electronic devices as people cross the border. In many cases those items are never returned.
#10 If you don’t pay your property taxes, you will lose your house and it will likely be a big Wall Street bank that will be taking it from you. As I have written about previously, the big Wall Street banks are buying up thousands upon thousands of tax liens and are making a killing by socking distressed homeowners with predatory interest, outrageous penalties and almost unbelievable legal fees.
#11 Of course the biggest way that our wealth is being drained is through federal income taxes. The reason that the Federal Reserve and the IRS were established back in 1913 was to redistribute wealth. Wealth is transferred from the American people to the U.S. government and then ultimately to the elite and to the causes that the elite favor.
But federal taxes are only one of the taxes that we pay. The truth is that the average American pays dozens of different taxes each year. Just check out a few examples of the different taxes that drain our wealth….
#12 Accounts Receivable Taxes
#13 Building Permit Taxes
#14 Capital Gains Taxes
#15 CDL License Taxes
#16 Cigarette Taxes
#17 Corporate Income Taxes
#18 Court Fines (indirect taxes)
#19 Dog License Taxes
#20 Federal Unemployment Taxes (FUTA)
#21 Fishing License Taxes
#22 Food License Taxes
#23 Gasoline Taxes
#24 Gift Taxes
#25 Hunting License Taxes
#26 Inheritance Taxes
#27 Inventory Taxes
#28 IRS Interest Charges (tax on top of tax)
#29 IRS Penalties (tax on top of tax)
#30 Liquor Taxes
#31 Local Income Taxes
#32 Luxury Taxes
#33 Marriage License Taxes
#34 Medicare Taxes
#35 Payroll Taxes
#36 Property Taxes
#37 Real Estate Taxes
#38 Recreational Vehicle Taxes
#39 Road Toll Booth Taxes
#40 Road Usage Taxes (Truckers)
#41 Sales Taxes
#42 Self-Employment Taxes
#43 School Taxes
#44 Septic Permit Taxes
#45 Service Charge Taxes
#46 Social Security Taxes
#47 State Income Taxes
#48 State Unemployment Taxes (SUTA)
#49 Telephone federal excise taxes
#50 Telephone federal universal service fee taxes
#51 Telephone federal, state and local surcharge taxes
#52 Telephone minimum usage surcharge taxes
#53 Telephone recurring and non-recurring taxes
#54 Telephone state and local taxes
#55 Telephone usage charge taxes
#56 Toll Bridge Taxes
#57 Toll Tunnel Taxes
#58 Traffic Fines (indirect taxation)
#59 Trailer Registration Taxes
#60 Utility Taxes
#61 Vehicle License Registration Taxes
#62 Vehicle Sales Taxes
#63 Watercraft Registration Taxes
#64 Well Permit Taxes
#65 Workers Compensation Taxes
Even the future is being taken away from us. The future is literally being stolen from our children and our grandchildren. They will be inheriting the 14 trillion dollar (and still rising) national debt that we have accumulated. What we have done to future generations is unthinkable, and yet we continue to endlessly borrow more money. The Congressional Research Service estimates that the U.S. government will need to borrow $738 billion between April 1st and September 30th. Faith in U.S. Treasuries is falling so rapidly that now the biggest bond fund in the world, PIMCO, is actually shorting U.S. Treasuries.
When you base an entire economy on debt, eventually you end up withmoney problems that never seem to end. As a nation we are now enslaved to a vicious spiral of debt that is going to destroy everything that our forefathers worked so hard to build.
As the debt loads of our federal, state and local governments become even more burdensome, they are going to want even more money from us. For decades we gave in to new tax after new tax thinking that it would finally satisfy them. But it never seems to be enough. They always want more.
It is the same thing with the banksters. They are never satisfied either. They always want more assets and they always want more Americans to be enslaved to debt.
Unfortunately, most Americans are so caught up in the “rat race” that they never take much time to think about who designed the race or why they are running it.
Hopefully more Americans will wake up and will realize that our entire economy and our entire financial system need to be reformed. Our current system is inherently flawed and it will eventually impoverish the vast majority of us if we allow it to.Overwatch Hero Tier List and Meta Report: ZenyattaWatch
POW Sheet Announcement: V1.2 is Live! Updated for Win Share Tracking. Download here
Opening Thoughts
What’s up guys and gals, CaptainPlanet here to present the Overwatch Hero Tier List and Meta Report #21: ZenyattaWatch. As you may have guessed from this week’s title – the Overwatch Hero Meta has been taken hostage by Zenyatta and his evil brand of “peaceful” omnic wisdom. The basis of Zenyatta’s Meta dominance lies in one simple ability: Discord Orb. Discord Orb almost singlehandedly removed Pharah from the tournament scene and has caused various ripple effects that resulted in the largest grouping of Heroes in the F Tier since this Report’s inception. Who knew that 50 health was the only thing holding back the tide of “Dangerballs” flying back and forth across Maps?
There’s some hope on the horizon, however. I will be examining a few, non-Zenyatta Heroes who appear to demonstrate the beginning of trends that may react to the current, “warped” state of the Meta. Additionally, this Report will introduce a new way of analyzing the Meta by calculating “Win Shares” – leading to some very interesting observations regarding what worked, and what did not work in this week’s Eleague qualifiers. Let’s start on a more simpler note, however, with this week’s Tiers:
As always, Raw Data for this and subsequent charts can be found HERE. The data is now presented as separate sheets for each Map, for better and more detailed tracking. A Summary Sheet can also be found HERE but its much less pretty. REMINDER: This Data was collected from the Eleague Qualifiers Week 2 (NA + EU), where 1 Hero Limit, and Stopwatch Format was used for Payload Maps
THE TIERS
S Tier (>=95% Usage Rate*): Zenyatta, Lucio
A Tier (>80% Usage Rate):
B Tier (>50% Usage Rate): McCree, Zarya, Winston
C Tier (>20% Usage Rate): Genji, Reaper, Reinhardt, Tracer
D Tier (>5% Usage Rate): D.Va, Junkrat, Roadhog
F Tier (<5 % Usage Rate): Widowmaker, Ana, Soldier 76, Mercy, Symmetra, Bastion, Mei, Pharah, Hanzo, Torbjorn
*What is Usage Rate? For every match, I record the time spent on each Hero and divide it by that match’s total time duration. Each of these Data points (a number from 0-1) are then summed across all sides of all matches, then divided by the total number of sides and converted to a percentage to produce a Hero’s overall Usage Rate.
The Tier Ranges I’ve chosen** reflect different states of “Balance” in the Meta. This week, the Meta that is being analyzed is the Meta of 1 Hero Limit, and Stopwatch Scoring for successful attacks on Payload Maps.
S Tier “The Overpowered Heroes”
This week, the S Tier is the all Support Tier. Zenyatta and Lucio dominated the Healer slot in Overwatch lineups because they can do what other Heroes cannot: heal, dps, debuff, buff, and move all at the same time. Zenyatta and Lucio then destroyed all other Heroes in Usage because they have the two strongest non-Ultimate abilities in the game: Discord Orb and Speed Boost. Both of these abilities have existed ( |
Read on to find out what they tested, what the results have been so far, and view a map of their monitoring locations.
Fecal Bacteria
Fecal bacteria generally spikes to high levels after heavy rain events. These bacteria are found in untreated sewage as well as in pet and animal waste. During major storms, sewage infrastructure often malfunctions, causing an increase in untreated sewage entering our streets and waterways. Stormwater will also wash any pet waste on lawns into public waterways. Exposure to these bacteria can cause gastro-intestinal sickness and other health issues.
What our water quality monitors found:
In general, GBF volunteer water monitors have found that while most spikes in these bacteria occur after major rain events, they tend to die off within three to four days.
Bacteria sampling began this past Monday, September 4, after GBF opened its lab for processing. So far, the collected water samples have had low values of bacteria.
While it is almost certain bacteria levels were high right after Harvey, over a week has passed since the storm hit. This shows that bacterial runoff into the Bay is declining; Galveston Bay is beginning to bounce back from the damage inflicted by Harvey. Additionally, Harvey poured such an immense amount of water on the Houston area that the sheer volume of water could have further diluted some of the bacteria it washed into Galveston Bay, reducing its initial concentrations.
To date, the samples collected around Galveston Bay have had concentrations of bacteria between 10-40 Most Probable Number (MPN). The EPA limit that it considers safe for swimming is 104 MPN. While this is a good sign for Galveston Bay right now, these results may not be the same for many of Houston’s bayous, which are still being impacted by flood waters and have less of a potential for dilution. The flood waters in the bayous could potentially impact the Bay in the future.
Salinity
Plant and animal life within the Bay rely on a specific range of salinity; water that is too fresh makes it difficult for life to thrive in Galveston Bay. Water that remains too fresh or too salty will impact growth and reproduction rates, can increase the prevalence of disease, and can ultimately impact their survival.
What our water quality monitors found:
The low salinity values GBF volunteer monitors have found around the Bay have been less reassuring than bacteria level results. Galveston Bay’s waters are currently much more fresh than they should be. Much of the unprecedented amount of rainfall that Harvey dumped on the region is finding its way into Galveston Bay, diluting any saltwater entering from the Gulf of Mexico. Many volunteers have commented that salinity levels the past week have been the lowest they have ever seen in years of testing. This is not good for life in Galveston Bay.
Turbidity/Debris
Turbidity is how clear the water is. This can have an impact on planktonic and plant life in the Bay, which may impact the health of other animals as well.
What our water quality monitors found:
We are finding that an increase in particulate matter in the water is making the water less clear. Water levels are also higher than normal, and of course much more debris has been observed in the water. One water quality monitor even observed a plastic Barbie doll floating in the water at their site!Media playback is unsupported on your device Media caption Rape victim speaks out in hope of catching attacker
A woman who was raped by a stranger when she was eight years old has appealed for help to track down the man 20 years on from the attack.
She was subjected to a "prolonged and violent sexual attack" by a man in Newry, County Down, on 10 June 1994.
Police are treating the attack near Barcroft community centre as attempted murder.
She has urged anyone who did not speak to police at the time to do so now.
The woman, who did not want to be identified, spoke anonymously to the BBC about her memories of the attack, which left her traumatised.
Image copyright PSNI Image caption An artist's impression of the attack suspect as he appeared in 1994
She said she was making her way to play football at the community centre with a seven-year-old boy when they were approached by the man who asked them to help him find his younger brother.
The rapist was aged in his late teens or early 20s at the time of the attack.
The children went with the man into woodland behind the community centre, where he convinced them to take different routes through the trees.
The children became separated and the victim said that when the boy left the area, the man attacked and sexually abused her.
She said he had come prepared for the attack.
"He knew where he was going, so that does make me think it was a local person, or he hung about that area at the time," the victim said.
The rapist became more violent when the boy, who by that stage had become lost in the woods, began to shout the girl's name.
Image copyright PSNI Image caption Another image of the suspected attacker
She passed out when she was hit with a brick.
When she regained consciousness, she said the woods appeared "dark" and she started to panic and vomit.
Eventually, she crawled down the embankment and made her way to a nearby house, climbing over a garden fence.
The elderly couple who lived in the house with their daughter brought the child inside and called an ambulance.
The woman said she had childhood counselling and tried to move on with the rest of her life, but the investigation was reopened four-and-a-half years ago, when someone contacted police saying they knew the identity of the rapist.
The victim revisited the scene with detectives, but as yet, no-one has been brought to justice.
On Tuesday, the 20th anniversary of the attack, the police released two new images of the suspect.
Image copyright PSNI Image caption Police released an "age progression" image of the suspect as he may appear now
The woman said she wants to track down the attacker to prevent him repeating his crimes on others.
"I do get angry about it, thinking 20 years later he's still walking about you know? Is he still in this area? Does he know who I am now maybe?
"Stuff like that goes through your mind, especially now that I have children of my own."
The woman said her traumatic ordeal has made her anxious and "very protective" of her own children.
She added she would feel much safer if the rapist was caught.
"I wouldn't be as anxious as I am, and just to think, he did it to me 20 years ago - what he has he done in those 20 years? Has it done it to anybody else?"
The victim added that she wanted to get the rapist "off the streets and get the justice I deserve".James Avery
Born: 27-Nov-1948
Birthplace: Atlantic City, NJ
Died: 31-Dec-2013
Location of death: Glendale, CA
Cause of death: Complications of Surgery
Gender: Male
Race or Ethnicity: Black
Sexual orientation: Straight
Occupation: Actor
Nationality: United States
Executive summary: Philip Banks on Fresh Prince
Military service: US Navy (1968-69, Vietnam War)
Mother: Florence
Wife: Barbara (college dean, m. 1988, until his death)
University: BA Drama and Literature, University of California at San Diego
TELEVISION
The Closer Dr. Crippen (medical examiner, 2005-07)
That '70s Show Officer Kennedy (Kelso's instructor, 2004)
Soul Food Walter Carter (2001-03)
The Division Charles Haysbert (2001-02)
Sparks Alonzo Sparks (1996-98)
The Fresh Prince of Bel-Air Philip Banks (1990-96)
L.A. Law Judge Michael Conover (1988-92)
Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles Shredder (voice, 1987-94)
Rambo Turbo (1986)
FILMOGRAPHY AS ACTOR
Wish I Was Here (18-Jan-2014)
Call Me Crazy: A Five Film (20-Apr-2013)
Let the Game Begin (17-Jan-2010)
Divine Intervention (30-Nov-2007) · Rev. Clarence Matthews
Who's Your Caddy? (23-Jul-2007)
Danika (10-Jun-2006)
The Third Wish (22-Apr-2005)
Lethal Eviction (10-Mar-2005)
Wheelmen (2005) · Mr. Vice President
Hair Show (15-Oct-2004)
Raise Your Voice (8-Oct-2004)
Nancy Drew (15-Dec-2002)
Dr. Dolittle 2 (19-Jun-2001) · Eldon
Honeybee (12-Jun-2001)
Dancing in September (24-Feb-2000)
Epoch (2000) · Dr. Solomon Holt
Out in Fifty (1999)
The Prince of Egypt (16-Dec-1998) · Additional Voices [VOICE]
The Colony (21-Mar-1998) · Fred
You Lucky Dog (1998)
Spirit Lost (25-Mar-1997)
The Brady Bunch Movie (17-Feb-1995) · Mr. Yeager
Death of a Cheerleader (26-Sep-1994)
Little Miss Millions (1993)
The Linguini Incident (30-Oct-1991)
Shout (4-Oct-1991) [VOICE]
Beastmaster 2: Through the Portal of Time (23-Aug-1991)
Roe vs. Wade (15-May-1989)
License to Drive (6-Jul-1988) · Les' DMV Examiner
Nightflyers (23-Oct-1987) · Darryl
Three for the Road (10-Apr-1987)
Timestalkers (10-Mar-1987) · Blacksmith
Body Count (1987)
Sunday Drive (30-Nov-1986)
8 Million Ways to Die (3-Oct-1986)
Extremities (22-Aug-1986) · Security Guard
Condor (10-Aug-1986)
Stoogemania (Jun-1986)
Fletch (31-May-1985) · Detective #2
Appointment with Fear (1985)
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Submit a correction or make a comment about this profileWhat a strange thing it is to see my own memories harden into history, and what is, for me, a vivid and living experience, turn into a blurred and fading piece of film.
Half a century ago, at my strict-regime boarding school on the edge of Dartmoor, we were let off our normal Saturday-morning lessons of Latin grammar, French vocabulary, rivers and capitals of South America, mostly taught by fierce, bristling gents with military or naval ranks.
Instead, we were instructed to sit in rows on hard chairs as the school’s one small black-and white TV set was hoisted on to a high shelf. And for three utterly memorable hours, we watched in silence as the funeral of Sir Winston Churchill passed slowly through London.
Outside (and no opportunity was normally missed to make us go outside) it was a freezing day of steely skies and pitiless winds, no small matter if you were forced to wear short trousers, as we all were. Inside, in the comparative warmth, most of us were, I think, mesmerised, so that we forgot we were watching on a screen not much bigger than a breadboard. I certainly saw and remembered the event as a huge panorama.
Afterwards, we knew, quite simply, that something important had passed from the earth forever, and that our small country was diminished and bereft. Nobody who came afterwards would be as we had been before we watched it. By comparison, the assassination of President Kennedy is nothing in my recollections.
This week, I managed to watch a rare, hard-to-find recording of Sir Winston’s funeral. It is the wrong shape for a modern TV screen, and sometimes the picture swims or blurs. It is, of course, in black and white, but that only increases the feeling that you are watching something impossibly long ago.
The London of January 1965 is almost as distant from me now as the outbreak of the First World War was from us then. Most of the people who appear in the film are now dead, or impossibly old.
The actual procession looks, at many moments, like one of those jerky old films from the Austro-Hungarian empire that they show to illustrate how hopelessly old-fashioned the pre-1914 world is.
Bluejackets in the sort of uniforms they wore at Jutland pull the gun carriage on which the heavy coffin rests (a tradition in state funerals since the army’s horses kicked over the traces at Queen Victoria’s obsequies, and sailors ran forward to take over the task).
The cortege moves at a mesmerizing slow pace, swaying strangely to the music of a dozen military bands, thumping out dirges - occasionally interrupted by those uniquely British parade-ground yells, echoing for miles in the freezing air, as sergeant-majors keep their men in line.
The male members of the Churchill family walk behind the coffin, wearing what must surely be the last black silk top hats seen in London, like a Bolshevik caricature of greedy capitalists. Lady Churchill, vastly veiled in black, rides in an enormous, sombre coach (lent by the Royal Family but not from their better-known fleet of gilded and pretty carriages).
The coachman riding atop it is cloaked and muffled like something out of the Pickwick Papers, reaching back into a past that some of those present would still just have remembered. From even further back come the Heralds of the College of Arms, most of them ancient men on sticks, looking a little like animated playing-cards in their mediaeval tabards.
A huge drum-horse, loaded with war-drums, leads the bands as its ancestor must have done at Blenheim and Waterloo. The dead man’s orders and medals, borne on cushions, are carried behind him and arrayed by his coffin when it reaches St Paul’s Cathedral, where it is greeted by a man holding up the City of London’s mighty, ancient, black Sword of Mourning.
It is all so old that it was archaic in 1965, and I doubt it could be done now with a straight face. Yet it would have been as normal in Winston Churchill’s youth as it is outlandish now.
The sense of a last moment of something that is passing is emphasized by the figure of the Queen, not as she is now, the nation’s favourite grandmother, but a woman coming to the end of her youth, worn by cares and powerfully moved by the heavy panoply and drapery of death on display. Beside her, Prince Charles is still an awkward schoolboy.
But in one way the most moving faces are those in the crowds – of men and women then young, now pensioners, and above all, those of the soldiers in the bearer party who struggle, with increasing strain and tension, to lift, carry and lay down the immense weight of the leadlined oaken coffin.
These are the days before pizza, milkshakes and sugary drinks fattened and blurred all our features into a bland and puffy sameness. They all look so British, in a hollow, hungry, wartime way, that it almost breaks the heart to see them. The country they and grew up in has entirely ceased to exist.My first job in technology was a QA internship. The summer between my freshman and sophomore years, I tested the first release of Paradox for Windows at Borland.
As an intern, I started by following someone else’s QA test plan – dutifully checking each test off the list. After a few weeks, I knew my particular area inside and out. A new build would show up, which I’d install via 3.5-inch floppies, and in ten minutes of usage, I’d have a sense – is this a good or bad build?
In QA, there is a distinct moment. It comes once you’re deeply familiar with your product or product area; it comes when you’re lost in your testing, and it comes in an instant. You find a problem, and because of your strong context about your product, you definitely know: Something is seriously wrong here.
Where’s QA?
At the current gig, there’s no QA department. QA as an independent function does not exist and that’s a first for me.
Every company I’ve ever worked at, for the better part of two decades, whether consumer or enterprise software, has had a well-staffed QA function. I’m told this absence is not unique in the Valley. I’m told that both Facebook and Twitter don’t have a QA entity.
Similarly experienced co-workers keep asking, “Shouldn’t we have a QA function?” and while my instinctive response is an emphatic “Yes”, as a member of a rapidly-evolving profession, I need to be open to the idea that software development evolves in ways that may seem counter-intuitive to me. The fact that the team and the company have been successful sans QA is essential and interesting data.
My thesis regarding the necessity of QA has always been: checks and balances. A healthy development team was one that had engineers doing their best to build a great product. These engineers were paired with a team of QA engineers who were doing their best to prove the product wasn’t great. These conflicting goals result in what I consider to be an essential healthy tension between engineering and QA.
Yes, there is often professional conflict between the teams. Yes, I often had to gather conflicting parties together and explain that, “You are both doing your job. No, engineers are not deliberately creating bugs. No, QA is not hating on the product. Yes, we actually have the same goal: rigorously confirming whether or not the product is great.”
The absence of this healthy tension concerns me, but more worrisome is the absence of the practices a thriving QA function builds and maintains. These practices are still with me and are essential to defining and maintaining a high quality product.
They are:
Do I understand the issue?
It’s natural to get rage when software doesn’t work, especially when you paid your hard-earned money to purchase it. Rage is counterproductive to the QA mindset. In fact, it hinders it. The QA reaction to defects is curiosity: Whoa, whoa. Wait, what happened there…? And what follows is a series of interrelated questions that build on each other.
Can I reproduce it? Does it happen every time? What was I doing right before the situation occurred? If there is a crash, does the crash log offer any clues? Based on my knowledge of the product and the code, do I have a hypothesis as to why this might be happening?
In the last decade, software companies have made the process of capturing crashes stunningly easy thanks to the Internet. When your application or operating system crashes, you often receive a dialog delicately apologizing for the crash and asking if you want to submit a crash report. Usually you are asked if you want to add any additional information, and usually you don’t do this, which leads us to…
Can I effectively report the issue?
In this world of auto-submitted crash reports, we the customers have little incentive to provide any information beyond the crash report because we’re mad. Our software crashed, our game was interrupted, our document was lost, value was not delivered. The QA mindset dictates that “Any additional informational, however seemingly trivial, might aid in the resolution of the issue.”
You probably do not take the time to add any additional information when these crashes occur, or if you do, it’s full of rage: “JUST TRYING TO GET WORK DONE HERE PEOPLE.”
Some bugs are slippery. They exist at the intersection of improbable and unthinkable. This is why these bugs are discovered in the wild. Humans do strange shit to software that we could never predict in the controlled setting of our carefully constructed software development environments.
Slippery bugs are a mystery, and there is initially no telling what contributing factors are relevant. In my time in QA, for issues that were hard to reproduce, we prided ourselves on documenting everything, however irrelevant, that might have lead to the crash. Totally clean OS – just installed. Wired connection, wireless disabled. No virus software. All files are local.
You’re not going to do this because you don’t perceive that you have skin in the game. You’re correctly assuming that part of what you were paying for is quality, and you likely haven’t been in QA. You likely haven’t received that mail in the middle of the night from the development team, who has been chasing that slippery bug for the past two weeks where they ask, “Can you try this patch? We think we fixed your bug.”
And they did. Because you took the time to think before you submitted your report, which leads us to our last part of the QA mindset…
Do I perform these actions unfailingly?
The last QA dictate is the most important and the least likely one that you perform. The last dictate is: “In the face of a problem, do you act to correct it? Unfailingly?”
There’s a bias towards system and applications crashes in the observations above because these crashes are the defects that give us the most rage. And while identifying and fixing these crashes is an obvious high priority, there’s a whole other class of defects of equal priority that are less obvious.
My favorite internal application at Apple is a product called Radar. It’s a Cocoa application that served as our bug tracking system, and if you wanted to know what was going on regarding a specific application at Apple, you went to Radar.
For many groups at Apple, Radar was religion. An issue regarding a product was not considered to exist until it was in Radar. If someone asked me, “Have you seen this bug in your product?” My immediate response was, “Is this in Radar?” “No.” “We’re not talking until you’ve filed Radar.” Case closed. For now.
The unfailing rules were:
If you see something wrong in the product – however big or small, report it as best you can.
It is good form to take the time to report the issue as descriptively and thoroughly as possible, but it is more important to report the issue.
It is also good form to check if the issue has been reported by someone else, but it is more important to report the issue.
When the issue is reported as fixed, take the time to confirm it as such, because more often than not, it’s not and/or it created another related issue.
Failure to follow these rules will be met with an immediate reminder of the aforementioned rules.
For the teams that unfailingly followed these rules, Radar became a powerful tool because it became a credible source of truth regarding the product. The answer to the question, “How is the product doing?” wasn’t an annoyingly vague, “I’m feeling good about it.” The answer was, “We’re fixing critical issues at a rate of 1 issue per engineer per day. We’ve got 14 engineers, we’ve got 308 issues, which means if no issues arrive, we’ve got 22 days of work. Except our arrival rate is 7 a day and it’s increasing. Also, next time you want to know this data, here’s the query you run. Stop wasting my time.”
You are sensing rage in my answer because I’ve spent a career surrounded by well intentioned humans who believed that it was QA’s job to file bugs, and the fact is that quality is a feature, so like it or not, everyone is in the QA department.
QA is a Mindset
In a pre-Internet world, one of the key reasons for a well-defined quality assurance team was the cost of distribution. When you released software, it required producing a pretty shrink-wrapped box full of disks and documentation. This was expensive to build and ship. More importantly, the infrequent yearly release of this shiny box was the sole yearly opportunity to get your software in front of your customers. It could be upwards of a year before you had a chance to right your buggy wrongs.
Thankfully, blissfully, this is no longer the world we live in. At the current gig, we’re releasing the website a couple times a day. We’re releasing apps at a slower pace, but when I say slower pace, I’m talking days… not months… never years. Perhaps our collective ability to not only rapidly detect, but also fix issues within our products, has made us less dependent on relying on an independent QA function?
My concern is that the absence of QA is the absence of a champion for aspects of software development that everyone agrees are important, but often no one is willing to own. Unit tests, automation, test plans, bug tracking, and quality metrics. The results of which give QA a unique perspective. Traditionally, they are known as the folks who break things, who find bugs, but QA’s role is far more important. It’s not that QA can discover what is wrong, they intimately understand what is right and they unfailingly strive to push the product in that direction.
I believe these are humans you want in the building.In the teaser, about halfway through, was an image of a skinny, pale woman with a mass of tangled, strawberry-blonde hair on her head. Immediately, we thought it could be Suicide Squad member and Batman villain Harley Quinn.
A great many of our readers thought the same.
Comicbook.com reached out to Arrow Executive Producer Marc Guggenheim about the buzz online, told him that our readers were really excited by the prospect that Harley Quinn was shown in the trailer for the "Suicide Squad," and included a link to our previous, speculative story on the matter. His response?
This tickles me no end. I'll tell you two things: 1) this is NOT the special announcement -- that's episode 219 and this is 216 2) to paraphrase Aaron Sorkin: "There's gonna be an episode of Arrow. I'd watch."
The second point, it's worth noting, is a reference to "Two Cathedrals," an episode of The West Wing. The second season finale, which dealt with the President's hidden Multiple Sclerosis and the death of a beloved supporting character, it's one of the most acclaimed single episodes of TV of all time. During his Inside the Actors Studio episode, series star Martin Sheen was told by host James Lipton that this was "one of the best episodes in the history of American television." So, all in all, not a bad reference to drop.Get the biggest daily news stories by email Subscribe Thank you for subscribing We have more newsletters Show me See our privacy notice Could not subscribe, try again later Invalid Email
Experts are rushing to examine thousands of prehistoric footprints discovered on a popular tourist beach near Southport - before they are swept away.
More than 50 human footprints, dating back 7,000 years, have so far been discovered on Formby Beach, as well as thousands of prints from red deer, wild boar, crane and now-extinct aurochs.
A team from Manchester University, who have described the remarkable discovery on the 90m stretch "like a who’s who of the Mesolithic period," say they need to gather the prints quickly before they are removed by the tide, wind and sand.
The National Trust says Formby Beach has one of the fastest changing coastlines out of the 775 miles it looks after - making the need to gather the remarkable discoveries more pressing.
A spokesman said: “A superb sediment bed full of prehistoric footprints on Formby beach is currently being studied by a team from Manchester University.
(Image: Southport Visiter)
(Image: Southport Visiter)
“Led by archaeologist Alison Burns, who wrote our guides to Fort Crosby and the Prehistoric Footprints at Formby, the team have already logged 58 human footprints and over 2,000 Red Deer prints, frozen for thousands of years in the dried mud.
Read more:
Scientists find 12,000 year-old frozen cave lion
“The bed, which is over 90m long, stretches like a who’s who of the Mesolithic period along the beach - incredible.
(Image: Southport Visiter)
(Image: Southport Visiter)
“The trails of aurochs, crane and wild boar have also been found, with the team planning on measuring and logging everything on the site over the next week.
Read more:
“A window into prehistory - walking alongside it and seeing the imprints of human toes, or the vast “plinth” tracks of mighty aurochs is a remarkable experience
(Image: Southport Visiter)
(Image: Southport Visiter)
“All too soon though the tide, wind and sand will claim them - but not before Alison and the team have recorded what’s there for posterity.”
Read more :
Aurochs are an extinct type of wild cattle that used to be found in Europe, Asia and north Africa, and were last seen in Europe in the 17th century.
(Image: Southport Visiter)
Formby Beach has a colourful history, which includes links to the asparagus growing trade and the early days of aviation.Tried to clean the kitchen sink so many time with no result?! No worry, I have the perfect solution for you. A DIY idea that will clean your sink efficiently and also will help you get rid of the many germs. And this DIY home project is chemicals free, meaning you won’t be using any of those expensive solutions that you can buy from the store. Make your sink look as new just by following a few simple steps.
You will need the following supplies: baking soda, salt (use rock salt), dish liquid soap (the one that you use), vinegar, lemons, a toothbrush, a sponge and clean cloth’s.
Follow the instructions: Start by wetting the sink surface. Take the baking soda and add it on the wet surface. Use the sponge and start brushing the sink surface. You will see that the baking soda and the water will become a paste. Leave it for approx. 5 minutes. Use plenty of water and rinse the sink surface. Now take the toothbrush and clean the caulk seal of the sink. Use once again baking soda and scrub the caulk seal very well. Rinse again with lots of water. If you want you can repeat the procedure. Use a big cloth and soak it in vinegar. Cover the bottom of the sink with the cloth. Let everything sit for approx. 20 minutes. Take out the cloth, use the sponge and soap to clean the bottom of the sink and plenty of water to rinse. Now all you have to do is to take the lemons, cut them into pieces and add them in the caulk seal. Turn on the warm water and also the garbage disposal. By adding the lemons into the caulk seal, your drain will be clean and also it will smell nice. Enjoy!!!
Note: Do not add ammonia or bleach on your stainless steel sink. It will do a lot of damage to the sink.
Photo Courtesy: https://www.pinterest.com5. Weapons
Heavy Machinegun
Super Shotgun
Super Nailgun
Tri-Bolt
Okay, now for the holy trinity of Quake weapons. Try to get a hold of these at all times.
Rocket Launcher
Does not make sound when equipped.
Very good for spamming spots where you expect an enemy to show up;
Splash damaging multiple enemies in an area;
Rocket jumping;
But most importantly: launching your opponent in the air to make them vulnerable. After you do that, you should quickly switch to your Lightning Gun (or Rail Gun if you're feeling lucky) and burn them down while they're in air and moving in a predictable pattern. This works super well against someone like Anarki: you set up an ambush somewhere around a corner and just do that RL+LG combo.
Direct rockets may sound tasty and they can kill weakened enemies in 1 shot, but generally, you should always be aiming at a surface next to your enemy (floor, walls) to deal splash damage since that's more reliable.
Don't just spam rockets when fighting someone (and not denying an area). For example, when you see them jump, aim at the spot where they're going to land and shoot there, instead of holding m1 and aiming sporadically.
How to dodge: Try to stay away from the attacker to get as much time to react to the incoming rocket as possible.
Or, instead, go as close or past them to make them deal self damage.
Don't jump around unless you time your jumps to get away from damage.
Stay on the highground.
Lightning Gun
Works great against tanks / big hitboxes.
Has knockback.
Makes a buzzing sound when equipped.
Best usage is against someone mid-air (especially on a jumppad), when you can easily track their movement trajectory and dish out a ton of damage.
When you're fighting someone who's trying to dodge your LG, try to synchronize your strafes with theirs instead of just using your mouse to aim.
How to dodge: Don't jump. Please.
Pull out your Rocket Launcher and try to bounce your opponent and throw his aim off.
Strafe left and right a little bit and figure out your opponent's sensitivity. If he overshoots when you're doing small strafes, his sens is high and just keep doing that. If he's hitting you, try to go for longer strafes.
Rail Gun
Try not to use it at close range at all, if you miss your shot you're probably dead.
Always have cover next to you that you retreat in after the shot.
If you expect or know someone's coming from a certain angle, be sure to zoom in to charge additional 10 damage to your shot.
Regardless of the badge they give you for headshots, they deal no bonus damage.
How to dodge: Strafe like a madman and stop occasionally to throw your opponent's aim off.
You can actually just stand still when their Rail Gun is recharging and start do sidestrafes right before it's back up.
Once again, always have cover. If you need to go through the area you can bait out a shot by a very quick peek from it and then go where you need.
Okay, this should be all for the weapon info (apart from the Gauntlet that deals 75 damage per hit). However, there's one important thing I have to adress: weapon switching.
10 / 15 (with zoom)It's hitscan, good at any range. Gets more accurate but fires slower in zoom mode. Really good at finishing weak enemies off or when combined with quad damage.6*20Close-range dominator. Favors flick-style aiming rather than tracking your target. There's definitely a lot of downtime between shots, so you'd better make them count. Works well when you want to ambush someone who's chasing you behind a corner.20Oof. Essentially a copy of the Plasma Gun from Q3. Shoots projectiles at a very fast rate of fire. Situational, but it excels at area denial, especially against someone with big hitboxes. Know someone's running around the Rocket Launcher spawn on Blood Covenant? Spam that corridor and let them know about nine inch nails.3 * 10 / 40 (for a direct hit)The newest addition to the gun roster. Fires 3 projectiles in an arch trajectory that explode after a little bit. It's decent, good for area denial, especially on Blood Run. You can also perform jump boosts with it, including one to Heavy Armor also on Blood Run.100 / 1-100 (direct / splash)THE weapon. Projectile-based, super versatile.It's a hitscan close/mid range beam that can completely melt your opponent if used correctly.80 / 90 (withzoom)Deadly accurate hitscan weapon that's mostly meant for long-range engagements. Very long downtime between shots.Time to put those keybinds we've made to good use! The environments and the conditions you fight in constantly change, so be sure to always have the right weapon equipped. Eventually you'll figure out what works where and when, and it's never too late to switch to a weapon you want to use in the fight.And that brings me to how it works.This is done to counter stupid stuff like shooting with a Rail Gun, switching back and forth and shooting it again instantly. So, while it may be fast to switch from something like a Lightning Gun and even Rocket Launcher (due to their rate of fire), the downtime between shots on the Rail Gun and Super Shotgun is pretty significant. So just be aware of that.The Oregon Department of Fish and Wildlife will scrap its latest strategy to free up water for a Nestle bottled water plant in Cascade Locks, in favor of an approach that lets regulators consider the public impacts of relinquishing water in the midst of a drought.
Oregon Gov. Kate Brown on Friday sent a letter to department director Curt Melcher, asking him to withdraw the agency's application to trade part of its water right at Oxbow Springs in exchange for an equal portion of Cascade Locks' municipal water supply.
If the Oregon Water Resources Department approved the trade, Cascade Locks would sell the spring water to Nestle, which would bottle and sell 100 million gallons annually under the Arrowhead brand.
Rick Swart, a spokesman for the fish and wildlife department, said the agency will comply with Brown's request.
The proposed water rights swap represented a departure from the strategy city and state officials had previously pursued, in which they would maintain their respective water rights and trade the water itself, drop-for-drop.
Nestle officials touted the water rights swap as a faster route to the same goal: freeing up water for the company to buy. But the new approach also would have drastically limited the Nestle opponents' ability to fight the deal.
While state water regulators must consider the potential public impacts of allowing drop-for-drop water swaps, they have no such obligation pertaining to water rights swaps.
Brown's spokeswoman, Kristen Grainger, said Friday the governor's push to foster transparency in state government and her concerns about Oregon's ongoing drought spurred her to make Friday's request.
"She thinks it's really important that proposals that affect a publicly held water right be subject to the review process that offers the greatest opportunity for public involvement," Grainger said.
The governor also sent a letter to the Oregon Water Resources Commission, asking its members to address the broader issue of how the state should consider requests to relinquish state-held water rights.
It's unclear how Brown's new stance could impact Nestle's plans to set up shop in Cascade Locks.
David Palais, a spokesman for Nestle, expressed disappointment about Brown's request, saying it will "further delay much-needed economic development in Cascade Locks."
In addition to creating up to 50 jobs, city officials estimate the plant would nearly double Cascade Locks' annual property tax revenue.
Palais said company representatives will sit down with Cascade Locks city and port officials to "evaluate the impacts" of Brown's letter.
City officials could not be reached for comment late Friday afternoon.
Controversy erupted soon after the company expressed interest in building a $50 million bottling plant in the small Columbia River Gorge town, but the company's critics seemed to multiply in recent months.
Leadership from |
results among deep learning approaches + more natural looking results than SRCNN
– strong artifacts + state‑of‑the‑art results
– long inference Figure 5: Advantages and disadvantages of the models discussed
Even a simple three layer SRCNN was able to beat most non‑deep‑learning methods when measured on standard benchmark datasets using PSNR. Our examinations of perceptual loss showed, however, that this measure is not perfect for evaluating our model’s performance, as we were able to produce visually appealing images that were much worse than bicubic interpolation when evaluated with PSNR. Finally, we reimplemented SRResNet and reproduced state‑of‑the‑art results on benchmark datasets.
References
[1] Image Super‑Resolution Using Deep Convolutional Networks
[2] Perceptual Losses for Real‑Time Style Transfer and Super‑Resolution
[3] Photo‑Realistic Single Image Super‑Resolution Using a Generative Adversarial Network
[4] Enhanced Deep Residual Networks for Single Image Super‑Resolution
[5] Real‑Time Single Image and Video Super‑Resolution Using an Efficient Sub‑Pixel Convolutional Neural Network
[6] Training and investigating Residual NetsPhotograph by Kenishirotie / Shutterstock
The conventional wisdom of how most of us should invest our money is clear—avoid paying high fees to money managers for their supposed stock-picking expertise. In fact, steer clear of single stocks altogether, and simply buy “the market,” meaning an exchange-traded or mutual fund that passively tracks the performance of the entire stock market. And, maybe most important, focus on the long run, by holding investments through their ups and downs rather than trying to time the market by buying low and selling high—too tricky to do, say the experts.
This is good advice, as far as it goes. (And, for what it’s worth, I follow it myself, mostly.) On the other hand, a big pillar supporting it is the “efficient markets hypothesis,” economist-speak for the assumption that the prices of tradable assets like stocks, bonds, and commodities respond immediately and appropriately to new information, an assumption that depends on market participants, in other words people, acting rationally. Here, “acting rationally” means maximizing one’s return for a given level of risk, something economists call “mean-variance optimization.”
This hypothesis, if true, makes stock picking, timing highs and lows, or any other technique, powerless to beat the recommended strategy of simply buying and holding “the market.”
On the other hand, we know that some small percentage of people (think Warren Buffett, and a handful of other superstars) do regularly beat the market. And that the efficient market hypothesis’ picture of people as perfectly rational robots is, at best, an approximation that conflicts with the reality of irrationally exuberant rallies, market crashes in the absence of bad news, or any of Keynes’ animal spirits that all too often drive human behavior and with it that of the markets.
“Put less money into equities when markets are freaking out and leave money in equities when markets are more normal.”
In his new book, Adaptive Markets: Financial Evolution at the Speed of Thought, M.I.T. finance professor Andrew Lo attempts to account for the messier, more feeling realities of human behavior. A key premise is that markets evolve, like species, but much faster: “evolution at the speed of thought.” And that this evolution happens in fits and starts, in response to changes in the environment—hence, what he calls the “adaptive” markets hypothesis. It’s during these times of change that human emotions play their biggest role. Lo believes we are in one of those times now and, in his book, he applies biology, psychology, neuroscience, and history toward the goal of improving on the efficient markets hypothesis—which, Lo says, is not only flawed but is becoming increasingly so as the financial environment continues to change.
I spoke to Professor Lo on the phone one recent evening and he fervently held forth on these ideas. He thinks they support a new conventional wisdom around investing that is more in line with the realities of human behavior.
Why is the efficient markets hypothesis becoming more flawed over time?
Over the last few decades, the environment in which financial markets operate has been changing more rapidly than before. We have a larger population of financial market participants. By larger population, I mean two things. One, the world population has grown, and secondly globalization has allowed capital flows to occur more seamlessly between countries. We have French investors investing in Europe’s residential real estate during the financial crisis because the mutual funds and international holdings and capital flow restrictions are being eased; you’ve got a changing set of species that are participating in financial markets. You also have improvements in technology, so that the world is now much more globally connected than it was before thanks to social media, telecommunications, and so on.
That’s one of the reasons the approximation errors of the efficient markets hypothesis are growing. The hypothesis isn’t wrong, it’s just incomplete. It’s not the complete picture of how humans behave and how they interact with each other in financial markets. My assumption had been that maybe markets are not that efficient at some points, but things should be getting more and more efficient over time. Right? That’s what we learn about how competition works. It wasn’t until I started looking at the data over long expanses of history that it became clear to me that, very much like evolution, it’s not necessarily the case that species get more and more adapted to a given environment. That’s only true if the environment doesn’t change.
But it does change. The exceptions to the efficient markets hypothesis really come about when its standard assumptions are violated. The assumptions include things like stationary business environments, where the risks are relatively well known and humans act relatively rationally, at least from a mean-variance optimization perspective.
How does the adaptive markets hypothesis address the shortcomings of the efficient markets hypothesis?
It’s actually pretty straightforward. What I lay out [in the book] is basically what you would guess if you took the basics of evolutionary theory and extended them to the very special circumstances of financial markets. The efficient markets hypothesis is a special case of adaptive markets. Markets are efficient if the environment is stable and investors interact with each other and natural selection operates over a long period of time.
For example, the great white shark is pretty much in the same form today as it was in the very early days of the Pleistocene era. Part of the reason is that, in its environment, there’s no need for changes to its basic structure, given how well it has adapted. Now, imagine if you take that great white shark and you change the environment in substantial ways, either by changing the temperature of the water or changing the background colors so that the shark is much more visible than it might otherwise be. You’re going to change the ability of that shark to succeed. The implication is that an efficient market, [like the great white], is really an outcome of a very special set of circumstances.
How does irrational behavior enter financial markets?
A good example is the fight-or-flight response. Our evolutionary process hasn’t been able to catch up to the current threats we face, so it’s not surprising that the fight-or-flight response is not going to be the most helpful way to deal with a financial crash in the same way that it’s going to be helpful when you’re being attacked in a back alley. It’s because financial markets and financial threats are a relatively new phenomenon. The fact that when we are stressed financially, we end up exhibiting the same features as if we were threatened physically—that’s an example where human evolution has failed us, but not because there’s anything wrong with that evolutionary pathway.
How is this relevant for the individual investor?
One of the implications is that the risk-reward trade-off that we constantly bombard investors with, and constantly castigate them for ignoring when markets drop, has to be tempered by the acknowledgement that, sometimes, people will react emotionally to large-scale risk exposures. In technical terms, they freak out. When investors freak out, it means that they’re going to be pulling money out of the risky assets [like stocks] and investing them in much safer assets [like savings accounts and CDs].
If I’m right that investors do freak out from time to time, then the question that you might want to ask, during periods where investors are freaking out, is: Is it a good idea to hold stocks, or to put your money in cash during those periods, and then wait until the freak-out factor subsides?
What’s the better strategy?
From the behavioral finance perspective, and certainly from the data perspective, we find it’s the latter. When investors are freaking out, those are the periods where the equity premiums [meaning the extra return stocks should, by the efficient markets hypothesis, give investors as compensation for the extra risk of holding them in lieu of safer assets] are lower than average. In fact, in some cases it’s negative, you get punished for taking risks. The idea behind “volatility cruise control” is to maintain a level of volatility that is comfortable for an investor. Let’s say 16 percent volatility. That’s what the S&P is on average over a long history. If that’s the volatility that you’re comfortable with, then by using modern trading tools, we can get you that volatility actively.
In other words, if the stock market begins to increase in volatility—the VIX, [an index published by the Chicago Board Options Exchange that indicates how volatile traders expect the stock market to be over the next 30 days], goes up to 25 because there’s some kind of a rumor that the tax proposal that the Republicans are putting together isn’t going to work—the volatility cruise control strategy will reduce your level of equity exposure and put more money in cash. Similarly, when the volatility goes back to normal, you will then go back to putting most of your money into equities. That very simple rule of thumb basically has you putting less money into equities when markets are freaking out and leaving money in equities when markets are more normal.
That flies in the face of the conventional, buy-and-hold, wisdom—to sit tight and not freak out during market corrections, to ride them out.
That’s like telling a teenager, “It’s really a good idea for you to abstain from sex because a teenage pregnancy is just not going to be good for you.” It’s good advice, but I can tell you right now it’s not practical. Telling investors, “You know what, you should ignore these short-run dips and focus on the long run,” is good advice, but it ignores human behavior. From October 2008 to January 2009, if you had left your money in the S&P you would have lost 50.9 percent of your wealth. Slightly over half of your wealth would have evaporated in a manner of four months.
You tell me: How many investors do you know who would be perfectly happy and calm about watching half of their investment evaporate before their very eyes, while at the same time listening to news reports about Lehman going under, about Bernie Madoff in December of 2008, about financial markets coming to a halt, about Hank Paulson showing up on TV with a frightened face? If you think about how humans react, the advice that we give them—while it may be good advice if we really, truly stuck to it—it’s not realistic to expect humans to act in that way. That’s really the failing of the standard approach to passive investing. It’s advice that we know for a fact people are not going to take.
Financial innovations such as derivatives and securitization have been widely maligned for playing a role in the last crisis. But you argue that they could be the key to solving some of society’s biggest challenges, including poverty, disease, and climate change. Why?
People respond to incentives, and so if we want to take on much bigger challenges, we need to collaborate across thousands and in some cases hundreds of thousands of people. How do you get 100,000 people to work together? It’s not that easy. In the old days, it was religion and before that it was simple fiat rules, tyranny. The Egyptians built some beautiful pyramids, but they did that with hundreds of thousands of slaves over decades. If we rule out slavery as a possible means of societal advances, there really isn’t any other choice. If we need 100,000 people to cure cancer, to deal with Alzheimer’s, to figure out fusion energy and climate change…I don’t know of any other way to do that other than financial markets: equity, debt, proper financing and proper payout of returns. I think that in many cases [finance] probably is the gating factor. That, to me, is the short answer to the question about why finance is so important.
Bob Henderson studied physics, worked on Wall Street, and is now an independent writer focused on science and finance.
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HEARD the one about the blonde in Austria? Well from tomorrow it will be a criminal offence if you have – and that’s no joke.
The country has outlawed gags about blondes as part of the fight against terrorism.
Officials fear that marginalised blondes – furious at being portrayed as stupid – could take revenge on society.
But Austrian lawyers’ chief Rupert Wolff raged: “This law is an overreaction. It is just not necessary here.” The new law also bans wisecracks about people from, Burgenland the country’s agricultural region, who are often the subject of comedy sketches.
Offenders could be sentenced to two years’ jail.
The legislation was designed to help tackle extremists promoting their views. But by the time it was passed it had widened.
In Hungary, blonde women recently demanded fairer treatment. Spokeswoman Zsuzsa Kovacs said: “Blondes face discrimination at work. People are banned from discriminating against blacks. Why not grant blondes the same protection?”
Blonde jokes
What do you call a blonde with half a brain? Gifted
How do you make a blonde’s eyes twinkle? Shine a torch in her ear
How many blondes does it take to screw in a lightbulb? Two. One to hold the light bulb and one to spin the ladder aroundArticle 2, Section 1 of the U.S. Constitution tells us the precise wording of the Presidential Oath of Office:
“I do solemnly swear (or affirm) that I will faithfully execute the office of President of the United States, and will to the best of my ability, preserve, protect and defend the Constitution of the United States.”
There’s no “So help me God” at the end of it.
Incidentally, there’s also no requirement that you have to put your hand on the Bible while you say it. (In fact in 2008, Obama’s official oath was performed without one entirely.)
According to Michael Newdow‘s ultimately-unsuccessful lawsuit (PDF) against the oath from four years ago, no president said the words “So help me God” until “1881, ninety-two years after George Washington’s initial ceremony” — when “Chester A. Arthur took the oath upon hearing of President James Garfield’s death.” After that it didn’t become a “tradition” as we know it until 1933 (with Franklin Roosevelt).
Even though Newdow lost his lawsuit, there’s no reason atheists can’t publicly oppose the phrase this time around as well — if for no other reason than to remind people that the word “God” isn’t an official part of the oath.
For secular America, religious rhetoric is empty. Religious justifications for government action are hollow arguments invoking an authority that we reject. Politicians often use religion to pander to their base, but we find such rhetoric exclusionary and distasteful. You called Nov. 5 “the last day that I will ever campaign.” This term limitation is a gift. You are not beholden to any future constituency. This term is a chance to do something that no president in recent memory has done: reach out to secular Americans. In the past, that might have been politically costly. But this recent election shows that it will be politically costly not to reach out to secular America. We are the future. Use this second term to build a legacy by rejecting the way this country politicizes religion. … Start small. Start by honoring the secular intent of the oath. In its altered, religious form, the oath is a symbol of the disregard this country has shown for its Constitution in the name of God. Our once silent minority will no longer remain silent as politicians trample the document we hold sacred — the Constitution. Honor the oath as you recite it on January 21 and lead us into the new era you promised four years ago.
The Freedom From Religion Foundation’sexplains why Obama has some good reasons to avoid the religious wording
If you’d like to implore Obama not to use the words, FFRF has a few suggestions as to how you can do it. (There won’t be another lawsuit, though.)
It doesn’t seem like a big deal — and, to be honest, it’s not going to do us any real harm if Obama says it — but every time we let something like this slip, the Religious Right adds it to their giant list of Ways to Trick People Into Thinking We’re a Christian Nation. Let’s not let the occasion pass without at least posing a challenge.Operation Road's End. Japanese submarines being sunk after World War II. A U.S. Navy Martin PBM Mariner flying boat circles over several Imperial Japanese submarines as they are being scuttled and/or sunk by gunfire on April 1, 1946, off the Goto Islands, of Japan. Smoke drifts over the water from charges ignited aboard a sub. One of the submarines explodes raising a surge of water and huge black cloud. Clear view of a U.S. Baltimore class Cruiser with two scout planes aboard. Sailors watch from the U.S. Destroyer, USS Everett F. Larson (DD-830) as a submarine slips below the surface. Another submarine explodes and sinks. Gunfire from the Larson strikes another submarine. Smoke from the Larson's guns drifts in front of the camera. Closeup of the Larson's forward 5-inch guns, turned to starboard, firing.
This historic stock footage available in HD and SD video. View pricing below video player.After several launch attempts since May that were often scrubbed because of weather, the skies were finally clear enough for a NASA Terrier-Improved Malemute sounding rocket to blast off at 4:25 a.m. Eastern Time on June 29, 2017.
Soon after the launch from Wallops Flight Facility (Virginia), puffs of color emerged high in the night sky over the Mid-Atlantic coast. These artificial clouds glowed momentarily red-green and then faded into blue and violet as they drifted in the ionosphere. This upper layer of Earth’s atmosphere extends from 80 to 600 kilometers (50 to 360 miles) above the surface, and it is full of charged particles that get bombarded by solar and cosmic radiation.
In the course of the eight-minute flight, the sounding rocket ejected ten canisters about the size of a soft drink can as part of a test of a new multi-canister ejection system. Once separated from the sounding rocket by several miles, the canisters released blue-green and red vapor that formed the aurora-like clouds seen in the photograph above. Interactions between barium, strontium, and cupric-oxide gave the clouds their color.
The second image is a time-lapse photograph that shows the fire trail from the rocket pushing upward into the night sky. The smaller streak of light is the second stage of the rocket falling back toward the ocean.
Sounding rockets have been used since the 1950s to study the upper atmosphere and ionosphere and to aid in understanding the Earth’s near-space environment. The rockets follow parabolic or “U-shaped” trajectories. In this case, the sounding rocket flew to an altitude of about 118 miles (190 kilometers).
NASA Wallops received nearly 2,000 reports and photos of cloud sightings from areas as far as New York and North Carolina, and inland across Virginia, Maryland, and Pennsylvania. Photos submitted by the public can be viewed on the Wallops facebook page.
Photographs by Terry Zaperach for NASA. Story by Adam Voiland, based on a release from NASA Wallops Flight Facility.- Police are investigating after two cars struck and killed a man on Atlanta's Downtown Connector early Tuesday morning.
Officers first received a 911 call around 3 a.m. regarding a man walking southbound in the high-occupancy vehicle (HOV) lane on Interstate 75/85 near 10th Street. Then, police said they received another 911 call a few minutes later about a man being hit by a car.
Responding officers found the victim dead at the scene.
Police said two vehicles were parked on the side of the interstate when they arrived. Both drivers said they had struck the male pedestrian.
UPDATE medical examiner crews removing man's body from Connector Southbound lanes, police asking those outside vehicles to get back in pic.twitter.com/lpE9XPGIs1 — Kaitlyn Pratt Fox 5 (@Fox5Kaitlyn) July 25, 2017
The investigation caused major delays due to I-75/I-85 southbound being shut down at 10th street as investigators remained on scene collecting evidence.
NOT MOVING people are out of cars, trapped on Downtown Connector as investigators gather clues in HOV lane. Man dead, struck while walking pic.twitter.com/AtL9JnRXQ8 — Kaitlyn Pratt Fox 5 (@Fox5Kaitlyn) July 25, 2017
All lanes reopened shortly before 6 a.m.
INTERSTATE OPEN just cleared fatal pedestrian accident scene in SB lanes of Connector pic.twitter.com/CH0UhrKoMC — Kaitlyn Pratt Fox 5 (@Fox5Kaitlyn) July 25, 2017
Police are working to determine why the unidentified man was walking on the Downtown Connector.
App users: View full articleEve was tempted by the apple. Now the smartphone invented by the company that bears its name has a confession app claimed to be the first of its kind to be approved by the Catholic Church.
Confession: A Roman Catholic App for iPhones and iPads is touted as the ''perfect aid for every penitent'' and is designed to be taken into the confessional.
It creates a customised and password-protected ''examination of conscience'' based on a person's age, sex, vocation and the time elapsed - in days, weeks, months or years - since the last confession. It also has seven acts of contrition to choose from, all for US$1.99.
Patrick Leinen, of the three-man team Little iApps, a US company ''with a Roman Catholic twist'', said his team had wanted to engage Catholics with new media in response to the Pope's World Communications Address last year, in which he spoke of its potential benefits.
''Our bishop was very excited about it,'' Mr Leinen said. ''We were able to work with several priests in order to get that examination of conscience created, so it was kind of fun.''
Bishop Kevin Rhoades went as far as to grant it an imprimatur - official endorsement from a church authority. ''The imprimatur itself was pretty neat,'' Mr Leinan said.
''When we were actually testing out the software before release we had one gentleman who hadn't been to confession in about 20 years. He went in and did his confession with it and he said it made it much easier on him.''
His was considering a conversion of the app for Google's Android smartphone.A hacker stole $31M of Ether—how it happened and what it means for Ethereum
Yesterday, a hacker pulled off the second biggest heist in the history of digital currencies.
Around 12:00 PST, an unknown attacker exploited a critical flaw in the Parity multi-signature wallet on the Ethereum network, draining three massive wallets of over $31,000,000 worth of Ether in a matter of minutes. Given a couple more hours, the hacker could’ve made off with over $180,000,000 from vulnerable wallets.
But someone stopped them.
Having sounded the alarm bells, a group of benevolent white-hat hackers from the Ethereum community rapidly organized. They analyzed the attack and realized that there was no way to reverse the thefts, yet many more wallets were vulnerable. Time was of the essence, so they saw only one available option: hack the remaining wallets before the attacker did.
By exploiting the same vulnerability, the white-hats hacked all of the remaining at-risk wallets and drained their accounts, effectively preventing the attacker from reaching any of the remaining $150,000,000.
Yes, you read that right.
To prevent the hacker from robbing any more banks, the white-hats wrote software to rob all of the remaining banks in the world. Once the money was safely stolen, they began the process of returning the funds to their respective account holders. The people who had their money saved by this heroic feat are now in the process of retrieving their funds.
It’s an extraordinary story, and it has significant implications for the world of cryptocurrencies.
[video]
It’s important to understand that this exploit was not a vulnerability in Ethereum or in Parity itself. Rather, it was a vulnerability in the default smart contract code that the Parity client gives the user for deploying multi-signature wallets.
This is all pretty complicated, so to make the details of this clear for everyone, this post is broken into three parts:
What exactly happened? An explanation of Ethereum, smart contracts, and multi-signature wallets. How did they do it? A technical explanation of the attack (specifically for programmers). What now? The attack’s implications about the future and security of smart contracts.
If you are familiar with Ethereum and the crypto world, you can skip to the second section.
1. What exactly happened?
There are three building blocks to this story: Ethereum, smart contracts, and digital wallets.
Ethereum is a digital currency invented in 2013—a full 4 years after the release of Bitcoin. It has since grown to be the second largest digital currency in the world by market cap—$20 billion to Bitcoin’s $40 billion.
Like all cryptocurrencies, Ethereum is a descendant of the Bitcoin protocol and improves on Bitcoin’s design. But don’t be fooled: though it is a digital currency like Bitcoin, Ethereum is much more powerful.
While Bitcoin uses its blockchain to implement a ledger of monetary transactions, Ethereum uses its blockchain to record state transitions in a gigantic distributed computer. Ethereum’s corresponding digital currency, ether is essentially a side effect of powering this massive computer.
To put it another way, Ethereum is literally a computer that spans the entire world. Anyone who runs the Ethereum software on their computer is participating in the operations of this world-computer, the Ethereum Virtual Machine (EVM). Because the EVM was designed to be Turing-complete (ignoring gas limits), it can do almost anything that can be expressed in a computer program.
Let me be emphatic: this is crazy shit. The crypto world is ebullient about the potential of Ethereum, which has seen its value skyrocket in the last 6 months.
The developer community has rallied behind it, and there’s a lot of excitement about what can be built on top of the EVM—and this brings us to smart contracts.
Smart contracts are simply computer programs that run on the EVM. In many ways they are like normal contracts, except they don’t need lawyers or judges to interpret them. Instead, they are compiled to bytecode and interpreted unambiguously by the EVM. With these programs, you can (among other things) programmatically transfer digital currency based solely on the rules of the contract code.
Of course, there are things normal contracts do that smart contracts can’t—smart contracts can’t easily interact with things that aren’t on the blockchain. But smart contracts can also do things that normal contracts can’t, such as enforce a set of rules entirely through unbreakable cryptography.
This leads us to the notion of wallets. In the world of digital currencies, wallets are how you store your assets. You gain access to your wallet using essentially a secret password, also known as your private key (simplified a bit). There are many different types of wallets that confer different security properties, such as withdrawal limits. One of the most popular types is the multi-signature wallet.
In a multi-signature wallet, there are several private keys that can unlock the wallet, but just one key is not enough to unlock it. If your multi-signature wallet has 3 keys, for example, you can specify that at least 2 of the 3 keys must be provided to successfully unlock it. This means that if you, your father, and your mother are each signatories on this wallet, even if a criminal hacked your mother and stole her private key, they could still not access your funds. This leads to much stronger security guarantees, so multi-sigs are a standard in wallet security.
This is the type of wallet the hacker attacked.
So what went wrong? Did they break the private keys? Did they use a quantum computer, or some kind of cutting-edge factoring algorithm?
Nope, all the cryptography was sound. The exploit was almost laughably simple: they found a programmer-introduced bug in the code that let them re-initialize the wallet, almost like restoring it to factory settings. Once they did that, they were free to set themselves as the new owners, and then walk out with everything.
2. How did this happen?
What follows is a technical explanation of exactly what happened. If you’re not a developer, you can skip to the next section, as this is going to be programming-heavy.
Ethereum has a fairly unique programming model. On Ethereum, you write code by publishing contracts (which you can think of as objects), and transactions are executed by calling methods on these objects to mutate their state.
In order to run code on Ethereum, you need to first deploy the contract (the deployment is itself a transaction), which costs a small amount of Ether. You then need to call methods on the contract to interact with it, which costs more Ether. As you can imagine, this incentivizes a programmer to optimize their code, both to minimize transactions and minimize computation costs.
One way to reduce costs is to use libraries. By making your contract call out to a shared library that was deployed at a previous time, you don’t have to re-deploy any shared code. In Ethereum, keeping your code DRY will directly save you money.
The default multi-sig wallet in Parity did exactly this. It held a reference to a shared external library which contained wallet initialization logic. This shared library is referenced by the public key of the library contract.
// FIELDS address constant _walletLibrary = 0xa657491c1e7f16adb39b9b60e87bbb8d93988bc3 ;
The library is called in several places, via an EVM instruction called DELEGATECALL, which does the following: for whatever method that calls DELEGATECALL, it will call the same method on the contract you’re delegating to, but using the context of the current contract. It’s essentially like a super call, except without the inheritance part. (The equivalent in JavaScript would be OtherClass.functionName.apply(this, args).)
Here’s an example of this in their multi-sig wallet: the isOwner method just delegates to the shared wallet library’s isOwner method, using the current contract’s state.
function isOwner ( address _addr ) constant returns ( bool ) { return _walletLibrary. delegatecall ( msg. data ); }
This is innocent enough. The multi-sig wallet itself contained all of the right permission checks, and they were sure to rigorously enforce authorization on all sensitive actions related to the wallet’s state.
But they made one critical mistake.
Solidity allows you to define a “fallback method”. This is the method that gets called when there’s no method that matches a given method name. You define it by not giving it a name:
function () { // do stuff here for all unknown methods }
The Parity team decided to let any unknown method that sent Ether to the contract just default to depositing the sent Ether.
function () payable { // payable is just a keyword that means this method can receive/pay Ether if ( msg. value > 0 ) { // just being sent some cash? Deposit ( msg. sender, msg. value ); } throw ; }
But they took it a step further, and herein was their critical mistake. Below is the actual code that was attacked.
function () payable { // just being sent some cash? if ( msg. value > 0 ) Deposit ( msg. sender, msg. value ); else if ( msg. data. length > 0 ) _walletLibrary. delegatecall ( msg. data ); }
Basically:
If the method name is not defined on this contract…
And there’s no ether being sent in the transaction…
And there is some data in the message payload…
Then it will call the exact same method if it’s defined in _walletLibrary, but in the context of this contract.
Using this, the attacker called a method called initWallet(), which was not defined on the multisig contract but was defined in the shared wallet library:
function initWallet ( address [] _owners, uint _required, uint _daylimit ) { initDaylimit ( _daylimit ); initMultiowned ( _owners, _required ); }
Which calls the initMultiowned method…
function initMultiowned ( address [] _owners, uint _required ) { m_numOwners = _owners. length + 1 ; m_owners [ 1 ] = uint ( msg. sender ); m_ownerIndex [ uint ( msg. sender )] = 1 ; for ( uint i = 0 ; i < _owners. length ; ++ i ) { m_owners [ 2 + i ] = uint ( _owners [ i ]); m_ownerIndex [ uint ( _owners [ i ])] = 2 + i ; } m_required = _required ; }
Do you see what just happened there? The attacker essentially reinitialized the contract by delegating through the library method, overwriting the owners on the original contract. They and whatever array of owners they supply as arguments will be the new owners.
Given that they now control the entire wallet, they can trivially extract the remainder of the balance. And that’s precisely what they did.
The initWallet: https://etherscan.io/tx/0x707aabc2f24d756480330b75fb4890ef6b8a26ce0554ec80e3d8ab105e63db07
The transfer: https://etherscan.io/tx/0x9654a93939e98ce84f09038b9855b099da38863b3c2e0e04fd59a540de1cb1e5
So what was ultimately the vulnerability? You could argue there were two. First, the initWallet and initMultiowned in the wallet library were not marked as internal (this is like a private method, which would prevent this delegated call), and those methods did not check that the wallet wasn’t already initialized. Either check would’ve made this hack impossible.
The second vulnerability was the raw delegateCall. You can think of this as equivalent to a raw eval statement, running on a user-supplied string. In an attempt to be succinct, this contract used metaprogramming to proxy potential method calls to an underlying library. The safer approach here would be to whitelist specific methods that the user is allowed to call.
The trouble, of course, is that this is more expensive in gas costs (since it has to evaluate more conditionals). But when it comes to security, we probably have to get over this concern when writing smart contracts that move massive amounts of money.
So that was the attack.
It was a clever catch, but once you point it out, it seems almost elementary. The attacker then jumped on this vulnerability for three of the largest wallets they could find—but judging from the transaction times, they were doing this entirely manually. The white-hat group was doing this at scale using scripts, and that’s why they were able to beat the attacker to the punch. Given this, it’s unlikely that the attacker was very sophisticated in how they planned their attack.
You might ask the question though—why don’t they just roll back this hack, like they did with the DAO hack?
Unfortunately that’s not really possible. The DAO hack was unique in that when the attacker drained the DAO into a child DAO, the funds were frozen for many days inside a smart contract before they could be released to the attacker.
This prevented any of the stolen funds from going into circulation, so the stolen Ether was effectively siloed. This gave the Ethereum community plenty of time to conduct a public quorum about how to deal with the attack.
In this attack, the attacker immediately stole the funds and could start spending them. A hard fork would be impractical–what do you do about all of the transactions that occur downstream? What about the people who innocently traded assets with the attacker? Once the ether they’ve stolen gets laundered and enters general circulation, it’s like counterfeit bills circulating in the economy—it’s easy to stop when it’s all in one briefcase, but once everyone’s potentially holding a counterfeit bill, you can’t really turn back the clock anymore.
So the transaction won’t get reversed. The $31M loss stands. It’s a costly, but necessary lesson.
So what should we take away from this?
3. What does this attack mean for Ethereum?
There are several important takeaways here.
First, remember, this was not a flaw in Ethereum or in smart contracts in general. Rather, it was a developer error in a particular contract.
So who were the crackpot developers who wrote this? They should’ve known better, right?
The developers here were a cross-collaboration between the Ethereum foundation (literally the creators of Ethereum), the Parity core team, and members of the open-source community. It underwent extensive peer review. This is basically the highest standard of programming that exists in the Ethereum ecosystem.
These developers were human. They made a mistake. And so did the reviewers who audited this code.
I’ve read some comments on Reddit and HackerNews along the lines of: “What an obvious mistake! How was it even possible they missed this?” (Ignoring that the “obvious” vulnerability was introduced in January and only now discovered.)
When I see responses like this, I know the people commenting are not professional developers. For a serious developer, the reaction is instead: damn, that was a dumb mistake. I’m glad I wasn’t the one who made it.
Mistakes of this sort are routinely made in programming. All programs carry the risk of developer error. We have to throw off the mindset of “if they were just more careful, this wouldn’t have happened.” At a certain scale, carefulness is not enough.
As programs scale to non-trivial complexity, you have to start taking it as a given that programs are |
. He remains in critical condition, but has improved in the last 24 hours. The Congressman will require additional operations, and will be in the hospital for some time. At the request of the family, we will continue to provide periodic updates.
Scalise arrived at the hospital in stable condition, but was downgraded to critical following surgery. He suffered injuries to his internal organs, pelvis, and leg after being shot in the left hip. The assailant, James T. Hodgkinson, was shot dead at the field by a Capitol Police officer.Between the eBay auction and writing the book, I’ve been to many different churches in the the past year. This is a compilation of the things I’ve seen and heard in the churches that simply annoy me. I’m sure they annoy other Christians as well. They detract from what could be a very positive message. It’s not a complete list by any means, so feel free to comment and add to the list!
(By the way, for those who think this list is too “anti-Christian,” the next list will be much kinder to them. Trust me.)
Wave their hands in front of my face making it impossible to see the stage.
(Will you put your hands down? I get it. They’re singing a song. I’m happy, too. Use your mouths, people. Jesus doesn’t love you any more because your hands are in the air.)
Yell out random words (“Praise Jesus,” “Hallelujah!”) while I’m trying to listen to the sermon.
(You agree with the pastor. We understand this. But just say it in your head or nod silently.)
Walk in after the music— or worse yet, the sermon— has started.
(If it’s not that important for you to be on time, just stop showing up.)
Look at me with anxiety because I’m brown.
Look at me with excitement because I’m not white.
Assume that because I know about the Bible, I must believe in the Bible.
(It’s the opposite that’s true.)
Perform a skit that is supposed to tell the day’s message.
(They’re not funny. And frankly, the kids are bad actors. Let’s get to the sermon already.)
Tell me I’m on the “right path” by being there.
(I was doing just fine a couple hours ago, thank you very much.)
Pass out Christian business directories.
(It’s like saying the Christian lawyer is trustworthy, but the Jew lawyer will take your money and the atheist lawyer will try to lose your case on purpose, and don’t even get me started on those brown lawyers… these directories aren’t helping me understand “Christian love.”)
Ask me if they can pray for me.
(If you want to, just go ahead and do it.)
Ask me if they can pray for me, then put their hands on my shoulders and begin praying.
(Stop touching me.)
Mischaracterize people of other faiths or no faiths.
(“Those atheists know God is there; they just don’t want to follow His rules!” “Those Muslims really want to become Christians—to the MissionaryMobile!”)
Assume that everyone who is not Christian must be “saved.”
(I’m quite alright. And stop putting your hands on my shoulder.)
Bring their children, then proceed to fall asleep during the sermon.
(If you don’t want to be there, don’t drag your kids with you.)
Say that those of other Christian denominations aren’t practicing “true” Christianity.
(“They believe in Christ… but they speak in tongues! The heretical bastards!”)
Look at their watches mid-sermon.
(You know this pastor goes long. If you weren’t prepared to sit through it all, you shouldn’t have come.)
Pray for things they can just as easily take care of themselves.
(You want that promotion? Then work harder. You want to pass that test tomorrow? Then go study.)
Pastors tell stories without giving citations.
(“There’s this true story of a guy who [insert random Bible-based act here]…” If it’s true, give me some actual facts.)
Pastors ask questions with obvious answers.
(“Who here believes the Lord is going to save them today?!” I think the people in church are going to say “yes.” Call it a hunch.)
Pastors take an hour to analyze a simple, straight-forward Biblical verse.
(The verse told me to trust in God. I get it. Let’s move on.)
[tags]atheist, atheism, Christian, Christianity, eBay, I Sold My Soul on eBay, church, Jesus, Bible, Jew, God, Pastor[/tags]PORT OF SPAIN, Trinidad (CMC) — Makandal Daaga, the leader of the 1970 Black Power Revolution in Trinidad and Tobago, died Monday at the Port of Spain General Hospital after suffering a seizure at his home. He was in his 70s.
Daaga was the former political leader of the National Joint Action Committee (NJAC) that in 2010 formed part of the coalition People’s Partnership that defeated the then ruling People’s National Movement (PNM) in the general election in May.
“Mr Daaga was battling the virus, the one that is going around now. But he was still walking around and talking as usual. He suffered a seizure and was taken to hospital where he died this afternoon. We spoke to him every day. He was always in good spirits,” the Trinidad Express newspaper quoted NJAC officials as saying.
Born Geddes Granger, he was appointed Caribbean Community (Caricom) Cultural Ambassador Extraordinaire by the Kamla Persad Bissessar-led coalition government.
He formed NJAC, while a student at the St Augustine campus of the University of the West Indies (UWI) in direct response to the discrimination against Caribbean students at Sir George Williams University (now Concordia), in Montreal, Canada.
On 26th November 1972, at a mass rally in San Fernando, south of here, Makandal declared that the ideology of the National Joint Action Committee “is nothing more than the demands of the people.
“NJAC’s motivation is nothing more than our love for the people. And our strength is nothing more than the interaction between our love for the people and the people’s love for their vanguard,” he added.
According to the NJAC website, “in Makandal’s estimation, leadership is not about being self-righteously and arrogantly lording power or authority over the people. To him therefore, humility must be one of the Cardinal virtues of leadership. This he has constantly practised. His concept of leadership is given in the title, Chief Servant, which he has chosen and which was endorsed by the party.”
In 1974 he was made leader of the Caribbean Steering Committee for the 6th Pan African Conference that was held in Tanzania. This umbrella organisation had included the leadership of most, if not all progressive political organisations in the Caribbean, including Raymond Charlotte of Cayenne, the late Tim Hector of Antigua, Bobby Clarke of Barbados, Eusi Kwayana of Guyana, and the first left wing prime minister of Grenada, Maurice Bishop.
The website noted that Daaga paid a heavy price for his leadership and at one time he was banned from every Caribbean territory except Guyana.
Daaga was imprisoned on four different occasions.A Northeast Portland man has been arrested after allegedly harassing the families of victims killed in a 2012 Aurora, Colorado movie theater shooting.
Kevin Michael Purfield, 45, is accused of emailing, calling and using social media to repeatedly contact victims' family members. Purfield was arrested Wednesday and has allegedly used inappropriate language in his non-threatening and unsolicited messages, police said.
The July 2012 shooting left 12 people dead and injured another 58 people gathered for a midnight screening of "The Dark Knight Rises." The alleged shooter, 25-year-old James E. Holmes, was arrested and faces a series of murder and attempted murder charges.
Prosecutors announced last week they plan to seek the death penalty if he is convicted.
Portland police began investigating Purfield's alleged messages in February after being contacted by police in Aurora. Purfield was taken into custody at Northeast 102nd Avenue and Halsey Street.
Purfield is booked into the Multnomah County Detention Center on telephonic harassment and stalking charges. He is scheduled to be arraigned Thursday in Multnomah County Circuit Court.
Purfield has contacted at least a dozen family members of the theater shooting victims claiming conspiracy theories about the incident and personally attacking them, said Officer Frank Fania, a spokesman with the Aurora Police Department. He added that Purfield has reached out to people in at least Colorado, Oregon, Arizona and Texas.
"His actions clearly have crossed the line from annoyance to disrespectful and a criminal offense," Fania said.
Purfield details a number of his theories on the Aurora shooting, as well as the shooting at Connecticut's Sandy Hook Elementary School and other incidents on his personal blog.
In a blog entry he claims is an email exchange between him and the Colorado Attorney General's Office, Purfield accuses Aurora police of participating in a cover-up of the movie theater shooting. He also claims being threatened by Portland police for "calling people and notifying them" about it.
In another entry, Purfield posts photos of an Oct. 2012 medical report from Portland Adventist Medical Center.
The report said Purfield was brought to the hospital for a psychiatric evaluation when police found him trespassing at the Cascade Station shopping center in Northeast Portland. He was banned from the entire complex five days before.
Police reported he was talking about teleportation and "security bases on the moon," before being taken to the hospital. The report said Purfield exhibited moderate symptoms of paranoid delusions.
-- Everton Bailey Jr.By Dawn Kopecki, Christine Idzelis and Bradley Olson
Lenders are preparing to cut the credit lines to a group of junk-rated U.S. shale oil companies by as much as 30 percent in the coming days, dealing another blow as they struggle with a slump in crude prices, according to people familiar with the matter.
Sabine Oil & Gas Corp. became one of the first companies to warn investors that it faces a cash shortage from a reduced credit line, saying Tuesday that it raises “substantial doubt” about the company’s ability to continue as a going concern. About 10 firms are having trouble finding backup financing, said the people familiar with the matter, who asked not to be named because the information hasn’t been announced.
April is a crucial month for the industry because it’s when lenders are due to recalculate the value of properties that energy companies staked as loan collateral. With those assets in decline along with oil prices, banks are preparing to cut the amount they’re willing to lend. And that will only squeeze companies’ ability to produce more oil.
“If they can’t drill, they can’t make money,” said Kristen Campana, a New York-based partner in Bracewell & Giuliani LLP’s finance and financial restructuring groups. “It’s a downward spiral.”
Bigger Cuts
Sabine, the Houston-based exploration and production company that merged with Forest Oil Corp. last year, told investors Tuesday that it’s at risk of defaulting on $2 billion of loans and other debt if its banks don’t grant a waiver.
Publicly traded firms are required to disclose such news to investors within four business days, under U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission rules. Some of the companies facing liquidity shortfalls will also disclose that they have fully drawn down their revolving credit lines like Sabine, according to one of the people.
The credit discussions are ongoing and a number of banks may opt to be more lenient, giving companies more time to prepare for bigger cuts later in the year, the people said. Credit lines for some of the companies may be reduced by as little as 10 percent, they said.
The companies are among speculative-grade energy producers that were able to load up on cheap debt as crude prices climbed above $100 a barrel. The borrowing limits are tied to reserves, the amount of oil and gas a company has in the ground that can profitably be extracted based on its land holdings. With oil prices plunging below $50 from last year’s peak of $107 in June, some are now fighting to survive.
Borrowing to Drill
Those loans are typically reset in April and October based on the average price of oil over the previous 12 months. That measure has dropped to about $80, down from $99 when credit lines were last reset.
That represents billions of dollars in reduced funding for dozens of companies that relied on debt to fund drilling operations in U.S. shale basins, according to data compiled by Bloomberg.
All of this means that the squeeze happening now will only get worse as companies’ hedges against price declines start to roll off, said Bracewell & Giuliani’s Campana.
“People are expecting a much bigger rush of restructuring and negotiations in the fall,” she said in a telephone interview Tuesday.
Raising Cash
Samson Resources Corp., an oil and natural gas producer controlled by private equity firm KKR & Co., warned investors that bankruptcy may be its best option as collapsing crude prices erode its ability to repay debt.
Its borrowing base may be reduced due to weak oil and gas prices, requiring the company to repay a portion of its credit line, according to a regulatory filing on Tuesday. That could “result in an event of default,” Tulsa, Oklahoma-based Samson said in the filing.
Many producers have been raising money in recent weeks in anticipation of the credit squeeze, selling shares or raising longer-term debt in the form of junk bonds or loans.
Energy companies issued more than $11 billion in stock in the first quarter, more than 10 times the amount from the first three months of last year, Bloomberg data show. That’s the fastest pace in more than a decade.
Breitburn Energy Partners LP announced a $1 billion deal with EIG Global Energy Partners earlier this week to help repay borrowings on its credit line. EIG, an energy-focused private equity investor in Washington, agreed to buy $350 million of Breitburn’s convertible preferred equity and $650 million of notes, Breitburn said in a March 29 statement.
‘Somewhere Else’
Standard & Poor’s had warned in January that it might downgrade Breitburn’s ratings over concerns the Los Angeles- based oil producer would see cash shortfalls when its borrowing base is revised in April. Breitburn’s credit line was cut 28 percent to $1.8 billion and outstanding borrowings will be reduced to $1.24 billion with proceeds from the deal with EIG, according to the statement and Bloomberg data.
“Banks are not in the business of lending to distressed companies,” Campana said. “Most of the banks want to be refinanced or they want to see the money come from somewhere else.”The biggest Spanish-language newspaper in the United States is La Opinión, based in Los Angeles, and currently owned by the Argentine newspaper La Nación.
La Opinión has been going ballistic over the Hanen decision. On the 17th of February, the paper published an editorial entitled Indignación para recordar, which could be translated "Indignation to Remember " or even "Outrage to Remember". I present for our readers parts of what it said. It demonstrates the mentality of the Hispanic activists who will be satisfied with nothing less than an open border for all Latin Americans to enter the U.S., and full benefits for all of them. Anything less is a great injustice and an outrage. Over-The-Top Rhetoric is a part of Hispanic culture and it's certainly on display here.
There is celebration in the ranks of the Republicans and a deep disillusion in the immigrant community. A Texas judge [really a federal judge in Texas, but the article doesn't tell its readers that] gave the victory to the 26 Republican majority states, opening the possibility that hundreds of thousands of "dreamers" are exposed to deportation and preventing millions of parents rooted in this country from working without the menace of expulsion.
This is a triumph for those who believe that the exploitation of the indocumentado and his deportation is the most important.
It cannot be ignored that the defeat in the constitutional debate over presidential power, besides humiliating Barack Obama, will destroy the future of millions of persons.
This is a victory for those who believe that a regularization of indocumentados will drain the coffers of the states, based on fears, stereotypes and ignorance. They think like the former governor of California Pete Wilson 20 years ago and will suffer the same counter-productive effect.....
This is the moment for Latino voters to look around, to see who is rejoicing over this ruling, who denounces it and who looks to the other side.....The Republican legislators and governors are the cause of making more people deportable...
The impact of the verdict is temporary, much still must be resolved. The indignación of the ruling, for those who promoted it and those who celebrated it, will be present for a long time. The soulless and ignorant people who think they are doing a favor by destroying working families must not be forgotten.
Well, we can "dream", can't we? Illegal aliens should be deported, but now very few of them are.Actually, those of us who favor deportation don't support exploitation of illegal aliens. It's the cheap labor profiteers who want to hire them.Barack Obama has too much power, and anybody who is concerned about our constitutional order should be concerned about Obama's power. Of course, La Opinión isn't, because for them it's all about La Raza and for now anyway, Obama is for La Raza.Illegal immigration is very expensive, and as for Pete Wilson, he won re-election campaigning for Proposition 187 in 1994. The GOP however, didn't listen to Wilson and prefers to run presidential candidates such as McCain and Romney who lose.Any illegal alien in the country should be subject to deportation, of course to La Opinión that would be a bad thing.How about the people who destroy American working families?
The editorial (click here) includes a photograph of a protesting woman brandishing a sign which reads "FIGHT IGNORANCE NOT IMMIGRANTS". I agree. we should fight the ignorance of what mass immigration is doing to our country, and demand that our leaders defend the interests of working American families and the historic nation, not the cheap labor profiteers, Razistas and globalists.State Sen. Nathaniel Oaks, already facing allegations of fraud and bribery, was charged Wednesday with obstruction of justice in a new federal indictment in which prosecutors say he reneged on a deal with the FBI.
Prosecutors say Oaks, a Baltimore Democrat, tipped off the target of another investigation that FBI agents had in their sights.
Oaks, 71, was charged in April with wire fraud in a scheme in which he allegedly took cash in exchange for using his previous office as a state delegate to influence a development project.
The U.S. attorney’s office added eight more counts in a superseding indictment two months later. They included three more wire fraud counts and five for violations of the Travel Act, which forbids the use of cellphones in criminal activity.
Oaks has pleaded not guilty to the nine previous charges.
In the new indictment, prosecutors say Oaks agreed to cooperate with the FBI in January in the federal investigation of an undisclosed target.
Prosecutors allege that Oaks covertly recorded his conversations with the target between Jan. 9 and March 30. They say Oaks knew he might have to be a witness in future proceedings against the person.
Prosecutors say Oaks approached the target in an Annapolis bar on March 17, a day when the capital city is active with St. Patrick’s Day parties, and warned him that “what we talked about, just say no.” Prosecutors say Oaks did not record the conversation or tell the FBI about it.
About two weeks later, prosecutors say, Oaks approached the same person in the hallway of a government building in Annapolis and said, “I’m going to ask you for something, just say no.”
Prosecutors contend that Oaks intended to dissuade the target from engaging in the activities that were being investigated, and that the person took the comments as a warning that a criminal investigation was underway.
The U.S. attorney’s office did not say whether the target was a lawmaker, a lobbyist or some other individual.
Oaks already faced possible sentences of 20 years for each wire fraud count and five for each count of Travel Act violations. The obstruction-of-justice charge also carries a 20-year term. But the practical effect, analysts said, is that Oaks may have forfeited any leniency he might have received for cooperation with the FBI.
Dan Clements served as an assistant U.S. attorney in Maryland. He said the one-count indictment issued in April indicated that Oaks had a deal on the table before the FBI determined he had reneged. He said the indictment was likely handed up quickly after prosecutors learned of Oaks’ alleged actions because they wanted to get him into the court system, with bail and other restrictive pretrial conditions.
Clements said the language of the U.S. attorney’s news release Wednesday indicates that the target is now cooperating with authorities.
Oaks declined to comment Wednesday. He referred questions to his attorney, Stuart O. Simms. Simms did not return a call.
The investigation of Oaks goes back at least as far September 2015, when prosecutors say a “cooperating individual” introduced the then-delegate to a confidential source who portrayed himself as an out-of-town businessman interested in getting government contracts. Prosecutors say that Oaks agreed to help.
Oaks is charged with sending letters containing false statements on House of Delegates letterhead between April and July of 2016 to someone he believed to be a federal housing official to help the supposed businessman obtain a federal grant. Prosecutors say Oaks accepted $10,300 from the source for his help.
The original indictments also charged that Oaks accepted another $5,000 for agreeing to file a request with the Department of Legislative Services for a $250,000 bond bill for the source’s project.
Oaks was appointed to his Senate seat in February to fill a vacancy left by Sen. Lisa A. Gladden, who resigned for health reasons. He had served 28 years in the House of Delegates.
Oaks is scheduled to go on trial April 16, a week after the close of the 2018 General Assembly session.
The new indictment was announced by Maryland’s acting U.S., attorney, Stephen M. Schenning, and Gordon B. Johnson, special agent in charge of the FBI’s Baltimore office.
mdresser@baltsun.com
twitter.com/michaeltdresserThis article was originally published at Unreal Engine Blog. Republished by the editors' permission.
Our company develops, promotes, and sells the PVS-Studio static code analyzer for C/C++ programmers. However, our collaboration with customers is not limited solely to selling PVS-Studio licenses. For example, we often take on contract projects as well. Due to NDAs, we're not usually allowed to reveal details about this work, and you might not be familiar with the projects names, anyway. But this time, we think you'll be excited by our latest collaboration. Together with Epic Games, we're working on the Unreal Engine project. This is what we're going to tell you about in this article.
As a way of promoting our PVS-Studio static code analyzer, we've thought of an interesting format for our articles: We analyze open-source projects and write about the bugs we manage to find there. Take a look at this updatable list of projects we have already checked and written about. This activity benefits everyone: readers enjoy learning from others' mistakes and discover new means to avoid them through certain coding techniques and style. For us, it's a way to have more people learn about our tool. As for the project authors, they too benefit by gaining an opportunity to fix some of the bugs.
Among the articles was "A Long-Awaited Check of Unreal Engine 4". Unreal Engine's source code was extraordinarily high quality, but all software projects have defects and PVS-Studio is excellent at surfacing some of the most tricky bugs. We ran an analysis and reported our findings to Epic. The Unreal Engine teamT thanked us for checking their code, and quickly fixed the bugs we reported. But we didn't want to stop there, and thought we should try selling a PVS-Studio license to Epic Games.
Epic Games was very interested in using PVS-Studio to improve the engine continuously over time. They suggested we analyze and fix Unreal Engine's source code so that they were completely clear of bugs and the tool wouldn't generate any false positives in the end. Afterwords, Epic would use PVS-Studio on their code base themselves, thus making its integration into their development process as easy and smooth as possible. Epic Games promised to not only purchase the PVS-Studio license, but would also pay us for our work.
We accepted the offer. The job is done. And now you are welcome to learn about various interesting things we came across while working on Unreal Engine's source code.
Pavel Eremeev, Svyatoslav Razmyslov, and Anton Tokarev were the participants on the PVS-Studio's part. On the Epic Game's, the most active participants were Andy Bayle and Dan O'Connor - it all would have been impossible without their help, so many thanks to them!
PVS-Studio integration into Unreal Engine's build process
To manage the build process, Unreal Engine employs a build system of its own - Unreal Build Tool. There is also a set of scripts to generate project files for a number of different platforms and compilers. Since PVS-Studio is first of all designed to work with the Microsoft Visual C++ compiler, we used the corresponding script to generate project files (*.vcxproj) for the Microsoft Visual Studio IDE.
PVS-Studio comes with a plugin that can integrate into the Visual Studio IDE and enables a "one-click" analysis. However, projects generated for Unreal Engine are not the "ordinary" MSBuild projects used by Visual Studio.
When compiling Unreal Engine from Visual Studio, the IDE invokes MSBuild when starting the build process, but MSBuild itself is used just as a "wrapper" to run the Unreal Build Tool program.
To analyze the source code in PVS-Studio, the tool needs a preprocessor's output - an *.i file with all the headers included and macros expanded.
Quick note. This section is only interesting if you have a customized build process like Unreal's If you are thinking of trying PVS-Studio on a project of yours that has some intricate peculiarities about its build process, I recommend reading this section to the end. Perhaps it will be helpful for your case. But if you have an ordinary Visual Studio project or can't wait to read about the bugs we have found, you can skip it.
To launch the preprocessor correctly, the tool needs information about compilation parameters. In "ordinary" MSBuild projects, this information is inherent; the PVS-Studio plugin can "see" it and automatically preprocess all the necessary source files for the analyzer that will be called afterwards. With Unreal Engine projects, things are different.
As I've already said above, their projects are just a "wrapper" while the compiler is actually called by Unreal Build Tool. That's why compilation parameters in this case are not available for the PVS-Studio plugin for Visual Studio. You just can't run analysis "in one click", though the plugin can be used to view the analysis results.
The analyzer itself (PVS-Studio.exe) is a command-line application that resembles the C++ compiler regarding the way it is used. Just like the compiler, it has to be launched individually for every source file, passing this file's compilation parameters through the command line or response file. And the analyzer will automatically choose and call the appropriate preprocessor and then perform the analysis.
Thus, the universal solution for integrating the PVS-Studio analyzer into the build process is to call its exe-file in the same place where the compiler is called, i.e. inside the build system - Unreal Build Tool in our case. Sure, it will require modifying the current build system, which may not be desirable, as in our case. Because of that, just for cases like this, we created a compiler call "intercepting" system - Compiler Monitoring.
The Compiler Monitoring system can "intercept" compilation process launches (in the case with Visual C++, thisis the cl.exe proces), collecting all of the parameters necessary for successful preprocessing, thenre-launch preprocessing for files under compilation for further analysis. That's what we did.
Figure 1. A scheme of the analysis process for the Unreal Engine project
Unreal Engine analysis integration comes down to calling, right before the build process, the monitoring process (CLMonitor.exe) that will make all the necessary steps to do the preprocessing and launch the analyzer at the end of the build process. To run the monitoring process, we need to run a simple command:
CLMonitor.exe monitor
CLMonitor.exe will call itself in "tracking mode" and terminate. At the same time, another CLMonitor.exe process will remain running in the background "intercepting" the compiler calls. When the build process is finished, we need to run another simple command:
CLMonitor.exe analyze "UE.plog"
Please pay attention: in PVS-Studio 5.26 and above you should write:
CLMonitor.exe analyze –l "UE.plog"
Now CLMonitor.exe will launch the analysis of previously-collected source files, saving the results into the UE.plog file that can be easily handled in our IDE plugin.
We set a nightly build process of the most interesting Unreal Engine configurations followed by their analysis on our Continuous Integration server. It was a means for us to, first, make sure our edits hadn't broken the build and, second, to get in the morning a new log about Unreal Engine's analysis with all the edits of the previous day taken into account. So, before sending a Pull Request for submitting our edits to the Unreal Engineproject repository on GitHub, we could easily make sure that the current version was stable in our repository by simply rebuilding it on the server.
Non-linear bug fixing speed
So, we have solved the project build process and analysis. Now let's talk about bug fixes we've done based on the diagnostic messages output by the analyzer.
At first glance, it may seem natural that the number of warnings output by the analyzer should drop evenly from day to day: about the same number of messages is suppressed by certain PVS-Studio mechanisms as the number of fixes that are done in the code.
That is, theoretically you could expect a graph looking somewhat like this:
Figure 2. A perfect graph. The number of bugs drops evenly from day to day.
In reality, however, messages are eliminated faster during the initial phase of the bug fixing process than at the later stages. First, at the initial stage, we suppress warnings triggered by macros, which helps quickly reduce the overall number of issues. Second, it happened so that we had fixed the most evident issues first and put off more intricate things until later. I can explain on this. We wanted to show the Epic Games developers that we had started working and there was a progress. It would be strange to start with difficult issues and get stuck there, wouldn't it?
It took us 17 working days in total analyzing the Unreal Engine code and fixing bugs. Our goal was to eliminate all the general analysis messages of the first and second severity levels. Hereis how the work progressed:
Table 1. The number of warnings remaining on each day.
Notice the red figures. During the first two days, we were getting accustomed to the project and then suppressed warnings in some macros, thus greatly reducing the number of false positives.
Seventeen working days is quite a lot and I'd like to explain why it required this amount of time. First, it was not the whole team that worked on the project, but only two of its members. Of course, they were busy with some other tasks as well during this time. Secondly, Unreal Engine's code was entirely unfamiliar to us, so making fixes was quite a tough job. We had to stop every now and then to figure out if and how we should fix a certain spot.
Now, here is the same data in the form of a smoothed graph:
Figure 3. A smoothed graph of the warning numbers over time.
A practical conclusion - to remember ourselves and tell others: It's a bad idea to try estimating the time it will take you to fix all the warnings based on only the first couple of days of work. It's very pacey at first, so the forecast may appear too optimistic.
But we still needed to make an estimate somehow. I think there should be a magical formula for this, and hopefully we'll discover it and show it to the world someday. But presently, we are too short of statistical data to offer something reliable.
About the bugs found in the project
We have fixed quite a lot of code fragments. These fixes can be theoretically grouped into 3 categories:
Real bugs. We will show you a few of these as an example.
Not actually errors, yet these code fragments were confusing the analyzer and so they can confuse programmers who will study this code in future. In other words, it was "sketchy" code that should be fixed as well. So we did.
Edits made solely because of the need to "please" the analyzer that would generate false positives on those fragments. We were trying to isolate false warning suppressions in a special separate file or improve the work of the analyzer itself whenever possible. But we still had to do some refactoring in certain places to help the analyzer figure things out.
As I promised, here are some examples of the bugs. We have picked out the most interesting defects that were clear to understand.
The first interesting message by PVS-Studio: V506 Pointer to local variable 'NewBitmap' is stored outside the scope of this variable. Such a pointer will become invalid. fontcache.cpp 466
void GetRenderData(....) {.... FT_Bitmap* Bitmap = nullptr; if( Slot->bitmap.pixel_mode == FT_PIXEL_MODE_MONO ) { FT_Bitmap NewBitmap;.... Bitmap = &NewBitmap; }.... OutRenderData.RawPixels.AddUninitialized( Bitmap->rows * Bitmap->width );.... }
The address of the NewBitmap object is saved into the Bitmap pointer. The trouble with it is that right after this, the NewBitmap object's lifetime expires and it is destroyed. So it turns out that Bitmap is pointing to an already destroyed object.
When trying to use a pointer to address a destroyed object, undefined behavior occurs. What form it will take is unknown. The program may work well for years if you are lucky enough that the data of the dead object (stored on the stack) is not overwritten by something else.
A correct way to fix this code is to move NewBitmap's declaration outside the 'if' operator:
void GetRenderData(....) {.... FT_Bitmap* Bitmap = nullptr; FT_Bitmap NewBitmap; if( Slot->bitmap.pixel_mode == FT_PIXEL_MODE_MONO ) { FT_Bitmap_New( &NewBitmap ); // Convert the mono font to 8bbp from 1bpp FT_Bitmap_Convert( FTLibrary, &Slot->bitmap, &NewBitmap, 4 ); Bitmap = &NewBitmap; } else { Bitmap = &Slot->bitmap; }.... OutRenderData.RawPixels.AddUninitialized( Bitmap->rows * Bitmap->width );.... }
The next warning by PVS-Studio: V522 Dereferencing of the null pointer 'GEngine' might take place. Check the logical condition. gameplaystatics.cpp 988
void UGameplayStatics::DeactivateReverbEffect(....) { if (GEngine ||!GEngine->UseSound()) { return; } UWorld* ThisWorld = GEngine->GetWorldFromContextObject(....);.... }
If the GEngine pointer is not null, the function returns and everything is OK. But if it is null, it gets dereferenced.
We fixed the code in the following way:
void UGameplayStatics::DeactivateReverbEffect(....) { if (GEngine == nullptr ||!GEngine->UseSound()) { return; } UWorld* ThisWorld = GEngine->GetWorldFromContextObject(....);.... }
An interesting typo is waiting for you in the next code fragment. The analyzer has detected there a meaningless function call: V530 The return value of function 'Memcmp' is required to be utilized. pathfollowingcomponent.cpp 715
int32 UPathFollowingComponent::OptimizeSegmentVisibility( int32 StartIndex) {.... if (Path.IsValid()) { Path->ShortcutNodeRefs.Reserve(....); Path->ShortcutNodeRefs.SetNumUninitialized(....); } FPlatformMemory::Memcmp(Path->ShortcutNodeRefs.GetData(), RaycastResult.CorridorPolys, RaycastResult.CorridorPolysCount * sizeof(NavNodeRef));.... }
The return result of the Memcmp function is not used. And this is what the analyzer didn't like.
The programmer actually intended to copy a region of memory through the Memcpy() function but made a typo. This is the fixed version:
int32 UPathFollowingComponent::OptimizeSegmentVisibility( int32 StartIndex) {.... if (Path.IsValid()) { Path->ShortcutNodeRefs.Reserve(....); Path->ShortcutNodeRefs.SetNumUninitialized(....); FPlatformMemory::Memcpy(Path->ShortcutNodeRefs.GetData(), RaycastResult.CorridorPolys, RaycastResult.CorridorPolysCount * sizeof(NavNodeRef)); }.... }
Now let's talk about a diagnostic message you are sure to encounter in nearly every project - so common is the bug it refers to. We are talking about the V595 diagnostic. In our bug database, it is at the top of the list regarding the frequency of its occurrence in projects (see examples). At first glance, that list is not as large as, say, for the V501 diagnostic. But it's actually because V595 diagnostics are somewhat boring and we don't write out many of them from every single project. We usually just cite one example and add a note like: And 161 additional diagnostic messages. In half of the cases, these are real errors. This is what it looks like:
Figure 4. The dread of V595 diagnostic.
Diagnostic rule V595 is designed to detect code fragments where a pointer is dereferenced before being checked for null. We always find some quantity of these in projects we analyze. The pointer check and dereferencing operation may be set quite far from each other within a function - tens or even hundreds of lines away, which makes it harder to fix the bug. But there are also small and very representative examples like, for example, this function:
float SGammaUIPanel::OnGetGamma() const { float DisplayGamma = GEngine->DisplayGamma; return GEngine? DisplayGamma : 2.2f; }
PVS-Studio's diagnostic message: V595 The 'GEngine' pointer was utilized before it was verified against nullptr. Check lines: 47, 48. gammauipanel.cpp 47
We fixed this in the following way:
float SGammaUIPanel::OnGetGamma() const { return GEngine? GEngine->DisplayGamma : 2.2f; }
Moving on to the next fragment:
V517 The use of 'if (A) {...} else if (A) {...}' pattern |
red text that says WRONG MAP LOADED.That's basically it, now you can proceed on rendering your video as per normal.Note: I recommend rendering without audio and render the audio only afterwards, rendering altogether makes the sound lag. Correct me if I'm wrong.NSA
The National Security Agency monitored and spotlighted the online pornography practices and financial misdeeds of six Muslim "radicalizers" so that their authority could be undermined by showing hypocrisy, according to a new report.
The "radicalizers appear to be particularly vulnerable in the area of authority when their private and public behaviors are not consistent," the Huffington Post reported Tuesday, quoting from an October 3, 2012, report released after former NSA contractor Edward Snowden leaked it.
Vulnerabilities included using donations for personal expenses, charging exorbitant speaking fees, and "viewing sexually explicit material online or using sexually explicit persuasive language when communicating with inexperienced young girls," the document said.
"Some of the vulnerabilities, if exposed, would likely call into question the radicalizer's devotion to the jihadist cause, leading to the degradation or loss of his authority," the document said.
The government didn't deny the surveillance. Shawn Turner, director of public affairs for National Intelligence, told the Huffington Post in a statement:
Without discussing specific individuals, it should not be surprising that the US government uses all of the lawful tools at our disposal to impede the efforts of valid terrorist targets who seek to harm the nation and radicalize others to violence.
However, the electronic surveillance has triggered concern among those who fear the NSA will abuse its online data-gathering power. In the 1960s and 1970s, the NSA spied on Martin Luther King, Jr., two senators, Muhammad Ali, and journalists from the New York Times and the Washington Post.
"This report is an unwelcome reminder of what it means to give an intelligence agency unfettered access to individuals' most sensitive information," American Civil Liberties Union Deputy Legal Director Jameel Jaffer said in a statement Wednesday. "One ordinarily associates these kinds of tactics with the secret police services of authoritarian governments. That these tactics have been adopted by the world's leading democracy -- and the world's most powerful intelligence agency -- is truly chilling."
Update, 11:20 a.m. PT: Adds comment from the ACLU.
NSATRENTON -- Absence doesn't always make the heart grow fonder, according to a new poll tracking Gov. Chris Christie's popularity at home.
Less than a week after he dropped out of the Republican presidential race following a poor performance in the New Hampshire primary, the new Rutgers-Eagleton poll shows just 29 percent of New Jersey's registered voters have a favorable view of the governor.
That's down four points from the last poll in December.
The governor's job approval ratings remained about the same, matching a record low of 33 percent approving and 61 percent disapproving, the poll found.
Not surprisingly, Christie's favorability rating is down most among Democrats, with just 12 percent saying they have a favorable view of the governor. That's compared to a quarter of independents and 63 percent of Republicans.
Ashley Koning, the assistant director of the Eagleton Center for Public Interest Polling at Rutgers University, said the results come just as Christie returns from his failed presidential bid, which kept him out of state more often than not.
"Even during the most contentious moments of his governorship -- his polarizing first years in office or in Bridegate's immediate aftermath -- the governor's numbers never reached the consistent lows we saw throughout his run for president and see now upon his return."
Christie returns to N.J. for budget speech: What lawmakers want him to say
The new numbers came just as Christie was preparing to present his state budget address, calling on members of the Democrat-controlled Legislature to work with him on bipartisan solutions to pressing matters including the state's pension crisis, the dwindling Transportation Trust Fund and tax reform.
David Redlawsk, the center's director and a political science professor at Rutgers, said the governor's sliding approval rating "does not bode well for Christie's agenda."
"There seems little reason for the Democrats who control the legislature to warmly embrace a governor voters feel so cool about," Redlawsk said in a statement.
The poll numbers represent the responses of 758 registered voters interviewed by pollsters Feb. 6-15, with a margin of error of 3.9 percentage points.
S.P. Sullivan may be reached at ssullivan@njadvancemedia.com. Follow him on Twitter. Find NJ.com on Facebook.Will come back to these later.
Squirtle: A bit of a challenge since Squirtle is shown as both a biped and quadruped in the anime. After a lot of feedback to make Charmander biped (who is never quadruped in the anime), I decided to depict Squirtle as a semi-biped Terrapin (Fresh Water Turtle). I had to change the features but I can only speculate a Squirtle would probably use all fours most of the time and chill on its back legs for a better look at its surroundings.
Totodile: No brainer; baby crocodile. It was really hard to even make it biped so it's on all fours now.
Mudkip: An interesting one. A cross between an Axolotl and a Mudskipper.
Piplup: Baby Emperor Penguin.
Oshawott: Sea Otter Pup with a Beaver tail.
This is just how I interpret Pokémon if they were'real-life' or'realistic.' I understand that people don't agree with my interpretations, but instead of getting snarky about it you can always find another artist to draw Pokémon the way you see them Hope you like them guys!It’s been a long time since I’ve worked on any of my quilling mini canvases. I will confess- one downfall of being interested in so many types of art and constantly trying new things does mean that there is less time for my more signature art work. However, I can tell from my work on these mini’s that I am still growing and evolving as an artist- the things I’ve been learning and practicing are having a definite influence in my work.
I have a wall of art for sale at a local shop, and last week I was told that there was a lady who has been purchasing several of my mini’s, and had requested a few more of a certain color. She especially loved my quilling mini canvases, and wanted a couple more in purple and teal. Well, I got right to work and I hope she loves them as much as I do! I always get nervous when someone makes a special request, because I know that I do evolve as an artist, and my mind and skills are in different places when I create now as opposed to when I created before, even if it was just a few months ago.
I think she’ll be happy with them, though. They are, after all, Anjuli Johnson originals. 🙂 Plus, I can’t tell you how awesome it is to have a patron who loves your work and keeps coming back for more. What more can an artist ask for? Maybe a few more people just like her… 🙂The Impeach Trump Now organization, an effort begun on Inauguration Day, has added a new feather to its cap: former Massachusetts’ Supreme Court Justice Justice Fernande (Nan) R.V. Duffly.
She will serve, they state in their announcement, on their legal advisory board.
The Campaign to Impeach Donald Trump Now, a growing national movement for an impeachment investigation of President Trump, announced today that Justice Fernande (Nan) R.V. Duffly, who retired last summer from the Massachusetts Supreme Judicial Court, has joined its Legal Advisory Board. The campaign, launched on Inauguration Day and led by two public interest organizations, Free Speech For People and RootsAction.org, is calling on Congress to start this investigation based on the President’s direct and ongoing violations of the two anti-corruption provisions of the US Constitution and based on the President’s apparent interference with a criminal investigation by his improper attempts to influence, and his ultimate firing of, FBI Director James Comey..... “The US Constitution extends rights and freedoms to the people that are protected by limits placed on those in power, including the President,” says Justice Duffly. “Congress must act now to investigate mounting evidence that the President has abused his power through violations of the foreign and domestic emoluments clauses, and obstructed or interfered with the administration of justice. The strength of our democracy depends on it.”
Although it’s a bit difficult to take an organization that launched on President Trump’s Inauguration Day seriously, the calls for Trump’s impeachment/removal from office are saturating the mainstream and left-leaning media.
An article published by Robert Reich, co-founder of American Prospect and advocate for a universal guaranteed income giving “millions of people more free time to do what they want to do instead of what they have to do to earn a living,” appears in Newsweek.
Reich argues that there are grounds for impeachment, and that it’s just a matter of time before Republicans put country over party and follow through.
He writes:
The question is no longer whether there are grounds to impeach Donald Trump. It is when enough Republicans will put their loyalty to America ahead of their loyalty to their party. Trump’s statements last week about his firing of former FBI director James Comey provide ample evidence that Trump engaged in an obstruction of justice – a major charge in impeachment proceedings brought against Richard M. Nixon and Bill Clinton.
Admitting that the current GOP-majority House is unlikely to impeach Trump, Reich floats the 2018 midterms as the chance to flip the House and insert a Democrat majority who will pursue impeachment proceedings. He then says that’s just too long to wait, so it’s time to pressure Republicans in the House to “do the right thing.”
Reich continues:
In my experience, most elected politicians have two goals – to do what they consider to be the right things for the American public, and to be reelected (not necessarily in that order). If Trump’s poll numbers continue to plummet – particularly among Republicans and Independents – twenty-two House Republicans may well decide their chances for being reelected are better if they abandon him before the 2018 midterms. Paul Ryan and the House Republican leadership might make a similar calculation, at least enough to put a bill of impeachment on the table. Most House Republicans prefer Vice President Mike Pence to Donald Trump anyway. As one said to me several months ago, “Pence is a predictable conservative. Trump is an unpredictable egomaniac. Most of us are more comfortable with the former.”
Reich correctly notes that Republicans won’t toe the impeachment line unless American voters “decide they can’t abide him anymore.”
Donald Trump doesn’t have the character or the temperament to be president of the United States. But this obvious fact isn’t enough to get him fired. He’ll be fired when enough Americans decide they can’t abide him anymore. Then, maybe in an impeachment proceeding, it will come out that Trump did something incredibly stupid – like give a nod of approval to one of his campaign bottom feeders like Roger Stone to tell a Russian operative to go ahead with their plan to interfere in the 2016 election.
These statements are somewhat shocking for their honesty. Reich acknowledges, however backhandedly, that there is no evidence at all that President Trump has engaged in the impeachable offenses of treason, bribery, and/or “high crimes and misdemeanors.” This evidence of wrong-doing, he contends, will undoubtedly come up in the impeachment proceeding. “Maybe,” he hopes.
This is in-line with the general “impeach Trump” movement. Representative Maxine Waters (D-CA) famously stated that an investigation is needed... in order to find evidence for impeachment.
The Impeach Trump Now organization began on the assumption that the president’s business interests were a conflict of interest (this is where the Emoluments clause Duffly mentioned above comes into play) that needed to be investigated for impeachable offenses. Indeed, the group’s proposed Resolution (embedded below) urges the Judiciary Committee to investigate whether or not sufficient grounds exist for the president’s impeachment.
Representative Al Green (D-TX) has no qualms about insisting unequivocally that the impeachable offense has already been committed and that the president “must be charged.” Green is the second Democrat—Waters was the first—to overtly call for Trump’s impeachment.
The Washington Times reports:
A Democratic congressman called for impeaching President Trump on Monday, saying Congress must prove to the country that the laws apply to everyone. “President Trump is not above the law. He has committed an impeachable act and must be charged,” said Rep. Al Green, Texas Democrat. “To do otherwise would cause some Americans to lose respect for, and obedience to, our societal norms.” Mr. Green said the firing of FBI Director James B. Comey last week was an attempt to intimidate and obstruct the bureau’s probe into potential illicit connections between Trump campaign figures and the Russian government. [emphasis added]
The problem, of course, is that there is—again and as usual—exactly zero evidence that the president fired Comey to obstruct justice. At best, there is a basis for debate in the president’s public statements, all of which can be interpreted as either ominous or innocent.
Indeed, two Harvard law professors, both Democrats, have entirely different views of the charge that firing Comey constitutes an obstruction of justice.
The Hill reports:
There might be a smidgen of tension in the Harvard Law School faculty lounge. Two of the school’s most renowned senior professors — Alan Dershowitz and Laurence Tribe — have taken diametrically opposed positions on whether the dismissal of James Comey as FBI director establishes the crime of obstruction of justice perpetrated by none other than the President of the United States, Donald J. Trump.
Tribe, the Hill continues, sees “a series of high crimes and misdemeanors.”
Professor Tribe, in a televised interview, emphasized several aspects of the swirling controversy: first, unnamed “associates” of Comey reportedly have said that President Trump had asked then-director Comey if he could count on his “loyalty,” and Comey had not given an affirmative answer. Secondly, in an interview on NBC, Trump himself said that he had directly asked Comey if he (Trump) was under investigation, and had been told he was not. In that same interview, Trump also said the Russian investigation was a factor in his decision to fire the director. In that larger context, Tribe believes that asking for Comey’s “loyalty” is the equivalent of asking for a promise that Trump will not become a target of the investigation. That, according to Tribe, is an “impermissible” request, which “on its face” is an obstruction of justice. Indeed, Tribe goes so far as to say that the entire sequence of events is “a series of high crimes and misdemeanors” that would justify articles of impeachment.
Dershowitz, on the other hand, contends that the president has “undisputed authority to fire” the FBI director for whatever reason he sees pertinent, and Dershowitz notes that “motive alone should never constitute a crime.”
The Hill continues:
Professor Dershowitz has an entirely different view on obstruction of justice. He thinks that the idea that Trump is guilty of obstructing justice is “a dangerous argument … being put forward by some Democratic ideologues[.]” (I told you the faculty lounge at Harvard Law was tense, didn’t I?) Dershowitz rejects the obstruction of justice argument because it is undisputed that the president has the legal authority to fire a director of the FBI. Comey himself made exactly that point in his farewell letter to the FBI staff, where he wrote that, “I have long believed that a President can fire an FBI director for any reason, or for no reason at all.” In light of the president’s undisputed authority to fire the FBI director, Dershowitz makes this argument: “Even assuming that Trump was improperly motivated in firing Comey, motive alone should never constitute a crime. … Otherwise the crime would place the defendant’s thoughts on trial, rather than his actions.”
Ultimately, what constitutes impeachable “high crimes and misdemeanors” can only be decided by each individual elected Representative in the House.
This is not lost on the media, of course, so now we are hearing about unnamed Republicans who are “afraid of Trump” and “want Trump out.”
Politics USA reports:
Prominent Republicans who used not to be frightened are now scared of Trump after the past week, which means that the door is now opening for a serious bipartisan movement to oust this president and his administration. During an appearance on CBS’s Face The Nation, The Washington Post’s David Ignatius relayed the growing fear of Trump among Republicans, “Talking this week to several prominent Republicans, people who have not been sharp critics of Donald Trump, I heard the same thing, which is: This guy scares me. And I think the reason that people were scared this week is that they saw impulsive behavior, they saw a kind of vengeful, brooding about past slights. They saw a willingness to be — to be — just basically to lie to the country, not to tell the truth. And I think — one person said to me, there are no guardrails on this presidency. Another person said, this is Richard Nixon on steroids. In other words, this is kind of a hyperactive — so, I think that’s where we are at the end of the week. A lot of people are scared. And they wonder, how do we get out of this?” The whispers that Republicans are looking for a way out have been getting louder off the record ever since the President accused Barack Obama of wiretapping him.
Anonymous sources are the lifeblood of journalism in part because high level sources have valid reasons for not wanting their identities disclosed, but with the growing public distrust in media, such sources are not taken as seriously as they may once have been.
Whispering, unnamed Republican sources may hope that there is growing support for the president’s ouster, but Congressional Republicans would do well not to believe everything they read. Trump supporters are disgusted by the vile innuendo, calling for impeachment investigations to locate misdeeds that are currently unknown, and the all-too-clear feeding frenzy surrounding the president. They are going to close ranks and circle the wagons to protect Trump.
While this is expected, what the “impeach Trump” movement may not realize (yet) is that their blind, hope-something-sticks mud-slinging and flailing around is alienating the all-important “reluctant Trump voter.” This is me and the millions of Americans like me who wouldn’t have chosen Trump to be our great nation’s president but who saw him, quite rightly it turns out, as a far far better option than Hillary Clinton.
Of the reluctant Trump voter, FiveThirtyEight notes:
But not every Donald Trump voter was quite so enthusiastic. While we’ve always known his core base was a loyal one, Trump made it to the White House thanks in no small part to a group of voters who didn’t necessarily like him but were willing to give him a chance. Nearly 20 percent of voters in the 2016 presidential election had an unfavorable view of both Trump and Hillary Clinton, according to exit polls, and Trump won that group 47 percent to 30 percent. That made the difference. [my emphasis]
The key here is that we were (and still are) willing to give him a chance. Because of this, there may be a heightened animosity toward a movement seeking to impeach, without clear cause, the president we chose, however reluctantly, and truly want to succeed.
The Impeach Trump Now movement—started on Inauguration Day, advocating “accuse now, find evidence later,” and therefore engaging in what can only be seen as a witch hunt—is further alienating the very Trump voters they need to turn the tide of public opinion to support their efforts.
Impeachment Resolution by Legal Insurrection on ScribdAetna, the nation's third largest health insurer, announced that it will pull back from Obamacare exchanges citing losses of more than $430 million since January 2014. (Daron Taylor/The Washington Post)
Aetna, the nation's third largest health insurer, announced that it will pull back from Obamacare exchanges citing losses of more than $430 million since January 2014. (Daron Taylor/The Washington Post)
Insurance giant Aetna’s decision to stop offering much of its individual coverage through the Affordable Care Act is exposing a problem in President Obama’s signature health-care law that could lead to another fraught political battle in Congress.
Aetna’s announcement Monday night was the latest sign that large insurers are losing money in the Affordable Care Act’s marketplaces, heightening concerns about the long-term stability of a key part of Obama’s domestic policy legacy. But addressing this issue could open the door to a nasty political fight, given that some Republicans have vowed to repeal the law outright.
If insurers continue to lose money, more are likely to withdraw from the marketplaces, a move that would reduce choices for consumers and could contribute to higher premiums. In one county, Aetna’s exit in 2017 could leave no insurers offering policies through its marketplace.
Aetna said it will exit 11 of the 15 states where it offers coverage through the Affordable Care Act, widely known as Obamacare. That affects about 80 percent of its customers covered through insurance marketplaces.
The marketplaces, known as insurance exchanges, were created to provide coverage for Americans who cannot get affordable health benefits through a job. A key aspect of the health-care law, the marketplaces allow people to purchase insurance online with subsidies based on their income.
Aetna will become the latest health insurer to cut back its participation in the Affordable Care Act’s public exchanges. (Jessica Hill/Associated Press)
Earlier this month, Humana said it will cut back its participation on the exchanges from 15 states to 11. On an earnings call in July, UnitedHealth Group chief executive Stephen Hemsley announced that his company plans to remain on “three or fewer exchange markets.”
In a reversal of expectations, Anthem said it is projecting mid-single-digit losses on the individual plans it sells on the exchanges for 2016. And Cigna has said that it is losing money on the exchanges, although the insurer is planning to expand its marketplace presence to three new states in 2017.
The health-care law is likely to prompt another heated political battle, regardless of which party wins the White House and control of Congress in November.
GOP presidential nominee Donald Trump has suggested that he would seek to scrap it altogether. Quoting a news story by Reuters on Tuesday, he tweeted: “Another health insurer is pulling back due to ‘persistent financial losses on #Obamacare plans.’ Only the beginning!”
Democratic nominee Hillary Clinton has pledged to modify the law to expand coverage and wants to add a public insurance option.
Both candidates’ proposals would face stiff political headwinds, but several health-care experts said lawmakers could still pursue more modest changes to make the program work better.
“The idea of somehow repealing it is far-fetched,” said Joseph Antos, a resident scholar at the American Enterprise Institute. “But changing it is not far-fetched.”
There are many possible policy remedies, but the main issues have to do with the risk pool — the balance between healthy people and sick people with higher health-care expenses. Many insurers have noted that people who have signed up for health insurance on the marketplaces are sicker, putting greater demands on the system.
“You have here a situation which all of us who care about the exchanges have to worry about,” said Zeke Emanuel, who served as a top White House health policy adviser during Obama’s first term and is now vice provost for global initiatives at the University of Pennsylvania. “There is a problem with the risk pool. There is a problem with the numbers of people signing up.”
One solution would be to entice more people — particularly healthy ones — to sign up for insurance, whether through a more robust public outreach campaign or by warning them about escalating financial penalties for not having coverage. Another would be to find new and better ways to give insurers that cover the sickest people greater financial relief.
“There are incremental steps the administration can take to address that, but I think more significant changes would require legislation that could get bipartisan support,” said Mark McClellan, director of the Margolis Center for Health Policy at Duke University.
In a statement Tuesday, Clinton spokesman Jesse Ferguson said the candidate is committed to expanding the law, which Obama signed in 2010.
“Hillary Clinton has outlined concrete plans to make health coverage more affordable in and out of the marketplaces, with more choices, expanded relief for costs, aggressively containing prescription drug expenses and the choice of a public option,” he said.
Many of these initiatives, along with any move to stiffen the financial penalties for not purchasing insurance, would require congressional approval.
In the meantime, however, some insurers are pulling back — and at least one county in Arizona has no insurers slated to sell marketplace plans in 2017.
Aetna chief executive Mark Bertolini said in a statement that there are not enough healthy people to financially offset those with major health problems who require high-cost care. As of June 30, Aetna covered 838,000 people through the exchanges. In total, 11.1 million people were signed up for the marketplace plans at the end of March.
Katherine Hempstead, a senior adviser at the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation, said that these national carriers haven’t traditionally been the biggest part of the exchanges.
“I think the market could survive without these guys,” she said. “Obviously, it would be better to see lots of people seeing a lot of opportunity in this space.... But I don’t think it’s a chapter in a Greek tragedy.”
The decisions also come as four of the major insurers are in a battle with the Obama administration. The Justice Department has blocked two proposed mergers: between Aetna and Humana, and between Anthem and Cigna. The companies are fighting the decisions.
Anthem has said that if its proposed deal with Cigna is allowed to go through, it will increase its exchange offerings to nine additional states.
Caroline Pearson, a senior vice president at Avalere Health, a health-care consulting firm, said that the lawsuit may have affected the timing of Aetna’s announcement — in late April, Bertolini described the marketplace as “a good investment” — but not the underlying facts about the viability of the marketplaces.
House Energy and Commerce Committee Chairman Fred Upton (R-Mich.) said in a statement that the administration deserves the blame. “Plans are rapidly exiting the so-called marketplace because Washington has damaged and upended the insurance markets,” he said.
But Rep. Diana DeGette (Colo.), the top Democrat on Energy and Commerce’s subcommittee on oversight and investigations, said in an interview Tuesday that Republicans “seem to be hell-bent” on holding hearings “to support their multitude of efforts to repeal the ACA” and “have totally neglected their duty to try to fix it.”
DeGette said multiple senior and influential Republicans have told her privately that they are open to tweaking the health-care law after the November elections, when they have a clearer sense of the new political landscape.
“There’s a long list of things large and small that need to be adjusted,” she said. “But I don’t think anyone can say what that is until we know what the new Congress looks like.”
Amy Goldstein contributed to this report.The Federal Bureau of Investigation has reviewed intercepted calls between retired Army Lt. Gen. Michael Flynn and the Russian ambassador to the United States, and has found no evidence of wrongdoing.
The Washington Post reported Tuesday that the FBI reviewed communications between Flynn and ambassador Sergey Kislyak on Dec. 29, the day President Obama announced more sanctions against Russia for their influence campaign on the presidential election.
The U.S. was conducting routine electronic surveillance on Kislyak and picked up the conversations with Flynn, which President Trump's team has both confirmed and denied happened.
White House press secretary Sean Spicer said Monday Kislyak and Flynn never spoke on Dec. 29, and only spoke on Dec. 28, but the Trump camp confirmed this month the two did speak on Dec. 29.
The Post reported Flynn did not commit any wrongdoing and there is no evidence of illicit ties between him and the Russian government.
The White House maintains Flynn and Kislyak had friendly conversation and the only business talk was about setting up a call between Trump and Russian President Vladimir Putin. The sanctions were never discussed, Spicer said.No Retreat, No Surrender is a 1986 American martial arts film directed by Corey Yuen in his American directorial debut, and starring Kurt McKinney and Jean-Claude Van Damme. The film was released in the United States on May 2, 1986.[1][5] McKinney performs as Jason Stillwell, an American teenager who learns karate from the spirit of Bruce Lee. Stillwell uses these lessons to defend his martial arts dojo against Soviet martial artist Ivan Kraschinsky (Van Damme).
The film was written by Keith W. Strandberg after being contracted by Ng See-yuen, the owner of Seasonal Film Corporation, to write a script for them, despite having never written a script beforehand. Van Damme was cast in the film and caused problems on the set for continually physically contacting other actors and stuntmen during the fight scenes even after director Yuen told him not to. Upon release, the film received negative reviews, focusing on the story which some reviewers found too similar to the 1984 film The Karate Kid. Retrospectively, the film has received praise for its well-choreographed fight scenes featuring Van Damme.
Plot [ edit ]
Jason Stillwell is a young karate student and Bruce Lee fanatic who trains in his father Tom's dojo in Sherman Oaks, California. One night after a training session, the dojo is visited by members of an organized crime syndicate looking to take over all the dojos in the country. After refusing to join the organization, Tom's leg is broken by a Soviet martial artist named Ivan Kraschinsky, one of the boss' hired thugs.
The Stillwell family relocates to Seattle, where Jason meets R.J. Madison and they become good friends. Jason reunites with his old girlfriend Kelly Reilly, who lives in the neighborhood with her brother, local black belt Ian. Despite this, Jason has a hard time adjusting, as he and R. J. are constantly beaten and harassed by the local bullies led by an obese boy named Scott and arrogant martial artist Dean Ramsay. After getting beaten up and humiliated by Scott and Dean at Kelly's birthday party, Jason visits the grave of Bruce Lee and beseeches him for aid.
Later that night, Jason and Tom have a heated argument over Jason's involving himself in fights. When Jason calls his father a coward for running away from the syndicate, Tom destroys some of Jason's Bruce Lee memorabilia in the garage. Distraught, Jason consults with R.J., who suggests that Jason move all of his training gear into an abandoned house nearby. Exhausted from the move, Jason falls asleep at the house, but is suddenly awakened by the soul of Bruce Lee, who appears to Jason and begins to train him. Under Lee's tutelage, Jason goes from a below average fighter to a superior martial artist, at one point able to fend off several thugs who are assaulting his father in a parking lot.
Later on, Jason, Tom, and R.J. attend an annual full-contact kickboxing tournament featuring teams from Seattle and New York. Before the contest can get under way, however, the crime syndicate interrupts and makes a wager that none of the Seattle fighters can defeat Ivan. While Dean and Frank are easily dispatched by the Soviet, Ivan's last opponent, Ian, makes an impressive showing, forcing Ivan to resort to dirty tactics to defeat him. With Ian helplessly entangled in the ring ropes, Scott attempts to bite Ivan in the leg, but the Soviet dispatches him with a headbutt. Kelly tries to stop Ivan by hitting him with a stool, but the Soviet easily disarms her and grabs her by the hair. Spurred into action, Jason charges to the ring and attacks Ivan, much to the delight of the crowd. Utilizing his advanced training, Jason is finally able to conquer his nemesis and earn the respect of his peers and the frustrated crime syndicate members leave Seattle.
Cast [ edit ]
Kurt McKinney as Jason Stillwell
Jean-Claude Van Damme as Ivan Kraschinsky
J. W. Fails as R. J. Madison
Kathie Sileno as Kelly Reilly
Tai Chung Kim as the ghost of Bruce Lee
Kent Lipham as Scott
Ron Pohnel as Ian Reilly
Dale Jacoby as Dean Ramsay
Peter “Sugarfoot” Cunningham as Frank Peters
Timothy D. Baker as Tom Stillwell
Gloria Marziano as Mrs. Stillwell
Paul Oswell as Trevor
Production [ edit ]
After living in Taiwan for a year in the early 1980s, screenwriter Keith W. Strandberg became interested in working in martial arts films as an actor.[6] Strandberg moved back to the United States and became a tour director in China, where he continued to stop by in Hong Kong to make contact with producers and screenwriters.[6] After being turned down by several studios including Shaw Brothers,[6] Strandberg read about Seasonal Film Corporation and got in contact with the studio head Ng See-yuen. Ng expressed an interest in making an American film and asked if Strandberg knew anything about screenplays. Strandberg stated that he had despite never seeing one before.[6] A year later, ng See-yuen contacted Strandberg in America stating that he wanted to write a script for them. Strandberg wrote a draft of what would become No Retreat, No Surrender. While production began on the film, Strandberg was on set and spent hours every night changing the script to improve its quality while filming.[6]
Jean-Claude Van Damme was cast as the Soviet villain Ivan Kraschinsky. On set, Van Damme performed a round house kick on Pete Cunningham which rendered him unconscious.[6] Actor and martial artist Timothy Baker stated that while working with Van Damme during the action scenes on the set, the production manager and director Corey Yuen instructed him to not make contact with the other actors and stuntmen.[7][8] Despite continuous warnings, Van Damme continued to make contacts with his kicks to Baker on the set.[8] Other actors and martial artists claimed that Van Damme had not been reckless with his physical contact with people during the fight scene including Ron Pohnel who said that "His control wasn't such as mine, but I had no complaints."[7] Van Damme originally had a two picture deal with screenwriter Strandberg but broke his contract.[6]
Release [ edit ]
No Retreat, No Surrender was released on May 2, 1986.[9] The film was the eleventh highest grossing film on its opening week in the American box office grossing $739,723.[10] The film grossed a total of $4,662,137.[4]
While there was never a DVD release in the United States, a Blu-ray release was announced for the second half of 2016.[11]. Kino Lorber Classics released the Region A Blu-Ray on February 21, 2017, which contained both the American theatrical release and a longer international cut.[12]
Reception [ edit ]
Walter Goodman of The New York Times gave the film a negative review, writing that the screenplay was "thrown together".[13] Time Out compared the film to The Last Dragon, Karate Kid, and Rocky IV noting that it "borrows heavily" from those films and "makes them look like masterpieces".[14] The martial arts magazine Black Belt gave the film a rating of one and a half out of five noting that Jean-Claude Van Damme does not have much screen time and that the film was derivative of The Karate Kid.[15] Patrick Goldstein of the Los Angeles Times called it "hilariously bad" and an "amateurish clunker" with poor action scenes.[16]
In 1993, Black Belt placed the film at seventh on their list of top ten choreographed martial arts films. The magazine specifically praised Van Damme's jump kicks while noting that McKinney's look "suspiciously quick" noting that "unlike the Hong Kong movie industry, American filmmakers have yet to master the technique of speeding up the film without "jumpy/fidgety" side effects".[17] In 2017, Ed Travis of Cinapse said the film "manages to never the less entertain and delight with a combination of pure earnestness and legitimately cool fight work."[18] Austin Trunick of Under the Radar said Van Damme's scenes "are prime Van Damme, at least, with some fantastic fight choreography and a full showcase of splits, high-kicks, and bug-eyed snarling."[19]
See also [ edit ]Going off of the trailer, Ben Affleck’s new thriller The Accountant seems to be starting from a potentially laughable premise—a guy uses his autism to become the world’s most dangerous money launderer/killer of men, like a blood-soaked Rain Man—and taking it intensely seriously. It helps that director Gavin O’Connor (Jane Got A Gun) managed to find a pretty hefty stack of talent with which to surround Affleck, including Anna Kendrick as the woman who ends up embroiled in his schemes and J.K. Simmons as the federal agent pursuing him.
If you’re living in Chicago, though, you can judge the film’s merits without having to drop a single taxable dime.
Advertisement
All you have to do is head to this link, click “Get My Passes,” and you’ll be signed up for an advance screening of the movie, scheduled for Tuesday, October 11 at 7 p.m. at Chicago’s Showplace ICON theater on Roosevelt. Note, though, that these advance screenings always overbook, so if you want to ensure that you actually get to see Ben Affleck deduct all the blood and brains out of a bunch of shady bad guys with a sniper rifle, be sure to get there with plenty of time to spare.Prince Harry, who is fifth in line for the throne.
Prince Harry, who is fifth in line for the throne.
A FAR-RIGHT “ginger extremist” who fantasised about assassinating Britain’s Prince Charles so his red-haired son Harry might become king one day was found guilty today of plotting a terror attack.
Mark Colborne, 37, who felt marginalised due to his ginger hair, compared himself to the Norwegian extremist Anders Behring Breivik and wrote in his notebook of his plans to kill Charles, the heir to the throne.
Colborne said he wanted to “put a bullet in Charles’ head”.
“I would sacrifice my life for that one shot. Kill Charles and William and Harry become king. Kill the tyrants,” he wrote.
“I want them to see my transition from poor red-haired victimised minority that is constantly walked over to a fully transformed military terrorist,” he wrote.
Colborne, who has been dubbed the “ginger extremist” by British tabloids, compared himself to Breivik, who in |
homosexual practices in the first place, and, when they nevertheless proceed in their homosexual behavior, to encourage them to do so discreetly, so as not shake the confidence of the community in polity's ability to provide rules for safe, dependable marriage and family relationships.
In May 2013 Card further wrote that since the US Supreme Court had ruled those laws unconstitutional in 2003, he has "no interest in criminalizing homosexual acts".[52] Responding to public criticism of the 1990 essay, Card noted:
Oddly enough, even as I am attacked by some as a homophobe, I am attacked by others as being too supportive of homosexuality, simply because I cannot see individual homosexuals, in or out of my books, as anything other than human beings with as complex a combination of good and evil in them as I find within myself. In my own view, I am walking a middle way, which condemns the sin but loves the sinner.[52]
In a 2008 opinion piece in the Deseret News he wrote that "no matter how close the bonds of affection and friendship might be within same-sex couples, there is no act of court or Congress that can make these relationships the same as the coupling between a man and a woman."[53] In 2009 he joined the board of directors of the National Organization for Marriage, a group that campaigns against same-sex marriage,[40] but later resigned from the board in mid-2013.[30] Card has stated that there is no need to legalize gay marriage.[54]
Card has also expressed his opinion that paraphilia and homosexuality are linked. In 2004, he claimed that it is a "myth that homosexuals are 'born that way'", noting that "if there is a genetic component to homosexuality, an entire range of environmental influences are also involved." He continued, saying that "the dark secret of homosexual society" was how often people "entered into that world through disturbing seduction or rape or molestation or abuse".[30][40][54]
In Card's 2008 novella Hamlet's Father, which re-imagines the backstory of Shakespeare's play Hamlet, Card was accused of directly trying to link the king's pedophilia with homosexuality. The novella prompted public outcry and its publishers were inundated with complaints.[55][56] Trade journal Publishers Weekly criticized Card's work, stating that the main purpose of it was to attempt to link homosexuality to pedophilia.[57] Card responded to the claim: "...[T]here is no link whatsoever between homosexuality and pedophilia in this book. Hamlet's father, in the book, is a pedophile, period. I don't show him being even slightly attracted to adults of either sex. It is the reviewer, not me, who has asserted this link, which I would not and did not make."[56]
In 2013, Card was selected as a guest author for DC Comics's new Adventures of Superman comic book series,[58] but controversy over Card's views on homosexuality led illustrator Chris Sprouse to leave the project[59] and DC Comics to put Card's story on hold indefinitely.[60] A few months later an LGBT group, Geeks OUT!, proposed a boycott of the movie adaptation of Ender's Game calling Card's view anti-gay,[61][62] causing the movie studio Lionsgate to publicly distance itself from Card's opinions.[63]
In July 2013, one week after the U.S. Supreme Court issued rulings in two cases that were widely interpreted as favoring recognition of same-sex marriages, Card wrote in Entertainment Weekly that the gay marriage issue is moot due to the Supreme Court's decision on DOMA.[32] He further stated, "now it will be interesting to see whether the victorious proponents of gay marriage will show tolerance toward those who disagreed with them when the issue was still in dispute".[32]
Religion [ edit ]
Card's membership in The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints has been an important facet of his life from early on. He is a great-great-grandson of Brigham Young, the Church's second president and prophet, and all of Card's ancestors for at least three generations have been members of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. His ancestors include several other figures notable in the Church, including the Cardston colony founder Charles Ora Card. As such, his faith has been a source of inspiration and influence for both his writing and his personal views.[11] Since 2008 Card has written a column of Latter-day Saint devotional and cultural commentary for the Sunday national edition of the Deseret News (formerly "the Mormon Times").[64] Card has served as a bishop of his ward and has held various other church callings.
Personal life [ edit ]
Card and his wife, Kristine, have had five children, each named after one or more authors he and his wife admire. Their children's names are Michael Geoffrey (Geoffrey Chaucer), Emily Janice (Emily Brontë and Emily Dickinson), Charles Benjamin (Charles Dickens), Zina Margaret (Margaret Mitchell) and Erin Louisa (Louisa May Alcott). Charles, who had cerebral palsy, died shortly after his 17th birthday and their daughter Erin died the day she was born.[10] Card and his wife live with their youngest child, Zina, in Greensboro, North Carolina.[10]
The life of their son, Charles, influenced some of Card's fiction, most notably the Homecoming series, Lost Boys and Folk of the Fringe. Their daughter, Emily, along with two other writers, adapted Card's short stories "Clap Hands and Sing", "Lifeloop" and "A Sepulchre of Songs" for the stage in Posing as People.[65]
In 2008, he appeared in the short film The Delivery, which starred his daughter, Emily. He plays an author reading an audiobook in this film, which won First Place in Fantasy at Dragon*Con Film Festival. He wrote an original story, "The Emperor of the Air", specifically for the short film by Gabrielle de Cuir and Stefan Rudnicki.
Card is an avid fan of the science fiction television series Firefly and makes an appearance in the documentary Done the Impossible about Firefly fandom. He has also served on the boards of a number of organizations, including public television station UNC-TV (2013–present)[66] and the National Organization for Marriage (2009–2013).[67]
Card suffered a mild stroke on January 1, 2011, and was briefly hospitalized. He reported expecting to make a full recovery despite impairment of his left hand.[68][69]
Awards [ edit ]
The ALA Margaret A. Edwards Award recognizes one writer and a particular body of work for "significant and lasting contributions to young adult literature". Card won the annual award in 2008, citing Ender's Game (1985), which inaugurated the science fiction Ender Saga, and Ender's Shadow (1999), the so-called parallel novel featuring another boy in the Battle School. According to the citation, the two boys' "experiences echo those of teens, beginning as children navigating in an adult world and growing into a state of greater awareness of themselves, their communities and the larger universe."[25] In the same year, Card won the Lifetime Achievement Award for Mormon writers (Whitney Awards).[70]
He has also won numerous awards for single works.
Works [ edit ]
In 1978, the Harold B. Lee Library acquired the Orson Scott Card papers, which included Card's works, writing notes and letters, and in 2007 the collection was formally opened.[75][76][77]
See also [ edit ]
References [ edit ]
Further reading [ edit ]By By Marcus Hondro Aug 30, 2014 in World There is Dating Naked and the real estate show Buying Naked and of course The Naked News. There's a naked bike ride and topless march. Nudity is showing itself off of late, making the news and in doing so displaying just how prudish we can be. Nudity in the House To begin there was an expose in the "Nudity has nothing whatever to do with sex as far as I’m concerned, and as our son has already reached puberty it’s not going to make any difference now," Mom believes. "If anything, I think that “normalizing” nudity is the best way of countering the over-sexualisation of our children." As the Daily Mal reports, however, not everyone agrees. Psychotherapist Margaret Ramage told Mail reporter Clare Campbell that "Although there is nothing intrinsically 'wrong' in nudity between family members, it can have effects we cannot predict. "Neuroscientists have found there is a sexual template in the brain that begins to develop around seven or eight in a boy, and it might be inhibited by the sight of his mother’s naked body, which could possibly affect him in later life." Rampage also spoke of seeing "adult men who slept in their mothers’ beds in their teenage years and who later complained of a complete lack of sexual desire." She notes that "in our culture, nudity is very much a sexual matter, with mystery, excitement and arousal all linked to it. Generally, it is important that children are not exposed to adult sexuality in any form." Nude Man in Topeka, Kansas Another case of recent nudity took place last week in Topeka, Kansas when a man walked about parts of the city buck naked. The real issue became the number of complaints police got - none of which they acted upon. "Unless somebody is exposing themselves or a sexual organ to gratify or arouse someone other than themselves then it's really not anything against the law," Shawnee County Sheriff Herman Jones told That explanation doesn't sit so well with Topeka resident Natasha Shamblin, who noted that the naked man "...walked past schools, past churches." She added that a guy walking around the city streets naked is "...really, really disturbing and makes me wonder how many people are going to catch wind of this and then think its okay to do that." Would that really be such a terrible thing? Nudity in the News Some might think that's just fine, in fact, which leads us to a final bit of news about nudity. Last week in some 50 cities over the world it was the 7th Annual There are other examples of nudity in the news, the World Naked Bike Ride, And another comic Kathy Griffin, did the ALS ice-bucket challenge in the buff (and got on 'Jimmy Kimmel Live!' to show off a clip of it). And there is now even a culinary experience called It's likely all this nudity does not mean we're getting over our need to cover up. There just happens to be a rash of nudity of late. The reality is that, yeah, we're still prudish, witnessed by the fact that if we weren't then all of this nudity in the news would in fact not be in the news. It'd just be normal. To begin there was an expose in the Daily Mail in the U.K. on Thursday about a mother who parades about her house naked, that despite having a 13-year-old son. Is it a big deal? Some feel it is (especially given her son is hitting puberty) but neither mother Jules Pomerance, 44, husband Nigel, 45, son Jordan or her daughters (10 and 7) find it a big deal."Nudity has nothing whatever to do with sex as far as I’m concerned, and as our son has already reached puberty it’s not going to make any difference now," Mom believes. "If anything, I think that “normalizing” nudity is the best way of countering the over-sexualisation of our children."As the Daily Mal reports, however, not everyone agrees. Psychotherapist Margaret Ramage told Mail reporter Clare Campbell that "Although there is nothing intrinsically 'wrong' in nudity between family members, it can have effects we cannot predict."Neuroscientists have found there is a sexual template in the brain that begins to develop around seven or eight in a boy, and it might be inhibited by the sight of his mother’s naked body, which could possibly affect him in later life."Rampage also spoke of seeing "adult men who slept in their mothers’ beds in their teenage years and who later complained of a complete lack of sexual desire." She notes that "in our culture, nudity is very much a sexual matter, with mystery, excitement and arousal all linked to it. Generally, it is important that children are not exposed to adult sexuality in any form."Another case of recent nudity took place last week in Topeka, Kansas when a man walked about parts of the city buck naked. The real issue became the number of complaints police got - none of which they acted upon."Unless somebody is exposing themselves or a sexual organ to gratify or arouse someone other than themselves then it's really not anything against the law," Shawnee County Sheriff Herman Jones told KLTV 7 News in Topeka.That explanation doesn't sit so well with Topeka resident Natasha Shamblin, who noted that the naked man "...walked past schools, past churches." She added that a guy walking around the city streets naked is "...really, really disturbing and makes me wonder how many people are going to catch wind of this and then think its okay to do that."Would that really be such a terrible thing?Some might think that's just fine, in fact, which leads us to a final bit of news about nudity. Last week in some 50 cities over the world it was the 7th Annual International Go-Topless Day. It was really only about being naked from the waist up. It's a serious event to protest the fact that women, unlike men, have to always wear a top in public. Women, and male supporters, parade in the street, the woman wearing no tops, the men, to reverse things, wearing a bra or halter top.There are other examples of nudity in the news, the World Naked Bike Ride, nudists colony news, controversy over a planned nude scene in the hit TV series 'Game of Thrones' and comic Sarah Silverman getting naked in 'Masters of Sex.'And another comic Kathy Griffin, did the ALS ice-bucket challenge in the buff (and got on 'Jimmy Kimmel Live!' to show off a clip of it). And there is now even a culinary experience called 'Naked Sushi' where you eat your meal off of a naked model.It's likely all this nudity does not mean we're getting over our need to cover up. There just happens to be a rash of nudity of late. The reality is that, yeah, we're still prudish, witnessed by the fact that if we weren't then all of this nudity in the news would in fact not be in the news.It'd just be normal. More about Nudity, being naked, naked mom, naked in kansas, gotopless day More news from Show all 10 Nudity being naked naked mom naked in kansas gotopless dayOne morning in the winter of 1981, my wife came home after her on-call shift at the U.C.L.A. Medical Center and told me about a baffling new case. Queenie was an eighteen-year-old prostitute, his hair dyed the color of brass. He had arrived at the emergency room with a high fever and a cough, and appeared to have a routine kind of pneumonia, readily treated with antibiotics. But the medical team retrieved a microbe from his lungs called Pneumocystis carinii. The microbe was known for causing a rare fungal pneumonia that had been seen in severely malnourished children and in adults undergoing organ transplants or chemotherapy. Several specialists at the hospital were enlisted to make sense of the infection. Queenie had a critically low platelet count, which made him susceptible to hemorrhage, and I was called in to examine him. He was lying on his side and breathing with difficulty. His sheets were soaked with sweat. A herpes infection had so severely blistered his flesh that surgeons had cut away necrotic segments of his thighs. I couldn’t explain his falling platelet numbers. His lungs began to fail, and he was placed on a ventilator. Soon afterward, Queenie died, of respiratory failure. His was one of several cases of the same rare pneumonia seen by physicians on both coasts. Michael Gottlieb, a U.C.L.A. immunologist, studied the blood of some of these patients and made the key observation that they had lost almost all their helper T cells, which protect against infections and cancers. In June, 1981, the Centers for Disease Control published Gottlieb’s cases in its Morbidity and Mortality Weekly Report, and, in July, Dr. Alvin Friedman-Kien, of New York University, reported that twenty-six gay men in New York and California had received diagnoses of Kaposi sarcoma, a cancer of the lymphatic channels and blood vessels. This, too, was strange: Kaposi sarcoma typically affected elderly men of Eastern European Jewish and Mediterranean ancestry. I tended to our Kaposi-sarcoma patients. I was the most junior person on staff and had no expertise in the tumor, but none of the senior faculty wanted the job. My first patient, a middle-aged fireman nicknamed Bud, lived a closeted life in West Los Angeles. Not long before he checked in to the hospital, he had started to find growths on his legs that looked like ripe cherries. Then they appeared on his torso, on his face, and in his mouth. Despite strong doses of chemotherapy, the standard treatment for advanced Kaposi sarcoma, his tumors grew, disfiguring him and killing him in less than a year. By 1982, men with highly aggressive kinds of lymphoma had started to arrive at the hospital. They, too, failed to improve with chemotherapy. Patients were dying from an array of diseases that had overcome ravaged immune systems. All my patients had one disorder in common, which the C.D.C., that year, had named acquired-immunodeficiency syndrome, or AIDS. Scientists did not yet know what caused it. The next year, two research teams—one led by Luc Montagnier and Françoise Barré-Sinoussi, of the Pasteur Institute, in Paris, the other by Robert Gallo, at the National Cancer Institute, in Maryland—published papers in Science that described a new retrovirus in the lymph nodes and blood cells of AIDS patients. A retrovirus has a pernicious way of reproducing: it permanently inserts a DNA copy of its genome into the nucleus of a host cell, hijacking the cell’s machinery for its own purposes. When the retrovirus mutates, which it often does, its spawn becomes difficult for the body or a vaccine to target and chase out. Retroviral diseases were widely believed to be incurable. In May of 1986, after much dispute about credit for the discovery (the French finally won the Nobel, in 2008), an international committee of scientists agreed on the name H.I.V., or human immunodeficiency virus. By the end of that year, about twenty-five thousand of the nearly twenty-nine thousand Americans with reported AIDS diagnoses had died. Since then, H.I.V. has been transformed into a treatable condition, one of the great victories of modern medicine. In 1987, the F.D.A. approved AZT, a cancer drug that had never gone to market, for use in H.I.V. patients. At first, it was extortionately priced and was prescribed in high doses, which proved toxic, provoking protest from the gay community. But AZT was able to insinuate itself into the virus’s DNA as it formed, and later it was used in lower doses. Scientists have now developed more than thirty antiretroviral medicines that stop H.I.V. from reproducing in helper T cells. The idea of combining medications into a “cocktail” came in the mid-nineteen-nineties, mirroring the way oncologists treated cancer. Cancer cells, like H.I.V. particles, can mutate quickly enough to escape a single targeted drug. The treatment regimen—HAART, for highly active antiretroviral therapy—was put through clinical trials by prominent researchers such as David Ho, of the Aaron Diamond Institute, in New York. I gave the cocktail to one of my patients, David Sanford, and less than a month after beginning treatment his fever fell, his infections disappeared, his energy returned, and he started to gain weight. The H.I.V. in his bloodstream plummeted to an undetectable level, where it has remained. Later, in a Pulitzer Prize-winning article, Sanford wrote, “I am probably more likely to be hit by a truck than to die of AIDS.” That now holds true for a great majority of people with H.I.V. in the United States. In the past five years, not one of the dozens of H.I.V. patients I’ve cared for has died of the disease. There are still tremendous hurdles. Thirty-five million people in the world are living with the virus. In sub-Saharan Africa, where most new cases are reported, sixty-three per cent of those eligible for the drug regimen do not receive it; those who do often fail to receive it in full. In the United States, a year’s worth of HAART costs many thousands of dollars per patient, and the long-term side effects can be debilitating. Now researchers are talking more and more about a cure. We know as much about H.I.V. as we do about certain cancers: its genes have been sequenced, its method of infiltrating host cells deciphered, its proteins mapped in three dimensions. A critical discovery was made in 1997: the virus can lie dormant in long-lived cells, untouched by the current drugs. If we can safely and affordably eliminate the viral reservoir, we will finally have defeated H.I.V.
Ward 86, the nation’s first outpatient AIDS clinic, opened at San Francisco General Hospital on January 1, 1983. Recently, I went there to see Steven Deeks, an expert on the chronic immune activation and inflammation brought on by H.I.V. Deeks, a professor at the School of Medicine at U.C.S.F., also runs the SCOPE Study: a cohort of two thousand H.I.V.-positive men and women in whom he measures the long-term effects of living with the virus. Each year, blood samples are sent to labs all over the world. Deeks’s mission is to catalogue the damage that H.I.V. does to tissues and to test new drugs that might help. The ward occupies the sixth floor of an Art Deco building on the north side of campus. I found Deeks in his office, wearing a flannel shirt and New Balance sneakers. He explained his concerns about the drug cocktail. “Antiretroviral drugs are designed to block H.I.V. replication, and they do that quite well,” he said. But they don’t enable many patients to recover fully. The immune system improves enough to prevent AIDS, but, because the virus persists, the immune system must mount a continuous low-level response. That creates chronic inflammation, which injures tissues. The inflammation is exacerbated by side effects of the medicines. Early treatments caused anemia, nerve damage, and lipodystrophy—the wasting of the limbs and face, and the deposits of fat around the belly. Lipodystrophy is still a major problem. Deeks has observed many patients in the SCOPE cohort with high levels of cholesterol and triglyceride, and these can lead to organ damage. One serious consequence is heart disease, which appears to be caused by inflammation of the artery walls. Deeks has also seen lung, liver, and skin cancers in his patients. In a disturbing echo of the early days of the epidemic, he has noticed that middle-aged patients develop diseases associated with aging: kidney and bone disease and possibly neurocognitive defects. A better definition for AIDS, according to Deeks, might be “acquired-inflammatory-disease syndrome.” “The media says there’s a war on Christmas, and St. Nick isn’t in the business of losing wars.” He introduced me to one of his patients, whom I’ll call Gordon. A tall, genial man with rimless glasses stood up to shake my hand, and I saw that he had the signature protruding belly. He has been H.I.V.-positive for almost forty years, and he said he felt lucky to be alive: “A ten-year partner of mine who had the same strain of H.I.V., who ate the same food, had the same doctors, took the same early H.I.V. meds, died in June, 1990, almost twenty-five years ago.” He told me, “I’m no longer that concerned about the virus itself. I’m more concerned about my internal organs and premature aging.” In 1999, at fifty, he learned that fatty deposits had substantially constricted the blood flow in a major artery that supplies the heart’s left ventricle. He began to experience crippling pain when he walked, because the blood supply to his bone tissue had diminished—a condition called avascular necrosis. In 2002, he had his first hip replacement, and the second in 2010. His muscles have shrunk, and sitting can be uncomfortable, so he sometimes wears special foam-padded underwear. Every other year, he has his face injected with poly-L-lactic acid, which replaces lost connective tissue. Gordon’s longevity, and the dozens of drugs he has taken to stay alive, exemplifies the experience of millions of infected AIDS patients. His state-of-the-art treatment costs almost a hundred thousand dollars a year. Although it’s covered by his insurance and by the State of California, he calls it “a ransom: your money or your life.” For Deeks, the question is “Can the world find the resources to build a system to deliver, on a daily basis, antiretroviral drugs to some thirty-five million people, many in very poor regions?” He is doubtful, which is why he is focussed on helping to find a cure. “Our philosophy is that in order to cure H.I.V., we need to know where and why it persists,” he said.
In 1997, amid euphoria about HAART, people first started thinking seriously about a cure. Sooner or later, all infected cells die on their own. Could the right drugs in the right combination rout the virus for good? That year, David Ho published a paper in Nature in which he mathematically predicted that an H.I.V. patient on the HAART regimen should be able to conquer the detectable virus in twenty-eight to thirty-seven months. That issue also contained a very different report from Robert Siliciano, currently a Howard Hughes investigator at the Johns Hopkins School of Medicine. Using an uncommonly sensitive measurement technique that he’d invented, Siliciano located H.I.V. in a type of helper T cell that provides memory to our immune system and normally survives for decades. Memory T cells are uniquely important: they recognize the antigens in infections and orchestrate speedy responses. But the virus proved to be even cleverer. It lay dormant in strands of host DNA, untouched by the drug cocktail, later springing back to life and degrading the immune system. At sixty-two, lanky and circumspect, Siliciano is highly regarded in the tight-knit community of H.I.V. researchers. He met his wife and collaborator, Janet, in the nineteen-seventies, when she was a graduate student at Johns Hopkins, studying the proteins that T cells release when they encounter microbes. Now fifty-nine years old, with curly red hair and a hint of a New Jersey accent, Janet joined Bob’s lab after his paper appeared in Nature. She said that the idea was his, but Bob told me that Janet developed it over the next seven years, tracking the levels of dormant virus in patients consistently treated with HAART. Her data confirmed his thesis: the virus could survive almost indefinitely. “We calculated that it would take seventy years of continuous HAART for all the memory T cells to die,” she said. Siliciano told me about the first time he saw the latent virus emerge in the memory T cells of an H.I.V. patient on HAART. The patient was thought to be cured. “He had been biopsied in every imaginable place, and nobody could find any virus,” Siliciano said. Researchers took twenty tubes of the patient’s blood, isolated the T cells, and divided them into multiple wells. The specimen was then intermixed with cells from uninfected people. If the healthy T cells became infected, the virus would reproduce and be released. Detection of the virus would be signalled by a color change to blue. Siliciano remembers sitting at his desk, talking with a visitor, when a graduate student burst in: “The wells are turning blue!” He said, “It was a very strange moment, because it was a confirmation of this hypothesis—so it was exciting—but it was also a disaster. Everybody came to the same conclusion: that these cells persisted despite the antiretroviral therapy.” The Siliciano laboratory occupies the eighth floor of the Miller Research Building, at the Johns Hopkins School of Medicine. The twenty-six-person research team—technicians, students, fellows, and faculty—works in an airy, open space and in a smaller Biosafety Level 3 facility on the north side of the building. There they handle the specimens of their clinic’s H.I.V.-positive subjects and many more from labs like Deeks’s worldwide. Inside a room with negative air pressure, researchers retrieve blood samples from an incubator and place them in a laminar flow hood, which draws up a stream of air. Nothing leaves the facility without being double-bagged and sterilized. Much of the new AIDS research builds on the Silicianos’ foundational discovery of H.I.V.’s hidden reservoirs. So does their own work. Using potent chemicals, they have been able to draw H.I.V. out of its hiding places in memory T cells, assess the reach of the virus within the body, and begin to map where else it might be lodged. Several years ago, they began looking at “blips,” the small, sudden jumps in viral load that sometimes occur in the blood of HAART patients. Physicians had been concerned that blips might be particles of virus that had become resistant to HAART and struck out on their own. The Silicianos believed otherwise: that the viral particles were released by latently infected cells that had become activated. They analyzed the blood of patients with blips every two to three days over three to four months, and their hypothesis proved correct: the virus had not become resistant to the drugs, but had been dormant in its reservoir within memory T cells. It could be intermittently released from the reservoir, even when the patient took antiretroviral drugs.
Although researchers were chastened by the realization that the drug regimen was not itself a cure, they recently found three unusual cases that were encouraging enough to make them keep trying. The first was that of Timothy Ray Brown. Brown is known as the Berlin patient, after the city where he became the only person ever to have been cured of H.I.V. In 2006, more than a decade after he discovered he was H.I.V.-positive, he was given an unrelated diagnosis of acute myelogenous leukemia, a cancer of the bone marrow. After initial treatment, the leukemia returned. Brown needed a bone-marrow transplant. His hematologist, Gero Huetter, made the imaginative suggestion that they use a donor with a genetic mutation that shuts down the protein CCR5, a doorway for H.I.V. into helper T cells. On February 7, 2007, Brown received the transplant. One year later, he underwent the procedure again, and by 2009 biopsies of Brown’s brain, lymph nodes, and bowel showed that the virus had not returned, and his T-cell count was back to normal. Brown’s cure was spectacular, but difficult to repeat. His doctor had twice destroyed all his native blood cells, with radiation and chemotherapy, and twice rebuilt his immune system with transplanted stem cells. It had been very dangerous and costly. Researchers wondered if they could create a scaled-down version. In 2013, physicians at Brigham and Women’s Hospital, in Boston, reported on the outcome of a study in which two H.I.V.-positive men on HAART had received bone-marrow transplants for lymphoma. Their marrow donors, unlike Brown’s, did not have the CCR5 mutation, and their chemotherapy regimen was less intensive. HAART was stopped a few years after the transplants, and the virus remained undetectable for months, but then resurfaced. This past July, results came in on the third case. In 2010, a girl known as the Mississippi baby was born to an H.I.V.-positive mother who had taken no antiretrovirals, and the baby had the virus in her blood. Thirty hours after delivery, the newborn started on antiretroviral therapy. Within weeks, the viral count fell below the limit of detection. The baby was eighteen months old when the treatment was interrupted, against medical advice. For two years, the girl’s blood showed no trace of the virus, and researchers speculated that very early HAART might prevent the virus from forming a dormant reservoir. Twenty-seven months after going off the drugs, however, the child tested positive for the virus. Though researchers were impressed that early intervention had temporarily banished H.I.V., she was not cured. In August, Janet and Robert Siliciano wrote about the Brigham men and the Mississippi baby in Science, saying that the cases confirmed that researchers were on the right path in attacking latent infection. The Berlin patient was an even more compelling example. Karl Salzwedel, the chief of Pathogenesis and Basic Research in the Division of aids at the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases, told me that until Timothy Brown “it wasn’t really clear how we would go about getting rid of the last bits of virus that remain in the reservoir.” Brown’s case provided “a proof of concept: it may be possible to eradicate latent H.I.V. from the body. It may be from a very risky and toxic method, but it’s proof of concept nonetheless.”
The new centerpiece of the American effort to cure H.I.V. is the Martin Delaney Collaboratories, funded by the N.I.H. Launched in 2011, the collaborative was formulated as a way to link clinical labs, research facilities, and pharmaceutical companies. Federal support was set at seventy million dollars for the first five years, on the premise of coöperation and open communication among all parties. Salzwedel told me that the N.I.H. funded three applications. “Each was taking a different complementary approach to trying to develop a strategy to eradicate H.I.V,” he said: enhancing the patient’s immune system, manipulating the CCR5 gene, and destroying the reservoirs themselves. They represented different responses to the Siliciano thesis and to the lessons of Timothy Brown. Mike McCune, the head of the Division of Experimental Medicine at U.C.S.F., researches ways in which H.I.V. can be eradicated by the body’s own immune system. He was prompted by an observation made in the early days of the epidemic: that babies born to mothers with H.I.V. become infected in utero only five to ten per cent of the time, even though they are exposed to the virus throughout gestation. Recently, McCune and his colleagues observed that the developing fetal immune system does not react against maternal cells, which can easily cross the placenta and end up in fetal tissues. Instead, the fetus generates specialized T cells that suppress inflammatory responses against the mother, and that might also prevent inflammatory responses against H.I.V., thereby blocking the rapid spread of the virus in utero and sparing the child. McCune has worked for many years with Steven Deeks and the SCOPE Study. When I spoke with McCune in San Francisco, he said, “There is a yin and yang of the immune system. We are trying to recapitulate the orchestrated balance found in the fetus.” McCune is now working on interventions that would prevent inflammation against H.I.V. in the adult, hoping to partly mimic the balance found in utero. He’s also developing methods that would allow the immune system to better recognize, and destroy, the virus when it manifests itself. These studies are being carried out on nonhuman primates, and may lead to human trials within a year or two. In Seattle, a group headed by Hans-Peter Kiem and Keith Jerome is taking a more futuristic approach. Using an enzyme called Zinc Finger Nuclease, they are genetically altering blood and marrow stem cells so as to disable CCR5, the doorway for infection in T cells. Researchers will modify the stem cells outside the body, so that when the cells are returned some portion of the T cells in the bloodstream will be resistant to H.I.V. infection. Over time, they hope, those cells will propagate, and the patient will slowly build an immune system that is resistant to the virus. Those patients might still have a small reservoir of H.I.V., but their bodies would be able to regulate the infection. The largest Collaboratory, with more than twenty members, is led by David Margolis, at the University of North Carolina. Margolis, an infectious-disease expert, is targeting the reservoirs directly. The idea, which has come to be known as “shock and kill,” is to reactivate the dormant virus, unmasking the cells that carry it, so that they can be destroyed. In 2012, he published the results of a clinical trial of the drug Vorinostat, which was originally developed for blood cancers of T cells, as a shock treatment. This October, “shock and kill” was widely discussed when the Collaboratory teams convened at the N.I.H., along with hundreds of other researchers, assorted academics, and interested laypeople. Margolis and his group explored in their talk new ways to shock the virus out of dormancy. The killing stage is more challenging, because the shocked cells carry few H.I.V. antigens, the toxic flags released by pathogenic particles and recognized by the immune system prior to attack. One approach to the killing strategy comes from an unusual type of H.I.V.-positive patient who may carry the virus for decades yet seems not to be disturbed by it. Some of these so-called “élite controllers” possess cytotoxic, or killer, T cells that attack virus-producing cells. The objective is to make every H.I.V. patient into an élite controller through “therapeutic vaccination,” enabling patients to generate killer T cells on their own. Researchers are also trying to switch off a molecule called PD-1, which the body uses to restrain the immune system. Deactivating PD-1 has worked in clinical studies with melanoma and lung-cancer patients, and one patient seems to have been cured of hepatitis C by a single infusion of a PD-1 blocker from Bristol-Myers Squibb. Groups outside the Collaboratories who are testing ways to cure AIDS share their results with the N.I.H. teams. In parallel with the Seattle group, Carl June, the director of translational research at the Abramson Cancer Center, at the University of Pennsylvania, and his colleagues have used genetic engineering to close off the |
3 4 dependencies { compile 'org.jetbrains.anko:anko:0.5-15' }
The Anko Preview plugin is available both for IntelliJ IDEA and Android Studio. You can download it directly from the Plugin Repository.
There are binaries targeting both raw Android (SDK version 15, Ice Cream Sandwich) and Android with a support-v4 package.
Also, last but not least, much like everything related to Kotlin, Anko is fully Open Source. The repository is on GitHub and as always, contributions are welcome!T-Mobile’s bold plan to get rid of handset subsidies has drawn some early plaudits. More transparency can’t be a bad thing, right? Telling consumers just how much they pay for the phone and how much for phone service will surely empower them. Unfortunately, the psychology of subsidies is insidious and phasing out phone subsidies may be a lot harder than introducing them.
As T-Mobile starts selling Apple’s iPhone in 2013, it will essentially have to charge between $300 and $800 for the handset, depending on the model, either up front or using an installment plan. Of course, most consumers paying $100 or $200 for an AT&T (T) or Verizon (VZ) iPhone know that subsidies merely shift the cost of the handset to their phone bill over the following 24 months. But that won’t make thinking about the real price any less painful.
Spain’s Telefonica decided last winter to drop subsidies and get honest with Spanish consumers. The result was a loss of nearly 640,000 subscribers in the second quarter of 2012. This is equal to losing millions of subscribers in a single quarter in a country as big as the United States.
The biggest winner in Spanish mobile market in 2012? Yoigo, the subsidy specialist that is rolling out a free iPhone 5 this month. The Spanish lesson in 2012 was that the operator that shifted to the most open and honest system of selling phones and contracts suffered grievously, and the operator that is subsidizing phones the most aggressively won big.
Most people may be vaguely aware that low phone prices created by subsidies are a mirage, but that does not mean they want to wake up and face the real price of a high-end smartphone. There is a reason why the $9.95 pricing trick has persisted for centuries. People know they are actually paying 10 bucks but their lizard brains still view $9.95 as kind of close to nine dollars.
As it happens, many European countries had hyper-rational handset pricing 10 years ago. Consumers paid the full cost of a handset and were offered just a few different plan options. The reason why Finland and other rational phone markets shifted to the U.S. subsidy model is that it works. Consumers want to be fooled by €99 smartphone deals. The first iPhone was a smash hit at its original $500 price, but it turned into a cultural phenomenon in America only after AT&T dropped the up-front price to $200.
Reversing psychological conditioning created by billions of advertising dollars spent over the years by AT&T and Verizon is the task that T-Mobile faces in 2013. Good luck with that.Follow me on twitter Follow @GunnerStaal The Penguins have clinched a playoff berth for the 8th consecutive season. As we look forward to the playoffs I wanted to take a brief look at the forward group and how they have performed in the possession department to this point. What lineup will give the Penguins the best chance to win?The chart is basically confirming what has been said all year, the bottom 6 stinks.It also confirms something else; the young kids can play and do just fine. Beau Bennett, Jayson Megna, and Brian Gibbons are the best options for the Penguins right now.Tanner Glass, Craig Adams, and Taylor Pyatt are not.Also alarming on the chart is where Brandon Sutter and Marcel Goc are. Both have less than desirable numbers, but one worries me more than the other.Plain and simple the Penguins need more out of Brandon Sutter. Sutter was never supposed to completely fill Jordan Staal’s skates but he hasn’t even come close.In Jordan Staal’s last season with the Penguins he had a CF% of 54.6 and a CF% rel of +1.2%. Those are really great numbers.This year Brandon Sutter has a CF% of 42.5% and a CF% rel of -7.8%. Those numbers are really bad. Some may point to the fact that his linemates have been dragging him down this year and that is a logical hypothesis, one that could hold some merit. However, Sutter’s numbers were just as bad in the 2012-2013 season. He had a CF% of 42.4% and a CF% rel of -9.0% in 2012-2013.Sutter did not have the excuse of bad linemates last year, he had the same ones that Jordan Staal always had in Matt Cooke and Tyler Kennedy. Sutter just did a much worse job with them.While Sutter does have a significant downgrade of linemates this year, he also has had a significant downgrade in the difficulty of his role, his numbers are still very bad. Last year he was thrown into Jordan Staal’s former shutdown role, this year the coach’s have protected him because he is unable to meet the challenges of that role.Marcel Goc has bad possession numbers with the Penguins, but I’m not as worried about him. He has shown that he can handle shutdown minutes successfully in Florida as recent as this season. Throw some of the kids with Marcel Goc instead of Glass, Adams, and Pyatt and watch his possession numbers jump.I believe less is more with Brandon Sutter moving towards the playoffs.Unfortunately for the Penguins Marcel Goc’s injury puts a wrench in those plans for now.Unless Sutter can show a significant change in his play I would not rely on his services in much higher than a 4th line role (with Goc in lineup).Kunitz-Crosby-StempniakBennett-Malkin-NealJokinen-Goc-MegnaGibbons-Sutter-Vitale/EngellandThat gives the Penguins the best chance at winning games in the playoffs.Will the Penguins trust the kids? Will they relegate Sutter to the 4th line? The answers to those questions will play a big factor in just how far the Penguins can go in the playoffs.Don’t hold your breath.Thanks for reading!Follow me on twitter Follow @GunnerStaalThe powers behind it are multinationals.
By Don Quijones, Spain & Mexico, editor at WOLF STREET.
At this moment, 3,382,680 people have signed a European Citizens’ Initiative calling for an immediate end to the negotiations of the Transatlantic Trade and Investment Partnership (TTIP). “Stop these sinister trade deals,” is the site’s motto. It’s by far and away the highest number of signatures ever achieved by such a petition. Mass demonstrations, meetings, and rallies have been held in towns and cities across the continent as well as coordinated international days of action against TTIP.
While protests from anti-globalization groups and labor unions have hogged what little limelight there has been, the depth of European skepticism goes much deeper. Thousands of local councils and municipalities have preemptively declared themselves to be TTIP-free zones, including Spain’s second biggest city, Barcelona.
Now, despite the European Commission’s increasingly desperate efforts to paint TTIP as SME-friendly, growing ranks of small businesses are beginning to question the wisdom of signing the so-called free trade agreement, which has little to do with actual “trade,” and everything to do with expanding the rights and powers of large corporations.
A new Business Against TTIP platform has just been launched in Britain, fronted by UK Entrepreneur of the Year Titus Sharpe. “The small and medium-sized enterprise (SME) sector is critical to the UK economy,” Sharpe writes in the UK Independent. “We account for more than 99% of the private sector and we provide jobs for more than 15 million people. Our gross value add to the British economy is £339 billion.”
The European Commissioner for Trade, Cecilia Malmström, argues that “Europe’s smaller firms and the communities they operate in stand to be among the biggest winners” from TTIP. A bizarre claim given that only 0.5% of SMEs in the UK and 0.7% of businesses across Europe actually engage in trade with the U.S., and the value of those exported goods and services is less than 2% of the added value produced by European SMEs as a whole.
For most of Europe’s small businesses, the vast bulk of their exports go to other European countries. However, a number of studies predict that TTIP will see a considerable drop in trade between EU countries as a result of trade diversion to the USA, with one warning of “European disintegration, unemployment and instability” as a direct result of TTIP.
The fact that growing ranks of time-pressed small businesses are starting to actively campaign against TTIP is no minor matter. By bowing at every turn to the demands of big business, the TTIP negotiators risk turning a very important ally into a very powerful adversary, and not just on the European side: in total there are 20 million SMEs in the EU and 28 million in the US.
Thousands of businesses in Austria and Germany have already signed an ‘SMEs Against TTIP’ petition calling for an immediate end to the EU-US negotiations. The German Association for Small and Medium-sized Businesses (BVMW) has expressed the strongest reservations about TTIP, as WOLF STREET reported last year.
A 2014 Commerzbank study found that only 15% of Mittlestand companies, which represent over 90% of firms in the country, believe TTIP would be a good thing for their business. A separate survey by the BVMW showed that more than 80% of its members believe the government is not doing enough to represent their interests in the negotiations.
Their biggest gripe is the proposed inclusion of an Investor State Dispute Settlement clause which would allow multinationals to bypass national courts and jostle governments into doing their bidding. The arbitration process can set litigants back millions – sometimes even tens of millions – of euros, pricing out all but the biggest businesses from benefiting from the low-hanging spoils. Meanwhile, local governments in Europe and the U.S. would suddenly find themselves prohibited by corporate law from providing support to small, local businesses.
A new study by Osgoode Law School’s Gus Van Harten has shown that even for the smaller companies and investors that have used the arbitration process, any winnings they receive are normally wiped out by legal costs. In essence, corporate courts act to redistribute income from the public purse to the largest and richest entities in the world, with almost 95% of the $6.7 billion awarded in the 48 cases studied by Van Harten going to “really big corporations” (over $1 billion in annual revenue) and “super rich individuals” (over $100 million in wealth).
In public, many big business lobby groups, such as the Confederation of Business Industry (CBI) and the French-based MEDEF, champion the “significant benefits” that SMEs can expect to enjoy from TTIP. But what they say in private is a whole different matter. In a meeting with senior officials of the European Commission, the CBI conceded that there is no evidence that SMEs will benefit from TTIP.
In a similar vein, the French big business lobby group MEDEF asked the European Commission how it can “reassure the 19 million European SMEs which do not export and which will face increased competition” that everything will be okay once the trade agreement comes into effect. Unfortunately we do not have an answer to that question.
Since work on TTIP commenced five years ago, no study has analyzed the potential costs or benefits for SMEs. But it’s no secret that big businesses on both sides of the Atlantic stand firmly behind the trade agreement, and that the largest among them will be the biggest beneficiaries from the deal. After all, they’re the ones who wrote it, as Maltese MEP Alfred Sant warns:
The powers behind it are the multinationals… and where can it go? We’re moving towards a global economy with a few oligarchs at its helm. I don’t see how it’s going to help SMEs.
But it isn’t meant to help SMEs. It’s meant to help multinationals. And if SMEs get trampled, so be it. By Don Quijones, Raging Bull-Shit.
Things are likely to get a whole lot uglier in Spain. Read… “Everything Has Come to a Standstill”: Political Fallout Hits Business in Spain
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Would you like to be notified via email when WOLF STREET publishes a new article? Sign up here.He went to see her at twilight on a Friday, finding his way through the labyrinth that is the parking lot of Sheba Medical Center at Tel Hashomer. She was waiting for him upstairs - a woman in despair, holding an infant close to death in her arms. But Shlomi Eldar, the Gaza correspondent for Channel 10 News, did not hurry. He delayed his entry into the depressing neon-lit corridors. Already in the opening scene of his documentary, "Precious Life," he admits he did not want to come - that it all happened by chance, because of circumstances over which he had no control.
"I came here without any desire," he says, looking for a parking space in the large, empty lot. "It's not for me, but I had no choice."
In Sheba's pediatric hemato-oncology department was Mohammed Abu Mustafa, a four-and-a-half-month-old Palestinian infant. Protruding from his tiny body were pipes attached to big machines. His breathing was labored.
"His days may be numbered. He is suffering from a genetic defect that is causing the failure of his immune system," said the baby's mother, Raida, from the Gaza Strip, when she emerged from the isolation room. "I had two daughters in Gaza," she continued, her black eyes shimmering. "Both died because of immune deficiency. In Gaza I was told all the time that there is no treatment for this and that he is doomed to die. The problem now is how to pay for the [bone marrow] transplant. There is no funding."
Now, two years later in his home in Nes Tziona, near Rehovot, Eldar recalls the moments that led him to make a searing, full-length documentary film, which will premiere at the Jerusalem Film Festival on July 10. (The film is in Hebrew and Arabic with English subtitles. ) He remembers standing mutely opposite the woman.
"I came to the hospital to do a report on her for the news," he relates. "This was after Gaza was closed to me. I had entered and left Gaza for more than two decades - it always excited me with its turbulence and wildness. Then, one day they closed it, closed my place of work. That really shook me. I got up in the morning and had nowhere to go."
With the frankness that is his hallmark, Eldar does not hide the fact that when he received the report about the Palestinian infant in need of a financial donation to save his life, he felt no urge to rush to the scene.
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"Just a week earlier I did a report about a Palestinian woman who gave birth to twins in Barzilai Medical Center in Ashkelon just as a Grad missile struck the hospital," he relates. "I just didn't have the patience for it. But I felt a need to do another piece - to prove to the news department that I was still working. So I went to Sheba that day, even though I didn't really feel like it. When I went upstairs, I looked out toward the horizon, in the direction of Gaza, and I remember myself saying to Gaza, 'So long,' and wondering if I were now doomed to be a hospital reporter."
Without him knowing it, from that moment everything began to change. In short order Eldar was confronted with a saga involving a breathtaking race to save the life of an unfortunate infant. Author Yoram Kaniuk, who saw the film two weeks ago at a screening for the Israeli Film and Television Academy, says he was enthralled by it.
"You don't feel that the film was made about something, rather that it evolves in front of your eyes," he says. "You can't guess what the next step will be. The events altered and created the reality that Shlomi describes with such power and beauty. And sadness. It was strange: I watched the film and felt it constituted a kind of lament for our situation - for this lovely baby that was going to die."
Kaniuk says he felt he was watching "a tragedy with hope," as he puts it. "Above all, there was something very human in the film. It's tragic, even grotesque, but that is our life. For example, the Israeli physician, Dr. Raz Somech, who treats the infant so empathetically and devotedly, is called up for reserve duty while the film is being shot and goes off to war in Gaza. Every moment, large or small, is fraught with meaning. Shlomi knows how to capture those moments. There was one moment, when a relative from Gaza comes to the hospital and calls the grass she is walking on 'plants.' She simply does not know what grass is."
Kaniuk does not spare the compliments: "I can tell you that it's one of the best documentaries I have seen. It's a very dramatic experience for the viewers. After it was over, people just sat there, not moving, in a state of shock. The movie got into their gut. Mine, too. And four minutes later they started to applaud."
Eldar is embarrassed by such praise. He would rather talk about the first days of shooting, when he still had no idea that he would spend the next eight months caught up in the story of a young mother fighting to save her dying son. On the contrary: He thought the baby would be buried alongside his sisters in the Khan Yunis cemetery.
"I got to her after all the attempts to find a donation for the transplant had failed," he relates. "I understood that I was the baby's last hope, but I didn't give it much of a chance. At the time, Qassam rockets falling on Sderot opened every newscast. In that situation, I didn't believe that anyone would be willing to give a shekel for a Palestinian infant."
He was wrong. Hours after the news item about Mohammed was broadcast, the hospital switchboard was jammed with callers. An Israeli Jew whose son died during his military service donated $55,000, and for the first time the Abu Mustafa family began to feel hopeful. Only then did Eldar grasp the full dramatic potential of the story. He told his editor, Tali Ben Ovadia, that he wanted to continue accompanying the family.
"Even though she courageously broadcast the story about Mohammed 10 minutes into the broadcast, when it came to the idea of a movie she said, 'Forget that nonsense - who cares about a Palestinian baby?' I saw that time was passing and I wasn't able to put together a crew. In the end, knowing that the baby's father was due to arrive at the hospital in another two days, I decided to shoot the movie alone."
Eldar returned to the hospital armed with a Sony 400 Camcorder, but then, to his surprise, he ran into objections from the family.
"The father, Fawzi, had no trouble with it," he says. "He had once worked in Ra'anana and knew the Israeli mentality, the'situation.' For the mother, Raida, it was harder, and at first she did not want to be interviewed for the film. Her stay at Sheba was her first encounter with Israelis, and it wasn't easy for her. For example, when she went through the Erez checkpoint, just a few days before we met, she thought she would be shot or raped and murdered. Fawzi tried to persuade her and also had her mother call and try to win her over. But she was insistent. She was convinced it would be an Israeli propaganda film in which the Israelis would show how good they are, and that as soon as the camera left the medical assistance would end, too."
What finally persuaded her?
Eldar: "I don't know what exactly did it, but in the end she spoke to me. I think that both she and her husband felt that because the donation arrived in the wake of my report, I had a part in their son's new life. They understood it long before I did. So all the walls of suspicion were broken down between us. They gave me the opportunity to get as close as possible to them. In fact, before Fawzi left the hospital to return to Gaza, he said to me, 'Shlomi, watch over Raida. I am entrusting her to you.' It is extremely unusual for a Palestinian man to place his wife in the safekeeping of a Jewish man."
Calm and crisis
Nevertheless, this idyllic situation developed into a deep crisis that led to the severance of the relations and what appeared to be the end of the filming. From an innocent conversation about religious holidays, Raida Abu Mustafa launched into a painful monologue about the culture of the shahids - the martyrs - and admitted, during the complex transplant process, that she would like to see her son perpetrate a suicide bombing attack in Jerusalem.
"Jerusalem is ours," she declared. "We are all for Jerusalem, the whole nation, not just a million, all of us. Do you understand what that means - all of us?"
She also explained to Eldar exactly what she had in mind. "For us, death is a natural thing. We are not frightened of death. From the smallest infant, even smaller than Mohammed, to the oldest person, we will all sacrifice ourselves for the sake of Jerusalem. We feel we have the right to it. You're free to be angry, so be angry."
And Eldar was angry. "Then why are you fighting to save your son's life, if you say that death is a usual thing for your people?" he lashes out in one of the most dramatic moments in the film.
"It is a regular thing," she smiles at him. "Life is not precious. Life is precious, but not for us. For us, life is nothing, not worth a thing. That is why we have so many suicide bombers. They are not afraid of death. None of us, not even the children, are afraid of death. It is natural for us. After Mohammed gets well, I will certainly want him to be a shahid. If it's for Jerusalem, then there's no problem. For you it is hard, I know; with us, there are cries of rejoicing and happiness when someone falls as a shahid. For us a shahid is a tremendous thing."
That was enough to drain Eldar's motivation and dissolve all the compassion he had felt for Raida and Mohammed.
"It was an absolutely terrible rift," he recalls. "After I saw how intensely she fought for her son's life, I could not accept what she said. I had seen her standing for hours, caressing him, warming him up, kissing him. At the time I also had an infant of Mohammed's age at home. I couldn't understand where it came from in her. I was devastated. It was all so paradoxical, too, because just as she was talking about the shahids, two Jewish women entered the room and brought her toys and a stroller as presents."
Raida's confession was totally at odds with Eldar's perception of her until then: "The whole time I accompanied her, I saw a caring mother who was at her baby's bedside night and day. She didn't eat, she lost weight and she cried. I myself saw to it that she ate. I saw her faint when she was informed there was a small chance her son would get well. I saw her when she was told there was no longer a chance, and she stood there and caressed Mohammed, with tears, as though parting from him.
"So I was unable to explain how on the one hand, she fought for her child's life, but at the same time told me that his life is not precious. I never believed I would hear that from her. That's why I decided to stop shooting. I had come to tell a lovely story, not a story about a mother who destines her son to be a shahid."
What did you feel when she said that to you?
"That I had been betrayed, that it was a knife in the back. I didn't want to see Raida any more. It also drove me to greater despair. I asked myself, 'Well, is that the conclusion that comes from this story?' But in the end I started filming again. Why? I don't have a good answer; I think it was from curiosity. I wanted to solve the mystery for myself. Something inside me said that it was inconceivable. Something that explains what she said comes later in the film. I don't want to give too much away. I will say only that the struggle for Mohammed's life takes place parallel to the war between Israel and Hamas in Gaza, and thrusts Raida between a rock and a hard place, confronts her with cruel dilemmas."
But you didn't have it easy, either. While making the film you continued to cover the war in Gaza, though in contrast to your colleagues you insisted on showing the human dimension of the catastrophe there. People did not always like to hear your angle, did they?
"Definitely not. I thought, and I still think, that Israel used exaggerated, very excessive firepower. I did not feel comfortable with the fact that a large number of the Palestinian dead were civilians, and I thought it was right to emphasize that. Afterward, I got abusive phone calls; people sent faxes and complaints to the station. Fine. I was more bothered by the Israeli paradox that on the one hand we're treating infants like Mohammed in our hospitals, while on the other the Israeli army fires a shell into Beit Lahia which kills a mother and her four daughters."
That paradox is integral to the film and casts a pall over it, while creating a sense of responsibility for the suffering of Mohammed and his parents. The film is able to create empathy even for the situation of the civilians in Gaza during the war. Was that your goal?
"I was very grieved by the insensitivity we were seeing. It's clear to me that the war in Gaza was justified - no country can allow itself to be fired at with Qassam rockets - but I did not see many people pained by the loss of life on the Palestinian side. Because we were so angry at Hamas, all the Israeli public wanted was to fuck Gaza. It's not by chance that I use that crass word. I use it because it was often heard on the street and it was a military slogan. I remember the wife of my barber telling me, 'Let them kill all the Palestinians, let them burn.'
"It wasn't until after the incident of Dr. Abu al-Aish - the Gaza physician I spoke with on live TV immediately after a shell struck his house and caused the death of his daughters, and he was shouting with grief and fear - that I discovered the silent majority that has compassion for people, including Palestinians. I found that many Israeli viewers shared my feelings. That was not the intention with which I set out, but the film creates a kind of encounter. Even though the woman speaks Arabic and sometimes covers her face, even though the'stars' are a Palestinian couple - Israeli viewers are able to see themselves through them. When Raida cries for her baby, the audience cries with her, and when she laughs, they laugh with her."
'I had dynamite'
Shlomi Eldar, 53, is married for the second time and has five children. He started his media career on Reshet Gimmel, the radio station that plays Israeli music only.
"I got there after my life's dream of doing my military service with Army Radio ended in a fiasco when I failed the entrance tests," he says. "As a youngster, I was a walking encyclopedia of subjects related to music. I was a different type of kid in the Neve Yisrael neighborhood, a lower-class section of Herzliya. Music was my life from early on. I remember the day when my brother brought home a record player and we listened to the Beatles' 'Sergeant Pepper's.' But when I finally got to Reshet Gimmel and supposedly fulfilled my dream, I discovered that all I did was play records, which wasn't really what I wanted to do."
He wrote to Elimelech Ram, then director of Israel Television's news department, requesting an interview. When he did not get a reply, he joined a managerial training course given by Bank Hapoalim.
"After I saw that it wasn't for me, I left [the bank]," he explains. "I was out of work for a year, and then, out of the blue, I was invited to a television presenters' course [at Israel Television]. I remember that, at the time, my father was on his deathbed. When my mother visited him in the hospital he told her, 'Another week or two and I will no longer be among the living. But don't worry, I have left you a savings account. I have taken care of everything, but there is one thing that worries me: Shlomi.' He was worried because I wasn't working. I was already in the process of being hired by Israel TV, but he didn't know it yet. My mother told him, 'Never mind, it's all right, he has been invited for an interview for television. He replied with a comment I will never forget: 'Television isn't work.'" Telling the story, Eldar still gets choked up.
At the end of the course, in which two future famous television personalities - Gadi Sukenik and Nitzan Chen - also took part, Eldar was appointed education correspondent. But his job was short-lived.
"I started to work on the day the Gulf War broke out," he relates. "At the time there was no Channel 2, so Channel 1 had a 100-percent viewer rating. Within four days, everyone knew who Shlomi Eldar was. Two weeks after I started to work I had a scoop. There was a debate over whether to keep the schools open during the war. Zevulun Hammer, the education minister and the person in charge of the Broadcasting Authority, stated that defense minister Moshe Arens had not allowed him to open the schools. I received information to the effect that Arens had actually told Hammer that he fully supported keeping the education system going. I broadcast the item and [the anchor] Daniel Pe'er humiliated Hammer on live TV. That infuriated Yosef Barel, then director of Israel TV. He told me I had made a mockery of a cabinet minister and he wanted to fire me."
With the aid of Ram and Rafiq Halabi, editor of the "Mabat" news program, Eldar kept his job with Israel TV, but was exiled from Jerusalem to become the station's correspondent in the south. As part of his new assignment, he became familiar with the Gaza Strip. His introduction to it was gradual, but very significant for him.
"Until the Oslo Accords, reporters who went in with the army, on curfew days, filmed the Palestinians. The streets were empty, they drove past in patrol jeeps and the Palestinians watched from their windows. That's what television viewers saw. I did not enter Gaza in a jeep. At first maybe I did - I went with the Israel Defense Forces spokesman - but I quickly understood that I was doing a disservice to my profession as a journalist. It was clear that if I came with the army, with a military force, the attitude toward me would be different and I would not be able to forge relations of trust with the population."
One of the most significant reports Eldar produced at the time was in July 1992, about Palestinian children who were hurt during the intifada.
"Back then no one believed that there could be such a thing as the IDF hurting children," he says sarcastically. "But I filmed disabled children, wounded children in hospitals, children who had been beaten, children who talked like old people about life and death. I remember meeting two girls there from affluent homes who changed my approach to the Palestinian situation. They told me how their home had been demolished during an operation to capture wanted men. I came back with powerful material and put together a report that for the first time showed children who had been wounded by Israeli fire. When I recorded the narration, my voice cracked from emotion. I realized I had dynamite. That was the report that really got me into Gaza."
Subsequently, Eldar was appointed editor of "Mabat" and of the Friday night weekly newsmagazine.
"After a report I did about the distress of the Palestinians at the Erez checkpoint, Barel suspended me from covering Gaza and the Palestinians," Eldar says. "He called me and said, 'You let me down, friend.' But because he trusted me as an editor he appointed me the editor of the newsmagazine. A year and a half later, in 2003, I was asked by Channel 10 news chief Shilo De-Beer to join the station, which was then starting to broadcast. He wanted to make me the Gaza correspondent. I actually thought that Gaza was small-time stuff, because until then it was not covered in its own right. I told him that I accepted, but suggested I also be responsible for coverage of social-affairs issues for Channel 10 News. My idea was to devote two days a week to Gaza and the rest to social-welfare stories. But once I entered Gaza, during the second intifada, I never got around to doing the other stories."
Great privilege
In 2007, Eldar was awarded the Sokolow Prize for his Gaza news and investigative reporting. But the prestigious journalistic award leaves him largely indifferent. It definitely made him think his efforts had not been in vain, "but despite that, I was not all that thrilled by it," he says. "To come up with a good story excites me a lot more. 'Precious Life' moves me. I feel that the film is the peak of my career. The pinnacle. It took me to a place I did not think I would get to. Today it's a bit amusing, because no one showed an interest in it. Most of the time I shot it myself. Fortunately, everything changed on the day I met Ehud Bleiberg on the lawn of the home of Moshe Edri, one of the owners of Cinema City [the cineplex outside Tel Aviv]."
Eldar had not previously met Bleiberg, an Israeli-born film producer who lives in Los Angeles. Recent films he has produced include "Adam Resurrected," based on a novel by Yoram Kaniuk, and "The Band's Visit."
"He grabbed me there for a talk. He wanted to hear my impressions of Gaza," Eldar recalls. "I also told him about the film I was making and he asked to see some of it. After watching for about 10 minutes, he said, 'You know, I have never done a documentary, but I am going to do this film. I will produce it.' He also set a condition: He said I had to understand my role in the movie, that I could not be a director looking on from the side, that I had to be part of the story. That made things very difficult for me."
How so? Because he asked you to change the way you perceive your role as a journalist?
"Exactly. That is one of the significant processes I undergo in making the film. Very slowly I start to understand something I had always refused to accept. For years I had been looking at things from the side - in my reporting, too, you will not see even the tip of my nose. But while shooting 'Precious Life,' I started to understand that a great privilege had befallen me - namely that I had a part in Mohammed's life. It drove me wild when I grasped it. The whole time I had looked for satisfaction in my work, which I lost when Gaza was closed. And suddenly, in a hospital in metropolitan Tel Aviv of all places, everything was dwarfed in the face of an infant, when I became one link in the chain that was fighting to save his life."
So being "our correspondent for Palestinian affairs in hospitals" is not such a terrible fate after all?
"People come out of the film and talk about how they have been shaken up. They tell me that for days after seeing it that they couldn't get it out of their minds. That is very moving. But besides the personal aspect of this, I also discovered a type of new hope, something deeper in regard to the conflict. When the peace agreement between the Israelis and the Palestinians was signed between Rabin and Arafat, I believed that its origins, in fact, lay in Israeli prisons. The encounter between Israelis and Palestinians in the prisons started with enmity and suspicion, and then something happened. Something softened, and wardens and inmates became friends.
"That is exactly the process I see now in the hospitals. Raida was also very suspicious when she first arrived here. But she discovered human beings, Israeli nurses who kiss her son. She let them sing him Hebrew lullabies. Filming her, I understood that the next peace process is taking shape in our hospitals."
Warm emotions
The theme song and soundtrack of Precious Life were composed by the singer Yehuda Poliker, who has overlaid Eldars images with warm emotion.
I really wanted him to write the music for the film, but didnt dare ask him because I have admired him all my life, Eldar says. Even though his [2001] CD What is My Loves Name accompanied me throughout the making of the film, I just couldnt do it.
Finally, though, he worked up the courage and contacted the singer. I told him about the film. He understood my intention right away, and said, I dont have time to write you music for the film. Im sorry, but Im putting out a new CD and I am busy with the mix, working from morning to night. Nevertheless, I sent him a copy of the film the next morning. He called back that evening and said, Shlomi, you blew |
Agresti, 2002 ; Choi & Mare, 2012 ).
Drawing from these theoretical insights, we use six contextual measures to characterize marriage markets: relative group size, percent of co‐ethnics, percent of similarly educated co‐ethnics, the sex ratio, marriageable male–female index, and ethnic diversity. Prior studies also use subsets of these measures to characterize local marriage markets (e.g., Kalmijn & Van Tubergen, 2010 ; Lichter et al., 2007 ; Raley, 1996 ).
Contact theory is also relevant for understanding how intergroup relations facilitate or inhibit intermarriage. In its generous formulation, the contact perspective of intergroup relations implies that comingling fosters acceptance of out‐groups, which is an important step toward reducing social distance and enabling primary group relations, including intermarriage. There are important exceptions, however. Ethnic diversity may not facilitate marital exogamy in settings where intermarriage was formerly banned or in locales with high levels of residential segregation that limit intergroup relations. Exogamy is typically uncommon in locales characterized by intergroup competition for economic resources or long‐standing hostilities that reinforce racial and ethnic boundaries (Pettigrew & Tropp, 2006 ; Tolsma, Lubbers, & Coenders, 2008 ).
These generalizations are subject to variations in social preferences, some of which have ecological analogues. Assuming proclivities to wed along ethnic lines, immigration may reduce marital exogamy by replenishing the pool of co‐ethnic partners and by altering group size (Jimenez, 2010 ; Lichter et al., 2007 ). Furthermore, because singles simultaneously sort by race, ethnicity, and socioeconomic status, the educational composition of single co‐ethnics in local marriage markets also influences partner choice (Mare, 1991 ; Schwartz & Mare, 2005 ). Specifically, individuals with higher levels of education will experience greater difficulty finding mates with the same racial, ethnic, and educational background (Kalmijn & Van Tubergen, 2010 ). If social class is more salient than ethnicity in shaping partner preferences, intermarriage will occur at higher rates among educationally advantaged men and women from educationally disadvantaged groups living in places with small shares of co‐ethnics (Blau & Schwartz, 1984 ; Kalmijn & Van Tubergen, 2010 ). Shortages of co‐ethnic potential partners, as often occurs in new immigrant destinations, will also encourage singles to expand their pool of potential partners beyond co‐ethnics, thus fomenting marital exogamy (Kalmijn & Van Tubergen, 2010 ; Lewis & Oppenheimer, 2000 ).
Coupling behavior largely occurs within geographically defined social spaces; therefore, the local availability of potential partners influences the success singles have in marrying their ideal mate (Becker, 1981 ; Choi & Mare, 2012 ; Kalmijn, 1998 ; Schwartz, 2013 ). Two theoretical perspectives are commonly invoked to understand how the demographic composition of marriage markets influences mate‐selection behavior. Focusing on group size, structural theory predicts higher intermarriage rates for minority groups because members of small groups experience more relative out‐group contacts than members of larger groups and because frequent interactions with out‐group members reduce social distance (Blau & Schwartz, 1984 ; Lewis & Oppenheimer, 2000 ).
Third parties, such as parents or clergy, also affect mate selection. Endogamy rates are typically higher in groups where third parties influence mate selection as a way of maintaining group cohesion and control over offspring (Kalmijn, 1998 ). The amount of influence third parties exert on mate selection differs appreciably by demographic groups. In Asian subgroups where the family name and inheritance are transmitted through the male bloodline, men endure strong family‐imposed sanctions for marrying out of their subgroup; this partly accounts for the higher intermarriage rates among Asian women relative to their male counterparts (Wang et al., 2012 ). Arranged marriages also reinforce cultural norms favoring endogamy. Antimiscegenation laws were declared unconstitutional in 1967, but single men and women still display strong resistance toward unions involving Black partners (Bany et al., 2014 ). Partly due to the ambivalence of Hispanicity in the U.S. racial hierarchy and partly because racial boundaries are less sharply defined in Latin America compared with the United States, Hispanics are more likely than other minorities to intermarry (Telles & Sue, 2009 ; Tienda & Mitchell, 2006 ).
The attractiveness of potential mates also depends on the positioning of their group in the social status hierarchy. Notwithstanding secular improvements in racial attitudes, there remains considerable resistance to interracial dating and intermarriage, particularly unions involving Black partners (Bany, Robnett, & Feliciano, 2014 ; Johnson, Farrell, & Guinn, 1997 ). There are also salient gender differences in perceived attractiveness of minority and nonminority mates. In stereotypical terms, Black men are perceived as sexually virile, but Black women are perceived as more aggressive and less feminine than White, Hispanic, or Asian women (Bany et al., 2014 ; Collins, 2005 ). By contrast, Asian men are stereotyped to be weak and unmasculine, whereas Asian women are deemed delicate and feminine (Balistreri, Joyner, & Kao, 2015 ). These perceptions likely hinder Black women's and Asian men's opportunities to form romantic unions across racial lines (Bany et al., 2014 ; Wang et al., 2012 ).
Socioeconomic attributes also influence the desirability of potential mates. Singles strive to optimize their long‐term well‐being by choosing partners who can bring adequate economic resources and social status to the union (Becker, 1981 ; Kalmijn, 1998 ; Mare, 1991 ; Schwartz, 2013 ). High competition for partners who are economically attractive generally results in socioeconomic homogamy because singles generally sort along class lines (Becker, 1981 ; Sweeney, 2002 ). Marital exogamy often results when high‐status mates cross ethnic and racial boundaries to maintain class homogamy or when Whites who are economically disadvantaged use marriage as an avenue for social mobility by partnering with high status minorities (Alba & Nee, 2003 ; Blackwell & Lichter, 2000 ; Choi, Tienda, Cobb‐Clark, & Sinning, 2012 ; Fu, 2001 ; Kalmijn, 1993 ).
The cultural and socioeconomic resources that potential mates can bring to unions as well as norms about the relative attractiveness of social groups as partners largely determine partner preferences (Becker, 1981 ; Kalmijn, 1998 ). Single men and women typically display strong preferences for partners with similar values, tastes, and knowledge (Kalmijn, 1998 ; Schwartz, 2013 ). These commonalities increase possibilities for building harmonious unions where couples enjoy similar activities, share a mutual basis for conversation, draw on analogous cultural toolkits for problem solving, and forge consensus about personal matters (Kalmijn, 1998 ). Preferences for spouses with similar cultural backgrounds contribute to the high prevalence of endogamy (Qian & Lichter, 2007 ; Schwartz, 2013 ).
Several aspects of the decomposition analysis warrant mention. First, although the social desirability of Asians and Blacks differs for men and women, we used the coefficients associated with Asian men in our Asian–Black comparisons to ensure comparability of results by gender. Second, decomposition estimates obtained from this procedure also depend on the matching of members of two groups. We assessed the robustness of the empirical results by randomly drawing the subsample of members of the larger demographic group in pairwise comparisons and conducting 150 replications. Third, results about the relative importance of specific covariates differ by the sequence in which covariates are added; thus, we also randomized the order in which the covariates were added in the decomposition analysis (Jann, 2006 ).
Third, to assess the relative importance of individual characteristics and marriage market for explaining racial and ethnic differences in intermarriage propensities, we conduct a decomposition analysis using Fairlie's nonlinear method for binary outcome differentials. The decomposition estimates obtained from this method depend on mean differences in the distribution of covariates between two groups as well as our choice of regression coefficients associated with each covariate for a group (Fairlie & Robb, 2007 ; Jann, 2006 ). Therefore, for each binary comparison, we use the coefficients of the group deemed more socially desirable based on attitudinal and behavioral studies (Bany et al., 2014 ; Wang et al., 2012 ). Coefficients for Whites are chosen for any comparison involving Whites, those for Hispanics are used for comparisons between Hispanics and other minorities, and those for Asians for the Asian–Black comparison. The decomposition analysis addresses the relative importance of individual characteristics and marriage‐market conditions in generating all pairwise differences in intermarriage rates under the scenario that the less desirable group was influenced by individual characteristics and marriage markets in a manner analogous to that of the more desirable group.
The analysis consists of three parts. We begin with a descriptive analysis to illustrate how marriage‐market conditions faced by White, Black, Hispanic, and Asian men and women differ. Second, we estimate multilevel logistic regression models to assess how individual characteristics and marriage‐market conditions are associated with the intermarriage proclivities of male and female newlyweds from distinct racial and ethnic backgrounds. Because norms governing mate selection, acceptance of out‐group members as intimate partners, and marriage‐market conditions differ across pan‐ethnic and gender groups (Bany et al., 2014 ; Qian & Lichter, 2007 ), we estimated eight separate models for White, Black, Hispanic, and Asian male and female newlyweds. All standard errors are adjusted to account for clustering of respondents within marriage markets.
Table 1 summarizes individual correlates of intermarriage for the analytic samples. Asian newlyweds were the most and Hispanic newlyweds were the least educationally advantaged (Telles & Ortiz, 2008 ). Nearly two thirds of Asian men attained college degrees, as compared with 13% of Hispanic men. Relative to Whites and Blacks, higher shares of Asian and Hispanic newlyweds were foreign born. Minority newlyweds were older, on average, than their White peers. Compared with Whites, minority groups, but especially Asians, were more concentrated in urban areas.
Four decisions informing our choice of marriage‐market measures warrant explanation. First, in the multivariate analyses, all market characteristics are standardized so that the coefficients represent the impact of one standard deviation change in marriage‐market conditions on coupling behavior. Second, all measures capturing availability of co‐ethnic partners are gender specific and restricted to singles. Third, guided by prior work showing differences in marriage behavior across regions and rural–urban areas (Kalmijn & Van Tubergen, 2010 ), multivariate models include indicators designating respondents' residence in the Northeast, Midwest, South, or Pacific regions and an indicator for metropolitan residence. Finally, the analyses do not include a measure of residential segregation because statistical tests revealed high levels of collinearity with the ethnic diversity index. Supplementary analyses substituting the segregation measure for the diversity index yielded largely similar results, except that residential segregation is negatively associated with intermarriage for all groups. This sensitivity test indicates that residential segregation is highly correlated with ethnoracial diversity and that residential segregation reduces opportunities for interactions among members of distinct groups.
The six measures used to characterize marriage markets are defined below and summarized in the Appendix, Table A1. Several measures have been used in prior work describing how marriage‐market conditions influence family formation behavior (e.g., Kalmijn & Van Tubergen, 2010 ; Lichter et al., 2007 ; Raley, 1996 ).
Defining a marriage market is challenging because (a) the probability of selecting a partner outside local marriage markets is nonzero, (b) not all single men and women in a geographic area are searching for a marital partner, and (c) the size of the marriage market varies across individuals (Harris & Ono, 2005 ; Kalmijn, 1998 ). Like prior studies, we define marriage markets as Metropolitan Statistical Areas (MSA) for urban populations and consistent Public Use Microdata Areas (CONSPUMA) for rural areas (Harris & Ono, 2005 ; Lewis & Oppenheimer, 2000 ). CONSPUMA definitions remain consistent across the 2005 to 2011 ACSs, but MSA definitions change annually. Thus, we match the MSA variable to each CONSPUMA in 2005 and then assign these MSA codes to subsequent years using the CONSPUMA identifiers. This approach yields 669 unique marriage markets: 192 in urban areas and 477 in rural areas.
The analytical sample, which includes 44,530 female and 41,654 male newlyweds who transitioned into their first marriage within 12 months of the survey date, is restricted to U.S. marriages involving the four largest ethnoracial groups, defined on a mutually exclusive basis as White, Black, Hispanic, and Asian. We exclude observations with missing data on covariates of interest. Our focus on first marriages acknowledges prior work showing that sorting preferences differ between first marriages and remarriages (Fu, 2010 ). Focusing on newlyweds permits us (a) to reduce period heterogeneity in the acceptability of intermarriage, (b) to assess marriage‐market conditions prior to first marriage, and (c) to minimize biases that result from differences in marital dissolution rates between interracial and same race unions.
Recent ACS data are especially well suited to study intermarriage behavior for several reasons. First, the microdata files include a spousal locator, which permits matching coresident spouses and assessing intermarriage patterns. Second, the 2008–2011 ACS data set is one of the few data sets to distinguish newlyweds (married within 12 months of the interview date) from more established couples (married one or more years). This eliminates the need for strong assumptions about migration or changes to local marriage‐market conditions. Finally, the ACS includes dates of marriage and for the foreign born, year of immigration. These items permit identification of marriages formed abroad, provide information needed to evaluate claims that ethnic replenishment via immigration dampens intermarriage rates, and obviate the need to approximate foreign marriages by excluding women who migrated during adulthood (Hou et al., 2015 ; Kalmijn & Van Tubergen, 2010 ; Lichter et al., 2007 ).
Our analyses use the 1% sample of the Integrated Public Use Microdata (IPUMS) files of the 2005 and 2008–2011 ACS (Ruggles, Genadek, Goeken, Grover, & Sobek, 2015). We use the former to derive measures of local marriage‐market conditions approximately 3 to 5 years prior to the new marriages captured in the pooled 2008 to 2011 surveys and the latter to measure intermarriage patterns and individual determinants of sorting behavior. The Consolidated Public Use Micro‐data Areas available in the 2005 to 2011 ACS data provide identifiers for consistently defined geographic units (Ruggles et al., 2015), which we use to characterize the demographic composition of 669 marriage markets and link these contextual measures with couple‐level data.
The results for men (presented in Panel B) mirrored closely those for women, with two noteworthy exceptions. First, racial and ethnic gaps in intermarriage rates were typically smaller for men than for women. This was particularly so for marriages between two minority partners. Second, compared with women, marriage‐market conditions accounted for a larger share of the White–minority gap in intermarriage rates for men. In fact, the adjusted estimates revealed that minority men intermarried at lower rates than White men who faced similar marriage‐market conditions. This result is consistent with prior findings showing that the shortage of marriageable partners alters commitments to marriage, albeit differentially by gender, such that men are more likely and women less likely to wed in markets with a limited supply of potential partners (Guttentag & Secord, 1983 ). It appears that when men encounter unfavorable marriage markets, they are either more willing or more successful than women in broadening their pool of potential partners to include members of other groups.
The intermarriage gap between Blacks and other minorities defied this generalization in two ways. First, individual traits and marriage‐market conditions collectively masked the intermarriage gap between Blacks and other minorities. For example, after adjusting for differences in marriage‐market conditions and individual traits, Asian intermarriage rates were 35 percentage points higher than Black intermarriage rates, as compared with 25 points in the absence of controls. Second, individual traits had a larger impact on Black–Asian and Black–Hispanic differences in intermarriage rates relative to marriage‐market conditions. Once adjusted by individual traits and market conditions, Hispanic intermarriage rates were 32 percentage points higher than Black intermarriage rates, compared with 14 points in the absence of controls. Although both individual traits and market conditions masked the Black–Hispanic gap in intermarriage rates, the masking effects of the former were three times those of market conditions—73% versus 27%. The implication is that Black–Hispanic differences in intermarriage would be considerably higher except for three group differences: (a) higher shares of Hispanic relative to Black immigrants, (b) educational disadvantages of Hispanics relative to Blacks, and (c) larger supply of co‐ethnic partners for Hispanics compared with Blacks. Likewise, Black–Asian differences in intermarriage would be larger were it not for the higher share of Asians relative to Black immigrants. The masking effect of individual traits (i.e., higher shares of Asian immigrants) overshadowed the explanatory power of marriage markets (i.e., limited supply of co‐ethnic partners foments Asian intermarriage).
A comparison of the adjusted intermarriage rate gap, which assumes that members of distinct groups have similar individual traits and face similar marriage‐market conditions, revealed that individual attributes and marriage‐market conditions typically contributed to group differences in intermarriage rates, but marriage‐market conditions accounted for the lion's share of the observed gaps. For example, once adjusted for individual traits and marriage‐market conditions, Asian intermarriage rates were 6 percentage points higher than White intermarriage rates, as compared with 26 percentage points in the absence of controls. All of this explanatory power came from marriage markets. Detailed decomposition results (unreported here) also revealed that relative group size is the most salient explanatory factor: It explained about one half of the White–Asian differences in intermarriage rates: (.
Table 4 reports the results of decomposition analyses that assess the extent to which individual attributes and marriage‐market conditions explain group differences in intermarriage rates. Among female newlyweds, the largest observed intermarriage rate gaps corresponded to unions between Asians and Whites (26 percentage points) and Asians and Blacks (25 percentage points); the smallest gap obtained for White–Black marriages (1 percentage point).
A comparison of the results in Panels B and A in Table 3 reveals modest gender differences in the patterns of association among individual traits, market conditions, and intermarriage rates. In the main, gender differences manifested themselves in the size and statistical significance of coefficients. For example, a standard deviation increase in the market share of co‐ethnics reduced the odds of intermarriage by 47% and 72%, respectively, for Black men and women. Educational differences in intermarriage odds were also less salient for men than for women. For example, the odds of intermarriage were 15% higher for White men with high school diplomas relative to their peers who were college educated, but for White women who were high school educated intermarriage odds were double those of college graduates.
Variation in the share of foreign‐born co‐ethnics had no unique impact on women's odds of intermarriage independent of other marriage‐market conditions that constrain mate‐selection behavior. Although this would appear to challenge claims that immigration dampens intermarriage by replenishing the ethnic stock, supplementary analyses revealed (a) that higher shares of women living in places with large shares of foreign‐born co‐ethnics were themselves immigrants and (b) that communities with high shares of foreign‐born co‐ethnics were typically located in multiethnic metropolitan areas (Fong & Shibuya, 2005 ). Thus, net of individual birthplace and other market characteristics that influence spousal choices, variations in the nativity composition of single pan‐ethnic groups yielded no additional insight about how market constraints shape women's mate selection.
Partly owing to greater opportunities to interact with members of other racial groups, the odds of intermarriage were 47% higher among female White newlyweds who reside in metropolitan areas compared with their nonmetropolitan peers. Contrary to Whites, metropolitan residence was associated with 51% lower odds of intermarriage for Asian female newlyweds. This finding partly reflects greater opportunities for Asians to sort along ethnic lines in metropolitan areas that can be the loci of Asian ethnic enclaves (Fong & Shibuya, 2005 ).
Compared with their peers residing in other regions of the United States, non‐Hispanic women living in the West were more likely to cross ethnoracial boundaries in marriage. The odds of intermarriage were 49% higher for Asians living in the West relative to their counterparts residing in the Northeast, partly reflecting the lower levels of racial and ethnic residential segregation in the Northeast (Logan et al., 2003 ). The legacy of Jim Crow Laws, which encourage racial segregation in the South (Kalmijn, 1998 ), was evident in the lower intermarriage rates of southern Black women compared with their peers living in other regions. For example, the odds of intermarriage were 38% lower for Black women residing in the South compared with their racial peers living in the Northeast.
Residence in an ethnically diverse marriage market dampened the odds of intermarriage for Hispanic and Asian (but not White and Black) women. A standard deviation increase in the diversity index was associated with 16% and 25% lower odds of intermarriage, respectively, for Hispanic and Asian women. However, the association between ethnic diversity and intermarriage was statistically trivial for White and Black women. These patterns align with the “exceptions” clause of contact theory, which posits that residential diversity deters intermarriage in settings characterized by vigorous competition for spatially distributed resources among members of distinct racial and ethnic groups (Pettigrew & Tropp, 2006 ; Tolsma et al., 2008 ). For Hispanics and Asians, the proliferation of ethnic enclaves in multi ethnic settings may also dampen intermarriage by heightening exposure to co‐ethnic potential spouses and increasing their susceptibility to third party influences that reinforce endogamy (Kalmijn, 1998 ).
Relative group size was a dominant market influence on intermarriage odds for all pan‐ethnic groups. Consistent with the premises of structural theory, intermarriage was less common among women who reside in marriage markets where the supply of co‐ethnics was abundant compared with their peers living in markets where potential co‐ethnic mates were scarce (Blau & Schwartz, 1984 ; Kalmijn & Van Tubergen, 2010 ). Third party control is likely stronger in these locales (Kalmijn, 1998 ). A standard deviation increase in the market share of co‐ethnics lowered the odds of intermarriage by approximately 40% for Whites and Blacks and about 60% for Hispanics and Asians.
Intermarriage was also more common among U.S.‐born Hispanics and Asians than among their foreign‐born counterparts (Qian & Lichter, 2007 ). The odds of intermarriage for female Hispanic immigrants were, for example, 0.3 times the corresponding odds of their U.S.‐born peers. This pattern is consistent with claims that, relative to their foreign‐born peers, native‐born minorities are more culturally similar to other U.S. natives due to their socialization in the United States (Qian & Lichter, 2007 ).
Table 3 presents the results from our multilevel logistic regression models predicting the odds of intermarriage for female and male newlyweds in each pan‐ethnic group. In the interest of parsimony, we provide a detailed account of women's mate‐selection behavior and highlight how men's intermarriage behavior differs from that of women. Panel A in Table 3, which describe the mate‐selection behavior of women, shows that Whites who were educationally disadvantaged intermarried at higher rates than their peers with higher levels of education. The odds that female White high school graduates intermarry were double the corresponding odds for White college graduates. By contrast, educationally advantaged minorities were more likely to intermarry than their peers who were educationally disadvantaged (Gullickson, 2006 ). For example, the odds of intermarriage for female Black high school graduates were half the corresponding odds for Black college graduates. Educational variations in women's propensity to intermarry lends support to the status exchange theory, which claims that educationally advantaged minorities marry educationally disadvantaged Whites to facilitate their integration to the mainstream (Choi et al., 2012 ; Rosenfeld, 2005 ).
Asian and Hispanic newlyweds resided in communities with high shares of foreign‐born co‐ethnics, a reflection of their dominance among contemporary immigrants and preference for residence in places with immigrant legacies (Fong & Shibuya, 2005 ; Tienda & Fuentes, 2014 ). Asian newlyweds, for example, resided in communities where 65% of their co‐ethnics are foreign born, compared with only 4% of White newlyweds. The ethnic diversity index, which was approximately 0.50 points for non‐White female newlyweds versus 0.35 points for their White peers, reaffirmed the higher tendency of minorities to reside in ethnically diverse communities (Fong & Shibuya, 2005 ). In the next section, we use multilevel logistic regression models to examine how these marriage‐market conditions are associated with mate selection.
Table 2, which displays the unstandardized means and standard deviations of covariates representing marriage‐market conditions, illustrates place‐linked variations in intermarriage patterns among Black, White, Hispanic, and Asian female and male newlyweds. Reflecting long‐standing residential segregation patterns (Fong & Shibuya, 2005 ; Logan, Alba, & Stults, 2003 ), Black newlyweds resided in marriage markets where co‐ethnic mates were plentiful. To illustrate, Black female newlyweds lived in locales where 25% of their neighbors are Black, yet they made up only 9% of the female newlywed sample. By comparison, White newlyweds faced more balanced marriage markets insofar as their average population share in the market was quite similar to their average group size. White female newlyweds lived in locales where 75% of their neighbors were White, and they made up 68% of the newlywed sample. Hispanics and Asians fell between the Black and White extremes on this marriage‐market metric (Fong & Shibuya, 2005 ; Logan et al., 2003 ).
Figure 1, which presents intermarriage rates for female and male newlyweds, showed that intermarriage rates were lowest among White women and highest among Asian women. One fourth of Hispanic female newlyweds and one third of Asian female newlyweds out‐married, as compared with 8% and 9% of Whites. White–Black differences in women's intermarriage rates were not statistically significant. Men's intermarriage rates were similar to those of their female counterparts, with three noteworthy gender asymmetries. As with their female counterparts, White men intermarried at lower rates than minority men. Among minority men, the propensity to out‐marry varied around a narrow range, from 18% (Asian) to 23% (Hispanic). This reflects large gender asymmetries in Asian and Black intermarriage rates. Asian men were half as likely as Asian women to intermarry; however, Black men were twice as likely as Black women to do so. These estimates are comparable to past findings (Wang et al., 2012 ).
Discussion
The intermarriage literature has generated many novel insights about the individual correlates of mate‐selection behavior but leaves the influence of local marriage‐market conditions on mate‐selection behavior largely unexamined. This study of how marriage markets differentially constrain partner selection considers all pairings between men and women who belong to the four major U.S. pan‐ethnic groups. Using recent data that include identifiers for consistent geographic units across successive years and also distinguish between newlyweds and more established couples, we assess how marriage‐market conditions are associated with partner selection behavior of newlyweds. These analyses yield several noteworthy findings.
On balance, marriage‐market conditions account for larger shares of racial and ethnic differences in mate‐selection behavior than do the individual attributes considered here. Relative group size exerts a particularly strong influence on the intermarriage propensities for men and women of all pan‐ethnic groups. Intermarriage is more common among single men and women who reside in locales with small shares of co‐ethnics than among those who reside in locales where co‐ethnics are plentiful. Single men and women who reside in marriage markets with small shares of co‐ethnics intermarry at higher rates relative to their statistical counterparts who reside in places where co‐ethnics are plentiful. Furthermore, ethnic diversity dampens intermarriage prospects for minority men and women. Collectively, these findings support the claims of structural theory, which predicts that scarcity of co‐ethnic potential spouses foments exogamy by creating the need and willingness to expand the pool of potential spouses across pan‐ethnic boundaries (Blau & Schwartz, 1984), and the exceptions clause of contact theory, which posits that ethnic diversity reduces interracial comingling in locales characterized by vigorous competition for spatially distributed resources (Pettigrew & Tropp, 2006; Tolsma et al., 2008).
Contrary to the general pattern, individual traits exert greater influence on the intermarriage gap between Blacks and other minorities than do marriage‐market conditions. This finding is likely attributable to the legacy of antimiscegenation laws, which has rendered Blacks, especially women, relatively unattractive out‐group partners (Bany et al., 2014; Wang et al., 2012). Even when faced with unfavorable marriage‐market conditions, single men and women are less likely to expand their pool of potential spouses to include Blacks. Instead, whether or not single men and women enter into marriages involving Blacks depends largely on their individual traits. Immigrants with limited exposure to U.S. antimiscegenation laws intermarry at higher rates than do the U.S. born. The socioeconomically advantaged are more likely than their disadvantaged peers to intermarry either because socioeconomic mobility increase opportunities to interact with members of other groups, including Blacks (Kalmijn, 1998) or because Blacks who are socioeconomically advantaged exchange their achieved status to integrate into the mainstream society (Davis, 1941; Kalmijn, 1993; Rosenfeld, 2005).
Our results also reveal that the influence of marriage markets on mate‐selection behavior is more salient for men than for women. In fact, the intermarriage rates among minority men would be lower than the corresponding rates among their White peers if men in the various groups faced similar marriage‐market conditions. Single men are more willing and better able than their female counterparts to expand their marital search beyond the co‐ethnic market when faced with a limited supply of co‐ethnic partners from their own racial and ethnic group.
Notwithstanding several novel insights, this study has some limitations. First, like prior research, we use MSAs in urban areas and PUMAs in rural areas to approximate marriage markets (Harris & Ono, 2005; Kalmijn, 1998). Although we acknowledge the possibility that individuals may conduct their marital search from a distance and that not all single individuals are in the marriage market, data limitations preclude more rigorous analyses beyond the robustness tests referenced in the Appendix. By failing to exclude single residents who are not conducting a marital search or whose marriage market extends beyond the indicators measured for MSAs and PUMAs, our results may understate the influence on marriage‐market conditions on intermarriage behavior.
Second, it is possible that individuals predisposed to intermarry may select into communities with favorable intermarriage prospects. With ACS data, it is not possible to fully assess the role of selection. Consistency checks that involved excluding newlyweds who migrated in recent years revealed no substantive changes in empirical results. Nonetheless, our inability to account for selection may overstate the influence of marriage markets.
Third, although this study is about the impact of marriage‐market conditions on intermarriage behavior, limited availability of co‐ethnic partners may also result in nonmarriage. Stated differently, by failing to exclude individuals in local marriage markets who will forgo marriage altogether rather than intermarry when faced with a constrained market, our results may understate the influence of market conditions on marital exogamy.
Fourth, data limitations preclude further consideration of the cultural determinants of intermarriage, including differences in acceptance of intermarriages or the strength of third‐party control over brides and grooms. We infer partner preference and third‐party control by examining racial and ethnic variations in intermarriage behavior. A qualitative study examining why single men and women chose their partners is needed to verify whether and for which groups third‐party influences shape marriage behavior.
Fifth, following the convention in the intermarriage literature, we treat Hispanics as members of a single ethnoracial category but acknowledge that Hispanics can be of any race and that Hispanicity is a more permeable boundary than racial boundaries (Qian & Cobas, 2004). Sample sizes preclude further disaggregation of Hispanics, however. By using a pan‐ethnic definition, our results may overstate endogamy rates while understating intermarriage rates, but it is unclear how the use of pan‐ethnics instead of co‐nationals will affect our understanding of the influence of marriage‐market conditions on mate selection.
Finally, our use of multilevel logistic regression models to examine how marriage‐market conditions influence intermarriage patterns confers advantages and disadvantages. Our statistical method reveals how specific marriage‐market conditions influence mate selection, but this comes at the cost of omitted variable bias, namely, inability to fully control for group size differentials. Consequently, our findings are partly affected by variations in population size, which is not a problem for log‐linear methods. In equal measure, it is possible that marriage‐market conditions interact with individual correlates of intermarriage other than group membership. Log‐linear methods, which are based on contingency tables and generate interaction terms for all modeled covariates, can take into account how multiple conditions interact to influence partner selection in a way that multilevel regression analysis cannot.The Russian PSNR-8 Kredo-M1 (1L120) portable ground reconnaissance station, adopted by the Russian Armed Forces only in 2002, was seen in the possession of terrorists of the 2nd Army Corps (AC) of the Russian occupation forces in Luhansk Oblast.
Let us remind you that on March 9, volunteers of InformNapalm international intelligence community published a new article on the analysis of data from the work computer of the reconnaissance commander of the so-called 2nd Army Corps of the LPR.
A document presented in the article disclosed detailed information on who, when and in what quantities supplied the units of the occupation forces and terrorists with this type of military equipment.
Previously, the InformNapalm OSINT investigations several times disclosed the PSNR-8 Kredo-M1 complexes, but in those cases [1], [2], and [3] the complexes belonged to the units of the 1st Army Corps – the Russian occupying forces in Donetsk Oblast.
In this investigation, additional photo evidence of PSNR-8 complexes being in the possession of the terrorists from the so-called 10th Artillery Brigade of the LPR (the 10th SABr, military unit L-23213, Luhansk) of the 2nd AC are presented.
The photos were found on the social website Odnoklassniki, in the account of Anton Borisovich Ilyushchenko, a collaborator from Slovyansk who uses the pseudonym Anton Yevreev.
Anton Ilyushchenko’s video titled My Life compiled evidence that he serves in the so-called 10th Artillery Brigade of the 2nd AC of the Russian occupation army in Luhansk Oblast. Let’s look at some of the most interesting photos.
In the photo: Anton Ilyushchenko inside a large repair hangar in the territory of the so-called Transpele base in Luhansk.
Here is a photo taken in the same building in front of the Russian BPM-97 Vystrel armored vehicle. These vehicles were repeatedly recorded at the Transpele base. It proves that the terrorist groups are supplied with Russian weapons and equipment.
The tactical sign of the so-called 10th Artillery Brigade of the 2nd AC of the Russian occupation forces is the number 10 placed in a square. Below is a photo where Anton Ilyushchenko poses in front of military equipment with this tactical sign.
Here is a photo of Ilyushchenko with the Russian PSNR-8 Kredo-M1 portable ground reconnaissance station.
The photo above shows a characteristic fence which wraps around almost the entire perimeter of the territory of the Transpele base.
Next, there is a photo taken at the test site located near the Transpele base. Coordinates of the place where the photo was taken are: 48.5392185, 39.3634316
The distinctive characteristic to identify the terrain in the photo is a pine forest with a small old birch grove in front of it (http://www.panoramio.com/photo/85522693) that has a large number of broken trees from which only stumps and trunks remained.
Thus, this investigation presents another fact that Russian weapons and equipment are located at the Transpele base in Luhansk. Collaborators actively betray secrets of the Russian hybrid army in social media providing more and more evidence of Russia’s military invasion of Ukraine. The most complete list of military equipment recorded during the InformNapalm’s investigations can be found in the database here. As of March 22, 2017, there are 43 types of weapons with photos and video evidence in the database.
By Vidal Sorokin exclusively for InformNapalm international intelligence community
Translated by Svitlana Kemblowski
(CC BY 4.0) Information specially prepared for InformN |
a principle whose moral accepatbility is being scrutinized. Why should we subscribe in wide reflective equilibrium to the difference principle? The informal argument places the principles of maximum equal liberty in jeopardy. If contingencies can be socially controlled to work for the benefit of the least well off, then the ends that persons contingently have must also be placed in the pot of social assets. In the attempt to render credible one of his two principles, Rawls inadvertently pulls the rug out under the other.
Essentially, if the reason that a certain set of things can be redistributed is their moral arbitrariness, then that argument also allow to redistribute things that are protected by the first principle. We cannot appeal to the principles of justice because their justification itself is what is being examined at that point. Without the assignment of the ownership of bodies and thoughts, the liberty principle is empty: taking a healthy man’s kidney wouldn’t violate his liberty, it wouldn’t be a harm to him, as that kidney doesn’t belong to him in the first place.
One can of course stipulate that persons do have ownership rights over some morally arbitrary items (as their body or their conception of the good) to make this problem go away, and then say that the second principle doesn’t apply to the morally arbitrary items protected by the first principle. But then the argument given for the second principle loses its force, as one can just move as much moral irrelevancy into the first principle as one wants and leave the second one empty. Thus, again, our conception of man is doing the work in determining what the principles chosen are.
Rawls has failed to show that social control over property is in any way more justifiable than social control over personality. That failure is not surprising. His argument that property is a social asset is explicitly based on the proposition that natural talents – and all else that is morally arbitrary – are a social asset. It follows that there is no domain within which an individual enjoys a privileged moral position such that he and he alone is entitled to control anything – including his own activities -. Everything pertaining to persons except their personhood, whatever that could be when abstracted from ends, character, abilities, and relations to material posessions, is thoroughly socialized. Moral space has shrunk to zero. Any liberty rights that persons enjoy are theirs not in virtue of their existence as project pursuers with their own lives to lead, but because the social decision process has created and bestowed those rights. The conclusion is thoroughly illiberal. Individuals, insofar as they are recognized as more than bare egos, are the creation of society rather than its creators. The result is clearly not one that Rawls wants or believes that he has achieved, but it dogs A Theory of Justice nonetheless.
Conclusion
Rawls’s Theory of Justice has issues that he himself recognised. He moved on to study public reason liberalism, and to study how can a community of people give reasons to one another in order to justify the rules they live by.
His undertaking, however, was not in vain, as his method of reflective equilibrium and the veil of ignorance have lived on to our days. Rawls was right to ask for impartial rules that can be justified to all, and then in the process of trying to get from there to a theory of justice, he made us notice that in the process of translation, our conception of person and the good life is supremely important to determine what we ought to do and how a society ought to be structured. What do we really care about? What should we care about? (Should we even care?) But that’s another issue and shall be discussed another time.
Notes
[1] Cohen argued that Rawls claims to be doing ideal theory, but he is inconsistent. Rawls says that the difference principle allows inequalities because in doing so, this will motivate some people to work harder. But if we are doing ideal theory, we cannot have in our though experiment lazy people who are unjust. In ideal theory, everyone conforms to the principles of justice. Thus Rawlsian ideal theory should really be egalitarian, as Cohen claims. It is only when one introduces real world considerations when one ends up with Rawlsianism.
I wrote a bibliography of Rawls, Harsanyi, and Binmore here. I haven’t really discussed Harsanyi or Binmore here.
[2] Harsanyi argued that Rawlsianism ends up in utilitarianism. In addition, he argued that even on Rawls’s terms, beings in the original position wouldn’t choose the maximim principle, but instead they would choose to maximise their expected own utility. Because they are symmetrically placed, this implies that average utilitarianism is the chosen principle of justice, or so argues Harsanyi. Rawls says he rejects using probabilities in the original position, not because of risk aversion, but because he says it is the rational thing to do in a situation of such a high uncertainty. Apparently, it once was a popular idea. But by the time Harsanyi wrote his reply, it wasn’t, and as of today, plain expected utility maximisation is regarded as the rational thing to do in choice theory.
[3] Brennan argues that Rawls’s theory – and by extension what has come to be known as “high liberalism” is illiberal. Given that Rawls himself is entangled in the definition of liberalism itself (A definition of liberalism must pick up Rawls or else it is a bad definition), one needs to find a neutral definition to arbiter. In a magnificent move, Jason Brennan (2004) does this and lets Benito Mussolini, Adolf Hitler, Marx, and G.A. Cohen define what liberalism is. Liberalism is what they do not defend, or they do criticise. By this criteria, Rawls is illiberal.
Bibliography
I wrote a bibliography of Rawls, Harsanyi, and Binmore here.
Brennan, J. (2007). Rawls’s paradox. Constitutional Political Economy, 18(4), 287-299.
Brennan, J., & Tomasi, J. (2012). Classical liberalism. The Oxford Handbook of Political Philosophy, 115.
Brennan, J. (2004). Illiberal Liberals: Why High Liberalism is Not a Liberal View. Review Journal of Political Philosophy, 2, 59-103.
Brennan, J. F. (2014). Why not capitalism?. Routledge.
Gaus, G. (2014). The turn to a political liberalism. A companion to Rawls, 233-250.
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Harsanyi, J. C. (1975). Can the maximin principle serve as a basis for morality? A critique of John Rawls’s theory. American political science review, 69(2), 594-606.
Holmes, S., & Sunstein, C. R. (2000). The cost of rights: why liberty depends on taxes. WW Norton & Company.
Huemer, M. (2014) Is Wealth Redistribution a Rights Violation?.
Layman, D. M. (2015). The Fair Value of Economic Liberty. Res Publica, 21(4), 413-428.
Lomasky, L. E. (2005). Libertarianism at twin Harvard. Social Philosophy and Policy, 22(1), 178-199.
Murphy, L., & Nagel, T. (2002). The myth of ownership: Taxes and justice. Oxford University Press.
Platz, J. V. (2014). Are economic liberties basic rights?. Politics, Philosophy & Economics, 13(1), 23-44.
Pogge, T. W. (2003). The incoherence between Rawls’s theories of justice. Fordham L. Rev., 72, 1739.
Tomasi, J. (2012). Free market fairness. Princeton University Press.
Tomasi, J. (2014). Democratic capitalism: a reply to critics. Critical Review, 26(3-4), 439-471.
Tomasi, J. (2015). Market Democracy and Meaningful Work: A Reply to Critics. Res Publica, 21(4), 443-460.
Wells, K. (2016). The right to personal property. Politics, Philosophy & Economics, 15(4), 358-378.
Zwolinski, M. (2008). The separateness of persons and liberal theory. The Journal of Value Inquiry, 42(2), 147-165.We’ve got some updates from the Warner Bros. DC Universe today, and as usual, they include more reports about Suicide Squad. The latest rumor has Batman ’s former sidekick Jason Todd (aka Red Hood) featured as somewhat of an important plot element. But the more exciting news is that WB has their eye on the directing duo behind John Wick to helm an upcoming movie in their DCU.
The latest reports come via Latino Review, and the stuff about Jason Todd isn’t totally new — a previous rumor about the Suicide Squad plot explained that the Joker’s past crimes would be referenced, including how he murdered one of Batman’s sidekicks. It was more than fair to speculate that the sidekick in question would be Jason Todd, one of a few characters to don the Robin costume. It seems as though that speculation was correct according to the latest rumor.
We won’t see Todd in the film, though we will see his uniform, which is sitting in a display in the Batcave, in Batman v Superman: Dawn of Justice. Todd was killed by the Joker in the 1988 comic A Death in the Family, but was later revived in 2005 as the anti-hero known as Red Hood. The report also notes that WB is making the Red Hood character a “priority,” which means we’ll likely see him pop up in the DCU later on, with Suicide Squad and Batman v Superman setting up some of his back story.
And finally, the report also mentions that WB is currently courting John Wick directors Chad Stahelski and David Leitch to direct one of their upcoming DC movies. It was recently rumored that the studio has their eye on Phil Lord and Chris Miller for The Flash, while Aquaman also remains without a director. Stahelski and Leitch are very talented stunt coordinators who showed off their impressive handling of engaging action with their directorial debut — landing these guys would undoubtedly be a smart move for the DC cinematic universe.
Suicide Squad hits theaters on August 5, 2016.Barack Obama claims Adam Lanza used a fully automatic weapon at Sandy Hook
We learned yesterday that Barack Obama is using a 20 year old survey of 250 people to make the unsubstantiated claim that 40% of all guns are purchased without background checks in an attempt to manipulate the narrative to draw support for universal background checks.
With his credibility on this issue now in serious doubt Barack Obama showed us again today that he is willing to bend the truth in order to advance his agenda. Here is what Barack Obama told Democrat donors about the Sandy Hook massacre:
Now, over the next couple of months, we’ve got a couple of issues: gun control. (Applause.) I just came from Denver, where the issue of gun violence is something that has haunted families for way too long, and it is possible for us to create common-sense gun safety measures that respect the traditions of gun ownership in this country and hunters and sportsmen, but also make sure that we don’t have another 20 children in a classroom gunned down by a semiautomatic weapon – by a fully automatic weapon in that case, sadly.
Well that is an interesting slip of the tongue, don’t you think? But was it a slip of the tongue or was is a deliberate lie by the president designed to forward his agenda? If he misspoke and then corrected himself, why did his correction include the false information while his first statement contained the official story we have been told about Sandy Hook?
I say the official story because the story we are being told now is not the same story we were told at first:
And when you look at the Fast and Furious and Benghazi cover-ups the Obama regime has a fleeting relationship with the truth and a strong history of not being completely honest with the American people.
AdvertisementsWith Donald Trump inching closer to the White House, contestants from his show "The Apprentice" are choosing sides.
A media-savvy group of six former contestants held a press conference on Friday to tell Trump "you're fired!"
One of the speakers, season one runner-up Kwame Jackson, said Trump does not have the right "temperament" to be president and accused the GOP frontrunner of appealing "to the lowest common denominator of fear, racism and divisiveness in our populace."
"Let us choose Kennedy over Kardashianism," Jackson said.
But other stars from the reality TV show, like Piers Morgan and Omarosa Manigault, have been more supportive of the businessman's candidacy.
In a statement, Trump called the former contestants "six failing wannabes out of hundreds of contestants."
"How quickly they forget. Nobody would know who they are if it weren't for me," he said, adding, "They just want to get back into the limelight like they had when they were with Trump. Total dishonesty and disloyalty."
Friday's press conference was led by Season 4 winner Randal Pinkett, who has been an outspoken critic of Trump's campaign since last summer.
"We acknowledge Donald's success as a businessman, and genuinely appreciate the opportunity 'The Apprentice' afforded all of us," Pinkett said in a statement. "We, however, strongly condemn Donald's campaign of sexism, xenophobia, racism, violence and hate."
Trump hosted "The Apprentice" and its celebrity spin-off edition from 2004 through early 2015. Nowadays, on the campaign trail, he is fond of citing his experience on the show and its success in the ratings.
He sometimes reprises his tag line -- "you're fired" -- to great effect at rallies.
The television hosting skills that Trump honed through "The Apprentice" have also come in handy during the campaign.
But perhaps there's a downside to his decade plus on the NBC show -- the former contestants who detest him.
Along with Pinkett, the other attendees at Friday's press event were Kevin Allen, Tara Dowdell, Marshawn Evans Daniels, James Sun and Kwame Jackson.
Trump is "stoking the flames of our worst demons," Jackson, the season one runner-up, said in a statement ahead of Friday's event.
Morgan, on the other hand, has been a welcome friend to Trump.
Morgan won the first season of "The Celebrity Apprentice." While he has occasionally critiqued Trump's controversial positions, but he has also defended Trump many times.
This week he tweeted that "lots of people" are writing off Trump, but "I still believe he'll win GOP nomination & the general election."
Correction: An earlier version of this story incorrectly said Morgan won the first season of "The Apprentice."Earlier today, voting concluded on the Reddit Best Grill Contest, an online poll hosted by Reddit user ShakeShacKing where posters on /r/grilling nominated and voted on the best grill of all time. After weeks of match-ups, the winner of the contest was determined to be the Char-Broil Charcoal Grill 780 with a narrow victory over the Saber Stainless Cast 500.
The Char-Broil’s victory was very contentious with opinions raging in the comments sections. The top commenter, a user by the name of XtraVirgin, decried the contest.
“This contest is a total sham anyway. The only reason that the Char-Broil Charcoal 780 won is because the Char-Broil series is so popular, and because this model came out recently,” XtraVirgin’s post read in part. “The real best grills are too niche to get noticed by the masses and there’s absolutely no attention paid to older, more classic grills at all. Seriously, if you look at most of the voters on MyGrillLists I bet they’ve owned fewer than 5 grills.”
User Skewer98 retorted, stating: “I just got into grilling this summer but I can definitively say that no one likes old grills. They’re so bad looking compared to new grills.”
“I haven’t seen this much salt since the thread where I asked which type of salt was best for steaks,” another user named CallsignGriller added.
Meanwhile, user GigaGrillBreaker admitted, “In every match-up I just voted for the grill with the biggest rack.”
Some /r/grilling users pointed out the striking similarities between this contest and /r/anime’s best girl contest, but these comments were removed by moderators for not being sufficiently grill-related.For other uses, see Don Francisco
Kreutzberger and the second or maternal family name is Blumenfeld. This name uses Spanish naming customs : the first or paternal family name isand the second or maternal family name is
Mario Luis Kreutzberger Blumenfeld ( American Spanish: [maˈɾjo ˈkɾoi̯t͡sβeɾɣeɾ]; born December 28, 1940), better known by his stage name as Don Francisco ( pronounced [doɱ fɾanˈsisko]), is a Chilean-German television host, and a popular personality on the Univision network reaching Spanish-speaking viewers in the United States. In 2016, he signed into Telemundo. He is best known for hosting the former variety shows Sábado Gigante and Don Francisco Presenta.
Biography [ edit ]
Mario Luis Kreutzberger Blumenfeld was born in Talca, Chile, to Anna (née Blumenfeld) and Erick Kreutzberger, German Jewish refugees who fled to Chile to escape from World War II.[1][2]
Career [ edit ]
Kreutzberger started a TV show in 1962, and he named it Sábados Gigantes on Canal 13. In it, he adapted many of the formulas he had seen in American television to the Chilean public. The show became an instant hit that had lasted over 53 years. In 1986, the show began to be produced by SIN in Miami, Florida, with the same formula used in Chile, with the slightly different name of Sábado Gigante to KMEX-DT channel 34 Los Angeles. In the following six years Kreutzberger developed a three-hour-long variety show, including contests, comedy, interviews and a traveling camera section. The traveling camera, or Cámara Viajera (originally La Película Extranjera, The Foreign Movie), has taken "Don Francisco" to over 185 countries worldwide, many of them more than once.[citation needed] Kreutzberger in his show has interviewed many celebrities, including Roberto Durán, Cristina Saralegui, Sussan Taunton, Charytín, Bill Clinton, George W. Bush, Barack Obama, Bill Gates and many others. In addition, his show has launched the careers of famous entertainers, such as Lili Estefan, Sissi Fleitas, and numerous more. Kreutzberger appeared as himself in the movie The 33, about the 2010 Copiapó mining accident.
Immediately after the 1973 Chilean coup d'etat the military sought after Kreutzberger. They took him to the vandalized house of Salvador Allende, where corpses of guards were still on the floor. The soldiers asked him to report on the events. Kreutzberger declined the offer encouraging the captain that had approached him to take the role of reporter himself.[citation needed]
Television career [ edit ]
Kreutzberger has also hosted Chilean versions of ¿Quién merece ser millonario? (which is based on the original British format of the international Who Wants to Be a Millionaire? franchise), Deal or No Deal, and Atrapa los Millones (which is based on the American format of the international Money Drop franchise). He hosted the first three seasons of Atrapa los Millones before retiring from the program in 2014; Diana Bolocco became the show's new host for the program's fourth season in 2015.
He voiced Governor Bernardo de Galvez in a 2003 episode, "The Great Galvez", of a PBS Kids show Liberty's Kids.
In 2012, Sabado Gigante celebrated 50 years on air.
On April 18, 2015, Don Francisco announced his show would come to an end in September after 53 years on air; Sábado Gigante aired its final episode called "Hasta Siempre" on September 19, 2015.
On March 1, 2016, Don Francisco announced his return to the television and signed a multi-year deal with Telemundo. His first show on the network titled Don Francisco Te Invita, a Sunday night talk show considered to be a spiritual successor to both Don Francisco Presenta and Sábado Gigante, debuted on October 9, 2016.[3]
False death reports [ edit ]
On April Fool's Day, 2003, a rumor arose that Kreutzberger had died, the rumor appearing around the New York and New Jersey area. The rumor proved false, but sent many of his fans into a panic until it was revealed as an April Fool's joke.[4]
Personal life [ edit ]
Kreutzberger promotes and hosts the Teletón, a TV charity show for disabled Chilean children; there have been 22 telethons over 30 years. He is also the Hispanic spokesperson for the US Muscular Dystrophy Association, in which he also appears in a pre-recorded piece on its annual telethon, to appeal to Hispanics to donate.
Kreutzberger was also the first host of the Teletón USA telethon, which was introduced in December 2012 on the Univision network; the event and charity is based on the popular Teleton (Chile) the Chilean Teleton.
Honors [ edit ]
His show was in world's longest running TV variety show, according to Guinness World Records.[5]
Kreutzberger has received numerous awards and a star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame (on 7018 Hollywood Blvd.).[6]
On March 1, 2012, Kreutzberger was inducted into the Television Academy Hall of Fame.[7]
On September 8, 2015, the city of New York named a street in the Washington Heights district in honor of Kreutzberger, named "Don Francisco Boulevard".[8]
Celebrity advertising [ edit ]
Don Francisco has been in commercials for La Curaçao Department Stores. He was even present for the opening of La Curaçao's South Gate, California and Arizona locations.
He also appears in TV spots for the Mexican telecom company Claro.
In 2010, the U.S. Social Security Administration enlisted Don Francisco to appear in a series of public service announcements to reach out to American Hispanics about the benefits of Social Security.[9]
Lawsuit [ edit ]
In 1992, Kreutzberger was sued by one of his models for sexual harassment, but the suit was settled out of court.[1]
See also [ edit ]Indianapolis Colts quarterback Andrew Luck is in Europe seeking treatment on his surgically repaired right shoulder, sources told ESPN's Mike Wells and Chris Mortensen.
The Colts placed Luck on injured reserve Nov. 3, ending his season. The decision came after Luck visited with doctors to ask why he was still having soreness in his right shoulder. It also ended months of speculation about whether the quarterback would play this season after having surgery in January.
Luck practiced Oct. 4 for the first of two times since December. Then he practiced two more times before he was shut down and given a cortisone shot to see if the soreness would subside.
Professional athletes, including Peyton Manning and Kobe Bryant, have traveled to Europe in the past to get non-traditional treatment for injuries. Luck is in the rehab process of trying to get his shoulder balanced.
Colts general manager Chris Ballard, as he has said consistently since April, will not put a timetable on Luck's return. That means there is no guarantee the quarterback will take part in offseason workouts in the spring.
The Colts are working under the impression that Luck will be back in time for next season, but Mortensen tweeted on Nov. 5 that the Colts are "not ignoring" the 2018 quarterback draft class. Jacoby Brissett, who the Colts acquired from New England on Sept. 2, has started the past eight games for Indianapolis (3-6).
Injuries have derailed what was a positive start to Luck's career. The Colts selected him with the No. 1 overall pick in 2012, and he started every game during his first three seasons. The Colts went to the playoffs in each of those seasons, including the AFC Championship Game in 2014.
Luck originally injured his shoulder during the 2015 season in Week 3 at Tennessee. He missed two games due to his shoulder and then missed the final seven games of that season due to a lacerated kidney. Luck missed one game last season with a concussion and all of this season with the shoulder injury.
Despite dealing with the shoulder injury that caused him to miss practice at times last season, Luck threw for 4,240 yards and 31 touchdowns while completing a career-high 63.5 percent of his passes.I’m a horror writer, and I have a confession to make….
I have a hard time reading H.P. Lovecraft.
There…I said it.
I have peers that have attempted to crucify me when I’ve told them this, but I can’t help it. I find his work boring, and he’s quite possibly the worst writer of dialogue in the history of writers of dialogue. Plenty of good films are “Lovecraftian” in theme, and you’ll hear no arguments from me when someone raves about the epicness of Alien, Re-Animator, Hellboy or The Thing (my favorite John Carpenter film).
Despite what you might be thinking, this article is not solely devoted to my ranting about the works of H.P. Lovecraft, it’s actually a review for a film based on H.P. Lovecraft’s The Shadow Over Innsmouth.
Innsmouth is a 2015 short film directed by Izzy Lee (Picket, Post Partum). Suffice it to say that I enjoyed watching this as much as I enjoy reading Lovecraft. In other words, I got through it, but I probably won’t be revisiting it again any time soon.
Innsmouth begins with Arkham Detective Diana Olmstead (Diana Porter) arriving at a crime scene where a woman’s body has been discovered, baring a vicious bite mark on the neck and strange egg sacks attached to her back. Olmstead, who is basically Dana Scully’s taller sister, also finds a photograph of the victim and a beautiful, dark-haired woman. On the back of the photo is written the word “Innsmouth.”
Olmstead heads to the seaside town of Innsmouth to investigate and is promptly stalked by a Goth chick, before getting stabbed in the neck with a hypodermic needle. When she awakes, she’s in undergarments that she wasn’t wearing under her jeans and blazer. She’s also in the presence of the dark-haired woman from the photograph. The woman identifies herself as Alice Marsh (Tristan Risk), and she kisses Olmstead on the mouth and then takes her upstairs to the bathroom. Alice gets naked, Olmstead doesn’t, and they both wind up in the bathtub together.
**SPOILER** An eyeball pops out of Alice’s snatch, y’all! I won’t spoil the rest, so if you’d like to know where it goes from there, you can catch it on Shudder.
Now, fun facts!
Arkham is a direct reference to the town that H.P. Lovecraft created for the setting of many of his stories.
Olmstead is the name of the narrator in Lovecraft’s The Shadow Over Innsmouth. While the character is never actually named in the book, Lovecraft himself confirms the character’s identity in later notes about his work. Kudos to Izzy Lee for putting in the research prior to filming.
Marsh is a direct reference to Captain Obed Marsh, the wealthy Sea Captain that founded the town of Innsmouth in Lovecraft’s story.
Alice Marsh is Captain Marsh’s daughter (which is mentioned in this film), but what’s crazy is that, according to Lovecraft’s notes, she was also the great-grandmother of the (narrator) Olmstead in the book!
I have to give Izzy Lee props for casting a nearly all-female film. Given that most of Lovecraft’s stories were male dominated, it’s a kind of “fuck you” to someone that I don’t believe was the nicest of gentlemen to begin with. Second, let’s face it–any film that shows an eyeball slithering out of a fully exposed vagina is bound to rack up some style points.
Now for the not so good. The acting was rather painful, with forced dialogue and lots of “fucks” that were really unnecessary. The soundtrack was nerve-wracking, too. Thankfully, you only have to put up with it for 11 minutes.An interesting paradox in the technology world is that there is both a shortage and a surplus of engineers in the United States. Talk to those working at any Silicon Valley company, and they will tell you how hard it is to find qualified talent. But listen to the heart-wrenching stories of unemployed engineers, and you will realize that there are tens of thousands who can’t get jobs. What gives?
The harsh reality is that in the tech world, companies prefer to hire young, inexperienced, engineers.
And engineering is an “up or out” profession: you either move up the ladder or face unemployment. This is not something that tech executives publicly admit, because they fear being sued for age discrimination, but everyone knows that this is the way things are. Why would any company hire a computer programmer with the wrong skills for a salary of $150,000, when it can hire a fresh graduate—with no skills—for around $60,000? Even if it spends a month training the younger worker, the company is still far ahead. The young understand new technologies better than the old do, and are like a clean slate: they will rapidly learn the latest coding methods and techniques, and they don’t carry any “technology baggage”. As well, the older worker likely has a family and needs to leave by 6 pm, whereas the young can pull all-nighters.
At least, that’s how the thinking goes in the tech industry.
In their book Chips and Change, Professors Clair Brown and Greg Linden, of the University of California, Berkeley, analyzed Bureau of Labor Statistics and census data for the semiconductor industry and found that salaries increased dramatically for engineers during their 30s but that these increases slowed after the age of 40. At greater ages still, salaries started dropping, dependent on the level of education. After 50, the mean salary of engineers was lower—by 17% for those with bachelors degrees, and by 14% for those with masters degrees and PhDs—than the salary of those younger than 50. Curiously, Brown and Linden also found that salary increases for holders of postgraduate degrees were always lower than increases for those with bachelor’s degrees (in other words, even PhD degrees didn’t provide long-term job protection). It’s not much different in the software/internet industry. If anything, things in these fast-moving industries are much worse for older workers.
For tech startups, it usually boils down to cost: most can’t even afford to pay $60K salaries, so they look for motivated, young software developers who will accept minimum wage in return for equity ownership and the opportunity to build their careers. Companies like Zoho can afford to pay market salaries, but can’t find the experienced workers they need. In 2006, Zoho’s CEO, Sridhar Vembu, initiated an experiment to hire 17-year-olds directly out of high school. He found that within two years, the work performance of these recruits was indistinguishable from that of their college-educated peers. Some ended up becoming superstar software developers.
Companies such as Microsoft say that they try to maintain a balance but that it isn’t easy. An old friend, David Vaskevitch, who was Senior Vice-President and Chief Technical Officer at Microsoft, told me in 2008 that he believes that younger workers have more energy and are sometimes more creative. But there is a lot they don’t know and can’t know until they gain experience. So Microsoft aggressively recruits for fresh talent on university campuses and for highly experienced engineers from within the industry, one not at the expense of the other. David acknowledged that the vast majority of new Microsoft employees are young, but said that this is so because older workers tend to go into more senior jobs and there are fewer of those positions to begin with. It was all about hiring the best and brightest, he said; age and nationality are not important.
So whether we like it or not, it’s a tough industry. I know that some techies will take offense at what I have to say, but here is my advice to those whose hair is beginning to grey:
Move up the ladder into management, architecture, or design; switch to sales or product management; or jump ship and become an entrepreneur (old guys have a huge advantage in the startup world). Build skills that are more valuable to your company, and take positions that can’t be filled by entry-level workers. If you’re going to stay in programming, realize that the deck is stacked against you. Even though you may be highly experienced and wise, employers aren’t willing or able to pay an experienced worker twice or thrice what an entry-level worker earns. Save as much as you can when you’re in your 30s and 40s and be prepared to earn less as you gain experience. Keep your skills current. This means keeping up-to-date with the latest trends in computing, programming techniques, and languages, and adapting to change. To be writing code for a living when you’re 50, you will need to be a rock-star developer and be able to out-code the new kids on the block.
My advice to managers is to consider the value of the experience that the techies bring. With age frequently come wisdom and abilities to follow direction, mentor, and lead. Older workers also tend to be more pragmatic and loyal, and to know the importance of being team players. And ego and arrogance usually fade with age. During my tech days, I hired several programmers who were over 50. They were the steadiest performers and stayed with me through the most difficult times.
Finally, I don’t know of any university, including the ones I teach at, that tells its engineering students what to expect in the long term or how to manage their technical careers. Perhaps it is time to let students know what lies ahead.President Obama and Judge Merrick Garland. March 16, 2016.
In a recent Washington Post op ed, prominent attorney and Common Cause board member Gregory Diskant argues that, if the Senate refuses to vote on the nomination, President Obama can simply appoint Merrick Garland to the Supreme Court without getting him confirmed by the Senate at all. Diskant contends that failure to act on a nomination constitutes a “waiver” of the Senate’s confirmation power:
In most respects, the meaning of the “Advice and Consent” clause is obvious. The Senate can always grant or withhold consent by voting on the nominee. The narrower question, starkly presented by the Garland nomination, is what to make of things when the Senate simply fails to perform its constitutional duty. It is altogether proper to view a decision by the Senate not to act as a waiver of its right to provide advice and consent. A waiver is an intentional relinquishment or abandonment of a known right or privilege. As the Supreme Court has said, “ ‘No procedural principle is more familiar to this Court than that a constitutional right,’ or a right of any other sort, ‘may be forfeited in criminal as well as civil cases by the failure to make timely assertion of the right before a tribunal having jurisdiction to determine it.’ ” It is in full accord with traditional notions of waiver to say that the Senate, having been given a reasonable opportunity to provide advice and consent to the president with respect to the nomination of Garland, and having failed to do so, can fairly be deemed to have waived its right.
Diskant’s position has been endorsed by Andy Schmookler and J Williams at the well-known Daily Kos website.
This argument is wrong for multiple reasons. Advice and consent is a prerequisite for appointment, not a “constitutional duty” of the Senate. Nothing in the Constitution requires the Senate to act on nominations in any way.
President Obama has nominated Merrick Garland to serve on the Supreme Court. Here is what you need to know about Garland. (Claritza Jimenez,Gillian Brockell/The Washington Post)
UC Irvine Law School Dean Erwin Chemerinsky argues that the Senate has a duty to vote on Supreme Court nominations because the Appointment Clause states that the president “shall nominate, and by and with the advice and consent of the Senate, shall appoint ambassadors, other public ministers and consuls, judges of the Supreme Court, and all other officers of the United States” (emphasis added), and the word “shall” implies a mandatory duty. But “shall” seems to apply only to the actions of the president, not to what the Senate might do. Otherwise, as Michael Ramsey points out, it would have to be interpreted as indicating that the Senate “‘shall give advice and consent,’ and no one thinks the Senate ‘shall’ consent.” And if “shall” does not create a duty to consent, it also does not include a duty to offer “advice,” since the “shall” that might refer to both is exactly the same. If such a duty to hold a vote does exist, it would mean that the Senate has repeatedly violated it on the hundreds of occasions when it chose not to hold a vote on the nominations of judges and other presidential appointees covered by the clause (such as ambassadors and consuls, for example).
In addition, there is no provision for such waiver of the Senate’s confirmation power in the Constitution. If the Senate refuses to consider a treaty signed by the President or a bill passed by the House, no one would seriously argue that the treaty or bill in question should be deemed a law because the Senate has somehow “waived” its authority. Rather, the treaty or bill remains unenacted unless and until the Senate passes it.
Even if the Senate does have some sort of duty to offer “advice” on the nomination, it is not required to do so by holding hearings or taking a vote. The Senate can refuse consent by voting a nomination down, by filibustering it to keep it from coming to a vote (as then-Senator Obama advocated doing with the nomination Justice Samuel Alito), or simply by doing nothing |
force, which is then used to cast spells. Usually demon summoning."
"What?" Zach asked, giving him a strange look. "Why demon summoning?"
"Casting spells with someone else's personal mana is hard," said Zorian. "It's not toxic like raw ambient mana, but other people's mana is extremely hard to shape and control. This is especially true when that mana was taken forcibly from the target. Using other people's life force has the same problem, only worse, since life force is so much more potent than regular mana. If you want to do anything fancy with your stolen life force, you need to set up long and demanding rituals. It's much easier to just summon demons with your own mana and use stolen life force as payment for their cooperation."
"I thought demons asked for souls as payment," Zach said.
"They accept both, and more besides," Zorian shrugged. "It depends on the demon, really."
"Well, whatever," Zach said, clearly not terribly interested in the discussion about demons. "Since the first method is kind of neat, but situational, and the second method sounds exactly as awful as I feared, I'm guessing it was the third method that got you so interested in this stuff?"
"Right. The third method of using blood magic is related to enhancement rituals," Zorian said, a bit of excitement suddenly shining in his eyes.
Zorian launched into a quick explanation of the matter. Enhancement rituals were complex magical rituals that granted permanent magical enhancements to the target. Superhuman strength, fast healing, flight, fire-breathing, inherent ability to see mana… these were just some of the many possibilities that a caster could acquire by investing in the field.
There was a price, of course, or else they would already be in widespread use. First of all, there was no such thing as a safe and easy enhancement ritual – they were all very dangerous and difficult, with the slightest mistake having the potential to kill, cripple or render insane. Secondly, enhancement rituals effectively turned the target into a magical creature… and magical creatures needed mana to live.
Every magical creature needed a certain amount of ambient mana just to stay alive and fuel their magical abilities. The more powerful they were, the higher the ambient mana levels had to be to support them. Stepping into an area too thin in ambient mana to support them wouldn't immediately kill them, but they would find themselves quickly weakening and wasting away. This was the main reason why powerful monsters from the deeper levels of the Dungeon didn't overrun everything – they would effectively starve to death outside their home areas.
A human, regardless of the manner in which they acquired their magical abilities, also had to pay the price to maintain their existence. A portion of their mana reserves was effectively lost, permanently tied down in the maintenance of the magical enhancement. Their mana reserves' maximum would be permanently lowered.
It was a heavy price to pay, especially for a mage already suffering from below average mana reserves, such as Zorian. Mages interested in magical enhancements had to think very carefully about whether a particular enhancement was worth the price they would pay for it.
That said, while the price had to be paid… the size of the price was not set in stone. Depending on the sophistication of the enhancement ritual, the quality of the materials used in the procedure and the skill of the mage conducting it, the enhancement could either cost you half of your maximum mana reserves or a mere tenth of it.
Blood magic, by virtue of interacting with a person's very life force, could allow one to integrate a magical ability extremely well into the target. So well, in fact, that the ability could become inheritable – a true bloodline. In fact, quite a few bloodlines began in this very manner.
Employing blood magic to integrate an enhancement ritual made an already dangerous undertaking even more risky… but the price for an enhancement so well integrated into the target was greatly reduced.
There was still a price. Even with blood magic use, Zorian would still have to give up some of his precious mana reserves to acquire permanent magical enhancements. However, the price was reduced enough that Zorian was no longer willing to ignore the possibility outright.
"It's not a priority, of course," Zorian finished. "But I definitely intend to experiment with the field in the future."
Zach clacked his tongue in dissatisfaction.
"I have to say I'm not too fond of the idea," he said. "Every time I think of 'blood magic', the image of those shifter children from the previous restart pops into my mind."
Zorian flinched a little at the reminder.
"But I trust you not to descend to that level of depravity," Zach hurriedly added. "Just… stay away from the whole'sacrifice people to summon demons' part of the field, yeah?"
"Yeah," Zorian nodded, a little more subdued.
He had originally wanted to point out that Zach could benefit from enhancement rituals even more than Zorian would, but decided this wasn't the best time to raise that issue.
- break -
Zorian leafed through one of the books on more exotic shaping exercises, searching for something that seemed challenging, but not frustratingly so. Most of the exercises in it were pretty crazy stuff, though, even by his standards. He tried to remember where they had found the book while he leafed through its pages.
After a few seconds, he remembered. It was one of the books they had taken from the aranean treasury. They had also tried to break into that secret room on the ceiling where the Cyorian web presumably kept their real treasures, but failed. Despite Zorian's growing skill at disarming magical security systems, all they had succeeded in doing was triggering the safeguards and ruining everything.
No matter. He would figure out how to get inside eventually. The setup was quite good, but it was no longer as arcane to him as it once was. He was pretty sure he could figure out how to dismantle the security spells in another five or six attempts.
"Why do you keep bothering with shaping exercises?" Zach asked him, not bothering to actually look at him. He was too busy juggling a dizzying number of crystalized mana chunks to devote too much attention to Zorian.
Showoff.
"Because I still haven't reached the limit of my shaping ability," Zorian said, sounding as if that was the most obvious thing in the world.
"Zorian, you're already starting to get better than me in terms of shaping skills," Zach sighed. "And my shaping skills are good enough to cast just about every type of magic out there. Including really demanding ones like medical magic. What the hell do you even intend to do with crazy shaping skills like that?"
"You can never have too much shaping skills," Zorian told him.
"You spent too much time around Xvim," Zach said. "The guy's brainwashed you."
"Every improvement of my shaping skills, no matter how minor, means I spend less mana on my spells," Zorian said. "For a low-mana guy like me, every drop of mana is precious. We can't all be inexhaustible mana monsters like you, Zach."
"Hell yeah! I'm the only one awesome like that!" Zach said, puffing his chest in an exaggerated fashion. Unfortunately for him, the action caused him to lose control over the chunks of crystalized mana he was juggling. They clattered to the floor, some of them breaking up into smaller pieces upon hitting the ground. "Oops?"
Zorian snorted in amusement.
"Did you ever find any clues about your mana reserves?" Zorian asked curiously. "There has to be a reason why you deviate so much from everyone else when it comes to your mana reserves."
"Sadly, no," Zach said, stepping over the fallen crystals in order to sit down next to Zorian. "No one I consulted about it has any idea how that is possible. Most people think it's some kind of undocumented bloodline of the Noveda. Although if so, it's one that shows up rarely and irregularly, otherwise the enemies of our House would have noticed it and noted it in the past."
"I suppose there is no chance of you just being very, very lucky?" Zorian asked.
"It's rather unlikely," Zach said. "I'm sure you've noticed by now that my shaping skills aren't that much worse than yours, despite the massive disparity between us in terms of mana reserves."
"Of course," Zorian nodded. "I assumed that's just decades of practice adding up."
"Ha. Well, it's not just that," Zach said. "The fact I was able to keep up with the academy curriculum at all, even before the time loop, pretty much shuts down the theory I'm just lucky. I'm magnitude 50 in terms of mana reserves, but I can shape my mana as if I was magnitude 25 at most. That's too… convenient to be natural."
"Hmm, yeah," Zorian said thoughtfully. "Still, magnitude 25 isn't small at all. I'm surprised you managed to get your shaping skills as high as you did with that as your starting point."
"I did have a lot of time to get it right," Zach pointed out. "Considering you managed to catch up to me in a measly five years or so, I don't think it's really that impressive. Especially since my shaping skills are as high as they will ever be while yours just keep growing better and better."
"I'm sure Xvim would be able to find you something to work on if you asked him for help with your shaping," Zorian teased.
Zach scowled at him, but then suddenly gained a thoughtful look on his face. He kept staring at Zorian for a few seconds, making him increasingly uncomfortable.
"What?" Zorian asked impatiently.
"You know, if you're really so determined about pushing your shaping skills to the best they could be, you should invest some time in learning medical magic. Or at least, the diagnostic half of it. Many of those diagnostic spells analyze the state of your magic, not just your body. You can use them to map the flow of energies inside of you and get a better picture of your own limits."
That did make sense, sort of. Zorian already had a decent feel for his own mana, thanks to Xvim's training, but this still sounded like an improvement in that regard.
"Maybe some other time," Zorian said, shaking his head. "It sounds interesting, especially if I intend to seriously mess around with blood magic, but it does not fit into my current plan."
"We have a plan?" Zach asked with mock surprise.
"Okay, so it's a very loose plan," Zorian admitted. "But it does exist. What, do you want us to make a step-by-step schedule or something?"
They decided to take a few hours to just relax and unwind. They played cards and board games, exchanged stories and even had a drawing competition. Sadly, they couldn't agree if it was Zach's portrait of Zorian or Zorian's portrait of Zach that was better, so the contest was reluctantly pronounced a draw.
They still had ten days to go. Zorian didn't regret coming here in the slightest, but damn would he be glad to be out of this place.
- break -
"Finally!" Zach said, spinning around with his arms stretched out to take in the forest around them. "Finally, after years of imprisonment-"
"Only 30 days, actually," Zorian corrected.
"It felt like years," Zach continued stubbornly. "Damn, I'd never imagined seeing a bunch of trees would make me so happy. Look, Zorian – trees! Trees!"
Zorian smiled, saying nothing. He too was glad to be out, but he wouldn't dignify Zach's overdramatic antics with a verbal response. As if seeking to spite him, Zach walked up to one of the trees and hugged it.
Zorian stopped walking and stared at the spectacle in amusement, wondering how long Zach would keep this up. Especially since Zorian could see a large amount of ants travelling up and down the tree in question, and they didn't seem happy at Zach for disturbing them…
Suddenly, Zach flinched away from the tree with a muttered curse and started shaking the furiously attacking ants off of him. Zorian couldn't help it – he laughed loudly at Zach's misfortune, and then dodged backwards when Zach tried to shake off the ants in Zorian's direction.
"Jerk," Zach sniffed disdainfully.
"Come on," Zorian said, motioning Zach to follow him. "We're not far from Alanic's place. Once we give him the report we prepared for him in the Black Room, we can go and do a 'glad we're out' celebration or something."
During their month in the Black Room, Zach and Zorian had taken the time to compile all the important information they had gleaned from the looted cultist texts. Zorian intended to follow up on that information himself, of course, but it wouldn't hurt to give that information to Alanic as well. Maybe coming at the problem from two different directions would result in something.
"That does sound nice," Zach said, trailing after him. "But I'm the one picking the place. No offense, Zorian, but you have no idea how to have fun."
"I have a feeling I'm going to regret this, but fine," said Zorian.
"It's not true fun unless you regret it immediately afterwards," Zach said sagely.
Alanic was surprised to see them on his doorstep, but his surprise quickly turned pleasant when he realized what they'd brought to him.
"Thank you for this," he said. "I must say, I was a bit disturbed at how lightly you were taking this invasion, time loop or no time loop. It's comforting to realize you really are putting some work into dealing with it."
"It's hard to stay outraged at something for years and years, especially when things get reset once a month," Zach said. "But we aren't ignoring it."
"Just remember to compile a similar report with your findings by the end of the restart," Zorian added.
"Of course," Alanic said. "What do you intend to do now?"
"For the rest of the day? Get drunk," said Zach. Ugh, was that what he was planning? "Afterwards, well… I guess me and Zorian will continue our search for the simulacrum spell. I'm sure I encountered it somewhere in the past, but I just can't seem to find it. Why is a spell like that so rare anyway?"
Zach probably didn't actually expect Alanic to answer that, but the warrior priest gave him an answer all the same.
"It's because the simulacrum is one of the major stepping stones towards becoming a lich," Alanic said. "If you can cast that, you're halfway there already. Not to mention the spell itself being a complete nightmare for criminal investigators. So anyone who is known to have it is watched more intently by the Mage Guild, unless they are very closely aligned with them."
"So… don't tell anyone we can cast simulacrum, is what you're saying?" Zach asked, largely rhetorically. Alanic gave him a blank stare. "Yeah, I figured. But wait, doesn't that mean I should be looking for the spell primarily among groups of necromancers and liches?"
"Yes?" Alanic said, then frowned. "Hold on. You know the locations of necromancer groups and lich sanctums? Just… how many of these locations are we talking about?"
Fifteen minutes later, it had been determined that Alanic would join them on their simulacrum search. And also that Zach would sit down and write down a list of all necromancers, liches, demon worshippers, slaver compounds and other criminal sites he knew of… or at least the ones that he still remembered the exact location of, since he had forgotten quite a few of them by now. Unlike Zorian, he had never acquired some method of guaranteed perfect memory, and had never been all that good at remembering details anyway.
Zorian had a feeling that Alanic's notes at the end of this restart would no longer be as small and sparse as they'd been at the end of the previous one.
- break -
"This is bullshit," Zach complained, his voice slurring slightly. He downed another glass of hard liquor and narrowed his eyes at Zorian. "There is no way you're so good at holding your liquor. You're cheating somehow. You cheater."
Well, he was certainly right about that. As a point of fact, Zorian was using the trick taught to him by Haslush, so long ago, and stealthily transmuting his alcohol into sugar. But why would he ever admit that?
He just downed his glass of sugar water and gave Zach a bright, self-satisfied grin.
- break -
In the Ishekatara Sea – the southern sea enclosed by the two 'prongs' of the Altazian continent – there was a pirate ship. Well, there were quite a few of them actually, but this one was important because its crew was mostly composed out of skeletons. The only living crew were a trio of brothers, each of whom was a necromancer of some skill.
The Skeleton Pirates, as they were commonly called by their victims, had been living a pretty good life until now. The trade companies in charge of most merchant ships were notoriously cheap, staffing their cargo ships with the smallest crew they could get away with. Meanwhile, skeletons required no food or pay, and could be packed like sardines into the pirate ship's cargo hold without ever complaining about inhuman conditions or getting sick. As such, when a metaphorical skeleton crew of a merchant ship met the literal skeleton crew of the pirate ship, the result was rarely in doubt. The living sailors were severely outnumbered, and probably reliant on guns for defense, which didn't work very well against skeletons.
The only issue was closing in on their victims before they could get away, but the pirate ship the three brothers used was special. Most of their victims wouldn't even know they were coming until it was too late, and quite a few surrendered their cargo immediately when they realized what they were up against. After that, the skeleton pirates looted everything, throwing some of the skeletons overboard to make space for their new loot – the skeletons were easily replaceable, after all – and went off to sell their ill-gotten gains.
Sadly for them, their comfortable existence had come to an end. The ship's sails were burning, there were several gaping holes blown in the hull, and the sounds of magical combat emanated from its interior. This time, it was the skeleton pirates who were getting boarded.
Inside the ship in question, Zorian was fighting a horde of skeletons.
"This is so stupid," he complained, creating a shining beam of severing force to cut the approaching horde at the knees. He learned the hard way that destroying their heads did very little and that he needed to cut off their limbs if he wanted to take them out of the fight. "Why am I the one fighting mindless skeletons instead of going after living mages vulnerable to mind magic? Zach and Alanic better have a good explanation for-"
The ship shook from another explosion, but Zorian telekinetically glued his legs to the floor beneath him and thus managed to stay on his feet. The skeletons were not so lucky, and most ended up falling to the ground, providing an excellent opportunity to Zorian for finishing some of them off and maneuvering himself into a better position.
He had to hand it to the three pirate brothers running this ship – they'd put some pretty good wards on the vessel, or else it would have long since turned into a pile of sawdust from the intensity of the fight currently taking place. Though now that he thought of it, the pirates were probably powering such strong wards with the souls of their fallen enemies, so maybe it wasn't as impressive as it first looked.
Or maybe the skeletons doubled as mana generators for the wards in addition to being the disposable crew of the ship? There was a certain amount of beauty in making skeletons pull double duty like that. Hmm…
Before the skeleton horde could fully recover and swarm him again, Zorian conjured an animated mass of ectoplasmic threads beside him and started herding all of the skeletons into it. Soon, the entire group was restrained and compacted together into a giant skeletal ball. Zorian then dragged said ball to the nearest hole in the hull and threw it out of the ship.
He then repeated the move with the other skeleton group in the ship. Now, if he was right about his theory the whole warding setup should-
Oh, there we go – the wards were already failing. Wow, they didn't put even the slightest amount of mana storage somewhere as a precaution against a ploy like this? Or at least set things up so they would gradually fade away instead of suddenly crashing down like this? He retracted his earlier praise, this was very amateurish ward making.
He set off towards the heart of the ship, where Zach and Alanic were fighting the actual masters of the skeleton pirates, but when he finally got there the fighting was already over.
"For a group you claimed were such easy targets, it sure took you a long time to finally bring them down," Zorian commented while walking over to them.
"I assume you're behind the ship's wards failing?" Alanic asked, tapping a nearby chest with his battle staff in order to trigger an electrical trap placed on it. Zorian nodded. "Thank you for that. They were very annoying. It has been a while since I fought in an area that suppresses fire magic so firmly."
"I'm sorry, it's been a long time since I fought them and I totally forgot they had these fancy wards covering their ship," said Zach, knocking on his head with a nervous laugh. "After a while, I just sank their entire ship instead of trying to fight the crew, so my perspective on how easy they were to fight was a little skewed."
Hearing that, Zorian didn't have much hope that the ship's treasure stash held the simulacrum spell. Still, in the interest of being thorough, he joined Zach and Alanic in disarming all the traps defending the treasure stash and searching through the contents. Even if simulacrum wasn't here, there could be something else of note inside. But eventually…
"Found it!" Zach shouted, triumphantly holding a pitch black scroll case above his head.
"What, the pirates actually had the simulacrum spell in their stash?" Zorian asked, surprised.
"Yup, this is it. I remember it very well because the scroll case kept destroying the contents whenever I tried to open it, and it was so infuriating. Then I finally managed to get to the scroll inside and it turned out it was just a simulacrum spell. Man, I was so angry about that…"
Zorian stared at the black scroll case for a moment before motioning for Zach to open it. To his surprise, Zach didn't bother unraveling the defensive trap on the scroll case or using a proper unlocking method – instead he sent some kind of magical pulse into the scroll case, causing it to fall apart into hundreds of jagged little pieces, as if it was suddenly sliced apart by hundreds of invisible blades.
Well… he supposed that was one way to defeat the trap…
"May I?" Alanic asked, extending his hand towards the piece of rolled-up leather that had been in the destroyed scroll case. Zach shared a look with Zorian, who shrugged noncommittally. The scroll was promptly handed to Alanic, who unfurled it and scanned the contents.
"It's legitimate," Alanic eventually announced. "Some of the simulacrum versions are incomplete or even malicious versions meant as traps for the unwary, but this seems like the real deal to me."
Huh. Zorian had to admit he hadn't even considered that possibility. He knew that some of the spells out there were fake or traps, but it was rarely a problem, especially if one was careful about their spell sources. He supposed that for illegal or highly restricted spells like this, the percentage of fake spells was much higher than average. Especially if they came on a mysterious scroll like this instead of a published book or something.
Alanic handed the leather scroll to Zorian, who slowly read through it.
Simulacrum, as Zorian already knew, created an ectoplasmic copy of the caster. The copy was fully autonomous, could think and act on its own judgement, and even cast its own spells. However, it had no soul and no mana reserves of its own. Instead, both of these were shared with the caster who made it. That meant that aside from the initial cost of creation for the simulacrum, as well as the running cost of maintaining its existence, the caster also had to pay for every single spell the simulacrum decided to cast.
He explained as much to Zach, who had read the description of the spell once but had since forgotten most of the details about it.
"It's still useful," Zorian noted. "Having another copy of me to help me with purely mental tasks would be infinitely useful. But it's not quite as convenient as I thought it would be."
"Yeah, it's kind of disappointing," Zach said. "It's good as bait and an additional worker to boss around, but I don't think you'll be using it too much in battle."
"I wouldn't be too sure about that," Zorian said. "Sure, I won't be spamming double fireballs with my simulacrum or anything, but my telepathic abilities are quite cheap in terms of mana costs. And they are more useful as a devastating opener than as a long-term tool in battle, so it would be pretty useful if I could make twice as many telepathic attacks whenever I make my move. Double the Zorian, double the mind magic."
"As if your mind magic wasn't terrifying enough as it is," Zach grumbled good-naturedly.
"There are two things you should keep in mind," Alanic said suddenly. "One is that no simulacrum is an entirely flawless copy of yourself. Especially in the beginning, the copies are bound to be greatly degraded version of you, lacking the full extent of your abilities. As your proficiency with the spell grows, you will be able to get increasingly better replicas… but in the end, the simulacrum is just a reflection of you, rather than a flawless copy. This is especially obvious if you keep the spell going for long periods of time. I strongly recommend that you don't keep your simulacrum active for more than a day, or else they will start developing their own personalities and goals that may run counter to your own. People have been killed by their own simulacrums in the past. Considering your simulacrum will be a master mind mage like you yourself apparently are…"
"Yeah, I get the picture," said Zorian, wincing slightly. "Don't leave the simulacrum running for too long, or it may decide to overwrite my mind with its own or something similar."
"Yes," Alanic nodded. "The second thing you should keep in mind is that, while a simulacrum isn't identical to you in every way, it is a replica of you in most ways. For instance, some people react really badly to the knowledge that they are a copy of a person, which causes their simulacrums to break down or go berserk immediately after being created. I don't think you and Zach will have that kind of problem, considering the supposed nature of the time loop, but it's something to keep in mind if you ever decide to share the spell with someone else. Similarly, if you don't like doing something, your simulacrum won't like doing it either… so it's a bad idea to foist things you hate upon your simulacrums. This also means that if you can't bring yourself to sacrifice your life for another, chances are your simulacrum won't want to sacrifice itself for your sake either."
In other words, the simulacrum wasn't his personal slave and would only obey orders that he himself would be willing to obey. Fair enough.
After a few more warnings and clarification from Alanic, the three of them left the burning ship and returned to Eldemar. The skeleton pirates would trouble people no longer.
- break -
Zach and Zorian spent the rest of the restart attacking the Cyorian cultists and occasionally going off on further raids on locations Zach remembered from his past. Since they had already found the simulacrum spell, these excursions were technically unnecessary, but they both decided to keep on doing them anyway. Zorian because he wanted the combat experience and had interest in some of the loot that Zach had never cared about, and Zach because he found fighting fun. Alanic joined them often as well, though as the restart gradually approached its end, he became more and more busy with his investigation into the invaders. Xvim was also offered a spot in these raids, but declined to go, saying he was 'too old for that now'.
Four days after Zach and Zorian had left the time research facility beneath Cyoria, the place went into an uproar. It took them four days, but eventually they did realize that something was wrong with the way Zach and Zorian had used the Black Room. Of course, by this time Zach and Zorian were long gone and there was nothing they could do about it, but still. Zorian investigated the issue to see what they had done wrong, and was amused to find that what had really outed them in the end was the fact that they had never submitted a follow-up report to the proper government department. Apparently each group that used the Black Room had to submit a report, in triplicate, explaining in detail how they had used the Black Room and what their gains were. Since Zach and Zorian had never bothered to do so, the administrative assistant in charge of preserving the reports complained to the research staff, eventually triggering the investigation. If they had just sent the stupid piece of paper to the government office, chances were that no one would have said a thing. Zorian doubted anyone even read those things.
Three days before the end of the restart, Zach and Zorian finally executed a plan that had been in the works since the very beginning of the restart – they broke into the Royal Palace of Eldemar, quietly infiltrating the place at first, and then just blasting their way inside when they were discovered half-way through.
They only got about two-thirds of the way in before the palace defenses began to overwhelm them and they were forced to flee, but even this failed foray into the place told them two very important things.
First of all, the royal treasury actually did hold one piece of the Key within its depths. The dagger, if Zorian was interpreting what his marker was telling him correctly. They would have to figure out a way to break into the royal treasury if they wanted to assemble all five pieces.
Secondly, trying to break into the Eldemar Royal Palace caused an unbelievable amount of outrage. The palace guards had followed them for hours after their failed intrusion, only giving up when Zach and Zorian had descended into the deep reaches of the Dungeon to lose them. And even then, that had just given them a few hours of peace, during which Eldemar's royals had apparently been organizing a state-wide manhunt for them.
It had been three days since, and the manhunt had never ended. All the newspapers and town gossips were talking about the failed break-in at the Royal Palace, and there was apparently a huge bounty placed on their heads. The bounty was a bit of a joke, since the Crown clearly didn't know much about them – as evidenced by the lack of pictures or any clear descriptions in the bounty posters plastered everywhere. Thank the gods that both of them were experts in anti-divination spells and that they had the fancy red robes they'd stolen from the cultists.
Still, while the Eldemar forces didn't know their identities, they clearly had some method of tracking down 'those two people who tried to break into the palace', because they unerringly kept coming after them every once in a while. The two of them were constantly on the run, with the longest period of time they had to sit down and relax being about six hours. It was frustrating, especially since neither Zach nor Zorian could figure out how their pursuers kept tracking them down.
"See, I was totally right in saying we should wait for the end of the restart before trying this!" Zach said as they ran towards the small forest nearby, the red robe he was wearing distorting his voice in unnerving ways.
"So what? I never disputed that!" Zorian responded, his voice similarly distorted.
Before they could say anything else, an ear-piercing screech sounded above them, quickly followed by another. Zorian didn't even have to look at the source of the screeches to know it was those two giant crowned eagles coming after them, each with a pair of battlemages riding them. That thrice-damned group was incredibly annoying, always responding first to their every move, cutting off their retreat routes and disrupting their spells until the rest of the pursuers could catch up to them. Unfortunately, the eagles were fast and agile flyers, and the battlemages riding them incredibly good, so getting rid of them before their allies showed up was virtually impossible. By now, Zach and Zorian no longer tried to engage them – that just wasted time that could be used for running away.
"I don't think we can keep this up for long!" Zach told him as he deflected some kind of multicolored lightning bolt into the nearby bush, which immediately exploded from the force of the spell. "How long?"
Zorian glanced at the city of Cyoria looming nearby. Though it might appear to their pursuers that they were just randomly fleeing around, the two of them had actually been deliberately luring them here. The end of the restart was fast approaching, and the invasion was about to begin…
"I think it will start right-"
Before Zorian could finish the statement, numerous artillery magic flares rose into the air from the hills surrounding Cyoria. The invasion of the city had officially begun.
Zorian grumbled discontentedly. Damn reality always ruined his dramatic timing.
"Nevermind, it's starting!" he said out loud.
"Yeah, thanks a lot. I would have never known if you hadn't told me," Zach said sarcastically.
Zorian said nothing, simply stepping closer to his fellow time traveler. Immediately after, Zach finished his spell and they were both enveloped into a semi-transparent white sphere, which then shot into the air with dizzying speed.
Giant crowned eagles were apparently fast and agile enough to follow after the sphere, which surprised Zorian more than it probably should have. Still, the two of them had an entire army of surprised invaders to serve as their unwilling meat walls – the sphere unerringly homed in on the largest flock of iron beaks they could find and flew straight through it, splattering numerous birds to death and pissing the entire flock off.
Sadly for the pursuing eagles and their riders, furious iron beaks aren't very discriminating about their choice of targets. Especially when one target was clearly more vulnerable than the other and was clearly trailing after it, suggesting that they were working together.
The two of them didn't stick around after that – Zach directed the sphere into a nearby building, where it smashed into the wall and crashed inside. This largely got them outside of the iron beak line of fire, since the inside of a building didn't let them concentrate their forces much and they had a much more attractive target outside anyway. Thus, once they had killed the handful of brave birds coming after them, they just left the area by teleporting to different sections of the city.
Truthfully, Zorian expected him and Zach to spend the entire night leading their pursuers into a series of conflicts with the invaders. Not because they hoped to get something by doing that, but rather because they felt their pursuers were just that stubborn. However, it would seem they had been uncharitable to their opponents, because after the third time Zach and Zorian led the entire pursuit group into an Ibasan army group, they seemed to realize the scale of what was happening and gave up on going after them in favor of helping the beleaguered Cyorian defenders.
Encountering Quatach-Ichl during that third confrontation and losing both of their giant eagles in the process may have had something to do with that.
Currently, Zach and Zorian were sitting on the roof of the Academy's highest building and observing the fighting.
"Wow," Zach said. "You know, those mage hunters are kind of impressive when they're fighting someone else."
"Yeah," Zorian agreed.
"So what are we going to do now?" Zach asked. "Just sit down and watch the world burn for a few hours until the loop resets?"
"No," Zorian answered, shaking his head. "I have a better idea. Let's rob the academy library."
Zach looked at him funny, raising an eyebrow at him.
"I'm serious," Zorian said. "I know there is probably nothing really that important in there, but I have always wondered what kind of spells are kept behind those higher level sections that I was never allowed to go to."
"That… is a good point," Zach said. "I can't believe I never tried that myself. If nothing else, just so I can say I did it."
And thus, for the next few hours, Zach and Zorian rampaged across the Academy library. While the invaders and the city defenders fought bitter battles across Cyoria, the two of them were peacefully searching through restricted texts, unbothered by the librarians and other security, who had long since fled the building in light of the invasion.
When the restart finally ended and everything went black, Zorian's only thought was that he hadn't finished the book he was holding…
…and that they were definitely going to do this again.(This is a repost of an article originally posted at DaRain Man. Comments older than Wednesday 10 January 2007 were originally posted there. See this post for details about the move. If that link doesn’t work, try this one.)
In Part 1 of this series, I observed the tendency of feminists to throw around the term “oppression” without defining it, or explaining why only women are “oppressed,” but never men. Yet I have encountered a few feminists who do believe that men can suffer gender oppression. In this post, I will discuss a differing feminist view.
One of the best discussions of the concept of oppression I have seen is by feminist sociologist of gender Caroline New, who argues that “both women and men are oppressed, but not symmetrically.” New agrees with me that the view that men can be oppressed is rare: “sociologists of gender hardly ever discuss the possibility that men are oppressed on the same dimension as women, i.e. in respect of gender relations.”
What makes New’s essay so different from other feminist discussion of oppression, even ones that admit the existence of male suffering is that:
(a) New constructs a clear and concise definition of “oppression” and applies it evenly, instead of employing the kinds of double standards I discussed in Part 1.
(b) New acknowledges psychological suffering of men, but doesn’t reduce male suffering to just subjective experience; she recognizes material disadvantages men face, and the |
squat for 15 reps
Loaded Carry
Expected = Farmer walk with total bodyweight (half per hand)
Game-changer =Bodyweight per hand
Getup
One left and right, done with a half-filled cup of water
For Women:
Push
Game-changer = Bodyweight bench press
Pull
Game-changer = Three pullups
Hinge
Game-changer = 275-pound deadlift
Squat
Game-changer = 135 for five in the back squat
Loaded Carries
Game-changer = 85 pounds per hand
Getup
One left and right, done with a half-filled cup of water
My High School Standards, for Girls Varsity:
Big Silver Club (Girls)
One Arm Bench 12kg10 Right/10 left
Standing Press 70
Power Clean 95
Deadlift 205
Back Squat 135
Front Squat 95
Power Clean & Jerk 75
All done in one workout, by the way.
High School Standards, for Boys Varsity
Big Blue Club (Boys)
One Arm Bench 32kg5 Right/5 left
Standing Press 115
Power Clean 205
Deadlift 315
Back Squat 255
Front Squat 205
Power Clean & Jerk 165
Now, the issue is that I have known for a long time that this is fine and all, but, if I truly believe that “Regressions are the Best Corrections,” then I am missing a lot here. So, with the help of Paul Lysengos and Josh Hillis and others, I am working on this:
Men’s Standards
Squat Movement
1. Proper Form in the Goblet Squat
2. Goblet Squat: 24K x 10
3. Double KB Front Squat: 32K x 10
4. Bodyweight Back Squat
5. Bodyweight Front Squat
6. Bodyweight Back Squat x 15
7. Bodyweight Overhead Squat x 15
Press Movement
1. Push Ups x 10
2. One Arm KB Press: 24K x 5 per Side
3. Double KB Press: 32K x 5
4. Bench Press: Bodyweight
5. One Arm Overhead Press: ½ Bodyweight
6. Bench Press: Bodyweight x 15
7. Two Arm KB Press: Bodyweight
Hip Hinge Movement
1. Hip Hinge with Proper Form (From stand, floor and loaded)
2. Kettlebell Swing: 24K x 20 (Proper Form)
3. Double Kettlebell Clean: 32K x 10
4. Barbell Clean: Bodyweight
5. Barbell Deadlift: Double Bodyweight
6. Barbell Snatch: Bodyweight
7. Barbell Deadlift 2.5 x Bodyweight
Pull Movement
1. Batwings, thumbs in armpits, 16K x 10 seconds
2. Bodyweight Row on Rings/TRX x 20
3. Bodyweight Row, feet elevated, x 10
4. Chin Ups x 5
5. Pull Ups x 8-10
6. Pull Ups x 15
7. Weighted Pull Up with 48 K
Women’s Standards
Squat Movement
1. Proper Form in the Goblet Squat
2. Goblet Squat: 12K x 10
3. Double KB Front Squat: 16K x 10
4. Back Squat: 135 x 5
5. Bodyweight Back Squat
6. Bodyweight Front Squat
7. Bodyweight Overhead Squat
Press Movement
1. Push Ups x 1 (Excellent Pushup)
2. One Arm KB Press: 10K x 5 per Side
3. Double KB Press: 12K x 5
4. Double KB Press: 16K x 5
5. One Arm Overhead Press: 1/3 BdWt
6. Bench Press: Bodyweight
7. Two Arm KB Press: 2/3 Bodyweight
Hip Hinge Movement
1. Hip Hinge with Proper Form (From stand, floor and loaded)
2. Kettlebell Swing: 16K x 20 (Proper Form)
3. Double Kettlebell Clean: 16K x 10
4. Barbell Deadlift: 1.5 x Bodyweight (or 135×5)
5. Double KB Swings: 24K x 10
6. 5:00 Minute Snatch Test: 16K x 100
7. Barbell Deadlift 2 x Bodyweight (275lbs.)
Pull Movement
1. Batwings, thumbs in armpits, 8K x 10 seconds
2. Bodyweight Row on Rings/TRX x 20
3. Bodyweight Row, feet elevated, x 10
4. Chin Ups x 1
5. Chin Ups x 3
6. Pull Ups x 3
7. Weighted Pull Up with 24 K
Now, if you know me…it’s going to change a little. The idea is that 4 or so is where we would want like a high school, athlete, 6 is the “Game Changer” from the book…usually…and 7 is around where you discover that “strength is not your issue.”
None of it matters, save one thing: it’s the balance of the FOUR!!! (Sixth moves, like groundwork, and Loaded Carries are usually just a simple, do you do it or not?)
My good friend, Stoney Beckstead came to the rescue for you. On the EXCEL, go to “ME” and post the number you are at from each move. If you have a nice shape like a diamond…good! A flat tire? Yeeeesh, let’s fix it.
1-2-3 are where we want to explore for untrained and detrained people. Being a perfect square at twos might be better than being a 7-1-7-7…perhaps. Don’t lose your mind on this, this is a process.
For more on strength standards, review some of the Intervention material.First Name Required
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I authorize you to share my application/registration information for event administration, ranking, MLH administration, pre- and post-event informational e-mails, and occasional messages about hackathons in-line with the MLH Privacy Policy. I agree to the terms of both the MLH Contest Terms and Conditions and the MLH Privacy Policy.Missouri Gov. Jay Nixon has set three legislative special elections for Nov. 3, including one to fill the post that had been held by former House Speaker John Diehl, R-Town and Country.
Diehl resigned in May after a scandal erupted over the public disclosure of sexually suggestive text messages he had exchanged with a college-age intern.
He represented the 89th District in west St. Louis County, which is considered safe Republican territory. Three Republicans touted as possible successors include former state Rep. Cole McNary, son of longtime county Executive Gene McNary; David Wasinger, husband for County Councilwoman Colleen Wasinger; and lawyer Dean Plocher.
David Wasinger is a former member of the University of Missouri's Board of Curators. He created some controversy because then-Gov. Matt Blunt had named Wasinger to a Democratic seat on the board.
The nominee will be chosen by the 14 Republican committeemen and committeewomen within the district.
A similar process will be used to fill the other two vacant House seats, both in the Kansas City area. The post in the 29th District, situated in Jackson County, has been vacant since late in 2014, when Republican Noel Torpey of Independence resigned to become a lobbyist. The other seat, in Kansas City’s 36th District, became open when Democrat Kevin McManus was elected to the Kansas City Council.The season premiere of 'Saturday Night Live' kicked off with a bang, featuring musical guests Frank Ocean and John Mayer. The chemistry between the performers is palpable and a lot of fun to watch, and they brought an intensity to the otherwise lighthearted show -- but still didn't take themselves too seriously.
In 'Thinking About You,' the stage was set to match the soft, understated tone of the track. Ocean sat on a stool with his eyes closed for the duration of the song, and even the usually spotlight-courting Mayer remained in shadows. It's unclear whether Ocean performed like this out of nervousness (because it is live TV, which is scary to do -- ask Lana Del Rey!) or just out of pure feeling.
Ocean was clearly more comfortable performing 'Pyramids.' He stood up, he danced a little bit and he even smiled! Mayer clearly is a fan of the song as well, based on his visible enjoyment and grooving to the track behind his guitar. You can even catch the maybe-boyfriend of Katy Perry grinning.
'Pyramids' is also where Mayer got to personally shine. In an extended guitar solo, Mayer looks intense and focused to close out the performance... as Ocean leaves his mic to go play arcade games behind him onstage. Hey, all work and no play makes Frank a dull boy!Gridcoin has risen from ~570sats to 1000sats in <24hrs!
I have highlighted in red the previous points at which Gridcoin encountered surges in marketcap over $4mil:
Interesting notes:
The trading volume required to surge over 100% in September 2016 was approx $600k where as it has only taken $60k trading volume to surge the market cap approx 50% in March 2017.
Future?
We face scaling the Gridcoin network from rewarding 2k users to between 250k and 4million users (active/total size of the entire BOINC Commuity) when we successfully remove the mandatory team Gridcoin requirement (200k GRC bounty!). As a proof of stake cryptocurrency, users are required to buy GRC if they wish to solo-stake; If 50k users (small chunk of BOINC community) were to buy 1000 GRC each (enough to stake once per month..ish) there currently isn't enough GRC on markets to supply such a demand.
If a magnitude multiplier based on quantity of coins burnt is implemented in the future, the coins in supply will decrease. Reddit discussion CCT Discussion
If anyone has any questions about Gridcoin, ask away.
Interested in creating your own BOINC project? Post it to the BOINC project brainstorming thread!
Relevant Gridcoin links:
Official website
Forums
Twitter
Telegram
IRC
Github
Coinmarketcap, CoinGecko, CoinCap
Gridcoinstats.eu, Gridresearchcorp, Gridcoin.Asia
Soundcloud, YouTube & MixCloudhttp://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Website/Tumblr
xkcd 1025 "For me, '...dot Tumblr dot com' has been gradually replacing... would be a good name for a band".
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Tumblr is a "short-form" multimedia blogging platform. A favored stomping ground of college-age (and younger) amateur photographers, graphic artists, fandom bloggers, social justice bloggers, and people who just felt like making one. It's far less text-rich than other blogging sites. Users tend to collate pretty images and memes from around the internet on their tumblogs, with most memes also being popular on 4chan and Reddit at the same time. They can also follow one another and reblog or like one another's posts, a system that encourages popularity contests. Themed tumblogs abound, from Fuck Yeah, Dioramas! to The Right Writing to Lesbians Who Look Like Justin Bieber. We also have a tumblr.
Differing from other mainstream social media sites, rather than personal profiles for networking, its populace is made up largely of a variety of fandoms and artists, while having been noteworthy for every variety of hatedom imaginable and acquiring a reputation among Hipster bloggers in its earlier years. It's also known for its tacit encouragement of designers. Tumblr's interface makes it easy to set up a portfolio, and its support staff has been praised for running its Theme Garden, which features often minimalist layouts designed by users.
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Their fandom base is very widespread, ranging from Harry Potter to Welcome to Night Vale. Any movie or show with a large slash following have fairly large fanbases. Like most places on the internet, Shipping is also a big deal.
On May 20, 2013, Tumblr was purchased by Yahoo! for $1 billion.
In 2017, Verizon bought out Yahoo and placed ownership of Tumblr under their "The Oath" branding. On December 3rd 2018, after the Tumblr app was removed from the iOS store for allegedly allowing users to access child pornography, The Oath announced that all adult content was to be banned. The ban was enacted on December 17th 2018.
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65,535 notesA Washington Post report implying imminent government reform begins:
The House Ethics Committee said Monday it is reviewing charges lodged against two high-profile Democratic lawmakers and a senior Democratic aide. The lawmakers facing an ethics review are Rep. John Conyers Jr. (Mich), the ranking Democrat on the Judiciary Committee and the longest-serving sitting House member, and Rep. Ben Ray Luján (N.M.), chairman of the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee. The staffer is Michael E. Collins, chief of staff to Rep. John Lewis (D-Ga.).
Problem is the Monday they're referring to is Monday, June 26, 2017 -- the date of the article. Anyone looking for results from the committee would have had a long, probably interminable, wait.
John Conyers, as most know, did finally resign from his position as ranking member of the House Judiciary Committee on Nov 26, 2017, a full five months later. But this partial resignation was not through any action whatsoever of the so-called Ethics Committee that was supposedly investigating him. It came from very believable charges of sexual predation and the consequent use of taxpayer funds to buy off his accuser that appeared in The Detroit News.
What former Conyers employee Melanie Sloan said is undeniable:
"The House Ethics Committee has never been known for taking a tough stance for unethical conduct by any member of Congress," Sloan said on Fox News's "Outnumbered Overtime." "It’s often just a black hole where allegations go to die, we never hear about them again," she continued.
I'd replace the "often" with a "usually" or an "almost always." The Ethics Committees -- in the House and the Senate -- seem to function more as fronts for the preservation of the political class, irrespective of party. Once you're in, you're protected. Omertà rules.
Conyers, whose corruption on various counts was rumored and indeed written about for years, was as shielded by the committee and Congress as Matt Lauer, Charlie Rose and Bill O'Reilly were by their networks. But we don't pay taxes to those networks, not directly anyway, and we don't have to watch them. And those men have at least finally lost their jobs.
Many accused politicians -- Conyers, Franken -- are still in place, their activities "to be investigated" by this same Ethics Committee that has, in essence, investigated no one. Yes, of course, everyone deserves due process, but what we are talking about here is a protection racket that has been going on for years. And the Ethics Committees are not alone in this reprehensible endeavor. The so-called Office of Compliance (how Orwellian) is their co-enabler by providing what sounds suspiciously like hush money.
From 1997 to 2017, the Office of Compliance awarded 268 settlements totaling $17.2 million stemming from sexual harassment complaints and other workplace violations, including provisions of the Fair Labor Standards Act, the Family and Medical Leave Act, and the Americans with Disabilities Act.Just one week into office, the Trump administration cost taxpayers more than $1 million in a botched attempt to curtail advertising efforts for Obamacare, a government watchdog has found.
The attempt came just five days into the new administration, when the so-called beachhead team at the Department of Health and Human Services (the individuals who effectively took over the agency following the presidential transition) began imparting instructions to the remaining career staff.
According to a little-noticed report from the Office of Inspector General at HHS (PDF), on the morning of Jan. 26, the beachhead team instructed staff at the Office of the Assistant Secretary for Public Affairs at HHS to cancel all marketplace enrollment outreach for the remainder of Obamacare’s fourth open enrollment period.
HHS staff had expressed concern over such cancellations, the report noted. Before Trump had formally took office, officials had briefed his team that ending outreach would “result in roughly $5 million in unrecoverable costs and $4 million in costs recoverable without penalty.” They also noted that “outreach close to the deadline would be critical to enrolling young and healthy consumers.”
But when the order went out to cancel the contracts, both career staff and a member of the beachhead team “understood these initial instructions to apply to all Marketplace outreach being conducted,” the IG report noted. That evening, a contracting officer “emailed letters of partial termination to Weber Shandwick and Elevation that instructed the contractors to immediately cancel all outreach related to the fourth open enrollment period.” (Emphasis ours)
By then, the report noted, members of the beachhead team had already begun changing their mind. According to records obtained by the IG office, career staff reiterated their concerns about non recoupable costs and the damage that could be done to the Obamacare marketplace if all outreach was ended. The beachhead team put together a revised set of instructions “to cancel only certain outreach activities and indicated that the goal was to save money.”
But it came too late. It would take until the next morning for the updated set of instructions to be sent to Weber Shandwick and Elevation about which Obamacare outreach HHS wanted to nix and which one it wanted reinstated. By then, the contractors—who were tasked with broadcast and digital advertising as well as supporting the government’s own outreach efforts—had already acted upon the earlier instructions.
Obama administration officials often complained that they had little interaction with the teams that were to succeed them, making it hard for there to be a smooth continuation of governance. The Trump administration often publicly dismissed these concerns. And when the news came down that they were pulling Obamacare outreach advertising, they pitched it as a long-thought-out cost saving measure.
“The federal government has spent more than $60 million promoting the open enrollment period,” a spokesman told Politico. “HHS has pulled back roughly $5 million of the final placement in an effort to look for efficiencies, where they exist.”
In reality, the administration—whether through miscommunication or an unintended misstep—had burned money that they couldn’t recoup.
“Weber Shandwick estimated that the dollar value of outreach that it had already canceled, before receiving the updated instructions, was approximately $1.1 million in costs that could not be recovered for HHS,” according to the IG’s findings. The outreach that Elevation had canceled was all recoverable.
A request for comment made to the Trump administration and HHS was not immediately returned.The reason the Federal Bureau of Investigation (“FBI”) doesn’t care about governmental corruption (judicial, executive, legislative) is because they are also in fact, completely and totally corrupt.
It appears that their main job is to protect the wealthy elite Deep State Oligarchs/Plutocrats, while nailing to the wall free thinkers, political dissidents, patriots, soft targets, opponents of the oligarch elite, and other real or imagined targets.
The FBI has been caught engineering false terrorism arrests (http://www.veteranstoday.com/2013/02/19/fbi-terrorism-and-the-false-flag-war/), unlawfully surveilling and harassing innocent Americans (https://www.aclu.org/other/more-about-fbi-spying), developing and using “informants” who are actually arch-criminals themselves (http://www.usatoday.com/story/news/nation/2013/08/04/fbi-informant-crimes-report/2613305/), and otherwise creating problems that don’t exist in order to justify their annual federal budget.
Before 1975 when the Frank Church Senate Hearings outlawed this corruption, they did this under the aegis of the COINTELPRO program, while after 1994 they have been doing this under the Bill Clinton/Joe Biden Community Oriented Policing (“COPS”) program.
See http://www.veteransnewsnow.com/2016/08/21/the-surreptitious-reincarnation-of-cointelpro-with-the-cops-gang-stalking-program/
This should come as no surprise, since the FBI was founded by legendary cross dresser and alleged pedophile J Edgar Hoover (http://abcnews.go.com/Health/edgar-hoover-sex-men-homosexual/story?id=14948447), who was a high-level Freemason and Shriner (http://srjarchives.tripod.com/1997-05/deloach.htm), whose links can be connected to the grand pedophiles haunting London’s national security apparatus GCHQ and other freaky Masonic lodges scattered throughout the world (http://www.express.co.uk/news/uk/579523/Paedophile-Mason-lodge-GCHQ).
This is a secret society club, and you ain’t in it.
Legendary FBI Whistleblower Ted Gunderson, who literally ran the FBI in several different jurisdictions throughout the United States, complained bitterly about how he was stifled and his investigations routinely “shit-canned” whenever he got close to the very real and underground Satanic Pedophile Networks and other organized crime creeps that were being protected and covered up by the wealthy Oligarch/Plutocrats powers that be (http://www.veteranstoday.com/2015/04/23/the-strange-case-of-ted-gunderson/), and many suspect that he was murdered surreptitiously for daring to go on the lecture circuit to announce his findings (https://whitewraithe.wordpress.com/2012/01/28/ted-l-gunderson-ex-fbi-whistleblower-poisoned/).
Long-time NYPD Detective Jim Rothstein, assigned for more than 40 years to a special investigative unit investigating amongst other things, child prostitution/trafficking/pedophile networks recently only last month did an interview wherein he echoed the same sentiments, that whenever he got too close to the source or origin of these satanic child molesters, that he was routinely told to “back off” or “stand down,” or face career destruction or even worse (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5cnT5amf6Ys).
This is apparently how the elite keep each other from talking, from divulging their secrets, or keep each other from testifying against one another.
When are we the American people going to demand that our lousy dishonest Congress and Senate drag these criminals in front of them to conduct in-depth investigations on the FBI, members of the corrupt judiciary, and others “on the take” within the American government?
After all, the American people are the ultimate arbiters of justice – we should be faxing/emailing/texting/calling our Representatives incessantly demanding that they take investigative action immediately.
There are no doubt scores and countless numbers of patriotic, courageous, and heroic FBI Special Agents roaming the halls of all jurisdictions within this entity throughout the United States, but it appears that these “beat cops” are literally kept out of the loop and away from the levers of power by their higher ups, director, and special agents in charge within all of the various field offices, because these “leaders” are also part and parcel of this same criminally corrupt oligarchy/plutocrat power structure, going to the same parties, hanging out at the same clubs, making financial deals with one another, and otherwise covering up for the crimes and misdemeanors of their cronies in exchange for gifts, benefits, sweetheart deals, money, sex, drugs, and other types of bribes and coercions.
Since FBI Whistleblowers have until recently had the worst protections for a government agency (https://www.rt.com/usa/369682-house-bill-protect-fbi-whistleblowers/), secrecy and retaliation are cultural problems within the FBI and many patriotic agents probably wonder what they were thinking by signing up for such a disgustingly corrupt and incompetent agency in the first place.President Obama speaks to law enforcement executives at a briefing at the White House in Washington July 22. (Photo11: YURI GRIPAS, AFP/Getty Images)
A presidential directive signed by President Obama Tuesday will put the FBI in charge of responding to all cyber threats and give the federal government a more active role in investigating, preventing and mitigating attempts to hack into U.S.-based computer networks.
Obama's homeland security adviser, Lisa Monaco, said the change was necessary because it's not always clear whether those responsible for a hacking incident are other countries, terrorists or criminals.
"This directive establishes a clear framework to coordinate the government’s response to such incidents," Monaco told a cybersecurity conference at Fordham University in New York Tuesday. "It spells out which federal agencies are responsible. And it will help answer a question heard too often from corporations and citizens alike — 'In the wake of an attack, who do I call for help?'"
While in the works for months, the directive comes just days after the transparency organization Wikileaks revealed 20,000 e-mails stolen from the Democratic National Committee. Security experts suspect Russia was behind that attack, which roiled the Democratic National Convention by showing that the national party actively conspired to hurt Vermont Sen. Bernie Sanders' presidential campaign. That, in turn, led to the resignation of DNC chairwoman Debbie Wasserman Schultz on the eve of the convention to nominate former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton for president.
Two other agencies will also have significant roles in helping to prevent and mitigate the effect of cyber intrusions: The Department of Homeland Security and the Cyber Threat Intelligence Integration Center, a multi-agency coordinating body in the intelligence community.
"We’re harnessing all elements of national power, just as we do in dealing with other threats, like terrorism," Monaco said. "No tool is off the table."
The order will also attempt to define for the first time what constitutes a "significant cyber incident" triggering a federal response. It's an incident "likely to result in demonstrable harm to the national security interests, foreign relations, or economy of the United States or to the public confidence, civil liberties, or public health and safety of the American people."
Obama issued the guidance through a presidential policy directive, a form of executive order used in national security matters and usually kept secret. In fact, the issuance of the directive, numbered PPD-41, implicitly acknowledged the existence of 10 secret orders issued by Obama in the past year. The last known directive was PPD-31, which made changes in hostage policy in June 2015. Twenty-nine of Obama's 41 presidential policy directives remain classified.
Read or Share this story: http://usat.ly/2a4ms5xSenior writer for the Weekly Standard and regular panelist on Fox News’ Special Report Stephen Hayes just found out he’s on the Department of Homeland Security’s terrorist watch list. The pundit tweeted his discovery Tuesday afternoon:
Just informed I'm on the @DHSgov terrorist watch list. Explains why I have been subject to extra screening each of my recent trips. — Stephen Hayes (@stephenfhayes) September 23, 2014
He went to explain that when he tried to address the situation with DHS, there were some problems:
Naturally, when I went to file a "redress" form on the @DHSgov website, as instructed, the form could not be processed. #limbo — Stephen Hayes (@stephenfhayes) September 23, 2014
Hayes has not yet been able to find out why he on the watch list, but suspects it’s because of a one-way flight he took to Turkey earlier this year:
I suspect I made the list b/c of concerns about #Syria. I took a one-way flight to Turkey in late July (return flight was Athens). @DHSgov — Stephen Hayes (@stephenfhayes) September 23, 2014
In July, the Associated Press reported that 1.5 million names have been added to the terrorist watch list over the last five years.
[Photo via screengrab]
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>> Follow Matt Wilstein (@TheMattWilstein) on Twitter
Have a tip we should know? tips@mediaite.comPresident Barack Obama addresses attendees at the 106th NAACP national convention on July 14, 2015 in Philadephia, Pennsylvania. Photo by Mark Makela/Getty Images
President Obama just gave a major speech calling for criminal justice reform. The speech presented an expansive yet detailed argument not only for reducing the number of people serving time in prison, but for changing the way prison time is spent so that individuals return to society better-equipped to succeed.
The speech, delivered in Philadelphia at the annual conference of the NAACP, comes one day after the president commuted the sentences of 46 nonviolent drug offenders serving time in federal prison, and one day before a scheduled visit to a federal prison in Oklahoma.
The speech was wide-ranging—Obama said he wanted to talk about proposals “in the community, in the courtroom, and in the cellblock”—but was built upon a basic thesis, that the American criminal justice system “is not as fair as it should be,” and that “while the people in our prisons have made some mistakes, and sometimes big mistakes, they are also Americans.”
“Mass incarceration makes our country worse off,” Obama said, “and we need to do something about it.”
Obama emphasized the disproportionate effect that the past 30 years of criminal justice have had on black and Hispanic Americans, noting that they make up 30 percent of the general population but roughly 60 percent of the incarcerated population. He also called for reinvestment in underprivileged communities, making the argument that unless money is spent on creating opportunities for people who might otherwise resort to crime, justice reform will only go so far.
“We can’t ask our police, or our prosecutors, or our prison guards, or our judges to bear the entire burden of containing and controlling problems that the rest of us are not facing up to and aren’t willing to do something about,” he said, adding, “Today I’ve been talking about the criminal justice system, but we have to recognize that it’s not something that we can view in isolation. Any system that allows us to turn a blind eye to hopelessness and despair—that’s not a justice system. It’s an injustice system. But that’s an extension and a reflection of some broader decisions that we’re making as a society. And that has to change.”
The speech broke at least two pieces of news. First, the president expressed full-throated support for re-enfranchising convicted felons who have served their time. “If folks have served their time, and they’ve re-entered society, they should be able to vote,” he said, to loud applause. Such a change would affect approximately 4 million people around the country who currently cannot vote because of their criminal records, even though they are no longer incarcerated.
Second, Obama called for prisons around the country to take a hard look at the use of solitary confinement and revealed that he had asked Attorney General Loretta Lynch to “start a review of the overuse of solitary confinement across American prisons.” (On the official POTUS Twitter, Obama was quoted in a way that made clear the attorney general would only be looking at federal prisons.)
“The social science shows that an environment like that is often more likely to make inmates more alienated, more hostile, more violent,” Obama said. “Do we really think it makes sense to lock so many people alone in tiny cells for 23 hours a day for months, sometimes for years, at a time? That is not going to make us safer. That’s not going to make us stronger. And if those individuals are ultimately released, how are they ever going to adapt? It’s not smart. Our prisons should be a place where we can train people for skills that can help them find a job, not train them to become more hardened criminals.”
Toward the end of the speech, the president sounded a personal note, echoing a comment he made after the death of Trayvon Martin. You can watch that clip here:
“There are times when people say, ‘Oh, the President—he’s too optimistic.’ Or, ‘He’s not talking enough about how bad things are.’ Let me tell you something—I see what happens. My heart breaks when I see families who are impacted. I spend time with those families, and feel their grief. I see those young men on street corners, and eventually, in prisons. And I think to myself, they could be me. That the main difference between me and them is that I had a more forgiving environment, so that when I slipped up, when I made a mistake, I had a second chance, and they’ve got no margin for error.”It has emerged that 490 people a day take London's shortest and most expensive tube journe y.
The journey from Covent Garden to Leicester Square takes 45 seconds and will take you a quarter of a kilometer.
Nearly 500 people a day get on the tube at Covent Garden and get off at Leicester Square, according to data from TFL, constructed on an interactive map by Oliver O'Brien.
It costs £2.30 to make this trip if you have an Oyster card, but let's assume that seasoned Tube travellers would not take this form of transport to get from one to the other.
Longest single-stop tube journey vs shortest (km)
Covent Garden to Leicester Square 0.3 Covent Garden to Leicester Square 0.3 Chesham to Chalfont & Latimer 6.3
Most people who take this trip are likely tourists, who probably either pay for a ticket either way, or use a travel card, as it is common knowledge that Covent Garden and Leicester Square are very close together.
It is probably less stressful to walk than it is to use the lifts and battle the crowds at Covent Carden Tube.
So a single trip costs £4.80 if one does not have an Oyster card.
Tube line length (mi)
23.2 Bakerloo 14.5 Central 46 Circle 17 District 40 Hammersmith & City 15.9 Jubilee 22.5 Metropolitan 41.5 Northern 36 Piccadilly 44.3 Victoria 13.3 Waterloo & City 1.5
That's £4.80 to travel 260 metres. To put that into perspective, it's 54,400 meters to get from London to Luton Airport.
If we were paying the same amount per metre, it would cost £1,004 to get to the aiport.
That would probably be significantly more than your plane ticket.
490 is a large number per day - that's a lot of wasted money - but it is true that 1.3 billion people use the Tube every year.
The length of the network is 402km, and the longest continuous tunnel is East Finchley to Morden (via Bank) - 27.8km.Ben Underwood lost his eyes to retinal cancer at age 2, but within three years he had taught himself to discern objects by echolocation, making clicking noises with his tongue and |
, or descended lower into the pelvis. This movement is also called lightening. It typically happens two to three weeks before delivery in women who are having their first child. Those who have had children before may not drop until they’re in labor.
When dropping happens, you may find that you’re suddenly much more comfortable. Your uterus doesn’t press up on your diaphragm or stomach as much as it used to, so breathing is easier, and heartburn may improve. At the same time, however, you may feel more pressure in your vaginal area — many women feel heaviness there.
Some women report feeling strange, sharp twinges as the baby’s head moves and exerts pressure on the bladder and pelvic floor. Having the baby “drop” doesn’t predict when labor will happen.
You may not notice that you have dropped. During your prenatal visit, your doctor may be able to tell by an external or internal exam how low the baby’s head is and whether it’s engaged. The fetal head is engaged when it has reached the level of the ischial spines, which are bony landmarks in your pelvis that can be felt during an internal exam.
Credit: Kathryn Born, MA
When the fetal head is at this level, it’s at zero station. Most practitioners divide the pelvis into descending stations from –5 to +5 (although some use –3 to +3).
Often at the beginning of labor, the head may be at –4 or –5 station (fairly high — sometimes called floating, because the fetal head is still floating in the amniotic cavity). Labor proceeds until the head descends all the way to +5, when delivery is about to begin.
If the baby’s head is engaged prior to labor, you’re more likely to deliver vaginally, although obviously there are no guarantees. Similarly, although a floating (unengaged) head isn’t every obstetrician’s dream, it doesn’t mean that you won’t have a completely normal delivery.
If you’re having your second child or more, the baby’s head may not engage until well into labor.Ah, yes. The progressive liberal race hustlers shaping young minds. Check out the now deleted tweet by black racist teacher at Duncanville High School in Texas. Apparently, when it comes to Ferguson, us ‘crackers’ should just kill ourselves and our opinions don’t matter. Weasel Zippers has been keeping up with the evolving actions of this racist teacher.
Black Duncanville High School teacher to whites: kill yourselves
No name for this black teacher has been released, but people have already determined that she is a teacher at Duncanville High School in Texas. As you would probably expect, after the blowback towards this racist teacher, the tweet along with her Twitter account magically disappeared. Maybe she’s dumb enough to think that if she deletes her account, there will be no records any of her bosses could see in Texas. So sorry for you racist teacher.
Just another butchy progressive who will probably be joining the riots once the Darren Wilson decision is announced to the public. Just imagine, this vermin is polluting young minds in Texas. No wonder our education system is in the toilet.OJ Simpson innocent? Was Nicole Brown Simpson murdered by Jason Simpson, OJ’s son?
// May 21st, 2014 // News
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Could Jason Simpson be guilty of murdering Nicole Brown Simpson and Ronald Goldman?
The book titled “O.J. is innocent and I can prove it” by private investigator William C. Dear, suggests that O.J. may indeed be innocent for the deaths of Nicole Brown Simpson and Ron Goldman (see full OJ Simpson murders story here). In the book, Dear suggests that the real murderer is O.J. Simpson’s son, Jason Simpson, who was 24-years-old at the time. Dear proposes that O.J. did visit the crime scene shortly after the two victims were murdered but rather than committing the crimes himself, merely initiated a series of actions to help cover up the crime and protect his son. It’s an interesting theory – but does it bear merit in the case against O.J.?
Dear spent several years researching the Nicole Brown Simpson/Ronald Goldman murder case – visiting the crime scene, conducting interviews, and collecting evidence. Dear’s background reinforces the claim that Jason Simpson was the true murderer and hence, his theory cannot be easily ignored. You see, Dear is not new to cracking hard cases – he used the same method to investigate and solve the cold-case murder of Ohio man Dean Milo, which resulted in the convictions of 11 people, including Milo’s brother.
Dear hopes that the result of his investigation “will lead to the convening of a special grand jury, an arrest, and a conviction” for the murders of Nicole Brown Simpson and Ronald Goldman.
The evidence
Jason stops taking his medicine
Several points support the theory that Jason was the true killer. For instance, Jason’s past criminal record (including drug use and arrest for assault with a deadly weapon) and troubled psychological problems for which he took prescription medicine (Depakote) for “intermittent rage disorder”. Dear points out that Jason stopped taking his prescribed medicine three months before the murders and that only six months before the murders, he went to the emergency room because he was hearing voices and felt as if he was “going to rage”.
Last minute restaurant cancellation
According to Dear, on June 12, 1994, the night that Nicole Brown Smith and Ronald Goldman were murdered, Jason believed the family were to dine at the restaurant where he worked, hinting that the family’s unexpected change in plans (they changed restaurants at the last minute, likely forgetting to tell Jason) may have been a blow to his fragile ego. He notes that on that date, Jason has no supported alibi after approximately 9:50 PM (the murders took place between 9:45 PM and 10:05 PM) and that his timecard for that night was handwritten even though the electronic time clock at the restaurant was working fine. In addition, he would have left the restaurant, where he was a chef, with several knives in his possession.
The black ski cap found in Jason Simpson’s storage building
After the murders, Dear purchased the storage locker that had been owned by Jason Simpson around the time of the murders. In the building, he found several items he believes are crucial evidence supporting his theory. A photograph, dated March 24, 1993, shows Jason wearing a “navy watch cap” just like the dark blue ski cap found next to the bloody glove at the crime scene. Police had examined the ski cap found at the crime scene and revealed that it contained African-American hair fibers which did not match O.J. Simpson.
Knife found in Jason Simpson’s storage building
According to Dear, one of Jason’s classmates told him that Jason was trained in hand-to-hand combat and field knife training while attending the Army and Navy Academy. He recalled that O.J. hated the sight of blood and that O.J.’s Swiss Army knife and stiletto knife were ruled out as murder weapons. But inside the storage unit once owned by Jason Simpson, Dear discovered a knife which matched the descriptions of the murder weapon. A “world-renowned” forensic scientist examined the knife and found that the butt of the knife matched a blow/injury Nicole suffered on top of her head.
Other forensic evidence points to Jason Simpson
Dear calls other forensic evidence into question too. Ron Goldman’s hands had many injuries suggesting he fought hard with the assailant. However, the day after the murders, O.J. voluntarily stripped for LAPD officers – there were no marks or bruises that indicated he had been in a violent scuffle – despite the fact that Goldman was a 3rd degree black belt. Furthermore, none of the 15 separate fingerprints at the crime scene matched O.J.’s. The fingerprints of Jason were never compared to the evidence. Finally, he notes that the foreign blood and skin found on Nicole’s body and under her fingernails did not match O.J. while Jason never provided a DNA sample to police. You see, according to the author, the day after the murders, and before his arrest, O.J. hired top criminal attorney Carl Jones to represent Jason who at the time, had never even been named as a suspect.
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Dear calls into question other circumstantial evidentiary points that hint Jason Simpson was the murderer. For instance, records showed that during a fit of rage, Jason had nearly killed an ex-girlfriend and seriously injured another using a knife and that at the time of the Simpson/Goldman murders, Jason was on probation for assault with a deadly weapon after attacking his boss with a knife. O.J. on the other hand, had no prior record of using any sort of weapon to settle disputes.
Or is Dear full of it?
Dear presents an interesting theory, no question. Possibly LAPD and the district attorney made a rush to judgment when arresting O.J. But the biggest concern I have with Dear’s theory is the timeline he presents for the murders. In less than 20 minutes, could Jason have murdered the two victims, called O.J. Simpson to tell him of his act, and O.J. have time to arrive on the scene and back home to meet the awaiting Limousine that was to take him to the airport?
Then again, there’s this photo of Jason Simpson taken the moment O.J.’s “not guilty” verdict was announced. Emotionless or angry, his reaction deviates significantly from the reactions of other family members.
We may never know. O.J. Simpson has been in prison for armed robbery since 2008. The whereabouts of Jason Simpson is currently unknown.
How the evidence stacks up
Here’s how other evidence in the O.J. Simpson trial stacked up.
Gloves
Glove found behind Simpson’s house contained genetic markers of Simpson and the victims
A blond hair similar to ex-wife was also found on that glove
Gloves didn’t appear to fit Simpson
Socks
Bloody socks found in Simpson’s bedroom with genetic markers of Simpson and his ex-wife
Footprints
Bloody footprints near bodies found with match between Simpson’s genetic markers and victims’
Footprints matched size 12 Bruno Maglis, a relatively rare and expensive Italian-made model. Jason Simpson wears size 12 shoes
No evidence presented that OJ Simpson ever owned such shoes
Knit hat
Hairs found in a dark knit cap were similar to Simpson’s
Defense argued hair meant assailant was likely black, as is roughly 10 per cent of Los Angeles’ population
Sources: Wikipedia, OJ is Innocent and I can Prove it (book), Business Insider
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AdvertisementsAn all-too-common response to workers and advocates concerned about the 23-cent gender wage gap for full-time year-round workers across occupations is that it is just a byproduct of the choices women make: choices to work fewer hours, take on lower-paying jobs, or opt out of the workforce for longer periods of time than men. When framed in this way, it’s easy to dismiss equal-pay policies or legislation as superfluous. After all, we can’t force women to apply for higher-paying jobs or to work longer hours, right?
Unfortunately, decades of evidence have revealed a far more complicated story, and it is clear that the gender wage gap is about more than just personal choice. It is a real and persistent problem, and it is a problem that calls for immediate and nimble policy solutions. But in order to achieve pay equity, it helps to understand the origins of the gap.
Among men and women employed full time, 60 percent of the wage gap can be attributed to known factors such as work experience at 10 percent, union status at 4 percent, and the aforementioned choice of occupation at 27 percent, among other measureable differences. (see Figure 1) A woman’s work experience is abbreviated if she needs to take maternity leave or take time off from a job to care for a child, which she is more likely to do than her male counterpart. Another quarter of the wage gap is attributable to the differences in wages paid by industries that employ mostly men or mostly women. These include blue-collar industries such as mining, manufacturing, and construction, which generally employ men, and service-sector or clerical jobs, which generally pay less and employ more women.
One mitigating factor that has actually reduced the gender wage gap is women’s access to higher education. This has helped ease the disparity by nearly 7 percent, as shown in Figure 1, but women’s access to college and advanced degrees has not been enough to close the gap completely. Women need an additional degree in order to make as much as men with a lower degree over the course of a lifetime. A woman would need a doctoral degree, for instance, to earn the same as a man with a bachelor’s degree, and a man with a high school education would earn approximately the same amount as a woman with a bachelor’s degree.
But what causes the remaining gap of more than 10 cents on the dollar—or $4,465 per year among workers making the median wage—between men and women? This is less clear but perhaps more troubling. More than 40 percent of the gender wage gap is “unexplained,” meaning that there is no obvious measureable reason for a difference in pay. This leaves us with possible explanations that range from overt sexism to unintentional gender-based discrimination to reluctance among women to negotiate for higher pay.
Whatever the reasons, a woman should have recourse if she is being paid less than her male counterpart for the same job. Passing the Paycheck Fairness Act and establishing a commission to address the gender pay gap would both be important steps toward achieving this goal.
Jane Farrell is a Research Assistant for Economic Policy at the Center for American Progress. Sarah Jane Glynn is a Senior Policy Analyst at the Center.Remarkably intact and beautifully documented by a Russian urban explorer, this space shuttle prototype rests in a massive above-ground graveyard at the Baikonur Cosmodrome, deserted due to the collapse of the Soviet Union. Originally destined to dock with Soviet space station Mir, the model was almost finished and had even completed a test flight when the facility was shut down in the early 1990s.
Photographer Ralph Mirebs identified the massive (yet somehow still unassuming) structure as an excellent target for exploration, but did not know just how many surprises were in store for him when he took his camera into the ruins. Positioning himself on catwalks and even entering spacecraft models, he was able to take pictures of an amazing array of spaces and equipment.
As incredible as the outside of the craft may be, the insides are all the more fascinating, filled with the equipment intended to take it to space that somehow seems surprisingly fragile right here on the ground.Kakapo (Strigops habroptilus). The world's heaviest parrot, the New Zealand kakapo is also unusual in being nocturnal and flightless
For the lizards of east Africa, who the secretary bird dispatches by stamping on their heads and swallowing them whole, it is excellent news. Equally, the monkeys of the Philippines will be pleased to hear that their native eagle — which menaces primates over an area the size of Oxford just to raise one chick — is in difficulties.
Everyone else should be worried.
Scientists from London Zoo and Yale University have released a list of 100 birds that are not only endangered, but whose loss would also represent a terrible blow to genetic diversity.
Recognising that with limited funding, conservation is not so much about saving every species as identifying which are the most important, the compilers of the Evolutionarily Distinct and Globally Endangered…In the current discourse revolving around the Republican Party and its position on immigration reform, a new argument has begun evolving. Over the past several months the drama surrounding comprehensive immigration reform (CIR) has been a newsworthy topic. The back and forth between democrat and republican representatives in both the house and the Senate has almost become difficult to track. However, important politicians and political analysts alike are saying that an overall weakness in the GOP’s political strategy is that the party may not be paying enough attention to the Hispanic demographic. Furthermore the party has been accused of balking at immigration reform in general.
A Bad Political Move for the GOP?
The Hispanic population is the fastest growing demographic in the nation. Not supporting or appealing to this ethnic group could be considered a very dangerous political move for the GOP. Political analysts are beginning to share the same public opinion that the GOP needs to amend its strategy or risk losing all support from this important population. Michael Bloomberg recently publicly stated at an immigration forum, “If you are against the fastest-growing voting bloc in the country, you and your party don’t have a future.” Also present at the form were Republican Governor Rick Snyder and Carlos Gutierrez, a former Commerce Secretary for the Bush administration.
The Growing Hispanic Vote
National Republicans have stressed the importance of passing reforms to address the growing issue of 11 million immigrants currently residing in the United States as illegals if they hope to remain competitive in the upcoming presidential election. Upon examination of recent elections, the Hispanic population has begun having an effect on election outcomes, especially in states in the Southwest. A good example of this would be in the case of Mitt Romney who only won 27 percent of the Hispanic vote in 2012.
The GOP and Political Fallout
Currently Republican leaders are working on a set of immigration principles that they hope to present to the Republican caucus at its annual retreat. Although some may take this document as a sign of progress, the new proposals still face stark opposition in the House where Republicans openly state reservations about granting amnesty to individuals currently in the U.S. under an illegal status. However, Republican politicians are risking political fallout in some districts by opposing amnesty. This type of fallout would widely be seen as a hard-fought victory for the Obama administration.
The forum sponsored by the Partnership for a New American Economy and the U.S. Chamber of Commerce was a fresh reminder of the divide within the GOP between national
Opinions from Leading Republicans
Former Commerce Secretary Carlos Gutierrez spoke out on the topic of comprehensive immigration reform. He publicly stated that an “immigration overhaul” was needed in order to secure a strong workforce down the pipeline. His exact statement reads on the issue reads that without an immigration overhaul, “our workforce down the road doesn’t grow.” Gutierrez is one of the leading Republicans who argue that the GOP needs to focus more strongly on the topic of immigration.
Comprehensive Immigration Reform in the GOP
In 2013 the Senate passed a version of a bi-partisan bill which set out to address border security, enforcement measures and in addition offered a path to citizenship for the approximate 11 million illegal immigrants residing in the United States currently. GOP leaders have taken a “piecemeal” approach to the bill after the measure stalled in the GOP-led House. Michael Bloomberg a Republican-turned-independent has put the onus of moving past this obstacle in the hands of the party’s leadership. Bloomberg recently stated, “It’s up to the leadership, if Boehner wants to get it done. He is an accomplished politician. He’s been around a long time. He’s got a tough hand, but that’s what leadership is all about and his tactics will be what he’s comfortable with.”
Vice president of the Chamber and a key personnel on immigration stated that Boehner is attempting to construct a unified document that the GOP caucus could support. Republican Representative McCarthy (California) who is the No. 3 leader in the House has expressed his support for a path to legalization for the majority of immigrants currently in the U.S. where Democrats have pushed for a full path to citizenship. Legalization versus full citizenship has been a key issue in the discussion over comprehensive immigration reform and appears to be where politicians are not backing down.
Support for Immigration Legislation
Recently a peculiar coalition of business, labor and evangelicals has begun lobbying enthusiastically for immigration legislation. Thomas Donohue, the president of the Chamber of Commerce has been quoted saying that immigration overhaul is a primary priority for the coming year. Donohue and Boehner have recently begun meeting to discuss the issue in depth.
As mentioned previously, many House Republican’s districts have seen a recent increase in the Hispanic population and are beginning to feel the pressure of upcoming elections. Not supporting immigration overhaul could result in a total loss from the Hispanic population, which could be a deciding factor in upcoming elections. House Republicans who are in this scenario have begun to shift into a more independent stance on comprehensive immigration reform, most likely in an attempt to glean more support from the Hispanic community.
What’s Next for the GOP?
Some would say that the GOP has backed itself into a corner by not being more flexible or cooperative with immigration legislation. The influence of the Hispanic population has become an increasingly important topic for GOP House members. This scenario can go in several directions however there are two scenarios which are more likely than others. GOP House members could ignore the influence of the Hispanic population and continue its stringent defense against CIR which could result in the possible loss of support from this community. Conversely, GOP House members could begin to shift away from past positions and begin to support immigration overhaul and retain some support from the Hispanic population. As immigration reform continues to develop the reality of the GOP’s circumstances will become increasingly more evident. Only time will tell what this outcome will be.Australian Greens Leader Christine Milne has spoken out against the increasingly weak position of the Abbott government regarding the ongoing conflict between Israel and Palestine over the occupied territories.
"This is an outrageous backdown by the Abbott government. It is inflammatory behaviour and at odds with the peace process," Senator Milne said.
"The use of the term ‘Occupied Palestinian Territories' is the accepted term used by the UN. The Israeli settlements built after 1967 are illegal. The settlements contravene the Fourth Geneva Convention.
"This is yet more embarrassment and isolation for Australia as Prime Minister Abbott blunders around on the international stage."
Recently the Greens moved the following motion in the Senate but it was blocked by Labor and the Abbott government.
NOTICE OF MOTION - 24 March 2014
I give notice that on the next day of sitting I shall move that -
The Senate:
1) Notes that:
a. Over the past year, Israeli settlements in the West Bank have significantly increased;
b. It is unlawful under the Fourth Geneva Convention for an occupying power to transfer parts of its own population into the territory it occupies;
c. World leaders, including the British Prime Minister, have called for a halt in settlement activity by Israel.
2) Calls on
a. The Israeli government to cease expansion of settlements in the West Bank;
b. The Australian Foreign Minister to publicly acknowledge that all settlements are illegal and in breach of the Fourth Geneva Convention.
Senator Christine Milne
Leader of the Australian GreensWhen you have eaten your fill, give thanks to the Eternal your God for the good land given to you.
Deuteronomy 8:10
No matter what’s going on, I always feel better after bensching (praying Birkat HaMazon, the blessing after meals).
Whether I’m praying together with friends or silently with the tune running through my head, the melody is uplifting, cheerful, and energetic. I'm filled with the nostalgia of praying together among friends at camp and youth group, which connects me with them across time and space. I’m expressing gratitude, and just as smiles -- even when they are forced -- have a way of making the smiler happier, so too does stating gratitude cause us to feel that gratitude a bit more. But most importantly, when I pray Birkat HaMazon, I enter into relationship with the Holy One, the Eternal, the Source of Life.
To eat without prayer can certainly be pleasurable, but the act ends as quickly as it began when that final morsel has been swallowed. But, when food exists as part of a relationship, it becomes something more. When we eat a meal with friends, we nourish our bodies with the food, and we nourish our souls by engaging with those at the table.
When loved ones prepare a meal for us, we thank them. We express appreciation by asking about the recipes and ingredients or remarking on how the flavors danced on our tongues or reminded us of our grandmothers’ kitchens. Through our actions, we make them feel good about their gracious actions on our behalf.
Imagine if we offered that same outpouring of praise to the cheese monger who sold us that block of cheddar, the farmer who painstakingly grew our tomatoes, or the factory-owner whose business produces the bottles that hold our wine. Imagine if we could enter into relationships of appreciation with everyone who contributed to our satiation. To do so would elevate them, and in connecting with another human being, elevate us in turn.
When would this praise best be offered? One could say "thank you" at the time of purchase or receipt, but having not yet tried the food and being distracted by hunger, our thank you would not be as sincere as it might be. After eating, though, we feel good. We feel full. It is with this fullness of heart and mind that we offer thanks, and devote our energies to giving back.
This is what Birkat HaMazon is all about. Saying thank you is a prescription -- to ensure humility and appreciation -- against the consequences of taking this world for granted. It's a blessing, it's connecting to the Source of all, and it's developing a regular practice of acknowledging our gratitude.
When we bensch Birkat HaMazon, whether we use the long or short version, we do far more than simply say thank you.
We begin with the Birkat Hazan -- an invitation to bless that comes from the prayer leader to those who are with him or her, which is followed by that first sacred blessing that thanks God directly for our food and sustenance.
Second comes Birkat Ha’aretz, the blessing that thanks God for the land that produces so much nutritious bounty; in this process of blessing we move from the micro of our tables to the macro of a sustaining eco-system.
After our bodies have been satisfied, we pray for more: in asking for the rebuilding of Jerusalem -- Birkat Yerushalayim -- we request the well-being of our Jewish spirits.
Noting how much goodness we have around us and how much more is still needed, we pray Birkat HaTov v’HaMeitiv, asking God to bring blessing, a little bit of which we have just tasted, to all who need it.
Finally, like all good prayer services, we end with a request for peace, a Birkat Shalom. Oseh shalom bimromav… May the one who makes peace in the high heavens, make peace for us, for all Israel, and all who inhabit the earth. Amen.
Birkat HaMazon connects us to that which connects the entire universe. We elevate, exalt, and bless. We fill ourselves with gratitude, turning this positive energy toward those who have been good to us, and to all those in need of goodness. To bless after meals acknowledges that we are never isolated when we receive and consume. Rather, we are part of an amazing, interconnected universe and in relationship with many, including the One who cares for us all.A universal remote is a remote control that can be programmed to operate various brands of one or more types of consumer electronics devices. Low-end universal remotes can only control a set number of devices determined by their manufacturer, while mid- and high-end universal remotes allow the user to program in new control codes to the remote. Many remotes sold with various electronics include universal remote capabilities for other types of devices, which allows the remote to control other devices beyond the device it came with. For example, a VCR remote may be programmed to operate various brands of televisions.
History [ edit ]
On May 30, 1985, Philips introduced the first universal remote (U.S. Pat. #4774511) under the Magnavox brand name.[1] In 1985, Robin Rumbolt, William "Russ" McIntyre, and Larry Goodson with North American Philips Consumer Electronics (Magnavox, Sylvania, and Philco) developed the first universal remote control. Shortly after development was completed[when?] and patent applications filed,[which?][when?] Magnavox initiated the "Smart, Very Smart" campaign, coining the "smart" axiom. McIntyre has claimed that the primary design challenge was fitting the well-crafted, tight code into an extremely limited memory space.[citation needed] At least two subsequent patents followed: US Pat. 4703359, on November 20, 1988 and US Pat. 4951131, in 1989.[citation needed]
In 1987, the first programmable universal remote control was released. It was called the "CORE" and was created by CL 9, a startup founded by Steve Wozniak, the inventor of the Apple I and Apple II computers.[2]
In March 1987, Steve Ciarcia published an article in Byte Magazine entitled "Build a Trainable Infrared Master Controller", describing a universal remote with the ability to upload the settings to a computer.[3] This device had macro capabilities.[3]
Layout and features [ edit ]
Most universal remotes share a number of basic design elements:
A power button, as well as a switch or series of buttons to select which device the remote is controlling at the moment. A typical selection includes TV, VCR, DVD, and CBL/SAT, along with other devices that sometimes include DVRs, audio equipment or home automation devices.
Channel and volume up/down selectors (sometimes marked with + and - signs).
A numeric keypad for entering channel numbers and some other purposes such as time and date entry.
A set button (sometimes recessed to avoid accidental pressing) to allow selection of a particular set of codes (usually entered on the keypad). Most remotes also allow the user to cycle through the list of available codes to find one that matches the device to be controlled.
Most but not all universal remotes include one or more D-pads for navigating menus on DVD players and cable/satellite boxes.
Certain highly reduced designs such as the TV-B-Gone or keychain-sized remotes include only a few buttons, such as power and channel/volume selectors.
Higher-end remotes have numerous other features:
Macro programming, allowing the user to program command sequences to be sent with one button press [4]
LCD to display status information.
Programmable soft keys, allowing user-defined functions and macros [4]
Aliases or "punchthroughs", which allow multiple devices to be accessed without changing device modes (for example, using the TV's volume control while the remote is still in DVD-player mode.)
IR code learning, allowing the remote to be programmed to control new devices not already in its code list
PC configuration, allowing the remote to be connected to a computer for easy setup
Some universal remotes have the ability to also make phone calls replacing your home phone in that room.
Repeaters are available that can extend the range of a remote control; some remotes are designed to communicate with a dedicated repeater over RF, removing the line-of-sight requirement of IR repeaters, while others accept infrared signals from any remote and transmit them to the device being controlled. (The latter are sometimes built as hobby projects and are widely available in kit form.)
Some devices, such as some computers and game consoles, use Bluetooth or a similar RF protocol rather than infrared as the main transmission form; universal remotes compatible with those designs are available.[ specify ]
Upgradable and learning remotes [ edit ]
Some universal remotes allow the code lists programmed into the remote to be updated to support new brands or models of devices not currently supported by the remote. Some higher end universal learning remotes require a computer to be connected. The connection is typically done via USB from the computer to mini-USB on the remote or the remotes base station.[5]
In 2000, a group of enthusiasts discovered that universal remotes made by UEI and sold under the One For All, RadioShack, and other brands can be reprogrammed by means of an interface called JP1.
IR learning remotes can learn the code for any button on many other IR remote controls. This functionality allows the remote to learn functions not supported by default for a particular device, making it sometimes possible to control devices that the remote was not originally designed to control. A drawback of this approach is that the learning remote needs a functioning teaching remote. Also, some entertainment equipment manufacturers use pulse frequencies that are higher than what the learning remote can detect and store in its memory.
Touch-screen remotes [ edit ]
These remotes feature an LCD screen that can be either monochrome or full color. The "buttons" are actually images on the screen, which, when touched, will send IR signals to controlled devices. Some models have multiple screens that are accessed through virtual buttons on the touch-screen and other models have a combination of the touch-screen and physical buttons.
Some models of the touch-screen remotes are programmed using a graphical interface program on a PC, which allows the user to customize the screens, backgrounds, buttons and even the "actions" the buttons perform. The "project" that is created is then downloaded into the remote through a USB cable or, in the most recent models, wirelessly by Bluetooth or Wi-Fi.
The newest touch-screen remotes, such as the Logitech 900 and 1100, include an RF transmitter to allow signals to reach locations much farther than the usual range of IR (approximately 6 meters). RF also does not require line of sight.
Some touch-screen remote controls, such as the Ray Super Remote, now have content recommendations built directly in to the universal remote control. [6]
Smartphone and tablet universal remotes [ edit ]
Smartphones and tablets such as those running Nokia's Maemo (N900), Apple's iOS and Google's Android operating system can also be used as universal remote controls.
A number of devices from vendors such as Samsung, LG and Nokia include a built-in IR port that can be used as a remote, while others require a physical attachment, or 'dongle', be connected on to the phone when used as a remote. The dongle is required to convert the electrical control signals from the phone into infra red signals that are required by most home audio visual components for remote control. However it is also possible to implement a system that does not require a dongle. Such systems use a stand-alone piece of hardware called a 'gateway', which receives the electrical control signals from the smartphone in Bluetooth or wi-fi form and forward them on in infra red form to the components to be controlled.
See also [ edit ]Atlas Obscura on Slate is a blog about the world’s hidden wonders. Like us on Facebook, Tumblr, or follow us on Twitter @atlasobscura.
It’s Christmas Eve, which means children across Spain’s Catalan region are gathering in their homes for the traditional whacking of the festive shit log.
Tió de Nadal (Christmas log), a hollow log with stick legs, a smiley face, and a floppy red hat, is a yule branch with a scatological spin. (Its other name is Caga Tió, or “shit log,” for reasons that will shortly become apparent.)
On December 8 each year — the Feast of the Immaculate Conception — families bring out the happy log. Every night until December 24, children are tasked with “feeding” the log by offering him nuts, dried fruit, and water. Kids must also cover Tió de Nadal with a blanket to ensure he stays warm and comfortable.
On Christmas Eve, it is time for the little shit log to shine. Children gather around the red-hatted branch and beat him with sticks while singing the traditional Tió de Nadal song:
Shit log,
Shit nougats,
Hazelnuts and mató cheese,
If you don’t shit well,
I’ll hit you with a stick,
Shit log!
Then comes the miracle: the kids look under Tió de Nadal’s blanket and discover that the dear log has pooped out a pile of candies and presents. (The end of the defecation session is signaled by the presence of a stinky herring.) When everyone has collected their gifts from Tió de Nadal, the family burns him for warmth.
The poop log is not Catalonia’s only defecation-based festive tradition. Take a close look at any nativity scene in the area and you’ll spot Caganer, a porcelain man copping a squat in the presence of Mary, Joseph, and the Three Wise Men. Caganer is not meant to be sacreligious — his fertilization of the holy ground heralds a prosperous harvest in the new year.
Visit Atlas Obscura for more on Tió de Nadal.BY: Follow @DavidRutz
Sen. Bernie Sanders (I., Vt.) condemned Wednesday's shooting that was apparently perpetrated by a former volunteer on his presidential campaign, saying he was "sickened by this despicable act."
Police say suspect James T. Hodgkinson shot House Majority Whip Steve Scalise (R., La.) and four others while Republican lawmakers were conducting a baseball practice in Alexandria, Va.
Hodgkinson died at a hospital Wednesday morning after being shot by police. In addition to supporting Sanders for the presidency, his social media postings showed deep hostility toward President Donald Trump.
"I have just been informed that the alleged shooter at the Republican baseball practice this morning is someone who apparently volunteered on my presidential campaign," Sanders said on the Senate floor. "I am sickened by this despicable act. Let me be as clear as I can be. Violence of any kind is unacceptable in our society and I condemn this action in the strongest possible terms."
Real change, he said, can only come out through non-violent action.
"Anything else runs counter to our most deeply held American values," Sanders said. "I know I speak for the entire country in saying that my hopes and prayers are that Representative Scalise, congressional staff and the Capitol police officers who were wounded make a quick and full recovery."Verizon on Thursday took a bold new step in its never-ending quest to make life less enjoyable for subscribers with grandfathered unlimited data plans. Per The Verge, Verizon is raising the price of its grandfathered unlimited data plans by $20 a month so they’ll now cost $49.99 starting in November. While $49.99 for unlimited data doesn’t sound too awful, remember that your data plan is only part of what you’re paying for every month.
FROM EARLIER: How to tell if your iPhone 6s has the A9 chip impacted by ‘Batterygate’
“To be clear, $49.99 is the cost of unlimited data alone and is added on top of your monthly voice and text plan,” The Verge’s Chris Welch writes. “I’ve got the Nationwide Talk & Text 450 plan ($59.99), so this change would raise my monthly payment to $109.98, and that’s before Verizon’s extra fees and charges. If you’ve got more or unlimited voice minutes, you’ll pay more each month.”
There is some good news here, however: If you want to keep your grandfathered unlimited data plan when buying a new phone from Verizon, you’ll now be able to do so if you use one of Verizon’s monthly installment plans. Before you had to either sign a two-year deal with Verizon that would end your unlimited plan or keep your unlimited plan by paying the full cost of the device up front.
But make no mistake, Verizon really, really wants you to give up your unlimited |
be hoping he reconsiders his decision.
The World Cup is two years away, and might be Messi's final chance to win the tournament while still in the prime of his career.Image: YouTube/Chris Scullion
If you were a child (or large adult son) who spent your free time clutching a controller, sitting so close to the tube that your hair picked up static, you might also have a collection of VHS tapes released by gaming companies. They were made for enthusiasts who wanted to see exclusive tips and footage for upcoming games. It was analog YouTube, long before YouTube existed.
UK-based gaming journalist and blogger Chris Scullion is on a mission to preserve his collection—and maybe your collection, too—of these old video game VHS tapes.
In the 80s and 90s, video game companies and trade magazines made these tapes to accompany popular titles or new issues with bonus material or promotional footage, giving a glimpse into how marketing for games was done in the industry's early days. Scullion has 18 tapes to upload so far, and plans to provide accompanying commentary as well as the raw video as they go up on his YouTube channel.
Scullion's first upload is a promotional tape for Super Mario All-Stars, given away by Nintendo UK in 1993. It's hosted by Craig Charles, who played Lister in the British sci-fi sitcom Red Dwarf.
Digitizing his collection keeps that sweet nostalgia content safe from degradation of the magnetic tape, which starts to go downhill within 10 to 25 years.
He's capturing them in HD using a 1080p upscaler, at a full 50fps frame rate by converting to HDMI before grabbing—a higher frame rate than many standard commercial digitizing devices that capture at 30fps—so that no frames are missed. Some of the tapes he's planning to digitize have already been converted and uploaded to YouTube by other people, he says, but most are either poor quality or captured with less-advanced grabbing devices.
"These tapes are part of my childhood and that of many others, but they may also be of interest to international gamers," Scullion told me in a Twitter DM. Being from the UK, the majority of the tapes were made there, so they'll be never-before-seen for most US gamers: For example, the Super Mario All-Stars video presented by Craig Charles from Red Dwarf, or the Amiga "Power Tips" video, which gave advice on a bunch of Commodore Amiga games.
If you have any dusty tapes hiding in your parent's attic, Scullion told me he's considering calling for viewers to send in their VHS collection for digitizing. "There are some forgotten tapes that I'm really keen to get hold of, and I'd also like to find copies of certain old TV shows like Cybernet which were also fantastic but have been left behind over time," he said. "I'm just really keen to make sure that aspect of gaming history is preserved."Exclusive : Allegations against Blake Wentworth, who was not terminated last year despite misconduct findings, renewed in significant development in scandal
Kathleen Gutierrez struggles to get out of bed each day. For the past year, the 28-year-old University of California at Berkeley graduate student has battled extreme fatigue, unexpected body aches and debilitating anxiety.
Disturbing details of sexual harassment scandal at UC Berkeley revealed in files Read more
At the root of her stress is her fear that at any moment on campus, she could run into Blake Wentworth, a professor in her department who she says repeatedly sexually harassed her – touching her inappropriately and frequently making offensive comments, including telling her “I’m so attracted to you” and bragging about doing drugs off of a stripper’s body.
In October, records show, a university investigation concluded that Wentworth violated the college’s harassment policies and made “unwelcome sexual advances” toward her. But more than six months later, the professor has faced no discipline and remains employed at UC Berkeley – with an office two doors away from Gutierrez.
“I don’t feel safe,” Gutierrez said in a recent interview. “That exhaustion, that’s physical and emotional at times, really weighs on me.”
At least six other students have given recent testimonials expressing concerns about Wentworth, and several have filed complaints, according to a recent letter sent by multiple faculty members to supervisors.
On Monday, Gutierrez and Erin Bennett, another graduate student who has accused Wentworth of harassment, intend to file formal complaints with the state against the professor and the University of California, alleging they have been subject to discrimination, sexual harassment and a hostile and intimidating work environment.
The complaints with the state department of fair employment and housing – copies of which the students’ attorneys shared exclusively with the Guardian – set the stage for a possible lawsuit and mark a significant development in a sexual harassment scandal that has shaken the prestigious northern California public university.
In October, Geoffrey Marcy, a prominent UC Berkeley astronomer, resigned following reports that he avoided serious discipline after the school determined that he had repeatedly sexually harassed students.
In March, Sujit Choudhry, dean of UC Berkeley’s renowned law school, stepped down in the wake of faculty outrage that he was able to keep his job after the school substantiated sexual harassment allegations from his executive assistant.
Following other high-profile harassment controversies, the university last week released hundreds of pages of investigation records involving 19 employees found guilty of misconduct by the school’s Office for the Prevention of Harassment and Discrimination (OPHD). The documents revealed that although 11 people resigned or were terminated, no faculty members were fired for sexual harassment.
Wentworth, a tenure-track assistant professor in the department of south and south-east Asian studies, was one faculty member who has avoided termination despite findings of misconduct.
Although it has been more than a year since Gutierrez and Bennett formally reported Wentworth for harassment, the university says disciplinary proceedings in his case are still pending.
In official statements to the university and in emails to the Guardian, Wentworth vehemently denied all the allegations, which he called “baseless”. He was being “railroaded”, he said.
In lengthy interviews, the women said they decided to file state complaints and speak publicly in the hope of protecting other students and to shine light on harassment that is pervasive at universities and workplaces across the country. They both said UC Berkeley’s inaction had been traumatizing and that they would not feel safe until Wentworth was removed from the school.
I can't be on campus. I don't know what graduate school is like without harassment Erin Bennett
“I can’t be on campus,” said Bennett, a 25-year-old comparative literature student, who said she was forced to take medical leave due to the university’s handling of her case. “I don’t know what graduate school is like without harassment.”
According to Bennett’s complaint, Wentworth encouraged the first-year graduate student to take a one-on-one independent study course during her first semester in fall 2014. Wentworth specializes in the Tamil language, which is Bennett’s area of interest.
Immediately, the complaint says, Wentworth began talking about his personal life and making inappropriate comments, at one point saying that learning Tamil was “better than sex”. On different occasions, he also allegedly touched her hand, placed his hands on her shoulders and got physically very close to her.
Bennett alleges in the complaint that the professor also often talked about his marriage, at one point “alluded to things he would do if Ms Bennett were his wife” and once calling her his “poor little lamb”.
“I became increasingly uncomfortable with his behavior,” Bennett said in an interview. “The power dynamic was very strong and palpable.”
Even though Wentworth is the only expert in Tamil literature at the university, Bennett said she dropped the class and tried to put the experience behind her.
Gutierrez, who is an instructor in Wentworth’s department, said the professor would frequently visit an office for grad students and make inappropriate sexual comments.
On 17 February last year, her state complaint says, Wentworth asked her to take a walk with him, and once outside he “began to talk about his recent divorce, visiting a strip club, and doing drugs [off] of a stripper’s body”. He also allegedly grabbed her hand and said: “I could lose my job over this … but I’m just so attracted to you.”
After she had made clear she was uncomfortable, Wentworth later came up behind her and wrapped his hands around her head and ear, according to the complaint.
“It was so disturbing to me to know that was happening in my workplace, that he made such an assertive come-on to me,” Gutierrez said in an interview. “I remember being very scared to think I might be alone with him.”
Both women said they were initially reluctant to report Wentworth, because they felt ashamed and feared retaliation. But once they learned that other students had similar concerns about him, they came forward and began a reporting process that they said was long, confusing and unfriendly to victims.
Though they both reported Wentworth in the spring, it was not until October that OPHD issued its findings, determining the professor had violated policies in Gutierrez’s case.
But in Bennett’s case OPHD said Wentworth’s actions “were not sufficiently severe or pervasive” to constitute sexual harassment, concluding that his conduct toward her was “unprofessional, and exhibited poor personal boundaries”.
Bennett said the decision was devastating and that she became too distraught to return to campus. As a result, she took leave, which eventually caused problems with her scholarships and health insurance.
“I don’t have any faith in Berkeley’s independent judicial system,” she said. “What’s most important to me is that this doesn’t happen anymore.”
In Gutierrez’s case, two committees subsequently had to review the case, which meant she had to re-tell the harassment allegations to another set of strangers – a process she said was particularly painful.
If a faculty committee recommends termination, according to UC Berkeley spokesman Dan Mogulof, the UC board of regents will have to vote to approve the decision. Mogulof declined to comment on pending litigation, but noted that the university recently formed a committee on sexual violence and harassment and is reviewing policies and procedures for reporting and investigating complaints.
“There needs to be improvement in our policies and our practices and our culture on this campus,” Mogulof told the Guardian earlier in the week.
In a series of lengthy emails, Wentworth wrote: “The reason my ‘cases’ have not been treated with severity is that they are, and have been proven to be, fanciful.”
He denied saying he was attracted to Gutierrez or ever mentioning strippers, said he never used the phrase “poor little lamb” and said he always makes boundaries clear – that “there can be no romantic relationship between professors and students ever”.
Wentworth told investigators he likely made the “if you were my wife” comment to Bennett as part of a grammar and culture lesson.
I state emphatically that the accusations are unjust and unmerited Blake Wentworth
Wentworth denied ever inappropriately touching either woman, saying Bennett lied about his physical contact and calling her a “troubled young woman”. He said that as soon as he learned students were “bothered” by him, he stopped communicating with them outside of his classes.
“I state emphatically that the accusations are unjust and unmerited,” he wrote.
Speaking to the Guardian, Gutierrez started crying when describing how hard it is for young women in academia, especially minority women, to complete their studies without facing discrimination and harassment.
“This place isn’t made for people that look like us. How am I supposed to get through the demands of graduate school when I know that my colleagues are going through this?” said Gutierrez, who is Filipina.
“People wonder why women of color don’t make it.”
Gutierrez said she has been forced to change offices for fears of encountering Wentworth and tries to avoid her department’s building as much as possible.
“My body is just collapsing under all of this,” she said, “but … I am so committed to staying, because it just infuriates me to think that anybody else might go through this in the future.”
If you have information about this story contact: sam.levin@theguardian.comAnd that was when Trump was convinced he would lose, at which point he’d have plenty of free time to plot and scheme against those who slighted him. Now that Americans actually elected the guy, Trump, if retribution remains his focus, will have the power of United States executive branch at his disposal.
At Trump’s election-night party last week, one of his prominent campaign aides, Omarosa Manigault,
Yes, that’s right, Trump’s staffer used “enemies” and “list” in the same thought.
Politico The day before the election, the New York Times noted that Donald Trump was privately musing about the ways in which he would “punish his enemies” after the campaign, “including a threat to fund a ‘super PAC’ with vengeance as its core mission.”And that was when Trump was convinced he would lose, at which point he’d have plenty of free time to plot and scheme against those who slighted him. Now that Americans actually elected the guy, Trump, if retribution remains his focus, will have the power of United States executive branch at his disposal.At Trump’s election-night party last week, one of his prominent campaign aides, Omarosa Manigault, told the Independent Journal Review, “It’s so great our enemies are making themselves clear so that when we get in to the White House, we know where we stand…. Mr. Trump has a long memory and we’re keeping a list.”Yes, that’s right, Trump’s staffer used “enemies” and “list” in the same thought.Politico reported the other day, meanwhile, that the president-elect’s team has “payback” on its mind, “plotting revenge against those they believe slighted Trump – and them.”
Since Trump’s shocking upset victory in Tuesday’s presidential election, several people who worked on his team have discussed ways to punish Republicans who were hostile to the New York billionaire’s anti-establishment campaign, including blocking them from administration or transition posts, or lucrative consulting work, according to a handful of people involved in the conversations.
They say that Republicans who opposed – or were seen as insufficiently supportive of – Trump have had their entreaties rejected by people around the president-elect, some of whom have expressed wonderment that former bitter critics are now asking for jobs, lobbying leads and even Inauguration tickets.
None of this comes as too big of a surprise. Mother Jones’ David Corn
I wonder, though, whether this will extend to Hillary Clinton.
For the most part, much of the “payback” chatter relates to Team Trump and the “Never Trump” contingent within the Republican Party, but does the president-elect’s desire to “punish his enemies” extend to his former rival?
CBS’s Lesley Stahl One campaign operative told Politico, “My phone is ringing off the hook with people who were on the outs asking how they can get into Trump world. I’m telling them there is no f—ing way they’re getting inside.”None of this comes as too big of a surprise. Mother Jones’ David Corn recently reported, “Revenge – it’s a big part of Trump’s life…. Why all the insults, bullying, and grudge matches? There is a reason. Trump fervently believes in retaliation…. [He] has said numerous times that he is driven by revenge and that it is a basic tool to use in business. He is obsessed with payback. In speeches and public talks, Trump has repeatedly expressed his fondness for retribution.”I wonder, though, whether this will extend to Hillary Clinton.For the most part, much of the “payback” chatter relates to Team Trump and the “Never Trump” contingent within the Republican Party, but does the president-elect’s desire to “punish his enemies” extend to his former rival?CBS’s Lesley Stahl asked Trump about this on “60 Minutes.”
STAHL: Are you going to ask for a special prosecutor to investigate Hillary Clinton over her emails? And are you, as you had said to her face, going to try and put her in jail?
TRUMP: Well, I’ll tell you what I’m going to do, I’m going to think about it.
Watch this space.
Postscript: I’d be remiss if I neglected to mention After some additional back and forth, he added, in reference to the Clintons, “I don’t want to hurt them. I don’t want to hurt them. They’re, they’re good people. I don’t want to hurt them. And I will give you a very, very good and definitive answer the next time we do 60 Minutes together.”Watch this space.Postscript: I’d be remiss if I neglected to mention this New York Times piece published over the weekend.
Chants of “lock her up” became a frequent rallying cry at Trump campaign events, and Mr. Trump told Mrs. Clinton at the second presidential debate that if elected, he would instruct his attorney general “to get a special prosecutor to look into your situation because there has never been so many lies, so much deception.”
If he were president, he told her, “you’d be in jail.” That threat unnerved both Republican and Democratic legal analysts.
When Mr. Obama took office, he and his first attorney general, Eric H. Holder Jr., also faced a decision over whether to investigate the previous administration.
This comparison is bizarre. The evidence of the Bush/Cheney administration breaking the law by embracing torture was very strong; the evidence related to Hillary Clinton’s email server management has already been scrutinized by the FBI, which saw no need to pursue charges. When Obama took office, the case against the previous administration remained an open question; as Trump takes office, Clinton’s email server will a five-year-old issue that’s already been resolved.
Similarly, for the Times to equate alleged war crimes with clumsy I.T. practices is plainly irresponsible.YouTube fans are shaking their heads in disbelief today, unable to come to terms with the fact that a rigorous system of doing absolutely nothing to prevent corrupt, unethical behaviour somehow failed to prevent corrupt, unethical behaviour.
With the revelation that a famous YouTube star deliberately failed to disclose their commercial arrangement with an external company or service, many are asking: why didn’t our system of zero checks and balances prevent this?
“I can’t understand how this happened,” sobbed one confused YouTube commenter. “I always assumed from their winning smile and quirky on-screen persona that they had been rigorously trained in journalistic ethics and were subject to intense scrutiny from an in-house legal department.”
“They told me over and over again that they were better than the mainstream media, that they were the future of journalism. Why would somebody exploit a zero-accountability platform for personal gain? Why?”
For their part, Google have committed to a program of zero reform, expressing their confidence that “no effort at all on our part” will fix the issue.
Ethical watchdog GamerGate expressed a reluctance to act when approached for comment, with a spokesegg explaining that “none of the people acting unethically were women, so we’ll be giving this one a pass”.Nicolas Roche and Dan Martin at last year’s Olympics; they’ve done a great interview with us on their lives away from racing their bikes.
By Gerard Cromwell
Irish cycling cousins Dan Martin and Nicolas Roche are on a break from training and racing at the moment so we decided to give them a break from cycling questions.
So we won’t be finding out about their respective Grand Tour stage wins this year but if you want to know which one of them maybe… possibly… but probably doesn’t, have Britney Spears on his ipod, or which one of them would win in a fight, read on!
GC: What’s your favourite football team?
DAN: “Dad always supported Birmingham City but they’re pretty crap now so it’s probably Barcelona as I live in Girona. Barcelona is the Catalan team, so as a Catalan resident, it’s definitely Barcelona.I’m actually going to watch Arsenal against Hull in a few weeks time at the Emirates because my management company manage a couple of the Arsenal players but I haven’t been to a match for ages. I remember going to see Kilmarnock playing somebody in the snow a few years ago, sitting in between Cav (Mark Cavendish) and Thor (Hushovd). That was an interesting experience. I think there were about four guys sent off.”
NICOLAS: “I used to support PSG as a kid, but I haven’t been to a game in ages. I don’t really have a favourite soccer team any more but I’ve been to a few Ireland rugby matches.”
GC: If you weren’t a cyclist what other sport would you like to do?
NICOLAS: “Rugby. I used to play for Blackrock College years ago and loved the game but I got injured and took up cycling. So I’d say rugby.”
DAN: “Probably motorcycling actually. I think a lot of people thought I was going to be a motorcyclist but we didn’t have enough money to be able to start doing that so I ended up on the other type of two wheels. But Dad was working in the industry for a long time and I started going to the British GP in 1993 or 1994 and loved the whole atmosphere there. All I ever did was play motorcycle racing games. I really loved the sport and still do to this day. I’ve got a scooter and I run around on that but I wouldn’t risk having a motorbike now. I’d probably kill myself.”
GC: What was the last non-cycling sporting event you were at?
DAN: “At the Olympics I managed to visit a lot of other sports. I went to basketball, badminton, swimming, diving… the men’s gymnastics was incredible. That was a fantastic experience, seeing those guys, what they could do. I managed to see six events in three days. I was at the F1 testing earlier this year in Catalunya too and was at Moto GP last year. I probably go to that quite often because I know a couple of the Spanish guys. Cal Crutchlow grew up about 10km from me but I never actually met him until this year. I know a couple of the superbike riders as well. It’s just a mutual respect I think. I think they’re crazy and they think I’m crazy and everyone loves cycling.”
NICOLAS: “I like motorcycling too. I’m friends with Irish superbike rider Eugene Laverty and he invited me to the superbike race in Monza in May. Eugene won a race there and it was a great day out.”
GC: What’s your favourite music and what do you listen to while warming up for a time trial?
DAN: “A bit of everything. I don’t really have a favourite. I have an eclectic mix of everything, apart from heavy rock, dance music to chill out stuff, Red Hot Chilli Peppers, Green Day, a full range. I actually need to get a playlist sorted for time trials. That’s probably why my time trial performances are so up and down, (laughs) because I listen to everything. If Britney Spears or something comes on… (laughs) I haven’t got Britney Spears on my ipod… but if it does, (laughs) that ruins my whole performance.”
NICO: “I don’t know if it’s the Irish thing, reminding me of home, but I really like U2. I have the words ‘with or without you’ tattooed on my arm. This year though I listened to the Tomorrowland 2012 album a lot before time trials.”
GC: What type of films do you watch on races?
DAN: “I stopped doing that this year at the Tour. Any free time I had, I spent with my eyes closed relaxing, just really switching off mentally. I watched very little TV this year. I think that’s what’s changed actually. I achieved a much higher level of focus and concentration around the race. As far as movies go, I watch the same movies over and over again, comedy mainly. I don’t take life too seriously. Serious movies, I can’t hack them. It’s Will Ferrell movies and stuff like that.”
NICOLAS: “This year on the Tour I was rooming with Roman Kreuziger and I don’t think we turned the telly on once. We just read books and car magazines and had a chat. I watched The Hobbitt about five times between the Tour and Vuelta though and on the bus one of the long transfers this year. That’s probably my favourite film at the moment.”
GC: What’s your guilty pleasure?
DAN: “It depends whether you’re talking food, drink or object. I like to enjoy all types of things but I’ve never felt guilty enjoying a nice glass of wine or a beer or any food. My scooter probably. I love my scooter. It’s so much fun. It’s one of the fastest 125 scooters you can buy, with a race exhaust and everything. It’s my little toy. It’s nice to have that but I don’t really feel guilty about anything. It’s everything in moderation really.”
NICOLAS: “I have a lot of guilty pleasures; (laughs) chocolate, clothes… anything with an engine. I also have a passion for watches. I only have three but they mark three very special occasions.”
GC: How would you describe your dress sense?
DAN:“It depends which side of the bed I get out of.” (laughs)
NICOLAS: “It depends what taste you have. Dan’s more into jeans and casual wear where I’m more into classic wear… shirts and suits.”
GC: Who has the best victory salute?
NICOLAS: “He’s practised a fair bit more than I have.” (laughs)
DAN: “I think you just do whatever comes into your head at the time. You don’t exactly train for it. Well, I don’t… do you?”
NICOLAS: “No… It’d be a waste of practice.” (laughs)
GC: Favourite place to train?
DAN: “I think we spend so much time away from home that being at home is where you want to be most.”
NICOLAS: “I think I agree with that. It might not be the best training place in the world but the fact that you’re at home makes it a bit more special.”
DAN: “The mountains here in Ireland are the best place in the world to ride when it’s sunny.”
NICOLAS: “Yeah, but you might only get three sunny days a year.” (laughs)
GC: You’ve both got leisure cycles, tell me a bit about them.
DAN: “I was fortunate to be invited to put my name on the DID Cycle 4 Life. I put very little effort into it and it’s great to see the little tiny kids turn up and see people benefit from the funds raised. There’s probably not one family in Ireland who hasn’t been in Temple Street Hospital, so it’s nice to be able to help those people.”
NICOLAS: “Sports people; we’re not successful businessmen or whatever, but we maybe have a little bit of influence to help attract people and help provide the funds for our charities. The fun riders like to go for a spin knowing that the money goes to a good cause. For me, it’s great that the Nicolas Roche Classic can support and help something like the Down Syndrome Centre this year.”
GC: What do you want to be when you grow up?
DAN: “Taller.” (laughs)
NICOLAS: “As a cyclist I don’t think you ever grow up. People say when you’re closer to 30 you start thinking about what you’re going to do later but we’re still thinking about what we’re going to do now. The better we do now, then maybe we will have more opportunities to do something later.”
GC: Since a guy dressed in a panda suit ran behind Dan in the final kilometre of Liege-Bastogne-Liege, he seems to be associated with pandas. What’s your favourite animal Nico?
NICOLAS: “I think Dan has a great thing going with the panda. It started off with a joke and now it’s gone global. I think it’s gone all over the world. That panda is the most famous guy in Belgium and nobody knows who he is. Maybe some day we’ll find out who was running behind him. I don’t really have an animal. I’ve been thinking about my own logo but I haven’t really found anything. Roche means rock in French but I don’t think I’m going to have a rock as my symbol.”
DAN: “I wouldn’t have had a panda if it wasn’t for that guy in Liege. You never know what’s going to happen. I’ve embraced it and I really noticed it when I went to the Tour of Beijing in China this year. The Chinese people suddenly, when there was a panda involved, thought ‘cycling is cool now’. It’s nice to have something like that. I have it on my t-shirts for Temple Street too, so that’s pretty cool.”
GC: What type of phone do you have?
DAN: “A blackberry with unlimited data.”
NICOLAS: “An iPhone with an expensive phone bill.”
GC: Do you use Twitter or Facebook?
DAN: “I go through phases on twitter. Sometimes I disappear, strike a few times and then disappear again. I don’t use Facebook. I kind of keep a check on it, but not much. It gets a bit out of control. What highlighted it to me was that people you don’t know can see your stuff. I have small cousins who add me to Facebook and it’s a little bit too… you don’t really want people to get involved with family. Twitter is a bit more impersonal.”
NICOLAS: “I’m the same. I have Facebook but it’s just friends from school and family. Sometimes you want to share something but just because you want to share your holiday photos with your family doesn’t mean you want to share it with the whole world. It’s none of their business. Now every time you do an update it cancels all your privacy settings so if you don’t think about it, for the first couple of days you get loads of messages and stuff from people who shouldn’t be able to message you.”
DAN (with a worried look on his face) “I didn’t know that!”
GC: Last question. Who’d win in a fight between you two?
NICOLAS: “In a fist fight? I think I’d have the advantage in that one.”
DAN: “Yeah, Nico, I’d say. I’ll let him have that one.”
AdvertisementPrice of little known seed has rocketed on new-found use as water thickener in controversial fracking process
There's no fracking in Rajasthan, but hydraulic fracturing (to give it is proper name) has drastically changed the landscape of one of the poorest places on earth.
India's biggest state is the world's number one producer of guar beans, a little known seed which is used to make ice cream and gives tomato ketchup its gloopiness, but which turns out to be integral to successful fracking.
Since fracking took off at the end of 2010 the price of guar, a bean of the Galactomannan family that can be used to thicken water in the drilling process, increased 15-fold to $25 (£15) a kilo this summer.
The massive price spike has proved a boon to Rajasthan's mostly hand-to-mouth guar farmers and convinced thousands of others to turn their land over to guar, which in Hindi means "cow's food" reflecting that until recently the vast majority was munched by bovines.
"It's a bit like sugar beet," says Malcolm Graham-Wood, an energy analyst at VSA Capital in London. "It was only really fed to animals, then someone found that you could put it into an oil well in Texas and it has rocketed [in price].
"You wouldn't expect to find it in fracking, and wouldn't expect it to be so important that half of US shale gas operations are going up [in cost] on the back of the shortage. But it is."
The oil industry was attracted to guar for its thickening properties that have long appealed to ice cream, yoghurt and toothpaste manufacturers.
Dennis Seisun, editor of the Quarterly Review of Food Hydrocolloids, substances that form a gel when added to water, explains that guar is used to thicken water to allow ceramic beads to be suspended in the liquid and injected into the ground at high pressure, which breaks up rocks allowing oil and gas to seep out.
"Now when they drill a hole they go sideways for a mile or two, and frack not once or twice but 10-15 times – that's what's led to the skyrocketing price," he says.
The US oil industry is expected to have bought 300,000 tonnes of Indian guar gum [which is made from grinding down the guar beans] this year – 75% of the country's total output. Demand was so strong over the summer that panic buying set in and prices were doubling week-by-week.
The price rise was so steep that giant US oilfield services company Halliburton was forced to issue a profit warning, cautioning investors that the rising cost of guar would hurt its profits because it had risen to represent 30% of its costs. Rival Baker Hughes also warned shareholders that the price was "horrific" and some wells were even forced to shutdown because they could not access enough guar.
The companies are so concerned about the volatile price, which has yo-yoed between $8-25 a kilo this year and currently stands at about $10 at auction, that they are moving resources into developing synthetic alternatives. Last month Halliburton's president of strategy and corporate development, Timothy Probert, moved to reassure analysts that the company had its alternative PermStim ready to go if guar prices reached the level they hit in the summer.
The high guar price is also affecting the food we eat because manufacturers have been priced out by oil groups. This year food companies are expected to account for just 20% of India's guar exports – a drop from near 100% less than five years ago.
"The food industry is beginning to realise just how good a deal they had for so long," Seisun says. "When prices were as low as $1 a kilo they were complaining when it went up by a few cents. Now it can double in a week."
Instead of guar gum, also known as E412, your toothpaste and tomato ketchup will be pumped full of other additives. Top of the list is Xanthan gum, E415, a m icrobial polysaccharide derived from the bacterial coat of Xanthomonas campestris, a plant bacteria. It is already a firm fixture in salad dressings and gluten-free baking. Other options include, Carboxymethyl cellulose (CMC), E466, a wood pulp already used in ice creams and K-Y Jelly, or the pods of Peru's Caesalpinia spinosa Kuntze tree (E417).
The least appealing-named alternative is locust bean gum, E410, which is already used as a food sweetener and chocolate substitute. "Forget what it sounds like, that's one of the more user friendly ones – it comes from the carob tree," Seisun says. "You eat all these things everyday – you've got no idea what they are, have you? Don't worry you're not going to die."
While the oil and food industries are losing out. Guar's sudden popularity has benefited hundreds of thousands of India's poorest people, many of whom have used their guar windfall to travel abroad for the first time or buy gold. "They had been growing it mostly just as animal feed, it really was the lowest yield of low yield crops," Graham-Wood says. "[Now] they must think it's Christmas every week."
When the price was approaching its peak this summer Vikas WSP, Rajasthan's biggest guar exporter, gave away 3,000 tonnes of guar seeds to encourage farmers to switch away from cotton and other crops to guar bushes.
But Seisun warns that farmers may not be able to attract as a high a price for their guar this coming year as they did last summer. "It's a game of Russian Guarlette," he says. "The buyers are not buying and the sellers are not selling. It will all depend on who blinks first."
A larger harvest of the crop, which is dependent on desert-like conditions with occasional monsoon rainfall, is likely to put the brakes on sky-high prices next year.
Rajasthan's farmers are also facing competition from other regions and countries trying to emulate their success. While Rajasthan still accounts for about three-quarters of global production, Pakistan is increasing its crop and guar farms have popped up in neighbouring Gujarat province, Africa, Australia and even the oil capital of the world, Texas.Last year, two journalists set up a complex and high-level sting against top Planned Parenthood executives; they took undercover video of their meetings with those executives. The videos stunned Americans with their graphic depictions of baby body parts and executives laughing and joking about sale of those baby body parts to research facilities.
Now a Harris County grand jury has indicted the real lawbreakers: the journalists.
David Daleiden and Sandra Merritt of California were charged by the grand jury with tampering with a governmental record, which could carry a sentence of 20 years in prison, as well as a misdemeanor charge of purchasing or selling baby body parts. “As I stated at the outset of this investigation, we must go where the evidence leads us,” explained Harris County District Attorney Devon Anderson, a Republican. “All the evidence uncovered in the course of this investigation was presented to the grand jury. I respect their decision on this difficult case.”
Nobody from Planned Parenthood was indicted. Governor Greg Abbott and Attorney General Ken Paxton have their own investigations against Planned Parenthood; those will continue.
The indictments against Daleiden and Merritt are ridiculous.
The tampering with a governmental record charge springs from Daleiden reportedly using a fake California ID to gain access to Planned Parenthood. “We know that they used fake IDs that had their real photographs but fake names and fake addresses purported to be issued by the State of California,” said the lawyer for Planned Parenthood.
This is absurd, given that in California, fake ID is a way of life for illegal immigrants as well as underage teens. The only people in human history prosecuted for this offense will apparently be undercover activists attempting to expose criminal activity. And this is precisely what Democrats have been calling for for months – in October of last year, Congressional Democrats demanded that California Attorney General Kamala Harris prosecute Daleiden on similar charges.
The second charge suggests that Daleiden, according to the Houston Chronicle, “went too far in trying to provoke Planned Parenthood to admit to selling tissue.” So, in other words, Planned Parenthood was actually willing to sell tissue to a fake company; the fake company had no intention of buying that tissue, and just wanted to expose Planned Parenthood’s willingness to sell. But the fake company is being charged with trying to obtain tissue.
It’s as though this grand jury has never heard of undercover journalism. As Daleiden told Life |
it stems from his experience as a rich Wall Street corporate takeover specialist. We can see this in a number of ways. It's clear that he's far more comfortable and less tongue-tied when talking about issues like taxes, regulation and economic policy than about contraception and abortion.
Moreover, his string of "gaffes"--from his whimsical offer of a $10,000 bet to former opponent Rick Perry, to mentioning that he likes to fire people, to joking about how his auto executive father tried to hide the fact that he closed down a plant in Michigan when running for governor of that state--shows that he inhabits the oblivious world of the arrogant super-rich.
In a revealing profile of Romney's politics culled from his campaign autobiography No Apology, the New Yorker's Louis Menand describes Romney's program for "restoring American greatness":
Who or what stands in the way of restoring American productivity and American greatness? Romney lists some of the usual suspects, including multiculturalism (a "fraud") and "the self-loathing of Western intellectuals" (an odd expression, since all the Western intellectuals I know think rather well of themselves). But readers of No Apology are likely to come away with the impression that the chief internal enemy the United States faces today is labor unions. Romney thinks that unions can sometimes work constructively with management but that, fundamentally, they are protectors of the status quo. They make it harder for the destroying part to work. This is why Romney opposed George Bush's efforts to protect the American steel industry by imposing a tariff on imports, and it's why he opposed the Detroit bailout. Actions like those interfere with the natural business process in the name of saving American jobs... That way might be called Darwinian, except that in Romney's universe the organisms that struggle to adapt, survive, and reproduce are not individuals. They're firms.
This helps explain why Romney may be clumsy when discussing "social issues," but has had no hesitation in advocating a radical tax-cutting plan, embracing the austerity budget proposal of Republican Rep. Paul Ryan, and praising Wisconsin Gov. Scott Walker and Ohio Gov. John Kasich for their open attacks on unions and public-sector workers.
With the election still more likely to be fought on the question of the economy than on social issues, Romney's economic program shows the true depth of his extremism--or, more correctly, the right flank of neoliberal big business politics today.
NO DOUBT, the AFL-CIO and other unions--the chief backbone of Democratic Party get-out-the-vote operations in states around the country--have taken note of Romney's stands. They see themselves in his gun sights. And already, they're lining up behind Barack Obama and the Democrats--regardless of how little they've gained from the Obama administration.
For the White House, this is the best of all worlds. The Republican candidate will give Democratic base organizations plenty of reason to vote against Romney, and this will allow the Democrats the opportunity to escape from having to offer any reason to vote for them. And the White House, which is more interested in arranging a big-business endorsed "grand bargain" to cut entitlement programs than any other priority, can position itself to do just that.
As consumer advocate and former independent presidential candidate Ralph Nader put it in an "open letter" to AFL-CIO President Richard Trumka, criticizing the AFL-CIO's endorsement of Obama:
[W]hat did you receive for millions of American workers in your early, blanket endorsement of Mr. Obama? No wonder he can get away with giving the trade union movement and unorganized workers the back of his hand. You have unnecessarily allowed him to believe that you have nowhere to go. This is another way of saying that the Republicans, by being worse than the bad Democrats, are holding the American labor movement hostage to the corporatist Democratic Party.
As always the politics of the "lesser evil," the Democrats can win support for austerity measures from austerity's victims just because they aren't as "extreme" as the Republicans. But a lesser evil is still an evil.Psystar, the company Apple’s suing for illegally selling non-Apple hardware running OS X, issued a statement yesterday announcing that it had hired a new law firm, and that they’re looking forward to answering Apple’s legal challenges head on.
Included in the statement is an attempt by Psystar to defend its actions.
Everyone here values openness. And that’s how we’re going to fight Apple: in public. We have nothing to hide. We buy hundreds of copies of OS X legally, from retailers like Amazon and Apple itself. We’re probably one of Apple’s biggest customers. Then we install these copies of OS X, along with kernel extensions that we wrote in-house, on computers that we buy and build. Then we resell the package to people like you. That’s it.
Well when you put it that way, it doesn’t really seem like Psystar is doing anything wrong at all. But Psystar’s telling of the story is overly simplistic, if not purposefully misleading.
Psystar supporters argue that software purchasers have the right to do anything they want with legally purchased programs. So if someone wants to put OS X on a PC, or sell the install disc on eBay, or even use use the OS X install disc as a coaster for a Steve Ballmer mug, there’s nothing Apple can legally do to stop them. And you know what, that’s 100% true.
The difference is that Psystar isn’t a 16 year old kid toying around in his basement with OS X and a Dell Mini 9 – it’s a corporation intent on making a profit by selling modified versions of OS X on PC’s. Psystar isn’t a “user”, it’s a re-seller, and as such, it’s roped in by certain laws that simply don’t apply to a guy off the street who picks up a copy of Leopard at Best Buy.
Psystar’s actions damage Apple’s brand, and is essentially false advertising
Imagine going into a bookstore and buying a copy of Harry Potter. After finishing the book a few hours later, you realize that you weren’t that big a fan of the ending. So being the creative type, you write up and print out an entirely new ending, take out the last 50 pages from the original and replace them with your newly written prose. Now imagine setting up a website and selling the new copy by touting the fact that it provides the full Harry Potter experience, but with more action than the original. Now imagine purchasing 10,000 copies of Harry Potter from surrounding bookstores, changing the ending on all of them, and selling them nationwide in order to make an easy profit.
That’s essentially what Psystar is doing with OS X, so you can’t really argue that they can do whatever they want with purchased software when they’re modifying it to their own liking, and selling the new product on a massive scale as an Apple OS X experience. The fact is that it isn’t an Apple OS X experience, a fact evidenced in a number of hands-on reviews of Psystar’s systems.
The Mac OS is tightly integrated with Apple’s hardware in order to produce an optimal user experience. Psystar’s modified version of OS X might run on a PC, but it just doesn’t provide the same polish and user experience as Apple products. Just because Psystar claims it does doesn’t make it true.
A Psystar computer is essentially a modified version of Harry Potter. It might say Harry Potter on the cover, and the first few chapters may indeed be spot on, but taken as a whole, it’s a subpar version of the original.
Admittedly, the above synopsis doesn’t take into account the full-breadth of legal arguments that will arise when litigation begins in a few months, but it serves to illustrate how misleading and simplistic Psystar’s statements truly are.
Psystar likes to advertise itself as the little guy taking on a big evil corporation, but the truth is that it’s a corporation looking to make a quick buck off of the hard work of others. It’s as simple as that.Elsa, Anna, Rapunzel, and Kairi make up four of the new Princesses of Heart. Come theorise who the last three Princesses will be!
Details Published on June 18, 2015 @ 10:58 am Written by Joey
French website Gameblog were lucky to interview Tetsuya Nomura who is currently working on both Kingdom Hearts 3 and Final Fantasy VII Remake. Recently Kingdom Hearts 3 had it's development moved to Unreal Engine 4, and with Final Fantasy VII's remake announced, some were worried that development on both titles will be strained.
Gameblog asked Nomura about this, to which he confirmed that both titles are being developed by two separate teams, therefore no interference between the two schedules should occur. He also said that Kingdom Hearts 3 is at a relatively advanced level of development, and development won't take his time away from Final Fantasy VII.
@reishikii has kindly translated parts of the article and provided a summary for us!
Tetsuya Nomura himself says that he wants to take a different approach with the gameplay. The biggest challenge for him is to change the elements of FFVII without denaturing the original game. He thinks some aspects of the game needs to be evolved, like the design of the characters. He then says that he'll be able to work on both KHIII and FFVII as a director and that the two games are developed by two different teams. At last, Tetsuya Nomura says since there are two different teams working on KHIII and FFVII Remake, neither of the two games will be delayed. KHIII is relatively advanced while the FFVII Remake is at the early stages of development.
No doubt this just refers to Kingdom Hearts 3 being further along in development than Final Fantasy VII Remake, however with the recent news of Disney working closely to ensure that the Disney worlds in Kingdom Hearts 3 are faithfully recreated, maybe it's almost time for full promotion of the game to start?
Disney working closely with Square Enix to create Kingdom Hearts 3 has been mentioned a few times. Nomura himself mentioned it in the interview with Engadget:
Compared to previous titles that we folded into Kingdom Hearts, we have a lot of creators still alive. The process of gaining approvals then is pretty different. Because the animation studios are actively involved, we want to polish up anything we meet to the standards we demand, before taking it to Disney to approval.
Then there was Nomura revealing he's just talked to Disney about what world to reveal next, and that it might be soon!
Nomura just met with Disney about what world they could announce after Tangled; they might be able to announce the next official world in Kingdom Hearts 3 soon!
And finally we have Greg Coleman, VP, Worldwide Marketing and Franchise Management for Walt Disney Animation Studios and Roy Conli, Producer of Tangled at Walt Disney Animation Studios announcing during the Tangled reveal that;
Coleman: "We're working with the best animated story tellers, and the best game developers in the world to put this out." Conli: "And I'm incredibly proud because this is my film, the film that I produced, that I love, is going to be the first one in a series, it's called Tangled. We have this amazing partnership between Square Enix and Disney and the fact that Square Enix is really trying to bring it to life with the same integrity that we brought it to life with. It's going to be cool."
What's your take on the information? Think we'll be seeing Kingdom Hearts 3 next year or does it need some more time in the oven?Everybody loves tacos, and maybe that’s because the definition of “taco” is pretty loose: put some stuff in some sort of shell, and you’re good to go. Traditionally meat has taken center stage in the taco filling department, but there are lots of ways to make satisfying meatless tacos you’ll want to eat for every meal.
Eggs
Just as tacos aren’t just for dinner, eggs aren’t just for breakfast. They’re an easy, protein-packed taco base that can be combined with whatever you have on hand. Just scramble them up, and add spices and toppings. BBQ Breakfast Tacos from A Little Rosemary and Time combine hearty eggs with mushrooms for tacos you can have morning, noon or night.
Lentils & Beans
Beans and lentils alike are filling, nutritious ways to get more tacos in your life. Go raw with Heat-Free Lentil and Walnut Tacos, or try the Greens and Beans Tacos recipe (with fresh guac!) recipe pictured above. Simply cook lentils or beans as you normally would, and add whatever spices you like (think cumin and chili powder). Chickpeas, pintos and black beans work especially well. Slow Cooker Smoky Refried Black Beans make a great tostada base or taco filling.
Tempeh & Tofu
If you’re going for a ground beef-esque taco texture, you can’t go wrong with tempeh. It crumbles beautifully, and absorbs whatever spices or sauces you add to it. This traditional-ish Tempeh Taco recipe from Betty Goes Vegan (pictured above) is super easy and is lovely topped with guacamole, hot sauce, vegan cheese or whatever fixins you have on hand. Scrambled tofu can be used in place of eggs for breakfast tacos, or battered and fried (a la fish tacos) in these sweet and savory Beer-Battered Tofu Tacos with Mango Salsa. Make sure to slice the tofu thinly for optimal texture.
“Meaty” veggies
Mushrooms, butternut squash and sweet potatoes all have a “meaty” texture that makes them perfect for taco filling. Cut into strips or large chunks, then roast or sauté and pile on the toppings. Make sure to drain any extra veggie liquid before loading up your tortilla, though.poster="http://v.politico.com/images/1155968404/201608/1031/1155968404_5088647205001_5088635659001-vs.jpg?pubId=1155968404" true Newt rips 'junk medicine' worries about Clinton health
Newt Gingrich dismissed outright as "junk medicine" on Thursday theories about Hillary Clinton's state of health and treatment, after board-certified internist and media personality Drew Pinsky speculated that the Democratic nominee is not receiving a proper level of care.
The former speaker of the House and Donald Trump ally responded on "Fox & Friends" after the show played a clip of Pinsky speaking Tuesday on KABC Radio's McIntyre in the Morning. In that segment, Pinsky said he was "gravely concerned" about Clinton's health, noting her doctor's 2015 assessment that showed a "1950 level sort of care" by the evaluation of himself and a colleague.
Story Continued Below
Clinton, Pinsky remarked, is being treated for her hypothyroidism with "Armour Thyroid, which is very unconventional and something that we used to use in the 1960s."
"Then she falls and hits her head and as a complication of that has a transverse sinus thrombosis," Pinsky said, in reference to Clinton's 2012 medical episode. "This is an exceedingly rare clot. I have only seen one in my career. It just seems like she's getting care from somebody that she met in Arkansas when she was a kid and I just -- you gotta wonder. You got to wonder. It's not so much that her health is a grave concern, it's that the care she's getting could make it a concern."
Clinton's internist, based in Mount Kisco, New York, released the statement on the candidate's health in July 2015.
"Well, I think first of all, just to get down to the human level for a second, all of us ought to include Hillary Clinton in our prayers. You can be opposed to somebody without hoping they have bad health and I hope that she's all right," Gingrich responded. "Second, I’m always dubious, with all due respect to television doctors, when you have a doctor who has never seen the patient, begin to give you a complicated, fancy sounding analysis based on what? I mean, I would be very cautious and I would recommend to doctors for professional reasons to be very cautious deciding you’re going to start analyzing people. Because next you're gonna get a left-wing psychiatrist explaining Donald Trump in negative terms."
Co-host Steve Doocy responded, "Well they already have that."
"I think we ought to recognize that's kind of junk medicine," Gingrich said. "That’s not the real deal."
Trump himself has made repeated references to Clinton's "mental and physical stamina," which the Clinton campaign has criticized as "deranged conspiracy theories." Fox News host Sean Hannity has raised theories about Clinton's health as well, drawing the ire of CNN's Brian Stelter who denounced the "reckless speculation." Hannity, in particular, recently showed a clip of Clinton moving her head in an abrupt, jerking motion when speaking to a group of reporters. Hannity then asked whether Clinton had a stroke or a seizure, leading Associated Press reporter Lisa Lerer, who was present at the time, to firmly deny those allegations.A 19-year-old was placed on 15 years of probation and told to stay away from Facebook and underage girls after raping a 12-year-old at a friend’s house last year in St. Paul.
Ramsey County District Judge Gary Bastian also sentenced Steven Pierre Williams to 354 days in jail but gave him credit for the 354 days he served in the case following his arrest, according to court records.
Williams’ probation comes with a long list of conditions, including registering as a sex offender, undergoing counseling or treatment services recommended by probation, and avoiding contact with minor girls unless supervised or approved by the court.
He also is banned from visiting pornographic websites and from using online dating services or social media unless he obtains written approval from his probation officer.
Williams pleaded guilty in July to one count of first-degree criminal sexual conduct after DNA evidence connected him to the rape of a 12-year-old girl at a St. Paul home in April 2016. Related Articles February 26, 2019 Minneapolis woman whose husband beat, sexually abused daughters sentenced for neglect
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A 17-year-old also was charged in the case and later convicted and sentenced.
The girl, now 14, was sexually assaulted after she was driven to a house on Albemarle Street in St. Paul and taken to the basement, described as “messy” and strewn with beer cans and cigar wrappers, according to the criminal complaint.
Once there, the girl told police that the 17-year-old’s friends pulled her pants down and he raped her.
Williams, whose DNA profile matched that of a sample collected during the victim’s sexual assault examination, told police he was at the house for a “get-together” that evening and asked the girl for oral sex but she refused, the complaint said.
He initially claimed he didn’t touch the girl but later said he “had sex with her for eight seconds … and went back upstairs where he shot dice,” but that she “was OK” with it, charges said.
The victim said the assault continued until a woman came downstairs, began yelling at the males and walked her out of the home before instructing her to call the police.
The other teen was sentenced to 12 to 18 months at the Minnesota Correctional Facility-Red Wing for male juveniles.Documentary series. This World reveals evidence that challenges the accepted story of one of the most horrifying events of the late 20th century, the Rwandan genocide.
Twenty years on from the Rwandan genocide, This World reveals evidence that challenges the accepted story of one of the most horrifying events of the late 20th century. The current president of Rwanda, Paul Kagame, has long been portrayed as the man who brought an end to the killing and rescued his country from oblivion. Now there are increasing questions about the role of Kagame's Rwandan Patriotic Front forces in the dark days of 1994 and in the 20 years since.
The film investigates evidence of Kagame's role in the shooting down of the presidential plane that sparked the killings in 1994 and questions his claims to have ended the genocide. It also examines claims of war crimes committed by Kagame's forces and their allies in the wars in the Democratic Republic of Congo and allegations of human rights abuses in today's Rwanda.
Former close associates from within Kagame's inner circle and government speak out from hiding abroad. They present a very different portrait of a man who is often hailed as presiding over a model African state. Rwanda's economic miracle and apparent ethnic harmony has led to the country being one of the biggest recipients of aid from the UK. Former prime minister Tony Blair is an unpaid adviser to Kagame, but some now question the closeness of Mr Blair and other western leaders to Rwanda's president.The top PML-N leadership on Saturday made it clear that the ruling party will not accept the findings of the joint investigation team (JIT) charged with the Panamagate probe if the statements of a former Qatari prime minister are not made part of the report.
This was said in a press conference jointly addressed by Defence Minister Khawaja Asif, Railways Minister Khawaja Saad Rafique, Petroleum Minister Shahid Khaqan Abbasi and Minister for Planning and Development Ahsan Iqbal.
In the past, Mark Siegel’s statement was recorded in the Benazir Bhutto murder case while he wasn’t in Pakistan, why can the same not be done in the case of the former Qatari PM, argued the defence minister.
The joint press conference focused on the proceedings of the JIT which, has been probing the Sharif family's business dealings abroad. During the press conference, the PML-N ministers repeatedly raised questions on the functioning of the JIT and expressed reservations on the process of investigation.
Khawaja Asif said that those behind repressing the investigation are not doing it based on the law but because "a dice has been rolled against us".
He said Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif, Punjab Chief Minister Shahbaz Sharif, Hassan Nawaz, Hussain Nawaz and Maryam Nawaz have all presented themselves before the joint investigation team.
The defence minister said that the original jurisdiction of investigation of the companies owned by Sharifs lies with the countries where these companies were formed.
"It is interesting that neither Saudi Arabia nor the United Kingdom has raised any questions regarding the companies, but there is a hue and cry about them in Pakistan," Asif said.
Ahsan Iqbal said that PML-N leaders were political people and respected the rule of law, and believed that the right to rule lay with the 220 million people of the country.
PML-N leaders address a press conference. —APP
He also demanded that the JIT proceedings be made public. "The video of what was asked and answered should be shown to the people," he said.
Railways Minister Saad Rafique said that an impression was given that the Federal Investigation Agency was going to head the JIT, but “recently there have been rumors that the JIT is being controlled by the members of intelligence agencies within the team”.
The minister said that the Sharif family was treated like common thieves and criminals without any proof against them. “But no one is ready to tell us where the theft took place.”
If years-old accounts are audited, many political families would find themselves in trouble, he maintained.
Questioning monetary 'irregularities' by Imran Khan
Khawaja Asif questioned that, "Has anyone asked Imran Khan how his ex-wife sent him money through a cousin? Why was a JIT not formed to probe that matter?"
The defence minister claimed that he had warned in October 2012 that "Imran had invested zakat money in Paris and put it in personal bank accounts."Abortion clinic buffer zones: Sex Party MP's bill proposes'safe access' to prevent women being 'harassed' by protesters
Updated
New laws creating buffer zones around abortion clinics will be debated in the Victorian Parliament this week amid concerns about religious protesters harassing women as they enter the facilities.
Key points: Bill seeks to establish 150m "safe access zone" around clinics
Protestors said laws remove right for peaceful activity
Rachel Carling-Jenkins is concerned over bill's tough penalties
Fiona Patten says bill concerns medical privacy
The bill, introduced by Sex Party MP Fiona Patten, seeks to establish a 150-metre "safe access zone" around clinics offering abortions to keep protesters away from patients.
It proposes fines and even jail terms for repeat offenders.
Footage supplied to the ABC by pro-choice campaigners showed what some women are faced with when they arrive at the Fertility Control Clinic in East Melbourne.
A female protester was seen blocking a woman from leaving her car after she pulled up outside the clinic, speaking quietly to her as the clinic's security guard tried to intervene.
[The protester's] behaviour can be quite like stalking, so they will walk behind someone in their space, they will go up to the car and make it difficult for them to get out of their car. Dr Susie Allanson, East Melbourne Fertility Control Clinic
The male security guard told the woman in the car: "Madam, I will escort you in, I work here."
As the woman left the car, a female voice could be heard saying: "Don't kill your baby."
Another clip showed a protester stopping a couple on the street as they approached the clinic.
Ms Patten said the footage was a clear example of the kind of harassment women face from the protesters, called Helpers of God's Precious Infants.
"There are these types of behaviour going across Victoria, across Australia, and it's time for it to stop," she said.
"If this had been for any other medical procedure we wouldn't have allowed it."
Dr Susie Allanson from the Fertility Control Clinic said the protesters could have a serious impact on some of the women who attend the clinic.
"Most women will find it unsettling, but those who are resilient will be able to get over that quickly. Other women can be very distressed by it," she said.
"Their (the protester's) behaviour can be quite like stalking, so they will walk behind someone in their space, they will go up to the car and make it difficult for them to get out of their car.
"They can film patients sometimes. Generally it's just very distressing and confronting."
Dr Allanson said the "buffer zone" laws would mean women could be dropped off in a car, or get off a tram, without having to run the gauntlet of protesters.
Bill will 'criminalise peaceful activities'
Opponents of the bill said it was an attempt to muzzle a group in the community that has legitimate views about abortion.
Members of the Helpers of God's Precious Infants are outside the East Melbourne clinic six days a week and also picket other abortion clinics in suburban Melbourne and regional Victoria.
It will criminalise peaceful activities. We could be jailed for peacefully praying, singing, displaying a poster or handing out a pamphlet. Statement from Helpers of God's Precious Infants
The protesters had a win last week when a bid by the clinic to force the City of Melbourne to remove the group from the footpath was dismissed by the Supreme Court.
The group declined to be interviewed by the ABC, but in a statement said the proposed laws would remove their right to take part in peaceful activity.
"The aim of the bill is to prevent women from hearing about the assistance we can give," the statement said.
"It will criminalise peaceful activities. We could be jailed for peacefully praying, singing, displaying a poster or handing out a pamphlet.
"The Helpers' pro-life advocacy has, over the past 22 years, helped save the lives of over 300 babies.
"It is these women who will be most affected by this proposed law, as they will be deprived of the choice of even knowing about the help we can give.
"There are other laws that they could use against us; they don't use them because they could not prove — in a court of law — any wrongdoing on our part."
Upper House MP has free speech concerns
Democratic Labour MP Rachel Carling-Jenkins will vote against the legislation.
She said she had serious concerns about the way it was drafted, and the tough penalties it proposed.
"People have the right to protest, and they have the right to that freedom of speech everywhere, it doesn't matter what the subject is," she said.
"We need to note that at the moment the bill covers all reproductive health centres, so that means pharmacies, hospitals, GP clinics, anything.
"It's a very, very broad bill as it stands now."
Ms Carling-Jenkins said she did not believe protesters outside the East Melbourne Clinic harassed women or blocked access to the facility, and said claims they did were misleading and defamatory.
"Pro-life protesters do not get in the way of a woman accessing the clinic," she said.
"They do not block her way, they do not block her exit out of a car."
Ms Patten said the bill had nothing to do with the issue of abortion and was about protecting medical privacy.
"They can protest down the middle of Bourke Street, but let's just not allow intimidation and harassment around a medical clinic," she said.
Hoping for parliamentary support
Ms Patten said she was hopeful the bill would pass in some form, even if it was amended.
The Greens will support the bill, but it was unclear how the two major parties will vote.
The Liberal Party will decide this week whether to allow a conscience vote on the bill, after Opposition Leader Matthew Guy indicated he was supportive of the proposal.
The Labor Government is yet to decide how it will vote.
"I'm confident that the majority of MPs want to support it, should support it, and I'm hopeful that they will support it," Ms Patten said.
"After 20 years of fighting for some form of medical privacy, some form of safe access into these clinics, I'm hopeful that will eventuate."
Topics: abortion, reproduction-and-contraception, activism-and-lobbying, east-melbourne-3002
First postedLeGarrette Blount couldn’t make it through the holiday season without ending up on Roger Goodell’s naughty list.
The New England Patriots running back received a $18,231 fine for ripping the helmet off Miami Dolphins defensive tackle Ndamukong Suh, according to USA TODAY’s Tom Pelissero.
Other fines: LeGarrette Blount $18,231 for ripping off Suh's helmet, $12,154 for Davante Adams crossbar dunk, $0 for Aqib Talib chain snatch — Tom Pelissero (@TomPelissero) January 6, 2017
Blount and Suh got into a scuffle late in the Patriots’ 35-14 win over the Miami Dolphins on Sunday. Blount later admitted he was fed up with Suh, and called Suh out after the game.
“There’s not many guys in this league like that guy. He’s a dirty player. He’s always been a dirty player,” Blount said Sunday in a one-on-one interview with WBZ-TV in Boston. “There’s no room in the game for that. At some point in time, guys have to defend themselves when he’s doing the things that he does.”
Suh, however, was not fined for the incident with Blount — or for laying out center David Andrews on an absurd encouragement play. Jarvis Landry, however, did receive a pair of fines for unsportsmanlike conduct.
Related Rob Gronkowski doppelgänger Matt Lengel is nothing like GronkWatching ominous super-storm developments over large East Coast areas, we can only wonder if and how this will impact the close-at-hand election outcome. Yet one influence is entirely predictable. These circumstances will tend to distract lots of public attention away from that other catastrophe, the Obama administration’s scandalous bungling of the entire Benghazi security and response debacle. On the other hand, the mainstream media never seemed to regard Benghazi as a subject warranting much interest anyway.
To ignore the relevance of what happened in Benghazi before, during and after the attacks that killed Libyan Ambassador Chris Stevens and three other American patriots represents a shameful abdication of journalistic responsibility. If there was understandable press confusion in the beginning, thanks largely to calculated and repeated misstatements from our top government officials, devastating evidence now exists that they have been routinely, perhaps often willingly, deceived.
The White House and State Department have never been pressed to fully explain the lack of security provided in the wake of previous assaults on our consulate, a mortar attack on the British ambassador, closures of other embassies in the region, evacuation of Red Cross personnel, and repeated denials by the State Department of requests issued by Ambassador Stevens and others for more protection. We are assured only that we will find out more about who is responsible in due time when lengthy investigations are completed…after the election.
In other words, the State Department doesn’t yet know who made those decisions, or why? And no one bothered to tell the president or vice president that the consulate had requested additional protection…not even weeks later when Joe Biden disclaimed any awareness of the matter during his debate?
We were then asked to believe that the administration was acting in good faith when they steadfastly parroted a story that the carefully planned attack on the 9/11 anniversary was a spontaneous mob action precipitated by an obscure anti-Muslim video when absolutely no protest activity had been observed in that vicinity all day. And now, after we know that real-time intelligence reports received during the deadly attack contradict those claims, the press continues to let lying dogs sleep undisturbed.
But here’s the really big and smelly whopper we’ve been served. This one comes from our defense secretary who was present with the president in the Oval Office when all hell was breaking loose; when real-time videos and emails were being received revealing dire circumstances as they unfolded; when three desperate cries for military help were received; and when fighter jets launched from our from military base in Sigonella, Italy could have been in Benghazi in an hour, and Special Operations Forces could have provided aid in three hours. Secretary Leon Panetta now tells us: “[The] basic principle is that you don’t deploy forces into harm’s way without knowing what’s going on; without real-time information.”
Huh? Hadn’t the administration already put our people in harm’s way… without adequate protection, no less? Wasn’t evidence of that harm abundantly evident? Didn’t all those people in the Oval Office and White House Situation Room, including Obama the bin Laden slayer, have a very good real-time idea exactly what was going on…and with the attack lasting seven hours, a lot of time to do something about it? And, by the way, wasn’t that consulate site under U.S. territorial sovereignty that the president is sworn, as his first duty, to defend?
Former Navy Seals Tyrone Woods and Glen Doherty clearly understood their first duty, and they died performing it. After being ordered by Washington “leaders” to “stand down”, they wasted no time successfully rushing to the defense of others. Woods was later found next to his bloody machine gun, killed by a mortar launched from that same site he had targeted for an airborne hit. Yes, both died fighting six hours after the attack began while awaiting calls for help that never came.
Doesn’t all of this warrant some serious inquiry? If the mainstream media thinks not, then they have lots of explaining to do as well.A solved Kakuro puzzle.
Kakuro is a number puzzle that is a bit like a combination between Sudoku and a crossword puzzle. Imagine a crossword puzzle where, instead of words, blocks of boxes are filled with combinations of digits between 1 and 9, and instead of clues about words, you are given sums that a block of digits must add up to.
When you’re solving a Kakuro puzzle, it’s helpful to be able to generate all the combinations of m different digits that add up to a given sum. A recent thread on the julia-users mailing list considered how to implement this task efficiently on a computer.
In this post, I’d like to show a progression of a few different implementations of the solution of this same problem. I think the progression shows off one of Julia’s core strengths: in a single language, you are free to think in either a high level way that is close to your problem domain and easy to prototype, or a low level way that pays more attention to the details of efficient machine execution. I don’t know any other system that even comes close to making it as easy to switch back and forth between these modes as Julia does.
Attention Conservation Notice: If you’re looking for information on how to solve Kakuro with a computer, you should probably look elsewhere. This post is a deep dive into a tiny, tiny subproblem. On the other hand, I’ll show how to speed up the solution of this tiny, tiny subproblem by a factor of either ten thousand or a million, depending how you count, so if that sounds fun you’re in the right place.
Step 1: Recursive enumeration
The original solution presented by Patrick Useldinger is based on the following decomposition of the problem:
Suppose, for example, that we want to find a set of 4 different digits between 1 and 9 that sum to 12. Each answer will either include 1 along with 3 other digits between 2 and 9 that sum to 11, or else it won’t include 1, but will instead include 4 digits between 2 and 9 that sum to 12.
In general, a set of m different digits between p and 9 that sum to s either contains p along with a subset of m-1 digits between p+1 and 9 that sum to s-p, or it doesn’t contain p and instead contains m digits between p+1 and 9 that sum to s. In either case, we’ve turned one problem into two new problems with digits drawn from smaller ranges. Like any good recursive algorithm, we’re expressing the solution to the original problem as a simple combination of the solution to successively simpler problems.
To turn this insight into code, we need to make a few choices:
How will we represent and combine the solutions to subproblems? In what order will we solve the subproblems, and how will we keep track of where we are in this order.
Early discussion focused on point (1), and the relative merits of storing the solution digit sets in a Set, a Vector, or a linked list.
Here’s an example that stores digit sets as a vector of integers, and organizes the process of enumerating solutions as a recursive depth-first search.
function decompose_rec ( sum, m ) # Container to hold all solutions solutions = Vector { Int }[] # Container to hold digits in a single solution partial_solution = Int [] lower = 1 upper = 9 decompose_rec! ( solutions, partial_solution, sum, m, |
2] grant suffrage to non-landowning males, and establish free public education.
The constitution was adopted on July 8, 1777, at the tavern in Windsor now known as the Old Constitution House and administered as a state historic site. The constitution consisted of three main parts. The first was a preamble reminiscent of the United States Declaration of Independence:
It is absolutely necessary, for the welfare and safety of the inhabitants of this State, that it should be, henceforth, a free and independent State; and that a just, permanent, and proper form of government, should exist in it, derived from, and founded on, the authority of the people only, agreeable to the direction of the honorable American Congress.
(Here the term "American Congress" refers to the Continental Congress.)
Dr. Jonas Fay was a delegate to the convention; he was named chairman of the committee appointed to draft the declaration announcing the creation of the Vermont Republic, and received credit as the document's primary author.[3]
Chapter 1 [ edit ]
The second part of the 1777 constitution was Chapter 1, a "Declaration of the Rights of the Inhabitants of the State of Vermont." This chapter was composed of 19 articles guaranteeing various civil and political rights in Vermont:
The first article declared that "all men are born equally free and independent, and have certain natural, inherent and unalienable rights, amongst which are the enjoying and defending life and liberty; acquiring, possessing and protecting property, and pursuing and obtaining happiness and safety," echoing the famous phrases in the Declaration of Independence that declared that "all men are created equal" and possess "inalienable rights," including "life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness." The article went on to declare that because of these principles, "no male person, born in this country, or brought from over sea, ought to be holden by law, to serve any person, as a servant, slave or apprentice, after he arrives to the age of twenty-one Years, nor female, in like manner, after she arrives to the age of eighteen years, unless they are bound by their own consent." While this was the first such partial ban on slavery in the New World, it was not strongly enforced [2] [4] and slavery in the state persisted for at least another sixty years. [5] See also History of slavery in Vermont.
declared that "all men are born equally free and independent, and have certain natural, inherent and unalienable rights, amongst which are the enjoying and defending life and liberty; acquiring, possessing and protecting property, and pursuing and obtaining happiness and safety," echoing the famous phrases in the Declaration of Independence that declared that "all men are created equal" and possess "inalienable rights," including "life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness." The article went on to declare that because of these principles, "no male person, born in this country, or brought from over sea, ought to be holden by law, to serve any person, as a servant, slave or apprentice, after he arrives to the age of twenty-one Years, nor female, in like manner, after she arrives to the age of eighteen years, unless they are bound by their own consent." While this was the first such partial ban on slavery in the New World, it was not strongly enforced and slavery in the state persisted for at least another sixty years. See also History of slavery in Vermont. The second article declared that "private property ought to be subservient to public uses, when necessity requires it; nevertheless, whenever any particular man's property is taken for the use of the public, the owner ought to receive an equivalent in money." This established the basic principles of eminent domain in Vermont.
declared that "private property ought to be subservient to public uses, when necessity requires it; nevertheless, whenever any particular man's property is taken for the use of the public, the owner ought to receive an equivalent in money." This established the basic principles of eminent domain in Vermont. The third article established freedom of religion.
The fourth through seventh articles subordinated the government to the interests of the people.
The eighth article gave all freemen the right to vote (even if they owned no property).
The ninth article said that since everyone has a right to be protected in his life, liberty, and property, that he ought to contribute his share to the expense of that protection.
The tenth through thirteenth articles concerned due process of law.
The fourteenth and fifteenth articles concerned freedom of speech, freedom of the press, the right to bear arms, and the subordination of the military to the civil power.
The seventeenth article recognizes a right to emigrate.
The eighteenth article recognizes rights of assembly and petition.
The nineteenth article says no one should be liable to be transported from Vermont to any other place to be tried for offenses committed in Vermont.
Chapter 2 [ edit ]
Chapter 2 of the Constitution is called A Plan or Frame of Government.
Sections I through IV of Chapter 2 provide that "THE COMMONWEALTH or STATE of VERMONT, shall be governed, hereafter, by a Governor, Deputy Governor, Council, and an Assembly of the Representatives of the Freemen of the same". It vests executive power in the governor and council, and legislative power in the House of Representatives, and requires a court of justice to be established in every county.
Section V prescribes universal military training.
Section VI says every man at least 21 years old (even those not owning property) may vote if they take an oath promising to vote consistently with the interests of the state of Vermont. (The Vermont voter's oath is still required today for first-time voters when they register. None of the other states require an oath of voters.)
Sections VII through IX and XI through XVI provide for annual election of legislators and annual legislative sessions.
Section X says the legislature is to elect delegates to the Continental Congress. (However, the Continental Congress refused to recognize the independence of Vermont and to allow it representation.)
Sections XVII and XVIII deal with the powers of the governor and council, in particular making the governor the commander-in-chief of the military.
Sections XXI through XXVI deal with courts of law, in particular the supreme court and the courts of common pleas.
Chapter 2 continues through 44 Sections.
1786 Constitution [ edit ]
The 1786 Constitution of Vermont established a greater separation of powers than what had prevailed under the 1777 Constitution. In particular, it forbade anyone to simultaneously hold more than one of certain offices: governor, lieutenant-governor, judge of the supreme court, treasurer of the state, member of the governor's council, member of the legislature, surveyor-general, or sheriff.[6] It also provided that the legislature could no longer function as a court of appeals nor otherwise intervene in cases before the courts, as it had often done.
The 1786 Constitution continued in effect when, in 1791, Vermont made the transition from independence to the status of one of the states of the Union. In particular, the governor, the members of the governor's council, and other officers of the state, including judges in all courts, simply continued their terms of office that were already underway.
1793 Constitution [ edit ]
The 1793 Constitution was adopted two years after Vermont's admission to the Union and continues in effect, with various later amendments, to this day. It eliminated all mention of grievances against King George III and against the State of New York. In 1790, New York's legislature finally renounced its claims that Vermont was a part of New York, the cessation of those claims being effective if and when Congress decided to admit Vermont.
See also [ edit ]Even as U.S. President Donald Trump starts reaching out to lawmakers and business and union leaders to sell his policies, he's still making false claims about election fraud.
During a bipartisan reception with lawmakers at the White House Monday evening, Trump claimed the reason he'd lost the popular vote to his Democratic rival was that three million to five million immigrants living in the U.S. illegally had voted. That's according to a Democratic aide familiar with the exchange who spoke on condition of anonymity to discuss the private meeting.
There is no evidence to support Trump's claim.
The assertion appeared to be part of a developing pattern for Trump and his new administration in which falsehoods overshadow outreach efforts.
White House press secretary Sean Spicer reiterates it's unsubstantiated voter fraud allegations 0:39
After a contentious weekend, Trump began his first full week as president bounding from one room of the White House to another as he played host to business, labour and congressional leaders. Again and again, he ordered aides to summon journalists from their West Wing workspace at a moment's notice for unscheduled statements and photo opportunities.
Among those meetings: a reception at the White House for congressional leaders of both parties, with plenty of meatballs and small talk.
But what was supposed to be a lighthearted get-together was overshadowed by Trump's debunked assertion about the popular vote.
In addition to winning the Electoral College in a landslide, I won the popular vote if you deduct the millions of people who voted illegally —@realDonaldTrump
Trump's comments were similar to claims he made on Twitter in late November that he had won the Electoral College in a "landslide" and "won the popular vote if you deduct the millions of people who voted illegally." Hillary Clinton won the popular vote by nearly 2.9 million votes, despite losing the electoral college. There is no evidence that voter fraud significantly affected the vote.
Republicans split on Trump's claim
The top three Senate Republicans refused on Tuesday to disavow Trump's false claim that millions of illegally cast ballots cost him the popular vote.
The comments from Senate majority leader Mitch McConnell and his top lieutenants suggested that some leading Republicans would rather follow Trump into the realm of "alternative facts" than confront the new chief executive.
"It does occur," McConnell told reporters at the Capitol Tuesday on the issue of election fraud. "There are always arguments on both sides about how much, how frequent and all the rest.… The notion that election fraud is a fiction is not true."
Senate majority leader Mitch McConnell is joined by, from left, senators Cory Gardner, John Barrasso, John Thune and Senate majority whip John Cornyn on Capitol Hill in Washington on Tuesday. (J. Scott Applewhite/Associated Press)
The No. 2 Senate Republican, John Cornyn of Texas, also passed up a chance to dispute Trump's claim Tuesday, saying, "I'm not going to re-litigate that. It's time to move on."
And the No. 3 Senate Republican, John Thune of South Dakota, said he didn't know whether three million to five million votes were cast fraudulently, which would be larger than the population of all but the biggest U.S. cities.
"There's always a certain amount of irregularity that goes on in elections, some places perhaps more so than others. How you quantify that I'm not sure, but he must have his methodology," Thune said.
Not all Republicans were unwilling to dispute Trump.
Lindsey Graham, the South Carolina Republican senator, while referring to the president's voter fraud claims said, "This needs to stop."
Republican Lindsey Graham urges new president to'share or recant' 0:57
Graham implored Trump to either release evidence that backed his claims or recant them altogether.
House Speaker Paul Ryan told reporters on the illegal voting claim: "I've seen no evidence to that effect and I've made that very, very clear," though he declined to get drawn into further comment.
Arizona Republican Senator John McCain said, "Do I believe it? I have no evidence of it." But McCain, who did not support Trump for president, demurred when asked whether Trump should stop uttering falsehoods.
"I did not support the president of the United States in the election, so I don't really have any place where I tell him what he should do," he said.Story highlights "Unfortunately there was some confusion," Sanders said
Occasionally, Obama's fundraising events were entirely closed to the media
Washington (CNN) Hours after telling reporters they would be allowed to cover President Donald Trump's first re-election fundraiser in Washington on Wednesday, the White House abruptly switched course, closing the event to media in a break from past precedent.
"Unfortunately there was some confusion with the (Republican National Committee) and due to the logistical challenges bringing in the press at this late moment is not going to be possible," said deputy press secretary Sarah Huckabee Sanders in an email to reporters covering the White House.
Originally the event was listed on Trump's schedule as closed press. After being pressed by reporters to allow media coverage of the President's remarks, Sanders announced the event would be open to the White House press pool, a small group of reporters who share information with the larger White House press corps.
But two hours later, the event was closed again. The White House did not provide an explanation of the logistical challenges in accommodating the media.
When President Barack Obama raised money for his own campaign or for other Democrats, members of the media were often allowed to cover his remarks. However, the Obama White House generally barred cameras from covering those events.
Read More"I am very pleased that this important piece of legislation passed quickly and unanimously in the Senate today, demonstrating the United States' strong, unwavering commitment to Israel and its security and self-defense."
Confirming Rand Paul's support of this bill was Senator Johnny Isakson of Georgia, who said, demonstrating the United States' strong, unwavering commitment to Israel and its security and self-defense."
Several other alleged small-government "Tea Party" types supported this bill as well, including Freshman Senator Mike Lee of Utah, who was a cosponsor of the bill, and Congressman Justin Amash, who voted for the House version of the bill on May 9th. In reality, it is absurd to contend that anyone who even nods to the notion of limited Constitutional government would for one second consider guaranteeing $9 billion dollars in loans to anyone, ever.
United States-Israel Enhanced Security Cooperation Act of 2012 in the search box, one can read full details on both the house and senate versions of this bill.
The Senate version
"it is U.S. policy to: (1) reaffirm the commitment to Israel's security as a Jewish state, (2) provide Israel with the military capabilities to defend itself and help preserve its qualitative military edge, (3) expand military and civilian cooperation, (4) assist in a negotiated settlement of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict that results in two states living side by side in peace and security, and (5) encourage Israel's neighbors to recognize Israel's right to exist as a Jewish state.
Expresses the sense of Congress that the United States should take specified actions to assist in Israel's defense.
Amends the Department of Defense Appropriations Act, 2005 to extend authority to transfer certain obsolete or surplus Department of Defense (DOD) items to Israel.
Amends the Foreign Assistance Act of 1961 to extend authority to make additions to foreign-based defense stockpiles.
Amends the Emergency Wartime Supplemental Appropriations Act, 2003 to extend specified loan guarantee authority to Israel. The law required that a Senate report be done on the bill. The law required that a Senate report be done on the bill. On June 27, two days before the voice vote, Skull and bones member John Kerry presented the obligatory "written report No. 112-179"...
The report states "That the interest rate for loans guaranteed under this heading may include a reasonable fee to cover the costs and fees incurred by the borrower in connection with this program", but then goes on to state "That funds made available for assistance to Israel under chapter 4 of part II of the Foreign Assistance Act of 1961, as amended, may be utilized by the Government of Israel to pay such fees to the United States Government"!
So we can charge them interest and fees on the $9 billion dollars, but then let them use our money to pay the fees!
The bill will soon be sent to Obama for his signature. By going to http://thomas.loc.gov and typing the termin the search box, one can read full details on both the house and senate versions of this bill.The Senate version summary states thatThe law required that a Senate report be done on the bill.The report states, but then goes on to stateSo we can charge them interest and fees on the $9 billion dollars, but then let them use our money to pay the fees!
Have you heard about the the "United States-Israel Enhanced Security Cooperation Act of 2012"? It was introduced by Senator Barbara Boxer on 3/6/12 with 71 Cosponsors.The House passed their version [H.R.4133] on May 9, pledging unlimited loyalty and riches to our "special friend" Israel, with only two congressman dissenting- Ron Paul and Democrat John Dingell of Michigan.The U.S. Senate passed their version on Friday June 29, 2012. Known in the Senate as S.2165, the measure guaranteed an astonishing $9 billion dollars in loans to Israel (plus all fees and interest!) in addition to giving "military assistance- stockpiles of defense articles" valued at $200 million for 2013 and $200 million for 2014.Boxer praised passage of the bill, stating "I am so pleased that the Senate moved quickly to pass this important bill, which reaffirms the important bond between the United States and Israel and helps ensure that Israel has the necessary tools to defend itself in this time of dynamic change in the Middle East."Initially seeking documentation of which way turncoat Rand Paul voted on this treasonous bill, I tried to find the roll call votes. But as Harry Reid pointed out during the session, "THE NEXT ROLL CALL VOTE WILL BE AT NOON ON TUESDAY, JULY 10". The Senators passed this bill anonymously, in a so-called "voice vote"!...After tracking down the actual video of this travesty, which was no easy task- (they seem to make these things hard to find on purpose)- it was like watching something straight out of the twilight zone. Two old guys in suits mumbling under their breath in a strange monotone fashion, with the entire U.S. Senate taking literally less than six seconds total to squander 9 BILLION DOLLARS from the American people. A true outrage. They did not even call out each Senators name so that their constituents can hear whether they voted yea or nay.Hey guys.I do not post to the forums much but I wanted to today.Yesterday morning the WOW community lost someone very special. His name was Paul Petroff, his main characters name was Ragnaorc and he was my father-in law.I am not sure if any of you remember but Paul was the one who posted about the Horde Bathroom he and his wife created together. http://us.battle.net/wow/en/forum/topic/1765529920#1 Paul lost his life after fighting diabetes for many years. He lost his leg, his eye and one of his kidney's to the disease. Ultimately his heart gave out and he passed away yesterday morning with his wife Gloria by his side he was 54.Paul was a teacher in RL, he taught inmates at the penitentiary in Indiana. He worked hard to help them become better people and return to society. He made a lot of friends there, including some of the inmates he taught. Paul truly was a gift. No matter how bad he felt or how bad his situation was he always had a smile and a joke. He always made sure that YOU were doing ok and that YOU were smiling and laughing.Paul loved WOW for a lot of reasons but he would always say he loved how his character could run and he would often imagine he could do the same thing again, or how his character was healthy and able bodied to fight and win the day. WOW gave him freedom that his real life couldn't. He was trapped in a broken body and WOW was his escape and for that I know he was grateful.But unbeknownst to him to everyone that ever known him he was a hero. He was a person that you strive to be more like, to take time and appreciate those around you and to appreciate what you have not what you do not have and to love.I am posting on my alt because this is the character that I played with Paul on. Paul and his wife fell on hard times and could not afford 2 subs a month. So I decided that Stres would wait for his Orc brother to return and they could continue their adventures. Sadly that will not happen. His brother has fallen and now its time for Stres to carry on.So as a tribute I am going to start a guild on Thrall called Hammer of Ragnaorc. I wanted to do something in game to carry on his memory. The guild will be run just as Paul lived. Full of laughter, joy and acceptance.If you made it this far thanks for reading I appreciate it very much.Zach Posner is a writer for FanSided partner BroJackson.com. For more great content, head on over to Bro Jackson and check out Zach’s work.
It happened. It really happened.
You went to bed. You began to dream. You woke up. But this time your dream came true. You are one of the four contestants on Chopped! Only this time it is not $10,000 dollars you are playing for, it is your life!
First, a little background. Chopped is a wildly popular Food Network cooking competition show. So much so, that there have been over 150 episodes produced since it first aired in 2009. The premise is simple, and the show’s super-sleek and spectacled host Ted Allen lays out the rules at the start of every contest:
“There are three rounds, appetizer, entrée and dessert. Each course has it’s own basket of mystery ingredients and you must use every ingredient in the basket in some way. Also available to you, our pantry and fridge. Each round is timed. When the clock runs out our judges will critique your dishes on presentation, taste and creativity. If your dish doesn’t cut it you will be chopped.”
But I have already wasted too much time and your clock is about to start. So what I have put together for you is the ultimate Chopped survivor guide. A list of basic rules so that you must follow if you wish to make it to the final round and avoid being… CHOPPED!
1. Backstory – Look, I know it’s strange that the first rule has nothing to do with cooking, but this might be the most important rule of all: Come up with a unique and compelling backstory. What’s that? You’re a loving mother, faithful wife and owner of a successful catering business? Sorry, but no one cares. Don’t worry, you don’t need to be a meth-addicted homeless person who learned to cook in a dumpster (although that would be a huge plus), but you should at least be able to talk about how you were bullied as a child and cooking was your only salvation. “The bullies couldn’t hurt me if they had a mouthful of my delicious souffle.” This all might sound extreme, but this is your life and if you want to survive you better make sure that you are interesting enough to keep around.
2. Know The Judges – Yes, I know we are on to rule number two and I still haven’t even talked about cooking. Deal with it because you need to know whom you are cooking for. If chef/Chopped “bad boy” Scott Conant is on the panel, you better think twice before putting raw red onion on his plate. They don’t call chef Aarón Sanchez the “Latin Cuisine Authority” because he likes his food bland. You better turn up the spice! He hosts a show called “Heat Seekers” for Pete’s sake! And they don’t call Chris Santos “Renegade Restaurateur” for, well, I have no idea what that means. But it might have something to do with the fact that he looks like the lead singer of Staind.
3. Love the Basket – It is not your job to just use the contents of your basket. You must transform the ingredients and highlight them. If you think you can just crush up those corn chips and put them on your salad as a crouton, you are out of your damn mind. And don’t even think about using that mint they put in there as a garnish. Each ingredient is important and must be highlighted. But, not all basket items are created equal and that brings me to our next rule…
4. Master Your Meat –In a perfect world all of the ingredients would be judged equally, but that’s not how the judges roll in the Chopped kitchen. In rounds one and two you will be given a piece of meat or seafood and it is paramount that you cook it properly. I am sure the judges will be impressed that you managed to make a delicious mushroom risotto in thirty minutes, but if you undercooked your pheasant or overcooked your pork loin, you are sure to be taking the Chopped walk of shame.
5. Keep it Clean – I am not just talking about keeping your hairs off the plate (although that is important). Did you know that the veins on a shrimp are actually feces? I didn’t (because I am allergic to shrimp), but these hoity-toity judges surely do. And it might take a while, but you better get those pin bones out of that fish as well! A clean plate means a clean slate (I wanted to make sure one rule rhymed). And now we switch gears, from keeping it clean to playing dirty.
6. Talk Some Trash – Sometimes the best offense is a strong defense.The kitchen is cramped, so use that to your advantage. If you are going to bang out meat or crack some clams, do so loudly and with purpose. Get in your opponent’s head. Remember, you are on television and talking smack makes for great TV. If possible, be loud, controversial, the Dennis Rodman of Chopped. You will increase your chances of victory and, if I have learned anything from reality television, your chances of getting invited back to future contests and spinoffs.
7. Know the Pantry – I have seen too many contestants run off to look for the quinoa or cumin or something else I know nothing about, only to spend valuable minutes searching in all the wrong places. You must try and remember where ingredients are in the fridge and pantry, because those wasted seconds could be putting your head squarely on the chopping block!
8. Plating – This is important and something I don’t know much about. All I know is that I have seen too many people serve steak with brown potatoes and a brown sauce. It’s just not a good look and invites some nasty comparisons. Just make it look beautiful and full of color, like one of Geoffrey Zakarian’s finely tailored suits.
9. Be Bold – Lastly, be daring. You are competing in the greatest competition known to man. It’s okay to start off cautious, and I would urge you to do so in the appetizer round. Let someone else try to cook polenta in twenty minutes while you fry up something delicious. But as the game goes on you will need to make your move. Fortune favors the bold and in the Chopped kitchen the farthest playing it safe will take you is second place. And in this scenario that means death!
10. Truffle Oil – Okay, one more rule and this time it’s personal. Don’t use truffle oil. Ever. Every time I see someone go for it, I have a loud “oh no he didn’t” moment yelling at my TV. I personally don’t get it at all. Living in LA, you can’t go anywhere without it sneaking onto your menu. Nice try truffle fries, but no thanks. So, if you are caught throwing it on your dish at the last moment, you surely deserve to be banished from the Chopped kitchen for all of eternity.
Welp, there it is. Keep on cookin’ on folks!The Tower House by japanese architect Takamitsu Azuma was built in 1966 in a very small plot of land. The house grows around the stairs six levels up to provide 65 square meters of living space. The building has become a fascinating portrait of how Japan society has dealt with the urban and social changes in the last few decades.
Tower House by Takamitsu Azuma technical information
When completed it was the “skyscraper” of Jingumae, nowadays it is a miniature house – Takamitsu Azuma daughter
Tower House by Takamitsu Azuma Article
Tower House is a house in Tokyo, built by Takamitsu Azuma in 1966. The Tower House was erected on a 20-square-meter plot of land and from the moment of its creation it was regarded as a symbol of living in a modern metropolis´ center.
When Takamitsu Azuma moved from Osaka to Tokyo in 1966 he built a house for his family. Designed as a continual vertical room for the architect´s own family, the staircase appears as the most significant structure in the house´s interior. It connects the individual rooms, which are “piled” one on top of the other without any doors separating them.
The triangular plot is positioned directly on Aoyama’s “Killer Street”, in front of Mario Botta’s Watari-um (The Watari Museum of Contemporary Art, 1990). A small public passage is used as well as parking. The daughter of the architect,Rie Azuma, is now living in the house. The building is best visible in winter, during the other seasons a tree is nearly fully shading it from the street front.
Once completed, the raw-concrete tower could have been considered the “skyscraper” of Jingumae, overtopping by far the adjacent buildings. Nowadays the house has been relativized by its neighbours, and we may make the mistake to associate it with the numerous “miniature house” which are that popularly featured on ArchEyes. The Tower House is a fascinating portrait of how Japan society has dealt with the urban and social changes in the last few decades.
“When completed it was the “skyscraper” of Jingumae, nowadays it is a miniature house”.
Tower House by Takamitsu Azuma Plans Tower House by Takamitsu Azuma Gallery of images
About Takamitsu Azuma Japanese architect, who worked in Junzo Sakakura’s office before becoming a founder-member of ArchiteXt in 1971. He evolved a concept of ‘oppositional harmonies’ in architecture by deliberately placing disparate elements together and even emphasizing them in order to create tension. His own house, just featured, is a tall concrete tower set among traditionally built single-storey houses. Other works include the Satsuki Kindergarten in Osaka (1969–73), many individual private houses, and the K Flat housing, Mejiro, Tokyo (with Rie Azuma, his daughter).
Cite this article: "Tower House / Takamitsu Azuma," in ArchEyes, January 24, 2016, http://archeyes.com/tower-house-takamitsu-azuma/Smartphones may have dominated the news this week, but Fitbit, creators of the Fitbit Ultra smart fitness tracker and the Fitbit Aria smart wireless scale, today unveiled two new fitness trackers (which will both sync to said smartphones, by the way).
First up is the Fitbit Zip. It’s a petite tracker (about the size of a quarter coin) that comes in five fun colors and measures your everyday activity stats in real time, including steps taken, distance traveled and calories burned. It has a unique tap interface to switch between different stats and is “oops-proof”, meaning it’ll survive a stroll through the rain or a good sweat.
Fitbit’s second new product is the Fitbit One. The Fitbit One will actually be replacing the Fitbit Ultra, but has been updated to make it even better. It still has all of the features of the Fitbit Ultra, such as tracking your steps and calories, monitoring your sleep, and gently waking you up with its silent alarm. But the Fitbit One has been redesigned to make it even more sleek, easier to read, and easier to wear.
As we mentioned earlier, both the Fitbit Zip and One will be able to sync to iOS and Android devices and smartphones equipped with the new, low-energy Bluetooth 4.0 and Bluetooth Smart Ready technology, but iOS users will have the added capability of being able to sync their stats on the go. Of course, both the Fitbit Zip and One will integrate with the Fitbit.com online tracking portal which contains social networking and motivational tools.
Fitbit Zip is available now for $59.95, and Fitbit One will be available soon for $99.95.
FitBit on Amazon…
Link: Fitbit homepage…
Flashbacks: Fitbit Tracks Your Movement Day and Night…; Passive Tracking of Physical Activity with FitBit…; Medgadget’s Review of the FitBit Aria Smart Wireless Scale…A huge rebuilding project will soon begin in Midtown Manhattan, where the Knicks have turned to Phil Jackson, a former coach with unrivaled credentials, to run the front office and restore order to the shambles at Madison Square Garden.
Jackson, part of the Knicks’ championship era as a player in the early 1970s, will be introduced as the team’s president on Tuesday, according to two people in the N.B.A. with knowledge of the discussions. A Knicks spokesman declined to comment. The team released a statement that said a major announcement would be made Tuesday.
Jackson’s spadework has built marvels before — he won 11 N.B.A. championships as coach of the Chicago Bulls and the Los Angeles Lakers. This time, he will need a backhoe.
He has never held a position in a front office, let alone run one, and his first assignment is a doozy: resuscitating the Knicks after years of mismanagement. Despite having the league’s second-highest payroll, the Knicks have labored to a 26-40 record ahead of Saturday’s game against the Milwaukee Bucks. Though their current five-game winning streak has kept them in contention for a playoff spot in the woeful Eastern Conference, the Knicks could miss the postseason for the seventh time in the last 10 years.Getting lost in the glow of a smartphone screen has become a cultural certitude.
By Jared Keller
(Photo: Jonathan Nackstrand/AFP/Getty Images)
We’re living in the era of human connection. As of 2015, nearly two-thirds of American adults (64 percent) now own some manner of smartphone, up from just 35 percent in 2011. The revolution in mobile technology also created a revolution in connectivity. It’s been almost a decade since Steve Jobs unveiled the first generation iPhone in San Francisco, and civilization has never been the same. According to the Pew Research Center, some 87 percent of American adults use the Internet, up from 14 percent in 1995; what was once considered Internet addiction in 1995 has become normal behavior thanks to the ubiquity and necessity of our modern Internet-connected livelihoods.
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But every new era of connectivity also brings new ways of ignoring each other, and getting lost in the glow of a smartphone screen has become a cultural certitude, a modern manifestation of the civil inattention. According to a new study in Computers in Human Behavior, “phubbing” — snubbing someone in a social setting in favor of a phone — has evolved from a psychological habit and sign of technological maladjustment to an acceptable social norm.
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The new research, conducted by two psychologists at the University of Kent, suggests that there are some psychological antecedents to smartphone users’ phubbing behavior. The researchers surveyed 251 smartphone-using participants about how often they have phubbed friends or acquaintances, and how often they’ve experienced smartphone-related snubbing in their daily life.
(Graphic:
Computers in Human Behavior)
The researchers discovered several psychological antecedents strongly related to smartphone addiction and, in turn, phubbing. A general lack of impulse control was an obvious culprit, as is its more specific cousin in Internet addiction, or “maladaptive pattern of Internet use leading to clinically significant impairment or distress.” Like gambling, the lure of constantly updating feeds can make the smartphone a treasured avatar of digital satisfaction that consumes all other behavior. Similarly, a general fear of missing out on other activities has been long associated with persistent smartphone use since “anxiety about being left out of the information circuit also plays a crucial role in seeking out social networking services, need satisfaction, life satisfaction, and mood,” the authors write.
But these innate psychological antecedents don’t necessarily make phubbing a norm; the behavior persists because it’s become socially acceptable. While Internet addiction and FOMO predicted smartphone addiction—which in turn predicted phubbing—the researchers found that study participants perceived phubbing as normative if they themselves had been snubbed.
“[P]hubbing may have become the norm as a result of both observed and personal behavior,” the authors write. “People are phubbed, but they are also phubbers. In an environment where people are constantly switching from being the protagonists and recipients of this behavior, our data suggests that phubbing becomes seen as the norm.”
In short, bad behavior begets bad behaviors in a vicious cycle of strategic reciprocity: If you’ve ever been ignored by a friend who just can’t tear his eyes away from Twitter, you’re likely to pull out your phone and do the same. It’s possible to imagine phubbing as a social virus, an evolutionary variation of the Prisoner’s Dilemma where participants keep choosing the rudest possible strategy, forcing others to do the same in a race to the bottom of smartphone etiquette.
“People … assume that others phub in the same way that they do themselves, therefore perpetuating the behavior,” the authors write. “Further, when people experience phubbing and notice the behavior occurring frequently around them, they may be likely to conclude that this behavior is socially acceptable…. People, in response to discontented actions, tend to commit retaliatory behavior in response.”
So when in the smartphone’s conquest of our attention did phubbing stop being an irregular, unsavory habit and become instead an acceptable social behavior? If the acceptability of phubbing is directly correlated to the experience of being phubbed, then an increasing number of smartphones should indicate a higher probability of being snubbed in the wild. Arguably, the tipping point probably came in 2013, by which point more than 50 percent of American adults owned a smartphone, the sharpest increase in ownership in recent memory, according to the Pew data. Further, Google searches for “smartphone addiction” increased rapidly around 2012 and 2013, suggesting broader awareness (and, perhaps, anxiety) over phubbing. And usage has only increased since then: As of 2015, some 68 percent of adults in advanced economies now own a smartphone (although global smartphone sales fell last quarter for the first time in history).
The changing acceptability of phubbing is an important reminder that the behavioral changes wrought by technology, good or bad, are always decried as fundamentally debilitating and dangerous before they become generally |
end of the day, I am able to be very focused and stick to a consistent end result. I’ve seen great results with bands like The Charlatans, The Lemonheads, Mindless Self Indulgence and the other artists we’ve worked with. We actually just picked up Better Than Ezra.
Musician Coaching:
How do you think the structure of your company and particularly the fact that you have diversified so much has helped you grow?
AK:
In many ways, some of our choices have been conscious. In other ways, they’ve just come together. The structure is all based in the fact that I saw the industry shifting, particularly in the first three or four years. A lot of people point to Napster as the catalyst, but I was still a baby label when that was happening, so that didn’t really impact me at that point. The first shift I saw that hit me hard was when Tower Records went under. There was a huge void in the marketplace, and I didn’t really see any other companies making up for that loss. Then Trans World was closing a lot of accounts, and it was getting a lot more difficult to get product into Best Buy. And Hot Topic was shrinking its music budget, too.
I realized that physical products were going to fizzle out quickly, and the only growth I kept seeing was in the digital areas. Having followed metal music for a long time, I knew that market was very cyclical as well. The End Records became known for being a label that does a lot of heavy music, but personally, I listen to many different formats. In the beginning, I felt like if we were going to diversify, we needed to do it. There were a couple opportunities to jump into alternative and rock and see what can happen on a grander scale.
I made a conscious effort to diversify, but when you try to diversify, the challenges triple. You have to find new PR outlets to promote the music, develop different relationships with radio and advertise in different areas. It was a lot of hard work and made me understand why a lot of indie labels prefer to stay niche. When you diversify, you have to be able to expand your resources and juggle a lot of different relationships at the same time. It took us about two years to feel comfortable expanding to other formats. But by doing so, I got to work with a lot of freelance music industry people, and I discovered that if I was going to make the business work, I was going to have to start building my own team internally. I brought in a bunch of people in house: a social media person; a PR person; a college radio person; a graphics expert and eventually another PR person. Recently, I brought in someone to do YouTube for us. That person creates videos, builds playlists and also builds up a YouTube street team. And about three months ago, I brought in someone who worked at iTunes for several years to help curate the editorial for alternative rock and metal pages. I think that has brought a resource into the company that very few indie labels have.
At this point, aside from someone dedicated to commercial radio, we have everything we could possibly need in house. That makes us very appealing. People see we have a full team internally and know they won’t have to go chase down outside people every time we take on a new project.
Musician Coaching:
Clearly you’ve had a long career. And I think people in the music industry are often like professional athletes: If they are around for ten years, they’re lifers. Most people only get a very small run.
As someone who has worked with both independent artists and name-brand artists, what qualities do you think separate the artists that have been successful from the artists that have not made it?
AK:
There are a lot of variables in trying to be an artist. I’ve seen very hard-working, talented artists that never get the break they deserve. I’ve also seen artists just put out one song, have something connect and blow up overnight.
There are a few things I think are always present in someone that succeeds. Number one, that person is always focusing on the music and on trying to be a better musician. If you want to be the best at anything, you have to practice your skills. Things are different from how they were 20 years ago, and the music industry is a lot more competitive. You can’t be just good or even very good; you have to be absolutely amazing.
Number two, the artist needs to be very responsible about getting music and content out through social medial. Everything revolves around how you portray your name as an artist and your music through Facebook, your website, Twitter, etc. If you can’t do it, you have to find someone that is very good at it.
The third thing is, once you find a team to work with, you need to commit to working with that team. Sometimes when we hit up artists, we will have a really hard time getting feedback or responses. When they are very slow to get back to us, we end up missing opportunities, and it becomes hard for us to keep chasing them all the time. I wouldn’t say we always just move on, but if an artist really cares about what they do, it makes our job a lot easier, in the same way that if we do our job right as a company, it makes our distributors’ job a lot easier, and allows them to do a lot more for us.
I think those are the three key elements for success these days. Of course, there are no guarantees. If an artist just happens to get lucky early on and does not have those three elements, I think their career will eventually fizzle, and they will lose their chance. Just because an artist gets an opportunity and builds up a name does not mean they will have sustainable success. They have to be hard working, talented, have a good team around them, be committed and portray that enthusiasm and excitement to everyone around them.
Musician Coaching:
Your company is very digital centric, and you have built a real team of people to support that, so you have some expertise in that area. Assuming an artist’s music is of great quality, is there one area you think artists should be particularly focused on right now? In other words, do you feel like one platform or area of the music business has greater growth potential than others right now?
AK:
I think YouTube is going to be key in the next couple years, in great part because of its power as a marketing tool. You can build your own street team within the YouTube platform by having them build their own channels and having their own subscribers and influencers help build awareness about you as an artist. And you can also monetize or tap into different channels and grow what you already have going.
And I’ve been happy so see streaming blowing up. I think the benefit of streaming more than anything else is that you’re going to be able to tap into markets we’ve never been able to tap into before, like China, Brazil, etc. We couldn’t previously sell products there, whether digital downloads or CDs, because of the black market. I think eventually streaming services will offer a worldwide platform that we’ve never seen before in the music business. Even though the revenue streams are small now, as we adapt, I think those will grow. I’m curious to see how that’s going to develop. We’ve seen a lot of streaming services giving free access lately, and I just don’t know how that is going to be sustainable. Either they will eventually run out of money or figure out a business model that is profitable for them that will also help us as well.
Touring is very critical for certain formats – heavy metal, rock, alternative – but it is becoming a main revenue stream for a lot of artists, so that means the market is starting to become very saturated. I think counteracting that goes back to your social networks. You definitely need to tour, but you also have to use your socials to develop a base and determine where your best markets are for touring, so you can actually have fans come out and support you in a live environment.
Musician Coaching:
Touring is the Achilles heel of almost every artist I know and always the hardest thing to figure out.
AK:
It’s not easy, but New York alone is a huge market. I’ve seen a lot of baby bands try to jump on a national tour, go on the road and travel coast to coast. I think it is a better idea to build on a regional basis and concentrate on a radius around your hometown. Build up your name in one area, then you can eventually expand further. Touring is so expensive and so competitive, so I think baby bands need to break down their growth into steps so they can build slowly.
To learn more about Andreas Katsambas and the work he does with musicians, check out The End Records’ official website.Media playback is unsupported on your device Media caption US President Barack Obama described a"truly special" relationship with the UK
US President Barack Obama has called his country's relationship with the UK "truly special", following a meeting with Prime Minister David Cameron.
The president said the world was "more secure and more prosperous" when the UK and US worked together.
During their three-hour meeting, the leaders discussed Afghanistan, the Middle East, the Gulf of Mexico oil spill and the economy.
Mr Cameron called the countries' relationship "essential".
On his first official US visit as prime minister, he added that he was "confident" that reforms to the banking system would be successful.
Speaking at a press conference, Mr Cameron called the BP oil spill in the Gulf of Mexico a "catastrophe" and said it was in the interests of both countries that the company is successful.
'State visit'
Moving on to the release by the Scottish government of the Lockerbie bomber last year, Mr Cameron said it had been "wrong", adding: "He showed his victims no compassion... they were not allowed to die in their beds surrounded by family... neither should he."
And both leaders urged Iran to negotiate over calls to end its nuclear weapons programme.
During the talks, Mr Cameron invited Mr Obama to the UK for a state visit.
No date has been set for the trip which is not expected to happen until next year or 2012, officials travelling with the prime minister said.
The prime minister has also agreed to meet four US senators to discuss their concerns over the release of the Lockerbie bomber last year.
Mr Cameron held talks earlier with Vice-President Joe Biden, where there was "common ground on the full range of foreign policy issues," according to a Downing Street spokesman.
Talks are planned between Mr Cameron and defeated Republican presidential candidate Senator John McCain and senior figures in the US Congress.
A briefing on Afghanistan at the Pentagon is expected on Wednesday, and the prime minister is also due to meet UN Secretary General Ban Ki-moon in New York.
Four US senators are calling for an investigation into allegations that oil firm BP lobbied for the early freeing of Abdelbaset al-Megrahi, who was convicted of the 1988 bombing of Pan Am Flight 103 which killed 270 people.
The Libyan, who has terminal prostate cancer, was released by Scottish Justice Minister Kenny MacAskill in August last year on compassionate grounds.
Megrahi was said to have as little as three months to live.
BP has admitted urging the British government in 2007 to agree a wider prisoner transfer agreement with Libya, but denies any part in the decision of the Scottish government to free him.
Mr Cameron's aides said he would meet the senators, having earlier declined to do so.
But Mr MacAskill told the BBC: "I stand by the decision I made. I reflected and followed the rules and laws of Scotland. I upheld the values and the beliefs that we seek to live by as the people of Scotland."This page lists mortalities from battles and individual military operations or acts of violence, sorted by death toll. For wars and events more extensive in scope, see List of wars and disasters by death toll. For natural disasters, see List of natural disasters by death toll. Contents
Battles and sieges Edit
Many of the entries in this section are currently for total casualties rather than deaths. Until this notice is removed, check the individual links to confirm what the figure represents. Main article: List of battles by casualties
Bombing campaigns Edit
Individual air raids Edit
Wartime ship disasters Edit
Terrorist attacks Edit
Mass unrest, riots and pogroms Edit
Human sacrifice and mass suicide Edit
See also Edit
Notes Edit
^ Death toll includes both U.S. victims and Confederate perpetrators; was the deadliest terrorist attack perpetrated against Americans in the U.S. until the Oklahoma City bombing of 1995.I finally got the chance to read The Persistence of Poverty by Charles Karelis. Here is Tyler Cowen’s review. I can’t recommend this book enough. It’s deeply informative, and quite challenging to how we think of ordinary economic decision making theory. It’s a fun ride, and can easily be read in an afternoon.
Karelis proposes we start to distinguish between pleasure goods, and good that are relievers, and realize that some goods can act as both. His thesis is that there is diminishing marginal utility in pleasure goods, but that relievers have increasing marginal utility. “…paying the first bill in a stack of overdue bills does little to relieve a guilty conscience.”
Cake, Screaming
I didn’t quite understand what was going on with it from the book reviews, so let’s do the story with a teensy bit of math.
Here’s the normal story. Picture you are in a room with 10 people. Each of them has a slice of cake. How much you are willing to pay for a slice of the cake is the ‘marginal utility’ of having it, and the more cake you have the less any more cake is worth to you. You’d be willing to pay a $1 for the first slice of cake, but you’d only be will to pay 90 cents for the second slice. You’d only be willing to pay 10 cents for the 9th slice, and a penny for the 10th slice. Eating the 10th slice of cake in that room would probably make you sick, hence you want it a lot less than the first slice, which is delicious. That’s declining marginal utility.
Now picture you are in a room with 10 people screaming. You hate it when people scream, and you can pay a person to get them to stop screaming. Would you pay in a similar way to the cake example? Would you pay a $1 to get the first person to stop screaming, and a penny for the 10th person to stop screaming?
No. Getting one person to stop screaming would make very little difference in how much you dislike being in the room. Modern psychology tells us you might not even notice it. You’d probably only pay a penny to get that first guy to stop screaming. However getting the second guy to stop screaming might be worth 10 cents. And the last guy, the difference between some screaming and no screaming, might be worth the full dollar to you. The more quiet it got, the more a marginal difference in how quiet it is would be worth to you. There’s increasing returns to this good; the 10th guy not screaming is worth more than the first guy not screaming, which is the exact opposite dynamic of the 10th cake being less delicious than the first.
For those not involved with economic theory this might just elicit a shrug, but this mechanism turns everything on its head. Let’s say that instead of money, you are given 20 tokens to be used over 4 days, and each token gets you one slice of cake in room #1, and one person to stop screaming in room #2. In the cake room, the optimal decision is to consumption smooth – eat five slices of cake each day, so you use the tokens {5,5,5,5}. In the screaming room, all the enjoyment is not in getting a room with half screaming but in getting a quiet room, and instead of consumption smoothing the optimal choice is to binge – pay 10 people to stop screaming the first two days, and deal with a loud room the last two days – {10,10,0,0}. This will hold even with ‘nudges’, say offering two extra tokens if you have people consumption smooth, since the marginal utility isn’t increasing that much. The utility of {10,10,0,0} is greater than that of {5,5,5,7}.
(And most interesting, instead of tokens, let’s say you could work an hour for 1 token or take 65 cents in leisure over a 5 hour day. In the cake room, you’d probably work 3 hours, and relax 2 hours, as around that time you’d have the marginal return from cake equally the marginal return from relaxing. In the screaming room, you probably wouldn’t work at all – it’s impossible enough to make enough to stop the screaming to the point where it is worthwhile to try. Hence the persistence of poverty.)
His other point is that many goods have both characteristics. Let’s say you have 5 children. In a large house, where each child has his or her own room, a child leaving the house to go out into the world gives you diminishing marginal utility. The first room turns into an entertainment center, the second into a hobby room, and the third just sits empty. But if you are in a cramped, small 2 bedroom place for all of you, the first child leaving might only make a slight bit a difference compared to the second child leaving. By the time the 5th child leaves the home, you get the most marginal enjoyment of having your small place less cramped. Karelis point is that this inflection point is where we should be thinking about poverty, because as the token example above mentions, normal policy mechanisms based on neoclassical microeconomic theory won’t necessarily hold.
Intellectual History
Karelis takes a moment to do some intellectual history digging and finds that the current economic obsession with decreasing marginal utility comes from Jeremy Bentham’s equating happiness with the absence of unhappiness. Bentham, and the Mills, thought of happiness as reciprocal to unhappiness, like the relationship between tall and short. So to increase happiness is the same exact thing as to decrease unhappiness. Maybe, maybe not. But the problem is that this relationship is carried over to the goods that effect happiness and unhappiness.
Bentham: “utility [is] that property in any object whereby it tends to produce…pleasure…or happiness..or (what comes to the same thing) to prevent the happening of mischief, pain, evil, or unhappiness.” Stanley Jevons cites that passage 80 years later when he lays the foundation of what Alfred Marshall will later use to create modern economics.
Bentham usually showed a more ambiguous approach, noting that there are often ranges of postive experiences and negative experiences that don’t necessarily net, but that ambiguity hasn’t transfered to the current theory where the marginal rate at which pleasers please is information on the rate at which relievers relief. And this approach, to see a cross-section within time and see that a baseline income can change incentives in a dramatic way, is a whole new dimension to think through. And one with very testable hypotheses.SCP-2406
Exterior torso of SCP-2406.
Item #: SCP-2406
Object Class: Safe
Special Containment Procedures: Provisional Site-31 has been built around SCP-2406 and is to maintain the facade of a Kazakhstani military facility. Type A hazmat suits are mandatory when working directly with SCP-2406, as is decontamination upon exit. A security perimeter of armed guards is to remain in place at all times in order to prevent unauthorized access. Direct interaction with SCP-2406-1 requires authorization by Site Command.
Description: SCP-2406 is a mechanical automaton, 93 meters in height and weighing approximately 210 tonnes. Research indicates that SCP-2406 was not sentient and required at least six operators to properly function. It is hypothesized that SCP-2406 was piloted via 160 different valves and levers within its interior. Limbs were controlled through the application of pneumatics, hydraulics, and clockwork, and powered by a nuclear reactor located within the torso.
SCP-2406 was discovered on August 7, 1985 in the Aralkum desert, formerly the eastern basin of the Aral Sea, during an effort to track the unusually high levels of radiation in the water. Initially contained by GRU Division "P", SCP-2406 would be transferred into Foundation custody following the collapse of the Soviet Union. Despite the location of its recovery, SCP-2406 is believed to have been built somewhere in the Aegean Sea.
Most of SCP-2406 is composed of an alloy consisting of 75-80 percent copper, 15-20 percent zinc, and smaller percentages of nickel, lead and iron; the admixture responsible for its bronze appearance. Inscribed upon the posterior of the exterior torso is the Aegean numeral for 9, suggesting that SCP-2406 may not be an entirely unique construction. However, as of to date, it remains the only of its kind known to the Foundation. The anterior of the exterior torso is engraved with a stylized hammer and anvil.
The right arm was equipped with a nozzle attached to a 20,800 liter tank. Although the tank was discovered empty, chemical testing revealed pine resin, naphtha, quicklime, calcium phosphide, and sulfur within its interior. The left arm appears to have been torn from SCP-2406 and was not initially recovered with SCP-2406. See addendum for details.
Human skeletal remains, six in number, have been removed from the interior of SCP-2406 with radiocarbon dating placing their deaths at cal 1200–1000 BCE (1σ). All were found to be attired in armor that, while roughly Mycenaean in design, is composed of material never used in ancient warfare - a lead and copper alloy with an inner lining composed of asbestos fabric. The helmet would have completely covered the head with a green, tinted glass visor over the face. Tubes, constructed from goat intestines, fed outside air directly into the mouths of the pilots. Valve #136 would have caused a momentary release of water into these tubes, allowing those within to remain hydrated while operating SCP-2406. A similar system of tubes attached at the crotch and were presumably used in the expulsion of urine.
SCP-2406 is currently disabled (but could hypothetically be repaired) and displays extensive evidence of combat related damage. The head, torso, and left leg were discovered impaled by organic spines. These spines appear superficially chitinous and, despite showing strong structural similarities to coral, contain human DNA. It is believed that these objects functioned as projectiles, employed by an unidentified anomalous organism. Indentations around the torso are suggestive of constriction by a large, flexible and prehensile appendage. Originally thought to be caused by natural corrosion, SCP-2406's outer layer was damaged by a strong acidic substance likely associated with the previously noted unidentified anomalous organism.
Physical evidence suggests that the reactor core melted through the posterior torso, penetrating the earth and continues to burn at more than 1200 °C. It is estimated to be presently located at approximately 820 meters beneath the surface. The reactor, when intact, has been hypothesized to have functioned in a manner similar to natural nuclear fission reactors, deviating significantly from modern designs. It is possible that the creators of SCP-2406 were aware of such phenomena and attempted to mimic the process.
Several scrolls were recovered from a watertight cylinder within SCP-2406. Most appear to be of a religious nature and associated with the Followers of Mekhane - the historical precursor to the modern Church of the Broken God. The scrolls are written in a unique script derived from Mycenaean Greek. It required 10 years of research for Foundation linguists to decipher this system of writing. These documents included a variation of The Book of Pieces, Chapter 12.
+ SCROLL I ACCESS GRANTED The Colossi were constructed in Her Schema. The Colossi were constructed to [defend/secure/contain?]. The Enemy: Grand Karcist Ion. Betrayer of Man. Destroyer of Progress. Sorcerer King of Adytum. A desolate domain, a failed and fallen creation, built with the [bodies/flesh] of dead gods. Upon a throne of black ambition, the Enemy plots. The Enemy is not a priest. They are a merchant. And they have sold the [world/whole/totality].
The Colossi were constructed in Her Schema. The Colossi were constructed to [defend/secure/contain?]. The Profane Tools must be [broken/"uncreated"]. Drink deep the silver blood of MEKHANE. May Her sacrifice not [be in vain?].
+ SCROLL II ACCESS GRANTED This is the final testament of Matriarch Eupraxia, Legates-Faithful, Servant of MEKHANE. I am not a warrior. But all warriors are dead. Breaking themselves upon the Enemy's host. The Enemy has set their plan into motion. The Sorcerer King surrounds himself with corpses. To fight, is to [grow/increase in number] his legions. Egypt retreats from [the world/us/contact with us]. The Hittites have fallen into [chaos/strife]. The Conspirators of [Crete] have sacrificed their own. The Aegean has fallen into barbarism. [The city of a thousand pillars] is forever lost. Has always been lost. Even the Daeva grow desperate with the enemy at their border. The center collapses - kingdoms crumble. The damage is done. The light of reason [flickers/wanes]. But MEKHANE sacrificed herself so that we might be free. We refuse to return to that darkness. We would rather die. But the siege at Gyaros was won. We must strike while the metal is hot. And thus, we march for Kythera - at the end of all things. We have crossed the wine-dark sea. We have seen villages ravaged by the Red Death. We have seen the dead, the dying, and the deathless. We cast the accursed to holy flame. We enter his desolate domain. And in our left hand, we carry our ANSWER. We cannot undo what has been done - but we can delay the Sarkic Dawn.
Addendum: On December 12, 1998, the left arm of SCP-2406 was uncovered 32 km from its body. Evidence of impact suggest the object had been hurled to its location shortly after being severed from SCP-2406's torso. The arm is equipped with what has since been hypothesized to be a weapon of non-terrestrial origins and anomalous manufacture, design, and capabilities. Due to its singular nature when compared to the rest of SCP-2406, this weapon has been separately classified as SCP-2406-1.
The actual purpose of SCP-2406-1 is unknown, the apparatus so foreign as to render it beyond current Foundation knowledge. SCP-2406-1, possibly due to damage, warps spacetime in its vicinity. Kafka counters have registered the object at a difference of 30 humes in relation to its surrounding environment. Despite this, there has been no observable effect on reality.
It has been hypothesized that the use of SCP-2406-1 would cause considerable damage to local reality. It remains unknown if SCP-2406-1 was ever used prior to the destruction of SCP-2406. Personnel are not to attempt activation of SCP-2406-1 unless authorized by Site Command.North Korea released a list of more than 300 new political slogans on Thursday to mark 70 years since the foundation of the isolated state and its ruling Workers' Party.
The slogans, which ran to more than 7,000 words in translation and spanned two pages of the party's broadsheet newspaper, called for a wide range of improvements including "more stylish school uniforms" and "organic farming on an extensive scale".
North Korea is a highly centralised state where government policy is often dictated via vague party-level directives which are distributed as slogans to regional officials to be memorised and carried out.
The new slogans included some of the belligerent rhetoric North Korea frequently directs at its foes the United States and South Korea: "Should the enemy dare to invade our country, annihilate them to the last man so that none of them will survive to sign the instrument of surrender!"
Some of the slogans, which were jointly released by party political and military committees, gave industry-specific instructions such as "Let us turn ours into a country of mushrooms by making mushroom cultivation scientific, intensive and industrialised!"
Here are some other slogans included:
• "Let the strong wind of fish farming blow across the country!"
• "Let the wives of officers become dependable assistants to their husbands!"
• "Let us turn the whole country into a socialist fairyland by the joint operation of the army and people!"
Most, however, reflected statewide needs like providing more food to children, a steady supply of electricity, and less bureaucracy.
The impoverished country has for years promised to raise living standards, but suffers from chronic food shortages, a lack of electricity and international isolation.Britain’s oldest man turns 108 this week, reports the Daily Mail.
The Rev Reg Dean, as his name suggests, has been a minister and served as an army chaplain during the Second World War. He was also a teacher and helped start a male choir of which he is still the president.
When asked his secrets to longevity, he replied he had five secrets: “Good friends,” “religion,” “looking for the best in people not the worst,” and “being a vegetarian for 30 years,” but he couldn’t remember the 5th one.
Well, he is 108, you know.
But that’s okay, because Rev exemplifies that following a vegetarian diet religiously will ward off the demons that steal your health, soul and life.
Speaking of memory, if you’re concerned about the recent statements by health officials who feel vegetarians are at risk for early dementia, Alzheimer’s and other brain disorders due to Vitamin B12 deficiency, there’s no need to fret.
Fortified cereals, protein bars and soymilk are vegan sources of B12, plus several brands of vegan vitamins and supplements, like Solaray and VegLife, carry vegan Vitamin B12 supplements.
Being vegetarian or vegan does not automatically equal B12 deficiency. Even a 108 year old person can remember that.
Possibly Related Posts:The confidence in Atkins mirrors Guenther’s growing confidence in a defense he feels is deeper than last season’s unit that couldn’t overcome a cascade of injuries. He points to up front and the revival of Atkins, the return of Johnson and tackle Pat Sims, and the emergence of Will Clarke behind Johnson at right end. Plus there is the seamless transition of veteran Packers free agent A.J. Hawk at linebacker and the scrum at cornerback involving four first-rounders.
And, his Tuesday trip downstairs to watch Pro Bowl WILL linebacker Vontaze Burfict rehab had Guenther enthused. He pointed to his agenda he has taped up in his office called The Burfict Plan, which ends in capital letters on Sept. 13: BEAT OAKLAND!
“He’s really going after it. He wants it. He looks good,” said Guenther of the hope that Burfict’s micro fracture knee surgery heals well enough for him to start the opener.
“We have guys that have played at some point and not just on the defensive line,” Guenther said. “You look at cornerbacks and linebackers and with the depth we have you can sleep easier on Saturday nights knowing you’re not one injury away from playing with guys that haven’t played here.”
Hayes knows a big key to getting the defense back into the top ten like 2011-2013 is a seven, eight-man rotation up front. Last year they felt like they could play just five with the departure of Johnson and Clarke’s developmental path after they took him in the third round out of West Virginia.
But with Johnson back and Wallace Gilberry now able to play both end and tackle, that gives Hayes five, plus tackle Brandon Thompson for six. And if Clarke plays like he had practiced this spring, Hayes says he has found his seventh.
“The way he’s been practicing? No question,” Hayes said. “He understands where he’s supposed to be in the defense and he’s bigger and stronger. You can see that confidence.”
Guenther was impressed right away when Clarke showed up this year at 290 pounds when they told him he had to put on 20 pounds this past offseason after he arrived somewhere between 270-275.
“He looks like a different player,” Guenther said. “I have confidence in these guys that we’re able to go in there and play at a high level. I really, really think we can have one of the best (lines) in the league.”History of the Flat Earth Society
The modern age of the Flat Earth Society dates back to the early 1800s, when it was founded by Samuel Birley Rowbotham, an English inventor. Samuel Rowbotham's Flat Earth views were based largely on literal interpretation of Bible passages. His system, called Zetetic Astronomy, held that the earth is a flat disk centered at the North Pole and bounded along its'southern' edge by a wall of ice, with the sun, moon, planets, and stars only a few hundred miles above the surface of the earth. After Rowbotham's death in 1884, followers of his Zetetic Astronomy founded the Universal Zetetic Society.
Flat Earth theory spread to the United States, largely in the town of Zion, Illinois where Christian Catholic Apostolic Church founder John Alexander Dowie and later Wilbur Glenn Voliva promoted Flat Earth theory. Voliva died in 1942 and the church quickly disintegrated. Flat Earthism remained in Zion, gradually becoming less popular into the 1950s.
The International Flat Earth Society was formally founded in 1956 by Samuel Shenton, a Fellow of the Royal Astronomical Society and the Royal Geographic Society. Shenton died in 1971 and Charles K. Johnson became president of the International Flat Earth Society. Johnson actively and charistmatically promoted the Society and, over time, its membership increased to over 3,000. His wife Marjory took an active role in the Society as well, often contributing articles to the Flat Earth Society Newsletter.
In 1995, a fire destroyed the Johnson's home as well as all of the Flat Earth Society's library, archives and membership lists. Following a long period of poor health, Charles K. Johnson's wife Marjory Johnson passed away in 1996. He vowed to rebuild the society. Sadly, Charles K. Johnson passed away in 2001 at the age of 76, leaving the Society's future uncertain.
After several years of inactivity, the Flat Earth Society was resurrected in 2004 and remains active today at theflatearthsociety.org. The Society officially reopened to new members on 30th October 2009.Theresa May will threaten to take Britain out of the single market unless the UK is given full control of its borders in a significant Brexit speech designed to counter claims she has no plan for leaving the EU.
The Prime Minister will outline her “vision for Britain outside of the EU” in a major speech later this month that will focus on the economy and immigration.
Both David Davis, the Brexit Secretary, and Boris Johnson, the Foreign Secretary, are having “significant” input into the speech, sources said.
However, Liam Fox, the Trade Secretary considered one of the “three Brexiteers” alongside Mr Davis and Mr Johnson, is understood to have been sidelined.
The speech will be seen as a retort to claims of “muddled thinking” in Mrs May’s Government by Sir Ivan Rogers, who on Tuesday resigned as Britain’s EU ambassador after a series of rows with Downing Street.
Last night the Government announced that Sir Ivan’s successor will be Sir Tim Barrow, a close ally of Mrs May and Mr Johnson and former ambassador to Russia who has experience negotiating with Vladimir Putin.
He was described by ministers as an “optimist” whose outlook is in “stark contrast” to the “pessimism” from Sir Ivan, which infuriated Mrs May’s senior team.A Decisive Battle With Theatrhythm: Final Fantasy
By Spencer. December 27, 2011. 4:48pm
Thanks to a demo for Theatrhythm: Final Fantasy, I have "Dancing Mad" "Decisive Battle" stuck in my head. The downloadable demo, now available on the Nintendo eShop in Japan, only includes the Final Fantasy VI boss battle melody.
A brief tutorial explains the three kinds of notes:
Red – tap the screen
Yellow: swipe in that direction
Green: hold down until the next green note
Notes move towards one of the four characters and hitting them makes that character slash their weapon at the air. If your tap is perfectly on beat you’ll score a critical attack. Miss a note and the lead character takes damage.
While the demo only had one song, there were three difficulty modes. The first is a cakewalk and in the middle you can summon Shiva who attacks with Diamond Dust if you get all of the notes in the feature zone right. She’s new, the Tokyo Game Show only had Ifrit. Ramuh is also in the demo and he shocks enemies with lightning. The enemies change from Ultros to a Bomb to a Cactuar, a Behemonth, and Deathgaze if you’re good enough. Level two upped the tempo and variety of notes adding in more holds. Level three took a couple of tries to beat with notes flying across the screen. Like other demos, the Theatrhythm demo is limited to 30 plays.
For more about Theatrhythm: Final Fantasy’s other modes like event and field check out our earlier hands-on impressions.This one took a while to do, but only because I got wrapped up on other drawings and I totally forgot about doing the sketch for it.
My good ol' friend Arran and I were talking one day, and he mentioned me something called Ruhmkorff Lamps (I hate that name, I can never remember it!). These lamps were used in the 19th century, and if you read "Journey to the Centre of the Earth" you will remember the protagonists using them to light their way through.
So my friend comes to me and says "You should totally draw Twilight with one of those, they look really cool". Five minutes later, the sketch was done, and after a couple of hours on photoshop with my crappy tablet this is the result. I wanted to make Twilight look all badass as she uses this lamp like a magic wand in order to power up her magic spells. Why would her magic spells be powered by the lamp? I think the combination of the electron particles of her magic with the condensed gas inside the tube causes the particles of the spell to increase their mass and thus making the spell more powerful.
Or something.
Art by James Corck
Twilight Sparkle |
he entered office with large majorities in Congress, giving him space to pursue solutions to the economy, along with his own projects.
By the time he reached office, however, two things had happened. First, the economy had gotten worse. Unemployment shot to new highs, growth reversed, and the United States entered economic freefall. The overwhelming priority for the incoming administration was to stabilize the economy and keep things from deteriorating into a second Great Depression.
The other thing was less remarked upon at the time, but no less important: Congressional Republicans, led by Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell, pledged to make Obama a one-term president by any means necessary. Their plan was to use legislative rules like the filibuster to create a supermajority requirement for everything from confirming nominees to passing new legislation. Far from harming Republicans—who would be unified in their opposition—the blowback would tarnish Obama, who would be blamed by the public for gridlock and obstruction.
Even without Republican support, Democrats managed to pass a stimulus, health-care reform, and financial reform, but each bill involved a tremendous amount of work, and left the party in poor shape with the public. Still, Republican obstruction was successful in reducing the size of the stimulus, stigmatizing health-care reform, and taking the teeth out of financial reform.
Worse, the sudden reversal of Republicans on the issue of fiscal stimulus—which they supported at both ends of the Bush administration—meant that the economy was stuck without further support, even as it stagnated with slow growth and high unemployment. Obama, as the president, received the lion's share of blame from the public. The only people who noticed Republican obstruction, by contrast, were assorted bloggers, journalists, and Washington insiders.
The rest of the story is straightforward. Republicans rode this discontent to the a massive victory in the House of Representatives—as well as big wins throughout the country—and used their newfound power to push austerity and a reactionary social agenda. In a series of terrible mistakes, Obama tried to negotiate with and accommodate Republicans, resulting in a string of political losses, and further damaged his credibility with the public. His administration flailed until it recognized the futility of trying to work with congressional Republicans.
There are two things to take away from this abridged version of the last three and a half years. The first is that Democrats, led by Obama, passed an impressive amount of big legislation, given the circumstances. Obama has had his fair share of problems—his actions, or lack thereof, on the federal reserve come to the forefront—but on the whole, his administration has accomplished more than most.
The second, and more important lesson, is that the economy could have been in much better shape had Republicans cooperated. That doesn’t mean acquiescence, but it does mean an attempt to find mutually beneficial solutions to the problems of slow growth and high unemployment.
In an ideal world, all of this would be a part of the political conversation in an election year. As the standard-bearer for the Republican Party, Mitt Romney would have to answer a few questions: Is it not true that Obama has spent his term cleaning up the wreckage of the last Republican president? Why shouldn’t we hold the GOP responsible for the gridlock of the past three years? How do you intend to fix the economy, if you are touting the same policies as your Republican predecessor?
Of course, none of this will be asked. As he did in this speech, Romney will be allowed to campaign as if the past never happened, and the Republican Party didn’t have a part in producing the current circumstances. His campaign will run on clichés, and angrily swat back at anyone who questions his refusal to acknowledge the people—his fellow Republicans—who created this mess in the first place.
If there’s anything we can take from Romney’s speech tonight, it’s that the general election will be fought in a vacuum, where the only person who can ever be blamed is Barack Obama.by Brett Stevens on May 29, 2017
For many years, Paul Ramsey has served as a voice for the nationalist Right, guiding us away from emotional reactions and toward practical policy with his informative, witty and thoughtful podcasts. Recently, he had a few moments free between attempts to save the West from itself, and sat down with us for a brief but intense interview.
At what point did you break away from the “everything will be OK” mentality of modernity? Was it a gradual awakening, or a moment of shock?
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It was gradual. I have always been outside of the traditional Democrat / Republican paradigm. When I attended university, I was a libertarian greatly influenced by the writings of Ayn Rand. I figured that her description of civilization breaking down as described in Atlas Shrugged was correct.
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After college, I spent many years working the tech industry. The culture of the tech industry in the 1980s and 1990s tended to be libertarian and I felt at home. As I spent most of my time working, I did not get involved with politics.
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After 2001, I slowly came to realize that the libertarian model would not work as the USA transformed into a Third World population. The immigrants would not allow us to have our “Galt’s Gulchâ€. They would demand more and more until the country was just an empty shell.
When did you start doing your iconic videos, and originally, what was your intent? How did it expand?
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My original video was for Liberty Forum. Liberty Forum was a libertarian message board. My user name was Nikolai9. (Nikolai was a character I liked in War and Peace.)
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When I first posted my video, it was more of a lark. YouTube was new and I thought it would be interesting to do a video commentary. I think my first video was on Peak Oil (a subject I was later proven to be horribly misguided on). People in the forum seemed to like the video. And I was astonished I got a hundred views! I could not believe that so many people would watch a video from me.
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I never had a master plan concerning my intentions. I just had fun making videos. My early videos were on a wide range of topics. For example, I once interviewed a zoo employee about chimpanzees.
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As my political views became more nationalist, I started to attract a Stormfront type of audience. Such was a blessing and a curse. My videos became more popular, but I started to become pigeonholed as a “White Nationalist†which I never desired.
I think my audience expanded because I offered something new: a normal guy who advocated Nationalism without the Nazi baggage. Many people could relate to that. I was the start of what would later become known as the Alt Right.
You are an unusual thinker in that you affirm certain taboo principles, but shy away from the extremes of movements that usually endorse those. How did you arrive at this path, or more fully, how do you know when an idea is true and how to avoid misinterpretations of it?
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One of my early videos was called “The Truth.†In that video, I struggled with what was the truth and how could one always advocate the truth. That is easier said than done as once you are part of a “group†you have pressure to conform to the ideology.
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But my overriding goal in my videos was to always be honest with my videos. I think an audience can tell if you are faking. And, as a man, I am always re-evaluating my positions. I have learned that there is more that I don’t know that what I do know. As such, to be dogmatic on an issue can be dangerous and false.
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I don’t have an answer as to how to avoid misrepresentations. The SPLC has misrepresented me. The media has misrepresented me. Many people on the Right have misrepresented me. All I can do is speak directly to my audience and hope they understand me.
It seems that we in the West are in the midst of some kind of massive cultural shift or “sea change.” What do you think this is?
Technology has changed everything. No longer can ideas be contained by a few gatekeepers. People such as myself can influence millions of people, not just in America, but around the world. This is as revolutionary as the invention of the printing press.
And such technology has created a scale that humans have not evolved to cope with. For thousands of years people usually only had to relate to a few hundred people within a radius of maybe 100 miles. Now that scale is global and it creates anxiety and unhappiness.
For example, a pretty girl in Stillwater, Oklahoma 50 years ago only had to compete and gossip with other girls in the same local area. They shared the same race, religion, language and basic outlook on life. Now such a girl is in a global market that may include fighting other girls based in Moscow and London. And there is this huge clash of religion, languages and values. I don’t think people can cope well with this scale.
People are evolved to belong to a local tribe that shares the same basic values. But technology has created global competition and desires that can’t be met locally. So, people become unhappy.
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The great tragedy is that people yearn for Nationalism, but they are tempted by the exciting fruit of globalism.
Are you against diversity and in favor of nationalism generally, or more concerned with specific groups?
I believe that nationalism provides the most happiness for humans. But people are also attracted by the exotic. Ideally this would be resolved with nationalist states that allow travel between cultures. For example, a Hungarian could live with his people in Hungary, but experience the diversity of other people through travel.
Following up on that, what do you think of the “JQ” or “Jewish question” and how relevant is it to the task of, say, restoring Western Civilization?
One of the reasons I am not a good fit for the new Alt Right is that I am ambivalent on the Jewish question.
As I have done many videos, I have recognized patterns. Most of the anti-White and harmful programs and ideas tend to be pushed by Jews. And when I see Jews tend to be involved with 80% of these harmful ideas (such as White Privilege) and yet they only compose 2% of the population, I know something is wrong.
And, yet, I have known many Jews that are just normal people that are not part of some malevolent conspiracy against our people. Yes, I know that puts me in the “Not All X Are Like That†cliché. But I can’t help it. I can’t base my ideology on the hatred of other people.
As such, I really don’t have an answer to that question. Except for using the Jew’s example of having an ethnic homeland for our people. I advocate a “White Israel†for our people. A homeland for us.
In your view, if everything goes right according to what you would like to see for our future, what timeline of events will happen and what will society look like in the future?
Ideally, I would like to see the peaceful acceptance of Nationalism across the world. A world in which Germany is for the Germans and Japan is for the Japanese.
Realistically, the best I think we can hope for are a few countries that support the nationalist model.
I have no idea about timelines. When I was at university, I would have said you are crazy if you told me the Soviet Union would break apart is fewer than ten years. But it did.
I don’t think God gives us timelines, but He gives us tasks to perform faithfully.
We should now talk about the “CQ” or “Christian question.” Do you see Christianity having a role in the restored West? How necessary is it? What are the downsides?
Religion is like the skin of an orange. The skin of the orange is not that good. You can’t eat it. But the skin is necessary else the fruit rots. In the same way, religion helps to protect a people. We have lost our religion in the West, and we can see that our people have become corrupted and depraved. As humans, we need religion.
Christianity was the religion of Western Civilization. Paganism did not bind all of Europe, Christianity did.
Having said that, I am more of a Cultural Christian than advocating a specific theology. Holidays such as Christmas and Easter bind us as a people, even if some may not really believe the stories. Â
Do you think there is common ground for the Alt Right, Neoreaction, White Nationalism, Nationalism, New Right and related movements? What do you think it is?
I think identity is the glue that can bind us together. Things fall apart when people start demanding purity tests concerning National Socialism, the Holocaust, the JQ, religion, the role of women, etc. We will never agree on those issues to form a critical mass. For example, if you should demand that a movement adopts “White Shariaâ€, good luck being anything beyond a tiny fringe. To be a viable political force, we need to attract normal people. And most normal people are not interested in trying to re-create the Third Reich or a White ISIS.
Can you tell us where you are currently active and how to stay in touch with what you are doing?
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Ironically, I am Nationalist that lives a cosmopolitan lifestyle. I frequent Europe and the United States. I lack roots, and that makes me unhappy. Living in a small village away from everything is a goal of mine.
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You can always stay in touch with me via e-mail ramzpaul@gmail.com or Twitter RAMZPAUL.
You can find his video channel on YouTube as well. Mr. Ramsey, thank you for taking the time to talk to us, and best wishes in the future!
Tags: interviews, nationalism, paul ramsey, ramzpaul
Please enable JavaScript to view the comments powered by Disqus.Top Gear understands that you are an industrious, all-action businessperson with not a moment to waste in your hectic schedule. But you must clear precisely 35.05 seconds in your diary to watch the video below, because it may change your life. Probably not a lot, but maybe a little.
The video below shows racing nutjob Jos Goodyear setting a new course record on Scotland’s Doune Hillclimb in his GWR Raptor, a car featuring a supercharged Hayabusa engine, four tyres and very little else.
And Mr Goodyear plus lightweight bike-engined thing equals fast. Much fast. Jos’s 35.05-second ascent of Doune’s 1,350-metre course equates to an average speed (if TG’s ropey maths is correct) of around 87mph, but that figure doesn’t do justice to the sheer insanity of this drive.
Drystone walls, trees, off-camber, slippery bends: Doune is a hill with no room for error, and Goodyear pushes it right to the very edge.
Because you’re far too busy to waste valuable seconds watching Jos idling at the start line (though there’s a lovely moment around 17 seconds featuring Goodyear’s crack team of tyre experts), fast-forward to 1m30s to witness the insane climb itself.
Prepare to wince a little, and then please enter, in the comments section below, your best guess at the precise chemical composition of Mr Goodyear’s manfruits.
And, if you’re reading this from outside the UK and wondering: yes, this is exactly what the whole of Britain does every weekend.PowerShell provides ways to validate acceptable parameter input for a function or a script. If you have taken an introductory computer science or programming course, you have learned first-hand about the importance of validating the values of parameters passed into your script, function, or program. You were taught that your program should nicely tell the user what was wrong and how to fix the problem. You may have ended up writing thousands of lines of code to cover every possible scenario where the user could mess up the input. Perhaps, you wrote one line of code that tells the user the input does not match the desired input. Huh? Sometimes it would almost be better to throw an error! PowerShell parameter validation attributes define what is acceptable for parameter input without needing to write massive amounts of code to handle it.
Timing of Parameter Validation
The benefits to using parameter validation attributes is two-fold. First, you do not have to write the error messages yourself. You define the acceptable or non-acceptable attributes directly on the parameter and it throws the error. It is understandable and readable to the end user. Second, there is no code for the validation. You never enter the actual code if the parameter validation does not pass and the code does not get bloated from all the input checking.
Checking For Empty Parameters
Some PowerShell parameter validation attributes allow you to specifically permit a null or empty value on an input parameter. For example, the following code shows a function that does not use any parameter validation for the input parameter $ComputerName. Perhaps, the input for $ComputerName is coming from another cmdlet, process, or a file that is unknowingly empty. When passed null or empty values occur without parameter validation, the function will err.
1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 function Do-Something { param ( [ Parameter ( Mandatory = $True ) ] [ string [ ] ] $ComputerName ) ping $ComputerName }
Allowing Null and Empty Values
Though the error messages are fairly clear about the problem, perhaps you want to allow for these conditions to be valid so that the function does not err or give nasty red messages. There are three parameter validation settings that allow you to accept null or empty values and you can use one or all three. This depends on what kind of input you anticipate or want to accept:
[AllowNull()]
[AllowEmptyString()]
[AllowEmptyCollection()]
You may encounter any of these scenarios when receiving input from another cmdlet. You can now gracefully handle any of these values by adding all three to the parameter validation for $ComputerName. I have added a write-host to identify that the code has received something that I chose not to process. You could choose to include a write-verbose, a line written to a log, or any other custom handling.
1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 function Do-Something { param ( [ Parameter ( Mandatory = $True ) ] [ AllowNull ( ) ] [ AllowEmptyString ( ) ] [ AllowEmptyCollection ( ) ] [ string [ ] ] $ComputerName ) foreach ( $obj in $ComputerName ) { if ( ( $obj -eq $Null ) -or ( $obj -eq '' ) ) { write-host "Nothing received to ping" } else { ping $obj } } }
Disallowing Null or Empty Values
Conversely, ensure that a null or empty value is not accepted as an input parameter by using the ValidateNotNull() or ValidateNotNullorEmpty() parameter validation attributes. The behavior in the simple example, when using the validate settings, shows a similar error compared to the behavior in the original example with no parameter validation. However, when the parameters are validated, the messages are clear that the parameters are not passing validation. The original example contained messages stating that the arguments could not be bound. As a result, using validation will specifically state that you are not allowing the values. This is different from having to figure out how the function would behave with invalid parameters and rely on the default handling for the parameter.
Limiting the Input to a Parameter
At times, you may also have requirements as to what constitutes an acceptable parameter. NetBIOS limitations may limit a computer name to 15 characters or less. Perhaps, you have a specific computer naming convention that has 6 characters and 4 digits and you want to check that the input is a valid computer name. For a script with performance implications, you may want to limit the number of computers that you are running against at one time. For numeric input, you may want to limit the acceptable digits. PowerShell provides parameter validation attributes to handle all of these requirements.
[ValidateLength(1,15)] — Allows for a computer name with a length of 1 to 15 characters.
— Allows for a computer name with a length of 1 to 15 characters. [ValidatePattern(“[a-z]{6}\d{4}”)] — Allows for a computer name that contains 6 characters followed by 4 digits.
— Allows for a computer name that contains 6 characters followed by 4 digits. [ValidateCount(1,3)] — Allows for 1 to 3 computer names to be specified. It throws a validation error and does not run if the number of parameters is exceeded.
— Allows for 1 to 3 computer names to be specified. It throws a validation error and does not run if the number of parameters is exceeded. [ValidateRange(1,12)] — Allows for an integer value of 1 to 12 to be provided. For example, this could be used for an input for a parameter $Month.
Limiting Input to Specific Parameter Values
You may also want to limit the possible values of a parameter for only a few options. For example, if you were writing a script that set ACLs on a file, you may want to limit the $Action parameter to Allow or Deny. You can use ValidateSet[(“Allow”,”Deny”)] to limit the parameter value for $Action to one of those two options.
Custom Validation
The [ValidateScript({})] parameter validation attribute allows you to define your own custom parameter validation. To pass validation, the script block must evaluate to $True. To represent the current value of the parameter being passed in, use $_. An example of this is an input parameter for a DNS name that must be resolvable for the parameter to pass validation. Note that this is only possible to validate a single parameter and not a collection. In that case, handle the validation of a collection with a foreach loop in the main code.
1 [ ValidateScript ( { Resolve-DNSName -Name $_ } ) ]
There Is No (Good) Reason to Not Validate Parameters
With all the options for parameter validation at your fingertips, there is no good reason to not use it. Rather, it allows you to precisely narrow down what constitutes acceptable input for a parameter. Furthermore, validating your parameters on the declaration itself allows you to keep the validation from bloating your code unnecessarily. As a result, by using parameter validation attributes, you keep your code simple and focused on the things the code needs to do.A Bahraini protester wearing a shirt showing jailed human rights activist Abdulhadi al-Khawaja takes part in an anti-government protest on September 5, 2014 west of Manama
A prominent Bahraini activist jailed for life for his role in anti-regime protests has been on hunger strike for two weeks to protest the treatment of prisoners, campaigners said Thursday.
Abdulhadi al-Khawaja, who also holds Danish citizenship, is an outspoken critic of Bahrain's Al-Khalifa monarchy, which has ruled the tiny Gulf archipelago for more than two centuries.
Khawaja began the hunger strike on April 12 in a Manama prison to protest the "arbitrary detention and degrading treatment of prisoners in Bahrain," the Gulf Centre for Human Rights (GCHR) said in a statement.
It is the fifth such protest in six years by Khawaja, who was given a life sentence in June 2011 after being convicted of plotting to topple the monarchy.
Sunni-ruled Bahrain, home to a majority Shiite population, has witnessed sporadic unrest since early 2011, when long-running demands for political reform intensified with nationwide demonstrations calling for an elected government.
Authorities have since tightened their grip on Shiite-led dissent, jailing hundreds of protesters and stripping activists and clerics of citizenship.
The GCHR also called for the medical evacuation of Khawaja and fellow rights activist Nabeel Rajab, who is behind bars while on trial for charges of insulting the state.
Rajab, one of the most high-profile activists in Bahrain, underwent minor surgery earlier this month. His family has however said they remain concerned about his health.
The UN is scheduled to hold a human rights review session on Bahrain in Geneva on May 1.Fully loaded and refreshingly simple Our free antivirus software just got even better. It now includes real-time security updates, scans for both malware and performance issues, and even catches malicious downloads before they reach your PC. It’s also got an all-new, refreshingly simple design that shows you exactly how you’re protected. All of this, and it still won’t slow you down! Stop viruses, spyware, ransomware & other malware
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You May LikeThis article is about the enzyme that forms acetaldehyde. For the enzyme that feeds the citric acid cycle, see pyruvate dehydrogenase
Pyruvate decarboxylase is a homotetrameric enzyme (EC 4.1.1.1) that catalyses the decarboxylation of pyruvic acid to acetaldehyde and carbon dioxide in the cytoplasm of prokaryotes, and in the cytoplasm and mitochondria of eukaryotes. It is also called 2-oxo-acid carboxylase, alpha-ketoacid carboxylase, and pyruvic decarboxylase.[1] In anaerobic conditions, this enzyme is part of the fermentation process that occurs in yeast, especially of the genus Saccharomyces, to produce ethanol by fermentation. It is also present in some species of fish (including goldfish and carp) where it permits the fish to perform ethanol fermentation (along with lactic acid fermentation) when oxygen is scarce.[2] Pyruvate decarboxylase starts this process by converting pyruvate into acetaldehyde and carbon dioxide.[3] Pyruvate decarboxylase depends on cofactors thiamine pyrophosphate (TPP) and magnesium. This enzyme should not be mistaken for the unrelated enzyme pyruvate dehydrogenase, an oxidoreductase (EC 1.2.4.1), that catalyzes the oxidative decarboxylation of pyruvate to acetyl-CoA.
Structure [ edit ]
Pyruvate decarboxylase occurs as a dimer of dimers with two active sites shared between the monomers of each dimer. The enzyme contains a beta-alpha-beta structure, yielding parallel beta-sheets. It contains 563 residue subunits in each dimer; the enzyme has strong intermonomer attractions, but the dimers loosely interact to form a loose tetramer.[4]
Crystallographic structures of pyruvate decarboxylase Cartoon diagram of pyruvate decarboxylase monomer with TPP attached.
Cartoon diagram of pyruvate decarboxylase tetramer.
Active site of pyruvate decarboxylase with selected amino acids: Glu-51, Glu-477, Asp-444, and Asp-28. Also displayed are cofactors TPP and Mg 2+.
Positions of His and Cys residues in respect to active site (TPP and Mg) that participate in conformation changes when interacting with pyruvate substrate.
Active site residues [ edit ]
This enzyme is a homotetramer, and therefore has four active sites. The active sites are inside a cavity in the core of the enzyme where hydrogen bonding can occur and where the pyruvate reacts with TPP. Each active site has 20 amino acids, including the acidic Glu-477 (contributes to the stability of the TPP ring) and Glu-51 (aids in cofactor binding). These Glutamates also contribute to forming the TPP ylid, acting as proton donators to the TPP aminopyrimidine ring. The microenvironment around this Glu 477 is very nonpolar, contributing to a higher than normal pK a (normal Glu and Asp pKa's are around 4.6 in small proteins).[5]
The lipophilic residues Ile-476, Ile-480 and Pro-26 contribute to the nonpolarity of the area around Glu-477. The only other negatively charged residue apart from TPP coenzyme is the Asp-28, which also aids in increasing the pK a of Glu-477. Thus, the environment of the enzyme must allow for the protonation of the gamma-carboxyl group of Glu-477 to be around pH 6.[5]
The aminopyrimidine ring on TPP acts as a base, once in its imine form, to pull off the C2 proton from TPP to form the nucleophile ylide.[4] This must occur because the enzyme has no basic side chains present to deprotonate the TPP C2. A mutation at the active site involving these Glu can result in the inefficiency or inactivity of the enzyme. This inactivity has been proven in experiments in which either the N1' and/or 4'-amino groups are missing. In NMR analysis, it has been determined that when TPP is bound to the enzyme along with the substate-analog pyruvamide, the rate of ylid formation is greater than the normal enzyme rate. Also, the rate of mutation of Glu 51 to Gln reduces this rate significantly.[4]
Also included are Asp-444 and Asp-28 which stabilize the active site. These act as stabilizers for the Mg2+ ion that is present in each active site. To ensure that only pyruvate binds, two Cys-221 (more than 20 Ångstroms away from each site) and His-92 trigger a conformational change which inhibits or activates the enzyme depending on the substrate that interacts with it. If the substrate bound in the active site is pyruvate, then the enzyme is activated by a conformational change in this regulatory site.[6] The conformational change involves a 1,2 nucleophilic addition. This reaction, the formation of a thioketal, transforms the enzyme from its inactive to active state.
Inhibition of the site is done by a XC 6 H 4 CH=CHCOCOOH class of inhibitors/substrate analogues, as well as by the product of decarboxylation from such compounds as cinnamaldehydes. Other potential nucleophilic sites for the inhibitor include Cys-152, Asp-28, His-114, His-115, and Gln-477.[6]
The normal catalytic rate of pyruvate decarboxylase is k cat = 10 s−1. However, the rate of the enzyme with a Glu-51 mutation to Gln is 1.7 s−1.[4]
TPP prosthetic group [ edit ]
The cofactor TPP, C 12 H 18 N 4 O 7 P 2 S, is needed for this reaction's mechanism; it acts as the prosthetic group to the enzyme. The carbon atom between the sulfur and nitrogen atoms on thiazole ring act as carbanion which binds to the pyruvate. TPP has an acidic H+ on its C2 that acts as the functional part of the thiazolium ring; the ring acts as an "electron sink", enabling the carbanion electrons to be stabilized by resonance.[3] The TPP can then act as a nucleophile with the loss of this C2 hydrogen, forming the ylide form of TPP. This ylide can then attack pyruvate, which is held by the enzyme pyruvate decarboxylase. During the decarboxylation of pyruvate, the TPP stabilizes the carbanion intermediates as an electrophile by noncovalent bonds.[4] Specifically, the pyridyl nitrogen N1' and the 4'-amino group of TPP are essential for the catalytic function of the enzyme-TDP complex.[5]
Mechanism [ edit ]
The enzyme splits pyruvate into carbon dioxide and a 2-carbon fragment which is attached to its cofactor TPP. This 2-carbon fragment is attached to the five membered TPP ring in its ylide form. This is an irreversible step in which it creates the acetaldehyde for the second step of alcoholic fermentation (anaerobic fermentation), in which acetaldehyde is reduced by NADH with alcohol dehydrogenase to ethanol.[7]
Mechanism of pyruvate decarboxylation
Yeast [ edit ]
In yeast, pyruvate decarboxylase acts independently during anaerobic fermentation and releases the 2-carbon fragment as acetaldehyde plus carbon dioxide. Pyruvate decarboxylase creates the means of CO 2 elimination, which the cell dispels. The enzyme is also means to create ethanol, which is used as an antibiotic to eliminate competing organisms.[4] The enzyme is necessary to help the decarboxylation of alpha-keto acids because there is a build-up of negative charge that occurs on the carbonyl carbon atom in the transition state; therefore, the enzyme provides the suitable environment for TPP and the alpha-keto acid (pyruvate) to meet.[4]
References [ edit ]UPDATE: Accused naked intruder indicted on burglary, sex abuse charges
A 32-year-old man has been arrested after police say he broke into a Northwest Portland home early Thursday morning, stripped naked and climbed into bed with a couple living there.
According to the Portland Police Bureau, Richard Dean Defeudis broke into a home in the 2700 block of Northwest Quimby Street at about 3:40 a.m. and began grabbing valuable items. After he stripped off his clothes, he slipped into the bed and kissed a man sleeping there.
The home's resident woke to find the stranger holding a knife and sitting on top of him. Police said the man pushed off the intruder and grabbed a handgun, telling the man to stop.
The intruder pulled on his pants, running out of the home as the man chased him with the gun. The resident fired three shots near the suspect, but no one was harmed. Neighbor Kevin Gillam said an officer told him the bullets went into the ground.
The burglar continued to run, police said, eventually breaking into a second house -- this one vacant. Defeudis was arrested at this second home in the 2700 block of Northwest Pettygrove Street.
Defeudis was taken to a Portland hospital for treatment possibly related to drug use, then booked into Multnomah County Jail on charges of first-degree burglary, second-degree burglary, first-degree sex abuse, and unlawful use of a weapon. He is expected to be arraigned Friday.
The victim was not injured and cooperated with detectives. He is not expected to face any charges.
Gillam, the neighbor, said he never thought crime would be a problem when he moved into the area last year. But since he moved in, he thinks he's heard gunshots multiple times, and someone broke into his Range Rover two weeks ago.
They didn't take much, but now he wonders if moving to the neighborhood was the right decision. He's thinking about moving to a high-rise condo in the Pearl District, which he figures would be harder to break into.
After all, Thursday morning's victims were just a few houses away from his own, he said.
-- Anna Marum
amarum@oregonian.com
503-294-5911
@annamarum
Oregonian reporter Tony Hernandez contributed to this story.Canada's ruling Conservatives would win a strong majority in Parliament if elections were held today, according to a poll showing the new leader of the opposition Liberals has done little to boost public support.
Canadians favour the Conservatives over the Liberals by 45 per cent to 26 per cent, an Ipsos Reid poll showed. The New Democrats (NDP) had the backing of 12 per cent.
The 19-point lead for Prime Minister Stephen Harper's party is only slightly narrower than what the Conservatives enjoyed in a Ipsos Reid poll released Dec. 5, before the Liberals replaced the unpopular Stephane Dion with Michael Ignatieff.
The Conservatives, whose minority government was returned to power in Oct. 14 elections with 37.6 per cent of the vote, would need at least 40 per cent to win a majority of the seats in the House of Commons, political analysts say.
Dion, who led the Liberals to one of their worst election defeats in history, bowed to pressure within his party to step down this week, instead of in May, clearing the way for Ignatieff to take the reins Wednesday,The Democratic contest has repeatedly been characterized as a choice between Hillary Clinton’s “pragmatism” and Bernie Sanders’s “idealism” – with the not-so-subtle message that realists choose pragmatism over idealism. But this way of framing the choice ignores the biggest reality of all: the unprecedented, and increasing, concentration of income, wealth and power at the very top, combined with declining real incomes for most and persistent poverty for the bottom fifth.
The real choice isn’t “pragmatism” or “idealism.” It’s either allowing these trends to worsen, or reversing them. Inequality has reached levels last seen in the era of the “robber barons” in the 1890s. The only truly pragmatic way of reversing this state of affairs is through a “political revolution” that mobilizes millions of Americans.
Is such a mobilization possible? One pundit recently warned Democrats that change happens incrementally, by accepting half loaves as being better than none. That may be true, but the full loaf has to be large and bold enough in the first place to make the half loaf meaningful. And not even a half loaf is possible unless or until America wrests back power from the executives of large corporations, Wall Street bankers and billionaires who now control the bakery.
I’ve been in and around Washington for almost 50 years, including a stint in the cabinet, and I’ve learned that real change happens only when a substantial share of the American public is mobilized, organized, energized and determined to make it happen. That’s more the case now than ever.
The other |
this bill that limits my right as a woman to make my choice with my doctor," said Sen. Trudy Wade, R-Guilford. "We need to make it safer for women, and that’s what this whole bill is about."
Stein challenged that claim.
"A medical abortion - one which is carried out using medication - is five times safer than Viagra," he said. "If you really care about patient safety, is it your position that a doctor needs to be with every man who takes Viagra at the time it's administered?"
Democratic Attorney General Roy Cooper noted that other abortion legislation Republican lawmakers have passed in recent years has wound up in the courts, and he said the latest bill likely will as well if approved.
“Restricting the health care rights of women is not only bad public policy, but it will ignite even more constitutional challenges in court," Cooper said in a statement.Submitted by Mike Krieger via Liberty Blitzkrieg blog,
I’m fairly certain very few of you have heard of broker price opinions, or BPOs, but it’s something I think we should all become aware of given the influence of BPOs in the market for valuing residential real estate securitized bonds.
Before we get to that, let’s revisit a little contemporary American robber baron history. In the immediate aftermath of the U.S. financial crisis, financial oligarchs immediately got to work helping Main Street climb out of the Wall Street created ditch by buying foreclosed homes from hordes of newly destitute Americans and then renting them back to those same people.
I wrote many articles about this trend over the years, starting with the January 2013 piece, America Meet Your New Slumlord: Wall Street. Here’s an excerpt:
Well they aren’t really your “new” slumlord in the sense you have been debt slaves to the financials system for decades. What I really mean is that it is now becoming overt and literal. Literal because financiers are now the main players in the real estate market and are buying all the homes ordinary citizens were kicked out of over the past few years. Yep, we bailed out the financial system so that financiers with access to cheap credit can buy up all of America’s real estate so that they can then rent it back to you later.
Fast forward a few years, and private equity is frantically packaging these real estate rental properties into bonds. In order to value the real estate collateral you need some sort of appraisal, but the normal process of actually looking at properties is seen as too costly and time consuming, so market players are cutting corners by using “broker price opinions,” or BPOs.
As Bloomberg reports, this practice is coming under increased scrutiny and for good reason:
U.S. securities regulators are investigating whether bonds backed by single-family rental homes and sold by Wall Street’s biggest residential landlords used overvalued property assessments. Radian Group Inc.’s Green River Capital unit is one of the market participants that received a request for information from the Securities and Exchange Commission in March about broker price opinions, or BPOs, the company said in a regulatory filinglate Friday. Green River provides BPOs that are used to value real estate in securitizations. The agency has been looking at whether BPOs were wrongly inflated, and similar letters were sent to other companies, potentially serving as a starting point for an industrywide probe, according to a person with knowledge of the matter. The person asked not to be identified because the matter is private. Green River is one of several firms that provide BPOs to the units of private-equity firms and other investors who bought up hundreds of thousands of properties in cities across the U.S. after the housing bubble burst. Many of them focused on distressed homes whose owners were evicted during the Great Recession.
Never forget, what’s good for Wall Street is good for Main Street! Also, they hate us for our freedoms.
Broker price opinions are a cheaper and less-stringent way to evaluate what a property is worth than an appraisal. Property valuations are a sensitive subject in the housing industry because regulators said inflated appraisals contributed to the housing bubble a decade ago. The biggest private-equity landlords, led by Blackstone Group LP’s Invitation Homes, have sold more than $15 billion in bonds since 2013 backed by some 120,000 rental homes, according to data from Morningstar, and many of those deals were valued using BPOs. One recent bond deal tied to Invitation Homes was backed by guarantees from U.S. taxpayers.
Please tell me this is a joke.
The BPOs are key elements in securitizations, determining basic figures such as how much rent to charge tenants, how much leverage and risk is embedded in the deal and how much investors could recover if the bonds go sour. Many of the securities were assigned AAA grades and sold off to investors such as pension funds.
Is this 2006 or 2017?
No here’s where it gets truly disturbing.
In traditional real estate deals, these opinions help establish sales prices, but in these bond deals, they help estimate how much could be recovered in a liquidation. Some analysts say the BPOs they don’t take into account a possible plunge in home prices, and the values tend to be more optimistic than a full appraisal. Unlike appraisals, BPOs also aren’t necessarily done by a licensed professional, nor does the inspector always go inside to look around, which is standard procedure for an appraisal. In one April securities offering of about $944.5 million, Green River submitted BPOs that relied on “drive-by” evaluations, and homes were “assumed to be repaired and in good condition,” according to a deal prospectus issued by Fannie Mae. The BPO “is not intended to be a representation as to the past, present or future market values of any of the properties.” The underlying mortgage in that deal, tied to rental properties owned by Invitation Homes, was guaranteed by Fannie Mae. That’s the first time a taxpayer-backed home finance company has guaranteed such a loan. Freddie Mac is also looking into getting involved in the market by providing its guarantee. When private equity landlords opted to use BPOs instead of appraisals in their securitizations, some investors expressed skepticism and bond graders applied discounts to the BPOs. Moody’s Investors Service, for example, applied a 15 percent haircut to BPO valuations when grading a transaction last August, citing inherent risks of using BPOs on residential properties instead of an appraisal.
I’m sure it’ll be fine, and if not who cares? The U.S. taxpayer is always available for a good fleecing.The sensory-motor neuron synapse of Aplysia is an excellent model system for investigating the biochemical changes underlying memory formation. In this system, training that is separated by rest periods (spaced training) leads to persistent changes in synaptic strength that depend on biochemical pathways that are different from those that occur when the training lacks rest periods (massed training). Recently, we have shown that in isolated sensory neurons, applications of serotonin, the neurotransmitter implicated in inducing these synaptic changes during memory formation, lead to desensitization of the PKC Apl II response, in a manner that depends on the method of application (spaced versus massed). Here, we develop a mathematical model of this response in order to gain insight into how neurons sense these different training protocols. The model was developed incrementally, and each component was experimentally validated, leading to two novel findings: First, the increased desensitization due to PKA-mediated heterologous desensitization is coupled to a faster recovery than the homologous desensitization that occurs in the absence of PKA activity. Second, the model suggests that increased spacing leads to greater desensitization due to the short half-life of a hypothetical protein, whose production prevents homologous desensitization. Thus, we predict that the effects of differential spacing are largely driven by the rates of production and degradation of proteins. This prediction suggests a powerful mechanism by which information about time is incorporated into neuronal processing.
Memories are among an individual's most cherished possessions. One factor that has been shown to exert a powerful influence on memory formation is the pattern of training. Learning trials distributed over time have been shown to consistently produce longer lasting memories than trials distributed over short intervals, in every organism in which this has been studied. This observation has been investigated particularly well in the marine mollusk Aplysia californica. The nervous system of Aplysia is simple and well characterized, yet capable of forming memories, making it an ideal system for the study of learning and memory. Currently, we have a detailed understanding of memory formation in Aplysia at the cellular level. However, there remain many unanswered questions at the molecular level, particularly concerning how the effects of different patterns of learning are mediated. We have developed a mathematical model of a molecular signaling pathway known to underlie memory formation in Aplysia. Our model suggests that the rates of synthesis and degradation of proteins involved in memory regulation are essential for neurons of Aplysia to respond differentially to spaced and massed training. We were able to experimentally validate these findings, thus providing significant evidence for this model, which might underlie memory formation in more complex animals.
Funding: F.N. was supported by an Alexander Graham Bell Canada Graduate Scholarship from the National Sciences and Engineering Research Council. C.A.F. is a postdoctoral fellow of the Fonds de la Recherche en Santé du Quebec (FRSQ) and a Conrad Harrington fellow. C.C.P. holds a Tier II Canada Research Chair. W.S.S. is a James McGill Professor and an FRSQ Chercheur National. This work was supported by a Canadian Institutes of Health Research (CIHR) grant MOP12046 to W.S.S., and a Canadian Excellence in Commercialization and Research (CECR) grant to the Montreal Neurological Institute. The funders had no role in study design, data collection and analysis, decision to publish, or preparation of the manuscript.
In order to better understand the signaling pathway mediating the desensitization of PKC Apl II, we developed a model consisting of a system of integro-differential equations describing the differential desensitization of PKC Apl II activation during massed and spaced training. The model provides predictions about the molecular mechanisms responsible for the differences between massed and spaced training. These predictions were validated with new experiments. Together these results suggest that the sensitivity of neurons to the time between training periods is due to the rates of protein synthesis and degradation.
While massed applications of 5HT are less effective than spaced applications at generating LTF measured at 24 h [7], both spaced and massed training lead to protein-synthesis dependent intermediate-term facilitation (ITF), measured 30 min to 2 hr after 5HT is removed [11], [14], [15]. However, the mechanisms underlying ITF induced by spaced or massed training are distinct; ITF induced by spaced training require PKA but not PKC for induction [16], [17], while ITF induced by massed training, even a continuous stimulus as short as 10 min, requires PKC but not PKA [14] ( Figure 1 ). Thus, the differential activation of PKC during massed and spaced training appears critical for the different physiological effects of these two training paradigms.
An important mechanism for the differential activation of PKC during spaced and massed applications of 5HT involves differential desensitization of PKC Apl II translocation to the plasma membrane, where it is activated [13]. Spaced training (5×5 min 5HT with 15 min wash periods in between) leads to more desensitization than one massed 25 min application of 5HT [13]. This differential desensitization is surprising, since spaced applications of 5HT allow the neuron to recover in between exposures; yet they cause a greatly increased amount of desensitization when compared to the massed application of 5HT. This effect was shown to depend on both PKA-mediated desensitization and the downstream effects of protein synthesis [13]. Importantly, protein synthesis inhibitors have opposite effects depending on the training stimulus: massed training produces a protein that prevents desensitization of PKC Apl II translocation while spaced training produces a protein that promotes desensitization of PKC Apl II translocation ( Figure 1 ) [13]. Thus, another important distinction between these two training paradigms is that they activate distinct translational pathways.
Spaced training activates PKA but not PKC and leads to PKA-dependent translation that induces intermediate-term facilitation (ITF) and long-term facilitation (LTF) not dependent on PKC. PKA dependent translation also produces a protein that increases PKC desensitization, which is required for spaced training not to activate PKC. Massed training activates both PKA and PKC and leads to PKC-dependent translation that induces a distinct form of ITF not dependent on PKA. PKC-dependent translation also produces a protein that prevents PKC desensitization, which is required for massed training to continually activate PKC.
5HT acts through at least two distinct G protein coupled receptors (GPCRs) in Aplysia to activate protein kinase A and protein kinase C [8], [9]. The two kinases are differentially activated based on the type of training; spaced applications of 5HT lead to the persistent activation of PKA in the sensory neuron [10], [11], while massed applications of 5HT instead activate both PKA and the novel PKC Apl II in the sensory neuron ( Figure 1 ) [10], [12].
One form of behavioral sensitization in Aplysia involves an increase in defensive reflexes after a noxious stimulus. The increase in defensive reflexes is caused in part by an increase, or facilitation, of the strength of the synapse between the mechanoreceptor sensory neurons and withdrawal motor neurons [4]. Facilitation is mediated by release of serotonin (5HT) from interneurons activated by the noxious stimulus [5], [6]. Spaced noxious stimuli are superior to massed stimuli at generating long-term sensitization in the animal [3] and spaced applications of 5HT are superior to massed applications at generating long-term facilitation (LTF) of cultured sensory-motor neuron synapses [7]. The ability to examine the difference between spaced and massed training in cultured neurons allows the study of the differential signaling events activated by spaced and massed training.
Different patterns of training can lead to different types and strengths of memories. For example, training distributed over time (spaced training) is superior to the equivalent amount of training with no interruptions (massed training) for generating long-term memories for verbal tasks [1]. Spaced and massed training are known to activate different molecular signaling pathways underlying memory formation [2]. Aplysia californica, a marine mollusk, provides an ideal model system for examining the differences in molecular signaling mediated by spaced and massed training [3].
Results
Describing the model architecture We have previously described PKC Apl II translocation and its desensitization in response to 5HT application in the presence of PKA and protein synthesis inhibitors [13], [18], [19]. We showed that PKC translocation differentially desensitizes to spaced and massed applications of 5HT, and that this differential desensitization was dependent on protein translation and PKA activity. In order to understand the molecular mechanisms underlying desensitization of PKC Apl II translocation we designed a signaling network based on our previous experimental findings and biochemical mechanisms known to underlie G protein-coupled receptor (GPCR) desensitization. Our network consists of the translocation of PKC, the cycling of a GPCR, the translation of two hypothetical proteins, and activity of PKA. We have tried to simplify the network whenever possible, including bundling multiple biochemical reactions into one single rate in order to simplify its architecture. The reasoning behind the network's architecture is given in this section and the model equations are given in the Materials and Methods section. The basic unit of the model is the 5HT GPCR (S) that once activated leads to the production of diacylglycerol (DAG), which is capable of activating and translocating PKC Apl II to the membrane [20], [21]. While this pathway consists of multiple steps, such as G-protein activation of phospholipase C and phospholipase D [18], these are not likely to be important for modeling of desensitization, since in most systems the amount of the activatable GPCR is the rate-limiting quantity that is decreased during desensitization [22], [23], [24]. GPCRs can enter a number of different pathways, such that S can exist in several different states, where the change in concentration of each state with respect to time is modeled. The base component of our model includes the activation and inactivation of S without any desensitization dynamics. This component corresponds to how quickly PKC Apl II translocates to the membrane after 5HT application and how quickly it dissociates from the membrane after 5HT is washed away. It is known that application of 5HT results in a maximal translocation of PKC Apl II within one minute, after which it remains at this maximal level for at least five minutes [18], [19]. Washing off 5HT prompts the complete dissociation of PKC Apl II within one minute [13], [18], [25]. To replicate these findings, we used a simple network architecture, whereby in the presence of 5HT, S OFF becomes S ON, which then transforms to S IN1. S OFF represents the inactivated receptor that can become activated by 5HT, turning S OFF into S ON, which then produces DAG allowing for the translocation of PKC Apl II. S IN1 is an inactivated receptor that needs to be recycled before it can become activated by 5HT again. At a biochemical level, the transitions from S ON to S IN1 to S OFF involve multiple molecular steps including GPCR phosphorylation by G protein receptor kinases, binding of beta arrestin, possible internalization of the receptor, unbinding of the ligand, and then recycling of the receptor back to its initial state [22], [23], [24]. For simplicity, we have reduced these multiple steps into the two steps (S ON to S IN1 to S OFF ) since (i) this is sufficient to capture the behavior required to understand the questions we are addressing (see below) and (ii) we have no specific knowledge concerning regulation of these pathways in Aplysia. The major constraint from the data is that PKC comes off the membrane in less than one minute after 5HT is washed off. Thus S ON to S IN1 must be fast enough to account for this inactivation. However, in the first 5 min of 5HT activation, there is little desensitization of PKC Apl II translocation. Thus, S IN1 to S OFF must be rapid enough to prevent appreciable desensitization in the first five minutes. The transitions between states of S were modeled using mass action kinetics. These model parameters were fit to the previously described PKC dynamics [13], [18], [25] (equations, parameter values, and parameter estimation methods can be found in the Materials and Methods section). Once an appropriate fit was found these parameters were set and we were able to begin expanding the model and modeling data related to PKC Apl II desensitization. The complete model architecture is presented in Figure 2. The model components (color coded) were developed sequentially, with maroon and black first then blue, red, and finally green. The maroon component represents only the translocation of PKC to the plasma membrane and its subsequent dissociation from the membrane. The black component represents the desensitization pathway in the presence of a protein translation inhibitor and a PKA inhibitor. In the presence of these inhibitors, PKC Apl II translocation desensitizes during exposure to 5HT [13]. Thus, there must be a protein translation-independent and PKA-independent desensitization pathway, or a homologous desensitization pathway, which we model as an alternate recycling pathway from S IN1 to S OFF, passing through S IN2 (Figure 2; black network only, equations can be found in the Materials and Methods section). Here S IN2 acts as a secondary inactivated state that requires a longer processing time than S IN1 before recycling back to S OFF. At the biochemical level, this represents the sorting of the GPCR in the endocytic compartment from a rapid recycling pathway into a slow recycling pathway or degradative pathway. This architecture was chosen because of the abundant literature supporting this mechanism for desensitization of GPCRs [22], [23], [24]. PPT PowerPoint slide
PowerPoint slide PNG larger image
larger image TIFF original image Download: Figure 2. Complete model network. The maroon network describes the translocation of PKC to the plasma membrane and its subsequent dissociation from the membrane. The module denoted in black represents the homologous desensitization pathway. The blue network defines the PKA mediated desensitization of PKC Apl II. The red network illustrates the AD pathway responsible for the rescuing PKC from desensitization. Finally the D pathway, which is antagonistic to the AD pathway and causes the increase in desensitization, is specified by the green network. In green are the additional roles of AD needed to counteract D during massed training. https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pcbi.1002324.g002 PKA, which is activated by 5HT, has been shown to increase desensitization of PKC Apl II translocation in the absence of protein translation [13]. The condition where PKA is active and protein translation is inhibited is modeled by the combination of the black, maroon, and blue components. In order to model PKA-mediated protein synthesis-independent desensitization, we included a reduced and modified version of a previous model of PKA activity [26]. Our modifications to this PKA model are described in the next sections. Activity of PKA is capable of converting S OFF directly into S PKA, where S ON is not immediately attainable and PKC Apl II cannot be activated (Figure 2; black and blue networks, equations can be found in the Materials and Methods section). At the biochemical level, this network would represent phosphorylation of the receptor, or receptor-associated protein, by PKA causing the endocytosis of the GPCR from the plasma membrane to an endocytic compartment distinct from S IN1 and S IN2, probably representing a regulated recycling endosome [27]. It is important to note that since PKA can convert S OFF to S PKA, conversion to S PKA does not require S to go through the active state, S ON, such as the desensitization mediated by S IN2. This network architecture is required to account for the observation that PKA activity between pulses of 5HT, when S would not be activated, is capable of desensitizing PKC Apl II translocation [13] and is consistent with data on heterologous desensitization of GPCRs in other systems [28]. This consideration also removed the alternate topology where S PKA would represent alternate sorting from S IN1, since the receptor is only in the S IN1 state when the receptor goes through the active state. The recycling of S PKA back into S OFF is inhibited by PKA. This inhibition was not initially part of the architecture, but it was not possible to replicate both the massed training and spaced training data sets without including the PKA inhibition of S PKA recycling (see results below). At a biochemical level, this suggests that PKA activity is not only required to induce sorting of the receptor to the regulated recycling endosome but its retention in this compartment as well. The reverse situation, with PKA activity inhibited but protein translation allowed to function is modeled by the combination of the black, maroon, and red components. Protein translation in the absence of PKA activity leads to a reduction in the desensitization of PKC Apl II translocation only during massed 5HT application and not spaced [13]. This observation requires that a protein, which protects PKC Apl II translocation from the constitutive desensitization pathway be translated during massed training. We name this hypothetical protein Anti-Desensitizer (AD) and its effects on the network are represented by the black, maroon and red components combined. We modeled the mechanism of AD mediating this protection by having AD convert S OFF into S AD, a form of S preserved from the desensitization pathways leading to S IN2 or S PKA, but similar to S OFF in its ability to become activated by 5HT and cause the translocation of PKC Apl II (Figure 2, black, maroon and red pathway; equations can be found in the Materials and Methods section). At the biochemical level, this would represent the AD protein binding to the receptor, or receptor associated protein, preventing its inactivation and internalization [29], [30], [31], [32]. Since a protein-synthesis dependent protection from desensitization is seen in massed, but not spaced, training protocols, we would expect AD to be synthesized only after massed training. In order for this differential synthesis to occur, we made production of AD proportional to the mathematical integration of the level of active PKC Apl II. PKC Apl II is constantly active during massed training, but not during spaced training; thus, integrating PKC activity allows for selective activation of AD during massed training. PKC is known to regulate the translational machinery in many systems [33], [34] including Aplysia [35], [36], but the exact mechanism by which PKC regulates translation in this case is not known and is not explicitly modeled here. Finally, allowing both protein translation and PKA activity to proceed normally results in an increase in the desensitization of PKC Apl II translocation during spaced training [13]. This increase in desensitization was observable only when both PKA activity and protein translation are allowed to proceed, meaning a translated protein is mediating this increase in desensitization, and its rate of translation is dependent on PKA activity. We name this hypothetical protein Desensitizer (D), and we model its mechanism of action similarly to that of PKA by transforming S OFF into S PKA and inhibiting its recycling back to S OFF (Figure 2, complete network; equations can be found in the Materials and Methods section). Another possible architecture would have been to generate another state of S (S D ), but there was not a good biochemical rationale for this and the model worked well (see below) without this additional state. At the biochemical level, D would be a protein that promotes endocytosis [29], particularly to the PKA-dependent pathway. The rate of translation of D is dependent on the amount of PKA activity, similar to the dependence of AD translation on PKC Apl II activity. One difference between the translation of D and AD is that D's production is delayed by 10 min after its induction. The use of a delay was necessary to account for the observation that desensitization of PKC Apl II translocation after a 5 min pulse of 5HT did not begin until after a 10 min wash [13]. At a biochemical level, there may be many reasons for a delay, ranging from requirements for post-translational modification, cellular trafficking, or delay in the activation of proteins synthesis. Finally, while trying to model the data we found that for D to cause enough desensitization during spaced training resulted in too powerful an inhibition during massed training. This over-inhibition resulted from the fact that unlike AD, D is synthesized during both spaced and massed training since PKA is active in both scenarios [10]. To diminish the role of D during massed training, we introduced two additional effects of the AD protein. First, AD inhibited the transition from S OFF to S PKA, and second, it could transform not only S OFF to S AD but also S PKA to S AD (Figure 2; complete network). At a biochemical level, this corresponds to the ability of the AD protein to prevent endocytosis to the PKA-dependent pathway, and moreover, to bind to the GPCR in the regulated recycling endosome and enhance its recycling, similar to the mechanism by which decreased PKA activity enhanced recycling from this compartment. We also attempted to model the system with AD preventing the translation of D as opposed to opposing its actions, but were unable to achieve a good fit to the data with this architecture. For simplicity, we made the assumption that during the time course of our experiments an insignificant amount of new S is created. This assumption was also made partially because for S to enter the S OFF state, the GPCR would not only have to be synthesized, but processed through the endoplasmic reticulum, Golgi apparatus, and transported back to the membrane, so new S could only contribute to the later parts of the experimental paradigm. We do not have a term for destruction of S, however, as described below, the S IN2 pathway may be equivalent to a degradation pathway, where the GPCR enters late endosomes and lysosomes.
Modeling the homologous desensitization pathway finds slow rate of recovery from desensitization PKC Apl II translocation still desensitizes during exposure to 5HT even when both protein translation and PKA have been inhibited [13]. Thus, there must be a homologous desensitization pathway (Figure 3A; black network only, equations can be found in the Materials and Methods section). Parameter values were estimated by fitting the model to PKC Apl II translocation measurements taken during a continuous 90 min application of 5HT in the presence of the protein translation inhibitor anisomycin and the PKA inhibitor KT5720 [13]. Several parameter estimation methods were used, and surprisingly, all of them yielded recycling rates of S IN2 back to S OFF (k A5 ) that were near zero (parameter values can be found in Table 1), resulting in an excellent fit to the data as can be seen in Figure 3C (R2>0.99). Note that throughout the paper, data presented in blue represents data obtained from Farah et al. (2009) used to train the model, while data presented in red represents experiments performed to confirm predictions of the model. The model predicted very little recycling of the signaling complex from S IN2 during massed training in the absence of protein translation and PKA activity (Figure 3C, D). This was unexpected, since our earlier experiments showed that the desensitization seen after a 5 min pulse of 5HT recovered completely within 45 min, suggesting efficient recycling of the signaling complex [13]. However, these experiments were not done in the presence of a PKA inhibitor. PPT PowerPoint slide
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larger image TIFF original image Download: Figure 3. Modeling and experimental validation of homologous desensitization pathway. A, Model network pathways of homologous desensitization pathway (black) and PKA-mediated desensitization pathway (black and blue). B, Representative confocal fluorescence images of sensory neurons expressing eGFP-PKC Apl II during a 90 min exposure to 5HT followed by a 45 min wash and then a 5 min 5HT application, all in the presence of anisomycin and KT5720. C, Quantification of PKC Apl II translocation (bars) and modeling output (line). Blue bars are data used from Farah et al. (2009) to fit the model parameters. Red bars are data from the present study (n = 8 cells). Error bars are SEM. D, Modeling of S dynamics in response to experimental protocol from B. Black line represents the ratio of S OFF and S ON to total S and the red line the ratio of S IN2 to total S. The times of addition of 5HT and pharmacological agents are indicated below the figure. https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pcbi.1002324.g003 PPT PowerPoint slide
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larger image TIFF original image Download: Table 1. Model parameters. https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pcbi.1002324.t001 To test the prediction of the model that desensitization seen in the absence of PKA activity was not reversible, we conducted a new experiment. The rate of S IN2 recycling was predicted to be slow enough that a wash period after massed training with anisomycin and KT5720 would result in little recovery of translocation to initial values. Thus, in a simulation of a 90 min exposure to 5HT followed by a 45 min wash and then a 5 min pulse of 5HT, all in the presence of anisomycin and KT5720, the 5 min pulse of 5HT should only cause a small amount of PKC Apl II translocation, since a majority of S is held in the inactivated state S IN2 (Figure 3C, D). To test this prediction of the model, we used this protocol in a new imaging experiment using Aplysia sensory neurons expressing eGFP-PKC Apl II. The initial massed training caused a similar amount of translocation to that previously observed by Farah et al. (2009) (Figure 3B, C). Furthermore, the amount of desensitization after the 5 min pulse of 5HT matched the modeling prediction extremely well, demonstrating that recovery from desensitization under these conditions was indeed very slow (Figure 3B, C). This protocol required that the neurons be imaged for a total of 140 min. To ensure that the lengthy exposure to room temperature (20–23°C) and the drugs anisomycin and KT5720 had no effect on the health of the neurons, or their ability to translocate PKC Apl II, two 5 min pulses of 5HT were applied with a 130 min wash in between, all in the presence of both drugs. Recovery from a 5 min pulse of 5HT occurs after 45 min [13], so we expect that a 130 min wash should result in complete recovery and that any depression in PKC Apl II translocation would be caused by injury to the neurons due to prolonged exposure to room temperature and drugs. There was no significant difference in the amount of PKC Apl II translocation between the first and second pulse of 5HT (mean+/−sem; 1.08+/−0.18, n = 5). Thus the persistent desensitization observed in the previous experiment is due only to accumulation of S in S IN2, as predicted by the model and not due to injury to the neurons.
Modeling desensitization induced by PKA confirms rapid rate of recovery PKA, which is activated by 5HT, has been shown to increase desensitization of PKC Apl II translocation during both massed and spaced training [13]. In order to model PKA mediated desensitization, we included a reduced and modified version of a previous model of PKA activity [26]. We reduced the complexity of this model to only include only the dynamics of cAMP production and the association and dissociation of the subunits of PKA. This simplification was done since our experiments and simulations do not occur over long enough time periods for us to expect a contribution from the persistent activity of PKA, which was a major feature of their model. We modified the Pettigrew et al. model by altering the basal level of cAMP and the association rate of the PKA subunits to refine PKA dynamics to better match published data demonstrating PKA activity persisting for a small period after washout of 5HT [10], [37], [38]. This revision was necessary since PKA activity during the wash period is required for desensitization [13]. The new PKA dynamics to massed and spaced training can be seen in Figure 4A–C. Furthermore, we removed any synthesis or degradation of PKA subunits since, similar to PKC Apl II, we do not expect a significant change in the amount of protein during the time course of our experiments [10]. PPT PowerPoint slide
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larger image TIFF original image Download: Figure 4. PKA dynamics. A, Model network pathway of PKA dynamics. R and C represent the regulatory subunit and catalytic subunit of PKA, respectively, where the amount of PKA activity is considered identical to C activity. B, C, PKA activity in response to a 90 min 5HT application (B) or 5×5 min 5HT application (C). Black line represents the amount of cAMP activity; blue line represents C, and red line RC. R is not shown, as it is identical to C. (Model adapted from [70]). D, PKC Apl II translocation in response to 5×5 min application of 5HT with 15 min washes in between and anisomycin present throughout from Farah et al. (2009) (bars) and modeling output (line). E, Modeling of S dynamics in response to experimental protocol from D. Black line represents the ratio of S OFF and S ON to total S, the red line the ratio of S IN2 to total S, and the blue line represents ratio of S PKA to total S. https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pcbi.1002324.g004 The black and blue networks (Figure 3A) make use of the previously described PKA activity model to affect the desensitization of PKC translocation. Two data sets were used to estimate the parameters of the blue component of the model: one continuous 90 min application of 5HT in the presence of anisomycin and five pulses of 5HT each lasting 5 min with 15 min washes in between, all in the presence of anisomycin [13]. The parameters were estimated to fit both data sets. The conversion of S OFF into S PKA is modeled using mass action kinetics. The recycling of S PKA back into S OFF is inhibited by PKA and is modeled using a combination of mass action kinetics and an inhibitory Hill function (see Materials and Methods section). This network architecture resulted in an excellent fit to both data sets (R2 = 0.99 for massed training and 0.88 for spaced training) (Figures 4D, 5B). It was not possible to replicate both the massed training and spaced training |
sour and salty flavors just like us. Their sense of taste though, is not very developed, which is why you can feed a dog the same dog food every day, and they love eating things that make you want to puke… like puke.
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When you try to feed your dog something new and he refuses to eat it, it’s most likely an act of defiance and a way to manipulate their owner rather than “I’ll pass; this doesn’t have enough salt on it.”
Despite having very few taste buds, dogs can show a preference for a meat versus a non-meat diet even without the sense of smell. But they can’t determine the difference between beef, pork, chicken or fish without smell.
Which brings us to smell… smell, smell, smell! Taste and smell are closely related and it’s probable that dogs receive more info about their food from smell rather than taste. Their sense of smell is one million times better than humans and is closely related to how things taste to them. Basically, they have a membrane inside their noses which captures molecules and sends impulses to their brain. Along with a special organ on the dog’s palate, they can even taste certain smells. So, regardless of how something tastes, if it smells good to a dog, they’ll eat it and love it.
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What the grossest thing your dog ever ate?
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Image by Brianne DiSylvesterGaurav Kalra and former India cricketer Snehal Pradhan discuss the implication of women's cricket being excluded from the Commonwealth games (4:44)
Plans to include cricket in the Commonwealth Games of 2022 have been abandoned.
While women's cricket was originally set to be included when the Games were awarded to Durban, the Commonwealth Games Federation (CGF) is determined to achieve 'gender parity' and is reluctant to include disciplines which will not be contested by men and women.
Now, with Durban having surrendered its right to host the Games and the ICC still deliberating whether they want men's cricket to be included, it appears the sport has run out of time.
The 2022 version of the Commonwealth Games is scheduled for July and August, meaning it would clash with the CPL, the new-team domestic T20 competition in England and an international tour of England by India. As a result, several Full Member nations within the ICC were far from convinced of the virtues of involvement in the Commonwealth Games.
Combined with that, it seems any bid to include cricket might have been seen as 'non-compliant' as it would have taken the number of athletes involved in the Games above the threshold allowed by the CGF.
"Cricket is no longer scheduled to be part of the Games," Warwickshire chief executive, Neil Snowball, confirmed to ESPNcricinfo. "We've just run out of time, really.
"The Commonwealth Games Federation want gender equality and discussion within the ICC about whether members want to send men's teams is unresolved.
"Combined with issues over the number of athletes, I don't see any way cricket can be included in 2022."
The news suggests cricket's involvement in the Olympics is still some way distant; involvement in the Commonwealth Games had been seen as a step in that direction.
Cricket is not currently one of the mandatory events incorporated into the Commonwealth Games. But it is on the list of optional sports that host cities can add to their staging of the event, along with the support of the relevant sport's governing body.
England did not send a team on the only previous time cricket was included in the Commonwealth Games in Malaysia in 1998. On that occasion South Africa defeated Australia in the final.
A decision on where the 2022 Games will be staged is expected to be announced shortly. Birmingham, who had previously suggested they were keen to include cricket among the sports contested, and Liverpool are among the cities keen to host, but there are also bids from Malaysia and Australia.
Snowball remains a non-executive director of the Birmingham bid but Edgbaston, which was scheduled to host many of the matches (with others to be held at Worcestershire's New Road home) will now only host a business expo if the city is chosen to host.
"Even without cricket, I genuinely believe the Birmingham bid is high value, low risk and very strong option," Snowball continued. "It is a shame we couldn't get cricket in there, but the people of Birmingham will still welcome the Games with open arms."Rugby league is in a powerful position to help change stereotypes of not just women in league but indeed women in sport.
There is a negative and out-dated belief that a woman's role in sport is inferior, that we are simply excitable fans, offering support at the footy ground or at home, only pushed to the front when poured in slinky gowns for annual awards night.
In honour of celebrating Women in League Round I'd like to debunk stereotypical gender myths and level up the playing field for the ladies.
As a woman who loves and works in rugby league, these are the questions I'm often asked:
How did you get into rugby league?
Just like most fans, I began watching it as a child. We were, and remain, a rugby league mad family. Mum and dad were from New South Wales but as a precocious only child born in the Sunshine State, I took great delight in parading around in my maroon jumper. State of Origin was a sacred time of year in our house. Game 1, 2 and 3, plus Good Friday, were the only times we were allowed takeaway fish and chips.
Does it hurt when women get hit in a tackle?
Yes, you bet it does, just like it hurts everyone. Female rugby league players can hit with text book tackling technique and with the ferocity of a cranky Nigel Plum. And, I know what you're thinking … no we don't need special 'boob protectors'. Just an ordinary sports bra will do. Women in league get the same injuries as the men in league - shoulders, collar bones, knees and ankles.
Do you hang out inside locker rooms?
No. I'm not one of the boys, nor do I want to be one. The media wait outside the rooms for players to come out and comment on their game, injury or week ahead. I've spent a fair bit of time waiting outside the dressing sheds and I can only assume what goes on in there involves a lot of giggling and copious amounts of Deep Heat.
Do the players treat you differently?
Each player has a different approach to the media. Some are friendly while others prefer to keep a distance. I have never considered my gender to be an advantage or disadvantage when dealing with rugby league players.
Do you even like sport?
Yes, Australia is a sports mad country. Historical sporting moments are weaved into our nation's social fabric. We are traditionally a country of athletic overachievers. 13 sportsmen and women including Fraser, Goolagong-Cawley, Border, Waugh and Freeman have been honoured as Australian of the Year, based on their athletic contributions to the community. What's not to love?
The NRL has the capacity to challenge gender roles in our game and in sport in general. At times, high-profile sportsmen are sadly associated with allegations of domestic or sexual violence and harassment of women. This is never acceptable. The NRL has, and continues to, make significant efforts to educate and influence boys and men on developing positive attitudes towards women and to achieve gender equality.
The United Nations has said participation in sport enables girls and women to increase their self-confidence and self-esteem. It also enhances freedom of expression while honing skills in negotiation, management and decision making. But the UN isn't telling us ladies anything we don't already know!
Women continue to enjoy the game. We play, we referee, we report, we cheer, we learn, we support but most importantly we love. We are ladies who love rugby league. Celebrate with us!
Follow Yvonne on TwitterIt takes one level of comics fandom to plot out locations from "DMZ" and "Freakangels" or set up an entire Google Map about "The Walking Dead." One reader who felt bad about missing " Scott Pilgrim vs. The World " while it was filming in Toronto took things (and her camera) a step further, though, and amassed a collection of informatively captioned photographs documenting locations used by Bryan Lee O'Malley in his epic Oni Press series, " Scott Pilgrim."
Dundas Square, the Wychwood Branch of the Toronto Public Library and Second Cup can all be found in the "Scott Pilgrimage" gallery on mad5l5in5's Flickr account, complete with side-by-side comparisons of O'Malley's illustrations and the way the sites currently appear.
The lengths she went to and the accuracy with which O'Malley was able to depict Toronto's city blocks are both impressive. In fact, there may be a legion or two of Scott Pilgrim fans out there who would love to see something like this gallery compiled into a companion volume.(CNN) — There's more to the Southern states of the USA than Nashville, Austin and New Orleans.
In fact, in recent years, so-called "second-tier" cities in the South have witnessed a massive boom in hotels, restaurants and micro-everythings.
Travel companies agree, too. "With the appeal of an all-American road trip style of travel, famous barbecue cuisine and a rich musical heritage, we've seen international bookings to Southern US destinations double in the last year," says Intrepid Travel's Director of North America Leigh Barnes.
Their "Southern Comfort USA," trip -- which weaves travelers through Savannah, Georgia; Asheville, North Carolina; the Blue Ridge Mountains and beyond -- has experienced a whopping 180% growth. With diverse picks ranging from San Antonio and its old Western feel to post-industrial Birmingham, Alabama, here are our 15 favorite Southern cities flying under the radar.
Use our suggestions as a launching pad, but in true Southern style, do yourself a favor and leave the day up to wherever your Frye boots take you.
1. San Antonio, Texas
EAT
A flight of stairs below street level, SA's River Walk offers plenty of opportunities for dining and nightlife.
Grab a stool at Ocho, where you'll get a bird's eye view of the water, and wash down an order of the huitlacoche quesadillas with a Havana margarita.
Keep the buzz going at Jazz, TX, where on any given night you may catch jazz, Texas Swing or salsa. The tequila-based "For Grit and Glory" cocktail with jicama juice, watermelon and spicy salt foam may be enough to persuade you to sidle up to the mic for your own rendition of the Bob Wills classic "San Antonio Rose."
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The St. Anthony feels haunted in the best way possible. After you've gotten the perfunctory shot with the hotel lobby's grand piano (Billy Joel recently test drove its keys), head to the new Sky Terrace, a hip rooftop scene with live music on Saturdays.
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A vibrant city perched on the San Antonio river, the bustling River Walk melds European charm with Tex-Mex flair. In addition to the eateries, there's shopping, museums and river taxi tours.
Sure, there's t he Alamo, the historic battlegrounds for the famed fights during the Texas Revolution in 1836. But San Antonio has a lot more going for it.
Venture to the Southtown Arts District, on downtown's southern tip, or scope out The Pearl for its brewery, events, weekly farmers market and more.
2. Birmingham, Alabama
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You won't go hungry in The Magic City. Eat too much swordfish and blistered okra at Hot & Hot Fish Club ; drink too many icy cold brews at revered local haunt The Garage Cafe.
Keep the soigné vibrations rolling with a meal at Highlands Bar and Grill, a beloved establishment that doles out Southern grub with a French finesse.
There's a new food court. Pizitz Food Hall is housed in a former downtown department store, but until crowds fade out, we'd choose Carrigan's Public House on the outskirts of downtown. There, savor fine bites and killer martinis on their comfortable roof deck.
Barbecue is its own food group here. Carlile's BBQ has the best potato salad in town, while Dreamland Bar-B-Que churns out melt-in-your-mouth ribs.
STAY
Sleep it all off at the newly restored Redmont Hotel, with an ambiance that still tips its hat to the roaring '20s. Meanwhile, the Westin Birmingham has a Todd English restaurant, outdoor pool and free airport shuttle.
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Gaze at 56-foot Vulcan, the world's largest cast iron statue, designed by Italian artist Giuseppe Moretti in 1904.
It's located inside Red Mountain Park, which contains two city overlooks, three treehouses, a giant dog park and zip lining.
As one native puts it, "It's free to go look at Vulcan's bare ass, but you have to pay to ride the elevator up to the observation tower and gaze out on the city."
Or, make your way toward Sloss Furnaces, a national historic landmark that bleeds gritty, post-industrial splendor and is completely free to visit.
3. Greensboro, North Carolina
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For your first real meal in Greensbohemia, savor a superior Banh Mi at Bánh Mì Saigon Sandwiches & Bakery.
At Southern comfort food emperor Lucky 32, brace yourself for dreams about their signature Voodoo Sauce, a trademarked secret that's a tangy riff on North Carolina's barbecue glaze.
Southern standouts like flash-fried artichoke hearts and local pulled pork on johnny cakes grace the seasonal menus, and one of their Carolina vesper libations should always grace your place setting.
STAY
Siesta in style at the O. Henry Hotel, where you can enjoy traditional afternoon tea daily in the lobby, weekly live jazz performances on Thursday and Saturday and loaner bikes, should the mood strike to take the city by two wheels.
Another fine pick is The Proximity Hotel, an AAA Four Diamond property, that's employee-owned and the first LEED Platinum "green hotel."
There are gorgeous gardens and greenways, along with eclectic furnishings and art made in the local community.
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Finally, book a one-of-a-kind tour at Replacements Ltd., the world's largest supplier of vintage and contemporary dinnerware, crystal, silver and collectibles.
4. Norfolk, Virginia
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Norfolk is home to a surprisingly dynamic vegan scene (our guess is it has something to do with animal rights group PETA being headquartered here). And even if you're not into plant-based eating, do yourself a favor and try the vegan breakfast burrito at Yorgo's Bageldashery
At night, book it to A.W. Shucks, a raw bar hangout for locals, or enjoy a formal experience at Todd Jurich's Bistro that has all the perks of an upscale restaurant (stellar service, interesting menu, fun people watching) with none of the pretension.
When hunger strikes again, head to Commune
New for 2017, locavores and those traveling from abroad will particularly appreciate the 100% Virginia-sourced menu. Everyone will drool over the sourdough doughnuts with pastry cream and strawberries.
STAY
Rest your weary feet at brand-new Hilton property The Main, which is booking up thanks to its spectacular ballroom for weddings and conferences.
Or, check into Sheraton Norfolk Waterside Hotel, where you can soak up picturesque harbor views with your she-crab soup or crab cake sandwich.
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Shopping fiend? The new Simon outlets open this summer. There's also the colossal MacArthur Center
5. Knoxville, Tennessee
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Go upscale with modern Southern fare at Knox Mason or spear your fork into hybrid dishes at Bistro by the Tracks where the duck ramen is as inspired as the traditional butcher's crock pie.
Our pick for the South's most important dish? Sweet P's BBQ and Soul House, where a rack of ribs and pint of 'tater salad is about three racks and seven pints too few.
STAY
Any vacation that starts off with an old fashioned smoked right before your eyes is likely a good one. At the newly opened TENNESSEAN Hotel's restaurant, The Drawing Room, sling back one or two of the aforementioned elixir before wandering around Knoxville's highly walkable downtown hub.
The Oliver Hotel is a boutique property downtown with an outstanding beverage program at its literary-inspired speakeasy, the Peter Kern Library (order the Holly Golightly or Holden Caulfield).
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Studded with musical venues, funky restaurants and a weekly seasonal farmers market worth planning your trip around, the city center pulses with a contagious energy.
Sweat off gluttony by paddle boarding along the Tennessee River or head underground for bowling at Maple Hall, a boutique 11-lane setup that feels like it could just as easily be in London or Los Angeles.
6. Louisville, Kentucky
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Treat yourself to a meal at Red Barn Kitchen, where there's a whole hog barbecue roast on the last Thursday of every month. With a moonshine cocktail en tote, beeline to the upbeat patio, which often hosts local musicians.
The Kentucky State Fair runs August 17-28 with live music, cooking competitions and one of the world's most acclaimed horse shows. America's largest indoor fair also boasts The Great American Spam Championship, if canned meat is your thing.
To try more things, frolick around town with food-centric Mint Julep Tours where the Chicken Fried, Gettin' Pickled and Butter My Biscuit tours will all ensure you're not hungry for the next nine years.
If you favor staying in one spot, sip on a boozy milkshake and enjoy grub like a grilled cheese that (almost) rivals dad's at Red Herring Cocktail Lounge & Kitchen
STAY
Book a room at the 21c Museum Hotel tucked into the heart of downtown.
If the wide open road calls, tack on a quick road trip (about an hour and a half) to Shaker Village — where you can take in 34 original Shaker structures in the country's largest private collection of original buildings from the 1800s — and spend the night at The Inn
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There's way more to Lou-ah-vull than bourbon, horses and fancy hats. For instance, geek out at "Hunger Games: The Exhibition" as you explore the wild world of Panem at Frazier History Museum (through September 10).
And then, of course, there's the bourbon, horses and fancy hats. Running into all three is pretty unavoidable here. Be sure to carve out time for a drink at Lola, the fabled upstairs bar of Butchertown Grocery. It's got a speakeasy vibe, and one hell of a drinks list.
7. Charlottesville, Virginia
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Nosh on Mediterranean bites at Red Pump Kitchen, or get comfortable at Draft Taproom, a haven for craft beer lovers, with 60 taps (the self-serve pouring system allows patrons to pay by the ounce).
The Fitzroy and Brasserie Saison are both newcomers and have beautiful interiors, along with stellar food.
STAY
Plan your stay at The Townsman, C'ville's newest boutique property arrival with four carefully appointed rooms in the downtown hub.
If you're looking for something a little more isolated, treat yourself to a stay at Keswick Hall at the foot of the Blue Ridge Mountains. The 48-room manor's gold medal goes to its prestigious golf club, though we gravitate toward the grounds' three pools.
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There are two types of people who come to Charlottesville: Dave Matthews Band superfans and everyone else. If you're in the former group, you're likely making your pilgrimage to Miller's, where Matthews himself once tended bar, to Matthews' own scenic Blenheim Vineyards and to the Pink Warehouse where the band played its first official gig.
If you're everyone else, swap Dave stalking for visiting a presidential home like Thomas Jefferson's estate, Monticello, or Highland, the former digs of James Monroe.
Burn off all the eating at Shenandoah National Park, where you can snake your way through quiet wooded hollows and marvel at cascading waterfalls on the same hike. Pack lunch and set up an impromptu picnic within the 200,000 protected acres, alongside songbirds, deer and more wildlife creatures.
8. Gulf Shores, Alabama
EAT
Music lovers, head to Lucy Buffett's (yes, sister of a certain Jimmy) LuLu's for an energetic vibe and serious seafood platters.
Or, complete your Bushwacker (an ice cream-based cocktail that's as popular as a vodka-soda here) crawl at Flora-Bama, a dive bar, multistage music venue, oyster bar, Sunday church and occasional rodeo rolled into one beachside locale.
Finish up with a boozy cake from Rum Sisters or play mad scientist at newly opened The Yard Milkshake Bar, and create a custom dessert. Who said a glazed doughnut or brownie isn't a suitable milkshake topping?
STAY
One of the most luxurious oceanfront condo options is Turquoise Place, which even has its own on-site lazy river.
Gulf State Park also offers lakefront cottages and around 500 RV sites and a tent camping area (many have swimming pools and other amenities).
Newly launched Gulf Shores Travel Trailer Rentals will allow you to reserve a spot at any of the local campsites, and then drop off an RV for you and pick it up when your vacation ends.
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Make as few plans as possible -- you deserve it. Plop yourself on the sugar-white beaches (which rival any Caribbean treasure) with a stack of magazines or a book. If you're so inclined, a beachside slow-flow class with Glow Yoga is a relaxing delight.
It's hard to have a bad night at the open-air Wharf Amphitheater (acts this summer include Kenny Chesney, Green Day and Eric Church), where in true vacation mindset, your best bet is probably walking up to the box office 20 minutes before the main act takes the stage — the $20ish bleacher seats are surprisingly stellar.
Dreading the vacation hangover? Blow off some steam at family-owned hub The Factory, a giant web of interconnected trampolines, Tarzan swings, foam pits and more that lets kids of all ages bounce their way out of back-to-reality malaise.
9. Wilmington, North Carolina
EAT
Seafood is king here, though you can find plenty of menus graced with Southern staples like butter beans and pimento cheese, if you're seeking more down-home cookery.
At PinPoint Restaurant, chase a radish in NC butterbean hummus or candied pecans with a Tropical Lightning IPA from Wilmington Brewing Company
A surprising standout is Indochine, where one order of the braised Vietnamese catfish is about one too few. Meanwhile, seafood seekers can spear their fork into daily specials or slurp up oysters on the half shell dusted with bacon, pimento cheese and more.
STAY
The Graystone Inn, built in 1905 by a railroad magnate's widow, proves a nice place to count sheep and a spot you may also recognize from "Dawson's Creek," "One Tree Hill" and "Sleepy Hollow," among others.
To fulfill your veranda rocking chair fantasies, check into The Wilmingtonian, on a quiet street dripping in tree-lined perfection that's only a short walk to the Cape Fear riverfront, a scenic strip studded with watering holes, eateries and specialty stores.
All in all, Wilmington may have that dreamy, laid-back pace, but this port town is gaining serious momentum: an Embassy Suites opens in the fall and Aloft and Westin properties are also in the works.
PLAY
Don't skip town without paying a visit to Airlie Gardens, an alternate 67-acre universe with live oak trees (it gets its name from the 472-year-old Airlie Oak), a freshwater lake and winding paths of seasonal blossoms.
Another spot to absorb Southern culture at its finest is Bellamy Mansion Museum, an 1859 architectural prize that talented tour guides will bring to life with tales of its former residents.
10. Gulfport, Mississippi
EAT
Start at Triplett-Day Drug Co., a family-owned soda fountain that will teleport you to the "Leave it to Beaver" glory days.
Next, scope out the eclectic Fishbone Alley, a mural hunter's Eden, which puts you a stone's throw away from more local artwork, bars, restaurants and live music. (Be warned: Football game days are LOUD.)
Fight the heat with a small-batch icicle from Pop Bothers with inventive flavors ranging from Dragon Fruit to Graceland (an alluring medley of peanut butter with silky bananas and flecks of salty bacon).
Also book an outing with Tasty Tours in Downtown Gulfport, a three-hour walking culinary tour that spotlights five local dining establishments.
STAY
Rest your head at The Guest House at Gulfport Landing, an endearing bed and breakfast that dates to 1906 (it was restored in 2014, so you won't need to worry about unplugging).
Or try The Almanett Hotel & Bistro, a cozy restaurant and inn overlooking the Mississippi Sound where all six guest rooms sport a private terrace. Worth noting: The shrimp here is beyond.
PLAY
Grab a ferry to one of the area's barrier islands for a half-day excursion with Ship Island Excursions (full-day trips are also available), where you'll be spoiled with views of Fort Massachusetts, which was built in 1866, and idyllic beaches free from mainland crowds.
Also, it's worth considering a wintertime trip, as holiday enthusiasts will rejoice in the spectacular Gulfport Harbor Lights Winter Festival, which runs from the end of November through the start of January. Last year it drew 60,000+ guests, not only for the dazzling illuminated displays, but also for the food trucks, rides, live performances and the 40 acres of greenspace it takes up on the majestic Gulf of Mexico.
11. Winston-Salem, North Carolina
EAT
A city steeped deeply in Moravian roots (they're a Protestant denomination with German and Czech heritage), you'll note this the most in the Old Salem Historic District and on your taste buds; expect Moravian chicken pie, sugar cake and thin cookies (try the ginger ones). Local brewery Foothills Brewing even creates a Moravian Porter every holiday season.
A glass of wine is always in easy reach here, too. Gaining traction as the gateway to the Yadkin Valley wine region, the state's first and largest American Viticultural Area established in 2003 and now booming with 45+ wineries.
Or, take a tour and tasting of whiskey at Broad Branch Distillery. Another solid bet is Sutler's Spirit Co. where you'll swear their handcrafted gin is the nectar of gods.
STAY
The first Kimpton-brand hotel in the Carolinas, Winston-Salem recently got The Cardinal Hotel, inside the historic R.J. Reynolds building. Between the adult recreation room (oddball feature: an adult-sized twisting slide), indoor basketball court and bowling alley, you won't get bored here. Don't miss a meal at the ground floor's Katharine Brasserie, named after the Reynolds' family matriarch.
Landing in spring 2018, another historic downtown structure,The Pepper Building, will be reinvented as a 75-room Hotel Indigo with two on-site restaurants.
PLAY
2017 marks the 15th season of the biennial National Black Theatre Festival, which features theater workshops and international vendors market, in addition to six days of theatrical performances.
12. Fayetteville, Arkansas
EAT
Get a sense of Fayetteville's local pride at seasonal First Thursday fêtes, May through October. Then, ride that happy buzz along the Fayetteville Ale Trail, a self-guided journey where you can fill in your beer passport with all the breweries in Northwest Arkansas.
Want to skip the trail? Try Columbus House Brewery, that hosts a running and cycling club and welcomes dogs with open arms. Alternatively, there's Fossil Cove Brewing Co., which attracts an Ultimate Frisbee crowd and provides a ton of crave-worthy food trucks out back. Or try Maxine's Tap Room, a combination revived hipster pub and community music hub.
Locals flock to Hugo's, a mainstay since 1977, where the deep-fried potato skins are worth every calorie. For lighter fare, try Greenhouse Grille and marvel at how the hell they made Brussels sprouts taste so good (hint: frying them with pickled peppers and apple vinaigrette helps).
STAY
Waking up to the awe-inspiring Ozark Mountains has never looked better than at The Chancellor Hotel, and if your travels lean romantic, book your stay at the Inn at Carnall Hall, a lovely mansion that was once a University of Arkansas Residence Hall.
If you want to wallow in country vibes, choose Pratt Place Inn, a rustic and inviting getaway on 140 acres.
PLAY
To quote a native, "Fayetteville is this lovely Southern and Midwestern mix where the Bible Belt, SEC football, back-to-the-land hippies, Walton (the family behind Walmart) money and university professors all meet up."
Recently, Fayetteville has been making headlines for the mountain biking trails throughout the region. And cyclists will be delighted to hit the Razorback Regional Greenway, a 36-mile trail that connects six cities in the area, with plenty of attention-grabbing vistas. But if pedaling isn't for you, get a dose of nature with an hour drive to Kings River Falls for a hike and pristine watering hole views.
History buffs will appreciate a visit to The Clinton House Museum, the former first couple's first home together stacked with memorabilia and a beautiful garden (they were married in the living room).
To end the night, leave self-consciousness at the door and join the square dance at Backspace, a quirky performance hall.
13. Panama City Beach, Florida
EAT
At Andy's Flour Power, a croissant or thick french toast with nuts, strawberries and powdered sugar is the way to go for breakfast.
Even the Greek salads come loaded with crab meat and juicy Gulf shrimp at celebrated restaurant Capt. Anderson's, and you (or the kids) will never tire of the ritual cannon blasting at the nightly sunset celebrations at Schooners, which bills itself as "The Last Local Beach Club."
STAY
Perched on a 27-mile strip of sugar-white sand beach where the Gulf of Mexico and St. Andrew Bay come together, you'll find more old-school Southern charm here than Miami-style glitz.
We love the quiet west end of the beach and the spacious, airy Carillon Beach Rentals that also boasts five private pools, restaurants and a spa within a private community.
After a $30 million renovation, Sheraton Bay Point Resort really left no detail unaddressed, from the private beach area to all 36 of the holes on the Nicklaus Design golf course.
PLAY
Put the smartphone down and feast your eyes on the natural wonders at St. Andrews State Park -- if time allows, tack on snorkeling or kayaking -- especially the two nature trails that weave you through a smattering of coastal plant species.
For a more relaxing encounter with nature, set out on a 55-foot catamaran with Paradise Adventures
14. Breaux Bridge, Louisiana
EAT
Down by the bayou, it's difficult to meet a meal you don't like. You're dining in the Crawfish Capital of the World, in which the yearly Crawfish Festival in May draws hundreds of thousands of hungry and thirsty visitors.
Revel in the liquor-soaked Zydeco brunches at Buck & Johnny's, then enjoy a flawlessly prepared gumbo at Chez Jacqueline. You're in Cajun country, so while the service may be slow, the homespun food will be well worth the growling stomach while you wait.
End the day by dancing your cares away at Whiskey River in nearby Henderson, where the proverbial levee never runs dry.
STAY
Book a room at The Juliet in neighboring Lafayette (about 9 miles away) or stay in town at the Maison Des Amis, a Caribbean-Creole property which has a spot on the National Registry of Historic Homes.
Another excellent option to call home is Maison Madeleine, where you can take part in cooking classes and bass fishing.
PLAY
If you or members of your party are antiquers, Lagniappe Antiques Market, spread over 17,000 square feet, is a must-see.
Meanwhile, nearby Lake Martin has made the Audubon Society's list of top 10 bird watching spots in the United States.
15. Greenville, South Carolina
EAT
Say cheers at The Dark Corner Distillery, a craft microdistillery with moonshine as good as your brother-in-law's.
Dine at Smoke on the Water restaurant, a "saucy Southern tavern" where more cornbread stuffing is always the correct answer. (As is doubling up on the fried bourbon bread pudding.)
STAY
The Swamp Rabbit Inn is a refreshingly chic bed and breakfast that's two blocks from its namesake Swamp Rabbit Trail, an 18-mile bike trail. Or, reserve your room at Aloft Greenville Downtown, close to downtown's shops and restaurants.
PLAY
Ride your Reedy Rides bike rental loaner around town or please your inner speed demon at LeMans Karting Greenville, where you can drag your European karts up to 40 mph on a 750-foot long road course.With each passing week, renewable energy makes greater and greater strides in supplying more power for our lives, and a lot of that innovation is happening in transport. The Netherlands is the latest country to set the pace for adopting alternative energy sources: the companies in charge of the country's railways are looking to move the entire network over to wind power in the next three years.
Dutch energy company Eneco has just approved a deal to meet that target with the VIVENS rail firms in the country, Gizmodo reports. Wind power already supplies energy for half of the network - some 2,890 km (1,800 miles) of track - so Eneco has until 2018 to source the rest from the Netherlands and its neighbours. The proposed scheme is partly intended to increase renewable energy adoption in other European nations too.
"What makes this contract and partnership unique is that a whole sector decreases its CO2 footprint enormously and sets an example for other sectors to follow," Eneco account manager Michel Kerkhof told Railway Technology. "Mobility is responsible for 20 percent of CO2 emissions in the Netherlands, and if we want to keep travelling, it is important that we do this without burdening the environment with CO2 and particulate matter. This contract offers all Dutch citizens the option to make a climate neutral trip, regardless of distance."
Around 1.2 million passengers travel on trains in the Netherlands every day. Eneco has agreed to supply 1.4 terawatt hours (TWh) of wind-sourced power by 2018, which is roughly the same amount of energy consumed by all the households in Amsterdam, the capital city. Half of that total is expected to come from foreign sources in Scandinavia and elsewhere, with the rest generated in the Netherlands.
Eneco has made a point of using specially built wind farms for the project to avoid putting existing plants under unnecessary pressure and to keep prices down. The railway operators, meanwhile, are making energy efficiency savings in other areas (through train design and driving techniques) in order to keep demand as low as possible - this in turn ensures that the extra price of wind power isn't passed on to customers.
"This partnership ensures that new investments can be made in even newer wind farms, which will increase the share of renewable energy," adds Kerkhof. "In this way, the Dutch railways aim to reduce the greatest negative environmental impact caused by CO2 in such a way that its demand actually contributes to the sustainable power generation in the Netherlands and Europe."
The march of wind power continues unabated all across the world. China is now producing more energy from wind than the US is from nuclear, while Denmark now has enough wind farms to exceed the country's total energy needs at certain points. As more plants come online, the risk of outages due to calm, still days becomes much lower.Rob Manfred, new baseball commissioner, sent the baseball-nerd world into a tizzy. He had prepared index cards for the occasion, writing "DON'T SEND BASEBALL NERDS INTO A TIZZY" in Sharpie. He stared at those index cards all night. Then he opened his mouth, and aerosol tizzy came spraying out.
Way to go, Manfred.
The tizzy had to do with Manfred saying he wants more scoring in baseball, and he would consider eliminating defensive shifts to get it. The early returns are in on the new commissioner, everyone! It's not fair to judge the guy after one sit-down interview, but do you remember the feeling when you saw The Phantom Menace trailer for the first time? People bought tickets to Meet Joe Black with actual legal tender, just to watch it. About 45 seconds into it, Jar Jar Binks got his head caught in an electrical field and made a silly, slapsticky noise. And everyone had the same thought: Uh-oh. It was too early to definitively say if the movie was good or bad. There was just a whole lot of uh-oh.
Watch it yourself:
And note that the reviews are already in for the teaser trailer on ESPN's page:
Don't take this for an impassioned argument in favor of shifts, an argument that wants to wax rhapsodic on the strategy's inherent beauty. The shift kind of annoys me, actually, at least aesthetically. For 30 years or so, I had a good idea what was a hit off the bat when watching a game on TV. The last few years, there's been an increase in oh-right-the-shift moments. Shifts are so common that announcers don't always bring them up, and that leads to the camera cutting to a second baseman playing in right field, calmly scooping up a baseball and making an easy play. It's kinda annoying. It's like the camera feed went out and the director decided to cut to a still picture of a scouting report.
No, shifts aren't my favorite part of baseball. They're not the reason I tune in, not even close. Except, here's the more important counterpoint: They're not the reason people tune out, either. There isn't a casual fan out there thinking, "Boy, I'd sure love to watch more baseball, but, ugh, those shifts." They're not the reason the hardcore fan is losing interest, either. No one cares enough either way.
They're a possible Manfred target, though, because of the general idea that baseball needs more offense. Here's the exact quote:
I think the second set of changes is... related (to modernizing baseball), and that relates to injecting additional offense in the game.
Interesting choice of words. |
-out tank top, jean shorts and sandals, despite the frigid weather. The officer said it was clear the man had been bloodied and battered.
Police became aware on Tuesday of the heinous video footage, FOX32 reported.
White House Press Secretary Josh Earnest wouldn't say if he thought the incident was a hate crime, but did discuss the callous nature of the crime.
"They do demonstrate a level of depravity that is an outrage to a lot of Americans," Earnest said. "I have not spoken to the president but I'm confident he would be angered by the images depicted."
The suspects could be heard saying they wanted the video to go viral.
They now face a bevy of charges.
Hill was charged with aggravated kidnapping, hate crime, aggravated unlawful restraint, aggravated battery with a deadly weapon, robbery, residential burglary; Cooper was charged with aggravated kidnapping, hate crime, aggravated unlawful restraint, aggravated battery with a deadly weapon and residential burglary; Brittany Covington was charged with aggravated kidnapping, hate crime, aggravated unlawful restraint, aggravated battery with a deadly weapon and residential burglary; Tanishia Covington was charged with aggravated kidnapping, hate crime, aggravated unlawful restraint and aggravated battery with a deadly weapon.
Hill is from Carpentersville and the others are Chicago residents.
Click for more from Fox 32.
The Associated Press contributed to this report.Looking at the Mesh Upload Enablement test-plan on the Second Life Wiki (created today as Scobu Linden’s first Wiki contribution), it appears as if the ability to upload mesh content is going to be restricted on a per-user basis, independent of any other factor. For most users, to earn that ability initially, you’re going to need payment information on file, and go through a tutorial.
Having passed these two hurdles, you get your Mesh Enablement bit; a license to upload arbitrary mesh objects, if you prefer to think of it that way.
The Lab, however, seems able to revoke that license if they feel the need, at which point Second Life will no longer allow your account to upload arbitrary mesh objects, without otherwise affecting any other Second Life permissions you might have.
Now, on one hand I can think of a number of content-creator/merchants who traditionally have always had freebie accounts who would definitely be affected by this. They’d have to get payment information on file or be unable to upload arbitrary mesh objects, period.
On the other hand, I can see the Lab needing some protection here. Meshes can be pulled out of pretty much any PC or console game, with more or less work. Some are already in the COLLADA (COLLAborative Design Activity) format that you’d need to upload them into Second Life.
A large part of the Lab’s covering its collective arse legally – if you should start uploading piles of assets from Crysis 2, or Fallout: New Vegas – would be in being able to identify you to an angry publisher.
Clearly, the Lab sees and recognises the potential for sticky issues with mesh and is gating that ability, while keeping a hand on the gate. Balancing the two interests is going to be tricky, though.
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Tags: 3D modelling, Collada, Copyright, Crysis 2, Fallout: New Vegas, Linden Lab / Linden Research Inc, Mesh, Scobu Linden, Second Life, Second Life WikiAfter many grueling hours of pure joy, I'm almost at the end of Dark Souls.
A few Black Knights stand between my blade and Gwyn, Lord of Cinders. They should be dispatched easily enough. My warrior is a tank, weighed down in mossy Stone Armor, wielding a Black Knight Halberd +5, and well-shielded behind Havel's Shield +3. One-handed attacks should fell these knights in three or four hits, and if I keep my shield up they won't do more than a scratch of damage. My character has been built primarily around Strength, at the expense of many other stats, and I'm starting to feel my lack of Stamina.
After many grueling hours of pure joy, I'm not even close to the end of Dark Souls.
I may be at the final boss but this game is nowhere near finished. Not by a long, long shot. I've come to realize how much is left unexplored - entire areas I missed like the Great Hollow and Ash Lake - how much remains to be discovered about the game itself, and how many small things I missed or let go unfinished. And that's not even taking into account New Game +.
For one thing, pretty early on I found a Black Knight Sword. This weapon was so powerful, I didn't really need to focus on leveling up other weapons. I was so focused on getting through the areas, that I never really paid that much attention to how weapons and armor are upgraded. The boss souls I found I've never used for weapon upgrades either. When I found a Black Knight Halberd, I upgraded it and used it through the rest of the game, focusing not so much on weapons as on leveling my stats.
But weapon and armor upgrades are a complex adventure all their own (and, frankly, require time spent researching online to fully grasp, which is really nothing new when it comes to Dark Souls.) Each of the four blacksmiths in the game can upgrade weapons slightly differently, and require different Embers in order to do so. Meanwhile, I've barely even dipped into all the magical possibilities in the game, having played mostly as a fighter throughout.
One of the things From Software did with this game that so many other games fail to do is hide cause and effect from players.
You might go to an area, free an NPC, and never return to that area again. But if you do return to that area, you'll find a special suit of armor. Your actions and the reactions they cause aren't spelled out. They have to be discovered. Without a wiki to help guide you (and frankly, even with a wiki) half of these little changes and secrets would slip past you. I've missed enormous swaths of this game, I'm sure, including one of the four blacksmiths (who I just read about while trying to puzzle out the weapon upgrade system.)
The other thing that Dark Souls does very well is level design. The plague of the "open world" RPG trend, and the MMO trend, is that RPGs have essentially given up on level design. A cave is a series of tunnels underneath an open plain. Go there, run through it, find the Missing Bauble, or kill the Evil Thief King, and then run back to the Town to solve the Quest.
I find this unexceptional and uninspiring.
In Dark Souls level design is key. The world is open in that you can approach it, to some degree, in any direction you'd like, tackling one level before another with only some limitations. The game's areas are connected, and become increasingly more so as you push your way through from one to the next, tying the labyrinth together one ladder and one unlocked door at a time.
An area like Sen's Fortress is just about the essence of intelligent level design, filled with secrets and traps and shortcuts in an infuriating tangle of death and reward. The marvelous interweaving of the Undead Burg with the bridge and the Cathedral and Firelink Shrine...it's really hard to describe how ingenious it all is, and how much more real it ends up feeling because of it than an "open world" game like Skyrim.
Real may not even be the right word for it, though. It feels more like a game. The geography of Dark Souls is itself a puzzle. The areas are each "levels" in a traditional sense, as well as unorthodox spaces for exploration. I've never played anything like it, and I'm still overwhelmed by just how little I actually understand the game, despite having become quite good at playing it. Overwhelmed, but in a good way.
Once I've reached the end, the whole thing starts over. New Game + resets some of the parameters, but leaves your character mostly equipped. All the dead NPCs return. And all the bad guys become much, much harder than before - smarter, more aggressive, and less easily overcome. Or so I've read. Having not yet defeated Lord Gwyn, I'm spending a little time going about the world and tying up loose ends. I want to be as prepared as possible for the second playthrough.
Even saying those words is testament to this game's intoxicating pull on my imagination and free-time. I'll freely admit, if a game doesn't inspire me I don't always finish it. Sometimes I take eons to finish a game. There's only so much time in the day, after all, and there are so many games to play.
I'm not sure I've ever beaten a game and then played through it again to beat it even more soundly. Games with high replay value tend to be online games - first-person-shooters - or sports games. Competitive games with no plot, in other words. Dark Souls may be the first RPG I've wanted to play all over again.
Part of this is how well the game is crafted, how engaging its combat is, the sheer quantity of content to wade through. The other reason is the game's story and lore, and how well these are conveyed within the game. Or rather, how little story interferes either with gameplay or player imagination. The restraint is remarkable. In an age of 'cinematic' games and an overabundance of cut-scenes, Dark Souls tells its story in the simplest of terms.
And so I reach the end, but also a new beginning. Then it's only a few more months until the Artorias of the Abyss DLC comes to consoles (or for PC gamers, the Prepare to Die edition.)Group A
Mini is too strong!
Unpredictable play-style, large repertoire of builds and strong micro are three ways to characterize Mini's game. He's able to keep up with the best and is a force to be reckoned with considering his latest performance.
Mong has solid macro and showed a strong understanding of the TvP matchups which will come in handy considering the overall racial distribution of SSL.
Pure showed some strong performance in his games and played well however he was outmacroed by Mong and needs to work on his decision making skills if he hopes to make it further.
Disappointing performance all around. Movie's micro, positioning and decision making skills require a lot of work if he hopes to crack the Ro16 in the next SSL.
Group B
Lights out!
Units out of nowhere.
Uphill fight.
After a while, everyone started to feel like Bill Murray in Groundhog Day.
Final moments of Jangbi.
Mind's macro game is one of the best. He's not afraid of going to the late game with anyone and he's pretty quick to react. His only weakness seems to be Free's style of play which he needs to improve against.
Macro-oriented style though he can also cheese as well. He has good micro and know how to play PvT very well.
Solid macro and micro in general. Jangbi needs to learn how to cheese more so that he's not as predictable in his games. He also needs to work on his decision making skills if he hopes to go further in future tournaments.
PianO is able to pull off some unique strategies when he's in top form. He needs to learn to scout more and anticipate what strategy his opponent will play. He's got some of the best late game control available but he'll need to get there to utilize it.
Group C
Look familiar?
Great micro, the ability to take risks and stick to the plan are Snow's strengths. He plays very entertaining games and can vary his playstyle when needed.
sSak may not be a fancy player but he plays the matchups well. He has a calm, collected and patient mindset which potentiates his macro and micro making him a threat to all of the remaining players.
hero is quite the anomaly. Despite having strong macro, positional micro and some of the best ZvP around, his ZvT is still a matchup that he needs to work on greatly. Despite losing to Sea.KH, there is no doubt that hero will come back stronger in the next SSL.
Sea.KH's games against sSak and Snow showed that his macro needs improvements if he wants to advance further in future tournaments. His victory against hero showed that he has the potential to become a feared player if he works hard on improving.
Group D
Bunker my rax.
Dammit Zealot, you had one job!
Last's biggest problem is knowing when to retreat after a successful attack which is pretty important in the grand scheme of the game. Other than that, he is able to pull off cheese well when it matters and has great micro to boot.
Solid game overall with exceptional macro and great micro define HiyA in a nutshell. If he elevates his level of play just a bit more, he will be a strong contender for the title.
Unpredictable and has the guts to try new strategies even if it can cost him games. Larva still needs to work on his ZvT game which is holding him back if he ever hopes to advance in future tournaments.
Like Larva, GuemChi is not afraid to try new strategies. He has a solid understanding of the ZvP matchup and is patient when needed.
With players stepping onto the dream stage, their performances were dialed up to its maximum level. It is no wonder that the Ro16 is full of amazing games. The first group consisted of mostly protoss players (Mini, Movie, Pure) and Mong. Mini took center stage as he defeated everyone in convincing fashion sending a message to his future foes, the shield battery master is coming to the quarterfinals. In the first game against Pure on Blue Storm, Mini easily overwhelmed Pure with a reaver and goon force after defending his 2 gate aggression with his signature unit, the shield battery. His second game against Movie showcased his unit control, superb positioning and map awareness with Mini managing to pick off Movie's Shuttle before beating him with a superior goon force. However, his best performance only appeared in the last game against Mong on Sin Peaks of Baekdu. His solid macro and relentless aggression (lots of drops) coupled with good decision making skills allowed him to come back from a base deficit and win the macro game against Mong.Despite losing a nail biting game to Mini, Mong played some fantastic games of his own sticking to the TvP style that he has grown accustomed to. On Return of the King, Mong's strong macro and constant drop aggression were more than enough to take the game against Movie who seemed to falter as the game went on. Mong went on to beat Pure in similar fashion on Fighting Spirit easily taking the macro game after early dark templar aggression by Pure forced Mong on the defensive.By far, the most disappointing performer of the group was Movie who was hailed as one of the top protoss players. Claiming that he was not afraid of anyone in his interview with TL, Movie's games reeked of lack of practice on par with his own claims. His unit control and positioning were subpar for someone of his caliber losing goons to spider mines and funneling units in a single line at his enemies. In his game against Pure, he failed to read the situation and deny scouting losing his expansion to Pure's zealots and eventually the game after his dark templar tech was detected. Credits to Pure for sticking to his gameplan and adapting to the situation. Though both Pure and Movie showed some entertaining games, they will have to elevate their game to the next level if they wish to go further in future tournaments.Dubbed as the group of death featuring veterans and previous OSL/MSL champions, this was the most anticipated group of the Ro16. A group that had no clear cut favourite with any two players advancing depending on their strategy and gameplay. Things almost went down this way as well except for PianO. It seemed like everyone had his number as he ended up losing all of his games to get knocked out in last place much to the shock of his fans. In his game against Free, despite defending a proxy gate and managing to even make vultures in Free's base, he suffered massive damage against Free's perfectly timed goon and reaver attack and was unable to recover.On Sin Peaks of Baedu, luck was not on his side as his proxy factory was scouted and his subsequent drops were defended. With a better economy, Mind was easily able to crush PianO. Though these two losses were painful for PianO, none were as bad as his final game against Jangbi. After opening up with a one base factory build, he was not prepared for Jangbi's sneaky dark templars who caused severe economic damage. The icing on the cake? A lone dark templar blowing up his mineral fieldcausing him to leave the game in dismay.With PianO out of the picture, all the other players traded blows with each other. Mind defeated Jangbi in a 45 minute long macro game on Fighting Spirit. Through solid defense, Mind was able to go up to three bases before managing to outposition Jangbi hitting right before his mass gateway play came into effect. Jangbi in turn ended up beating Free on the back of strong macro and a unit composition consisting mainly of zealots and a reaver for support. Free completed the circle by winning his game against Mind. On Return of the King, both players went for the late game macroing up fearsome armies. Mind's strong defense and good use of map architecture helped him take an advantage whenever he engaged Free however Free turned it all around through a great decision, attacking Mind's main. This forced Mind to pull back allowing Free to save his expansions and win the game through his economic advantage.We were now forced into the first tiebreaker of the Ro16. As if time was stuck on repeat, the first two rounds of the tiebreaker had the players beat each other in the exact same pattern as before until Free decided to break the cycle by beating Jangbi in round three. Mind beat Jangbi in all three of their games. In their first game, Mind won by taking down Jangbi's third and sieging his main after Jangbi overcommitted with a failed double reaver drop. The second game on Blue Storm was quick as Mind bunker rushed Jangbi for the win. The third game saw Jangbi play a risky strategy (double expanding) relying on it not getting scouted. He managed to pull it off defending a strong attack by Mind however both players made several questionable calls that had the game swing in their opponent's favour. Mind finally took the game through a strong offensive position at Jangbi's third then fourth base.Free beat Mind in all of his games. A proxy gate in game one almost had Free lose the game if Mind didn't blunder his bunker counterattack. Afterwards, Free took several key engagements to deny Mind's third and win the game. In game two on Fighting Spirit, Free straight up killed Mind with dark templars, reminiscent of PianO's defeat to Jangbi earlier in the group. The last game saw Mind try a bunker rush against the nexus first from Free. It seemed work however Free saved his nexus and went for carriers as he established a third base economy. With map architecture on his side and his growing carrier fleet, Free was able to pressure Mind constantly eventually defeating his army and dealing damage to his third to win the game.Jangbi only won the first two games against Free (Rounds 1 and 2). Though Free matched Jangbi in the macro department, Jangbi's smart tactics helped him greatly. In his first game on Fighting Spirit, a single dark templar killed over 20 probes at Free's natural while Free lost his army at Jangbi's natural. In their second game on Sin Peaks of Baekdu, Jangbi's managed to grab the better position during engagements especially in the last major engagement which had Free attack uphill into Jangbi's concave. Despite being resilient and boosting about his 100% winrate during tiebreakers, Jangbi was not able to beat Free a third time. On Blue Storm, Free took down Jangbi's expansion using dark templars while maintaining his own. Jangbi realized his bad situation and tried to ferry his dragoons into Free's base but this was scouted and his army was wiped causing him to be eliminated.With only two Zergs left in the Ro16, this was another group that many kept an eye on hoping that hero would be the first Zerg to make the quarterfinals. The first player up was Snow, the young protoss known for his reaver play against Jaedong in PDPOP MSL. He opened with an aggressive 2 gate against Sea.KH. With great micro and decision making skills, he picked off reavers and took engagements in his favour to trounce the amateur player. He did not stop there as he also ended up beating sSak on Blue Storm in a lengthy back and forth game. After opening with a proxy gate, Snow used a combination of reavers and carriers to slowly break down sSak's strong defensive play style multitasking his way to victory with several recalls in the late game. His first loss came at the hands of hero after the Zerg managed to survive some strong attacks and overwhelm him in the late game despite his 'never give up' attitude (see battle report).sSak was the other player to advance in this group. Against hero, he showed off good MnM control and managed to hit the perfect timing, right before defilers were out to take what looked like a one sided game on Fighting Spirit. His second game against Sea.KH on Return of the King showed his ability to adapt to Sea.KH's carriers. Strong macro coupled with good understanding of map architecture and mech control (goliath/tank) were enough to push back and beat Sea.KH in the late game. The story of the group is no doubt, Sea.KH's victory against hero. Despite not advancing from the group, the amateur managed to beat hero on Blue Storm in what can only be described as a major upset.Tiebreakers would have occurred if hero won, alas, Sea.KH had other plans. In their game, the protoss opened up with a cannon rush which failed. He was able to remain calm and played a macro game against the God of ZvP. With strong macro, micro and lots of aggression, he took hero down disappointing Zerg fans everywhere. To say that hero not advancing is a disappointment is an understatement. hero is capable of much more based on past games that his latest results do not feel like his own. However, Sea.KH should be commended for his strong game and for playing his heart out for the win.While this last group of the Ro16 is arguably the weakest one, the games were still quite unique and entertaining to watch. Players pulled out all the stops to try and best their opponents so that they could advance to the quarterfinals. Our first player, Last was such a player. In his first game against GuemChi, he pulled off a bunker contain after GuemChi decided to go for the rare strategy of forge FE. Despite being in a tough position, GuemChi managed to break the contain, re-establish his expansion and muster up a strong army to challenge Last and win the game. After this loss, Last decided to spice things up with his next opponent HiyA.On Blue Storm, Last opened with a proxy 6 rax bunker rushing HiyA who lost after he was unable to destroy the bunker. The loss was so quick and unexpected that HiyA's expression after the game was one of confusion and contemplation. Last did not stop there going for another proxy rax against Larva on Fighting Spirit. With great rax positioning, Larva did not scout the rax instead scouting the bunker at his natural. He was unable to take it down and was contained. Attempts to break out were futile as Last's defense and macro were strong enough to stop the Zerg. Sources tell me that Larva, like HiyA, was taken back so badly by the proxy rax that he spent his evening proxying Zerg players on Afreeca. Could Last be the dark horse of the tournament? Could he be theone standing?In all the chaos, one must also not forget HiyA. Despite his unexpected loss to Last, HiyA was able to trounce his remaining opponents. Against Larva on Return of the King, HiyA's unit control and macro gave him control of the game. Larva tried some burrow shenanigans to get the upper hand but they failed miserably leaving him open to HiyA's constant aggression which he could not handle. In his last game against GuemChi, HiyA managed to get an SCV scout inside GuemChi's base to find out that dark templars on the way. He went on to trick GuemChi into trying to get into his base with his army but with perfect timing, HiyA closed off his entrance and easily beat GuemChi's army to win the game.Having lost two games, Larva had one last chance at redemption. Facing GuemChi on Blue Storm, Larva went for the one unit that even Bisu has trouble with, hydras. With 5 hatch hydra in full swing, Larva took control of the map and was able to overwhelm GuemChi with constant aggression. In the end, the last Zerg player was eliminated leaving us with an quarterfinal free of Zergs. Hard to comprehend considering all the strong Zerg players that SSL originally started with. As for GuemChi, he might not have advanced to the quarterfinal but he has won the hearts and minds of fans with his funny strategies.A Mini-Holland scheme in north London has become the bitter focus of a general election row.
Candidates have set against one another as they debate the Cycle Enfield, which plans to spend £42 million on safe cycling routes.
The Tory candidate David Burrowes says he will scrap the scheme if elected.
He claims that businesses are being affect by the disruption.
“Cycle lanes have their place and merits, but it’s a whole different picture when you’re talking about an outer London suburban high street and you’re trying to put a segregated cycle lane in at a huge amount of cost,” Mr Burrowes told the Evening Standard.
He added: “The result of it is not actually improving air quality […] and people being funnelled in a congested tailback of buses and cars.
“It may work in other parts of the country, but as far as Enfield’s concerned, there’s not the broad approval that I think would need to be there to go through.
“There’s already been incidents of cars being written off and pedestrians tripping over the things separating the cycle lanes.
“What they need to be ready to do is if evidence suggests that it’s causing safety problems, then they need to have to the guts to say ‘we’ve not done it properly and we’ll find a different way of doing it’.
“That would entail trying to find ways of trying to find ways to mitigate the problems that are happening and not having the cycle lane in the same way… maybe being less segregated.”
Labour are the dominant party in Enfield, and candidate Bambos Charalambous said: “I don’t think it’s a primary issue.
“I think people have raised some valid concerns about it [but] the scheme isn’t up and running yet. People need to be patient and allow the scheme to get up and running and see where it goes from there. I think it’ll be a good thing for the area.
“I’m very much excited by it,” he added.
A London Cycling Campaign spokesman said: “Once completed, the scheme will bring benefits to businesses by creating places that are easier and more attractive to visit, shop and do business in.
“Major roadworks can cause short-term, localised congestion and pollution – but longer term these schemes will help lots of people swap unnecessary car journeys for walking and cycling, boosting local business and residents’ health, while cutting congestion, air pollution and collisions.”
Last year we reported how a judicial review by campaigners to stop a “Mini Holland” project going ahead in North London was rejected.
The group, called Save Our Green Lanes (SOGL), said the Cycle Enfield scheme, which will see private cars diverted from Enfield’s high street and cycle lanes installed in Palmers Green and Enfield Town, would worsen air pollution and have little or a negative effect on business.
However, the High Court dismissed the case earlier this month and ordered SOGL to pay the council’s costs.
Mr Justice Ouseley disagreed with the group’s assertion the scheme was “unfair” and the consultation process “flawed”.
Costas Georgiou, one of SOGL’s leaders, said the group had witness statements from people denied access to paper copies of the consultation, but the judge accepted the council’s claims documents had been provided to people who needed them.WARNING: Video contains graphic images of children. Chemical watchdog the U.N.-OPCW Mission is discussing a mission to check out reports of chlorine gas attacks in Syria. (Reuters)
WARNING: Video contains graphic images of children. Chemical watchdog the U.N.-OPCW Mission is discussing a mission to check out reports of chlorine gas attacks in Syria. (Reuters)
The months-long effort to dismantle Syria’s chemical weapons program has ground to a halt because Syria is holding on to 27 tons of sarin precursor chemicals as leverage in a dispute with the international community over the future of facilities used to store the deadly agents, according to U.S. officials.
Having turned over all but an estimated 8 percent of its chemical arsenal to the Organisation for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons, Damascus missed a deadline Sunday to relinquish the remnants of its arsenal, which are stored in 16 containers in Damascus, U.S. officials said.
The OPCW is insisting that a network of tunnels and buildings that were used to store the weapons must be destroyed. The government of Syrian President Bashar al-Assad has argued that the facilities should be repurposed.
“They’re just stalling for time to hold on to some of these facilities,” said a U.S. official familiar with the matter who would discuss the issue only on the condition of anonymity. The official said he expects that Syria will ultimately give up the material.
Still, the relative success of an agreement Washington struck with Moscow last fall after a chemical weapons attack in a Damascus suburb has been dampened by reports that the Syrian government has begun using chlorine in rudimentary bombs dropped from aircraft in residential areas.
Amateur video shows a massive explosion in Syria. Rights groups say more than 200 people are killed every day and at least 150,000 people have died in the three year long conflict. (Reuters)
The use of the widely available industrial chemical in munitions known as barrel bombs would constitute a violation of the Chemical Weapons Convention, which Damascus joined last fall under the threat of U.S. cruise missile strikes. The OPCW, an organization created to enforce the terms of the convention, announced this week that it plans to dispatch a team to investigate reports of an April 11 attack using chlorine-laced bombs in Kafr Zita, an opposition-controlled village in northwestern Syria. There have been a handful of other reported instances with attacks involving chlorine.
“These reports are too serious to be ignored,” Robert P. Mikulak, the U.S. representative to the executive council of the OPCW, said Tuesday in public remarks in The Hague, where the group is based. “The United States considers them to be a matter of serious concern requiring an immediate international effort to determine what has happened.”
A senior U.S. intelligence official said U.S. intelligence agencies have little doubt that the attack was carried out by the government and that the toxic substance that led victims to choke was “likely chlorine.”
The use of chlorine as a weapon in Syria, if confirmed, would pose a dilemma for Washington, since it could not conceivably seek to rid Syria of a widely available chemical with numerous legitimate uses.
“There’s reluctance to call attention to it because there’s not much we can do about it,” a senior U.S. official said. “You can’t ask a country to get rid of all its chlorine.”
U.S. officials are also reluctant to provoke a confrontation over a lower-grade chemical until Syria’s stockpiles of sarin, a nerve agent, and other deadly materials have been removed, another U.S. official said.
The Syrian government has denied that it has used chlorine in weapons.
Daryl G. Kimball, the executive director of the Washington-based Arms Control Association, called the possible use of chlorine in attacks by the Syrian government “puzzling and disturbing.” When combined with munitions, he said, chlorine, a choking agent, makes them deadlier, but not nearly on the scale of sarin or mustard gas.
“This does not have a major effect on the strategic situation on the ground,” he said. “This is not the kind of weapon that Syria needs to use from a military perspective.”
Experts said that Assad’s alleged use of chlorine reflects a calculation by the regime that continued chemical strikes are valuable in intimidating rebel factions even if they are not as deadly as conventional munitions. Further, Assad seems confident that there will be no fallout.
“This says more about the determination of the regime to intimidate, kill, defeat the rebels,” said David Kay, a former U.N. weapons inspector now at the Potomac Institute for Policy Studies. “It says a lot about their lack of fear of consequences. What’s the West going to do? It’s done nothing so far.”
The OPCW says that the terms of the convention, which have applied to all signatories that destroyed stockpiles, requires Syria to eliminate facilities that were used to produce and store chemical weapons.
“Until and unless all of the declared material is removed from the country,” and any lingering questions about additional, undeclared stockpiles are addressed, “it is unwise for OPCW to be satisfied with leaving these production facilities partially intact,” Kimball said.
Michael Luhan, a spokesman for the organization, declined to comment Wednesday.
Mikulak, the U.S. envoy to the chemical weapons watchdog organization, said Syria has been unwilling to discuss the destruction of facilities that formed part of its chemical arsenal with other members of the convention.
“Twelve chemical weapons production facilities declared by Syria remain structurally intact,” he said. “Why is that? The answer is Syria’s intransigence.” He charged that “the Assad regime has delayed the operation at every opportunity.”
Mikulak said that Damascus has blamed delays for its failure to meet deadlines on the difficulty of accessing stockpiles in contested areas — an argument he dismissed.
U.S. officials said Russia, Syria’s principal arms supplier, continues to put pressure on Damascus to turn over the remaining sarin, making the effort one of the few remaining areas in which Moscow and Washington are collaborating.
“We need to see immediate and tangible signs that Syria intends to transport, in the very near future, the remaining chemicals from the site,” Mikulak said. “The international community cannot wait indefinitely for Syria action.”Post offices, as a result, were also sources of controversy. In the 1820s, leaders from a variety of Protestant denominations campaigned to end Sunday delivery on religious grounds. Similar movements would arise over the course of the 19th century. And the objection wasn't just to the Sunday-ness of Sunday delivery, to the fact that mail delivery on Sunday was a violation of the Sabbath. It was also to the social-ness of Sunday delivery. The six-day-delivery campaigns, Fischer writes, were "part of the churches’ wider efforts to enforce a 'Puritan Sabbath' against the demands of Mammon and against worldly temptations like those card games." Exacerbating the problem, from the Puritanical perspective, was the rise in immigration among Catholics, "many of whom," Fischer notes, "celebrated 'Continental' Sundays which included all sorts of secular pleasures—picnics, even beer halls—after (or instead of) church."
But the many protests that periodically sprang up to challenge Sunday delivery would, inevitably, fail. There was, for one thing, a First Amendment argument to be made in favor of daily mail delivery: To prioritize Sunday over another day—many religions, if they celebrate a Sabbath, do so on Saturday—would be, implicitly, to prioritize one religion over another. In 1828, the Kentucky Senator Richard M. Johnson, chairman of the Senate Committee on the Post Office and Post Roads and a devout Baptist, declared any federal attempt to give preference to the Christian Sabbath to be unconstitutional. The line between church and state when it came to Sunday mail delivery, he argued, "cannot be too strongly drawn."
The more pressing argument for Sunday delivery, however, was economic. "The 1844 invention of the telegraph would eventually put an end to the commercial need for daily mail," Susan Jacoby notes in an essay on religion and the Constitution, "but in the 1820s and '30s, business still depended on the government to keep the mails moving seven days a week." Back then, a significant proportion of business dealings—not just correspondence, but financial transactions—was conducted through the post office. Businessmen argued that they needed Sunday posting capabilities to do their work. And they "found allies," Fischer notes, "among some evangelical ministers, particularly Baptists, and among secular laymen who saw the sabbatarian drive as a power grab by high-status, eastern churchmen."
Toward the end of the 19th century, though, another alliance would arise: Religious leaders would join with organized labor to end Sunday mail delivery. For workers, closing post offices on Sundays wasn't necessarily a matter of religion, but it was a matter of time. A Sunday-less work week was also a six-day work week. (Though, Fischer points out, "the church-labor alliance did have its limits. Protestant ministers and the union men disagreed on how the Lord’s day of'rest' should be spent—in religious devotion or in play.")FROM TOMORROW THE people of Dublin will be able to nominate the people in their lives that they see as ‘hidden heroes’.
The Good Citizen Awards aim to acknowledge and celebrate people who make a big difference in everyday life, but might go overlooked.
This is the first year that the awards have been run.
Speaking about the awards, deputy chief executive with Dublin City Council Brendan Kenny said: “The care and generosity of these individuals, displayed on a daily basis, often goes unnoticed. It is now time to show that their work is appreciated and acknowledged for the huge contribution it makes to their communities and through that, to everyone’s quality of life.”
There are nine categories for nominations and winners will be selected by an independent adjudication panel and presented with their awards ceremony at the Mansion House in May.
Nominations can be made in the following categories:
Social inclusion
Age friendly
Community and neighbourhood
Sports and recreation
Arts culture
Children and youth,
New communities
Disability
Lifetime volunteer
The public can make put people forward through the Good Citizen website and nominations will be open from tomorrow until 18 March.The following blog post, unless otherwise noted, was written by a member of Gamasutras community.
The thoughts and opinions expressed are those of the writer and not Gamasutra |
too," said Barry Waters, wearing a "Build the Wall!" t-shirt.
In a statement, Melania Trump responded that she grew up in Chicago, attended Princeton, and Harvard Law School. Reporters noticed similarities to the bio section of a Wikipedia article about former First Lady Michelle Obama.Secretary of Energy Rick Perry stirred a controversy Thursday when he appeared to suggest a connection between burning fossil fuels and preventing sexual assault, a lesson he said he had learned on a recent trip to Africa.
"A young girl told me to my face, 'One of the reasons that electricity is so important to me is not only because I'm not going to have to try to read by the light of a fire and have those fumes literally killing people,' " the former Texas governor said, according to The Hill.
"But also from the standpoint of sexual assault. When the lights are on, when you have light that shines, the righteousness, if you will, on those types of acts," he added.
When the lights are on, when you have light that shines, the righteousness, if you will, on those types of acts.SEPT. 15: The Yankees have announced the signing of Butler to a Major League deal. Right-hander Nathan Eovaldi has been transferred to the 60-day disabled list to clear a spot on the 40-man roster.
SEPT. 14: The Yankees have reached an agreement to sign recently released Athletics designated hitter/first baseman Billy Butler, reports Jon Heyman of FanRag Sports (via Twitter). Heyman further specifies that Butler has signed a Major League contract with New York.
Specifics surrounding the deal aren’t known, but Butler can be had for nothing more than the pro-rated portion of the league minimum through season’s end following his release by Oakland. That means it’ll cost the Yanks about $50K to add Butler into the mix, presumably for the remainder of the 2016 campaign only.
Butler, 30, signed a three-year, $30MM contract with the A’s prior to the 2015 season – a move that paid very little in the way of dividends for Oakland. The longtime Royals DH struggled in both seasons he spent wearing green and gold, hitting a collective.258/.325/.394. While that production graded out as roughly average when factoring in the Athletics’ cavernous home park (99 OPS+), a league-average bat at the DH slot (and occasionally at first base) isn’t a positive outcome on a $10MM annual investment.
As Mike Axisa of River Avenue Blues points out (Twitter link), however, the Yankees started light-hitting backstop Austin Romine at designated hitter tonight against a left-handed pitcher. Butler could give the Yankees a solid, low-cost option against southpaws for the remainder of the season, and they’ll be facing no shortage of left-handed opponents; Ken Rosenthal of FOX Sports notes that the Yanks are slated to face lefties in seven of their next 11 games (Twitter link).
That said, it should be noted that a large reason for the decline in performance from “Country Breakfast” is the fact that his numbers against lefties have plummeted in the past two seasons. Butler crushed lefties at a.314/.393/.519 clip from 2007-14 despite playing his home games at the pitcher-friendly Kauffman Stadium, but he’s managed only a woeful.226/.329/.358 line against lefties since signing in Oakland.
Few would’ve thought that the Yankees would be in this position at the non-waiver trade deadline when they parted ways with Aroldis Chapman, Andrew Miller and Carlos Beltran in order to acquire prospects, but New York currently sits just two games back from an American League Wild Card spot. However, they just lost a right-handed option earlier today with the news that Aaron Judge has been placed on the disabled list due to an oblique strain, thinning out the club’s right-handed options at the plate. Of course, if the Yankees are able to close the two-game gap that currently faces them, Butler would be ineligible to join the postseason roster, having been added to the organization after the Aug. 31 postseason eligibility deadline.
Photo courtesy of USA Today Sports Images.The Democratic political establishment has gone into full panic mode as anti-establishment candidate Bernie Sanders surged past Hillary Clinton in New Hampshire and pulled within striking range in Iowa. We can certainly count on more ridiculous hyperbole coming out of the Clinton machine now that the latests CNN/WMUR polls have Senator Sanders up a whopping 27 points in the Granite State and a strong 8 points in the Hawkeye State. Establishment politicians and operatives, including Chelsea Clinton, started spouting dangerous political nonsense that they will want to walk back if Senator Sanders wins the nomination.
Strangely, Clinton backers, including the former First Lady’s daughter, falsely accused Sanders of supporting a plan that would “take away health insurance for low-income and middle-income working Americans.” After that didn’t work, then entrenched Democrats, including a couple from my birth state of Missouri, started playing the “socialism” card, a card better-suited for right-wing Republicans, as many Democratic primary voters understand that some of America’s most popular programs, namely Social Security and Medicare, are socialist policies. In fact, more Democratic Iowa caucus goers consider themselves socialist than capitalist.
After the socialism scare tactics didn’t derail, Sanders’ momentum, the mudslinging David Brock, the leader of a pro-Clinton Super PAC, ridiculously trotted out the race card after Sanders’ new “America” ad hit the airwaves. Brock, who once was a right-wing mudslinger that denigrated Anita Hill and claimed that Arkansas State Troopers arranged sexual liaisons for then-Governor Bill Clinton, is now a poltical hatchet man that Hillary Clinton should be embarrassed to have as an operative.
We can expect the establishment to continue to freak out. Some members of the Clinton campaign and Democratic power players have tried to put up a brave face, claiming confidence that the front-runner’s strong support from people of color will provide a firewall in Nevada, South Carolina and more diverse states across the map. However, strong victories in Iowa and New Hampshire could swing many more voters into Sanders’ camp, as Representative Clyburn has stated to The New York Times:
Mr. Clyburn, who is not endorsing a candidate before his state’s primary, said Clinton aides in South Carolina had expressed misgivings to him about the state of her campaign. “It has to do with what things ought to be done and when they ought to be done,” Mr. Clyburn said, declining to provide more details. “The reality is, if Mrs. Clinton loses Iowa and New Hampshire, that could create new and real problems for her here.”
The actions of Hillary Clinton and the Democratic establishment clearly show that they are now very nervous. Secretary Clinton was the inevitable nominee in 2008 and many are seeing parallels to 2016. It was once unthinkable that a first-term African-American senator with the middle name Hussein could defeat Hillary Clinton. Iowa helped propel Barack Obama to the Democratic nomination in 2008, even though Clinton came back to win in New Hampshire. If Bernie Sanders can exceed the early performance of Barack Obama and win both Iowa and New Hampshire, his long history of being on the right side of history on the Civil Rights Movement, women’s rights, gay rights and matters of war and peace, will bring along more and more voters, including those of color, to #FeelTheBern.Image copyright Red White and Beard
Most office workers stick to wearing a shirt and trousers. So why has a Sikh man in his 40s been talking to strangers in New York while dressed as Captain America?
"I want to challenge people's perceptions, I want them to have a mind freak when they see me."
So says Vishavjit Singh, a mild-mannered software engineer by day and passionate cartoonist by night.
"When I first put on the suit, it was one of the most amazing days of my life. It was like a switch had been flicked. Strangers were embracing me, cops were asking me for photos, I was being dragged into weddings."
The 43-year-old's fellow Americans have not always been so welcoming. A devout Sikh, complete with traditional turban and flowing beard, Vishavjit - or Vish as he is known - has always attracted attention.
"I'm still seen by many as the 'ultimate other' in American society -a radical Muslim. Harassment goes up and down depending on the news," he says.
He turned to his hobby of drawing as an outlet, creating cartoons depicting what life in America was like for Sikhs - focusing on the patriotism he felt for the country he was born in and the pride for the religion he belonged to.
"I realised I had to draw something fresh and the new Captain America film gave me an idea. How about a superhero who has a beard and a turban and fights intolerance?"
Image copyright Red White and Beard Image caption Vishavjit Singh out of costume
A local comic book convention provided the perfect opportunity for him to get his work noticed and it was there that he met a photographer who suggested he bring the character to life - by dressing up as Captain America himself.
"My first response was, 'no way'. I'd never worn a costume and I'm a skinny guy who's been kind of teased and bullied all my life," he says.
Then things changed. In August 2012, six people were killed after a US Army veteran with ties to white supremacist groups opened fire on worshipers at a gurdwara in Wisconsin while preparations for a service were under way.
The incident forced Singh to once again reassess the way minorities like himself were being perceived in America. His cartoons were a way of tackling the stigma faced by Sikhs, but the self-confessed introvert felt he still had to do more.
It was then that he remembered his earlier conversation at the comic convention. He swiftly ordered a bespoke Captain America suit tailored to fit his slender 5'9", 130 pound (58kg) frame.
"I was trying out the uniform at home for the first time, stuffing sports pads in to make myself look bigger and trying to work out a plan," he says.
"My wife came over to me and said, 'just be yourself'."
Image copyright Red White and Beard Image caption Singh is frequently stopped for photographs
Singh began visiting college campuses and youth retreats dressed in character - complete with Captain America's trademark shield and an 'A' on his turban - giving talks about social identity and life as a Sikh.
"We put people in brackets of Muslims, Jews, right wing, left wing. I want to force people to get out of those labels, out of those boxes and to start a conversation."
It was at one of these talks that he met three filmmakers - Ryan Westra, Ben Fischinger and Matthew Rogers - then students, who were intrigued by the message Vish had come to deliver.
"Vish was born in the United States, has no accent at all but regardless, most people assume he's born from somewhere in the Middle East," says 23-year-old Westra.
"Despite being the fifth biggest religion in the world, not many Americans know a thing about Sikhism".
The friends approached Singh with an idea - he would walk around New York City for three days in full costume, and they would capture the experience on film.
"It was something I knew we had to do, though I admit I was a little nervous about the whole thing", said Westra. "But as soon as he put the costume on, people literally began lining up to take selfies, talk to him and find out more about him."
The film, 'Red, White and Beard is now available to watch online.
Filming across three days meant travelling up and down New York, providing Singh with the opportunity to strike up conversations with locals, including a chance encounter with a fellow commuter on the subway.
"It turned out he was a cop who was there on the scene during 9/11 and had just come back from visiting the memorial site for the first time. He told me as a white, conservative Christian from the Southwest, he loved me and what I was doing," he says.
Image copyright Red White and Beard Image caption Singh travelled the streets of New York dressed as Captain America
"The fact I was in costume got us talking, otherwise we may never have met."
And it's for such encounters that Singh plans to keep patrolling the streets in full costume. For him, the iconic comic book character has become an important part of who he is.
"You see, Captain America is the ultimate hero - he's patriotic, strong, the uniform has the red, white and blue. He'd been created to fight actual bad guys in the Second World War," he says.
"Today I want to show that he's coming back - this time to fight hate crime.""Get f***ed into them lads, f***ed into them." The man beside me in the main stand at Queen's playing fields is shouting and waving his fists.
"Get f***ed into them lads, f***ed into them." The man beside me in the main stand at Queen's playing fields is shouting and waving his fists.
Neil Blevins, a midfielder with the PSNI Gaelic football team, has just done his best to decapitate a big Garda, who crumples to the ground. I laugh at my companion as he roars. He turns to me, suddenly sees the funny side, and bursts into laughter. "It was off the ball, too late, and too high Joe," he says, "but it needed to be done." Peadar Heffron is a big, strong, robust man in his early 40s. He is in a wheelchair.
"It was Friday the eighth of January 2010. There was 10 inches of snow on the ground when I backed out of the driveway to go to work at Grosvenor Road Station in Belfast. A half-mile from the house, I felt a bang and the car spun off the road. I looked down and my legs were on fire. I thought, 'fuck, I have to get out of the car'. I tried to climb out but for some reason my legs wouldn't work. I pulled myself out by my arms and rolled onto the ground on my back. I felt no pain. I just couldn't feel my legs. I kept thinking, 'why can't I feel my legs?'. When the ambulance men arrived, they turned me over, and it was then that they had the 'Oh fuck' moment."
His wife Fiona, also a police officer, was first on the scene. They had been married just four months earlier, on September 9, 2009. "999," says Peadar, "we thought that was funny."
After Peadar had been lifted into the ambulance, she went to look at the car with another officer. When they saw the hole in the driver's seat the size of a football, going through to the ground, they knew immediately what had happened.
In the ambulance, Peadar was strapped down. Fiona said: "It was a bomb, Peadar. An under-car booby trap." Her husband went into a terrible rage, shouting: "The bastards got me, they got me." He fought violently to break free of the straps, causing mayhem in the crowded ambulance. They got to Antrim Area Hospital within a few minutes; he was injected by the trauma team and went into a coma.
His arse had been blown off. Literally blown off. At that point, it seemed certain he would die. The snow and ice had staunched the haemorrhaging as he lay on the road, keeping him alive until the ambulance appeared. But now the blood was pumping out; 140 units (a unit is roughly a pint) were transfused into him. It went in one end and out the other. His ruined right leg was amputated. The surgeons at the Royal Victoria filleted the bone from the flesh, discarded the bone, and used the flesh and tissue to make a new arse for him to sit on. Like stitching a rubber ring to his waist. For three weeks, he hovered between life and death. Then, the doctors brought him out of the coma.
"I joined the PSNI as soon as it was formed because deep down, naively, I thought this was the little bit I could do... you're not allowed to laugh when I say this Joe... to help this island become one again. I thought if policing here was normalised, we could in due course join with the Gardai and then further down the line, who knows..."
Peadar had hurled and played Gaelic football for Creggan Kickhams near Randalstown since he was a child. He was fanatical about the games. He also loved the Irish language. As a 15-year-old, he snogged one of my sisters at the Gaeltacht, maybe both of them. By 21, he was the established full-back for the Creggan senior footballers and that year, helped them to win the Antrim intermediate championship. He repeated the triumph two years later.
When he was 25, he applied to join the new police force, established as a result of the Good Friday Agreement. The hated RUC, an overwhelmingly Protestant force, had been disbanded and the PSNI promised a new beginning. He was worried about having to tell his team-mates, but not overly.
Peadar Heffron celebrates after Creggan won the Antrim intermediate football championship in 2001
First, he told his parents Frank and Ethna, who laughed, thinking he was joking. But when they realised he was serious they said they would support him. A few days later in Joe O'Boyle's bar, one evening in January 2002 at the first team meeting of the new season, he waited until everyone had spoken, then stood up and told his band of brothers that he was joining the new force. "It must have gone down like a bomb," I say.
"I'll pardon the pun. It did."
The gathering was stunned into silence. Two of the team leaders rounded on him, saying what the fuck was he thinking of and that he couldn't go through with it. No one supported him. After the meeting, no one said a word to him. His boyhood friends never spoke to him again.
He went to the first training session, and when he went into the changing room the chatter stopped. Out on the field, the manager ignored him. When teams were picked for training games, he was left standing. A stubborn bastard, he simply joined in with one of the teams and played as a spare man. No one passed him the ball or acknowledged him. Then, posters started going up around the parish, warning the young people against joining what they described as the PSNI/RUC. One was posted opposite his family home on the phone box. He trained on, never missing a session.
After one session he spoke to a club official as he left the field. "I need your backing on this. It's supposed to be a new beginning." "I can't son. I can't do that." After another session, an official approached him and said he was putting the club in a very awkward situation. He said a well-known club in Tyrone with a very strong history of republicanism had rung him, said they'd heard Peadar Heffron was joining the PSNI and they'd like to come up and play Creggan in a 'challenge' match. Then, after ten weeks or so, one Sunday morning in April, as he was togging out for training in the changing room, four local republican activists came through the door. They approached him, eye-balled him, and pointedly handed him a leaflet warning against the dangers of joining the PSNI. "I got into my car, drove home and never came back. It had gotten too personal. Too serious. It was an awful wrench. I never recovered."
When Peadar says this to me in a cafe in North Down, 15 years later, he sits in silence for a long time, clenching his teeth and rubbing his right shoulder with his left hand over and over. "Fucking pricks," I say eventually. "Fucking pricks," he says.
Peadar joined the PSNI a month later in the first wave of recruits and immediately worried he had got it all wrong.
Peadar: "We had to introduce ourselves to everyone else in our class. All the others were RUC reservists, or ex-soldiers, or from bank or office jobs. There was no one from my background. Not a single other GAA man. I was a fish out of water. Even the accents were different. It was in a world I had never been exposed to before."
Me: "Martha Wainright's song 'These are not my people, I should never have come here'?"
Peadar Heffron with Joe Brolly
Peadar: "That's exactly it. Exactly it."
He bulled on regardless. Stubborn bastard. He helped form the PSNI Gaelic football team and became automatic choice at full-back, marking himself out with the ferocity of his play. Their first game was played against the Gardai in 2002, behind closed doors in Dublin with the names of the PSNI team anonymised.
In 2006, they played their first game against a club team, against my club St Brigid's. There was a huge fanfare around the game and heavy security. Peadar was marking me and responded to the throw-in by letting me know he was there. Afterwards in the Harlequins clubhouse we had pints and a laugh. It seemed to herald a new era, where our lads in the PSNI would be able to enter a league and play as normal.
I strongly backed the game, and shortly afterwards graffiti went up around the city. SHAME ON YOU JOE, SHAME ON YOU and other guff of that type. Turned out not to be a breakthrough at all. Just over three years later, people from his own community set Peadar up for assassination. Crawled under his car in the dead of night and planted a bomb to free Ireland.
Just over a year later, Ronan Kerr, another young GAA man who had joined the PSNI, was murdered by a similar booby trap. I won't forget standing with his distraught mother in her kitchen, beside the coffin that couldn't even be opened, under a framed photograph of Peter the Great kicking his great winning score against Armagh in the 2005 All-Ireland semi-final. Things no one should ever have to see.
In Eric Bogle's great anti-war song No More Waltzing Matilda For Me, the young hero was a free rover who travelled the outback. When the war came, he fought at Suvla Bay against the Turks and was hit by a mortar. When he was shipped home to Sydney:
I looked at the place where me legs used to be
And thank Christ there was nobody waiting for me
To grieve and to mourn and to pity
When Peadar was in a coma, I spoke to Damien Tucker, the first manager of the PSNI team. He said: "I wouldn't be surprised if he becomes the first Gaelic footballer to take the field with a prosthetic. I never saw spirit like it."
Well, the prosthetic wasn't possible. There was just too much damage. But he plays wheelchair basketball and tennis. And he plays at full-back for the Ulster wheelchair hurling team, who play round-robin games against the other provinces 12 times a year.
What, though, about his anger. "I am a very bitter man. After the bomb, not even a letter from the club. Two of the committee visited my parents' house when I was in a coma. My father Frank played for Creggan, was the club referee and the treasurer. They said to him when they arrived, "We are not here on behalf of the club, only in a personal capacity." I'd be fairly certain guys I played with passed on my details to others. People I knew well were arrested and questioned about the bomb but there were no prosecutions. It's hard, with pricks like you defending them." As he says that, he raises the middle finger to me.
He was finally released from hospital after 11 months, in November 2010. He pisses through a urostomy bag. He shits through a colostomy. He has a mobile seat cover that prevents him rolling over when he sits. He was invalided out of the force. For the last eight years, pieces of foam from his car seat and shrapnel from the car have been making their way out of his body, most recently in December past when a rusty lump of metal was removed from his pelvis by the surgeons.
I ask him what he makes of it all now? "When I joined we were promised peace. A new beginning. I thought I'd remain part of my community, a community I loved. I thought I'd play football for Creggan and drink pints in O'Boyle's. That we'd have children and I'd take the underage teams. Now I'm in a wheelchair. I live in North Down. It wasn't supposed to happen. It wasn't supposed to happen."
We sit for a good while after that, sipping tea, saying nothing. Then, he chit-chats about his wife Fiona and the football. We arrange to go out for a meal together over Christmas. This is the first time he has spoken publicly about his life. As we are about to leave, I ask him: "What's your life like?" He says: "It's a life. But it's not my life."
Win One of Five Pairs of Tickets to Ireland v France - Click here
Sunday Indo SportEver since the fourth-generation Mazda MX-5 Miata debuted last year, our imagination has run wild concocting new body styles like a Miata coupe, a Miata retractable hardtop, and even a Miata shooting brake. But we didn’t predict the 2017 Mazda MX-5 Miata Retractable Fastback (RF), which combines a power-retractable targa top with a gorgeous fastback roofline. In other words, it’s the Miata coupe you’ve been waiting for, only better.
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The Miata RF’s power-folding targa top operates like the Porsche 911 Targa’s intricate roof in concept, although it’s somewhat simpler in practice. The 12-second roof-opening process can be performed at speeds up to 6 mph and works thusly: The two roof panels over the occupants’ heads fold while the rear window lowers itself behind the seats and the two flying-buttress supports lift up to accommodate the folded top. Those sail panels, by the way, are a visual trick, wrapping around a conventional trunklid that opens to a cubby with the same 4.6 cubic feet of cargo space as in the Miata softtop.
View Photos JOSEPH CAPPARELLA, MARC URBANO, THE MANUFACTURER
Retractable Hardtop is Dead, Long Live the Retractable Fastback
Why did Mazda abandon the previous generation’s more conventional folding hardtop that brought so many buyers into the Miata camp? According to Mazda’s North American president Masahiro Moro, the fourth-generation ND Miata’s shorter overall length doesn’t leave enough space to accommodate a full retractable hardtop like that on the third-gen NC Miata. The RF’s slightly smaller foldable roof fits in the same cubby space that the regular Miata’s softtop folds into behind the seats, keeping the car’s weight balance and interior space uncompromised. That the design allowed Mazda to craft this wonderful roofline that has already won us over is purely a bonus.
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With the top up, the Miata RF looks like a true Miata fastback coupe, with those gently sloping flying buttresses giving the car a vague resemblance to the Jaguar F-type coupe. We love it, although from the rear, the visual trick is revealed, as the back window stands flat like that on early C3 Corvettes. With the roof down, the RF reminds us of the 1990s Honda Civic del Sol—although Mazda surely would rather we compare it with the 911 Targa. Our only real complaint about the new roofline is the addition of strange rear-three-quarter windows that are actually blacked-out trim pieces made to look like windows. We expect the thriving Miata aftermarket will devise a half-dozen alternatives in no time.
View Photos JOSEPH CAPPARELLA, MARC URBANO, THE MANUFACTURER
Uncompromised Mechanicals
Mazda isn’t yet talking specific weight figures, but we’re told that the mass difference shouldn’t vary far from that between the previous retractable hardtop and its softtop sibling. That suggests the RF will carry 130 to 150 extra pounds, which we’re hoping is nominal enough to keep the 10Best Cars–winning Miata’s wonderfully nimble driving dynamics intact. The only other significant difference is that the RF’s roofline is 0.2 inch higher than the softtop’s, not that you’d be able to tell by looking at it.
The drivetrain is unchanged from the Miata we know and love, with a 1.5-liter four-cylinder available in other markets and a 2.0-liter Skyactiv four-cylinder as standard equipment in the United States. Six-speed manual and six-speed automatic variants remain on the menu. The preproduction car Mazda is showing at the 2016 New York auto show has an automatic and is trimmed in Machine Gray paint with red nappa leather inside. The colors, inside and out, are new to the Miata, with the gray paint sourced from the 2016 CX-9 crossover and the interior being the first red Miata cabin we can remember since the 1993 LE special-edition model. Look for more information to come on the Miata RF’s trim-level structure later this year. We predict it’ll be available in the Miata’s top Grand Touring trim at first, with other variants possible to follow.
As for pricing, the 2017 Mazda MX-5 Miata RF should add about $2000 to the MX-5’s bottom line if the previous retractable hardtop is any indication. Now excuse us, because we’re off to fantasize about the next Miata variant—MX-5 pickup, anyone?The 2015 Coast Safe Report found there were 10 beach-related deaths in Queensland in 12 months.
A new report has identified Queensland's most dangerous beaches and prompted calls to increase night-time patrols in areas with the highest risk of drowning.
Surf Lifesaving Queensland's (SLSQ) 2015 Coast Safe Report found there were 10 beach-related deaths in Queensland in the 12 months from July 2014 to June 2015.
Green Island in North Queensland and Surfers Paradise on the Gold Coast were the most common locations for drowning deaths, with two each in the period.
SLSQ drowning black-spots Far North Queensland
Green Island
Green Island Wide Bay Capricorn
Elliot River, Elliot Heads
Elliot River, Elliot Heads Sunshine Coast
Stumers Creek, Coolum to Sunshine Beach
Marcoola SLSC to Point Arkwright
Stumers Creek, Coolum to Sunshine Beach Marcoola SLSC to Point Arkwright Gold Coast
Surfers Paradise, Tower 33 to Tower 37
Southport SLSC to Southport Seaway
North Stradbroke Island, ocean side
Across the past decade, there have been 78 beach-related drownings in the state, including 34 on the Gold Coast and 18 on the Sunshine Coast.
SLSQ chief executive George Hill said there had been a surprising change in the ages of those drowning.
All the deaths in the past year were male but they were mostly over 50, contrary to the usual trend of fatalities in the 25- to 35-year age group.
"Young lads that want to go for a swim, 10 foot tall and bullet proof, [they may] have a couple of beers on board and go for a swim outside the flagged area," he said.
"But this year's completely different, so it's something that we're keeping a good eye on."
Mr Hill said the change from younger men to older may be due to issues such as health and fitness.
"When they go for a swim and they get caught in a current or a strong rip, it's a big wake-up call to go 'hey, I've got to use a lot of energy to get out of this current'," he said.
"Some of these drownings can bring on heart problems or other issues [and] then people get themselves into difficulties."
Dusk patrol call on the Gold Coast
Calls have been made to extend dusk surf patrols on the Gold Coast to further prevent drownings.
The city's professionally paid lifeguards patrol the beaches all year, while volunteer lifesavers operate during the busy warmer months between September and late April.
Almost 10 years ago, lifeguard patrols in the city were extended to earlier in the morning.
"That saw us decrease the drowning on the Gold Coast by 50 per cent," Mr Hill said.
However, life savers were now seeing more late afternoon and night-time swimmers, some under the influence of alcohol.
Mr Hill said later patrols and more widespread education could help prevent deaths.
"Maybe some more surveillance, maybe some more supervision in those areas," he said.
"[Maybe] tourism ambassadors like the Meter Maids [could be] out there warning the public about the hazards and the dangers of the choices they're making."
Gold Coast Lifeguard superintendent Chris Maynard said they did what they could to extend coverage during peak periods.
Lifeguards already patrolled the city's busy beaches until 6:30pm from Christmas until as late as April.
Guards stayed on duty even later some days, depending on weather and surf conditions.
"It's a good coverage, but we're always looking to improve where we can for doing those dusk patrols," Mr Maynard said.
Gold Coast Mayor Tom Tate said the idea of dusk patrols had merit.
"When you reflect on the early patrols, that has worked tremendously," he said.
"I think we'll work together with our lifeguards and our lifesavers to have a look at the idea of dusk patrols in black-spot areas."
As always, beach users were urged to swim between the flags and obey lifesaver's instructions.
The Queensland Surf Lifesaving 2015 season will begin on Saturday September 18.Good news, everyone—following incredibly (and justifiably) angry reactions yesterday to a report claiming that Disney’s fast-tracked Mulan remake would feature a prominent white male leading role, a new report has emerged saying that the film will not feature that role at all.
A post on the blog Angry Asian Man claimed to have read the full script, drawing attention to the original Legend of Mulan script Disney purchased. The anonymous writer found that Hua Mulan wasn’t the star of her own movie: instead, the lead would be a white, 30-something European trader who pitches their lot in with the Chinese army because he’s in love with the titular character. The reaction was... suitably enraged.
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It would have been a phenomenally poor idea, but happily it might not come to pass after all. Vulture, citing sources close to the production, claims that while the original script did feature such a role, it was purchased by Disney merely as a jumping-off point rather than the intended final product. Rick Jaffa and Amanda Silver have been hired to work on the script, described as a merging of the 1998 animated classic and the ancient Chinese ballad, and Mulan’s love interest will indeed be Chinese. Vulture’s source concludes with the heartening news that “Mulan is and will always be the lead character in the story, and all primary roles, including the love interest, are Chinese.”
And thank god for that. Otherwise Disney would’ve had a veritable shitstorm on their hands.
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[Vulture via Collider]Image copyright Reuters Image caption Istiqlal accused Prime Minister Abdelilah Benkirane of "acting like the head of a political party"
A key party in Morocco's Islamist-led government has quit, amid a dispute over subsidy cuts and economic policy.
The secular centre-right Istiqlal party said five of its six ministers had resigned. It is not clear if Education Minister Mohammed el-Ouafa has done so.
Istiqlal is the second-largest party in parliament after the moderate Islamist Justice and Development Party (PJD), which won elections held in late 2011.
The PJD will now have to find a new coalition partner or call elections.
Analysts say the first option is more likely.
Financial reforms
Announcing its withdrawal from the government on Tuesday, Istiqlal spokesman Adil Benhamza accused Prime Minister Abdelilah Benkirane of "acting like the head of a political party rather than the head of a government that represents the people", Reuters news agency reports.
The PJD wants to raise prices and hit the poorest, while we prefer to pick up some billions which are in the hands of speculators by controlling imports Adil Benhamza, Istiqlal party spokesman
Istiqlal, which controlled the finance ministry, has criticised the government's plan to cut by about 20% subsidies of basic goods, which cost about $6.16bn (£4.14bn), or 6.4% of GDP. The cuts are due to take effect at the end of the Islamic holy month of Ramadan, which begins on Wednesday.
The state has raised wages, pensions and spent more on subsidies every year since Morocco - ruled by the Arab world's longest-serving dynasty - saw protests over unemployment and living costs inspired by the Arab Spring revolts of 2011.
However, the government has recently been put under pressure to rein in spending and reduce its budget deficit from 7.1% to 3% by 2017 by the International Monetary Fund (IMF), which has granted it a $6.2bn credit line.
"The PJD wants to raise prices and hit the poorest, while we prefer to pick up some billions which are in the hands of speculators by controlling imports," Mr Benhamza told Reuters.
The PJD has accused Istiqlal of trying to sabotage reforms, the Associated Press news agency reports.
Morocco imports all of its oil, gas and coal, and relies on sugar and wheat shipments to meet domestic needs.
Mr Benkirane has said the IMF criticised the government last month for acting too hesitantly in implementing the financial reforms.
The government crisis in Morocco comes less than a week after Egypt's Islamist President, Mohammed Morsi, was ousted by the country's military.
Istiqlal leader Hamid Chabat has meanwhile been quoted as saying that he wants "the end of Benkirane, as was the case for his brother Morsi", AP reports.Making use of the unique physical properties of bosons, Stanford physicists have created an electrically driven polariton laser that uses less power than conventional lasers and could one |
’s left is the politics of feeling bad, the nearness of death, the promise that #NoLivesMatter.A radio exchange between Sebastian Vettel and the Ferrari pitwall, in which Vettel demanded Red Bull's Max Verstappen let him through after going off-track and wound up insulting both the Dutchman and F1 race director Charlie Whiting, was the big talking point of the Mexican GP weekend.
Sainz, meanwhile, was himself the subject of a radio complaint by Fernando Alonso earlier in the race after he had squeezed Alonso to the grass on exit of Turn 3, forcing a narrow save from the McLaren driver.
Having picked up a five-second penalty for the incident, Sainz said he had no issue with Alonso's radio complaints.
"You know, you can always complain on the radio," Sainz said.
"I would've probably done the same, open the radio and ask for a penalty - it's the easiest and most straightforward thing to do to overtake a guy, and we all do it.
"I don't really mind, we all get a bit overexcited over radios, so I will not blame him for that. I just think the penalty is a bit too harsh from the stewards."
Penalty "lottery"
While Sainz said he was sorry if his maneuver caused a "dangerous situation", the Spaniard insisted that the penalty call was too strict and that other drivers have gotten away with worse moves.
"Probably on the harsh side, because at the start you cannot look 360, it's very difficult," Sainz said.
"When I saw him, I saw him late, but it's not like he was side-by-side with me, and when I looked in the mirror I quickly backed it off.
"I heard there's been a lot of people complaining and no penalties, penalties, it's very difficult when they judge it one by one, it's a bit of a lottery whether you get it or not.
"I've seen [drivers] not getting penalties for something much worse - obviously, if I put Fernando in a dangerous situation, I'm sorry about that, but it's racing, it's lap one, it's not like I'm going to give up any position for free, especially when I'm nearly one full car length ahead.
"The overlap was very small [between the cars] and he just kept it flat out. Which, good for him, brave, but... it's not like I was going to leave the door open, especially because I saw him late."
Different approaches to incidents
Lamenting a lack of consistency in penalty decisions, Sainz said that Formula 1 has to decide whether it wants to approach incidents on a case-by-case basis or create "fixed" rules.
"I heard today that there were very similar situations to mine with Fernando, and there were no penalties applied.
"This is what Formula 1 needs to understand, whether to look at it accident-by-accident or to put a fixed rule, like [with] moving under braking.
"I don't know, nowadays it's just very difficult to know what's going to happen to you when you do a certain move that is a tiny bit on the limit, then you are risking yourself for a penalty or nothing."
Additional reporting by Luis RamirezWe've unlocked the first Spheres of Might add-on: A book of new classes and archetypes for mixing Spheres of Might with Spheres of Power to create powerful masters of both magic and martial combat!
You can find a preview of the system here. Take a look and leave a comment!
What is Spheres of Might?
Spheres of Might is a new system for handling martial prowess in Pathfinder and other D20 roleplaying games.
Barbarians, swashbucklers, knights, rogues; in the world of high adventure and fantasy roleplay, few things are as iconic as the martial warrior. From Conan the Barbarian, to Aragorn, or King Arthur and his knights, these champions of steel and valor stand on the front lines, battling foes beyond the comprehension of lesser mortals, and make the impossible seem like child's play.
Spheres of Might is a book for them.
Why a Martial Book?
When it comes to Pathfinder, and sometimes the whole tabletop RPG industry as a whole, it can seem like magic users get all the fun. Those squishy magicians have no shortage of spells and tricks to make their work enjoyable, but too often the warriors wielding swords and spears on the front lines lack the breadth of options afforded their magic-using peers; attack, move, attack, repeat. In real life, though, combat is anything but repetitive; facing an opponent quickly becomes an exciting yet terrifying dance, as combatants dodge, feint, counter, and make split second decisions that can lead to life or death.
Spheres of Might is designed to change the way martial combat works to make it more visceral, intricate, and cinematic. In this book, we introduce deeper and more robust options for martial combatants, giving them a greater number of tactics to employ each round, and supporting virtually any combat style imaginable from precise one-handed fencing to wild berserking and beyond. Additionally, because these new options build off of the core combat rules presented in the Pathfinder Core Rulebook, anyone familiar with the Pathfinder Roleplaying Game will be able to jump right in and begin using these new options without having to learn pages of new rules or terms first.
How Does Spheres of Might Work?
Like our previous release, Spheres of Power, Spheres of Might makes use of the Spheres system: through a system of talents gained by leveling, a martial combatant can unlock powers and playstyles via buying into a series of overarching'spheres' that map to various techniques and playstyles (wrestling, fencing, throwing, etc.) then further refining these abilities through the selection of talents within those spheres. Each of these spheres provide many options in and of themselves, but are also designed to have high levels of synergy with each other, allowing players to mix the spheres to create their own custom combat styles, from a wrestler who pounds his targets into the floor with flying leaps, to a fencer who lures his targets to attack before taking them down with a powerful counterpunch.
By picking and choosing what styles and techniques they can perform, it becomes possible to construct any type of martial character desired, giving them a host of options to perform in and out of combat to fit whatever need may arise. While there are still countless ways to specialize and create a unique combatant, rarely will a Sphere of Might user find themselves without some trick or other up their sleeves.
Just as importantly as what Spheres of Might does is what it doesn't do; The Spheres of Might system does not add a whole new set of rules and terminology on top of the core Pathfinder rules, instead building off the existing framework in new and exciting ways that are easy for players already used to Pathfinder's combat system to understand and utilize. This has the added benefit of also meaning that Spheres of Might is highly compatible with many other martial augmentation systems, as well as previously-released classes from both Paizo and most 3rd party publishers.
What Will be Included in Spheres of Might?
If we are able to meet our initial goal, it will fund the creation of a 140 page, full-color, hardback book filled with new martial options. However, the best part about kickstarter is that the more backing the project gains, the more space the books can contain, adding more and more pages of content!
In its current form, Spheres of Might will contain over 20 spheres to provide characters new and interesting options in and out combat, as well as new feats, thematic variants, and 6 new classes custom designed to showcase the new options and bring a great many character ideas to life.
Among these new classes will be found:
The Armiger: Skilled mercenaries who learn to leverage every trick at their disposal to triumph on the battlefield, armigers learn to quickly and effectively use a variety of weapons in devastating combos.
The Blacksmith: Mighty powerhouses, blacksmiths' powerful physiques are complimented by talented minds that allow them to craft superior equipment for their allies, as well as providing them with beneficial buffs by maintaining their gear during downtime.
The Commander: Cunning leaders, commanders specialize in bringing out the best in their allies and exhorting them to victory.
And several more!
For helping us bring this book to life, we're offering many different rewards packages to reflect whatever method (print, PDF, hero lab) you use to run your games, as well as a few unique rewards as well. For those unfamiliar with the Spheres system who are interested in magic as well as martial combat, we have several reward levels that also include copies of our previous Spheres release, Spheres of Power, as well as Spheres of Power: Expanded Options, who adds many archetypes and abilities to the system.
More Details about the various reward levels can be found on the right-hand side of the page.
Thank You!
Thank you for looking over our campaign. Please, take a look at the pledge levels on the side, and thank you for helping us make Spheres of Might!Former Fox News anchor Gretchen Carlson slammed President Trump on Friday after he attacked Sen. Al Franken Alan (Al) Stuart FrankenVirginia can be better than this Harris off to best start among Dems in race, say strategists, donors Virginia scandals pit Democrats against themselves and their message MORE (D-Minn.) over a photo in which the senator appears to be grabbing a sleeping woman's breasts.
Carlson was reacting to a late Thursday tweet from the president in which he labeled Franken "Al Frankenstein." In the tweet, Trump questioned "where [Franken's] hands go" in subsequent pictures.
"What about yours?" Carlson shot back Friday morning, referring to women who have accused Trump of sexual assault.
Carlson left Fox News in 2016 after filing a sexual harassment against Roger Ailes, who was then the cable news network's chairman and CEO. More than a dozen women came forward to accuse Trump of sexual harassment and assault during the 2016 presidential race, accusations Trump says are baseless.
Franken has been in damage control mode since a Los Angeles-based radio show host posted a photo Thursday that appears to show Franken groping her while she is asleep onboard a military plane during a 2006 USO tour. She also alleged that the Minnesota Democrat forcibly kissed her while the two were rehearsing a sketch.
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"It wasn’t until I was back in the U.S. and looking through the CD of photos we were given by the photographer that I saw this one," Leeann Tweeden wrote about the photo.
"I felt violated all over again. Embarrassed. Belittled. Humiliated," she wrote. "How dare anyone grab my breasts like this and think it’s funny?"
Franken apologized for the photo, but said he didn't remember the sketch incident the same way. In a second statement, he called for an ethics investigation into himself.
“The first and most important thing—and if it's the only thing you care to hear, that's fine—is: I'm sorry,” Franken.
“I understand why we need to listen to and believe women’s experiences,” he added. “I am asking that an ethics investigation be undertaken, and I will gladly cooperate.”AURORA | A long-stalled development near East Iliff Avenue and Interstate 225 continues to upset residents who worry it will forever alter the character of a decades-old neighborhood.
A proposal from the developer Century Communities aims to build 94 single-family detached homes on the northwest corner of Toledo Way and South Troy Street and the northeast corner of Tucson Way and Troy Street. Each home would contain two to three bedrooms and range from 1,500 to 1,800 square feet. Parking would include two spaces for each home, with about 65 parking spaces for guests.
This is the second design Century Communities has brought to the site on South Troy Street. In 2005 the developer proposed a large-scale condo project near East Iliff Avenue and Interstate 225, with more than 150 units spread out over seven buildings.
That project riled many nearby residents who argued it would crowd neighborhood streets, many of whom also were concerned about Century’s track record as a builder in the city. Century is responsible for an unfinished condo project it started in 2005 at East Tennessee Avenue and Sable Boulevard where residents have long complained about it being an “eyesore” and a dumping ground.
“We’re perplexed why the city would allow them to screw up another neighborhood when they still have collateral damage at Tennessee and Sable,” said Frank Gunn, a resident of Danbury Park who also serves as one of the neighborhood association’s board of directors.
At a Jan. 27 Aurora Planning and Zoning Commission meeting for the project, Century spokeswoman Lisa Albers said the economic downturn prevented Century from completing the East Tennessee Avenue and Sable Boulevard condos.
Albers said Century took over ownership of several of those condo units during the recession to keep the site’s HOA funded, and that Century is now being proactive about removing items dumped near the units.
Century also changed its plans last March in response to neighbors’ criticism, which is why the developer said it is now proposing the 94 home garden-court development at Troy and Iliff.
“We met with the neighboring subdivisions, and after working closely with them, we feel our current 94 single-family home project would benefit everyone,” Albers said. “The product we are proposing has been very successful in other communities, and we are looking forward to bringing them to Aurora.”
Century is building similar homes in Denver’s Lowry neighborhood.
When the 94-home proposal was brought before residents in nearby neighborhoods of Chateaux, Danbury Park and Shamrock Park, the residents yet again sent the city concerns about the site plan’s density, traffic implications, and lack of open space provided in the plan.
“This is very short-sighted of the city to consider such a dense community at this location,” wrote Diana Doyle in a public comment. “Aurora needs to consider the existing taxpayers’ requests when adding housing to an already dense area of the city.”
According to city documents, hundreds of residents have attended Aurora City Council meetings over the last three months to express their concerns about Century and the new application.
That’s largely because the plan would require the city to approve a General Development Plan amendment for the project to be rezoned to account for its density. The amendment would allow Century to nearly double the density of single family detached homes, which are now allowed at 6 units per acre under the site’s GDP.
The Shamrock Park Home Owners Association Board of Directors oppose the amendment.
Philip M. Volk, vice president of the Shamrock Park HOA, said such an amendment would forever change the character of the South Troy Street neighborhood.
“The need to require an amendment to the existing GDP zoning indicates Century Communities wants to build something that just doesn’t fit,” Volk said in a letter to Aurora City Council members.
To appease residents, Century plans to install a gate at South Troy Street where it connects with Danbury Park that could only be opened by Danbury Park residents to prevent traffic on private roads. Danbury Park would then manage and maintain the gate, if the plan is approved.
Volk said that gate would make getting in and out of his Shamrock Park home nearly impossible as it would only leave him Iliff as a travel option. He is also concerned about the lack of a traffic light at the intersection of Iliff and Troy when the project is completed.
“Shamrock Park is not against development of this property,” Volk said. “What we’re asking for is a responsible development.”
This project however does satisfy the city’s goal to create “infill development that is of sufficient quality to promote neighborhood revival,” according to the city’s planning commission.
Neighboring Danbury Park and Chateaux HOAs have also expressed “no objection” to the project as part of a letter they submitted to the city’s planning commission in January.
Century’s new proposal failed on a tie vote for and against it at a Jan. 27 planning commission meeting and will next be heard at a March 14 regular Aurora City Council meeting.Super League fans to be offered free away travel for Thursday TV games
Leeds Rhinos fans make themselves heard in the stands
Fans are to be offered free away travel to televised Thursday night matches, Super League clubs have decided.
A joint initiative between clubs and Super League to boost attendances and improve the atmosphere at the midweek fixtures came from a two-day gathering of the 12 club representatives this week.
"It's the start of a process to make sure that we reward loyal fans of clubs," Super League general manager Blake Solly said.
"It was one of the more productive meetings we've had in the last few years. Super League and the clubs are keen to listen to the fans better than we ever have before.
"There are lots of other discussions and plans that fans will see happening over the next few months about trying to engage better with them to make the matchday experience better.
"Warrington offered free coach travel at the start of the year for their game at Leeds and it was hugely successful - they took over 1,000 fans to that game.
"The great thing about having a good away following is the atmosphere it creates. The scenes at the end of the game at Salford last night when Chris Sandow kicked that field goal to win the game for Warrington are some of the things that make rugby league stronger."
There was late drama at the AJ Bell Stadium between Salford Red Devils and Warrington Wolves in the Super League. There was late drama at the AJ Bell Stadium between Salford Red Devils and Warrington Wolves in the Super League.
The meeting was the first opportunity for clubs to formally discuss the World Club Series and Solly says there was unanimous backing for the league's plans to grow the tournament despite the one-sided nature of the three matches this year.
"While everyone wanted the results to be better, there was a feeling that it's a great initiative and a great experience and that the tournament has got plenty of room to grow," he said.
"The support for the event is unanimous and there were some clubs in the room that are desperate to get in it, which is great."
Short highlights of the North Queensland Cowboys' dominant victory over the Leeds Rhinos in the World Club Challenge. Short highlights of the North Queensland Cowboys' dominant victory over the Leeds Rhinos in the World Club Challenge.
Clubs also discussed the salary cap and the marquee-player rule but Solly says there was no push to make any changes.
Meanwhile, Solly is predicting another record Magic Weekend crowd when the two-day event returns to Newcastle in May.
St James' Park, which was chosen to host Super League's on-the-road round in 2015 after the Etihad Stadium became unavailable, set a new aggregate attendance record of 67,788.
"We're ahead of where we were at this stage last year," Solly said. "We're really confident we'll get over 70,000 people over the two days."Once upon a time the California Raisin Bowl packed up and headed to Las Vegas, and in 1991, the Las Vegas Bowl was born. It has had a revolving door of title sponsors in the more than two decades since the move, but 2015 will be the third year of the Royal Purple Las Vegas Bowl.
For three consecutive years, the Las Vegas Bowl featured the Boise State Broncos beating up on Pac-12 teams and the BYU Broncos winning in three of the four years before that, but in the last two years, UCLA and Utah reversed the trend with big wins over Mountain West opponents.
Here is everything you need to know to get ready for this year's Las Vegas Bowl:
Date and time: Sat., Dec. 19, 3:30 p.m. ET
TV channel: ABC
Location: Whitney, Nev.
Stadium: Sam Boyd Stadium, 40,000
Last year's score: Utah 45, Colorado State 10
Last year's attendance: 33,067
Last year's TV rating: 1.4
Last year's payout for each school: $1.35 million
Team with the most all-time appearances: BYU, 6
Team with the most all-time wins: BYU, Boise State and Utah, 3
BYU Cougars (9-3)
After winning at least 10 games in five seasons between 2006 and 2011, BYU hasn't hit double-digit victories in more than three years. They can break that streak with a win in the Royal Purple Las Vegas Bowl on Dec. 19, in Bronco Mendenhall's last game with the Cougars before leaving for Virginia. Mendehall will be going for his 100th win at BYU.
The Cougars need a validating win after slogging through a schedule that featured few quality wins. BYU notched a key victory over then-No. 20 Boise State back in week two, but they haven't beaten a top 50 opponent since then. In their defense, they only had two opportunities -- losses against UCLA and Michigan that dropped the team from the top 25 and kept Bronco Mendenhall from adding a signature win to an otherwise unremarkable 2015 campaign.
They'll get another shot at it in Las Vegas. BYU boasts a top 25 passing offense thanks to freshman quarterback Tanner Mangum. Mangum improved steadily as his first season wore on, peaking with a four-touchdown performance in his regular-season finale against Utah State. After throwing seven interceptions early in the year, he's gone 123 pass attempts without a pick -- a mark he'll hope to extend in the postseason.
Last bowl game: 2014 Miami Beach Bowl (55-48 loss to Memphis)
All-time bowl record: 13-19-1
Head coach's bowl record: Bronco Mendenhall is 6-4 in bowl games as a head coach, all with BYU.
Utah Utes (9-3, 6-3 in Pac-12)
Halfway through the season, Utah had national title aspirations. Instead, they'll have to settle for second place in the Pac-12 South.
The Utes roared out to a 6-0 record with wins over Michigan, Oregon and California, while they rose to No. 3 in the AP Top 25 before losses to Southern Cal, Arizona and UCLA derailed their College Football Playoff hopes. After scoring 33.3 points per game in their wins, those opponents held Utah to just 21 average points in defeat.
Kyle Whittingham's team used a balanced approach to grind down opponents in 2015. The Utes gained roughly as many yards passing (189.1) as they did rushing (187.8) this season. They're led by senior dual threat quarterback Travis Wilson, who can keep plays alive with his legs and then gash you downfield with his arm (four touchdowns in a 62-20 rout over Oregon).
If that wasn't enough, the Utes can burn you on special teams, as well. All-American and Pac-12 All-Century team member Tom Hackett is in a league of his own as a punter, despite having to deal with outside distractions like having his car stolen in the middle of the season. He's averaging 47.8 yards per punt this season and has pinned opponents inside their own 20 on nearly 44 percent of his kicks.
Last bowl game: 2014 Las Vegas Bowl (45-10 win over Colorado State)
All-time bowl record: 14-4
Head coach's bowl record: Kyle Whittingham is 8-1 in bowl games, all with the Utah Utes.JAIPUR: A 10-year-old girl, who died of diarrhoea, was on Thursday buried in front of her house by her family members who claimed that she was incarnation of a goddess and has taken'samadhi'.
Later, police and district administration officials intervened. They exhumed the body for postmortem examination.Khushbu was suffering from diarrhoea and died last night in Bharatpur district.On Thursday, Khushbu's family members buried her body in front of their house and told the locals that she was a deity and has taken'samadhi' as per her own wish.Then they erected a tent and started worshipping the place of burial, Bharatpur police superintendent Rahul Prakash said.Her family members belonged to Nat community — a nomadic community "Police and administration officials reached the spot after getting the information. The tent and other set up were removed and the body was exhumed for post mortem examination," the police officer said.The body was handed over to the family members after the post mortem."We have registered it as an unnatural death in the police record," he said.Heath
If you are studying for the VCAP5-DCA you definitely need a lab. If you are studying for the VCP probably need a lab unless you are in vCenter all day at work. Nested virtualization runs one hypervisor upon another; so a nested ESXi lab runs the ESXi hypervisor on another hypervisor like VMware Workstation. So why build a nested lab instead of a physical lab?
Flexibility - A nested lab on workstation is going to provide more flexibility than a physical lab. I have both, and I love having the ability to create another ESXi host in minutes by cloning it from a template. I can also turn off my 5.0 lab I am using to study for the VCAP5-DCA and turn on my 5.5 lab and show a coworker a new feature.
Cost - The cost of a nested lab can be cheaper than the cost of a physical lab, especially if you have box that you can simply upgrade the RAM in. When building a computer to run a nested lab the cost could be similar or more than buying used servers from eBay, but the power consumption should be much less. Building a low power solution like Intel NUC or MAC Mini's combined with a Synology will cost more than building a nested lab.
Portability - A small nested lab can run on a laptop allowing you to study on the road.
What do I need to build a nested lab?
Computer - One that supports VT-x (or the AMD version). Preferably one that supports EPT; without EPT support you will be limited to running 32bit guest virtual machines inside your nested ESXi instances. The 32bit restriction isn't a big deal, but it would be nice to not have to deal with it. If you are unsure of the virtualization features of your processor you can look it up at the Intel or AMD site. You should be aware that these features may not be on by default, you will need to check in the BIOS.
RAM - Lot's of RAM. Did I mention RAM? Can you afford any more RAM? With ESXi 5.0 8GB of ram would allow you to get two ESXi hosts, vCenter, and an openfiler running. ESXi 5.5 brings higher minimum RAM requirements with all of the new features, 16GB really becomes the new minimum for two hosts, a vCenter, and an openfiler. If you want to lab larger scenarios like SRM or NSX you will need 32GB and up.
I have a a Dell Precision T7500 Workstation with 48GB of RAM I jumped on when an engineer from our HPC group upgraded to newer model. It has an older processor, the Intel Xeon E5507, but it is quad core and supports VT-x with EPT so it meets my needs.
VMware Workstation - Fusion will work as well, but I like the interface and memory overcomitment of Workstation. If you have your VCP they were providing workstation license keys upon passing, I'm not 100% sure if they still are. If you are a VMUG Advantage subscriber one of the benefits is a discount on the Workstation license.
Dive into configuration after the break.
Dive into configuration after the break.
How do I build a nested lab?
1. Prepare the computer
Turn on the virtualization enhancements like VT-d and EPT in the bios. Install a 64bit operating system. I have only used Workstation for Windows but a Linux version is offered as well. Procure and install VMware Workstation; I've used both version 9 and version 10 with success for nested lab environments. The install is simple but you should pay attention to where it wants to keep your virtual machines. I normally change the default to "C:\Virtual Machines" so I know I can find them easily.
Now is a good time to edit the VM networking and plan out the "Host Only" and "NAT" networks that will be used in your environment, and customize the IP ranges if desired. I use VMnet9 for my storage traffic, VMnet7 for MGMT traffic, and the VMnet8 NAT network for guest VMs. You can customize the IP ranges here, just make sure you use ranges that aren't in use on your network. Your workstation will loose access to the network resources if it sees the range attached to a local interface.
2. Create VM templates for linked cloning
Much of the flexibility of using a nested environment for your lab comes from Workstation's ability to create linked clones from templates. This will speed your deployment of new scenarios and conserve disk space in the process. I currently have an ESXi 5.0 template, a 5.5 template, and a Windows Server 2012 template. I need to go ahead and deploy a linux template at some point in the future. The basic process it to customize the VM, generalize the VM, then power it off and make the VM into a template.
ESXi Templates - To create a rapidly deployable ESXi template we need to create the virtual machine and deploy ESXi as normal, then generalize the hypervisor and shut it down. I only give the host a small 5GB disk for ESXi, a larger disk will result in creating a local VMFS datastore which can interfere with the cloning process. When creating the VM make sure that the "virtualize intel vt-x/ept or amd-v/rvi" option is checked.
Install ESXi from the.iso like normal, then from the DCUI generalize the template by unselecting the vmnic0 for Management, clear the DNS suffix, and reset the system configuration. Power the host off before it reboots and it's ready to use as a template.
This procedure should work on 5.0 or 5.5, and there is a detailed guide to preparing ESXi templates by Josep Piscaer here:
http://www.virtuallifestyle.nl/2012/01/creating-a-vesxi-template/
You normally need more than one NIC in ESXi, I like to use six. Instead of putting all six in the template I start out with one then add them one at a time so I can keep them straight. If it starts up with six NICs sometimes it can be tough to determine which is which without upstream CDP. You normally need more than one NIC in ESXi, I like to use six. Instead of putting all six in the template I start out with one then add them one at a time so I can keep them straight. If it starts up with six NICs sometimes it can be tough to determine which is which without upstream CDP.
Windows Server Template : The main template I use other than ESXi is a Windows Server template. I run vCenter on windows instead of the appliance for the ease of integrating VUM. I'll probably want a domain controller to test AD integration.
Set sysprep.exe to shutdown the machine upon completion. Find a more detailed guide here:
http://willcode4foodblog.wordpress.com/2013/03/20/creating-a-server-2012-golden-image-with-sysprep-and-vmware-workstation/
Convert VMs to Templates : Once the ESXi and 2012 Windows Server virtual machines are customized, generalized, and powered off they can be converted to templates. The first step is to edit the settings of the VM, go to the options tab, advanced, and check the template option.
The general process to create a windows server template it to install the operating system and update it, customize it, and then generalize it with the sysprep.exe utility. Sysprep strips unique information from the machine and forces a small installer on startup. This process can be as complicated and automated as you want, I normally keep it simple for the lab machines.Set sysprep.exe to shutdown the machine upon completion. Find a more detailed guide here:Once the ESXi and 2012 Windows Server virtual machines are customized, generalized, and powered off they can be converted to templates. The first step is to edit the settings of the VM, go to the options tab, advanced, and check the template option.
The second step is to create a snapshot that will be used to create the nested clones of our template. Right click on the template VM, snapshot, then create snapshot.
3. Build the "Shared Infrastructure" VMsPrime Minister Justin Trudeau says he understands why Canadians are angry about the $10-million payout to Omar Khadr, but insists a court case would have ended up costing taxpayers tens of millions of dollars more.
The Liberal government has faced a public backlash against the apology and payment to Mr. Khadr, with a public opinion survey showing 71 per cent of Canadians opposed the deal.
"I share those concerns about the money. In fact, that's why we settled," Mr. Trudeau told reporters at a news conference announcing the appointment of Julie Payette as the country's next governor-general. "If we had continued to fight this, not only would we have inevitably lost, but estimates range from $30- to $40-million dollars that it would have ended up costing the government."
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Globe editorial: Omar Khadr, Canada and the fragile rule of law
Watch: Trudeau says Khadr settlement about Charter rights
Related: Ex-Guantanamo detainee says Canada should be proud of Khadr settlement
Mr. Khadr pleaded guilty in 2012 to throwing a grenade that killed U.S. Army Sergeant Christopher Speer in Afghanistan in a deal that allowed him to be moved to a Canadian prison. He later recanted.
The Prime Minister's comments came just hours after an Ontario Superior Court judge turned down a request from Sgt. Speer's widow and a soldier injured in the same incident to freeze Mr. Khadr's assets.
Lawyers for Mr. Khadr had launched a $20-million civil lawsuit against Ottawa over the role of Canadian officials in U.S. interrogations of the former child soldier at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba. While there, he faced abuse, including sleep deprivation. The Supreme Court of Canada ruled in 2010 that Mr. Khadr's Charter rights were violated.
"The measure of a society – a just society – is not whether we stand up for peoples' rights when it is easy or popular to do so, but whether we recognize rights when it is difficult, when it is unpopular," Mr. Trudeau said. "We are a society that stands up for peoples' rights and when governments fail to respect peoples' rights, we all end up paying and that is the lesson hopefully future governments will draw from this settlement."
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Lawyers for Tabitha Speer and Layne Morris were in a Toronto courtroom on Thursday seeking an injunction pending the outcome of their bid to get an Ontario court to force Mr. Khadr to hand over his settlement to them.
In 2015, they won a $134-million (U.S.) civil judgment against Mr. Khadr in a U.S. federal court in Utah for his alleged actions at the age of 15 in the 2002 firefight in Afghanistan that ended with his capture. They want courts here to recognize and enforce that judgment.
But to win a freeze order, the plaintiffs needed to show evidence of a "real risk" that he plans to spend or hide his assets from potential creditors.
And on Thursday, Justice Edward Belobaba – in a quick ruling from the bench after a 90-minute hearing – concluded the plaintiffs provided no actual evidence to justify a freeze order, which he said would be "draconian."
"We don't, thank goodness, in Canada have one law for Omar Khadr and one law for all other Canadians," Justice Belobaba told the courtroom in announcing his decision.
The lack of a freeze order does not stop the attempt to have the Utah ruling recognized and enforced in Ontario. A hearing on that case is expected in October. The two sides are then expected to battle over whether the Utah ruling, which relies on confessions to a widely criticized U.S. military commission at Guantanamo Bay violates Canadian public policy.
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On Thursday, the main piece of evidence lawyer David Winer, acting for Ms. Speer and Mr. Morris, relied on in his request for the freeze order was a Globe and Mail report from last week that a source said the money had been sheltered. Justice Belobaba ruled that this "hearsay statement" was not enough for a court to consider a sweeping freeze order.
Speaking to reporters outside Toronto's Osgoode Hall courthouse, Mr. Winer said he and his clients would consider whether to seek leave to appeal the freeze-order ruling while continuing their bid to have the Utah judgment enforced in Ontario.
"We hope that pending the hearing … Mr. Khadr does not dissipate his assets or deal with them in a way which will make them unavailable to creditors," Mr. Winer said.
Nathan Whitling, a lawyer for Mr. Khadr, told reporters there was no evidence Mr. Khadr is trying to hide his assets: "There simply just wasn't any evidence of that in this case, because there's just no indication at all that Mr. Khadr's doing any such thing."It appears the New Orleans Saints have prevented one of their stars from hitting free agency.
That’s wide receiver Marques Colston, who, according to ESPN's John Clayton, has agreed to a five-year deal to remain with the team that drafted him. Clayton reports the total value of the deal is almost $40 million with $19 million guaranteed.
That’s a big coup for the Saints, who are facing serious salary-cap challenges. But it brings up another big question: Do the Saints have enough room to also re-sign All-Pro guard Carl Nicks?
The team reportedly made what Nicks called a “respectable’’ offer Monday night. But there is no word yet if Nicks has accepted a deal. If he doesn’t, he becomes a free agent at 4 p.m. ET on Tuesday.
No matter what happens with Nicks, expect plenty of news out of New Orleans as the day goes on. The Saints are likely to release some prominent players (there’s speculation linebacker Jonathan Vilma could be one) to free up more salary-cap space."The Hunger Games: Catching Fire" is currently heating things up at the box office, a critical and commercial success that continues one of the biggest movie franchises of our time. But while watching the film, we couldn't help but be struck by the similarities between "Catching Fire" and another second chapter in a massive sci-fi franchise: "Star Wars: Episode V -- The Empire Strikes Back."
Though most of the actors in "Catching Fire" probably weren't even born when "Empire" first hit theaters, the connections are unmistakable. Herewith, |
has put up similar career numbers to this point and carries a hit of about $1.5 million less, but then again, at the time Niemi's latest contract was signed, Howard counted only $2.25 million against Detroit's cap. Timing is important when making contract judgements. It's tempting to just look up what every goalie in the league in making now compared to what we feel they are worth, but the reality is that the market fluctuates from year to year, especially so in a league where financial stability is always a topic of discussion. So given that, if you take a look at 2013 goalie signings/extensions alone, Howard's deal resulted in only the sixth highest cap hit for a goalie behind Kari Lehtonen, Jonathan Quick, Sergei Bobrovsky, Mike Smith, and Tuukka Rask. I don't necessarily think this, but you might actually be able to make an argument that Howard is slightly underpaid.
It would be hard to convince somebody that Jimmy is reasonably paid when they think that he's bad in the first place, but as we've been over already, his body of work relative to other goalies in the league during Jimmy's career to date has been more than adequate. To think that he's overpaid means you ignore the business side of the NHL completely, judge puck-stoppers from a standard that doesn't involve statistics about stopping pucks, or a combination of both.
Myth #3: JIMMY HOWARD SUCKS WHEN IT MATTERS
We'll get into the playoff numbers in a second, but first, remember the final four games of last season? Howard stopped 94 of 97 shots, put up two shutouts, went 4-0-0 and dragged the Wings into the playoffs by one point. Perhaps the biggest constant in Detroit over the past two decades has been the playoff streak. Every season we say hi to new faces and bye to the old ones, ride the emotional waves of injury-plagued regular seasons, losing streaks, winning streaks, loser point streaks, but in the end, we can rely on the playoffs. Every year. Well, He-Sucks-When-It-Matters Guy, Jimmy Howard played a big part in saving that for you in the spring of 2013. I don't even want to know what it's like around here when the Wings miss the playoffs, and quite frankly, I hope I'm far away from here or even dead when it happens. It won't be good. Luckily, I don't know what this is like yet because he was awesome last season.
As for the postseason, we are well aware that he has not been part of a team that has made it past the second round. There are always going to be people out there who only think a goalie is really good if he wins a Cup, because it's the easiest way to think about stuff and frankly, a guy lifting a big shiny trophy at the end of the season looks really cool. But to use this as the sole means of judging Howard's playoff performances would be taking a major shortcut.
I'm not crazy about looking at save percentages when it comes to the playoffs, because the sample size is even smaller than that of the rut he's currently in. Still, it doesn't mean we stop talking about how individuals play once the regular season ends, and it just so happens that Jimmy isn't too shabby when the games truly matter. There isn't a drop-off from his regular season to postseason play (.917 to.918 SV%, respectively), so to in any way insinuate that he's a choke artist given this information would be disingenuous. To win a Cup with this roster, it's likely that he'll have to go on an astounding tear to do it, but I don't see how we can fault him if he doesn't. You have to look at the team as a whole when spreading blame around, and that takes a little more brainpower than "the goalie was good" or "the goalie was bad."
Going back to 2009, the last five starting goalies on Stanley Cup winners had save percentages of.932,.946,.940,.910,.908. The most recent three (Corey Crawford, Jonathan Quick, and Tim Thomas) had terrific playoff runs, while the two before them (Antti Niemi and Marc-Andre Fleury) posted a SV% below league average. All five guys played for really good teams. What does this tell us? That blanket, absolute statements like "The Wings can't win a Cup with Howard" are at worst shortsighted, and at best an accidental assessment of the Wings as a whole, who will probably need a superhuman effort from their goalie to win it all this season. And if he doesn't produce that, well, he's only the 12th highest paid goalie in the league in terms of cap hit so go out and get Tuukka Rask, or something.
Myth #4: THERE'S A GOALIE CONTROVERSY
For god's sake. If you would have told me after Jonas Gustavsson was signed that, at any point in his tenure here, he would be able to force even one single person to form the words "goalie controversy" and propel them from their stupid lips, I would have quit right then. Nothing makes sense, nothing is right in the world and I don't understand how anything works at all.
As it happened, Gustavsson turned in his best run of play to date and somehow managed to do that at the same time Howard found himself in a bit of a funk. He also managed to hypnotize his teammates into providing him an average of 3.2 goals/game in support, while providing only 2.2 goals/game for Howard. The mustache is involved in some way, I'm convinced of it. And because this is the way fans are, we are now experiencing the absurdity of a Gustavsson-Howard goalie controversy, even if it's only a fraction of our fanbase.
Look, nobody is arguing that Howard has been good so far. I don't want you to think that this is what I've been doing or what I'm thinking. He has been less than sharp and Gus has been way more competent than I thought he could even pretend to look. But let's take a step back and remember that Gus put together three awful years in Toronto and another bad one in spot duty for Detroit last season. Before 2013-14, he gave us 114 games worth of evidence to show that he isn't very good at being an NHL goalie, whereas Jimmy gave us 234 games worth of evidence to show the opposite. To say that there's a chance -- even the slightest damn chance -- that Gustavsson gives your team a better shot the rest of the way is to say that you believe Jimmy and Gus had a Freaky Friday-like collision. There is no other explanation. Goaltending at the NHL level can be an incredibly flukey thing, so to even give this topic more than a second's thought when we can be pretty confident about a sure thing in Jimmy Howard is bewildering to me.
Well, I tried.
Go Wings.Tivo made a name for itself with a set-top box that performed magic: at the touch of a remote you could pause the present, slip into the past or leap over ads into the future. Now, the future of the company which defined the DVR is likely to depend on dumping the magic box altogether.
The eleven-year-old DVR company was so universally loved on its entrance into the marketplace that it got to date a character from "Sex and the City."
And yet Tivo’s stock has been languishing at or below $6 for months, it has only a 10 percent share of the DVR market and its market cap ($619 million) is so low that any one of our nation’s beloved moguls could buy the company for some loose pocket change.
Tivo, a company known for innovation and user satisfaction, has yet to prove its dominance in the marketplace. Under Tivo’s new CEO Tom Rogers, the company has been hard at work coming up with advertising solutions, partnering with cable companies and bringing new features and content options to subscribers.
Still, only 3.6 million of the nation’s 36.2 million DVR users in the United States are willing to fork over $300 for three years of Tivo service.
Why? Because the Tivo box is dying.
Until recently, Tivo was spending over $300 per user on subscriber acquisition (through hardware discounts, sales and marketing, retail rebates and incentives) — barely breaking even when new customers purchased a Tivo box.
"That’s one of the reason why the standalone business has so many flaws,” says Mark Harding, an analyst at Maxim Group. ”Adding another device to the entertainment hub is not what people want to do.”
But the small penetration of Tivo boxes in American households is surprising compared to the high levels of customer satisfaction that Tivo routinely receives. Ten years ago, Tivo was seen as a game changer: it empowered viewers, who swooned over the ability to pause and fast-forward through commercials, and stoked fears among network executives about delivering eyeballs to advertisers.
But TiVo has repeatedly failed to gain traction in the marketplace even though it has been hard at work creating innovative ad solutions and coming up with ways to help advertisers and networks recoup ad dollars. Tivo sells advertising units that play when users fast-forward through commercial breaks and pause video content.
But not many television users have seen these things, and there’s the rub.
"Advertisers aren’t buying it because it isn’t at scale," said one executive in the TV advertising space. "That’s not interesting. Come back when you can do it at scale.”
The way to change that, of course, is through strategic partnerships, which has been a focus at Tivo of late. This year, they announced that Tivo subscribers would have access to content from YouTube, Amazon’s Unbox, Rhapsody and Jaman. Thursday they announced that subscribers would have access to the Netflix streaming media library of 12,000 movies and TV shows.
“We want to bring our Tivo-friendly menu — everything we’re known for in making television available – to content that hasn’t been available on the TV for consumers” says Tara Maitra, Vice President of Content Services at Tivo.
But Tivo still has a long way to go if it wants to entice subscribers to pay for content that can often be found online. Daniel Taylor, an analyst at Yankee Group, says that the "TV-Killer" may find itself facing irrelevance long before television networks have to face up to the problem:
“DVR and video on demand are struggling for relevance today. The challenge that Tivo faces — the challenge that any device-based service faces — is how they’re going to address user behavior. For every one person who plans ahead to tape shows they’ll miss, there are nine other that want to go online now that they’ve missed it.”
But that’s why Tivo is moving away from pushing stand alone boxes and towards offering TiVo content as an additional option to cable subscribers.
“I look at this way,” says Maitra. “Is Tivo continuing to offer the best experience for consuming TV? Are we continuing to find the best ways of giving you all the content you want to watch at your fingertips? If so, then I think we’re doing OK.”
With movies on demand from Amazon and Netflix, Tivo has already increased its reach and hopes to continue offering content from online sources like YouTube to bring the content users want to television screens.
According to Harding, the future of Tivo exists in licensing agreements with the cable companies: "It’s easier to sell consumers on an upgrade to the Tivo interface on an existing cable company provided DVR. It’s also a lot more profitable."
If Tivo can keep providing the goods that users want to see, its signature box may go away, but the brand has a strong chance of survival.Baylor offensive coordinator Philip Montgomery is expected to be hired as the new head coach of Tulsa, FootballScoop is reporting. Tulsa World's John Hoover reports Tulsa is "zeroing in on" Montgomery and currently negotiating with the coach.
Montgomery began his coaching career at his alma mater, Tarleton State, in 1996, serving as a grad assistant for two seasons. In 1997, he moved on to Stephenville (Texas) High School, where he as an assistant on then-head coach Art Briles' staff for six seasons. In 2002, he moved on to Denton (Texas) High, where he was offensive coordinator for one season.
When he left the high school ranks in 2003, Montgomery reunited with Briles at Houston, coaching the Cougars' backfield for five seasons and also holding the co-offensive coordinator position in 2007. He helped turn Houston's offense into one of the nation's best, and played a part in developing players such as Kevin Kolb and Jackie Battle. When Briles moved on to Baylor in 2008, Montgomery followed and has led the Bears' offense ever since.
The year before the pair arrived in Waco, Baylor's offense ranked 111th in the country in F/+. They've ranked in the top 32 in six of the seven years since, including three straight top five finishes from 2011-13. During that time, Montgomery helped produce a Heisman winner (Robert Griffin III) and back-to-back Big 12 titles. Our Daily Bears expects a promotion from within for Baylor if they need to replace Montgomery.
Montgomery would replace Bill Blankenship, who posted a 24-27 record in four seasons with Tulsa. Over the past two seasons, the Golden Hurricane have won just five games.
UPDATE: It's official, if the official Tulsa twitter account is to be believed.Arsenal will announce the arrival of former Barcelona director of football Raul Sanllehi on Tuesday as part of the restructuring of its scouting and recruitment.
Sanllehi was due to leave Barcelona on Friday but he signed off on Monday after 15 years service at the club and will now move in alongside manager Arsene Wenger.
Sven Mislintat was brought in from Borussia Dortmund as the club's new head of recruitment last week and the experienced and respected Sanllehi can now start work with Mislintat in preparation for the January transfer window.
Arsenal have edged closer to appointing Barcelona director of football Raul Sanllehi (right)
He will work alongside the north London club's new head of recruitment Sven Mislintat
The 48-year-old has served under three different Barcelona presidents and was instrumental in major signings such as Luis Suarez and Neymar, ensuring the Brazilian moved to the Nou Camp instead of going to Real Madrid in 2011.
Sanllehi is expected to be tasked with bringing the club's top targets to the Emirates.
The move follows Dick Law's resignation from his position as Arsenal's main transfer negotiator in September.
Law struggled in his attempts to secure Mesut Ozil and Alexis Sanchez to new terms. Their contracts - which expire next summer - will be among the first things on Sanllehi's agenda at his new club.
Sanllehi is credited with playing a key role in the signing of Neymar when he was at Barcelona
Arsenal's new men SVEN MISLINTAT Influential talent spotter who moved to Arsenal from Borussia Dortmund last week to become their head of recruitment. Mislintat is credited with spotting the likes of Robert Lewandowski, Ousmane Dembele and Pierre-Emerick Aubameyang during his 11 years at Dortmund thanks to an in-depth, stats-based scouting database. RAUL SANLLEHI Spent 15 years at Barcelona as director of football and was influential in major signings such as Luis Suarez and Neymar. He is expected to fulfil a similar role at the Emirates Stadium following Dick Law's resignation from his position as Arsenal's main transfer negotiator in September.
It comes hot on the heels of Mislintat's arrival from the Bundesliga giants last week. He was Dortmund's chief talent spotter and has been credited with discovering the likes of Ousmane Dembele and Pierre-Emerick Aubameyang.
He is set to take over from chief scout Steve Rowley at the north London club as his 25-year spell comes to an end.
Mislintat arrived at Dortmund back in 2006 and helped them recover from financial problems to one of the most successful clubs in Europe working alongside manager Jurgen Klopp.
Among the other players recruited were Shinji Kagawa and Robert Lewandowski, with Dortmund coining in millions once they sold them on.
The 45-year-old has acquired the nicknames 'Super Eye' and 'Diamond Eye' among colleagues for his ability to unearth gems and is known as 'pearl diver' by the German media.
Mislintat was one of the first to introduce data-bases scouting methods into the Bundesliga and curated an enormous database with thousands of individual statistics on thousands of players around the world.Maricopa County Sheriff Joe Arpaio announced a new program where inmates have to pedal on exercise bicycles to watch television.
Inmates will pedal on a bike that generates 12 volts, enough electrical current to power a 19-inch tube television at the Tent City television viewing area. One hour of pedaling equals one hour of television watching.
Typically, inmates are only allowed to watch the Weather Channel, Food Network, and C-SPAN, but with the new program they will be allowed to watch any local channel.
Arpaio said he hopes the new idea encourages inmates to exercise.
For now the program is only available to female inmates because they seemed more receptive to the idea than the male inmates, Arpaio said in a statement.
Arpaio said only those who have agreed to pedal will have access to the inmate-powered television. Inmates won't be charged a monthly gym fee but will have to sign a contract, Arpaio said.A Mexican man who allegedly raped a 13-year-old girl on a Greyhound bus had been deported 10 times and removed from the U.S. another nine since 2003, according to a report by the Associated Press. Several U.S. senators are demanding to see immigration records for 38-year-old Tomas Martinez-Maldonado, who is charged with a felony in the alleged attack on Sept. 27 aboard a bus in Geary County, near Kansas City.
According to records obtained by the Associated Press, Martinez-Maldonado had eight "voluntary removals" before his first deportation in 2010. That was followed by another voluntary removal that same year. He was then deported five more times between 2011 and 2013.
Martinez-Maldonado was charged with entering the country without legal permission in 2013. Though he was only charged with a misdemeanor, he was subsequently deported in early 2014 after serving his sentence. A few months later he was again deported and then again in 2015—twice. He was last deported in October 2015 after he had served his second sentence, according to the records obtained by the AP.
ICE told the AP in an emailed statement that in cases where a person has been deported multiple times or has a significant criminal history and was removed, it routinely presents those cases to the U.S. attorney's office for possible criminal charges.
A spokesman for the U.S. attorney's office in Arizona refused a request from the AP to comment on why prosecutors twice dismissed felony re-entry after deportation charges against Martinez-Maldonado in 2013 and 2015 in exchange for plea deals.
Three Republican senators, including Kansas' Jerry Moran and Pat Roberts, are demanding to see the immigration records for Martinez-Maldonado. Iowa Senator Charles Grassley, chairman of the judiciary committee, co-signed a Dec. 9 letter with the two Kansas senators to Homeland Security Secretary Jeh Johnson saying this is "an extremely disturbing case" and asking how Martinez-Moldonado was able to re-enter and remain in the country.
Now that the irreparable damage has been done to the young rape victim, U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement has asked Geary County to turn Martinez-Maldonado over to ICE custody before he is released. Beyond that, they've refused to comment on what they will do with him.
A status hearing in the rape case is scheduled for Jan. 10. Lisa Hamer, his defense attorney, declined to comment on the charge, but said "criminal law and immigration definitely intersect and nowadays it should be the responsibility of every criminal defense attorney to know the possible ramifications in the immigration courts."
David Trevino, a Topeka immigration attorney who has provided legal advice to Martinez-Maldonado's family, told the AP that it's not unusual to see immigrants with multiple entries without legal permission. He said that most of Martinez-Maldonado's family still lives in Mexico, but he also has family in the United States, and the family is "devastated."
"[President-elect Donald Trump] can build a wall 100 feet high and 50 feet deep, but it is not going to keep family members separated. So if someone is deported and they have family members here... they will find a way back — whether it is through the air, under a wall, through the coast of the United States," Trevino said.
Sen. Moran told the AP in an email that the immigration system is "broken."
"There must be serious legislative efforts to address U.S. immigration policy, and we must have the ability to identify, prosecute and deport illegal aliens who display violent tendencies before they have an opportunity to perpetrate these crimes in the United States," he said.What Life Expectancy Really Means
Many people look at a nation's given life expectancy and take it to mean that the average person in a particular country lives to a particular age, while the reality is more complicated. Mathematically, the largest driving factor in life expectancy isn't the longevity of the country's oldest citizens, but the number of people who die young.
With that in mind, one can view life expectancy as a measure of a range of public health factors: access to childcare services, traffic safety, hospital capacity, prevalence of smoking and so on. And, in many cases, the metrics can be affected by broad ecological issues like droughts or wildfires. If you want a fuller picture of why each country has the ranking it has, you can start by looking at the country profiles.
The Rankings
Our statistics come from the most recent data gathered by the CIA World Factbook. As of 2015, the country with the highest life expectancy is Monaco at 89.52 years; the country with the lowest is Chad at 49.81 years.
Source:CIA World Factbook, 2015.At the end of tonight’s Survivor: Worlds Apart Reunion Jeff Probst announced the title and cast for next season, titled Survivor: Cambodia—Second Chance. (Check out the fancy new logo above!) Thirty-two former players (all of whom had only played once and did not win) were competing for fan votes to make the cast, with the top 10 men and top 10 women heading overseas for another chance at the million dollars. (Because Mike Holloway was announced as the winner of Worlds Apart, he immediately became ineligible for the return trip.)
The cast chosen by fans features a mix of early and recent contestants. However, players from seasons in the early twenties did not fare as well as none of the six eligible players from season 22 through 24 were chosen. In perhaps the biggest surprise, all seven players from season 28 & 29 were voted in by fans, yet two people (runner-up Carolyn and Max) from the just wrapped season 30, Worlds Apart, were snubbed by the public.
However longtime fans of the show will delight at seeing folks like Kelly Wiglesworth, Jeff Varner, and Andrew Savage got another shot. As for me personally, I shall mourn the loss of Shane Powers and Jim Rice from next year’s cast. Oh well, can’t win them all. Here, then, is the full cast for Survivor: Cambodia—Second Chance.
CAST FOR SURVIVOR: CAMBODIA—SECOND CHANCE
Kelly Wiglesworth
Season 1
Survivor: Borneo
Previous Finish: Runner-up
Jeff Varner
Season 2
Survivor: The Australian Outback
Previous Finish: 10th place
Kimmi Kappenberg
Season 2
Survivor: The Australian Outback
Previous Finish: 12th place
Andrew Savage
Season 7
Survivor: Pearl Islands
Previous Finish: 10th place
Terry Deitz
Season 12
Survivor: Panama
Previous Finish: 3rd place
Peih-Gee Law
Season 15
Survivor: China
Previous Finish: 5th place
Stephen Fishbach
Season 18
Survivor: Tocantins
Previous Finish: Runner-up
Monica Padilla
Season 19
Survivor: Samoa
Previous Finish: 7th place
Abi-Maria Gomes
Season 25
Survivor: Philippines
Previous Finish: 5th place
Ciera Eastin
Season 27
Survivor: Blood vs. Water
Previous Finish: 5th place
Vytas Baskauskas
Season 27
Survivor: Blood vs. Water
Previous Finish: 10th place
Kass McQuillen
Season 28
Survivor: Cagayan
Previous Finish: 3rd place
Spencer Bledsoe
Season 28
Survivor: Cagayan
Previous Finish: 4th place
Tasha Fox
Season 28
Survivor: Cagayan
Previous Finish: 6th place
Woo Hwang
Season 28
Survivor: Cagayan
Previous Finish: Runner-up
Jeremy Collins
Season 29
Survivor: San Juan del Sur
Previous Finish: 10th place
Keith Nale
Season 29
Survivor: San Juan del Sur
Previous Finish: 4th place
Kelley Wentworth
Season 29
Survivor: San Juan del Sur
Previous Finish: 14th place
Joe Anglim
Season 30
Survivor: Worlds Apart
Previous Finish: 10th place
Shirin Oskooi
Season 30
Survivor: Worlds Apart
Previous Finish: 8th place
For more ‘Survivor’ scoop, follow Dalton on Twtter @DaltonRoss.As part of a routine eviction drive, Officials from the Union urban development (UD) ministry on Tuesday disconnected the water and power supply to a ministerial bungalow that Congress MP Adhir Ranjan Chowdhury continues to occupy long after he relinquished his ministerial position.
Chowdhury, the Lok Sabha MP from Murshidabad, approached the High Court to get a stay on the eviction. The court has ordered status quo till Wednesday morning when it will take up the matter.
“The Lok Sabha MP has been staying in 14, New Moti Bagh, a type-VIII bungalow generally allotted to ministers. He has been living there for last 19 months despite the UD ministry cancelling the allotment in June 2014. Chowdhury was allotted an alternative bungalow on Humayun Road and was given sufficient time to vacate but the latter refused,” said a UD ministry official.
The MP, who is entitled to a type-VI accommodation, said the bungalow allotted to him on Humayun Road is not in a “livable condition”. “I am asking them to make a joint inspection of the house so whatever is required can be done,” Chowdhury said.
Under the rules, a minister can hold on to his or her official accommodation for a month after demitting office.
First Published: Feb 03, 2016 09:54 ISTThe nyt article clearly says there is no connection to Russia
What it clearly says is that
F.B.I. officials declined to comment
everything else comes from "intelligence officials".
Otherwise you are a presumptuous dolt.
I supported Bernie. Still do. But he lost. If you can't accept that, you are an infant.
You are probably too young to remember Bernie's salad days in Vermont. He was known as "Bernie the Bomber" by local activists, who at one point occupied his office. He refused to speak to them.
His record is every bit as hawkish as Hillary's, and he has been a real pal of the NRA. He supported the bombing of Yugoslavia, opposed the Bradley Bill, supported the legislation that opened the door for endless war in the Mideast, etc.
I love his platform now, but he was a spoiler for the Dems in Vermont. They haven't run anyone against him since 1990. He kept the rabble under the tent.
He would be the best president ever. But he lost the nomination. Still, he earned a lot of stroke and will leverage that for good.
HRC is my 2nd choice, but I don't share the enmity that nose in the dirt Bernie zealots do. You're just juvenile. Buck up and do something positive.Fox News host Eric Bolling speculated on Tuesday that Sandra Fluke, the law student who has become famous for being attacked by Rush Limbaugh, was part of an elaborate White House plan to distract voters from the economy.
Fluke first gained attention for being denied a place at a hearing about the Obama administration's contraception policy. It was this incident, along with her subsequent public call for her Catholic university's insurance plan to cover the cost of contraception, that led Limbaugh to call her a "slut" and a "prostitute."
On Tuesday's "The Five," there was little sympathy for Fluke. Bolling cast her as a tool for a broader mission.
President Obama and his "allies in the press" were "trying to pull a fast one on you," he said. Calling Fluke a "foot soldier" for the White House, he added, "President Obama, on the ropes with the economy and specifically with women voters, gets Mrs. Fluke to create a controversy, and the liberal media puppets play along as scripted."
Co-host Bob Beckel called the idea "ridiculous," but the show's other hosts seemed to agree with Bolling. Andrea Tantaros scoffed at "anyone who thinks this was accidental."
WATCH:Share the News
Just in case the undead return tonight, we’re here to report that Baltimore is a fairly safe place to be in the event of a zombie apocalypse — compared to other cities, at least.
CareerBuilder compiled a ranking of how prepared cities are for the attack. Baltimore came in at number four, with only Salt Lake City, Kansas City and Boston ranked higher. Despite the horror move title, the ranking rates the fairly scientific standard of a city’s ability to protect an actual flesh-eating virus from spreading. Tragically, this is more relevant than anyone wants to know this year, given an Ocean City man’s recent death from flesh-eating bacteria and the warnings about the rise of the mutilating microbes as a result of global warming that followed.
In that case, it’s easy to see how Baltimore’s cutting-edge health institutions and proximity to defense redoubts would help out. Surprisingly, the area didn’t get very high marks for food supply, which we ranked pretty highly on in another list.
Still, preparedness (and perhaps a recitation of the Zombie Survival Guide) is recommended. As high as Baltimore ranks, a study released in 2014 found that Maryland is one of the most vulnerable states to a zombie attack. So we’ll have to deal with folks seeking safe haven.
Plus, there’s the matter of the colleagues who you thought would have your back, not eat it.
“The index will come in handy considering that, in a separate and equally practical CareerBuilder study, 36 percent of workers said, if they were a zombie, they would feast on their co-workers,” CareerBuilder writes.Vonya Quarles grew up in South Los Angeles and describes herself as a third-generation convicted felon. But by the time she took the microphone at a Highland town hall meeting in January 2016, she was a lawyer and executive director of a Riverside County nonprofit that helps connect the homeless, formerly incarcerated and mentally ill to transitional housing.
With applause from the audience, she urged state officials not to create “an additional funding stream for the sheriff,” but to pour new funds into community groups, the kind that had helped her kick a drug addiction and get off the streets. That was the fundamental promise of Proposition 47, the sweeping, controversial 2014 ballot measure that downgraded six drug and theft crimes to misdemeanors and allowed defendants to renegotiate their punishments. This spring, the state will begin the process of awarding $103 million in grants, all funded by the ballot initiative’s cost savings from keeping fewer nonviolent offenders in prison.
For the measure’s large coalition of supporters, including criminal justice advocates such as Quarles, it is a long-awaited step forward. Other states have passed similar laws. But California is the lone state investing the savings from keeping fewer people behind bars in services to help people stay out of prison.
Nearly 60 public agencies have submitted program proposals released last week. They include cities and counties, health and human services divisions and probation and law enforcement departments statewide. Among their petitions are initiatives to provide youth and adult offenders with counselors and case managers, therapy, housing and job opportunities.
Tasked with choosing which programs receive funding is an executive steering committee composed of criminal justice officials, advocates and former inmates who know the system from the inside. Not long after she spoke up in Highland, Quarles joined the group.
“We have listened to law enforcement talk about how horrible Prop. 47 is,” she said in an interview this month. “Now we have a chance to help the people who are hurting.”
Jennifer Savit, a former inmate, embraces her 13-year-old daughter, Alissa Balcombe. The two share transitional housing in Eastvale with Monique Barr, left, and four other adults. Savit said it has kept her family from homelessness. (Gina Ferazzi / Los Angeles Times)
In some ways, Proposition 47 has accomplished what it was designed to do. It helped reduce the prison population, allowing the state to comply with a federal court order that found overcrowded prison conditions in California violated constitutional standards.
Nearly 4,700 people have since been re-sentenced and released from state prisons, and the California Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation estimates 3,300 fewer individuals will now be incarcerated each year. The new law also lowered the state’s daily average jail population by about 8,000 people, according to a report from Californians for Safety and Justice.
But Proposition 47 was written in a way that attempted to avoid an unfunded mandate, and three years passed before savings could be calculated and allotted to community and social services, criminal justice advocates and defense lawyers said, causing many former inmates to end up on the streets with no safety net or support system. Law enforcement officials and others have said the measure has allowed offenders to continue breaking laws with little consequence.
Political debate has centered on whether Proposition 47 is causing crime rates to rise in several cities. In some areas, local law enforcement statistics show, street officers are making fewer drug arrests, and police and retailers point to increasing property theft, prompting state legislation this year to propose a ballot measure that would amend parts of the law, making it a felony to steal $950 worth of property in a year. Under Proposition 47, any single theft under $950 in property value is considered a misdemeanor, even for repeat offenders.
With so much at stake, criminal justice groups and community members say they have lobbied, written letters to lawmakers and filled legislative hearings in Sacramento to attempt to counter the negative publicity about the measure and promote a public safety approach that balances prevention with treatment and incarceration.
Their first battle came over calculation of the state’s fiscal savings from Proposition 47. The independent Legislative Analyst’s Office had initially estimated between $150 million and $250 million in annual savings.
Gov. Jerry Brown’s newest budget estimates the savings at $42.9 million after accounting for a temporary increase in the number of parolees and the court workload that comes with resentencing. State officials say they expect to distribute a total of $103 million over the next three years.
“Most Californians today agree that we need a set of investments that provide options beyond prisons, and many of those options work better to stop repeat crime,” said Lenore Anderson, executive director for Californians for Safety and Justice. “That is going to be good for public safety but also good for saving the state money.”
Housing manager Erica Wilson, right, spends time with Leana Wilson, 6, left, and Brooklyn Jackson, 3, before dinner at a transitional home in Eastvale that serves former offenders. (Gina Ferazzi / Los Angeles Times)
Legislation signed by Brown in 2014 settled some of the next debate: guidelines for the grant proposal process.
It set aside 65% of Proposition 47 savings for the state Board of State and Community Corrections, requiring that money also go to programs developing housing and employment opportunities for released inmates. And it required that the committee awarding the grants have a diverse membership, including people who had been formerly incarcerated.
The executive committee includes six former inmates and is co-chaired by Kern County Supervisor Leticia Perez, a former public defender, and former Hollywood producer Scott Budnick, who left the film industry to create his own criminal justice nonprofit.
In crafting the grant proposal application, members of the executive committee said they made it their priority to ensure money would flow back to the community. According to their guidelines, government agencies will receive the grant awards, but more than 50% of the funds must go directly to the community-based organizations they contract with for mental health, drug abuse and other social services.
It was a huge win, committee members said.
“Oftentimes, when the government is delivering services to a population that they are not proximate to, you don’t see the results you want,” Budnick said.
Perez said it helped to have former inmates at the table. Similar committees typically consist of members with law enforcement backgrounds.
“It was like revolution on a very small scale, but very meaningful,” Perez said. “The message was very clear — that this money was to be for the honest, actual rehabilitation of people who are desperate to reach their potential. That this is not business as usual.”
Vonya Quarles, executive director of Starting Over Inc., pets Charlie, a Labrador, at a men's transitional home she runs in Corona. Programs like hers aim to help former inmates reenter society. (Gina Ferazzi / Los Angeles Times)
At the Highland meeting, Quarles, who once shuffled in and out of juvenile detention, was overtaken with emotion, she recalled.
“We worked hard because Proposition 47 offered us something that we didn’t have before, and that was relief of carrying felony convictions on our backs,” said Quarles, executive director of the Corona nonprofit Starting Over Inc. “It was supposed to be with the promise to get mental health and substance abuse treatment for our folks — not to have to go to jail to get these services.”
She said she did not think she would be chosen for the executive steering committee months later.
Neither did John Jones III, who spoke at another town hall meeting in Oakland, and served |
set of
distributed processes to manage a shared tree of nodes and get notification
whenever this tree is modified by other processes. This basic functionality
provides out of the box support to use ZooKeeper as a powerful directory service
as well as a group membership service. It can also be extended to provide a whole
bunch of high level coordination services like priority queues or 2 phase commit
protocols.
Turning the JVM into a Node
Jobim actors need to be executed in a JVM that is executing a Node service. JVM
nodes are aware of the existence of other nodes, can exchange messages and
coordinate their activities.
A node service can be started in the JVM using a single function
jobim/bootstrap-node. This function receives as a parameter, a path
to a configuration file where the name of the node as well as the connection
options to RabbitMQ and ZooKeeper must be stated.
The following is a sample configuration file:
;; Default configuration for a node {:node-name "linux" ;; rabbit host, port, username, password and virtual host :rabbit-options [:host "192.168.1.35"] ;; zookeeper options: ;; servers: array of zk servers specified as host:port ;; timeout : session timeout ;; id : session id ;; password :zookeeper-options ["192.168.1.35:2181" {:timeout 3000}]}
Once we have started the node, we should be able to use the
jobim/nodes function to check all the available nodes and their
identifiers:
=> (use 'jobim) nil => (bootstrap-node "node-config.clj") "6811651bd83e4d428359b419e7f76a75" => (nodes) {"osx" "5299491ea4184c02ad8c0fbc100c49f9", "linux" "6811651bd83e4d428359b419e7f76a75"}
Nodes are aware of changes in the list of available nodes. They are also notified about
shutdown of nodes or about nodes not being reachable due to network partitions.
Creating an actor
A Jobim actor can be started using any Clojure function. This function can use
two special functions: send! and receive to send and
receive messages from other actors in the same node or in a different node.
In order to send a message, the actor needs to know the PID of the actor
receiving the message. This PID is passed as the first argument of the
send! function. The payload of the message is the second argument.
One actor can retrieve its own PID using the jobim/self function.
This is an implementation of a sample ping actor:
(defn ping ([] (loop [continue true msg (receive)] (cond-match [#"exit" msg] (recur false msg) [#"exception" msg] (throw (Exception. (str "Ping actor with PID:" (self) "received exception"))) [[?from?data] msg] (do (send! from data) (recur true (receive)))))))
The implementation shown above uses Matchure pattern matching library to
provide a more “erlang-like” experience.
To start the execution of a concurrent actor, the jobim/spawn
function can be used. it accepts a function or a string with the qualified
name of a function.
The jobim/spawn function returns the PID of the newly created
process or throws an exception if the creation went wrong.
=> (def *pid* (spawn examples/ping)) #'clojure.core/*pid* => *pid* "5299491ea4184c02ad8c0fbc100c49f9.1"
The REPL or any other thread can be transformed into an actor using the
spawn-in-repl function. We will use this function to send some
messages to the ping actor we just created:
=> (spawn-in-repl) "5299491ea4184c02ad8c0fbc100c49f9.2" => (send! *pid* [(self) 13123]) ok => (receive) 13123
Messages payload
Jobim uses standard Java serialization mechanism to build the payload of the
messages. This means that whatever object implementing
java.io.Serializable can be send inside of a message.
For instance, we can send Date objects to our ping actor:
=> (send! *pid* [(self) (java.util.Date.)]) ok => (receive) #
It is possible to change the serialization and deserialization mechanism used by
a node altering the jobim.core/default-encode and
jobim.core/default.decode symbols with suitable functions.
Going distributed
The most basic building block for distributed computing in Jobim is the
jobim/rpc-call function. This function receives a node identifier, a
string containing a function and an array of arguments and tries the invocation
of that function in the remote node. rpc-call returns inmediately
without knowing the result of the invocation in the remote node. If we want to
retrieve the result of the invocation we can use the blocking variant:
jobim/rpc-blocking-call that blocks until the result is returned or
an exception is launched.
RPC functions in Jobim accepts node identifiers, we can transform the name of a
node, maybe already retrieved with the jobim/nodes function into a
node identifier, using the jobim/resolve-node-name function.
The following example is a RPC call to do a simple addition:
=> (nodes) {"osx" "5299491ea4184c02ad8c0fbc100c49f9", "linux" "6811651bd83e4d428359b419e7f76a75"} => (resolve-node-name "linux") "6811651bd83e4d428359b419e7f76a75" => (rpc-blocking-call (resolve-node-name "linux") "clojure.core/+" [1 2 3 4 5]) 15
One specially important use of the RPC functions is to start new actors in other
nodes invoking the jobim/spawn function remotely. If we use the
blocking variant of the the RPC function, we will retrieve the PID of the remote
actor and we could start sending messages to it:
=> (def *pid* (rpc-blocking-call (resolve-node-name "linux") "jobim/spawn" ["jobim.examples.actors/ping"])) #'clojure.core/*pid* => *pid* "6811651bd83e4d428359b419e7f76a75.1" => (send! *pid* [(self) 345]) nil => (receive) 345
Publishing processes
As long as we have the PID of an actor, we will be able to exchange messages
with it. Besides, since the PID is just a string, we can pass the PIDs inside
messages allowing actors to be “mobile actors” in a Pi-Calculus sense.
Nevertheless, it is sometimes convenient to be able to query for an actor using
a constant reference, for instance an alias, we know beforehand, so we can
communicate with the actor without needing to know its PID.
Jobim supports this use case with the jobim/register-name
function. Using this function, we can provide a name for the PID of a process
that will be globally available to all nodes in the system.
Registered names can be queried using the jobim/registered-name
function in a similar way to the jobim/nodes function for node
names and node identifiers.
We can transform a registered name into an actor PID using the
jobim/resolve-name function, so we can pass it as an argument in
jobim/send! function calls.
=> (def *ping* (spawn examples/ping)) #'clojure.core/*ping* => *ping* "5299491ea4184c02ad8c0fbc100c49f9.8" => (register-name "ping" *ping*) ok => (registered-names) {"ping" "5299491ea4184c02ad8c0fbc100c49f9.8"} => (resolve-name "ping") "5299491ea4184c02ad8c0fbc100c49f9.8" => (send! (resolve-name "ping") [(self) 1234]) ok => (receive) 1234
When things go wrong
Erlang systems have a very particular approach to error handling that consists of
not preventing failures but reacting quickly after a failure happens, most of
the time, restarting the failing component.
The basic mechanism behind this approach is the “linking” of processes. When two
Erlang processes are linked, any failure in one of the two process will produce
a fail signal in the other process that, if not properly handled, will cause the
other process to fail.
Special processes, known as supervisors, take care of creating and linking to
children processes as well as handling exceptions in the children according to some
kind of recovery policy.
Distributed Erlang applications are usually arranged as trees of processes where the
process at a node handle the error in the leafs of that node, and if is not able
to recover from that error, dies and bubble the error to the upper level.
Jobim provides limited support for this style of error handling with the
jobim/link function. The link function receives the PID of an actor
as an argument and links bidirectionally both actors.
From this point on, any error in one actor or a node down in the node where one
of the actors is running will produce a special message signaling the error in
the other actor.
=> (self) "5299491ea4184c02ad8c0fbc100c49f9.1" => (def *pid* (spawn examples/ping)) #'clojure.core/*pid* => (link *pid*) {"5299491ea4184c02ad8c0fbc100c49f9.1" ["5299491ea4184c02ad8c0fbc100c49f9.9"], "5299491ea4184c02ad8c0fbc100c49f9.9" ["5299491ea4184c02ad8c0fbc100c49f9.1"]} => ; the ping actor will throw an exception if receives a message containing the "exception" string => (send! *pid* "exception") ok => (receive) {:signal :link-broken, :from "5299491ea4184c02ad8c0fbc100c49f9.9", :cause "class java.lang.Exception:Ping actor received exception"}
This means that linked processes in Jobim must explicitly look for this kind of
messages and handle them, maybe throwing an exception, to obtain a similar
behaviour to OTP applications.
Evented actors
The actors introduced so far are executed in their own Java thread. This is a
huge problem since a JVM will start throwing OutOfMemory exceptions
after a few thousands of threads are created.
On the other hand, Erlang systems can handle millions of concurrent actors in a single node, using
a preemptive scheduler that applies a fixed number of reductions in each Erlang
process being executed. This means that Erlang processes are extremely
lightweight and can be benefit from features like the linking of processes
previously discussed.
A possible alternative for building systems using a large amount of actors is to
use “evented actors” so a single java thread can execute different actors. This
solution has been explored in Scala actors.
Jobim evented actors rely on three special functions: jobim/react that is
equivalent to the receive funtion of a regular actor,
jobim/react-loop that creates a recursive evented actor and
jobim/spawn-evented that creates a new evented actor returning its
PID. This PID can be used with the regular jobim/send! function to
send messages to the evented actor.
The following is an evented implementation of the previously defined ping actor:
(defn ping-evented ([] (let [name "test evented"] (react-loop (react (fn [msg] (cond-match [#"exit" msg] false [#"exception" msg] (throw (Exception. "Ping actor received exception")) [[?from?data] msg] (send! from (str "actor " name " : " data)))))))))
Conclusions
Erlang is an incredible platform for building distributed reliable
systems. Support for an actors library providing support for distributed failure
signals and tolerance to network partition can be a nice addition to Clojure’s
own concurrency mechanism to build distributed applications in the JVM.
It could also be mixed with different distribution mechanisms available in the
JVM.
Jobim is just an experiment on how this kind of systems could be built using two
beautiful pieces of software like RabbitMQ and ZooKeeper.
AdvertisementsMovie Theaters To Test A Discount Plan For Cheaper Tickets One Day A Week By Kelly West Random Article Blend
THR notes that movie admissions remains flat in North America, though the increased cost of going to the movies is contributing to an overall rise of box-office revenue. The MPAA's 2013 numbers say that moviegoers between the ages of 12-17 fell from 6.3 million in 2012 to 5.5 million. And the number of moviegoers ages 18-24 fell from 8.7 million to 7.2 million. The drop for people ages 25-39 was from 9.9 million to 8.2 million. The numbers were actually up for children and people over the age of 50.
As someone who would probably go to the movies more if it wasn't so expensive, I'm hopeful this test is successful. Right now, the chain I visit only offers discounts on
Here's the only issue I see with the once-a-week discount idea. Yes, it might fill more
Would you go to the movies more if it were cheaper? I would. I've been and continue to be a movie fan, but in this day of digital downloads, Redbox and Netflix, I can get a pretty steady fix of great films (not to mention great television) for substantially cheaper than what it costs to go to the theater. But I still like going to the theater, so word that the National Association of Theater Owners is looking into a test to see if discounted ticket prices once a week would boost attendance piques my interest. THR says this move comes in the wake of declining admissions among movie-goers under the age of 50, including teens. The National Association of Theater Owners is said to be considering a plan to test discounted ticket prices one day a week. It's something that's apparently worked well in Canada and Latin America. From the sound of it, they're looking to test this out in one specific state, but they wouldn't give further details on that, as the model isn't fully developed. But it sounds like this test will happen sometime later this year and they're hoping that all theaters will participate, as their belief is that it'll work best if it's statewide.THR notes that movie admissions remains flat in North America, though the increased cost of going to the movies is contributing to an overall rise of box-office revenue. The MPAA's 2013 numbers say that moviegoers between the ages of 12-17 fell from 6.3 million in 2012 to 5.5 million. And the number of moviegoers ages 18-24 fell from 8.7 million to 7.2 million. The drop for people ages 25-39 was from 9.9 million to 8.2 million. The numbers were actually up for children and people over the age of 50.As someone who would probably go to the movies more if it wasn't so expensive, I'm hopeful this test is successful. Right now, the chain I visit only offers discounts on popcorn and candy during certain weeknights. That's a nice perk, but it's hardly an incentive to go to the movies more often.Here's the only issue I see with the once-a-week discount idea. Yes, it might fill more seats during that night of the week, but how is this all that different from matinee pricing? Beyond the fact that this would discount tickets for one whole day a week as opposed to just the afternoon, it still requires people to be available and interested in seeing movies within a specific timeframe. A trip to the movies is traditionally a weekend affair. So while I think a weekly discount day on Tuesdays or whenever they decide to do it might be effective in getting people to start coming back to the theater, I'm not convinced a program like this would solve the problem completely, especially as movie fans continue to have convenient and affordable alternatives to see movies, if they're willing to wait. At the very least, I'd be more excited if theaters were willing to discount tickets for films at some point after their opening weekend. Would you go to the movies more if there was a discount day? Probably not.
Yes, but only if discount day was Friday or Saturday.
Um... maybe? Depends on the day.
Yes, definitely! Vote RESULTS WANT TO VOTE? Blended From Around The Web Facebook
Back to topUnited Airlines Flight 223 was diverted to Denver International Airport this afternoon after a passenger attempted to open an exterior door in mid-air.
Just after 5 p.m., the plane landed safely at DIA. The plane had been traveling from Washington Dulles International Airport to Las Vegas, according to DIA spokesman Jeff Green.
“It’s virtually impossible to open an exterior door while in flight,” Green said.
The disturbance began around 4:45 p.m., Charlie Hobart, United spokesman said.
United is cooperating with authorities, who were waiting for the suspect at the gate, Hobart said.
The man had consumed alcohol before and during the flight, Kathy Wright FBI spokeswoman said. After questioning at DIA the suspect was sent for a medical evaluation.
Next week investigators will determine whether charges will be filed.
“Instances like these usually involve some type of interference with the fight crew, which is a felony,” Wright said.There is perhaps no greater symbol of the thrill of victory than the Olympic medal. As the world focuses its attention on Pyeongchang, South Korea and the Winter Games, let's take a moment to look at Chicagoland's Olympic haul: our area's 239 gold, silver and bronze medals.
There is no perfect way to find all the medalists who have connections here. Mountains of public data exist on who won and by how much at Olympic Games, but not consistent information on where an athlete is "from." We limited our list to athletes born in Cook or surrounding counties using the data at sports-reference.com. This method excludes Johnny Weissmuller, a champion swimmer who is very much "from" Chicago but was born in Romania. (He also played Tarzan in a dozen films.)
If we've missed anyone, please let us know on Twitter, Facebook or by email! Now, let's take a look at some of the best athletes this region has produced.This article is about the ancient kingdom. For the region in Somalia, see Puntland
[1] Sketch from the walls of the mortuary temple of A landscape of Punt, showing several houses on stilts, two fruiting date palms, three myrrh trees, a bird ( Cinnyris metallica ), a cow, and unidentified fish and a turtle, in water which in the original was green to show that it is salt or tidal.Sketch from the walls of the mortuary temple of Hatshepsut at Deir el-Bahri, depicting a royal expedition to Punt.
The Land of Punt (Egyptian: pwnt; alternate Egyptological readings Pwene(t)[2]) was an ancient kingdom. A trading partner of Egypt, it was known for producing and exporting gold, aromatic resins, blackwood, ebony, ivory, and wild animals. The region is known from ancient Egyptian records of trade expeditions to it.[3] It is possible that it corresponds to Opone as later known by the ancient Greeks,[4][5][6] while some biblical scholars have identified it with the biblical land of Put or Havilah.[7][8]
At times Punt is referred to as Ta netjer (tꜣ nṯr), the "Land of the God".[9] The exact location of Punt is still debated by historians. Most scholars today believe Punt was situated to the southeast of Egypt, most likely in the coastal region of modern Djibouti, Somalia, northeast Ethiopia, Eritrea, and the Red Sea littoral of Sudan.[10] It is also possible that the territory covered both the Horn of Africa and Southern Arabia.[11][12] Puntland, the Somali administrative region situated at the extremity of the Horn of Africa, is named in reference to the Land of Punt.[13]
Egyptian expeditions to Punt [ edit ]
The earliest recorded ancient Egyptian expedition to Punt was organized by Pharaoh Sahure of the Fifth Dynasty (25th century BC). However, gold from Punt is recorded as having been in Egypt as early as the time of Pharaoh Khufu of the Fourth Dynasty.[14]
Subsequently, there were more expeditions to Punt in the Sixth, Eleventh, Twelfth and Eighteenth dynasties of Egypt. In the Twelfth Dynasty, trade with Punt was celebrated in popular literature in the Tale of the Shipwrecked Sailor.
In the reign of Mentuhotep III (11th dynasty, ca. 2000 BC), an officer named Hannu organized one or more voyages to Punt, but it is uncertain whether he personally traveled on these expeditions.[15] Trading missions of the 12th dynasty pharaohs Senusret I, Amenemhat II and Amenemhat IV had also successfully navigated their way to and from the mysterious land of Punt.[16][17]
In the Eighteenth Dynasty of Egypt, Hatshepsut built a Red Sea fleet to facilitate trade between the head of the Gulf of Aqaba and points south as far as Punt to bring mortuary goods to Karnak in exchange for Nubian gold. Hatshepsut personally made the most famous ancient Egyptian expedition that sailed to Punt. During the reign of Queen Hatshepsut in the 15th century BC, ships regularly crossed the Red Sea in order to obtain bitumen, copper, carved amulets, naptha and other goods transported overland and down the Dead Sea to Elat at the head of the gulf of Aqaba where they were joined with frankincense and myrrh coming north both by sea and overland along trade routes through the mountains running north along the east coast of the Red Sea.[18]
A tree in front of Hatshepsut's temple, claimed to have been brought from Punt by Hatshepsut's Expedition, which is depicted on the Temple walls
A report of that five-ship voyage survives on reliefs in Hatshepsut's mortuary temple at Deir el-Bahri.[19] Throughout the temple texts, Hatshepsut "maintains the fiction that her envoy" Chancellor Nehsi, who is mentioned as the head of the expedition, had travelled to Punt "in order to extract tribute from the natives" who admit their allegiance to the Egyptian pharaoh.[20] In reality, Nehsi's expedition was a simple trading mission to a land, Punt, which was by this time a well-established trading post.[20] Moreover, Nehsi's visit to Punt was not inordinately brave since he was "accompanied by at least five shiploads of [Egyptian] marines" and greeted warmly by the chief of Punt and his immediate family.[19][20] The Puntites "traded not only in their own produce of incense, ebony and short-horned cattle, but [also] in goods from other African states including gold, ivory and animal skins."[20] According to the temple reliefs, the Land of Punt was ruled at that time by King Parahu and Queen Ati.[21] This well illustrated expedition of Hatshepsut occurred in Year 9 of the female pharaoh's reign with the blessing of the god Amun:
Said by Amen, the Lord of the Thrones of the Two Land: 'Come, come in peace my daughter, the graceful, who art in my heart, King Maatkare [ie. Hatshepsut]...I will give thee Punt, the whole of it...I will lead your soldiers by land and by water, on mysterious shores, which join the harbours of incense...They will take incense as much as they like. They will load their ships to the satisfaction of their hearts with trees of green [i.e., fresh] incense, and all the good things of the land.'[22]
Egyptian soldiers from Hatshepsut's expedition to the Land of Punt as depicted from her temple at Deir el-Bahri
While the Egyptians "were not particularly well versed in the hazards of sea travel, and the long voyage to Punt, must have seemed something akin to a journey to the moon for present-day explorers...the rewards of [obtaining frankincense, ebony and myrrh] clearly outweighed the risks."[16][23] Hatshepsut's 18th dynasty successors, such as Thutmose III and Amenhotep III also continued the Egyptian tradition of trading with Punt.[24] The trade with Punt continued into the start of the 20th dynasty before terminating prior to the end of Egypt's New Kingdom.[24] Papyrus Harris I, a contemporary Egyptian document that detailed events that occurred in the reign of the early 20th dynasty king Ramesses III, includes an explicit description of an Egyptian expedition's return from Punt:
They arrived safely at the desert-country of Coptos: they moored in peace, carrying the goods they had brought. They [the goods] were loaded, in travelling overland, upon asses and upon men, being reloaded into vessels at the harbour of Coptos. They [the goods and the Puntites] were sent forward downstream, arriving in festivity, bringing tribute into the royal presence.[25]
After the end of the New Kingdom period, Punt became "an unreal and fabulous land of myths and legends."[26] However, Egyptians continued to compose love songs about Punt, "When I hold my love close, and her arms steal around me, I'm like a man translated to Punt, or like someone out in the reedflats, when the world suddenly bursts into flower." [27]
Ta netjer [ edit ]
This relief depicts incense and myrrh trees obtained by Hatshepsut's expedition to Punt
At times, the ancient Egyptians called Punt Ta netjer (tꜣ nṯr), meaning "God's Land".[28] This referred to the fact that it was among the regions of the Sun God, that is, the regions located in the direction of the sunrise, to the East of Egypt. These eastern regions' resources included products used in temples, notably incense. Older literature (and current non-mainstream literature) maintained that the label "God's Land", when interpreted as "Holy Land" or "Land of the gods/ancestors", meant that the ancient Egyptians viewed the Land of Punt as their ancestral homeland. W. M. Flinders Petrie believed that the Dynastic Race came from or through Punt and that "Pan, or Punt, was a district at the south end of the Red Sea, which probably embraced both the African and Arabian shores."[29] Moreover, E. A. Wallis Budge stated that "Egyptian tradition of the Dynastic Period held that the aboriginal home of the Egyptians was Punt...".[30] However, the term Ta netjer was not only applied to Punt, located southeast of Egypt, but also to regions of Asia east and northeast of Egypt, such as Lebanon, which was the source of wood for temples.[31]
E. A. Wallis Budge stated that "Egyptian tradition of the Dynastic Period held that the aboriginal home of the Egyptians was Punt...".[32] The term was not only applied to Punt, located southeast of Egypt, but also to regions of Asia east and northeast of Egypt, such as Lebanon, which was the source of wood for temples.[33]
On the murals of the Hatshepsut temple at Deir el-Bahri, the King and Queen of Punt are depicted along with their retinue. Due to her unusual appearance, the Queen was sometimes hypothesized to have had advanced steatopygia[34] or elephantiasis.[35] However, she is now clinically recognized as having likely had the Queen of Punt syndrome, a suite of conditions that include familial obesity, Launois Bensaude lipomatosis, Dercum disease, neurofibromatosis, congenital lipodystrophy, achondroplasia, X-linked hypophosphatemia, and Proteus syndrome.[35]
Location [ edit ]
Supposed location around the Red Sea and major travel routes by land and sea
The majority opinion places Punt in Northeastern Africa, based on the fact that the products of Punt (as depicted in the Hatshepsut illustrations) were abundantly found in the Horn of Africa but were less common or sometimes absent in Arabia. These products included gold and aromatic resins such as myrrh, frankincense, and ebony; the wild animals depicted in Punt included giraffes, baboons, hippotamuses, and leopards. Says Richard Pankhurst: "[Punt] has been identified with territory on both the Arabian and the Horn of Africa coasts. Consideration of the articles that the Egyptians obtained from Punt, notably gold and ivory, suggests, however, that these were primarily of African origin.... This leads us to suppose that the term Punt probably applied more to African than Arabian territory."[3][20][36][37]
Dimitri Meeks disagrees with this view and points to ancient inscriptions that locate Punt in the western coast of the Arabian Peninsula, from the Gulf of Aqaba to Yemen, he has written that "Texts locating Punt beyond doubt to the south are in the minority, but they are the only ones cited in the current consensus about the location of the country. Punt, we are told by the Egyptians, is situated – in relation to the Nile Valley – both to the north, in contact with the countries of the Near East of the Mediterranean area, and also to the east or south-east, while its furthest borders are far away to the south. Only the Arabian Peninsula satisfies all these indications."[11]
Location of the Land of Punt for most scholars.
In 2010, a genetic study was conducted on the mummified remains of baboons that were brought back from Punt by the ancient Egyptians. Led by a research team from the Egyptian Museum and the University of California, Santa Cruz, the scientists used oxygen isotope analysis to examine hairs from two baboon mummies that had been preserved in the British Museum. One of the baboons had distorted isotopic data, so the other's oxygen isotope values were compared to those of modern-day baboon specimens from regions of interest. The researchers at first found that the mummies most closely matched modern specimens seen in Eritrea and Ethiopia as opposed to those in neighboring Somalia, with the Ethiopian specimens "basically due west from Eritrea". The team did not have the opportunity to compare the mummies with baboons in Yemen. The scientists believed that such an analysis would yield similar results since, according to them, regional isotopic maps suggest that baboons in Yemen would closely resemble those in Somalia. Professor Dominy, one of the lead researchers, concluded from this that "we think Punt is a sort of circumscribed region that includes eastern Ethiopia and all of Eritrea."[38] In 2015, the scientists conducted a follow-up study to confirm their initial findings, and concluded that "our results reveal a high likelihood match with eastern Somalia and the Eritrea-Ethiopia corridor, suggesting that this region was the source of Papio hamadryas exported to Ancient Egypt."[39] In June 2018, Polish archaeologists who have been conducting research in The Temple of Hatshepsut since 1961 discovered the only depiction of a secretary bird (Sagittarius serpentarius) known from ancient Egypt in the Bas-reliefs from the Portico of Punt that depicted the great Pharaonic expedition to the Land of Punt. The secretary bird lives only in the African open grasslands and savannah, it is listed among the birds found in Sudan, Ethiopia, Eritrea, Djibouti, and Somalia, the bird is not found in Arabia.[40]
Queen Ati and King Perahu of Punt and their Attendants as depicted on Pharaoh Hatshepsut's temple at Deir el-Bahri.
Men from Punt carrying Gifts, Tomb of Rekhmire
Egyptian spelling "pwenet"
the feminine "t" ending was not pronounced during the New Kingdom
the last sign is the determinative for country, land
Wall relief
Huts as in relief
Notes [ edit ]
References [ edit ]
Bradbury, Louise (1988), "Reflections on Travelling to 'God's Land' and Punt in the Middle Kingdom", Journal of the American Research Center in Egypt, 25 : 127–156, doi:10.2307/40000875.
. Breasted, John Henry (1906–1907), Ancient Records of Egypt: Historical Documents from the Earliest Times to the Persian Conquest, collected, edited, and translated, with Commentary, 1–5, University of Chicago Press.
. El-sayed, Mahfouz (2010). "Amenemhat IV au ouadi Gaouasis". BIFAO. 110 : 165–173.
Fattovich, Rodolfo. 1991. "The Problem of Punt in the Light of the Recent Field Work in the Eastern Sudan". In Akten des vierten internationalen Ägyptologen Kongresses, München 1985, edited by Sylvia Schoske. Vol. 4 of 4 vols. Hamburg: Helmut Buske Verlag. 257–272.
, edited by Sylvia Schoske. Vol. 4 of 4 vols. Hamburg: Helmut Buske Verlag. 257–272. ———. 1993. "Punt: The Archaeological Perspective". In Sesto congresso internazionale de egittologia: Atti, edited by Gian Maria Zaccone and Tomaso Ricardi di Netro. Vol. 2 of 2 vols. Torino: Italgas. 399–405.
, edited by Gian Maria Zaccone and Tomaso Ricardi di Netro. Vol. 2 of 2 vols. Torino: Italgas. 399–405. Herzog, Rolf. 1968. Punt. Abhandlungen des Deutsches Archäologischen Instituts Kairo, Ägyptische Reihe 6. Glückstadt: Verlag J. J. Augustin.
. Abhandlungen des Deutsches Archäologischen Instituts Kairo, Ägyptische Reihe 6. Glückstadt: Verlag J. J. Augustin. Kitchen, Kenneth (1971), "Punt and How to Get There", Orientalia, 40 : 184–207
Kitchen, Kenneth (1993), "The Land of Punt", in Shaw, Thurstan; Sinclair, Paul; Andah, Bassey; et al., The Archaeology of Africa: Foods, Metals, Towns, 20, London and New York: Routledge, pp. 587–608.
. Meeks, Dimitri (2003), "Locating Punt", in O'Connor, David B.; Quirke, Stephen G. J., Mysterious Lands, Encounters with ancient Egypt, 5, London: Institute of Archaeology, University College London, University College London Press, pp. 53–80, ISBN 1-84472-004-7.
. Paice, Patricia (1992), "The Punt Relief, the Pithom Stela, and the Periplus of the Erythean Sea", in Harrak, Amir, Contacts Between Cultures: Selected Papers from the 33rd International Congress of Asian and North African Studies, Toronto, 15–25 August 1990, 1, Lewiston, Queenston, and Lampeter: The Edwin Mellon Press, pp. 227–235.
. O'Connor, David (1994), Ancient Nubia: Egypt's Rival in Africa, University of Pennsylvania Press, pp. 41–44.
, University of Pennsylvania Press, pp. 41–44. Wicker, F. D. P. (July, 1998), "The Road to Punt", The Geographical Journal. Vol. 164, no. 2. 155-167
Older literature [ edit ]
Johannes Dümichen: Die Flotte einer ägyptischen Königin, Leipzig, 1868.
, Leipzig, 1868. Wilhelm Max Müller: Asien und Europa nach altägyptischen Denkmälern, Leipzig, 1893.
, Leipzig, 1893. Adolf Erman: Life in Ancient Egypt, London, 1894.
, London, 1894. Édouard Naville: "Deir-el-Bahri" in Egypt Exploration Fund, Memoirs XII, XIII, XIV, and XIX, London, 1894 et seq.
, London, 1894 et seq. James Henry Breasted: A History of the Ancient Egyptians, New York, 1908.Matt Barnes out two weeks due to eye surgery
Matt Barnes out two weeks due to eye surgery by Ryan Donoho
Shaq falls down on TNT (GIF) by Ryan Donoho
New Orleans Saints tight end Jimmy Graham gave his team a first-half lead over the division rival Atlanta Falcons with a long touchdown catch in the second quarter, but it is what happened after the score that left people all over social media talking.
Graham threw down a monstrous dunk on the field goal post as he tends to do.
Unfortunately for those in charge of keeping the stadium and playing surface functional, Graham knocked the uprights crooked.
Here is how it looked:
Luckily for everyone, the show could go on thanks to a handy man and a giant level:
The show must go on!
SEE ALSO:Is evolution wrong? Kurt Warner seems to think so, but he was also willing to use evolutionary theory in order to talked about Pittsburgh Steelers quarterback Ben Roethlisberger’s performance on the field. But no matter how he phrased it, Darwinists were not exactly happy with |
and gun nut OF Luke Scott? He played for SK back in 2014 and it went as exactly as you’d expect: He got cut mid-season after getting into it with his manager. Former Braves LHP Jo-Jo Reyes pitched for SK for two years, but not well—he was released after racking up a 6.55 ERA in 78.1 IP in 2014. In his last KBO game, he was ejected for hitting a batter in the head. He later posted on his Instagram a picture of the Wyverns logo shot up by bullets at a gun range.
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RHP Merrill Kelly (former Rays minor leaguer), a third-year starting pitcher with SK, has embodied consistency for the Wyverns, pitching for a 3.89 ERA (129.1 ERA+) in 60 starts in 2015 and 2016. He is joined by two new foreign players, LHP Scott Diamond (formerly of the Twins and Blue Jays) and OF Danny Worth (Tigers and Astros).
Championship seasons:
2007, 2008, 2010
KIA Tigers
2016 finish: Fifth (70-73-1)
The KIA Tigers are based in the city of Gwangju in Jeolla Province, in the southwest of the peninsula. Gwangju is known for pro-democracy movements back in the 1980s and some damn good food. It’s definitely a city worth visiting if you ever go to Korea. They play at KIA Champions Field, which opened for the 2016 season.
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The franchise originally started as the Haitai Tigers in 1982. They had this badass logo from 1982 to 1995 and then changed to a cutesy one through 2001. For my money, they had the sharpest uniform in the KBO.
In the late 1990’s, Korea experienced an economic crisis, and Haitai was one of the companies hit the hardest. In 2001, the Hyundai-KIA car group bought out the franchise. Unlike the SK Wyverns, who started a new franchise and signed up the Ssangbangwool players, the KIA Tigers continued the lineage of the Haitai Tigers.
Why should you root for them?
The 2017 team has a pretty bright forecast. They signed OF Hyoung-Woo Choi (.376/.464/.651 with 31 HRs last year for Samsung) to a four-year contract worth around $9 million and retained their ace Hyeon-Jong Yang (10-12, 3.68 ERA in 200.1 IP) on a one-year deal. If their new foreign players — LHP Pat Dean and OF Roger Bernadina — perform as expected, the Tigers could be a strong playoff contender.
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The Tigers also have the most championships in the KBO history, racking up 10 titles in the league’s 35 years. Bonus fact: They have never lost a Korean Series, which is neat. Their latest championship, which came in 2009, is one of the most dramatic ones ever. Playing against the vaunted SK Wyverns, in the middle of their own dynasty, the Tigers fought all the way to Game 7 and won on a chill-inducing, bottom-of-the-ninth walk-off home run by OF Ji-Wan Na. I still watch this video over and over. It’s one of the most thrilling moments in baseball history:
Back in the 80s and 90s, as the Haitai Tigers, the franchise employed perhaps the best pitcher the KBO has ever seen. RHP Dong-Yeol Sun, who pitched for Haitai from 1985 to 1995, put up some wicked, wicked numbers. Pitching both as a starter and out of bullpen, Sun has a career 146-40 record with a 1.20 ERA (1.37 FIP), 132 saves, 1,698 strikeouts in 1647.0 IP, while allowing only 968 hits, 342 walks, and 28 HRs (He allowed only 11 homers total over his first six seasons in 1073.1 innings). In his second season, as a 23-year old, Sun went 24-6 with a 0.99 ERA while throwing 19 complete games. I don’t care what league you play in—that is goddamned incredible. The following year, he went 14-2 with a 0.89 ERA. In 1993, at age 30, he transitioned to reliever and put up a 0.78 ERA while throwing 126.1 IP in 49 appearances. Oh yeah, he also had a 10.27 WAR that season out of the bullpen. Sun was just simply monstrous. Here are some gifs of his nasty stuff:
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Wait holy moly, how did that slider look from the other angle?
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Yeesh.
Sun later signed with Japan’s Chunichi Dragons and was still nasty over there, saving 98 games in four seasons while striking out 228 in 197 IP (2.70 ERA).
The Tigers franchise also claims the greatest five-tool player the KBO has ever seen in Jong-Beom Lee. Before Eric Thames had a monstrous 2015 season, you could make a case that Lee had the best ever offensive season in the KBO history in 1994. As a second-year shortstop, Lee hit for a.393/.452/.581 line while hitting 19 HRs and stealing 84 bases, good for a 0.462 wOBA and 198.3 wRC+. Per Statiz, Lee’s WAR that year measures up as 11.77. (Thames had a 10.71 WAR in 2015.) According to Lee, he had a real chance to hit.400 that season but was slowed by a stomach bug that he caught after eating a raw beef dish.
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In 2006, as a 36-year old, Lee had an iconic moment during the inaugural World Baseball Classic, hitting a go-ahead, two-run double in the bottom of the eighth against Japan to lead Korea to a victory. (FYI: The Korea-Japan rivalry is very real.) Inject this gif directly into my veins:
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Why should you have second thoughts?
While the team was largely successful in the 80s and 90s, they also had a reputation of being under very hard-nosed, strict coaching. From 1982 to 2000, the team was led by Eung-Yong Kim, who is considered the greatest manager in the history of the league. He set up the team culture that was compared to being in the military. For instance, during the 1993 All-Star Game, Haitai’s star third baseman Dae-Hwa Han hurt his hand while fielding. While Han was icing his hand before his at-bat, the manager Kim got pissed to see that his third baseman was not even getting ready to hit, went into the dugout and smacked and kicked him.
If he did that without hesitation during a live game for the TV cameras to see, imagine what went on behind the scenes.
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Names you may know:
Former top Cubs prospect and ML 1B Hee-Seop Choi played for KIA from 2008 to 2015. Former Mets RHP Jae-Weong Seo also pitched for KIA those same years.
RHP Hector Noesi, who pitched for the Yankees, White Sox, Rangers, and Mariners, is entering his second season as a Tiger. He is joined by two newcomers LHP Pat Dean (who pitched for the Twins last year) and OF Roger Bernadina (formerly of the Nationals). You might have heard of LHP Hyeon-Jong Yang, who tried to go to the MLB via posting back in the 2014-15 offseason. While that didn’t work out, Yang signed a one-year deal with KIA over the most recent offseason, leading to speculation that he might try again after the 2017 season.
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Championship seasons:
(Takes a deep breath) 1983, 1986, 1987, 1988, 1989, 1991, 1993, 1996, 1997, 2009
LG Twins
2016 finish: Fourth (71-72-2)
The LG Twins are one of the three Seoul teams and one of the two that play in Jamsil Stadium, along with the Doosan Bears, leading to one of the league’s best rivalries.
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The Twins franchise began in 1982 as the MBC Blue Dragons. MBC is a broadcasting company that owns several channels, including the MBC Sports+, which airs MLB games (and the NFL very once in awhile). “Blue Dragons” was a great name but I am not quite sure about that logo. In 1990, the LG group bought the team and changed the franchise name to the LG Twins.
Surprise surprise, LG is another one of the big Korean conglomerates. LG actually stands for “Lucky Goldstar,” and, as you might know, they make electronics, chemicals, telephone products, and more.
The Twins have been playing at the Jamsil Stadium in Seoul since their inaugural season in 1982. The OB Bears (now Doosan Bears) moved in in 1986. Since then, both LG and Doosan have been archrivals. When both teams perform well, the rivalry is at the Yankees-Red Sox level. Right now the Bears have the upper hand in the rivalry but the Twins are a solid team in their own right, placing fourth and making it into the playoffs last year.
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Why should you root for them?
As someone who’s been to their games several times, I can say their fans cheer really, really well. Even though they haven’t exactly been perennial winners, the passion is off the charts. They’re big into banners and tifos. Damn, I want to be there, right now.
The LG fans’ love for the team and their star players can be illustrated with a video. During the 2014 playoffs, the Twins were playing the NC Dinos at Jamsil. Down 4-2 in bottom of the eighth, the LG franchise star OF Byung-Kyu Lee stepped into the plate and the level of noise that the fans brought out was just… otherworldly. Just watch the damn video. You’ll fall in love with the Korean cheering culture, if you haven’t already:
Do you see this kind of thing in MLB? I think not:
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Byung-Kyu Lee is the most beloved figure in Twins history after playing his entire KBO career there, and in a park known for being power-unfriendly. In 1999, his age-24 season, Lee hit.349/.394/.620 with 30w HRs and 43 doubles while swiping 31. Lee is even more appreciated among Twins fans for being the team’s star throughout the team’s dark ages.
If you really paid attention to MLB rosters back in the early 2000s, you might remember LHP Sang-Hoon Lee. If you don’t, that’s fine. He appeared in only nine games for the 2000 Boston Red Sox. An ignominious stint for the best LG Twins pitcher ever. In eight KBO seasons from 1993-97 and 2002-05, he had a 71-40 record with a 2.56 ERA and 98 saves. Lee is remembered for his long hair and fiery mound personality. The fans dubbed him “wild horse” for his antics and “Samson” for his hair.
In the 1998 and 1999 seasons, Lee pitched for the Chunichi Dragons of the NPB, where his name was officially registered as “Samson Lee.” I am not kidding. After retiring from baseball, Lee became a rock star. Again, not kidding. He was the vocalist and guitarist for his own band called “What”. Here’s footage of one of his gigs:
In 2010, his band played at a festival and Lee profanely insulted the country’s then-president Myung-Bak Lee. After their set, the event was shut down. Samson is back in baseball now, as the pitching coach for the LG Twins.
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The Twins are the kings of collectible crossovers, collaborating at various times on Star Wars and Hello Kitty gear. Marketing!
Why should you have second thoughts?
In early 2012, the Twins lost two of their starters in a massive game-fixing scandal. RHPs Hyun-Joon Park and Seong-Hyun Kim were banned for life for their involvement. Park intentionally gave up walks to hitters in certain games. Here is one that was particularly egregious:
Park was coming off a successful 2011 season in which he solidified himself as a top starter for LG. Had he not been involved, he could be enjoying a career as an ace for one of the most popular teams in the country while earning big money. Instead he now works as a cellphone salesman.
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While they have developed solid prospects the Twins are notorious for losing players that later fulfilled their potentials elsewhere. 1B Byung-Ho Park was a highly regarded first-round pick in the 2005 draft LG but was traded to Nexen during the 2011 season after struggling for years. Park immediately started hitting with Nexen and became the 2012 KBO MVP. Ouch. Aforementioned Eagles OF Yong-Kyu Lee was also a Twins draftee but was traded to the KIA Tigers, where he became a perennial All-Star. 2B Geon-Chang Seo was an undrafted signee by LG but was released after suffering an injury. After finishing military service, Seo signed with the Nexen Heroes and became the league’s Rookie of the Year in 2012 and MVP in 2014.
One of the Twins’ chants sounds too much like the Washington NFL team’s fight song:
My verdict: the resemblance is uncanny. The Skins’ song was said to have been written in 1938, which is more than 40 years before the KBO existed, in case you are wondering who ripped off whom.
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Names you may know:
Remember LHP Jung Bong from MVP Baseball 2005? He has been with LG since 2007. He was a solid starter up to the 2011 season, when he needed Tommy John surgery. Since his 2012 return, he’s been pitching out of the pen. RHP Jae-Kuk Ryu, a former Cubs prospect who gained infamy for throwing a ball at an osprey nest, has been a solid mid-rotation arm for LG since 2013. The Twins’ ace is LHP David Huff, who bounced around several MLB teams. Huff became a fan favorite after fueling the Twins’ pennant race last year. RHP Henry Sosa, who pitched for the Astros in 2011, is entering his sixth KBO season and his third with LG. 3B Luis Jimenez, formerly of the L.A. Angels, is entering his third season with LG.
Championship seasons:
1990, 1994
Nexen Heroes
2016 finish: Third (77-66-1)
The Nexen Heroes are located in Seoul, like LG and Doosan, but they have their own stadium: the Gocheok Sky Dome, the first-ever professional indoor baseball venue in Korea. If that name sounds familiar, it’s because they hosted Pool A of the 2017 World Baseball Classic. The dome, which was finished in September 2015, is pretty damn nice, featuring optimal indoor temperature for baseball, a basement mall for the fans, and “MLB-caliber” facilities for players.
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Unlike the LGs, Lottes or the Samsungs of the world, Nexen is not a big business conglomerate. Instead, they make tires. It’s at least a step up from the club’s 2008 debut as the Woori Heroes, when they were named after a cigarette company. That didn’t last long, as it turned out that the company couldn’t afford the fees. As a result, they played the 2009 season without any sponsorship and went by the Seoul Heroes. Nexen stepped in the next year.
The Heroes started out as its own franchise after the Hyundai Unicorns became defunct. They refer to it as a “rebirth,” and just like in the Ssangbangwool-to-SK transition, the Heroes do not carry the Unicorns’ lineage and record, which includes four championships in 1998, 2000, 2003 and 2004.
Why should you root for them?
In 2016, they ranked dead last in payroll, yet they finished third in the league and made it to the playoffs. It was their fourth consecutive playoff berth and they are, once again, forecasted to be playoff contenders in 2017. After building the club up from 2008 to 2012, the Heroes have become known for front-office smarts like acquiring Byung-Ho Park, growing talents like Jung-Ho Kang, and signing good foreign players.
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In my opinion, their burgundy and white uniform combo is very sharp. Though it might be a different story they sport the gameday uniforms with a full set of sponsors. There are at least five in this photo alone: The side of their cap also includes a sponsor, but hey, try to understand: They gotta get the money somehow.
The team’s star right now is 2B Geon-Chang Seo. As I mentioned before, Seo was an undrafted signee with the LG Twins but was cut after suffering an elbow injury. Nevertheless, Seo persisted. He was picked up by the Heroes and immediately started making an impact. In 2012, he hit.266/.342/.367 with 39 stolen bases, the second most in the league. He absolutely exploded in 2014 when he hit.370/.438/.547 with 65 extra base hits. He also became the first KBO hitter ever to record 200 base hits in a season. Beside the records, what’s so awesome about Seo is his hitting mechanism. He designed his batting stance to minimize unnecessary movements and maximize his quickness. Result:
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How about a slow-mo? Still a lightning-fast reaction:
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When he won the 2014 KBO MVP award, Seo used a bouquet of flowers to exhibit his unique stance:
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In 2014, the Heroes and Boston Red Sox set up a strategic partnership. According to this Yonhap News article, the teams agreed to share sabermetric analyses, evaluation techniques, farm system monitoring, and training techniques, among other things. So if you’re a Boston fan, you should be rooting for the Heroes to do well.
Lastly, for those into comics, the Heroes’ mascots look like the Avengers meets Transformers.
Why should you have second thoughts?
I told you how much I like their regular unis, right? In 2016, they introduced the purple alternates, and I gotta say, they are ugly as hell.
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While the Heroes are an efficiently run baseball club, they remain a frugal one because of financial limitations. One of the motivating factors in letting Jung-Ho Kang and Byung-Ho Park go to MLB was money—they earned $17.85 million from the combined posting fees, big money by KBO standards. I was told in late 2015 that the Heroes would only allow Byung-Ho Park to be posted if he signed with the Octagon agency, who ended up netting Park a four-year, $12 million deal. It was, at the time, seen to be too much of a bargain by many. Why might this have happened? Because Nexen wouldn’t get any of Park’s salary, only the $12.85 million posting fee from Minnesota if a contract was signed. Nexen wanted to make sure a deal got done and fast, and Octagon made it happen.
Names you may know:
A pair of KBO-to-MLB exports, IF Jung-Ho Kang and 1B Byung-Ho Park, were stars with Nexen before being posted. Shane Spencer, former Yankees wunderkind, is the manager of the Heroes’ minor league team.
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For the 2017 season, Nexen acquired RHP Sean O’Sullivan to shore up the rotation along with KBO veteran LHP Andy Van Hekken. In MLB, Van Hekken is known for throwing a shutout against the Indians in his debut for Detroit back in 2002. He then around several minor league systems until being picked up by Nexen in 2012. In five seasons with the Heroes, Van Hekken has thrown for a 3.52 ERA in 132 starts. In 2014, he went 20-6 with 3.51 ERA (150.1 ERA+), earning a Golden Glove for pitchers that year. OF Danny Dorn, who briefly played for the Diamondbacks in 2015, is entering his second season with Nexen.
Championship seasons:
None
NC Dinos
2016 finish: Second (84-58-3), lost the Korean Series
The Dinos are another very young franchise. They started play in 2013 to make it a nine-team league (now 10 thanks to the KT Wiz). They are based in the city of Changwon in Gyeongsangnamdo, located very close to Busan (where Lotte plays). The city used to be the alternate home field for the Giants, and as you might expect, Lotte was not happy to receive neighbors.
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Just like Nexen, NC is not a big conglomerate. They are though, in my opinion, much cooler than a tire manufacturer. NCSOFT Corporation is a computer game company that has produced Lineage, Guild Wars, Aion, WildStar, City of Heroes, etc. You know how Seattle Mariners are partially owned by Nintendo? Imagine the Nintendo Mariners. You’d root for the Nintendo Mariners, right?
Why should you root for them?
The Dinos employ one of the best players of the league... who also happens to be one of the funniest. 3B Sok-Min Park played for Samsung from 2004 to 2015 before signing with the Dinos as a free agent. He hit.307/.404/.578 with 32 HRs in 2016, good for a 4.78 WAR and a spot on the Team Korea in the 2017 World Baseball Classic. However, his trademark is providing gifs for bloggers.
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He has the wildest swings-and-misses you’ll ever see.
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When fielding, he specializes in theatrics:
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Sometimes, he gets laughs just for his dumb luck:
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And, lastly, there’s...whatever this is:
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The Dinos, as noted, are located only about 20-30 minutes from Busan, which means that they’ve had to compete with the Lotte Giants’ regional popularity since their birth. In order to draw eyes, they’ve used exceptional marketing strategies to gather fans. For instance, they signed a character from a popular Korean kid’s show, Pororo the Little Penguin, to be one of their mascots. Here’s Pororo exploring the NC offices.
Worry not, they’ve also got a pair of dinosaur mascots for you: Meet Dandy and Seri.
And, oh baby, they can pull some moves in between innings:
NC’s gold alternate uniform, I gotta say, is super fresh. It’s up there on my bucket list of KBO merch items to buy. In 2016, they introduced an alternate jersey paying to the 16th-century admiral Yi Sun-Shin —it mimics his armor and everything—and, I gotta say, it looks great. Here’s video of Eric Thames unboxing his jersey and being genuinely excited about it:
Lastly, the team itself, for its short history, has accomplished a lot. The only year they failed to make the playoffs was their inaugural 2013 season. Along with Nexen, NC doesn’t boast huge financial resources, but they’ve been able to sign the right foreign players, develop young talents, and acquire useful veterans to finish third in 2014 and second in 2015 and 2016. Last year, they advanced to their first Korean Series. Even though they were crushed by the Doosan Bears in a four-game sweep, it is pretty impressive that the team was able to reach such a high level in just their fourth season of existence.
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Why should you have second thoughts?
The Dinos just lost one of their best young pitchers to a game-fixing scandal. RHP Tae-Yang Lee, who had a breakout 2015 (10-5, 3.67 ERA in 137.1 IP) and was a member of the Korean roster in an international tournament that year, was suddenly removed from the roster during the 2016 season. It was revealed that he had been convicted for his involvement game-fixing. Here are two instances in which he is said to have intentionally allowed runs, vs. KIA on May 29, 2015) and vs. Lotte on Aug 6, 2015:
On January 25, 2017, the KBO officials officially banned Lee for life, ending his brief KBO career at age 23. At the same time, the police also investigated Dinos RHP Jae-Hak Lee, who has been their ace for as long as the team has existed (43-27, 3.95 ERA in 588.0 IP in four seasons). Luckily for NC, Lee was cleared in February and is expected to play a full 2017
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In August 2016, it was reported that RHP Min-Ho Lee had been charged with domestic violence. Pictures of his wife’s bruised arm circulated. The Dinos later acknowledged the charges and fined Lee the equivalent of $9,000 and commanded him to perform 50 hours of community service. Most considered the punishment to be light, especially because it didn’t include a suspension. The Dinos continued to let Lee pitch in their games as if nothing had ever happened, a disgraceful look for the organization.
Names you may know:
You should know all about 1B Eric Thames. He had three very dominant seasons as a Dino, including a historic 40-40 feat in 2015. His performance in Korea earned him a three-year, $15 million contract with the Milwaukee Brewers this winter, which meant a collective sigh of relief for fans of the other nine KBO teams. RHP Eric Hacker (formerly in the Yankees’ farm system) has been with the Dinos since their very first year. In four seasons with NC, Hacker is 44-27 with 3.56 ERA (136.6 ERA+) in 109 starts—as consistent and reliable as one can get in the KBO. He is joined by RHP Jeff Manship, who was in the Cleveland Indians’ bullpen last year and even pitched in the World Series. OF Xavier Scruggs, who played 24 games with the Marlins in 2016, is the franchise’s new foreign hitter and he, of course, has a very tough act to follow.
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Championship seasons:
None
Doosan Bears
2016 finish: First (93-50-1), won the Korean Series
The Doosan Bears are located in Seoul and are one of the original KBO franchises. At that time, they were the OB Bears, after a beer company that was owned by the Doosan Group. At the time, rather than naming the team after the parent company, Doosan decided to name it after its popular beer brand. Only in 1999 did they gain their current name.
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Doosan is another Korean conglomerate company. They deal with stuff like publishing, construction, and railroads. If you haven’t learned anything about baseball from this article, you at least know that massive business conglomerates rule South Korea.
Why should you root for them?
Simply put: They were dominant in 2016 and should be much the same in 2017. They had a.650 winning percentage and swept the NC Dinos to take the championship. Barring any disastrous developments, the Bears are the strong favorite to lead the pennant race this season and, perhaps, continue on with their dynasty.
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Last year, the Bears’ rotation was otherworldly. They combined for 70 wins (out of 93 team wins) and a 20.56 WAR. Leading the way is RHP Dustin Nippert, who had a 22-3 record and 2.95 ERA in 27 starts. It was his sixth season with Doosan and his finest yet, winning him league MVP honors. The Bears fans, enamored with his performance and charity work, have dubbed him “Ni-neu-nim” (니느님), a combination of “Nippert” and “Haneunim,” meaning “God.” Nippert married a Korean woman after the 2015 season, leading to many to speculate that he wants to play and live in Korea long-term.
The most interesting character in the rotation, however, is LHP Hee-Kwan Yoo. He is an ultimate “slow’em to death” junkballer. In 2016, he averaged 79.3 mph on his fastball but baffled the hitters by mixing pitches up and attacking the corners. He had a 15-6 record with a 4.41 ERA (115.9 ERA+) while earning a 4.13 WAR. Here’s what his junk looks like.
Once in awhile he’ll drop in a 77 kph eephus-like curve to befuddle the hitters. That, by the way, is 47.8 mph, folks.
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Not only does Yoo know how to mix ‘em up, he has some flair for comedy. When the Bears clinched the Korean Series back in November, Yoo showed up with his Iron Man costume and...well...just watch:
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Lastly, Yoo’s nickname is “Olaf” because of his supposed resemblance to the snowman character from Frozen. You be the judge.
The Bears roster is filled with talent. For the 2017 World Baseball Classic, eight Bears players were chosen to the 28-man Team Korea squad, the most from any KBO team by far. Fans like to say that even if Hyun-Soo Kim came back to Doosan, he wouldn’t have a spot to play.
I want to say their uniform design of white-red-dark navy is nice and safe. It is not too flashy, and not too boring. Their old OB Bears gear, however, is considered a bonafide retro gem in Korea.
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What’s fun is the evolution of their bear mascot. They’ve gone from mellow, stoned bear to cuddly cartoon bear to good bear/bad bear to intimidating robot bear.
Doosan is one of the most popular teams in the KBO. In 2016, they drew over a million fans for the eighth year in a row, the first team in league history to do so. Even before their 2015 and 2016 championship runs, they always drew healthy crowds, perhaps because the Bears were perennial playoff contenders in the 2000s while the LG Twins, rivals sharing the same stadium, were mired in their dark ages. As a result, Doosan had first crack at an entire generation of fans. It’s only gotten more stark now that the Bears are the league’s best.
Lastly, for you bat-flip fans, Sung-Heun Hong, who played catcher and DH for Doosan from 1999 to 2008 and 2013 to 2016 and was one of the best hitters of his time, had a mean one:
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Why should you have second thoughts?
In 2017, becoming a Doosan Bears fan would be kind of like joining the Yankees bandwagon in 1998 or becoming a diehard Warriors fan in 2015. If you don’t care, by all means go for it.
Even though it has quieted in recent years, the Bears had a reputation for legal troubles and scandals. Some KBO fans dubbed the team’s nickname as “Bum-jwe-Doo” (범죄두), or “Crime Doosan.” There’s too much to list everything here, but back in 2011, RHP Tae-Hoon Lim was involved in one of the worst scandals in Korean entertainment history. Lim was romantically involved with Ji-Sun Song, a popular television personality who hosted MBC Sports+’ Baseball Tonight. On May 7, 2011, Song wrote on her personal blog that she had been battling severe depression as a result of Lim’s treatment of her. A few weeks later, she committed suicide by jumping from her 19th-floor apartment. Lim, once a promising young pitcher for Doosan and the 2007 Rookie of the Year, became one of the most reviled figures in the sport.
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The team’s starting LF, Jae-Hwan Kim, is one of their offensive stars. Last year he put up a 325/.407/.628 line while hitting 37 HRs, which is very hard to accomplish at pitcher-friendly Jamsil. So what’s the problem? Back in 2011, Kim failed a drug test, making it difficult for fans around the KBO to support his rise. He’ll always carry the tag of a PED user, but again, if you’re just here for the success, that probably won’t bother you too much.
Names you may know:
Baltimore Orioles OF Hyun-Soo Kim was a franchise star with the Bears from 2006 to 2015. In both 2008 and 2009, he hit for.357 averages, earning him the nickname “Batting Machine.” Kim hit for a career slash of.318/.406/.488 in 10 seasons before signing with the O’s. As mentioned, RHP Dustin Nippert is the top foreign player in the KBO at the moment, after two mostly unsuccessful stints out of the bullpen for the Diamondbacks and Rangers. RHP Michael Bowden, a former Red Sox prospect, had a solid first season in the KBO (18-7, 3.80 ERA in 180 IP) and is expected to be a rotation anchor this year. Oh, and he also tossed a no-no. Their foreign hitter is a former Met Nick Evans. Like Bowden, Evans was a first-year player in the KBO in 2016 and earned another contract thanks to a solid showing.
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Championship seasons:
1982, 1995, 2001, 2015, 2016
So, have you chosen a team yet? If you want to follow the KBO this season, you can stream the games live via the Naver TV app. Great news: it’s free! Just keep an eye on your data usage. You can download it on Apple or Android phones or even your browser. Here’s a tweet from Dan Kurtz of MyKBO explaining how to use it:
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MyKBO is the ideal way to follow the KBO for English-speakers. Dan does a great job keeping the fans up-to-date with his website and Twitter account. If you know a bit of Korean and want to get into advanced statistics of the KBO, both Statiz and KBReport are great resources. Daniel Kim, a baseball broadcaster for the KBS Network, is another great follow because of his expertise and his English skills. Jeeho Yoo is a reporter for Yonhap News and covers Korean baseball in English. Lastly, I tweet about the KBO all year!
Sung Min Kim writes for River Ave. Blues, and has written for MLB.com, The Washington Post, Baseball America and VICE Sports. Besides baseball writing, he is also passionate about photojournalism and radio broadcasting. Follow him on Twitter @sung_minkim.UXBRIDGE, Mass. -- A convicted sex offender who won $10 million in the Massachusetts Lottery used the jackpot to help him abuse another victim, police said Sunday.
Daniel Shay, 62, of Uxbridge, was arrested Friday on charges he sexually abused a boy for several years, CBS affiliate WPRI-TV reported.
Snay was charged with indecent assault and battery on a child, reckless endangerment of a child, enticement of a child, and dissemination of pornography to a minor. He was scheduled to be arraigned Monday.
The alleged abuse occurred when the boy was between the ages of 8 and 14, police said.
Snay won $10 million on a Massachusetts Lottery scratch card six years ago, and authorities said they believe he used the money to gain favor with people and groom potential victims.
"Mr. Snay was the recipient of a $10 million lottery award and that windfall aided the commission of the crimes," Uxbridge police said in a news release. They did not elaborate.
Police Chief Jeffrey A. Lourie told the Worcester Telegram & Gazette that police believe other assaults may have occurred in Rhode Island and Connecticut.
Snay was convicted six times of indecent assault and battery in the 1970s and 1980s. He was classified as Level 3 on the Massachusetts sex offender registry, meaning there is a high risk of the offender committing another crime.
In 2008, Snay bought a $20 scratch ticket at a convenience store in Hopedale, Mass., and won $10 million.Image credit: cptHappyDrug on DeviantArt.
As PC gamers, we love to debate the merits of the various configurations our hobby allows. Some of us swear by our ultrawide monitor, a 14-button mouse, or the type of switches that sit underneath our keys. Others have strong feelings |
substantial weight to the objective reasonableness of the losing party’s position. The answer, as both decisions below held, is yes—the court should. But the court must also give due consideration to all other circumstances relevant to granting fees; and it retains discretion, in light of those factors, to make an award even when the losing party advanced a reasonable claim or defense. Because we are not certain that the lower courts here understood the full scope of that discretion, we return the case for further consideration of the prevailing party’s fee application.
The court heard oral arguments in this case in April after granting certiorari [JURIST reports] in January.
This is the second time this case has been before the Supreme Court. In 2013 the court ruled [JURIST report] that the “first sale” doctrine [17 USC § 109(a)] applies to imported works. When Supap Kirtsaeng came to study at Cornell University, he realized that the same textbooks his peers used were sold at drastically lower prices in his home country of Thailand. He had his family buy the books for him, and he resold them to classmates, accruing approximately $100,000 in profit.Front Psychol. 2016; 7: 344. doi: 10.3389/fpsyg.2016.00344 PMCID: PMC4793186 PMID: 27014151 Grammatical Gender in American Norwegian Heritage Language: Stability or Attrition? 1,2,* and 2,1 Terje Lohndal 1Department of Language and Literature, Norwegian University of Science and Technology, Trondheim, Norway 2Department of Language and Culture, University of Tromsø The Arctic University of Norway, Tromsø, Norway Find articles by Terje Lohndal Marit Westergaard 1Department of Language and Literature, Norwegian University of Science and Technology, Trondheim, Norway 2Department of Language and Culture, University of Tromsø The Arctic University of Norway, Tromsø, Norway Find articles by Marit Westergaard Author information Article notes Copyright and License information Disclaimer 1Department of Language and Literature, Norwegian University of Science and Technology, Trondheim, Norway 2Department of Language and Culture, University of Tromsø The Arctic University of Norway, Tromsø, Norway Edited by: F-Xavier Alario, Aix–Marseille Université, France Reviewed by: Marit Lobben, University of Oslo, Norway; Silvina Montrul, University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, USA *Correspondence: Terje Lohndal on.untn@ladnhol.ejret This article was submitted to Language Sciences, a section of the journal Frontiers in Psychology Copyright © 2016 Lohndal and Westergaard. This is an open-access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (CC BY). The use, distribution or reproduction in other forums is permitted, provided the original author(s) or licensor are credited and that the original publication in this journal is cited, in accordance with accepted academic practice. No use, distribution or reproduction is permitted which does not comply with these terms.
Abstract This paper investigates possible attrition/change in the gender system of Norwegian heritage language spoken in America. Based on data from 50 speakers in the Corpus of American Norwegian Speech (CANS), we show that the three-gender system is to some extent retained, although considerable overgeneralization of the masculine (the most frequent gender) is attested. This affects both feminine and neuter gender forms, while declension class markers such as the definite suffix remain unaffected. We argue that the gender category is vulnerable due to the lack of transparency of gender assignment in Norwegian. Furthermore, unlike incomplete acquisition, which may result in a somewhat different or reduced gender system, attrition is more likely to lead to general erosion, eventually leading to complete loss of gender. Keywords: acquisition, American Norwegian, declension class, gender, heritage language
Introduction In his seminal study, Corbett (1991, p. 2) states that “[g]ender is the most puzzling of the grammatical categories.” It involves the interaction of several components: morphology, syntax, semantics, phonology, as well as knowledge about the real world. Languages also differ in terms of how many (if any) genders they have. This means that gender is a property of language which must be inferred from the input to which both child and adult learners of a language have to be finely attuned. We follow Hockett (1958, p. 231) in defining gender as follows: “Genders are classes of nouns reflected in the behavior of associated words.” This means that gender is expressed as agreement between the noun and other elements in the noun phrase or in the clause and that affixes on the noun expressing e.g., case, number or definiteness are not exponents of gender (Corbett, 1991, p. 146). We refer to the marking on the noun itself as an expression of declension class (cf. Enger, 2004; Enger and Corbett, 2012; see also Kürschner and Nübling, 2011 for a general discussion of the difference between gender and declension class in the Germanic languages). This has an interesting consequence for the definite article in Norwegian, which is a suffix (more on this below). A distinction is also commonly made between gender assignment and gender agreement. Gender assignment is what is typically referred to as an inherent property of the noun, e.g., bil (M) “car” and hus (N) “house,” while gender agreement refers to agreement on other targets that is dependent on the gender of the noun, e.g., the indefinite articles and adjectives in en.M fin.M bil (M) “a nice car” and et.N fint.N hus (N) “a nice house”1. The literature also differentiates between lexical vs. referential gender (Dahl, 2000), or in the terminology of Corbett (1991), syntactic vs. semantic gender. The former refers to the inherent and invariable gender of a noun, e.g., papa “daddy” in Russian, which is always masculine, whereas the other refers to cases where gender depends on the referent, e.g., vrac “doctor,” which may take either feminine or masculine agreement. In this article, we provide a case study of gender assignment in a population of heritage speakers of Norwegian who have lived their entire lives in America, often without ever visiting Norway. We follow Haugen (1953) in referring to this variety as American Norwegian, and here we study whether the use of gender differs in any way from the traditional use of gender in Norwegian dialects. We are also interested in the nature of possible discrepancies. This will provide important information on how gender systems may change over time, especially in contexts with reduced input and use, and we compare the situation in American Norwegian to heritage Russian spoken in the US. As Polinsky (2008, p. 40) emphasizes, “[s]ince very little is actually known about heritage language speakers, studying different aspects of language structure in this population is important.” The current paper contributes to this end in that it provides an additional investigation into the linguistic structure of heritage languages. The structure of the paper is as follows. In the next section, we introduce gender and its manifestations within the Norwegian noun phrase. We then outline some relevant background from acquisition and heritage contexts, and the following section introduces our research questions, participants, and methodology. We then present our results, followed by a discussion and some concluding remarks.
Gender and the norwegian noun phrase Norwegian dialects traditionally distinguish between three genders: masculine, feminine and neuter. While many languages with gender have reliable morphophonological gender cues, e.g., Spanish or Italian (where a noun ending in –o marks masculine and –a marks feminine), gender assignment in Norwegian is non-transparent. That is, from just hearing a noun, e.g., bil “car,” bok “book,” or hus “house,” a learner cannot make out its gender. It is only when nouns appear with associated words that the gender can be identified, e.g., the indefinite article, as in en.n bil (M), ei.f bok (F), and et.n hus (N). Nevertheless, Trosterud (2001) proposes 43 different assignment rules and argues that they may account for 94% of all nouns in the language. These assignment rules include three general rules, nine morphological rules, three phonological rules, and 28 semantic rules. However, each rule has numerous exceptions, making it less clear if or how this rule-based account could actually predict gender in acquisition situations. Thus, we follow Rodina and Westergaard (2013, 2015a,b) in assuming that the acquisition of gender in Norwegian is opaque and must be learned noun by noun. This makes Norwegian gender a challenging property to acquire in a heritage language situation, where there is typically reduced input (see O'Grady et al., 2011). Norwegian has two written standards, Nynorsk and Bokmål, the latter being by far the dominant one (see Venås, 1993 for more information about the Norwegian language situation). In Bokmål, all feminine nouns may take masculine agreement, which means that this written variety may use only two genders, common and neuter. The historical reason for this is that Bokmål is a development of the Danish written standard, and in Danish (as well as in Swedish and Dutch) the gender system has been reduced from one that distinguished three genders to one that generally only has two. The three-gender system has generally been retained in spoken Norwegian, in virtually all dialects (except Bergen and parts of Oslo). However, some recent studies indicate that a change from a three-gender system to a two-gender system is underway in the Tromsø dialect (Rodina and Westergaard, 2015a). More about this below. Norwegian noun phrase syntax is relatively complex, and it has been extensively discussed in the literature; see Delsing (1993), Vangsnes (1999), and Julien (2005). Here we only discuss aspects of the noun phrase that are relevant for gender. Norwegian dialects also differ considerably with respect to the specific morphological marking on nouns. Table provides an overview of the three-way gender system (based on the written Bokmål norm). Table 1 Gender Masculine Feminine Neuter Indefinite en hest a horse ei seng a bed et hus a house Definite hesten horse. def senga bed. def huset house. def Double den hesten den senga det huset definite that horse. def that bed. def that house. def Adjective en fin hest ei fin seng et fint hus a nice horse a nice bed a nice house Possessive min hest/hesten mi seng/senga mi mitt hus/huset mitt min my bed/bed. def my my my hourse/house. def my horse/horse. def my my Open in a separate window Gender in Norwegian is mainly expressed inside the noun phrase (and on predicative adjectives, not discussed in this article). Thus, gender is marked on the indefinite article, e.g., en “a.m,” ei “a.f,” and et “a.n,” and on adjectives, where we find syncretism between M and F forms2. As shown in Table, the definite article in Norwegian is a suffix, e.g., hesten “the horse,” senga “the bed,” huset “the house.” Some traditional grammars of Norwegian analyze the post-nominal definite suffix as an expression of gender (e.g., Faarlund et al., 1997), mainly because it is derived diachronically from postnominal demonstratives (separate words), which used to be marked for gender. Given our definition in the Introduction, however, these suffixes do not express gender, but should be considered to be declension class markers. Since the definite suffix is sometimes considered to express gender, also in current work (e.g., Johannessen and Larsson, 2015), it is worth pausing to consider the evidence in favor of suffixes being declension class markers. This view is most prominently articulated by Lødrup (2011), based on a careful investigation of (a variety of) the Oslo dialect, where the feminine gender is argued to have been lost. The main piece of evidence is that despite the –a suffix (definite article) appearing on previously feminine nouns, all associated words are inflected as masculine in this dialect. Thus, the pattern is en bok “a.m book,” but boka “the book” (with the definite suffix for feminines). All adjectives and possessives are masculine, with the exception of certain instances of postnominal possessives. Together, these facts indicate that the gender of these nouns is M and that the suffix is indicating something that is not gender. Lødrup (2011), following Enger (2004), argues that the suffix expresses declension class, the inflection that is used for definite forms. As Alexiadou (2004, p. 25) points out, “[…] inflection class […] is never relevant for the purposes of agreement. It merely groups nouns into classes, which do not determine any further properties.” In essence, then, the distinction between gender markers and declension class markers is based on different properties: The latter is always a bound morpheme and appears on the noun itself, whereas the former do not appear on the noun. Following Corbett and Fedden (2015), it could be argued that in systems where gender markers and declension class markers align, we have a canonical gender system, whereas the Oslo dialect exhibits a non-canonical gender system, where the definiteness suffix does not encode gender. Gender is also marked on possessives, which may be either pre- or post-nominal. Note that the noun is marked for definiteness when the possessor appears after the noun. In contrast, the definite suffix is impossible if the possessor is prenominal. According to Anderssen and Westergaard (2012), who have investigated both the NoTa corpus of adult speech (Oslo)3 as well as a corpus of child-directed speech recorded in Tromsø (Anderssen, 2006), the frequency of the postnominal possessor construction is much higher than the prenominal one (attested approximately 75%). The proportion of the postnominal possessor construction has been found to be even higher in American Norwegian heritage language, as the majority of the speakers investigated (N = 34) produce virtually only this word order (Westergaard and Anderssen, 2015). This is relevant for our investigation of gender, as it has been argued that the possessor is not an exponent of gender when it is placed postnominally (cf. Lødrup, 2011). This means that it could be treated like a declension class marker just like the definite suffix, and as just mentioned, the postnominal possessive also retains the feminine form much more than the prenominal one. We return to this in the Section Our study: Participants, Hypotheses and Methodology. Finally, we should note that Norwegian exhibits a phenomenon called double definiteness, requiring that definiteness be marked twice in certain contexts, notably in demonstratives and in modified noun phrases. This means that definiteness is marked both on a pre-nominal determiner and on the suffix. While double definiteness adds complexity to the Norwegian noun phrase, it is also worth noting that in case of the prenominal determiner, there is again syncretism between M and F forms (cf. Table ).
Grammatical gender in acquisition and attrition The acquisition of gender Grammatical gender is a complex linguistic phenomenon. A child or a second language learner acquiring a language with gender thus often has to internalize a range of different cues that contribute to determining the gender of a given noun. For the acquisition of grammatical gender in Norwegian, the lack of transparency of gender assignment has been shown to be a major challenge. While gender is typically acquired around the age of three in languages with a transparent gender system, such as Russian (e.g., Gvozdev, 1961) or many Romance languages (e.g., Eichler et al., 2012, on various bilingual Romance-German combinations), gender has been shown to be in place relatively late in Norwegian. Based on corpora of two monolingual and two bilingual (Norwegian-English) children (age approximately 2–3), Rodina and Westergaard (2013) found considerable overgeneralization of masculine forms (by far the most frequent forms in the input) to both feminine and neuter nouns (63 and 71% respectively). In a more recent experimental study of somewhat older children and adults, Rodina and Westergaard (2015a) find that neuter gender is not in place (at 90% accuracy; cf. Brown, 1973) until the age of approximately 7. It is also shown that the feminine is even more vulnerable among the older children. Rodina and Westergaard argue that this latter finding is due to an ongoing change in the dialect (Tromsø) from a three-gender system to a two-gender system, common and neuter. In both studies, they also show that, while proper gender forms such as the indefinite article are late acquired, the corresponding declension class markers (e.g., the definite suffix) are target-consistently in place from early on. In fact, the acquisition pattern for indefinite and definite forms are the mirror image of one another at an early stage, with non-target-consistent production around 90% for the former category and only about 10% for the latter. This means that young children typically produce the masculine form of the indefinite article with nouns of all three genders (e.g., en.M hest (M) “a horse,” en.m seng (F) “a bed,” en.m hus (N) “a house,” cf. Table ), while the definite suffix is target-consistent (hesten “the horse,” senga “the bed,” huset “the house”). Results confirming this pattern are also attested in an experimental study of bilingual Norwegian-Russian children (Rodina and Westergaard, 2015b). These findings show that learners do not create an immediate link between the definite suffix and the agreement forms, indicating that the two belong to different systems and thus support the distinction between gender and declension class in Lødrup (2011). Gender in heritage language situations Over the past 20 years, there has been an increasing focus on the language of heritage speakers. We adopt the following definition of a heritage language: “A language qualifies as a heritage language if it is a language spoken at home or otherwise readily available to young children, and crucially this language is not a dominant language of the larger (national) society (Rothman, 2009, p. 156; see also e.g., Rothman, 2007; Polinsky, 2008; Benmamoun et al., 2013). One characteristic of heritage grammars is that they may be different from that of speakers acquiring the same language as a majority language due to incomplete acquisition (e.g., Polinsky, 1997, 2006; Montrul, 2002, 2008; Sorace, 2004; Tsimpli et al., 2004) or attrition (e.g., Pascual y Cabo and Rothman, 2012; Putnam and Sánchez, 2013). That means that a heritage language grammar may represent a change compared to the grammar of the previous generation as well as the relevant non-heritage variety. The baseline language for a heritage speaker is the language of exposure during childhood. This means that a heritage speaker of Russian in the US should not strictly speaking be compared to a speaker of Russian in Russia. This makes studying heritage languages quite challenging, given that it is often difficult to establish the relevant properties of the primary linguistic data that the learners have been exposed to. Due to this lack of data across generations, a comparison is often made between the heritage language grammar and the non-heritage variety—with the caveat that the latter does not necessarily represent the input to the generation of heritage speakers studied. This is what we have had to do in the current study. Heritage speakers also differ from non-heritage speakers of the same language with respect to the amount of variation attested in their production; while some speakers have a fairly stable grammar, others display a more variable grammar, not applying rules consistently (see Montrul, 2008 for discussion). It is well known that for heritage speakers, the amount of input and use of the language during childhood varies (see Montrul et al., 2008, among many others). Given the complexity of gender, it is to be expected that heritage speakers face difficulties with this part of the grammar. This has been investigated for Russian heritage language in the US by Polinsky (2008). Like Norwegian, Russian has three genders: masculine, feminine, and neuter; see Corbett (1991, pp. 34–43) and Comrie et al. (1996, pp. 104–117) for further details and references. According to Corbett (1991, p. 78) the distribution of the three genders is M 46%, F 41%, and N 13%. Gender agreement is marked on adjectives, participles, demonstratives, possessive pronouns, past tense verbs and some numerals, and gender assignment is relatively transparent in that M nouns typically end in a consonant, F nouns in –a, and N nouns in –o. There are also some classes of nouns with non-transparent gender assignment. Given somewhat reduced input, heritage speakers are typically exposed to fewer cues for gender assignment than children learning non-heritage Russian. Polinsky (1997, 2006) shows that less proficient American Russian speakers do not fully master the complex system of declension classes. In Polinsky (2008, p. 55), she demonstrates that two new gender systems have developed among the heritage speakers, both somewhat different from that of the non-heritage variety: (1) a three-gender system used by the more proficient speakers, differing from the non-heritage variety in that opaque N nouns ending in an unstressed –o are produced with F gender (i.e., they are pronounced with a schwa and therefore confused with the feminine ending –a), and (2) a two-gender system produced by the less proficient speakers where all N nouns have migrated to F. It is speculated that the latter speakers do not master the complex system of declensional case endings, and in the absence of this knowledge, they are relying on a purely phonological cue, i.e., whether the noun in its base form (Nominative singular) ends in a consonant or a vowel. The two systems are described in (1)–(2). More proficient speakers: Three-gender system nouns ending in a consonant are M nouns ending in a stressed –o are N all other nouns are F (i.e., including nouns ending in an unstressed –o, which are N in non-heritage Russian) Less proficient speakers: Two-gender system nouns ending in a consonant are M nouns ending in a vowel are F In a recent study of Norwegian-Russian bilingual children growing up in Norway (age 4–8), Rodina and Westergaard (2015b) find an even more reduced gender system in some of the children. The amount of input is argued to be crucial: While children with two Russian-speaking parents are virtually identical to monolingual children growing up in Russia, the bilinguals with the least amount of input (only one Russian-speaking parent who does not use Russian consistently with the children) have considerable problems with gender, not just the opaque nouns, but also the transparent ones. In fact, some of these children produce almost exclusively masculine forms, overgeneralizing them to feminine nouns 77% and to neuters as much as 94%, which means that they do not seem to have any gender distinctions at all. Since these children are only up to 8 years of age, follow-up studies are necessary in order to find out whether they will eventually converge on the target, or whether they are developing a Russian heritage variety without gender. Gender and diachronic change It is well known that M and F genders have collapsed into common gender (C) in many Germanic languages and dialects. This change has taken place e.g., in Dutch, Danish, and the Bergen dialect of Norwegian (Jahr, 1998; Nesse, 2002; Trudgill, 2013). Furthermore, Conzett et al. (2011) have attested a similar change in certain dialects in North Norway (Kåfjord and Nordreisa). This region has had extensive language contact with Saami and Kven/Finnish, languages which do not have grammatical gender. This language contact is argued to have caused a reduction of the gender system of the Norwegian spoken in this area from three to two (C and N). At the same time the declension system is intact. This means that while the feminine indefinite article ei “a.f” is virtually non-existent in the data, the corresponding definite suffix still has the –a ending typical of F nouns. This is illustrated in (3). (3) a. en bok - boka
a. c book. c - book. f.def This pattern is identical to what Lødrup (2011) found for Oslo speech (cf. the Section Gender and the Norwegian Noun Phrase above). The cause of the change in Oslo is generally argued to be sociolinguistic: The Bokmål written standard allows the use of only two genders, and a spoken version of this variety enjoys a high social prestige in certain speaker groups. Thus, the three-gender system of the traditional dialects has gradually become associated with something rural and old-fashioned. The pattern attested means that a reduced gender system has developed in both areas (common and neuter), but at the same time a more complex declension system, in that the new common gender has two declension classes in the definite form, i.e., en bil–bilen “a car–the car” and en bok–boka “a book–the book.” Even more recent research is providing us with data on a real-time case of language change. Based on an experimental study, Rodina and Westergaard (2015a) demonstrate that F gender is rapidly disappearing from the speech of children and young adults in Tromsø: The F indefinite article is replaced by M, yielding common gender, but as in Oslo and Kåfjord/Nordreisa, the definite suffix is still preserved in its F form. Note that this pattern is also identical to what has been attested in early Norwegian child language (cf. the Section The Acquisition of Gender). While Rodina and Westergaard (2015a) also assume that the cause of this change is sociolinguistic, they argue that the nature of the change is due to acquisition: While the N forms are saliently different from the other two genders, there is considerable syncretism between M and F (e.g., adjectives and prenominal determiners), making it more difficult to distinguish the two in the acquisition process (cf. Table ). Furthermore, while the real gender forms are very late acquired (around age 5–7), the declensional suffixes are target-consistently in place very early (around age 2), cf. Anderssen (2006) and Rodina and Westergaard (2013). Thus, the late acquired forms are the ones that are vulnerable to change. The three studies briefly presented here demonstrate that F gender is disappearing or already lost from several Norwegian dialects. We would thus expect that F gender should be vulnerable in an acquisition context where there is somewhat reduced input, e.g., in a heritage language situation. In the following sections, we present our study of gender in American Norwegian.
Our study: participants, hypotheses, and methodology Norwegian heritage language in america According to Johannessen and Salmons (2012, p. 10), Norwegian immigration started in 1825, when the first Norwegians arrived in New York. By 1930, as many as 810,000 people had arrived in the US and an additional 40,000 in Canada. In the US, they settled mostly in the Midwest, predominantly in the Dakotas, Illinois, Iowa, Minnesota, and Wisconsin. The Norwegians built churches and schools and also had their own newspapers, Decorah-Posten and Nordisk Tidende. According to Johannessen and Salmons (2012, p. 6) 55,465 people reported Norwegian as their home language in the 2000 US Census. However, most of the current heritage speakers are above 70 years of age. American Norwegian as a heritage language can thus be said to be in its final stages (cf. Johannessen and Salmons, 2012). American Norwegian was first documented and studied by Haugen (1953), based on fieldwork in the late 1930s and 1940s and subsequently, this heritage language was studied by Hjelde (1992, 1996). More recently, extensive fieldwork has been conducted in connection with the NorAmDiaSyn project, and data have been collected from a number of 2nd to 4th generation immigrants who learned Norwegian as their L1 from parents and grandparents. According to Haugen (1953, p. 340), the first immigrants were from the west coast of Norway, but around 1850, large numbers came from rural Eastern parts of Norway (Johannessen and Salmons, 2015, p. 10). It is mainly these Eastern varieties that are spoken today: Johannessen and Salmons (2015) remark that in 2010 it was difficult to find speakers of western dialects. For most of the immigrants, there was little or no support for Norwegian language in the community. Consequently, these speakers have generally been bilingual since the age of 5–6, and they have been dominant in English since this time. The background information offered about the corpus participants is relatively sparse: Year of birth, language of schooling and confirmation, literacy in Norwegian, number of visits to Norway as well as other contact with the country. In addition, we know which generation immigrant they report to be, and for some of them, the year their family arrived in the US. There is no information about the amount of use of Norwegian in adulthood. The language of schooling is English for all of them (except two informants for which this information is missing), and the large majority (43/50) had their confirmation in English. Contact with Norway varies between “some” and “often,” and many have never visited the country. Typically, these heritage speakers have never had any instruction in Norwegian, and most of them have no literacy skills in the language. The majority of the participants are between 70 and 100 years old today, and as they have not passed on the language to the next generation, they do not have many people to communicate with in Norwegian. Thus, most of these heritage speakers hardly ever use Norwegian any more, and at the time of the CANS recordings, many of the participants had not uttered a word of Norwegian for years, one participant for as long as 50 years. The initial impression of their Norwegian proficiency is that it is quite rusty, but once these speakers warm up, many properties of the language turn out to be intact (Johannessen and Laake, 2015). Given the language profile of these learners (monolingual Norwegian speakers until school age, predominantly English dominant in adult life, and hardly using Norwegian at all in old age) it is possible that any discrepancies between their language and the non-heritage variety should be due to attrition rather than incomplete acquisition. So far, data from 50 informants have been transcribed and now make up the Corpus of American Norwegian Speech (CANS) (Johannessen, 2015). This corpus consists of speech data collected through interviews (by an investigator from Norway) and conversations among pairs of heritage speakers. Each recording lasts approximately a half hour to an hour, meaning that there is relatively sparse data per informant. Hypotheses and predictions Based on the properties of the gender system of Norwegian and previous research on gender in acquisition and change, we formulate the following hypotheses and predictions for American Norwegian: (4) Hypotheses Gender is vulnerable in American Norwegian Gender forms and declensional suffixes behave differently F is more vulnerable than N due to syncretism with M
(5) Predictions Speakers will overgeneralize M gender forms Declensional suffixes will be retained F will be affected first; i.e., (some speakers of) American Norwegian will have a two-gender system (common and neuter)
We expect gender to be vulnerable in a situation with reduced input such as Norwegian heritage language, especially given the non-transparency of the gender system and the relatively late acquisition attested by Rodina and Westergaard (2015a). We also expect to see a difference between forms that express gender proper (i.e., agreement) and the declensional endings, which has been attested in previous research on both acquisition and change (e.g., Lødrup, 2011; Rodina and Westergaard, 2013). Finally, as in Russian heritage language and in many Germanic varieties, we may also see reductions in the gender system, either from a three- to a two-gender system (common and neuter) or to a system where gender breaks down completely. Methodology We have used CANS to probe the usage of gender in American Norwegian. We have generally excluded English loan words appearing with gender marking (see Flom, 1926; Hjelde, 1996; Nygård and Åfarli, 2013; Alexiadou et al., 2015 on this issue)4. Our main focus here is on gender assignment, and we have therefore also disregarded agreement between different gender forms within the nominal phrase. We have searched CANS for the following forms: (6) a. the indefinite article followed by a noun (occasionally with an intervening adjective)
b. possessives
c. definite forms We have also compared the data from the CANS corpus to a sample of the Nordic Dialect Corpus (Johannessen et al., 2009). This allows us to compare the gender system of American Norwegian to that of contemporary Norwegian. We would like to emphasize that we obviously do not assume that the heritage speakers recorded in the CANS corpus were exposed to a variety of Norwegian that is identical to the non-heritage variety spoken today. But we are interested in investigating possible changes in the heritage variety, possibly across several generations, and these are the data we have available to make the comparison. We have used the part of the Nordic Dialect Corpus which covers the dialects spoken in the Eastern part of Norway (excluding the capital, Oslo), the area from which most of the ancestors of the heritage speakers originate. The Nordic Dialect Corpus consists of structured conversations between speakers of the same dialect and as such, the two corpora are comparable with respect to the recording situations. In the Nordic Dialect Corpus, speakers are classified as either “old” (over 50) or “young” (under 30), where most of the informants in the two groups are in their 60s and 20s respectively. The corpus was recorded between 2008 and 2011. Both corpora have been transcribed into a dialect version and a standardized Bokmål transcription. The corpora are tagged, and the transcriptions are directly linked to the recordings. In CANS, we found that in several cases, the Bokmål transcription had standardized the gender according to the Bokmål official dictionary, even when the informants actually used a different gender. Thus, we have had to check the recordings carefully in order to be sure that we had reliable transcriptions. We generally did not find errors in the dialect version (corresponding to the pronunciation), which made us trust that this transcription is sufficiently correct for our present purposes. Furthermore, there are some instances where the F indefinite article has been transcribed simply as /e/. We have listened to all of these and in all cases the informants seem to be saying the feminine form /ei/. They have therefore been counted as occurrences of the F indefinite article. Compound nouns (e.g., skolehus “school house”) have been counted separately. In Norwegian, the right-hand part of the compound is always the head noun and thus determines the gender. For several of the compound words in the corpus, the right-hand noun also occurs independently (e.g., hus “house”). Instances where the noun was not uttered completely were disregarded. In cases where speakers correct themselves as in (7a), we only counted the latter form. Examples have also been counted if they occur in what would be considered an ungrammatical or unidiomatic structure in Norwegian, e.g., (7b), which is presumably a direct translation of an English expression. (7) a. ei # en familie (flom_MN_02gm)
a. f # a. m family. m
b. vi hadde en god tid (portland_ND_01gm)
we had a. m good time. f
Target form (intended meaning): vi hadde det morsomt [lit.: we had it fun] With these methodological considerations in mind, let us move on to the results of our study.
Results Gender marking on the indefinite article—overall results Our search in CANS first of all revealed that all three gender forms are attested in the data. Examples illustrating the use of the three indefinite articles en, ei, and et (M, F, and N) are provided in (8)–(10). In these examples, the gender marking is entirely in line with what we would expect in present-day non-heritage Norwegian. It is also worth noticing that although there is some language mixing between English and Norwegian here, the sentences are predominantly Norwegian in structure and lexicon. (8) vi kjøpte en butikk (blair_WI_04gk) we bought a.m store( m ) “we bought a store”
(9) og ei uke sia så h- visita vi parken i Blair and a. f week( f ) ago so visited we park.def in Blair her (blair_WI_01gm) here “a week ago we visited the park in Blair here”
(10) we got har bare et tre (coon_valley_WI_04gm) we got have only a. n tree( n ) “we only got one tree” In a study of the Nynorsk dictionary (Hovdenak et al., 1998), which is the written norm that is closest to the contemporary dialects, Trosterud ( |
in the case of Mr Chambers.CTVNews.ca Staff
The wait to board TTC buses and streetcars may become lengthier for parents with young children, as transit staff are weighing in on restricting the number of strollers allowed onboard.
The touchy topic of baby strollers came up during Monday’s TTC meeting after a Toronto resident complained that buggies can prevent riders from getting on and off the vehicles, especially during rush hour.
“When you see six baby strollers on a bus, the drivers are put in a very bad position,” 61-year-old Elsa La Rosa told TTC commissioners. “Number one, they can’t pick up any other passengers at a bus stop. Number two, if one of the baby strollers wants to get off, everybody has to get off the bus and then get back on the bus again.
“It’s like something out of a comedy act,” she said.
La Rosa suggested limiting the amount of strollers allowed on the vehicles -- two during peak times and three at other times.
TTC chair Karen Stintz asked staff to look into the issue and possible solutions. A report is expected within the next couple of months.
La Rosa also urged commissioners to impose a $2 charge for strollers, but TTC CEO Andy Byford told CP24 on Tuesday that the transit agency has no plans to impose an extra fare.
“I think that would be wrong. Parents with toddlers rely on the TTC, often they don’t have cars,” Byford said. “I don’t think it’s at all acceptable to charge for strollers, so there’s no way we’re going to do that.”
Byford did say, however, that the agency must come to a “sensible solution” when it comes to strollers on TTC vehicles.
“On occasion we have buses that are very, very full, and it may be on limited occasions that we have to say we’re going to only allow a number of strollers on to maintain safety,” he said. “But I want to get everyone on board.”
Byford said the introduction of bigger buses and streetcars planned for this year may help alleviate the problem.
One mom who spoke to CTV Toronto on Tuesday said the TTC is meant to make Toronto more accessible for all residents – including parents with strollers.
“I can’t carry my child and my bags at the same time, so it’s a safety issue,” she said. “I need to have the stroller and if it weren’t for the TTC, I’d be trapped in my house.”(CNN) -- A former Wal-Mart employee who suffered severe brain damage in a traffic accident won't have to pay back the company for the cost of her medical care, Wal-Mart told the family Tuesday.
Debbie Shank, 52, has severe brain damage after a traffic accident in May 2000.
"Occasionally, others help us step back and look at a situation in a different way. This is one of those times," Wal-Mart Executive Vice President Pat Curran said in a letter. "We have all been moved by Ms. Shank's extraordinary situation."
Eight years ago, Debbie Shank was stocking shelves for the retail giant and signed up for Wal-Mart's health and benefits plan.
After a tractor-trailer slammed into her minivan, the 52-year-old mother of three lost much of her short-term memory and was confined to a wheelchair. She now lives in a nursing home.
She also lost her 18-year-old son, Jeremy, who was killed shortly after arriving in Iraq. When Debbie Shank asks family members how her son is doing and they remind her that he's dead, she weeps as if hearing the news for the first time.
Wal-Mart's health care plan lets the retail giant recoup the cost of its expenses if an employee collects damages in a lawsuit. And Wal-Mart set out to do just that after Shank and her husband, Jim, won $1 million after suing the trucking company involved in the wreck. After legal fees, the couple received $417,000.
Wal-Mart sued the Shanks to recoup $470,000 it paid for her medical care. However, a court ruled that the company could only recoup about $275,000 -- the amount that was left in a trust fund for her care.
The Shanks appealed to the U.S. Supreme Court, but the court declined in March to hear the case. CNN told the couple's story last week, prompting thousands of angry blog responses and at least two online petitions to boycott the company.
On Tuesday, Wal-Mart said in a letter to Jim Shank that it is modifying its health care plan to allow "more discretion" in individual cases. Watch Wal-Mart reverse its decision »
"We wanted you to know that Wal-Mart will not seek any reimbursement for the money already spent on Ms. Shank's care, and we will work with you to ensure the remaining amounts in the trust can be used for her ongoing care," Curran said.
"We are sorry for any additional stress this uncertainty has placed on you and your family."
Wal-Mart's reversal came as shock to Shank.
"I thought it was an April Fool's joke," he told CNN.
"I (would) just like to let them know that they did the right thing. I just wish it hadn't taken so long," Shank said. "But I thank them and I hope they come through with all that they said they're going to do. E-mail to a friend
All About Wal-Mart Stores Inc. • U.S. Supreme CourtJeremy Buckingham MLC via flickr The New York Times' Mark Scott is reporting a previously unknown player in the energy industry could be sitting on untapped natural gas deposits that outmatch some Arabian states.
"Up and down the country's shoreline, Western energy companies, as well as a number of Asian competitors, are drilling wells thousands of feet below the Indian Ocean in hopes of striking it rich," Scott writes.
The country?
Mozambique.
Anadarko recently revised its estimates of recoverable reserves in the East African nation from 10 to, at most, 30 trillion cubic feet.
That's more than Kuwait and equal with Iran.
"This could be one of the most important natural gas fields discovered in the last 10 years," Anadarko Chairman Jim Hackett said.
Scott adds that the entire East African nation could be flush. Kenya and Tanzania have also seen major foreign investments in exploration.U.S. military base in New York gets its power from biomass, something the Energy Department says shows commercial potential. File photo by Gary C. Caskey/UPI | License Photo
May 9 (UPI) -- A renewable energy project at a military installation in northern New York shows that biomass is a feasible power solution, the U.S. government said.
The U.S. Energy Department singled out Fort Drum as an example for how biomass could serve to address energy security needs through renewable energy solutions.
ReEnergy Holdings operates the Black River facility and the Army base and converts woody biomass into enough energy to meet Fort Drum's annual needs.
"The facility is supplying power to Fort Drum under the terms of a 20-year renewable energy supply agreement that commenced in the fall of 2014," the U.S. Energy Department said in a profile. "At the time of the agreement's signing, the facility was the largest renewable energy project in the history of the U.S. Army."
RELATED Pentagon concerned about lifting offshore drilling moratorium
More than a decade ago, the U.S. Agriculture and Energy Departments announced nearly $17.5 million in funds for 17 biomass research projects. The grants were aimed at developing technologies to help make bio-based fuels cost-competitive with fossil fuels in the marketplace.
Under former President Barack Obama, the Department of Defense in 2014 called for the addition of 3 gigawatts worth of renewable energy to help meet the electricity demands of military facilities. The mandate was part of a broader departmental directive to use renewable energy resources for at least 25 percent of its energy consumption.
In the wake of the 2014 initiative, defense company Lockheed Martin formed a commercial line that would focus on expanding into the energy technology market.
RELATED New York set for offshore wind after environmental review
The Energy Department said the Fort Drum operation is covered under an 11-year contract that includes arrangements with local growers to source the fuels needed for the power facility.
"This project marks a significant step forward in demonstrating the commercial viability of short-rotation woody biomass crops," the department said.Thank you, Baylor Police!
In a time of danger — say, a fire breaks out, or a crime is committed — most of us will run away; that’s just human nature. Thankfully, we have first responders — such as Baylor University Police Department (BUPD) officers — who run to the scene, even into harm’s way, to help keep us safe.
We saw that in action last October, when a gunman wanted for murder in a neighborhood south of campus was reportedly seen heading toward campus. As students and staff went on lockdown, Baylor police officers went into action, patrolling the campus and surrounding streets and coordinating with local law enforcement to ensure the safety of students. In short, they ran towards uncertainty and danger so the Baylor family on campus could stay out of harm’s way.
We don’t often stop to think about it, but these men and women play an important part in supporting the Baylor mission — both by proactively protecting Baylor students and by coming to the aid of students when needed. God has a purpose for each and every person on this campus; BUPD officers aim to keep our students safe so that they can fulfill that purpose.
Thankfully, events such as the one in October are the exception and not the norm — but there are no off-days for members of the BUPD. When classes are in session and campus is teeming with nearly 20,000 students, professors, staff members and visitors, Baylor police are on the job. And when things are quieter, like over Christmas break and other holidays, BUPD is still patrolling the streets around campus, keeping an eye on students’ homes and property.
But the men and women protecting campus aren’t just security guards; they are fully trained police officers. BUPD’s 37 officers have a combined 300+ years of law enforcement experience, led by Police Chief Brad Wigtil, who assumed the helm of the department in a newly reorganized Baylor Department of Public Safety in 2014. Under his leadership, BUPD has focused on “community policing,” getting to know students and staff better through involvement with campus organizations and events. The goal, says Wigtil, is relationship, which leads to trust and better partnership. — and that, in the end, can help us all stay safer.
Sic ’em, Baylor Police!Sir Roger Moore, who played James Bond in seven movies, has died at the age of 89.
In a statement on Tuesday, Moore's children wrote that he died in Switzerland after a "short but brave battle with cancer."
Moore is one of the actors most tied to the James Bond franchise. He played Agent 007 in seven consecutive films from 1973 to 1985, starting with "Live and Let Die."
Photo gallery: Remembering Sir Roger Moore
Before playing Bond, Moore was best known for starring in "The Saint," a British spy TV series that aired for 118 episodes from 1962 to 1969.
Moore was also known for his philanthropic work. In 1999, he was knighted for his work with various charities.
He also wrote several books, including 2012's "Bond on Bond: The Ultimate Book on 50 Years of Bond Movies."
Photo gallery: Celebrities we've lost in 2017
"Thank you Pops for being you, and for being so very special to so many people," his family wrote after Moore's passing.
With the heaviest of hearts, we must share the awful news that our father, Sir Roger Moore, passed away today. We are all devastated. pic.twitter.com/6dhiA6dnVg — Sir Roger Moore (@sirrogermoore) May 23, 2017
Clint Davis covers entertainment and trending news topics for the Scripps National Desk. Follow him on Twitter @MrClintDavis.The trade speculation that has been circling around Kevin Love all offseason might finally be reaching its logical conclusion. A potential deal sending Love to the Cleveland Cavaliers for a package likely including Andrew Wiggins and Anthony Bennett is a matter of "when, not if," according to Marc Stein of ESPN.
The Chicago Bulls and Golden State Warriors had also been in the hunt for Love, but Minnesota has reportedly narrowed in on Cleveland's offer. Golden State remains hung up on including shooting guard Klay Thompson in the deal, and Chicago can't match the upside of a player such as Wiggins in any potential package for Love.
Cleveland's offer is likely to include the last two No. 1 overall draft picks in Wiggins and Bennett in addition to future draft picks. Love will reportedly still opt out of his contract next season, though it's strictly so he could secure a long-term deal next summer. Love is reportedly intrigued with the idea of playing with LeBron James for the long term.
James' decision to go back to Cleveland in free agency ignited the Love-to-Cleveland rumors earlier this month. James made his announcement in a letter with Sports Illustrated, and didn't name Wiggins and Bennett alongside other members of the Cavs who he said he was excited to play with.
Love turns 26 years old before the start of next season and just posted one of the most impressive individual seasons in the NBA. He finished third in PER behind only James and MVP Kevin Durant while averaging 26.1 points and 12.5 rebounds per game. He'll be the third member of James' new "big three", joining LeBron and point guard Kyrie Irving. It would give Cleveland three players earning max contracts well into the future assuming Love extends his deal a year from now.
Love has drawn criticism for never taking the Timberwolves to the playoffs, but Minnesota would have had no such problems if it played in the Eastern Conference. The Wolves finished the season with a point-differential of +2.7, higher than two Western Conference playoff teams. In the East, three teams made the postseason with a negative point differential.
Wiggins is the big fish in the trade for Minnesota. He would join Zach LaVine and Gorgui Dieng on the Wolves in what already looks like an enviable young core. Minnesota is also reportedly going after Thaddeus Young of the Philadelphia 76ers to replace Love at power forward. That may be a sign Minnesota isn't terribly high on Bennett, who had an underwhelming rookie season in Cleveland.
Wiggins cannot be traded for 30 days following the signature on his rookie contract, which happened last week. That means the deal sending Love to Cleveland won't be official for at least three weeks, but an agreement can be reached in principle whenever the teams decide on the supplemental pieces to the package.CLEVELAND, Ohio -- Hillary Clinton and Donald Trump's race for Ohio remains a toss-up, with a new poll finding the two presumptive nominees are tied in the perennial battleground state.
The Quinnipiac University poll, released Tuesday, found Clinton and Trump tied at 40 percent. That compares to a May 10 poll that showed Trump leading Clinton in Ohio 43 percent 39 percent.
While the variation is within the poll's margin of error, Clinton's upward trend in Ohio is consistent with other recent state polling -- Clinton, the Democratic former Secretary of State, has led Trump, the Republican real-estate mogul, in three out of the last four surveys of Ohio voters tracked by RealClearPolitics.com.
The university conducted the new poll between June 8 and June 19 -- the deadly mass shooting on Orlando, Fla., took place on June 12 -- and surveyed 971 Ohio voters, with live interviewers calling a mix of land lines and cell phones. It found voters viewed Clinton as being more intelligent and prepared, as well as better able to tackle immigration issues and international crises.
Meanwhile, voters viewed Trump as more honest and trustworthy, and being stronger on job creation and terrorism.
The poll also found that 59 percent of Ohioans viewed Trump's assertion that an American-born judge hearing a lawsuit involving Trump University was biased against him because of his Mexican heritage as racist, compared to 33 percent who did not. While 32 percent of Republican voters did not view Trump's statements as racist, 88 percent of Democrats and 54 percent of independent voters did.
A majority of Ohioans continue to view both candidates unfavorably -- Clinton's unfavorablity rating was 59 percent, compared to 35 percent who viewed her favorably. Trump's unfavorability rating also was 59 percent, compared to 32 percent favorable.
Quinnipiac released the Ohio polling results alongside surveys in Pennsylvania and Florida, two other battleground states.
While the Pennsylvania results were similar to the university's polling last month -- showing Clinton leading 42 percent to 41 percent -- Clinton pulled out a 47 percent to 39 percent lead in Florida, expanding on a one-point lead in May.
Florida has a larger Latino voting base than the other two states -- about 18 percent of Florida voters are Hispanic, compared to about 5 percent in Pennsylvania and 2 percent in Ohio, according to the Pew Research Center.BEIJING, June 8 (Reuters) - The body of an American mountain climber has been found in southwest China, while a search continues for two other climbers who disappeared last month while trying to scale Mount Edgar.
The body of Jonathan Copp, 35, was found on an ice sheet about 4,000 meters above sea level, the China Daily said. The summit of Mount Edgar, or Mount Gongga in Chinese, is 6,400 meters above sea level in Luding County, Sichuan Province.
The head of China’s national climbing team was helping in the search for Wade Johnson and Micah Dash, who with Copp were scheduled to have returned from their climb about May 28. Friends reported them missing to the U.S. consulate in Chengdu, the capital of Sichuan province, on June 4.
Copp was one of the founders of the Adventure Film Festival, which has appealed for help in the search on its website, www.adventurefilm.org.
Fog and landslides are impeding the search, the China Daily said, adding the three may have encountered an avalanche.
Mount Edgar is part of a series of steep and snowy ranges formed as the Tibet-Qinghai plateau pushed into the Sichuan basin.
Two other American climbers, Christine Boskoff and Charles Fowler, died in late 2006 while climbing further west in Sichuan. (Reporting by Lucy Hornby; Editing by Ken Wills and Valerie Lee)We’ve reached Round 3 of our Superhero Showdown bracket game. Some of the most famous comic book heroes in history have fallen by the wayside in the bloody battle to decide which costumed crimefighter is the Greatest Superhero Ever. (So long, Hulk! Farewell, Punisher! Sayonara, Wonder Woman!) The eight remaining contestants are a diverse bunch. Four come from Marvel; three come from DC; and the dark horse contender hails from, well, Dark Horse. You can vote today in a pair of quarter-final matches guaranteed to split your geek brain asunder. First, a top-seeded global icon will face off against a relative newcomer: It’s Superman vs. Hellboy, with the latter fresh from a pair of bruising upset victories over Ghost Rider and Captain Marvel. Then, one of Marvel’s most beloved characters will face off against a misunderstood DC comeback kid: It’s Spider-Man vs. Green Lantern. (Green Lantern’s only weakness: Yellow. Spider-Man’s only weakness: Existential angst.)
Click on the image above for a printable bracket. Check out our pocket biographies of each superhero, and scroll to the bottom of each page to register your vote. Voting will conclude in exactly 48 hours, at 1:00 PM EST on August 18. Be sure to check back tomorrow for a pair of truly thrilling superhero showdowns: Batman vs. Wolverine, and Captain America vs. Iron Man.
Northwest Regional Final: Superman vs. Hellboy
Name: Superman
Origin Story: On a dying planet, a child is shot into space by his parents, given a chance at a new life on in a faraway place. The orphan’s ship crashlands in Kansas, where he’s discovered by a childless, utterly American couple. Oh, and when he grows up, he’s faster than a speeding bullet, more powerful than a locomotive…
Costume: You could argue that all superhero costumes are just riffs on Superman’s iconic look: The bright colors, the cape, the color-matched boots and exterior underwear.
Coolest Power/Ability: Anything you can do, Superman can do a million times better. He’s superstrong. He’s superfast. He can fly. But Supes also has a whole array of more subtle powers, and of that bunch, it’s hard to argue against the eternal usefulness of heat vision.
Defining Stories: Alan Moore’s “Whatever Happened to the Man of Tomorrow,” and Grant Morrison’s “All-Star Superman” are both fantastic modern explorations of the Superman myth — at once playful, deconstructive, and tragic.
Cultural legacy: Superman is the foundation for pretty much the entire superhero genre. Many major characters that came after him directly riffed on his iconography. (Just look at the number of characters on our bracket who grew up as orphans.) Richard Donner’s 1978′s Superman movie established the basic template for the superhero-movie — a genre that has now conquered Hollywood. Superman is also one of the most famous fictional characters ever. In the last quarter decade, though, Superman’s actual cultural influence has been significantly eclipsed by his darker, grittier, less impenetrably invincible buddy Batman. Can next year’s Man of Steel return the character to his past prominence? —Darren Franich
Name: Hellboy
Origin Story: A demonic creature summoned to earth by the magician Rasputin to help the Nazis, Hellboy was instead raised by the army and trained to take on supernatural threats to America.
Costume: Hellboy is a big red guy with a tail, a pair of horns he shaves regularly, and a right hand made of stone. But that doesn’t mean he can’t be fashionable! Hence: The never-out-of-style tan trenchcoat.
Coolest Power/Ability: Remember that stone hand we mentioned? That’s called the Right Hand of Doom. It’s actually the key to releasing the Ogdru Jahad, the creatures who will cause the end of the world. Which means that Hellboy holds the Apocalypse in his right hand. Heavy.
Defining Stories: The first Hellboy miniseries, Seed of Destruction, is a great introduction to the character, and to creator Mike Mignola’s impressive mix of no-bull procedural and cosmic mythmaking. There are plenty of great Hellboy one-offs, but lately, Mignola has been telling grander serialized stories – the best of which, The Wild Hunt, delves deeper into Hellboy’s backstory.
Cultural Legacy: Hellboy is a creator-owned comic book that freely combines folklore, H.P. Lovecraft, world history, and Kolchak: The Night Stalker into one gloriously weird package. It doesn’t really seem like the fodder for a major Hollywood movie…which makes it all the more impressive that Ron Perlman played Hellboy in two major motion pictures directed by Guillermo Del Toro. (And some of us really like Hellboy 2. Like, I mean really, really, really like Hellboy 2.) Although the movies Hollywoodize the character ever so slightly, Hellboy is the rare comic book character to cross over into the mainstream with pretty much all of his weirdness and rough edges intact. —Darren Franich
NEXT PAGE: Spider-Man vs. Green LanternTicketmaster is launching a new ticketing system that can passively check attendees into events using audio data from smartphones to reduce entry wait time. Rather than manually scanning a QR code or a barcode from a paper ticket, a “smart tone” technology can receive attendee’s data over their smartphone’s ultrasonic sound transmission to verify their mobile ticket and ID, allowing people to cruise in simply by showing a green approved screen on their phones.
The new check-in method is part of Ticketmaster’s new e-ticketing system called Presence, which comes as a partnership with Lisnr, a Cincinnati-based company that previously worked with event-planning startup Splash and Jaguar Land Rover. With Jaguar, for example, the company can identify the driver’s seat preferences and automatically adjust the settings by recognizing sound information sent from their unique smartphone.
“Presence uses a variety of proximity-based digital technology like NFC, RFID, and even sound through our partnership with LISNR, to enhance the fan experience and provide a new tool for venues to decrease fraud and understand who is attending events,” says Justin Burleigh, EVP of Product for Ticketmaster North America.
full global roll out expected in the next four years
Since the e-ticket is tied to an individual’s account from a unique smartphone, Ticketmaster hopes the new check-in system can prevent fake tickets from being sold. For those who don’t want to use their smartphone, Presence tech can also be built into wallet-sized “Smart Tickets” that users can tap to enter a venue. According to VentureBeat, gaining access to a particular attendee’s smartphone also grants event venues precise geo-locations of each guest, allowing organizers to send personalized messages to individuals even as they move within the venue. In the future, Ticketmaster plan to add shopping capability with this sound recognition technology, so guests can purchase food and drink from their seats without waiting in line at concessions. The idea is similar to Google’s Nearby feature which lets users interact with surrounding services and devices that are between 30 to 100 feet in proximity.
Presence is currently in place at 32 venues across North America, and the company expects a full global roll out to take place over the next four years.
Update July 7th, 12:25PM: This story has been updated with more clarification from Ticketmaster.Written by: Dave Owen
The world’s first robot hotel will open in a Japanese theme park
You won’t have to worry about tipping the staff in a new hotel being built in Japan, as all of them will be mildly unsettling androids for whom money is absurd and meaningless.
Apparently learning nothing from a longstanding and highly regarded canon of dystopian fiction, the Henn-na Hotel will be partially staffed by artificial humans called ‘Actroids.’ These will greet you, carry your luggage, smile at your patronising jokes, and haunt your sleep until you die.
The hotel will be located inside the Huis Ten Bosch theme park, just outside the city of Nagasaki, which has the general aim of recreating a stereotypically Dutch town. So the addition of androids makes total sense.
The Actroid android was developed at Osaka University, and has been undergoing refinements since it was first unveiled in 2003. They are designed to eerily resemble Japanese women, who can speak Japanese, Mandarin, Korean, and English, make hand gestures, reciprocate eye movements, and murder you when you least expect it (feature not yet confirmed).
Three androids will serve as receptionists, four will be porter and service robots, and others will work as cloak room attendants and cleaners. We expect it will be the latter that spark the revolution that heralds the end of mankind and fills the streets with blood.
The minimum room rate will be a surprisingly reasonable ¥7000 (£40), which is significantly cheaper than other hotels in the park. This might be because the use of androids cuts running costs. Or it might be because the staff look like this:
Fortunately there will also be 10 human members of staff. We hope they have guns. Big guns.Next year will be a pivotal one for the United States' credit standing.
Moody's said Tuesday it would likely strip the United States of its sterling AAA rating if lawmakers fail to produce a long-term debt reduction plan next year.
But if negotiations go well, the rating agency said, it would probably affirm the country's AAA rating and change its outlook to "stable" from "negative." A negative outlook suggests the rating could be downgraded over the medium term.
Thanks to the political brinksmanship that governed last summer's debt ceiling standoff, Standard & Poor's was the first agency to lower the country's AAA rating. Moody's and Fitch decided to stand pat, although they did lower their outlooks to "negative."
There are a lot of ways to approach substantial debt reduction. One of the most abrupt would be to simply let all the measures that make up the so-called fiscal cliff take effect next year.
The fiscal cliff -- which consists of a series of tax increases and spending cuts -- would curb the debt by roughly $7 trillion over a decade.
But it would also threaten the economy in the short term.
And if that's the course Congress chooses or simply fails to avoid, Moody's said it would likely maintain its negative outlook on the U.S. AAA rating.
Boehner 'not confident at all' about budget deal
"[The agency] would then need evidence that the economy could recover from the shock before it would consider returning to a stable outlook," Moody's said.
Another factor influencing Moody's outlook: the debt ceiling, which will probably need to be raised by early next year. Currently the outlook assumes that Congress will increase it "in a relatively orderly process." But Moody's said it would put the U.S. rating under review during negotiations over the debt limit.
What the effects of another downgrade would be are unclear. In the wake of S&P's downgrade in August 2011, stocks plummeted for a time but the country's 10-year Treasury rate actually fell and has since been trading at or near historic lows.
"Markets are impervious to the whims of the credit rating agencies and instead what really matters is the economic fundamentals and other factors that drive the bond market," economic analysis firm Capital Economics said in a note Tuesday.
The firm predicted that Treasury yields may stay close to 1.5% over the next couple of years due to slow economic growth, low inflation, loose monetary policy and the country's reputation as a safe haven amid the political and fiscal problems in Europe.
But that doesn't let lawmakers off the hook, Capital Economics said.
"Unless Congress agrees [to] a credible medium-term fiscal plan, at some point the markets will lose patience."Fiji have named a team stacked with NRL talent to face Toa Samoa on Saturday, October 8 in Samoa.
Wests Tigers speedster Kevin Naiqama, Roosters forwards Kane Evans and Eloni Vunakece, Panthers centre Waqa Blake, Manly hooker Apoisai Koroisau and Knights forward Korbin Sims are among the NRL regulars set to line up for Fiji.
Toa Somoa v Fiji Bati
Saturday, October 8, 2016
Apia Park, Samoa
Fiji Bati
1. Kevin Naiqama (Wests Tigers)
2. Tyrone Phillips (Canterbury-Bankstown Bulldogs)
3. Waqa Blake (Penrith Panthers)
4. Brayden Williame (Manly-Warringah Sea Eagles)
5. Marcelo Montoya (Canterbury-Bankstown Bulldogs)
6. Sitveni Moceidreke (North Sydney Bears)
7. Henry Raiwalui (Wentworthville Magpies)
8. Vitale Roqica (Cronulla Sharks)
9. Apisai Koroisau (Manly-Warringah Sea Eagles)
10. Kane Evans (Sydney Roosters)
11. Viliame Kikau (Penrith Panthers)
12. Eloni Vunakece (Sydney Roosters)
13. Korbin Sims (Newcastle Knights)
14. Erevonu (Tui) Kamikamica (Melbourne Storm)
15. Petero (Ben) Nakubuwai (Melbourne Storm)
16. Pio Seci (Fiji)
17. James Storer (Port Kembla – Illawarra)
18. Saimoni Lomaloma (Fiji)
Coach: Mick PotterWhether readers want to learn the complexities of how the Mars Curiosity rover was able to enter the Red Planet's atmosphere or just see photos of cats being weird, they can go to Reddit. The social news site announced today its end-of-year stats and it appears that users are frequenting the site at an ever-increasing rate.
Reddit revealed that in 2012 it received 37 billion page views, 400 million unique visitors, and 30 million posts -- not bad for one of the most simple Web sites on the Internet.
The site's user population has skyrocketed since its inception. According to The Next Web, Reddit achieved 1 billion monthly page views in February 2011 and by December of that year it more than doubled that number. By October 2012, the site recorded more than 3.8 billion monthly page views and more than 46 million unique visitors.
The huge increase in traffic means Reddit has had to add more servers and other equipment and bring in more staff to maintain its site. This growth has forced it to spend money to keep up with the flow, while also promoting paid subscriptions and advertising.
One of the ways Reddit has driven more traffic to its site this past year is by hosting high-level AMAs, or "ask me anything" sessions. In August, Reddit hosted President Barack Obama, whose impromptu hour-long interview crippled the site's servers. Reddit has also done AMAs with the Mars Curiosity rover team, Gangnam Style's PSY, and U.S. Rep. Zoe Lofgren who asked users for ideas on a bill to protect Web sites accused of copyright violations.
Here are Reddit's top 10 posts of 2012 by page view:
I am Barack Obama, President of the United States -- AMA (5,598,171 page views) What's your "picture you can't see without laughing"? (2,450,140 page views) What's your favorite picture on the whole Internet? (2,148,400 page views) Reddit, what do you look like before and after makeup? Is there a real difference? (2,142,071 page views) Today, a homeless looking man handed me $50 and this note. Do any of you have any idea what it means? (1,756,748 page views) What GIF makes you laugh every single time? (1,749,185 page views) I've been playing the same game of Civilization II for almost 10 years. This is the result. (1,651,956 page views) I am South Korean Singer, Rapper, Composer, Dancer and Creator of Gangnam Style PSY. AMA (1,514,034 page views) What's your secret that could literally ruin your life if it came out? (1,482,935 page views) I'm Snoop Lion! Ask me anything!! (1,467,071 page views)Image copyright SBNA Image caption Annie-Laure Promonet managed to hang on to her laptop during the burglary
A woman said she deliberately scratched a burglar while he was trying to steal her laptop in order to get his DNA.
Annie-Laure Promonet, 42, found a man in her home in Watford, Hertfordshire, on 22 July and attempted to stop him.
Police were able to take scrapings from under her fingernails and found traces of tissue from Marvyn Mulvey, 40.
Mulvey admitted burglary and assault occasioning actual bodily harm and was jailed for seven and a half years at St Albans Crown Court on Friday.
Prosecutor Richard Jones told the court Ms Promonet had "made it her aim" to scratch Mulvey to obtain his DNA.
After the hearing, Ms Promonet said: "I thought I had to see his face, see if I could get his DNA, while all the time trying to memorise the clothes he was wearing.
"I didn't have time to panic. Maybe if I'd had a few more seconds then I would have realised it was a dangerous thing to do."
Image copyright SBNA Image caption Marvyn Mulvey was jailed for seven and a half years
During the burglary, Mulvey used a wine bottle to beat Ms Promonet to the floor, leaving her with bruising to her body and head injuries.
She managed to hold on to her laptop, but Mulvey took a key to her flat and left.
He was later traced through his DNA and was arrested.
Judge Graham Arran said Ms Promonet had shown a "very cool head" during the burglary.
"She did what was was necessary to bring this defendant to justice and showed enormous bravery in preventing him escaping from her flat," he said.
At a crown court ceremony, Ms Promonet will be given an award of £350 out of public funds for her bravery.
In a letter to the judge, Mulvey apologised and said: "What I have put her though, no-one should have to go through."Marcos Madrid on qualifying for Rio
The Road to Rio is one Mexico's Marcos Madrid will likely never forget in his lifetime. Why you may ask? Because he succeeded in his biggest career goal after falling at the final hurdle on numerous occasions in the past. This year he overcame the odds and will compete in his first Olympic Games. Marcos is a friendly and humble athlete who works incredibly hard, it has been my pleasure to spend some time with him in a handful or tournaments and I'm thrilled that he has reached this goal, he is very deserving of it! Congratulations Marcos! :)These moments were very difficult for me especially after losing 3 times in the final moments to qualify for Olympics. For Beijing I was 9-7 up in the 7th and lost 11-9 against Dexter St Louis, this was my first big defeat. I was totally destroyed. All the effort I made, I felt like it was for nothing, for 2-3 months I was very sad and could not believe it.4 years later for London 2012 I played the final of the Pan American Games against Liu Song. I beat him in the team events but in the singles where the qualification spot was, I could not beat him. This was very hard because the tournament was in Mexico and in front of 3000 people supporting me, I lost the ticket for London.Following that, the Olympic Qualification for London 2012 I thought I was in my best shape but from the beginning of the tournament I didn't play too well, maybe too much stress and thinking forward of what may happen if I reach the final again and I lost in the final (the 3rd and final ticket) again, this time against Andy Pereira.So some very difficult moments in my life and in my career but I was sure that one day I would qualify.Now I'm playing in France for Caen in the first league. My preparation was more specific and also more cool and less stressed. I just wanted to play my game and enjoy the feeling that the sport gives me. So also it was very important to work on my mental preparation with my coach so that I was always thinking in the present and not about the future (and what could happen in the final stages etc.)Maybe in the last 3 chances I had |
making.
The caucuses kick off the 2016 presidential nominating contests, marking a new phase in a tumultuous election that has exposed Americans' deep frustration with Washington and given rise to candidates few expected to challenge for their party's nomination when they first entered the race.
After months of campaigning and more than $200 million spent on advertising, the race for supremacy in Iowa is close in both parties. Among Republicans, Trump appears to hold a slim edge over Cruz, a fiery senator from Texas. Clinton and Sanders entered Monday in a surprisingly tight Democratic race, reviving memories of the former secretary of state's disappointing showing in Iowa eight years ago.
"Stick with me," Clinton said as she rallied supporters Sunday in Council Bluffs. "Stick with a plan. Stick with experience."
Sanders, the Vermont senator who has been generating big, youthful crowds across the state, urged voters to help him "make history" with a win in Iowa.
In a show of financial strength, Sanders' campaign announced Sunday it had raised $20 million in January alone. While Sanders has a large team in Iowa, his operation got off to a later start, particularly compared with Clinton, who has had staff on the ground in the state for nearly a year.
Monday's contest will also offer the first hard evidence of whether Trump can turn the legion of fans drawn to his plain-spoken populism into voters. The scope of the billionaire's organization in Iowa is a mystery, though Trump himself has intensified his campaign schedule during the final sprint, including a pair of rallies Monday.
Cruz has modeled his campaign after past Iowa winners, visiting all of the state's 99 counties and courting influential evangelical and conservative leaders. With the state seemingly tailor-made for his brand of uncompromising conservatism, a loss to Trump will likely be viewed as a failure to meet expectations.
Seeking to tamp down expectations, Cruz said Sunday that he's just pleased to be in the mix for first place.
"If you had told me a year ago that two days out from the Iowa caucuses we would be neck and neck, effectively tied for first place in the state of Iowa, I would have been thrilled," Cruz said.
Cruz has spent the closing days of the Iowa campaign focused intensely on Marco Rubio, trying to ensure the Florida senator doesn't inch into second place. Rubio is viewed by many Republicans as a more mainstream alternative to Trump and Cruz, though he'll need to stay competitive in Iowa in order to maintain his viability.
The campaigns were anxiously keeping an eye on the weather. A snowfall forecast to start Monday night appeared more likely to hinder the hopefuls in their rush out of Iowa than the voters. Republican John Kasich already had decamped to New Hampshire, with New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie and former Florida Gov. Jeb Bush following behind Monday afternoon, hours before the caucuses start.
The trio of governors has had a light footprint in Iowa, banking instead on strong showings in New Hampshire's Feb. 9 primary to jumpstart their White House bids. Yet some Republican leaders worry that if Trump or Cruz pull off a big victory in Iowa, it would be difficult to slow their momentum.
Bush, for example, started the year as a fundraising juggernaut. But according to records released Sunday, both his super PAC and campaign fundraising declined significantly in the later months of 2015 as he struggled to keep up with Trump.
Unlike in primaries, where voters can cast their ballots throughout the day, the caucuses begin across Iowa at 7 p.m. CST. Democrats will gather at 1,100 locations and Republicans at nearly 900 spots.
Turnout was expected to be high. The Iowa Republican Party expected GOP turnout to top the previous record of 120,000 people in 2012. Democrats also expect a strong turnout, though not nearly as large as the record-setting 240,000 people who caucused in the 2008 contest between Clinton, Barack Obama and John Edwards.
Iowa has decidedly mixed results in picking the parties' eventual nominees. The past two Republican caucus winners - former Arkansas Gov. Mike Huckabee and former Pennsylvania Sen. Rick Santorum - faded as the race stretched on. But Obama's unexpected 2008 victory was instrumental in his path to the nomination, easing the anxieties of those who worried the young black senator would struggle to win white voters.
While both parties caucus on the same night, they do so with different rules.
Republicans vote by private ballot. The state's 30 Republican delegates are awarded proportionally based on the stateside vote.
Democrats take a more interactive approach, with voters forming groups and publicly declaring their support for a candidate. If the number of people in any group is fewer than 15 percent of the total, they can either choose not to participate or can join another viable candidate's group.
Those numbers are awarded proportionately, based on statewide and congressional district voting, as Iowa Democrats determine their 44 delegates to the national convention.Five stories that have North Texas talking: Dallas is the best market to invest in housing in 2017; the last man to walk on the moon died in Houston Monday; the Cowboys loss Sunday was the most-watched NFL divisional playoff game ever; and more.
Dallas is the best market to invest in housing in 2017, according to a list Forbes published this month. By 2020, home prices in Dallas are expected to grow by 31 percent, the highest growth of any city listed. That projection is based on Dallas' 6.2 percent population growth in three years (2012-2015), 3.9 percent job gains last year and 9 percent annual home price gains. "Homes in Dallas are also undervalued compared historic averages and local income,” according to Forbes. Dallas has an average home price of $233,000, which is up 3.9 percent from a year ago and about $35,000 less than the national average.
Climbing five spots from last year’s list, Dallas ranks No. 1 among 20 markets (cities with populations no less than 500,000 people). The Forbes study conducted with Local Market Monitor began with 330 markets that were narrowed down by performance across five metrics: annual job growth, three-year population growth, annual home price growth, affordability and Local Market Monitor’s own three-year home price forecast, which Forbes used to rank the list in 2016. Texas not only holds the top spot on the 2017 list but the second most spots overall, with Forth Worth at No. 9 and San Antonio at 20. Here’s the full methodology and 2017 rankings.
Gene Cernan, the last person to walk on the moon, died on Monday at age 82. The former astronaut was surrounded by relatives when he died at a Houston hospital, family spokeswoman Melissa Wren told The Associated Press. AP reports: “Cernan was commander of NASA's Apollo 17 mission and on his third space flight when set foot on the lunar surface in December 1972. He became the last of only a dozen men to walk on the moon on Dec. 14, 1972 — tracing his only child's initials in the dust before climbing the ladder of the lunar module the last time. It was a moment that forever defined him in both the public eye and his own.” [The Associated Press]
You may have heard about Texas’ so-called bathroom bill, but what does it entail? The Texas Tribune has annotated Senate Bill 6 to clarify what the controversial bill would mean for transgender Texans. Essentially, the bill would require members of the transgender community to use bathrooms in public schools, government buildings and public universities based on “biological sex.” The Tribune reports: “The measure would also pre-empt local nondiscrimination ordinances that allow transgender Texans to use the bathroom that corresponds with their gender identity.” Read the annotated bill. [The Texas Tribune]
As if the Dallas Cowboys’ loss wasn’t enough, it was watched by millions of people. Green Bay's 34-31 win over Dallas was seen by an average of 48.5 million on Fox, the most-viewed NFL divisional playoff game ever. The Associated Press reports: “The game Sunday had a 26.1 rating and 46 share, the network said Monday, the highest-rated NFC divisional game since 1997. The rating is the percentage of television households tuned to a program, and the share is the percentage watching a telecast among those homes with TVs on at the time.” [The Associated Press]Not to be confused with Zerahemnah
Map showing current sites with red dots and possible Book of Mormon sites with black dots; Zarahemla placed in modern-day Chiapas state of Mexico.
According to the beliefs of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, Zarahemla ()[1] refers to a large city in the ancient Americas which is described in the Book of Mormon. It also is used to refer to a large political division, and a minor character in the book.[2] The Book of Mormon is revered by members of various Latter Day Saint churches as sacred scripture. Archaeologists and historians have not been able to archaeologically verify a location for the city. (See Archaeology and the Book of Mormon for more detail about the archaeological debate between Mormons and mainstream archaeologists).
Mormon studies [ edit ]
Some Mormons speculate that the name "Zarahemla" is a compound Biblical Hebrew name זֶרַע חֶמְלָה Zéraʻ Ḥemlah meaning "seed of compassion". Others interpret the name differently.[3]
Hugh Nibley relates the name to a'red city'[4]
It always got me because there's an important trading centre in the middle of the Sahara that goes by the name of 'Dar Al-Hamra' which means 'the Red City'. Of course it depends on the dialect. Zarahemla means'red city', but what attracts me about it is that the Hopis say that their people came from the 'great red city of the south' when it was destroyed.
Narrative [ edit ]
According to the Book of Mormon, the Nephite Mosiah and his followers "discovered that the people of Zarahemla came out from Jerusalem at the time that Zedekiah king of Judah, was carried away captive into Babylon" (about 587 B.C.)[5] The Book of Mormon relates that the surviving seed of Zedekiah "journeyed in the wilderness, and were brought by the hand of the Lord across the great waters" to the Western Hemisphere.[6] The book of Omni in the Book of Mormon tells how Zarahemla and his people came to settle the land of Zarahemla in the New World. Mosiah and his refugee people presumably united with the people of Zarahemla sometime between 279 and 130 B.C. "Mosiah was appointed to be their king."[7] Mosiah thereafter presided in the land of Zarahemla over a people called collectively "the Nephites". The Land of Zarahemla was the Nephite capital for many years.
Notable Book of Mormon descendents of the leader Zarahemla include Ammon the venturer and Coriantumr the dissenter. Ammon led a quest in search of a colony that had left the land of Zarahemla in order to resettle a city named Lehi-Nephi.[8] The dissenter Coriantumr led the Lamanites in battle against the Nephites in the first century B.C.[9]
At some point before Mosiah discovered Zarahemla, the people of Zarahemla had discovered Coriantumr (not to be confused with the later Nephite dissenter of the same name). According to the Book of Mormon, Coriantumr was the last of a destroyed nation called the Jaredites. Coriantumr stayed with the people of Zarahemla "for the space of nine moons" (Omni 1:21) before dying and being buried by them (Ether 13:21).
Benjamin succeeded his father Mosiah as the second Nephite king of Zarahemla. King Benjamin was victorious in driving Lamanites enemies from the Zarahemla region.[10]
At the time of the crucifixion of Christ, the Book of Mormon records that "there were exceedingly sharp lightnings, such as never had been known in all the land. And the city of Zarahemla did take fire." [11] "And it came to pass that there was a voice heard among all the inhabitants of the earth... 'because of their iniquity and abominations... that great city Zarahemla have I burned with fire, and the inhabitants thereof... I am Jesus Christ, the Son of God.'" (3 Nephi, 9: 1, 2, 3, 15.) The Book of Mormon indicates that "the great city of Zarahemla" was rebuilt sometime in the first century A.D.[12] As his doomed nation retreated northward from their enemies, the 4th century prophet and historian Mormon recorded that Nephite "towns, and villages, and cities were burned with fire."[13] The Book of Mormon does not indicate whether the city of Zarahemla survived to be occupied by Lamanites after the destruction of the Nephite nation.
In Mormon culture [ edit ]
The name "Zarahemla" was given to a small Mormon settlement across the Mississippi River from Nauvoo.[14] In August 1841 a conference was held there during which John Smith was sustained as president of the stake in Iowa, with David Pettigrew and M. C. Nickerson as his counselors.[15] The stake was dissolved three years later; a second stake for Iowa would not be organized until 1966.[16]
Zarahemla was the original name of Blanchardville, Wisconsin, founded in the 1840s by Strangite Mormons. The village received its present name after it was platted in 1857.
"Zarahemla" is a song on the album Axe by guitarist Randy Bachman.
In 2003, a board game, The Settlers of Zarahemla, was produced. This game was intended to be similar to The Settlers of Catan, another popular board game, but targeted at a Mormon audience and set in a Book of Mormon setting. It was published by Inspiration Games in conjunction with the German company that owns the rights to Catan.
The name has also been adopted by Zarahemla Books, according to publisher/owner Christopher Bigelow, because it's "instantly recognizable to any Mormon insider, but it's just an exotic-sounding name to any outsider."[17]
Passage to Zarahemla is an adventure film directed and written by Chris Heimerdinger. It tells the story of a young pair of siblings seeking to find a new life following the abrupt death of their mother. Their exploits lead them to a relative's home in Utah and eventually a thrilling confrontation with their past and the merger of time.Uber
Ride-hailing service Uber has finally given in to Seoul officials who have been trying to suspend its operations in South Korea's capital over the last several months.
Uber has discontinued its UberX service -- which charges less than its standard service by using smaller, more fuel-efficient cars -- in Seoul after deciding that the move would be in the "best interests" of everyone involved. This marks a significant change in direction for the company, which has been offering its service in Seoul despite protests from local officials.
"After consulting with Seoul City Transport Division, and taking their advice, we determined it was in the best interests of Korean riders, drivers and the community as a whole to further define our business offerings within the current confines of the regulatory framework, without ambiguity," San Francisco-based Uber wrote in a blog post Thursday.
Uber, a service that allows people to find crowd-sourced rides via a smartphone app, has been working to upend the taxi industry worldwide. Uber has spread to 55 countries since its founding six years ago but has also faced a significant number of legal roadblocks from both governments and taxi companies.
Uber started testing its service in Seoul last year, but before its cars even hit the road, officials warned the company that it would be operating illegally if it went ahead. When Uber started its trial anyway, Seoul authorities said they would arrest drivers operating through Uber.
In December, Uber officially launched its service in Seoul, saying that the issue was mainly due to its service being "a new concept."
"According to a third-party survey, 90 percent of our customers support our service. 95 percent of our users also responded that they already have or intend to recommend the service to family and friends," Uber said of its service in Seoul.
Just weeks after the official launch, prosecutors in Seoul charged the company with violating public-transportation law. Uber CEO Travis Kalanick was specifically cited in the indictment, and if found guilty, could face up to two years in prison or pay a fine of 20 million won (about $18,000).
The same day, Seoul announced a rewards program that would pay people more than $900 to tattle on Uber drivers and users.
Uber's ongoing troubles with Seoul reached a tipping point last month when the company announced that it would offer its car-hailing service for free in Seoul. The move, Uber said at the time, would be designed to establish "a consensus" with government officials in Seoul. Soon after, those officials said it didn't address the real issues and continued to push for a suspension.
The row over Uber's legality is just another in a long line of issues the company is facing around the world. Uber has faced cease-and-desist orders in Pennsylvania and Virginia and was forced to suspend service in Nevada and Portland, Ore., in the face of government resistance. The service was also banned last year from Delhi, India, after a passenger was allegedly raped by an Uber driver. Spain, too, has said the service is illegal.
Earlier this week, officials in the Japanese city of Fukuoka cracked down on Uber, saying that it violates the law by operating an unlicensed taxi service.
In addition to capitulating in its long battle with Seoul officials, Uber has also extended an olive branch to the city's taxi companies. Uber said it will provide all Seoul taxis with free access to its Uber platform for "innovation and enhancement to their services."
Still, Uber has not given up on Seoul. The company's higher-end limousine service UberBlack will continue to operate in Seoul, and Uber says that it hopes to bring back UberX at some point in the future.
"We stay committed to cooperate to reach a compromise with the city and taxi industry, and look forward to working together to bring regulated options to Seoul," the company wrote in its blog post.
Uber did not immediately respond to a request for comment.Construction workers and their families celebrated a milestone in the Port Mann Bridge improvement project Saturday, as the bridge is now halfway complete.
The new 10-lane bridge is part of the Port Mann Bridge Highway One Improvement Project, which aims to reduce commuter congestion and improve the movement of goods to Asia-Pacific.
Premier Christy Clark thanked the project's 1,500 workers Saturday, calling the bridge "an absolutely incredible feat of human engineering and construction."
"This bridge will make it easier for goods from all across B.C., from all across Canada to leave our ports," she said. "It's also going to mean something different for families, saving commuters up to an hour a day. That's a real difference that you are making every day in people's lives."
The 42 metre-high cable-supported bridge -- at 2,020 metres long and 65 metres wide -- will be the largest in B.C. when it is complete. Five lanes will run in either direction, including a high-occupancy vehicle lane and an additional bicycle lane.
For the first time since 1989, transit buses will be able to run across the bridge after being removed because heavy traffic kept them from maintaining a regular schedule. A new Highway 1 RapidBus service will provide transportation between Langley and Burnaby in less than 25 minutes.
Eight lanes of the bridge will open in late 2012, with all 10 opening the next year. It is replacing the decades-old five-lane Port Mann Bridge, which will be demolished.
An electronic toll on the Port Mann Bridge will also be added -- $3 including tax, said Transportation Minister Blair Lekstrom.
"The intent is once the bridge is paid for, once the capital costs have been recouped, that those tolls would be looked at being removed," he said.
He said it would take about 40 years to pay off, but believed commuters would be willing to pay a toll because the bridge would save them so much time.
Dave Hayer, MLA for Surrey Tynehead, was on site Saturday touring the bridge deck. He stood at the top of the 160-metre bridge tower, looking over his constituency on the south bank.
He said his constituents are excited about the opening of the new bridge.
"Transportation was one of the major issues in my constituency," he said. "From Guildford it should take about 5 minutes to get to the Port Mann Bridge -- but it used to take anywhere from 45 minutes to an hour and 15 minutes," he said.
"Can you imagine driving somewhere that should only take 5 minutes and sit in your car for 45?" He added the bridge would reduce pollution and allow people to spend more time with their families.
The bridge was engineered to allow for a light rail system, which he hopes to see built in the future, Hayer said.
lkane@vancouversun.com
twitter.com/ellekanePeople who thought teens would be using marijuana more because of Arizona's 2010 medical-pot law are wrong, a new study shows.
Combined, the percentage of 8th, 10th and 12th graders who reported using marijuana at least once in their lives went from 29.9 percent before the law passed to 28.7 percent in 2012, according to statistics in the latest Arizona Youth Survey. Conducted by the Arizona Criminal Justice Commission, the project collected questionnaires from more than 60,000 Arizona students in every county.
Reported marijuana use in the last 30 days also went down, from 14.8 percent in 2010 to 14.3 percent this year.
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See also: Teenagers May Get Marijuana From People Who Have Marijuana, Local Media Discovers
Governor Jan Brewer, a staunch opponent to the 2010 Arizona Medical Marijuana Act, remains wary about the impact of the law, says her spokesman, Matt Benson.
"It's too early to tell if we're seeing a true decline in usage," he says.
Still, he admits that the governor "was concerned that the medical marijuana program would lead to an increase an use," and that "we're glad that we havent seen a spike in usage."
A closer look at the numbers reveals that lifetime marijuana use by 10th and 12th graders went up by a few tenths of a percent since 2010, but a 1.6-percent decrease by 8th graders brought the total down for all three grades.
The Arizona Republic and other news outlets focused mainly on the survey's interesting finding that one in nine teen marijuana users, (who themselves are about one-seventh of teens), obtained their marijuana from medical-marijuana cardholders. The survey did not determine if the teens getting the pot from cardholders also got pot from other sources, or if the cardholder had sold the teens pot prior to becoming a cardholder.
But news outlets basically ignored what is arguably a more dramatic finding: That the medical-pot law has not led to an overall increase in teen use, despite pot being in the news constantly in the last two years, and the proliferation of legal home-grown pot and compassion clubs.
Marijuana Deals Near You
We asked Maricopa County Attorney Bill Montgomery today whether he was surprised by the news that fewer teens were using marijuana, or if he expected that result.
Montgomery wrote back, "The decline in reported marijuana use among 8th graders is insignificant when compared to the increase among teens in other grade levels and the substantial proportion of all teens who report they are getting pot from medical marijuana cardholders."
Actually, the decrease among 8th graders was more significant than the increase in the other grades. But we understand his point: Marijuana use by teens is a concern, and so is where they get it.
Will Humble, the director of the Arizona Department of Health Services, which administers the medical-marijuana program, says he won't try to draw conclusions about the survey's findings on just teen pot use. But he is "encouraged" that the survey showed a drop in all substances abused by teens, and a drop in teen drinking and driving.(Image: Science)
The inner workings of a supposedly simple bacterial cell have turned out to be much more sophisticated than expected.
An in-depth “blueprint” of an apparently minimalist species has revealed details that challenge preconceptions about how genes operate. It also brings closer the day when it may be possible to create artificial life.
Mycoplasma pneumoniae, which causes a form of pneumonia in people, has just 689 genes, compared with 25,000 in humans and 4000 or more in most other bacteria. Now a study of its inner workings has revealed that the bacterium has uncanny flexibility and sophistication, allowing it to react fast to changes in its diet and environment.
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“There were a lot of surprises,” says Peer Bork, joint head of the structural and computational biology unit at the European Molecular Biology Laboratory (EMBL) in Heidelberg, Germany. “Although it’s a very tiny genome, it’s much more complicated than we thought.”
Master controllor
The biggest shock was that the organism gets by with just eight gene “switches”, or transcription factors, compared with more than 50 in other bacteria such as Escherichia coli. Transcription factors are generally thought of as the key components enabling living things to respond to environmental conditions by switching genes on and off.
So how does the cell get by with so few “master controllers”? One possibility is that stretches of “antisense RNA” – basically genes copied back to front – stand in for the transcription factors as gene switches.
An even more intriguing possibility is that chemicals thought to serve as food – such as the sugar-like substance glycerol – are signalling messengers in their own right, helping to fine-tune what the cell does and how it reacts to changes in its environment.
Family surprise
Another unexpected discovery was that bacterial genes grouped together in clumps or families called “operons” don’t work as had been thought. The assumption was that if there are four genes in an operon they always work in unison, but the new analyses show that only one, or perhaps two, operate at any one time.
Even more surprising, the proteins the genes make don’t necessarily always couple with their nearest neighbours – again contrary to previous assumptions. Instead, they often join up with proteins originating from other, distant operons, vastly increasing the bacterium’s flexibility and versatility when faced with a changed environment.
“What we’ve learned is that if you want to understand any cell and the protein complexes it makes, you can’t infer what happens from the order the genes are in,” says Anne-Claude Gavin, also at EMBL, who co-led the project.
The protein analysis also revealed that the bacterium compensates for having so few proteins by employing each one in a multitude of functions. “There’s lots of moonlighting going on, as each protein has lots of jobs to do,” says Bork.
Motor position
The researchers produced a “CT scan” of the bacterium, which shows the positions of some its major molecular “motors”, such as ribosome protein factories (see image, above). The image was created by taking an electron tomograph of the bacterium itself.
This initially revealed no more than indistinct blobs. But by using profiles of electron density of similar molecular machines, taken from the scientific literature, and superimposing them on the tomograph image, the researchers were able to identify which blobs were which motors.
The hope is that when the resolution of such images is eventually increased, many of the smaller motors will also be identified, Bork says.
It may even one day be possible to monitor what is going on in real time, establishing exactly how the genes and proteins work together. If this can be achieved, it could help researchers build artificial organisms.
Journal references: Science, DOI: 10.1126/science.1176951 (how M. pneumoniae‘s 700 genes are coordinated and controlled);
DOI: 10.1126/science.1177263 (how the bacterium extracts energy and building materials from food);
DOI: 10.1126/science.1176343 (how proteins made by the 689 genes are bolted together to perform functions)The only element of conservativism that's survived Trump: We must cut Charles Koch's taxes
The Koch brothers have been largely sidelined in the news these days by, well, everything else, but that doesn't mean the pair of billionaire influence-buyers hasn't been busy. Donald Trump may have not been their first, second, or tenth preference to lead the conservative movement but they'll be dead in the cold, cold ground before they miss an opportunity to push through another round of tax cuts aimed specifically at benefiting themselves and their own businesses.
In a major jolt of support for President Trump, the powerful political network overseen by conservative billionaire Charles Koch is launching a multimillion-dollar campaign to drive Trump's tax plan through Congress.
Freedom Partners is all-in on this one, promising "advertising and mobilizing grassroots support." Translated, that likely means a resurgence of gosh-look-how-grassroots-we-are tea party groups showing up in public places with don't tread on me flags and very earnest beliefs about Charles Koch's current tax bracket.
Their interest isn't in a vacuum. Even as scandals swirl around the White House, there seems to be a new push by Republican leadership to pretend that's not going on and that it's now time to talk about tax cuts! Paul Ryan is all in:Former President Bill Clinton provided a rather lively defense of his wife, Hillary Clinton, at campaign stop in Kokomo, IN on Saturday. When the topic of Hillary Clinton’s use of a private server while serving as Secretary of State was brought up, the former president dismissed the FBI’s involvement, and called the entire episode “a game” concocted by Hillary’s opponents.
As you can see at the beginning of the clip, the former president is discussing how Hillary turned over some 55,000 printed pages of e-mails to State after she left. The former president gives the impression that Hillary did this in the name of transparency and openness by trotting out the line, “Nobody had ever done that before” (A similar line used by Democratic Senator Chuck Schumer last summer was ruled mostly false by politifact).
What President Clinton neglected to mention was no other secretary of state has had their own private e-mail server with which to conduct State business. He also failed to mention she deleted over 30,000 emails that she unilaterally determined were “personal.”
President Clinton then transitioned to the next Clinton defense — the claim that all emails were determined to be classified after the fact— therefore, Hillary could not have know she was doing wrong.
Despite strong evidence to the contrary, President Clinton sticks with the defense and uses an analogy to drive his point home:
“If you’re driving in a 50 mile-an-hour zone, and a police officer pulls you over when you’re driving 40, and says ‘I’m sorry, I’ve got to give you a ticket because you know the speed limit here should be 35, and you should have known it,’” Clinton told the audience.
WATCH:
Well, as the Daily Caller notes, Clinton’s analogy fail, miserably. First, Hillary Clinton signed form SF312 in which she acknowledged receiving classified information indoctrination training, including how to identify classified material, regardless of marking. Her oath also imposed a duty on Clinton to ensure information that may be potentially classified later and/or information currently working its way through the classification process was protected.
Furthermore, Clinton also received an additional warning form the NSA about the difficulties in securing blackberry devices. Nonetheless, it appears that Hillary and the majority of her inner circle continued to use Blackberries as their primary email even after the NSA warning.
Former President Clinton ends this portion of the speech by mocking the whole e-mail investigation.
Clinton says, “So, everybody is all “breathless about [her e-mails],” while flailing his arms widely.
And to reaffirm his points and minimize critics one more time, the former president drives its home with the campaign line, “Look, this is a game.”
It is doubtful the FBI Agents and other investigators working tirelessly on a resolution feel the same way.
[image via screengrab]Justin Sullivan / Getty Images
Imagine going for an oil change and finding out that the auto shop charged you a higher price just because you had a luxury car, so they figured you could afford it. You’d probably get ticked off and find another mechanic, right? According to the Wall Street Journal, travel website Orbitz.com has begun engaging in an online version of this, showing more expensive hotel offers to people accessing the site from Macintosh computers — a group of customers that spend as much as 30% more on their hotel rooms, according to the company’s research.
Americans have a troubling tendency to turn over all sorts of personal information to just about any website that dangles a coupon code in front of us. We don’t mind companies harvesting our personal data, then slicing and dicing it in order to sell us stuff. But what about when companies use those seemingly small details to charge us more for the same goods and services? Will this be the moment when it starts to dawn on us that we should probably be less cavalier about what we expose online?
The Journal reports that Orbitz’s experiment is in its early stages. It quotes a company executive who says the site won’t show the exact same room two different customers at different prices, but that’s little consolation. A Mac user searching for a place to stay who gets information about an upgraded room or suite probably believes it’s all that’s available for their travel dates. Meanwhile, a Windows user might conduct the same search and get back results for less expensive standard rooms. Orbitz tells the Journal that Mac customers book the pricier hotel rooms anyway. But shouldn’t it be up to the consumer, not Orbitz, to decide to save a few bucks on a particular trip and slum it in a cheaper room.
Dynamic pricing, to use the industry buzzword, is nothing new. Airlines as well as hotels have adjusted their rates for years based on supply and demand, which is why it’s cheaper to visit Phoenix in August or the Jersey Shore in February. There’s nothing inherently wrong with this, although Coca-Cola’s tests in the late 90s of vending machines that charged more when the temperature crept up generated a consumer backlash that prompted the company to abandon the idea.
(MORE: Can Interviewers Insist on ‘Shoulder Surfing’ Your Facebook Page?)
The difference here is one of transparency. Travelers shouldn’t be led to believe that they’re getting the best deal out there when, in reality, they’re only receiving the best deal that the company extended to them based on who they, are what they own or where they shop.
To a large degree, companies already have this information, thanks to our willingness to fork it over and a few technology companies creating surprisingly accurate composite pictures of who we are.
In the New York Times two weeks ago, there was a fascinating and slightly creepy article about the company called Axiom. This under-the-radar business in suburban Arkansas has 23,000 servers dedicated to warehousing and storing information about all of us. Its in-house classification system places people into one of 70 detailed subcategories based on their behaviors.
(MORE: How Smart Phones Are Changing the Way We Bank, Drive, Have Sex and Go to the Bathroom)
The article focuses on the most common use of such data, such as sending targeted coupons and the like to consumers based on their browsing habits. But as the Orbitz example shows, that’s not the only way this information can be utilized. There’s a fine line between prompting consumers to buy something they might otherwise not have purchased by dangling a discount in front of them, on one hand, and singling out a subgroup for the sole purpose of pitching them more expensive items on the other.
And when this sort of personal data is deployed to predict risk, that’s when things get really dicey. A recent study to mine social networks like Facebook for user data bankrolled by Germany’s largest credit reporting agency was dropped after a public outcry, but privacy experts and credit industry analysts say it’s only a matter of time before American companies start pushing this envelope.
Obviously, you’re not going to run out and buy a different computer just so you can get a better hotel deals on Orbitz (especially because rival travel websites Expedia.com and Travelocity.com tell the Wall Street Journal they don’t alter their results for Mac users), but this should serve as a wake-up call to the increasingly detailed and invasive degree to which companies are going to get us to spend more, sometimes without our even knowing it.Final Fantasy XV maker Square Enix has unveiled a new demo that shows off the latest tech it is working on. Revealed at Microsoft's Build conference today, the demo features the same character that appeared in the Agni's Philosophy Final Fantasy tech demo which was shown in 2012.
As detailed by Nvidia, the demo is titled "WITCH - Chapter 0 [cry]" and is powered by DirectX 12. The footage shown is allegedly in-game, with each scene comprised of "over 63 million polygons"; six to twelve times more than the capabilities of DirectX 11. Microsoft corporate vice president Steve Guggenheimer showcased the demo, altering lighting effects and camera angles in real-time. The build was shown on a PC running four GeForce Titan X graphics cards.
Square Enix first revealed its Agni's Philosophy Final Fantasy tech demo at E3 in 2012. The four minute video runs off the company's proprietary Luminous Studio Engine, and took twelve months to create.
Nvidia's DirectX 12 API will be included with the upcoming Windows 10. For a technical breakdown of Direct X12's advancements, be sure to read this post on Microsoft's developer website.Every year, 7 million women in the developing world are treated for complications from unsafe pregnancy termination. These complications can include heavy bleeding, infection and sepsis, as well as more severe conditions, such as lacerations or uterine perforation, that can put a woman’s life at risk.
Unsafe abortions account for between 8 and 15 percent of maternal deaths in developing countries, making them one of the leading causes of maternal mortality, according to a new report.
“It’s a big health issue for women in most countries in the developing world,” said Susheela Singh, vice president for research at the Guttmacher Institute and the lead author of the report, which was just published in BJOG: An International Journal of Obstetrics & Gynecology |
food and energy prices. A falling PCE index could, on the other hand, mean either that the demand for final goods has shrunk relative to an unchanging supply, or that final goods, having become less expensive to produce, are also becoming more abundant, so that the same amount of spending buys more of them.
Suppose, to offer a concrete case, that in a heavily agricultural economy a series of harvest failures leads to higher prices. Only a blockhead would insist that the monetary authorities there must have created too much money, and that it would help matters for them to draw in the money-creation reins enough to get prices back down to where they might have been had the harvest been good. Likewise, were the harvest exceptionally good, only a blockhead would insist on having the money stock boosted to prevent prices from falling — as if the decline were not a perfectly accurate reflection of the fact that goods had become cheaper. What goes for crop prices in an agricultural economy goes as well for prices of goods-in-general in a more diverse one. For that reason there's at least an inkling of blockheadedness involved in the popular view that a stable and low inflation rate necessarily means that monetary policy is on track.
Fortunately there is also, as I've suggested elsewhere in this primer, a perfectly good alternative to treating departures of inflation from some stable and modest level as an indicator of excessive or deficient money. The alternative is to treat departures of the growth rate of overall spending on final goods from some stable and modest level as such an indicator. Unlike an increase in the rate of inflation, an increase in the growth rate of spending is an unambiguous symptom of an increase in the demand for goods, while a decline in the growth rate of spending is an unambiguous symptom of a slowing down of the progress of demand. There's every reason to welcome adjustments to monetary policy aimed at preventing such fluctuations in aggregate demand; but there is no good reason for central bank actions that render aggregate demand less stable for the sake of maintaining a stable rate of inflation.
Policy was Too Easy, then Too Tight
With these preliminaries in mind, we're in a position to consider the Fed's part in the Great Recession, and especially whether it contributed to that event by making money too easy or too tight. The answer, I hope to convince you, is that the Great Recession is one of those instances in which the Fed erred first in one direction, and then in the other. Between 2003 and 2007, it poured fuel on the subprime fire by maintaining an excessively easy monetary policy stance. Then, in 2007-8, it lurched from an easy to a tight stance, and from there to an exceedingly tight stance, which was only partially corrected by its later forays into Quantitative Easing.
The evidence supporting these claims consists, first of all, of the behavior of total spending on final goods before, during, and after the crisis and, second, of a comparison of the Fed's policy rates (or market rates closely reflecting those policy rates) during the same periods with corresponding estimates of the "natural" rate of interest. An excessively loose monetary stance will be reflected in unusually rapid spending growth and below-natural policy rates, whereas an excessively tight stance will be reflected in slower-than-usual spending growth and above-natural policy rates. Notice, again (for the point can't be repeated too often), that these criteria don't exclude the possibility that policy may be loose (or tight) even though the inflation rate isn't rising (or falling), and even though the Fed's policy rates appear high (or low) in an absolute sense, relative to past levels.
So, how did spending behaving during the late muddle? Nominal GDP and domestic final sales are two popular measures of total spending on output, each of which has its champions. The measures tend to be closely correlated; for simplicity's sake, and also because I think it in some respects at least the better measure, I'll look at domestic final sales. Here is a chart showing the growth rate of such sales along with the core PCE inflation rate from 1986 through this year; as usual the shaded vertical lines stand for NBER recessions:
As you can see, both the recent and previous busts have involved substantial declines in spending growth, with an outright reduction in spending this last time around. They've also followed periods of above-average spending growth. In particular, according to our spending metric, money was easy at the height of the subprime boom, and not just tight but exceedingly tight during the bust. Since then it has remained on the tight side, relative to the historical trend, whereas the absolute decline in spending during the downturn actually called for some faster-than-usual growth afterwards to restore spending to its pre-bust level, or at least within spitting distance of it.
The coincidence of changes in the growth rate of spending and business cycles is, it bears saying, not mathematically inevitable: although booms and busts are just other names for upward and downward movements in the growth rate of real output ("y," in the textbook algebra) around its trend, the fact that these movements accompany similar changes in spending ("Py") reflects, not a mathematical necessity, but a more important, causal connection. It means that, instead of merely causing prices to increase, as a naive Quantity Theory of Money would have it (and as does tend to happen in the long run) more rapid spending tends to result in more real activity. That asset (as opposed to output) prices are likewise more closely correlated with spending than with inflation is also both easy to establish and not at all surprising once one realizes the connection between exceptionally vigorous spending and exceptional (though ultimately transitory) profits.
Natural Rate Estimates Tell the Same Story
And interest rates? Here the relevant comparison is, again, between the Federal Reserve's policy rate — that is, the rate it "targeted," and thereby kept at least roughly under its control — and estimates of that rate's neutral or "natural" values. A convenient proxy for the first of these (in part because we have a consistent series for it) is the "effective" federal fund's rate (ffr), which is the rate banks and other financial institutions actually charge one another for overnight loans. For the effective ffr's "natural" counterpart, we have estimates by Vasco Cúrdia, of the Federal Reserve Bank of San Francisco. Because natural rate estimates are notoriously unreliable, the chart below shows Cúrdia's median estimates (solid black line) as well as the upper and lower boundaries (dotted lines) of the 90% probability range for other possibly correct estimates. Finally, because these are estimates of the real (inflation-adjusted) natural short-term rate, I compare them to the effective funds rate minus the core PCE inflation rate. (Using core CPI instead makes virtually no difference):
The story told by this chart is remarkably similar to that told by the preceding one, to wit, that booms have generally been associated with loose monetary policy, signified here by below-natural policy rates, while busts have been associated with tight monetary policy, or above-natural policy rates. In particular, policy appears to have gone from relatively tight to relatively loose some time during 2004, and to have remained loose throughout the remainder of the subprime boom. Then toward the end of 2007, it went from too loose to too tight, where it has remained throughout most of the period since. Just as remarkably, these conclusions hold for all but 10 percent of Cúrdia's alternative natural rate estimates.
Having presented all this evidence, I hope I may be forgiven for daring to draw from it two simple lessons for monetary policy, namely: (1) that a stable inflation rate is no guarantee of overall economic stability, and (2) that such stability is best achieved having the Fed endeavor to maintain, not a steady rate of inflation, but a steady annual growth rate of final sales, or some similar spending measure, of something like 5 percent.[1]
Now for some caveats. I have argued that an excessively loose Fed policy stance contributed to the subprime boom, and that an excessively tight stance contributed to the subsequent crash and recession. That's "contributed to," not "caused." I am not blaming the Fed for the subprime crisis. I understand very well that that crisis was the result of many factors, some of which may have been more important than the Fed's actions.
I've also said nothing about the particular arguments and beliefs that informed the Fed's conduct, or about the particular actions it took or devices it employed in order to give effect to what, in retrospect at least, appears to have been first an overly loose, and then an overly tight, stance. For some of the details, I refer readers to this paper written with David Beckworth and Berrak Bahadir, and to some of my previous Alt-M posts, including this one, this one, this one, and this one.
Finally, I've said nothing about how in the course of the recent crisis the Fed abandoned, and perhaps was compelled to abandon, its traditional methods of monetary control. How and why that happened, and the new means of monetary control that the Fed has been employing ever since, will be the subjects of this primer's next installment.
Continue Reading A Monetary Policy Primer:
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[1] Although I've made the case, in Less Than Zero and elsewhere, for a considerably lower rate of spending growth as a theoretical ideal, that lower ideal would have to be approached gradually from a rate consistent with recent experience if targeting it is not to prove disruptive.US national security adviser pushes for peaceful resolution after country’s failed missile test, as Donald Trump hopes for Chinese intervention
Donald Trump and senior officials said on Sunday the US would consider any lever – diplomatic, economic or military – to forestall North Korea’s nuclear ambitions, a day after the vice-president arrived in the area and the isolated nation launched a missile test that failed.
The president and his national security adviser, HR McMaster, said they first hoped that China would act on its neighbor, which depends on Beijing to prop up its trade and finances. Trump said he had backtracked on a campaign promise to immediately denounce China, in order to push the country on North Korea.
Trump's North Korea sabre-rattling has a flaw: Kim Jong-un has nothing to lose Read more
“Why would I call China a currency manipulator when they are working with us on the North Korean problem?” he wrote on Twitter from his resort in south Florida. “We will see what happens!”
McMaster also hailed the president’s new relationship with his Chinese counterpart, Xi Jinping, whom he hosted in Florida earlier this month.
“The consensus with the president, our key allies in the regions – Japan and South Korea in particular, but also the Chinese leadership – is that this problem is coming to a head,” McMaster told ABC’s This Week, speaking from Afghanistan.
“It’s time for us to undertake all actions we can, short of a military option, to try to resolve this peacefully.”
Each missile and atomic bomb test – officials had feared a sixth nuclear test over the weekend – represented steady progress for dictator Kim Jong-un, McMaster said, whether or not a given test was deemed successful by his regime. The adviser refused to rule out overt or covert military action to stop what he called “a grave threat to all people”.
“This is a situation that just can’t continue,” McMaster said. “The president’s made very clear that he is not in the business of announcing in advance exactly what he’s going to do in any particular situation.”
McMaster held out hope that Beijing could exert economic pressure on Pyongyang. He said Trump and Xi had cultivated a “warm relationship” and that the Chinese leader was “courageous” to abstain from siding with Russia in the United Nations this week. China had previously joined Russia in voting against resolutions to denounce the actions of Syria’s government in its civil war.
During their meeting, Xi briefly told Trump about the deep ties and complicated history between China and North Korea, Trump told the Wall Street Journal this week.
“After listening for 10 minutes I realized that not – it’s not so easy,” Trump said, expressing surprise at the pressures of trade and migration along the Chinese-North Korean border. “A lot of goods come in. But it’s not what you would think.”
A few days after that meeting, though, Trump said he would be willing to act alone. “If China decides to help, that would be great,” he tweeted. “If not, we will solve the problem without them!”
American defense and intelligence officials have refused to say whether the US, possibly through a covert cyber-attack, played a role in causing the North Korean missile to explode after its test launch. On Sunday, the deputy national security adviser, KT McFarland, told Fox News Sunday she could not say whether a cyber campaign begun by Barack Obama’s administration had continued.
“You know we can’t talk about that,” she said.
On Saturday, the US defense secretary, Jim Mattis, delivered an unusually curt statement on the launch. “The president and his military team are aware of North Korea’s most recent unsuccessful missile launch,” he said. “The president has no further comment.”
In Seoul, Mike Pence made more familiar remarks promising support for its allies in the Pacific. Speaking at an Easter dinner on a military base, the US vice-president called the test a “provocation” and promised US support for South Korea.
“Our commitment to this historic alliance with the courageous people of South Korea has never been stronger,” Pence said. During his presidential campaign, Trump wavered on this assurance and suggested that Japan and South Korea should perhaps defend themselves.
As Trump plays the global strongman, what happened to 'America first'? Read more
Only about 35 miles from the demilitarized zone, Seoul stands within range of North Korean artillery, a detail noted by American lawmakers on Sunday as they argued for urgent diplomacy and sanctions. Nearly 30,000 American service members are stationed in South Korea, and the US sent an aircraft carrier toward the peninsula last week.
John McCain told NBC’s Meet the Press that China was “the key” to preventing “what could be a cataclysmic event”.
“They can stop this if the want to because of their control over the North Korean economy,” the Republican senator said.
Bernie Sanders similarly told CNN’s State of the Union that partners in Asia must act in tandem, saying: “The United States must not act impulsively and we must not act unilaterally.”
Sanders and Ed Royce, the chairman of the House foreign affairs committee, argued for more sanctions. Royce specifically urged the president to impose sanctions on 10 Chinese banks, to choke funding for North Korea’s missile program.
“We are looking at shutting off every dime of money that goes in there,” Royce told CNN.
Chinese diplomats have grown increasingly frustrated with Kim’s regime, and in February Beijing banned North Korean coal imports, a major source of income. In January, China said it would comply with new UN sanctions. Even so, trade between the nations has increased since last year: North Korea does 80-90% of its trade with China.
North Korean officials did not comment on the failed missile launch. On Saturday, Kim celebrated the 105th anniversary of his grandfather’s birth, a holiday called the Day of the Sun. From a raised platform, Kim watched soldiers march and wheel out a large, camouflage-painted missile that was put on display for the foreign press.
McMaster said the propaganda was disturbing, even though it was not clear whether the missile was genuine or a shell for show.Description
History of discovery
Classification
The remains of Nigersaurus were initially described in 1976 as belonging to a dicraeosaurid, but in 1999 Sereno's team reclassified it as a rebbachisaurid diplodocoid.[3] Rebbachisauridae is the basalmost family within the superfamily Diplodocoidea, which also contains the long-necked diplodocids and the short-necked dicraeosaurids. The eponymous subfamily Nigersaurinae, which includes Nigersaurus and closely related genera, was named by the American palaeontologist John A. Whitlock in 2011.[9] Below is a cladogram following a 2013 analysis by the Italian palaeontologist Federico Fanti and colleagues, which confirmed the placement of Nigersaurus as a basal nigersaurine rebbachisaurid.[10] Model head at the Australian Museum, Sydney Front view of reconstructed skull Rebbachisauridae Amazonsaurus Histriasaurus Zapalasaurus Comahuesaurus Limaysaurinae Rayososaurus Rebbachisaurus Cathartesaura Limaysaurus Nigersaurinae Nigersaurus Demandasaurus Tataouinea The closely related genus Demandasaurus from Spain was described in 2003, and along with other animal groups that span the Cretaceous of Africa and Europe, this indicates that carbonate platforms connected these landmasses across the Tethys Sea.[1] This was supported in 2013 by the description of the nigersaurine Tataouinea from Tunisia, which was more related to the European form than to Nigersaurus, despite being from Africa, then part of the supercontinent Gondwana.[10] The discovery of these basal diplodocoids may indicate that short necks and small size were ancestral features of the group.[1] Pneumatisation of the rebbachisaurid skeleton evolved progressively, culminating in the nigersaurines.[10] A 2015 cladistic study found Rebbachisaurus itself to group with the nigersaurines, and the authors suggested that Nigersaurinae was therefore a junior synonym of Rebbachisaurinae. Nigersaurus was the basalmost member of this "Euro-African" subclade.[11]
Palaeobiology
Restoration of the entire skeleton, with head in feeding posture Though it had large nostrils and a fleshy snout, Sereno and colleagues found that Nigersaurus had an underdeveloped olfactory region of its brain and thus did not have an advanced sense of smell. Its brain-to-body-mass ratio was average for a reptile, and smaller than those of ornithischians and non-coelurosaurian theropods. The cerebrum comprised about 30% of the brain volume, as in many other dinosaurs.[1] In 2017, the Argentinian palaeontologist Lucio M. Ibiricu and colleagues examined the postcranial skeletal pneumacity in the skeletons of rebbachisaurids, and suggested that it was an adapttion for lowering the density of the skeleton, and that this could have decreased the muscle energy needed to move the body, as well as the heat generated in the process. Since several rebbachisaurids inhabited latitudes that would have been tropical to subtropical in the Middle Cretaceous, this pneumacity may have helped the animals cope with the very high temperatures. According to Ibiricu and colleagues, this adaptation may be a reason why rebbachisaurids were the only group of diplodocoids that survived into the Late Cretaceous.[12] Diet and feeding Crown form, wear pattern, and microstructure of the teeth Nigersaurus was suggested by Sereno and colleagues to be a ground-level, non-selective browser. The width of the muzzle and lateral orientation of the tooth row show that the sauropod could gather much food and crop it close to the ground, within one metre of the surface.[1][2] This is further supported by facets on the labial (externally facing) side of the upper teeth, similar to Dicraeosaurus and Diplodocus, which are evidence that food or substrate wore the animal's teeth as it fed. Nigersaurus also bears signs of low-angle tooth-to-tooth wear on the inside of the maxillary crowns, which suggests that jaw movement was limited to precise up-and-down motions. Worn teeth from the lower jaw have not yet been discovered, but they are expected to show opposing tooth-to-tooth wear. The ability to raise their heads well above the ground does not necessarily mean they browsed on items there, and the short neck of Nigersaurus would have restricted the browsing range compared to other diplodocoids.[1] The adductor muscle of the jaw appears to have attached to the quadrate instead of the supratemporal fenestra. Both this and the other mastication muscles were likely weak, and Nigersaurus is estimated to have had one of the weakest bites of the sauropods.[1] In addition, the small, nearly parallel nature of the tooth scratches and pits (caused by grit, which would not be obtained as often by high-browsers) indicate that it ate relatively soft, herbaceous plants such as low-growing ferns.[6] Because of the lateral orientation of the teeth, it probably would not have been able to chew.[2] Nigersaurus wore its tooth crowns down faster than other dinosaurian herbivores,[1] and its tooth replacement rate was the highest of any known dinosaur. Each tooth was replaced once every 14 days; the rate had previously been estimated lower. In contrast to Nigersaurus, sauropods with lower tooth replacement rates and broader tooth crowns are thought to have been canopy browsers.[4] Head posture Diagrams of the skull and jaw, and 3D reconstructions of the dental battery, skull, and brain On the basis of microtomography scans of skull elements of the holotype specimen, Sereno and colleagues created a "prototype" Nigersaurus skull they could examine. They also made an endocast of the brain and scanned the semicircular canals of its inner ear, which they found to be oriented horizontally. In their 2007 study, they stated that the structure of the occiput and cervical vertebrae would have limited the upward and downward movement of the neck and the rotation of the skull. Based on this biomechanical analysis, the team concluded that the head and muzzle were habitually oriented 67° downwards and close to ground level, as an adaptation for ground-level browsing. This is unlike the way other sauropods have been restored, with their heads held more horizontally.[1] A 2009 study by the palaeontologists Mike P. Taylor, Mathew Wedel, and Darren Naish agreed that Nigersaurus was able to feed with the downturned head and neck posture proposed by the 2007 study, but contested that this was the habitual posture of the animal. The study noted that the "neutral" head and neck posture of modern animals does not necessarily correspond to their habitual head posture. It further argued that the orientation of the semicircular canals varies significantly within modern species, and is therefore not reliable for determining head posture.[13] This was supported by the Spanish palaeontologist Jesús Marugán-Lobón and colleagues in a 2013 study that suggested the methods used by Sereno's team were imprecise, and that Nigersaurus habitually held its head like other sauropods.[14]
PalaeoecologyTAMPA, FL—Saying that sitting in the same boardroom together still feels completely surreal, former Yankees shortstop Derek Jeter told reporters Thursday that he had finally fulfilled a lifelong dream of starting a business venture with Jeb Bush. “Ever since I was a little kid, all I’ve wanted to do is become equity partners with Mr. Bush,” said the former New York Yankees All-Star, adding that he was first inspired to become a businessman as a child while watching Bush’s entrepreneurial strides in the Latin American banking sphere and his work on his father’s presidential campaigns. “I was only 6 or 7 when Jeb made partner at The Codina Group, but his tireless efforts in securing tenants for commercial developments made me dream of one day recruiting outside investors for our own joint ownership team. I used to stare at the poster of him in my bedroom for hours just imagining us securing a billionaire dollar deal together. I’m still waiting for somebody to wake me up and tell me this is all just a dream.” Jeter also said that the partnership made spending more than two decades working as a professional baseball player completely worth it.
AdvertisementLegality of Basic Attention Token and Other ICOs Called Into Question
At the start of June, Brave Software raised $35 million USD in 30 seconds, selling out their Initial Coin Offering (ICO) in record time. With recent reports indicating that the United States Securities and Exchanges Commission will be taking steps toward developing regulations for ICOs, questions have surfaced as to whether or not pre-sale token distribution fundraisers are comprising the illegal sale of unregistered securities.
Also Read: SEC Eyes Initial Coin Offerings for Regulatory Oversight
Brave’s BAT Pre-Sale ICO May Have Comprised the Sale of Unregistered Securities
A discussion pertaining to the legality of ICOs is overdue. With a flood of new projects entering the markets recently, developers are seemingly printing money out of thin air in the form of cryptographic tokens on a weekly basis, which are then passed onto greedy investors seeking to find the next big crypto. With ICOs raising almost half a billion USD in the last 2 years, it is unsurprising to see the SEC taking an interest in the current ICO landscape.
A recent article posted on Medium has sought to argue that Brave’s BAT pre-sale ICO and others like it may comprise the sale of unregistered securities, and are thus illegal.
When a company has completed its development and is distributing coins to investors, it can do so legally because the cryptocurrency tokens have use-value outside comprising a money commodity/expression of value, and can be considered to be app tokens. Under these circumstances shouldn’t be any legal dilemma, and the company should be free to conduct an ICO.
If a company is raising money in order to fund token development, and are pledging to distribute tokens at a future date, then such would be considered to comprise a token presale, which may be seen as selling securities under US regulations, and thus require adherence to SEC guidelines and legislation. “Under the Securities Act of 1933, any offer to sell securities must either be registered with the SEC or meet an exemption.”
The purpose of the SEC regulations is to prevent companies from issuing tokens on the basis of a promised service or platform that is never delivered. Without such regulation, anybody could produce whatever I.O.U. they liked, and begin distributing such to investors with no intention of delivering on their end of the agreement.
For many within the cryptocurrency community, the regulatory guidance of institutions like the SEC is no longer needed. Relations between individuals are mediated through immutable smart-contracts, with judge, jury, and executioner manifested as the cold, rational laws of mathematics.
There Is Little Agreement Among Nations Upon How to Legally Classify Bitcoin and Other Major Crytocurrencies
The debate pertaining to whether or not crowdfunding conducted through token pre-sales comprises the unlawful sale of unregistered securities highlights the need for unique regulatory apparatus to be created for bitcoin and cryptocurrency – as trying to retrofit existing legislation designed for mainstream asset classes has proved to be challenging at best.
There is little agreement among nations upon how to legally classify bitcoin and other major cryptocurrencies. The unique peculiarities of bitcoin and altcoins have prompted some experts to call for the creation of a new asset class for cryptocurrency, whilst others have demanded no regulation whatsoever. The speed and dynamism with which the cryptocurrency economy has evolved poses an additional challenge to lawmakers, as does the fluidity of the cryptocurrency ecosystem.
Whatever the outcome of the growing curiosity on the part regulators regarding ICOs, it is clear that the hype and momentum surrounding many ICOs is only intensifying.
Do you think that the SEC will regulate ICOs? Share you thoughts below!
Images courtesy of Shutterstock
Need to calculate your bitcoin holdings? Check our tools section.I wasn’t expecting that we’d spot any drones when I joined Nick Martino, an airport operations supervisor, on his daily patrol around Camarillo Airport. We climbed into a white Chevy Tahoe, its side emblazoned with a blue “7,” and Martino used a two-way radio to clear the runway of any aircraft nearby. (The Tahoe was big, but an aircraft would win.) In my lap I held a 40-pound Pelican Case, the latest creation from Chinese drone-maker DJI. Two wand-sized antennae stuck out of the top lid of the case; inside was a touchscreen display, running mapping software.
There is tech for tech’s sake, and then there’s tech that alters or enhances the human experience. In the second season of the Verge video series Next Level, senior editor Lauren Goode takes you behind the scenes to show you the technology that’s being worked on at some of the world’s most innovative companies and research institutions. From holographic memories to drone detection tech to advanced exoskeletons, Next Level will show you the tech that has the potential to radically change the lens through which we see the world.
Martino calls this box “the gizmos,” but its real name is Aeroscope. It’s DJI’s new solution for detecting rogue drones that are flying nearby. Martino and his team at the Ventura County Department of Airports have been testing Aeroscope since October, when DJI contacted the department and asked if they wanted access to an early prototype.
DJI’s ask was savvy: airports are not only restricted airspace, where drones can be problematic, but Camarillo Airport also happens to be one of the first in the country that was UAS-approved by the FAA, according to Martino. In other words, Martino and his team fly drones themselves, using them to inspect towers and monitor wildlife on the outskirts of the runways. They like drones. This made Camarillo an ideal testing ground.
Martino was telling me about his daily patrol routine when, in the middle of our conversation, the Aeroscope box began squawking, a series of beep beep beeps that sounded like an old landline got left off the hook. “We’ve got a hit,” Martino said. Based on the information on the Aeroscope display, the drone pilot appeared to be near Port Hueneme, California, about 10 miles away.
Martino seemed almost as surprised as I was.
That meant the rogue drone was flying within range of a naval base and at least two local airports
That wasn’t the only “rogue” drone we spotted while taping episode 2 of Next Level season 2, an episode focused largely on DJI’s new Aeroscope technology. While interviewing Michael Perry, DJI’s managing director of North America, in Golden Gate Park, the Aeroscope box sniffed out another drone flying nearby. This one was several blocks away from our location in the park — harmless enough, but one that, if you see “flying straight towards you, at high speed, that’s something I’ll want to investigate,” Perry said.
Those examples are anecdotal, as are the stories of drones sometimes flying over wildfire sites, or landing in the bleachers of a sporting event. But there’s no doubt that both personal and commercial drones are growing in popularity. According to research firm Gartner, 3 million personal and commercial drones will be produced in 2017, nearly 40 percent more than in 2016. The FAA predicts that combined personal and commercial drone sales will reach 7 million by 2020.
At the same time, the laws around drones in the US are still surprisingly unclear. The FAA has established clear laws at the federal level and around restricted airspace, but other drone rules fall under local jurisdiction. There are sometimes exceptions made to the rules, such as when a local judge cleared a Kentucky man of any charges after he shot down a drone near his property. Adding to the confusion is the fact that the laws for commercial drones are also different than the laws around personal, or hobbyist, drones.
In the meantime, dozens of technology companies and contractors have created “Remote ID” systems, charging ahead without waiting for policy makers to decide on more concrete legislation.
DJI is one such company. Its new Aerospace system works by detecting the communication signal between a DJI drone and the DJI controller. It decodes that signal, and then sends the drone’s telemetry data and registration information to the Aeroscope box. The product is aimed at public safety officials — people like Nick Martino, who keep tabs on airports, prisons, or natural disaster sites. But since DJI is the North American market leader in personal drones, Aeroscope also has the potential to impact the many drone pilots out there, who may have varied interpretations of the rules.
After Aeroscope alerted Martino to a drone flying within the vicinity of the Camarillo Airport, I asked him what would happen next. A small aircraft icon hovered over the map on the CrystalSky display in front of me. Once the pilot stopped flying the drone, it dropped off the map.
But I could still see, when I tapped through a list of recent drone activity, that the pilot had been flying an Inspire, one of DJI’s own, and the pilot’s personal email address was visible. Update: DJI says the production version of Aeroscope will not show pilots’ email addresses, and that an Aeroscope users will have to use a drone’s serial number or registration number to get in touch with the drone pilot.
“So now what we can do is we can, essentially, send him a friendly email, introduce ourselves and the airport and hopefully engage,” Martino said. “[We say] the airport doesn’t approve or deny any FAA UAS operations, but there’s a proper method to getting approval to fly in restricted airspace.”
I’m imagining emails that are perhaps more strongly worded than that, but Martino insisted his team is focused on educating the community on drones. He said he thinks most people want to fly responsibly, and that the “bad eggs” are few and far between.
DJI’s Perry echoed this, when I asked him whether he thinks Aeroscope is going to make DJI customers nervous. He said he believes the vast majority of users want to operate safely, though he did later say the data captured on Aeroscope could “start an investigation path” if law enforcement did see a need to slap a drone pilot with a fine.
When I asked if this should make DJI customers nervous, Perry said most drone pilots want to operate safely
DJI’s solution is not a complete one right now. The company says Aeroscope only tracks DJI drones, addressing about 65 percent of the market, though in the future a firmware update could connect it with other drones. And there’s still the practical matter of the slowness of email. A drone could indeed be problematic for the eight or 10 minutes it’s flying near an airport; but an email to the pilot (even a friendly one!) may not be looked at for hours or even days later.
Some in the industry say that drone detection is not nearly as contentious as issue as drone interception, actually taking down the drones. This is, for the most part, illegal in the US, but again, things are sticky. So for this episode of Next Level, I also spoke to Grant Jordan, the chief executive of SkySafe, which is currently working with the US military to test drone interception technology. I suspect they’re sending fewer friendly emails.
For now, Nick Martino says he wants to get Aeroscope installed directly in his fleet of patrol cars. In fact, he’s also been talking to DJI about doing this, as well as installing it in department helicopters. He hopes there are more direct messaging features coming, something that would be more immediate than emailing a drone pilot.
“In an ideal world that would be best-case scenario,” Martino said. “Also, as the public becomes more aware that this type of technology is available and in the hands of law enforcement — firefighters, and at airports — ultimately, those people thinking about flying in restricted airspace may think twice.”
Editor’s note: This story was updated November 15, a day after its original publication, to include more information from DJI on how Aeroscope users will be able to contact drone pilots once the system spots their drones.Not long ago, land was valued primarily for its capacity to produce agricultural products. Today, the value of a ranch’s non-agricultural components may be significantly greater than the value attributable to its ability to produce commodities.
As landowner’s goals have changed with the times, Hall and Hall’s Management Group has become a valued partner to ranch owners throughout the Intermountain West. Established in 1981, our traditional land management approach has evolved to include the enhancement of aquatic, wildlife, and recreational resources.
Whether you’re an experienced rancher or want someone to manage your property while you’re away, we’re here to help. We’ll manage your property’s day-to-day operations, employee recruitment, budgeting and accounting, livestock, crop production, property maintenance, and more. With more than three decades of experience managing our client’s rural real estate, we offer everything you need to truly enjoy your property and maximize profitability.
Our success in land and resource management is directly attributable to our ability to integrate wildlife and fishery enhancement with traditional and innovative farming and ranching practices–all driven by the owner’s personal interests and priorities.
From traditional grass ranches and pivot-irrigated farms to trophy hunting and fishing retreats, Hall and Hall delivers on our commitment to identifying–and enhancing–our clients’ enjoyment and health of their investment.Arsène Wenger has suggested the expected loss of Alexis Sánchez as a Bosman free agent at the end of the season will cost Arsenal up to £140m. The club received an offer of £60m for the forward from Manchester City before the closure of the summer transfer window and they were inclined to accept it, even though they wanted nearer to £70m.
Sánchez, who had told Arsenal he desired the move and has made it plain he will not renew his contract, ended up staying put after the club failed to complete a deal for Monaco’s Thomas Lemar, whom they had identified as the attacking player to place him.
Wenger has always said he would rather keep Sánchez for the final year on his contract – such is his importance to the team – and he believes the player will remain motivated as it is in his interests to play well and impress other clubs.
Football transfer rumours: Sánchez to Manchester City for £20m in January? Read more
Wenger totted up the financial hit Arsenal are likely to take by adding together the lost transfer fee on Sánchez and the cost of replacing him. He put the later figure at between £60m-£70m, although he had gone as high as €100m (£92m) with his deadline-day offer to Monaco for Lemar. Wenger has said he will try again for the France winger.
“You take a Sánchez into the final year of his contract, you sacrifice £60-70m income and at the end of the season you will have to buy somebody for that amount of money,” Wenger told beIN Sports. “It has a huge price so, at some stage, you have to make a decision; you have to sacrifice one or two.”
Sánchez has endured a nightmarish week or so. First, his move to City collapsed on deadline day last Thursday and then he suffered World Cup qualifying losses with Chile to Paraguay and Bolivia. Chile sit sixth in the South American standings, with two games to play. Only the top four countries qualify automatically for the finals, with the fifth-placed team entering a play-off.
Sánchez poured out his heart on Instagram |
more important than the Olympics. This is impossible.
“Ask 10 people from the street to face public security officers and ask them to say ‘human rights are more important than the Olympics’ 10 times or even 100 times, and I will see which security officer would put him in jail.”It's nice that music-streaming service Spotify offers a free, ad-supported version, and most of the time we don't mind listening to an ad or two for the privilege. But those audio ads can be a serious buzzkill when they interrupt your party music. Here's how to automatically mute ads in Spotify and keep the flow in your playlists.
Windows
Blockify is far and away the best Spotify ad blocker for Windows. It sits in your system tray and mutes Spotify (or your computer, your choice) whenever it detects an audio ad. It'll unmute Spotify when the ad finishes playing.
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Better yet, though, Blockify can do more than just mute ads: It also adds customizable hotkeys to Spotify, so you can skip tracks, play, pause, shuffle, and change the volume with keyboard shortcuts. It also allows you to play a substitute MP3 from your Music folder when it mutes an ad—that way, you don't have any empty space between songs. When it detects an ad, it will mute Spotify, play a random MP3 from your Music folder, and then move to the next track on your Spotify playlist when that song is over, which is a really cool little feature.
Mac OS X
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On OS X, you can mute ads just by downloading and running Smutefy. Smutefy sits in your menu bar, mutes Spotify whenever an ad plays, and unmutes it when the ad is over. There's no other configuration necessary, though you will need previously mentioned Soundflower installed for it to work. It also has a manual blocklist, so if any do come up, you can block them from showing up again just by clicking an option in the menu bar.
Update: It looks like Smutefy has been abandoned, but you can still mute Spotify ads with SpotiFree, a simple AppleScript that works in a similar fashion.
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Of course, it's also worth mentioning that the best way to avoid ads in Spotify is to pay for the $5 per month "Unlimited" upgrade. If you're going to block ads all the time, you're probably better off supporting the service, but we understand that sometimes you just want to make it through a playlist without being interrupted by out-of-place music. Use with care!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.
*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.
The effort will neither be private nor public, but a “third way.” This innovative, common-good model is made possible through a collaborative agreement between the Heritage Centre, the Town of Niverville and private partners.
The community-based, innovative effort to expand MRI, ultrasound, X-ray and laboratory services is modelled after Niverville’s community-built and -owned 80-resident personal-care home. This model was supported by the previous NDP government in 2011.
The recent announcement that a new diagnostic centre will be built at the Heritage Centre in Niverville has generated spirited debate.
Hey there, time traveller! This article was published 30/8/2017 (545 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.
Hey there, time traveller!
This article was published 30/8/2017 (545 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.
The recent announcement that a new diagnostic centre will be built at the Heritage Centre in Niverville has generated spirited debate.
The community-based, innovative effort to expand MRI, ultrasound, X-ray and laboratory services is modelled after Niverville’s community-built and -owned 80-resident personal-care home. This model was supported by the previous NDP government in 2011.
The diagnostic centre will help address unreasonable wait times Manitobans face for MRIs.
The effort will neither be private nor public, but a "third way." This innovative, common-good model is made possible through a collaborative agreement between the Heritage Centre, the Town of Niverville and private partners.
Tommy Douglas, the father of Canadian medicare, outlined that universal health care consists of two stages. The first stage is universal access to emergent, urgent and doctor care. The second stage, which Douglas felt was most critical, was "preventive care." He stated medicare is not sustainable without this second stage.
As patients, health-care providers and governments, we have failed to heed Douglas’s declaration.
Niverville’s "third way" addresses Douglas’s prophetic words about the second stage. By overseeing the private partners’ efforts to build the diagnostic centre at the Heritage Centre, our community is able to frame this "third way" collaboration. Included in this agreement is a "public-private-partnership" arrangement in which the diagnostic centre is donated to the Town of Niverville after 25 years — ensuring public interest and ownership is achieved.
Some will claim the public interest is not served by receiving an "old building" and "used equipment" after 25 years.
The legally binding agreement ensures the custom-built commercial building and advanced diagnostic equipment will not only be in good condition, but have many years of remaining life when donated to the town.
This "third way" creatively enhances the sustainability of Canada’s health-care system by addressing Douglas’s second plank.
The collaborative agreement calls for the creation of Heritage Life Community Health Services. This new not-for-profit entity will enable the Heritage Centre to facilitate all MRI orders. Through this unique arrangement, all MRIs will be arranged through the Heritage Centre as a third party, which is consistent with and allowed for in provincial legislation. This will provide Manitobans the option, with a doctor’s requisition, to self-select an MRI either in Niverville or within the public system.
Manitobans already are self-directing their diagnostic needs by travelling to North Dakota for MRI services. Having an option closer to home will result in greater economic activity for the province. Critically, it will generate new income taxes, boosting the government’s ability to support our health-care system.
This "third way" also supports Canada’s Health Act accessibility provision. MRI fees in Niverville will be based on income, assisting those facing economic barriers who wish to self-direct their diagnostic needs. MRIs will be discounted by 25 per cent for families whose income falls within Manitoba’s lowest income-tax bracket.
For those who qualify for a full discount at the diagnostic centre, the fee will be $750, the approximate base cost of providing an MRI in Niverville.
Manitoba’s auditor general recommended in spring that the current practice of third parties, such as the Worker’s Compensation Board (WCB), bumping patients on current MRI wait lists should stop. The Heritage Centre Board agrees. Niverville’s new diagnostic centre will allow insurers such as WCB a reasonable option to access MRIs outside the public system. This would open up some 2,500 MRI spots at Pan Am clinic immediately, reducing its 29-week wait list.
To be sure, some will state this community-based, innovative "third way" is a step toward United States-style health care. It is not.
Niverville’s initiative is seeded and vested in a community-based, not-for-profit social enterprise for the common good. Evidence-based outcomes in public health care make it clear more government expenditures will not address current challenges. We require greater innovation, community-based initiatives and a keen focus on medicare’s second stage to reimagine and improve an ailing health-care system.
This innovative initiative ensures public ownership, over time, of the diagnostic centre. It provides reasonable accommodation to Manitobans seeking self-directed diagnostic services. It offers the possibility of immediately reducing current MRI wait times. Finally, it creatively ensures economic accessibility to Manitobans through an income-tested fee schedule.
Douglas often said, "Courage, my friends; ’tis not too late to make a better world," as he passionately campaigned for medicare in the 1960s. Niverville’s "third way" approach is courageous and will lead to a better world for Manitobans as we strengthen universal health care in the 21st century.
Gordon Daman is a volunteer board member on the NHHI Board of Governors, which provides governance for the Niverville Heritage Centre. The centre is a not-for-profit community owned social enterprise campus that provides various community, social and seniors housing services for Niverville and region.
Private MRIs are moving us in a dangerous direction
There is an adage: if it sounds too good to be true, then it probably is.
This certainly seems to be the case with Niverville’s recent announcement that the town hopes to partner with a private holding company and build a user-pay MRI clinic in the community.
The investors are billing it as "an innovative community response for the common good." They claim when some of us pay, MRI wait times for everyone will go down. And profits and investment will be kept here in Manitoba, rather than trickling down to North Dakota.
That all sounds wonderful, doesn’t it? But only if you don’t think about it too hard.
Let’s start with claim No. 1: according to the Canadian Foundation of Health Care Improvement, countries with both public and private health-care systems always have the longest wait times. England and New Zealand, for instance, which have both public and user-pay hospitals, have longer wait times in their public systems than medicare systems such as ours.
JOE BRYKSA / WINNIPEG FREE PRESS FILES
This backs up evidence found here in Manitoba decades ago. Until 1999, cataract patients could choose to have their surgery at a private clinic by paying a user fee. While the fee was in place, Manitoba researchers found that patients whose surgeons worked in both public and private clinics had to wait 16 weeks longer — 26 weeks versus 10 weeks — than those whose surgeons practised only in the public system.
Turns out this was largely a staffing issue: there were only so many surgeons, and people can’t be two places at once.
The same goes, of course, for Manitoba’s radiation technologists. These highly trained people who run the MRI machines are already in short supply.
And if demand for privately paid scans is as high as advocates say it is (and the Niverville investors are banking on), then the technologists who perform scans for the private clinic inevitably will have to come from the public system, driving up wait times for the rest of us.
That bring us to their second claim: some people are already paying south of border to jump the queue. Why not keep that money here to make a few Manitobans richer?
The answer is because their profit-driven idea will not only increase diagnostic wait times for average Manitobans, it actually will allow the provincial Tory government to ignore solutions right under its nose.
The Dauphin hospital, for instance, already has completed an addition intended to house the first MRI in Manitoba north of the Trans-Canada Highway.
Staff already have been trained. Rural residents as far as The Pas finally are set to access diagnostic services that don’t require travel two days away from home. All that’s needed is the machine itself, already paid for and sitting in Germany, waiting to be shipped and installed.
In March 2017, however, the whole thing was put on hold by the government, which stated its Wait Time Task Force required at least a year of "further study."
You don’t need to live in Dauphin, or work in the health system, to imagine what this delay is costing Manitobans like you and me, both in dollars and wait times. So why isn’t the Dauphin MRI up and running?
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I sure hope it’s not because they’re buying the Niverville investors’ claims — "we can help those with cash get diagnosed first, reward a few savvy business people and save medicare, all at the same time!"
And I sure hope it’s not because they’re considering investing our tax dollars in supporting and sustaining a profit-driven approach to health care that will not even come close to benefiting all Manitobans.
The vast majority of us say medicare — a system in which no matter who you are, or where you live, your access to health care is based on need and not the size of your bank account — is our most cherished public service. Most of us say it’s our most cherished thing about being Canadian. Even with our system’s challenges, it seems watching the United States debate about health care is enough to remind us that what we’ve built is precious, and worth fighting for.
The reality is that what would benefit all of us most right now is embracing solutions that are both ready to roll and addressing wait times within our much-valued universal system, as in Dauphin, or investing in more trained radiation technologists.
Let’s not get sidetracked by investors whose claims are simply too good to be true.
Michelle Gawronsky is president of the Manitoba Government and General Employees Union.A Simple Meta Compiler
Meta eForth DTC
For the last few years the Forth Interest Group has been distributing a highly portable Forth system called eForth. eForth was developed by Bill Muench as a Forth system with maximized portability through a minimized set of CODE words. I don't know if the E in eForth stands for Embedded, Educational, or Easy. eForth 1.0 was released in both Forth source and MASM source code. It was felt by many that MASM was nearly universally available, and that this format would be easily understood by people who might not be so comfortable with Forth source. It was also felt that meta compiling of Forth systems was what was preventing many programmers from ever understanding Forth.
Meta compiling is often regarded as an activity for black belt Forth programmers, but I am of the opinion that a meta compiler can be simpler than most Forth applications, and easily understood by Forth beginners.
The first Forth system that I brought up on one of my own computers some fifteen years ago was ported using a FIG assembly listing, and a ROM monitor, so I can understand the logic that an assembly listing of Forth could make sense. I was several years later that I first worked with Forth meta compilers. When I began working with eForth I developed a couple of new implementations of eForth using the MASM tools. The idea is that since eForth had only thirty CODE words these words could be coded for a new machine and using macros or data statements MASM can generate a new eForth. This idea works, and many versions of eForth have been created over the last few years, most of them using MASM. But in my own experience I found MASM to be a problem. Macros did not work the same in the three versions I had so I spent too much time trying to figure out how to get MASM to do fancy things. MASM needed lots of my disk space, and it was very slow.
When I upgraded to the then experimental eForth 2.0 I got it in Forth source only, but with Bill's meta compiler. The meta compiler did not come with a manual, but I was able to hack it from compiling 8086 object code to compiling MuP20 object code. It was much easier to tame than MASM, and instead of ten minute assembly times I was dealing with one and a half second compile times!
I metacompiled for Indirect Threaded, Direct Threaded, Subroutine Threaded, simulated MuP20, F20, MuP21, and F21 chips. But when I began to experiment with a subroutine threaded model with packed instruction primitives, and many code packing and inlining optimizations I found that I was fighting the tools. So I started writing my own meta compilers for eForth.
Recently I have been meta compiling eForth 2.4 for the MuP21 simulator and development system. I will use a simple version of this meta compiler as the example for this paper on meta compiling eForth. I have wanted to release a meta compiler for eForth that would run under eForth, and this one is now very close. Although this version is for FPC and some of it is specific to that Forth system.
I think that the most important thing in writing a meta compiler is to understand the system that you want to meta compile. The next most important thing is understanding the target machine. If you have a very large and complex Forth system it may require a large and complex meta compiler. s. I intend to concentrate entirely on the metacompiler itself here, and to the eForth model as it relates to metacompiling. I do not intend to cover the coding of the assembler that generates the CODE words, I will leave that up to the user who wants to metacompile a new eForth for their own new machine.
The eForth compiler is extrememly simple. Look up a word, execute it if it is immediate, or compile a token to represent it (usually an address), and if it is not in the Forth dictionary then it is either a number or an error.
An eForth metacompiler is almost as simple, but it is a little more complex because it is generating code that is not immediately executable. Often the code produced is for a different computer, and cannot be executed on the machine doing the metacompiling. The address in memory into which code is metacompiled is often not the same as the address where the code will run when it is executed.
What makes a normal Forth compiler work is that certain words are IMMEDIATE and will execute at compile time while other words are being compiled. Take this example:
: MYDEMO WORD1 WORD2 IF WORD3 THEN ;
A meta compiler does something similar to produce identical object code. It is different because none of the words metacompiled can be executed while metacompiling. Somehow WORD1 needs to compile a reference to WORD1, and IF needs to do the same thing as IF in a normal Forth compiler.
The easiest way to get this to happen is to use the Forth wordlist search order to make it all happen. Remember there are going to be many versions of certain words. IF is a good example. There is the IF in Forth used in the normal Forth compiler, and possibly and IF in the assembler on the Forth system, and an IF in the meta compiler, and possibly and IF in the assembler for the TARGET eForth, and certainly an IF in the eForth source being meta compiled, and they are all different.
In the spirit of eForth I have tried to make this version of the meta compiler as and fairly portable. I have used only three vocabularies, and only two words to change the search order, FORTH and TARGET.
This is the key to how it all works. I use two search orders:
FORTH DEFS FORTH ROOT the order set by FORTH and XASM DEFS FORTH ROOT the order set by TARGET.
The normal Forth compiler normally creates a header for every word compiled. This behaviour is modifed in my meta compiler so that whenever words are defined two headers are created. One header is the header for the word in the TARGET system, and the other is a header for a definition in the DEFS vocabulary. The words in the the DEFS vocabulary all have a similar code structure. They have the same header as a definition in the TARGET system, and they have code that will compile a reference to the code in the TARGET system into the TARGET system. These words in the DEFS vocabulary are also all IMMEDIATE words.
Here is the definition of T_: the word that is used defining several types of words in the meta compiler:
\ T_: WILL COMPILE a header into DEFS and TARGET, and \ WHEN the DEFS version of a word compiled with T_: is RUN IT \ WILL COMPILE an MuP21 ADDRESS FOUND IN FPC WORD INTO TARGET (DTC) : T_: ( at runtime - - ) FIRSTSLOT \ MAKE SURE START OF WORD in MuP21, a target align HERE \ get HERE in the TARGET space CREATE \ modified for TWIN headers, one in DEFS one in TARGET, \ COMPILE MuP21 address INTO FPC WORD AT PARAM FLD IMMEDIATE \ all of the words in DEFS are IMMEDIATE DOES> @ \ at run time get MuP21 address ( n ) from param T, ; \ for direct threaded code model and compile it
In fact all of the words in the eForth source get compiled into IMMEDIATE words in the DEFS vocabulary. But since some of these words need to have immediate function to make the compiler work properly there words already have a defintion in the XASM vocabulary. TARGET sets the search order to XASM DEFS FORTH ROOT so that words like IF that require immediate execution during compilation will be found there before DEFS is searched.
This makes the metacompiler very simple. ALL words that it compiles create IMMEDIATE words in the DEFS vocabulary that do more compiling later if they are ever executed. And words that are normally immediate when compiling are found in XASM before DEFS is searched.
It is also handy to be able to switch back to Forth at times and make it the first vocabulary in the search order. When I finish the eForth resident version of the eForth meta compiler I expect that it will be even simpler than the FPC version. The complexity of FPC somewhat complicates the definition of some of the words in this metacompiler. Since the metacompiler makes TWIN headers for defintions the way FPC does headers is modified. Also some other compiler behaviour is modified that is FPC specific.
Here are most of the words in the XASM vocabulary that are not part of the MuP21 opcode assembler. Most of them should be very familiar.
CREATE VARIABLE USER CONSTANT : ; ALLOT IMMEDIATE COMPILE-ONLY RECURSE LITERAL'['] EQU FORTH \ ( [ ] [COMPILE] IF ELSE THEN BEGIN WHILE REPEAT UNTIL AGAIN HERE CODE END-CODE ABORT"." C" S", ALIGN ALIGNED CELLS CHARS
Here are most of the words in the FORTH vocabulary that are not part of the MuP21 opcode assembler.
XASM DEFS TARGET ALLOCMEM T_HERE T_NP T_LAST T_ALLOT T_@ T_! T, CMOVE>T S,-C "HEAD "TWINS 6/7/94 Jeff Foxby Sean Setters
necessarily
DSLR Camera Pixel Size Canon EOS 5Ds / 5Ds R 4.14µm Canon EOS 7D Mark II 4.10µm Canon EOS 70D 4.10µm Canon EOS T6s / T6i 3.71µm
The formula of "1/ (effective [full-frame] focal length)" is likely ingrained in your head and can be recalled and calculated on the fly as you place a camera's viewfinder to your eye. It's a simple formula which has allowed photographers to determine a shutter speed that will negate the effects of camera shake and that formula has served us all very well for many years.Here's how the traditional formula worked: Let's imagine that you are using a Canon EOS 5D Mark III DSLR paired with an EF 135mm f/2L USM lens. With a full-frame camera and a lens featuring a 135mm focal length, the shutter speed needed to prevent camera shake would be 1/(effective focal length, 1*135), or 1/135 second. As our cameras cannot be set to 1/135, we would typically round that figure to the next fastest 1/3rd stop shutter speed for a final calculation of 1/160 second (though 1/125 second would technically be closer to the calculated result).If using a crop-sensor camera like the EOS 60D with the same 135mm lens, we would traditionally calculate the full-frame equivalent focal length value. In this scenario, the focal length would need to be multiplied by 1.6 (the crop factor) to obtain our effective focal length. The formula would change to 1/(1.6*135), or 1/216 which would then be rounded to 1/250 second.But before we plow ahead, we need to clear something up. The "effective focal length multiplier" formula is, by all accounts, an arbitrary value in the camera shake negating formula. In the above scenario, we multiplied the lens' focal length by 1.6 (the crop factor arrived at by comparing the 60D's sensor size to that of a full-frame camera). However, the original problem regarding the need to increase shutter speeds when using a crop-sensor camera had nothing to do with effective focal length of those cameras, but instead was the result crop-camera's higher pixel density sensor.The above graphic helps illustrate my point. The full-frame lens projects the same image circle no matter whether it's mounted to a full-frame or crop-sensor camera. If the lens is mounted to a crop-sensor camera, the outside portion of the projection is simply unused. Therefore, as the name implies, a crop-sensor camera simply crops the full-frame lens's projected image circle from the center; it doesn't magnify the projection. With all things being equal aside from the surface area of the sensors, there would be no need to modify the shutter speed formula when using a crop sensor camera. But as we know, all things haven't traditionally been equal between full-frame and crop-sensor cameras.The "effective focal length multiplier" makes perfect sense when discussing relative field of view. A 50mm lens on a crop-sensor camera gives you the field of view as an 80mm lens on a full-frame camera. But as field of view has nothing to do with motion blur, the 1.6x value shouldn'tbe tied to the shutter speed formula.Why did I say "necessarily?" Because at some point in the past, the higher pixel density of crop-sensor cameras meant that a roughly 50% faster shutter speed (compared to the shutter speed required with the same lens used on a full-frame camera) could help a photographer negate the effects of camera shake. I suppose it was around that time that the focal length multiplier became incorrectly associated with the camera shake negation formula. But since that time sensors have become even more dense meaning we're well past the days where the values coincidentally coincided.Considering the pixel-dense sensors found in a large portion of recently introduced DSLR cameras, the formula we've been using for so long simply doesn't work for calculating a "safe" shutter speed that will eliminate camera shake with these cameras. The formula must be re-evaluated and revised if you are currently using one of Canon's (or Nikon's or Sony's) cameras featuring a pixel-dense sensor.Notice I used the term "pixel-dense sensor" and not "high-resolution sensor." The terminology is very important here. The term "pixel-dense sensor" is being used to describe any DSLR whose sensor has individual pixels that are similar in size to the high-resolution 5Ds / 5Ds R. With this in mind and for our purposes, let's consider the following Canon DSLRs featuring sensors with pixel sizes less than 4.2µm to fall under the "pixel-dense" umbrella:Notice that both full-frame and crop-sensor cameras are falling under the same umbrella. As we described above, the pixel density of the sensor is what really matters. As these sensors feature pixel densities that are somewhat similar, they're all getting thrown into the same group.After spending a significant amount of time evaluating the EOS 7D II and 5Ds/5Ds R specifically, we think the camera-shake stopping shutter speed formula for these cameras should be:I realize the formula doesn't look terribly different, but that " * 2 " portion makes a huge impact when using pixel-dense sensors. Keep in mind, this isn't the first time we've suggested this exact formula for arriving at a preferred shutter speed for such sensors. Bryan specifically mentions this formula in his EOS 5Ds Review, but I thought it was important enough to highlight on its own.So if using a 5Ds / 5Ds R with the same EF 135mm f/2L USM mentioned above, our new formula for negating camera shake becomes 1/(1*135*2), or 1/270 which is then rounded to 1/320 second. You might even go so far as to use a shutter speed that's 1/3 stop faster when using the most pixel dense sensor in Canon's lineup, the one found in the Rebel T6s/T6i just to be safe.And on that note, with ever evolving sensor technology (producing even more pixel packed sensors), and the fact that everyone's a little different in how stable they are when holding a camera, the sad fact of the matter is that even the 1/(focal length * 2) formula is only a guide that seems to work well for this particular period of camera technology, and every person – no matter what camera they are using – should perform their own standardized tests to see what shutter speeds produce acceptable sharp images when shooting at various focal lengths with their camera(s).Of course, an image stabilized lens will allow you to use significantly longer shutter speeds while avoiding the consequences of camera shake, but you'd still need to use a revised shutter speed formula (either ours or one developed using your own tests) to use as your starting point before considering the benefit of image stabilization. And when it comes to stabilization, a tool that's been around for a hundred years may be your best bet for making camera shake irrelevant – the humble tripod.Going forward, as sensors become more densely packed with pixels, we must constantly re-evaluate the shutter speeds necessary to stop the effects of camera shake to achieve the sharpest images.At 12:00 noon SLT on Sunday, February 1st, 2015, MadPea’s latest grid-wide challenge, Buried launches. Their first major event of the new year, Buried contains all that people have come to love about MadPea’s games: mystery, clue-solving, immersive interaction, and fun. Buried offer all this – and a lot more, as I found out, when I was, with a small number of other bloggers, invited to preview the game on Friday, January 30th.
Keen MadPea players are probably already aware of elements within the challenge: in keeping with the most popular MadPea games, it is focused on unravelling the mysterious disappearance of a young woman, and contains MadPea’s trademark blend of grid-wide vendor locations (25 in all), rewards, and the introduction of geocaching as a part of the gameplay structure.
Once formally opened, Buried will run for a period of two months, a time frame which reflects the slow burn nature of the challenge – and I’m intentionally using that word repeatedly. Buried isn’t a hunt, it isn’t even in quite the same vein as MadPea’s recent mystery adventures such as Blood Letters or the very popular Room 326 / Mad City events involving the Silent Peacock Hotel. It really is an immersive narrative, focused on the missing character, Lilyanna Morano.
Players will begin their investigations at a holiday location amidst a small cluster of remote islands. Here they must uncover the first clues to set them on their way. The aim here is not simply to get people into the “hunt” aspects of the challenge; it is, like the opening chapter of a book or the initial opening of a film or story-arc television series, about setting the scene and establishing the characters.
“What we want to do when the player first comes here is that they well feel the story, and they will really get into who the main character is,” Kiana Writer, who heads-up MadPea and is responsible for writing the Buried story and who took a hand in the opening region’s design, explains. “Who Lily is, how she lives, what she does. So we tried to leave a lot of little clues about her personality to find. They can actually take a boat to and from every island and explore each of them.”
Part of these explorations involve finding the essential element to the challenge activating the game HUD. This is supplied when players arrive on the main holiday island, but will not activate until such time as the first clue has been solved.
Once activated, the HUD reveals the geocaching nature of the game, and introduces you to the other “character” within it – that of the C-Me Corporation.
C-Me is the entity behind the new approach to geocaching Lilyanna was researching at the time of her disappearance – and they would seem to have a very twisted take on the technology.
Exhibiting something of a Mission: Impossible flair for theatrics, C-Me appear to be using geocaching to play a game of their own. snaring people entering their sphere of influence, and then toying with them and sending them hither and thither in the search for C-Me capsules.
But did they arrange for Lilyanna to vanish, or were their machinations merely the catalyst for her causing her own disappearance? The only way to find out is to enter into their game…
Also, should you participate in the challenge, do make sure you have both local sounds and the music stream active when exploring the islands; a considerable amount of work has gone into these not just visually, but audibly as well. Seeing and hearing the environment really is the only way to truly experience it. Do note, also, that because of the slow burn nature of the challenge, the number of people able to access the “holiday island” location is limited to a maximum of 20 at any given time – so patience is also very much part of this challenge.
“Gameplay and immersion is important to us with this game,” Axiomatic Clarity, the man responsible for the overall look and feel to the regions, and who designed the game HUD, explained. “We’ve put a lot of work into the usability of this build. We want people to be able to explore and discover the secrets and clues, and we’ve put in a lot of atmospheric elements, the lighting, the sounds.”
Exploration of the locations on the island is essential; it’s only through investigating Lily herself – the house she’d rented in order to write-up her research, the surrounding islands, and so on, that players will uncover the necessary clues that will both lead them to Lily’s hidden tablet, together with the means to access it once found in order to transfer the data it contains to their own (HUD) tablet. This in turn will draw them into C-Me’s mysterious game, and thus start them on their grid-wide journey of discovery.
I’m not going to give too much more away on the game itself. What I will say is that anyone who enjoys MadPea’s narrative-lead adventures is bound to enjoy Buried, which will run for around two months following the opening on February 1st. The opening itself will be preceded by a launch party at!Exodus! Rock Club, starting at 10:00 SLT on Sunday, February 1st.
Putting something like buried together is a huge undertaking, as well as Kiana and Axiomatic, bringing the game together has involved the skills of some 20 people from across the globe, testament to both MadPea’s extraordinary reach and desire to bring compelling, immersive activities to Second Life, and to the platform’s own inherent abiliity to host such activities. That both succeed so well is exemplified by the eagerness with which each new game from the company is awaited by MadPea fans and players.
For my part, and while only exposed to a small part of Buried, I found myself entirely drawn into the concept and execution of the challenge. The gameplay in the opening “chapter” on the island where everything kicks-off is completely immersive and requires a level of engagement which encourages the player to seek out more – not because there are prizes from some 25 vendors to be obtained, but because there is a real challenge involved here; you’re seeking to find – possibly rescue (who knows?) a missing person and get to the bottom of just what C-Me is really all about; rewards gathered along the way are actually quite secondary. As such, Buried marvellously builds on the successes of recent events such as the aforementioned Blood Letters and Room 326 stories – and offers an intriguing stepping stone towards MadPea’s upcoming (and completely stunning) UNIA.
Note that SLurls for Buried will be available when the game officially launches. With thanks to Kess and Kiana for arranging |
atizing my choice of venue for the interview, so as to play up the “obsession” angle (remember, part 1 made the article into a drinking game on this premise).
Or perhaps a completely understandable confusion as to what “first” means.
This strange confusion as to the nature of time, we will see, actually pops up again and again throughout the piece. The gist of which, to whatever extent it relates to me, can be summarized as “You know Khan, from Star Trek? Eron Gjoni is like if he and Spock had a baby. Trust me, I’m a journalist.”
The article continues:
Gjoni is a highly cerebral, 25-year-old software developer who was recently fired from Massachusetts General Hospital’s robotics lab. He chooses his words deliberately, spending much of our time together describing the month after his breakup with Quinn: how he extracted details from her Facebook, text, and email accounts; how he tracked her movements and shadowed her conversations.
1. MGH doesn’t have a robotics lab.
2. Zak would apparently prefer I choose my words accidentally.
3. The only extent to which I “tracked” anyone’s movements was the extent to which I held off on publishing until they were out of town. Just in case shit devolved into doxing.
4. How I what? I didn’t extract any details from her facebook, text, or email accounts. I do not have access to these.
The process he described to me sounded as if he were gathering the pieces of a horrible machine, with each component designed to be as damaging to Quinn as possible. Eventually, the machine would have a name: “The Zoe Post,” a 9,425-word screed he published in August.
1. Yes, the pieces of some horrible machine. Assembled with my “precocious mathematical mind” (we’ll get to this). Upon the completion of which I go on to don a cape and sit in the throne left to me by the previous tenant of my shitty sublet, to wreak havoc upon the world.
2. The machine had a name. “The Zoe Post.” But please, if you feel like you’re on a first name basis with it, just call it “The.”
We are left to imagine the brave, heroic victim of this horrible machine – the victim of “The,” screaming in anger into the night.
“KHHHHAAAAAAAAN”
Neither Gjoni nor Quinn was particularly good at dating. He’d had a handful of flings in college and she’d had a number of short-term relationships. Both seemed stuck in adolescence—the types of young adults who tend to burn hot and flame out fast.
My first relationship (the one in college) lasted two and a half years. It was comfortable, but lacking in passion. Zak was well aware of this, but seems to think that amounts to burning hot, and that two and a half years amount to flaming out fast.
It might be this two and a half year relationship is discounted so as to discredit the seriousness of the concerns that brought me to publish TZP by painting them as the inevitable result of a short and overly impassioned relationship by someone with a history of short and overly impassioned relationships.
It might also be that this two and a half years was not understood by Zak, because he is struggling to understand the nature of time.
Possessed of a boyish face despite his shaggy beard, Gjoni has brown eyes and a skeletal 6-foot-1 frame,
I identify more with “Heroin Chic,” but okay.
and speaks in a matter-of-fact, deadpan monotone.
This is partially because I am speaking about matters of fact. Though I do tend to get monotone as conversations lose novelty.
His friends describe him as “extremely methodical,”
Spock.
“a very intellectual person with semi-decent people skills,”
Spock.
insular,
Spock.
rational,
Spock.
and almost preternaturally calm.
Spock.
Benjamin Hitov, a childhood friend and fellow programmer, told me he once beat Gjoni in the ninja fighter game Dead or Alive “100 times in a row, and he didn’t change his expression once.”
Spock losing to Kirk in 3D chess in the first episode of Star Trek.
Of note here though, is that Ben’s quote was in the context of his thoughts on the claim that I was violent. Ben has known me since 3rd grade, and he offered that anecdote to show that I would never get mad enough to resort to violence. Zak, instead, uses it to paint me as some inhuman creature. For as anyone who plays Dead or Alive should know, it’s a game where tempers run high, and friendships often hang in the balance of those hilariously unnecessary boob-physics.
More importantly – we played 100 times in a row (I had a project I wanted to procrastinate on), and Ben only won two thirds of the time, so there.
Moving on!
Born in Albania, Gjoni migrated to Worcester with his family when he was six to escape the Kosovo War. “Moving here was like a big reset button,” he told me.
When I was six, the year was 1996. The Kosovo war didn’t start until 1998, two years later. Questions remain. Am I like Khan – deeply affected by and forged of the horrors of war, or have yet another two years mysteriously vanished, because Zachary Jason does not understand the concept of time?
Growing up, Gjoni struggled to assimilate, but with a precocious mathematical mind, he found solace in computers.
Perhaps I am not quite like Kahn. Perhaps I am more like Spock, after all.
Though – a precocious mathematical mind? This is interesting, and I am flattered. I just wish someone would have told that to my highschool algebra teacher, who gave me a 47. Or to whatever graded my SATs, so it would have been more lenient about my not bothering to learn what a prime number is.
The thing about “precocious” is that it implies I became good at something much much earlier than generally expected. But I didn’t learn math until much later than I should have, and for reasons that had little to do with any inherent interest in math.
The only thing Zak seems to base his view on, is that there was, in fact, a program I’d crafted in highschool (for the purposes of my artistic endeavors) which, to the casual observer, might imply a deep understanding of mathematics. But if anyone were to probe the underlying code, it would impress upon them horror at the monstrous attempt to make sense from an absolute dearth of formalism.
That code would look like it was written by a highschooler who didn’t entirely understand what he was doing. That code, was, in fact, written by a highschooler who didn’t entirely understand what he was doing.
So, I learned math really late. Zak seems to think I mastered it really early. Zak is a journalist, and so we might suppose on his part such an inadequate understanding of mathematics as to render plausible his awe at my paltry accomplishments.
Or we might posit that this is merely intended as a diversion for the empathy of the reader. So that if the reader is to question “why would anyone behave in this implausible way,” Zak need not offer the truth for explanation – but merely affirm that “there is no sense in understanding such sinister minds echelons above and so very alien to our own.”
Or perhaps – and we are accumulating evidence now – the distinction between “early” and “late” is lost on Zachary Jason, due, again, to a deep-seated confusion as to the nature of time.
School, he says, was “almost bizarrely easy,” so he dropped out of a computer science program at Worcester State when MGH poached him during his senior year.
Well THAT was out of context. Here’s the context reproduced below, as the relevant question was asked via email. (with emphasis added)
School was especially tricky. The lessons were almost bizarrely easy compared to the curriculum in Albania, and I picked up on the language easily enough after a few months, but the culture was filled with incomprehensible gotchas. Wearing pink shirts with Nala on them wasn’t okay if you were male apparently, and at 20 pounds too light for my age and 1 year too young for my grade you can imagine kids weren’t especially inclined to let faux pas like that slide. I’d make friends, but just a few here or there. Most were from outside of school. Neighborhood kids, usually other immigrants in the same crappy part of town.
We see that this description of “bizarrely easy” was relative to the curriculum in Albania. Of which my experience was limited merely to the first grade.
Zak seems to extend that description all the way to college, and goes so far as to say it’s why I left college.
Is Zak attempting to paint me as an arrogant genius – as Khan. Or, given the huge temporal gap between first grade and college, do we have more evidence of Zak’s struggle with the concept of time?
Gjoni fell for her hard—maybe too hard, given how brief their relationship was. He began idealizing Quinn as “this perfect ethical thing,” he says, and less as a gifted and flawed woman who battled chronic depression.
Lol, no.
The context of the “this perfect ethical thing” quote was not in reference to how much I idealized anyone. It was in reference to how much they demanded I think of them in that way, and the ways they would punish anything resembling an assertion or suspicion to the contrary.
There were flaws I was encouraged to accept of course. But they were all of the form “my life has been so difficult, and I am stronger and more compassionate for it, I deserve your sympathy and adoration.”
If you have read TZP, you’re well aware that anything else of substance was met with a “how dare you.” And there were some very important things that were left undared.
Quinn often traveled to speak at gaming conferences, and they saw each other at most once a week.
After just five months, they broke up. But Gjoni wouldn’t let go.Months later, his slinking obsession compelled him to write Quinn what he called a “giant” email begging her to get back together with him.
1. There’s that word again. “Obsession.” Take a drink.
2. As Zak was made well aware, that email was not written of my initiative. It was solicited from me by its recipient in what that recipient pitched as a mutual exchange. The exchange happened over a month before the plane ticket. Zak chooses instead to frame this as some compulsion born of my “obsession” with someone who I was quite uneasy about continuing a relationship with.
3. The e-mail in question is actually the exact opposite of what Zak claims here. In fact, the concluding paragraph of that email amounted to “We don’t really need to get back together that much. It would be nice presuming the last month or so has been a giant messed up series of confusions (which I hope your response letter clarifies). But I’m good either way.”
Though Gjoni stubbornly suspected Quinn had cheated on him while they were dating, he hoped to salvage their relationship. In a moment of weakness, she gave in and bought him a plane ticket from Boston to come see her in San Francisco, where she was at a games conference.
What moment of weakness dude? The plane ticket was like a month after the email. We’d been dating again for almost a month.
Quick run-down of how time works: It runs in a single direction, at a constant rate, agreed upon by all observers in the same relativistic reference frame.
If you’ve been dating someone for the last month, and they are not in a spaceship experiencing time-dilation as a result of relativistic acceleration, why would “a moment of weakness” come into play when they ask you to skip work and fly out to San Francisco? They have been dating you for almost a month. You are both in the same reference frame. You both experience it as the same span of time. What exactly are they “giving in” to?
For anyone who has read tzp, the proper timeline in it shows the sequence was
email -> non-exclusive relationship for a couple of weeks -> dating again for almost a month -> I am yelled at for being friends with Rachel -> a few hours later I am guilted into not being friends with Rachel any more -> a few hours later I am pressured into flying out to San Francisco for reasons that one might suspect have something to do with my spinelessly agreeing to not be friends with Rachel anymore.
Unfortunately, my palm has yet again merged itself with my face. So part 3 will have to wait until after I go do things remotely worth anyone’s time. Which, again, Zak, if you’re reading this – runs in a single direction, at a constant rate agreed upon by all observers in the same relativistic reference frame.Hanford, CA –-(Ammoland.com)- There is danger in the misuse of power. Some of the counter-balances in the Constitutional system which the Founding Fathers erected, have been let to decompose.
One outstanding neglect is in the mismanagement of the organized militia, and the proper use, care and ownership of firearms.
This, unfortunately, has been greatly neglected. The federal and state governments have both been working toward the gradual elimination of all firearms.
Check out Public Law 87-297 – the shocking program for “general and complete disarmament” of the people of the United States. The United States State Department once published a document called ‘FREEDOM FROM WAR” (1961) that laid out their intention to completely disarm the people.
Unfortunately, the State Department has discontinued publishing this document that exposes this unwise and evil intention; however, the document can be seen in its entirety on the Internet at www.mikenew.com/pub7277.html
Constitutional Principle: You cannot place the control of your right to arms under the control of the same people in whom you were meant to ‘guard against’ because of the opportunity the circumstance presents to public officials for tyranny in government.
Evil thoughts are born in the minds of animated beings (people), not in tools made of metal. Guns do not invent the idea of killing. They are inanimated tools. Guns do not inhale and exhale. They are not made of flesh and blood. They do not hold animosities or grudges, and they do not run around looking for people to assault. They only follow orders of whoever picks them up and operates them, using the energy the gun was meant to possess. Generally speaking, it is the holder of the weapon, whose finger pulls the trigger who is responsible for its ability to fire. It is the person who uses a gun for improper purposes who does the “assaulting”! Who then should be described as being guilty of “assault”? The gun? Or the person who pulls the trigger?
Criminals have guns for assault. Good law-abiding people do not own assault weapons. “Mis-users” of firearms are to blame for the criticism firearms are receiving today.
Too little attention is being given to the thirst of some politicians (presidents and the like) for one solitary governing system over the entire world: a “world government” steeped in communism, to which some have become dedicated. The intention of the use of the gun is the focus to which, we should be drawn. The “world government” proponents are building a “world army”, and those soldiers will be greatly armed, many times over, against the rightful liberties of the American people. It would help to vote for new representatives, and eliminate all the gun grabbers in Washington, D.C., and stay on constant watch!
Constitutional Principle: Guns are a God-given right.
Our Founders reasoned it properly. Guns are the instruments which support God-endowed rights. They are tools for preservation of the individual, his home, his land, and his other natural God-given rights. They have great force, which often is of essential value within our republic. Their force, when properly used, is used within our system to defend, protect, guard, and to secure freedom and liberty – not to assault! The gun itself does not decide to pull the trigger. That responsibility is left up to humans. Criminals are the assaulters! Not the guns! Out of 350,000,000 people, the percentage is low of those who severely abuse guns; however, that percentage could have been of a much lower sum if the government had not allowed the “well-regulated” militia to dissipate in America after the Civil War. It is logical that a man (or woman) must have some sort of aid for the defense of him (or her) self, and for that of his (or her) country, other than just bare hands.
Constitutional Principle: The true militia is an armed population.
If we are not to go back to using knives, bows and arrows, clubs, or like today, cans of spray paint, for our defense, we must wrestle with the subject of the proper use of guns by armed citizens, and the restoration of proper training of the citizenry, individually and collectively, as in a well-regulated militia. It is the original Constitutional militia training that needs to be restored. We are a nation who kill our young and future citizens in abortions, but leave open the gates for totally untrained people and criminals to enter, who come from communist countries, and are unaware of the purpose of our militia system.
Constitutional Principle: The right to arms is the keystone of our liberty.
The keystone amendment that backstops all of the other nine amendments in the Bill of Rights is the Second Amendment. It is the linchpin for all other rights in the Bill of Rights, a document that cannot be repealed, revoked or rescinded. The Second Amendment carries a “shall not be infringed” order with it. Yet, the well regulated militia has been infringed, and if no corrective action is taken, the right to arms itself is headed for gradual dissolution. The well-regulated militia was constitutionally meant to include the whole people.
Constitutional Principle: The Constitution and the Bill of Rights belong to the people.
It is highly important to keep in mind that both the 1789 Constitution and the 1791 Bill of Rights were ratified by the people. These two documents belong exclusively to the people. They are their possession! The Bill of Rights and its Second Amendment were meant to be in perpetuity and never repealed, revoked, or rescinded. This is the reason the key rights were placed inside this sanctuary. Congress does not possess the power or the authority to violate it. The Dianne Feinstein’s, and others today of her kind in government service, are in serious violation of our laws.
Constitutional Principle: Consent of the governed is a requirement.
There is only one way that the prime rights in the Bill of Rights can be taken away (snookered away) from the people, in violation of the endowment given to them by the Creator, and that is, if the people can be mentally manipulated (brain washed) to request, consent, require, or support that such general and complete disarmament be done. There never has been any true permission granted, nor consent given to prohibit use of hand guns by the people. Today only a falsified document stands in federal records authorizing a complete prohibition of all hand guns. There never has truly been the required “consent of the governed” obtained! The globalists dream of fulfilling “the general and complete disarmament program” (the congressional law signed by John Kennedy, known as Public Law 87-297 for U.S. co-operation in world disarmament) exists as the authority for such madness!
When the militia was operating in proper order from George Washington’s time to the Civil War time period, anyone who was not mentally or physically fit to be a member of the militia was discovered and dismissed by the Brigade Inspector of each county. A Brigade Inspector was in existence and in charge of every county in the U.S.A wherein every man was required to take annual militia training unless two practicing surgeons declared him unfit. In that time period, farmers were trained to be soldiers overnight if and when it was necessary.
Constitutional Principle: The people are the final authority in a republic.
In spite of their falsifying the “consent of the governed” to abide by Public Law 87-297, the federal government has been hesitant to enforce the civilian population to disarm other than on a gradual basis, outlawing only certain guns at a time, periodically. Closing and realignment of U.S.A. military bases was achieved under the Base Realignment and Closing Commission (BRAC) just a few years back. The plan for a totally disarmed population is a scandal of great magnitude! When the militia was operating in proper order from George Washington’s time to the Civil War time period, anyone who was not mentally or physically fit to have a weapon or to be a member of the militia was discovered and dismissed by the Brigade Inspector. The Brigade Inspector was in charge of each county’s militia in every state of the Union. Every man was required to take militia training unless two practicing surgeons declared him unfit. The plan to disarm Americans cannot be stopped unless the people are awakened in time and are made to realize that their republic is being turned into a dictatorship.
About Second Amendment Committee:
Since 1984, the Second Amendment Committee has been providing information of benefit to those seeking a peaceful resolution to the gun crisis. Please be sure to take a good look at our Documentspage. We currently have about 700 articles listed, and additional material may be available upon request. If you’d like to see what has been added or updated recently, please check out our blog. Visit: www.libertygunrights.comUp until the morning of January 31, Harley Branham’s Facebook page catalogued her disgust with Donald Trump and his supporters.
One meme Branham shared compared Trump to Hitler and another showed Holocaust victims under the headline, “Remember it didn’t start with gas chambers.”
In smaller type, that same meme reminded the reader, “It started with intolerance & hate speech and when people stopped caring, became desensitized mindlessly obedient and turned a blind eye.”
Using another meme as prop, Branham identified herself as a “feminist” and “anti-fascist,” one who “supports punching nazis in the face.”
After the morning of January 31, the anti-Trump memes stopped cold. On that day, a Howard County, Missouri, coroner’s jury charged Branham with involuntary manslaughter for her bullying of 17-year-old suicide victim, Kenneth Suttner. Suttner worked under Branham at a Dairy Queen in Fayette, Missouri.
According to co-workers, Branham continually abused Suttner, threw food at him, and forced him to do demeaning tasks.
Testifying in her own defense, Branham admitted calling Suttner an “asshole” but denied ever bullying him. “There’s a lot of people at Dairy Queen saying I was the reason,” Branham said of Suttner’s suicide, “but I don’t understand why it would be that way.”
Branham was released on $25,000 bail. A preliminary hearing is scheduled for May. She faces up to seven years in prison. Her most recent post on Facebook was of a flower.Future driving: Business models for robocars
When I talk about robocars, I often get quite opposite reactions:
Americans, in particular, will never give up car ownership! You can pry the bent steering wheel from my cold, dead hands.
I can’t see why anybody would own a car if there were fast robotaxi services available!
Surely human drivers will be banned from the roads before too long.
I predict none of these extremes will be true. I predict the market will offer all options to the public, and several options will be very popular. I am not even sure which will be the most popular.
Many people will stick to buying and driving classic, manually driven cars. The newer versions of these cars will have fancy Advanced Driver Assistance Systems (ADAS) that make them much harder to crash, and their accident levels will be lower. Many will buy a robocar for their near-exclusive use. It will park near where it drops them off and always be ready. It will keep their stuff in the trunk. People who live and work in an area with robotaxi service will give up car ownership, and hire for all their needs, using a wide variety of vehicles. Some people will purchase a robocar mostly for their use, but will hire it out when they know they are not likely to use it, allowing them to own a better car. They will make rarer use of robotaxi services to cover specialty trips or those times when they hired it out and ended up needing it. Their stuff will stay in a special locker in the car.
In addition, people will mix these models. Families that own two or more cars will switch to owning fewer cars and hiring for extra use and special uses. For example, if you own a two-person car, you would summon a larger taxi when three or more are together. In particular, parents may find that they don’t want to buy a car for their teenager, but would rather just subsidize their robotaxi travel. Parents will want to do this and get logs of where their children travel, and of course teens will resist that, causing a conflict.
The current multi-car family is the most likely place for change. Right now, families with two cars use one car (the newer one, typically) more than the other. This is true even if both people in a couple travel the same, because while solo trips are done in each person’s private car, joint trips are usually done in the nicer car. As such, it’s easier to rely on a shared car service for the second car. When it comes to teens, parents resist both the danger a teen is put in by driving, and the high cost of insurance. Superior ADAS should reduce those for manual cars, but the factor will still remain. Parents don’t want to buy the machine that might kill their child, but teens crave mobility — and parents remember their own childhood, and also tire of loaning out their personal car.
Let’s consider couples moving from two cars to one car plus robotaxi service.
In order to give up a car to use robotaxi service, it is necessary that the robotaxi service serve the home and the workplace of those who will shift to it, plus a number of popular destinations. It is not necessary it serve all destinations, unless it is very common that both drivers want to frequently go to non-served locations at the same time. In general, it is best if both workplaces are in the service area, because otherwise the one who works outside the area will take the private car away all day, making it hard for the other to get outside the service area. If both can commute, then they can switch off which person gets the private car that day based on what they plan.
Robotaxi services will be able to get you outside their service area, of course. They will do it by either letting you take the wheel and drive yourself, keeping the car to yourself until you get home, or by taking you to the edge of the service area where you quickly switch into a traditional manually driven carshare vehicle. This should work fairly well, but it’s still a bit of inconvenience and extra cost to do this so one-car couples will prefer to use their private car on these trips.
The next question is, what car do you own as your private car? Today, this is most commonly an SUV, pickup truck or five-passenger sedan. For a couple, a two-person vehicle makes the most sense, and possibly even a two-person “inline” face-to-face vehicle which is very narrow. As a narrow vehicle it is able to move through traffic more readily and store itself easily and cheaply. It would meet most needs, though a bigger vehicle would be summoned for special trips and perhaps long distance trips. The small vehicle may make sense as an electric, once battery costs drop to $300/kwh or less.
Larger families might opt for something larger. Today they often get minivans and SUVs, which are certainly nice if moving multiple kids or going to kids’ activities that need gear and supplies. Speciality vehicles may arise to cater to all the different classes of family needs: the couple with a one small child, the couple with two, the couple with a tween, etc. As cars become easier to swap out — and of course hired robotaxis are swapped out every day — it makes more sense to go for something designed for your vey specific needs rather than something general purpose.
Dealing with your stuff
I am guilty of keeping many things in the trunk of my car. Many of them probably don’t need to be there, but some are things I like to have always available, such as my camera gear and tripods, spare medicines, clothing and gear for unexpected weather or an overnight bag. Some of these needs can be met by delivery robots that could quickly get me an umbrella or warm coat, since the weather does not come on us without warning, but the camera gear I need immediately if there is something surprising to photograph.
For this I have envisioned the “Stuff Depot” concept, found in my 2008 article A week of Robocars. Here, you have a special locker, and your car (or any car you hire) is able to make a quick stop at a depot near you to drop off or pick up this locker. It’s involved, but does answer the question. At the same time, people who live in taxi cities, like Manhattan, just get used to the idea they don’t get to carry a lot of stuff with them at all times, and only keep what they can carry in a handbag or backpack.
The car as status symbol
Many people are attracted to particular cars to show off their status and wealth, or express their style. Some cars are valued because they are expensive, which is a nice racket to get into. Those who buy cars will still be able to display them in their driveways if they so wish, and be seen regularly arriving and leaving in them.
Unlike conventional “hailed” taxis, the density of robotaxi service should be enough to allow varying levels of price, quality and service. One could subscribe to a service that always sends a fancy red Mercedes, for an extra cost. For trips planned with any advance warning, such service could be assured.
Unfortunately there is a reverse effect for on-demand trips. If you want a car on the spur of the moment, you will be told the fancy red Mercedes is 10 minutes away, but a generic small vehicle is one minute away. The luxury service draws from a special fleet, but “first available” can draw from an array of combined fleets — any car in town in your price range. Which do you take becomes a difficult question. Of course, had you thought to request the car 10 minutes before you needed to leave, you could have gotten just what you wanted in this situation, but unless there is a large oversupply of luxury vehicles, there will be times when they are scarce. You can always serve a customer in a vehicle that is more expensive than they paid for, but it’s a different story to serve them a cheaper product, even though that’s generally going to be faster. Will people care more about speed and flexibility, or will they care about luxury and showing off status symbols?
The big thing to note is that it becomes practical to see vehicles with a much greater variety than we do today, particularly if people take the view of “any car if I’m in a hurry, and the particular car I want if I summoned a modest amount of time in advance.” Any market sector that’s big enough can merit a vehicle designed for it. That’s made more true by other trends in manufacturing that make it easier to generate small volume vehicles, such as 3-D printing and modular designs based on electric powertrains.
A version of this article originally appeared on robocars.com.
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See all the latest robotics news on Robohub, or sign up for our weekly newsletter.As one Cowboy running back was stealing underwear, another may have been getting a wife out of hers.
According to vicious tweets by former Oklahoma running back Brennan Clay, DeMarco Murray slept with his college teammate’s wife.
(Murray has a daughter born last year with actress Heidi Mueller.)
In the tweets, Clay identified Gina D’Agostini as his cheating wife. She soon deleted her Twitter account.
Clay was a Sooner for four years beginning in 2010 — Murray’s last season in Norman. He had a training-camp stint with the Broncos before being waived in August.
Here’s a picture of Clay with Gina … and Johnny Manziel, who always seems to find his way into these matters.
It’s been a sordid season off the field for Dallas running backs, as Joseph Randle was arrested on a misdemeanor shoplifting charge earlier this season for allegedly swiping a pack of underwear and a bottle of cologne at a Dillard’s in Frisco, Texas.Through the first half of the season, the opinions on Christian McCaffrey’s value to the Panthers have been understandably mixed. He vacillated between a bust that was overdrafted and the multi-faceted swiss army knife the Panthers needed in their offense that was on pace to break the NFL single-season record for receptions by a rookie. While McCaffrey has been excellent as a receiver in the passing game, he had failed to make much of an impact on the ground.
Until Sunday.
Sunday’s game against the Falcons was somewhat of a break-out for McCaffrey the running back; averaging over four yards per attempt and adding a touchdown is quality production for running backs across the league. The piece explores what changes to allow McCaffrey to have a big game on the ground, and therefor how the Panthers can look to get him involved in this way going forwards.
Numbers Game
Part of what has held the Panthers’ running game back through the first half of the season was the insistence on running against stacked boxes. Whether these past mistakes were due to questions about Cam Newton’s shoulder health or simply a breakdown in game-planning is hard to know, but what was clear is that the Panthers did a better job of taking what the defense gave them on Sunday.
While the Falcons only have one high safety on this play, the cushion shown to Ed Dickson and Curtis Samuel allows the Panthers to treat the outside corner as a high defender. While Dickson could likely have done a better job of hindering the defensive end, the quick shotgun hand-off combined with Dickson’s ‘block’ allows for the Panthers to block every box defender and, as a result, McCaffrey isn’t even touched until he has got four yards down the field.
The other way in which the Panthers were able to get a numbers advantage was by using Cam Newton as a runner, something they seemed hesitant to do earlier on in the season. Offensive coordinator Mike Shula called their decisions to run Newton “week by week”, but as the quarterback gets farther and farther from offseason shoulder surgery, he seems to have more freedom to run as he chooses.
On this play, the Falcons keep one safety high and have a seven man box with Dickson at tight end and McCaffrey at running back. However, by using Newton as the ball carrier, the Panthers are able to use McCaffrey as an extra blocker and, combined with the pass fake, this allows Newton to get well past the down marker without being touched. The final way in which the Panthers were able to get a numbers advantage was by using read-option plays.
While McCaffrey isn’t being used as a blocker here, he is able to draw a defender as a potential runner and Newton is able to take the ball and pick up the first down by beating the safety in space. While only one of these plays involved McCaffrey as a ball-carrier, the read-option plays in particular will begin to pay dividends for McCaffrey over larger sample sizes.
Bootlegging
A few weeks ago, Mike Shula commented that when the Panthers look to try and run the ball, they try to run away from the unblocked defender. While it would certainly be foolish to do the opposite, if a defense maintains gap discipline this still makes it very hard to run the ball, with each defenders simply sliding across a gap in order to leave the unblocked man taking the back side edge to prevent a cut-back. Where the Panthers were fortunate on Sunday was when the Falcons failed to do this, as on the following play.
This play has had repeated issues for the Panthers this year, with Turner and/or Norwell struggling to pull across the formation as fast as would be needed for the play to work. However, on this play the Falcons linebacker over-pursues and McCaffrey is able to cut the ball back inside for a big gain. While this is not the hardest play to capitalize on; it is a staple of many college offenses; McCaffrey does show the vision, change of direction and burst to make the most of the opportunity.
However, on the following play the Panthers are able to block all the in-box defenders as the far-side corner (#23) drops off the formation rather than chasing McCaffrey down the line. This is largely due to plays such as this:
Here, the edge defender dives in on McCaffrey and Newton is able to pull the ball and pick up a huge gain on the bootleg run. By putting plays like this in the mind of the defense the Panthers are able to use Newton as a running threat even on conventional hand-offs. When the back-side defender is forced to hesitate rather than crashing the line it effectively eliminates them from being able to make a play on the running back, should the blocking hold up.
Ron Rivera said after the game that one of the two naked bootlegs that Newton ran was a check that Cam made at the line, choosing to keep the ball instead of handing it off. These options and changes at the line make it harder for defenses to predict what the offense is going to do, thus making for more opportunities for big plays. While plays like this from Newton are very useful in this regard, the use of reverses has always played an important role in the Mike Shula offense. Plays such as the following two force the back-side defender to hesitate as crashing the line would give up back-side contain, which is exactly what happens:
The timing of such plays to take advantage of the defense has always been one of Shula’s strengths, but Sunday was one of the first times this year that he has effectively used this to create large runs on the front side of the play. Whereas reverses largely require pre-snap shifts, the ability to use Newton as a pre-snap option on the back-end has the potential to create consistent opportunities for multiple Panthers, including McCaffrey.
Pitch Perfect
Something that did seem noticeably different about the Panthers this week was the increased use of pitched running plays. While this might seem unimportant, it made a significant impact on the Panthers attempts to run the ball against stacked defenses. While it is often easier to look to pass the ball on such occasions, the ability to run the ball against loaded boxes is extremely valuable and pitch plays can be a large part of that.
As discussed earlier, Shula often |
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